As a young man, Tadeusz Jarosz toiled in a Polish shipyard feeling stuck in a Communist system that failed to reward good work.
He emigrated to America in 1974 and started his own business in Wethersfield, Jarosz Welding Inc., which he has since moved to the South End of Hartford. In America, he says, his hard work has paid off.
Until recently.
Jarosz, known as Ted, says he nearly lost his business and his home because he has not received more than $500,000 for metal work he did as a subcontractor on construction projects at Manchester Community College, Lincoln Middle School in Meriden and Southern Connecticut State University. The debt he’s accumulated disturbs him and his wife.
“She can’t sleep at night. Why should I suffer like that?” Jarosz said. “If you sign a contract, you got to finish the job.”
Jarosz’s dire experience is not uncommon. The contractor on the three projects, Haynes Construction, of Seymour, has been involved in close to 50 lawsuits, according to a search of state Superior Court cases, mostly as a defendant of suits over construction projects.
Yet the state Department of Administrative Services (DAS), which pre-qualifies firms for state contracts, continues to approve Haynes. It last gave Haynes the thumbs-up in January, three years after the firm got a failing grade from the Connecticut Department of Public Works (DPW) for its performance on Southern Connecticut State University –- an unfinished project that was begun in 2003.
Lawsuits Unsettled
Though many of the lawsuits against Haynes have been resolved, many others –- from subcontractors of all types — haven’t. There’s B-G Mechanical Contractors of Chicopee, Mass., which filed suit in July 2006. There’s United Steel, of East Hartford, one of New England’s largest structural steel builders. Others have settled their cases with Haynes: East Hartford’s Horizon Services Corp., a commercial cleaner, Capitol Light & Supply Co. of Hartford, and Silktown Roofing, in Manchester.
It isn’t only subcontractors that pester Haynes Construction for money. In September of 2005, the town of Enfield spent $7,500 on an independent audit of the construction of the town’s new high school, another Haynes project, more than a year behind schedule and over budget.
Paul Haynes, principal of the firm, wouldn’t comment on whether dozens of court cases was an unusual number for a construction company.
“I couldn’t answer that,” he said.
But it seems to be a perfectly acceptable record to DAS, which is charged with pre-approving state contracts, and to DPW, which signs the deals.
DAS, which pre-qualifies contractors to bid on work based on standards of integrity, capacity, experience, financial background and safety, reviewed Haynes Construction in January and passed, despite its track record for serially offering low project bids and then underpaying partners.
Peter Hunter of DAS said it was not unusual for an approved company to be involved in frequent litigation.
“This is very common in the construction industry. You wouldn’t find any company not involved in litigation,” he said.
Sums In Dispute
Though Jarosz has yet to file suit, his experience with Haynes seems to be indicative of the company’s track record of offering terrifically low bids for projects and underpaying subcontractors.
But Haynes, while acknowledging he still owes Jarosz some money, said the welder’s estimates for how much he is owed are wildly inaccurate.
He said the overdue pay is partly due to his difficulty getting paid by DPW, which contracted for the renovations at Manchester Community College and the building of the new student center at Southern Connecticut State. Haynes won the Manchester project with a $28.6 million bid in the summer of 2000, but the scope of the work, which involved arts and law buildings, ran over and DPW acknowledges owing Haynes more. A request for more money is on the state bonding agenda.
“They’ve made a claim for a certain amount and we’re settling it for far less than that,” said Jeffrey Beckham, managing attorney for DPW.
Haynes says he has no qualms with the state over the Manchester project, though he says he won’t owe Jarosz any of it.
“Mr. Jarosz has been paid on Manchester,” he said.
Not so with the $22.8 million Southern Connecticut State work, for which DPW says work has not been completed, Haynes says he has not been paid and legal proceedings have begun.
A DPW review of the project two weeks before its target completion date, in December 2004, found it less than three-quarters done, with no chance of it being completed on time. In its evaluation, the DPW gave Haynes 16 points out of a possible 90 points, or 17.8 percent. It rated Haynes’ work as “unacceptable” in most areas.
DPW ranked the work of Haynes subcontractors, however, as “good,” the company’s highest mark in any area. Haynes said when he gets paid, so will Jarosz.
“I’ll close him out when I get closed out from the owner,” he said.
Beckham said DPW avoids getting involved in payments to subcontractors.
When the Southern Connecticut project manager, John Cavacas, received an irate phone call from Jarosz in January, he wrote a letter to Haynes asking him to “immediately contact Mr. Jarosz and work out his issues.”
“As a general proposition, when subcontractors do work they should be paid for that work,” Beckham said in an interview.
“We would presume that our settlement would allow them to compensate their subcontractor.”
Meanwhile Jarosz has written letters to everyone he can think of, including Lt. Gov. Michael Fedele and U.S. Sen. Christopher Dodd. He stopped calling Haynes.
“It was like a big joke to him. He just laughs in my face,” Jarosz said.
