City Council - Regular Meeting

City Council Chambers and hear that at your August meeting there were some changes that need to be made to it before the Council can act on it.

Okay so we're continuing item number 11 H to the August 13 regular meeting. Disclosure of ex parte communications on items where the Town Council acts in an adjudicatory or quasi-judicial capacity. Any disclosures? number four honoring anthony alcazar for 10 years of service to the ross to the town of ross rich okay well when i started here in december of 2016 i think within

Two weeks of starting, we had a major storm, started actually going overbank. We heard the alarms going off and I was watching Windship Bridge and I came back to the office and, you know, Anthony, you know, you need to check the, oh yeah, we checked that. Well, you need to look at, oh yeah, we've looked at that. It was just, he'd already had all of the hotspots covered before I even, you know, had anything to say about it. And I knew I had a staff I could work with and be effective and proactive in the public works maintenance department. And he's continued that stunningly throughout the 10 years that I've been working with him. Anthony, in his time while he's been here, he's completed the leadership academy. He's achieved a degree in communications from Arizona State University, online correspondence. He's completed classes in arborist studies and as maintenance supervisor. He handles all the tree permitting and he does the vegetation management review for all the planning and building permits. I've got him training or he's completed basically the training on the underground service alert ticket responses and the subsequent payment markups that needs to be done. I think we get like three of those a day. I get a lot of those for a small town. And he Yeah, he handles utility markings, and he's an extremely valuable resource to the town. And it's just been an honor working with him for the last 10 years, and I hope he stays on. Anthony, you got anything to say to the council? Step up.

Thank you, Council. Thank you for the acknowledgement. I'd just like to thank Krista and Rich. I mean, it's a great work environment. It makes it really easy to come to work. And 10 years have gone really fast. also all the my co-workers it's fun interacting with them daily and you know all the residents for making me feel a part of the community even though i don't live here it's just been a great 10 years and i look forward to hopefully 10 more thank you thank you anthony

Not done. So Anthony, in honor of your service here, the town would like to present you with this certificate of appreciation for your 10 years of service.

Yes.

Next, I get to read a proclamation honoring public works direct director rich minutes for his 10 years of service to the town of Ross and wishing him well in his well earned retirements Chris do you want me to read this, or would you want to read this on.

Would you please Thank you.

So I am honoring Richard Simon it's upon his retirement as public works director and town engineer. Whereas Richard Simonich is a Ross native who as a child attended Ross Elementary School, lived in Winship Park, and went on to build a career of more than 30 years in civil engineering, land development, water resources, and stormwater management across Marin, Monterey, and other Northern California counties. And whereas Richard Simonich joined the town of Ross as public works director and town engineer in December 2016, returning to serve the community where he grew up. City Council Chambers, And whereas Richard simenich oversaw the successful delivery of numerous capital improvement projects, including the bolinas avenue storm drain improvement project phase one. City Council Chambers, pavement rehabilitation on streets throughout town, the conversion of 206 streetlights to led technology pedestrian safety improvements through the laurel grove safe safe pathway and shady lane safe routes to school projects. City Council Chambers, Securing over $500,000 in regional grant funding installing new pedestrian bridges at natalie coffin green park repaving Sir Francis Drake boulevard and establishing utility undergrounding districts. City Council Chambers, And whereas Richard Simon it's advanced the windshield bridge replacement project through state and federal environmental review and major planning milestones. securing a projected 4.3 million in federal and state funding for the replacement of the more than 100 year old bridge and shepherded the adoption of a comprehensive storm drain system condition assessment and capital improvement master plan in 2023 to guide the long-term management of the town of ross's three miles of draining infrastructure Whereas Richard Simonich is a skilled pilot and guitarist who has brought the same spirit of curiosity and dedication to his personal pursuits as he has to his professional work. And whereas it is most fitting that the town of Ross recognize and celebrate the many contributions of Richard Simonich and wish him a well deserved retirement. City Council Chambers, Now, therefore, on behalf of the town of Ross and the Ross town Council, I do hereby thank and honor Richard seminar for nearly 10 years of exceptional service to the town of Ross. City Council Chambers, As the town of Ross public works director and town engineer for his skill and dedication that he brought to every project and for the lasting improvements, he made to the infrastructure safety and sustainability of the town of Ross Thank you rich.

I'd like to thank the council throughout the years for their support in the capital improvement program. Moving forward, all those projects that the mayor mentioned, none of that could have been done without the support of our governing board, and I do greatly appreciate that. It's been a wonderful 10 years. The commute from Sonoma every day is tough, but as soon as I get into work, I'm like, oh, I'm in Ross, and the day floats by, and then there's the commute home. But yeah, it's been a pleasure being able to use the skills I learned in the 30 years in the private sector consulting into civil engineering consulting to bring it here to move all these projects forward. And it's great. It was great to come back to Ross. The thing I loved about it is not very much has changed in the last 50 years. It still physically looks the same. The demographics have changed quite a bit since the 60s, but in a good way. It's brought the vision of the town forward. I think it's a good mix of... of people that live here they've been great people they're very appreciative of good work and good communication and for the most part they've all been wonderful to work with so thank you very much and I'll be seeing you for the next two weeks but then I'm down the road thank you thank you

We're moving on to item number six, which is a proclamation honoring and expressing gratitude to Mr. David Nassau for his generosity and commitment to the town of Ross, contributing to the Ross Police Department for 14 years. And our new police chief Aguilar will read the proclamation.

Good evening. Good evening, everyone. And when I first got here, I think it was important to show gratitude once I learned everything that Mr. Naso has done for this town. So I have asked for this proclamation, and it will be my pleasure to read it. Excuse me. Whereas Mr. David Nassau, a Ross resident, has been a generous benefactor of the town of Ross Police Department, beginning his charitable contributions in 2012 and continuing his steadfast support every year since. whereas mr nassau's sustained charitable contributions play a critical role in safeguarding those who protect us and through his visionary support the town the town's first responders are equipped with state-of-the-art protective gear advanced technological upgrades and vital operational tools and whereas These investments have done more than modernizing the department. It has ensured that the town's police officers can answer every call for service with the highest degree of safety and confidence, ultimately creating a more secure environment for every resident, business owner and visitor in the community and Whereas Mr. Nassau's quiet and consistent generosity given year after year without expectation of recognition reflects the very best of the civic spirit that defines the town of Ross. And now, therefore, the town of Ross hereby extends its deepest gratitude to Mr. David Nassau. Excuse me, Mr. David Nassau. I want to make sure I get it right, for his exceptional generosity and enduring commitment to the town of Rouse. His investment in our first responders does more than modernize the department. It strengthens the safety and security of every resident, business owner, and visitor in our community. And the town is profoundly grateful for his visionary support. dated this 9th day of July of 2026, signed by Julie McMillan, the mayor of the town of Ross.

Mr. Nassau.

Thank you very much.

Those following those other folks it's kind of humbling, since all I did was write checks and they do real work. Also. We've I guess this is gratitude for 43 years of living here and. When the chief suggested a proclamation at 83 you'll take any attention, you can get otherwise otherwise I think this would have just gone on on net unnecessary, so thank you very much, and thank you all for your service.

City Council Chambers, Now it's time open time for public expression, which is limited to three minutes per speaker on items that are not on our agenda. City Council Chambers, Anyone in the Chamber, which is to make public comments.

I'm Bob Archer. I live on Walnut Avenue. And I just want to comment briefly on the Marin Grand Jury Report on MCE, our electricity company. It's an extraordinary document. I wrote to you about this. And there's a lot to do. Today's IJ report on the MCE meeting shows a continued effort of those on the board, the chair, the vice chair, and the chair of the executive committee to maintain control of a process that has gotten us to where we are today, in control of the hiring of a new CEO. So There's a long way to go for repair of this organization. MCE, as you're probably aware, is an $800 million annual operation, basically a commodity broker. But less discussed is the over $500 million of reserves. And there's some policy decisions ahead before real reform takes place as to what to do with some of those reserves. The business as usual approach is to spend on reportedly clean energy climate related expenditures which raises questions as there was one letter to the editor of the Marin IJ thanking MCE for its community support including building pickleball facilities. So there's some major decisions ahead. And I think the most significant issue right now in California and across the country is affordability. California's electricity rates, including MCEs, are the highest and the lower 48. So I hope Ross will be a voice on that board in the next year or two. for trying to reduce rates, which is the pathway to expanded climate investment and behavior. So thanks for your attention to this.

Thank you. Anyone else? Gerald, are you speaking on the Winship Bridge issue? Okay, perfect. Surprise.

i'm going to thank you i love this old building but the acoustics in this room are just simply hard to access so i appreciate what i have read that the town is considering doing something to improve that and i am fully supportive of it there are many of us who have listened for years and we will be very happy to have improvement thank you

Mayor Mrakas, Thank you anybody else in the Chamber anyone online for public comment, no one online Mayor, thank you we're moving on to the mayor's mayor's report. Mayor Mrakas, First, moving forward with our facilities project last week, the town received five proposals from architecture firms out of 10 who earlier submitted their qualifications. Tonight we will consider asking the town manager to negotiate a contract with one of the architects for Council approval as soon as possible. The Ross fire station addressed in the recent Marin grand jury report the June 11 2026 Marin county civil grand jury report. quote, better service at lower cost, optimizing essential services for the future of Marin, close quote, recommends combining various Marin special districts to benefit residents to improve services at lower costs. It also addresses efforts to reopen the Ross Fire Station. And as noted in a recent IJ article, quote, The fight to restore the town of Ross Fire Station is a clear example of misguided civic engagement at odds with effective services today, which relies on coordinating resources across jurisdictions, not maintaining standalone structures for symbolic reasons. Ross's risk profile has also changed. Stronger building standards have reduced fire risk while an aging population requires better medical response. Staffing a standalone station is easy to demand but difficult to sustain, according to local firefighters. Rather than building for yesterday, Ross's elected officials should focus on a coordinated countywide system emphasizing strong medical response capabilities. I have a link to the full report in my report The town must respond to the grand jury's report by September 11, 2026. New Sir Francis Drake paving. Thanks to public works director and town engineer Rich Simonich, the paving last month on a portion of Sir Francis Drake went seamlessly and quickly. It's wonderful to drive on the new smooth surface and the striping has made the roadway safer. Marin wildfire risk evaluations. This week Marin wildfire announced it will begin conducting free wildfire risk evaluations in the Wellington and shady lane neighborhoods during the August 3 timeframe. In the meantime, Marin wildfire encourages you to review your 2024 inspection report, and if you haven't already please complete some of the recommendations. When the inspectors arrive at your home, please join them and learn more about hardening your home and making your garden safer. City Council Chambers and please take advantage of marines wildfires popular chipper day to remove your debris, you can make a reservation for free pickup and then I include the link to make a reservation. City Council Chambers and please take advantage of marines wildfires popular chipper day to remove your debris, you can make a reservation for free pickup and then I include the link to make a reservation. City Council Chambers and please take advantage of marines wildfires popular chipper day to remove your debris, you can make a reservation for free pickup and then I include the link to make a reservation. City Council Chambers and please take advantage of marines wildfires popular chipper day to remove your debris, you can make a reservation for free pickup and then I include the link to make a reservation. City Council Chambers and please take advantage of marines wildfires popular chipper day to remove your debris, you can make a reservation for free pickup and then I include the link to make a reservation. City Council Chambers and please take advantage of marines wildfires popular chipper day to remove for the town's 4th of July parade to celebrate America's 250th birthday. Beach and his wife Janie moved to Ross in 1974 and have been huge contributors to our town ever since. Congratulations, Beach, and thank you and Janie for your many years of dedication and volunteer service. After the parade, residents enjoyed songs from the Shady Ladies, bluegrass from Windy Hill, and a beautiful solo by Hayden Haviland Ross School graduate and rising junior at Sonoma Academy. The day went off flawlessly with enormous thanks to many, including the Ross Police for serving delicious hamburgers, brisket, and all the sides, the volunteers, many young bakers competing with me and i lost who contributed to the delicious pie competition town manager johnson and her husband and daughter for guiding the many writers on the popular mechanical ball ross public works members anthony alcazar and zach baker for their continuous help and especially to ross recreation staff wyatt man along with his wife and several friends City Council Chambers and Mallory Baron along with her father for organizing the day, so that everything ran perfectly and residents had a wonderful time. City Council Chambers and Mallory Baron. Council committee and liaison reports anyone.

City Council Chambers. I want to thank Diane Rudden who is one of the leaders for age friendly Ross is not here tonight and she asked me if I would please read the age friendly report that she would have given had she been here. She's sorry that she can't attend the meeting tonight. Her husband Ross said it was an honor to drive beach cool during the 4th of July parade. Diane wanted to thank the town staff for helping with the 4th of July parade and especially to thank Wyatt Mallory, Anthony, Zach, and the Ross police. There is a picture that she gave me of Ross and Beach in front of this fancy car. And maybe that will be in Ross review. So I've given it to Zach. Okay. And then she says, Beach is definitely a cool person. There are a few people who stopped by the age friendly table that was in the commons and took some of the documents and brochures that they had, thank you.

So I attended the MC board meeting last month. In representing Ross and as Bob Archer brought up in his comments, the CEO has been removed from MC and the board is going through a governance process and a process to pick a new CEO so. City Council Chambers, Hopefully, there are changes afoot it's something that we all need to pay a lot of attention to, especially with the marine grand jury report that was issued. City Council Chambers, Really scathing of both the management team and the board, and I hope that our seat will be a powerful seat, because the people. The same people who kind of brought this upon MCE are the same ones now trying to steer it in a direction of their making. And what really needs to happen there is a full cleaning of the house because it's too big of an agency and there's too much corruption. So I hope that everybody here will pay attention and I encourage everyone to listen in to some of the meetings because they're very important as the agency steers this new direction forward. And it's gonna be probably the biggest, most significant agency that affects all of our residents and the entire county. So stay tuned.

Anyone else? Okay, thank you. Yes, Chris Martin.

Good evening, Mayor and council members. I'm giving the report on flood zone nine advisory board earlier this year, the county and the flood zone nine advisory board concluded that the proposed building bridge to removal project in San Anselmo was not viable and should be abandoned. FEMA determined that removing the bridge would increase flood elevations for close to a dozen downstream properties and required those impacts to be fully mitigated. District staff concluded that these requirements couldn't be met. At the June 25th meeting of the Floods Hill 9 Advisory Board, county staff was given approval to proceed with developing plans and a budget for the removal of the defective fish ladder near the post office and replace it with a new fish ladder that allows fish to pass and is hydrologically neutral and will not raise base flood elevations downstream or upstream. We'll see what's developed. The Flood Zone 9 Advisory Board also directed staff to seek funding for the installation of fish resting ponds in the concrete channel. No doubt you've heard that a very strong El Nino has formed in the Pacific. Chris Blunk, the Director of the County Department of Public Works stated that this may mean an increased risk of severe storms and significantly above average rainfall in the coming year. El Nino is expected to temporarily raise sea levels by two to three feet. Vulnerable waterfront communities like Corte Madera, Sausalito, Larkspur, San Rafael likely will face compounded flood risks when these tides overlap with storm surges. It's been over 20 years since the Ross Valley has had a 100-year flood. The 2005 flood threatened lives and flooded homes, businesses, schools, fire stations, police stations, and other facilities as well as causing $100 million in property damage. Flood Zone 9 Advisory Board approved an allocation of $250,000 from its operating budget for the county's initial preparation for the anticipated storm season. The county is determining how to spend these funds and it pledged to work with Flood Zone 9 towns. Ross has had an aggressive program maintaining its creeks. Thanks to Anthony. But not all towns do this, and their debris and discarded large limbs end up in our creeks frequently. In the past, a limited amount of Flood Zone 9 money were spent engaging the Marin Conservation Corps to remove debris and damaged large tree limbs that can clog or compromise the flow of stormwater in our creeks and streams. I ask that the town of Ross consider recommending That the county spend some of these funds clearing debris from from flood zone nine creeks prior to the wet season and in compliance with all fish and game regulations property. Property owners also need to be reminded that it's their responsibility to keep the creeks and their borders free of debris and chemicals that can clog the channel, causing local flooding and endangering the surrounding area. During the 2005 flood, Congressman Huffman happened to be on the Lagunitas Bridge and saw a hot tub going down the creek.

that happens and there's a lot of preparation that has to be done before the wet season thank you thank you chris can we chris can i ask you a question about flood zone is there going to be some sort of what's the flood zone board doing and the county on the safer bridge just like looking at what happened and what went wrong it reviewed and it's still reviewing uh a lot of the things that went wrong

communication issues, some cases lying and presenting false data. The work that will be done on the fish letter coming up, well, the board wanted a different engineering firm to work on it. There were a lot of mistakes. There's a lot of changing faces, both at the county level and staff level. And it's a pity because we're not going to see an allocation of funds like that targeting, you know, improvement to the flood district.

So sorry. So are they working? Is there an official report they're working on? Or I'm just curious what...

There's something online you can get now, but I think it's being reviewed now by members, and I'm sure there'll be amendments to it.

Okay. Thank you. Sure.

Thank you, Chris. Staff and community reports. Ross Property Owners Association. Is there a representative from RPOA here? Is there anyone online, Zach, from RPOA?

No one online, Mayor.

OK. Town Manager Johnson.

Thank you. Good evening, Mayor and Council members. Just wanted to add on a few things to the Mayor's lovely comments about the 4th of July event. We were very short staffed this year. And so I'm particularly grateful to Zach and Anthony and our Public Works Department for working overtime on a holiday, no less, away from their families. And also just to add on big thanks to members of the Ross Police Officers Association and their family and friends who put together a terrific booth serving hamburgers chips watermelon drinks to event participants with no charge i think that's just an amazing a really nice gift to the community and also several other community volunteers did assist staff as well as staffing the ross history area and our newest firewise neighborhood booth handing out information so that was really great to see so thanks thanks to everyone A work is again beginning on Shady Lane today and continuing until Wednesday, July 15th. The entire roadway will be slurry sealed and re-striped with new center line, stop bars, and directional sharrows for bicyclists. Expect no parking and single lane traffic control between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. on the entire length of Shady Lane between Lagunitas and Bolinas. City Council Chambers, Thanks for everyone's patience during the installation of our three new pedestrian bridges in natalie coffin green park the contractor needs to spend a few more days. City Council Chambers, finishing up the work and our public works director rich has promised me, he will not retire until his project is totally done. And then finally, I would like to thank Rich for 10 years of exemplary service to the town of Ross. He's been a key member of the town's management team and the force behind most of the improvements you can see around town. and even more improvements that you can't see in my 30 years of reviewing staff reports for council meetings rich is the best public works writer i have had the pleasure of working with i am going to miss him a lot not only for that reason but other reasons and so on behalf of the entire staff team we congratulate rich on his well-deserved retirement and wish him and his family the very best thank you rich

item number 11 is our consent agenda um and there are items a through g on the consent agenda does any member of the council wish to remove an item from the consent agenda does any member from the public wish to remove an item from the consent agenda anyone online zach no one online mayor okay great then we'll um bring it back and can we please have a motion

I move we approve the consent agenda A through G. I'll second.

Mayor McMillan? Yes. Mayor Pro Tem Robbins? Yes. Council Member Kirchherr? Yes. Council Member Dally? Yes. Council Member Salter? Yes. Passes unanimously.

Oh i'm sorry i'll start over then lucky you number 12 is public hearing on planning projects 186 prospect drive design review nonconformity permit and the variance and town council consideration of adoption of resolution number 2638 approving the project subject to conditions roberta yeah good evening mayor and Council members.

