By Greg Nikkel
Weyburn city council made a departure from usual practice and went with the highest-priced proposal, for a short and long-term study of the city’s landfill with a view to improve and upgrade it, and to make it self-sustaining as a city utility.
The City of Weyburn put out a request for proposal (RFP) for the landfill, and seven consultants responded, none of them from Saskatchewan, ranging in price from $29,000 up to $160,232, with the proposal on the upper end of the scale chosen to do the study.
Council had originally earmarked $200,000 in 2015 for a study to be done, but the study was not done “due to competing priorities”, and was set for this year instead.
City engineer Sean Abram said the large discrepancy in prices for the study was due largely to what each consulting firm was proposing to do for the city in the study, and the firm with the highest price-tag will provide the most comprehensive and wide-ranging study of all the consultants.
Coun. Dick Michel objected to the high price tag, while acknowledging the study is crucial and important for the city to undertake.
“I’m not used to taking the highest tender on a project of this size,” he said, asking city manager Bob Smith what his thoughts were on this proposal.
Smith declined to make comments on the proposals, saying, “The director of engineering is far better to assess these things, with his experience in dealing with these RFPs. I know when I reviewed it, I wasn’t drilling down and reading them four times,” referring to Abram who said he read over all the proposals as many as four or five times each to try and determine which would be the best one for Weyburn to go with.
Abram pointed out also that this was not a tender, but a request for proposal, with the difference being that the city put out what their needs and requirements were in asking for proposals from consultants about what they would do in a study of the city’s landfill.
The City wants a five-year operational plan to provide a detailed plan for the operation of the landfill, including improvements to the operations, a review of the landfill’s compliance with environmental regulations, and a financial review to make the landfill self-sustaining.
The City also wants a long-term plan with a view to providing value to city residents, including being environmentally responsible, financially sustainable, including what it would cost the city to replace the landfill, and to eventually decommission the current one.
The proposals were reviewed by Abram, city manager Smith, the superintendent of public works, Claude Morin, and the superintendent of the water treatment plant, Shabbir Sakrani. The company chosen was Sperling Hansen Associates based in North Vancouver.
Councillors Winston Bailey and Mel Van Betuw both said they could not support the proposal with this price tag, as they felt the same information could be obtained at half the cost from a different consultant. Bailey added that part of his difficulty with this proposal is that the future regulations said to be coming from the government is not known, so it didn’t make sense to spend this amount on a consultant on what may or may not be coming down the road for the city.
“I’m not in disagreement to doing the study, I just can’t justify $160,000,” he said, and Van Betuw echoed his concerns in agreeing with Coun. Bailey.
“I just feel we could get just as much information for $80,000,” said Coun. Van Betuw, pointing out this company even put in $20,000 just for “incidentals”.
“There was a significant difference in the task list of what they would do for us. That is what it boils down to,” said Abram. “We’re not getting the same information from each of these proposals. You will end up with three substantially different reports.”
In supporting this proposal, Mayor Debra Button pointed out the city budgeted $200,000, and this proposal is much less than that. As far as the coming changes in environmental regulations, “I do know there are changes coming down for municipalities operating landfills. It’s a matter of when, not if. What we’re asking for here is to get ahead of the curve on this.”
The proposal was passed by a vote of 4-2, with councillors Van Betuw and Bailey against.
City council voted on a tender for new crosswalk lights at the intersection of 18th Street and First Avenue, where three vehicle-pedestrian collisions have taken place, including one involving a 14-year-old bicycle rider this past week. The winning bid came from an Alberta-based company, Can-Traffic Services, for $36,608.
There were two Saskatchewan-based companies who also bid, with Industrial Electric of Weyburn bidding $44,694, and Fabers Electric of Carlyle bidding $61,730 on the project.
Questioned on the wisdom of hiring a company based in Sherwood Park, Alta., Abram said their bid was 22 per cent lower than the next lowest bid. The city is hoping the work will be done by the end of September.
In the Building Department report, the city issued five building permits worth a total of $133,500, four of them for residential additions or alterations, and one for a garage. Year-to-date, the city has issued 48 building permits worth a total of $4,052,100.
