A special expedited process was used to decide which companies would handle making face masks for school children in short order, the provincial government says. Pictured: An Alberta student dons a mask like the ones they'll be required to wear to school this fall.--NEWS PHOTO
gslade@medicinehatnews.com@MHNGillianSlade
The government has ordered 1.7 million reusable face masks for students returning to school this fall.
About 90 per cent of the masks will be supplied by Old Navy, and the balance by IFR Workwear in Red Deer, at a total cost of $4.2 million.
When the school re-entry plan was announced on July 21 the decision on masks in schools was still pending because Dr. Deena Hinshaw, chief medical officer of health, was still considering emerging scientific evidence from other jurisdictions, says a press release. In the meantime Alberta Education together with the Provincial Operations Centre, began preparing for the contingency should Hinshaw decide to recommend that students and faculty wear masks.
The province has contracting policies that allow for an expedited process in urgent situations where a normal tendering process would take too long.
“Choices were made by non-partisan bureaucrats at the (Provincial Operations Centre), who evaluated whether a company could meet both quality requirements and the demands of a large order in a very short amount of time,” said Timothy Gerwing, press secretary for municipal affairs, noting that neither the minister for education nor municipal affairs “played any role in the selection of the companies.”
Gerwing says it was not realistic to order small quantities from many suppliers to reach the total required, particularly considering the short time frame for supply, said Gerwing.
It has been noted that Education Minister Adriana LaGrange’s political riding is Red Deer.
“Frankly, it’s disappointing that some are even suggesting that, unless they’re suggesting an Alberta employer should have been eliminated from contention because it happens to be located in a given riding,” said Gerwing.
POC staff use a Government of Alberta-approved emergency purchasing procedure, which was put into place in 2014, to procure items locally without a request for proposal under emergency provisions in the New West Partnership Trade Agreement and the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement, he said.
In a recent press release, LaGrange said that Alberta Education and the POC are confident that masks, sanitizer, thermometers and face shields will be distributed to school divisions before students go back to the classroom. The statement says many local businesses expressed an eagerness to help. In general these businesses have limited production capacity. The primary objective is to ensure that the large volume of reusable masks is obtained and distributed in time for the start of the school year.
