Late yesterday afternoon COX Communications filed a formal bid protest regarding last Monday's decision by the board to move forward with EREC's proposal for phase one of the county's Broadband
construction in the north end of the county.
The nine page document from the Gunster Law Firm on behalf of COX lists multiple reasons why COX and Gunster believe the decision made Monday by board vote should not only be walked back by the board, but that the Board should also, affirmatively and unilaterally reverse course and AWARD the project to COX.
From the firm's letter of 11-30-2022:
"The County is obligated to provide Cox recourse following the County’s materially extensive RFP revision and arbitrary blackout suspension for only a select two of the shortlisted proposers. If the County persists in awarding EREC the RFP and fails to invoke the discretion the County’s Purchasing Ordinances provide, Cox will be unfairly and inequitably excluded from consideration despite having submitted a technically sound proposal covering the entire service area requested. Allowing such a deviation from standard procurement procedure to stand taints the entire RFP process the County has established. Therefore, the City must uphold Cox’s protest and award it the contract pursuant to the RFP."
Much more to come on this. I will publish the full document once the county attorney agrees with me that this is a public record which can be released. I believe it is, but am awaiting her confirmation before I release it.
Read it, below
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12 comments:
Great. They won't take care of the customers they already have in the populated areas, and they want to take on more in agricultural areas.
While I understand their frustration with the procurement, wouldn't it be nice if they actually focused on serving their existing footprint adequately for a change?
No need for concern.
Third-term commissioner, Steven Barry, has assured our great citizens that he has “spoken with the county attorney and there is an IMPRESSION that we are good”.
However, what I heard from our attorney was that; “Anything could be challenged.” and “This has not followed our usual process.”
It appears to this citizen that we are applying for federal money, and we are deviating from our usual bid process in order to affect the outcome.
I no longer trust Steven Barry’s judgment.
Mr. Barry has recently attempted to clawback hundreds of thousands of dollars from the great Escambia County citizens because he feels that he made a poor decision in choosing from our two available retirement program options.
Under Commissioner Barry’s leadership, our county jail burned to the ground in 2014 resulting in a tragic loss of lives and multiple lawsuits.
Commissioner Kohler seems to be the only commissioner who is not willing to follow Steven Barry over the edge of a “fiscal cliff”.
May and Bergosh, as usual, are following Barry like lemmings.
Robert Bender demonstrated concern, but likely should have demonstrated more assertiveness.
Steven Barry’s half-baked plan is already blowing up in our faces.
I would think since the board agreed to waive the black out period and the board agreed they would be the committee, then they(you) covered their bases. I'm not surprised Cox filed this but I imagine they will not be successful.
JC posted this one on Escambia Citizens War. how about the one below, or get Noah your fake account to do it? Sad really about Noah, must leave scars on the brain. 😢
Of course he didn't link the blog, just the Cox protest.
Hey weirdo.
The rose is for propaganda, Tokyo Rose.Escambia Rose 🌹 🤣
Sorry about that last comment. put them in moderation, it accoplishes nothing. I just get aggravated thinking of what they have done to people. I know the best thing is to not visit the site.
Now he is lying saying you didn't post the entire document. It's right here.Just link the blog Cotton.
Why does JAR play stupid? Is she blocked from reading here, like she does to many people?
Them maybe more people will come out of the echo chamber and read.
TJ is so long winded. The voters by referendum denied fee simple on the ballot.
Anon 7:34--Once I received word that the document was a public record I linked the whole document early this morning. At the bottom of the blog post it says "read more" and when it is clicked, the rest of the document is there. JC is not bright, so he probably could not figure that out. LOL.
Why won’t you answer the question about using ARP funds vs federal infrastructure funds ?
Ha ha, yes I figured it out, By the time I looked this afternoon it was already here. He just did a copy of the first page after you published the whole doc.
I'm sure you all expected this but I'm thinking you knew to dot the I's and cross the T 's ahead of time.
She has to print a question with all big ole question and exclamation marks, I see she is trying to defend herself for filing the administrative hearing yet again, so she sees this.
Where is her eyeroll emoticon. Wonder if she's 😟 😨 😟 😨 worried.
I love the image on the other blog, Jimmie would use the Nellie Olson pic.
People have a right to use their property.
And the Cox rep can protest, I hope it doesn't delay the use of our federal grant.
8:46--Asked and answered in a stand-alone post where I discussed Broadband exclusively this past Tuesday. Re-read it and you will get the answer but the gist of it is/was the board set aside $22 Million in ARP funds to commence the project knowing full well we would leverage that money to get grants as we are applying to do, also knowing we would be working with private companies on this where such companies will be sharing costs with the county for the installation. This should be a surprise to noboady as we have been discussing it for two years. And counties all across America are doing the exact same thing with their ARPA funds, too. It's called intelligent, strategic infrastructure planning. Somebody wake up the stockbroker downtown and explain this to him, too.
No one is questioning the importance of broadband and getting it done. The question is regarding the use of AARP funds versus infrastructure funds, and you have not answered that yet.
Must not be anyone competent enough to get those funds!
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