Vice President: Mr. Gembala called for nominations for Vice President. Mr. Gembala nominated Bill Manousopoulos for Vice President; Mr. Furtek seconded the nomination. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 3-0.
Mr. Pondinas said it is unknown if there is any buried pipe or anything underneath the residential lots. If someone buys any one of those three lots, they may not be able to put a shed or any structure in that area. It is part of the easement on those lots. Mr. Pondinas doesn’t know if it is wise to get the permit and then find out IDEM says we can’t do it. Then the $8000 permit fee is lost. You need the permit to drill the well. It would take about two to three months to get everything going. Mr. Pondinas suggested that Mr. Gembala send the drawing to IDEM and find out if we can do it.
Mr. Furtek asked if we could send the drawing to IDEM for approval without paying the $8000 application fee. IDEM can tell us if we can do it or not.
Mr. Gembala suggested we table this permit until Haas finds out what the options are.
Mr. Manousopoulos made a motion to table this permit in its entirety pending on the answer we get from IDEM and the engineers as to whether or not we can move along without paying the permit fee and get a timeline for approval. Mr. Furtek seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 3-0.
Mr. Manousopoulos made a motion to amend Item B for consideration of Cender Dalton and Baker Tilly for the service agreement for 2022. Mr. Furtek seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous 3-0 vote.
Mr. Pondinas stated that we should be able to attain that area and at the same time, build the buildings and well houses. Well 9 still needs to be connected to Cline Avenue. There’s 600 feet to go into the treatment plant. There is a question getting the pipe, but they are working on it. Both wells could probably be operational by 2023.
Mr. Pondinas said they are working on a water main coming out of Well 4 and coming up to U.S. 41 going south to 109th. The water main that’s in front of Décor Tile that Franciscan owns now, goes from the middle of Alsip Nursery and goes south all the way to a valve that’s close to the Shrine. It would go up 105th to Bailey and then out to the field and stop with a stub there. It can go further east and when that developer who owns that 200 acres wants to tie in, they can do that. The Board should be getting something soon as these were sent out for bids.
Mr. Manousopoulos made a motion to pay the Water Utility Docket as presented. Mr. Furtek seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 3-0.
Water District APVs in the amount of $13,975.87.
Mr. Manousopoulos made a motion to pay the Water District Docket as presented. Mr. Furtek seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 3-0.
Respectfully Submitted:
Gerri Kudzia, Recording Secretary
St. John Waterworks Board
Mr. Manousopoulos thought the Board was going to wait for IDEM to see if it was going to be acceptable to even put the well there.
Mr. Pondinas stated that an email came out today (1-21-22), and it was sent to the Board. The Board already has a copy of the plot of the three lots in that circle. Megan said that wasn’t going to fly, so that’s not going to be possible the way it is. They probably won’t pass that. It is going to have to go back to the Developer. That’s why the Plan Commission wants a letter from the Water Board.
Mr. Furtek agreed with Mr. Manousopoulos in regards to retaining Baker Tilly.
Mr. Manousopoulos passed the gavel over to Mr. Furtek. Mr. Furtek acknowledged receipt of the gavel.
Mr. Manousopoulos made a motion to approve Baker Tilly as Financial Advisor for 2022 for the Waterworks Board. Mr. Furtek seconded the motion. The motion carried by a roll-call vote of 2-0.
Mr. Manousopoulos Yes
Mr. Furtek Yes
Mr. Manousopoulos regained possession of the gavel.
Mr. Furtek Yes
Mr. Manousopoulos Yes
Respectfully Submitted:
Gerri Kudzia, Recording Secretary
St. John Waterworks Board
Mr. Furtek Yes
Mr. Manousopoulos Yes
Mr. Gembala Yes
Mr. Manousopoulos made a motion to approve the January 21, 2022, special meeting minutes as presented. Mr. Furtek seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 3-0.
Mr. Furtek Yes
Mr. Manousopoulos Yes
Mr. Gembala Yes
Mr. Gembala asked if that conservation area on the subdivision plat is going to be approved by the Plan Commission.
Mr. Pondinas said no, he didn’t think so. At the Peerless meeting, the engineers said it was okay and good to go.
Mr. Dravet stated there is actually a proposed Well 10. It will be near the existing Wells 3 and 5. It was brought up in that meeting, there was an additional fracture in that same area. The first step in this process is to do an aquifer test to make sure that this proposed well will not interfere with 3 and 5. Right now, we’re not technically allowed to run 3 and 5 at the same time because they’re only 20’ apart unless it’s an emergency. So we are going to try to get a 5” diameter pipe about 225’ down and run a two hour test pump to make sure that it can produce the water quality and not interfere with the existing wells. We have a quote of $7950 to do that test well. So we’re looking into adding this. It is close-ish to 3 and 5 so it’s already on Town-owned property. Getting the pipe installed will be relatively easy because the treatment plant is right there. There are a lot of advantages to that particular location. This will be in addition to Wells 8 and 9.
Mr. Pondinas added this is a cheaper way of seeing if that’s going to work. I think that the total price might be around $21,000. If we find that it works, that’s another well we can drill.
Mr. Dravet said they are going to put data logging transducers into this new well. It will run 3 or 5 or potentially both for a small of time to do a worst case and see how that affects the aquifer. The new well will be drilled 10’ away from that location. I’m hoping to put a permanent transducer down in that existing pipe to permanently monitor the aquifer.
Mr. Gembala asked Mr. Pondinas about his email concerning the purchase of the 18” pipe. Mr. Pondinas said they did find 18” pipe. There is 600’ to go to from Redeemer Church into the building. There is concern about the line stop for Well 8. It stopped right on the property line and it measured 210 more feet. Mr. Pondinas thinks we should order 850’. The price would be a little more than $66,000. This should go to the Town Council and tell them we need that to connect Well 8. If there’s extra pipe, it can be stuck on the stub that is off of Cline and Parrish. It would head south, and we can put a reducer on there so we’re not going to waste any pipe. It would go 16” from there all the way to Well 9. The engineer said we can do that but we have to match up the 18” pipe to finish that project. It’s going to be a 40 x 40 building for Well 8. Not sure where they would come in to it because I haven’t talked to the engineer. We want to make sure we have enough 18” pipe to complete that project. That pipe will just be in the ground and come into the building. From there it will be ductile. We need to get Well 9 going because it will probably be the spring of 2023 when it will be ready. The way we are building in Town, we are going to have to get both of those wells going.
Mr. Manousopoulos made a motion to approve the cost of the IDEM Permit. Mr. Furtek seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 3-0.
Mr. Furtek Yes
Mr. Manousopoulos Yes
Mr. Gembala Yes
Mr. Manousopoulos made a motion for a recommendation to the Town Council to purchase the 18” pipe Mr. Pondinas found. Mr. Furtek seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 3-0.
Mr. Furtek Yes
Mr. Manousopoulos Yes
Mr. Gembala Yes
Mr. Manousopoulos made a motion to execute the Baker Tilly Contract for the Water Board. Mr. Furtek seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 3-0.
Mr. Furtek Yes
Mr. Manousopoulos Yes
Mr. Gembala Yes
Mr. Pondinas sent the Board a bid from Ferguson Waterworks for an 8” stainless steel meter which is used to monitor water we receive from Schererville. A water study was done and it was found that the meter should be calibrated or changed out. It is 15+ years old and because of its size, the cost is $11,465, plus $500 for a sending unit. It’s a turbine meter and not sure if we can get parts to rebuild it. The new meter would be an octave meter which has no moving parts in it.
Mr. Manousopoulos made a motion to recommend the purchase of the meter for $11,465 from Ferguson Waterworks to the Town Council. Mr. Furtek seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 3-0.
Mr. Furtek Yes
Mr. Manousopoulos Yes
Mr. Gembala Yes
Mr. Pondinas mentioned there was going to be a demonstration of the new SCADA System at Austgen Electric on Wednesday, February 23rd. He invited Mr. Manousopoulos to come.
There is going to be a meeting with the engineers on Wednesday, February 16th, regarding the water main placement for the W. 93rd and U. S. 41 corner expansion project.
Mr. Manousopoulos made a motion to accept that there are no write-offs. Mr. Furtek seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 3-0.
