Okaloosa County BOCC — April 15, 2014 — Action Item Printout — reading text

BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS AGENDA REQUEST DATE: April 15, 2014 TO: Honorable Chairman and Members of the Board FROM: Jeff Littrell SUBJECT: Trailer Mounted By-Pass Pump - Emergency Sole Source Purchase DEPARTMENT: Water and Sewer BCC DISTRICT: 5 STATEMENT OF ISSUE: OCWS staff is requesting BCC approval for an emergency sole source purchase of a 12" Diesel Powered Trailer Mounted By-Pass Pump to be utilized at Post Office Lift Station and other lift stations in the long-term future. The sole source form and documents from a previous bid process are attached for your review. BACKGROUND: The Post Office Lift Station, located on 37th Street in Niceville, is one of our oldest and largest lift stations in our entire service area. It pumps approximately 800,000 gallons per day from the East County Service Area (Bluewater Bay, Lancaster, Raintree, etc.) to the Niceville Valparaiso Regional Sewer Plant in Niceville. In the modern era, a station of this magnitude should be built with three or four pumps. Being an old lift station, it was only designed to have two pumps. Unfortunately, only one pump is in service - the other aging pump exploded on 3/27/2014. With a few sewer spills in the past year at this lift station (they were reported properly and the spills did not get into a body of water or wetlands), we need a reliable solution. Per state regulations, any public lift station shall have a minimum of 2 pumps in it. We feel that it is not responsible to operate this lift station with only one pump in operation. In addition, this lift station will be no longer be needed after Phases 1-5 and 9 are completed of the East County Master Sewer Plan (attached) - approximately 8 months from now. Instead of spending over $60,000 for a new pump for Post Office Lift Station, where lead time for the pump is approximately 6 months, we feel that a better alternative is to purchase a trailer mounted by-pass pump to be utilized at Post Office Lift Station, in the case of failure of the remaining pump which is currently in service. In the future, when Post Office Lift Station is eliminated, this can be used at other lift stations during emergency conditions. With so many large lift stations aging, the need for a second large horsepower trailer mounted by-pass pump is increasing. On Dec. 18, 2012, the BCC approved a bid award of the first large horsepower trailer mounted by-pass pump to the low bidder meeting specifications - Thompson Pump (Pensacola), in the amount of $97,750.00. We have since found that pump to be very useful; however, we need it to be utilized at other lift stations for emergencies, and we can't use it for other emergency needs if is it sitting stationary at one station (Post Office Lift Station) for a long period of time. Thompson Pump is willing to provide the same pump in the 2014 model for the same price - $97,750.00 (see attached quote). Since we have an emergency, time constraints, and since this has been competitively bid out, staff is recommending the purchase of this second large trailer mounted bypass pump from Thompson Pump for $97,750.00. A Sole Source Form requesting the emergency procurement is attached to this agenda request. With our responsibility and stewardship to our customers in mind, we feel that this is the best and quickest option from an environmental and financial perspective. Should the BCC approve this request and Purchasing issue the subsequent purchase order, the new trailer mounted bypass pump should be here in approximately 30-45 days. If we were to go through the process of obtaining quotes or the bid process, the timeline would be extended anywhere from 1-3 months in order to go through procurement, subsequent BCC agenda requests, submittals, and final approvals. By issuing an emergency purchase order now, this will help meet our time constraints - essentially of needing this pump "yesterday". This piece of equipment is not in the approved Capital Outlay portion of our FY2014 budget. The Water & Sewer fund has sufficient amounts to pay for this emergency purchase. A budget transfer will be required and that transfer will be brought before the BCC for approval. OPTIONS: Approve or deny. RECOMMENDATIONS: OCWS requests BCC approval to authorize Purchasing to issue an emergency purchase order to Thompson Pump in the amount of $97,750 for a large (12") diesel powered trailer mounted by-pass pump per the attached quote. RECOMMENDED BY: APPROVED BY: Ernie Padgett, County Administrator