Tonight, the applicant at 186 Prospect Drive is requesting Town Council consideration for design review with nonconformity permit and a variance. The project is proposing construction of a new swimming pool, a fire pit, a spa, outdoor kitchen, repairs to the existing rear and front decks, as well as site walls. The project also includes construction of new walkways with exterior lighting and widening the existing driveway. A variance is required to allow the pool, spa, outdoor kitchen, fire pit, retaining walls to encroach into the required setbacks, as well as construction of a wall exceeding six feet in height. At the ADR meeting on June 16th, the ADR voted a four to zero in support of the project. However, the EDR recommended the applicant to reduce the height of the proposed fireplace to 48 inches. In response, the applicant did revise the plans and they did also remove that fireplace. Yeah, they removed the fireplace. And in the construction management plan, the applicant has indicated that the three vehicles will be accommodated on site and all materials will be stored on site. Staff request that the Town Council consider adopting Resolution 2638, approving design review and nonconformity permit and variance. Thank you.

Thank you. Any questions from Council members? Matt?

So, Alex, I think we had an issue before where trucks were going from San... This property is right on the border of San Anselmo, where they were going through carrying the dirt and debris and sort of kind of impacting the roads. I just want to make sure that they there is a traffic management plan that avoids the issue we had in the past.

So the it's not in the construction management plan, but baked into our conditions of approval, we did add that condition of certain roads where they can only have certain weight of a truck. So that's always going to be in all the projects that go before the council.

Mayor Mrakas, Okay, great and then Roberta did you did we ever I think there was this issue where, especially when it was on the border between San and someone did we did you coordinate have you coordinated with San and someone to make sure we're sort of aligned I can crystal.

Thanks. That was pretty recent. I think that happened, and yeah, that day I did coordinate with the San Anselmo city manager and their planning and building director, and they promised to take a closer look at that. So I think it's covered. They should be putting it into their conditions for their projects.

and we did also identify the roads so that they're very aware of this issue of um so we did follow up that took about half a day yeah yeah i think it would be great if we so you've added to the conditions of approval if we can talk to the planner at san anselmo make sure we're just aligned and we both have that in there since we have projects that will be using both roads especially like this one for example thank you

Is there any public comment on this item? The applicant can make a statement, but you don't have to. Great. I don't think anyone has any questions. Zach, there's no one online, right?

No one online, Mayor.

Okay, so we'll bring it back for any discussion or a motion. I'll move that we adopt resolution number 2638.

Second.

Mayor McMillan. Yes. Mayor Pro Tem Robbins. Yes. Council Member Kircher. Yes. Council Member Dowling. Yes. Council Member Salter. Yes. Motion passes 5-0.

Great, thank you.

Can you log in?

Moving on to the administrative agenda now. Item number 13, Town Council to receive a status update from the Public Works Director regarding the current and proposed overhead utility undergrounding projects in Ross.

Christa? Thank you, Mayor. Just a couple of minutes here to adjust here for our staff presentation.

Yeah, this is great.

I get a laptop logged itself off during the previous discussion, but we are back online for this next item, the undergrounding of overhead utilities and Ross current projects status report. So we have currently three. underground projects in various stages of approval in the process. We have a Rule 20-A admin center right here that we are working on with PG&E, and we'll get a little bit more into the status of these as we go forward. We have the West Ross Rule 20b Assessment District Project that's very near to completion of the design phase. And then we have the Upper West Ross which is currently moving forward in the petition phase and preliminary engineering and that has been done. But this gives you kind of idea of where these districts are forming within the town. First, we look at the Town Administration Center Underground Utility District. This is, of course, our administration parcel. It's a small district. We're just going to be undergrounding actually four poles, two along Lagunitas and then two along Sir Francis Drake. This pole that says riser pole, that's actually going to be a pole to be removed. The riser pole is going to be closer to Sylvan Lane. And we'll get into the status of that here. So the town administration center underground district that is So the status of the town administration center, the status is not 90% bid documents complete. The status is that we're about 35% done with the bid documents. We're just getting into, we finished the alignment of the joint trench and we're getting into the design phase with PG&E for them to design all the facilities, transformer locations, street light locations and that sort of thing. The estimated cost is $2.7 million, less the $290,000 Rule 28 credits that we've accumulated over the past, I think, 20 years. The schedule is construction in spring 2027 through fall 2027. That's assuming we can keep moving forward with the design. It's moving at a good pace. We have Harris Associates as our district engineer. They've been working with PG&E. We've had at least four meetings, coordination meetings with PG&E. And now that PG&E is entering the design phase, we'll start pulling in Comcast and AT&T as a joint occupants of the poles. And then there'll be joint occupants of the underground trenching. the purpose for the town administration center underground utility district was partially so we have this opportunity to use our rule 20aa rule 20a funding that 290 000 in credits also it's going to provide flexibility for when we redesign the administration center to once these polls are underground we have lots of flexibility as to where ingress and egress can occur for both the administration center and the future housing that's proposed on the site, and also to beautify this primary entry intersection to the town of Ross. The proposed Upper West Ross Underground Utility District is a Rule 20D district. That's shown here in grey, and that is Hmm, hold on a second. Yeah, we're gonna talk about the Upper West Ross, sorry. They're all named similar. Upper West Ross is this district up here that's proposed, it's currently in the petition phase, as I mentioned. items required to initiate this Upper West Ross District. It's very similar or it's identical to the process that we went through with the West Ross District, which we'll be talking about after this, where we have an informal assessment district boundary prepared, and that has been prepared. The neighborhood group hired Harris Associates to do the preliminary pre-initiation engineering and boundary. City Council Chambers, They also prepared estimates of the design and construction costs in order to prepare the estimate of the individual parcel assessments so that's that's all been completed on a basis on a preliminary district boundary and the boundary is going through. City Council Chambers, Some modifications here and there are a few people have called into. uh opt out of the district which is allowed for by our policy if they are on the outer fringes of the district and they want to opt out of the district so far the ones who wanted to opt out are is because they're already their utilities are already undergrounded it's the roadway off of upper road And some of them just don't you know they don't want to be in the district, though they would be an actual negative vote and they won't sign the petition. And if they are on on the fringe and we can keep a contiguous district we allow them to opt out. So, but it's still a fluid situation. The neighborhood groups been great to work with very proactive group. They're currently circulating the petitions of interest, that's a step four, and they're looking for 65% property owner support in the district. And if the initiation of the district is approved at a public hearing, the property owners or the subset of these owners must pay the town in advance for the engineering and legal services costs. These payments will reside in a similar or same town administered separate general ledger account. City Council Chambers, So at the end of the presentation after Council, we go to public you open the floor to the public, I believe the neighborhood group is here to add some more information and discuss their actions to date. Moving on to the West Ross Underground Utility District, which is also a Rule 20b assessment district. And Rule 20b means that it needs to be funded by something other than PG&E. It doesn't need to be an assessment district, but that's the best and most popular way to move these districts forward as a town managed Public Works project, but it's funded through the sale of the bonds which are paid for by the annual assessments of the property owners. So the Westeros district, and this is including the Thomas and Hilgert properties. Let me go back to this. DRAWING. SO DURING THE DESIGN PROCESS OF THE DISTRICT, PG&E DETERMINED AT A FEW LOCATIONS THAT THEY WOULDN'T BE ABLE TO COMPLETE THE GRID, THE ELECTRICAL GRID UNDERGROUNDING WITHOUT HAVING TO ACQUIRE EASEMENTS THROUGH PRIVATE PROPERTY. SO IN LIEU OF THAT PROCESS, WHICH WOULD HAVE ADDED SIGNIFICANT COSTS AND TIME, THEY ASKED US, WELL, IF If these properties on Thomas Court and these properties up here in Hilgert, if they would join the new district, then we won't need to get easements from them. We can just run the undergrounding right up the road. And the neighborhood group met with those property owners, not all of them, but most of them. Mayor Mrakas, And they agreed in concept to join the district now we need a Council action would amend the boundary of the rule 20 be district that's that would be a required before we can move forward. Mayor Mrakas, and bond Council, who I believe is in the on the zoom. Mayor Mrakas, group. City Council Chambers, mentioned that they should probably be petitioned, you know we need to see where really they stand officially the petitions become part of the town clerk's record, and then we proceed with. City Council Chambers, revision of the assessment district boundary and we work those properties into the engineers report for the assessment district. City Council Chambers, So the status of this project is it's about 90% ready for going to bid and balloting that is the design is of the joint trenches completed the design of pg and ease facilities all the locations of all the transformers and that's all been completed. City Council Chambers, specifications and bid documents are very nearly done. In fact, I got an encroachment permit application from PG&E to do the undergrounding about two weeks ago, and we're definitely not ready to issue the encroachment permit, as I'll get into in a minute. We have a number of steps to go through with Council and staff involvement to get to this point of getting this project going, and I'll get into that in a little bit. The 2019 estimated cost of this This project was $7,035,000 based on the preliminary boundary and estimates done during the petitioning phase. The 2025 estimated costs after we got PG&E's estimates for the undergrounding is 23,820. So you can see the course of six years, that is quite the, what is that, 300% escalation. The contributor expenses to date. Now, this is money that the contributors have given to the town to keep in a escrow fund account so that we pay the invoices as they come. We pay the invoices for CSW, the district engineer, and we pay the invoices for PG&E and Bond Council as well. City Council Chambers, They have contributed 276,479 dollars of their own money to. City Council Chambers, keep this move this project forward the number of assessed parcels is 125. City Council Chambers, And the median total assessment per parcel total is 163,612 dollars, and that would be. City Council Chambers, I believe, over, they would pay that back over 30. City Council Chambers, 39 years I think. City Council Chambers, It clarification on that, but it's 30 or 39 years and the schedule for this work, once we get through. City Council Chambers, bidding we and we revise the assessment report and the assessment report is adopted by Council and we get authorization to bid and we award the bid, it would be to construction seasons after that point. two years to spring-summer construction season to probably complete this project. So this is a little detail about how the costs are broken down. We come up with basic construction costs, incidental expenses. We have bond financing expenses to get a subtotal project cost of $21 million. Keep a bond reserve fund. Mayor Mrakas, 1,000,850 to capitalize interest 1,005. Mayor Mrakas, So total assessed project cost is 24 million 431. City Council Chambers, And of that it's broken out into a general benefit of two and a half percent of that is a general benefit that's a that's a benefit that's not specific to any parcel it's a general benefit for the general population as such that money cannot be part of the assessment, it has to be paid by. City Council Chambers, Somebody other than. City Council Chambers, The assessment so that would be you know currently we're looking at. the property owners to pay that money up front. Now our policy does allow the town to contribute $25,000 towards that, but that's still a significant amount of money that would need to come up with before we can, we need to have the bond sale and all of this funding in place before we award the project. And then the special benefit, that's the amount of the assessment and the bond sale Mayor Mrakas, Is 23 million 820,000 that's the special benefit that's allocated among all the parcels that receive actually receive a benefit from the underground and the benefit is there's the safety benefit there's a visual benefit and. Mayor Mrakas, A few of the other things that will be more specific when we come to Council with the assessment district report. so in in conclusion of this presentation the town professional clerical and finance staff as well as the town council must carefully prioritize work to advance these projects along timely prioritization is important to reduce potential impacts associated with escalating construction costs fluctuations in the bond market and changes in parcel ownership so to kind of summarize we have project nearly ready to go to bid. Well, we also need to have the boundary revised and we need to advertise and authorize the bid. Once we get all of the bids back, the highest and most or the lowest and most responsive bidder, we take that amount and we give that to the assessment district engineer. He revises the assessments to more accurate costs. That's another council uh hearing and then we uh get i have another council meeting to approve that assessment district report and then we go to balloting and that's another heavy council and staff commitment of time to get the get the balloting done and the balloting it doesn't pass, the contributors, they lose all the money that they've put up front, the project does not move forward, and that's kind of the ending of it. I'm not going to get into the particulars of the balloting and all that. That's described pretty well in the policy. So after the balloting, If it passes, then we need to award another council meeting to award the project and get the project going. And in between that, we need to decide how and what is the process for selling these bonds and moving forward with that and financing the project. So that is, as you can see, a big commitment of time. I can see four consecutive council meetings to get this project under construction. So that concludes my report. And I'm here to answer any questions. I hope Stephanie DiMarco and her group is available on Zoom. But when we open up the public comment, we can take those comments. And that concludes my report. Thank you.

CHRISTIE WOODARD- Thank you, Rich. Questions from council members? Matt.

MATTHEW WALKER- So thanks, Rich. I don't know if you remember, but a CIP probably Last year, the year before, we talked about trying to create some organization around this undergrounding. Do you have any other any thoughts about that? Because if each one of these groups wants to do this, we have to go through this process every single time and not I mean, the West one obviously is the largest and probably the most far along. But we talked about is there a way that the town can steer this in a direction so that it is easier to process and easier to let neighborhoods know that we're looking at your neighborhood, but it has to wait its turn, essentially.

I think that's really up to the council if they want to sort of, from what I'm hearing, what I'm understanding you're saying, we can't have two or three districts going on at the same time. That's just not feasible with our resources. City Council Chambers, So when an application for an undergrounding district comes along and i'm just thinking out loud here, the Council can say, well, we need to, we need to do one at a time. City Council Chambers, We can put you on the you know, provide the new neighborhood group with some sort of implementation schedule or something like that that's a good question and I think that's a that's something that we need to start considering.

City Council Chambers, And I mean I know we're losing you, unfortunately. But there are economies of scale with doing these projects, correct? I mean, just even having to go for so many bonds.

Strictly financially speaking, I think that there is economy of scale because then you have more properties contributing. But boy, the disruptions from this construction, though, during the West Rossum, you've got Glenwood, you've got all of Lagunitas, Fernhill, parts of Norwood that, you know, they're going to need to be closed sometimes for, not closed, but, you know, your basic one-way traffic control for two years. And then when you're done with all that, City Council Chambers, You have to convince 210 property owners to disconnect their services and reconnect to the undergrounding risers that are at their property line you got power and you got cable. City Council Chambers, And that is paid out of pocket by the individual property owners. City Council Chambers, If you, you know, talking to tipper on about this process, they have that small hawthorne district, which was a cookie cutter subdivision what basically one street and a bunch of lots on either side, for the most part. City Council Chambers, There are groups of people who they. City Council Chambers, We just couldn't get ahold of really to hey you needed your power is going to be shut off in two months, you need to do your connector. City Council Chambers, Your services to these risers you need to hire a contractor and get these things connected you're going to be without power now. You expand that compare that Hawthorne district to this West Ross district. That's a that's gonna be a huge coordination effort between the the town and the contractor and the property owners to make sure they all get connected up to the undergrounding district. I I see that and and my discussions with the with the district engineer today. We see that as as one of the. One of the main time consuming and one of the more difficult aspects of the undergrounding district is the final get everybody on connected to this underground district, so that they can have power, because Pg. I don't know how long they wait, but they're it's in their best interest to get remove the polls and the power and to energize the undergrounding process. City Council Chambers, Economy of scale, you know, maybe financially, but when you get projects this size, there is logistical problems that would really start burning into staff time and consultant time and things like that so that's the kind of stuff you have to look at.

City Council Chambers, yeah So what I was saying is, we have this great policy, but now that we're actually seeing things come forward. Mayor Mrakas, It seems like we need some leadership from the town and the staff to toward kind of see oversee these processes and make them actually work. Mayor Mrakas, And that's what i'm afraid of is yeah now you've got four different districts all coming forward, and I think it's going to overwhelm our staff and our ability to manage this.

City Council Chambers, Anyone else, I have a question which was there ever or is there yet a solution to how to count it for the upper West Ross district how to count the parcels that are owned by the town or by the. City Council Chambers, The county or the you know open space district.

City Council Chambers, yeah that's great question, thank you for bringing that up so yeah that. To get the petitioning done and then further on to get them, these governing boards, to the balloting stage is something that's not really addressed in our policy. We don't really know. And one of the parcels is the town of Ross owns. It's undevelopable, and it's probably a zero assessment. but and a bond council is available i think tonight to answer some questions and this might be a good one for him to answer is that uh i i think they still need to go through the petitioning process let's just take ross for example um it would be a council action yes we want to sign the petition for the upper this new upper west ross district and what's the process for that we don't it's true we don't really have a process for that but it's something that um I think we would need a consultant either bond counselor or a municipal consultant to help us with and that would require an amendment to our policy perhaps or it could be just a council action that allows this as an amendment I'm not sure what the process is myself but it's something that staff could work out with with our consultants thank you

no elizabeth that's the question i was going to ask bill do you have anything i was a little confused about the the general benefit the 2.5 did you say that the residents of the of the district would pay for that or would it be the entire town well it's a good question mayor it's we haven't really pinpointed uh who's going to pay that but it has to come from from some

entity or some contributor or some uh you know a deep pocket somewhere the town's committed to 25 000 per our policy policy sorry i'll just step in because i remember drafting that policy it requires some other entity besides the town to pay for the general benefit it can't be assessed under prop 218 but the neighbors in the neighborhood need to come forward with that as an additional amount

So I think I read, I was having trouble seeing, it was $610,000 minus 25,000. So it's in the high 500s that the neighbors in the district would need in addition to the amount that they're being assessed.

Okay.

Okay. Any other questions? So Bill.

Rich, the money that was originally put up for this project, by various owners. I think it was 270 something thousand dollars. And I seem to recall that was something that could be recovered by the people who put it up if it went forward. But is that in the category? I mean, is it that separate from what we're talking about as a general benefit contribution?

City Council Chambers, Yes, this this money was put forward and I think it's it's 325,000 or something like that I have it in here they've spent 260,000 to date and there's some money left to get us to the point of. City Council Chambers, balloting and the district engineer reviewing the assessment district it's not for construction or anything like that. And yes, if the balloting passes and the district moves forward, that upfront money that they put up a few years ago, that can be part of the assessment, as well as staff time spent on moving through the district. And that's a tally I need to give Krista before I leave, is the time that I've spent working with the consultant on this project, because that's all reimbursable, too, City Council Chambers, Under well it's all payable by the by the bond sale and the assessment district, thank you, I just wrote that down okay something that I need from you.

City Council Chambers, I are you done, I have one more question why could you just give a general explanation as to why the costs have gone from 7 million to 24 million.

Mayor Mrakas, The engineer provided me when he gave me that estimate he provided me with three or four reasons. Mayor Mrakas, A lot of them was just. Mayor Mrakas, general cost of. Mayor Mrakas, materials, the increased costs of you know the logistics behind delivering the materials Labor costs all of that has gone up and and. Mayor Mrakas, You know that's that's basically is it's the cost of doing these types of projects plus. the actual infrastructure costs and the addition of the Hilgert and Thomas parcels and that undergrounding. And, you know, finally knowing where all these, the electrical, what did they call them? Transformers, where all the above ground transformers go. Those are extremely expensive. That count increased as well. City Council Chambers, So it's it that's basically it it's the car there's a cost of construction for this undergrounding. City Council Chambers, That caused these these costs to rise and that's 2025 that's before you know the the gas prices went out of control the diesel prices went out of control so and we'd have to be interesting to see once these bids come back with the actual costs will be.

City Council Chambers, Thank you, public comment of krista excuse me, Mayor and rich I recall that you had a question for our bond Council has been waiting patiently online, can we ask him your questions now.

Yeah, we have Nick Yeager from Stradling Law. Just some general information, Nick, if you wanted to, on your views of how this district is going and where it's headed.

Yeah, sure. Sorry. Hopefully, everyone can hear me. I'm not too loud. Yeah, my name is Nick Yeager. I'm a partner at Stradling Yaka Carlson and Routh, and we've served as bond counsel kind of since the beginning of the West Ross Underground District. You know, Rich, if you have a question for me, I'm happy to answer. I don't really have anything specific to add. I think you kind of laid out the status of where things are and where things are going pretty well. And you covered the general versus special benefit discussion as well.

Mayor Mrakas, yeah I mean I for Council has any specific questions as far as you know, like I guess for the commitment to the bond sale. Mayor Mrakas, Is that something that I would imagine blind Council would assist us with or is that where we would need sort of a.

