Downstroke

Missing parts: Chico State is no longer full-speed-ahead on its plans to contract with a vendor to run the on-campus parts-and-supplies store. The likely corporate vendor would have cut into $500,000 worth of business the university does each year, much of it with local retailers selling everything from paper towels to tools.

“Most important is the local business relationship,” university President Paul Zingg said in an e-mail interview with the Chico News & Review. “We are a part of our local community and should be doing business here.”

When interviewed for an article in the CN&R’s Feb. 16 issue, University Director of Facilities and Management Glennda Morse was matter-of-fact about seeking such a vendor and requests for proposals (RFPs) had already been announced. But when local vendors heard of the plans, they took issue, some pledging to withdraw support from the university. The retailers could still have sold to the corporate-run parts store.

Now, Zingg refers to the idea as simply “under consideration.”

“If we pursue this, it will be done through an open RFP process; and, second, whatever we do will not jeopardize our business relationships with our local vendors,” Zingg said. “I have made these conditions clear to the folks at the university who are in charge of this side of our operations.”

House hunters: It’s the bulldozer or $1 for six houses in the path of Enloe Medical Center’s planned expansion on The Esplanade. The hospital put the 1950s-era homes on West Sixth and Magnolia avenues up for sale last week, contingent on the expansion passing the City Council.

Of course, the buyer would need to pay to move the house, and have land on which to deposit it. Potential buyers have until March 20 to make an offer, and must put up a refundable $3,000 to prove they can back it up.

A visit to the Butte County Assessor’s Office showed that Enloe has owned several of the houses for more than a decade and went so far as to join some together on one lot, and as a result not all of the houses have a distinct parcel number. Two others were purchased in 1999 and 2001. County records reveal that Enloe was generous in its July 2005 purchase of the former home of a woman who’d lived at 1551 Magnolia Ave., across from the emergency room, from the house’s construction in 1955 until failing health prompted the sale of the three-bedroom, one-bath way above market value at $520,000.

The houses are at: 1551 Magnolia, 1537 Magnolia, 1507 Magnolia, 221 West Sixth, 140 West Sixth and 249 West Sixth.

A contract for Compass: After months of contentious contract debate that included pickets and a one-day strike, contractor Compass has a tentative deal with its employees at Enloe Medical Center.

Members of the housekeeping and food service workers staff voted 84-to-1 on March 7 to OK the tentative agreement. The contract will cover three years and includes retroactive raises, better benefits and added job security. Besides the 4-percent retroactive raise, which ensures no one will earn less than $8 an hour, the workers will get a 5-percent raise on Jan. 1, 2007 and then again the following year.

Service Employees International Union (SEIU) 250 has represented the employees since April 2004.

Enloe outsourced the services to multinational corporation Compass in 2003, saying the hospital was in the business of health care, not housekeeping and food.