With the city of Fort Smith facing at least one lawsuit and possibly more surrounding on-going issues at the landfill and with the city recycling program, the Fort Smith school board decided on Monday night to table a proposed contract for the city to take the districts recycling until the next meeting.
The district was set to award the bid for services to the City of Fort Smith as the lowest of three bidders on the propose contract to replace the current one held by Altes sanitation, which is set to expire this Friday at midnight.
The City bid came in at $250,035 for a three-year term, but uncertainly about the legality of that bid in face of the fat Fort Smith didn’t even have a legitimate recycling program in place at the time of the request for bid had the board members putting on the temporary brakes.
Local attorney Joey McCutchen, who is is the attorney of record for fired city sanitation director Mark Schlievert, addressed the board about possible pending litigation against the city over the recycling fiasco, and he wasn’t talking about his client.
No announcement has been made to date on whether or not Schlievert will file a wrongful termination suit on the city.
Instead, McCutchen was referencing speculation that the city might be sued over the way they handled the awarding on their new recycling contract to a Missouri-based firm on June 20, and uncertainty whether the city was even eligible to bid on a recycling program contract during a period in which they had no viable recycling program.
Inside Fort Smith has also learned that a group of citizens are considering legal action in light of the awarding of the contract to Third Rock Recycling over the bid of Marck Recycling/Pen Sales which was $268,600 less over the two year period.
In addition, the City was hit by a lawsuit this past week that seeks to reach class action status so that residents of Fort Smith can be enjoined in the suit that will be seeking a refund for fees for the 2½ years the city ran a bogus recycling program.
Two weeks ago, the Board voted in a committee meeting to finalize the contract the City but the motion and vote to table, which came upon the recommendation of superintendent Doug Brubaker.
Denny Altes, representing the company that currently holds the contract, said he would consider extending the current contract long enough for the board to sort out the legalities.
Altes finished second in the bidding for the contract , according to district records. His bid of $268,164.00 was under that of Waste Management, which put their number at $300,183.31 for the three year deal.
