Takeover agreement provides company leverage to finish job

The long-stalled project could wrap up next spring, but no later than June '06.
By MARY GRZEBIENIAK
VINDICATOR CORRESPONDENT
MERCER, Pa. -- Work will resume by Oct. 21 on the partially completed Oakland Avenue Viaduct in Sharon, which has been closed for four years due to a beam misalignment.
Completion is expected by next spring and legally required by June, at the latest.
Atty. Bill McConnell Jr., Mercer County commissioners' solicitor for litigation, said he observed a crane and workers on the site Wednesday morning and believes work has already begun.
McConnell spoke at a press conference Wednesday called by Mercer County commissioners to announce they have negotiated a takeover agreement with Fidelity and Deposit Co. of Maryland in Baltimore, which issued the performance bond for the bridge contractor, Carmen Paliotta Contracting Inc. of Library, Pa.
Under the agreement, commissioners will pay Fidelity the $704,464 still owed on the $3.6 million project. That money will be reimbursed to the county from state and federal sources. In exchange, Fidelity will see to it that the bridge is finished by June 2006.
Fidelity has elected to have Paliotta finish building the bridge instead of hiring another contractor. If bridge completion costs more than what is still owed, Fidelity will bear the cost.
Breaking it down
In addition, under the agreement, a drainage culvert running under Pa. Route 62, which was damaged during demolition of the original bridge, will be repaired. McConnell says he believes that culvert can be repaired without tearing up the road.
According to a repair plan approved by PennDOT, Paliotta will reposition several of the leg footing base plates on top of the bridge's cement pedestals. This is expected to correct their deviation from the contract specifications and correct the beam misalignment at the top of the bridge. The existing bridge structure is not expected to have to be disassembled in order to fix the misalignment.
Possible litigation
Remaining legal issues, including whether anyone will have to pay damages for the years of detours and inconvenience caused by the bridge closing, will be decided after the bridge is back in service. Paliotta and commissioners have lawsuits pending against each other in common pleas court. Damages for the delay "could well be the subject matter for a lawsuit after the bridge is completed," McConnell said.
He took pains to point out that public statements and pressure were not a factor in resolving the bridge issue. Some members of Sharon City Council recently passed a resolution calling for commissioners to resign and also for a state attorney general investigation into use of the money earmarked for the bridge.
McConnell called the resolutions "political" and "outrageous" and said they had no factual basis. He said commissioners' only connection to the bridge is the fact that the county owns it. Despite the county's ownership, PennDOT, not the county, controls funding and makes all project decisions, he said.
Despite much pressure, commissioners were unable to call the bond against the contractor until the fault was determined to be Paliotta's, McConnell said. This determination, which required years of study by experts, was what held up the project's resolution, he said.
McConnell thanked Sharon Mayor David Ryan "who got Pennsylvania to focus in and prioritize this project." He also lauded Atty. David Scotti of the Pittsburgh law firm Duane Morris, who was appointed special counsel to help commissioners resolve the case. He said Scotti's work was critical in reaching the agreement and said the state has agreed to reimburse the county for Scotti's fees, up to $200,000.