DATE:
June 28, 2022
CATEGORY:
Consent
DEPT.:
Finance and Administrative Services
TITLE: Newspaper Advertising Bid Award
RECOMMENDATION
Authorize the City Manager or designee to award the contract for legal advertising for Fiscal Year 2022-23 to the Daily Post as the lowest responsible bidder.
BACKGROUND
The Mountain View City Charter (Charter) requires the City to conduct a bidding process each year to select a newspaper to publish official City notices. Section 1109 of the Charter states:
“The council shall let annually contracts for the official advertising for the ensuing fiscal year. [...] The council shall let the contracts for such official advertising to the lowest responsible bidder publishing a newspaper in the city which is a newspaper of general circulation and has been in existence at the time of the awarding of the contract at least one year; provided, that the council may reject any or all bids and advertise for new bids.”
State law also re quires the City to provide notice of upcoming land -use decisions either by publishing the notice in a newspaper published in the City or by posting the notice at designated locations. The City meets its legal noticing obligations by posting the notices of hearings as required by State law because there is no newspaper of general circulation in the City of Mountain View as defined by State law. In addition to satisfying the legal noticing requirements, the City provides additional notice of agenda items by publishing them in the newspaper.
ANALYSIS
The City has advertised and solicited bids for advertising for Fiscal Year 202 2-23 to meet the intent of the Charter provision and provide notice of upcoming agenda items , in addition to posting notice at City facilities and on the City’s website. The bid specification requested that the
Newspaper Advertising Bid Award
June 28, 2022
bid be based on one thousand one hundred inches ( 1,100”) of advertising, and the notices will be placed in the legal notice section of the newspaper. The City received two bids as follows:
• The Daily Post in the amount of $11.00 per inch, no minimum charge, $12,100 total.
• The Daily Journal’s San Jose Post Record in the amount of $11.80 per inch, no minimum charge, $12,980 total.
As a comparison, for Fiscal Year 2021-22, the City awarded the bid to the Daily Post in the amount of $12.50 per inch, no minimum charge, $13,750 total.
The City’s noticing requireme nts generally include solicitation of purchasing and construction bids, public meetings, and land-use hearings. For the past several years, the City has averaged at least 34 City Council meetings per year , in addition to Regular Meetings of advisory bodie s.
Additional considerations involve the timing and noticing of agenda items that are reviewed by both the Environmental Planning Commission and the City Council. The City also has a policy that establishes additional timelines for notifying the community of upcoming agenda items. Due to these many constraints, a once-per-week publication would significantly limit the City’s ability to schedule agenda items and comply with the City’s noticing requirements. Information published in the newspaper is key since data services (used by vendors and contractors) collect information for their clients from the newspaper. The information is also accessible online.
The Daily Post will enable the City to place notices of City agenda items in the newspaper five days per week. Based on the bid specifications of one thousand one hundred inches (1,100”) of advertising in the legal notice section with five-day ad placement capability , the Daily Journal’s San Jose Post Record met the minimum bid requirements but was bid at a higher unit price.
The placement of notices in the legal advertising section of the Daily Post for public meetings may also be supplemented with additional ads in the following: Mountain View Voice (which publishes once per week on Fridays), the San Jose Mercury News , direct mailings to residents, email, traditional agenda subscriptions, local -access television ads, and notices on the City’s website.
The Daily Post, in combination with other noticing approaches used by the City, is an efficient means of reaching the target audiences for which different notices are intended.
FISCAL IMPACT
Funds for legal advertising are included in the budget.
Newspaper Advertising Bid Award
June 28, 2022
ALTERNATIVE
Reject all bids and readvertise for new bids.
PUBLIC NOTICING
Agenda posting.
Prepared by:
Ann Mehta
Purchasing and Support Services Manager
Approved by:
Jesse Takahashi
Finance and Administrative
Services Director
Approved by:
Audrey Seymour Ramberg
Assistant City Manager/
Chief Operating Officer
AM/4/CAM
502-06-28-22CR
202089