Severe pollution causes hazardous gases to bubble up from the Tijuana River. (Photo by Thomas Murphy / Times of San Diego)
New court documents in a lawsuit over San Diego County’s $26 million contract to supply air purifiers to residents affected by air pollution from the Tijuana River suggest the county was aware that the air purifiers did not meet noise and filtration requirements as outlined in the contract — yet moved forward anyway.
The documents are included in an amended writ of mandate filed by Medify, the company that lost the $26.8 million air-purifier contract to Oransi LLC in March.
Attached to Medify’s legal challenge are declarations from county procurement specialists in charge of awarding the contract, which provide a timeline of the days leading up to the county’s acceptance of Oransi’s bid to deliver tens of thousands of air purifiers to residents.
According to the declaration, county Procurement Specialist Nallely Anderson wrote to Oransi on March 19, in a pre-award survey, requesting that the company confirm its purifiers could meet the air filtration requirements while still operating under the 45-decibel noise limit.
The next day, without any response from Oransi, the county moved forward with the contract and submitted a Notice of Intent to move forward with Oransi.
Three days later, Anderson’s declaration states that Oransi responded to the county’s questions about whether or not their air purifiers met the bid requirements.
In its response, Oransi’s representative referred to internal testing, which showed that the air purifiers neither met the air filtration requirements at their highest speed nor did they meet the sound limitations.
Despite this, the county of San Diego and the San Diego Air Pollution Control District continued with Oransi.
The county’s push to deliver 30,000 air purifiers is part of its plan to provide relief to South Bay residents and business owners forced to breathe in the noxious hydrogen sulfide that rises from the polluted waterway. The purifiers are viewed as a temporary solution as the United States and Mexico hunt for a way to fix aging and inadequate infrastructure at the transboundary water treatment plant.
In its newly amended legal challenge, Medify is asking that a judge overturn the air purifier contract with Oransi and award the contract to Medify, or, if nothing else, force the county to go back to the beginning and issue a new bid.
In a statement to Times of San Diego, Oransi Chief Operating Officer Ben Barani said his company and the county followed all necessary steps and his company was rightly awarded the contract.
“The Oransi air purifier supplied to SDAPCD under the contract (the AirMend Pro), in addition to being the most cost-effective product in the bidding process, was superior to all other competitors’ products in every respect cumulatively. That is why Oransi was awarded the contract,” said Barani in an email to Times of San Diego.
In regard to the legal challenge and Medify’s claims, Barano declined to comment due to pending litigation.
County spokesperson Tammy Glenn also declined to comment due to pending litigation.
San Diego County Air Pollution Control District has not responded to a request for comment.