The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit has affirmed a lower court finding that the Delaware River Port Authority intentionally shut out the lowest bidder on a $17 million bridge-painting project.

The appeals court upheld the decision of a U.S. district court judge in Camden that the DRPA “acted irrationally” when it rejected the low bid by plaintiff Alpha Painting & Construction Co. for failure to document its workplace safety record. The judge below correctly concluded that the DRPA “has gone out of its way” to award the contract to the second-lowest bidder, instead of the plaintiff, which submitted the lowest bid, the appeals court said in Alpha Painting & Construction v. Delaware River Port Authority. But the appeals court said the district judge exceeded his authority when he ordered the DRPA to award the contract to Alpha.

The agency, seeking bids to strip and repaint the Commodore Barry Bridge, required bidders to provide their OSHA 300 reports and Experience Modification Factors (EMFs) for New Jersey and Pennsylvania from the previous three years. OSHA 300 reports give a summary of a company's number of employees, number of injuries reported and a description of each injury. EMFs are an insurance industry index measuring the frequency and severity of workers' compensation claims against a company.