Sanbonton's ex-DPW chief still under fire

Jeff Jenkins, chairman of the Building Committee, said yesterday he understands the frustration Selectman Dave Nickerson expressed Wednesday night about some recent road/building work undertaken by the Department of Public Works (DPW) — particularly the repaving of the municipal parking area around the town office and public safety buildings.

At a Wednesday night meeting in the town office building , Nickerson — who used to oversee road projects for the Verizon company — said the town has been wasting “a ton of money” on the local work, and he expressed particular concern about the municipal paving project.

Jenkins and Nickerson both say that work began on the parking lot project before a contract was signed with selected contractor Cip Cormier, and before the specifications in engineering plans could be altered with necessary changes. Now, some of the work will have to be done over.

Selectmen Steve Ober indicated on Wednesday night that he was the one who authorized work to begin. "Look, I screwed up," he admitted while apologizing to his fellow board members, "because we needed to get something started."

Jenkins estimates correcting problems there might cost the town between $3,000 and $4,000. “His (Nickerson’s) figures weren’t researched,” he said. “But he was just trying to show that it wasn’t peanuts we were throwing away.”

On Tuesday Jenkins, in his role as Building Committee chairman, sent a letter to the selectmen outlining some serious concerns his group has about the work. “The Municipal Parking Lot project has been in the planning for more than three years,” the letter reads. “There have been commitments made to the NH DOT (Department of Transportation) with parking and handicap access, plus much input given to the planning stage by department heads and others.” (The U.S. Department of Justice also has jurisdiction over the issue of handicapped access to public buildings so town leaders wanted three spaces to the immediate north side of the structure to be set aside on a flat space for handicapped drivers.)

“At your meeting of April 16, 2008 you were made aware that the plans submitted by (North Conway civil engineering company) H.E. Bergeron dated March 3, 2008 had many omissions that raised concerns by both the Building Committee and your department heads. Those concerned were discussed and later followed up in writing to all involved: Director Hubbard, Police Chief Mark Barton, Fire Chief John DeSilva and yourselves, dated April 17, 2008,” the letter continued.

“We have learned that the plans were never updated as to your concerns as Director Hubbard indicated they would be,” it adds. “We have also been told the contractor (Cormier of Sanbornton) has started work on this project without a signed contract or agreement in place. It is the belief of the Building Committee that this project should be HALTED IMMEDIATELY until these shortcomings can be corrected for the town’s best interests to be served, both financially and for product usefulness. The lack of follow-through shown here will bring more public outcries about all our incompetency and abilities to manage.”

In an e-mail memo dated several days earlier, on Sunday, Aug. 10, Jenkins wrote to the three-man Selectboard (and copied to other town officials), outlining his frustration with Hubbard.

“What concerns me is that Director Hubbard either ignored our concerns or neglected to make note of them because the project seems to be moving on without addressing them,” it reads.

The Building Committee Chairman noted a drainage problem running from the back of the town office building where a serious flooding problem occurred several years ago out to Rte. 132, which town staff have jokingly referred to as “Love Canal.”

Jenkins wrote that despite discussions with Hubbard and long-time DPW employee (and resident) Wayne Elliott, the drainage pipe “was installed 30-feet away from where the NH DOT had agreed to let us discharge the water, creating a retention problem for the slope at the end of the town office parking lot and that will undermine our pavement, and (it) was also never connected to the original catch basin behind the office (building.)”

Jenkin’s e-mail also mentions an official at the Fire Department told him that “the ongoing project was not only not addressing that (building’s) problem as planned” — which was ensuring that trucks would have the clearance to get in and out of the garage without “bottoming out” on the ground — “but in fact (it) was making it worse.”

Nickerson was not available for comment yesterday but new Town Administrator Bob Veloski said he was still researching the background and the current status of the project. He said he did not yet know how much money was sent to either engineer Bergeron or contractor Cormier on the paving project. The total project is currently estimated to cost about $86,000.

But Jenkins said that outside of the specifics of Nickerson’s complaints about the parking lot project, the selectman was still upset because it appears that former (DPW) Director Hubbard did not use a set rate schedule for contractors who are sometimes hired to do work on DPW’s projects.

“There are some contractors who live in town and who would do work for less than their normal rate, because it’s their town and they want to help out,” Jenkins said. “But there are others who weren’t, who were even charging more…”

Since Hubbard apparently did not have a set rate schedules some “expensive” contractors were sometimes hired, which lead to Nickerson’s complaint that the town has “wasted tons and tons of money on contractors” recently.

At Wednesday night's meeting, the selectmen decided to delay signing the municipal parking paving contract and to try to negotiate with Kip Cormier on a solution to the project's various problems.