ROGERS -- City crews are working on major construction projects that at least one private contractor wanted sent for bids.
Mayor Greg Hines said the work, including earthwork worth an estimated $1 million on the new soccer complex, and other jobs would have gone to private firms through competitive bidding under normal circumstances,
"I need the work," said Mike Necessary of NEC Inc. of Rogers. "I have equipment sitting idle now that could be doing this job." He also has workers available.
Necessary wondered how the city's Maintenance Department can do these projects and still meet core responsibilities. There are numerous "clogged drainage ways in town, numerous crushed driveway side drains, numerous broken sidewalks, numerous potholes around town, and so on," he said a June 18 e-mail to Hines.
"We taxpayers did not pass all these taxes for city forces to use maintenance money to construct improvements," the e-mail said. The message also questioned the quality of the city's work and Rogers' compliance with state environmental regulations.
Hines denied any regulations had been violated, that quality was compromised or that the backlog in maintenance work was serious. Jobs that didn't go through the bidding process were all under demanding time constraints, sometimes involving public safety, he said.
The mayor cited repair to Price Lane as an example. At first the city wanted bids for repair work on that street, but closer examination of the roadway found immediate repair was needed to prevent a collapse, Hines said. The need for city crews to take immediate action was discussed at a City Council meeting in June, before the work was done, he said.
The soccer fields are the foremost example of time pressure on city projects, Hines said.
"They're tired of hearing excuses on why the project's not done, and frankly I don't blame them," he said of residents. The soccer fields are financed by bonds the voters approved in 2011. The fields were originally scheduled to be ready by this year. The new target date is spring 2015.
"Contractors don't get the phone calls from people asking why this isn't done," Hines said. "I do."
The city wanted to build a sports complex on low-lying land that would require considerable earthwork to ensure proper drainage.
"The real estate market at the time the city bought that land was booming, and we decided that buying this land and doing the work on it was going to be cheaper than buying elsewhere," Hines said.
By the time bonds were approved for park construction in 2011, that estimate proved incorrect.
"We planned on $9 million for the whole project, and the lowest bids came in at $16 million," Hines said. By that time, the recession that began in 2008 had dampened land prices. The city determined it could now afford to acquire land adjoining Veterans Park. This would allow the soccer complex to use expanded park facilities such as restrooms and parking lots instead of building new facilities and the utility extensions to reach them. Building at Veterans Park got the the project's estimated cost back within the $9 million budget.
The site change put the project far behind schedule. Drawing up bids specifications, advertising and waiting for bids would take more time, Hines said. More important, city crews are responsible to city administration. A contractor may have several contracts at once, and move crews or equipment to whichever one he wishes. Provisions such as high-priority, "drop dead" dates for completion drives bid prices up. City crews can be ordered to get the job finished.
"If we don't do it in-house, we won't be able to deliver it to the public in the time we promised," Hines said.
Arkansas Code Title 22, Chapter 9, Subchapter 2 spells out competitive bidding requirements. Any construction job costing more than $20,000 requires such bids, but only if a contract is awarded to a private company for the work. Any contract expected to cost more than $50,000 requires at least two weeks notice "in a newspaper of general circulation published in the county in which the proposed improvements are to be made or in a trade journal reaching the construction industry." Another week is required after the publication of the last notice to give construction companies time to submit bids.
Contractors already had bids for the earthwork prepared when Hines announced that city crews would do the job instead, Necessary said Thursday. "He has some valid points, but I can make an argument with all of them," Necessary said of the mayor.
Any time savings the mayor gleans from using city crews is small and more than offset by the costs of leaving needed maintenance work waiting, Necessary said. Competitive bids would assure the work is done at a good price, he said.
Hines agreed the city should seek competitive bids in principle, saying the city does seek competitive bids for most major jobs. However, getting the soccer fields built on time is a matter of keeping a promise to voters who approved the bond financing for the project.
"The bidding laws are not in place to protect contractors, but to protect taxpayers," Hines said. Bid requirements aren't designed to ensure contractors get city business.
Richard Hedgecock, executive vice president of the state chapter of the Associated General Contractors of America, made exactly the same point about protecting taxpayers, but from the opposite point of view.
"When you're dealing with the taxpayer's money, you're always looking for the best return, and the best guarantee of that is competitive bidding," Hedgecock said.
The mayor's argument concerning completion time is plausible, Hedgecock said. His group is headquartered in Little Rock and is the state's largest association of contractors. Competitive bidding requires public notice periods that involve waiting for at least several weeks.
"In this situation, with the hiccups, I can understand the justification," said Hedgecock, who cautioned he wasn't familiar with the specifics in Rogers.
In a related issue, Hines confirmed the city failed to take competitive bids when it should have for concrete work done around the city for years. J&L Concrete and Excavation of Rogers has done and continues to do much of the city's concrete pourings.
Over the years, the size and value of that work grew to the point the work should have been awarded in bids. The matter was brought to his attention earlier this year and the concrete projects have been open to bids since.
"J&L still wins them," he said.
NW News on 07/06/2014