BY DAVE BENJAMIN
Staff Writer

JACKSON - A contract has been awarded by the Township Council for the installation of a synthetic turf field at the Holman School sports fields.

The council approved the contract at its May 22 meeting. Four bids were received from firms that wanted to install a synthetic turf field for football and lacrosse at the sports complex.

The winning bid was the lowest bidder, the LandTek Group, of Amityville, N.Y., with a bid of $914,913.

Also bidding on the job were Green Construction, $1,122,380; Applied Land-scapes Tech, $1,162,925; and Bob Viersma and Sons, $1,179,425.

"Our project engineer French and Parrello determined that the LandTek Group was the lowest bidder," Business Administrator William Santos said. "We also called around for references."

Santos said municipal officials determined that at other jobs it undertook, the LandTek Group was "on time and stayed within the budget. That weighed heavily as well. Many times a government can just take the lowest bidder and the lowest bidder ends up costing more than the highest bidder. But [we did our homework] and we had very good references for the LandTek Group."

Santos said the company's bid is within the timeline and the budget that have been established for the project.

Mayor Mark Seda said, "I'm proud to announce it's the first of the ballfields that will be done. It came in at a decent price. We made sure the specs were tight because we have a tight time schedule. We're looking for fields by Aug. 1."

Seda said Pop Warner youth football officials understand the schedule can go as late at Aug. 15, but that would be the absolute limit.

Seda said Jackson's sports organizations came together to help make the project a reality.

Council President Angelo Stallone said he thinks having a synthetic turf field that can be used all the time will help alleviate scheduling problems and field availability issues for Jackson's sports teams.

Councilwoman Emily Ingram said Jackson's youngsters are very excited about having a synthetic turf field to play on.

Councilwoman Ann Updegrave said there have not been enough accommodations for all of the sports organizations in town to use the fields effectively. She said that is expected to change once the synthetic turf field is in place and used to its maximum efficiency.