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County buys back-up generator for County Community Services
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By Charlie Warner
Argus News Editor
Figuring they were saving more than $8,700 in the storage shelving bid received for the County Community Services building, the Houston County Board unanimously approved a motion to purchase a slightly used generator for $9,500 from Viking Electric of Spring Grove.
The generator will serve as a back-up for the county’s IT department in the event of a power outage. Currently, the county has a 50-year-old generator located in the jail, which will only provide limited power to the Sheriff’s Office and the commissioner’s room in the basement of the Courthouse, which serves as the Emergency Services command post.
County Finance Director Casey Bradley approached the board during the May 26 meeting about the generator. He explained that a representative of Viking Electric told him they had a $12,000 back-up generator that was originally ordered for Agriprocessors of Postville, Iowa. When the processing plant went out of business last year, Viking was stuck with the large generator.
Viking Electric has the wiring contract for the county’s new office building (the former Meyer Furniture Store building) and asked Bradley if the county might be interested in the generator. Earlier in the May 26 meeting, the board received news that the bid for the massive shelving complex, which includes 57 units, for the basement of the new office building was $8,721 less than anticipated.
“If we can get a $12,000 generator for $9,500, I feel we should move forward with this. When opportunity knocks, we need to act,” said Commissioner Dave Corcoran.
“But is this something we really need right now?” Commissioner Tom Bjerke asked.
Bradley replied having a back up generator in County Community Services wasn’t critical, but the plan was to utilize the server in that building as a back up if something happened to the main server at the Courthouse.
When asked by Bjerke why the new generator shouldn’t be located at the Courthouse, Bradley replied it wasn’t large enough to power a facility of that size, but would be able to handle the new office building.
Public Health Nursing Director Deb Rock said she felt it would be good to have a back-up generator at County Community Services, as her department has many vaccines that require refrigeration.
“We need a back-up for this building, we can get a new generator with a two-year warranty at a used price and Viking is there now to install it. I make a motion to approve the purchase and installation,” Corcoran said. His motion was seconded by Commissioner Bob Augedahl and unanimously approved.
With the cost to install the system, the price tag for the generator was $12,650.
New shelving system
The board approved a $15,097.24 bid from FSS Business Products for 57 shelving units to be installed in the basement of County Community Services. The county had received an estimate from Corporate Express, which is the normal vendor for office supplies that was $8,721 higher than the FSS bid.
The county plans to move the majority of the hard records now stored in various locations in the Courthouse and other spots in downtown Caledonia to the large, dry basement of County Community Services. The county is required by law to keep paper copies of records dating back a century or more. The records storage area will be secured with a locked chainlink fence system.
According to Bradley, the shelving system meets all OSHA standards and will be able to be put together by the sentence to serve personnel, which will be another cost savings for the county.
You can contact Charlie Warner at
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