The Portsmouth School Committee this evening unanimously denied a request to reconsider a bid award for replacing windows at the high school. The $290K contract had been awarded on June 25 to the Martone company, but this evening, the CEO and attorney for Trac Builders appeared before the committee to argue that their bid — which was $15K lower — should have been selected, and urged reconsideration. Five residents were on hand for the gripping exchange that followed.

Trac CEO Bill Tracey said that he was "shocked and disappointed" when he learned that his company was not awarded the contract despite a lower bid. "With all respect to Martone," said Tracey, the qualifications of Trac "far exceed theirs."

School Department attorney Richard Updegrove had a few questions for Tracey, centering on the materials submitted with the bid, and whether they responded fully and accurately to the requirements specified.

"The invitation to bid required installer certification from Kalwall [the manufacturer of the windows]," said Updegrove. "Your bid lacked this. Correct?"

Tracey agreed that this was correct, but noted, "In my 20 years of doing this, these things are easily cleared up post-bid."

Updegrove asked about the requirement for three references, attesting to the company's experience with similar jobs.

"In 20 years," said Tracey, "All the experience [questions are] post-bid. If someone was going to tell me that you were low bidder and someone was going to find a way to give it to a third bidder because of a questionable document..."

"Do you know what 'responsive bidder' means?" asked Updegrove.

"I do," said Tracey. "I'm not so sure you do. You can't make a certain document a matter of responsiveness. You can't make a post-qualification a matter of responsiveness."

The school committee weighed in. Vice-chair Dick Carpender spoke from his corporate experience responding to Requests for Proposal (RFPs). "If we want a letter that says certified installer," said Carpender, "I wouldn't want to find out you are not. My problem is, what if we award it, and can't do the job? These things are important to me personally. If they're not in the bid, in my opinion, that disqualifies the bid. Based on the best knowledge we had, that night, opening the bid, we made an award in good faith."

Facilities committee chair Michael Buddemeyer agreed. "Having the qualifications after the bid is awarded is difficult. If the RFP states submit A, B, and C, [and you don't provide them] it automatically disqualifies you."

Even Committee member Jamie Heaney was on board. "I concur with Mr. Carpender," he said, noting that the award was based on the "Best information at the time."

Tracey tried to argue that they were not given the chance to correct any deficiency. "After [submitting] the bid, our company had considerable conversation with facilities [director Don Davidson]," said Tracey. "Everybody knows us. We have no reason to think we needed to do anything else."

"Everybody may know you," replied Committee chair Sylvia Wedge, "But I don't think anyone here knows you. A paper submitted incomplete gets a failing mark."

Liz Harris, the Elmhurst PTO vice president, asked the committee to reconsider, hoping to save the school some money. "I don't need to remind you what $15K means to this district," said Harris. "$15K represents the entire profits of the fundraising at Elmhurst; that's a lot of money to us."

Carpender was sympathetic. "We sincerely appreciate all the work of all the parents, but there's two separate issues," said Carpender, stressing the importance of following the established process.

Updegrove summed it up neatly. "When invitations to bid go out, they have requirements," said Updegrove. "We're talking about responsiveness. The prevailing vendor submitted all of the requested documents. It is clear that Mr. Tracey's company did not. You have a contract that was executed with the prevailing party." He pointed out the risk of legal action from the prevailing bidder if the committee voided the agreement. "I can guarantee the cost of that will exceed $15K."

After some scab-picking questions by PCC, Inc. President Larry Fitzmorris (How many bids? 5. Range of bids? $232K-$340K) the committee voted unanimously to ratify the prior award of the contract to Martone.

In other business, the committee awarded contracts for sprinklers and fire alarms at the high school. Meeting adjourned at the ludicrously early hour of 6:46.

Note: Yeah, I know the blogging has been a little thin the past couple of weeks. Things have been crazy busy at work. Mea maxima culpa.