School facilities: design-build contracts.

(1) Until January 1, 2025, existing law authorizes a school district, with the approval of the governing board of the school district, to procure design-build contracts for public works projects in excess of $1,000,000, awarding the contract to either the low bid or the best value, as provided. For those projects using best value as a selection method, existing law requires competitive proposals to be evaluated by using only the criteria and selection procedures specifically identified in the request for proposals, and requires the school district, as it deems appropriate, to weigh certain minimum factors, including price of the project. This bill would authorize a school district, as an alternative to price of the project, to instead weigh as a factor the proposing design-build entity's design cost, general conditions, overhead, and profit as a component of the project price. The bill would require a contract that is awarded based on the proposing design-build entity's design cost, general conditions, overhead, and profit as a component of the project price, to be subject to further negotiation and amendment up to the sum of the costs of construction subcontracts awarded, and would require construction subcontracts for the design-build contract to be subject to an open book evaluation by the school district. If the school district determines the sum of the costs of the construction subcontracts exceeds the anticipated value of the project to the school district, or if any individual subcontract is unreasonable, the bill would authorize the school district to require the design-build entity to repeat a certain process in the awarding of construction subcontracts or to cancel the design-build contract with the school district. (2) Existing law authorizes a governing board of a school district to alter certain existing public project contracts without the formality of securing bids, as provided, if the change does not exceed a specified statutory amount or 10% of the original contract price, whichever is greater. Existing law requires the governing board of a school district to determine the method of payment for construction contracts, including progress payments for completed portions of the work or for materials delivered on the ground or stored subject to the control of the board and unused. This bill would explicitly apply those provisions to contracts awarded for design-build contracts for public works projects in excess of $1,000,000, as described in (1) above.