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4. COMMUNICATIONS (Cont'd) Mr. Brownell advised that the report he has received is that we had a contract wi -th the general contractor- -Goins Construction Company and he had listed Howell Electric Company as his electrical subcontractor, under Permit No. 70945. We have no arrangements with any of these unauthorized people doing electrical work. President Nimtz said, as he understands this situation, this contract is not with this Body; it was with Model Cities. It was not a Redevelopment contract and Ms. Swan was requested to redirect her letter to the Model Cities Agency, as this is a Model Cities contract. Ms. Swan said that the same conditions probably occur under the Redevelopment contracts as the same people are involved in many of the contracts. Mr. Brownell advised he didn't feel that we would as we require performance bonds and are getting substantial contrac- tors in the E -7, Bureau of Housing Program. President Nimtz advised this is the situation we are getting into. In the first letter discussed, from Ms. Conchita M. Washington, the complaint was that we are requiring bid bonds in these contracts, and the reason for this in talking to the present members of this Com- mission- -who are long -time members--is'.that we are try- ing to protect the public in this activity. On the one hand, we get a complaint because we are asking for bonds in these matters to protect the public and to insure that once they bid they are going to enter into the contract, and, secondly, when they enter into a contract, they have a bond to complete it. Since having completion bonds, we have not had any incidents with any Redevelopment contract come to light that we know of. The Chair requested Com- missioner Wiggins to comment on the subject. Commissioner Wiggins advised that we are not in a position that we can require the contractors to hire union help neces- sarily, but we can, and do, require they pay the prevailing wage rates, and this is a part of the. understanding and the knowledge and the forms that the contractor files when he bids on the jobs that we are involved with. There would be no advantage to the contractor to hire substandard help when he has to pay the price that it costs for top -grade help; e.g., when you have to pay for it, you may as well have it, and this is probably the rationale that most of the contractors would make that are working on jobs we are involved in. This does mean that the jobs will probably cost more money, and we are having problems getting contractors to bid on the contracts under these terms to bring them within our price for the amount of work that needs to be done just to bring it up to code - -not anything fancy - -the remodeling just to bring it up to the city building code. These repairs are running beyond - 5 -