Nassau County Executive Thomas R. Suozzi today announced a countywide, money-saving initiative for the purchasing of supplies. The Nassau County Legislature is expected to approve Nassau County's membership to the Long Island Municipal Cooperative Purchasing Group. Nassau County will join with nearly 20 municipalities in the LIMCPG in an effort to reduce overall costs across the County through a cooperative purchasing plan.

The Long Island Municipal Cooperative Purchasing Group was created in December 2000 as an initiative of the Nassau County Village Officials Association. The goal of the LIMCPG is to allow for centralized cooperative purchasing among members, while each municipality in the group separately can decide to issue purchase orders. The LIMCPG members currently include Bayville, Bellerose, Farmingdale, Floral Park, Garden City, Great Neck, Great Neck Plaza, Lake Success, Lynbrook, Malverne, Mineola, New Hyde Park, Roslyn, Roslyn Estates, South Floral Park, Williston Park, the City of Glen Cove, and Westbury Water and Fire District.

"Nassau County's involvement in the Long Island Municipal Cooperative Purchasing Group is something that will be very beneficial to all sides," said County Executive Suozzi. "The municipalities and the County will both prosper from the money saved, and consolidating our bid requests will be much more efficient."

The LIMCPG has signed an agreement with E-Public bids for e-procurement initiatives, and as a result, E-Public Bids has developed an Internet based application for the procedure. The Purchasing Group now has the capacity to develop a bid request and electronically distribute of a bid to registered suppliers. "Joining this purchasing cooperative provides the County purchasing departments access to group purchasing while also embracing technological advances--and all this was developed in our own back yard by a Lynbrook-based firm," said Lynbrook Mayor Eugene Scarpato.

"As the chair of the Towns, Villages & Cities Committee, I have been actively involved for the past two years in encouraging cooperative purchasing agreements, and I am very pleased that Nassau County is taking advantage of this cost-saving initiative," said Nassau County Legislator Craig Johnson. "Innovative and efficient ideas such as these are just another small example of how we are building a better Nassau County."

Currently, Nassau County generates a bid request, but the volume in the bid request only includes anticipated County requirements. The present system has no way of automatically including other municipalities within the county in the request. According to the new system, an LIMCPG member will be appointed as the lead agency to handle the particular bid, and will follow all required procurement laws, including advertisement. That agency will then provide a report of the bid results to the members, who will each determine if the prices and terms are acceptable.