The Town decided to renew its one-year “time and materials” contract with professional consultant Crispell Snyder, Inc. for 2012 after hashing out concerns regarding the professional consultant’s stability. 

It was also agreed that a new contract bid would be delivered for 2013 to open up the options.

According to the 2012 contract with Crispell Snyder,  charges for planning would be $85 per hour and $68 per hour for GIS technician services.

“We haven’t had any problems with them but their turnover is atrociously huge,” said Clerk Kim Banigan about the firm’s high attrition rate. 

Having the contract come up for renewal every few years seemed like a good practice, said Supervisor Mike Kindschi.  Putting the service out for bid would help facilitate competition and keep costs down, but while Banigan agreed with Kindschi in this case, changing contractors for this type of work isn’t always good. 

“You need good continuity with your consultant for this type of thing, but we don’t have that with them anyway.” 

Supervisor Steve Anders asked whether they should deny the contract extension at hand and start sending out bids for the 2012 contract.  This seemed cutting it close to Chairman Kris Hampton who said the Planning Commission might need help before a new consultant was selected. 

Anders said there were no foreseeable changes to the 2012 comprehensive plan or any other area related to planning. allowing several months to go ahead and begin the search. “If we had something pressing or going on, I would say it’s a no brainer.”

Kindschi said it would be better to wait for 2013.  Hampton agreed with Kindschi saying it would be good to give the Planning Commission plenty of time to do its research.  “They could start in June, send out an RFP and see what they get back.”