Travis County Commissioners Court
May 16, 2006
Item 15
Number 15 is to approve modification number two to contract number 05 ae 0176 jj, lockwood, andrews and new nam, inc. For east side service center project.
>> can you give me a brief explanation as to what is really going on where we've gone from $20,000 of signoff on this to now 83.5 and is that somebody going to continue to climb or --
>> good morning, Commissioners, cyd grimes, purchasing agent. Roger is going to explain that to you.
>> good morning, judge, Commissioners. The east metro -- the east side service center project, we have an engineer on board who has the capability of doing structural engineering services. And because of the obstacle we had for the last two months for fundings and the rest of that, we have the problems of keeping up the schedule. It's normal when you have a consultant on board helping with the engineering process, and we do have the capability of doing structural analysis and structural design to have that firm on board with a notification to their contractor. So we did have a negotiation with them, and the cost to do three buildings for the amount of 24,500. That's a good fee. And I would say that we're going to be back on the schedule pretty soon to get this project moving forward. And really right now we need to structure engineers to move forward with the design because right now the structural engineering is on a pass of getting this project back to normal schedule.
>> do we anticipate, roger, that this may continue to escalate?
>> for the lan, I don't think so, but the issue we're going to have probably about two or three weeks, we're looking at a mechanical, electrical and plumbing engineers to help us to finish the -- these type of documents. So lan they will have everybody on board, so we're going to go outside and get other firm to help with purchasing, and we can get somebody on board and move forward with it. But I don't think that the lan is going to increase at this time. But again, they provide different type of engineering services. It's civil engineering we have not to exceed and we have done very well on that. Now, with a different type of engineering, with a structural engineering, we have 34,000, and I think that's a good way of doing that.
>> would you have anticipated that we would have gotten to this price when we started? Given the time, is that where we are with this thing? If you're saying we're not going to go any further from this, I just watched something go from 20 to 83.5. If you're saying that's where --
>> one thing, roger, I think they were doing some of the work in-house and I know that he's a structural engineer and probably anticipated that maybe they would do that work and with their work load he's now bringing them in. And it makes sense to stay with the same engineer on the same project. And legally we can do this, y'all can do it.
>> and you can be sympathetic to whenever we read our pages and we see 195% of the original contract amount, 417.5% of the original contract amount, I mean, that jumped off the page at me. So --
>> I had to look back at the total now at 83.5 because it does kind of stump out at you. We started at 20 and now we're at 83.5.
>> but the difference is there were different tasks that the same company had to perform. It's not like the civil engineer is definitely different than this particular structural engineering. In fact, it was three tasks in there that the same company is doing. So it's not that it's one task and the price is he is ca indicate lating, it's just the point that this particular one particular contractor that does -- the person that we're using here has had to do multiple tasks. And so this is just a third task of the other two tasks that have already been performed. So in essence, in the not to exceed amount, that's also associated with this $83,500 is something that will limit them to at least the 24,500-dollar increase. So that's basically what it is, and it's nothing more than that. And then again, when the mechanical and electrical stuff come in, that will be a whole different firm that will have to deal with that particular situation. So this is the ending of this particular firm -- I can see you've got a firm that can do multitask, and of course they would have to be paid for each task.
>> I understand that, Commissioner. Maybe -- I know you don't like to work these things out and get them into offices, which is different language, but whoever puts the language together in your reading, modification number 2 will increase the not to exceed contract amount from 59,000 to 83.5, an increase of 24.5, which constitute an increase of 417.5%. Maybe you can't docketter that thing up. It's what it is. But I will tell you whenever I see increases of 417.5% and 195%, I mean, I guess you can put lipstick on a hog, but you've still got a hog. That shocked me. I understand what we've done with this, but that's pretty alarming to me and I think we'll continue to see that thing go.
>> I was saying that same thing yesterday on the increments that increased as this particular thing was done. This was a funding thing also that we had to go look at in this thing. I wasn't concerned about the increase like all of us are, and I saw that, but then I had to get an explanation on why and things like that. And maybe the language can be different later, but right now I guess the point is the way it was brought and I needed further explanation also, and I did get that from roger on the same question that you asked. Correct, roger?
>> correct.
>> and I know Commissioner Daugherty didn't just call me a pig with lipstick, but we always give y'all information.
>> no, what I said was in describing things, I mean -- maybe it's exactly what it says, but it is alarming. If I sent you something that said that it had gone not to exceed and it was 400% over, you would be calling and saying what is this, Gerald?
>> perhaps we need to make it clear what is a price modification, and we've had many of those due to steel prices, etcetera, versus this is a contract modification, we are purchasing additional services, and the last time I checked, when you add something to somebody's thing, there's an extra bill for that. So it's just making it very clear that this is a contract mod, not a price contract mod because if it were a price, that their prices for performing the exact same work that we had been doing, that's a way different thing. They're doing extra work, we need to pay them for it.
>> that's why I said you need to explain it that way versus it just looks like that what we've got is we've got something that costs 400 percent over what we thought something was going to cost even though we do -- I think we all understand this modification.
>> and I think this letter to cyd was just perfunctory on the front page.
>> move approval.
>> second.
>> I see this is structural engineering services.
>> that's correct.
>> what is it?
>> it's building the design for the foundation, for the piers or for the slab on grade and also doing the design for the steel structure and the beams and all that and the roofing, and that's what we call the structural engineering.
>> this is work that needs to be done by somebody, the only question is by whom. And we're just adding it to the contract for the engineers already in place.
>> that's correct.
>> okay. Any more discussion? All in favor? That carries by unanimous vote. Thank you very much.
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Last Modified:
Wednesday, May 17, 2006 10:30 AM