So, yeah, if, you know, that would be kind of after the stage at which, you know, we've done the balloting, the assessments are finalized and set, and then we would go out, the town would go out to sell the bonds to get the remainder of the project fund. We would assist with that as bond counseling, you know, preparing the documents, preparing the disclosure documents to sell the bonds. but you know the town would require other services you know there'd have to be an underwriter that would you know underwrite the bond sale and sell the bonds to investors as well as a municipal advisor that would be the town's fiduciary um to assist with kind of the financial aspects of a public bond sale okay oh thanks nick uh go ahead so one question for the bond council is the bond being backed by the town like what's the credit It's payable only from the special assessments on the properties. The town's general fund is not.

How do they assess the credit? Is it of the people that live here, their ability to pay?

So the bonds would be secured by the right to foreclose on a property that didn't pay. So it really comes down to the value of the property. They kind of do some credit calculations based on the value of the property as compared to the amount of the bonds.

is kind of the most basic way to think of the credit okay so it would be very high given that the property values are very high here i would i would imagine so yeah um it's it's really uh it's a shame that this is such an expensive process process and how long it takes two to seven years um i mean it clearly benefits neighborhoods to have undergrounding in many ways do you see any changes in the future of ways to streamline this in reduce the costs either state legislation or national legislation or marin county um that's a good question

Well, you know, the streamlining, the bottlenecks in this process, if I may, you know, is getting a commitment between Council and staff to move this forward. We were ready to go with this and bring it to Council in January, December, January. We had a meeting, I had a meeting with Stephanie DeMarco and that Rich Souza, the CSW district engineer, and I'm like, Rich, I want to bring this to council in no later than May. And he said, yeah, we'll finish it up. We'll get it going. PG&E is ready to go. And when I brought it to Krista in our weekly coordination meetings, she's like, well, no, we can't do it. We've got this and this going on. well can we do it then no it's it just kept getting pushed ahead i we could not krista and i could not find a staff or a council meeting that we could do the three or four consecutive meetings so you know we were planning i wanted to get this out to bid in june do the balloting in july and you know get this thing moving this construction season but we um

I want to add in, though, is my recollection is that the leaders of the group put a pause on it.

They did put a pause on it when we discussed it in November and December. We'd just given them the new estimate of costs, and they wanted to check the temperature of the group. And then I didn't get back with them until a few months later. And by then, there was no place to stick this into the council agenda. So we did have a pause. They wanted to get a reassessment of their group and if everyone's still on board. But by then, it was too late. We'd missed the window.

City Council Chambers, Rich I, I know that you in the town have done everything you possibly can in the Community neighborhood groups to i'm actually thinking of is it there's a lot of towns that have this issue. City Council Chambers, All of them around and i'm sure in California, is there any statewide effort to deal with utility companies and undergrounding and making this more available to cities and towns, without it taking so long and costing so much.

City Council Chambers, yeah i'm not i'm not sure I know PG&E is really stepping up the undergrounding of their transmission lines and and any lines through extreme high fire hazard places. City Council Chambers, I don't know how low, we are on that totem pole, but that our best bet would to get a PG&E in a more proactive role in the CPUC.

City Council Chambers, To come up with with some sort of streamlining of it and i'll just add Neil probably can speak to that better because he's involved in a lot of that statewide legislation, but I just know from my own personal experience with other cities. City Council Chambers, it's usually is cutting back on the amount that they're willing to spend on undergrounding like in the 20 a context, the amount of money is not coming to cities as much as it used to there's been state legislation trying to urge them to do more and they've been fighting that.

City Council Chambers, Thank you.

Public comment on this item. Anyone in the chambers would like to make public comment? Gina?

Okay, well, good evening, Mayor McMillan and council members. My name is Gina Nellison, and I'm speaking on behalf of the Upper West Ross Underground, Utility Undergrounding Neighborhood Group. First, thank you to town staff for the work done so far and for identifying the key issue in the staff report for our group, which is that the town's policy does not currently explain how public or non-residential parcels should be handled at the petition and balloting stages. So this issue may determine whether our district is feasible at all. And our neighborhood is sort of unique because we have these open space parcels on the inside. So if you exclude these public parcels, we have 29 out of 39 parcels signed. which is 74%, well above the 65% petition. But if the public open space parcels inside our boundary are included and they are not signing, which includes the town, our support falls to approximately 64%, which is just below the threshold. Because these are internal and not fringe, we can't redraw the boundary. And so we respectfully ask council to direct staff working with the town attorney, bond council and the assessment engineer to return with a clear answer on the correct parcel count and petition denominator for this project before it's deemed insufficient. The second issue is upfront funding. And the town's own experience so far shows the scale of that barrier with private people having to raise between $300,000 and $400,000 before getting to just balloting. And if that ballot fails, contributors recover only what has not been spent. So really hundreds of thousands of dollars are at risk. Our group has advanced 10,000 so far, but the report acknowledges that we may still run into hundreds of thousands of dollars. And this is where the creative thinking of maybe combining these districts, it could be workable. So put simply, if the price of getting to ballot is volunteer neighbors raising hundreds of thousands of dollars, many otherwise viable districts will never reach the point where true neighborhood support can even be tested. Nearby towns are finding more workable models. Tiburon recently asked residents to fund a third of early engineering and design costs, while the town covered the remaining two thirds. Belvedere's municipality supported approach has helped that city become nearly fully undergrounded and we're not asking Ross to you know, copy these policies wholesale. We're just asking whether there can be some creative early-stage risk on the part of the town, a reimbursable advance, limited cost-sharing, or revolving feasibility fund. Anyway, we're very grateful to Ross' help and for the town's stewardship, and we hope this can be a win-win for residents and the town alike. So, thank you.

Councillor Osanic- Thank you. Anybody else in the City Council Chambers, Anyone online no one online man no one okay we'll bring it back for any further discussion.

City Council Chambers, So I think it's clear, we need to have a town led initiative for this, I think, if we don't have this agenda is as a Council item to sort of. work through what is our plan then we're just going to have these mushrooming groups come before us and even just having to issue this many bonds would just be almost impossible for us to do we're already seeing that in the civic center i mean it's it's a big process to go out to the market and and seek a bond and to have to do that for every single one of these districts seems really duplicative so my suggestion is that we create a plan so we have a policy but now we need a plan like how did the residents want to do this how do we enable them to do it so that it doesn't tax the town staff and our ability to execute on everything we have to do and that's only through coordination and our leadership on what we should do so I and and then Gina's comment here I mean the fact that there are parcels that we own but they are do they count or do they not I mean this is too much We need it needs to be comprehensive where the answers are very clear. City Council Chambers and the residents know what they're up for the last thing i'd say is the losing of the funds is just this is a travesty that people would put up $500,000 for a district and then it just completely goes away. City Council Chambers and the residents know what they're up for the last thing i'd say is the losing of the funds is just this is a travesty that people would put up $500,000 for a district, and then it just completely goes away. City Council Chambers and the residents know what they're up for the last thing i'd say is the losing of the funds is just this is a travesty that people would put up $500,000 for a district, and then it just completely goes away. City Council Chambers and the residents know what they're up for the last thing i'd say is the losing of the funds is just this is a travesty that people would put up $500,000 for a district, and then it just completely goes away. City Council Chambers and the residents know what and here's all the answers. And then we move through the neighborhoods and we say, we're gonna offer this or combine these districts together so that there's just one bond that we're issuing for all of them, but it takes leadership. And right now there's a void. So I really suggest it just needs to be an item that unfortunately gets added to the list of something we are coordinating. Otherwise it's very quickly gonna get out of hand.

Yeah, I, I appreciate the policy. It was written quite a few years ago. But I learned a lot just reading that policy. And I think you're right, there has to be a plan. I tried to figure out how do we do that without burdening staff already burdened with a lot of responsibilities. So do you have a suggestion for how we might have that plan?

You know, I don't want to get too far off our agenda item here, but I suppose we're still on it, and Ben will let us know. I tried to organize one of these where I live, and it really is daunting. I mean, first you have to go to your neighbors and say, I'll put in so much money, will you put in money? And there was some interest, and then those neighbors sold their house. And so it's time to start over. And plus, the topography of where I live, you know, over on the east side, these neighborhoods are kind of crazy. I mean, it's about as far away from a grid system as you can imagine. And so, just talking, I think I was talking to Rich, just how would they do this? And I remember, Rich, you said, I'm not sure you could do it. In other words, how would you even underground it? And a lot of it would be hand... Doug by hand. So this is what the initial money goes towards, the engineering and so forth. But if you want to know why this is such a long process, it's very complex. And for an individual homeowner, it's really overwhelming. Unless you have a lot of people who are on the same page or somebody who's really dedicated to this, like I remember Stephanie DeMarco was leading this, well, back in 2019, before 2019. Anyway, I would be in favor of that, but that may be a future agenda item. But I do think there is something here that could be discussed. Generally speaking, we'd be safer and the town would look a lot better if we could get rid of some of these telephone poles. And I think other communities like Tiburon, Belvedere, and so forth, they are really into that. The county's way ahead of us over in Greenbrae and so forth.

anyway yeah that's that's my thought and maybe we should discuss this at the end of the meeting but i think we should bring back as a future agenda item some of these issues and try to advance and coordinate and have some implementation of our policy and work out the knits that we're seeing maybe we have to hire a consultant to to do that um especially with rich retiring

Or part-time staff person. I mean, you think it's going to be, it's going to take a lot of time.

Yeah.

What's the timetable for trying to determine what happens with the town-owned properties, you know, in Genus District, for instance? Because the plan can be, you know, it might take a while to develop a plan, but it feels like there's some urgency to try to make that, to decide what to do with those properties.

Well, we could bring that back on a future agenda item, but we'd need some legal analysis and help with that.

There is, as of July 30th, there is no one here to do this. No one. So it won't be brought back until we can obtain a replacement for Rich, because even overseeing a consultant takes staff time and understanding. So it's, you know, the council is also, you've prioritized expeditiously moving forward with the architect selection process so we've got that and then if you recall during your cip discussion you also have prioritized a complete renovation of the ross common so um you know those are things the council is going to need to think about but in answer to mayor pro tem's question i don't see that question being answered um anytime soon City Council Chambers, Until we can have our riches position replaced yeah.

City Council Chambers, So maybe we can just put it on the agenda for future meeting and we're most likely looking at next year. City Council Chambers, Not sooner.

City Council Chambers, Well, I have one suggestion for that, so I think gina if you could combine your group with the West group. Mayor Mrakas, It would solve the issue, because the denominator will be so big at that point. Mayor Mrakas, So I mean in the interim until we have a new public works director and we can formulate a plan to really try to make this, I mean the West group is so big, so if we can try to coordinate groups together in the interim, then. Mayor Mrakas, If that's allowed, then we can hopefully have one one big project yeah rich, could you address that.

Yeah, we, Gina and I discussed that when we were kind of going over strategizing. So the West Ross District again is, PG&E's signed off on it. They, like I said, they've issued an encroachment permit application. They want to get moving on it. Now, if we tell them, hey, we got 40 more parcels. Can we, you know, can we turn this into a new, entirely new project? a what is the west ross folks going to say about that uh you know one year delay on on turning this into a new project and and b i don't think i don't think pg e would would want to do that that's not the project that's not the that that the tariff is has agreed to there's there's there's so many issues involved with that i don't think that's a solution that should be pursued

City Council Chambers, Also, unfortunately, we have to table, this is really without yeah well we'll add it to our pending agenda items, and you know when when we have a rich replacement, we will try to advance it. City Council Chambers, Okay, thank you rich. City Council Chambers, Now we're moving to item number 14 town Council to receive a presentation regarding alternative project delivery and procurement methods. City Council Chambers, For implementation of the Ross civic Center project and discuss the town's priorities regarding project delivery procurement schedule cost certainty and risk allocation. City Council Chambers, David Kelly. yeah.

Mayor and Council, just take us a few moments to... Yes, sorry.

Good evening, Mayor McMillan, Mayor Pro Tem Robbins, honorable council members. I'm David Kelly. I'm your project manager. Tonight is a presentation by Dustin Alamo with Griffin Structures. in regards to additional procurement methods that are available for the town's consideration. This is an item that we've been actively discussing in regards to project delivery and procurement for the Civic Center project. Since the last council meeting we've met with the town attorney staff in regards to what would be required to implement this procedure said Council give us direction it would require some some very basic amendments to our municipal code which if directed we can bring back but. Prior to that. decision we should Council want to move forward we want to give Council opportunity to be educated on these particular procurement methods for project delivery and some background on this particularly progressive design is that Marin County has been fairly aggressively implementing this new process that has been design to facilitate project delivery and also do so in a manner that provides a number of benefits which

dustin will cover in his presentation today so with that i'll turn it over to mr alamo to give council a presentation on some alternative procurement methods great good evening mayor mayor pro tem members of the council as mentioned i'm dustin alamo from griffin structures serving in the capacity of an owner's rep tonight i'm going to give give you a little bit of a mini series of master class on project delivery so try to keep it as brief as possible but really the goal is simply education and discussion And a high-level overview of project delivery, what it means, the different options available to the town, and how those decisions can ultimately affect cost, schedule, risk, and implementation. So before getting into delivery methods, I think it's important to acknowledge where the project stands today. So council has identified the citizen advisory committee alternate concept as the preferred concept for further evaluation. And at the same time, that concept and the facility master plan are being refined. So in simple terms, the town's working through two related questions. What's exactly the project we want to implement here? And then once that's sufficiently defined, what's the best way to actually deliver that? So those two conversations are closely related and that's the context for tonight's discussion. So the town has already completed a significant amount of facility planning and initial project visioning as you're aware. The town's completed qualification process for firms capable of updating the master plan. and receive proposals for that work on july 2nd we've been retained as your owner's rep and the next phase is really about refining the project concept the budget while also evaluating the appropriate delivery approach the important point here is the town is not starting from scratch there's substantial work already completed that can inform the next decisions so before comparing the different options i want to define what we mean by project delivery it's simply the structure used to organize design procure and construct a project it determines who contracts with whom who is responsible for design cost and construction when the architect and contractor are integrated how risk is allocated and importantly when the town begins receiving meaningful costs and schedule certainty This isn't, there's not really one universal correct delivery method. It really is, it's about aligning the town's priorities with the characteristics of the project. City Council Chambers, So this is a simple diagram very basic but it's the traditional design process that most of us are familiar with. City Council Chambers, You really move from pre design into schematic design and design development construction documents, once you do all that you bid it out and then you build it it's a really simple design bid build. City Council Chambers, In the contractor generally enters the process in this at the very end of the design phase. City Council Chambers, And that's an important distinction, because by the time the builder is evolved many of the major design and project decisions have already been made. City Council Chambers, So this graphic is probably the easiest way to understand the primary differences between the three delivery methods i'm going to discuss tonight. City Council Chambers, The top is that design bid build it's a little bit hard to read but. The gray is your owner advisor selection. The green is architect selection. Then the orange is design. The other green there at the top is the bidding process, and then the blue is build or construction. So you can see the top one is very linear. The architect is selected early, completes the design, and then the contractor is selected later. The second one there in the middle of the page is design build. The town would develop bridging documents or criteria documents and then procure an integrated design build team, architect and contractor together to complete design and build. And then progressive design actually moves that integrated team further or earlier in the process. So the town would establish a project program, objective, budget parameters, and then would select a design build team before the design is fully developed. So as you move down this chart, what really changes is the timing and level of integration between design and construction. Let's go into a little bit more detail. So starting with that design bid build approach, The first public bid project in the U.S. dates back to 1796, and 230 years later, nearly everything about construction has changed, or evolved, I should say, but basic design-bid-build structures largely remain the same. The owner hires the architect, the architect completes the design, and then once the design's complete, the contractor bids the work. The defining characteristic is that design and construction are contractually and sequentially separated. So design bid build can absolutely be successful here. Virtually every public agency has successfully delivered projects this way. The challenge here is predictability. Because contractors they're not involved in the design, the town may not receive the true market pricing until the projects fully designed and publicly bid and there's a lot of risk, especially in renovation projects. If bids come in over budget options become difficult and limited. You can either add funding, redesign the project, or reduce scope. And that separation can also contribute to constructability issues, change orders, and disputes during construction, mostly the most adversarial process of them all. But there are ways to mitigate it. That's really what my firm does. If you do design, bid, build, You can mitigate those by engaging with the owner rep or construction manager early. You perform independent cost estimates through design. You focus heavily on schedule constructability reviews, site logistics, contract terms, contingency management. They're all tools we routinely use to improve outcomes. The point here is that design-bid-build doesn't work. It's just that the owner has to actively manage the gaps created by the separation between design and construction. City Council Chambers, Okay let's go to design build which creates a different contractual structure, instead of separate architect and contractor contracts, the town contracts with a single design build entity. City Council Chambers, responsible for both design and construction, it creates a single point of accountability and allows costs and schedule information to influence design decisions in real time. It also allows procurement of long lead items, and in some cases, construction activities like site grading, utilities, demolition to occur earlier in the process than waiting until you're fully complete with design. The trade off is that traditional design build requires owner to more clearly define the project before procuring the design build team. Otherwise price padding allowances and contingencies are sure to be incorporated into pricing because they're ultimately pricing risk. So you typically need strong bridging documents performance criteria clearly established quality expectations and also requires timely owner decision making. And because design build proposals can be expensive for teams to prepare, the procurement itself needs to be thoughtfully structured to maintain competition in the marketplace. So now let's get to the last one, progressive design build. This is a variation of design build that has become increasingly common for public facilities in California, the biggest difference here from design build is just when the design build team is selected. So rather than fully defining the design through bridging documents, the owner can establish program project objectives performance requirements and budget parameters at a very early level. And then the design build team is selected through a competitive best value process from there, the owner owner's rep and design build team collaboratively develop the project together. And that design progress along, the design progresses along, excuse me, alongside continuous cost estimating and scheduling by the contractor, constructability reviews and phasing analysis, and ultimately we're developing the project together to a point of a guaranteed maximum price, which is generally about design development phase. Ultimately, that team would develop that GMP through open book process and then the town has the option of proceeding with that price or as a contingency plan, you could just bid it out as a traditional design build project. So the biggest advantage is early integration you'd have the architect contractor key trade partners owner REP and the town all working together collaboratively while the project is being developed. City Council Chambers, The town remains actively involved in all major decisions, but instead of designing first and pricing later. City Council Chambers, Design decisions are continuously evaluated against cost and schedule and construct ability. City Council Chambers, This is especially helpful when due diligence for existing buildings can be integrated early in the process, open walls see how the existing building is you know the realities of the existing building for a complex or evolving projects that can provide a lot of flexibility. So we hear a few common questions about progressive design build. Does it take longer is one of the questions. The short answer is absolutely not. The way that it's developed gives you the ability to really overlap design and construction as you saw in some of those diagrams. Is it more expensive is one of the questions and it's not inherently more expensive it's it's certainly not low bid, but the opportunity is you get best value selection with earlier cost transparency and fewer surprises later so we're all rowing in the boat together. And then does the owner lose control? The owner remains actively involved throughout the progressive phase, ultimately determining whether to accept the guaranteed maximum price or proceed in a different route. So just just demonstrating how it could look for your project, the town would complete the master plan amendment and establish the updated program project objectives and budget parameters those documents would then be the basis for the progressive design build procurement. And the town would competitively select a design build team. The team would work with the town through phase one to advance design and evaluating costs, schedule, and develop that guaranteed maximum price at design development, the end of design development, which is roughly 60% of the design. And the town would have a clear decision point they would return back with that gmp price and you could choose to proceed into phase two complete the design, which is construction documents and then build the project. And that's why it's called progressive the project, the design the price are progressively developed together. So this table summarizes the trade offs here design build. design bid build, excuse me, provides a high degree of direct design control and is familiar, but cost certainty and contractor involvement generally arrive later. City Council Chambers, Design build creates greater integration and can improve schedule efficiencies, but requires the project to be more clearly defined before a design build team can be selected. City Council Chambers, And then progressive design build maintains an integrated structure, while allowing the project to continually evolve collaboratively. City Council Chambers, Now, again there's no single approach that's universally best for all projects, it just depends on what the town values most and how defined the project is at the time of procurement. So as David mentioned, there are a number of nearby examples. We're seeing more public agencies evaluate integrated delivery methods for civic and public safety facilities. San Rafael has used design build for its public safety campus and is now using progressive design build for its library and community center. The county of Marin using progressive design build for its fire facilities and some other facilities on the docket. We're currently assisting a number of cities and counties in SoCal on a number of progressive efforts. But the common themes are really about bringing construction expertise early, improving cost certainty, maintaining operations, and preserving flexibility for phased implementation. City Council Chambers, Excuse me, so bringing this back specifically to Ross, we see three potential implementation paths you don't have to make a decision tonight, of course, but just laying out some options and ideas. City Council Chambers, Path a is the traditional approach the town completes the master plan architect selection retains that architect and or releases another design procurement again for full design. City Council Chambers, Once that project is designed, then you go out for construction bid it and you build it. City Council Chambers, path be preserves the master plan architect, but then adds a bridging design phase, so we go more to that design build option. City Council Chambers, So the architect would complete the master plan amendment and then develop additional documents, including design intent performance standards and quality criteria, the town within procure design build team on the basis of those bridging documents. City Council Chambers, So you'd have to add a bridging scope to the master plan architect or procure a bridging architect. City Council Chambers, And then path see is progressive design build the town will complete the master plan amendment using the updated program and planning documents as the foundation for progressive design build procurement. The design build team would enter early and help develop the design budget phasing implementation strategy together towards a GMP guaranteed maximum price and then you lock in pricing early in the design process. Now again, not not any recommendation here tonight, but just options. So for us the delivery decision shouldn't happen in a vacuum there's several project specific considerations here Community outreach public process will be important, the civic Center has unique historical character civic identity aspects. Certainly need to consider town and public safety operation operational continuity. The scope and financial feasibility are still being refined, as well as bond timing, ballot readiness, all those considerations. And the town may ultimately need flexibility to phase improvements over time, depending on financials. So taking all those into account as you decide what delivery decision you'd like to proceed with. City Council Chambers, There's also a procedural consideration specific to these options alternative delivery methods are permitted under California law, however, as I understand that the town's current municipal code is structured around a more traditional procurement. City Council Chambers, If the Council ultimately decides that alternative method is appropriate amendments to the municipal code may be required. City Council Chambers, So we'd come back to the Council separately for future consideration in concert with your town attorney. and all of his feedback. So where do we go from here? This is really a policy discussion receiving council feedback tonight. The town would then complete the master plan amendment consultant selection process. As that work progresses, we can continue evaluating delivery strategy in parallel. If an alternative method is appropriate, staff and town council can evaluate necessary municipal code amendments, and ultimately we return to council with a specific procurement strategy. And the key is really about preserving flexibility today as you start making some key decisions on this project. City Council Chambers, So one final point before I release you guys to questions here, you know moving quickly today on aspects of this project doesn't always mean delivering the project faster. City Council Chambers, there's there's more to this, you see, on the back end of this so keep that in mind, as you, you know deliberate on all these different aspects of the project with that happy to answer questions.

