Onto the Next “Stage” — The City of Moscow Approves a Construction Bid

The Moscow City Council approved a bid for construction on the East City Park stage project this past. Hear about that subject and more in this week’s report!

Read the full transcript of the video below:

How’s it going y’all? Aiden Anderson here with the Moscow Minutes. The county took a break from meetings this week, but I hope you all got to enjoy the county fair this past weekend as I did. That leaves us with a pretty short city council, so let’s get into it.

To start things off, Amanda Argona and JT Manning presented on the nearly finished season of the Moscow Farmers market, highlighting that this year is the 50th anniversary of the market itself, and that the market this year has so far generated nearly $2.5 million in gross sales. Additionally, rapid market assessment data will be coming to the city before too long. They also mentioned that the Moscow Farmers Market is still available to vote on in the America’s Farmers Market Celebration contest, and it currently sits at #1 in Idaho, and #21 nationwide.

Next up, David Schott presented a public hearing for a right-of-way vacation request on Lincoln Street. A right-of-way vacation is when the city terminates its interest or control over a given area of street, thus transferring the right-of-way in that area back to private property owners. In this case, the street in question is the terminus of Lincoln Street, and the applicants for the request are the adjacent property owners.

Presently, it’s unfeasible for Lincoln Street to be extended or developed further, there are no utilities in the area of that street, and it remains unpaved in this section. So, while it seems like a straightforward item, the public hearing process was still required by law. With minimal interaction from the public and from the council, the vacation request was approved unanimously.

Councilor Scott Sumner recused himself due to a conflict of interest for the final item of the meeting, which was the consideration and acceptance of a bid on the East City Park stage project. The city has been talking about replacing the East City Park stage for some time. Last month, the city put out a notice for bids on construction of the stage, the roof structure, and adjusted concrete pathways around the park. Now, at this meeting, they made a decision on those bids.

Typically, city staff recommends going with the company with the lowest bid. In this case, that was Mangum Construction with a bid of $668,000 for the project, alongside a bid alternative involving increasing the width of the ring path around the proposed stage from 6 feet to 8 feet for an additional $6,350, for a total of $674,350.

When the council discussed this item, Evan Holmes brought up a previous question he had at a public works and finance meeting about delaying bid acceptance until the city could have discussions about possible volunteer groups or community groups helping with the stage. Drew Davis praised the under-budget nature of the bid, and mentioned his excitement for a new stage after the project had been sitting on city planning paperwork for so long. Mayor Lewis also took a moment to explain the nature of the price increases to the stage project compared to when it was first put on the city’s radar, as well as a few other details about the plans for construction.

When it came time to vote, the council approved acceptance of the bid 4-1 with Evan Holmes dissenting. The council then briefly discussed directing their staff to have a final discussion with the community about the width of the ring path before moving on to their weekly reports and an executive session.

That’s all I got for you this week! We’ve got an election coming up before you know it, so stay tuned for our upcoming county candidate interviews and spotlights! As always, we’ll have the relevant links posted with this video, and if you have any questions, please reach out. I’m Aiden Anderson with the Moscow Minutes. See you next time!