In a rare situation for the City of Lloydminster council, a procurement motion was defeated, leaving administration to figure out the next steps.
The safety codes services; building and plumbing contract award, was presented to council Nov. 24. The item was previously debated extensively at the Nov. 3 council meeting, with councillors raising concerns over administration’s recommendation to award the contract to Lethbridge-based Parks Enterprises Ltd.
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Public concerns were also heard by council prior to both meetings.
Coun. David Lopez wanted to see the public consulted on the proposed company change.
“We missed a step and we missed a major step. I just don’t know how we go and approve this, missing that major step,” he said. “I fear we’re not going to have the same level of service as what we have right now.”
Lopez says he’s not happy with the prospect of tax dollars going to a company without a local office.
“I’m not happy with it, I’m just going to put it that way. I’m not happy with how this was done; tax dollars going outside of the community to a company that doesn’t even have an office in Lloydminster,” he said.
Administration clarified they followed their procurement process and policy when developing and sending out this request for proposal (RFP).
Coun. Jim Taylor asked how the scoring matrix was created.
“That was an administration team that put the RFP together,” said Terry Burton, the city’s director of planning and engineering.
Taylor explained the process creates a roadblock when making the decision to support administration’s recommendation.
“What I’m seeing, I’m happy now. Admin is following procedure, coming up with the way they’re scoring it and then, based on that scoring, asking council to finalize a decision that is already been made on the criteria that admin has put in front of us,” he said. “It creates kind of a roadblock where I didn’t get to agree upon the way the proposal was made, but you’re asking me to make a decision based off the way the proposal was scored.”
City manager Dion Pollard says a challenge in Lloydminster’s procurement process is that council isn’t involved in, or aware of, the scoring criteria.
“I would say our teams, as Don (Stang) mentioned, they put the best foot forward in terms of what we normally do, how we grade them,” he said. “We did even take a few members of our planning team out of the process, so it was viewed properly in terms of how it was evaluated and included some other members of administration to evaluate that.”
Coun. Michael Diachuk says it’s difficult to get the whole picture on why Parks was chosen over the current vendor, Superior Safety Codes Inc.
“I think part of the challenge sometimes is that the whole story never gets to be shared to the same level and depth. There are two customers involved in this; one is the construction community and the other is the city,” he said. “We’re privileged to have heard some of the information that’s not really out for public discourse and it needs to remain that way for a lot of reasons. I think some of this is the fact that there has been a successful relationship with this individual.”
Diachuk pointed to the new tender winner being available more as the new tender asks them to be available four days a week instead of 3.5, while still offering the same level of service.
Coun. Michele Charles Gustafson noted the importance of having a local presence.
“Maybe we’re getting a sense of how important having local criteria is in this procurement process,” she said.
Administration gave some insight into what they deem as important in awarding this contract.
“What we believe is important is the number of days the inspector will be in the city and available for inspections,” said Don Stang, executive manager of operations.
Burton clarified the current contract required inspectors to be available for 3.5 days and the communication the city received from Parks is they’d be available four days a week.
“Where their office is located, where the electronic plans go to those things were less important, which is why it wasn’t included there,” said Stang.
Coun. Justin Vance echoed the sentiment from other councillors that he wasn’t happy with the recommendation.
“I’m still not satisfied with the award of Parks, as well,” he said. “I know we’ve had all the information brought to us and all of your respective teams did your due diligence and went through the process and informed us as much as you can.
“One email to me is concern from a developer, but when I’m getting eight, nine, 10 emails from developers, that’s an alarm.”
Council defeated the motion to approve the award of the safety codes services; building and plumping permit plan review and inspections services to Parks Enterprises.
According to Burton, the current agreement ends on Dec. 31.
The City of Lloydminster said in an email to the Meridian Source it is currently confirming next steps following council’s decision. Administration is reviewing the appropriate process moving forward and an update will be provided once more information is available.
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