Perhaps the third time will be the charm.
The city has decided to reject the two bids that were taken during the second bidding process and reopen the bidding procedures for the Kit Land Nelson Park splash pad, Mayor Joe Kilsheimer said Wednesday, August 16, during the Apopka City Council meeting.
The City Council voted 4-0 to go ahead with that plan. City Commissioner Doug Bankson abstained from voting.
In March, the city advertised for bids for the splash pad, but received no responses, requiring the city to re-advertise the project, which produced the current bids that the City Council rejected.
Kilsheimer said he, city attorney Cliff Shepard, and city staff had a discussion over the splash pad project just prior to the August 16 meeting.
The city’s bid documents allows the Apopka to re-advertise the project for contractors, according to Shepard.
“Of the last two weeks — I think of all the issues we had to deal with since I’ve been in this chair – I heard more about this issue and the process than I have heard on just about any other issue before the City Council,” Kilsheimer said. “It’s important to me that the process of the city of Apopka be viewed by the public and by all respective bidders as scrupulously as we could possibly make it.”
Kilsheimer said the city has been meticulous in the bidding process.
“Everything that we’ve done has been provided for in the documents that we put out, and so all the bidders should have been aware of the various provisions that were in that document and how things could have gone because they were enumerated with documents,” Kilsheimer said.
The City Council voted on August 2 to waive the late bid submittal of Apopka firm AccuTech to build the splash pad, as well as let city staff work with the company in reducing its proposal cost.
In the second solicitation round, Ryan Fitzgerald Construction (RFC), of Mount Dora, and AccuTech, of Apopka, submitted bids on July 19 for the $750,000 construction of the Kit Land Nelson Park splash pad.
AccuTech submitted its bid four minutes past the 2 p.m. deadline that day, but the city’s bid documents gives the right to waive this and evaluate the solicitation, city officials said.
Whereas RFC’s bid designs were at $713,399 and $722,852, AccuTech’s designs were $859,852 and $934,563.
Ryan Fitzgerald, RFC principal, expressed frustration that AccuTech won the contract, in spite of RFC proposing to do the project for at least $160,000 less than what AccuTech suggested and the latter’s lateness.
After the August 2 meeting, Fitzgerald said in an interview he was considering taking legal action against the city.
“If we end up in court, we’re going to be six to eight months down the road,” Kilsheimer said at the August 16 City Council meeting.
This story appears in the Friday, August 18, edition of The Apopka Chief.
