Negotiations between the City of Plymouth and a contractor have led the Plymouth Board of Works to tentatively formalize work at the Wastewater Treatment Plant.
The City intends to issue bonds to finance the $10-million project. That process is underway, but so is the price agreement and contract terms with Kokosing Industrial. They’ve been tasked with seeing the Wastewater plant upgrades through to completion.
Mark Sullivan with Midwest Engineers represents the city in the design process. He says the contract recommendation follows a tedious process of reviewing cost estimates.
“There were several items in which there were potential deducts and we investigated that,” says Kokosing. “We investigated things like: some offered that product in 316 stainless steel versus 304 stainless steel and we weighed the plus and minuses and the longevity to make sure we were getting the biggest bang for our buck.”
Sullivan made an “engineer’s recommendation” to the Board of Works on Monday to formalize the process. An increase in sewer rates will help pay for the financing.
Once work has been started later this year, invoices will be turned into the city for payment approval. Sullivan says that in most cases this method is faster with savings going back to the City of Plymouth.
Sullivan says there was another topic that came up in negotiations that includes compensating the company for shop drawings if the City were to back out of the agreement.
“We’re doing it at the beginning which gets this process rolling,” says Sullivan. “So really while we’re completing financing we’re starting to work on shop drawings and getting the paperwork done. We won’t order the equipment until they actually sign, but that lead process will all be completed.”
The City would be entitled to the drawings if the worst case scenario should occur. Otherwise, starting on the shop drawings now will speed up the timeline by a couple of months.
The Plymouth Board of Works approved awarding the project to Kokosing and agreed to pay for the shop drawings, unanimously.
