Repository: UIHistories Project: Board of Trustees Minutes - 1962 [PAGE 1258]

EXTRACTED TEXT FROM PAGE:

1961]

UNIVERSITY OF I L L I N O I S

1255

"To University of Illinois, an Illinois corporation, the sum of Twenty Thousand Dollars ($20,000.00), to be invested and the income therefrom to be used for the support, maintenance, and upkeep of the Dr. Alfred S. Burdick Memorial Room in the Y.M.C.A. Building and for Y.M.C.A. activities in said building." The University Y.M.C.A. Building in Champaign has a room so designated, but is owned and operated by the Young Men's Christian Association of the University of Illinois, a corporation separate from the University. It appears that the intention of the Testatrix can best be carried out by the University renouncing this bequest and permitting its distribution to the Board of Trustees of the Young Men's Christian Association of the University of Illinois. A petition for approval of such distribution has been filed by the Northern Trust Company and Theodore Sheldon, Executors of the estate of Ella Grace Brown Burdick, deceased, in the Probate Court of Lake County. The Vice-President and Comptroller and the Legal Counsel recommend that the Board of Trustees renounce this bequest to the University of Illinois, and authorize the Legal Counsel to execute on its behalf such papers, documents, and pleadings as may be necessary to accomplish this purpose and to permit this bequest to be distributed to the Board of Trustees of the Young Men's Christian Association of the University of Illinois, or to such other person or corporation as the Court may designate. I concur.

On motion of Mr. Johnston, this recommendation was approved.

SETTLEMENT WITH CONTINENTAL BUILDERS, INC. (22) In March, 1949, Continental Builders, Inc., an Illinois corporation, having submitted the lowest bid for the general work in connection with the construction of the Florida Avenue-Race Street Faculty Housing Project, was awarded the contract for that work. Under the provisions of that contract, Continental Builders, Inc. was required to furnish a performance bond, in an amount and with sureties satisfactory to the University, within thirty days after the opening of the sealed bids. When that bond was not promptly furnished and it became evident that Continental Builders, Inc. was experiencing difficulty in securing and furnishing it, the Board of Trustees, at its April, 1949, meeting, took action directing that, if the bond would not be furnished before the expiration of the thirty-day period, the award of the contract to Continental Builders, Inc. would be set aside and new bids would be taken for the contract for the general work upon the project. On the last day for furnishing the bond, the University was notified that United Pacific Insurance Company had agreed to execute it as surety. However, that company did not then have the rating required by the University in the last publication of Bests Guide. For this reason, the University notified Continental Builders that it would not accept a bond executed by that surety company as surety and, when no other performance bond was tendered the following day, the award of the contract to Continental Builders, Inc. was set aside and its bid deposit in the sum of $10,792.95 was forfeited and retained by the University. Claiming that the University's above mentioned actions were unreasonable, wrongful, and unlawful, and that it is entitled to a refund of its bid deposit plus interest thereon and to recover from the University other damages it alleges it sustained by reason of the foregoing, Continental Builders, Inc. instituted suit against the University in the Superior Court of Cook County, Illinois, in April, 1954. In that suit, it prays judgment against the University in the sum of $70,000 and the costs of suit. Since the suit was instituted it has developed that, although United Pacific Insurance Company did not have in the 1948 issue of Bests Guide, which was the last published issue of that publication in April, 1949, the policyholders and financial ratings required by University regulations with respect to surety companies executing bonds running to the University, it actually had the required ratings with Bests at the time it offered to execute Continental Builders, Inc.'s Performance bond and those ratings for it were shown in the 1949 issue of the Guide which was issued about two months later. Had University officials known 'his at the time the bond was tendered, it would have been accepted, and Con-