Good Morning Cheyenne County Nebraska,
Yesterday we went to the Cheyenne County Commissioners’ meeting to see if we could slow down the bidding on the County’s HVAC system and see if we could spend the money in a way that benefits our county as we have explained in the last couple of posts. Didn’t work. We appreciate the commissioners for giving us ample time to explain our concerns and thoughts in a very cordial meeting. They did listen and the system did work. We thank them for that opportunity. Ourselves and others were given the opportunity to question not only the process but the over-inflated bid we were going to accept.
We knew going in that it wasn’t going to work though. The county had brought in 3 people from Johnson Controls to defend the bid. They had a video conference setup with another HVAC to talk about American Rescue Plan money. The outcome of the meeting was already determined basically because the county had placed itself in a position where it had no choice but to spend this money. Why do you say? The county put out the bid on December 1, 2022. They closed the bid on December 16th and now awarded the bid on January 3rd. This bid happened too fast, not enough bids were received and it is all our fault, everyone in this county, for letting this type of excessive spending happen yet again. $766,837 of our money was spent yesterday on a bid we feel was way too high for what we are getting. This process should have been slower, with more public input. It was rushed through which should never happen with this amount of money. We should have explored more ways to involve our local HVAC workers so the money doesn’t leave that county as it is doing now. We didn’t get good value in this deal.
The value of your money….
Everything we do as we move forward needs to have value if we are going to lift up this county. We need to make sure every dollar is spent wisely. Look at the $766,837 that the county just spent. The bid was twice as much as what we received from other HVAC companies. Our county though only had one bid to work with so it had to be spent. They did give some logical reasoning as to why. They did contact 7 companies for bids, but only 1 bid, the one that services the building now was given. They presented reasonable arguments that being rural, it is difficult to get bids. Makes perfect sense. There was merit to some of the county’s thought processes. However, all that understood, we did NOT get good value for our tax dollars with this. Look at it this way, in 2019 the City of Sidney bought the Cabela’s building we show above for 1 million. We all know that. Many didn’t like it. However, for 1 million the city purchased a newer brick building in the city that is the same size as the county’s current building. We just spent ¾ of that amount for HVAC. Doesn’t make sense. We sure didn’t get the value with this HVAC. The city, for a little more money, got an entire building. Just some things to think about.
Your cost….
Government spending is not free money. You pay for it in taxes. Our federal spending this last week of 1.7 trillion just added thousands of dollars of debt to every household in America. Yes, this latest spending by our county does the same. American Rescue Plan money is not free money or monopoly money. It is our tax dollars coming back to us to be used for community assistance. It is your money. Yesterday every single person in this county gave $86 dollars to the county for this HVAC. Again. So if you are a Cheyenne County family of 4 you just gave $344 to this project. This is why we fight so hard to make sure that your money is spent cautiously, and we receive the most value. Everyone needs to wake up and make sure we are getting the most value for every dollar we are spending. It didn’t happen here. The commissioners said they are very willing to listen to us in the future and it is our hope that EVERYONE in this county takes a more active role in the direction of this amazing community.
We are not done….
We want to thank Eric, Carla, Marguerite, and Lynette who all questioned this bid and tried as we did to slow down the process so we can make sure it was done right. We appreciate the county’s position and they made some very good points as to why they had to do this. The process did work in that respect. We are going to continue to make changes to help this community. One last thing this morning that we would like everyone to take a look at. In doing HVAC research and exploring the values of money in this community we came across the purchase of this building above. The city of Sidney just voided the lease by UST Global for this city-owned building. Look at the taxes. This building was purchased in 2019 for 1 million. That is an arm’s length sale. It is appraised at 2.5 million….wow, how does that happen when it was purchased for 1 million? Doesn’t make sense. Now, look at the amount of tax whoever leases the building has to pay. $57,619 a year in taxes is a lot for a business here in Sidney. In 2015 and 2016 according to the records, Cabela’s paid over $90,000 each year, in taxes, on this building. That is a lot of tax. Too much for our small community. We are killing our downtown with taxes. I will put a link to the City’s Purchase Fact Sheet below just so everyone can be more informed.
Our Future…..
We are making changes. They are coming. We have a new assessor taking office tomorrow and that will help us with a fresh look. The county is now looking at microphones and video systems. Another small victory. Victories are slow to come because we need more community involvement. If more people would speak up we could do this faster. It is hard though in a county of 9,000 when only 6 people show up to speak out. We need you to like and share the posts. Talk to your neighbors and work together to make the changes. We can do this!