Mr. Furtek Yes
Mr. Manousopoulos Yes
Mr. Gembala Yes
Mr. Manousopoulos made a motion to pay the Water District Docket as presented. Mr. Furtek seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 3-0.
Mr. Furtek Yes
Mr. Manousopoulos Yes
Mr. Gembala Yes
Water Utility Docket in the amount of $757,543.79.
Mr. Manousopoulos made a motion to pay the Water Utility Docket as presented. Mr. Furtek seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 3-0.
Mr. Furtek Yes
Mr. Manousopoulos Yes
Mr. Gembala Yes
Mr. Furtek Yes
Mr. Manousopoulos Yes
Mr. Gembala Yes
Respectfully Submitted:
Gerri Kudzia, Recording Secretary
St. John Waterworks Board
Mr. Pondinas stated that you have to pay for the IDEM Permit now and after that, the well will be drilled probably in June.
Mr. Dravet further clarified that the previous request from Peerless for $21,750 is for an exploratory well between well 3 and 5. The Peerless request for $145,765 is specifically for well 9.
Mr. Gembala wanted to put on the record that we will be billed as each phase is completed.
Mr. Manousopoulos made a motion to approve the Peerless Midwest Request to Purchase in the amount of $145,765. Mr. Furtek seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 3-0.
Respectfully Submitted:
Gerri Kudzia, Recording Secretary
St. John Waterworks Board
Mr. Manousopoulos made a motion to approve the February 28, 2022, special meeting minutes as presented. Mr. Furtek seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 3-0.
Mr. Gembala stated that everything has been executed on the contracts we had at the special meeting moving forward on all of those items.
Mr. Pondinas said an email came in today about 2 p.m. from Haas Engineering regarding the upcoming water main projects. Since the Board did not have a chance to review everything, there will be a special meeting on Monday, March 21st at 5:30 pm to discuss it.
The SCADA System is moving forward with the water side and it will probably start going in at the end of this month.Mr. Dravet mentioned at the last meeting, the Board approved the Wonderware Licensing so we’re good for the new software update for the new SCADA System. We are moving to a system platform. It’s supposed to be real slick.
Mr. Manousopoulos made a motion to pay the Water District Docket as presented. Mr. Furtek seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 3-0.
Water Utility Docket in the amount of $286,502.59.
Mr. Manousopoulos made a motion to pay the Water Utility Docket as presented. Mr. Furtek seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 3-0.
Mr. Manousopoulos asked to add the following to Reports and Correspondence:
Mr. Manousopoulos said he has been getting quite a few phone calls especially from our senior residents regarding in respect to inflation. He would like to begin talks with Baker Tilly about instituting a water senior discount.
Mr. Manousopoulos made a motion to put something together with Baker Tilly about instituting a water senior discount. Mr. Furtek seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 3-0.
Mr. Gembala would like this added to the next agenda if it is ready by then.
Respectfully Submitted:
Gerri Kudzia, Recording Secretary
St. John Waterworks Board
Mr. Scott Kuchta with Haas & Associates said there are four sub-projects.
1. Olcott Ave. from 95th to 97th
2. Olcott Ave. between Homestead Heights Dr. running north to just south of Bull Run Ditch
3. 96th and 97th Courts which are cul-de-sacs that back up to the back rear yards of houses that are on Olcott
These three sub-projects are kind of all in the same neighborhood.
4. West 85th between Primrose and Magnolia Street on the northwest corner of Town.
All of the Olcott projects including 96th & 97th are 8 inch main replacement projects. These are mains that have been failing over the years that Public Works identified as areas that need main replacement. In addition, since 8 inch is the new Town standard for minimum main size, we’re going from 6 to 8 for those mains.
Then 85th is currently an 8 inch main and that will get upsized to 12 inch because there’s currently 12 inch running up to Primrose. That will extend the 12 inch all the way out to Magnolia along 85th.
Mr. Gembala wanted to know where the main is located on 85th. Mr. Kuchta said it’s sort of down the north side of the westbound travel lane. We seem to be clear of that. We are going to be in the roadway shoulder. Unfortunately, there’s a continuous gas line and various other conflicts along there. That said, the road is overdue for repaving, so we figured this is a good time to get in there. It’s going to be basically on the edge of pavement for, don’t hold me to this, maybe two thirds of that whole length will be right along the edge of pavement. There is a portion as we get closer to Primrose where we can get back into the shoulder grass area. There is storm water and gas utility all along that south side of the road.
The Olcott projects from 95th to 97th in addition to the Bull Run Ditch down to Homestead Heights will include complete sidewalk and tree replacement. So we’re basically going to clear that right away from the property line to the back of the curb. Included in this is new driveway aprons, sidewalks and trees. That’s one of the causes of failure particularly between 95th and 97th are tree roots. The Courts which is the third sub-project in that area, just doesn’t have sidewalks but will be getting new driveway aprons in the areas we disturb.
Mr. Kuchta stated this is about 3.8 million assigned from the bond measure last year. Prices are a little bit unknown right now, but we’re coming in at under 1.6 million (1.53 right now). Part of the purpose of putting this out to bid now is so we can get some pricing feedback. Then we will know how much is left for the balance of the projects that are allocating to that 3.8 million. Unfortunately due to inflation, we’re probably going to have to lose some total aggregate scope of all the projects we had hoped to do with that bond money.
Mr. Gembala wanted to know if more than one contractor will be involved with these projects. Mr. Kuchta responded that it will be one contractor, one contract with four different site areas.
Mr. Gembala asked if there is any foreseen problems with material shortage. Mr. Kuchta said yes, material and contractor availability and pricing materials. The Board will have 60 days to award and beyond that, the contractor can back out. That is basically how long they can hold their prices.
Mr. Manousopoulos wanted to know if for some reason something goes wrong with the contractor, do we have an out in the contract.
Mr. Kuchta says they typically put in liquidated damages and is not sure what the amount is. That is one way to adjust for that. They will also have a performance bond that will be issued with the project. If there are significant issues for things that we agree are beyond everyone’s control, I think we just come back to the Board and negotiate with the contractor about how to get it done.
Mr. Gembala asked if the bids will be opened by the Water Board. The bids will be opened by this Board and then recommendation to the Town Council would probably follow. The bids can also be held under advisement after they are opened until the following meeting.
Mr. Manousopoulos made a motion for Haas & Associates to proceed with bidding for Contract 1 - 2022 water main replacement project. Mr. Furtek seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous roll call vote of 3-0.
Mr. Furtek Yes
Mr. Manousopoulos Yes
Mr. Gembala Yes
Respectfully Submitted:
Gerri Kudzia, Recording Secretary
St. John Waterworks Board
Mr. Manousopoulos made a motion to approve the March 21, 2022, special meeting minutes as presented. Mr. Furtek seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 3-0.
Mr. Gembala wanted this to be put on next month’s agenda.
Mr. Manousopoulos made a motion to submit the bid to legal and to the Town Engineer for review. Mr. Furtek seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 3-0. Mr. Wiszowaty will let the Board know when the bid is reviewed and if there will have to be a special meeting.
Mr. Pondinas mentioned the water main project bid. Mr. Gembala reminded everyone that at the last meeting we emphasized the availability and material before we start the project so that they will have everything they need.
Mr. Scott Kuchta with Haas & Associates stated that they did hear from prospective contractors that they are very busy. We wanted to complete this obviously as there are a number of bond projects coming. We have got to get this started. We set a completion deadline for October, the end of the season. There is concrete and asphalt in this project so we have to get that done before the freeze. So we’re kind of bound by that timeline and unfortunately only got the one bid. We will review it and talk to Dyer about some of their numbers. We’ll go through it and see if there’s anything that seems high to us or if there’s anything that can be reduced or scope change. There could be some cost savings. We’ll go forward and take it under advisement with the Board.
Mr. Wiszowaty wanted to know the estimate on that project.
Mr. Kuchta said it is about 1.6 for Alternate A or B. It was a little bit more for Alternate A in line with Dyer’s. We expected Alternate A to be more expensive and Dyer came in as such.
Mr. Gembala asked if we were finished with Town wise on U.S. 41. Is there anything else we have to worry about?
