INDIAN RIVER COUNTY – The County Commission today awarded a $2.49 million contract to Bill Bryant & Associates Inc. to design and build four softball fields and related infrastructure at the Vero Beach Sports Village.
The award was made contingent to finalizing the land swap with the city in which the county received the property where the fields will be built.
County Attorney Alan Polackwich told the commissioners that he had discovered an error in the deed to the land that needs to be corrected before the deal is finalized.
According to Polackwich, the error, which is a statement that the land will continue to fall under certain green space restrictions that it doesn’t actually fall under, is a mere clerical mistake.
He said the language had inadvertently been carried forward from an earlier version of the deed and the city was in agreement with him about correcting it.
Bill Bryant & Associates was selected by a seven-member bid evaluation committee on May 6, even though the company has not previously built a ball field. Committee members considered five factors in choosing from among nine bids submitted for the project: experience with similar projects, understanding of the Vero Beach Sports Village project, schedule of work and ability to complete the project in a timely fashion, and the cost, or bid amount.
Each factor was weighted, with the greatest weight going to cost and schedule. When the independent numerical evaluations of all committee members were totaled, Bryant came out on top.
Besides the ball fields, the company will design and build dugouts, bleachers, restrooms, concession building, fencing, lighting and irrigation and drainage systems.
Bill Bryant & Associates is a Vero Beach general contracting company that has been in business since 1981. General Manager Robert Paugh said the company is excited about the job.
“We have been in the community for a long time and we are most pleased to be awarded this contract,” he said. “To come out number one in the evaluation process is rewarding in itself. We’ll start site-planning and design work within the month and hope to begin construction by midsummer.”
Paugh said his firm’s lack of specific experience with athletic fields is irrelevant, because the company’s team includes a designer who has designed athletic fields and because the nature and scope of the work, such as earth-moving and constructing buildings and fencing, is what the company does day in and day out.
“We plan to have the project completed by early 2012,” Paugh said.
