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After the Ohio Supreme Court criticized the prevailing wage portion of Franklin County’s “Quality Contracting Standards,” the County has gone back to the drawing board and enacted new bidding standards that will be used to determine the “lowest and best” responsible bidder. In an effort to defuse the criticism of the 2002 standards for penalizing companies for minimal prevailing wage “violations,” the new policy only disqualifies contractors if:

• There were more than three (3) prevailing wage “findings” in a two-year period; and
• The findings met or exceeded $5,000 per project.

Minor prevailing wage violations or settlements would not disqualify the bidding contractor. No single finding based upon a journeyman-to-apprenticeship ration is to be considered unless part of multiple similar findings.

Finally, a contractor may be disqualified if the contractor has an Experience Modification Rating (“EMR”) rating of greater than 1.5 (formerly 3.0) with respect to the Bureau of Worker’s Compensation risk assessment rating.