The body shop is responsible for all collision and cosmetic repairs not limited to transit buses. This is all of the city's fleet vehicles and equipment, including all police cars, fire trucks, buses, plows, dump trucks, related city equipment, and any other city government vehicles. Will eliminating and outsourcing this valuable service save tax dollars? Will our community benefit from higher rep
air cost, or delays in scheduled service caused by moving body work to outside commercial sources? These sources would often be outside of town and move local money to other communities. The time and transit costs would be an additional overhead. The city shop was designed for larger vehicles and fleet equipment, while local shops are not able to accommodate vehicles of this size. The body shop also handles any miscellaneous city projects which are not handled by other sources - this includes the city park amusement rides (train rides etc), the purple charity parking meters downtown, and many other various projects. Will the city contract out all these repairs to one single location, or will they ask for bids on each individual repair? Neither is preferable to having all work go through the currently cost-efficient body shop, which is staffed by only one person. This proposal would not save Iowa City any money or time. It would cause unnecessary burden and delay for inner city departments including the Police and Fire Departments. http://www.press-citizen.com/comments/article/20111223/NEWS01/312230003/City-plan-calls-bus-fare-hike
