Historically, the City of East Lansing has performed City right-of-way tree plantings utilizing internal Department of Public Works staff. Eighty to one hundred trees a year over two planting cycles (fall and spring) have been typical, which are installed in parkways (the area between sidewalk and road), parks, and road medians. However, the City’s lack of specialized equipment, staff capacity, and planting expertise are limiting factors that reduce the number, size, and quality of tree plantings we can perform. The City seeks a qualified firm to furnish, transport, and plant trees to outsource our tree planting operations. The project also includes the watering of trees through the first two growing seasons, performed by the Contractor or their subcontractor.
Due to equipment and expertise, the City’s staff has only planted containerized trees. However, the City is open to pricing for the purchase and planting of ball and burlapped, bare root, and container trees to compare options, sizing, and costs. The City is open to planting a mix of each type, based on the goals of specific locations (i.e, larger ball and burlapped in strategic park areas, smaller, cheaper trees for routine street plantings, etc). These decisions will be determined by pricing, and therefore the total number of tree plantings is not yet known, but the City has a budget of up to $70,000 for the project. Awards shall be made for fixed price agreements with no guarantee of quantities to be ordered.
The attached bid forms requests unit price per tree planted for a variety of approved species, as well as the cost for bi-weekly watering during the guarantee period.
