The city of Hermiston will have to wait at least two more weeks before awarding the contract for a new city hall.
Bids for the project were expected to be reviewed Monday night, but a particular detail in contractual law will prevent the city from awarding the contract for another two weeks. Hermiston City Manager Byron Smith pulled the resolution from the agenda prior to Monday’s meeting.
“The law relating to public contracting requires that, once we open the bids, we send out notices to all those who bid and we have to give them seven days to let them know we plan to award the (contract) to the low bidder,” Smith told the council on Monday. “They will then have those seven days to protest or if they disagree for some reason.”
The city received five bids from contactors ranging in cost from the low bid of $8,660,000 from Griffin Construction out of The Dalles to the high bid of $11,484,000. Smith said the city will send out notices to the other four contractors today and expects the city council to award the bid at its next meeting on Feb. 8.
The project was estimated to cost just under $9 million.
