City Council - Special Meeting

Councilmember Kirchherr? Here. Councilmember Dowling?

Here.

Councilmember Salter?

Here. Can you hear me okay?

Yes.

Yes. Can you state your location if the agenda has been posted and if there's anybody in the room with you?

I'm participating via Zoom from One Market in San Francisco. The agenda has been posted and there's nobody in the room.

Thank you.

um has the agenda been posted yes mayor any changes to the agenda not for me um so what i'd like to do is um instead of taking public comment right now i would like to go through the agenda items and then take public comment and then we'll bring it back for discussion at the end um and I will allow additional time for certain members of the public to the extent that they need additional time, okay? So I called this meeting, special meeting, Monday morning, and it was based on a meeting that Elizabeth Robbins and I had with the Citizens Advisory Committee on Friday morning, June 19. And they expressed concern to us that the momentum and focus of the CAC plan that they proposed on April 29th was being lost. And the focus was to embrace the CAC plan, hire an architect, and start designing right away. To them, there is no need to update the facilities master plan. City Council Chambers, Various planning and design elements driveways elevation of the bays police car parking etc can be worked out by the architect. City Council Chambers, They also. City Council Chambers, told us that there's no need to determine a procurement method design bid build or design slash build prior to hiring an architect. City Council Chambers, they're very concerned that delays and a shifted focus from implementing the CAC plan to updating the facilities master plan. is hurting the support and the momentum for the CAC plan. And they're concerned that this will make it harder to pass a bond measure to fund the CAC plan when that happens probably hopefully March of 2027. So their direction to Elizabeth and me on Friday was hire an architect as soon as possible based on subcommittee recommendation. Don't update the facilities master plan. rescind the RFPs that are currently outstanding to update the facilities master plan, delay deciding on a procurement process for now, and direct the staff to work with the CAC. I felt obligated to bring those concerns back to the entire council. I am only one person on the town council. I'm 20% of the town council. Being mayor in the town of Ross, means I just need to be really on time for our meetings. That's about it. So I wanted to share with the council and with the staff, the concerns that the CAC raised, and we can have a discussion and figure out how we can go forward from here. Elizabeth, do you have anything to add?

Well, yes, just one other thing, which is with respect to the delay, This really is time sensitive because we want to be sure that we can complete the paramedic facility before the deadline of January, 2029. And that is being jeopardized also. So, besides the reasons you mentioned, Julie, this was the other concern of the CAC that we weren't moving fast enough to meet that obligation.

Thank you. So, Town Manager Johnson, you wrote an excellent City Council Chambers, staff report that we received very late last night, thank you, I am maybe you could briefly address some of the concerns that you raised in your staff report. City Council Chambers, Briefly, because I think most of us have seen it. City Council Chambers, That would be really helpful great.

Thank you. Good afternoon, Mayor and Council members. The purpose, as I understand it, of today's discussion is not to revisit the Council's discussion to identify the CAC concept as the preferred alternative for the Civic Center project. That decision was made on May 6 when the Council adopted resolution number 2623. The council has already selected the CAC concept as its preferred design concept. This is not a debate about concept B versus the CAC concept. The request for proposals, what we call an RFP, for plan amendment services is intended to implement the CAC design concept. It is not intended to replace it. or delay it, but to implement it. So the question before the council today is a different one. And that is, how should the town proceed with the implementation of the council's preferred concept, which is the CAC concept? Staff evaluated the demands made by CAC and FORF and prepared the staff report sent late last night to the Council and then posted online this morning outlining two potential paths forward. The first option is to continue with the facility master plan amendment and concept validation process authorized by the town council on June 11th. The second option is to terminate that current RFP process and proceed directly into negotiations with a single architectural firm. After careful and detailed review, I strongly recommend that the council continue with option one. Option 1 is based on sound project management, fiscal stewardship, procurement integrity, and risk reduction. It is not based on opposition to the CAC concept. Again, the Council chose it. That's what we're doing. In fact, the current RFP process is intended to substantially advance that cac concept not to replace it to advance it the purpose of the facilities master plan amendment process is to refine and validate the council's preferred concept resolve the outstanding technical and operational issues which are outlined in the agenda report Develop reliable cost information and establish a sound foundation for future design, financing, and implementing decisions. Several significant project issues remain unresolved. These include future fire service planning, police operational requirements, public works needs, site circulation and parking, floodplain compliance, historic preservation requirements, project phasing, cost validation, financing strategy, and project delivery methodology. These issues directly affect project scope, cost, and feasibility. These significant project issues must be addressed and resolved before the Town commits to a long-term, multi-million dollar architectural services agreement. One of the key reasons for recommending Option 1 is that it preserves the integrity of the competitive procurement process that is currently underway. The Town Council authorized the RFP on June 11th. 10 highly qualified firms have been invited to participate and proposals are due on July 2nd. That is eight days from now. allowing that process to proceed provides the town with independent professional perspectives competitive pricing and valuable information regarding project scope methodology and cost by contrast option two would require the town to termate to terminate an active procurement process and negotiate directly with a single architect before many of the fundamental project assumptions have been resolved. At this time, the town does not yet have a validated project scope, a construction budget, an implementation strategy, or policy direction on several key issues, including future fire service planning. As a result, staff would be negotiating architectural services without first establishing the critical information necessary to effectively evaluate scope, fees, overall value. Staff is also concerned that unresolved project issues would continue to evolve during design, increasing the likelihood of expensive contract amendments with the architect, redesign efforts, cost increases, and schedule impacts. Another important consideration is future financing. If the town ultimately pursues a general obligation bond or another financing strategy, it is important that voters and decision makers have access to a clearly defined project scope, reliable cost estimates and a realistic implementation plan. Completing the master plan amendment and concept validation process will help provide this information. I would also like to emphasize that continuing the current process is not expected to create a lengthy delay and may in fact save time. Based on the current schedule, staff estimates that the amendment and validation effort can be completed with approximately four months and enable the council to weigh in on a potential funding measure. This work can position the town to begin financing evaluations in late 2026 and early 2027 while substantially reducing project risk. include include in closing staff's recommendation is straightforward the council has already selected its preferred concept and now the town should take the time necessary to validate that concept confirm project requirements establish reliable costs evaluate financing options and develop a clear implementation strategy before entering into a long-term architectural design agreement for these reasons i recommend that the council maintain its current direction allow the facility master plan amendment rfp process to continue remember proposals due in eight days and continue implementation of the cac concept through the structured planning process it's already been authorized by the council thank you for the opportunity

Dan, would it be okay if people have, if council members have questions of Krista to ask them now? Questions, council members?

You know, I just have one. It's a question about the wording. The beginning of the staff report said that the meeting on June 19, whether the meeting today is to discuss demands made by the CAC and Friends of the Ross Firehouse to the Mayor and Mayor Pro Tem on June 19. There weren't demands. It wasn't fourth. It was the Citizens Advisory Committee that asked to meet with Julie and me as members of the Architecture Procurement Committee, whatever we call ourselves. And there were recommendations made at that meeting discussed amongst everyone. There were no demands. So really, this meeting today is to discuss the recommendations that the CAC shared with the mayor and mayor pro tem on June 19.

I'm sorry, is that a question for me?

You know, I realize, I mean, the question was, why is it worded that way? But it's really an It's okay. I mean, it's not really a question. It's more of a reflection.

Krista, are there ways that you could speed up the process a bit or do things simultaneously, several things at the same time, as opposed to A, B, C, D, A and B together, C and D together, some way to just speed up the timeframe so that instead of having a report available what, November, it might be available in end of August, October.

