Towing contract bid has unfair requirements, appeals board rules

The bid for the city's towing contract contained two unfair specifications, according to a city appeals board that recommended the mayor change the bid specs.

The decision is a response to an appeal by Midwest Towing that bid requirements for the lucrative towing contract unfairly favored current contract holder Capital Towing.

Midwest Towing described five unfair issues in its appeal.

The appeals board agreed with two of those issues.

The requirement to have nine specific kinds of trucks at the time of bid closing makes it difficult for small towing companies to bid, according to the Midwest Towing complaint.

The Procurement Appeals Board recommended that bidders have six trucks at the time of bid closing and show the financial ability to obtain the additional three trucks.

The board also recommended that the city provide more information to potential bidders on the computer system the successful bidder must have.

Mayor Chris Beutler will make the final decision on the towing appeal.

The bid process was halted before the bid close date after Midwest filed the appeal.

Capital Towing has had the city's towing business for 16 years.

The four-year tow contract can be renewed for another four years, almost guaranteeing the winner will have city business for eight years.

The contract includes towing and storage of vehicles improperly parked on city streets and towing of vehicles damaged in accidents when police call for the tow.

This was the second bid process in recent months for the new towing contract.

In early October, the City Council rejected the low bid from Capital Towing after it heard complaints about that bidding process from competitors.

State Police Cancels Pat's Service Center as Towing Service Provider

The Massachusetts State Police has stopped using Pat’s Service Center for towing services on state highways, citing the recent indictments of several employees for assault, kidnapping and civil rights violations.

State Police said Pat’s Service Center was removed from the station towing lists for the Worcester area Feb. 17, one day after several employees, including the owner’s two sons, were arraigned in Worcester Superior Court for alleged beatings.

“The evidence developed in the recent investigation of assaults committed by employees of Pat’s Service Center made clear to us that the company was in violation of our tow service agreement,” said state police spokesman David Procopio.

“The actions of Pat’s employees as supported by the evidence are contrary to the values and ideals of the Massachusetts State Police.”

The move by state police comes after AAA Southern New England ended a 24-year relationship with Pat’s, citing the same reasons: alleged beatings by employees of Pat’s.

Patsy Santa Maria Sr., owner of Pat’s Service Station, said he has lodged an appeal with the state police.

He said the state police had used his company for calls on Interstate 290. State Police said Pat’s provided towing services for decades.

Mr. Santa Maria said the employees charged in connection with alleged beatings in 2009 and 2011 no longer work for him. But he said they are not guilty of the charges.

“My people are 100 percent innocent. They didn’t do anything wrong. But I had to let them go because that’s what’s expected of me. It’s not very fun but that’s the system, unfortunately.”

Towing contract appeal goes to appeals board

The requirement that the city of Lincoln's towing company contract provide free towing and storage for city-owned vehicles isn't fair to private citizens.

It raises the cost for people unfortunate enough to get towed by the city, Lincoln attorney Peter Katt said during a meeting of the city's Procurement Appeals Board on Tuesday morning.

The bid has been advertised for city-ordered towing of people illegally parked on city streets or property and city-offered tows that occur when a police officer asks if a person wants the city to call a tow truck after an accident, Katt said.

But then the city has asked the towing company that wins the bid to also provide a "ginormous amount of free service," he said.

Is the goal to get the lowest possible cost for the private citizen or to use the contract to get a whole bunch of stuff free for the city, asked Katt, who represented Midwest Towing at the hearing Tuesday.

Midwest Towing contends bid specifications for the towing contract unfairly favor current contract holder Capital Towing.

City Attorney Steve Huggenberger argued Tuesday that the bid specifications are not illegal and are intended to assure the towing contract meets the city's needs.

"Midwest simply doesn't like city policy," he said.

The appeals board will offer its recommendations on the towing contract specifications to Mayor Chris Beutler, who makes the final decision.

The bid specs require the company to have nine specific pieces of equipment at the time of bidding, which, Katt said, are the exact equipment owned by the incumbent company.

Midwest co-owner Jeff Jackson said his company had to spend $50,000 to buy two trucks so it could bid, even though Midwest owns about 30 trucks already and could provide good service using that equipment.

The city's tow company needs to be able to tow many vehicles quickly during snow emergencies, and that specific set of equipment works, Huggenberger said.

For example, the city towed 217 vehicles from residential streets in four days during the recent snow storm.

The city made a decision to require specific vehicles rather than have penalties or a performance bond, Huggenberger said.

There are different ways to assure performance. "We wanted the company to be ready on Day 1," he said.

"We don't let two guys and a jackhammer bid a construction project," Huggenberger said.

But the city doesn't require contractors to have two cranes on a specific job, Jackson said.

The four-year tow contract can be renewed for another four years, almost guaranteeing the winner will have the city business for eight years.

Capital Towing has been the city tow company for 16 years.

Bob's Towing Unleashes the Dogs, Fullerton Police Bite Back

A week after the Weekly reported that local business Bob's Towing had sued the Fullerton Police department for harassment, the department fired back with a salvo of its own. Tuesday's city council meeting saw the embattled department unveiling a nearly 600 page report detailing a year-long investigation of six service providers who competed for a city franchise.

Nearly 200 of those pages offered a scathing portrayal of Bob's Towing.

In January of 2011 the city put out a request for bids which would award qualified companies a franchise. The city would charge tow companies a $75 fee for each police tow to cover an estimated $250,000 in administration costs.

