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By Cole Parkinson
Vauxhall Advance
With the Municipal District of Taber once again hosting a sealed tender sale to sell off surplus equipment within their ranks, the results were brought forward for council decision. This year, 18 items were offered up for sale, with the vast majority of high bids coming from auction companies — only three high bids were from private buyers, according to M.D. of Taber administration.
Council was able to discuss the results of the tender sale at a special meeting held on Nov. 9.
“I sent the package out online and notified a bunch of the auction companies and people like that and they come and bid on it. The results of that are in front of you. We actually had a lot more people bid than what’s on the list here. I just felt these were the ones that would be the high bidders in this scenario,” explained Stu Weber, director of Public Works.
Administration explained this year they received a lump sum offer for all available equipment. It was also confirmed by administration that there were no instructions to bidders stating they could not put forth a lump sum and that number was higher than putting all other high bids together.
“The different scenario that happened this year is the Ritchie Brothers came in and offered an all-in bid. Initially, I wasn’t sure how to handle that. So, I went through and added up the totals it is $188,975. Ritchie Brothers offered us $225,000 for everything, so it’s about a $36,000 difference for the Ritchie Brothers to take all of it,” continued Weber. “I also went through and looked at it, and there were a few private individuals that would have been high bidder otherwise. Of that, only $12,431 of that would have went private anyways. The rest is back and forth between auction companies.”
Administration recommended for council to accept the bid from Ritchie Brothers and not leave the extra $36,000 on the table. A motion to accept the offer from Ritchie Brothers to purchase all the surplus equipment from the M.D. for $225,000 was carried unanimously by council.
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