The $12,000 Garbage Scow: How Seattle’s City Council Tried to Buy a Trash Boat for Less Than a House
When the lowest bid for a municipal garbage scow came in at nearly $13,000—more than double the estimate—the city council was forced to slash specifications, revealing the tight financial straits of early 20th-century Seattle.
When the City Council decided to build a garbage scow, it was estimated that one answering the present necessities of the city could be built for $6,000. When the bids were opened last Friday night, the lowest one was for $12,739, and as a scow costing that much was considered altogether too expensive for the city to build in its present straitened financial condition, the whole matter was referred back to the committee on health and police.
The committee has instructed the city engineer to prepare new plans and specifications for a $6,000 scow, so that the cost will come between $5,000 and $6,000. This can be done by leaving out some unnecessary iron work provided for in the former specifications and making a few other modifications that will not affect the utility of the scow, while greatly reducing the cost of constructing it.
Sealed proposals for the construction of the scow according to the new plans and specifications will be called for in a few days.
This 1903 report on municipal waste management highlights a perennial urban struggle: the gap between projected infrastructure costs and actual bids. Just as Seattle today grapples with skyrocketing construction costs for housing and transit, early Seattleites faced the same reality when basic sanitation services exceeded their budget by 200%, forcing them to downgrade the quality of public assets.
From readers
No comments yet. If you know something about this story — a correction, a family memory, a source — it belongs here.