Apparently great time for low bids on public projects: bids on Police Department work beat estimate by more than $1 million

Apparently, it's good to seek bids on public construction work in a down economy.

That was the explanation that the City Council heard this week as eleven companies submitted sealed bids in a competition to repair flood damage at the Police Department.

Council member Chuck Wieneke couldn't figure out why the city consultant's cost estimate for the project was $3.77 million when the bids that were submitted came in between $1.9 million and $2.3 million.

“I'm just curious. How can the estimate be that far over?” Wieneke asked Sandy Pumphrey, the city engineering staff member who presented the bids on the project to the council.

Pumphrey said one piece of the bid – replacing police officer lockers – was pulled from the original bid and bid separately. That accounted for about $300,000, which he said still didn't explain the wide gulf between the estimate and the actual bids.

Pumphrey said it apparently had to do with “market conditions,” which means contractors want work.

“I'm glad the people who bid understood the market conditions better than the architect,” Wieneke said.

Council member Justin Shields, a longtime local labor leader, expressed dismay that the two apparent low bidders – one was from Iowa City, one from Fort Dodge -- were not Cedar Rapids firms.

Shields is trying to push the council to award contracts to local firms that will pay union-rate wages, an idea that runs counter, noted council member Tom Podzimek, to state law that requires a sealed bid process in which the bid is given to the lowest responsible bidder.

Shields wants a statute that would require contractors on public projects in the city to pay “prevailing wages.”