Board of Public Works Meeting - March 25, 2026: Approves Bid Award, Change Orders, and Contract Amendments
Board of Public Works Meeting - March 25, 2026
The Board of Public Works met on March 25, 2026, at 1:00 PM in the Public Assembly Room of the City-County Building. Acting Chairman Adrice Redman presided. The board unanimously approved a bid award for drainage improvements, multiple change orders (including final change orders), professional services amendments, and a final acceptance. Several items involved time extensions to accommodate grass establishment under IDEM permits, and one bridge project saw a significant cost increase due to a structural collapse during rehabilitation.
Bid Awards
- 2022 Thoroughfare Drainage Improvements Area 4 (SD-22-103): Awarded to Calumet Civil Contractors, Inc. for $5,858,000 as the lowest responsive and responsible bidder. The engineer's estimate was higher, and the board questioned a 36% lower bid. Nathan Sheets, Deputy Director of DPW Engineering, explained that utility conflicts with Citizens Energy Group were reduced after bidding, and contractors were competitively pricing lump sum items like mobilization. A bid alternate for pavement repairs in the Ridge Hill Trail neighborhood was not awarded due to a partner withdrawal. Substantial completion is scheduled for May 17, 2027, with final completion by July 12, 2027.
Change Orders
- Nickel Plate Trail (GT-06-001): Change Order No. 4 with Calumet Civil Contractors, Inc. – no cost change (total remains $11,882,938.63) but added 253 days to substantial and final completion dates to meet IDEM permit requirements for grass establishment.
- South County Line Road Added Travel Lanes (ST-45-067): Change Order No. 3 with Renascent, Inc. – no cost change (total $898,093.27) and added 330 days for the same grass establishment reason.
- Ralston Campus Infrastructure Improvements (ST-25-522): Change Order No. 2 with Edward & Jones Concrete, Inc. – no cost change (total $1,482,038.42) and added 330 days. Board member Leslie Schulte noted the need to balance project deadlines with road opening requirements; DPW plans to adjust scheduled completion dates proactively in future bids.
Change Orders – Final
- Concrete Pavement Reconstruction of Heathrow Way (ST-21-095): Change Order No. 3 (Final) with Milestone Contractors, L.P. – decreased amount of $239,220.22 (new total $2,234,104.70) and added 144 days. Adjustments included final quantity true-ups, additional pipe and pavement removal, structure rehabilitation, and pavement marking refreshes.
- West Washington Street over Little Eagle Creek (BM-24-113): Change Order No. 3 (Final) with Pontem Contractors, Inc. – increased amount of $134,233.52 (new total $6,315,417.17) and added 90 days. Nathan Sheets explained that the bridge, originally a rehab project, became a full replacement after a spandrel wall collapsed during demolition. The final contract amount was three times the original bid due to the unexpected structural failure. The new bridge is now open.
Professional Services Amendments
- On-Call Inspection Services (ENG-20-024): Amendment No. 3 with Christopher B. Burke Engineering, LLC – no cost change (total $500,000), updated rates, and extended expiration to December 31, 2027 to complete work on the Farley Top drainage project and a project on 91st and Ream Creek.
- Southport and Five Points Rd Roundabout (ST-48-009): Amendment No. 2 with CrossRoad Engineers, PC – no cost change (total $391,789), added a subconsultant (right-of-way buyer), and extended expiration to December 31, 2027.
- 29th and 30th Streets Two-Way Conversion (ST-17-052): Amendment No. 1 with Hannum Wagle & Cline Engineering (HWC Engineering) – no cost change (total $1,180,585.28), updated rates, and extended expiration to December 31, 2027.
- Temporary Labor Personnel Services (Contract 20181): Amendment No. 5 with Keys2Work – no new dollars, extended the agreement term to March 16, 2027.
Final Acceptances
- Derbyshire Rd over Derbyshire Creek (BR-46-088): Final acceptance with HIS Constructors, Inc. – final contract amount of $1,388,326.69.
