LAWTON – City staff will solicit bids on extending the pedestrian path at Lake Helen, and a multimillion-dollar contract to replace six miles of sanitary sewer lines in southwest Lawton was awarded.
The City Council approved plans and specifications for the Lake Helen Trail engineering project, and authorized city staff to solicit competitive bids.
Engineering Director Joseph Painter said the pedestrian path along the east side of Lake Helen will be extended to the flagpole area at the north side of the lake with 1,714 feet of new 10-foot-wide walkway. The project also will include construction of 758 feet of new 5-foot-wide sidewalk that will connect the flagpole area with the fishing pier and foot bridge located nearby, Painter said.
The contract calls for the work to be finished within 45 calendar days after a work order is issued. City officials budgeted $550,000 for the job.
The council also awarded a $4 million contract to McKee Utility Contractors for construction of the South Wolf Creek Trunk Expansion. That job will feature “rehabilitation” of approximately 32,000 linear feet of sanitary sewer lines between Southwest 52nd and Southwest 67th streets south of Lee Boulevard. According to city spokesperson Caitlin Gatlin, the project will entail “total replacement” of an 18-inch line with 36-inch and 42-inch mains.
The contract will be financed from a $30 million Clean Water State Revolving Fund loan, Public Utilities Director Rusty Whisenhunt said.
McKee won the contract even though the Prague company’s bid was more than twice as high as the engineer’s estimate. A second bid was deemed to be “unresponsive.”
Another reason the contract was awarded to McKee harkens back to a consent order the Oklahoma Department of Environmental Quality reached with the City of Lawton, requiring the city to rehabilitate 191,000 linear feet of failing sewer lines.
Construction/Rehabilitation for Phase III Sewer Rehabilitation “is to be completed by January 1, 2025,” city staff informed the City Council. “To meet this deadline, it is imperative the Public Utilities Department contract out the South Wolf Creek Trunk Expansion #5 Project, as our field workers continue completion on other projects…” The contract calls for the work to be “substantially complete” within 240 calendar days after a work order is issued, and to be finished entirely no more than 30 days later.