The subpoena for Groton officials seeks records for two school projects, the West Side Middle School and the Carl C. Cutler Middle School, which were converted into elementary schools at a cost of about $90 million in 2019. Groton is the fourth municipality to receive a subpoena from the federal grand jury concerning school construction programs. The others are Bristol, Hartford and Tolland. The subpoenas asked municipalities to submit all responsive material to the grand jury by March 15. The town was prepared to hire Stamford Wrecking Services for the West Side project and American Environmental Inc. for the Cutler project because they were the lowest bidders. There were significant price disparities between what the winning companies had offered and what AAIS had proposed. For the West Side school project, for instance, Stamford Wrecking’s bid was hundreds of thousands of dollars less than the bid submitted by AAIS. A similar situation played out in Bristol when city officials there tried to hire a contractor for hazardous waste removal at the Bristol Elementary School project.
At least 4 towns now subject to subpoenas in school construction probe