ZIWA'S ASCENT DUE TO POLITICAL INFLUENCE AND INTRIGUE?

Anonymous said...

Look into the $3.5 million remodelling contract the port gave Ziwa Construction, to redo a perfectly fine office building. U know Ziwa, Sergio Arguelles' company. MARCH 27, 2018 AT 7:50 PM

By Juan Montoya

Little by little, city and county residents have been hearing of Ziwa Corporation, the construction company that started to snag costly construction projects in the private sector and has by has now – if the above commenter is to be believed – through its political influence, has become a contender for publicly-funded construction .

According to its website, ZIWA Corporation was started in 1996 by Jorge de la Garza with the intent of "creating a company tailored to customers needs through a well trained group of professionals, focused on each project's unique needs"

It claimed that it has "a complete understanding of the construction industry in both the US and Mexico" and to "have developed a team approach through innovative management and partnering that focuses on schedule, safety, technology and quality."

But what the website doesn't say is what other construction companies in the city are saying now: that the company really was funded with the capital provided by Sergio Arguelles, the so-called King of Maquilas in Matamoros, a person closely allied with Tomas Yarrington, the former governor of Tamaulipas now under house arrest in Italy.

In fact, the word on the street is that Arguelles bought a controlling interest in the Rancho Viejo Golf Resort as a "prestnombres" for Yarrington.

Lately, Ziwa has garnered lucrative contracts with the City of Brownsville, the Port of Brownsville, and the Brownsville Independent School District.

In it's portfolio, its work for Arguelles' FINSA Development's Maquila Association office in 2010 at a cost of $1.6 million heads the list. This is followed by the $2.3 million project to refurbish the railroad facilities at the Port of Brownsville in 2011, and then by the work on John Cowen Warehouse in 2014 at $1.7 million. John Cowen is the brother of Brownsville Navigation District commissioner Ralph Cowen. They, in turn, are the brothers of Brownsville Independent School District trustee Phil Cowen. 

Other projects included the maquila-based Precision Tools, Magnetek, Delphi, Panasonic, and a dozen others on the U.S. side including QC ONICS, Polytech, Corporate Express, Lockheed Martin, Highland, Penske, ITD Precision, Workforce Solutions, HEWL Development, and Milwaukee Tool, etc.

When it comes to private, commercial and industrial projects, it is up to the customer to decide without going through the bidding process. How Ziwa has traversed through that requirement is what has piqued the interest and raised some eyebrows as Ziwa competes against other contractors.

Take the bidding on the Port's Administrative Complex Rehabilitation and Building additions considered by the commissioners on Dec. 12, 2016. In it's evaluation, the staff recommended that low bidder Gonzalez-De la Garza and Associates with the lowest bidder at $6,600,000 and a total bid including the alternates of $6,830,500 be awarded the contract.

But someone pointed out that GDG had failed to submit the unit cost form required by the bid proposal and – after executive session – the port, on a 3-2 vote, awarded the contract to Ziwa, whose base bid of 6,775,000 and $7,106,000 including the alternates was $275,000 higher than the lowest bidder. The board decided to table the awarding of the contract until after they discused it in executive session.

Once out of the closed meeting, commissioner John Reed made the motion to award the contract to Ziwa seconded by Ralph Cowen and joined in voting "aye" by chairman John Wood. Commissioner Tito Lopez and Carlos Masso voted "nay."

Something similar happened recently during a meeting of the BISD. In this case, it was an item giving Superintendent Esperanza Zendejas authority to negotiate a $4.04 million building contract with Ziwa to build the Porter Early College High School Fine Arts Building.

Although the trustees were given the rankings of the nine companies who bid, they were given no dollar amounts. 

If the backup to the item would have contained dollar numbers, they would have known that the BISD administration was recommending that the trustees award the lucrative contract to ZIWA,  whose bid was fourth from the lowest and would cost BISD taxpayers $72,000 more that the lowest bidder (see graphic at right).

The board ended up approving the motion by trustee Joe Rodriguez 3-1 – again, after emerging from executive session – to authorize Zendejas to negotiate with Ziwa to build the Porter Fine Arts Building.

Three trustees voted to give away $72,000 of the district taxpayer dollars on suspect evaluations by the administration is a question that still lingers in people's minds. Only trustee Minerva Peña voted against the item.

Trustee Philip Cowen stormed out of the meeting when  it was called called for a vote. Trustee Dr. Sylvia Atkinson, believing that the vote would not be held, left immediately after the closed session.

This is the convoluted reasoning by the evaluators:

The price category carried a maximum score of 60, construction experience 15, construction team and subcontractors 10, company's professionalism and subcontractors 10, construction performance 25, and financial strength 20 for a maximum possible score of 140.

As far as price category, "or best value," D. Wilson Construction scored the maximum 60, Wil-Con LLC followed with 59.66, E-Con Group scored 59.46 and Ziwa came in fourth with a 58.56.

Overall, Ziwa scored 133.96 of a possible 140, D.Wilson Construction 120.8, Wil-Con LLC 115.68, and E-Con Group 123.46.

Although Ziwa came in fourth in the price ranking, the final scores including the other five categories placed them over the others. Ziwa, for example, got a 14.8 of a possible 15 for company experience from the evaluators. How the evaluators gave Ziwa, founded in 1996, a higher score than D. Wilson (13), which has been in business since 1957 and has offices in the Rio Grande Valley and in San Antonio and was named one of the top 100 construction companies in Texas, is anyone's guess.

That ranking alone placed it over D. Wilson, the lowest bidder.

And let's not forget the use of change orders by Ziwa to inflate the cost to the City of Brownsville at the renovation of the old Mother of Perpetual Help building project at the corner of Madison and Sixth streets.

Robert Luna, Director of the city's Purchasing Dept. and City Engineer Carlos Lastra recommended calling for the sixth change order on the project that sent the cost soaring to close to $1 million.

The original contract to renovate the building the co-called Brownsville Community Resource Center was for $880,000. Contained within that contract was $53,475 for a "contingency" fund. That fund – except for $12,639 – was been gobbled up by four change orders by Ziwa that totaled $40,835.

Then the contractor said he needed an additional $82,919 that depleted the contingency fund and would require $70,279 to do the job right.

That will make the cost of rehabilitating the old Mother of Perpetual Help building a staggering $953,754, almost $1 million. Now, some would say, wouldn't it have just been better to get a brand new building with that $1 million?

Of course, if you have the right connections in local government like Ziwa appears to have, these change orders and quick fixes of the bidding process seem to be just par for the course.