The Carroll Community School District (CCSD) has accepted a settlement stipulation from Graphite Construction Group after its bid was not awarded the contract to construct the new transportation facility. CCSD Board of Education met with the Graphite Construction owner Russel Carew (Cah-rew) in October to discuss the project and gather more information about the company. Graphite Construction submitted the lowest bid of $4.64 million. After gathering more information, board members discovered that four out of five projects Graphite worked on with architect group DLR were not completed on time and are currently involved in over a dozen lawsuits. Carew said that the transportation facility project would not be completed on time due to not being able to hold the precast supplier’s bid-date schedule because two months have passed after submitting a bid before the award of the contract would have been given. Carew even suggested pushing the project start date back to spring so that he would have the job completed by the end of 2025. Board members decided to award Merit Construction, who came in at the next lowest bid of $4.9 million, claiming they were the “lowest, responsive and responsible bid.” Graphite Construction sought legal action against the district, challenging the rejection of the low bid. Per a stipulation settlement, Graphite Construction agreed to voluntarily dismiss the case if the district would make known the only reason CCSD did not accept the bid was that the construction company could not meet the project’s schedule. Board members approved to sign the stipulation to avoid further legal action. Currently, Graphite Construction has eight open cases against other schools, businesses, and cities, and 16 lawful action suits taken against them.
CCSD Signs Settlement Stipulation To Avoid Further Legal Action From Graphite Construction