Thank you for the question. This process actually usually takes over a year. So four months is really, is already moving quickly, especially because the CAC concept includes reusing or an existing trying to reuse an existing building which is going to require studies and such as hazardous materials you know really digging in whereas if you didn't have to do that you wouldn't we that would save time right there so there are there are a lot of policy issues that the council, we need direction from the council on. So I think if the council were to agree to, you know, setting up a meeting schedule every two weeks, I recall when I first started working here, there was a lot going on with the Branson school conditional use permit amendment process and I believe Elizabeth Robbins was mayor at the time and and she had a good idea which was to schedule these she knew they were going to require special meetings so she set out let's let's let's put these meeting dates in place and if we don't need them we can always cancel it I think that would be a good place to start so that with the architect on board and we can get the council and of course the community input at the meetings and I think that would be a good place to start. The architect is certainly an incredibly important part of this process, but there are other things that we need to be moving along on. It's trying to figure out how we're going to finance. That is not ending. Our negotiations working with an affordable housing partner, that moves forward. OSBT, Karen Hollweg, Communication that the work with the telecommunications to come up with the lease agreement, the discussions ongoing discussions with a paramedic authority, there are all different parts of this process that are moving along and that are necessary to keep moving forward with. OSBT, Karen Hollweg, As we get Council. policy direction on some of these really key things, that is going to help us. We need to be developing an RFP for the big architect contract, right? So we don't want to have to wait until the very end when the council actually adopts the amendment. Once we have the council direction on some of these big policy issues, we can be in the meantime working on that so it can start right away. So I would be working with our part-time project manager, David Kelly, and our owner's representative, his name is Dustin Alamo with Griffin Structures, who has extensive experience working on these kinds of public process projects to move things forward as quickly as we can. I mean, I certainly hear that. We all, I mean, from the employee perspective, we all want to have a new place to work. And we definitely want the paramedics to have a home to go into, as is our contractual obligation. So that is our intent. That's what we'd be doing. But I have to, I'm not going to be able to just to say, yeah, we're going to get it done within a month, just to, I need to be straightforward with you that this is a public, this is a process. it's it's going to take time and things are going to come up that need to be dealt with but if we have the council prepared to give us that feedback and allow that formal process for um community input that council meetings allow for that's going to help us tremendously so you're saying that one of the ways to speed up this process may be for because you're talking about making policy decisions that affect the moving

Right is for us to meet more frequently is that a lot of work on your staff to prepare for multiple Council meetings in a month.

In addition to what you're already doing yeah I mean certainly our town clerk and our staff have to put together the meeting it's it's more about. You know, preparing the agenda items and working with the town attorney's office on any items that require his review but. You know, my entire career I've worked for councils that meet twice a month or more. So I think really the hardest part is one of the hardest part is scheduling the meetings. Hardest, it's tangible, but the council, you're busy. You have other boards and commissions. The town attorney is busy. He has other clients. it's hard getting everybody together. But if we do as Elizabeth Robbins did four years ago and set up a series of meetings, and if we don't need them, cancel them. I think that's a good way to start.

So on the opposite side, so if we don't meet as frequently, then the council is holding up the process.

Yeah, I mean, that's certainly part, it's part of it, yeah.

Okay, thanks.

Assuming we were to go with, what is it, option one, which is what we left the last meeting with, and we go through this initial phase, what do we end up with by ideally December? What do we have? How detailed is that plan? It's probably going to show us where buildings are and so forth. Will it include a floor plan? Well, or does that all then go over to the architectural firm? Do you know?

What do you mean by to the architectural firm? The architect would be working on it.

You know, we're throwing all these terms around, and perhaps I have a misunderstanding based on those terms. But based on my experience, you start out with an idea, and then if you have a lot of expertise, which my firm does, we have people who do construction on our staff, or we used to. We do a lot of that. Then we go to the architects and say, okay, give us the plans, or tell us what's wrong with this. And then we go ahead. Now here, we don't have that kind of in-house expertise. So we're looking for some firm outside to help us, an architectural firm or another firm. When we did the original site plan, we did not start with an architectural firm. We started with a firm that could help us think this through. and give us a lot of alternatives. But what we ended up with was pretty general. It didn't include detailed plans, but it did take into account what our needs were space-wise.

Are you talking about the concept? Okay. Well, that actually was done by an architect firm. Was it? KPA is an architect firm. And they're actually, yeah. Okay. But that is a planning document.

Yeah.

Not construction documents.

Yes.

And so I'd like to do is we do have David Kelly, our part-time project manager is available. And I'd like him to chime in because I don't want to give you the wrong information. Is that okay?

Yeah.

He's right here.

I don't mean to belabor this. I'm just trying to get a clear idea of how we can move this ahead and whether there's not some duplication of effort here, particularly if we have two different firms doing this. We start off with one firm and then we go to a different firm for the detailed drawings. And that, I think, could result in delay and more expense.

City Council Chambers, yeah and I at this stage in the process I kind of highly doubt that it would be you know, of course it's always ultimately it's up to the Council. City Council Chambers, But I think it would be, I think, having a different architect firm come in and do this to the other part would you know they that there's a lot of work that's already that would have already been done so um. I think that would be, as we're looking at firms, that would be a little more, that would be challenging to have two different firms.

But let me... We were starting from scratch when we did the previous thing. We're not starting from scratch here. We're pretty far along. And I'm just wondering, do we really need two phases? But sure, if David has a perspective.

Sure, let me ask, David, are you on now? Oh, hi, David.

I am Krista. Thank you. Can the council hear me? Okay.

Did you hear council member culture's question?

Yes, I did.

Okay.

And to rephrase the question, I think council member, you're asking whether through the update of the master plan you would have, or the council would have a floor plans. And the answer is not necessarily. But what you would have is an advancement of the CAC concept, identifying more specifically the square footages that have been validated for each of the respective uses provided for in the Civic Center. um you really get into floor planning when you get into into schematic design and and really beyond that when you start doing you know layouts of uh equipment and so forth so you you probably wouldn't have with the master plan amendment uh the level of floor planning that i think you're you're asking about um one additional consideration just to mention is that council is going to consider alternative project or procurement delivery methods, which is gonna include one of those options for council's consideration is gonna be the progressive design build process, which is being implemented more widely by a number of local cities in Marin County. And in that case, both the contractor and architect are selected together as the design team to move the project forward. And there is some opportunities for initiating that process while we're completing the master plan. And, you know, that that obviously there's, there's some work to do to implement that process. And I don't want to assume that council is ultimately going to. Support that, but that that would be and is 1 of the key reasons. Why town managers is recommending strongly option 1 is because. If you go with option 2, it kind of precludes alternative procurement methods, which. We think if council does decide to move in that direction, that it's going to save time on the back end. And in addition to time, reduce, reduce risk for the town, because you'll be basing the, the project cost on a guaranteed maximum price. And putting a lot of the risk on the builder design team going forward. So that's just something to add to to Chris's perspective. The other element to consider with respect to saving time that staff can be working on. during the master plan update is really refining the project description. And the reason I mentioned that is because the project description is really a critical element of moving forward with the CEQA environmental document. And that's where there's some risk if you do move forward with schematic design. And if things change, of course, we don't have a detailed project description now. It would be ideal to develop that and then concurrently start working on the environmental review process. And there are probably a number of special studies that will be necessary to undertake to move that process forward. But that, again, is an effort kind of to the earlier question about saving time, that could also, if there's some overlap there, that could save time.

Can I ask a follow-up question? What, if we were to go the design-build route, what do we need to have done before that, I mean, to prepare for that? What do we need to make a proposal to a developer and an architectural firm to do the design-build?

My understanding, and this is something that's new for Krista and I, and that's part of bringing on Griffin Structures, who has the expertise in this field. But what we really need is a solid project description that will enable us to issue what's similar to an RFP to select both the builder who's gonna be the general, the GC or the general contractor, along with the architect. And that's where you get a lot of value in terms of cost savings, because they're working out issues in advance, they're working together to make sure that it's a constructible, buildable project. and you're reducing ambiguity from the design process as you go forward. Also, because of having a guaranteed maximum price, there's concurrent value engineering that's being undertaken to help save costs. But there is some process and we're going to be, we've already have meetings scheduled with the town attorney to work on bringing forward the implementation strategy for council. And again, that's something we want to advance and would support option one.

Matt, do you have any questions?

Yes, thank you. The first is just the staff report. Who told you that the friends were making demands? Why is that in the staff report?

I told her that.

Okay, because the meeting was with the Citizens Advisory Committee, correct?

It was, Matt, but there was a representative from FORF attending the meeting as well.

okay but isn't are there two members of fourth on that committee you know i don't know but i don't think that the material issue for us to discuss today is fourth or no it's it's all over the staff report so i'm i'm i want to make sure that the record is very very clear about what happened at this meeting what was said and what is what what we're putting in our staff reports So, if 4th was not in attendance, and it was not a 4th meeting, I think that this staff report needs to be amended. So, I would like that to be very clear, because we should not be putting in here that this council is making decisions based on demands made of it by a group that made no demands. So, Krista, you wrote this report, so that's why I'm asking you the questions.

Yeah, and your comments will absolutely be reflected from the minutes of that meeting, but I will not be amending my staff report.

I do want to point out, Matt, that the agenda does not have the word FORF in it, and we're not really here to discuss FORF today. So let's try to focus on this. Let's try to focus on the CAC recommendation and how to .

I am reading the staff report. The staff report on this item. This is the item that we're speaking about and a staff report that is issued for this item. Is that not correct? So, then you that it says right here. That the council, we, we, in response that the, there was a promise made by the 4th. And that was not being honored. What what does that have to do with with with anything?

