Orem bid process ‘extremely unusual’ says RFP professional
2KUTV discusses the Orem bid process
2KUTV
The following article about the Orem City bid process was originally posted by 2KUTV.
OREM, Utah (KUTV) — Jesse Riddle is the Legislative Council for the City of Orem. He has been in the job for just a matter of months but was tasked with one of the most controversial decisions, and bid processes the city has had to make in recent years.
He was tapped by the Orem City Council to find a company to do a feasibility study asking if Orem should split from Alpine School District, the largest district in the state. A feasibility study is required by state law if a community is considering separating from its parent district.
If history is any indication, school district splits can be divisive. Case in point, the breakup of the Jordan School District in 2008. In the wake of the divorce, the Canyons School District was established. The path to separation was ugly at times and difficult for many east and west side communities it affected.
Controversy in Orem
Riddle’s decision to pick Discover Education Consultants has sparked controversy in the usually serene Utah County town. Discovery Education Consultants was established just weeks before it won the contract to conduct the feasibility study. Thus, that decision raised eyebrows. However, so did the man who started Discovery. Dr. Paul McCarty has been a long-time advocate for school district breakups. He was an early proponent of the Jordan/Canyons split. More recently, he was part of a team advocating for Draper City to break away from the Alpine School District.
The review process led to a complaint that was filed with the Utah State Auditor’s office. The auditor ruled that the city did not violate any city or state laws when selecting Discovery Education Consultants. However, they did recommend that all public entities use the so-called RFP process whenever possible.
Enter The Bid Lab
Chris Jones and our Crisis In The Classroom team partnered with Jordan Harary with The Bid Lab in New York City. The Bid Lab is an expert on the Request for Proposal process used by city, county, and state organizations. This assures taxpayers get a fair and transparent process when the government picks a private company to do work. “I think it is in the best interest of all taxpayers that the RFP process is used, again, because it ensures that we are receiving the best goods and services out there,” says Harary.
Orem Bid Process Review
We sent Harary the city’s request for bids and the 2 bidders who responded. Before viewing the bids, Harary had a member of her team review and redact the documents. This way, she and her colleague could not see the names associated with the candidates. Because the city’s request for bids did not include a scoring sheet, typical of the RFP process, The Bid Lab established one themselves. Harary says Orem’s process was littered with concerns. She says Orem did a poor job of getting the word out about the bid. It was not advertised nationwide, which is common for RFPs. “You want it to be available to as many applicants as possible because this is in the best interest of the city. The taxpayers want to find the most qualified person for the job,” says Harary.
Additionally, Crisis In The Classroom has learned that instead of casting that wide net as Harary suggested, the city had just a handful of unofficial conversations with 6 or 7 companies that might be interested in doing the study. Harary was also troubled by one of the requirements the city had in the request. Namely instructing potential candidates that they must drop off the proposal in person. Jordan Harary says this shrinks the pool of firms willing or able to drive to Orem to drop them off. Harary says this is unheard of in the RFP world. “Which in my years doing RFPs, in the hundreds if not thousands that we’ve submitted, I’ve never seen,” says Harary.
The Bids
So Orem eventually received just 2 bids. One from Salt Lake City firm, Lewis Young Robertson and Burningham and Discovery Education Consultants. LYRB has 3 decades of experience and dozens of municipal studies under its collective belt. Most importantly, says Harary, LYRB did the feasibility study for the Jordan/Canyons split, the only school breakup in Utah state history. Draper City Mayor Troy Walker, who was involved in discussions about the Jordan/Canyons split in the early 2000s, told Crisis In The Classroom that LYRB is the only firm in the state qualified to do such a study.
The other firm was Discover Education Consultants. They’ve been in business for 3 months. They also do not have a web presence that Crisis In The Classroom could find, and have not done any work for any city, county or state agency. In addition, Harary says it’s inconceivable that Discovery would win this bid. “To have a firm that is newly formed and had never actually conducted a feasibility study before seems like something I would shy away from personally, and in my experience, a government agency would also shy away from,” says Harary.
Crisis In The Classroom 2KUTV Conclusion
So, Crisis In The Classroom wondered by the city would pick a firm that Harary says is not qualified. We have found that support for the split may go all the way to the top. At a recent meeting of the Orem City Council, newly elected Mayor David Young said, “there are a number of compelling reasons why to split,” he continued, “There’s more local control if we had our own district,” said Young.
In the end, Harary says LYRB was by far the most qualified firm to conduct the study, “they’re (LYRB) much more experienced, having actually done this exact job,” says Harary.
Read the original article about Orem’s bid process at the 2KUTV article link: Orem city’s bid process ‘extremely unusual’ says RFP professional. Then, read The Bid Lab’s recommendations to make sure your bidding process is fair and transparent.
