The Board of Health and the town’s Health Department are making another attempt to obtain a general contracting bid for the town’s Transfer Station renovation project.
Health Director Andrew Petty briefed the board on the department’s plans to get a contractor to take the job after it was revealed at the board’s meeting last month that no general contracting bids were received.
Petty said that he has been working with the architects to gather a list of all qualified contractors in the state. The list also included the dollar amount for projects that companies are certified to work up to, and Petty said the department is looking at companies that are certified to work on projects that are less than $25 million, as the cost of the Transfer Station is estimated between $1.5 and $2 million.
He added that the department is trying to narrow the contractors down to companies located in what he called “the Northeast region,” which includes roughly 25 companies ranging from the North Shore to as far out as Canton.
From there, the department will be sending out letters to the companies, containing details and logistics of the job.
“We sent out letters to all these contractors. We sent out letters to approximately 21 contractors, expressing interest in our project, letting them know what the project is, and providing a link to all the pertinent information,” Petty said.
The department will make calls to the contractors in the coming days after it has received the letters to see if there is tangible interest.
“Once we know we have some interested parties and we’ve answered all of that, we will then put the project out to bid,” Petty said, adding that there has already been some interest from local contractors.
With summer approaching, Petty said that a concern going forward is that many contractors already have projects set for the coming months, likely forcing the department to work around contractors’ availability.
Later in the meeting, the board also authorized Petty to use up to $9,000 to have an engineering company conduct a feasibility study. The study would potentially allow the department to simplify certain aspects of the project that could make it more appealing for contractors.