This Tuesday, during a special meeting of the City of Brownsville Commission, the members will consider to rescind a 6-1 vote taken in the April 21 meeting where they awarded a $2.8 million street improvement contract to a Brownsville firm even though the low bidder was a construction company from Mission.
The comprehensive project is in District 3 and encompasses Anacua Street that turns into Naranjo Road on the city's north side from the 77-83 expressway and east toward the Cameron County Rucker-Carrizales Detention Center off Old Alice Road. It includes paving, sidewalks, driveways and drainage improvements.
At the April 21 meting, both the Finance and Engineering departments recommended that the lowest bidder, Total Commitment Construction Co., of Mission, be awarded the contract in the amount of $2,810,332.75.
When the item came up for the vote, several commissioners asked the if the "local preference" or "best value" consideration could allow them to award the contract to the local contractor (G&T Paving, of Brownsville). Under the "local preference " option, if the second-lowest bidder is from the city, commissioners are allowed to award it ghe contract if it's within 5 percent of the lowest bid.
G&T's bid was $2,894,709.60, $84,377 higher than Total Commitment Construction's low bid of $2,810,332.75. However, the commission was told by the Engineering and Finance reps at the meeting that the amount was well within the 5 percent allowed under the local preference or best value, which was $140,516.
The majority - all six others including Mayot Trey Mendez, and commissioners Ben Neece, Rose Gowen, Joel Munguia, John Gowen and Nurith Galonsky - heeding the city staff opinion they could exercise a local preference in favor of G&T Paving, voted to give it to the Brownsville vendor.
That might have turned out to be the wrong vote for the right reasons.
Only Commissioner Jessica Tetreau objected to awarding the local bidder the contract because she thought paying G&T's $84,377 more for the project was too much, even considering the firm was a local vendor. Videotape of the meeting shows that to be her only objection, and made no mention of the applicability (or non-applicability) of local preference or best value options. (The right vote for the wrong reasons?)
In the days following the meeting, nagging doubts set in and reached the ears of city staff and city attorney Rene De Coss. Were the "local preference" or "best value" alternatives really available to the city commissioners? After hashing it out, both agreed that they were not.
"The Texas Local Government Code Section 271 (local preference) was cited as a basis to award contract to a non-lowest bidder. Upon subsequent award review, it was determined that because of the contract amount threshold ($100,000) Section 271 could not be invoked," the new staff recommendations states.
Also, "We also reviewed Texas Local Government Code Section 252 (Best Value) which provides the ability to award contracts to a non-lowest bidder. Section 252 is not allowable for street construction projects."
"The Finance Department recommends rescinding the award from G&T Paving and awarding the contract to the lowest responsive and responsible vendor, Total Commitment Construction, in the amount of $2,810,332.75. The City Commission maintains the option to reject all bids and rebid this project," the back up to Tuesday's agenda states.
Short of rebidding the project, it appears that awarding it to the lowest bidder, Total Commitment Construction, would be the only choice left to the commission short of delaying the project and starting the bidding process all over again - and possibly exposing the city to litigation from the lowest bidder - litigation whose outcome could be considered a foregone conclusion.
15 comments:
Latinos for TRUMP 2020 . We are everywhere!
Juan, i was in McAllen over the weekend and, man, they have a load of street projects going. Yes, during the virus bullshit! Come on, Browntown!!!
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That local company has been doing buiness with the city for a very long long time. The only doubt here is the location where the street repairs are going to be done. There are a long more streets that need repairing than that area. Go to the barrios and fix those streets FIRST pinche pendejos...
AND THERE WILL BE LITIGATION YOU CAN BET ON THAT GUEYES
Latinos for Trump? Pendejos y pendejas. Culos baratos.
Chinguen su pinches putas madres!
City must Follow the law, lowest bidder is well the lowest bidder. No Compadre deals here come on brownsville, time to wake up, old politicians need to go lucios in mind-both jr and the turd.!!!!
Latinos for trumputo must the cocos and there are a bunch of them HERE babosos
latinos for trump. must be from mexico.
260,000 Words, Full of Self-Praise, From Trump on the Virus
need more convincing stupid republicans
Take 3 or 4 nothing's gonna change unless we???
Latinos for Trump! We don't need hate. Stay classy my friends. God bless you and stay safe.
You must ask how much money has been given to Joel Munguia, Mayor Trey Mendez and Ben Neece for their campaigns by the Leeroy Gonzalez aka G & T Paving?
Thats city politics at its best, the lowest bidder should have been awarded the contract regardless of where they are from. The bottom line is to save tax dollars as much as possible. Get with the program city commission.
WHAT "SAVE TAX DOLLARS" - sounds funny
Stay classy with trump you really must be a classy moron. - guey
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