By Louis Zylka
The 830 Times
City council members have rejected bids for an improvement project at the Del Rio International
Airport.
On the agenda of the council’s regular meeting on Tuesday was a resolution to authorize and
direct the city manager to reject all bids for the airport taxiways realignment project and the
construction of a helipad.
Councilman Carmen Gutierrez made the motion to approve the resolution, and Councilman
Jesus Lopez Jr. gave a second.
As mentioned in the agenda packet provided to the council by Assistant City Manager Manuel
Chavez and submitted by Airport Superintendent Juan Onofre, the 2021 Airport Master Plan
identified various short-term projects needed for the airport to comply with federal aviation
regulations.
During previous council meetings, resolutions were discussed and approved to authorize the
city manager to submit a grant application to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). The
grant is for federal funding towards improvements at Del Rio’s airport.
As mentioned in the agenda packet, the bids received for the project were reviewed by the city’s
contract engineering firm, Knowledge Skills and Abilities Engineers Inc., which found the
bids “to be 52 percent higher than the probable construction cost.”
Chad Pennel, Senior Project Manager at KSA Engineers Inc., told the city his company
recommends, “That the bid submitted by AR6 (a company that submitted a bid) be rejected, and
the project be re-bid, in an attempt to obtain more competitive bids.”
No further questions were asked about the projects or the bids, and the council continued with
the next topic on the agenda.
