EDITORIAL POLICING CITY CONTRACTS BID FOR LAPD'S NEW HEADQUARTERS RAISES MORE QUESTIONS ABOUT COST AND QUALITY.

THE Los Angeles Board of Public Works is right to be concerned that the only construction company to bid on the new police headquarters was Tutor-Saliba.

For one thing, the bid is $43 million over the city's budgeted $200 million for construction of a replacement for the Parker Center headquarters. But even more worrisome is the fact that Sylmar-based Tutor-Saliba has a checkered history with cost overruns and shoddy construction problems on other projects.

If the city is lucky, it would get its new police HQ for just $400 million when all is said and done, only $250 million more than originally projected four years ago. If it is not, then the whole thing will be as structurally unsound as Parker Center is reputed to be and cost even more.

Board of Public Works President Cynthia Ruiz lamented the single bid, but noted that there's just not many companies able to handle this big a project, particularly when there's already so much downtown construction going on.

That may well be, but it's not reason enough to hire a company well known by the city as problematic, most recently with the Van Nuys FlyAway job. Despite nearly getting fired from the FlyAway job, Tutor-Saliba won another city contract for runway expansion at LAX, proving once again it pays to contribute heavily to the politicians' campaigns.

Indeed, the city itself might share some of the responsibility of discouraging competition by continuing to award projects to politically connected firms like Tutor-Saliba.

Even before Tutor-Saliba was involved, the LAPD headquarters project was inspiring skepticism as the price tag continued to creep upward, from $150 million four years ago to $340 million for design and construction. And it would reach $383 million if the city accepts the Tutor-Saliba bid -- many millions more than it cost to build the entire Metro Orange Line busway.

The Public Works Board appropriately held up the bid for a review by the city engineer over the next month. This would be the right time for those who serve the public to rethink not just the bid, but also the feasibility of the LAPD center project at this time and the entire bidding process.