A look behind the scenes of constructing Quakertown's skate park provides an excellent view of how the borough does business. And, unlike the park itself, it isn't pretty.
Actually, the idea of a community skate park is rad. It sure beats having hordes of Tony Hawks ollie-ing through shopping centers, carving down city steps, and grinding the handrails of area homes. So, during 2003, Qtown built a park just for boarders, with seventeen pieces of equipment.
The plan was approved by the Bucks County Conservation District in a letter to the borough dated July 29. However, on that same day (and presumably prior to receipt of the BCCD approval letter), Borough Manager David Woglom accepted a "bid" from Nimaris Construction L.P. to build a 100' x 120' blacktop pad for $26,300. The bid itself, dated 7/14/03, was on Nimaris Construction L.P. letterhead, signed with an indecipherable signature over the printed words "Nimaris Construction L.P.". Woglom's letter of acceptance was directed to Nicholas Ciccone.
State law requires any contract of $10,000 or more to be offered for written public bidding. This means, among the many requirements, that there be a resolution of borough council, public newspaper advertising, and sealed bids, opened in public.
However, the July 29 letter from Woglom to Nimaris claimed that the acceptance was "an amendment to our existing contract". A search of Quakertown records showed that there were no prior contracts with Nimaris Construction L.P. This was confirmed by the borough. What is going on here?
I delivered another Open Records Law request, the seventeenth by their count. Show me the contract. Show me the public bidding. Show me the advertising and resolution of council - those elected leaders, and watchdogs who claim to know everything that goes on in their town.
Quakertown responded by providing a letter from Woglom to Kirk Bracalente of Bracalente Construction Inc. dated May 9, 2003, accepting that company's bid for 2003 street resurfacing (five enumerated projects with two alternates) at a cost of $129,114. No mention of the skate park, or Nimaris. Nimaris had done no other blacktop work for the borough. But Nick Ciccone and Kirk Bracalente are owners of both. Awarding the skate park contract in this manner is totally improper, and illegal under state bidding laws.
Further research showed that Bracalente Construction's bid for street work required payment and performance bonds, a traffic count, detailed schedules of prices, liquidated damages, prevailing wage, PennDOT approval, and half-a-dozen additional documents. All things that dramatically drive up the price of the actual work, but are necessary for public improvements like streets, that are paid for, in whole or part, by federal, state or county funds.
Because of the extent of the work, and the many costly requirements, these big jobs are invariably done by the big boys - the ones who can afford to spend big bucks to make big bucks. In this case, the street work was paid for totally from Bucks County Community Development funds and state Liquid Fuels money.
But there are many smaller companies, or even larger ones who just don't want the hassle, and bureaucratic boondoggles, of state work, who would have been thrilled to bid on the skate park job. Probably at a nice saving. But they were never given the chance. No one was. Woglom (again) took the easy way out, ignored the laws designed to protect the public from exactly that kind of favoritism and waste, and just handed the contract to people he knew.
And to make matters worse, he tried to hide the misdeed by making it appear that the skate park work was part of a properly-bid contract. It wasn't. Nimaris and Bracalente are totally separate legal entities. The street work was approved and paid for with county and state funds, but Woglom's hand-written notes show that the skate park pad was paid to Nimaris from the borough's "Debt Service Fund". No Bracalente involved.
Nicholas Ciccone claims that, as far as he knew, there was public bidding, and last week, July 25, he promised to show me any proof that he had in his files. I am still waiting.
The balance of the skate park job was put out for public bid on September 15, 2003, in a letter from Woglom. But even this was done questionably. Woglom received an email on September 23 from Mike Mapp, a potential bidder, complaining that the required specifications were "heavily geared toward Hot Rails", another potential bidder. The email also pointed out that the borough didn't know what it was doing by asking that the equipment be built elsewhere and delivered already set up. "It would be next to impossible and very expensive to ship these pieces completely assembled."
The specs were modified, and Mapp, the guy watching Woglom, eventually received the contract for $79,753.36.
The Nimaris job is the tenth illegal no-bid contract I have uncovered, totaling more than $200,000. In each instance the borough has had the same responses: Woldow doesn't know what he's talking about; Woldow doesn't understand state bidding laws; Woldow is just plain lying; the completed projects (pool, landscaping, veterans memorial, park) look great, i.e. the end result justifies the means.
And, as usual, I offer borough council the same rebuttal: Let's show all of the citizens of Quakertown our documents. You know, the ones that prove who is telling the truth. The ones you have been hiding for years. Stop with the name-calling-but-uninformative letters to the editor, and the trust-us-we-didn't-do-anything-wrong "newsletters" which avoid giving real answers.
There is an election coming up, and the voters deserve to hear - and see - the truth. If you have nothing to hide, why are you trying so hard to hide it?