Key Outcomes
- All motions were approved unanimously by the board (members present: Adrice Redman, Sabako Juwanza, Bob Perrin, Dan Heek, Leslie Schulte).
- The board directed DPW to consider extending project completion dates proactively in future bids to avoid repeated change orders for grass establishment.
- No other business or public comments were presented. The meeting adjourned by motion.
Meeting Transcript
Good afternoon. I'd like to call to uh the March 25th Board of Public Works meeting to order. I'm Adrice Redman, acting chairman of the board. Board members, would you please introduce yourself starting from the left? Sabako Juwanza. Bob Perrin. Dan Heek. Leslie Schalte. Thank you very much. I would also like to introduce uh board counsel, uh Benjamin Moracle and Acting Board Coordinator, Colin Campbell Maher and the DPW staffed. Uh the first item on the agenda is to adopt the March 25th, 2026 agenda. So moved. Uh moved by Bob Perrin. Do I have a second? Second. Second by Sabako Jawanza. All in favor signify by saying aye. Any opposed? The motion carries. And next on the agenda is item number two, bid awards, Nathan Sheets. Good afternoon, Nathan Sheets, Deputy Director of our Engineering Division for DPW. Starting with uh justification for bid award for SD 22103, this is our 2022 Thoroughfare Drainage Improvements Area 4 with Calumet Civil Contractors Inc. The engineering division staff recommends the Board of Public Works approve and authorize the director to award SD 22103 Thoroughfare Drainage Improvements Area 4 to Calumet Civil Contractors Inc. in the total not to exceed amount of $5 million on the basis that they are the lowest responsive and responsible bidder. A bid alternate was included for pavement repairs in the Ridge Hill Trail neighborhood near West County Line Road and Morgantown Road. The bid alternate was not awarded due to the INEP partner withdrawing their project. Project SD 22103, 2022 thoroughfare drainage improvement project area four consists of drainage improvements and structural rehabilitation of Bluff Road from Wicker Road to just south of Thompson Road. Substantial completion is scheduled for May 17, 2027, with final completion scheduled for July twelfth, twenty twenty-seven. And if you have uh questions about that particular item, I'd be happy to try to answer them. Thank you. Nathan, uh are there any questions? And Nathan, um just so we know what we're evaluating here. So as I understand from reading through some of this, that the after the engineer made his estimate that there was some significant uh changes and reducing conflicts with utilities and all that and that but he then he did not re-estimate based on that. Correct. Um I know I know you know when I talked about the um bid being sixty-three percent uh roughly less than the engineer's estimate. It's 36 percent, by the way. Okay. Uh so that's uh you know that tends to be a concern sometimes. Um we had our designer uh look at the uh bids and um if you look at uh I think in your packet, the the second or third page um shows what the other bidders were at, and um you know there was a decent spread there, but um based upon their unit prices that they provided, the uh low bidder, um in this case Calumet, a lot of their bids that are the lump sum bids, which are like MOB and DMOB, maintenance of traffic, those tended to be um quite lower than what what we anticipated, which I think goes to show that uh contractors are hungry out there and and so we're satisfied with um uh that that bid that was placed. But you are correct, I guess long story short. Um we had some conflicts with Citizens Energy Group. Um, and any time that there's a conflict uh that's part of a project, there's risk associated with that conflict. And so a lot of times contractors will build that risk in monetarily to their bids. And in this case, um after uh bids were received, we continue to work with citizens to minimize that that impact. And so um we suspect that that also plays a role in that very competitive bid um bid amount. Okay, and then one of the one of the things, yeah, looking at that, yeah, a lot of it's mobilization and whatever else, kind of labor. But uh the the one thing that stuck out as far as materials was the uh HMA type C that uh it was significantly less than what the engineer estimated, but it was quite frankly kind of close closer to what some of the other bidders bid. So in your mind, is that a reasonable yeah? I mean, uh obviously with HMA asphalt being a petroleum-based product, uh, you know, it's it's kind of a toss-up as far as what what um what we're gonna get from a pricing perspective. Yeah, and we've got plenty of experience with uh Calumet, all positives as I can remember.
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