What's up with the towing contract?

This is probably the number one issue in the city right now.  Area Towing has had the towing contract in the city for 20ish years.  The contract is essentially no cost to the city; there are defined towing rates charged to the people towed.  Area Towing is the exclusive towing company for city vehicles, accident victims, impounds, etc.  In 2016 the council looked at rebidding the towing contract and passed a resolution to put Area Towing on a month-to-month contract until the City Council chose a replacement.  The contract was never rebid until the current council session.

I’m not going to include dates on the following because most of the early discussions were in open business with is captured on the video, but not in the minutes so it’s not as easy as searching for an agenda item.

In a nutshell, people started complaining about the towing bills they were getting from Area Towing; storage rates, service fees etc.  Then the owners of Area Towing started an environmental clean up company that added to the bills, mostly going to the insurance companies, but as they started declining to pay; they went after the vehicles owners.  Some of these bills were upwards of $20,000.  I’m not going to go into a lot details, as Area Towing likes to sue people, but if you Google “Taylor Area Towing”, you will find plenty of stories.

The City Council formed a “Towing Committee” to look at the towing contract, research the issues and make recommendations regarding the RFQ that would go out for a new towing vendor.  Amongst others; Council Women Brandana and Winton where on the committee.  The committee toured tow yards and met with other communities to understand how they handled towing contracts.  Councilwoman Winton was unhappy with the lack of progress of the committee and presented her recommendations related to a towing RFQ to the council.

The recommendations of the towing committee and Councilwoman Winton were sent to the purchasing department for consideration when they wrote the RFQ for the towing contract RFQ.  The RFQ was issued and quotes were received from multiple vendors.  The qualified vendor list was limited; the contract included restrictions based on the distance from the city, security, etc.  The tow company is also the city impound lot, so there are a lot of additional restrictions.  Area Towing filed a lawsuit against the RFQ and a judge ruled in their favor and the city had to remove some of the restrictions place to prevent the alleged over charging from occurring again.  The RFQ was reissued.  JT Crova was the low bidder.

At a very heated meeting, the City Council voted 3/3 on a motion to award the contract to JT Crova; with Brandana, Daniels and Rose voting no.  Councilman Johnson then made a motion to award the contract to Area Towing, which was voted down unanimously.  The mayor determined we had now city towing contractor.  Following the meeting the Mayor awarded the emergency towing contract to JT Crova.  As there is no charge to the city, this did not require Council approval; they only have to approve contracts over $2000.  Area Towing sued and Judge ruled that the 2016 resolution overrode the Mayor’s decision as it gave Area Towing the contract until the City Council chose a vendor.  Attempts to overturn that resolution have been blocked consistently as has an attempt to put it on the ballot for the voters to decide.

As it stands now, Area Towing is still the towing contractor with the city; complaints continue to come in. 

Councilwomen Daniels, Rose and Brandana continue to vote against taking the contract from Area Towing.  They claim they don’t like either vendor, the RFQ process was flawed, they didn’t meet the requirements, etc.  Lots of excuses but no solutions.