Mr. Kuchta responded that for water main projects – the U.S. 41 east side 12 inch relocation is still a pending project. I had sent via email within the last month an update from Army Corps. We did receive that today and I’ll forward it to the Board. They did agree with our wetland delineation jurisdictional determination. That will be one of the pending projects we’ll begin to spend the rest of the bond money in addition to Wells 8 and 9. Those are the design projects we’re going to get going on next. In terms of other U.S. 41, were your referencing utility conflicts or something specific in terms of the water projects. The west side is also part of the process we discussed previously to get some of these bid unit prices back. Again as we just heard, inflationary period, busy time for people. We’ll see where these numbers come in and what effect that has on projections for future projects due to spending the bond money. We will go on to the next one presuming, of course, we award this or however the Board proceeds with this one.
Mr. Pondinas wanted to know if we are going to have to move a lot of water main on the west side or replace. When they came across this year, they came on an angle. Milestone said something they might get it resolved and there might be no conflict.
Mr. Kuchta asked if Mr. Pondinas was referring to the St. John Ditch crossing box culvert. Mr. Pondinas replied yes. Mr. Kuchta said he did not know the status of that. The last correspondence Mr. Kuchta had with the State was through Milestone where he clarified some things about the existing 1978 plans we had sent. I do not have a status update on that.
Mr. Manousopoulos made a motion to pay the Water Utility Docket as presented. Mr. Furtek seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 3-0.
Water District Docket in the amount of $21,398.21.
Mr. Manousopoulos made a motion to pay the Water District Docket as presented. Mr. Furtek seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 3-0.
Respectfully Submitted:
Gerri Kudzia, Recording Secretary
St. John Waterworks Board
Mr. Scott Kuchta from Haas & Associates recapped that we received only one bid for the Water Main Replacement Projects. The Alternate B that we would take on that was $2.04 million and change. This is quite a bit higher than our engineer’s estimate that was done for the bond only a year ago last spring for the 2021 bond. Obviously, there is significant inflation going on around us but in addition to material inflation, there also seems to be labor shortage within these trades. Unfortunately we are in that area now. This project is not in isolation. It’s part of a roster with other projects that the Town intends to fund with the bond revenue from last year. We met with Joe Wiszowaty, Bob Davis and Wayne Pondinas a week ago Monday and circulated some email follow-ups after talking to the contractor. We did receive a revised price from the contractor to only execute a portion of Contract 1.
Contract 1 was actually 4 independent sites, 4 independent water main projects. We did ask for a revised price from them just to perform the W. 85th portion of the project which is site 4 in the contract. They did provide us a cost for that of $1,004,031.31. That was actually, as a percentage basis, even higher than the overall percentage over our original estimate. Of course, the more volume, the more discount you get on the price. So cutting back their total work for that project as a percentage basis, that actually went up. But certainly that’s only half the amount of the total contract, if the Board wanted to get something going and pursue that. Another option is to rebid this at a later date. We are working with one set of numbers here from one contractor. We are quite limited in our ability to assess where things are in terms of competitiveness.
Mr. Gembala pointed out that the new bid does not include restoration. The other bid, portions included restoration for driveway cuts and so forth. This is inside of the road.
Mr. Kuchta stated that it is under the road so there are significant costs due to that. We are hoping that the intent of the Town is to pave that road within the 2023 season. It is in pretty bad shape. It would still be good for the water main to be replaced before the road is repaved. There is some incentive to do it now or early next year. That said, it’s quite a bit higher on the price. We did map out this 30-50% increase on the bond estimated projects. You are just not going to have enough money to get some of the core projects done for Wells 8 and 9, U.S. 41 and some other projects that are listed in that bond.
Mr. Gembala stated he could see by all the correspondence of emails concerning this and your meeting with Bob Davis and everything, we would have to take out more than we need to out of our bond. The wells are most important right now. I think we should put this under advisement or on hold for now. That is a lot of money for just that section of water main. That is pretty excessive.
Mr. Wiszowaty agreed that prices are crazy, supply chains are messed up, manpower is messed up. It’s just a really bad time in terms of getting projects done right now and not just here. Our priority right now should be Wells 8 and 9. Those are moving forward and that’s a whole capacity issue. Bob Davis, Wayne and I are in agreement on that and we take a look at getting that completed before we move in to the next phase.
Mr. Gembala made a motion to reject the bids and put the project on hold at this time. Mr. Furtek seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 2-0.
Mr. Kuchta made a comment for general awareness. The intent of releasing this bid was to get some pricing feedback from the market too. Unfortunately it wasn’t the best news, but it is feedback. At least there is some information to guide us as we go forward with those other projects. In general, we do think bidding in the fall for next season is probably going to be our best bet, smaller projects, more flexibility. In normal markets, grouping the projects, more work for contactors is good, get better prices. It’s a crazy market. We actually think smaller markets more dissected may be better. Nobody really knows right now what’s going on. We have the plans ready to go. These projects do need to happen. There have been several repairs just this week on W. 85th under this section. It may not happen under the bond funding or it may just happen at a later date under the bond funding. These projects do have to happen at some point in the coming years. Whenever we have the money, we can go out to bid on these on these four sites.
Mr. Gembala wanted this to be kept on the agenda.
Mr. Furtek made a motion to approve the request to purchase for Austgen Electric for installing a chlorine analyzer at the Gates WTP for $6244, for Monix WTP for $6244 and a chlorinator valve for Monix WTP for $19,412 for a combined total of $31,898 for the Water Bond Appropriation. Mr. Gembala seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 2-0.
Mr. Furtek made a motion to approve the request to purchase for Austgen Electric to install a Ross altitude valve at the Kilkenny Water Tower for $59,154 to be paid out of the Water Bond Appropriation. Mr. Gembala seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 2-0.
Mr. Gembala asked is INDOT doing the work and we just pay the bill?
Mr. Kuchta replied yes, unfortunately state law is such that this is within the State right-of-way, the Town has a right to be within the right-of-way. However, the State has a right to make improvements and the local utilities have to either move, vacate or do whatever they have to do in order to allow the State to make those roadway improvements. The box culvert is an extension of their roadway improvements.
Mr. Gembala asked Mr. Kuchta what he recommends the Town to do.
Mr. Kuchta said they are looking at a few options in terms of both. We don’t think based on the conflict area that temporary support is going to be a viable cost effective option. It’s going to involve quite a bit of engineering that will ultimately have to be approved by the State as well. They made that clear.
Alternatives include temporarily shutting down that water main, removing that pipe and putting it back. The painful part of this is there’s not an actual conflict with the structure. There’s a conflict with the construction of the structure. The pipes can go back in the exact same place they are now. In discussions this week, we got some positive feedback from a contractor that I won’t name. It’s just in process about directionally drilling underneath the creek/river which would allow that main to remain in service except for a few days of connecting, or possibly remain in service for the entire time that it’s replaced. The benefit of that is the main would remain in service. This is a pretty important main on the west side. We do have a 12-inch system network on the east side, the Ravenswood Commercial Subdivision and Target and all that. But this is straight north of the treatment plant, so it’s pretty high velocity stuff coming through there to serve the whole northwest part of town. So that would be the incentive to keep that service going.
It also might be the most cost effective and most timely to just drill a new one. Another benefit to that is it could theoretically, (until INDOT comes again), be a more permanent solution at least for the water main to get it under the creek/river. No matter what they do with that box culvert in the future, we should be okay. That will depend probably on some pricing and contractor feedback. We will probably be developing this a lot over the coming weeks and coming to you at next month’s board meeting maybe with requests for action to either go for quotes or bids. Maybe as alternate one remove and replace as open trench and then that alternate would be to drill underneath. See which one comes in with a more cost friendly benefit to the Town. We will keep you updated so you are informed. We’ll be working with Bob and Joe to see what we can do.
Mr. Pondinas asked about cost to the Town.
Mr. Kuchta responded that they did a very, very preliminary, with no design in this. Just looking at the length and the pipe. Some rough numbers we’re looking at is maybe $150,000, maybe $170,000 for the remove and replace of both the water main and the sanitary. We haven’t looked at the cost of horizontally drilling it.
Mr. Pondinas explained why he wanted to know about cost. He stated that INDOT never reimbursed us for the 12-inch water main they hit. They made us move our sanitary line once down a little south of there. That cost us $110,000 or $115,000 and then they came back and said we didn’t have to do that. Now they are telling us this. We shouldn’t have to pay the whole bill on this. We have to stand up. Don’t they have to have a surety bond for when something like that happens and we can hold them liable or something?
