By Megan Kelley
Staff Writer
LAKE ORION — The Lake Orion Community Schools Board of Education unanimously approved bid awards for ongoing bond projects during its meeting on March 22.
First up, was a bid award for furniture at multiple schools. The project scope consists of furniture for art, music, administration offices and classrooms in the following buildings: Blanche Sims, Stadium Drive, Carpenter, Orion Oaks, Paint Creek, Pine Tree, Oakview and Waldon.
Bids were awarded to: Custer Inc. ($357,977.08), Great Lake Furniture Supply ($244,814.52), Dew-El Corporation ($172,515.32), Interior Environments ($114,338.31), Yeo & Yeo Technology ($12,305) and ISGC ($130,065.73).
Including the 10 percent contingency of $103,201.60, the total for this bid award rounds out to $1,135,217.56. Funding will come from the district’s 2022 Bond Series 2.
The board also approved the purchase of large area audio and video equipment for the high school, middle schools and elementary schools.
The district issued a Request for Proposal (RFP) in January but only received one response.
“Typically, one response is not a desired situation. In terms of making the decision of rejecting this bid response and going back out or validating what we’ve got and moving forward with it, the process was basically the tech designer pulled out some data from recent bids they were involved with other districts,” said Assistant Superintendent of Business and Finance John Fitzgerald. “From a comparability point of view, the numbers were fair.”
District administration chose not go back out for bids over concerns that they would either not get any bids or would end up with a higher bid.
The board authorized administration to enter into a contract with Advanced Lighting & Sound (ALS) in the amount of $667,243 with allocated contingency of $67,000 for a total of $734,243.
Funding for this project will also come from the district’s 2022 Bond Series 2.