§ 2-26-46. Cooperative procurement, piggybacking.

(a)

Cooperative procurement. Unless otherwise prohibited by law or grant agreement terms, the purchasing official is authorized to negotiate with other public procurement officials for the conduct of a joint procurement on behalf of each participating public agency where, in the judgment of the purchasing official, doing so would leverage the benefits of volume purchases, create clear delivery and/or supply chain advantages, and/or create a demonstrable and substantial reduction of administrative time and expense. Examples of cooperative procurement events can include joint solicitations or use of a third party aggregator or broker.

(b)

Piggybacking. In any agreement for the acquisition of commodities between the county and a vendor which has resulted from a competitive solicitation process, the purchasing official is authorized to include a term authorizing the agreement to be utilized by other public agencies to acquire the same commodities. The purchasing official is also authorized to acquire commodities by use of an existing agreement between a vendor and another public agency where such agreement has resulted from a competitive solicitation process. Purchases made in this manner, commonly called piggybacking, should not substantially differ in specification, quality or price from the terms of the initial agreement. Use of a "piggybacked" contract must be consistent with its solicitation and contract parameters and restrictions. Requirements must remain substantially the same as the existing "piggybacked" contract. For the purposes of this section, the term commodities may include a service component such as installation or maintenance, so long as the predominant purpose of the agreement is not the acquisition of the service.

(Ord. No. 14-32, § 8, 9-23-14)