The Tribune

By NEIL HARTNELL

Tribune Business Editor

nhartnell@tribunemedia.net

The Bahamian group bidding to take over the New Providence landfill’s management yesterday said it had “the wind taken out of us” by the Government’s decision to put the contract out to public tender.

Henry Dean, the ‘point’ person for the Waste Resources Development Group (WRDG) consortium, described the disclosure of the Government’s Request for Proposal (RFP) plan as “shattering” for its members.

Mr Dean, who is also president of United Sanitation, told Tribune Business that WRDG and its Bahamian partner, financial services firm Providence Advisors, had thought their management bid had advanced past the RFP stage.

Still, emphasising that “all is not lost”, Mr Dean expressed optimism that the combined experience of WRDG’s 10 waste services provider members, together with Providence Advisors’ financial and capital raising capabilities, would still be “superior” to any rivals that emerged via an RFP process.

“We had submitted a proposal in partnership with Providence Advisors,” Mr Dean said of WRDG’s efforts to-date, adding that its members had attended numerous meetings and discussions over the landfill with the Government.

“So that bit of information certainly took us by surprise,” he added of Tribune Business’s revelation that the Christie administration now planned to issue a formal RFP seeking multiple bids for the management contract.

“It took the wind out of us,” Mr Dean told Tribune Business. “We had thought we were beyond that, because that [an RFP] was one of the things we’d asked about initially.

“None was forthcoming, and we were told pretty much that it was not necessary.... We were surprised at that bit of news, and coming out the way it did, it was shattering for us.”

Kenred Dorsett, minister of the environment and housing, told Tribune Business on Monday that the Government hoped to launch a properly structured RFP, seeking multiple bids on the landfill contract, “as soon as possible”.

“An RFP [Request for Proposal] is being structured now, and that will be advanced to deal with the total operation and remediation of the site,” he explained.

“That is what is being completed. Everyone will be able to participate because we want to make sure that we are comparing apples to apples. We’re having a structured programme so that everyone could submit, based on the parameters, and then we could move forward.”

Mr Dean, though, said the WRDG/Providence Advisors group remained a string contender because it had answered all government queries regarding its bid to-date.

“All is not lost,” he told Tribune Business. “We are still hopeful because we still believe we will have a superior proposal compared to others, and the collective experience we bring to the table, no other group will have.

“As the group with the experience, the Government’s concern was whether we could find the financial, intellectual and technical capabilities to put it together. We demonstrated the capacity to do that.”

Mr Dean continued: “The Government may have had concerns about the financial funding, but we’re beyond that. We’ve secured technical expertise.

“Hopefully, they will revert to what we thought was coming in an agreement with our group, so we can begin the process.”

Mr Dean acknowledged that there were advantages associated with the Government launching a formal RFP process, namely greater transparency and the opportunity to obtain the best bid - and solution - out there.

“While we are disappointed, it may open that up and help to demonstrate our capabilities, so that when we are given the job there will be no issue related to that,” he said.

Going the RFP route could, though, delay the selection of a private sector landfill manager and remediation of the site, whose recent blaze has re-ignited health and environmental concerns, plus disrupted the lives of residents in Jubilee Gardens and other nearby communities.

Tribune Business understands that there are also fears the RFP process may be overtaken by the imminent general election, and that it will be left to the next administration to decide the way forward. All of which delays potential resolution, and threatens to prolong the suffering of nearby residents.

An open, structured ‘beauty contest’ process where all contenders will know the rules and criteria under which they are bidding is another advantage associated with a formal RFP process.

However, the decision to go this route now raises immediate questions as to why the Christie administration did not choose this process for the landfill four to five years ago.

It instead ultimately signed the ill-fated management agreement with Renew Bahamas, despite many observers wondering why it had not structured an RFP - the process that was used for the BEC management contract and the second mobile communications license.

The landfill, as a publicly-owned asset with massive health and environmental implications, was seen as ideally suited for an RFP, with the Government’s selection of Renew Bahamas criticised for lacking transparency.

Many Bahamians, especially those living near the landfill, will likely wonder whether much grief, cost and disruption could have been avoided had the Christie administration gone the RFP route earlier.

WRDG also complained at the time that they were asked to bid on substantially different terms from Renew Bahamas.

Renew Bahamas walked away from its New Providence landfill management contract in the immediate aftermath of Hurricane Matthew, citing security and safety concerns amid the absence of electricity supply, and a spate of thefts and shootings.

It had previously been seeking to renegotiate its management contract and associated financial terms with the Christie administration, having revealed to Tribune Business it had been incurring continuous, heavy losses.

The Government subsequently charged that Renew Bahamas had used Hurricane Matthew as an excuse to pull-out, having realised that its business model - which depended almost exclusively on the sale and export of materials recycled from the landfill - was not viable or sustainable.

The imminent Baha Mar opening and general election has intensified pressure on the Government to resolve the landfill’s woes