Questions? Elizabeth. How long does it take to amend the municipal code? And is that very simple and straightforward? And if that's the case, is this something we should do so that it would be an easy option? Or do we wait until we're sure that that's the procurement that we want?

As far as the amendment, it's like any other ordinance. You'd have to have a first and a second reading, and then it goes into effect in 30 days. So, I mean, there's no downside in amending your code to allow for these alternative procedures in the future, even if we don't take advantage of them now.

Thank you.

When exactly do we need to decide on these options?

You don't have to decide now. I would say before you proceed past your master plan architect, you should start really figuring out what you want to do. At the end of that master plan update, that's when you really need to chart, are we using this document as the basis for procurement on progressive? Or do we need to pivot to something different? And of course, there's a lead time for getting a procurement out for any other option you want to do. So you want to start thinking about it.

City Council Chambers, And is that would that be your role as part of the owners REP along with the whatever whichever architect is retained to amend the facilities master plan, would you do that in conjunction with the town manager to. City Council Chambers, yeah we're here for support and as much or as little as you need, so you would envision coming forward with a recommendation kind of down the road pros and cons. City Council Chambers, If that's requested at timing that that would be my request.

We've had some extended discussions about the different phases of our moving ahead and we started with this preferred concept And now we're moving to what we're now describing as the schematic stage, preliminary to the actual architectural drawings, the construction drawings, preliminary to bidding the project out. So when you refer to the master plan, are you referring to the schematic stage?

I am it's so I don't think you guys are taking it quite to schematic the end of schematic design, I think it was advanced conceptuals is systematic I mean to me, these are all key architectural vocabulary words so schematic design follows conceptual design. there's a whole process to that. City Council Chambers, So I think conceptual design is what I understand the amended master plan will result in.

City Council Chambers, Alright, so is it then at the end of that process that you do the. Yes, assuming you're doing design build now you get the team together and you say okay here's what we have now we need we need bids on.

architectural firm construction firm that can work together on this if you're going to go design build, you need to take the design, a little bit further. So you'd have to you'd have to get a bridging architect or you know add a amendment to your master plan architect to advance the design to a more robust bridging document set. which is basically the end of schematic design. Now I'm really confusing you.

I just want to be clear on what stage we are coming upon. I mean, one of the things we'll be discussing tonight is retaining an architectural firm for this initial work. City Council Chambers, And I do think it's important we understand what we're what we're doing at this stage, if we want to keep the option open for design build is that something needs to be built into this right now, or can we proceed with what we're we're already proceeding with.

City Council Chambers, I think you proceed what you're doing right now, but I would suggest that you know the next meeting or two you start really making decisions about which way you'd like to navigate to. So when I come back with a contract for this architect, you know, is there direction to proceed towards a certain delivery method. I think that would be helpful to understand, so we can get a jump on that process and prepare for it, because if it's. City Council Chambers, If you want to go progressive design build we'd want to get ahead of the procurement of that and so in alignment with the master plan updates. City Council Chambers, You know that procurement could be happening and so once that's done, we can take that and use that as your procurement to the marketplace to procure a design build a progressive design build team, but if you go design build. City Council Chambers, you'd have to advance the design a little bit further past your master plan amendment to the end of schematic design to really understand the performance metrics of what you want to try to build. City Council Chambers, So there's a lot of qualitative information that you want to define as part of a bridging document set otherwise if you just use your amendment i'd say design builders are going to pad your costs. City Council Chambers with all kinds of things that they're just pricing risk they don't know what you want so they're just either assuming or they're padding it with costs. City Council Chambers with all kinds of things that they're just pricing risk they don't know what you want so they're just either assuming or they're padding it with costs. City Council Chambers with all kinds of things that they're just pricing risk they don't know what you want so they're just either assuming or they're padding it with costs. City Council Chambers with all kinds of things that they're just pricing risk they don't know what you want so they're just either assuming or they're padding it with costs. City Council Chambers with all kinds of things that they're just pricing risk they don't know what you want so they're just either assuming or they're padding it with costs. City Council Chambers with all kinds of things that they're just pricing risk they don't know what you want so they're just either assuming or they're padding it with costs. City Council Chambers with all kinds of

Well, thank you i'm still not sure I completely understand it but i'm sure there are people who would understand what you're talking about I just want to make sure if we're going to be approving a contract we're improving the right things to be in that contract, given how we would like to move ahead.

I think it's appropriate to prove what you need to on the basis of the rfp and the and the process you're on right now, I think it's totally fine but down the road you're gonna have to make some some decisions.

City Council Chambers, Thank you.

City Council Chambers, So um. City Council Chambers, One of the things we could do right now is just work with staff to change the municipal code, so we have those options we do that now yeah and then we have a few more meetings to go before we have to make that decision about design build or progressive design correct.

City Council Chambers, Yes, okay yeah i'd say probably two meetings to okay.

So i'm i'm also with bill i'm a little confused about the process so maybe Kristen can help we had a meeting where we talked about. Just basically redoing our facilities master plan so using the citizens advisory committee plan and then kind of updating the master plan and then from there, once we had that master plan redone we would hire an architect and start going and doing schematic design. But then we had a special meeting like a week or two ago, where was said no, we need to go faster and so. That that meeting it was we're going to do this rfp and then we're selecting an architect to not just do the facility master plan update, but then also work on schematic design. City Council Chambers, No, no, so please this is the question, so please advise what where are we what what was actually decided, and I was on zoom so I wasn't here, so it was I could not understand where we're we're we're supposedly at right.

City Council Chambers, i'd like David Kelly to his. City Council Chambers, yeah that's fine speaks with a lot of finesse verify.

City Council Chambers, Thank you, Council member Salter for your question and i'll try to dovetail and address Council member purchase question as well. City Council Chambers, You know, in the next agenda item you're going to receive an update on. the RFP process. And just to foreshadow that discussion, what's proposed as part of this effort is to update or amend the master plan to incorporate the Citizens Advisory Committee's concept into the master plan and include all the elements that weren't reflected on the concept when it was submitted to council. That document, once it's complete, will provide the basis for the next step. And what that means is, again, the three processes is we would hire an architect at that point to Mayor Mrakas, develop construction documents basically hundred percent so that means you know complete architectural drawing civil drawings that we we put out to bid and we we you know it's a it's kind of a blind process we we you know we asked. Mayor Mrakas, Contractors to provide us bids. The the second alternative design build would be we complete this master plan. We hire a retain an architect. It could be the same architect that we hire to do the master plan update doesn't have to be make sure it comports with the city attorney's analysis that we can do that. They would, if that was the next process, we would employ them to do the schematic design drawings, which are basically 30%. 30% entails kind of basic level floor planning with some of the basic MEP systems. So you know that's that's your electrical plumbing and so forth, some of the basic civil design drawings and then you engage the the public process to take those drawings to 100% through the design build with with the progressive design. We complete this master plan process, and with with Dustin's help, we would procure a progressive design build team. So you would hire both an architect and a contractor. Usually you're really hiring the contractor that has an architect as part of the team. to take the project through the entire design and construction process. Get us at least to about, I think it's 60% design development drawings to give us that guaranteed maximum price. And that's where you there's this off ramp built in if Council doesn't feel comfortable with that that we call it GMP. There's the off ramp for Council to say, you know, let's go traditional design bid build. Board of Trustees Meeting, otherwise you continue forward, and you complete. You've selected your contractor, your design team, and you go to a hundred percent, and you and you and you start moving forward with with construction. So I hope it's kind of these three three buckets, or three tiers, or three paths, I guess, path, A, B, and C. All of which is really predicated on completion of the master plan, getting all that work refined, making sure all those assumptions meet with your support and approval. We've got all the elements there. We now want to move into this next phase of design, either 100%. City Council Chambers, 30% for design build or you know hire hire a contractor and and architect together to take us through progressive design if you're more visual you can see right here that progressive this this red box.

City Council Chambers, This would basically be your master plan amendment you take those documents and you're bidding it from there to get a progressive design bill entity.

Mayor Mrakas, Okay, so sorry I just those a lot, let me just break it down, so I want to make sure we're all clear, we are hiring on the agenda tonight is hopefully we had an rfp to select an architect and that. Mayor Mrakas, scope of work is to get us to the master plan amendment and that's it no schematic design know nothing further is that correct. Mayor Mrakas, that's correct. Mayor Mrakas, Okay, and then, once we have that you're saying this is where the jumping off point comes to use one of these three delivery options once we have that facility master plan updated as a concept.

That's right.

Use it or enhance it, basically. Okay. So then my question to you, Chris, is what did we decide at this last meeting? Because I thought that's where we were at at the first one.

So at your special meeting on June 24th, you decided the council voted to essentially maintain the status quo, which was to stick with the RFP process that was to amend the facilities master plan.

Okay. So nothing changed. Okay.

No, it was. Yeah.

OK, so I'm sorry we weren't Elizabeth and I were on zoom so you guys were here and then I just remember you saying we're fine and so we're like OK. OK, so basically that's what's happening. So as soon as we select this architect, we were basically getting this amended master plan and then we have to have the jump off point. OK, thank you.

So if on this design build thing, as I understand it, when we're selecting an architect. It's within the discretion of the council and we don't have to engage in a bidding process. But when we get to construction, we have to bid it out. So when you have a combined architectural planning and construction firm, does that get bid out or is that, I mean, how does that even done? Yes. Is it a package deal and so the lowest bidder gets the deal?

Lowest qualified is how the code is written. It's the best qualified or best value is the procurement policy. So you would, you would do it based on qualifications and price is a component of it. You know, depending if it's design, build a progressive, you know, design build, you would have an actual dollar amount for your project because you are advancing to bridging documents. And so they can give you a more confirmed price on the whole project value versus progressive. They don't, they can't give you a price for your project yet. We generally will work on it together and develop a price, but. if we have as part of the master plan process an idea of how much your budget is for the project we can pre-negotiate certain aspects of construction so overhead and profit their general conditions general requirements other all their fees early in the process and use that as part of the competitive fee negotiations as well as all the architecture fees so there's there's a strong fee negotiation piece in progressive that we can absolutely do as part of the the best value selection.

If we don't go the design build route, just the traditional route where the construction is the last part of it.

Yeah.

Do we then have three contracts with architectural firms first the master plan, then the schematic stage, then the actual detailed construction drawings, I mean you.

It depends what you do with your first you know contract with the architect, but yeah it would be separate architecture contracts and then separate contractor contracts.

Which is where conflict happens, but if I may on that scenario, you have the option of sticking with your same contract with your same architect throughout the process and the traditional you know early on schematics won't disqualify that architect from later bidding on these other alternative processes. when he mentioned and i'm sorry i forgot your name dustin dustin yeah when dustin mentioned in his proposal or his presentation the bridging contractors that's used because if you're happy with your existing architect they can't do that bridging work if they're going to later bid on the design bill So there's a lot of iterations as this moves forward. If you're happy with your existing team, you're gonna have to figure out how to work with them and keep them if they want to do that work in the future or bid on that work in the future.

Mayor, just a follow up with Councilmember Kirchherrs. I the way I heard your question was is if we use the traditional design bid build? Do we have to have three architects? That's what I heard was your question is that I hear that incorrectly? three contracts three different contractual arrangements they don't have to be three different architects no i meant that's what i meant three different three different contracts but with architects yeah so but then dustin you i thought i heard you agree with that there's i thought it was just we would just need two i heard you say three contracts not three architects okay so you could feasibly have an architect contract for the amendment another contract for the architect for full design full design and then a contract with a contractor yeah so two two contracts with architect engineering firms one contract with a builder that's right i'm just trying to understand we have five proposals now and i'm just trying to understand what are they for in terms of what we've been talking about they are to amend the facilities master plan right City Council Chambers, it's a planning level nothing for planning level just. City Council Chambers, Like planning concept level planning level.

City Council Chambers, And our decision tonight about that is not going to in any way jeopardize these other options those other options will come in a few months, based on what's going on with the amendment of the facilities master plan and your judgment.

that's right that's right and and the purpose tonight is that this council just like we did a few months ago with having a consultant team here to talk about the debt financing it's just it's kind of educating we want to educate the council and the community and staff on this and get you start thinking about it so that the council has this opportunity to ask questions maybe you want us to follow up On with more information on a particular topic we want to give you time to do that before we're just hitting you up straight out with this very important decision.

yeah I would agree with Elizabeth recommendation to go ahead and do the ministerial work of amending the code, so that we have. City Council Chambers, These options, so that we're not with I mean the the timing is the most critical thing, so we want to be nimble and we want to have as much done as we possibly can and have as many options available as we can.

City Council Chambers, David and I already had an initial meeting with two of ben's colleagues two Fridays ago, and I was very you know they they're experts in their field and. City Council Chambers, It sounded like it's a very it's very doable you know with with ben's help, of course, so. City Council Chambers, can certainly work on that.

City Council Chambers, And that will take what to Council meetings.

you'll have to introduce at one meeting just like any ordinance introduce and then at your next meeting um second reading and then it takes 30 days to go into effect yeah matt um just regarding the sequencing with sequa how does that work in terms of the timeline of when we would actually go and start the environmental study in terms of the environmental review

My recommendation would be we start that process as we get close to completing the draft master plan. The draft master plan is going to provide the project description that will form the basis for assessing the environmental impacts of the project. and we want to make sure that we include as much detail and as much of the elements of the project in that project description. So if there's ever any question whether something was included, we can point back to that project description and say, Yes, these elements were reflected in the environmental document and considered. So it'll that'll be one of those. There should be some City Council Chambers, Concurrence with respect to the timeline of starting that environmental review process as we're nearing completion of the facility master plan.

City Council Chambers, Okay, so just in terms of like actual dates, if we were thinking of the facility master plan amendment occurring in the fall at some point, we would then start the environmental review based on that document that. City Council Chambers, That that follows, so it would take how long is your estimate for the environmental review to be completed and sort of go through that one that's somewhat challenging to answer yeah.

City Council Chambers, depends on our consultants advice on what type of level of environmental review, we need to do and based on the project description it's way too preliminary right now to say how long it's going to take. City Council Chambers, But rule of thumb is a full er takes a year, a year, at least a year and a half.

and that's just the rule of thumb for any if we do an EIR. So just going back to so if we we get the amendment done in the fall and then we will be a year of environmental reviews so we wouldn't sort of be able to let's say shovel ready for a year but during that time we're doing schematic design and doing all these other items to be ready for for that following fall to be able to do construction.

We run it concurrently design and sequel together and hopefully it's not as involved as the ir but it is that could be a lot more issues the creek obviously which.

We even when we were doing our bridge, there was a whole NEPA they found Indian remain so there's you know it can get very, very quickly. Difficult so i'm just trying to so we all know the timeline of we're done in the fall with. City Council Chambers, This amendment and then we probably have a year of environmental review but we're concurrently doing the other work schematic design and engineering and. City Council Chambers, Getting ever you know, one of these three strategies put up so that we're probably hopefully ready to do construction in a year's time from the fall so fall of 27. That.

City Council Chambers, I think what Ben says it depends on the. City Council Chambers, The project description right and that's going to determine the length of the environmental review and if we can do a mitigated negative deck or whatever yeah I mean it depends on that, but also depends on the design method and you know there's a lot of.

City Council Chambers, A lot of dependent issues that are going to be sorted out as you move forward, it would be impossible by that certainty today or even a rough outline all I can say is for sequel to worst case scenario is a year and a half to do in the ir.

but whether we have to do that remains to be seen yeah no i'm just trying to get and i think this would be helpful david in one of your updates is sort of like a game chart yes just showing here's when we go for sequa here's when we think we're going to be shovel ready here's just so we these are all educational items but just helping us sort of calibrate when we actually think we're going to actually start this project yeah and it might be good to start

City Council Chambers, from January 2029 and work backwards, at least for you know the paramedic facility because that's our critical date, I mean everything else done to would be wonderful but that's, the most important thing.

so earlier this week i had a conversation with council member dowling about this very thing and and we if david has given several um updates to the council and it usually does include a gantt charge but it's gonna it needs to be it's gonna it's continually going to be refined and so we can We'll try to put something together noting the town attorneys advice there his comments, but we'll do our best to keep the Council informed on what we see as being a timeline.

I was gonna say I think it's particularly important we'll have a sense of what the contractors supposed to do, but the staff are also doing things to complement the work the contractors are doing, and sometimes we don't see that so having a chart. would be very helpful.

Can we take public comment on this item? Anybody in the chamber want to make a public comment? Anyone online?

No one online, Mayor.

OK.

So we'll bring it back for any further discussion.

Sorry, we have one hand on mic.

Yes, go ahead.

Mr. Wynne, you could.

Hi. Can you guys hear me OK?

Yes.

