March 9, 2010 · Derek · archive: txp/article

Tacoma City Council Meeting for March 9th, 2010

Tonight’s Tacoma City Council meeting actually had some debate. Two big items on the agenda included the Cheney Stadium remodel and a resolution that continues to move the Elks project forward. There was, for the first time, a fair amount of talk this evening. Here are our notes:

C O N S E N T A G E N D A

RESOLUTIONS
Resolution No. 37992 setting Thursday, April 1, 2010, at 1:30 p.m., as the date for a hearing by the Hearing Examiner for Local Improvement District No. 3967, for the relocation and construction of sanitary sewer mains to serve the Point Ruston, LLC development within the City of Tacoma and the Town of Ruston.

PROCLAMATIONS, RECOGNITIONS, PRESENTATIONS, AND ANNOUNCEMENTS

Mayor Strickland proclaimed March 11, 2010 as Arthur R. Anderson Day in the City of Tacoma. Mr. Anderson was born 100 years ago on this date. He founded Concrete Technology Corporation in 1951 and became a leader in the pre-stress concrete industry. He also worked on Cheney Stadium … but we’ll talk about the stadium further down the post.

PUBLIC COMMENT

By request …

Tony Anderson came forward to speak in favor of Purchase Resolution No. 37993 (Cheney Stadium).
Former Mayor Bill Baarsma came forward to give us a bit of his history and experience with the Lansing Lugnuts at Oldsmobile Park and speak in favor of Purchase Resolution No. 37993 (Cheney Stadium).
County Councilman Tim Farrell came forward (as an independent citizen) to urge the Council’s support of Resolution No. 37995 to move the Elks project forward.
Tim Waer from the Tacoma Pierce County Sports Commission came forward to support Purchase Resolution No. 37993 (Cheney Stadium).
Rick Moses from Elks on Broadway LLC came forward to support Resolution No. 37995 so that he can kick this project off and create a new anchor for downtown Tacoma.
Brad Mingle came forward as a minor league baseball fan to support Purchase Resolution No. 37993 (Cheney Stadium).
Former County Executive John Ladenburg came forward to support Purchase Resolution No. 37993 (Cheney Stadium) and to provide some advice to the new councilmembers.
Former City Councilmember Mike Lonergan came forward to represent himself and his radio show listeners to say, “Let’s Play Ball” and support Purchase Resolution No. 37993 (Cheney Stadium). He did have a few caveats and asked that the public become more involved as it moves forward .
Grace Pleasants from Elks on Broadway LLC and other projects around town came forward to urge council to support Purchase Resolution No. 37995.

R E G U L A R A G E N D A

RESOLUTIONS
The council split the two items in the purchase resolution so that they would be considered separately.
Purchase Resolution No. 37993 (Item 1) awards contracts to:

Wiss, Janney, Elstner Associates, Inc., in the amount of $217,426 to conduct a study and provide consulting services for the live load rating of the Hylebos Bridge ; and

Purchase Resolution No. 37993 (Item 2) awards contracts to:

Mortenson Construction, Inc., in the amount of $23,000,000, plus a contingency of $1,408,750, for a contract total of $26,547,750, including sales tax, budgeted from the 2009 LTGO Bond Cheney Stadium Phase III, for the Cheney Stadium Upgrade Phase III Design Build Project.

Councilmember Fey offered an amendment that added the following conditions to the awarding of the contract:

Proposed design will be made available for public input within the next two weeks to include web access and a public meeting.
Mortensen shall provide a cost estimate for an extension of the roofline to what exists today.
Council shall be provided with regular status updates relating to the development of final design and construction.

Of course, the councilmembers had some opinions …

Councilmember Mello agreed with the amendment and stated that this would provide a public feedback loop while allowing the design/build process to continue.
Councilmember Manthou did not support the amendment. He stated that it’s bad business for the Council to change the rules mid-process. Plus, he hasn’t gotten a lot of public input in the last week and doesn’t believe two more weeks will change anything.
Councilmember Boe agreed with Councilmember Manthou and thought it was unfair to change the process.
Councilmember Woodards supported the amendment.
Councilmember Campbell spoke in favor of a nice sunny day in Tacoma … and against the amendment. He also stated that the only thing worse than no public input is insincere public input.
Councilmember Fey stated that the process matters. His amendment is a way to fix some parts of the process so he could support this resolution. So, he supports his amendment.
Councilmember Lonergan stated that the things in the amendment should be provided any way. We shouldn’t have to ask for it. He voted no.
Mayor Strickland stated that she would support the amendment, but wants it clear that she absolutely supports the resolution as a whole.

