For months, Mosites Construction Co. and PennDOT have wrangled over safety issues at a work site on Route 51 near Aliquippa, but not for the reasons that led to the deaths of two workers last week.
PennDOT added $4.1 million to Robinson-based Mosites' $11.9 million contract after the company threatened in April to publicize its claim that the agency jeopardized public safety by deciding not to fix a steep, slide-prone hillside.
Mosites insists its only concern was safety. But PennDOT took the threat as a way for Mosites to beef up its contract.
"They were trying to gain leverage," said John Ekiert, assistant district executive for construction at PennDOT's District 11 office in Collier.
Mosites Project Manager Brian Gilkey rejected the assertion.
"They've had numerous slides in recent history in which people have been injured on that roadway," Gilkey said. "The whole job was predicated to make that hillside safer for the traveling public. We can't go in and do this contract work when at any point in time it was like dynamite and could kill somebody.
"These guys out there who work for us are like family."
The Route 51 slides are severe and often cover the entire road. Slides in January 2003 and April 2002 closed the road for weeks.
And work zones can be dangerous: Thirty-four people died last year in PennDOT construction areas.
On Wednesday, Mosites foreman Curt George, 33, of Eighty-Four, Washington County, and Denny Kunz, 55, of Slippery Rock Township, Lawrence County, an inspector for GAI Consultants, died when a dump truck backed over them. Federal safety officials are investigating the deaths.
The dump truck driver, Charles Orzeck, 27, of Greensburg, was not charged.
Four Mosites employees, including Gilkey and George, clashed with PennDOT officials over safety issues at the Aliquippa site during an April 22 meeting.
Mosites threatened to shut down the job, saying it would not be safe to work or drive on Route 51 if the hillside was not stabilized.
They added, "should the news media find out about this, it would look bad for PennDOT," according to a PennDOT memo recounting the session.
PennDOT decided to restore the hillside work after fearing the work could become more costly and take even longer by rebidding. The agency also hired a mediator for its discussions with Mosites.
The agreement gave $4.1 million to Mosites, which then hired Janod Inc. of Quebec, a Canadian company that specializes in scaling hillsides. The agreement also gave Mosites an extra year to complete the job.
"We felt that we had to move along and get this hillside work done," Ekiert said. "So, we made a decision to move along. We knew it was going to have an impact on the project."
Janod's work is expensive and has been questioned by PennDOT brass.
Janod, one of few North American firms to do the dangerous work, billed $104 an hour for its employees. While most of its employees were paid $21 an hour, the remaining $83 an hour per employee covered the company's overhead costs and profit, PennDOT records show.
Janod's overhead charges included $220,000 in administrative costs, $60,000 in advertising, $260,000 in professional fees for engineers and attorneys and $60,700 in financing charges, according to PennDOT records. The agency authorized the costs.
"The bottom line is simple logic," said Daniel Journeaux, Janod's president. "These are actual costs and part of our overhead. If we do not count these costs, we go out of business."
PennDOT admits some costs charged by companies working on Route 51 in Beaver County were high. A sampling of costs billed to the state agency:
