Scarborough – “The place to grow a business”

As Scarborough residents and business owners, we find this to be a very misleading slogan.

I am the co-owner of Gelinas HVAC Inc. of Scarborough. My partner and I opened our business in Scarborough in 1994. We have been lifelong residents, raised our families, bought commercial and residential property, and have paid our taxes to the town of Scarborough. We have eight employees, some of which are also Scarborough residents. We, along with every one else in Scarborough, have seen taxes and fees rise and understand the fiscal responsibility of the town’s manager and the purchasing agent. It is hard for me to understand why a services contract that we have had with the town for eight years was not recently renewed and was awarded to Honeywell – (A fortune 100 company that is one of 30 companies represented on the Dow Jones Industrial Average, with over a 120,000 employees in 100 countries). It appears that Honeywell did not need to come to Scarborough to grow its business.

Honeywell has had the HVAC (heating, ventilation, and air conditioning) contract for all of the town’s property’s except for the schools and fire stations for the past year. They had submitted a bid to the town’s purchasing agent, Keith Matherne, to continue with those properties for $48,125. Because of Mr. Matherne’s desire to have one central contract for all of the town facilities, the company also bid for the town’s fire stations at $4,258.

Gelinas HVAC Inc. has been the town’s fire station heating and air conditioning maintenance providers since 1999. As we have done for the past eight years, I submitted a renewal maintenance proposal to Mr. Matherne. This agreement had the same rates, fees, and structure that I have had for the fire stations for the past few years. After my proposal for the fire stations was received, Mr. Matherne called Honeywell and told the company that my bid came in at $2,500 ($1,758 less than Honeywell’s) and would the company, therefore, match that offer. The company told him that it would and Mr. Matherne then awarded the contract for all of the town properties to Honeywell for $50,625.

The final contract that has been awarded to Honeywell is for the town facilities at $48,125 and the town fire stations at $2,500 for a total of $50,625. While Mr. Matherne now does have his one central contract, he has not saved the town any money. The original contract with Honeywell and the Gelinas proposal was for the exact same amount of money. This does not even mention the discrepancy in the service call fees for miscellaneous issues that will arise at the fire stations during a year (which have been averaging 10 calls per year for the past eight years). Gelinas had guaranteed a labor rate $21 less per hour 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. and $64 less per hour after hours and weekends. While I do understand the need to try and save money and keep costs down, none of this makes any sense to us. If after all of the bidding numbers came through and Honeywell had given a lower total price, I would understand the decision. However, there is no way the town is saving money with this decision.

On April 11, we filed a complaint with the town manager asking for an explanation or better clarification as to how this contract would save all of us taxpayers money. To date we have had no reply from the town manager.

We have lived in Scarborough for our entire lives and intend to stay here for a long time. I can’t understand how two local businessmen can be used as a pawn by a town employee to get a central contract from a much larger business. Scarborough – “the place to grow your business?” Maybe it should say: “The place to grow your already big business at the expense of the local small businesses.”

William Gelinas

Brian Mclellan

Gelinas HVAC Inc.

Scarborough