So Council Member Salter, when we write staff reports for agenda items, we almost always include information about why the item is on the agenda, why this is being brought forward to the council. what the action is. Little bit of history, little bit of context, options, alternatives, financial impact. This is the information that I was provided as to why we needed to have a special meeting. I had very, very short amount of time to write my staff report. I did ask if there was a letter from FORF that I could include. The mayor told me there was not. And this is my staff report. The minutes will reflect your comments. But this is an 11-page staff report. I don't know what else I can say to answer to your question.

I'm troubled too as well, Krista. My time is being taken and all of our time by this emergency meeting being called. I'm surprised and the council only met less than two weeks ago and already made their direction clear. I am surprised this emergency meeting was being called. and all of our time is being wasted so i want to make sure that we understand why we're all being called together to look at this again and i'm very troubled by the characterization that there's this other group that was not at this meeting making demands and i don't think that that's fair to anyone the second thing in here is that it's pointing to the fact that we as a council adopted a resolution based on this promise which i also do not believe is true at all. I think that the citizens group came forward with a beautiful plan that everybody liked. It had nothing to do with this quote unquote promise. So before issuing reports, I think we need to make sure that we have the facts straight because these reports will sit forever. And it's very, very disconcerting to be called into an emergency meeting based on facts that are not true, which are actually just lies. And I'm sorry that you were lied to.

So I did not call this special meeting. This is the staff report for this item. And any council member that has comments about my ability to write staff reports or what I write in staff reports are most, are absolutely welcome to provide those comments to me at any time really, but especially during my annual review.

Okay. Well, to be clear, it's not about your ability to write the staff report.

Matt, can you ask a question, please, about what's on the agenda? Let's focus on that, all right?

Okay. So, Krista, I'm curious, since the council met less than two weeks ago and voted four to one to move forward with your option, how you feel about this special meeting being called? I'm still not understanding why we're here.

But Matt, I thought Julia made it clear that the CAC met with Julia and me, made some recommendations that we agreed with and we thought should be shared with council members so that we could consider them. I mean, that's why we're here.

Again, it was less than 2 weeks municipal code and the brown act, allow the mayor to call a special meeting. It was not up to the town manager. So her feelings about it being called are somewhat irrelevant. So, let's move on.

Okay, so Chris said, sort of be clear, you are still standing by the original decision we made to less than 2 weeks ago. To continue along that path.

Yes, as stated in my staff report and my verbal report that I made at the beginning of this meeting at 2pm which is i'm calling. option one.

Okay, thank you that's it. Yes.

So my question krista is there is there any way to does the facilities master plan have to be amended before we can jump to working on schematics and layout of floor plans and. City Council Chambers, Trying to expedite I know in a normal situation normal situation where we have the luxury of time, like we would have you know if we'd started in 2023. City Council Chambers, We would have tons of time, but unfortunately the commitment in the long term lease with the paramedics requires us to deliver a paramedic facility by. City Council Chambers, January of 2029 i'm just wondering if there's any way to layer all these steps together so that we can be moving forward on. multiple fronts. I know you said we're doing the housing, we're doing a lot of other things, but in terms of the most critical thing right now is getting this cost information for the December 4th filing to meet the March 2027 general obligation bond. And so I'm just wondering if there's any way to amend the facilities master plan later, do the work, but not be kind of bureaucratic about it. City Council Chambers, jump to schematics and and look at the as belts and get the. City Council Chambers, open up the building and get the cost estimate to the best that we can for the general obligation bond.

so i i very much understand the council's interest in moving forward and i hope the council recognizes that what we've been doing this past year has largely been in response to a couple members of the city council putting roadblocks in our way okay so it is part of my responsibility a big One of my primary responsibilities is my fiduciary responsibility to this organization. At a project cost that is going to be upwards of $25 million, if it includes a fire station, you're looking at $10 million more than that. You, it is my strong recommendation that you have a facilities master plan that is accurate that incorporates your preferred concept, which is the CAC plan. and that we are able to price, get an architect agreement that will be more than $3 million. It will be more than that if this truly has a fire station in it. I need to be able to negotiate an agreement that I will have no leverage If there is no competitive process, this is a it you might not in and the town attorney is welcome to add in with the professional services agreement, we do not have to do low bid. A best practice is, and you will see every city does request for proposals. That is a best practice. You can look at the GFOA website. You can look at the League of California Cities website. They all say you do request for proposals. So there is some element of competition. We can look at the qualifications. We can look at the hourly rates. milestones and how many hours of architect work and we want to try to prevent change orders if I am asked to go out and negotiate with one firm with no leverage it is in effect the council giving out a blank check and I know this is not what you want to hear but this is the reality a blank check

the contract that we currently have the RFP is that what it is that we currently have pending is based on time and materials correct no it's a fixed fee we are we are going to be getting fixed fee proposals okay

But that's just for amending the Facilities Master Plan. It's going to be teeny tiny compared to what this big project is. And so what's on the agenda today, if the Council wants me to go in and negotiate a multi-million dollar agreement with no competition, no proposals to compare to, And then if they have, let's say they say it's going to take 500 hours to do something, and I will consult with my experts, right? I'm not a contractor, but I have people that are my experts, and they're going to say, wait, it's only going to take them 100 hours to do that. It's going to take them half. What kind of leverage am I going to have when they're going to be able to say, and I'm not saying it's, they're going to be able to say, well, the council said, you know, you have completely wiped out my ability to get a competitive agreement. It could be a fantastic architect, but they're not doing it for free. And I don't think a single one of those 10 firms is a nonprofit. So they want to make money and doing an RFP is a recognized best practice industry standard.

But the, the, you know, what I don't understand is, I want to ask my follow up, Elizabeth.

Oh, okay. And then you can go. The contract that we ultimately hire for the big project, I mean, I'm looking at the little project, which is what we're talking about now. And then the big project, which is actually designing the building and You know that's the big project isn't isn't it true that that the cost to the architect would be paid as a percentage of the construction costs.

That that's normally how it's done yes that's my understanding Okay, so if you add in a fire station right. yeah. And so if we negotiate an agreement with an architect and it doesn't have a fire station in it and then all of a sudden through the process, because they would be doing the facilities master plan process or not, but if at some point a fire station gets popped in there, $14 to $20 million more than depending on whether it's a Depending on if you're reusing the building or you're you know it could be 10% to 20% right is what what i've what's my understanding is what the architect will get then you're going to have 10 to 20% more. And what's that going to be it's going to be a change order and once you have an architect it's not like you're going to want to change change horses. so it it is um it's very important that we have a really tight scope of work when we start with you don't you don't want to come up with cost you know we need to have a solid solid project budget and then we can use that to um for the council to consider if you want to go to the voters and if so for half much how much the last thing you want to do is change your mind or say, oh, sorry, voters, we need more money. And I outlined all this in the staff report, and I'm not as articulate as a construction expert would be. I just want the council to understand this is a big project for us to begin with and to be asked to do it without a best industry standard best practice in place is setting us up to fail it'd be like asking me to do it without the town attorney you know it would be like asking me to you know it's you're setting you're setting me you're setting up our organization to fail and that That's my honest opinion. I really tried to put stuff with the help of David Kelly and my staff report. And we have every intention of moving this forward. We have every intention of and have we are embracing the CAC beautiful. I hope that's what it ends up being.

Elizabeth, did you want to ask a question?

I still don't understand Christian how we got from May 6, where we approved the CAC plan and set up a committee to choose an architect. And then that committee met on May 12 and we went through all the RFQs. And then on May 13, the whole plan shifted that now we need to update the master plan and we're not working on the architect. I still don't understand that. I'm comfortable going back to where we were on May 12 and May 6 planning to choose an architect. And I'm sure you could tell from my comments at the last meeting, was not in favor of moving ahead to update the master plan, but voted for it because I didn't want the council to look, you know, yet again, like we're dysfunctional or divided. I want us to be moving forward together, but I still don't understand how we got from where we had plans to hire an architect. And then the next day, those plans are gone. And you suggested that we need to hire, we need to update the master plan. That's a step I have never understood.

