Judge finds bid process flawed; orders rebid

BY JAY BODAS
Staff Writer

Absurd and improper - those were the words state Superior Court Judge Robert Longhi used to describe Edison's bid procedures for a contract awarded earlier this year.

"Here we have a flawed process with respect to the bid, there is no question about it," said Judge Longhi at a Nov. 16 civil case at the Middlesex County Courthouse in New Brunswick where the judge ruled that the township must rebid.

The case was Business Automated Technologies v. Township of Edison and Trikaya Group LLC, which had been filed Oct. 6.

BAT and Trikaya are computer system design and installation firms that offer services to companies and municipalities, according to BAT's filed complaint.

In August, the township held a public bid for a yearlong contract for computer services, and four bids were received.

The companies and amounts bid were: BAT at $184,504.50, Computer M.C. at $237,763.90, Trikaya Group at $246,000, and Dax Technologies at $255,000.

The contract, which the township had the option to renew for three additional years, was awarded to Trikaya, the third-lowest bidder. As such, the difference between Trikaya and BAT's bids over the four years would have been approximately $260,000.

"It is flawed in many ways, not the least of which is the portion of the bid specifications that say how they are going to evaluate people, and that we can't question how they did it that way," Judge Longhi said. "That is totally absurd and improper. Why it was done that way, I cannot determine with what I have before me, but it is improper and the bidding process is flawed."

Not all questions were answered about the bid process.

"Everybody had questions with regard to how they could bid on this," Longhi said. "There were a number of uncertainties and vague areas."

BAT alleged in its complaint that there were a "number of vague areas in the bid specifications" and that the process for evaluating the qualifications of the companies used a "vague" process that was directly overseen by Mayor Jun Choi.

Judge Longhi ruled to set aside the contract that was awarded to Trikaya and to require the township to rebid it.

"The individual rights of the bidder are important," Longhi said. "But the paramount rights is that of the public because the public entity which is bidding is required to obtain the lowest responsible bid. It has got to be a bid that provides the public with the best possible deal, whether that is in terms of the lowest dollar amount or the person best qualified to perform the process."

On hearing the ruling, BAT President Isaac Fajerman was visibly furious, yelling at the judge before storming out of the courtroom.

"I am not bidding again, and that is the bottom line," Fajerman said. "I don't need to be in this garbage."

Bernard Reilly, attorney for BAT, referred to Trikaya as a "favored son" of the township, and he argued that instead of rebidding the entire contract, it should be awarded to BAT since it was originally the lowest responsible bidder.

"There were multiple bidders each time," Reilly said during his remarks. "Maybe if you rebid it, there will only be one. In fairness, everyone has revealed their prices now. It could be underbid, or it might change [Fajerman's] bid. There are all kinds of things that could happen."

"There has been no evidence of anything to preclude him from getting this contract," Reilly said. "He should get the contract, and he is prepared right now to get the contract. It should have gone to the lowest responsible bidder."

While attorney for Edison Township Albert Cruz admitted that there were "errors" in the bid process, he argued that a completely new bid procedure for the project, open to any interested company, was the correct remedy.

"Very clearly the township has recognized, and the mayor wrote a letter, recognizing there are errors in the process," Cruz said. "There is now an opportunity to remedy those errors. I recognize [the process] was faulty, but ... the plaintiff wants to gain a contract as a result of a bad process."

The process has to go back to square one and has to allow all bidders to bid on the specifications, Cruz said.

Judge Longhi ordered that the new bid process should be completed within 60 days of his ruling.

"I don't want to be arbitrary, I just want to get this process going," Longhi said. "I want to order it be done in 60 days, and everybody will be allowed to inspect the facilities to determine what is necessary and isn't necessary."

In the original bid procedures, BAT had not been allowed to inspect the facilities for which they were bidding to provide their services.

Longhi also ordered that better specifications be used to describe the project and to evaluate the bidders.

"There may be people out there that might have bid on this contract that did not because they didn't know what they needed to do," he said. "So the public has been deprived of having multiple bids and having the lowest qualified bidder. Maybe there could have been 10 [bidders]."

Longhi also allowed Trikaya to rebid on the contract if the company wished to.

Present at the hearing was Trikaya owner Bhal Desphande, who earlier this year had been selected by Choi to be a member of the township's Economic Advisory Group.

After the hearing, Desphande said that BAT was "begging for work."

"The way these people are, they are begging for work," Desphande said. "We don't go and beg for the work. We don't demand. The price we quoted was right for the work."

When asked if he would rebid, Desphande said at this point, they would simply "follow the judge's order."

"I don't know what the new specifications for the contract will be, but I think Edison taxpayers deserve the best," he said.

Jerry Barca, a spokesman for the administration said that the mayor will work to fix the flawed process.

"There was a judgment of no wrongdoing, Barca said. "The judge also ruled that the process was flawed, which is something the mayor already stated and has been committed to addressing."