City awards bid for wastewater treatment plant improvements

The city of Breckenridge has awarded its construction contract bid for the first phase of its wastewater treatment plant improvements utilizing funds from the Cleanwater State Revolving Fund. 

The contract was awarded to Purcell Contracting, LLC from Meridian, out of six bid submissions. The proposals were opened Thursday, Aug. 28 and a scoring committee composed of city staff reviewed them per the Competitively Sealed Proposal (CSP) criteria.

City engineers then reviewed the score sheet and recommended the contract to be awarded to Purcell Contracting in the amount of $696,150. 

This recommendation was approved by the Breckenridge City Commission at their Tuesday, Oct. 14 meeting. Commissioner Blake Hamilton made the motion for approval, which was seconded by Commissioner Junior Fernandez, the only two commissioners to attend the meeting. Mayor Bob Sims also voted in favor. 

The TWDB project also includes approximately $3.15 million in loan/grant funding available for construction, according to the engineer. 

“Phase two will (then) include other improvements for the wastewater treatment plant and sewer lines as well,” City Manager Cynthia Northrop said. “Staff and engineers are recommending that Purcell Contracting is the highest ranking, basically the lowest and best bid.”

Northrop added that the funding is a 70/30% matching grant.

The total base proposal price is broken down to $33,000 for mobilization, bonds and insurance; $375,000 for four horizontal brush aerators; $182,000 for two dewatering containers, one polymer feed system, heat trace; $1,200 for one frost proof fire hydrant, $300 for 31 4” PVC pipe, $500 for 108 2” ductile iron pipe and $13,000 for one ultrasonic flow meter. 

The total score that Purcell received out of a possible 100 points was 92.9, beating out Dowtech Specialty Contractors (83.6). Purcell scored 46.4/50 for proposal pricing, 17.5/20 for contractors' qualifications, 15/15 for current and completed projects and references, 9/10 for adherence to technical requirements of the request for proposals and 5/5 for safety record. 

The wastewater treatment plant improvements are following the city getting into compliance at its lift stations from several deficiencies found by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality. 

Those deficiencies were corrected by late August and work then began on putting out bids for the first phase of the wastewater treatment plant improvements. Work on the wastewater treatment plant accelerated when former Public Works Director Kegan Burns highlighted the deficiencies in his resignation letter.