Committee recommends expanding buy-local to all of Linn County

A City Council committee this afternoon recommended that the city's 7-month-old buy-local policy on certain purchases and projects be extended beyond Cedar Rapids to all firms in Linn County - with a qualification.

The qualification is not a little one. The committee wants jurisdictions in Linn County outside of Cedar Rapids to adopt their own buy-local policy like Cedar Rapids'  as a condition of Cedar Rapids opening up its its buy-local preference to businesses in another Linn County jurisdiction.

Ken DeKeyser, an engineer with Hall & Hall Engineers in Hiawatha, asked the council committee to expand the buy-local policy now and not condition it on what he said would be a time-consuming process to get other cities in the metro area and Linn County to adopt their own buy-local ordinances to mirror Cedar Rapids' policy.

Committee members Chuck Swore, chairman, Pat Shey and Don Karr quickly agreed Tuesday that the Cedar Rapids buy-local policy could be improved if it were extended to include businesses in the metro area and Linn County. Many of those have employees who live in Cedar Rapids and shop in Cedar Rapids, and so the city dollars that go to those firms end up being spent in the local economy, the three council members said.

Council member Kris Gulick, though, pointed out that the buy-local program does cost local taxpayers money, and he suggested the idea of reciprocity so that other communities do what Cedar Rapids does if their businesses are to benefit from Cedar Rapids' buy-local progam. The committee agreed to that.

Swore said he will discuss the matter with the full City Council at its meeting this evening.

Judy Lehman, the city's purchasing manager, reported to the committee that 13 bids in the last four or so months have gone to Cedar Rapids firms that would have gone to a business outside of Cedar Rapids but for the buy-local policy. Most of the bids were for purchases, not construction projects, she noted.

The 13 bids represented a total of $138,982 in city purchases and cost the city $6,331 more than the city would have had to pay if it had used the low, non-local bids.

Lehman estimated that the city had about 100 or so bids in the four-month period, and she noted many of those business went to Cedar Rapids firms without the need for the buy-local help.

Lehman estimated that it has cost the city about $12,000 in staff time and other expenses to institute the buy-local program. Changing the rules would result in additional administrative costs, she noted.

The Cedar Rapids council put its buy-local policy in place in January in hopes, especially, of helping flood-hit businesses in Cedar Rapids.

Businesses in the metro area, though, protested that such a policy was unfair to them.