College Station approves $1.08M landscaping contract despite local-preference objections

The College Station City Council on June 26 approved a contract award to Incircle Management Incorporated for citywide landscape maintenance and mowing, accepting a staff recommendation and a motion to approve by Council Member Smith. The vote was 6–1.

The council packet shows Incircle submitted the lowest cost proposal in a field of six and earned the highest evaluation score under advertised criteria (50% qualifications/experience, 35% price, 15% references). Pete Kaylor, assistant director of public works, told the council Incircle ‘‘received the highest score of the six proposers’’ and that staff had checked municipal references for experience.

Local vendors and some council members urged preserving a local-office preference. Tucker Gallagher, owner of Green Teams, said his family business has served College Station for 50 years and urged specifications that reflected local standards, noting the city’s current mowing schedule (18 trips per year in the contract) understates local expectations. Dan Riddle, representing Yellowstone Landscape, questioned whether an out-of-area company “with no current employees in the market” could reliably staff 189 city sites and flagged a discrepancy he saw between a portal-listed figure and the contract amount.

Council members debated trade-offs between keeping work local and saving taxpayer dollars. Council Member Mhaney said she was ‘‘very disappointed’’ the local-office requirement was removed; others, including Smith and Schaefer, said the advertised evaluation weights were lawful and that staff could terminate the contract if performance fell short. Smith said the bids were outside the 5% local-preference band and that state law constrained the council’s options. Mayor Nichols noted staff retained contract remedies, including cancellation and rebidding.

The contract value approved was not to exceed the amount noted in the agenda packet; staff said the incumbent vendor had an extension through July and, if approved, Incircle would begin operations Aug. 1. Council directed staff that if they wished to change future solicitation requirements (for example, restore a 30-mile local-office preference), they could instruct staff to revisit the RFP language before the next solicitation.

The council’s action will move the contract to execution; staff said score sheets and detailed bid tabulations are posted or available upon request, and vendors can obtain their weighted scores after award.

The council approved the remainder of the consent agenda items earlier in the meeting; Incircle’s award was pulled for discussion and voted on separately.