Erie County finance panel discusses moving to electronic bidding, sets July 1 start to allow vendor onboarding

At an Erie County Finance meeting, members considered an ordinance to amend the administrative code to permit electronic bidding for all competitive bids and requests for proposals and agreed to set the ordinance's effective date to July 1 to allow for vendor onboarding.

The proposal would replace the county's largely paper-based process with an online platform managed by Penbit. A committee member advocating the change said, "It's all paper based," and described an instance in which a summer jobs bid was delivered late to an upstairs office and missed the deadline. The member also said e-bidding "gets you more bids over the course of time" and that fees would be assessed to vendors rather than paid by the county.

Supporters argued the switch should increase competition and streamline administration. "That'll be really streamlined with electronic bidding," one supporter said, and noted that other counties reported no reduced access after making a similar change. Meeting participants proposed moving the ordinance's effective date to July 1 to allow two months for training and onboarding with Penbit so purchasing staff could notify vendors and set up the new system.

At least one member raised concerns about digital access and operational burdens on staff: members asked who would assist vendors without computers and whether staff would be responsible for unlocking phones or otherwise managing access during meetings. Proponents responded that other counties had used hybrid approaches when necessary and that the platform vendor typically charges vendors, not the county.

The transcript shows members agreed to change the effective date to July 1 and asked staff to update the ordinance text (noted as a change on "page 11"). The record provided does not include a roll-call vote on final adoption of the ordinance; it records discussion and an agreed change to the effective date.