MOOSE JAW — Prairie South School Division has given Staples Canada a $2 million contract to provide cleaning and janitorial supplies for the new Coteau Hills Elementary School over the next five years.
The division awarded the company the contract in January after posting a tender on SaskTenders looking for custodial supplies and bathroom dispensers, with the half-decade contract having an estimated value of $400,000 annually, according to a report presented during the recent board of education meeting.
“This (tender) was a little bit earlier than we would have done otherwise, but we needed to have our dispensers and stuff for the new school,” Ron Purdy, superintendent of finance, told trustees. “So, we did this now.”
When division administration awarded the contract, it also “evaluated the basket of goods” that it would be receiving and determined that the value of the supplies is actually around $205,000 per year, even though the contract is worth roughly $400,000 annually, he continued.
“This is our first contract with Staples, so we’ll see how that goes,” Purdy added.
When asked whether administration had considered awarding the contract to a local company, Purdy said everyone could apply for the contract on SaskTenders since it’s a provincial website. However, no one locally applied for the tender.
Also, in January, the division office needed to replace a planer for Central Collegiate’s practical and applied arts program, so it purchased that tool from Busy Bee Tools for $15,373.
Administrative procedure 513 deals with issuing contracts and says the board has delegated responsibility for the awarding of tenders to division administration, except where bids received for capital projects exceed budget, the board report said. In that case, the board can accept or reject those tenders.
Meanwhile, competitive bids are required for the purchase, lease or acquisition of an interest in real or personal property, for the purchase of building materials, for the provision of transportation services and for other services exceeding $75,000, and for the construction, renovation or alteration of a building and other capital works exceeding $200,000, the report added.
The next PSSD board meeting is Tuesday, March 4.
