Brief, less than an hour meeting. Here is my recap on sole source contracting issues and Ann St. property.
Consent Agenda
They adopt everything on the agenda except
16 is referred, and they discuss 9, 14, 22 and 24.
Item 9 – Private Security for Public Health
Mike Verveer asks why they are waiving a RFP for security services? Why is this time sensitive? David from Public Health says that the City Attorney’s office suggested that they just piggy back off another contract where they are already getting security services through the county. There was a competitive process. Verveer clarifies that there was a competitive process through the county but that City Purchasing and City Attorney, not Corporation Council for the County, thought this was ok. Verveer says that there needs to be a strong rationale when there is a sole source and not a competitive process and he knows that there are security services that the city uses, and they have considered having one contract across all agencies for security services. Public Health says that the county security services were more similar to what they were looking for so that is why they went that way. Verveer asks if they looked at all the security contracts because PerMar is used by the Monona Terace, JBM is used by the parking utility, RTM is from Milwaukee for Freakfest. Public Health says that the issue of timing is that they get 3 hours notice if there needs to be a quarantine and so they need to do this quickly. Verveer says that they never needed this service before. Public Health says that we never had Ebola before.
Item 16 – Moving Street Occupancy to Traffic Engineering
Referred to the next Board of Estimates meeting.
Item 14 – Contract for Alcohol Service at Olbrich
Verveer explains that he got an email from someone concerned that here was not a competitive bidding process for catering at Olbrich Gardens which is lucrative because of all the weddings that are there. Eric Knepp the Parks Superintendent says there was a competitive process 3 years ago. Blue Plate renegotiated a percentage change. The city gets about 14% or $30,000 at Olbrich and Warner on the alcohol component. It is possible that someone would give a higher percentage, but the concern was the delay in the process to get a new liquor license holder and the staff time that goes with that, so they extended for 2 more years, especially for those who existing relationship. Their contract is up in April. He says that it is $6500 if they raise it 4% and 14% is already pretty high. Verveer asks when they last went out for a competitive bid? Knepp says it was 2011 and there were 4 responses. Verveer says that he thinks they have had this contract since before 2009. Verveer asks what the existing agreement is and the tweaks to the new agreement. Knepp says that Blue Plate is willing to work with OBS, Rhapsody in Blue, Cocktails in the Conservancy, etc, they give back 30%. Verveer asks where that money goes, to Olbrich or to the general fund. Knepp says that the city gets 15% and OBS gets the rest. Knepp says that the other events are going from 13% to 14% under the new agreement which is about $2500 per year.
Larry Palm says that the time constraint is in April and how will we not have this same problem in 2 years, should we just do it for 18 months or 28 months so we don’t mess with the wedding season. Knepp says that this does tat because it ends December 31 in 2016. He says this is 20 months. This tells anyone coming in for 2017 that there might be a change. Palm is concerned taht this is a 24 month agreement, and there are 3 2 year extensions that could happen. Knepp says that language could be struck.
Palm moves to strike the language about renewals and end December 2016. Seconded.
Mayor discloses that he has a relative that works for Food Fight, which Monty’s Blue Plate is a part of.
Joe Clausius clarifies the motion.
Verveer asks if the motion will affect negotiations. Knepp says he doesn’t think it will. Verveer asks about why they don’t do he same thing at the golf courses, he hears complaints there are no longer spirits at the golf courses. Knepp says that there is an issue will the license being for a premise and issues with private events vs. leagues. He says there is not enough profit in liquor, the leagues they lost were because 2 or 3 people out of 30 couldn’t have bloody mary’s. We are losing opportunity. We sell the malted beverages under state law, we can’t have people selling liquor on a day to day basis, but they can do it for events. The outing business they could handle, but not leagues. Knepp says that they are meeting to try to have a proposal for the council to consider.
