RICHMOND, Va. -- The City of Richmond agreed to pay a contractor 1.8 million dollars to mobilize men and equipment and perform five days worth of work to relocate 11 Confederate "statues" owned by the city, according to contracts and invoices received by CBS 6 through a FOIA request.
NAH LLC said in its proposal it would cost $900,000 to mobilize the necessary men and equipment to Richmond, and estimated it would cost an additional $900,000 for five days worth of work.
Each day of work cost the city $180,000 so the contractor could keep the "necessary manpower and equipment on standby in, or very near the City of Richmond, ready to work at the direction of the City from 12:01 on July 1, 2020 to 11:59 p.m. on July 9, 2020."
The signed proposal goes on to read that "the City agrees to pay $180,000 per day for this time regardless if crews are on standby or working on the relocations."
In the proposal, which Mayor Levar Stoney signed July 1, NAH LLC included under exclusions and clarifications "In the event that all the considered statues enumerated above are successfully relocated, the City agrees to pay $1,800,000 for services rendered, regardless of the actual days worked."
The Arthur Ashe statue on Monument Avenue was included in the company's relocation list, but it was never moved. According to a memo the Mayor sent City Council on July 10, "family members who requested the city remove and relocate the monument during a peak of civil unrest in the city prior to July 1 now wish for it to remain in its current place on Monument Avenue."
In that memo, the Mayor told Council 14 pieces of statuary were removed by the contractors.
Two online fundraising effortsto raise money to pay back the city for the removal of the monuments have raised nearly $31,000 so far, which is far short of the $1.8 million the city needs.
