No one anticipated the mess it would become. The Española Valley High School gym bleachers have been in use since the gym was built in 1977, District Procurement Officer Gilbert Sanchez said. This summer, repairing the antiquated bleachers to make them safe and work properly for the basketball season did not appear a hard task to the Española School Board.
“What is happening with the bleachers?” Board Member Andrew Chavez asked during the Nov. 20 Board meeting. “The bleachers have become a fiasco and a half.”
“I agree. It has been a fiasco,” District Superintendent Danny Trujillo said.
In May, the Board approved a request for proposal to repair the bleachers. During a June 22 special meeting, the Board awarded the project to School Equipment Inc. The contract was for $240,000, all out of general obligation bond funds. For this amount, School Equipment Inc. was to refurbish — not replace or upgrade — the upper- and lower-level bleachers at the high school. They would also replace broken foot boards, seats and risers, refinish existing seats, replace P-rails and provide new safety rails and new, higher-powered motors.
By August, though, trouble had begun. Trujillo came to the Board and said the contractor had done some ground work and the bleachers were in worse shape than anticipated. Soon after, the first change order from School Equipment, Inc. came in, with the following price tags:
For the upper bleachers
• 80 P-rail (the rails situated on the bleacher aisles) holders at $10,000;
• 160 aisle steps at $16,000;
• Repair of 1,000 seat and riser brackets for $5,000.
For the lower bleachers
• The change order included 48 P-rail holders at $6,000 and
• Four permanent and 12 recoverable American with Disabilities Act seating at $15,075
With all the additions and changes to the original bleacher renovation, the Board had begun to discuss more additions to the bleachers, namely chair backs for the lower-level bleachers. The Board approved a new $416,000 contract with School Equipment Inc. for installing chair backs on the home side of the lower bleachers and refurbishing the wood on the rest of the bleachers.
However, vague timelines and conflicts between the District, contractor and subcontractor have kept the project from being completed — any of it. As of Wednesday (Dec. 4), none of the bleachers have been completely refurbished, motors have yet to be installed, P-rails are not attached and the chair backs are nowhere to be seen.
“The position of the school is that we have been put in the position of mediator between the contractor and subcontractor,” Trujillo said at the Nov. 20 meeting.
He said the District was essentially being held hostage by the contractor, School Equipment Inc. The contractor met the first deadline of having the lower-level east side bleachers in usable condition by Nov. 9. The next deadline was Dec. 10, to refurbish part of the uppers, then on Dec. 28, all the bleachers were to be refurbished. The chair backs, if they came, would not be installed until March, he said.
“This is the part that the contractor is contesting,” Trujillo said.
Trujillo said School Equipment Inc. never signed any type of agreement for the new timeline. Instead, it was a verbal agreement, which School Equipment Inc. is now contesting.
“The contractor is saying he never agreed to refurbish the lower bleachers,” Trujillo said.
Due to the complications in the bleacher renovation contract, the item was added to the Nov. 25 work session agenda. During this time, Trujillo said he and District Director of Facilities Adan Cordova had created a new timeline, which School Equipment Inc. would have to agree with, or have their contract canceled.
“Basically, it’s agree with this timeline or we’re going to cancel your contract,” Trujillo said.
Cordova said the new timeline removed the purchase of chair backs, which would save the District $120,000 at this time, making it $296,000 — still higher than the original contract. The new timeline has School Equipment Inc. completing the lower east side bleachers by Dec. 15. The lower west side bleachers and the upper-level bleachers would be refurbished and all work completed by Dec. 31, Cordova said.
“They think they can complete it by Dec. 31,” Cordova said. “I had a conversation with him (contractor) today and he said if the Board agreed to it, he’d commit.”
In addition, the new agreement would charge School Equipment Inc. $500 per day for every day past Dec. 31.
Trujillo said he saw this as the only option the District had. The subcontractor was acting unprofessional, not getting work completed, taking long breaks and lunches. Instead of falling on the District to supervise their performance, the job should have fallen on the shoulders of the contractor, he said. Because of this, he felt this agreement was the District’s only choice and if the contractor did not agree, the contract would be dissolved.
“They do have a recourse. They can come back and sue us for a breach of contract,” Trujillo said.
However, the breach really would be on the side of the contractor, not the District, Trujillo said.
“It’s a win-win,” Trujillo said.
Though no formal action could be taken at the work session, the Board came to a consensus agreeing with the superintendent’s recommendation to present School Equipment Inc. with this ultimatum.