Arizona republican., 1911-07-29
STATEMENT BY CONTRACTOR
 vlEUx.

It was with considerable surprise
 that I read in your issue of yester- day that the paving commission of
 the city of Phoenix had notified the
 Barber Asphalt Paving company that | it would refuse to accept the curbs and gutters on Washington street be-
 tween Third and Fourth streets.
 was awarded the contract for doing
 the curb and gutter work required by I the contract between the city and l the Barber company and construct | ed the curbs and gutters condemned | by the paving commission. My bid
 was a fair one and was based on the
 plans and specifications adopted by 1 the paving commission and approved | by the city council, as near as a practical man could base a bid on | said plans and specifications. My
 reputation in your city for first class
 work is without a flaw. I believe, and | in the fifteen years in which I have | been engaged in this kind of work | in your city l have built up a rep utatiOn that cannot be taken from me by any such action as was talk, n | by the engineers in conforming the work under m- contract with the Barber company. These engineers find five specifications under which they condemn this work They say first that the curbs and guttcrs. as laid do not conform to the specified tions in the following particulars: l. Expansion joints with tarred pa- per were not put in every fourth scoring" Inspection. Sec. of the specifications says: "The contractor shall prosecute the work only in the presence of Some authorized agent of the paving commission. and any work done in the absence of such agent shall be subject to rejection" This work was done in the presence of MT. Cornwall, the authorized agent of the paving commission, who. in the interest of a better grade of work, instructed me to make an open joint rather thar a tarred paper ex- pansion joint
 2. Where expansion joints were found they do not conform to SCOT irg exscept in the west half of the block on south side of Washington street between Third and Fourth streets. in which latter expansion joints were found every fourth SCOT ing. but no tarred paper" This was according to instructions of Mir Corn wall, made before witnesses.
 2. Forms do not extend the full depth of the work as called for in the specifications" Placing concrete No. IT. of the specifications says: ''The total thickness of the finished gutter shall be five inches" The plans on file in the city hall shows that the total thickness of the fin ished gutter shall be seven inches. Il used a six-inch form. being as near as it was possible to come between and plans and specification. and be ing one inch deeper than called for by tho specifications.
 4. The alignment pf the curb face Is poor" The alignment of the curb conforms strictly to the stakes as set by tho engineers.
 :. Tn many places the concrete in the bottom of the gutter is not as per specifications" Two inspectors supervised this work and pronounced it according to specifications.
 This answers the faults found by the engineers and to any person ar persons without prejudice I will glad ly leave the verdict
 Now that the paving commission has seen fit tn open the ball and find fault where none exists, through desire to vent a personal spite I shall take it upon myself to call the atten- tion of the people of Phoenix and m f-tiP I'll fax paving for the construction of these gutters and the paving of the streets to a few things that ought to be remedied before his paving comnis- sion has gone any further in its work
 First: Tho plans on file at the city hall do not conform to the spec ifications. The plans show the gut ters tO 5e se"en inches while the specifications say they shall be five inches. The specifications call for one quarter inch top while the plans do not show an:' top at all. In this respect wish to sa-- that be- ing practical cement man. a res ident of this city and with a reputa- ton to sustain. I took it upon myself to make from H to + inch tops in these gutters. and myself bore the extra expense When this work was shown to MT. Hackett If tho pnvirg commission it failed of his approval.
 Here is a sample of what I had to work against and the mate idiOcy of the drafters of the specifications. No. IT of the specifications. under the caption Placing concrete says: Concrete for gutters shall be placed in forms ns soon as mixed and i'm mediately tamped in a thorough man 'rer, using small curb tamper at the outer edges, and evenly struck off and smoothed to the top of the forms A trowel finish layer A inch thick shall be laid composed of one part cement and 1A parts of coarse sand that will pass through a screen of one-ouarter inch mesh and that part passing through to be rejected" This calls for sand that will pass through quarter inch mesh and then says that the sand that passes through the quarter inch mesh shall be rejected. The commission that adopted such specification certainly krew it's business and should be re- tained as the proper guardians of the peoples interests. This is just one instance of many of the same