Competing companies included: Anaheim Fullerton Towing, Metro Pro, Brookhurst Towing, Bob's Towing, Country City Towing and To' Mo' Towing.

The report, filled with inspection records of each companies' buisiness offices, tow trucks and their drivers, summarily recommended the city council grant a franchise to long-time contractor Anaheim Fullerton Towing with a secondary franchise going to To' and Mo' Towing. Both were hailed by commercial enforcement officers as models of professionalism.

But the bulk of the voluminous tome included police reports, court records and other documents not typically released by police to the public. These painted the owner of Bob's Towing, Charles "Charlie" Al-Badawi, who recently sued the city, as a dishonest businessman, fond of hiring shady characters who roam the highways outfitted with substandard rigs and equipment.

Despite the mountains of paper work police presented to the council, no contracts were awarded. Following a presentation by Traffic Bureau Manger Lt. Scott Rudisil, Councilmember Bruce Whitaker remarked about the singular criticism heaped on Bob's Towing.

Councilman cracks down on Predatory Towing

Brandon Wright had no idea he had parked in a tow-away zone, so he was dismayed to find his vehicle had been removed from a private Clifton parking lot on Jan. 19. Then he experienced sticker shock: The towing company insisted he owed 500 bucks to get his car back.

“I knew there must be some law that protects your car from literally being held hostage,” said Wright, 26, of Corryville, a recent University of Cincinnati law school graduate.

Sure enough, Ohio law does limit a towing fee to $90 per tow, plus $12 per day for storage. But Wright says the towing company claimed he had researched the wrong law.

Wright ended up paying $570 – and turned to City Hall for help. Wright's concerns, emailed to city officials on Jan. 26, inspired Councilmember P.G. Sittenfeld to consider a crackdown on “predatory towing practices.”

On Wednesday, Sittenfeld issued a news release saying his bi-partisan motion “has the signatures of all nine members of Council and will lead to harsher punishments for those who commit predatory towing.” The council members had signed a motion directing the city law department to draft new legislation within a month.

Sittenfeld says he wants to enact an ordinance with three main prongs against towing companies that overcharge people: “a harsh fine,” in an amount yet to be determined; potential jail time for repeat offenders; and offenders' removal from the list of towing services that the city hires on a rotating basis.

Noting that “there are a lot of good and honest towing companies,” Sittenfeld says, “I think there are probably endless people that have been taken advantage of.” He thinks most people probably don’t know their rights and wouldn’t know how to research them, as Wright did.

“This time, they happened to take advantage of the wrong person,” Sittenfeld said of Wright, and commended him for stepping forward in the hopes that other people won't be victimized.

Both Sittenfeld and Wright have heard people report similar experiences. Sittenfeld says companies that are unscrupulous can get away with no meaningful punishment.

Right now, Ohio law carries only a $150 fine for towing companies that are caught overcharging people, Sittenfeld said, adding, “That's not much of a deterrent,” because the fine doesn't cut into the company's ill-gained profits.

Sittenfeld vowed: “We’re going to put some strong deterrents on the books.”

In addition to contacting city officials, Wright filed a small-claims suit against the company that towed his vehicle, Kenwood Towing.

City police and the prosecutor's office mediated the dispute and persuaded the company to refund Wright's money; in exchange, Wright will withdraw a small-claims-court suit that he had filed, when the check for $442.26 clears. As long as that happens, Wright said, “my personal gripe with them is over and done with.”

A man named Tom who said he represents Kenwood Towing denied that the company overcharges. He refused to give a reporter his full name for this story, and said: “Ain't no story. Ask the city why they're charging so much.” Then he hung up.

Sittenfeld said he didn’t know what to make of that comment.

Wright, a political science major in college, was at first skeptical that his message to city leaders would get any attention. He was pleasantly surprised that it inspired action – not just for him, but also for “other people like me, college students who can't afford to pay $500.”

“The response that I received at least partially restored my faith in public service,” he said.

Midwest Towing appeals bid specifications for city tow contract

The fight over the city's towing contract enters a new phase with an official appeal of the bid specifications.

The appeal by Midwest Towing, a competitor for the contract, says the specs used to determine who will get the next four-year city contract are unfair to citizens and favor the company that has held the contract for the past 16 years.

Citizens are hurt financially by a requirement that the company with the contract tow and store city-owned vehicles at no charge, according to the appeal notice. As a result, it says, the towing company must charge citizens more.

The company with the contract tows and stores vehicles illegally parked on city streets.

The city's five-member Procurement Appeals Board will meet at 9 a.m. Feb. 14 to consider the appeal, said Vince Mejer, city purchasing agent.

The board usually handles a couple of appeals a year, and they generally question the decisions to award a contract, Mejer said.

It's unusual for an appeal to deal with the bid specifications themselves, Mejer said.

This appeal stopped the bid process before bids were submitted, he said.

It was the second bid process in recent months for the towing contract.

In early October, the City Council rejected the low bid from Capital Towing, which has handled city towing for 16 years, after it heard complaints about that bidding process from competitors.

The four-year contract allows for an automatic four-year extension, meaning the winner likely will have the city's towing business for eight years.

This appeal lists several bid specifications that Midwest Towing believes favor Capital Towing. They include:

• Requiring a specific number and combination of towing vehicles similar to the fleet of the current contract holder.
• Requiring a computerized system for collecting parking ticket fees without any information on what type of computer system would suffice.
• Providing no information on owner-requested tows, important to companies determining the appropriate bid price. The company with the current contract has that information, but competitors do not.