City Council is asked to award a construction contract to Sletten Construction for the City of Billings’ Water Reclamation Facility (WRF) Nutrient Upgrade, Expansion and Improvements in the amount of $61,681,033.00. 
 
The City of Billings will be required to comply with a new Montana Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (MPDES) discharge permit in the fall of 2019.  Under the new permit, the WRF will need to meet more stringent discharge standards for total nitrogen, phosphorous and ammonia.  HDR Engineering recently completed the project design which will not only enable the WRF to meet new and anticipated future discharge standards but also meet future increased flow rates to the WRF.
  
During the summer of 2016, City staff completed a formal process of soliciting and evaluating qualification packages from interested contractors and prequalified ten (10) of them to bid the project.  After publicly advertising the project to these contractors, potential subcontractors and suppliers for thirteen (13) weeks, staff opened bids on January 10, 2017.  There were three bidders and each bid exceeded the available funding.  During design, the project was organized into schedules in order to be able to award a contract that matches the available funding.  After review, staff recommends that City Council award a construction contract for the W.O. 14-11, WRF Nutrient Upgrade, Expansion and Improvements project, Schedules I, II, III, IV, V, X, XI, XII, XVI, and XVII, to Sletten Construction in the amount of $61,681,033.00.

In addition, city code section 13-502(c) allows "where the size of the contract makes it probable that administrative change order authority will be quickly exhausted, the city council may, upon recommendation of the city administrator, extend the aggregate limits of subsection (b) in an amount set by council resolution for a specific project".  A contingency of $3,000,000, approximately 5% of the project award amount, has been designated and staff is requesting that Council extend the City Administrator change order signing authority up to that amount. 
 
 

↵City Council may:

• Award the construction contract to Sletten Construction, contingent on sale of bonds and approve extension of administrative change order approval, or;
• Award the construction contract to Sletten Construction, contingent on sale of bonds and do not approve extension of administrative approval.  Not approving the extension will require change orders above $500,000 (0.8% of the contract) to be presented to City Council which would cause delays and associated costs.
• Disapprove award of the construction contract to Sletten Construction.  If the project is not completed, the City will be unable to meet the requirements of the new plant discharge permit to be issued by MDEQ and will not have the capacity to treat increased flows to the plant expected in the years to come.

 

Bids were received on January 10, 2017 for W.O. 14-11, WRF Nutrient Upgrade, Expansion and Improvements Project, and the following table shows the results:
 

Bid Schedule	Williams Brother - Dick Anderson Construction	RSCI	Sletten Construction
I--Secondary Treatment & Overhead, Blowers, Concrete Repairs	$42,864,894.00	$49,271,184.00	$43,849,726.00
II--Secondary Digester	$1,572,851.00	$1,181,800.00	$861,900.00
III-Corrosion & Odor Control	$7,187,228.00	$5,413,300.00	$5,215,700.00
IV--Controls Upgrade	$614,457.00	$105,300.00	$495,000.00
V--Solids Processing Building, Centrifuges, Polymer System	$4,218,234.00	$4,364,407.00	$4,109,507.00
VI--Primary Sludge & Scum Pump Stations, Rotary Screen Building	$1,320,357.00	$1,714,000.00	$1,356,900.00
VII--Administration Building incl. Base Bid Drilled Pier Quantities	$5,400,980.00	$3,280,300.00	$3,767,000.00
VIII--Gravity Thickener, Digester & Sludge Control Building	$3,452,001.00	$2,668,200.00	$2,673,900.00
IX--Air Floatation Thickener Building & Equipment	$1,440,255.00	$1,061,500.00	$854,600.00
X--Site Work & Asphalt Resurfacing	$1,671,662.00	$2,351,700.00	$1,347,800.00
XI--Secondary Pump Station & Pump No. 4	$1,005,424.00	$1,309,800.00	$731,200.00
XII--Electrical Improvements incl. Base Bid Drilled Pier Quantities	$4,406,043.00	$3,888,900.00	$2,837,100.00
XIII--Primary Influent Piping	$1,993,289.00	$2,871,700.00	$2,573,900.00
XIV--UV Building & Equipment	$576,908.00	$702,100.00	$516,800.00
XV--Headworks & Wash Bay, Vortex Grit Unit	$942,325.00	$911,267.00	$702,267.00
XVI--Interceptors	$2,995,179.00	$3,243,700.00	$2,210,100.00
XVII--Handling of Petroleum-Containing Materials & Groundwater	$64,350.00	$64,400.00	$23,000.00
Total Bid Price:	$81,726,437.00	$84,403,558.00	$74,126,400.00

Since the total price of all bids exceed budgeted project funds, staff evaluated the project schedules to determine which should be deleted from the project.  Staff recommends that Schedules VI, VII, VIII, IX, XIII, XIV and XV be removed from the project and City Council award a construction contract for the W.O. 14-11, WRF Nutrient Upgrade, Expansion and Improvements Project to Sletten Construction in the amount of $61,681,033.00.  Staff also recommends that City Council approve an additional $3,000,000.00 in contingency funding for the project.  Award of the project will also be contingent on the sale of sewer revenue bonds.

Staff recommends that City Council award a construction contract for the W.O. 14-11, WRF Nutrient Upgrade, Expansion and Improvements project to Sletten Construction in the amount of $61,681,033.00 and allow City Administrator to approve change orders up to the contingency amount.