When the council is setting special meetings and giving me and staff 24 hours to 48 hours to respond when we're being asked by the council to respond to the cac proposal or even last january the fourth proposal getting it you know the day before january 1st Your expectations are absolutely unreasonable. I called on May 6th. The council set up a subcommittee. Great. I set it up, had myself, a project manager, and a consultant there Six days later, over a weekend, we hold the meeting, which I had thought would be the first of many meetings. It was a kickoff meeting where we had the ten proposals. We gave them to you a few days ahead of time. We had a nice spiffy matrix. It was the kickoff meeting. It is, you know, and it was a, I thought it was a collaborative, let's, you know, let's brainstorm. I'm getting input from two longtime council members on what you thought your input on the selection of an architect. And then I went away on vacation for two weeks. I come back, and it was very apparent to me that staff was not ready to bring forward to council information about the procurement policy on June 11. And rather, we needed to have. But I knew that the council very much wanted to move forward. And it became very apparent to me that there are so many unknowns. There are so many decisions that the council, frankly, has been punting. There are a lot of questions. There's a question about this fire station. And until we have that settled, we cannot go into a, I cannot effectively negotiate an agreement for a multi-million dollar contract. So it's unreasonable to expect that things are not going to change, especially when you're throwing special council meetings, multiple special council meetings at me. I think we have to focus on moving forward, and I would appreciate not having to constantly defend myself about something that happened a month ago. We just need to move forward.

I think I'd like to open it up.

I have one last question.

Okay.

Just for clarification, Krista, you just said that it would cost $25 million without a fire station and $10 million more with a fire station. Where are you getting those numbers?

So $25 million is what the current last, as part of the election code report that staff prepared with Many consultants that we presented in the Council accepted on January 8 it included a. A an update of the cost estimate to to implement concept be. okay yeah i traded that to 25 million dollars and it also had a cost escalation so 25 million dollars would be what it would cost estimate to do concept b if we were to build it in 2026 27. And then that spreadsheet showed that by the time, if we didn't build it till 2031, it would be upwards of over $30 million with costs, with construction cost escalation. So that's where the $25 million came from. The $10 million is, and I will not be held to the $10 million because I actually think that it's more, is based on the fact that, what was it, in 2020, the council got an estimate that having a fire station was $14 million. Well, that and we just received actually as part of that election code report um mary mcgrath the very experienced fire station architect indicated and actually chief weber chief of marin county fire services i believe he has said that fire stations now cost 19 to 20 million dollars so adding on 10 million dollars even if i know the cac proposal they're basing it on on well let's have share let's have more let's incorporate more shared spaces between the paramedics and police and fire station so maybe it's there's some savings because you won't it wouldn't be a standalone fire station but 10 million dollars is very conservative number if you have a if you have a full fire fully outfitted fire station It's going to cost a lot. But again, during a facility master plan process, if the council makes the decision to include into the facility's master plan a fully loaded with all the tenant improvements fire station, you will get the cost. It's not going to be me saying, oh, $10 million. It's not going to be for saying what they think. It's going to be Actual it's going to be professional cost estimating from fire department professionals and you'll have that as an outcome as a deliverable with your facility master plan amendment process.

Okay, so I just want to call your attention to the, um, the April 29th meeting from the proposal on page 23, where concept be just as, as you said, with no fire station is about 25Million. But their proposed civic center and town center with a fire station is 22.7M dollars. And they said this was extracted from a bid from a contractor. So, I just want to make sure that we are using apples to apples or comparison because we're no concept B is no longer on the table. So, I don't think we should be talking about it.

and uh what we received from the cac was an estimate of 22.7 million and that should be validated that's why it's called a validation process no i agree i just think we should be using those numbers because that's what we have right now but that's not being that's coming from a group of citizens but that's not coming from um town staff that's not an official town number

I just want to add it's also very unclear the scope of how much of the fire station is actually built out just versus empty space. It says including a firehouse. So we're going to move to public comment. I think given I'm happy to allow people additional time if people need additional time. Let's just be respectful that it's a Wednesday afternoon at almost 3 o'clock. So who wants to go first?

Good afternoon, Madam Mayor and members of the Council. My name is Mike Rosenbaum and I live at 14 Madrona Avenue here in Ross. I am here to address my ongoing concerns regarding the Friends of Ross Firehouse Fourth Initiative and the town's current policy direction. First, there is a fundamental lack of clarity regarding leadership. We need to know who is driving decisions at Fourth. If the board's president, Mr. Herbst's word is no longer reliable from the April email, the town deserves to know who is actually setting their agenda. We are witnessing a tail wagging the dog scenario where an outside organization appears to dictate policy to the town of Ross leading to the rescinding of resolutions that were passed only months ago. Second, the abrupt cancellation of an architect RFP authorized just two weeks ago is deeply troubling. Bypassing an established competitive process in favor of a no-bid arrangement undermines the integrity and ethical procurement standards for a municipality and raises significant questions about fiscal responsibility. Third, we are being asked to evaluate CAC's concept of a plan without a clear financial strategy. If FORF is confident in their vision, they should be transparent about their funding. I ask that FORF provide specific details on their pledges and financial backing rather than operating in opacity. I suggest the town of Ross demand Stephanie DeMarco produce a validated list of contributors and amounts to the town manager and the town treasurer so that an adjusted parcel tax can be associated with the upcoming ballot initiative. It is time to put up or shut up or admit that the parcel tax will be $6,000 in perpetuity. Finally, I must remind the town council of the Marin Grand Jury Report, which explicitly describes the Ross Fire Station as a misguided civic engagement. By disregarding these findings, the council's exposing the town to unnecessary liability. I urge you to consider the long-term risk. The citizens of Ross should not be forced to bear the cost of defending council decisions that ignores established guidance. I call on the Council to maintain the integrity of our existing processes, honor previous commitments, and stop allowing external pressures to dictate policy that risks our fiscal and legal standing. I'm going to leave copies for the Council and the Marin IJ. Thank you.

Thank you. Anyone else? Mr. Kuhn?

I would like Dan to be on simultaneously.

Zach, can you move Dan Winey?

There he is. Dan Winey has a lot of talk. There you go. Can you guys hear me okay?

Yeah. Hi, Dan.

Can you see me? You can't see me, though. Just my hand, right?

Can we see him, Zach?

Mr. Winey, is your camera on? Yep, my camera's on.

yeah um promote you to panelists okay great so do you guys have the start the video Okay, can you guys see me? Okay.

Yeah. Yes.

