Meeting Site - City of Lakewood - The Center

Margarita Lee, Chair, opened up the meeting at 2:00 PM. As a guest was present, we conducted our traditional member introductions.

Larry Lafferty, AT&T Mobility (Global Account Manager), for Orange County and San Diego, with its office in Cerritos, informed us that:

Beverly Crisp informed us that Buena Park is in the process of building a new Police Station building/facility.

Jan Steese indicates that Arcadia is considering the possible construction of a new City Hall facility, as its current layout/design is not conducive to ease of use by its residents.

Kathleen Hodge indicated that Torrance Unified School District worked diligently to investigate environmentally clean "green" (non-toxic) cleaners and chemical program for its warehouse stock inventory. The new cleaners have a Green Seal Certification that meets Cal OSHA, EPA, and Global Ecolabeling standards. Their bid award to 3M is handled through distributor Grainger. It offers deep price discounting, and is a cooperative contract.

Additionally, their district is looking to offer students use of 'Health Centers', providing commercial work-out equipment at no cost.

Felice Fromm noted that the City of Torrance has a similar desire to be considered a 'Green City'. As such, staff is being directed to be quite conscious of how it is doing business and review what it is buying.

Nancy Pickard indicated that Fullerton has just awarded a contract to 'Sungard' for a new Financial Management system.

Karie Webber noted that there is 'possible' employee strike activity (picketing) by Prudential Overall Supply employees (City of Long Beach currently has a uniform laundering contract with Prudential), though Prudential's plant is in the City of Carson.

Additionally, they are busy with efforts to remove underground storage tanks.

Jan Steese noted that her efforts to obtain sealed bids from various appliance dealers were unsuccessful; as no one would respond. As a result, she personally went to a few appliance dealers and had sales staff provide price quotations first-hand with her visit to the dealer.

Cynthia Duprey noted that agencies disposing (through surplus equipment auctions//brokers) of 1960-2006 diesel engine vehicles should take note of relatively new AIR Resources Board requirements. Vehicles with a diesel engine of 450 CI or larger CANNOT be licensed again to operate in the State of California. Therefore, you should specify that the equipment auctioneer have the new purchaser (buyer) of the equipment complete, sign and return the 'ARB' form to relieve the city of such responsibility.

Marc Monforte has staff working with a District Consultant to evaluate how they 'might' find a useful process to undertake to reduce their ongoing expenses for gasoline and diesel fuel. They are reevaluating OPIS (+-) formulas; reverse auctions, etc. They are looking at developing different ways to purchase this volatile commodity at more significant savings.

Marc utilizes a 'cost savings'/ 'cost avoidance' monthly report to gauge buyer's performance.

Bill Gellman brought two newspaper articles to share with members that he felt offered valuable/useful information to relate:

Peter Foley of National Intergovernmental Purchasing Alliance will be our next guest speaker at the upcoming November 7 meeting in Lakewood at 2:00 p.m., to discuss new contracts.

Our Christmas/Holiday get-together meeting is scheduled for December 5 at 1:00 p.m., so mark your calendars now for this annual event. Peter Foley is donating door prizes, and good food (chicken and ribs) and commradery are certain to be enjoyed by all attending.

Hope to see you all there.

Reporting:

Bill Gellman Secretary