Help wanted! County needs vendors

One Southeast Texas county is having trouble getting bids on a bridge replacement project.

During the July 25 meeting of the Hardin County Commissioners Court, Cody S. Croley, senior project manager with LJA Engineering, Inc., said there were no bids received in a third attempt to solicit bids for the Beaver Brook Road Crossing Improvement Project, south of Lumberton, off Keith Road.

In a July 18 letter to County Judge Wayne McDaniel from Croley, the project manager informed the elected official that bids were scheduled to be received on the project on July 11.

“Unfortunately,” Croley advised, “the county received zero bids.”

Croley recalled the county received one bid on the first attempt in February, but he recommended the court not to accept it because it was higher than the project’s budgeted cost.

“It was from a new company we were not familiar with and didn’t have much history with that company name,” Croley added.

A second attempt to solicit bids in March also resulted in no bids. According to Croley, contractors picked up plans and came to the pre-bid meeting to ask questions – but no bids were forthcoming. After the second bid opening, Croley spoke to some contractors and was informed that they were all “very busy.”

“We waited several months between the second and third bid attempts in hoping to create more interests, Croley advised, and, after some perceived interest from a prospective bidder in June, the project manager coordinated a meet-and-greet with the design engineers in LJA’s transportation department that prepared the Beaver Brook plans. A virtual meeting with the contractor and the designers was held June 28.

Croley said the contractor had two issues hindering ability to bid on the project. The first issue was the phasing of the project as stated in the construction plans.

“The phasing called for the remaining culverts to be filled in prior to the opening of the bridge,” Croley detailed. “This was an oversight in the development of the project phasing and would have presented some safety issues during a rainfall event. However, this was an easy fix and was quickly corrected to show the culverts would remain open until the bridge was completed.”

The second issue was the contractor felt that the necessary equipment to install the concrete piles that would support the bridge could not fit on the proposed plan site without interfering with traffic flow. 

“The bridge option was chosen by the county to replace the existing crossing, partly due to its allowability in maintaining traffic flow on Beaver Brook during construction and, thus, eliminating the need for an all-weather bypass route installed offsite. The contractor had discussed the issue with two pile-driving subcontractors,” Croley advised the county leader. He added that the design engineers took comments from the contractor and are in the process of making some changes to the site layout to improve the constructability and to allow the pile-driving equipment more room.

“However, the changes could not be made in time for the bid opening. These changes will not affect the final bridge design or layout but will allow for more room on the site for construction. We anticipate the design changes will be completed by early August. We will discuss the changes with the prospective bidder and also others at a future pre-bid meeting,” according to Croley. “It is recommended, therefore, that Hardin County rebid the project soon after the design changes have been completed.”

Croley told the commissioner court that, in 26 years of project management, he’s never had a project that needed more than two bids.

“Ultimately, it’s going to take four to get this thing out,” Croley added.

“There has to be a problem why they’re not bidding,” said Pct. 1 Commissioner L.W. Cooper Jr. “These contractors are making money off the government and there has to be a reason why they’re not bidding other than they’re busy.”

Croley said the Hardin County construction is not a typical ditch or road project.

“It’s a specialized bridge construction project,” Croley said. “There’s not many contractors in the area that would do it. There’s only three or four who’d be interested.”

Croley noted that the project is behind schedule from the completion date originally reported to FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency). Cooper said the residents who live on Beaver Brook Road will blame the court for the project being delayed. Pct. 3 Commission Amanda Young told Cooper that residents have been apprised of the project’s progress.

“We’ve waited five years for FEMA to even approve this project,” Young described. “It’s been an issue from the beginning. It’s a large project in replacing a whole bridge and it’s a very long bridge.”

Croley said there’s a proposed design for the project, with some plan sheet modifications that need to be discussed with the contractor to see if it addresses his concerns. Croley told the court that, after the second bid attempt, he reached out to the Texas Department of Transportation and Jefferson County for a list of contractors that had recently worked bridge projects.

McDaniel asked if the bids were posted on CIVCAST, a website to post projects for civil engineers and governmental agencies. Croley said all three bids were posted on CIVCAST.

“There was at least 30 or 40 or more plan holders, 10-12 which were general contractors and the rest were subcontractors or material suppliers,” Croley said, adding that some contractors said they decided not to bid on the project because it was a FEMA project and they would have to wait several months to get paid.

Before the current changes, Croley said the estimated project cost was $2.5 million; the original bid was $4.2 million.

Cooper said the county needs to broaden their area for soliciting bids.

“We could post it in the Houston Chronicle or whatever,” added Cooper. “No one’s getting this from The Silsbee Bee.

The court approved the project be readvertised.