Okay. So, well, you guys, you guys brought up a lot of a lot of questions and a lot of really good information. I just say just a couple things. One is, is that, you know, we all have the same goal here in terms of what it is that we're trying to do. And I think in a lot of ways, we're sort of talking past one another. When I listen to Krista and I read the staff report, everything that Krista has said is absolutely true. Everything that she outlined in terms of scope of work needs to be done. I think there's a difference in sort of the words that we're using and maybe a little bit more about the process that we're going through here. That when we talk about updating the master plan, everything that's articulated in that scope of work that went out in the RFP actually is part of schematic design. I mean, that is essentially schematic design. And I disagree. I guess the one thing, David, where I would disagree with you is that schematic design, in fact, does typically include detailed floor plans, space plans, conceptual reflected ceiling plans, sections, elevations, that kind of thing. And it is a normal process that I think every client goes through. Many times when we're at this stage of the process, we don't really know what things are going to cost. It's interesting. We're throwing numbers around, which makes me extremely nervous because the reality is we just don't have the information to really know exactly what those numbers look like. So my recommendation would be to what Krista has right now at the table if you were to simply if we were to simply layer on more information let's get let's meet with the department heads verify the program uh take a look at the building there's some you know work certainly that needs to be done in terms of an engineering analysis we need to get as builds done we need to lay out i mean the fact of the matter is we need to lay out the departments listening to the police chief in the last meeting. One thing he talked about is, you know, where's my evidence room and where's my locker for weapons and everything else. All those things need to be determined right now and should be included in what we call it. Maybe we just call it simply an updated master plan and schematic design package, but that will allow us to get a very detailed cost estimate. So we'll have plans, elevations, sections. We'll understand we'll have some preliminary engineering that gets done. We'll have a cost estimator on board. We'll be running concurrent meetings in terms of environmental requirements or maybe looking at what has to happen with staff in terms of relocation. All those things are done as part of schematic design work. I think the question of I think what's what's happening here is that in many ways we're trying to define exactly what it is that we want to do. We don't know what it is. We don't know where we're going with this yet. So. So, David, when you're talking about the project delivery method, that is, in my mind, A very important part of the role that the architect would have in this next phase is helping town and staff and you and the owner's rep ultimately determine what is the best delivery model. Could be design build, could be design build, it could be some modified design build process. That is very typical and we don't have to sign a multi-million dollar contract with an architect we don't we can take what krista has right now embellish it a little bit more in terms of scope of work get us to the point where we know exactly what project what it is that we're getting in terms of of content right what kind of drawings are we getting are we getting outline specifications everything that we need so that at the end of this phase We're going to have a number that we're comfortable with. And so I think the question comes up, the fire station keeps coming up here. the fire station in this next phase right now needs to be laid out. It needs to be laid out. We need to understand the requirements. We need to understand from an operational standpoint whether we can accommodate them or not. It doesn't mean that the fire station needs to be part of the scope of work moving forward. It needs to have space allocated for it. We need to understand that it works in the context of all the other departments. But we can draw a line around it and say this portion of the project um can be held till a later date because there's other things that we need to go through to get citizens approval for that and if it is approved great and if it isn't approved then we need to have options for what we do with that space if we don't move forward with it so it's and i think that the issue of the architect is that it is very, very, very common for an architect to be hired only for schematic design or feasibility studies or developing a detailed master plan only for that scope of work. And the town can always reserve the right to bid that project later, right? We always have the right to bid it later. And quite frankly, from an architect's standpoint and from an engineer's standpoint and all the other consultants involved, the more clarification they have on the scope, the better. The fees are going to be tighter. They're going to have a better understanding what the deliverables are. And typically, I would also argue that typically construction projects in this day and age are not bid on a percentage of construction costs. That is incorrect. They are typically a lump sum. What architects will do is they will look at their fees and the consultant fees as a percentage of construction costs to try to understand the magnitude of this project compared to other work that they've done to try to understand whether the scope is such that they have a really good sense of exactly where they need to come in at. But it will not be a percentage of construction costs. It'll be a lump sum. David, it may be a GMP. Maybe it won't be a GMP. Maybe it'll be a cost plus model. We can get the general contractor to bid general conditions overhead and profit, put an 8% fee on it, and we can look at every single bid. We can look at every subcontractor bid. The whole point is there's a lot of different ways to deliver this project that will give us the best project we can, the highest quality that we can. And it's not a decision that we need to make right now. It's not a decision, and it will be a decision that we'll need to make in the next six months. But getting this first piece of the puzzle in place, making sure that we can accommodate from an operational standpoint everybody's needs, make sure that we understand the implications, site planning all of this so that we've got a package. So that I think from the citizens advisory perspective, we want this to move forward and it enables us to have a number that everybody's comfortable with so that if we do offer a bond, the sooner the better, and we're going to know that we can stand behind that number. And the fire department piece of it can be bid and bid, or it can be estimated as a separate piece of the puzzle so that as we're moving forward and trying to understand whether we want a fire department or not, what's the infrastructure cost of doing that? And then we have to layer on the operational cost, but we don't need to make that decision right away. So, I mean, I think, again, we're all saying it's interesting because we're all saying exactly the same thing. But I do think in some ways we're just talking past one another. And I think the right way to go about this is to get together, is to try to move forward in this next phase as quickly as we can, because time is of the essence. And I guess the one concern that I would have just observing this is things like the paramedic you know, conversations that need to take place, Ross Valley Fire, all the other things that need to happen. Boy, time is of the essence here and we could get ourselves pushed back into a corner early next year where all of a sudden, we don't have a choice of incorporating the paramedics facility in the existing building we've got to build a separate building for it and i think that would be a real real mistake and a shame so i i think again taking what krista has layering on another you know another more detail to it make sure we understand what deliverable what we want back as a town and move forward but reserve the right to move forward with the project with the architect that may do the first phase. Maybe they do great, we love them, and maybe they don't. And I think the other piece of this, David, is I'll go back to drawings that need to be done for design. Let's talk about design builds for a second, because I think it is important. A design architect can do schematic design and advanced DD, that package, the town will retain the ownership of all the drawings that are done, That package can be given then to another general contractor and a general contractor will hire their own architect. Most of them are not architects. That package will go to a GCN architect. They'll do the construction drawings, and then the design architect overviews the entire project to make sure that from a design intent and from a quality standpoint that the general contractor and the general contractor's architect is doing exactly what they should be doing. It can also go a different route. The architect that does the design development drawings can also be the one that gets assigned to the general contractor. So, and that's a very common delivery model on the, on the, you know, it's a very different scale project, but on the San Francisco airport, we're the conceptual design architect. We did the design development drawings, and then we were assigned to the general contractor as their architect. So we had a dual role of overviewing the quality of the construction design intent, but our, we moved from the client being the airport commission to the general contractor and or both. So the point is there's just a lot of different ways to do this. And I think it's premature to try to outline exactly what it is that we're, how we're going to go about it without really having an understanding of exactly what needs to be done and ultimately what is the best approach. So, I mean, that's my input as an architect in trying to help, you know, move this process forward because I do think ultimately, again, the goal is the same, that we just want to have a great project and we want to get it done, you know, all the right, you know, the right way for the right reasons.

Let me add to that. I'm not an architect. I'm another finance guy. We have four months before we have to file for the bond measure in March. We missed it for this fall. We only have four months. That is like overnight in this business. The reason we ask for the acceleration is to avoid missing the November ballot. It's July, August, September, October, four months. The actual filing date is, as you said, November 7th, I think, or December 4th. We don't have time. And so we've got a guy who is about to retire from the world's largest, most sophisticated architecture firm on the planet who knows more about this stuff than we do. more than David does, more than anybody does. If you think there is a weird thing that we've got to do research for, you can bet somebody inside Gensler somewhere on the planet knows the answer to that. They find it out like that. So we've got the varsity team getting behind us here. And we're not doing anything to hurt anybody else's position inside the town. We have to be right and we have to do it fast. And the whole town, there are about 500 people who have seen the video. Nobody said that sucks. Quite the opposite. And they know exactly who built it. So Gensler is way ahead of everybody else that's on the list. So why not do it? They're not going to be more expensive than anybody else on the list, but they're already on first or second base. Nobody else is even at the plate. Any questions?

Are you suggesting to hire Gensler for the, to just start and work on the, on the, say again, are you proposing hiring the architect to start the design and the scope of work and the project, or are you proposing.

hire an architect to update the master plan i i don't think that there is much of a difference we need to get the schematic design done and we have to have that done so i understand what is likely to be the cost of this project now you can call it facility master plan or you can call it something else doesn't really matter But this particular subject at this particular time is about schematic design and the cost associated with what is likely to ensue after that. That's why we need to have the information for the ballot initiative.

So we already have those RFQs for an architect. So is that enough to go on?

Now we just need the schematic design work done. And as Dan said, we can deal with whatever architect we want later, and it might be Gensler. It should be Gensler in my view, but it could be somebody else. Dan, say what you want.

Yeah, Elizabeth, Councilman Robbins. So I don't, you know, I guess I want to make sure that you guys all understand that, that my viewpoint of this and everything that i've talked about as far as i'm concerned represents town's interest that's first and foremost in my mind i don't i mean i would be great if the firm got the project but it doesn't really matter to me in all it doesn't in any way whatsoever and moving forward on this and any guidance that i've tried to give today or in the previous meetings or even the work that we've done is simply done to try to do the right thing for the town for all the right reasons. I just want to make sure people understand that it could be any architect. I would be sitting here and if it was another architect that wasn't performing or wasn't doing the things that we, I'd be all over their case as well. It's just that I think everybody needs to understand that That's really what I'm personally trying to do, and I think the Citizens Advisory Committee is trying, everybody's trying to do the same thing. And how we go about it, I wish in a lot of ways we could clearly define exactly what the road forward looks like, You know, at 99.9% of the projects you can't, you know, you sort of go down the road and you make good decisions and you work collaboratively and ultimately you get to a place hopefully where everybody walks away when it's all said and done and you've done a great project. And so I think, you know, to me, that's what the goal is here.

Can I ask you a question, Dan? Given that the RFPs are due in eight days, would you be troubled by allowing those RFPs to come back and then look at them and figure out the top few based on that, and then negotiate a scope that accommodates the schematic element as well to ensure that we can meet this December 4th filing for the general obligation bond in March?

Yeah, I think that's, you know, town council wants to move in that direction. I think that's a very reasonable way to go. I mean, at this point, we're only, you know, what, 10 days away. I think the only thing is, and I'm not sure whether you've heard back from architects, but I would guess that the architects probably would ask for a fair amount of clarification. Because when I did read the RFP that went out, I thought there were a lot of I mean, if I was bidding it, there were a lot of questions that I would have. So it would be an opportunity to go back and clarify the scope to the point where we're saying these are the drawings that we want as part of this next phase. We want to outline specifications, whatever it is, but be very, very clear with the architects as to what the deliverable is. the more clear we are in terms of what it is that we want and what it is that we expect, the better the price is going to be, right? Because we're not going to put contingencies in or whatever. But yeah, I think that's a reasonable way to go. I think we need to keep in mind that And this goes back to what Krista was saying, and this is where I think it does, time is of the essence in the sense that if we go through this next phase as outlined right now, I didn't know whether the intent was gonna be to hire an architect to do the whole project or just update the master plan and then go back out for architects to do the whole project. I think in this case, You know, your schematic design, basically updating the master plan of schematic design is going to take probably about 12 weeks would be my guess. At the end of that 12 weeks, we should have a very comprehensive set of drawings and we'll have, you know, everything that we need to be able to get pricing, including we probably should have a cost estimator running concurrently with us. So at the end of this 12 week period, we know exactly what those numbers look like, but As long as we don't get bogged down in having to, you know, two weeks of negotiations and then two weeks of this and two weeks of that, because all of a sudden our back's going to be up against the wall in terms of trying to do what we need to do, you know, early next year.

