City Leaders To Take Closer Look At Construction Contracts

Tulsa leaders will take a closer look at the city's construction contracts in the next fiscal year.

At a budget meeting Thursday morning, City Auditor Cathy Criswell laid out her proposed budget for the next year. A big part of it will fund a project to audit contracts for fixing city streets.

City Councilor Connie Dodson said, "Obviously a lot of us get complaints as far as, ‘why are these jobs taking so long?’ ‘They're standing around doing nothing.’ ‘The streets are blocked off and there's nobody even there.’"

Dodson wants to make sure the city isn't wasting time or money and said the audit will help.

Criswell said there are multiple things her office will look into including, how quickly things are getting done, how contractors calculate their costs and if the City is staying in their budget.

"The other thing that we look at is quality. Are we getting what we're paying for,” Criswell said. "That's another complaint, too."

Dodson said she's also been studying other states to figure out how to solve the problem.

"I know in North Dakota they say they have two seasons. They have winter, and they have construction. So they tend to get it done on very, very, tight schedules because they have limited time without bad weather. So I understand the constituent complaints when things seem to drag out for a while," she said.

The ball is already rolling on the project. Now the city auditor's budget just needs to be approved to keep it going.