Allen County Commissioners decided to wait another week to award a bid on two ambulance barns to be constructed in Humboldt and Moran despite receiving a recommendation from architects Zingre and Associates, who drew up the plans for the barns.
Commissioners Jerry Daniels and Bruce Symes were both ready to vote but as expected, Bill King wanted to postpone it another week.
King was visibly upset with how the bid process went down at last weeks meeting. Two of the companies he explicitly asked to be involved in the bid process did not receive bid sheets or notification of a pre-bid meeting. Waverly Lumber, who was awarded a bid to construct the Allen County Volunteer Fire Station in Moran, was one of the companies who didnt receive a bid sheet.
I am ready to move forward with this, Daniels said. This has been drawn out long enough already. If it were not for land acquisitions taking so long, the one in Humboldt could have been built last year and the one in Moran could have been built and completed this year. I was pleased with the bid process.
Zingre and Associates recommended Koehn Construction of Fredonia for the job. The company came in $49,000 less than the next lowest bid at $698,000 for the two barns.
While King agreed they were already running behind on the project, he said he was not prepared to vote on it at this time.
COMMISSIONERS tabled a vote on purchasing a rescue boat and trailer. Daniels said they narrowly avoided another potential flood when Tropical Storm Barry made its way through Arkansas this past weekend.
Commissioners agreed the county needs to purchase a boat soon and perhaps look at purchasing another one in the coming year. Commissioners were going to have Terry Call get another bid from Tactical Rescue Services out of Arkansas. The company gave the county a bid of $36,418.50 for a rescue boat and a trailer that would hold two boats.
Symes suggested the county should look at other sources and maybe find someone that specializes in used boats. Daniels disagreed, saying over the years my experiences with boats, is you always purchase new. You just never know what you are going to get until it arrives.
EARLIER IN the meeting commissioners agreed to purchase vinyl tile for the elevator entry at the second floor and on the basement level, as well as on the elevator itself. Public Works Director Ron Holman received one bid for the job, which came from Iolas Decorator Supply for $2,915.85.
PUBLIC WORKS Director Mitch Garner reported that his short-handed crew has been mowing but that two mowers had broken down. He reported that he has two workers currently working on a hangar at the airport and is about to start doing dirt work at the site of the volunteer fire station.
