The San Jose City Council will revote on its plan to rebid the $7 million construction contract for an Eastside library. On Friday, Councilmember Rose Herrera submitted a memo calling for reconsideration of the June 23 vote, taken on the eve of the July council recess.
“I did that because there was a lot of concern about the process and there’s no harm in having it heard again,” Herrera said. “A lot of my constituents were asking questions about it. I’m not saying I’m going to change my vote… I just think it needs to be fully vetted. I’m very concerned about getting people to work and getting projects going.”
Barry Swenson Builder was the low bidder of 22 contractors who submitted bids in the highly competitive process. The second lowest bidder challenged Swenson’s bid, saying the structural steel contractor, while properly licensed, fell four months short of the experience requirement specified in an ambiguously worded part of the city’s request for proposals.
The rebid will slow down library construction by as much as six months, according to the city’s head of public works, resulting in a likely completion in 2011 rather than 2010.
The challenge was launched by Zolman Construction of San Carlos, which built San Jose’s Mayfair library and ironically was targeted by a similar complaint in 2008. Two competitors and union officials at that time attacked Zollman’s qualifications for a city construction contract, accusing Zolman of submitting an illegible subcontractor list with names crossed out and referring to a state complaint suggesting that Zolman made cash payments to workers to avoid paying prevailing wages and employment taxes. City staff recommended disqualifying Zollman based on false statements made on a prequalification questionnaire.
The complaint against Swenson’s subcontractor, Elmer’s Welding of Sacramento, says the firm lacks the required four years’ experience. Even though the firm did the structural steel work on a Target store in Natomas, CA, near Sacramento, in 2005, and a Sam’s Club in Carmichael in 2006, that work should not count as experience because it was conducted before the welding firm received its C-41 license from the state three years ago, critics say.
The case was made in a nine-page June 16 letterto the city from Weinberg, Roger and Rosenfeld, which describes itself on its website as the “largest union-side labor law firm in the country.”
The San Jose Silicon Valley Chamber of Commerce opposes throwing out the bids and starting again.
“Protests filed by labor unions and one builder who submitted a more expensive bid were reviewed by staff, who found the complaints lacked merit,” Chamber CEO Pat Dando wrote in a position piece. “But labor unions continued to protest, appearing before the City Council to claim one of the subcontractors did not have proof of sufficient experience — that was rejected by the city attorney and city staff. Yet a majority of council members did what the labor unions asked and voted to toss the contracts and start over. Instead of boosting the economy and creating jobs.”
Mayor Chuck Reed and councilmembers Sam Liccardo, Pierluigi Oliverio and Pete Constant voted against the motion to scuttle the bids.
Supporting the June 23 vote were councilmembers Nancy Pyle, Madison Nguyen, Kansen Chu, Rose Herrera, and Ash Kalra. Also voting in support of the measure was Councilmember Nora Campos, whose husband, trade union official Neil Struthers, urged the council not to grant Swenson the contract.
A short video with excerpts of councilmembers’ comments during the discussion is posted here.
Shouldn’t Campos recuse herself on the vote? Her husband is a registered lobbyist, who is taking the lead on this issue.
It’s a real shame that residents of our community—who need literacy the most yet lack the means for transportation—are going to have to travel to other parts of the city for an six months because of a technicality. We will be almost two years without a library. More privileged areas got their libraries built before us.
Our neighborhood library is now closed.
Hopefully, members of the council will wake up, and represent the people who elected them and not the unions that bankrolled them.
See what the city library’s website says:
George
Nora Campos is a walking conflict of interest
Looks like this is Labor’s payback for Barry Swenson’s support for the McEnery family’s Urban Markets project.
Look at how they fumbled to come up with reasons to ditch the bid. Do any of these guys really know how many years of experience welders need to qualify as experienced? They all look so confused.
It must be easy to look that perplexed when you don’t know why you are voting for something and just following the Pied Piper.
Nora should have recused herself, based upon the support of the motion by her husband, Neil Struthers, the uber-union guy.
Nancy Py le—the replacement for Forrest Williams as most confused & confusing counclimember.
If the council is worried about Elmer’s Welding’s qualifications, just insert an indeminity clause in the contract requiring Swenson to cover any problems with Elmer’s work, should they arise.
This vote was pure kowtowing to the unions, at the expense of those who would use the library, and every taxpaying resident of SJ. This will never end until we throw these people out of office, and don’t elect them to higher offices when they are termed out.
Simply put, this will never end.
This vote is just the tip of a very very very large iceberg. The unions push their weight around city hall all the time. Reed is weak and powerless to stand against them.
It’s only a situation like this when the unions doing something highly visible and really obvious that they get caught. Their own arrogance and desire to play sleazy politics is a day-to-day happening at city hall. Most people are just seeing this play out publicly for the first time.
I want to say this before I comment: I’m not a Union member, or a member of the Chamber. As many of you say, “I don’t have a dog in this race.”
