Amador County – The Ione City Council for the second time in recent months has approved a reworking of a request for bids on a city work project, this time to rebid the replacement of sewer pipelines under Preston Avenue.

City Engineer John Wanger told the council at its May 3rd meeting that bidders are required to have insurance and to also have that insurance be provided by an admitted carrier in the state of California. He said they opened the bids April 12. However, the apparent low bidder, Casadores Construction, was not qualified to be covered by such California insurance carriers because he “has been licensed for less than a year.”

Wanger said the engineer’s estimate of the project was $116,000, and Casadores’ low bid was $104,983. The high bid was $188,000 from Wunschel & Sons Incorporated, and also bidding was GroundWorks Construction Incorporated.

The other bids seemed to over-estimate the cost of encountering potentially contaminated soil, between Shakely Lane and the Creek, Wanger said. The soil there was contaminated by a Chevron fuel tank leak several years ago, Wanger said, but the site was cleaned and the case was closed. He said if contaminated soils are found by excavation, several things would occur. First they would take the soil to store at the city corporate yard, then test it to see if it needs to be specially disposed.

He said the companies “threw a significant amount of money at that line item” for fuel contamination. Wanger recommended they reject all of the bids, and do a minor change in bid requirements regarding the soil issue, to instruct bidders to use an industry schedule to set costs. Wanger said then they could re-advertise the project and go out for bids again.

Mayor David Plank asked if Chevron could be asked to pay for remediation and hauling off soil, if more contamination was found. Wanger said Chevron would be responsible for paying such costs. He said they could also get funds from the state’s “underground tank fund.”

The council voted 5-0 to follow Wanger’s suggestion to reject the bids, and prepare for a rebid, with an amendment by Councilman Daniel Epperson to notice Chevron about the project and the potential issue.

Story by Jim Reece This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.