Wildwood commissioners Monday fired PC Construction, which was hired to build a new wastewater treatment plant and upgrade the 40-year-old existing plant.
City Manager Jason McHugh recommended the termination after he said the city and company failed to reach agreement on a contract.
The city will issue another request for proposals to build a new plant capable of processing four million gallons daily.
McHugh said PC Construction completed the project’s first phase, upgrading the current plant to process 3.55 million gallons daily. Commissioners approved a $1.2-million payment to the company for that phase with funds from the federal American Rescue Plan Act. Total cost of the upgrade was $3 million.
Hydraulic and piping issues had prevented the plant from handling its full capacity.
Rapid growth, including homes in the Villages of Southern Oaks, apartment construction and new businesses, has fueled Wildwood’s need for more wastewater treatment capacity. The city’s population nearly doubled in three years to 30,327, according to a University of Florida estimate. A recent national magazine article described Wildwood as the fastest growing city in the nation.
Instead of building a larger plant with a six-million-gallon capacity, city officials decided to build a smaller plant and continue operating the current plant to reduce construction costs.
PC Construction, one of two bidders, was hired earlier this year as a construction manager at risk (CMAR) for the project. To move the project along, the two sides negotiated a pre-construction contract pending negotiation of a full contract.
In a memorandum to the commission, McHugh wrote that negotiations were difficult on both contracts.
His concerns with the full contract included a 9.5 percent CMAR fee, how the guaranteed maximum price was calculated, elimination of most of the contractor’s risk and the form of the proposed contract,
“Simply put, it would be extremely difficult for the city to properly manage costs under the proposed contract,” he wrote.
At the meeting, McHugh told commissioners that contract negotiations failed.