On February 6, 2024, East Ascension Drainage Commission, comprised of the entire 11-member Ascension Parish Council seated Ex Officio, declined to approve a $726,000 change order for the substantially complete, New River Channel Improvement project. The original contract was not awarded to Boone Services, LLC, but the low bidder (Bridging the Gap, LLC) would not or could not perform, so Boone got the job on November 29, 2021 (contract amount $4,816,000). A 15% increase was too much for commissioners to swallow.
Project Engineer H. Davis Cole was tasked with investigating the cause and reporting his findings at an unspecified later date…and that date is finally here. Included on tonight’s EA Drainage Commission meeting agenda is:
(6) GENERAL BUSINESS
a. Approval of Change Order No. 3 for the New River Dredging Project, adding 208 days to the contract time and increasing the contract value by an additional $374,301.69, bringing the new contract total to $5,242,911.69. (Davis Cole, Engineer)
b. Approval of substantial completion of the New River Dredging Project. (Davis Cole, Engineer)
Not quite a 50% reduction in the change order request from two years ago (see below).
Included in the February 6, 2024 EA Drainage Meeting Packet:
NAME OF PROJECT: NEW RIVER CHANNEL IMPROVEMENTS
PROJECT NUMBER: EAD15004
ENGINEER: H. Davis Cole & Associates, LLC
CONTRACT Amount Add to the Contract amount the sum of $726,000.10
Time for Completion Add to the Contract Time: 208 Days.
The New Date for Completion is 6 February 2024
ORIGINAL CONTRACT AMOUNT: $4,816,000.00
Previous Additions $52,610
Previous Deductions $0.00
Net Amount Prior to this Change $4,868,610.00
Amount of This Change … $726,000.10
CONTRACT AMOUNT TO DATE … $5,594,610.10
Drainage Excavation to actual quantities
DESCRIPTION: Additional “over” excavation was required to remove soft soils throughout the entire reach of New River Channel in areas where installation of embankment fill was required to achieve a maintainable slope.
JUSTIFICATION: To prevent failure of the embankment, the additional “over excavation” was required to remove soft materials to provide a stable base for the placement of new embankment material.
BID QUANTITY: 52,000 CY
ACTUAL QUANTITY: 72,918 CY
ADDITIONAL COST: $648,458.00
ADDITIONAL DAYS: 208
Supporting documents included in tonight’s meeting packet state:
SCOPE OF CHANGES: Balancing Change Order to record actual quantities utilized vs. quantities bid. Addition of sign replacements per owner requests
JUSTIFICATION FOR CHANGES: The original as-bid quantities were estimated based upon information know prior to the bid. Upon execution of the work, quantities deviate from what was estimated based upon actual field conditions encountered on site.
It should be interesting to see how this plays out this evening as sources have described a fair amount of antipathy between the contractor and project engineer (behind the scenes of course). Whatever transpired over the last 27 months, is it enough to satisfy six EA Drainage Commissioners sufficiently to approve the new change order.
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