July 07, 2008

Local governments, school districts and fire districts now have a new resource to save taxpayers money.

As promised in County Executive Andy Spano’s State of the County Address, Westchester has launched an extensive program to help municipalities and these districts save money in the procurement process by sharing existing county contracts and creating new cooperative contracts.   

“This will save taxpayers money by getting local governments, schools and fire districts the best deal possible,” said Spano. “This initiative focuses on bidding and purchasing cooperatively on the items that we all need to purchase anyway. Why not take advantage of this to get the best deal together? Savings will be realized in all areas of procurement.”

This is one in a series of shared service initiatives that Spano has implemented to reduce the costs shouldered by local governments and districts. This effort is designed to give them a one-stop place to find information relating to cooperative purchasing and ways to work together to develop new joint contracts.

The county recently surveyed its 148 local governments, school districts and fire districts and found there to be great interest in a  shared procurement process and cooperative contracts. Respondents also said they want the ability to access Westchester County contracts from a Web site, instead of by mail or e-mail. 

This has now been done. Purchasing agents are encouraged to register an online account with the county's Bureau of Purchasing and Supplies, a division of the Department of  Finance, in order to access the list of current contracts. The site will be updated regularly, with the goal to have more and more contracts available. In order for local governments to purchase using county contracts, they need to have an inter-municipal agreement with the county, many of which already exist.

To assist the municipalities and districts with the process, the county has designated a shared services coordinator, Dianne Munro. Munro, a professional buyer for government agencies for more than 17 years, will continue to reach out via telephone, e-mails and meetings with local governments and districts to explain the cooperative purchasing process, demonstrate the Web site and identify commonly purchased items in order to create cooperative contracts. The county will also provide training and information to those agencies that wish to generate revenue through the sale of surplus property, another area the county has been very successful with.

New Rochelle Mayor Noam Bramson praised the initiative, saying, “This is a valuable means of controlling costs without diminishing the quality of services available to our taxpayers. I applaud the county executive for his initiative, and I am confident that many communities like New Rochelle will avail themselves of this opportunity to promote efficiency and savings.”

How it will work
For years, local governments have benefited from some county contracts by “piggybacking” off county- created contracts. This means that the county creates a bid for a specific item or set of items and includes in the wording of the bid that local governments must be permitted to order through this contract at the same prices and terms available to the county.  This has saved local governments and districts administrative costs associated with the bid process. 

While this has been beneficial,  the county is now taking this further. Before bidding, the county will work with local governments and districts to establish bid specifications and then bid  and award the item(s) jointly. The joint effort will save administrative costs and should lead to lower prices due to the economies of scale.

For example, if Westchester County needs 50 picnic tables and local recreation departments need 35 picnic tables, Westchester will prepare a bid document for 85 picnic tables, presumably getting a better price due to the quantity. And each participating municipality saves time and money associated with the bid process, such as the costs of document preparation and advertising.

Some of the examples of contracts the county already has in place are:

• biodegradable leaf bag
• cement brick and allied materials
• fire extinguisher refill and service
• fire extinguishers
• granular chlorine 100-pound drums
• grass and wild-flower seed
• hazardous waste lamp pick up service
• indoor recycling containers
• industrial gases
• lumber
• polyethylene liners
• resuscitator inhalator and air pack refill and service
• sodium hypochlorite and sodium hypochlorite II