Mr. Kuchta asked Wayne if he was referring to the previous force main project with a bond.
Mr. Pondinas said he was. I think we even gave them a piece of property. Then they hit our force main. Then they hit our water main. That was $4000 damage there. We’re taking some awful big hits as a Town. This was not in the plan a few years ago because it came up this year, if I understand it right.
Mr. Wiszowaty wanted to know if this was actually part of the scope of the project or is this something that came up as a change.
Mr. Kuchta responded that the box culvert was in the INDOT 2020 set of plans. As I said, the nature of this conflict is it’s only a conflict because of the construction process that they go through to remove and replace that. But what Wayne is speaking to is, within those plans through multiple projects and coordination and other conflicts, INDOT has then since changed the scope. The Town has executed several of these relocation projects or the manner in which we’ve executed them has been because of those INDOT plans that then INDOT changes midway through.
So far for instance, the water main replacement between 101st and 101st we lowered that far below the five foot normal depth in order to accommodate an INDOT ditch swale that was supposed to go in there. So we were down eight, nine, ten feet at one point immediately next to a storm sewer structure. There is quite an expensive excavation for the Town. INDOT ended up just eliminating that ditch and sodding it. All that extra depth was unnecessary.
As a water main then on the west side, the same 12-inch force main further south, not very much farther south than where we’re talking about. A similar situation; there was going to be an INDOT ditch that was supposed to be installed there. Haas & Associates worked with INDOT trying to get them to eliminate that ditch or shift the ditch. They said that was not possible. That’s what I think Wayne was referring to the $110,000 project the Sanitary District funded last year or two years ago. INDOT ended up not constructing approximately half of that drainage ditch so that worked to lower not all of that project, but half the scope. So I think that’s what Wayne’s sort of speaking to. Unfortunately plans change and we’re caught in the middle.
That is a little beyond our pay grade in terms of what the Town’s responsible for specifically with INDOT. We did generate and send out a memo last year about this issue laying out some of the State’s rights and the Town’s rights. The gist of it is, the Town has a right to be in the State right-of-way with its facilities as do some of the other core utilities such as NIPSCO gas, NIPSCO electric, communications and then sanitary and water. There’s another right that the State has to construct facilities within their right-of-way and if you’re in the way, you have to move. It’s kind of a competition of these two rights.
Certainly I would recommend we do everything we can to confirm over and over again that there is no other possible way that INDOT can replace this culvert without those facilities moving.
Mr. Wiszowaty said that project has been laboring along for far too long. I don’t know who screwed that project up but that’s definitely a mess. I hear about it every day from residents, from everybody.
Mr. Kuchta stated that some of this is frustrating. Communications are not great. Some of it is just life. Unfortunately we’re all sharing that right-of-way. The Town owns 85th and if NIPSCO gas is in the way of a Town road widening project, NIPSCO has to move at their cost. This is the one major state right-of-way in town. We’re just a local utility in the state’s right-of-way. Unfortunately these are some of the costs that come with it.
Mr. Gembala mentioned for informational purposes only, we received the application for the permit for Well 8 that Haas & Associates applied for to the State. Also with that, we received a well site survey from IDEM on Well 8. There are eighteen items there and nothing stands out as an issue. There is nothing we need to do, just to know that has been processed.
Mr. Furtek made a motion to pay the Water District Docket as presented. Mr. Gembala seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 2-0.
Water Utility Docket in the amount of $374,818.29
Mr. Furtek made a motion to pay the Water Utility Docket as presented. Mr. Gembala seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 2-0.
Mr. Kuchta responded that Milestone, the contractor for INDOT, stated they need 75 foot both south and north of the center line of the ditch, so 150 foot is essentially the conflict area.
Respectfully Submitted:
Gerri Kudzia, Recording Secretary
St. John Waterworks Board
The Town has two facilities, a 12-inch water main housed in a steel casing that appears to be about 20 inches, and also a 12-inch sanitary force main. Both of those lie almost on top of each other on top of the box culvert on the west side of the highway running north-south, parallel to each other as I discussed last month.
The Town has to relocate or essentially get out of the way of INDOT to take out the existing box culvert that is there and replace it. It’s virtually the same size structure, so this isn’t a pure conflict because the pipes can actually go back in the exact same place they’re in now and the exact same locations. In order for INDOT to put the box culvert in, the pipes are in the way so they have to come out while INDOT does their work. Then we can put them back in place. The total conflict area that INDOT has declared is 150 LF basically 75 foot in each direction north south centered from the center of that ditch crossing. I have asked for clarification from INDOT and have not gotten a response yet. On the official INDOT State plans, they are calling for a removal of 50 LF of that guardrail that’s in this area. We have put together a probable cost estimate for the work required. On that, you will see that there’s actually two line items for the removal and replacement for the water main. One is where the guardrail is not present, presuming they did not remove the 50 foot of guardrail in that area. The balance would require the Town’s contractor to maintain that guardrail in place. It will be a little bit trickier with that guardrail in place to replace that water main and the sanitary force main.
So there’s two issues on the agenda tonight related to this. The first one is 5A on the agenda which is the declaration of emergency. You can read the justifying reasons laid out there. There are four of them presented. Once that is declared, the Town can solicit quotes or bids without an advertisement period as long as it’s from at least two reputable firms that deal with this type of work. All that does is basically waive the minimum advertisement and wait period for other bids. It is 7 days for quotes which are under $150,000 or at least 14 days, typically around 21 days if it is above $150,000 advertising in newspapers.
The emergency declaration will allow us to directly contact two contractors. The plan is to deliver this bid project to Gough Construction who is the current underground contractor sub to Milestone which is the State Highway contractor doing the work out there now. The Town has used Gough before. Gough was the contractor for the Redevelopment Commission for the West 96th ground improvement project. We’ve also used them as a sub on another project in Town related to the West 96th development for some water main work for that project. We’ve used Milestone multiple times in the Town as well. So we have a work history from the Town’s perspective with both contractors. This would be sent to Gough, they are on site now. Theoretically, we would get a better price from them due to lesser mobilization costs since they’re already there. They would be fully in control of that process, both in terms of removing and replacing the Town’s facilities but also putting in that box culvert.
Additionally for competitive purposes and for common sense, we would want another price. We are planning to give this to Grimmer Construction for a quote. We have used Grimmer multiple times in this town. Grimmer was used for 108th Street and for the 101st to 101st water main relocation work we did last summer. That would be the plan to send it to those two contractors for a bid/quote price, Item 5B.
Mr. Manousopoulos wanted to know how long we give these contractors to get back to us since we’re only sending it to two.
Mr. Kuchta said the benefit to this process is there is no defined timeline in terms of minimum or maximum. In this case minimum, we want to move it along as soon as we can.
Mr. Wiszowaty stated that we don’t need both of them to respond.
Mr. Kuchta replied that there is no time restriction that he knew of.
Mr. Manousopoulos questioned the guardrail. He wanted to know why we have to maintain it since it’s on a state highway.
Mr. Kuchta responded that there’s an existing guardrail that runs all along that section of the road that far exceeds the project area we’re talking about. So the State is already planning to remove 50 LF of that guardrail basically centered over the box culvert that they’re replacing. However, the State is requesting the Town relocate or get out of the way 150 feet. We know a contractor going in to remove and replace the water main would have 50 free feet of access. For the balance of that area, they would have to negotiate around a guardrail that’s in place. I’m still waiting for the State to confirm that’s what they are intending to remove only 50 feet. Ideally they would remove 150 feet and we could get in there unobstructed for the whole length.
The other purpose of this is we are going to request that they only remove 50 feet now, maybe up to 70 feet of pipe to get out of the State’s way. It’s a little bit complicated because the 150 foot obstruction zone is what the State is fearful of damaging due to setting up equipment on both sides of the box culvert excavation area with some heavy equipment, a lot of vibration. The current box culvert in the ground is poured in place, sort of a monolithic unit that they’re going to have to drill and really shake that thing to get it out. New box culverts come in small sections. They put them in place, stack them and it goes pretty fast. So the real work is tearing the existing one out.
