MONTESANO — The Grays Harbor County commissioners took the unusual step of rejecting the top bids for three recent timber harvest sales and awarding the contracts to the second-highest bidder.
The move came at the request of top bidder for all three sales, A-1 Timber, which has operations in Chehalis and Alaska. County Forestry Director Larry Smith said the timber company miscalculated its bids, and it’s unlikely the company would have been able to pay the bid anyway.
A-1 Timber had bid $520 per thousand on a 2.8 million board feet sale on Powell Road. The next highest was Sierra Pacific at $392. A-1 bid $504 per thousand on 613,000 board feet at Grass Creek. The next highest bid was $440 from Chehalis Valley Timber. The company also bid $530 per thousand on 4 million board feet at Section 4 R.O.W. Next highest bid was $350 from WT Timber.
Smith explained to the commissioners that if they didn’t reject the top bids because of the timber company’s miscalculations, then the county may have had to eat the sales in the end — or go after the company for not meeting its obligations.
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