My view is get it going now. Why wait another week? Gensler did the planning for this. They've already had a team who's been looking at this building. And a week is a lot of time in the amount of time that we have left.

Well, and whether we do it or not, I mean, whether our... Look, I'm retiring, you guys, so it's not my firm anymore. But whether Gensler does it or not, if you do take the next nine days, you'll have pricing. So I think that'll satisfy probably some, you know, certainly interest in the room that, you know, want to make sure that the pricing is... is comparable um i doubt you know being in this business for 45 almost well 50 years now that you know what krista said is true you know it doesn't have to be low bid you want to pick the right firm for the right reasons and i think you know ultimately you know that should be the end game here but if we were to stay with the current plan i'm not sure the council has the right dates and availability to make that work i mean i i think we were told that

these bids for the rfps for the um to update the master plan were due soon but we were to be reviewed by the committee that's julie and me and the staff committee um on july 8 i think the day before our july 9 meeting but that would be too late to put it on the july 9 agenda And that pushes it all the way back to August to even hire someone because there weren't many dates in July when we could get together for a meeting. So I think that, I mean, I think we want to make this process work so that July 9 at our meeting, we've hired an architect to do whatever we want, whether it's just start with a project or the master plan or whatever. But my concern about these RFPs is, as I said, they're going to come in too late. and the council doesn't have a meeting time to go over it until August. Whereas the committee has met already and looked at the RF.

Go ahead. We're supposed to be asking the public questions, and then we'll have a chance to deliberate. And so is there anyone else in the chamber who wishes to make a public comment? Yes, Mr. Hannum.

Thank you very much, Madam. Richard Hannum, architect, developer, known Dan for those whole 50 years. We develop a lot of high-rise buildings, apartments, multifamily. I spent 50 years as an architect in the city doing these things. What Dan described is the critical path to delivering a project and establishing your scope, your budget, and your financeability. And you have none of that information right now. You don't have the weeks of public process to establish what that will be in order to make the deadlines that are being looked at.

It's going to just simply take too many cycles.

The shortest distance, as Dan has provided it, and we, by the way, happen to also, as architects, hire Gensler to do all these projects for exactly this reason. We have surety of completion of the product and a certain time schedule, and they understand what we need to do pricing. And that pricing is what everybody's going to be concerned about is do we have the right scope and do we have a reasonable set of numbers that when we go before the public for financing, we can stand behind it and make sure the project that we want to bring on can be delivered within that framework. The bad part is to go for it and be wrong. And then you have to go back and then you stop. So in order to not stop, you have to shorten the timeframe. One way quickly to look at it is a back off schedule. from the due date for this election. And you're gonna find out that you're three weeks behind schedule. Because you can't get there unless you make this decision. So from that standpoint alone, surety of information, quality of work, this still leaves totally open the discussion of what happens after you get to that point of scope and budget. And then you're free to do what you want. And you have time. But right now you really don't. So thank you.

hi laura conroe first of all friends support the town hiring an architect to draft schematic designs for the center that include a fire station the people of this town want a fire station back I think it's important to keep in mind, which it seems to be getting lost sight of by some of the comments that I've heard made today, is that our town is very lucky. We are not a large city. We are very lucky that we are a small town that have dedicated citizens that truly want to deliver to this town a fire station in a very cost-effective way. it has been demonstrated over and over again that there are dedicated people who have expertise in construction and architecture that have shown time and time again that this project can be done and can be done cost effectively And yet it seems, and it's very frustrating, that this seems to get ignored. The Citizens Committee, which was approved and was supported, have shown that a fire station design is possible in a cost-effective way. You have a whole committee of town residents that have expertise in construction and in architecture. You heard Dan today talk about it. you've had the friends commit the friends who have two individuals that are expertise is construction that have demonstrated and shown that cost effectively this can be built in numbers that are much lower than the numbers the town was floating several years ago and still keep being cited that are inaccurate And it's time that the council leans on the experts in this town and believes what they are presenting to you. There is an incredible divisiveness that there is this resistance to believe what these experts in our town who have devoted their time for free out of the goodness of making sure that this town can have a fire station, And you should just embrace that. There is another town many years ago that they needed to rebuild their school, the town of Piedmont. They couldn't, they then finally used architects and a construction company in their own town to get the job done. They got numbers, could do the project. Because they leaned on and embraced and relied on people in their little town to get the job done. That's the same thing here. Lean on the people in this town who have the expertise that know how to complete this project cost effectively. You're going to get more from them than you are hiring some third party consultant who has no genuine interest or vested commitment to making sure there's a fire station. We all want a fire station. Everybody wants a fire station in their town. Believe the people that have devoted their time and expertise to show that it's possible. I don't understand why members on town council and on staff just keep resisting this fact. Thank you.

Thank you, Laura. Anybody else? Tom.

I'm Tom Gaffney, a town resident, and I strongly encourage the council to adopt a speed-up action on proceeding with this project. I think redoing the master plan, it will get done if you hire the correct architect. So please consider the fact that you're not paying for the architecture for the final consideration as Dan has told you and it's time for the town to get together so that we can because we're going to have to to to approve a bond issue and I think uh once we get a good design and some good cost cost estimates then we can proceed with a lot of confidence so thank you very much Bill

Hi, Bill Poland, resident of the town. I just want to say that having worked on the committee for these past months and have known the guy for many, many years, what's been offered up by Dan is extraordinary. He's the most altruistic person I've been around in many, many years. So we have the benefit of going slowly in one fashion in that you all are allowed to many other decisions. But in the meantime, he gets us on the right track out of the gate so that we can meet the various deadlines that have been talked about. So thank you.

Thank you. Anyone else in the chamber? Anyone online, Zach?

Yes, Mayor, there's two online. Molly, can you please unmute?

Hi there. Can you hear me?

Yes, we could hear you.

I'm Molly Gamble, 14 Norwood. And my message to the council and staff is to take Dan Wynne's lead. I think your time is up. The residents have been watching and listening and waiting as this conversation gets lost in a bureaucratic morass for at least six years. It's actually much longer. And the process that has unfolded is really unrecognizable to me as a lifelong resident of Ross. You've had years to get this done. And through all these years, the cost projections just rise. And we just keep shuffling the papers to show that the costs just keep rising. And it's a complicated process, as Krista outlined. But the town needs the process to change. The process that the town has been using for years since this decision was made in 2019, it's not working anymore. You are losing precious time. You are losing precious support. You are losing credibility and trust to ever get this project done. The project plan changed in May. So change your plan to get it done as soon as possible. Thank you.

Thank you. Anybody else?

Yes. Stephanie DeMarco, please unmute.

Good.

Hi, can you hear me? Yes. Okay. I wanted to share the perspective of Friends of Ross Firehouse. So we were very encouraged by the CAC Committee concept in April and the unanimous support of the Council. We've always had a single objective, restoring a fully operational fire station in Ross. We've repeatedly stated that we would consider withdrawing our ballot initiative if the Town made a clear and binding commitment to achieve that objective. unfortunately little meaningful progress has occurred since april rather than moving forward with hiring an architect to create the schematic design for a new fire station consistent with the cac proposal the council instead chose to hire a new consultant to do further study and update the facilities master plan as a result the amended plan will not be completed until later this fall well after the August 7th deadline by which Friends must decide whether to withdraw the initiative. The staff report circulated ahead of the special meeting today, as Matt has pointed out, asserts that the Friends made demands to the town council, we want to set the record straight we have never made any demands to the council the town or its staff the delays in moving forward on this project have nothing to do with the initiative the pattern of delays hiring more and more consultants but not an architect and escalating budgets has unfortunately characterized this project for many many years we welcome the opportunity to avoid a divisive election and unite the town community over a shared solution The CAC plan provides a path forward, rebuilding the town center in a cost-effective manner, including a fire station. We encourage the council to adopt the CAC plan, commit to rebuilding the fire station, and hire an architect. Then we can begin the important work of restoring the fire and emergency medical services that Ross residents want, need, and deserve. Thank you.

Thank you. Anyone else, Zach, online?