Denise DeMarb also clarifies the amendment, she is concerned about when they will start scheduling events for 2017. Knepp says they start in late March, but that is enough time to notify the person that there will be a liquor vendor, but we don’t know who it will be for certain. DeMarb asks when they would go our for an RFP. Knepp says in January 2016, but he will work with purchasing, he says there would be a 2 month window to respond. There would be a month to review, they have to be credible and give the highest percentage, a contract could be signed in July, to begin in January and that would be enough time to get the licenses they need.
The amendment and the motion pass unanimously on a voice vote.
Item 22 – Land Banking Ann St. property
John Strasser says this is straight forward and just gives staff authority to work on this. He says he has met with members of the private sector to partner with them on this land banking. Staff from finance and the city attorney’s office have worked on this to look into how they might do this.
Clausius asks what property this is? Strasser says it is the Expo Inn and there is a lot of interest in the property but it is all for extremely minimal investment and a lot of the proposals don’t meet zoning. There is a lot of interest in the property because it is a cheap property that has a viable property, it is inhabitable. We shut it down for the safety of the building. This was developed in the Town of Madison. It’s 2.5 acres, its been vacant so long, so there are few viable options for the property itself, it needs to be combined with other properties to be something desirable. Clausius asks if this would be a placeholder? Strasser says if they are successful in this public-private venture, they could snap up a lot of the properties, demolish everything, prep the lots and have it ready for development and just sit on it for however long it takes. They had some serious interest in significant investment by a prominent developer several years ago, but the recession in 2008 killed it, but they can’t fight off these inappropriate uses forever and if we don’t get control of that property somebody will and we will be stuck with whatever they put in there for decades to come and that is a lynch pin property for the whole frontage. Right now they are looking at putting a Head Start program in one of the parcels and then that property will be locked in for decades to come, and they are all very poorly built, planned, laid out buildings. The parcels need to be assembled and we need to avoid someone getting in there on the cheap and tying up the buildings for the future. Clausius says he is skeptical of buildings like this, he clarifies that there is no money commitment. Stasser says that they would try to come up with a financing option.
Marsha Rummel says that this caught her intention because she has done landbaning in her district and she is wondering if he intends to use the current program? Would he follow the guidelines and criteria. Strasser says that city landbanking uses city funds and that fund is almost empty, and this is a $5 – 6M venture to assemble and demolish these properties. Real estate developers in this city know that to plan development, everyone needs to get control of the areas of the city and set it aside for development. If we can have the private sector finance it in partnership with the city, the banks could purchase, a real estate group would be formed, the city would be a partner but it would stay off our books but we would help decide when it gets sold for a profit. Rummel says it sounds like the answer is no, but there are city funds. Strasser says there are no city funds. Rummel says that is not what the resolution says, what is the role of the city if private developers want to do this. Strasser says they need the city staff to be a partner in it. Rummel asks if there would be a RFP. Strasser says that is what they are trying to do but they need this to have staff work on it.
Mayor Paul Soglin says this isn’t a commitment to buy, this is to look at the options for the property, this would be a report, we could drop it, do additional exploration, or have other instructions which might include money at that time.
DeMarb asks staff to speak to the plan for this area of the city, how would this fit with that plan. What do you see this resolution asking for and going forward with. Natalie Erdman says that there are plans from 2005 that look at this area. There are also bus rapid transit plans that identified connections that could be done. Her understanding is that staff would look at the plans, the financing and report back on the options. They feel they could do that relatively quickly. She hasn’t been involved in discussions with investors. DeMarb asks if the plan will be siloed or be comprehensive, how long would this take? Erdman says this has been in play for a long time, the state building near here is in play now too. They can look at all the plans and would it give a recommendation. They can give the facts says Erdman.
Rummel asks if this would be more than 910 Ann St. Erdman says that they won’t do a new study, they will just look at all the plans. Rummel says it wouldn’t be about just one parcel then.
