Last week marked the deadline for bids for professional service contracts. By Wednesday, the deadline, Secaucus had received more than 100 bids for various professional services, ranging from town attorney to town prosecutor.
In total, at least eight contracts have been cut, totaling $270,000 in savings.
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Last year’s count
In 2009, the Town Council approved 23 contracts to lawyers, accountants, public relations specialists, and other professional service providers, spending more than $1 million.
That number was actually $110,000 less than the amount of money the council had spent on professionals in 2008, when 24 such contracts were approved. Despite the savings to taxpayers, Mayor Michael Gonnelli and his allies on the council have argued that Secaucus could save more money by doing some outsourced work in-house, and by soliciting competitive bids for contracts.
By outsourcing the work, a town can use the companies’ services only when needed and avoid paying the benefits associated with full-time labor. But critics believe that some outsourced work is unnecessary, some could be done by current municipal employees, and that too many contracts are awarded to politically connected donors and supporters.
When those 23 contracts were awarded last year, many residents were also critical of the fact that some contracted services received only one or two bids, meaning there was very little competition for the work.
The new Town Council won’t award the professional service contracts for another month, but already there have been changes to the way contracts are advertised. And a few contracts have either been eliminated or combined to save money.
In total, at least eight contracts have been cut, totaling $270,000 in savings.
The cuts
The list of professional services and contractors that were cut this year isn’t surprising, given the Independents’ voting record on the Town Council. Most of the contracts they eliminated are the ones they have voted against each month over the past three years.
The contract for attorney Dan Beck, who received $24,000 last year to do lobbying in Trenton on Secaucus’ behalf, was cut, as were other lobbying fees paid to other attorneys. For example, MBI Gluckshaw, which was paid $23,700 last year to lobby on tax-sharing issues in Trenton, has also been cut.
“I just think this is work we can have done for free by our legislative representatives in Trenton,” Gonnelli said last week. “Working with [Assemblyman Vincent] Prieto, [Assemblywoman] Joan Quigley, [Congressman] Steve Rothman, and [State Sen. Nick] Sacco, we can probably be just as effective, if not more so, than we were using Gluckshaw.”
The $90,000-plus contract paid to the firm of Weiner Lesniak, the town’s special tax attorney, has also been eliminated, as was the contract to Calvanico, a firm that received $27,000.
Also done away with was the contract given to a town architect, which saves another $10,000.
Public relations work that was done last year for $20,000 will this year be combined with a grants writing position for a cost savings.
The town plans to save another $79,000 by accessing services offered by the North Hudson Community Action Corporation, rather than having similar services offered by Meadowlands Hospital Medical Center.
Finally, last year the town attorney’s fees were capped at an hourly rate of $210; this year the hourly rate for the town attorney will be capped at $175.
The town hopes to realize additional cost savings by doing some work in-house that had previously been done by professional service providers.
Street sweeping, for example, which until recently was done by Dependable Sweeping, has already been taken over the Secaucus Department of Public Works. Some grant writing will also be done by current municipal employees rather than outside professionals.
100 bids
For the remaining contracts that will be filled this year, the town received more than 100 bids, an increase over the 27 or 28 bids Secaucus received last year.
The town expanded the scope of its advertising. Ads soliciting bids were posted on the municipal Web site and of the League of Municipalities Web site, as in the past. But ads were also placed in two daily newspapers.
Mayor Michael Gonnelli and his allies were critical of the level of advertising done in the past and blamed the low number of bids, in part, on the way advertising was done during Dennis Elwell’s tenure as mayor.
“I hope to get at least six to eight bids for each contract,” Gonnelli said. If the town gets less than three bids for any one professional service, he said the town would re-advertise and try to attract more bids to increase competition.
Some services that haven’t been put out for bid in several years were this year.
“We haven’t solicited bids for our broker for dental and health insurance. They’ve had the same people here since 2003,” the mayor said. “I felt that was something we should be going out to try to get competitive bids for.”
He estimates it will take the council a month to sift through all the bids received last week. In cases where the town received two or more unusually competitive bids, the firms might be called on to make presentations before the Town Council before the contract is awarded, the mayor said.
E-mail E. Assata Wright at awright@hudsonreporter.com.