Lorain/Elyria, OH
Elyria Schools sued over EHS project
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ELYRIA — A subcontractor contends that it performed nearly $425,000 worth of work on the new Elyria High School but hasn’t received a dime for its effort.
Sitetech, a Grafton-based excavation company specializing in commercial, industrial, athletic and municipal site work, filed a lawsuit Friday in Lorain County Common Pleas Court against Energy America Geothermal, LLC, a New Mexico-based company.
Elyria Schools is named as a co-defendant in the case.
Energy America was the lowest bidder and won the geothermal contract with the school district worth more about $1.7 million. Installing the geothermal system, the most eco-friendly of the building’s features, involved digging deep into the ground so the earth could be used to heat and cool the building.
The new Elyria High School has close to 300 such holes on the property.
In the lawsuit, Sitetech argues Energy America hired the company to do excavating work so the area would be prepared for drilling. The company contends it is owed more than $425,000 for labor and materials associated with excavation work on project, no part of which has been paid although demand for payment has been made.
The work is question was completed between Oct. 13, 2008, and April 25, 2009.
Sitetech is suing for breach of contract and wants to collect interest and attorney fees.
In addition, the lawsuit also asks Elyria School to release any funds it may be holding that rightfully belong to Sitetech.
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wow, the drama never ends in elyria does it?
but if the other company hired the people to clear the land; how is this the schools responsibility?
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They can sue anyone that had even the slightest involvement in the desision making process of the project. Cast a big enough net and some people may just pay up instead of going to court. Most likely though this is just a way for the school to put pressure on the company to pay, ie pay them before your recieve the last of the money you are owed.
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Yeah, and I think that as ECS being named as co-defendents in the suit, that the judge could order payment directly from the school’s construction budget of the $1.7 million bid amount that has not yet been paid to Energy America, if there is any left…
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lol…. sounds like they didn’t get the kickback from Energy America… and want the school to pay.
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heres a thought. how is it cheaper for a company on almost the west coast to do this work than for a more local company to do it? it says the energy america is from new mexico and was given the bid because theres was the lowest. couldnt’ anyone closer come in cheaper? on the other hand; sometimes you get what you pay for.
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@Eatown…
I am guessing that Energy America, Inc. is just an engineering company, so it doesn’t really matter that they are located New Mexico. I am also guessing that they are probably doing what is called EPC for the geothermal heating and cooling, meaning they are doing the ENGINEERING, PROCUREMENT, and CONSTRUCTION, subbing out the construction work to local companies to do the excavation & ground work, pipefitters, and HVAC guys to do the actual installation.
And there could be any number of reasons that, even though they are located so far away, they were the least expensive. They could already have a very similar project already completed, so there wouldn’t have to be a lot additional engineering involved, keeping costs down. They may have had ’shop space’ to fill, where maybe other bidding companies didn’t, therefore the others were charging more of a premium. Any number of factors could have gone into their bid making them the lowest cost bidder.
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thanks eer71 for the comments. it helped make some sense of my questions.
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