Potential tweaks to district bid policy part of future discussion

The Lincoln County School District #2 Board of Trustees held their regularly scheduled meeting April 8, and discussed a multitude of items facing the area. Those in attendance included Chairman Darnell Simpson and board members Dave Jenkins, Lynn Call, Connie Day and Jake Long. Timothy Teichert joined the meeting via Zoom. Member Jed Johnson was absent for a family commitment. Superintendent Matt Erickson, District Secretary Barney Kleeman and Director of Technology Kyle Weber.

One topic that took up a large portion of the meeting was one of bids being presented by school district employees who also have businesses of their own. While no wrongdoing or accusations were made, this is the second month where the topic was brought up with the idea that some tweaks to the district policy may need to be addressed.

Mr. Lynn Call in particular related a personal experience recently and liked the situation to a moral dilemma. He said that while there is no real inside information for these bids, he said those familiar with an organization potentially have an advantage because they understand the “lay of the land”.

“Our obligation isn’t just to do the right thing, but that the public see us doing the right thing,” he said. “Right now if there is an inquiry about bids, I cannot defend it. As a trustee, I need to be able to defend it. I don’t feel it’s a totally fair process. Making a judgement whether or not this process meets the standard of fairness; I think we can come up with a solution. But we need to come up with a process that I feel is good and that I can explain and is transparent to the public.”

Mr. Call expressed concern that the district may be conditioning some contractors that if someone is bidding from the inside, they don’t bid on the project.

Mr. Warren Hicks, Director of Facilities, addressed the concern stating that the facilities department “spends an extraordinary large amount of time in contacting potential bidders,” he said. “I would promise that we are definitely as proactive as we can be to get the word out. I would love to have a set of rules and I’m more than open to working with a committee.”

Chairman Simpson asked for a committee with Mr. Call, Mr. Long and Mr. Jenkins volunteering in addition to Mr. Hicks and Mr. Warren.

Mr. Teichert noted through his Zoom connection that he felt strongly there was nothing wrong with the current process because all bids are sealed bids.

In other notes, a potential SVHS pilot program for a commercial Drivers License class taught by Victor Hardesty was presented to the board. It was noted that if the pilot course is successful and interest increases, SVHS will pursue approval for the course to continue.

Mr. Long noted there is a cost and school requirement for CDL licenses now and this course could potentially save people thousands of dollars if they were to utilize it.

Chairman Simpson gave a report on his attendance in the Consortium of State School Boards Associations (COSSBA) conference. One portion of the conference that he reported on included the increasing numbers of students who are victims of “sextortion” which was noted includes 1 in every 5 teens. Chairman Simpson also mentioned at some point a “bell to bell” phone free zone is a discussion he would like to have for LCSD #2.

Superintendent Erickson gave the enrollment update and stated that the district is currently at 2,835 students, this is a decrease of 51 from April of 2025. He also reported that Star Valley High School is down 54 students from September of this school year and down seven from last month.

Mr. Hicks gave a facilities update which included a spotlight on several custodians who went above and beyond to perform deep cleaning during Spring Break. Mr. Hicks reported that projects that are currently out for bid include: District-wide carpet replacement, district-wide asphalt repair and seal coating, district-wide concrete replacement and additional sidewalks at SVHS.

Mr. Hicks also reported that some recent bids were pulled after discrepancies with current policy and he noted that it is “very difficult to get certain projects bid, particularly for Cokeville.”

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