JAY – Selectmen unanimously voted Monday to eliminate a warrant article that would have raised an additional $100,000 and would have approved buying a firetruck this year.
Voters will still consider raising $100,000 to add to the firetruck reserve account at the annual town meeting referendum April 25, that is included in the Fire Rescue Department’s proposed $252,772 budget. The firetruck reserve account stands at about $212,000 now.
Selectmen made their decision after learning that only one company out of nine submitted a bid for a rescue/pumper truck that the Fire Rescue Department is looking to buy.
An independent audit assessing the apparatus needs of the department recommends a new rescue/pumper truck be bought to replace Engine No. 3 in 2005. Voters have rejected buying a new truck the past two years.
The only bid came from Pierce, which was for $374,042.
The bid package submitted was at least 4 inches thick in a binder.
The only other correspondence the town received was from an E1 sales representative, which noted that the company would have to make hundreds of variations to the required specifications to submit a bid to build a truck, Town Manager Ruth Marden said. The company claimed it couldn’t bid because the bid specifications were for a Pierce truck.
Selectman Rick Simoneau said he didn’t want to put the truck before voters again, if they didn’t have something new to present. He had hoped several bids would be submitted.
He suggested a new committee be put together, which included a town mechanic, to meet with vendors to discuss specifications for the truck.
“I just don’t feel it’s fair to townspeople,” Simoneau said, “knowing we have one bid.”
The other selectmen agreed with Simoneau.
Selectman Barry McDonald added that he didn’t want to anger voters by asking them to raise $200,000 for a firetruck this year and have them shoot down both articles.
Fire Rescue Deputy Chief Scott Shink said he didn’t understand why E1 wouldn’t submit a bid since it had bid on the same truck a couple years ago as did Pierce and another company.
Committee members would need to be committed to the time consuming process, Shink said, to meet six or seven times with each vendor to go over different parts of the truck.
Selectmen suggested that Shink see if the department still has the bids submitted from the companies two years ago, which could speed up the process.
It would take seven to eight months to build a truck.
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