This Time It’s Formal: Palm Coast Council Fires Holland Park Contractor Over Delays

The Palm Coast City Council this morning took an unprecedented step on a contract so large: it aborted its contract with Tumbleson White Construction, the contractor hired in January 2015 to renovate Holland Park. That $4.7 million project is half a year behind schedule, and may not be done before next year.

City Administrator Jim Landon has blamed Tumbleson White of falling severely short of its commitments, describing its workers as putting “their feet up on the dashboard” and letting the day pass. Company representatives were not at the meeting to speak for themselves.

The council approved the move unanimously, after just 10 minutes of discussion and no questions from council members. “I approve and double approve,” council member Heidi Shipley said.

The city took over the project several months ago, first working alongside Tumbleson White, then essentially—but not yet formally—taking over entirely. Today was the formal ratification of that move. The city has hired its own subcontractors and put its own workers on the job, or did so until Hurricane Matthew struck, causing yet more delays as city workers had to be pulled out of Holland Park to attend to more critical needs across the city.

Tuesday, the only question council members got from a member of the public was about the city’s due diligence, when it contracted with Tumbleson in January 2015. Landon defended the city’s approach. “We have hundreds of projects that have been done on time and in budget,” Landon said. “This one is very visible, it’s bad news.” Nevertheless, he said, the city did what it normally does. This time, the contractor did not work out “for a variety of reasons.”

Landon gave no indication as to when the project will be done. “We have money still in the budget to pay for that work to be completed,” he said, “but we have put the bonding company on notice that the fact that they couldn’t get it done, and if there are additional costs, we will expect the bonding company to pay for those additional costs.”

Landon first threatened to fire Tumbleson at the beginning of September, though that threat appeared to have been premature: the city backtracked quickly, saying it was actually working alongside Tumbleson, but not getting rid of the company. By mid-October, the threat became more serious, turning into a final notice, particularly after the city was angered over Tumbleson’s delays in paying subcontractors.