Yeah, that was, I have to commend you. That was really a very good, very succinct presentation. And I think there's only, there's just a couple of considerations. One is that if town council decides to move forward with an architect and the architect updates the master plan and schematic design, then those documents in effect can become a part of the bridging documents. So there's no time loss there. I think it's gonna be really important that any architect that is selected that the town retains ownership of any of those documents. Some architects would not allow that to happen so that if at some point in time, let's say you have one design architect that does all of the bridging documents, which essentially would take it through DD, then sometimes that architect is assigned to a general contractor. And sometimes the drawings that that architect prepared to actually get sent to an architect that the general contractor has actually hired. So I think that ownership of documents is a really important consideration. I think that I would caution council on selecting a general contractor and architect at the same time. And the only reason being is that many times a general contractor's architect is not a design architect. From a technical standpoint, they're perfectly competent. They can do the construction drawings, CA or whatever, but they're not necessarily strong in terms of design. So again, I think this is a really good presentation, but during this next phase of work, updating the master plan, and if council decides to move forward with doing some level of schematics, I think that's perfectly appropriate. I think the good thing about getting through schematics some level of schematic, so let's call it modified bridging documents, hopefully at the end of three or four months that we would have a price recognizing that, you know, there are contingencies that we'd have to keep in there, but we'd have a number that we could start to work with that would help us in terms of, you know, setting up the bonding and everything else that needs to be done. So, again, that was really a great presentation. I appreciate it.

Thank you, Dan. City Council Chambers, Anybody else sack online no one else online Okay, so any further discussion.

City Council Chambers, I just think we, we have to make sure we're really clear because we're not even clear about what what what we're deciding what the timeline is and what the scope is. City Council Chambers, Even Dan whiny was just talking about doing schematics, but it was very clear we're not doing schematics, this is just a concept for us to amend the master plan. City Council Chambers, And from the last special meeting, I was confused, I thought we were trying to move this quicker and do schematics, but now we're not doing that. City Council Chambers, So being really clear, this is the scope, this is what we're paying for this is the timeline and then getting us to be able to sequence things so that. If anybody in the town asks us, we're able to answer them because I myself was very confused. So we just really have to be really clear about what we're doing, what the scope is and what the timeline is and deadlines. So we're not over promising and under delivering.

For everything. I agree.

Anything else? I just want to say the one thing that we totally agreed on that we need to do right now is to City Council Chambers, change the municipal code so and staff will prepare that okay and ben's office yeah and I totally agree with that, I think I think all five of us probably do.

City Council Chambers, Okay.

City Council Chambers, Great so now we're moving on to item number 15. City Council Chambers, Town Council to receive a report regarding the status of the request for proposals process for professional planning technical evaluation and facilities master plan amendment services. City Council Chambers, For the Ross civic Center project and considered directing the town manager to negotiate a professional services agreement with one of the firm's responding to the rfp process.

open the separation. Yes. All right. Okay. Good evening, Mayor McMillan, Vice Mayor Pro Tem Robbins, honorable council members. I'm David Kelly. Good evening. This this agenda item is intended to provide a status update on the request for proposals or RFP for professional planning, technical evaluation and facilities, master plan amendment services for the Roth Ross Civic Center project. The The purpose of this presentation is to update the Council on where we are in the procurement process and outline next steps. Staff is not requesting approval of a consultant or professional service agreement this evening. Mayor McMillan requested that staff provide Council with an update on the status of the RFP's process. The presentation will cover a couple of things. It will cover the status of the RFP, the five proposals that were received, the evaluation process that staff is following, along with next steps. So quick background. As Council may recall, on June 11th, the Council authorized issuance of the request for proposals This was sent to the 10 firms that had previously responded to the town's RFQ. The purpose of this RFP is to select a consultant to prepare an amendment to the facilities master plan to incorporate the citizens advisory committee concept or the cat concept. City Council Chambers, The work is intended to incorporate and validate the council's preferred civic Center concept which you've designated in resolution 2623. City Council Chambers, evaluate operational technical issues develop updated planning level cost estimates and prepare the amended facilities plan that will guide future implementation. The RFP was issued on June 12th, and proposals were set to be received on July 2nd. In response to the RFP, the Town received five complete proposals by the deadline. The firms that submitted proposals include Group 4, Gensler, a joint team of HED and BRW. For reference, BRW was the architectural team that submitted a design for a fire station as part of the ballot measure. In addition, proposals were submitted by Nolan Tam as well as KPA. Each of the proposals really reflects a unique and different approach, a unique team composition and level of technical effort, project schedule, and fee structure. And staff, upon close of the process, started review of those proposals. The RFP asked each of the consultants to address six major tasks. These included project initiation, which is just kind of a standard task and review of existing conditions, along with program validation, moving forward into site planning and concept refinement, a technical evaluation of the CAC concept, moving that effort into cost estimating and implementation strategy, and finally, preparation of an amended facilities plan. Collectively, these tasks are intended to provide a well-defined project description before advancing into future design and implementation. In preparation for review of those proposals, staff prepared proposal rating worksheets. The proposal rating worksheets included a number of factors. The evaluation criteria included understanding of the project, the technical approach, relevant experience, whether they had public safety and historic preservation expertise, along with the project schedule and overall value to the town. The town manager issued a supplemental staff report that provides a detailed evaluation matrix, providing a brief summary of all of those review factors. So in terms of the selection process timeline earlier today, the Council subcommittee which consists of Mayor McMillan and Mayor Pro Tem Robbins met with staff to review the submitted proposals. Staff anticipates interviewing the highest ranked firms conducting reference checks as appropriate and entering into negotiations with the highest ranked consultant. once negotiations are complete staff will return to the council with a recommendation for consultant selection and approval of a professional services agreement and currently staff is planning to bring those forward for council's consideration on august 4th i do want to note that that is of course subject to the consultant or the architect you know executing the town's professional service agreement In terms of next steps are pretty straightforward. The staff will conduct interviews, negotiate a professional service agreement with the highest ranked firm, and then return to council on the fourth. And so basically that's a brief overview of the RFP process. There's a lot of detail in the matrix around each of the proposers. Again, a project approach, the timeline, as well as the cost, all of that was considered today by the subcommittee and discussed. And we can say that there was fairly unanimous, nearly unanimous support around the top three firms with I think one exception, but otherwise out of the five, there was three proposals that ranked the highest. So with that said, that really concludes presentation update on the RFP process. And happy to entertain any questions Council may have regarding the process.

Questions?

Well, thank you for sharing the overview and staff's recommendations. As you know from our meeting, the staff's recommendations didn't completely align with those of the council member reps. And my question is, there's no reason that the town council can't proceed tonight to direct the town manager to negotiate a contract, an agreement. there's not a requirement to go through with more discussions or interviews. Is that correct?

I would defer to the town attorney on that, but I think you're correct. I think the issue that you're referring to, Mayor Pro Tem, is the discussion around interviews, and I think it's staff's perspective that interviewing at least the top firm is a very important is part of this selection process. One is just it's a best practice, and we believe there's value in setting up appropriate negotiations of the scope of work that will form the basis of the professional service agreement that will be brought back for Council's consideration.

And that's correct there's no requirement to have interviews and you can direct staff tonight to. move forward negotiations with one of the architects as the agenda makes very clear that's on the agenda tonight.

And. I mean. i'm not sure how much it wasn't a close me but um. one of the one of the submitters a majority of the committee members listed the same person as as the top choice so if we were to proceed i guess the question is is there any reason we wouldn't proceed with the top choice of the majority of the committee members today Yeah, but I'm not sure I'm asking enough.

Okay, item. We're sticking with questions right now.

I'm trying to understand what happens in the second circle. So maybe the first one. So conduct interviews with the top three people. And that would happen between now and the next council meeting, which is scheduled for the first part of August.

I've asked the council to save the date of August 4th, which is a Tuesday.

Okay.

So that we, because the council had asked me to get a date as quickly as possible. And that's the first date that we will have three members here. And in fact, all five members are going to be, or from my understanding, all five of you will be able to attend that meeting. So because the August council meeting is not scheduled until the second Thursday of the month is August 13th.

So between now and August 4th, the committee would meet again, do an interview of the top, I don't know, two or three candidates. And then once that decision is made, City Council Chambers, Between now and the fourth you will actually. City Council Chambers, develop a contract with that top candidate so by the time you come to the August 4 meeting, you will have done the interviews chosen the top candidate and there will be a contract ready for the Council to approve.

yes assuming the the consultant signs our agreement and i'm able to bring you the contract so that is my that that is that is staff's recommendation okay um it is not staff's recommendation to bypass our process and go with one tonight because we have not completed a full evaluation. We've literally had a couple of days. We have not called references. We have not met these people in person. There's a whole lot of things that we would be doing. There's questions that actually the subcommittee members had today about the proposals that we received. In many cases, we haven't been able to answer the questions yet. So we just haven't had time to do the work that is that our best practices that we would normally do. So staff's recommendation is, as you described, take the top two or three, interview them next week. And then I don't see the interviews as delaying. My target goal is to bring you back something on August 4th.

That's what I wanted to check because If you didn't go through this process of doing the interviews, if you didn't do the interviews, you wouldn't come back anyway until we say, okay, we're going to go with the top candidate. We make that decision today. You wouldn't be able to bring back a contract for approval until August 4th.

Exactly.

Is that actually true, because if we were to choose a candidate tonight, why couldn't there be a contract that's ready sometime next week? It's not a very complicated contract, and that would save almost a month, a month between tonight, July 9, and August 4.

So I don't quite... Because the council, there are not going to be three members of the council to take action. So anything over... Take action when? To take action on a contract.

I mean, I think that there are... I would be surprised if there's not some time between now and August 4, when three of us are physically here. Well, this is more discussion, how we proceed. But one question, going through interviews, as you were just outlining, and then coming before the council on August 4, I don't see how there could be a contract ready to sign because the committee can't pick the person. The committee can recommend a person to the council, but the council has to decide. It seems to me that if we're going through an interview process, we're not going to be ready on August 4. We're only going to have a recommendation, which is where your council member reps to the committee are already at. And so, I mean, there is a possibility of having a contract much sooner than August 4. It only takes three people to have a meeting and sign it.

Ben, how long does a contract like this typically take, or Krista, how long does a contract take?

we have a standard professional services agreement that has already been vetted by the town attorney that we use all the time um we have a uh the advantage of having this request for proposals is we have a scope of work in it um so it's going to be and I I can also ask Dustin because Dustin's done a lot of these too is we have to reach agreement. I'm very interested in the recommendations that Dustin has because I know the council is that your priority is to move this along as quickly as possible. So I'd like to see there be provisions and that agreement that require the consultants to meet our milestones, and Dustin and his firm have recommendations on how to do that, and of course we need to work very closely with our town attorney's office on that. So, you know, It's very, very clear to me that the council wants us to move forward as quickly as possible. As you've seen, we're doing stuff every week. We're giving you staff reports and providing information and doing back handsprings to move this thing forward. And August 4th is, let me assure you, You have all given me information about what your availability is, and August 4th is the first work day that we can meet.

But it's not required that all five of us meet.

We should just focus on questions and then do public comment, and then we can do discussion.

So who are the top three firms? And did we score them?

Yeah, so we prepared evaluation worksheets, and those were very detailed in terms of how the scoring, again, based on those factors that we showed earlier, project understanding, technical approach. So there was a very distinct.

So it's a very direct question. Who are the top three firms? What are their names and what are their scores? That's what I want to know. dustin's said it wasn't you know i want to make sure with the town attorney i thought we were advised are we allowed to you're allowed there's no score there wasn't a uh there wasn't a quantitative score okay so we tried to not say who the top three firms are like i don't understand what what are we doing here can we just whoever was in the subcommittee please tell us or the staff who are the top three firms yeah so three of the five people

chose Gensler as the top firm. Okay. I can actually tell you in my notes.

The other two were Nolan Tam.

Right.

Nolan Tam, which is a local firm as well as HED slash BRW.

HED, BRW. Okay. Yeah. And of those three, was there a sort of standout that everyone seemed to like?

Well, three of the five of us chose Gensler as the top

Three out of the five in the meeting. Yes. Okay.

And I might add that of not every, we did provide scoring worksheets. The five, I did not participate in the scoring. Destin did not participate. It was David, Roberta Feliciano, Rich Semenich, and our two subcommittee members that participated in this evaluation. The subcommittee members did not score on their sheets. One of our staff members scored in an interesting fashion. We don't think it was 100% accurate. But what we did determine was of the people that did score, they were very close. The scores were very close. There was consensus that KPA was not on anybody's top three and that only one member listed group four on their top three. And so I thought it was very encouraging news that the other three were on all those people's top three list. So I think that was really encouraging.

No, no, great. We don't need to belabor it. I'm just wondering, we weren't there, those of us that weren't there. Sorry, the last question I have is, Can we, let's say if we wanted to send our general professional services contract to these top three and have them start working on the contracting while the interviewing and the rest of this is going on. And they were provided a copy of the town's agreement as part of the RFP process. So marking it up, I mean. I mean, I'm sure you provided it, but actually asking them to mark it up as if they were awarded the contract.

We don't want them to mark it up.

Mayor Mrakas, Oh, we just make them like that there's no okay sorry I so then i'm wondering why it would take a while to sign it if we just force them to take it's you know.

City Council Chambers, Normally, in this these processes and then again dustin does these all the time, but we, this has been condensed into two days, so this meeting that we had today staff did not we weren't able we hardly had any time. The discussion was not, nothing has been comprehensive. Nothing, it has not been typical. We have not called references. We have not, we have many questions about the proposals. This was just a very initial conversation.

So- No, no, I understand that. I'm just- We normally- All I'm asking is these little pieces that we were worried about, because I agree with-

Councilmember Dowling that okay well if we're sort of targeting the August 4th how we can just get as much of this through so that that August 4th meeting is a deciding meeting essentially which it sounds like I mean that that is that is my goal rest assured that is my goal and working with our team we would like we would it is our strongest hope I just can't give you 100 commitment because it's it depends a lot on on um the responses you get

yeah i think a critical factor i think this is mayor pertemp's point is whether there's value in in the interviews and uh i think staff that's a point that we we just feel is is a critical aspect of of negotiating an agreement we we've heard that the committee say who they like or who the kind of the preferences uh but it's also you know part of This is a team we're going to work with for you know at least the next 3 months, and it could be longer. And there's going to be it's going to be intensive work. Just it you know it's it's who's part of that conversation is who's going to be the project manager. Who you know who's going to be the primary interface with staff on critical issues, how they deal with those issues. I think that's where you see maybe the perspective is whether there's interviews or not difference. And I think that's where staff and Chris is saying, hey, we think it's important to at least Mayor Mrakas, Do that do another step of due diligence of interviews and and reference checks and and again and do it diligently quickly efficiently and bring the bring back the recommended. Mayor Mrakas, Agreement, you know with with with the recommended bring back an agreement with the recommended consultant at your next meeting on his fourth. And as, as we mentioned, we, we think the subcommittee members to council members may or may pretend should be part of that interview process too because we think it could be, it could be really valuable just to be part of that process. you know ultimately we and i know krista's perspective is to negotiate the the the best price for the town and that's going to be you know we we see it on paper but you know it's going to we have a realistic conversation with the with the architect um you know there's probably going to be some some some changes and maybe some updates to that to that scope of work especially around some of the items that you know we know as part of that were part of their scope assumptions uh that are they're going to be relying on the town to do uh you know how how we we address those as well you know we're being told oh okay bill wants to yeah i i

Well, I have a question about just the negotiating process. It seems to me if we designate the winner tonight, then the winner is going to know they're the winner. And so, you know, you don't really have any uncertainty there in the negotiations. As far as they're concerned, it's a done deal. They name their price and that's it. Whereas if you're interviewing three firms, Then the person who wins doesn't doesn't necessarily know that till the end, and so there is some give on these figures, you at least have that in play. I mean I would just as we're talking i'm thinking back to I would never with my law firm not interview somebody of course i'm hiring attorneys but also. of contractors people who work for us expert witnesses i mean i would have to really be in a hurry and really pressed not to personally interview somebody in my business i always go out to the properties and i don't just go out i walk around i talk to the maintenance people i talk to the property it's amazing what you're going to learn when you talk to people that weren't weren't there initially. And then that suggests more questions and so forth. So I do think that could be valuable. I'm sorry. It's more of a question. But I guess my question was, is that important? And I think the answer is yes.

Yeah. And I spoke at length about this at the last meeting, is that if you tell me tonight to negotiate with one firm, yeah, my leverage is shot.

it's it as ben said it's something that the council can do and you're just going to have to understand what the consequences of that will be so but we already have prices so we're not really expecting to negotiate on price are we i mean we're really just wanting to get a contract so that we can get going on the work where i don't see that we're in a negotiation we've We have a scope of work and people have sent in their estimates and our choice looking at the proposals is based on their price and especially, which hasn't come up and wasn't in the staff report, their timeline. One of the groups is able to turn this around in 12 weeks. The others were 20 to 22 weeks and one was nine months. And so, you know, knowing that we've got a deadline trying to get the paramedic building built that we want to get a bond measure for March. You know, walking back that 12 weeks looked very appealing. And that was the firm that had three first choices from the group. And so and knowing that the timeline is so tight, that was one of the reasons that that that we were wanting to move forward tonight. And it's not it's not that we just got these RFQ piece. I mean, we did. But way back in May, We spent the same amount of time looking at these same companies with their RFQs. So we've gone through talking about them. We've gone through looking at their pros and cons. So it's not that we just got this.

Elizabeth, let's save these things for debate.

Mayor, may I add that in regards to the amounts of time that they put in the proposal, that's an important part of putting together a contract because you could have a firm that says 12 weeks or a firm that says 16 weeks. How are we going to hold him to that? That needs to be all buttoned up in the agreement. And I'd like just real briefly, because, you know, Dustin has so much experience working on these processes, is do you have any comment, having heard this discussion, these questions, is there anything that David and I you could add that would be helpful?

Yeah, I mean, I think it's, you know, negotiations is a key part of this. So, you know, having as much leverage as you can, and it is, you know, totally a best practice of what we do. So that that's not only contract negotiations, but scope negotiations and fee, those are kind of the three legs of the stool here that we want to, you know, maintain our City Council Chambers, position on so without giving away our position and what we would ask for I i'll just leave you with those elements would all be worked on as part of the agreement.

City Council Chambers, krista in the rfp that went out did it state that we expect this project to be done by a certain date or did it just say do it as quickly as possible.

um you know david wrote the rfp so let me let me i don't want to um be inaccurate the the rfp did not provide an explicit uh timeline yeah um it it what what it did do is ask for the consultant's recommendation on an approach and part of the approach that you really see varies throughout those proposals uh one of the the City Council Chambers, David Ensign, City Council Chambers, Items that consumes a fair amount of time is public outreach right and different consultants assumed different levels of public outreach. City Council Chambers, And I think that was a big factor in terms of the timeframe for delivery of an amended master plan was the level of the level of number of meetings and design review and so forth, and so. City Council Chambers, That. part now it's not every firm has different amounts of resources that they can bring to the table to deliver a project within a certain timeline but that also affected that timeline so uh that's just something again to to weigh as part of your consideration but they were specifically told in the selection criteria that one of the criteria is understanding the project and resolution 2623 and 2623

said very clearly that such analysis shall be as expeditious as possible. So they, you know, as far as.

I realize that, but expeditious as possible could mean different things to different people. So I just want to make sure, particularly if you're going to be doing the interviewing and we really would like this sped up. So, you know, it's not 24 weeks, but 13 weeks that you really talk about. We do have this deadline. Can you meet it?

Well, I think the firm that said 12 weeks understands that.

But maybe the others did not know that.

Maybe the others did not know that. Let's keep to question.

Any more questions? Any more questions? And then we can have a discussion. We've exhausted the questions. Any public comment from the audience? Anybody online? Oh, Bob, yes.

