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COUNCIL FLUSHES PHARMACY BIDS
Source: Gonzales Ascension Citizen
Date: 9-May-2007
Author: Aaron E. Looney

DONALDSONVILLE - The Ascension Parish Council voted Thursday to scrap bids for the parish's jail pharmacy service after discussion over an out-of-state company making the low bid brought about concerns over the bidding process.

The matter came up during bid reports at the council's regular meeting, held at the Parish Courthouse.

Parish Purchasing Agent Bonnie Borel told the council that the low bidder for the service was Diamond Pharmacy Service of Indiana, Pa., the company which also handles the same service for the East Baton Rouge Parish Jail among others nationwide.

However, Parish Councilman Martin McConnell said that the other bidder, Landry's Pharmacy of Gonzales, did not know about the bid notice until the day that bids were to be accepted and could not place a bid in time.

"(Landry's Pharmacy) was not aware of the bidding until right before closing time and did not have the opportunity to put together a bid," McConnell said. "I'm not trying to stack the deck in any way, but I really do believe in doing business locally."

Both Borel and parish legal counsel Ricky Babin said that the parish followed proper public bidding procedure to procure bids. This includes advertising the bid request in the parish's official journal, The Gonzales Weekly Citizen, for a three-week period.

When asked by the council if it could reject the bids, Babin said they could only do so if there was a specific cause.

"You can't use that someone didn't know as a cause," Babin said.

Councilman Doug Hillensbeck then asked if the matter needed to be taken into executive session, to which both Babin and Council Chairman George Valentine said it did not.

When Councilwoman Cheryl Fontneot asked if the matter could be sent back to committee, Babin said that the council may want to "look into some other method of purchasing prison pharmaceutical services" if it is not comfortable with the current plan.

Parish President Ronnie Hughes said that the parish does not have to bid the service out, but decided to do so to give local businesses a better opportunity to vie for the service.

Citing that there were still many unanswered questions about the process, McConnell then made a motion - seconded by Hillensbeck - to reject all bids and send the matter to the council's Executive Committee for further research.

In a related matter, the council voted to begin the process of obtaining a bond of up to $11 million to fund a planned expansion of the jail facility.

Hillensbeck questioned the project, stating that numerous changes had apparently been made and that he needed more information on the status of the project before he could make a decision.

Valentine said that the matter was simply a "preliminary resolution" to go before the State Bond Commission with the proposal. He added that there is currently no concrete plan on the jail expansion.

Parish bonding attorney Malcolm Dugas told the council that the matter simply starts the process and puts a cap of $11 million on the proposed bond issue.

"We need to get something in place," Valentine said.

Parish President Ronnie Hughes said that the bond is necessary because the parish was only able to budget $1 million in the current budget for the jail expansion.

"A lot of work still needs to be done," Hughes said. "We want to build something that will meet the needs of this parish longer than two years."

Valentine added that there is a possibility of a revenue-sharing agreement between the parish and the Sheriff's Office that has yet to be determined as well.

Earlier in the meeting, Hughes said in his report that he recently received a letter from the Environmental Protection Agency's regional office in Dallas dated April 27 stating that the parish had been approved for an Environmental Information Document (EID) regarding a planned wastewater treatment facility for the east bank.

"This was a necessary item for us to move forward with a comprehensive wastewater treatment site in the parish," Hughes said. "This is something we've been waiting on for quite a while."

The letter read that facilities approved by the EPA include improvements to Ascension Consolidated Utilities District No. 1 on the west bank as well as facilities in Hillaryville and Darrow and planned sewer improvements to the parish jail.

The proposed wastewater treatment facility could possibly be located on land currently owned by BASF and located near the Lamar-Dixon Expo Center.

An EID describes and evaluates the environmental impacts of the feasible alternatives, according to information from the Environmental Protection Agency.

Hughes said that representatives from the Corps of Engineers will be at the council's Finance Committee meeting, scheduled for Thursday at 6 p.m. at the Courthouse Annex East in Gonzales. From there, Hughes said, he hopes to have a master plan ready for a council vote by the body's first June meeting, held in Donaldsonville.

When asked by Councilman Adrian Thompson if the parish has spoken to BASF about acquiring the land through donation, Hughes said that the issue had yet to be finalized. However, he added that BASF "has made a strong commitment" to the plan.