Tuesday, June 14, 2011

Mission Impossible (Maybe)

Your assignment, if you choose to accept it, is to find the supporting Board of Education documents that will account for the total payouts for each of the last two fiscal years. Use of the new search box on the MCPS website is encouraged. The old search engine yielded more retrieved documents - in my opinion.

As the company with the largest procurement contract - $600,000 - submitted for approval at the upcoming June 16, 2011 BoE meeting , Walker Willis contracts were scrutinized.

Known as the company that brought you the incredible, storable sod, Walker Willis has been a busy multitasking contractor to MCPS in the area of PLAR** contracts.

For FY 2011, Walker Willis Corp has received $2,946,041 from MCPS.
Note: FY 2011 = July 1, 2010 thru June 30, 2011

The following BoE meeting documents have accounted for some of this multi-million dollar distribution:
  • August 26, 2010 9181.4 Masonry Thru-Wall Flashing & Waterproofing**Awardee Walker Willis/T/A Custom Masonry $450,000
  • Jan 11, 2011 9398.2 Retaining Walls and Stormwater Management Modifications**Awardee Walker Willis/T/A Custom Masonry $ 250,000
  • Feb 8 2011 9181.4 Masonry Thru-Wall Flashing and Waterproofing—Extension**Awardee Walker Willis/T/A Custom Masonry $263,150
  • June 16, 2011 9701.1 Specialty Cementitious Coatings at Various Locations—Extension**Awardee Walker Willis/T/A Custom Masonry $ 600,000

However, these documented amounts only add up to $1,563,150.

Would someone be willing to help me find the remaining approved contracts for $1,382,891 in supporting BoE documents?

For comparison, in FY 2010 (July 1, 2009 thru June 30, 2010), Walker Willis Corp received $1,896,907.

It might be easier to find the BoE document(s) to account for the $210,234 discrepancy in the FY2010 figures. Total contracts approved in BoE documents found add up to $1,686,673.

  • July 27, 2009 9701.1 Specialty Cementitious Coatings at Various Locations—Supplement**Awardee Walker Willis/T/A Custom Masonry $ 100,000
  • March 9, 2010 9398.2 Retaining Walls and Stormwater Management Modifications—Extension** Awardee Walker Willis/T/A Custom Masonry $300,000
  • June 8, 2010 9161.3 Athletic Field Renovation** Awardee Walker Willis/T/A Custom Masonry $686,673 9701.1 Specialty Cementitious Coatings at Various Locations—Extension** Awardee Walker Willis/T/A Custom Masonry $ 600,000

PS Could you also find out how many athletic fields at various locations were renovated for $686,673? Maybe this information can be found - or used - in the County Council/MCPS contractor provided draft artificial turf report.

PPS Might also be helpful with FY10 and/or FY11 analysis: CIP12_Appendix_F Planned Life-cycle Asset Replacement (PLAR) Projects Completed Summer 2010


The ** means it falls under Planned Lifecycle Asset Replacement (PLAR). This project provides funding for the repair or replacement of major site improvements and building systems that have reached the end of their useful life. Some of the items that this project covers are field rehabilitation, exterior resurfacing (including driveways and tennis courts), interior partitions, doors, lighting, windows, security gates, bleachers, communications systems, and flooring.

Agnes Jones-Trower

2 comments:

  1. Entering
    "walker willis":www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org
    in Google seems to give more information. (The colon : is google syntax for search for this phrase only on the website name that follows the colon.)

    e.g.
    April 28
    9161.3 Athletic Field Renovations—Extension**
    Awardee Walker Willis/T/A Custom Masonry
    9163.4 $500,000

    March 28
    9398.2 Retaining Walls and Stormwater Management Modifications**
    Awardee Walker Willis/T/A Custom Masonry
    $250,000

    ReplyDelete
  2. Some web sites will offer two different search fields on their home page, one for Google and one for their own. Google has limitations, e.g. very recent files might not have been "crawled" by Google search engines and so wouldn't be available via Google searches. Google has more options available but the MCPS search engine could be optimized specifically for school stuff. (I've never used the MCPS search function so this is just a hypothetical example.)

    The April 28 document referenced below is http://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/boe/meetings/agenda/2010-11/2011-0428/4.1.1%20BOARD25000.pdf
    It is dated June 16 so I could guess 4/28/11 was the date it was posted.

    The March 28 document referenced below is
    http://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/boe/meetings/agenda/2010-11/2011-0328/3.1.125,000.pdf
    It is dated March 28, 2011.

    More information on google syntax options is at http://www.google.com/support/websearch/bin/static.py?hl=en&page=guide.cs&guide=1221265&answer=136861&rd=1

    I'm sure other search engines also have syntax to help specify more advanced queries but I've never tried. I did just try the above phrase in the Bing search engine and it didn't work.

    ReplyDelete

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