The State is basically saying they don’t want to be responsible for damaging our facilities underneath their equipment. The only hard conflict is 50 to 70 feet where they are actually going to dig down where pipes would be in the way. The balance of that the State is saying they are not going to be responsible for the other areas where they are setting up on top of. From the Town’s perspective, I understand why the State wants that reassurance that they won’t be responsible from that. But that doesn’t mean they are going to damage those pipes. That’s a lot of extra pipe, particularly with this guardrail, to replace if we don’t have to.
So what we’re recommending is we only remove the minimum amount that’s the hard conflict where they’re actually going to dig. Then they will put the box culvert in, replace it, put it all back in place. At that point, there are various tests, cameras, pressure tests that we can do on the balance of the pipe that’s in place to verify its integrity. If we verify that the pipe was not damaged outside of that hard conflict zone, there’s really no need to replace that pipe particularly the sanitary force main. Based on our limited knowledge of what’s out there, the sanitary force main appears to be completely west of the guardrail, the water main is east of the guardrail into the shoulder area of the state highway. We just don’t see it likely that 150 feet of sanitary force main would need to be replaced as part of this. We don’t want to authorize doing that just because they said to. We would want to verify that it actually needs to be replaced. The same holds true for the water. We’re just a little less confident because we believe from the Town locates, that a good portion of the water main is actually on the road side of the guardrail. In which case, there’s a better chance that they may damage it as they think they will. Again, why replace pipe that you don’t need to.
Mr. Wiszowaty confirmed that Councilman Pondinas made the call to secure the correct amount of pipe for the project.
Mr. Manousopoulos wanted to confirm that the 150 feet of guardrail belongs to the State and if we wanted to do something, we would have to get their permission to remove it.
Mr. Kuchta replied yes.
Mr. Manousopoulos also wanted clarification that if the State hit or damaged something of ours, they want us to be responsible.
That is correct Mr. Kuchta replied. The State identifies the total length of the conflict and then they’re not responsible for what happens within that conflict area. That’s how it’s playing out in this case. Some discussion ensued on this topic. We are trying to coordinate with the State as much as possible. That’s why if Gough hopefully would give some friendlier prices for being on site that would be the best solution out of all this. That is by no means guaranteed.
Mr. Manousopoulos wanted to know how long it would take for the job to be done.
Mr. Kuchta said since Public Works isolated the valves, the water main can be shut down at any time. The water main can be isolated on the west side. The sanitary force main likewise can be shut down at any time. We have two other outlets from lift station one that head east. Both mains have to be drained. If it’s Gough, it would just be mobilization from the contractor. We have not defined that in the bid. That’s something we would talk to each contractor about as we approach them with this about what is a realistic schedule. Essentially it’s a two-stage project. There’s two mobilizations that we put in the bid. Mobilization one is drain both mains and cap them at the two ends of the conflict. Depending on the State’s preference, we could even take the pipe out in that 50-70 feet of what we know is going to be a real conflict. Then they will demobilize and the State will get in there and do their work. We were told the box culvert could be two weeks of work alone without any delays. Three weeks I would say for that. Then we would come back and put the pipe back in place and get the mains back in service.
I don’t have a direct answer as to when they get out there. That could definitely be a role in determining which quote to go with too. If they’re equal and one can be out there tomorrow and the other one is six weeks out. I’m happy to take in advisement any thoughts about that specifically. Obviously the purpose of the emergency declaration and moving this forward is to get the conflict area out of conflict as soon as possible.
Mr. Manousopoulos asked Mr. Wiszowaty when you declare an emergency, it’s just for this project, right?
Mr. Wiszowaty responded that we spoke with counsel about this. It’s basically a two-step process. The Waterworks Board would declare an emergency to require the 12-inch water main temporarily abandoned, removal and replacement at U.S. 41 St. John ditch crossing is a Public Works emergency pursuant to IC 36-1-12-9 of the Indiana Code. That would justify the declaration and that would be part of the motion for the declaration. The second part he was speaking about is the Waterworks Board would be administered through Haas & Associates authorizing solicitation of construction quotes for the temporary abandonment, removal and replacement of up to 150 LF of 12-inch diameter water main at the project site. Time is of the essence. Quotes for the project will be sought under an emergency basis pursuant to IC 36-1-12-9. For a minimum of two contractors, specifically Gough, Inc. and Grimmer Construction, Inc. known in the public construction work performed. There would be the two motions. The other part of that motion I would also add, is that Haas would review the bids and recommend to the Town Manager to go ahead and move forward. Of course I would send it to the Waterworks Board before I did that. I think you need to know the quotes and what Haas is recommending before authorization. Then we don’t have to have special meetings.
Mr. Pondinas commented that with this project, there’s no valves just pipe. No hot taps except the pressure tap to drain the sanitary. No water main hot taps. We saved some money that way. The pipe is already procured by us. They just have to do the emergency declaration.
Mr. Kuchta said the cost estimate included the contractor providing the pipe. So there will be some material savings because we have the pipe.
Mr. Furtek made a motion to approve the Declaration of Emergency. Mr. Manousopoulos seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 2-0.
Mr. Kuchta asked Mr. Wiszowaty which board will manage the contract since the Sanitary Board will be going through a similar process.
Mr. Wiszowaty replied with respect to what Mr. Kuchta is bringing up, instead of having to go back and forth to both boards, we were doing a cost split on that. I think you came up with a number on that.
Mr. Kuchta said we have number from the estimate. It is a unit price contract like most underground work that we do. While there is a number in particular as it’s broken out, Items 7-14 would be the responsibility of the Sanitary District regardless of what those extended cost estimates. These are just estimates, we don’t have the bid numbers which are contract numbers yet. Most importantly are those units associated with those pay items 7-14. If the Waterworks Board were administering the contract they would then seek reimbursement from the Sanitary District for those items. Items 1-6 are virtually the same projects. For simplicity, those are the general items up top. We would recommend just a 50/50 split between the boards on those items.
Mr. Wiszowaty stated basically what Scott was saying is that the Waterworks Board or the Sanitary Board would be taking lead on the project. That way, we’re only doing one contract instead of two separate contracts. It just makes things a little bit easier in terms of managing the project. So that way, the Sanitary Board would reimburse the Waterworks Board for the work that’s done.
Mr. Pondinas asked are they are going to split $193,620?
Mr. Kuchta replied well not quite. You will split Items 1-6, 50/50 between the boards. You will pay none of Items 7-14, well you will but will be theoretically reimbursed from the Sanitary Board. Then you will be responsible for Items 15-24 in their entirety. There is a 20% contingency built into all those numbers.
Mr. Wiszowaty stated that the total amount is $193,620 is his opinion of the cost of the project basically getting reimbursed $90,660 based on that number.
Mr. Kuchta said Item 15 is that 50 linear foot where we assume the guardrail will have been removed and our contractor will be able to get in there pretty easily. Item 16 is that balance of the conflict area where we believe the support or protection of that guardrail would have to be part of their cost. So it’s going to be a more costly procedure for them. That’s the item we hope to not even have to use or use only a portion of it. This theoretically should be a conservative guide. We would hope to actually do better on several of these items. We’ve seen very crazy things in the world of construction pricing over the last year and a half.
Mr. Manousopoulos has no problem with the Waterworks Board taking the lead and paying everything out but he doesn’t want to speak for the Sanitary Board. Maybe we hold it until they meet and then make the motion pending approval by the Sanitary Board.
Mr. Furtek made a motion to take lead on the project pending the approval from the Sanitary Board. Mr. Manousopoulos seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 2-0.
Mr. Furtek made a motion to approve the Core & Main Request to Purchase for a total of $94,729, which includes the additional amount of $1,101.50. Mr. Manousopoulos seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 2-0.
Mr. Wiszowaty said that Well 9 was also part of that issue. We wanted to make sure we didn’t go short on bond money for Wells 8 and 9.
Mr. Pondinas stated the bond money is for Wells 8 and 9, tying into the Monix WTP and the SCADA System.
Mr. Wiszowaty suggested that we might consider doing 85th as a separate thing earlier this fall, that way it gets done. Paving 85th would be a separate project not related to the water funds. We could rebid the water main portion for 85th keeping the same scope of work just to get that done before we start paving. Mr. Wiszowaty asked if we were looking at doing a FDR on that project.
Mr. Kuchta replied that was not official yet. That seems to be how it’s going and it may depend on how well it goes on the east part of 85th this summer. I think we’re still waiting on corings and some other things for that to make that final call.