Palm says that if he looks at the title, he doesn’t get that from this, “no way, no how”. He says this identifies a specific parcel, its says landbank and it talks about suitable and funding sources, city to purchase the property and that is completely different. How do you justify what you just said with what is written on the page, which is what we adopt.
Verveer asks if he can “rudely” jump in, he says it is not just the title, but its the now therefore be it resolved clause that does not jive with what we are hearing at all. Erdman says this was not drafted by city staff. They say Don Marx drafted it at the direction of Alder Strasser. Strasser says he has no attachment to what is drafted except that they explore options. His interpretation is that identifying funding sources could mean anything. If we’re partnered, we can look at authoring initiating purchasing the property but not purchase it. He is trying to find all the ways to come at this besides the city has no money so its dead, you can read into what you want, but there will not be authorization of funding. They were asked to have staff produce a report and until there is a report you are asking for something to be done before it is done. Verveer asks if zoning is the issue. Strasser says that every serious proposal that has come forward in the last 2 years has been shot down by zoning because of the way the property is laid out by the Town and its proximity to the beltline. Its because the proposed uses have been shot down in zoning, he says all the parcels along Ann St. are hard to develop on their own and the last thing we want is to open up the Expo Inn again. We need to demolish and rebuild something and nothing seems to fit that has been proposed. Verveer says that it has been a drain on resources in the police department, I don’t think anyone wants it reopened as we know it. Are you saying potential developers have been discouraged by zoning or planners? Strasser says there has been 3 real proposals for use of the parcel, one was Single Room Occupancy small apartments, a serious proposal by the developer of Hotel Red, he had walked the property and had everything mapped out. He had a proposal on the table and an option to buy. The second one was simliar. The other was an extended stay hotel, but you can’t stay more than 90 days in the city of Madison, so they cannot do their business anywhere in the City of Madison, not just on that property. These were all meetings with multiple city staff and the result is always that they can’t do that with the property. Verveer says that they would strike language about starting negotiations, does he agree. Strasser says he has been out sick, but whatever they need to move forward to have a discussion about policy he is ok with, but he wants to come forward with some new ways of doing this.
Mayor says they need substitute language to direct the staff to come back with a report on recommendation for public-private or joint utilization of the property and surrounding environs, he recommends that. Mayor says that Alder Strasser and him discussed this some time ago, he recommended a resolution because they get so many demands on staff from alders for work like this which is more than just an hour or two of time and he thinks it is important to have a discussion of the entire council to use staff resources like this. He says the language is not quite what they discussed, but with an amendment they can get to clarity about possibilities of the site. He points out another site that could have had something creative done, that is now dozens of storage lockers. At Ann St. we know the state building will be for sale and they can relocate the street. So, this is one of the great, great locations in the city, minutes from campus and downtown, minutes from interstate which means you are in Chicago and Milwaukee stop light free and it would be a shame to not look at this particular parcel on the Southside that is a great untapped area of the city. He would like to see a resolution and move this forward.
DeMarb says that they all agree that this urgent and important, but as written its hard to support. What they have heard is they want a report on this property and surrounding area and potential partnerships with the city, she would like to support that, but she can’t support what is written here. If you could put your heads together and write it up as an amendment, she would find it easier to support this.
Palm agrees, he can’t support this language, he doesn’t think they can change this, every paragraph talks about purchase, its embedded in the language. He talks about the Royster Clark Special Area Plan and he thinks that is what he wants to do, he thinks that is great. He says that process worked well. He wants to support it, but the language doesn’t do that. He says you could do that between now and the council, but tonight he can’t do that.
Mayor says to refer to council without recommendation and that they work on a substitute resolution.
Rummel asks them to mention the plans and remove landbanking, that has specific guidelines.
Palm moves to refer to council without recommendation. Seconded. Verveer says he wants it clear that a substitute be drafted.
Passes unanimosly, as does the main motion.
Close Session
They move to go into closed session to discuss stagehands litigation.