Councilmember Walker was not on the dais this evening. The Council split on the amendment 4 to 4 … It Failed.

At this point we had comment on the resolution AS IS:

Councilmember Woodards was “saddened” by the lack of a public process, but would support the resolution. She stated that if citizens are expected to pay for the stadium, it should have had some input. That said, she voted for it.
Councilmember Boe wanted to talk about the process. He held up the original design documents and said that he was somewhat surprised by the optimism of the proposal. He was perplexed by how any design/build team would create what was in the proposal given the timeline and budget. He spoke at length on the process and said that he cannot vote on it because the City didn’t follow its own rules appropriately.
Councilmember Mello was disappointed by the lack of an “average” citizen on the selection committee.
Councilmember Lonergan gave a shout out to those that can’t handle the sun … and voted in favor of the resolution.
Councilmember Fey said that he is conflicted because process does matter and so does the City’s word. He reluctantly voted for the resolution.
Councilmember Campbell stated the process on this project sucks. However, to get it done it needs to move forward and he supports it.
Mayor Strickland said that all this talk tonight has set the expectations for the team as the project moves forward. She’s disappointed that the amendment didn’t pass, but she supports the resolution.

The resolution passed 7 to 1.

Resolution No. 37994 authorizes an amendment to the Neighborhood Stabilization Plan with the Washington State Department of Commerce to include authorizing funds to be used for the acquisition of property with blighted structures, the demolition of blighted structures, and the construction of new, affordable housing.

Resolution No. 37995 authorizes the execution of a Design-Build Preconstruction Services Agreement with GLY Construction, Inc., in the amount of $328,000, budgeted from the Community and Economic Development Special Revenue Fund, for a public garage to be built in conjunction with the Elks on Broadway, LLC mixed-use development project located at 545-565 Broadway. The City took several steps to try and minimize its risk as the project slowly moves forward step by step.

The McMenamin’s project plans to be open for St. Patrick’s Day 2012.

At ninety minutes, this was one of the longer meetings of the year. Not quite the epic history lessons of past Councils, but it was definitely interesting to hear a bit of debate.

Filed under: City-Council, Downtown-Elks

21 comments

Kevin March 10, 2010

If it was even close to how you have stated it… this is “debate”?
The amendment to the Cheney Stadium resolution Should Have Passed.
I would have pushed to delay the vote for one week so that all 9 members could be present (this is too important of a project to not have all 9 voting) and so the amendment could be studied further… before a vote.
Tim Smith March 10, 2010

Watching the council struggle to understand the design/build imbroglio and with an attempt to interheckle a public comment period near the end, I was flummoxed when not two resolutions later, they approved another design build/ process for the Elks Parking Garage without raising the public input banner. Other than the black and white balloon drawings provided, have we seen any rendition of what the garage might to look like?
Tim Smith March 10, 2010

Watching the council struggle to understand the design/build imbroglio and with an attempt to interheckle a public comment period near the end, I was flummoxed when not two resolutions later, they approved another designbuild/ process for the Elks Parking Garage without raising the public input banner. Other than the black and white balloon drawings provided, have we seen any rendition of what the garage might look like?
Tim Smith March 10, 2010

I’m also concerned that after disclosing his participation as part of a design/build team Councilmember Boe chose not to recuse himself from the matter. Poor ethics choice.
tacoma1 March 10, 2010

But Tim
In Tacoma we build parking garages. That is who we are. That is what we do best.

And I would have preferred to see a postponement of the Stadium vote until the next meeting as well.
RR Anderson March 10, 2010

Boe worked on a IMAGINE TACOMA design for a Cheney Stadium on the Foss tank farm, is this an ethical conflict of interest there too? best mocking of wining design i’ve heard so far: “Cabellas on steroids”
Squid March 10, 2010

Cabellas on steroids? This place will be SMALLER than Cabellas. It’s Cabellas on saltpeter.
Tacoma Joe March 10, 2010

“Squid” made a good point in the News Tribune comments: “This is paid for by USER TAXES. If you don’t go to games you don’t pay.” Most residents (and clearly not even the city council, especially Woodard, Mello and Campbell) seems to have an understanding of this.
RR Anderson March 10, 2010

I’m sorry, does it cost $30 Million to build a real Cabelas? I dunno.
Fantum March 11, 2010

@ Erik B. Yes we see Councilmember Boe worked for free.
Was there a determination by the City Attorney that no conflict existed?

