Settlement reached on Oak Park Library

By John Loesing Acorn Staff Writer

Although shunned by a contractor and investigated by a grand jury, the new Oak Park library still might be open by this spring, officials say.

Ventura County reached a tentative settlement last week with the contractor’s insurance company, a move that allows construction on the long-delayed project to move forward.

Keith K.C. Lee, Inc., a Los Angeles builder, defaulted on the 10,000 square-foot library last summer. CNA Continental Casualty, an Illinois-based surety bond company, agreed to pay the county $275,000 in liquidated damages and cost overruns, said Dan Murphy, assistant Ventura County counsel.

"There’s been an agreement with regard to the liquidated damages and the potential for latent defects," Murphy said. "We are not out anything."

The final cost for the new library will exceed the original $2.2 million estimate, however.

Murphy said a new contractor has been chosen and construction could resume within several weeks. The project will take three-to-four months to complete. The name of the new contractor wasn’t released.

"The new contractor bid an amount to finish the contract, we have a certain amount that has been withheld, and the surety will pay the difference between what we withheld and what it will cost to complete the new contract," Murphy said.

The county-funded library is located on the campus of Oak Park High School and will be open to both students and community residents.

The library has been sitting half-built for months and is long overdue. Tall weeds have sprouted throughout the construction area and piles of dirt and debris clutter the grounds.

Delays began when state and county inspection crews found defects in the masonry work, among other problems. In one instance, a tower overlooking the one-story building had to be torn down.

"It’s an eyesore. We want to get it done," said Todd Haines, an Oak Park resident and longtime member of the community’s Municipal Advisory County.

The ill-fated library dates back to 1997 when Oak Park Unified School District and Rancho Simi Recreation and Parks District wrestled with a complicated land swap deal that would have given the library more ground upon which to build.

The original library was planned for 15,000 square feet.

Questions about deed restrictions and title insurance forced the library to be built on a smaller, school-owned parcel.

Construction finally began in July 2000 and was supposed to take just over a year, but what was once a promised to be a new centerpiece for the school and community was later left abandoned as the contractor walked off the job.

Seismic Controversy

Soon after the default, the Ventura County Grand Jury received a citizen’s complaint about the library delays and began an investigation.

The complaint charged the county with incompetent supervision and refusing to fire the contractor after he "cut corners" and "failed to follow approved plans."

"The central thing was an accusation that the public officials responsible had somehow not followed the requirements for seismic conditions," said a grand jury spokesperson who asked to remain anonymous. "That, of course, turns out to be not true."

The grand jury said the county acted in accordance with the state’s earthquake laws when it approved the Keith Lee contract, but the 19-member body also said the county failed to "fully verify" Lee’s qualifications, which ultimately led to the construction fiasco.

"There is no formal pre-qualification process for construction contracts," the grand jury said in its findings. "However, the [Ventura County] Public Works Agency does check to see that the apparent bid contractor has the required license for the work specified," among other qualifications.

The grand jury said the agency acted "responsibly and competently" during the course of the construction.

Lee eventually passed county muster, even though former Ventura County Supervisor Frank Schillo reported that the contractor had a history of shoddy work on a project in Beverly Hills.

Among the problems in Oak Park, Lee failed to designate a masonry subcontractor and couldn’t perform the work himself. Because the contractor faced high penalties and financial hardship, the county allowed him to voluntarily default.

Officials immediately began negotiating with the insurance company for payment of damages. Murphy said, that by law, the insurance company can take action against the contractor to recover those damages.

Lee couldn’t be reached for comment.

Students Make Do

Crowded conditions on the Oak Park campus forced officials to turn the school’s old library into classroom space last fall, leaving students without a library.

Throughout the school year, students have had to rely on their home computers and other libraries in Conejo Valley/Las Virgenes to get their work done.

"The library we had before was not really that adequate and so people who really wanted a good library weren’t using ours anyway and that was one of the motivating factors to build this new facility," said Cliff Moore, Oak Park principal.

Thanks to the Internet, the students have access to a Web database that contains full text from more than 250 magazines and periodicals worldwide.

"It’s specifically for educational institutions, so it’s something that has been—for the research part—has been able to pick up some of the slack there," Moore said.

School officials kept college guides, textbooks and other reference materials on the campus, but the county took the majority of the library books and placed them into storage until the new facility is finished.

When completed, the library will feature some 20 computer stations with access to periodicals, encyclopedias, jobs and government. Students and the public can take advantage of a separate audiovisual room with state-of-the art electronic equipment.

Also planned are study carrels and seating for at least 100. A large children’s section will be included as well.

The library isn’t the only construction taking place on the OPHS campus.

The school is adding a 15,000 square-foot activities building with kitchen, band room, chorus room, multipurpose room and seating for 400.

Construction on that facility proceeded on schedule until the recent high winds blew down one of the walls, Moore said.

Although construction on the activities building started two years after the library, both buildings could be finished around the same time.