Brew follow-up: City Hall carpeting budgeted at over $10 per square foot
That’s about double the amount for normal carpet installation. General Services cites many reasons for higher costs. Vendors doing the work are campaign contributors.
Above: The rich decorative carpeting in the Curran Conference Room on City Hall’s fourth floor will not be replaced.
The Department of General Services has budgeted $698,132.02 for new carpeting at City Hall, plus another $50,000 for hard-surface flooring to be installed in high-traffic areas in place of carpeting.
Divided by the 66,000 square feet to be carpeted, the project comes to $10.58 a square foot – or more than double the $4-to-5 a square foot installation price quoted to The Brew by several commercial carpet companies.
Steve Sharkey, director of General Services, said the carpet installation – by CB Flooring, working on a non-competitive purchase order that expired yesterday – will come to $6 a square foot.
The additional $4-plus is a result of inspection costs, contingencies and needed improvements to City Hall’s floor subsurface, he said. For example, the city has budgeted $113,354.80 for construction and bid contingencies.
“This isn’t like carpeting a new building. City Hall is 150 years old,” Sharkey said.
Recently-Installed Carpet Has Worn Out
General Services also clarified that only about half of the hall’s carpeting (two full floors and some additional rooms) date back to the late 1970s.
Earlier documents released by the Board of Estimates suggested that nearly all of the building’s carpets were about 35 years old.
Steve Sharkey. (Photo by Mark Reutter)
During in the early 2000s, new carpeting was installed in heavily-trafficked areas. “But,” Sharkey said, “that carpeting was of a lesser grade and has not held up well.”
Last week, The Brew broke the story that Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake and the Board of Estimates were about to approve $750,000 for new carpeting.
The expenditure was justified on the grounds that much of the existing carpeting was worn beyond repair and presented tripping and other safety issues.
Most of the new carpeting will be installed in offices that are rarely tread on – or seen – by the general public. These include the offices of City Council members and staff, and agencies run by the mayor.
The thick decorative carpeting of the Mayor’s Ceremonial Room and the Curran Conference Room will not be replaced. “These have been well maintained,” Sharkey said.
About the only visible difference to visitors, when the carpeting is completed, will be Room 215 used for Board of Estimates and Liquor Board hearings. The room and surrounding areas, including an interior balcony, will be replaced with new carpets.
Medium Grade Brown “Okuni”
Sharkey described the new carpeting as a “medium commercial grade carpet tile” colored chocolate brown with some off-white flecks (known in the trade as “okuni”).
The new carpeting will look like this. The color is called Okuni 2951.
He said the relatively high cost of the carpeting is a result of the decision to install the carpet over weekends so as not to disturb city workers or the public during office hours. “Mobilization and demobilization every weekend is going to add costs,” he said.
In addition, the “luan” subflooring of previous carpet installations has deteriorated and needs to be removed. Moving furniture and smoothing out uneven flooring in parts of the building will also present challenges, according to Sharkey.
Finally, he said, the city is required to follow American Disability Act rules and local, state and federal environmental codes that will increase costs compared to a modern building or a building without existing carpeting.
Contractors are Campaign Contributors
The carpet will be installed by Columbia-based CB Flooring under a $500,000 contract awarded by Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake and Board of Estimates on March 9, 2011. The contract, which originally included another vendor, Total Contracting Inc. that dropped out of compliance, has four one-year renewals.
CB Flooring is owned by Carol and Chuck Bode and has done work for the city for years, including the installation of flooring for the Baltimore Convention Center.
The company also has been a consistent contributor to local elected officials, according to Maryland Election Board records.
On January 6, 2011 – two months before it was awarded the carpet contract – CB Flooring contributed $500 to Rawlings-Blake’s campaign committee. On June 22, 2011, it wrote another check to the mayor’s committee for $500.
More recently, the company contributed $1,500 to the Anthony Brown-Ken Ulman gubernatorial ticket.
The minority subcontractor on the carpet project, Carpet for Pennies, contributed $200 to Rawlings-Blake in her 2011 election and $500 since then.
The Baltimore-based vendor wrote campaign checks to two other Board of Estimates members – City Council President Bernard C. “Jack” Young ($250) and Comptroller Joan M. Pratt ($250). Carpet for Pennies also contributed $800 to former Mayor Sheila Dixon in 2007.
Contractor “Out of Compliance” with Minority Rules
According to city records, CB Flooring went “out of compliance” with the city’s Minority and Women’s Business participation rules on February 18, 2014 and had until April 19 to come back into compliance.
The company is still out of compliance, Thomas B. Corey, chief of the minority office, told The Brew today. The company is required to have 10% Minority (MBE) and 5% Women (WBE) participation, but the vendor has only a single MBE participant.
Corey explained the situation as follows:
“General Services is entering into a new contract with CB Flooring. They are honoring a Purchase Order issued a while back under the contract that expired yesterday [April 30]. We are working with CB Flooring to have them come into compliance with the recently expired contract.”
Sharkey said he did not know when re-carpeting would commence at City Hall. CB Flooring did not respond to an e-mail request for comment.