BOARD02191

• Board Meeting Date: 7/18/1964
• Description: Agenda or Table of Contents, Minutes
• Board Meetings - Doc Type: Meeting

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MR. STAPLETON:

MR. DUGAN:

NR. STAPLETON:

MR. DUGAN:

able to present a situation that demonstrated
some error. In any event, it was the Secre-
tary's opinion that the best action would be
to take the second low bid.

Now, we are getting a little bit tired of
having this thing happen. There seems to be a
rash of this and when the contractors find that
they have left a million dollars or so on the
table, they want to get out of it. However, we
think we do have a great contractor in the Puget
Sound Bridge and Dry Dock Company. Ne have had
experience with them and we are looking forward
to getting the shO\~ on the road."

I

"\"lell, I was particularly concerned. After
all, that was a $2 million difference to the
Bureau and the taxpayers as I gathered it;
that is, between the $8 million and the $10
million second low bid. Is that right?"

"That is definitely so. We hate to see this
kind of money left on the table. We always
consider the possibility of readvertising under
situations like this. However, once all the
cards are placed on the table obviously, if we
readvertise, the bids are going to come in some-
where in the vicinity or higher than the lowest
bracket and these were all bracketed. In the
case of Ruedi at about $10,500,000, with Peter
Kiewit and Morrison-Knudson considerably higher.
On readvertising we would be very doubtful that
we could save any money.

All we can say is that Ruedi is going to
cost us more than we anticipated as a result of
the bids received and we are going to have to
sharpen our pencils and make economies every-
where we can. vIe intend to do this."

I

"Is the contractor that made the mistake, is
he financially responsible to the government in
any respect for the $2 million?"

"I don't know what action the Secretary
might take in recourse. This hasn't been