Hi, everyone. Bob Herbst.

um you've you've done your rfq these are all very well qualified firms there's absolutely no reason to do an interview process now you could very well authorize your town staff to negotiate a final agreement with whoever you guys tonight say is your favorite um and and they can put in there uh you need to complete it by 12 weeks you you can negotiate any of these contractual issues and and that's what your town staff can do and if the if that preferred architect won't meet those terms then you move on to number two it's this isn't really that complicated this is how these types of contracts are done in the private sector all the time so I think you have the information you need you definitely don't need a bunch of interviews you know who these people are they're all very well qualified staff did a great job with the RFQ on that so it's just up to you guys now Pick someone and let staff negotiate whatever terms you guys tell staff you want them to finalize. They got to finish it in 12 weeks, 14 weeks, whatever it is. You give them two or three things and let them do it.

Thank you. Anyone else in the chamber? Anybody online?

I'll give them a second to raise their hand. No one online, Mayor.

OK. OK. So now we will bring it back for discussion. I guess my maybe I should go last as the mayor. I'll go last.

Okay, Matt. So I maybe we shouldn't go yet. We should discuss more. Here's what I am voting for.

I think everybody here is totally aligned with wanting to go quicker. Like there's just nobody here who doesn't want this process to have already been over with. So for me, August 4th really isn't that far away. It's less than, I mean, it's already July 9th, so it's less than a month. It's less than a month to have a final Mayor Mrakas, You know sort of finalists ready and a contract and and I don't think it's that that long to wait, I like three more weeks isn't going to make this thing make or break I really don't think that. Mayor Mrakas, But what I what i'm hoping is what i'm would love to add to this is during the if there are interviews or sort of questions go back to the respondents. is this issue of the schematic design, right? Like Dan Whiney said on the call, oh, you know, we'll call them bridging documents or scheme, is I would love if part of this, we're all for the amendment of the master plan, but that they're taking that next step to sort of start drafting the actual drawings, that actually will move the ball forward quite a bit if we get that in scope for this, that it's not just the master plan amendment. So my hope would be like, hey, is that a part of this scope? Can we add that to this and see what they say? Because I actually, that is the item that will move this the farthest is actually having schematic designs done as a part of the amendment process, which I thought we were sort of leaning towards in the last special meeting. Mayor Mrakas, So that would be my request is like wait till August 4 but go back to them with. Mayor Mrakas, here's all the things we need, we need it to be 12 weeks we need you know we need you to be that the fast timeline we need you to be able to do these bridging document slash schematics. Mayor Mrakas, And sort of force on them the scope that we really want them to come back to us with and either they'll say yeah i'm in and my price hasn't moved or. Mayor Mrakas, No, we can't meet that timeline or whatever it might be, but I don't mind spending three weeks to get that diligence done so that the scope is really well set to what we want out of this process.

Mayor Mrakas, But can we ask them to do something that wasn't in the rfp.

It seems risky to change the scope now. I feel like when we're in the middle of it, working well with an architect, I think there could be changes to the plan at that point. But to go back and start over, it's...

We should stay within the scope of the RFP, but I think what I heard from Dustin is people call things different things depending on who they're talking to. And we heard that last time from Dan Winey as well. So I think that's one of the reasons why staff wants to City Council Chambers, Further engage with these consultants to understand exactly what we're going to get. City Council Chambers, They have the response, but we don't know until we kind of probe what that looks like what exactly it is in to find that in the scope so hopefully it meets our needs, so I don't think we should be many in the rfp scope, but understanding what exactly we're getting.

i would still push to settle on someone tonight because there was one person who can do it in 12 weeks who was the first choice of three of the people today including julie and me and i truly doubt that we can't find three of us who can be available someday between now and august 4 when we could sign a contract i mean even like next month you guys are gone like wednesday thursday friday that would be a whole week we could perhaps have a contract signed as quickly as the end of next week because it only takes three of us at a special meeting to do that and the timing really matters and we have an excellent top rated candidate and i just don't know why we wouldn't go ahead with that and direct our our town manager to do a um to negotiate a contract that was the top rated candidate can do it in 12 weeks. It's, you know, I mean, we're lucky that we have this. I just don't I think we're we're making a big mistake if we slow it down because there's no benefit to slowing it down. Even at the end of August or beginning of August, we are almost certain to end up with the same top ranked candidate. And why wait all these weeks to delay the project? I also don't think I quite understand if there are interviews. Somebody has to decide who's the top ranked candidate from those interviews. I mean, we're here right now. The five of us could choose someone. But if there are interviews, then we five have to get together again to talk about who that would be. And then we need a contract. So we're not going to be done on August 4th if August 4th is the first time we five are together. But we're together now. We could choose someone now. and it only takes three at a meeting to sign the contract. And then we are way closer to getting our bond building done and getting the paramedic building done. And again, it's sort of like we're dancing around our top candidate, and we've been doing that for months now, and it doesn't make any sense.

Well, I tend to support a fair process, and I agree that having an interview can make a difference in terms of how the staff feel working with, say, the heads of the teams and feel comfortable with them, because they're going to have to be working with these people for a long time. I think that the timing is not so terrible. City Council Chambers, August 4 is what three weeks away, as you said it's very if if we can't even I think we can't really sign a contract and I would until August 4 and I would really like to give the staff. City Council Chambers, And the two of you, the opportunity to actually interview, I would like to make sure that krista has leverage moving forward, so I think we should do the interviews between now and the fourth. and the top candidate, I'm not sure what happens, does the council have to agree on who the top candidate is? Okay, so the five people agree on the candidate, Krista then starts negotiating that contract.

Which five people?

I'm sorry, the committee, your committee, the one that you're on.

But this should be a council decision, not a committee decision, who we are hiring.

Just ask Krista, do you need the council to agree on the firm?

so of course the process the process typically is that the town manager brings forward i am the purchasing agent for the town and anything that's over fifty thousand dollars which this will be i bring forward to the council as a contract with contract attached so that you can review it and the council is asked to um authorize the town manager to execute the agreement. Of course, you can say no. Or you could say, no, we're not going to do it now until something else is done with it. That's how it's typically done. We had a great, I thought, we had a great subcommittee meeting today where we had very good discussion and the subcommittee was created by the council to provide input to staff on the selection. So I would very much like to have these interviews Next week, ASAP, and I would very much like the two members of the subcommittee to be included as part of that. And then when the interview is done, we'll probably have to do them by Zoom. When the interview is done, we all talk about it. And I would like to have, that would be ideal, to have consensus to come back to council.

What if we have the same as today, that Julie and I feel one way, and you and The other staff person feels the other. Who's choosing here?

So, first of all, it was not me. I did not score or make an evaluation today at all. So, I mean, I think you're getting ahead. I mean, if that ends up being a problem, we could attempt to call a special meeting if we needed more guidance. Of course, that's going to be difficult because we need to have three people physically in ROS. So, I mean, I don't think we should borrow trouble. I think we can have a good process next week and conduct some interviews and get this thing done.

I think we should do the interviews. You know, I heard what Bob said and I understand that and probably in my business I might say the same thing for the people I deal with because I deal with the same types of people over and over again. This is a little different, I think. It's a big public project with lots of different moving parts. And if I were doing the interviewing, I would have a lot of questions for them about, well, how are they going to do this? And do they have the people available? Do they have people in this area, that area, if it's not already covered in their written material? And what I typically do is I interview a lot of people, but I learn things. And then I ask the other people, well, how would you approach it? And I might not have even thought of that if somebody hadn't mentioned it in another interview. So I think it can be valuable. And I really don't think at the end of the day there's going to be a big time difference. I think we can get this done on August 4th. So that's my take.

I'm still uncomfortable with I think that this first contract, if we hire the top candidate, it's only 12 weeks, so we're not talking about a lot of time. But I'm still kind of uncomfortable with this process that the committee, instead of the five of us, are the ones who are directing the issuance of the agreement. It has to come back to the five of us, and we're here now.

If I understood correctly, it will come back to us on August 4th. There'll be a contract with one of those firms that was the highest scoring firm based on the interviews. So we have the ability to say yes, this is great, or no. So we do have that choice to make that decision about the contract. Is that correct?

Mayor Mrakas, yeah I would add Elizabeth is that we you guys we trust you I don't think that I don't think that we, the three of us are very comfortable with the two of you, but we're out but we're there more than two. Mayor Mrakas, we're not we'll bring it back and we all say no right if that's the case, you say you know that we really actually don't like the final contract and you're right, we will have lost time on that already we're on that.

I mean, we're ready to go right now.

We all are leaning in the same direction. Everybody really likes one firm. We all know who that firm is. But doing this little bit of more due diligence and quite frankly, honestly, maybe we can they are one of the highest bidders, right? Maybe we can lower their price. I don't know what's going to happen, but I don't know that this three weeks like we have to we're going to this is mission critical. The whole thing is going to blow up if we don't do it today. So it's three weeks. It's really in the amount of time we've spent on this. I feel like it's not that much to wait for.

I think if we did it tonight, it wouldn't be three weeks. I think we can get the contract by the end of next week. That's where I don't see this August 4 stretching way out. I don't feel that we need to wait that long.

But we wouldn't have three people here. Pardon me? We wouldn't have three people here at the end of next week. Well, aren't you here next week, Terry? Because two of us are going to, I think you're tired. I'm gone. We're gone.

Yeah, but the three of us are here next week, all week. I mean, so if it's a matter of signing a contract.

Well, how about we leave this? If you can do it faster, right, you do your interviews. If you can do it faster, we just call a special meeting, right, earlier than August 4th. I mean, I'm willing to do that.

The interviews and the contract.

Yeah, so I'm saying if staff and you guys all agree and you get it faster and the three of you are able to do a special meeting.

So what if we had a special meeting next Friday and then we do have the interviews? Then at least we're weeks ahead.

Okay, Krista, what do you think? Could I just say my... Julie, you haven't spoken.

I think it's absurd. You're just playing. Don't be planning on having that. And remember, the council procedures manual says that when you call a special meeting, that the intent is that all five council members are able to participate. That is the basis on what I polled the council. It's like you have a procedures manual. You give me direction. That's what I do. I don't get to pick and choose what it is. So that is the basis on what I did the polling. I think it's going to be challenging even when you have three people here, it's going to be challenging for two members, one of whom is going to be nine hours ahead. So you're eight and nine hours ahead. So to do what? It's August 4th. August 4th is going to be incredibly challenging as it is. So I don't want you to start setting aside Friday. Next week it's not going to happen.

I guess my view, I hear what you're saying in terms of wanting to kick the tires and have more leverage and do more due diligence and all that kind of stuff. But we started the meeting today, this afternoon, by saying all five of these firms are excellent firms. And I think I gravitated towards Gensler because it may be a little more expensive, but it's because they have the availability to meet our schedule and that's the most paramount thing in my mind we have to get going we have to complete this we we need to get this paramedic facility delivered by january of 2029 and i would hate for us to go do you know do more due diligence kind of be you know at an impasse come back on august 4th City Council Chambers, Not decide go back out again do more interviews do more negotiations, I mean to me. City Council Chambers, Gensler is the creme de la creme I think maybe crystal you could meet the team. City Council Chambers, If you like, I am assuming you're going to really like the team, and you can negotiate a contract with that team, and if you don't like the the you know, one of the two people, you can say. City Council Chambers, I don't really like this person, this person doesn't I don't have good chemistry with this person, could you put a different person on on this on this team for me to work with. City Council Chambers, And I feel like the gangster firm gets the project they get the Community they get the urgency. City Council Chambers, We I don't think we would go wrong hiring them. So, and they're the only ones that looked at this and recognize the schedule issue. Everyone else is 20 weeks, nine months, 24 weeks, 22 weeks. That's just, and you can negotiate, but their costs are gonna go up because they're gonna have to throw more people on earlier. So I don't know that we're gonna get that much more value By negotiating, so I mean we would get educated, but I trust I trust Gensler to be a good partner with us and ethical and working really well with us. So my view is, I would rather just proceed tonight with recommending Gensler and asking you to negotiate a contract with Gensler based on all the information that they've already provided.

us with um like all the other firms um and and keep moving forward but it sounds like i am in the minority why don't we have krista come back to us so i mean the two of them are it's hard because we are not in the subcommittee so they're both saying gensler is there maybe just tell us what your fear is of i know you said you want to have maximum leverage is it just the price or do you have your own reservations like Because the two council members that are closest to this are both sort of leaning that way. So we understand the process you want to do, but is there some issues you're having with Gensler?

So I'd like Dustin David to add on that in the particulars. But for me, it is that we have not been allowed to do the basic standard of professional staff work on this. We started looking at the proposals on Monday afternoon, right? Three day weekend. And we have not been able to, we haven't been able, I haven't been able to call people in other cities, hey, how did they do on that project? You know, I mean, Dustin can give us some, Dustin can give us some information. But that's my main concern. And when you ask a lot of questions about what happened in the subcommittee today, well, I'm kind of embarrassed that I haven't been able to. I can't provide. I report to the entire council. And good staff work would be, for me, to be able to have a staff report and a good presentation that would be sharing with you all, all the input that all the members, everybody that was at that. And I can't do that. It happened today. So that's my overall concern about this. And so I would like to be able to have conversation this week right now it's going to be summertime i sure hope we can get everybody on a zoom call i would like to include the two subcommittee members there i i think that um i understand the mayor where you're coming from but you also you're making a lot of assumptions about that you know that Shortening the timeframe is going to make us, because we can ask these questions in the interview process to the other firm saying, well, one of the firms said they can do it 12 weeks. How about you? Can you do it in 12 weeks for the same amount of money or less money? How about less money? Because Gensler, that's my main issue with Gensler. Gensler is twice as much money. as one of them. So those were my kind of, those are my bigger picture, and that I would like to ask David and Dustin for specifics, more specifics.

I think, Krista, you hit on what I see as a critical issue is, and I know it's because it ranks very highly with the, The Council members that are on the committee is the timeline, and we were not explicit in the Rfp. I didn't say you have to complete it in you know 13 weeks, and set out. You know that that's it's clear that the the firm that did that was was aware of you know the time constraints. Now is is was that because Board of Trustees Meeting 05. the same amount of time. And again, I think it's also just the importance of being able to have a conversation around the scope of work with the team before you before you make the final selection. It's it's just it's just In my career, it's been a best practice and it's what you what I feel comfortable with. And that's what we're used to as professionals. And so that's why we're advising strongly that we do have an interview. And that when you at least have two firms in that process, you you, you, you're trying to create a level playing field. But we also hear council members and what you're saying in terms of, you know, why you like the firm and that that may not change, but at least you could be part of that process in that interview. So you can hear the same things that we do when we have that when we asked the critical questions.

yeah i would i would just add that you know i work in this business i submit proposals all the time and most of those times i'm interviewed same way because people on paper are different than people in person uh i have a whole marketing team that puts together proposals and they spin it and make it look beautiful but you know knowing who you're working with on a person-by-person basis is so important no matter who the top City Council Chambers, You know, rated proposer is so just making sure that chemistry is there, and then, of course, you know digging into due diligence of scope and cost and timeline, these are all critical aspects of the process so. City Council Chambers, I don't think there's any issue per se with gensler is just doing the due diligence today robust way to make sure you're making the right decision.

Even if we do interviews and another firm says, yes, I can do it more quickly, I don't see, Gensler met the selection criteria, in my opinion, better than any of the other firms. including being able to do it quickly, which is part of the resolution. And we happen to have been working with Gensler since January, and they have an excellent reputation. So I don't really understand what we think we're going to learn in an interview. As I said, we have a firm that meets our selection criteria perfectly, can work quickly, has demonstrated they understand the project based on what they've done already. And, you know, I don't see, it just feels like we're wasting time and, you know, the time of the other companies because I think we've got a I don't see, having looked at the RFQs and the RFPs, I don't see that meeting someone and saying hello for 45 minutes is going to change my sense of the reputation of these firms. I don't think there's much to be gained because we know a lot already. And we're also hiring an entire firm with all of their resources. We're not just hiring the person who happens to come to the interview. So that's just a small piece of the whole firm. So it's not as revealing as the firm's reputation.

I think we should just go around and say if we want to City Council Chambers, hire Gensler tonight and ask the town manager to try to negotiate a contract with Gensler immediately or, if we want to go through the interview process with the top two or three firms and then bring it back as quickly as possible, but definitely by August 4 so i'll go last.

So I will go first. And I'm just going to say it's such a strange dynamic for the five of us. I mean, probably I'm sure all of you too, because we have to not, I feel like I'm sort of in lost territory here. I my head spinning i'm like what this is not our usual dynamic, so I, but I appreciate that because it really means everybody is sort of bringing in their their views and we're not trying to be in our normal alliances, which is sort of a nice change, I have to say, but it makes us a little uncomfortable. Um, I, I would say that it just, look, we, we know we've got a great, we have a great diamond with Gensler and we all like them. I don't think the three weeks is really gonna kill this project. I just, I, I don't think it's, if it was gonna be months and months, and if we end up picking them, is that three weeks, are we gonna look back years from now and be like, God, we really should have picked them three weeks earlier. It's just not that much time to wait. I appreciate that the staff just wants to ask their questions. and also evaluate the other firms. And I do think we all have to look at our own biases. We are a little biased. We've been working with Gensler and Dan Winey. We love his project. We love the design. He's brilliant on all these calls. He's a master and there's a reason why he's like running the firm. So we all have a little bias. We all like him, but to give the staff, I mean, Krista said she didn't even have time to really review this before this meeting, to give them a little breathing room and just give them a little more time to do the due diligence, it's not gonna make or break this project. It's just not. And it's what they're asking for. And I don't think it's unreasonable. So I'm with you. I mean, the last meeting, I was like, hire Gensler. You know, it's like we all get that piece of it. But to give our staff and give a little breathing room to ask questions. And quite frankly, if we can negotiate them to a lower price, I actually think that's worthwhile that we knock 100K off of it. Then that is worth the three weeks. OK, so, you know, and giving the other firms there was no deadline set. Right. There was no timeline saying you have to meet this. It's a little unfair to the other firms because Gensler had the inside track. They knew what a rush we're in. The other firms had no clue. So can they do it? And guess what? We'll have our answer real quickly if they say, we cannot meet that timeline, just they're gonna bow out. So I sort of still just, I'm where I was before. I totally wanna hire Gensler and I love Gensler and I love Dan Winey, but I don't think waiting three weeks is gonna really just handcuff this and it gives everybody a little breathing room and a little more comfort in that final decision.

But still try to talk you out of it. I don't know that we have to wait three weeks. Because if we if we were if we've moved forward with Gensler tonight, we could have a contract by the end of next week. And that that is better. The other thing at the other point is, if you find out that the other firms can do it, they can adjust their proposals and do it in 12 weeks. Are you going to hire them? But we're we're, we have a lot of reasons, especially The selection criteria that the committee went through, Gensler came out on top.

Like I said, Elizabeth, if we end up with a lower price, it would have been worth it.

Well, they already cut $100,000 off of it. They had an alternative proposal, and they cut it down to $387,000 from $400,000-something. So they've already actually been negotiating with us and have brought their proposal down as far as how much money it costs. Terry, I can't convince you.

I support the idea of interviews. I support August 4th. We make big decisions. We get a contract. We agree on it. We move on.

Interviews, August 4th.

Interviews, August 4th, subcommittee. If the subcommittee, you go through this and you still feel Gensler is the top choice, Then I think the expectation is that Krista would take direction from the subcommittee that the council appointed to do this. Of course, the council always has the final word on this, as it would on any contract. But that's the process I think that we should follow. I mean, it's always possible something could come up that is so important that nobody feels comfortable. going ahead without bringing back to the Council, but I think we all feel we really would like to have this done by August 4th.

But when will the subcommittee meet again?

We're going to be on Zoom calls next week.

Yeah.

That's what we're doing.

Just meet via Zoom.

We're all in agreement that if it can go faster, let's say you meet and have the interviews and staff is like, we love this, Gensler's our pick too, and it comes sooner than August 4th, let's do a special meeting. He's willing to do it from Paris and I'll do it from New York and we'll make it happen.

