I hope you are doing well. Thank you for your time and for the work you do.
Pursuant to the Maryland Public Information Act (PIA) (Md. Code, GP § 4-101 et seq.), I am requesting an electronic summary of purchase orders (not the individual purchase orders themselves) issued by Howard County Public Schools from March 1, 2026 to July 31, 2026.
This report may also be referred to as an accounts payable summary, check summary, check register, bill or claims report, or vendor analysis report. Any spreadsheet or report that lists vendor names and amounts paid would be fully responsive to this request.
If available, please include:
-Vendor name
-Description of purchase or payment
-Total price or amount paid
If vendor names are coded, please include the code key if it's easily available. We're happy to accept whatever form this data is already maintained in — raw exports or standard reports (Excel, CSV, or PDF) are perfectly fine. We will accept partial data if you do not have a document with each of the above components or the entire timeframe requested.
Responsive to this request, please find the following records linked below:
• The Board of Education of Howard County awards contracts over $50,000 regularly through Bids and Contracts Reports: https://hcpss-org.community.diligentoneplatform.com/document/3fe24fa7-8462-40ee-8cad-b7641d2c6dfc/ - this is an example of the most recent one, and there is typically one per meeting found on the Board’s website: https://hcpss-org.community.diligentoneplatform.com/Portal/Default.aspx.
• Contracts between $25,000 and $50,000 are reported quarterly: https://hcpss-org.community.diligentoneplatform.com/document/fec620fb-8821-4ad8-b957-8ecefbd5b697/ – this is an example of the most recent report.
• A public contracts database was also recently adopted by the school system: https://hcpss.bonfirehub.com/portal/?tab=openOpportunities.
• Outside of contracts, total yearly payments by vendor over a threshold of $25,000 are also reported on this website: https://www.hcpss.org/f/vendors/index.html.