Mill Creek, Wash. — The Mill Creek City Council unanimously authorized participation in a Port of Everett Job Order Contract (JOC) on Nov. 11, allowing the city to use fixed unit-price task orders to speed maintenance and small public-works projects.

Public works staff described JOC as an indefinite-quantity, task-order contracting method that uses an RSMeans unit-price book administered by Gordian to pre-scale unit costs and reduce time and overhead for small construction tasks. Staff said JOC can reduce procurement lead time on some projects by up to 65%, and emphasized that no new city funds were requested; the method simply changes the contracting pathway for eligible tasks.

Councilmember Cavalieri moved to authorize the city manager to execute an interlocal cooperative purchasing agreement with the Port of Everett for participation in job order contracting. The motion passed 7–0.

What’s next: Staff will coordinate with the Port of Everett and Gordian to set up access and then use the JOC mechanism for qualifying maintenance and small construction tasks under normal procurement approval thresholds.