No one else on line, Mayor.

Julie. Yes, Bill. Before you close public comment, can I pose some additional questions to Dan if he's still in line? Yes, Dan. Hi, Bill Kirchherr. Hi. I'm trying to sort out the time deadlines here. I think we all agree that times of the essence, we want to get through this schematic design process and have numbers by the deadline, which is, I think, let's say at the end of November, maybe before that. And the question we have is do we just short circuit this whole thing now before all the RFPs are responded to and move ahead with hiring a preferred candidate or do we wait for those remaining RFPs to come through and have some further process? And it's not clear to me what difference, I mean, I guess my question is, how much of a difference does it make in terms of being able to get to the point of, say, the council approving the contract, which the council has to do, meaning it would have to be negotiated by, say, the April meeting, I mean, the August meeting. Is that realistic? I don't know how long this process takes. And particularly if you're going to wait for all the RFPs to come in.

Yeah, I think we could work backwards from it, but let's assume that schematic design will take somewhere between 12 and ideally 14 weeks. So I think there's a number of questions that come to mind. is clarification of the scope for this next phase, updating the master planning and doing some level of schematics. So that is gonna take some time, right? Because they're gonna have to clarify the scope, gonna have to get it back to an architect and architect's gonna have to respond. So if we were to go through the process, I guess it would be two weeks out, if it would be possible, and I don't know how it works with this, Town Council is scheduled to be able to get an architect on board and start negotiating the contract immediately after that. So we had somebody, let's say, on board within three to four weeks. So that would take us to the end of July. Then you've got August, September, October. You're in the early part of November. And assuming, I'll turn to Jeff now for a second, if we had a very comprehensive package, we had all of our cost estimating, we had all the engineering work that needed to be done, all the backup stuff, is that, say, first, second week of November realistic in terms of being able to meet the deadlines that we need to meet in terms of a ballot, I mean, an initiative for a bond? And that would be for Jeff. So I don't. So I think that, you know, we could get everything done by the first part of November. And then the question is, how quickly could we get what we need to get to the town for a vote?

You know, how we describe the bond measure in the in the ballot has a ton to do with how successful we are going to be to get the 71% we need. And in order to have that well written, we've got to have at least a week or two before to plan this out. You don't get it on November X and then file on X plus one. You just don't. Is that fair? Anybody else?

So I guess the conclusion would be that going through this next two weeks, I mean, look, we're only 10 days away. I think the question is how quickly can we move after that, after all the submittals come in, to negotiate a contract with an architect? And if we can do it in a couple, three weeks, which we should be able to, I just don't know what it requires in terms of town council's approval and any other sort of internal process that needs to take place.

And judging from emails from Krista about our availability in the second half of July. It seems to me that unless we move in early to mid-July, so the July 13th or whatever, the July 9 meeting, I don't think we make those deadlines. I don't think we get an architect on board until the August meeting. That's August 13. And that puts us way behind in terms of trying to meet that November deadline. So I guess my question to you, Jeff and Dan, and also to Ben is what What is the way to fast track? What is the fastest way we could fast track bringing an architect on board to do what we've talked about that is clarify the scope, do schematics, and have a budget? So if those are our projects now, can that be fast tracked so that we're making a decision at the July meeting?

Sure, you could even, yes, I mean, I think we could take, you could take Krista's RFP as it stands right now, as we talked before, add additional information to it in terms of deliverables and scope, take a look at the RFQs that came in, select the architect, Whatever process you go through in selecting the architect, get an architect in. I think any good architect would work under a letter. You don't need to have a final contract at that point, but they would certainly be able to give you a cost of doing schematic design based on what we have outlined right now. And that would no doubt be a lump sum. It could be, you know, I would not recommend going T&M with a not to exceed. I just do lump sum. I think it's the easiest way to do as long as we have a clear scope. But you could get them started on a letter intent and that would be it. And the final negotiations of the final contract, you know, the terms and conditions and such could be approved at a later date. I just think getting somebody on board and getting them moving as quickly as we can, you know, the better off we're going to be.

So Ben, is there any reason we can't do that? Basically, choose an architect at the July 9 meeting. And if we're doing that, are we basing that on the RFQs from May, or are we waiting for the RFPs from early July? Elizabeth?

i think what mr whiney was saying and which i would agree with is you should you should definitely wait for the rfp response for july 2nd and then negotiate with whoever you want to negotiate with based on those responses a revised scope or maybe it's not revised maybe the scope that comes in is exactly what we were thinking one of the things mr wine said was it seems like a lot of people are talking past each other we looked at a resolution that the council approved in may a lot of these components that are on the agenda today are already being considered as part of the master plan amendment process, the validation, the cost updates, all those things are coming forward in the RFP, which is due on July 2nd. So what I would recommend is you get those responses come in, you negotiate with the architects however you think is appropriate based on those responses, and get the scope and the agreement ready for approval as soon as possible. And if that means having a special meeting in July, then we have a special meeting in July. I doubt July 9th is going to happen if they're coming on July 2nd, but middle of July or the third week of July seems very reasonable as far as getting a scope hammered out and a professional services agreement signed.

I don't think that, I mean, Crystal, you can correct me, but I thought that you said that the council absolutely has no way to meet between July 9 and August 7 or something.

You know, I think we can work out those details. And I think this meeting and the, you know, the meeting that we had on Friday underscores, as well as the schedule to try to meet the December 4 filing deadline, that we all need to be flexible and available And just because you're you know on vacation, just like you're on vacation Elizabeth but you called in and here you are on a Wednesday afternoon when you could be at the beach, so we all we're all very. committed and dedicated to getting this done. So Richard, did you have one more thing, brief thing to add? No, okay. So I wanna bring it back for discussion and direction to provide to the town manager. What I'm hearing is we should wait for the RFPs to come in on July 2nd. We should meet expeditiously thereafter and from that choose an architect. to work on schematics and cost information and the other items that are identified in that earlier resolution 2623. And time is of the essence. And in order to meet this December 4th filing is going to be a Herculean effort by the council, by the consultants, by the architect, by staff, by the CAC, by everyone. And I think we're all committed to doing that. We all want what's best for the town. And so we need to move forward. That's my recommendation. Others?

Well, I think we should probably pick dates if we're doing that, Julie, so that we really are moving forward. I mean, we've heard that these RFPs are due on the 2nd. I mean, I get that, you know, Monday, Friday is a holiday, but if we want to have a council discussion on July 9, you know, why not meet on July 6 or 7 to go over the RFPs so that we can present something to the council on July 9?

I am confident that you and I and Krista can work and staff can work offline to be as prepared as we possibly can by July 9. I think we are all hearing the urgency of what we need to do. So I'm We will get that done. I don't want to sit here and go over dates right now. There's a lot of people here, Elizabeth, that would be leaving.

I have some comments, if I may.

Yep, Matt, go ahead.

So we met June 11th, and I was the only person who voted against this plan, and now here we are again. And I would just say this has just been a complete failure of leadership. And I personally believe we should just appoint Gensler and Dan Winey to see this process through. And I am just, I don't need any more information. I don't need any RFPs. We, we have experts and they actually live in town and are very dedicated and have worked for free. For a number of months to bring us to this point. And, you know, I, you know, there are people on this council that have been on it for almost a decade and pass that. There was many opportunities to get us this project done and it hasn't. And in fact, I feel like it was. The worst decision ever to close the fire station down under false pretenses that we can't afford it. And so here we are. The time to get going is now. We have a group of citizens, 10 people of experts that live in town and care about this. I have no fear that they're trying to price gouge anybody. I think they're dedicating their time and service out of love of their community. And I think that any more wasted time on process is just going to look terrible to the community. It will look like a failure of leadership yet again. And we just need to put this to bed, appoint Gensler and Dan Winey and the committee to work on this project on our behalf. and set the process forward so that we can move forward together in clarity, get it out of this council, let the experts do their job, and stop running around pretending that we know what we're doing. Because if we did, this project would have been done a long time ago.

So Matt, I agree with you. And Ben, do we have the ability to appoint an architect firm today?

No, that's not on the agenda, nor would it be, you don't have a contract before you, you don't have it. So the answer is no, that would violate the Brown Act.

What would it take?

No, it says in there that we can direct staff to negotiate with a selected preferred vendor on a contract. That is completely within our discretion. That is what I'm saying direct staff to negotiate a contract with Gensler to see this project forward.

No, and that is on that is actually on the agenda is 1 of the options architect to bring, bring back the agreement later not to choose the architect tonight. We cannot do that this afternoon. That would be a brown act violation council members alter.

I'm not going to it's 1 of the options listed in the agenda. That would be my recommendation bill or Terry.

