March 16, 2020 10:32am
The county’s procurement policies generated a lot of discussion at this week’s Huron County council meeting.
The discussion was around the awarding of a tender for three tandem plow trucks to a Sarnia Company, that had submitted the lowest bid, rather than a local company.
“Typically our purchasing policy is that staff recommend the lowest tender on a fixed-tender bid, that’s typically what we’ve gone,” said Steve Lund, Huron County Engineer. “That does promote free and open tendering by suppliers and bidders, so that’s one of the good things and it usually gets us the lowest possible price.”
It was also noted that always buying from local suppliers tends to discourage other bidders over time, but he adds, where the bids are within hundreds of dollars, geographic issues can come into play.
Lund also points out where they go from a fixed-tender situation to an RFP they consider factors other than just the lowest price. He says when they look at something like the owning a truck on a life cycle basis, they also consider the operating costs, which can be significant from one vendor to another, so that’s something they have to be aware of and take into consideration.
In this case, council elected to go with the lowest bid.
