Court Opinion

ID: 9454360
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 18:44:27.911371+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:34:05.400682
License: Public Domain

DAVIS, Judge
(concurring in part and dissenting in part):
I join the court’s opinion on the claims under the “Changes” clause. As for the “Changed Conditions” aspect, I agree with Commissioner White that “the Board could reasonably accept, as it did, the Government’s evidence as to the date when ground water was first encountered by Woodcrest, and the Government's circumstantial evidence indicating that Woodcrest was not misled by the defendant’s erroneous failure to show the ground-water table on the core boring logs.” Perhaps the most important piece of evidence on which the Board could, and did, rely was testimony that Wood-crest placed its initial order for the procurement of dewatering equipment five days prior to the time when ground water was first encountered in the per*415formance of the excavation work.1 As the commissioner said: “This indicated to the Board that Woodcrest expected to encounter ground water and was not misled by the defendant’s erroneous failure to show the ground-water table on the core boring logs.” In addition, the Board found, permissibly, that (in Commissioner White’s words) “Woodcrest’s president (who was in charge of the preparation and submission of Woodcrest’s bid on the proposed contract) was familiar with Florida and had supervised the performance of construction jobs in different parts of that State, that he knew that the project site was located between and fairly close to the Atlantic Ocean and the Banana River, that he knew that the terrain was flat and lowlying, that he knew that the area had a heavy annual rainfall, that he knew that the subsoil which was to be excavated in connection with the performance of the contract consisted of sand, and that he knew that sandy land absorbs water rather than repels it.” To me, all of this adds up to a substantial basis for the administrative conclusion that plaintiff was not misled. See Centre Mfg. Co. v. United States, 392 F.2d 229, 239, 240-241, 183 Ct.Cl. 115, 133-134, 135 (1968) (dissenting opinion); Sternberger v. United States, 401 F.2d 1012, 185 Ct.Cl. 528 (Oct. 1968) ; Koppers Co. v. United States, 405 F.2d 554, 186 Ct.Cl.-(Dec. 1968). I would uphold the Board’s determination and dismiss the entire petition.
LARAMORE, Judge, concurs in the foregoing opinion concurring in part and dissenting in part.

. There was a conflict as to when ground water was first met; on this point, the Board chose to believe (as it had a right to do) the Government’s witnesses rather than plaintiff’s president.