Jacksonville veteran company out nearly $10,000 amid construction dispute

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — A local veteran staffing firm is caught in a construction-related dispute between two larger companies.

Ben Davis is President of Now Hiring Heroes, which finds work for veterans in the private sector.

He tells Action News Jax he supplied several welders as part of the construction of Wildlight Elementary School last year.

Invoices from that work totaled nearly $10,000, money that was never paid.

“I’m a small-business owner, there’s not a whole lot of employees at my company,” Davis said. “Our bottom line is being heavily hurt by this.”

For months, Davis said he called Quality Mechanical Contractors, the company expected to pay his employees.

But Quality Mechanical told Davis it hadn’t been paid by the primary contractor, Thomas May Construction.

As Action News Jax learned, Thomas May Construction is suing Quality Mechanical for breach of contract and negligence.

Court documents allege that Quality Mechanical provided “defective workmanship” and delayed its completion by “abandoning the project.”

“We would like for someone to at least be cooperative with us, let us know there was litigation, which we didn’t know until you uncovered,” Davis said.

The owner of Quality Mechanical spoke with us on the phone Friday evening.

He called the claims in the lawsuit “unfair” and said that delays were actually caused by Thomas May Construction, as well as weather. He said Thomas May then asked his company to perform the work within a much shorter timeline.

Quality Mechanical’s owner said he was sympathetic to Davis’ situation, but reiterated that he didn’t have the resources to pay Davis, since his company was never paid.

He also said he believed the lawsuit from Thomas May Construction might put his company out of business.

Action News Jax has been trying to get a comment from Thomas May Construction for weeks now.

Calls to the company had gone unreturned. Then on Friday, an employee told reporter Kevin Clark she was unable to put him in contact with anyone about the lawsuit.

Caught in the middle of this dispute between two bigger companies is Ben Davis. He said that other small contractors haven’t been paid because of this dispute.

“Any kind of payment would help us at this time,” he said.

Cox Media Group