Fort Bend Independent School District administrators recommended renewing the district’s job order contract, but dropping the main contractor that’s been performing much of the work over the past two years.
The recommendation didn’t fly, as FBISD Board members recorded a 3-3 tie vote at Monday night’s meeting, and Trustee Ken Bryant abstained.
Whether to drop Houston contractor RHJ-JOC, Inc. from a multimillion-dollar job order contract became a bone of contention, with Trustee Stan Magee defending the company, and school administrators unable or unwilling to spell out why they were recommending the firm be dropped.
Board members have questioned in the past why RHJ had not completed several projects under the contract, which began in 2004. On Monday, board members appeared to be aware of issues involving the company, but carefully avoided mentioning them in public.
Magee said research he did indicates the district is “getting ourselves into a situation where… some of the very same things done with RHJ – Jamail Construction has done.”
Magee never specified what he meant by “same things.”
Jamail had been secondary contractor under the job order contract – which has involved dozens of maintenance-type projects throughout the district. Lee Petros, associate superintendent for facilities & planning, said a total of 65 projects expected to cost $11.5 million were represented in the contract.
Board President Lisa Rickert noted school bond money had been pledged to the projects, and the public “was told we would complete a certain amount of work over a certain time frame.”
Acting Superintendent Manuela Pedraza said about half of 21 projects given to RHJ in 2004 – the first year of the contract – still have not been completed. “There have been some concerns that have been brought to me,” she said.
Magee asked for specific reasons for wanting to terminate RHJ.
Rickert suggested that “if you’re going to get into performance,” a closed session might be appropriate.
Board Trustee Bruce Bain said he’ prefer to get “more information in open session,” and asked Petros for an assessment of RHJ’s work.
Petros said “we don’t have an issue with quality,” but talked about an “extensive review process” the contractor uses.
Rickert said she had a question for Petros about his expectations of being able to free up staff time by operating under job order contracts rather than requests for proposals.
“I put that in my memo to the entire board,” Petros said.
“What is is related to?” Board Trustee Cynthia Knox asked. “I haven’t heard anything related to the performance of the contractor.”
“You stated… almost half the projects weren’t completed,” Rickert told Petros. “I guess that to me is a concern. My goal here is to get back on track. We are already three months into 2006… and we’re behind from last year.”
But the tie vote leaves the administration with the same group of contractors its been using.
“This was supposed to provide guidance,” Petros said after the vote.
Pedraza said she’ll confer with legal counsel to see what options the district has in picking contractors for various portions of the remaining JOC work.