Having said that I want to point out something that happens on here that really disturbs me. By making a blanket statement like, “Labor, or the Chamber,” you are doing a great disservice to thousands of people in those organizations. Holding Chamber leaders, or Labor leaders, or certain individuals accountable for their actions is one thing, but this stereotyping is unfair.
I know a lot of Chamber members who did not support the Chambers attacks on Cindy Chavez during the Mayoral campaign, and I know a lot of Labor members who voted for Mayor Reed. Just because you are a member of something, or voted for someone doesn’t mean you’ve given him or her your blanket, blind, and deaf vote of confidence that they’ll always do the right thing every time.
On a side note: regardless of the issue at hand, bending the rules is not something I support when it comes to transparency ~
#10, Kathleen, something we can agree upon. It is not only unfair, but dangerous to stereotype. I know many teachers who believe the teachers’ unions aren’t representing their best interests in the political arena. Ditto other labor union members…just like there are chamber members who disagree with some of their actions.
And transparency is everything. Without it there is no integrity or accountability.
Conflict,
Actually, if NC had an original thought, it would die of lonliness.
This post leaves out a big part of this story. You should have seen the Rules and Open Government Committee meeting last Wednesday. Nancy Pyle was going on and on trying to block Pete Constant from leaving the door open to reconsider this vote.
She basically said she was right and she wasn’t going to change her vote so that was that. The she accused Constant of bringing this up “outside of the process” and accusing him of not following the rules. She said if this was allowed it would open up every vote to reconsideration. She whined about being onthe council fr 4 1/2 yeas and never seein an abuse of the system like this.
Fortunately Constant not only knows what the rules are, he has actually read them. He correctly pointed out that the council follows Roberts Rules of Order, and lo an behold all votes are subject to reconsideration at the meeting the vote is made, or the very next meeting!
Maybe Nancy Pyle should have spent some of those 4 1/2 years actually learning what the rules are. This isn’t the first time she’s been confused or the first time she has made baseless acussations.
I hope the chamber regrets having endorsed her bid for re-election.
This is one almaden resident that is counting the months until we get a representative that understands what’s right, has common sense, and isn’t just a schill for the over involved, corrupt labor unions.
#1 comment, it sounds like you do not know parliamentary procedures.
RESOLUTION NO. 74574
A RESOLUTION OF THE COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF SAN
JOSE AMENDING THE RULES FOR THE CONDUCT OF ITS
MEETINGS, SUPERSEDING RESOLUTION NO. 74312
(e) Reconsideration
Any action taken by the City Council is subject to reconsideration if the motion to reconsider is made by a Councilmember who voted with the prevailing side. A motion to reconsider may only be made at the Council meeting where the original vote was taken or at the next Council meeting. Once a majority of the City Council has voted to reconsider an action, the reconsideration can be held immediately or at a later Council meeting as designated by the Council.
Apparently a member of the Rules Committee not on the prevailing side brought this matter forth to the committee in charged of setting the City Council agenda. No discussion should have taken place at the Rules committee, the entire Council should have heard it if a member of the prevailing side chose to do so. This is a violation of their own rules. For the Mayor to allow for this to occur demonstrates he was behind violating the rules of the game. I
#12—the motion to reconsider was brought by a member of the prevcailing side. Sit down
#13, JMO, I believe #12’s point was that this should have been brought up at the council meeting, not the Rules Committee. If his citation is correct, so is he…
#13 – You are clearly missing my point. I notice that you tend to do that regularly with other postings.
#14 – Thank you. Here is my source, http://www.sanjoseca.gov/clerk/CouncilDocs/RulesOrder.pdf, Go to page 15.
This issue is that Pete Constant violated Council Policy, adopted on September 8, 2008 and signed into LAW by Reed, and Mayor Reed (The Mayor who ran on open and sunshine government AND swore on oath not to lying, steal or cheat) did too for allowing the discussion to go beyond the Rules & OPEN GOVERNMENT Committee. Neither of them were on the prevailing side so they could and should have not brought or discuss this matter to this committee. The case before us, Councilmember Herrera needed to submit the request to the Rules Committee by Friday, July 24, no later than 3 p.m. but obviously she did not because she was on vacation somewhere on a cruise in the European continent, according to some sources, while hard working families are barely surviving like some of Herrera’s constituents in the King and Tully area. Not only were Sunshine Policies were violated This whole issue seemed orchestrated because Pete and Chuck pressed the issue (keep an eye on their political contribution forms to see if they get a nice check)asking for a placeholder so that a council member on the prevailing side had that option. Since Pat Sausedo is the new (newly created) VP of Public Policy for the Chamber of Commerce, secured Herrera’s endorsement from the Chamber’s COMPAC, Herrera buckled from the pressures. Herrera is the easiest person to crack. She does not know her values, which is a big rookie mistake. I would not be surprised if she turns out to be a one-term councilmember. Rules are Rules and should not be changed in the middle of the game, yes you Mr. C. Ruffs Reed! At the very least, I can thank Waite because I know where he stands on issues. Maybe next time I will vote for him.