Do you have things to say? Okay.

I support moving on with the RFP process. I think Krista gets the importance of moving as quickly as we can. I'm not fond of hiring an architect to do it without any opportunity for other architects to weigh in. We have an RFP process. Let's finish it. I think if we dropped it, to be perfectly honest, I think our credibility would be zero. And I think that even if legally it would be not a conflict of interest to hire, just make a decision to hire an architect without any competition, there's also the issue of perceived conflict of interest, which can also really hinder the town. um i think it's going to be an exceedingly busy four months i was listening to some of the things that needed to be done for example refine the project description begin environmental review select the project delivery methods, update the master plan, begin the process to hire an architect, and do the schematic design. It's a lot. Are you ready for it? I hope so. And I think that the Council is interested in working with you to make this happen as quickly as possible. And I know some of us be more than willing to meet night and day to move it along. So I'm for continuing on with the process that we started.

As I understand it, Based on Chris's report and what she's indicated this afternoon, she has three concerns. One is what we're doing is not what would be described as best practices. And I'd agree with that if we had more time, but we don't. And we're also halfway or something. We're well into the process. We're not starting from scratch. If we had more time, then I suppose I would be, my concern would be different. Transparency and fairness. Transparency and fairness sort of militates in favor of at least getting all the proposals that we have requested. How long we take going through those and so forth, I think we should be ready to really, really roll and maybe we can start beforehand. But that is why I think we should not just, well, there's also the Brown Act problem, but I don't think we should just say, okay, let's go with Gensler or something today. I would not be in favor of that. Nine days is something I think we can live with, but I think we're committed to the urgency of this. The last point was possible duplication and having to actually end it this ended up costing more or taking longer when we're trying to save time if we had all the time in the world, I would agree with that let's take it step by step, but after hearing Dan whiny particularly. to describe this whole process as schematic design process. I have, I don't actually, I think that removed that concern. I think we have a clear demarcation between the design phase and the schematic, design schematic phase and then the detailed architectural plans. And I think we can segment this. I think we can divide it further into stages, I think it's possible when we negotiate the contract, we could say. By a certain date, we would like this information for the Council, we would like this issue resolved to the extent you can. And you know pick an issue where the public works department goes where you know what are we looking at with the firehouse do we have to elevate it or not. and work with that. I mean, nobody can, you know, I mean, it happens when it happens, but if we have that kind of detail in advance, I think it'll move along more rapidly. And I do agree with take your finish date and work back from there to make sure you've given yourself a cushion and you can do it. with the idea being we have a complete package to go to the voters with. Not all the details, that's later. That's after the architects get involved. That can change. So that's what I would think. I would agree with that. But I do think we ought to get this nailed down just as soon as we can.

So I still don't understand why we need to wait for RFPs. I mean, first, I think it was way overreaching to send it to 10 different architects when we only had three or four on a shortlist to begin with. But leaving that aside, I'm hearing that we need to hire an architect, choose an architect quickly. We have RFQs from a few months ago. I don't understand what's wrong with just using those and choosing an architect as quickly as we can. I don't understand why we need RFPs to choose an architect. And yes, counting back it's important to be sure that we have a cushion, but I don't think we have a cushion unless we're actually choosing an architect on July 9. So the only way I'd be okay with waiting for these RFPs is if we have it scheduled that we recommend an architect, either based on the RFQs from last spring or the RFPs from July 3 or 2 or whatever, and that we recommend an architect on July 9. I think anything less than that is too much of a delay. And again, I don't see why... We need to wait for the RFPs. We have RFQs. I just don't get the whole RFP process. And I would like to make sure that we choose an architect on July 9 and base that on the RFQs that we've already received. Or sooner, or choose an architect sooner at a special meeting.

I think we're all committed to expedite this as quickly as possible. And to the extent we can get the RFPs by July 2nd and distill them down and come to the council with a recommendation on July 9th, which would have to be in the packet the Friday before. And I think there's a holiday in there too. So that's going to be, I don't even know if that's possible. City Council Chambers, Christa saying this it's not possible in terms of information is at the packet so we're going to have to have a special meeting probably the following week. City Council Chambers, To you and I can meet and with staff and we'll have a really good idea of what we're doing and then we'll have to have a special meeting, hopefully, it will be very quick pro forma special meeting the following week. City Council Chambers, We have to set. City Council Chambers, We know the end deadline the December 4 deadline, but we also have to be realistic about you know what staff can do and what's entailed so and I do want to just say one other thing. City Council Chambers, I have been on the Council since 2017 and I have been working literally almost every month on these facilities. And Dan Winey and many others started working on these facilities in 2000, 26 years ago. And I don't think anyone ever anticipated how difficult this issue would be. And we want to do this right. I don't want any other council in the next 100 years to have to deal with these issues. It's too divisive. It's too painful. It's too upsetting. So we need to do this right. And we understand the schedule, but we can't make compromises just to meet a schedule. We have to do this right. So I think, I think, I'm not sure we have anything else left to, left to discuss.

No, but I wanted to add to Alyssa's, why can't you use the RFQs? Was there not enough information in there maybe to make a good judgment?

There's no cost information in the RFQs. They're just like beautiful brochures. with pictures of past projects.

But that's what we were planning to use to choose to recommend an architect until the question of what's the procurement going to be. And so then that morphed into let's update the master plan and that morphed into let's sending out RFPs. But if we back up, we did have RFQs that we meant to use to choose an architect. So I still, I mean, if I'm outvoted, that's the way it goes, but I still don't see why we can't back up to that.

I think Krista was being really prudent in getting those RFQs so that we would be positioned once there was a decision, we would be nimble and flexible and be able to go out with RFQs or RFPs, sorry. So, you know, we can beat this horse to death. I think we've beaten it enough. Ben, do you have anything to add?

No, I mean, I would just add, Elizabeth, when you look at the resolution that required us to do the RFP, It has a lot of information in there that's exactly the information that is going to be helpful for the schematics that Dan whiny is talking about so that I think that's why it just makes sense to get the rps which you don't have that in the rfqs the rfq is just an informational sheet about architects and their rates. So you're going to have something to work with as far as a scope that they're already responding to what you'll have to massage a little bit more once you engage in the you know review and discussions with those architects, but I think.

scope of the rfp is going to be a lot more tailored to what it sounds like the town is looking to move forward to the next step in order to get a cost estimate then i i'm hoping that we can have the town staff commit to having uh a selection meeting i guess that's julie you and me in the committee by the by the next week june the week of june 15 hopefully early in the meet that you know the the early in the week, Monday, June.

You mean July.

Or July. So, yeah, sorry.

I already have that committee, subcommittee meeting scheduled with you both for 2 p.m. on July 9th. I did that like, that was done like two weeks ago. I already have, I've already sent out a save the date for August 4th as a plan B. And, but I need to remind the council, and we don't need to get into more scheduling, but you must have three people physically in Ross. So all your intentions of being able to zoom in, that's great. But you need to have three people here. And that is the issue with the availability I have received thus far. It's not staff. So the week of July, you can continue to discuss but you need three people here.

But the week of July 13 is an option if there are three people here. Is that right?

You have one council member that is leaving town on the 15th on an airplane. You have another one that is on the airplane on the 16th and I will do my best to try to see if I can get it on the 14th. I'm sure those council members that are leaving on airplanes are going to love to have to spend a council meeting, but you know, I, I, it depends on if we have an agreement in place, I have to bring forward a complete contract With to the council, so it's not just me. It's not just the council. It depends on the firm. It depends on legal review. It's all I mean, there's, there's just a lot of going on. There's a lot of different.

So, can I alter an opinion of what we could do? What about an interim step where we, the CAC created this concept with Dan Winey and Gensler. what about just engaging and we could hire dan winey and gensler to take that project a little bit further so why not just start the next step of there and engage just them to keep working because we don't want to lose time in the midst of this process So instead of, you know, like, let them continue to work as long as he's obviously Gensler and didn't want to do it. But we just sort of engage them to continue working till we figure out the next phase. And it's maybe a limited engagement with Gensler to just keep the work moving forward until we've completely all been able to meet and select the person. And it might be Gensler at the end of the day, but we can at least hire them for an interim period.

i'd kind of rather make it the 13th or 14th of july if we possibly could because then we've made a bigger step but um maybe if we can't do that maybe yours is yeah yeah if we can turn by the 13th you just keep saying we might all be out of town and i would hate to lose a whole month right i agree okay i think the three of us think we should go forward receive the rfps and then move as expeditiously as possible after we receive the rfps in

So I think it's a wrap. It's 4 o'clock. Thank you, everyone, for being here and being online.