Okay, so I think you have the direction that you need, right? Yeah, sure.

And that's interviews by Zoom next week?

Yes, to the extent that they can be set up as quickly as possible. Yes, that's the plan. Yep. Okay. Yeah, 10 o'clock is coming up fast. Do we need to take a break or should we just keep going? Five minute break. Okay, so we'll resume at 9.30. We're starting. We are on agenda item number 16, which is town council to consider adopting Resolution number, hello. You guys are having too much fun.

Yeah.

We are on item number 16, Town Council to consider adopting resolution number 2637, calling for an election for the passage of the Ross Valley Paramedic Authority four-year special parcel tax for the tax cycle 2027 to 2031. and requesting consolidation with the November 3rd, 2026 statewide general election from the Marin County Board of Supervisors. Manager Johnson.

Thank you, Mayor. This item was continued from your June 11th council meeting per town council direction so that the ballot question language could be edited. The Ross Valley Paramedic Authority has provided paramedic services to the community for over 40 years. And I'm going to call them RVPA. RVPA is funded primarily through a special parcel tax revenues. Every four years, the voters within each member agency's jurisdiction vote to fund the parcel tax for another four-year period. Voters have consistently approved the RVPA parcel tax. The current tax expires on June 30, 2027. To maintain funding, each member agency must place the parcel tax on the ballot as a local ballot measure, which must be approved by two-thirds of the voters. Under the proposed tax, each taxable residential unit is taxed at a rate of up to $107.50 the first year. and every 100 square feet of developed non-residential property. And then that rate can be adjusted up to $4 per year. During the period of the tax, the governing body of each member agency annually confirms the tax by adoption of a resolution. rvpa recommends the annual increase in the tax within the limit every year based on the financial need of rvpa to maintain its service the tax is not automatically increased four dollars per year but rather may be up to that amount depending on the financial condition of rvpa So as if you recall your discussion on June 11th, you asked that the proposed ballot language, just the beginning of it is changed. So I won't read the whole thing. It's in your staff report. But to maintain local ambulance services staffed by paramedics available to respond to 911 emergencies Shall the Ross Valley paramedic authority measure be adopted continuing for four years the paramedic special tax of up to 107.50, and it goes on. Upon passage of the RVPA tax measure by two-thirds of the voters, the parcel tax becomes effective ten days after it is declared by the town council. the resolution um also that you are asked to adopt tonight also requests that the marin county board of supervisors consolidate the local election with the statewide general election on november 3rd 2026. so it is recommended that the town council adopt resolution 2637 calling for an election for renewal of the ross valley paramedic authority four-year special parcel tax for 2027 to 2031 and requesting that the marin county board of supervisors consolidate the election with the statewide general election in accordance with the election code thank you chief mahoney on the zoom if he if he wants to say anything or add anything

I don't know if he does.

I don't have anything to add. Thank you.

Thank you for being here. Questions?

Was was the did the text go to the fire department? Did everyone review it? Is everyone comfortable with the text?

Thank you for the question, Council Member Salter. I sent it to Chief Mahoney who shared it with the RVPA. They kind of pushed it back to defer to us at the council as the local level. We did send it to our attorney that we've been working with closely in Ben's office again, and we also sent it to the Marin County's election office to make sure that it meant there's no special way you count the the the words in the ballot question and they were um okay with it okay so no objections from anybody no objections yes thank you any other questions public comment on this item anybody here anybody online zach no one online mayor great so we'll bring it back for any discussion or a motion

City Council Chambers, One question Elizabeth I know you were really looking at the text was this are you good with the new tax.

City Council Chambers, This is what we agreed on last week last month it's fine.

City Council Chambers, Someone want to make a motion Okay, I move we adopt resolution number 2637. City Council Chambers, Second.

Mayor McMillan. Yes. Mayor Pro Tem Robbins. Yes. Council Member Kircher. Yes. Council Member Dowling. Yes. Council Member Salter. Yes. Motion passes 5-0.

Thank you. Thank you, Chief Mahoney. Good night. Item 17, Town Council to receive a status update from the Public Works Director regarding Winship Avenue Bridge Replacement Project.

Mayor Mrakas, Matt yeah i'm recusing myself from this item because of my residence is close to the bridge.

let's see. and and to bring up the presentation. All right, Mayor and Council, thank you for taking in this presentation tonight. Rich Domenich, Public Works Director on the Winship Avenue Bridge Replacement Project. Just a brief update. We're not going to get into too much depth tonight, but we are going to cover some key points. I like this picture here. This is the condition of Winship Bridge about 55 years ago. Looks pretty much the same as it does today. That guy there fishing is my older brother Jim. He used to catch steelhead in that creek. So discussion outline, we're going to do identifying the needs, basically the why that town council moved forward with this project. We're going to look at safety considerations, flood protection, and the need to improve structural deficiencies. Then we'll look at the CEQA and NEPA environmental process, looking at the 2020 initial study and mitigated negative deck. and the mitigation monitoring and reporting program. And then we'll take a look at the 2026 NEPA. Yes, 2026 NEPA was approved by Caltrans just Tuesday. They let me know that all the documents are in, all the sign offs are in. We're just waiting on the formal letter and that'll get a little bit more into that. when we get to that item then we're going to look quickly at the hydraulics considerations and the no-rise certification we'll take a quick look at the hydraulic models that were used to develop both the environmental process and the conditional no-rise certificate and a real quick lesson on hydraulics 101 and then a quick look at the fema process and then open it up for discussion So why does the town need this bridge to be replaced? Well, the safety considerations, Caltrans, of course, has identified the bridge as being in need of replacement. The structure is below minimum tolerable limits by the NBIS and DOT themselves. the geometry is quote intolerable requiring a high priority replacement because of inadequate lane width and adequate sidewalk width and especially an adequate freeboard during the 50 and 100 year storms that's the criteria of the federal highway association and potential for continued continued undermining scour and structural cracks and spalling and the potential for catastrophic failure you can see some of these These pictures were actually from I think my 2019 presentation. But you can see the bridges is in pretty bad shape. It's definitely not a John Buck Leonard reinforced concrete bridge like at Shady Norwood, Glenwood, and the Sir Francis Drake Bridge and the Lagunitas Bridge before it was replaced. This is an earth-filled arch bridge. We don't have any as-builts on it. We really don't know what the design criteria was for it or the construction materials that were used for it. Flooding considerations. Inadequate capacity identified in several reports by several sources. The 2011 Capital Improvement Study by the Marin County Flood Control District identified it as a critical in-channel measure needed to increase creek capacity. Ross Valley Flood Protection Watershed Programs, it's part of Zone 9 flood control, It mentions that the Winship Bridge restricts flow in the creek, causing impacts due to upstream backwater effects. But most importantly, again, it's the Federal Highway Association criteria that inadequate freeboard increases likelihood of debris collection and catastrophic failure. Now, with regards to the first two bullet points, this is not a county project. This is a town project. It always has been. just because the county identified it as a structure within the quarter Madera Creek and San Anselmo Creek floodway as causing a restriction that doesn't mean that we are on any obligation to meet any goals of the Marin County flood control district I don't confer with them they don't confer with me they liked an update on the schedule of our work that's basically the content of any of our conversations that we have, that I myself have with flood control. They have an interest in it because of the regional impacts of Korda Madera Creek and San Anselmo Creek. Other than that, flood control gave us, reimbursed us for the CEQA process because that was not part of the HBP program. But other than that, there's no, There's no continuing conversation and agenda and program goals that we're trying to meet in conjunction with any flood control agenda. The important thing that moved us forward and into an approval for the HBP grant funding was the inadequate freeboard, which is an FHWA requirement. because of the possibility of debris collection. Now this picture here, this is that flood event. It was a six or seven year flood event that happened at the end of 2016. This is the one I was talking about earlier that I started work here and two weeks later we had this flood. And this is a picture of the Winship Bridge upstream. Right as the flood horns, warning horns were going off in San Anselmo and Ross, the barrels are very nearly submerged. This is, and again, this is a six or seven year flood. It's not the hundred year flood. So imagine if debris started collecting and a large tree or a hot tub came down and smashed into the bridge. Now, or maybe 20 years from now, you're a good chance of having a catastrophic failure. That's something we want. That's why we need to continue with this bridge project is because if we said, oh, we don't need it and we stopped, design on it or halted it, and something like that happens. I mean, you wanna talk about liability, we have an ongoing project, we need to be proactive and continue on this project to mitigate that type of catastrophic event. And, as I mentioned it's structurally compromised earth filled structural not accommodate rehabilitation to address deficiency, so the question was asked well why are we replacing the bridge. Why don't we just widen the sidewalk and widen widen the roadway you can't really do it with this type of bridge or you can't really do it. I don't want to say it's infeasible, but it would be extremely costly. We don't know what the bridge is made of and how it could handle widening and doing some sort of cantilever on either side over the bridge. It wasn't the way we wanted to go. We got the funding for a full replacement. City Council Chambers, Like to meet the freeboard requirement, we can't remove the Center pure of a of a double arch bridge and hope that it that it maintains structural integrity just not it's not really feasible. City Council Chambers, You know, require a new project scope defining contract amendment repayment of the caltrans HPP funds expended to date, because we'd be abandoning the. City Council Chambers, replacement Program. City Council Chambers, Budgeting for rehabilitation is problematic without extensive investigation and testing, including destructive testing, we really need to we would really need to figure out what this bridge is made of to in order to just widen it and. City Council Chambers, Not recommended at all. City Council Chambers, Okay secret neither process. To meet the California Environmental Quality Act requirements of the project, the town performed an initial study followed by a mitigated negative declaration, certified in 2020 through the adoption of the ISMND and the mitigation monitoring and reporting program that is required with ISMND. The initial study's findings determined that project revisions and or mitigation measures outlined in the MRP can eliminate or reduce the effects on the environment to a less than significant level on these following points. There are several points you need to address in a a mitigated negative deck but we found that with the mitigation monitoring and reporting plan we can reduce air quality biological resources concerns cultural tribal resources hazardous materials and wildfire the hydrology and water quality incidentally the The Stetson model showed findings of no significant impact for the hydraulics impact portion, and we'll talk about that in a little bit. Noise, vibration, and transportation, all of these can be mitigated to a less than significant level. Therefore, we were able to continue with the ISMND and not have to go to a full EIR. The mitigation monitoring and reporting program that was adopted with mitigating negative deck compliance with this MMRP, most of it involves impacts during construction. And then there's some post-construction requirements as well. It's enforced by California Public Resource Code 21081.6. The MMRP compliance measures integrated into project bid documents and special conditions. So the contractor must take into account the needs for the during construction mitigation requirements. And the town will also hire specialty consultants and equipment to monitor and report compliance. And then once we got CEQA adopted and certified, we went into the NEPA process. The NEPA process was required because the federal funding through the Federal Highway Bridge Program. So that triggered the NEPA requirement. NEPA only evaluates issues with strict federal oversight that differ from CEQA, such as the Federal Endangered Species Act, and that's the National Marine Fisheries and Department of Fish and Game and those sort of federal offices. And then there's the National Historic Preservation Act, Section 106, which is the... extremely intense in this case, the tribal consultation, which I think that it took a little bit more than three years to get through just the section 106. And then hurray, the NEPA categorical exemption for NEPA was approved by Caltrans just this Tuesday, July 2026. Long time coming. And then with that, Mayor Mrakas, categorical exclusion, we are required to we have we have drafted a local assistance NEPA permits and environmental commitment record so that's a big laundry list of items that. Mayor Mrakas, The town and the town's consultants and the contractors will have to follow a sort of a checklist of during the pre construction, you need to do this, you need to notify caltrans when you're. when you're starting certain elements of mitigation for the Fish and Wildlife and the Section 106 stuff. So it's basically a set of conditions for the categorical exclusion that Caltrans is, we drafted, it got approved and We will be distributing that to our contractor when we got a bid here in a year, maybe, year and a half. This environmental commitment record is intended to clearly document the NEPA clearance commitments in a way that makes them actionable during construction. It requires the review and approval of our dewatering plan. That's the... Realign temporary realignment of the of the creek flow, while we work in the channel. The fish relocation plan the riparian revegetation plan and. that's being prepared by caltrans prior to the construction of the bridge. So that's kind of the environmental process that we've concluded now with the Windchip Ridge project. Concluded the process, but we're just beginning to do the mitigation requirements as we go into construction. Okay project components just want to give some highlights here, so this is the new bridge alignment is this these darker lines at the edge, these are the abutments the wing walls of the bridge there and there this dash line here is the public right away. And down here, public right-of-way, we have John Crane's house here. The gray is his deck. You can see it approaches into the right-of-way. Fairly certain that it's always been like that. It's nothing that Mr. Crane built himself. As far as I can remember, even back when we lived there, that deck was always right up against the bridge. We do intend with the new bridge to be moving it away from Mr. Crane's house by three or four feet, and then it's going to consequently move this direction about three or four feet. We're going to maintain the width of the sidewalk and street by eliminating those wide uh they're now planter boxes and they've got nice flowers in them and stuff like that but those those are going to be have to go away and we're going to have more of a standard bridge railing like we have out here in on the lagunitas bridge but you're welcome to hang flowers and things like that on the bridge things like that um so that's kind of an interview uh so uh mr crane is definitely uh the high most highly impact City Council Chambers, Impacted resident by the construction, as you can see. City Council Chambers, And then over here, we have. City Council Chambers, That you know the sure on your residence is up here and the corral residents 20 windshield is just off the map down here. City Council Chambers, So. City Council Chambers, And as we move into the right away phase which comes right after now now we're out of NEPA. We're going to need construction easements through to work around this area, Mr. Crane's house and in Mr. Corral's property and Mr. Crane's property. Probably these will be temporary access easements, so we can maintain these wing walls that extend out of the right of way. But that's really the extent of the right-of-way negotiations that are coming up. We have this wing wall, Karel owns this property, or Shirani owns the property all the way across here. So we'll need a easement, maintenance and access easement for this wing wall of Shirani, maintenance access easement for this wing wall off of Karel, and temporary construction easements for work on the bridge next to Mr. Crane's house. More than likely, this section of the deck will need to be removed temporarily or permanently. That's not up to me to decide. But the noise and vibration impacts like that, we definitely need to be sensitive to John Crane's lifestyle. I believe he works at home and that will be something that we need to make sure the contractor is familiar with as we go into construction. Okay, talk about the hydraulics and no rise. The hydraulic modeling, it's always Confusing to the layperson because they use so many different terms here regarding the modeling. So for our initial study on our mitigated negative deck, we used the Stetson, the 2017 1D, 2D model. 1d 2d model results for the proposed project showed no increase in water surface elevation in the floodplain and therefore no flood mitigation was required and no flood mitigation was identified and identified in the ismnd the fema corrected effective model the 2022 version is the basis for the Winship Bridge no-rise certification. For existing conditions, the FEMA effective model required insertion of more cross-sections at the bridge locations, thus becoming the corrected effective model. And then for the proposed conditions, so we can make the comparison of the no-rise, the FEMA corrected effective model required modifications to the proposed bridge geometry, becoming the post-project conditions model. So Hydraulics 101, all this is showing is a cross section of the new bridge. This is the black, the roadways up on top. And I'm using 5000 CFS as a general number. That's not the exact number that's crossing under the bridge, depending on what study or what storm you're looking at. So 5000 CFS coming downstream 5000 CFS going under the bridge and of course it's 5000 that continues down pretty basic that's open channel flow non pressurized flow. Then you get into the condition where the flow exceeds the capacity of the bridge coming under. The driving force, what's pressurizing this water to force the 5,000 going through is the elevation difference of this water. As this water builds up, it's a pressure that drives through. We call this head. The delta H is the change in elevation head. Whether this comes from a group of pumps or it's coming from elevation or something else, it's all the energy that pushes the water through this. Assuming this has reached its peak elevation, it's stopped rising, it usually occurs at the peak of the storm, or this is no longer rising. So you have 5,000 coming in, 5,000 going under, 5,000 coming out. What that means is you're not... You're not adding more water here or here. It's all in equilibrium, so that's kind of the fundamentals of getting no rise when you have a more constricted opening. You would say, well... You're increasing the opening you're going to increase all the flooding downstream well no you're not really it's just going to you're going to build up backwater and force the same amount of water through the bridge. So the no-rise certification, as far as the FEMA process is concerned, the Town of Ross followed the only process acceptable to FEMA for compliance with 44 CFR. Compliance with 44 CFR also satisfies Ross Municipal Code 15.36 Flood Damage Prevention Code for construction within the regulatory floodway. fema does not review or approve no rise certification documents the responsibility to obtain review and approve these documents lies strictly with the local floodplain administrator now a good example of this is i've done at least two no rise certifications in ross the one the most recent i remember was a adu on shady lane about three years ago they were the only place they could put their adu part of it was sticking into the regulatory floodway uh And I said, no, well, no, you can't do that unless you can prove no rise. Well, they hired Stetson, and Stetson did an evaluation and was able to show that the project did not cause a rise. Now, Stetson has no interest in whether this project moves ahead or not. they came up with the requirements to show under FEMA's no-rise requirements that there's no rise. So I'm not submitting that to FEMA or anything. They rely on me as the floodplain administrator to say, yeah, he's followed the rules. He's okay to do this encroachment into the floodplain. This project is no different. It's a city project. Yeah, the city's the owner. It's slightly different. But FEMA, the bottom line is FEMA has no review of no-rise certification. It's up to the town. The proposed bridge and channel design parameters used in the no-rise certification must be verified by the post-construction as-built. So this is important, too. So this no-rise certification we have now is conditional, right? We haven't built the bridge yet. Stetson originally, when they came up with a no rise, they said, Richard, with your Quincy's 2017 design, we're not getting no rise. This is what you have to do. A little modifying of the bottom of the channel. We actually had to lift it up a little bit and some minor adjustments to the bridge geometry. City Council Chambers and City Council Chambers. City Council Chambers. City Council Chambers. City Council Chambers. City Council Chambers. City Council Chambers. We need to correct that so that it does. So it's a conditional no-rise certification. That's important to know. But most no-rise certifications, well, all of them that I've done have been conditional. They're always done before the project. Hey, can we do this project? Yeah, if you build it this way and the no-rise certification says, that if you build it this way, there's no rise, then you've met FEMA's requirements. I hope that that makes sense. So that concludes my presentation for tonight, and I open it up to discussions and questions for staff.

Questions?

Thank you, Rich. And again, this is just an update. There's no action item.

As you went through the no rise and the certifications, there's still a lot of community members who are concerned about the replacement causing more water downstream. I don't quite know how we address that.

Are you asking me how we would address that?

Are you confident that replacing the bridge won't create more flow downstream?

Based on the review of the analysis, yes. It's sound hydraulics. There's nothing wrong with the idea that just because you're increasing the open area of the bridge that that's going to cause a rise. It just doesn't work that way. What would be a problem is if you've created a large opening because you had a catastrophic failure and you have backwater. If that happens instantly, yeah, all those houses, they're going to get flooded and worse. It's the gradual varied flow of open channel flow and then going into pressure flow that it's been proven in labs for hundreds of years, and that's how things function. If you get... uh like turbulence turbulence and eddies because a tree got stuck on the wing wall and yeah you'll get you'll get a rise there because you know something got something changed the hydraulic characteristics of the bridge so I'm I'm confident that the hydraulics are making sense thank you Because the flow that's coming down the creek is the same that's going under the bridge, is the same that's going historically before the bridge was built and after the bridge was built, there's no change in what's coming down the channel. Now, if you look at the building bridge two, Growth Team, Our project is worlds apart from that we've met fema's requirement we've met our own floodplain requirement, because we had an have no rise we're not that there was no historical overbank with the fema effective model. So we haven't, raising the bridge doesn't pull more water into the channel, which was the fait accompli of the building bridge too. Hey, we removed this obstruction, but all of a sudden all this water that used to go into San Anselmo downtown is now staying in the channel. Because there was always this backwater effect that happened. FEMA's documented it, Stetson's documented it. The no-rise certification shows no overbank situation. It's the same queue. Stetson's analysis during the ISMND showed no downstream impact. Thank you.

