Minority contractors too expensive, builder says By LYNN STEVENS / H-P Staff Writer
BENTON HARBOR -- If they had bid competitively, Phyllis Watson would have hired Benton Harbor construction companies gladly. But they didn't.
Watson told city commissioners at their regular meeting Monday night that she tried very hard to use city companies as subcontractors. But their prices were too high for her budget for the low- to moderate-income houses, and their bids were not submitted on time.
Commissioner Etta Harper last week had called for an inquiry into why Watson's company, HER Construction, had not used locals to dig or pour foundations for the first of 54 houses planned for the Bellview neighborhood. Harper was concerned that Watson sold her plan in part because she is black, but she had no black Benton Harbor residents on her building crews.