Agenda - Council - 06/12/2001 - Laserfiche WebLink

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ACTUAL MOVING AND RECONNECTION COSTS The Uniform Relocation Act regulations provide that a displaced business may receive compensation for expenses related to' moving the personal property, equipment, and inventory from the project site to a replacement location. Eligible costs include those associated with disconnecting and disassembling the movable property, packing the items, moving up to a distance of 50 miles, and unpacking, reassembling and reconnecting the personal items at the new site. Other eligible costs include those associated with insuring the move for the replacement value of the personal property and storage of the personal property for a period not to exceed 12 months. Reimbursable expenses are those, which are documented and determined by the Displacing Agency to be reasonable and necessary. Compensation to a business or farm operation for a "self-move" is determined by first securing two bids or estimates of the cost a professional commercial moving company would charge to conduct the move. The lower amount sets the payment limit to the displaced business for a non-documented self-move. For an uncomplicated, low-cost move, the relocation rules allow for a moving payment to the displaced business to be based on only one estimate obtained from a professional moving company or a qualified agency staff estimator. . Often times the services of special technicians are also needed to determine eli~ble ' moving-related costs. Examples of some special services, which may be required, - include a rigger to handle a particularly heavy piece of equipment or plumbers and electricians for disconnect and reconnect of specialized movable equipment. Connection of the personal property to utilities available nearby, modifications to the personal property necessary to adapt it to the replacement structure, the replacement site, or the utilities at the replacement site, and modifications necessary to adapt the utitides at the replacement site to the personal property are all considered eligible moving-related expenses if they are also deemed reasonable and necessary. Some items of personal property are so specialized that the original supplier of the item or a mover specializing in' such transfers must handle their entire transfer. Examples of this type of personal property include telephone systems, alarm systems, and many types of computer systems. Often times two specialists are required just to move a business% telephone service - one to disconnect and reconnect the business's telephone equipment and another to disconnect and reconnect service to the equipment. The latter is generally non-competitive, 'that is, there is only one company, which provides local telephone service, and its charges to reconnect the service must simply be paid'. While there is certainly abundant competition for telephone, alarm, and computer sys[ems, once a business has chosen the type of system it wishes to use, it generally must be installed by the provider of the system. A business may choose to substitute an item of movable property at the time of its relocation. The moving and reconnect costs are still allowable as long as the system being installed is similar to the one, which was in use at the project site. -97-