Mr. Pondinas asked if that would be the start of October.
Mr. Manousopoulos said it would be. The rate would be the rate before our increase of 30%. So we would take 30% off their bill.
Mr. Wiszowaty wanted to know if this has to be done by ordinance.
Mr. Manousopoulos said we will submit everything. Water rates are done by the Utility Board. Some discussion ensued regarding public hearing, etc.
Mr. Furtek made a motion for the Town Manager to look into the particulars of getting the senior water rate going and report back to the Waterworks Board. Mr. Manousopoulos seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 2-0.
1. Addresses ending in an even number may only sprinkle and water lawns on even number days of the month.
2. Addresses ending in an odd number may only sprinkle and water lawns on odd number days of the month.
The reason this has become necessary is because we’ve gotten a huge amount of water usage during the hours of 4 a.m. – 8 a.m. on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. I don’t know if the sprinkler contractor installing sprinklers is just automatically setting these up on those specific days but we have to manage our water better. This is probably a nice proactive way to do that without an outright sprinkler ban. We don’t want to do that obviously. We want to make sure we are managing our water responsibly. Until we see some kind of improvement to that, we want to try this and see where it goes.
Mr. Manousopoulos wanted to know if we’re asking people to do this or telling them this is what they have to do.
Mr. Wiszowaty answered this is the plan that we put together for the Town. This is something we are asking on a voluntary basis. If there’s not people that are partaking in this process, then obviously we would have to take it to another level which we may end up even going a little further to institute that process while this plan is in effect. Hopefully people take and acknowledge and adhere to it.
Mr. Manousopoulos asked how much are we pumping in the hours of 4 a.m. to 8 a.m.
Mr. Wiszowaty stated that we are at maximum capacity. The Hack Water Tower, which is a half million gallon tank, is draining precipitously during that time. We’re trying some different techniques to kind of arrest and slow down that process by putting valves in. Something that may need to happen at some point is an altitude valve put in at Hack. That might cause the issue to abate. What they’re trying to do is to watch and see if Kilkenny and The Gates Water Tower kind of go down and take the pressure off of Hack. We’re trying some different things over there. I got to give our water guys a lot of credit. They’re working hard at trying to manage the problem.
Mr. Manousopoulos wanted to know if we looked into anything else as far as water conservation other than suggest to people when they can and can’t sprinkle their lawn.
Mr. Wiszowaty said that is the most critical time and that’s obviously what we’re seeing is on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. It’s on those days specifically where the problem is. It’s a critical problem because you drain your water tower and you lose your pressure and we don’t want to get to that point. We have temporarily shut down the bulk water station because that’s just taking water out of the system that we’re paying the Town of Schererville right now. We are getting 1.2 million gallons a day from Schererville.
Mr. Pondinas stated that they’re going to put an altitude valve in the Kilkenny Water Tower but you can’t do that in the summertime. They’re making it now and it should be here maybe September when things slow up. Then that has to be mounted vertical inside the tower. There has to be a pad put down. One of our guys could probably build a shed around it at the walls. Then electric is going to be run to it so there’s heat in there so that valve don’t freeze. That altitude valve can be run on the SCADA System where it can turn on and off. It can run full open, half open and that will keep the water flowing to help improve the water hydraulics for the Town. The altitude valve in The Gates Water Tower is working well and that’s helping and it’s feeding Hack St.
More discussion on water conservations took place between Mr. Manousopoulos and Mr. Wiszowaty. Mr. Manousopoulos is against shutting down the Splash Pad because of our failure as a Town to plan accordingly.
Mr. Manousopoulos would like raising the Bulk Water rate put on the agenda for discussion at the next meeting.
Mr. Pondinas reported that the SCADA System is going along good. Everything else is moving along pretty good.
Mr. Furtek made a motion to pay the Water District Docket as presented. Mr. Manousopoulos seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 2-0.
B. Water Utility Docket in the amount of $291,255.43
Mr. Furtek made a motion to pay the Water Utility Docket as presented. Mr. Manousopoulos seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 2-0.
Respectfully Submitted:
Gerri Kudzia, Recording Secretary
St. John Waterworks Board
Mr. Gembala: This meeting is for a special issue only for both boards. We’re going to have a presentation of quotes for U.S. 41 water and sanitary main conflicts due to the work being done on U.S. 41. We are going to consider a quote from only one bidder for sanitary and waterworks. The sanitary issue is U.S. 41 150 LF of sanitary force main temporary abandonment, removal and replacement as a declaration of emergency. The other reason is for U.S. 41 150 LF of potable water main temporary abandonment, removal and replacement as a declaration of emergency.
B. Sanitary District: Board Members present: Kim Krull, Richard Setlak, Patricia Sims-Smierciak, Robert Kmetz, Ken Gembala. Also present: Wayne Pondinas, Town Council Liaison; Joe Wiszowaty, Town Manager.
I’ve discovered in contacting numerous contractors these are fluid times for these small jobs. What it essentially comes down to is these small jobs are very problematic for contractors right now. There are so many projects and they’re such scale that all their crews are tied up. So what happens is a crew will shake loose on a Thursday that they didn’t expect, and they will look for work for them for the next week. But if you call them on Wednesday prior to that crew shaking up, they would have said not available for three months. I’m speculating that’s what happened with Grimmer in this case. Regardless, they did not put a bid in. They notified us several days in advance of the bidding deadline.
Gough did. You should all have their bid. They submitted a bid for $363,422. This is substantially more than our opinion of probable cost which we thought was mildly conservative at $193,620. Our costs were somewhat inflated for that. That said, it’s very difficult to price, particularly mobilization costs for small jobs. Due to being a small job, they can offset as much of those costs over larger quantities of materials. We expected some range in that but didn’t expect double. We had hoped that their mobilization costs would be significantly reduced due to the fact that they will already be mobilized on site to replace the box culvert for the State.
That being said with only receiving one bid, we really can’t compare that with other contractors. Still it was significantly higher than our estimate. That’s not totally surprising given it’s such a small job. However, I did provide a breakdown of all the other items. There are some significantly different costs than expected. When I say expected, I mean based on historical numbers for these same units. Those top line numbers, the mobilizations costs in particular, can vary a lot based on the scale of the project. That’s where they’re supposed to vary the actual unit costs of the pipe and the various other things should be within a reasonable range. Some of those were quite a bit out of range. It’s a unique project based on the drainage of the force main and things like that. There is so little pipe that those other costs end up making a big part of it. It is sort of the best we can do based on our historical knowledge of other similar projects. Again we are really handicapped by only having one bid come in.
Essentially the decision before you tonight is do we accept this cost from Gough and contra award it and they can proceed presumably as soon as possible. We had hoped Gough would be awarded the job because they’re also the sub for doing the actual box culvert. Theoretically there shouldn’t be a conflict between contactors because they’re the same contractor at the same site. That said, it’s significantly higher than our estimate. I did distribute this revised Appendix B. It is just an update of the information I have provided to you during the week.
In anticipation of this situation where we’re looking for additional bids if we decide to reject the Gough bid and rebid it to see if contractors were truly available. We obviously just went through this with Contract 1 for the Waterworks Board. We only received one bid from Dyer Construction for that job. That was a very large job. The Waterworks Board ended up tabling that project to rebid it in the fall hoping to get better prices. That came in also significantly higher than expected as part of the water bond work.
We contacted 13 firms in addition to the 3 firms that we previously contacted. That’s a total of 16 different Northwest Indiana underground plumbing contractors. This is quite unusual to literally have to call 16 different contractors to see about the availability. There is a potential of two or three that do have a strong interest in bidding it and appear to be available within the next month to achieve the first phase of the project which is the demolition half of the project. After the Town removes its facilities, the State will come in and put the box culvert in. Then the Town will put their facilities back.
Mr. Wiszowaty: What is the State’s timeline to put the new culvert in?
Mr. Kuchta: Three weeks. I think they actually said two without any delays, but we added the third week for our planning purposes. So three weeks from breaking ground to completing it. There was a mobilization time that was discussed. I believe it was three weeks for the culvert or something like that to actually get the culvert on site. I don’t know exactly if that overlaps with that period or not from the State’s perspective.
Mr. Wiszowaty: I think what they said is you give us the go ahead on this and we’ll get it mobilized now. If we get pricing back that’s sane, then we can go ahead and get that started.
