Opinion ID: 370399
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: claim against wmata

Text: 13 With respect to plaintiff's claims against WMATA, the district court held that: 14 WMATA through its engineers and consultants undertook to advise and consult with its contractors and supervised their performance against specifications. It convened the February 1974 meeting in an attempt to arrive at a reasonable solution. Beyond this it had no duty, contractual or otherwise, to enforce its resolution of a dispute between two adamant contractors who had contractual obligations to cooperate and remedy a problem wholly within their control. (8a) 15 We disagree with this conclusion of the district court. Section 1.14 of the contracts in question are as follows: 16 The Authority may undertake or award other contracts for additional work, and the Contractor shall fully cooperate with such other contractors and Authority employees and carefully fit his own work to such additional work as may be directed by the Contracting Officer. The Contractor shall not commit or permit any act which will interfere with the performance of work by any other contractor or by Authority employees. 17 In Hoffman v. United States, 340 F.2d 645, 166 Ct.Cl. 39 (1964), which involved similar provisions in contracts 8 between the United States and contractors who were constructing parallel bridges 500 feet apart on the same river, the court held that the United States had an obligation under the contract to secure the cooperation of the upstream contractor for the benefit of the downstream contractor. The court went on to state: 18 These rights inured through the right of the Government to require cooperation from this subcontractor through the Government contract with the prime contractor, the State of Oregon. There is no evidence that defendant ever attempted to secure this cooperation, other than arranging for one unsuccessful conference with Young & Smith who refused to make any changes 'because nobody offered to pay for it.' 19  . . . For the Board to say, under circumstances where the contracting officer himself found the acts of the contractor upstream to be the cause of plaintiff's delay, that 'the contracting officer is not designated by the contract as the arbiter and quite properly refused to take sides in the matter,' is a complete and unwarranted disavowal of all responsibility on the part of the Government to direct or require cooperation from anyone (except plaintiff). Such a conclusion by the Board is erroneous as a matter of law and not supported by the substantial evidence in the administrative record. 20 Id. at pages 650-51. 21 The contracting authority has the duty to invoke its contractual rights to compel cooperation among contractors. Abutting contractors enter into contracts such as are present here with entities such as WMATA with the expectation that supervisory authority will be exercised to insure cooperation. Cf. Paccon, Inc. v. United States, 399 F.2d 162, 185 Ct.Cl. 24 (1968); L. L. Hall Construction Co. v. United States, 379 F.2d 559, 177 Ct.Cl. 870 (1966). 22 In this case, as in Hoffman, the contracting authority limited the exercise of its supervisory authority to the arranging of an unsuccessful conference, when it had a duty to compel cooperation. Shea had a right to expect cooperation from MKE and to expect WMATA to enforce § 1.14 for Shea's benefit. WMATA's failure to exercise its supervisory function and compel cooperation has resulted in their breach of a contractual duty owed to Shea. Therefore, the district court erred in concluding that Shea's cause of action against WMATA lacked merit.