It looks like Washington’s next ferry won’t have Martinac’s fingerprints on it.
The state’s prime contractor building a new 144-car ferry, Vigor Industrial, terminated a subcontract with Tacoma-based J.M. Martinac Shipbuilding on Wednesday.
Vigor said Martinac refused to meet demands to lower its price to $14.8 million, which Vigor says is what it should cost to outfit the boat with heating and cooling systems and other finishing touches.
Instead, Martinac made a final offer to do the work at the cost of time and materials, without any profit for the company. It was a “creative solution,” Vigor spokesman Steve Hirsh said, but Vigor needs a bottom-line price tag.
“What Martinac offered there was to work with an uncapped, unlimited budget,” Hirsh said.
That won’t work when Vigor has agreed to produce a boat for the state for $115 million, he said.
The cancellation is good news for Everett, where a subsidiary of Portland-based Vigor is now slated to do the finishing work for the price Martinac couldn’t meet.
“If they know how to manage the job in Everett to reach that number,” Martinac Vice President Jonathan Platt said, “they should have no problem knowing how to manage the job in Tacoma to reach that number.”
“I just don’t know what else we could have possibly offered. We’ve got a lot of disappointed guys,” Platt said.
Pierce County loses about 100 jobs with the decision, out of about 500 jobs around the state that will be needed to build the ferry, Vigor says. Another subsidiary will build the hull in Seattle. Nichols Brothers Boat Builders will build the ferry’s upper structure on Whidbey Island for $17 million. Seattle-based Eltech Electrical will wire the boat for $7 million.
Tacoma still will have a small, $1 million share of the work, as Jesse Engineering will build the fore and aft hull units where cars drive on and off.
Ferry officials in Gov. Chris Gregoire’s administration didn’t raise objections, despite pleas from Pierce County lawmakers, said Rep. Larry Seaquist, D-Gig Harbor.
As “owners,” Transportation Secretary Paula Hammond said Tuesday, “we typically don’t get into the middle of disputes with primes and contractors.”
Seaquist said lawmakers now turn their attention to overseeing construction.
“We just need to look and make sure that they’re able to do what they’re contracted to do,” Seaquist said. “I personally have got great concern about the risk of cost overruns.”
Other legislators celebrated Wednesday’s announcement of subcontractors, including Senate Transportation Committee Chairwoman Mary Margaret Haugen, D-Camano Island, whose district includes Whidbey Island. Haugen pushed legislation last winter that helped fund the new vessel with a 25-cent charge on every ferry fare.
“This means jobs not only on Whidbey but across the entire Puget Sound area,” Haugen said in a news release.
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