I agree that he has great potential on the council in matters such as this, but he also has a responsibility to be up front about his ties to very important decisions before the council – especially when they are news to one of the major <ahem> players, the Rainier Team owner, Aaron Artman.

Boe could still have had his say and pointed out his concerns and then just abstained or recused himself.
Tacoma Joe March 11, 2010

What Boe did wasn’t a tragedy, but it was wrong. He should admit he made a mistake and apologize.
Tacoma Joe March 11, 2010

What Boe did wasn’t a tragedy, but it was wrong. He should admit he made a mistake and apologize.

Yes I did read this, too: “Legally, though, Boe wasn’t required to recuse himself under the city’s ethics code because he didn’t have a financial interest in the ballpark project, Pauli said.” – TNT

So what? There are a lot of things that aren’t illegal but are wrong. Just because it’s not illegal doesn’t make it the right thing to do. Just like secretly pre-selecting the two council appointees was also determined to not be illegal, this is not how I want my representatives to behave just because they can. Have some pride. Hold yourself to the highest standard. Do the right thing, not what you can get away with.
Fantum March 11, 2010

@Erik B

The determination, today, after the fact, is good for Boe.

Sadly, by voting, he helped defeat an admendment designed to tip that hat to public involvement. Also, other more senior members of the council “can and typically do recuse themselves from voting for ethical, personal and political reasons even when the slightest appearance of a conflict of interest arises, according to Pauli and council members. For instance, Manthou, an employee of Bates Technical College, said he abstains from voting on city contracts involving Bates, even though his work has nothing to do with them…” quoting the TNT blog-o-port.
justice March 11, 2010

There is the legal definition of conflict of interest in the city code, which it does not sound like he violated.

Then there is appearance of fairness, which is much more broadly defined and applied. That is, if a reasonable person would think there may in fact be an unfair situation, then there in fact may be.

It does not sound like there is anything to file suit over, nor does it sound like there would be any reason to expect relief or redress even if there was a court determination of a violation.

Here is where I think there is a mess up: the potential conflict should have been disclosed at the beginning of the discussion. It does not mean he would need to recuse, but rather give the other councilmembers opportunity to share their concerns about appearance issues.
Squid March 11, 2010

RR: according to my research on the interwebs, a Cabelas store costs $40-75 million. But that includes all the stuffed deer. Sounds like our project is in the ballpark.
Tacoma Joe March 11, 2010

You can’t tell me that Boe “had nothing to gain” from being able to say he collaborated on his friend’s winning design. Whether money was involved or not (and we’re only going by what was told to a reporter about that) he was invested in this project via friendship and involvement.

Whether he disclosed that and recused himself or not, he would benefit for the design he worked on to have been selected. Period. I’m glad he apologized. However, there also seems to be some mystery about why the winning bid (which was over budget and lacking design requirements) was selected…
TacomaTank March 11, 2010

It is incredibly depressing to see how easily people have gotten distracted from a couple of really important questions that remain unanswered…and will probably never be addressed:

1. How did a design that omitted two key design features defined in the RFP (roof and concourse) win over projects that had incorporated them, including one of them at a lower cost?

2. Why did the City’s RFP include so many inconsistencies and false direction?

3. Why did the selection committee disregard the concerns raised by all teams about the discrepancies between program and budget – for over two months – and then change the selection process at the end after hundreds of thousands of dollars had been spent by the Contractors?

it was probably a good thing that the proposed amendment to the purchase agreement was deadlocked the other night, they were asking the winning team to provide a cost estimate to add a roof to their design, a feature that the other designs have, and included in their bids. That would have muddied the waters even more.
RR Anderson March 11, 2010

@squid. Ah, interesting. I read on TNT comments that people think the winning design isn’t northwesty enough. perhaps the design could benefit from a few stuffed deer. Maybe a totem pole for good measure.

If somebody could submit my stuffed deer idea to the design team that would be great.

Thanks.
crenshaw sepulveda March 11, 2010

Looks to me there will be another vacancy to fill on the city council pretty soon. I wonder if Stanley the Cat is still interested. Sorry to see that Boe didn’t work out despite the intensive vetting process that the council went through in order to come up with his selection.
Tacoma1 March 11, 2010

Hopefully, it’s just a learning curve situation. Perception is reality.
Squid March 13, 2010

I have some taxidermy I could contribute – free of charge.