Evening Republican, Volume 14, Number 162, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 9 July 1910 — Is Such Work Fair or Just. [ARTICLE]

Is Such Work Fair or Just.

A bunch of school and township sup ply men in the state are sitting up at nights and wasting a whole lot of gray brain cells in devising means to circumvent the township trustees and land some easy money contracts. The State Accounting Board has been at some pains to frame up a “Classified Notice to Bidders,” copies of which

are to bp sent out to all the township trustees of the state for their guidance in purchasing supplies and in advertising for the same. In making up the lists, the board called in the assistance of school supply men, but seemingly did not consult the trustees to any great extent. It is stated that it is the purpose of the board to so shape the classes that home people can have a chance at the sale of the most of the goods, or such things that they may be able to supply, but an inspection of the sample “Notice to Bidders,” which has been sent out to the trustees by' the Columbia School Supply Company, of Indianapolis, seems to contain a few jokers which will put local people at a disadvantage in a good many of the twenty-two classes enumerated.

In the first place, the notice specifies that “A bid on the goods of any class must cover all the checked items in that class.” Then when you get down into the classes you find goods jumbled together that are not usually carried by the same dealer. For instance, floor oils, cocoa mats and dust pans are put in one class. It is doubtful if there is a firm in Rensselaer that carries all four of the items enumerated in stock. Drug companies and hardware men may carry the floor oil, while grocers sell the brooms and furniture men the mats. Either of the businesses named can furnish the articles handled by themselves as cheaply, or even cheaper than a school supply house, but the requisitions made by the trustee is not usually large enough to warrant them in going out into the market and picking up goods not carried in stock.

The same in blank books and printed forms. These are both thrown into the same class but the local printer can furnish all of the printed forms and he cannot furnish the blank books in most cases, as he is not equipped for the making of them. The notice though, says he must bid on all articles specified in the classes as fixed. The school supply houses that helped prepare these forms, were aware of that fact, but were they honest enough to sail attention to it?

Farther, one supply company in the state went so far as to mail out with these sample forms of notices to bidders, a circular letter which strongly hinted that a trustee must not deviate V -it from the same, or he would likely get into trouble with the state examiners.

To the average citizen, it looks like there is a good deal of and red tape about the whole With advisory boards and field examiners to watch him up, and a settlement to be made with the county commissioners and with itemized vouchers, a trustee buying in the open market could not go so very far wrong.

It is all right to advertise for bids on all purchases of any considerable amount, but when it comes down to a good many items in the lists submitted, the saving in purchase price is not enough to pay for the time and paper taken to put through the matter to warrant bothering with the same. Farther, it is doubtful if the law ever contemplated such work either. It seems to be. reading more into a statute than what is really there^.