Four Queens school jobs, 84 bids. The NYC School Construction Authority opened the last two on Wednesday, May 13, 34 minutes apart, and the difference between them tells you how this market works. The plain roof-and-wall job drew 24 bidders. The one with HVAC, fire alarm and structural work in it drew 11.

P.S. 90 Horace Mann, 86-50 109th Street in Richmond Hill, solicitation 26-22820D, opened at 11:43 a.m. The scope is flood elimination, parapets, exterior masonry, windows and roofs. KG Construction Services, Inc. was low at $13,798,000 of 24 bids. Euro Castle Construction Corp. was second at $14,174,251, a $376,251 gap (2.7%). KOKO Contracting, Inc. was third at $14,828,000 and National Environmental Safety Company, Inc. was high at $21,666,000. Ten bids landed inside $1.61 million of the low. Board: RFI-000494.

P.S. 84 Steinway, 22-45 41st Street in Astoria, solicitation 26-026718, opened at 12:17 p.m. The SCA's bid schedule lists structural repairs, exterior masonry, roofs, flood elimination, HVAC upgrades, fire alarm replacement and windows. ABC CONSTRUCTION CONTRACTING, INC. was low at $21,775,000 of 11 bids. Adam's European Contracting Inc. was second at $22,990,000, $1,215,000 back (5.6%), and P & K CONTRACTING, INC. third at $23,150,000. Armstrong Roofing, Corp. was high at $32,940,000.

P.S. 64 Joseph P. Addabbo, 82-01 101st Avenue in Woodhaven, solicitation 26-22485D, opened Friday, May 8, at 12:16 p.m. Roofs, masonry, windows, parapets, flood elimination and rooftop condenser units. Twenty-five bids, the most of the four. Army Construction, LLC was low at $12,378,400 and VENUS GROUP, INC. was second at $12,457,000. That's $78,600, or 0.6%. BHAGHIANA GENERAL CONSTRUCTION INC was third at $12,610,151. Twelve bids were inside 8% of the low. POSITIVE ELECTRICAL ASSOCIATES, INC. was high at $22,485,000, an 81.6% spread.

P.S. 70, 30-45 42nd Street in Astoria, solicitation 26-23275D, opened back on March 18 at 10:54 a.m. Roofs, windows, parapets and exterior masonry, 24 bids. This one had an outlier. B N Restoration Inc was low at $11,775,786. The next bid, B & R Construction Services Corp, was $13,749,000, and KOKO Contracting, Inc. was third at $13,800,000. The low was $1,973,214, or 16.8%, under second and 27.2% under the $16,166,500 median. WHITE ROCK CONSTRUCTION CORP. was high at $21,350,000.

Across the four tabs, 44 different firms put in 84 bids, and four bid all four: Whitestone Construction Corp., P & K CONTRACTING, INC., ANSU CONSTRUCTION, INC. and Armstrong Roofing, Corp. None of those four was low anywhere. The four apparent low bids add up to $59,727,186, and no firm was low twice. None of the tabs came with a published engineer's estimate. Apparent low is not an award.

Why this matters. Scope decides the crowd. A roof-windows-masonry job is work dozens of SCA-qualified GCs can self-perform or sub out easily, so the room fills and the margin between first and second shrinks to almost nothing, as P.S. 64 showed. Add mechanical, fire alarm and structural pieces and half the room stays home. If you're a GC, that's where the thinner fields are. If you're a sub, the crowded jobs mean more calls for your number, not fewer.

What to do next. Masonry, roofing, window and waterproofing subs: price to KG Construction Services, Inc. at P.S. 90, Army Construction, LLC at P.S. 64 and ABC CONSTRUCTION CONTRACTING, INC. at P.S. 84, where HVAC and fire alarm subs are in play too. At P.S. 70, keep numbers alive with both of the first two bidders until the SCA acts. Our P.S. 84 listing is RFI-000493, P.S. 64 is RFI-000501 and P.S. 70 is RFI-000765.

Update, Sept. 28, 2026: The SCA's tabs now mark the apparent low as awarded on P.S. 90 (KG Construction Services, Inc.), P.S. 84 (ABC CONSTRUCTION CONTRACTING, INC.) and P.S. 64 (Army Construction, LLC). On P.S. 70, the tab marks the second bidder, B & R Construction Services Corp at $13,749,000, as awarded and as the lowest responsive bidder. The record gives no reason B N Restoration Inc's lower bid was not taken.