Mr. Manousopoulos: Who are the other companies that expressed some interest in it?
Mr. Kuchta: It’s Woodruff & Sons, B & D Sewer and then ironically, Grimmer today notified me that they have a crew that just became available. I won’t name firms, but there were firms I contacted on Friday with interest and today are not interested. There were firms on Wednesday that were not interested and on Thursday they were. It’s like changing by the hour. I do want to caution that there is a risk to rebidding any project that you will receive higher bids or no bids. So you do have sort of an offer on the table. These are crazy times.
Mr. Wiszowaty: So what’s your recommendation with respect to the current bids that are pending before the two boards tonight?
Mr. Kuchta: I don’t really know what to advise. This is sort of the executive decision time from the executive board. What I would say is it’s an extremely high bid. We have serious interest from two or three serious contractors that do a lot of this work. It’s not a high risk.
Ms. Sims-Smierciak: The Engineer’s opinion of probable cost is what it is. Then we have the second one, the Gough. I’m taking it that the Engineer’s opinion is a fair and reasonable just price. Are we in a price gouging thing or is it supply and demand on the market? What substantiates a $169,000 variance? You know ten percent or something you could see. Is the Engineer way off or is Gough way off? What are we dealing with here? Are we blaming the market and availability, inflation, supply chain and all of the above?
Mr. Kuchta: There’s no direct answer unfortunately. The reality is our opinions of probable cost are base generated from years of historical data including current bids just from Dyer Construction for real contracted work for a big project in this town. Very similar relocation work, the town just south of here lowered the same sanitary force main for the INDOT ditch that never got built. We have real costs from Grimmer Construction from that. That work was completed a year ago. We have price data from a year ago from the 101st – 101st water main relocation on the east side of U.S. 41/12-inch water main, the same thing we’re dealing with here. So the Gough numbers are substantially higher than real contracted prices and bid prices from competitive bidders at that time. All I can do is assess the numbers for Gough. I cannot assess the intention and I never would. I don’t know how they would justify those per unit. Just so you understand when we receive bids, if there’s one or two units that are way off, we call them and say are you misunderstanding or are we missing something. We go through a little process back and forth. Every one of these numbers is substantially higher.
Mr. Gembala: Haas & Associates has been our Engineer for many years going back into the nineties. I’ve always seen reasonable estimates. In the past, contactors usually came internally close. This is very unusual to see that almost fifty percent higher on some of these items. They don’t want the work?
Mr. Kuchta: All I can say is we are extremely limited by only having one bidder. This is America. A contractor can ask to be paid for whatever they want. We have competitive bidding to sort of cancel that out. With only one bid, we’re limited.
Mr. Wiszowaty: To that point, if you were getting any kind of substantial work done at your own home, you’re going to want to look at at least two people to give you some kind of price comparison. I don’t think it would be in the Town’s best interest to say okay we’re going to take Gough and go with that. I don’t think that’s anyone’s intention here tonight. I guess the bigger question is what’s our alternative and where do we go?
Mr. Kuchta: The primary actionable alternative tonight is to go basically through the same process and rebid it under the Emergency Authorization. I don’t know if you have to reactivate that tonight.
Mr. Wiszowaty: I talked to Westland about that. He said it would probably be best to restate the emergency situation.
Mr. Kuchta: Perfect. So we just start the process again. We would of course invite Gough to bid again or resubmit their current bid. Then we would invite these three contractors. I would encourage it to be worded not be limited to these three contractors.
Mr. Wiszowaty: That’s a good point. If there’s any other bidders that are specified from 1 through 16 on here.
Ms. Krull: I don’t see LGS Plumbing on here. I think they have done some kind of this work in Crown Point. Is there some reason why they weren’t contacted?
Mr. Kuchta: I don’t know specifically about LGS, I can inquire though.
Mr. Kmetz: I find the mobilization costs outrageous given that the equipment is already there. I think they think we’re in a desperate situation and taking advantage of it.
Mr. Gembala: The thing is I’m sure every member here wants us to be responsible for the Town money. We are very unhappy about spending that much more money than estimated. What is the gun that the State has over us right now?
Mr. Kuchta: At the last meeting, we addressed communication with INDOT. I don’t know if Joe had any inroads. I have specifically asked if the contractor for the State if they are charging the State delays on their contract and I never got a response from them. I don’t know Joe if you’ve heard.
Mr. Wiszowaty: I had not heard. I had spoken to Scott the engineer on the project and explained the situation to him. He was very disappointed in Gough as well. He was very understanding and very disappointed in the amount that was presented on this matter. He said to keep him updated on stuff. We have our weekly calls or he reaches out to me every week. We have been having really good communication now. I don’t know what happened in the past but we’ve definitely been talking.
Mr. Kuchta: In terms of the gun, it’s hard to establish everyone’s benefits from this project being completed as soon as possible. They want to get paved and that road finished by the end of this year. Obviously the sooner the Town can move the facility, the better. I did reach out to the State to find out about delay costs or something like this to get some indication of any financial implication, but I haven’t gotten a response. I don’t know that it has to be done next week versus three weeks from now versus six weeks. All I know is they want to get it done. I will tell you the only reasonable way to get contractors is to give them about four weeks from today to get that demo work completed. So we’re looking at early August, mid-August.
Mr. Wiszowaty: They are looking at three weeks for them to get everything teed up and done on their end. What time frame are we looking at to reconnect test everything?
Mr. Kuchta: That would be a few weeks after that.
Mr. Wiszowaty: So we are looking at some time in August, end of August maybe?
Mr. Kuchta: The end of August I would expect the box culvert to be on its way to being completed. I don’t expect the Town’s facilities to be back in place until September or maybe even early October. That would be the goal. Again, the amount of work is actually not substantial, it’s having the crews available to get there. Just for your information some feedback from these 16 contractors. Over and over I heard the same things. We’re on large projects, we do not have time for repair projects (this is what this is considered). Others have stated that they’ve never been busier. Apparently, the union is out of workers, there’s no union laborers to send out to these firms so they can’t expand. It’s inflation and too much work. It is really a crazy situation. I don’t mean to dodge the question about Gough’s bid but that’s the sphere it’s operating in. It doesn’t mean we won’t get reasonable bids from others. We just need to get them.
Mr. Pondinas: On the bid price, we already got the pipe. They got $44,550 for pipe but it also includes a permanent backfill. So that bid price of $363,422 could probably be about $25,000 cheaper because we already have the pipe.
Mr. Kuchta: Their bid for the actual pipe item was actually quite good for that very reason.
Ms. Sims-Smierciak: We have a meeting next week. Do we have any realistic expectation that we may have some bids?
Mr. Kuchta: I have confirmed with at least two of these contractors that they would be able to provide a price by Friday.
Some discussion ensued between the board members regarding reviewing the bids, communication about State delays and saving the taxpayers thousands of dollars.
There also was discussion regarding the actual declaration that was in conflict which the State realized in March and advised us in May.
Ms. Sims-Smierciak: How confident are you that we’re going to get more than Gough’s bid if you had to personally guess?
Mr. Kuchta: To clarify, Gough may not bid again. So in order to go to bid, we would have to reject Gough’s current bid. Gough may not bid, or bid higher or adjust their bid to be more competitive. I genuinely hope Gough rebids. If they have questions or there’s some misunderstanding about the scope, this would be a perfect opportunity to get a more competitive bid back that the Town would consider. We are fairly confident that we’re going to get at least one other bidder, hopefully three besides Gough.
Mr. Wiszowaty: Not specifying who they are, just allowing those that have been approached to provide a quote. I think we should make sure that the motion states that we’re going to allow this to be an open process for those who want to quote because it might change from today.
Mr. Manousopoulos: So we’re not just specifying it to these 16 any longer. Once we reject that bid, we’re opening it up as an emergency quote for anybody.
Mr. Wiszowaty: It’s got to be presented to at least two of them by state law. It doesn’t say you can’t have more.
Mr. Manousopoulos made a motion to reject the bid from Gough presented to the Waterworks Board. Mr. Furtek seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous roll call vote of 3-0.
Mr. Furtek Yes
Mr. Manousopoulos Yes
Mr. Gembala Yes
Ms. Sims-Smierciak made a motion to reject the bid from Gough presented to the Sanitary District Board. Ms. Krull seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous roll call vote of 4-0.
