District 300 board wins parking lot sealing do-over

Du Quoin Community Unit District 300 has successfully challenged the outcome of a $59,140 resealing contract reached this spring through district architect Paul Lunsford with Town & Country Paving, Inc. of Carbondale. The company has agreed to perform the work again.

The "communications problem" is part and parcel of an ongoing review of the district's relationship with Herrin, Ill. based Lunsford Architect which designed both Du Quoin schools when the relationship was better. The Du Quoin Board of Education continues to revisit the issue of whether Lunsford will be the district's architect in the future. "We are still having that conversation," said Dr. Kelly.

Dr. Kelly told the board and the newspaper that the agreement made with Town & Country through Lunsford called for resealing the very large drives and parking areas at the Middle and elementary school with two coats of machine-applied sealant, then relining the parking lanes and crosswalks on the property.

"Our expectation was two machine coats," said Dr. Kelly.

What the district got was one coat of machine-applied sealant and one coat of sprayer-applied sealant.

The sprayer application is a less desired way of resealing a bituminous asphalt surface.

The real rub is that at the time the board accepted the Lunsford recommendation to give the contract to Town & Contract over a much lower bid from Du Quoin-based Perry County Paving, a local bidder.

Perry County Paving, Inc. of Du Quoin owned by Jim Whitley has been in business since 2007 and submitted to the board a bid of $42,000 to re-seal the same parking areas.

After a lot of deliberation, back and forth discussions with Lunsford and a lot of anxiety over local loyalty the board awarded the bid to the out-of-town contractor.

The bid difference was $17,000.Whitley's bid was for a sprayed application, but he came back to tell the board he could rent the equipment to apply the sealant with a machine.

Whitley says the action was unconscionable given the fact that he pays taxes on both his home and his large business property west of Du Quoin to District 300 as part of his tax bill.

Whitley's bid was the lowest of the three bids submitted.

The only other discussion of the night came from parent Donna Taylor about a playground altercation between her child and another student.