MSA agrees to lower fees on Abby project

By Kevin O'Brien

An engineering firm has agreed to cut its latest contract with Abbotsford by $10,000 after city officials questioned how much the city was being asked to pay on a couple of street projects. DPW Craig Stuttgen, who had previously grilled engineer Dan Borchardt of MSA Professional Services, apologized last week for "allowing myself to get all worked up" at the council's April 7 meeting. Stuttgen also took some of the responsibility for the confusion surrounding MSA's proposed $22,800 amendment for extensions of Linden Street and Grube Drive. To explain his reaction to MSA's amendment, Stuttgen used the analogy of regularly buying vehicles from a car dealer and thinking he was getting a good deal on his latest purchase. "Then I feel like when I went to pick up the car, it didn't have wheels on it," he said. Stuttgen said MSA's bid had come in considerably lower than one submitted by its main competitor, Cedar Corps, but it did not include a line item for construction administration, which eventually ended up costing four times what Cedar Corps had bid. Borchardt thanked Stuttgen for his apology, and said he did a historical analysis of what MSA has charged the city for all of the projects it has done in Abbotsford. He said the engineering fees, as a percentage of construction costs, have ranged from 8.9 to 33 percent, based on the actual amount of work done by the firm's employees. "Historically, MSA has always provided the value that we say we're giving to the city, in terms of what we budgeted for hours versus what we actually put into a project," he said. After Borchardt sat down with Stuttgen to go over MSA's charges, Borchardt said they realized they were using different methods to determine the numbers. "We were able to adjust our engineering charges to more or less fit that 15 percent target that the city has," he said. Stuttgen and the council spent about an hour talking about how engineering fees are calculated based on the type of work that

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needs to be done and how to control those costs going forward.

The project at the center of the billing dispute includes an extension of Linden Street to the east of 11th Street to accommodate expansions by Witmer Furniture, and the establishment of a new road, Grube Drive, going south from Opportunity Drive west of STH 13. They initially started off as separate projects before being combined under one engineering contract.

Stuttgen said he wants to maintain a good working relationship with both MSA and Cedar Corps to ensure the city gets competitive bids for its projects. To guarantee a fair playing field, he said the city cannot allow services such as construction administration to increase way beyond the original bid amount like it did in this latest project.

“That line item should have been ironed out long before we got to that last meeting,” Stuttgen said.

City administrator Josh Soyk said the city needs more detailed options to review when an engineering proposal is presented.

“I think we need a better breakdown of construction administration so we can pick and choose what we actually need from it,” he said.

Borchardt said the challenge on his end is sticking to a number when the scope of a project changes or when the work is delayed and prices go up. He also said the choice of general contractors can have an impact on the final price, as some require more “handholding” than others.

Ald. Jeremiah Zeiset suggested that future engineering contracts include a provision that prices are good for one year and subject to change after that. Stuttgen said he was open to that idea.

In the future, Stuttgen said he was planning on giving both engineering firms a form to fill out with what they believe are the services that will be needed for a project, without including prices. The competing firms will then be able to check either other’s list to see if anything is missing before they submit actual bids.

Soyk said his goal is to see engineering firms bid based on a percentage of the contractor with the lowest bid.

To some extent, though, Zeiset said the city needs to trust its engineering firms to present their best guesses for services without insisting they cover every possible contingency.

“The problem is, if we try to nail everything down ahead of time, you’re going to have to shoot high enough so you’re covered, and we’re probably going to end up paying more in some situations because of that,” he said.

Ultimately, the council approved MSA’s $12,800 contract amendment without formally making changing the way it handles engineering bids.

Other business

■ The council granted a variance request to Paul Jakel, allowing him to build a storage unit within the side-yard setback at his property at 501 East Spruce St. Under the variance, which was recommended by the city’s board of appeals, Jakel will be able to build a 65 by 40 foot mini-storage building to the west of the old Abby Tire building.

■ Ald. Mason Rachu was appointed council president.

■ The council approved committee and commission appointments for 2025-2026, based on recommendations by Mayor Jim Weix. New Ald. Paul Erikson was replaced by citizen Roger Calmes on the planning commission.