City council awards landfill contracts
The gatehouse at the city’s landfill will be changing hands next month.
The gatehouse at the city’s landfill will be changing hands next month.
In a 3-2 vote at Monday evening’s council meeting, council opted to award a five-year contract to Lanix Property Management Ltd. for an annual cost of $139,250.90
Lanix had the lowest of two bids on the deal.
The current gatehouse operator, the Raven Recycling Society, submitted the higher bid of $149,777 annually. Another higher bid was submitted but disqualified due to a lack of tender security.
Raven has been running the gatehouse since 2000, when it was awarded its initial contract.
A five-year extension to the contract followed in 2005, with two more two-year extensions after that.
The contract was extended by another month in December.
While city staff had recommended another one-year contract extension on this and another contract at the landfill, council turned that down, opting for just a one-month extension to allow time for it to be put out to tender.
At last night’s meeting, councillors Betty Irwin and Dave Stockdale voted against the contract award, arguing their votes were for the same reason they voted against just a one-month extension in December.
As Irwin said, there’s no issue with the tender and award brought forward.
However, she felt the contract should have been extended by one year, as a number of changes are expected for the landfill this year with the anticipated addition of a curbside recycling program.
One year would have given time for any issues to be worked out as those changes happen, they each said during council discussion.
Irwin noted the importance of being consistent in her vote.
A letter to the editor published in Monday’s Star noted the involvement of Justice Minister Mike Nixon as a founder of Lanix.
It also noted the involvement of others associated with the Yukon Party in various roles in recycling in the city, but also noted: “Absolutely nothing in the above is unlawful.”
Ownership of the company did not come up during council discussion last night.
Through the tender process, it was determined “... Lanix has the skills and abilities to undertake this contract.”
In a previous interview, Raven’s executive director, Joy Snyder, said Raven will “adjust and keep going.”
Meanwhile, the transfer station at the landfill will remain in the hands of General Waste Management, which bid $81,000 annually on the five-year contract with another 3-2 vote on the award.
Irwin and Stockdale voted against the contract award.
The $81,000 annual cost compares with a current annual contract cost of $112,251.
General’s was one of two bids on the deal, though the other was disqualified due to a lack of tender security.
The new contracts will come into effect Feb. 1.
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Comments (1)
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Just Say'in on Jan 15, 2015 at 5:43 pm
I am an avid recycler. Well, Ok, maybe it is more my wife. I think it is great but we can't loose touch with reality as well. It can not be done at any cost to the Tax Payers and the environment. Two things are happening or at least have been happening. We are either spending huge amounts of money to export our garbage to the lower mainland and burn thousands of gallons of diesel in the process or just take it to the dump. That is correct, most of the bottles that my wife worked so hard at washing, picking off the labels and removing the tops in an effort to clean up the planet were just crushed and sent to the dump. Why keep living the lie. They do not want our glass in Vancouver, believe it or not they already have lots, a never ending supply that only about 5% gets recycled. Why would they want to import any? Cardboard that is bundled at Raven, gets wet and black mould and is useless and goes to the dump. I could go on and on but it is just not viable were we are unless we burn burnables to make heat or power that is the only way.