LAKEWOOD RANCH — After being given a 30-day termination notice in August, Wackenhut Corp. will be asked to accept month-to-month employment in Lakewood Ranch due to a bidding error when a new security firm was selected.
A month ago, district boards approved a recommendation by the Inter-District Authority to dismiss Wackenhut for roving patrol and gate guarding in Summerfield, Riverwalk, Greenbrook, Edgewater and Country Club, and to replace it with Alert Protective Services of Sarasota, the winner from a field of 10 companies whose bids were considered.
But IDA officials recently discovered that an 11th bid was mishandled, a fact that IDA lawyers say requires that the bidding process must start all over again, which will cancel the previous vote.
“A proposal from a vendor was rejected and shouldn’t have been,” said Lakewood Ranch community manager Bob Fernandez after the issue was discussed at Tuesday’s accounts and invoices workshops at Town Hall.
Supervisors Alan Roth and Phyllis Troy expressed concern because they say they have not received security reports in September from Wackenhut, which was supposed to turn things over to Alert on Oct. 1.
In other news:
n John and Shirley Surowiec were trapped in their car for awhile on Hidden River Trail over the weekend.
When the couple encountered high water on the road between Lakewood Ranch Boulevard and Lorraine Road, John urged his wife to, “Just keep going slowly.”
But eventually they could go no further. A Lakewood Ranch maintenance crew, which was putting out high water signs, helped them back up and out of danger.
“It was scary,” Shirley Surowiec said.
The temporary closing of Hidden River Trail and some other roads, and the flooding of Adventure Park in Greenbrook were about the worst outcome of the rain in Lakewood Ranch on Friday and Saturday.
Lakewood Ranch officials Tuesday called the rain “close to a 100-year rain event.”
A 100-year rain event is often considered nine to 10 inches of rain in 24 hours.
Officials are now saying Lakewood Ranch got eight to nine inches of rain in 24 hours Friday and Saturday.
No homes were flooded, but it was apparent that some drainage ditches need cleaning, said supervisor Dave Brucker.
n Lakewood Ranch ponds and lakes are so filled with vegetation that they have become the No.1 resident complaint, leaving irrigation pressure, cell phone towers and illegal golf cart users in the dust, supervisors agreed Tuesday.
Lakewood Ranch is on its third lake maintenance vendor in the last two years and there is still a level of dissatisfaction, said operations director Ryan Heise.
“Maybe the problem is that the standards we have set for them are not the ones we really want,” said Bob Stepleman of District 2.
The duties assigned to the current lake care vendor do not include actually going out in the lake and pulling out algae and other vegetation and debris by hand, Heise said.
Apparently, that costs more. But Carol Frankland of the Summerfield-Riverwalk Village Homeowners Association reported that lakes that have a “rock,” the resident name for a pond aerator shaped like a rock, are reporting satisfaction with their ponds and lakes.
Heise said he will try to get more “rocks” approved in the budget.
Richard Dymond, reporter, can be reached at 708-7917.
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