WOODCLIFF LAKE—A special mayor and council meeting will be held Monday, Nov. 22 at 6 p.m. on Zoom to discuss the Broadway Causeway project that recently came in at hundreds of thousands of dollars over its estimated $300,000 price tag and caused council to table any decision while it attempted to get an extension on a looming state grant deadline.
Residents can access the Zoom link on the borough’s website. The council may vote on whether to approve a low grant that was $416,000 over the project’s $300,000 total budget line item.
A state Department of Transportation (DOT) grant for $175,000 for the Causeway improvement project had a deadline of Nov. 21, said borough business administrator Tom Padilla at the council’s Nov. 8 meeting.
Padilla did not return a Pascack Press email about whether the DOT grant deadline had been extended.
While officials expected bids in the $300,000 range — based on prior budget projections — the lowest qualified bid was from AA Berms LLC, Belleville, at $716,444. A non-consent agenda resolution to award AA Berms the project was tabled Nov. 8 pending a possible grant extension and project re-bid. Much of that bid was due to fencing cost, which was bid at over $300,000.
Suez had initially offered to provide chain-link fencing for free on the Causeway, said officials, but members wanted a more aesthetically pleasing fencing option. Attorney John Schettino said officials could remove the fencing cost from the grant, without penalty, but the bid would still be nearly $120,000 over the project’s budgeted amount.
Councilman Craig Marson pointed out Nov. 8 that council only approved a $300,000 budget line item for the Causeway work, and even the lowest bidder was nearly $416,000 over that budgeted amount.
Marson said Nov. 8 that the high bid was “making a mockery of what we were trying to do seven months ago” during budget reviews and development. Marson said even if the fencing cost was removed from the lowest bid, the bid was nearly $120,000 over what was budgeted.
It was unclear why the council was making a last-minute decision on the grant, given the $175,000 grant was at stake should the initial $300,000 budgeted project not be undertaken.
Besides the AA Berms LLC low bid, the three other bids submitted were for $979,640 (Zaccaro Inc.); $1.357.883.97 (Your Way Construction, Inc.); and $1,380,908.00 (Covino & Sons Construction Co.).