School Construction Delayed Due to Complaint Against Construction Firm

The Town Council learned on September 19 that the three bids for construction of the net zero K through 5 Fort River school project all came in almost $3 million under the projected cost of $76 million. At the October 21 meeting of the council, however, they learned that several bid protests have been filed against the low bid from CTA Construction Managers in Waltham. The other two bids were from J&J Construction in North Billerica and Fontaine Brothers of Springfield.

Town Manager Paul Bockelman told the councilors that the execution of the contract has been put on hold pending resolution of a bid protest filed by two construction industry organizations and one of the other two bidders. The protest asserts that CTA Construction Managers is not eligible to be awarded the contract. 

Bockelman did not specify the basis of the complaints, but said that bid protests are common for large public projects and can often be resolved with the involvement of the state Attorney General’s office. He said that the Attorney General’s office will conduct a hearing next week to review the bid protest and issue an opinion as to whether or not CTA can be awarded the contract. If the matter is not resolved to everyone’s satisfaction by the Attorney General, any party can take it to court.

The dispute is delaying any signing of contracts with vendors, but Bockelman said that all bidders agreed to hold their bids for an additional 30 days while the issue is being resolved. He admitted that the town is unhappy about the delay, because “we’re on a relatively tight timeframe where we need to get the school open in the fall of 2026. We can’t lose time this early in the process, and we’ve been trying to convey that to the Attorney General, as well, to expedite the hearing and the resolution of this.”

According to the state website “A complaint or allegation that the Bid Laws have been violated is a ’bid protest.’ Bid protests generally arise from an allegation that the awarding authority has violated the state bidding laws during the prequalification or bid solicitation stage; or that a bidder has violated the bidding laws in its bid; or that an awarding authority has violated the bidding laws in the award of the contract.”

The Elementary School Building Committee was supposed to have met October 18 to discuss awarding the construction bid for the new school, however the meeting was canceled at the last minute, presumably due to the filing of the bid protest. The committee is now scheduled to meet on October 25 at 8:30 a.m. on Zoom.