Ms. Krull Yes
Mr. Setlak Yes
Ms. Sims-Smierciak Yes
Mr. Ken Gembala Abstain
Mr. Kmetz Yes
Mr. Ken Gembala Abstain
Ms. Krull Yes
Mr. Setlak Yes
Ms. Sims-Smierciak Yes
Mr. Kmetz Yes
Mr. Ken Gembala Abstain
Ms. Krull Yes
Mr. Setlak Yes
Ms. Sims-Smierciak Yes
Mr. Kmetz Yes
Ms. Sims-Smierciak made a motion for the Sanitary Board to authorize the Waterworks Board to continue to take lead on the contract as the primary board and to reimburse all costs associated to the Sanitary District. Ms. Krull seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous roll call vote of 4-0.
Mr. Ken Gembala Abstain
Ms. Krull Yes
Mr. Setlak Yes
Ms. Sims-Smierciak Yes
Mr. Kmetz Yes
Mr. Furtek Yes
Mr. Manousopoulos Yes
Mr. Gembala Yes
Mr. Furtek Yes
Mr. Manousopoulos Yes
Mr. Gembala Yes
Mr. Manousopoulos made a motion to authorize the Waterworks Board to take lead on the contract as the primary board and to accept reimbursement of all costs associated to the Sanitary District portion of this project. Mr. Furtek seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous roll call vote of 3-0.
Mr. Furtek Yes
Mr. Manousopoulos Yes
Mr. Gembala Yes
Respectfully Submitted:
Gerri Kudzia, Recording Secretary
St. John Sanitary District
Mr. Manousopoulos made a motion to approve the July 11, 2022, special joint meeting minutes as presented. Mr. Gembala seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous vote of 2-0.
Mr. Wiszowaty: The bids came back with respect to the conflict on the U.S. 41 culvert project. Haas directly solicited the bids for the project. These were due by the 15th. Three companies submitted their bid. Gatlin Plumbing $300,000; Woodruff & Son $356,599.88; and Gough Construction $363,422.
Based on the review of these, Gatlin’s bid of $300,000 is the lowest bid received according to Haas’ assessment. Their bid amount is below the median total bid value of $311,570 for all three bids received. Some of the notable cost items from Gatlin - mobilization costs, erosion control and sodding are below the responsive median mobilization cost that were presented. Gatlin’s cost for the pipe removal and pipe installation exceeded the respective median costs for the same items from the other bidders. Gatlin’s cost for the pipe disinfection and pressure testing are below the respected median bid amounts. Haas also notes that each bid varies from item to item with the lowest overall bid typically having the lower unit cost for the key items. Due to the relatively small scale of the project, no single bidder work items cost appear to have dominated the final result.
In comparing the bids to the Engineering’s opinion of cost which was estimated at $193,620, obviously that’s a cost estimation for budgeting purposes but not necessarily what you’re going to arrive at. The recommendation from the Engineer to the Town is at the earliest convenience acceptance of the Gatlin Plumbing bid for $300,000 as submitted on July 15th and authorize the Town Manager to award and execute the construction contract with Gatlin Plumbing to be administered by Haas & Associates with the Waterworks Board taking lead on that project.
Mr. Gembala read a memo from Scott (Haas & Associates) addressed to the Waterworks Board recommending awarding the work to Gatlin for $300,000.
Mr. Gembala: Looking at these things, it’s amazing to see $70,000 for mobilization in one bid and $29,000 in another. It seems like it’s not going to get any better. We’re going to have to get this going. It’s still less than what we had at the meeting the other day. With the recommendation from the Engineer shown in the record and with this email to me dated July 16th from Scott (Haas & Associates), I’ll need a motion to accept one of these.
Mr. Manousopoulos made a motion to award the bid submitted by Gatlin Plumbing for $300,000 to be administered by Haas & Associates and to authorize the Town Manager to execute all documents necessary. As mentioned in our special meeting, this is an emergency because of the time frame to move forward on the U.S. 41 project. Mr. Gembala seconded the motion. The motion carried by a unanimous roll call vote of 2-0.
Mr. Manousopoulos Yes
Mr. Gembala Yes
Mr. Davis: The truck we have is a 1999, very similar to that one. We put about 100 hours/year of pump time on it. It has been put on our five year plan. The past couple of years we have done some upgrades and repairs. We feel it can last a couple more years. Last Thursday, Standard Equipment brought the Vactor truck by for a demo. Wayne Pondinas has been kind of driving this since it was here on Thursday just to get things started. I appreciate all his efforts. I feel it’s in our best interest that we look at this one and you gentlemen can look at it too. But we also would like to see some other vendors and see what they have to make it a fair game and then proceed from there. It would also give us time to plan the financing and budgeting for this new piece of equipment. I do believe it is needed but the upgrades we made to our truck will take us through the next couple years. Maybe a couple minor repairs but overall it should take us through the next couple years. Also I think we should look for some grant money through MS4 to help offset the cost of this piece of equipment.
Mr. Manousopoulos: Now that we have the MS4 Board starting up, is this something we can put off until we get situated there?
Mr. Davis: I believe it is. Again I believe we can keep it up and running. It is in good shape for its age. It’s just starting to show signs that eventually yes we will need to replace.
Mr. Manousopoulos: I agree with Bob in that we look elsewhere also. I know it’s brand new with only 50 miles or what not but a lot of things comes through the system where we can always find it at a lesser price. If we have to go or want to go new, there is a time line on it but it’s not something that I think we have to rush into especially if maybe it is in our Five Year Plan and we haven’t budgeted for it. To put $500,000 out there is a lot.
Mr. Wiszowaty: I’m sure they have smaller units too that might be more practical for our department which might save some money too.
Mr. Gembala: I know with fire trucks, we have to go out for bids. We can’t just let somebody stop by and say would you like to buy that.
Mr. Wiszowaty: Right. There is this new program called Source Well which kind of eliminates that. But we still want to see everybody’s equipment they have to offer. This is a Source Well vendor.
Mr. Manousopoulos made a motion to table the discussion on the vac truck. Mr. Gembala seconded the motions. The motion carried by unanimous roll call vote of 2-0.
Mr. Manousopoulos Yes
Mr. Gembala Yes
Mr. Pondinas joined the meeting at this time.
Mr. Manousopoulos made a motion to table the water bill adjustment for seniors and keep it on the agenda. Mr. Gembala seconded the motion. The motion carried by unanimous roll call vote of 2-0.
Mr. Manousopoulos Yes
Mr. Gembala Yes
Mr. Gembala: You’re talking about the culvert on U.S. 41, we already passed that. I know some things are on hold like the Patterson St. water main and so forth because of cost. Is the SCADA System completed for the water side?
Mr. Pondinas: They’re tweaking it. Basically I think it’s all built and installed. I don’t think there’s much more to do but they are watching how the water is being used. They are tweaking certain things at the plants. On the sanitary side, the cabinets are all built. I don’t know what else is going on with that. The main thing right now with the water and the consumption and how they can adjust that. The altitude valve for the Kilkenny Tank should be coming. That will be installed after the peak season like September or October. That should help.
Mr. Gembala: Realistically what are we looking at for the wells to go on line, next year?
Mr. Pondinas: Yes sometime next year maybe summer, I’m not sure because after the transition line is done, then you have to build the building. It’s all determined on when we drill well 9 (which is going to come in probably another week), what the quality of water is meaning does it have a lot of sulfur in it. How are we going to treat it. Are we going to send it all to the Gates Treatment Plant or build another treatment plant? Or are we going to add on to the Gates TP? That will all be determined when we drill Well 9. That should start on the 25th.
Mr. Davis: Wayne is correct. They are going to start drilling Well 9 on July 25th. The test well they want to do by Monix TP by Well 3, 4 and 5 got bumped and scheduled for August 4th or 5th. A little bit of good news, with the new SCADA System basically in place for the past week or so, we were able to stop the supplement from Schererville. That’s as of right now. The weather is in our favor but things could change.
Mr. Manousopoulos Yes
Mr. Gembala Yes
Mr. Manousopoulos Yes
Mr. Gembala Yes
Respectfully Submitted:
Gerri Kudzia, Recording Secretary
St. John Waterworks Board
