Key West Towing Contracts to Change
If towing companies are upset that the city will now hire only one towing company, they can blame themselves.
That’s according to Mayor Craig Cates—who doesn’t back the change. As mayor, he’s witnessed years of squabbling among Key West towing companies, which led the City Commission to put a single towing contract out to bid.
“All the infighting with the different companies is what caused this,” he told KonkLife Saturday. “It was all too unmanageable. All the arguing put a strain on the city staff, on code enforcement, the police department.”
Less than a handful of towing companies, Arnold’s Towing, Anchor Towing and Key West Towing have vied for the right to tow broken down city vehicles, illegally parked cars, DUI vehicles and other automobiles the city wants removed. The city now assigns each tow company the work on a weekly basis. One week, it’s Anchor Towing; the next week, Key West Tow, and so forth.
The rotation, however, didn’t stop accusations of favoritism in the awarding of rotation weeks.
When one towing company was allowed to work, even though it didn’t have the required truck, other companies cried foul. When another company was allowed to tow city vehicles when it didn’t have required on-site storage, other companies cried foul. Should Arnold’s Towing be the only company with its phone number on city no-parking signs when other companies don’t have their numbers on the signs? And the bickering went on …
“I thought it had all calmed down about the size of the tow trucks,” Cates said of an exception that was given one tow company. “Then there was the lawsuit.”
When City Manager Bob Vitas gave Anchor permission to keep towing in spite of not having a required heavy-duty tow truck, “the other companies got mad at that,” Cates said. “They said it wasn’t correct. Mr. Vitas agreed and he took it back. Now Anchor is suing the city.”
A city commission-approved Request for Proposal, from which one company will be chosen, requires the winning towing company to give the city back a percentage of the money it collects for towing city calls.
“The RFP asks each bidder what percentage a payback they’re willing to pay the city,” said Mark Jester, of Anchor Towing. He chuckled as he said it.
The contract also will be rewarded based on a towing company’s storage facility, 24-hour staffing, and for having the required tow truck muscle, and other requirements.
One towing company professional, who asked not to be identified, said the proposal to give the city a cut feels like a kickback.
“None of us likes paying the city,” the towing company employee said. “But we work on their island, we play by their rules.”
The bid will be rewarded in February. Cates said he hopes it will calm the bickering.
“After all the years of arguing, complaining about each other and the lawsuit, the city said, ‘You know what? We’ll just put out an RFP and have one company and not have the headaches. That’s how all this came about.”
The anonymous towing company employee said the city towing work isn’t a make or break proposal.
“It’s not particularly a lot of money,” the employee said. “The city generates 400 tows a year, and you split that among each company on the rotation.”
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