Any questions? Bill, do you have any questions? Okay. Any public comment?

I'm going to come first because I don't get to ask you questions so then I can do it during public comment. From the neighbors I've spoken to, the concern seems to be that, one, if you're digging the channel out, to make the no rise, whether that, you know, dirt moves. So it could come back and then it will, you know, change the flow. So I know you're not allowed to answer my questions, but I'm just giving you the digging out of the channel and maybe one of the council members can help. But that was one question. And then the other was John Crane in his email had actually the county or somebody put a chart showing building bridge two leaves and it shows you this rise and then it says the Winship Bridge leaves and then there's even this more rise. So these are, I mean, these are like, they're just normal residents and they're seeing these things and they're like, but it's showing these rises and they're digging out the channel. So I totally appreciate your analysis, but I think helping the public learn a little bit more about these very particular issues might put to rest some of the questions.

Might I respond? yeah go ahead rich yes thank you uh mr salter um yeah a couple things that i did read john crane's email so we're we're not actually digging out the channel we're uh part of the um process that uh stetson identified was the fact that the The 2017 Quincy drawings showed the channel being excavated under the bridge. And that was causing the water to change it quickly as it came out of the bridge because of this. Coop and that was causing a rise so Stetson actually recommended that we bring that back up to match more of the existing channel grade So if you look at that cross section that john crane. showed and it actually confused me the first time I had to call sets and say wait, what are you doing here let's say well. You need to keep the channel, the same elevation that it is historically you're not going to get that jump as it comes out of the bridge. So I encourage John to look at that more closely. What they're showing is that, hey, Quincy wanted it scooped out down here, If you want to remove that hydraulic turbulence, you need to bring the channel back up to more of what the current elevation is. I'm not 100% sure why Quincy did that. I think they were just showing grading, and that was going to be filled with anti-scour material or something like that. Bottom line is the channel bottom needs to match kind of where it is now. We're not altering that. City Council Chambers, or altering the quincy's design or saying don't scoop out keep keep it level running through so that's just a misconception of reading that cross section, the other thing. City Council Chambers, The other question was about those pictures of the rise now let's. City Council Chambers, I had to chuckle when I when I saw those those are those are pictures of the effects of removal of building bridge to this is those pictures were set up for the safer er process. If you remove building bridge to and you let all this water through look at this is the rise you're going to see it when she bridge. Downstream and we all know now hit by the past history, the past few years is yeah it rises by a couple inches due to the safer project it's got nothing to do with our project. except the fact that yeah maybe that if we do our project even more water is going to be coming through because of the safer project now that project is identified as a cumulative impact in our ismnd according to what chris said earlier that safer projects pretty much off the off the books at this point so we need to keep moving forward with our project and not worry about what's happening with building bridge two when that happens and we're done with our project that's not our that's not our problem i mean i would defer to the town attorney that's not our problem or maybe we need to re-look at our ismnd and take appropriate actions to make sure we have a solid document that the public is happy with and that staff's happy with right

City Council Chambers, When we move forward with the project for bidding we'll have to update our I ms D and make findings and whether you know, given the lapse of time, whether certain studies need to be conducted. City Council Chambers, To update the msd or not that again is a secret consultant driven process or ready to move forward with the actual construction.

One final thing on that. Interesting, one of the photos that was sent to me to try to prove that the bridge was causing flooding was showing that all the flood protection, increased flood protection, our problem was our bridge was causing upstream. And I was just like, well, that's not a very good piece of evidence showing that our bridge is causing flooding when it's showing 14 inches of additional flood protection. City Council Chambers, That's out of context, all those photographs that you've seen of these these mysterious pictures that that were up and i've I saw him I remember when the county put them up and then five months later they're gone I don't know why I didn't put them up there there's a county safer project photos it's it's totally irrelevant.

City Council Chambers, Anyone else public comment, yes.

Hi, everybody. My name is Jennifer Mota, and I live at 82 Sir Francis Drake Boulevard, which is two houses downstream of John Crane. So I'm hearing that this project has nothing to do with the SAFR, but correct me if I'm wrong, this project was part of the final EIR that was approved for the SAFR project in 2018, correct? Oh, you can't answer? Okay. So with the final EIR, with the SAFER project, Winship Bridge was included in that project. It's in the EIR. And in that project, there are many homes downstream of the building bridge in San Anselmo that we're going to see an increased rise in base flood elevations in the 100-year event. um and my home is one of them along with many downstream i'm sure you guys followed the safer project and what happened with that but after going through a whole process with fema and there's lots of evidence out there that removing that obstruction caused more water to stay in the channel and create increase in water level downstream So what I saw in an earlier notes or presentation was that taking out this obstruction is going to lower the water surface elevation upstream of the bridge by 14 inches. So where is that water going to go? Every action has an equal and opposite reaction. So if you're lowering the water 14 inches right upstream of the bridge, how can you say there's going to be no rise anywhere else? So, my concern really is that, you know, the final EIR for this project was approved in 2018. I haven't seen an EIR approved or even completed for anything that was for this no-rise analysis that was done in 2022. Since the final EIR in 2018, this project, not the SAFR, but the Winship Bridge project has changed. There's been changes in the design. There's now going to be a change in the creek bed. As a public member who lives right downstream of this bridge, I haven't seen any public notice as to why these changes have been made. It also seems to me that a different model was used to run This simulation in the EIR in 2018, the 1D, 2D model was used, but it looks like in this no rise review, the FEMA 1D model was only used, which shows way lesser impacts than the 1D, 2D model. My concern is not simply that the analysis of this no rise in 2022 versus the analysis of the removal of the bridge in 2018 have different results, but that the public record doesn't clearly explain how a project that was evaluated in 2018 under one design has become a project now certified as having a no rise in 2022 after design modifications were incorporated. Sorry, may I just have another minute? I think that I would like to be entitled, and I think the public and all of you should be really asking some deeper questions here. I think that it would be really important to be able to see a detailed description of the design changes made and why those changes were made. and what those impacts are. I would like to see a description of why they were necessary and how they affect modeled flood elevations downstream and upstream. I also think it's really important to see a comparison of the hydraulic results from the 2018 final EIR and the 2022 no-rise certification analysis. I also would like an explanation of whether the design changes made after the final EIR require additional environmental review. I haven't heard anything about an EIR being completed since 2018. And I know that there have been changes to this project in the design, which is very concerning to me, especially living so close to the bridge. So thank you. Appreciate the extra time.

Thank you. Can you respond to that, Rich?

I can respond to a few. A lot of what she asked was actually presented in my presentation. The Winship Bridge, yeah, it was part of the analysis from the SAFER EIR, so it was everything down to Kent Field, including Sylvan Lane. Everything was part of the hydraulic analysis shown on the plates of who's receiving additional flooding and who's getting flood reductions. They were in the EIR. They were in our mitigated negative deck. Again, the town of Ross did not prepare an EIR. We prepared a mitigated negative deck. The reason for if you have 14 inches upstream and you've reduced it to nothing downstream, I explained that in Hydraulics 101 earlier, that it's all driven by pressure flow. If you build up head upstream, you can push the water through. I don't think I need to go through that again. A lot of the other questions are, you know, that would need to be submitted to staff for evaluation. as far as the you know the changes in the slight changes in geometry and the channel I'm not sure if that uh is what uh triggers a re-evaluation of our ismnd but I think like what the town attorney says it's uh once we get into final design we we are not even in final design we're still on the with these minor changes that we haven't changed the EIR we've just told Stets uh told Quincy, who's now a consort, the design engineer, to make sure that this gets incorporated into the final design. We haven't changed anything yet, but we plan on doing it. And that sort of thing, the final design will be available to the public. And we want to have another, we will have another presentation on that when it goes to, when we go to bid or pre-bid.

So if I could just add, amplify what Rich is saying. The 2018 EIR, we're not relying on that. That's a flood control district EIR. How they analyzed what we were doing, that's not our document. Our document that we did for CEQA purposes with the 2020 initial study MND. So that's the conclusions in that MND is what guide the project. So whatever the 2018 EIR, that was not, we were not the lead agency for that. That was for the SAFER project. Thanks. I just want to make that clear because I think the speaker was confusing those two concepts. What was it called again that you're basing? The EIR from 2018 was led by the flood control district.

The C4 from 2020?

Correct.

What was the name of that exactly?

The initial study mitigated negative declaration from 2020, which was certified.

It's on the town website for download. It's been up there for several years.

I think I have one minute of it. I only took two.

No, I want Charlie Goodman to go, and then we got to, it's getting really late.

Just before I start, the 2020 CEQA that you referred to, Were there any public comments made to that?

Yeah. There were several. Oh, yeah.

Do I have comments in there?

I think you do. Yeah. I know John Crane has some. We got several.

Okay. I do not remember a 2020 CEQA. Yeah.

I got it. It was right before COVID started, and I got it certified at the county.

COVID started in 2018.

Well, 2019, and it broke out in March 2020. I was at the... Yeah, that's when I was at the county getting it certified.

Charlie, go ahead.

You've all received my letter already. So there's been a number of things tonight that are additional things. that have come up. First of all, I heard Chris Martin stand in front of you and, as your advisory board member, admit that the county has lied and given misinformation. That's coming. We've been saying that, Gerald, John Crane, Jenna, we've all been saying that for years. The information that you're relying on is not true. Stetson's information, you have a D1 and a D2, and it's all been intertwined so that the numbers come out that you can do these things, and they now, the county now knows that it's not so. They're looking at the, we're down at where the fish ladder is. Now all of a sudden at the last advisory board meeting, they say, oh, we can't do anything with that because 200 homes are gonna flood downstream. All of a sudden, we've been screaming about this for years. All of a sudden though, they admit, They can't do anything. They have to have an absolute negative change in that fish ladder, and that's why that's not going to go forward. So if you look at all of these projects that have been done in Marin County, every one of them has failed. The Sunnyside detention basin is supposed to hold 88 cubic whatever it is, the water, it holds 13. You get into San Anselmo, the whole situation with the bridge failed. You come down into Ross, all of these things are failing. You can't keep going like this. And one of the big things you're worried about is indemnification. Well, let me tell you, you take that bridge out, you are all on the hook. He's gone. but you're going to be on the hook if there's any failure or any wrongdoing there. The final thing I want to tell you is you talk about the Windship Bridge and how bad it is. You know, this is what they use in Cordo Madera Creek where the Army Corps of Engineers is. That's the steel that was used in the Lagunitas Road bridge. And the poor guy that did that job lost money because that bridge was built like a brick shithouse. Pardon that expression. You say that you don't know what's in the windship bridge. Well, I got to bet that this is the kind of product that they use in the windship bridge, not this. The final thing is, I know that safety for the children going across that bridge is an issue. Have we looked I went by there today and I look, you know, maybe there's a way of putting a three foot wide bridge or walkway alongside of that windship bridge that we could put in and we resolve the safety issue. Thank you.

Thank you, Charlie.

Yeah, I had something else planned too. It was going to be funny, but frankly, I don't think it's very funny at this point. It just seems that, unfortunately, well, let me just say, Charlie and I have both been doing this flood stuff for 50 years. I worked hard on the Lagunitas Bridge. I'm familiar with Caltrans. I have worked with the Corps. We're not newbies to this. We've been through this. And yet we're hearing a lot tonight that appears to be, it's taken us by surprise to hear that all of these procedures that we're asking for have been completed. Excuse me, when? How much public input? Because we have just finished with the Corte Madera Creek and SAFER. And what did we do? We had public input. and we spoke to the federal agencies who do the permitting and they said you're right these projects are infeasible the county was not saying that but this all happened because for a long time no one listened So when Richard is saying that he has done all this, I don't say he hasn't done it. I'm sure he's done everything he said he did. But I also heard coming out of his mouth things that the county has now put in their lessons learned from what happened to the pausing of those two very expensive projects. And unfortunately, he said them for a long time, and I think he still believes them. And I know this is not the moment to argue about them. It's silly. But I will tell you, they are not true. They are unfortunately no longer relevant. So what I would say, I will give you this one little piece. Since 2014, it's a long time ago, unforeseen factors have delayed replacing the Winship Bridge. recorded testimonies link winship to the san tomo flood projects past and future the council is hearing questions based on changed conditions and technology public hearings and a reassessment are essential because there are a number of items that you did not hear tonight the bank grading is important there is over bank flow if you're going to mess with the banks that needs to be quantified i don't see that resolved there is also the bedrock drilling which alarms the neighbors very much because and it's in quincy i mean it's not a secret it's been there since the beginning it needs to be resolved. There needs to be a careful look at what mitigation is going to be required before you step into this mess. Because unfortunately, the old information is being used to build current NEPA. And this is wrong. CLOMER is the way to go, but FEMA cannot give you accurate CLOMER without a proper updated MT2. I mean, that's how it's done. And that's how we got to the point of the permitting not being possible for those two projects. And it would be unfortunate to have to go through that again, but honestly, if we know you're wrong, What choice do we have? I'm not going to sit back and let it happen. Thank you.

Is there anything you want to respond to, Rich?

Just a reminder that we're not using the Stetson model for the no-rise. We're using the FEMA effective model. That's all we're required to use. There are parts of the Stetson model that I don't necessarily agree with. A lot of the channel geometry and things like that, yeah, they've got more detail. But I think we need to stick with the FEMA model per the Code of Federal Regulations and our own permitting uh our own floodplain ordinance code and and the requirements of FEMA that's it we have no we're not compelled to use the Stetson model except for we used it for our ismnd and it showed no effect um is there any there's no one else in the chamber is there anyone else online for comment no one online Mayor

So we're not acting on this, it was just a report. So a status update. Does anyone wanna say anything else? Thank you, Rich. I'm not sure what we're gonna do without you. But thank you so much. All right, moving on to item number 18. Town Council to consider authorizing staff to initiate the recruitment of one resident at large member to the Advisory Design Review ADR group. Roberta, oh, you say it's so late for this. Thank you.

Good evening, Council.

Sorry, just a pause. We had made a new rule about whether we worked late.

Yeah.

Me too. I'll make it quick. Good evening, Mayor and Council. So this item is coming before you because we have an at large ADR member whose term is up on August 13th and they are not seeking reappointment for their term. So the item before you is to consider authorizing staff to put out a recruitment through the Ross review and through email blast it would be out for 30 days and then we would get applications for residents in the community who are who could be an at-large member they don't have to have design or architecture experience or background There is in the resolution under the section of making an appointment that the town council shall conduct interviews and appoint the ADR group member, and that a majority vote of the council is required for the selection of an ADR group member. Currently, we do have four members, so we still have a quorum. And even if we had three who could attend, that would be sufficient. So if this isn't, you know, a priority at this time, and you didn't want to conduct interviews, you know, in August or September, you could postpone to a future date, or you could also modify the recruitment approach. And I'm here for any questions. Thank you, Roberta. Any questions?

Do all council members have to participate in that interview process?

It needs a majority vote. So as long as there's a majority at that at the interview, then you could proceed with that. It's an interview right here at the council, right? Yes.

It is an option for the council to consider, let's say, if we do a recruitment and if we do get quite a few applicants, could we ask the ADR to screen them or shortlist it, so to speak, and then bring them back to the council? Is that something the council could do so that you don't spend an entire meeting?

Yes, I believe so. They can modify the approach. I think that's a great idea.

Or I was wondering, can we do it to one of our subcommittees? We have subcommittees. Maybe the government, what's the government one?

You don't usually replace yourself. That's where it's a little odd, the ADR doing it.

No, no, I'm just saying the council has a subcommittees for these things. I would refer this to a subcommittee. So it's two council members to do the interviews because that's how we pick the treasurer. Julia and I met and we interviewed and then we recommended to the full council and then everyone approved.

So would it be general government? Is that the... Mayor Mrakas, Okay, so that would be my recommendation, so then you don't waste the full Council that's a good idea, but one Oh, can I. Mayor Mrakas, So I you know it's great we have for design people, and this is the at large seat, but if there was a design person who was interested, is there any reason we couldn't appoint that person. Mayor Mrakas, The makeup when I see it says at large, but.

It doesn't say you know oh yeah it does say other residents from the town may be appointed as necessary, but it did say the makeup would be for architects design professionals or building designers and one resident at large, so it seems like you do have the discretion to appoint another. City Council Chambers, Design professional if that was your preference.

City Council Chambers, I would say, sometimes it's hard to get design professionals to be on the ADR and if we have you know five and then one leaves. City Council Chambers, And then, maybe that's a not a non design person I had to turn down someone with the design experience wants to be on the ADR because they are really valuable. City Council Chambers, So I guess, then we would recruit you know it can be it's an at large position you don't need design.

um background but but design background is is acceptable is that disqualifying it's not disqualifying right yeah okay any public comment on this item anybody online zach no one online mayor okay so um i think you have our authorization roberta

Okay, so we'll post the recruitment and go from there. Did you want to proceed with having ADR conduct the initial interviews or a subcommittee?

The subcommittee of Elizabeth and Terry, the General Governance Committee, I think that's what you're called, or the Procedures Manual Committee. Committee, right. Okay. Okay. Okay. Thank you. Thank you so much. Item 19.

I think you have to take public comment. I did.

yeah um item 19 there's been a request to potentially continue that item until august does anyone object to that okay can i have a comment on that on the continuance yes i'd just like to make a comment to the council because i'm not going to be here next month okay so i i was um

A little surprised to see this on the agenda. Having spent 12 years on the council, it probably cost me a couple thousand dollars a year out of my pocket. I'm sure that at this point you're spending that. I did it because I felt it was a privilege to be able to serve the town of Ross. I had lived here for 50 years. It was really my way of giving back. I kind of felt like the founding fathers. They were in South Carolina or Virginia and they had to go all the way to Philadelphia on their own money and stay in their own hotels. But they did it because they wanted to build a country. And the other thing is that when you go out and you're doing a variance, you're doing this thing, you're doing this out of your time and your effort. And nobody can say to you, oh, well, you're getting paid for this job. You're making money on this. I know the other communities get paid a stipend. But I've just always felt, you know, whether it was the Marin County when we had our mayor and councilman's meeting, you know, the other towns would pay for that. But Ross always paid, individual council members paid to go to those meetings. I just feel that this is a different community than anywhere else in the whole country, and I just feel that it's wrong. The amount, by the time you pay your taxes, you're not making any money. Why would you wanna do that? I think it kind of cheapens what we do up here. Thank you.

Any council correspondence? Sorry, we're moving to item number 20, no action items. Any council correspondence? Future council items, we already discussed amending the ordinances to allow us to do those options of building, bidding, et cetera. Anything else?

Yeah, I wanted to agendize if someone would join me on this Tony Tutto's issue. this, the letter we got, I'm concerned, really concerned that that that it might drive the business out. So I don't know what the usually these things are dealt with with the town. But if this gets public, and there's I think the public's gonna be very upset. So I don't know how to handle that. Or but I do think there will need to be a public forum to talk about it.

um i uh this is um i earlier this evening today i sent the council just to give them a heads up about the code compliance letter that was sent because of the violations of the town's code process under our code enforcement and it will come to you eventually if it needs to so it it's not an administrative legislative item for a future agenda item it would be appropriate to follow that process

If it's challenged, correct.

Okay. Anything else? Council member participation at the communication table on the, what's the date, Krista, August 13th? Who would like to be at the post office table? Terry and I did it today. It was very enjoyable. We did not receive one complaint. Everyone found a place to park. Everyone was in a good mood. It went by really fast. Any takers? Elizabeth, you said yes?

Yes.

OK. Anybody else? August 13.

It's a Thursday.

I can try to do it with Elizabeth. OK.

Okay, great, thank you. 21 meeting evaluation. It's really late. Any comments?

I think it was late. Yeah, it was a good discussion.

Right, good, yeah, I agree. All right, we are adjourned, thank you.