A Prince Rupert City Councillor is looking to do a little hometown shopping when it comes to some of the items that the City of Prince Rupert puts out for bid, with Councillor Barry Cunningham pointing towards a recent call for vehicles for the public works department as an area where preference should be given to local vendors.
The topic came up toward the end of Monday's Council session when Councillor Cunningham asked about the purchasing policy in place at the city and if local businesses would get preferential treatment when it comes to the tender process.
"I just notice that there is a tender out for vehicles for the yard, or for city workers and I was wondering if businesses that pay taxes in this town will have preferential treatment. I noticed the last time we put out a tender for a vehicle it went to a company in Terrace and the difference in price was only 1500 dollars. And if you get a couple of warranty calls on a vehicle, that 1500 dollars is eaten up pretty quick ... I'd rather see a tendency towards people that pay taxes and employ people in our town, supplying the city with their vehicles and that"
Mr. Cunningham asked if there was a change required towards the city's policies on purchasing when it comes to some of the city's purchases.
The City's Financial Officer outlined how the current policy does not say that it is going to enable locally owned businesses to over-ride any other bids, adding that if Council wanted to entertain any changes that city staff could into the language of the requests.
The councillor followed up on Financial Officer's comments by that by noting how it would be good and how it was common sense and good business for the town and an opportunity for the city to take some leadership in the area of buying locally.
You can review the discussion from the City's Video archive starting at the 15:30 minute mark
It's not the first time that the Councillor has tried to have City Council consider a bit of boost towards the local business community, he raised similar questions back in August of 2018 an inquiry at the time which did not seem to gain much traction around the council chamber.
The current City of Prince Rupert policy on purchases can be reviewed here.
You can find some of the recent Request for Bids from the city through our archive page here.
More notes of interest from Monday's City Council session can be found on Council Timeline feature, while a wider overview of council discussions is available from our Council Discussion Archive.
For a look at some of the news out of the city's commercial sector see our Business archive here.
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