Pursuant to Section 120.57(3)(f), Florida Statutes, the issue is whether Respondent's proposed rescission of an award of a design-build contract to Petitioner for the construction of additions to two high schools was contrary to the Respondent's governing statutes, rules or policies or contrary to the specifications of Respondent's request for qualifications.Respondent violated statute requiring the award to the lowest responsible bidder when Respondent rejected protester`s bid for violation of an ill-defined, previously undisclosed conflict-of-interest prohibition.
The School Board of Palm Beach County opened sealed bids on March 9, 1989 for the construction of additions to and remodeling of the Jupiter Elementary School. The apparent low bidder was Milne and Nicholls, Inc., with a base bid of $1,452,000. The next lowest bidder was Spirit Construction, Inc. Spirit Construction filed a timely formal protest to the bid tabulation showing Milne and Nicholls, Inc. as low bidder. Ultimately, the proceeding was assigned to the Division of Administrative Hearings for formal proceedings. At the final hearing, Spirit Construction's Exhibits 1-6 were admitted into evidence, but Exhibit 3 was admitted only to corroborate the testimony by William Hodge of Spirit Construction. School Board Exhibits 1 and 2 were admitted into evidence as was Joint Exhibit 1.Contractors failure to list material supplier for work it would do itself rather than through a subcontractor not a material defect in its BID
