Smud

Public Contract Code section 7104 requires that a local public entity that has contracted for public work involving an excavation deeper than four feet issue a change order altering the contractor’s cost of performing the work when the subsurface conditions at the jobsite materially differ from those “indicated” in the contract. (§ 7104, subds. (a)(2) & (b).)

Plaintiff Condon-Johnson & Associates, Inc.. (Condon-Johnson), was the low bidder on a contract with defendant Sacramento Municipal Utility District (SMUD) to construct 13 concrete foundations for piers to relieve the pressure caused by the moving hillside behind a powerhouse owned by the utility. The contract required Condon-Johnson to bore holes through the hillside to the site of the pier foundations. The contract contains a changed conditions clause incorporating the requirements of section 7104.

The contract sets forth soil boring information for the “p[iir]pose of determining what type of rock may be encountered . . . .” The information includes the boring logs from two test borings by SMUD adjacent to the jobsite and the results of compression testing of two rock samples selected by SMUD from one of the…