Pittsfield to Continue With Wastewater Treatment Project Plan
Resident Craig Gaetani was unable to get the council's support in his request to delay the sewer project until he has the ability to craft a new plan.
The City Council had given the OK earlier this year for Mayor Linda Tyer to borrow up to $74 million for significant upgrades to the wastewater treatment plant.
The administration went forward with the project developed by consultants and the final bids were opened two weeks ago and contracts are pending to be awarded.
But on Tuesday, the City Council spent two hours considering whether or not it would backtrack on the project it previously proposed. The push was to give resident Craig Gaetani three months to develop a new proposal for the project for the council to compare and contrast in hopes of saving money.
The City Council has no authority over awarding contracts nor managing such a project — its authority extends to whether or not money would be appropriated for it. The council had already approved authorizing capital spending on the wastewater project.
But now faced with the sticker shock of the project, a few city councilors wanted to ask the mayor to wait, let Gaetani develop a different project, and then restart the bidding process in hopes to get a better price tag.
"If what they can do is saving us millions of dollars, why wouldn't we look at it?" Councilor at Large Melissa Mazzeo said.
The city is under an administrative order by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to make significant upgrades to lower the amount of phosphorous and aluminum being discharged into the Housatonic River. The issue dates back to a 2008 permit requiring the lower levels of the chemicals.
The city fought and lost in court over the issue and, in 2012, eventually gave in. The city then piloted technology, put out a bid for consultants and then hired the winning bidder, Kleinfelder, to create a design. In multiple authorizations from the council, some $9.5 million was spent developing testing, engineering, and designing the system.
In early 2018, as the mandated timeline to break ground approached before potential fines could be levied, the council delayed providing construction funds at first that nearly put the city out of compliance with the longstanding EPA order.
After lengthy debates early this year, eventually, the council agreed to move forward with the project. The EPA then agreed to move back its required timeline back six months to allow for the bidding process.
Gaetani, who has had a lengthy and testy history with city officials, was given the OK by the council to provide a presentation on what he thought would be a better option.
On Monday, he was joined by Justin Lis, who said he works for Prescott Clean Water, to give that presentation on new technology that the pair said is better for the environment, smaller in footprint, easily adaptable over time if newer standards are issued, and, as they emphasized the most, less costly. For about four hours, Lis and Gaetani discussed the technology and processes with the council's public works subcommittee.
"The price of the project is going to be the lowest price the function requires," Lis said.
The council was split on giving Gaetani such a forum — approving his request by a 6-5 margin — but Tyer was less interested. On Tuesday, Tyer said even if the council voted in favor of delaying the project further, she was still going to move forward with the plan that is already in motion.
The mayor, whose role includes management of such capital projects, said the city needs to comply with federal and state laws; that the utilities must be constructed and engineered correctly, and that there are a number of public procurement issues that would raise the cost of the project to re-do as reasons not to pursue another option.
She said the project has been pending for a decade and nearly all of the work required to get to a groundbreaking has already been done.
"We have no evidence, no proof, nothing to show us that this is a tried-and-true method," Tyer said of Lis and Gaetani's plans.
According to Purchasing Agent Colleen Hunter-Mullett, the companies who bid on the project only have to keep their prices for 30 days. Gaetani and Lis asked for a 90-day delay. The procurement process includes a request for proposal for designs, a pre-qualification phase for both subcontractors and general contractors, and then the bidding process and would have to start over if such a delay was granted.
"I think we need to get going. We are very close to awarding the bids. They came in lower than anticipated," Tyer said.
Commissioner of Public Utilities David Turocy said the contracts haven't been awarded yet but it is looking like the $74 million project is coming in about $13 million lower than anticipated.
Turocy estimated the costs to rise by about $5 million if there is a delay — mostly because of one year of inflation and bids then going out in the middle of summer when contractors likely already have projects lined up. He added that if the city backs out of a bidding process at this point, contractors are less likely to come back in the middle of summer with better prices.
"We can't just hold the bids and come back three months later and say we want to use your bid prices," Turocy said.
Turocy added that similar processes to the one Lis and Gaetani were presenting were tested during the pilot stage and determined not to fit the city because the discharge would not meet EPA standards.
Gaetani and Lis both said the cost savings with going with their technology would significantly outweigh any loses taken by changing the design.
Meanwhile, many city councilors questioned why Lis' company did not bid on the contracts. The councilors felt if the company wanted the project it would have been looking for projects to bid on and would have gone through the proper process instead of making a last-minute pitch to the council.
"This is the 9th inning, if you want to step up and hit a home run for us, you need to be prepared. You guys are not prepared," said Councilor at Large Earl Persip, questioning the lack of municipal projects the company has done and specific answers about the design and costs for such a project in Pittsfield.
"For something this big, I need somebody with a proven track record and I need technology that has been used in wastewater treatment plants."
Lis said the company has one municipal wastewater project moving forward in Libya, but councilors didn't like that the technology hadn't been deployed for systems in the United States. Lis said there are about a half-dozen projects in the United States in the works.
Multiple councilors cited a lack of information about Prescott, saying with Kleinfelder, Tighe & Bond, and Aecom, which developed the city's project, it is easy to find hundreds of municipal projects they've been involved in. But that isn't the case with Prescott.
Ward 7 Councilor Anthony Simonelli cited Lis and Gaetani telling the council's subcommittee that company higher-ups would be on hand to answer detailed questions the councilors asked and received no answer for on Monday night. But, those individuals never showed at Tuesday's council meeting.
Lis said those officials were deployed to the state of Florida to instead mobilize a team to develop a project and arrange demo equipment to bring to Pittsfield.
"If this project is that important to this company — they were scheduled to come here and in mid-air, their flight went a different direction — my feeling is they should be here representing their firm if they want to be involved in this," Simonelli said.
Simonelli also said the company should have bid on the contracts if it wanted to be involved.
Lis said he wasn't working for Prescott when the bids went out. He said he is a city resident and had gotten interested in the project after believing the city's consultants crafted a plan that isn't the right fit for Pittsfield. He said he then brought the project to the attention of the company.
Gaetani for years has been pushing to get access to the water and wastewater treatment plants and multiple administrations have denied him access. He said he sent the mayor requests to be involved in the project but those, too, were ignored. Both Gaetani and Lis said detailed specifics for the city couldn't be developed because of that lack of access.
Lis wants 90 days to fully develop a project specifically fitting the city's needs and said he's adapt the engineering already done on the project to fit his company's technology at no extra cost.
Ward 4 Councilor Christopher Connell motioned for the delay and only received support from Mazzeo and Morandi.
Tags: wastewater,
