Kodiak Borough awards janitorial contract 6-0 after bid protest

The Kodiak Island Borough Assembly voted 6-0 Thursday to award a janitorial services contract to J&R Cleaning Service, a company connected to a borough employee, after a competing bidder filed a formal protest and assembly members debated the integrity of the procurement process.

The losing bidder was disqualified before the protest reached the assembly. Engineering and Facilities Director Cody Allen said the rival firm failed to include a required bid bond. "They didn't provide a bid bond for bid security," Allen said. "And so that automatically deemed them non-responsive, and we let them know as such."

Borough Manager Amy Williams denied the protest. She told the assembly the employee was excluded from every procurement step and that bids were stored in a floor-bolted safe accessible only to finance staff. "As soon as we identified that there was going to be a potential conflict at that pre-bid meeting, every step that could be taken to separate the two was already done," Williams said. She also noted that protests are typically handled at the manager's level and that the prior janitorial contract had already expired June 30, which complicated Assembly Member Jeremiah Gardner's suggestion of a one-month extension.

Gardner initially said he intended to vote no, calling the situation poor optics and suggesting the borough rebid the contract. Mayor Jared Griffin pushed back. "A conflict exists when someone has the ability to improperly influence the outcome," Griffin said. "We have to ask, which decision in the procurement process was improperly influenced? We can't point to anything there."

Gardner said the discussion changed his mind before the roll call vote. "I do really trust the staff here," he told the assembly. "And no, the optics aren't perfect, but you were exactly right."

In closing comments, Gardner said he still saw poor optics in the situation and called on the assembly to review the conflict-of-interest section of borough code to reduce the chance a future procurement forces the same debate. Williams said staff had already discussed possible code changes at agenda setting to make that section more clear.