In a rare event, last Tuesdayâs low bidder for the Muddy Creek Bridge Project approved by the Linn County Board of Commissioners was disqualified after failing to register to be listed on a âplan holders listâ and turning in a bid that excluded one item and an incorrect quantity on a second bid item.
Linn County Roadmaster Wayne Mink told Commissioners Roger Nyquist, John Lindsey and Sherrie Sprenger Tuesday morning that Carter & Co. from Salem, which has done business with the county on several other occasions, submitted a bid of $840,594.
Second low bidder was Marcum & Sons of Redmond at $856,000. The county engineerâs estimate was $1,090,305.
When Linn County Commissioner Will Tucker was 15 years old, he ran away from home and lived in San Franciscoâs Haight-Ashbury district, which in 1968 was the epicenter of the hippie movement.
âI strung beads for a few weeks and girls would sell them for 50 cents,â Tucker said. âI saw the good and bad in people.â
Tucker chose to do good things in life, a decision that has guided his decision-making ever since.
Tuesday, with only 48 hours left, the clock was ticking on Tuckerâs time in office. But phone calls from constituents in need â flooding, a neighborâs garbage pile, squatters â continued rolling into his temporary office in the county courthouse in Albany.