Still no answers from Government on court building contract
By Matthew Taylor
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Construction site of the new court house building
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Government has refused to confirm whether Landmark/Lisgar Construction was the choice of Works and Engineering technical officers for the combined Police and Court building.
The Royal Gazette revealed in October that the $78 million Police/Court building is months behind schedule, according to building experts. And it's understood that one Lisgar manager left the site amid concerns about the progress.
But Government has not said whether its own experts had recommended Bermudian firm Landmark and Canadian firm Lisgar should have been given the contract.
And Government also refused to answer an e-mailed question about whether Landmark/Lisgar had put up a performance bond to insure the taxpayer if the project goes over budget or is late.
Last night Shadow Works and Engineering Minister Pat Gordon-Pamplin said: "I am very concerned about Government's inability or refusal to answer basic questions given the experience with earlier contracts such as Berkeley and the bus station which ran significantly over budget.
"It's important that we don't go through that experience again."
She said Government had a duty to be transparent when it was spending taxpayer's money.
"Especially given their history of not selecting the right contractor – or everything they touched turning to mud and being tremendously over budget," said Mrs. Gordon-Pamplinon.
"I would have thought the Ministry would not want to repeat those mistakes and would want to be more forthcoming to show they have a handle on things. They need to come clean."
Last month Works and Engineering consultant Julian Hall, said a management shake-up was planned but he blamed much of the delay on a faulty geological survey which underestimated the amount of hard rock.
He also said a statement would come from the Ministry but so far it has remained silent.
In March Government said the project, which had risen by $3 million to $78 million, would be ready by September 2010.
Works and Engineering Minister Derrick Burgess said $66 million was for construction of the building, another $6.9 million was for a construction manager fee and $5.1 million was built-in for unforeseen changes.
Planning permission for the new court and Police complex was originally approved in principle in February 2001 and construction finally began in December 2007.
Located at the corner of Church Street, Court Street and Victoria Street, it will feature four courtrooms on the second floor, plus a Family Court on the third. Landmark Construction, set up in 2001, won the contract for the multi-million-dollar project after teaming with Lisgar, who are based in Ontario.
Ten firms had expressed an interest in bidding for the project and five were shortlisted and invited to submit bids, with Landmark beating two rivals.
