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Public Construction Bids

Public construction bids are bids placed to provide construction services for a state, federal or local agency, including school districts. Due to legal requirements, public construction bids are frequently longer and more complex than a bid prepared for a private business.

When it comes to regular bids, the lowest price usually is enough to win a contract. Public construction bids, however, can include a number of requirements that go beyond having the lowest price. Public construction bids, like nearly all other bids, want to know the strength of the contractor and their safety record. However, public construction bids may also require a contractor to lay out their plan for working with a certain percentage of women or minority-owned small businesses if they win the project, as demanded by law. There may be other issues related to matters such as the environment that go beyond private bid requests.

Public construction bids are usually assembled by a number of people, from the construction staff to the public relations team, but the numbers are normally handled by an estimator or accountant assigned by a general contractor to a specific project. No two estimates are the same, as requirements differ from one project to another.

During the traditional bid process, public construction bids cover the amount it would cost a general contractor to build a project, pay its employees and make a small percentage of profit. The estimate covers the cost of items like concrete for the foundation, cables for electrical wiring, flooring, plumbing, carpentry and HVAC (heating, ventilation and air conditioning).

In the design-build process, public construction bids are more involved. In this process, an architect and general contractor combine as a team and present a building or project design and construction contractor services in one proposal. The design-build process is used by those who believe an architect-contactor team with a past history of working together would be more efficient and, as a result, cheaper than an architect and contractor working together for the first time.

Public construction bids for a construction manager at-risk (CM at-risk) project falls in between the two. The architect is hired separately from the general contractor, but the contractor is involved in the project from the pre-construction process all the way through completion. The estimate comes in the form of a guaranteed maximum price, which covers all services rendered from pre-construction through the building process.

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