City council denies animal control contract to veterinarian

The Grand Island City Council rejected the idea of awarding the city's animal control contract to veterinarian James Kimbrough and his wife, Carole, -- at least for now.

After two and a half hours of debate and discussion before a crowd of more than 115, the only thing that was clear about the animal control contract was the presence of confusion.

The Kimbroughs wondered why city administration had failed to distribute their full proposal to the council. The Central Nebraska Humane Society, which also submitted a proposal to continue the services they currently provide, wondered why their cost numbers were miscalculated by the city's evaluation team.

The council wondered about service hours, euthanasia plans and designs for a new building the Kimbroughs proposed to build.

Even Assistant City Attorney Wes Nespor was left scratching his head without answers after having received "updated" information from the Kimbroughs as late as Tuesday morning.

"There's just a lot of things we don't know," said Councilman John Gericke, who moved to deny the contract.

Denying the contract required six votes, but only five came in Tuesday night. However, Councilmembers Joyce Haase and Bob Meyer abstained, which under Roberts Rules of Order, count toward the majority, said City Clerk RaNae Edwards.

That officially gave seven votes to deny the contract. Council President Mitch Nickerson voted against denying the contract, and Councilmembers Peg Gilbert and Tom Brown were absent.

Twenty-one people spoke about the contract -- most of them associated with the Central Nebraska Humane Society.

The society had proposed to continue existing animal control services for $318,000 a year, but city staff calculated that cost to be $368,000 during an evaluation of the three proposals received. The difference was $50,000 worth of animal license fees that city staff maintained would be received by the society, but not remitted back to the city.

Humane Society board of directors President Gail Yenny said the license fees are retained by the society, but deducted from its overall contract price.

As Nespor put up a PowerPoint showing the society at an annual cost of $368,000 versus the Kimbroughs' $249,850 proposal, minus $50,000 of collected license fees, for a total annual cost of $199,850, the audience objected.

"This, I believe, is unfair," said society board member Chris Eberhardt. "You are not comparing equal services."

The city requested proposals for animal control -- not flat-out bids that specified a certain number of service hours, employees, animal control officers and on-call and emergency services. Nickerson said the proposal gave the opportunity to "rethink" how animal control services are provided.

But the Humane Society simply submitted its proposal based on what it currently provides, including more service hours than the Kimbrough contract.

"We were proposing ourselves right out of an opportunity to provide services," Eberhardt said.

Councilman Larry Carney and former Mayor Jay Vavricek both said the proposal process lacked a transparency in government.

Bill Marshall, president of Five Points Bank, expressed his dissatisfaction and confusion about the proposal and evaluation process and read a letter from Edgar Reynolds Foundation Chairman Fred Glade. Glade warned the city that turning its back on the Humane Society, with its new tax- and donor-supported building, is detrimental to community building.

Once the council denied the Kimbrough contract, it could take no further action because no other proposal was on the agenda -- and no other proposal has been released publicly.

Gericke, Councilmen Larry Carney, Bob Niemann, Kirk Ramsey and Jose Zapata voted to deny the contract to the Kimbroughs.

Gericke suggested the city determine what it wants for animal control and potentially request bids instead of proposals, but no further action has yet been determined.

The current animal control contract with the Humane Society expires Sept. 30.



For the record

In other action Tuesday night, the city council:

‰ Approved $108,622 of new hires for a 911 dispatcher, 2 part-time library assistants, four part-time library pages, a custodian for the new Law Enforcement Center and the reclassification of a Librarian II position to become the assistant library director. Joyce Haase and John Gericke voted no.

‰ Approved $65,400 of funding to outside agencies, $120,000 to the Central District Health Department and $20,000 to Clean Community Systems.

‰ Met in closed session for an update on IBEW union talks and real estate negotiations with Fonner Park regarding the State Fair.