Friday's Internet Edition, 4:36 AM, March 12, 2010.
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True, the second round of bids did come in remarkably lower than the first bids to design the new Davie County High School. But the architects had already been paid a healthy chunk of their fees — about $260,000.
The watchdogs, Bill Foust, Randy McDaniel and Jay Mintz, often called the Three Amigos for dogging the school board and county commissioners, took credit for what turned out to be only phantom savings. And the editor foolishly thanked them.
They are hereby un-thanked.
There were no savings. Engineer John Gray said, in fact, the county will pay about 10 percent more because of some late design changes. He’s now calming the concerns of potential builders who have heard about the contract flap and must wonder if Davie people are a little nutty over this high school project.
We are, of course. But pleasantly so.
“It has made it more expensive because a whole lot of contractors are more shaky about the project. It is a more difficult sell now than it was before,” he said last week.
If that happens, the Amigos may get credit for adding to the taxpayers’ burden. We won’t thank them for that either ... subscribe to the Davie County Enterprise, P.O. Box 4639, Salisbury, N.C. 28145.
