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HomeMy WebLinkAbout09/05/2000, 4 - REQUEST BY SAN LUIS OBISPO COUNTY ARCHAEOLOGICAL SOCIETY FOR MATCHING FUNDS FOR RENOVATION OF THEIR TEACHING AND ARCHIVE FACILITY council cf-5-co j agenda REpoRt ,�Nut CITY OF SAN LUIS OBISPO FROM: Ken Hampian,Assistant City Administrative Officer Prepared By: Wendy George, Assistant to the City Administrative Officer W y SUBJECT: REQUEST BY SAN LUIS OBISPO COUNTY ARCHAEOLOGICAL SOCIETY FOR MATCHING FUNDS FOR RENOVATION OF THEIR TEACHING AND ARCHIVE FACILITY CAO RECOMMENDATION 1. Give conceptual approval to providing funds from the unappropriated General Fund balance for an advanced payment of $21,000 to the San Luis Obispo County Archaeological Society (SLOCAS) for storage of the Chinese artifacts from the Palm Street Parking Structure project. The payment can then be used by SLOCAS as matching funds for a grant to renovate the archive facility. 2. Direct staff to develop an agreement with SLOCAS for eventual storage of its Chinese archaeological collection, including an advanced partial payment of the required curation fee in the amount of $21,000, and to return to Council for final approval of the agreement. DISCUSSION SLOCAS's Need for Grant Funding Assistance On June 20, 2000, a.representative of SLOCAS spoke at a City Council meeting, requesting the City's assistance in helping the organization meet its matching funds requirement for a Transportation Enhancement Activity (TEA) grant. The purpose of the$172,000 federal grant is to renovate two buildings at Camp San Luis Obispo, which have been leased to SLOCAS, so they will meet federal standards for archaeological archival storage and will provide improved teaching facilities. When SLOCAS initially applied for the grant, it believed that an "in-kind" match would be acceptable to receive the federal funding. Unfortunately, when the grant was awarded, SLOCAS was informed that the local match must be in the form of cash, leaving the organization currently unable to collect the grant funding. Without the improvements to the facility, there is no place in the County which meets federal storage regulations and can appropriately store collections so that they can be used for teaching and research, as well as public display. City's Need for Archaeological Archival Storage In the past, SLOCAS has provided some storage services at no cost to the community. However, the Society's capacity has been limited and the building itself is marginally adequate. The proposed renovated facility will have a much greater capacity and will also provide a proper Council Agenda Report—Request by SLOCAS for Matching Funds Page 2 storage environment. Staff has visited the current facility, and while the Society's efforts to use the space given to it by Camp San Luis Obispo are commendable, the old army buildings themselves are in a deplorable state. SLOCAS will be providing a great benefit to the community by upgrading its facility, and will especially meet an upcoming need of the City. The City is presently overseeing an archaeological project, headed up by Dr. John Parker, to sort and catalog the materials excavated from the site of the current Palm Street parking structure. Dr. Parker estimates that his volunteers will have completed the project by next spring or early summer, and the City will then be faced with the need to find an archaeological archive location for the estimated 150-200 boxes of artifacts that will remain. Unless SLOCAS is able to perform the renovation of its current facility, the City will need to look outside the County for storage of its collection. Sending the materials to another county will not only be expensive, but it will deprive the local community of access to part of its own history. Therefore, the City truly has a vested interest in seeing that the renovation proposed by SLOCAS actually occurs. As indicated, in the past, SLOCAS has not charged for the storage it has offered. However, once the facility has been remodeled, SLOCAS will need to charge for services, like other locations do, in order to pay for maintenance and operations. SLOCAS has researched curation fees from other facilities and found that they range from one time charges of$600 - $1000 per box. Based on this information, SLOCAS plans to set a curation fee for its facility of $700 per box. The curation fee will be paid up front when the agreement for storage is signed. Using the proposed rate, if the City were to store its Chinese artifacts in the new SLOCAS facility, it would cost in the range of$105,000 to$140,000,based on the estimated number of boxes. SLOCAS Proposal to City SLOCAS has proposed to the City that we enter into an agreement with them which would be mutually beneficial to both parties. Under its proposal, the City would make an advanced payment to SLOCAS of $21,000 on its future storage costs. This payment would allow SLOCAS to meet its grant matching requirement. With the grant funding in hand, SLOCAS will be able to remodel its existing facility so that there will be space for the City's collection when cataloging and sorting are complete next year. In return, SLOCAS will reduce the storage rate for the City's boxes to $400 per box, rather than the regular rate of$700 per box. The savings to the City would range from $45,000 to $60,000, depending on the number of boxes. Once the storage of a collection is agreed to and final payment is made, the storage is considered to be perpetual. In developing an agreement with SLOCAS, the City will need to include language which addresses what the responsibility of SLOCAS will be should it lose its lease with Camp San Luis Obispo. SLOCAS estimates that once the remodeling is complete, currently archived materials will take up about 30% of the available space. The artifacts now being cataloged can easily be accommodated in the new remaining space. SLOCAS recognizes that the improved archival space will also be needed by upcoming projects, such as that proposed by the Copelands. However, the proposed agreement with SLOCAS would only address the City's need for Council Agenda Report—Request by SLOCAS for Matching Funds Page 4 archiving the Chinese artifacts currently being cataloged, as it would be almost impossible to anticipate the volume of material that may come from the Copeland or other future projects. The lease with the state for the two buildings does include land area surrounding them that could be developed for additional storage at some point in the future. At this stage, staff will simply assure that the agreement will acknowledge the City's possible interest in added storage space in the remodeled or any future facility,with terms to be determined when the need is known. FISCAL EWFACT Funding for this proposal is not available within existing resources, As such, we recommend appropriating $21,000 from the unreserved General Fund balance. Based on the 1999-01 Financial Plan Supplement and Council-approved changes since then, this will result in an ending fund balance that is 21.3%of operating expenditures, compared with our policy minimum of 20%. This impact on fund balance, however, could change if other uses of the reserve occur prior to the time the final agreement is returned to the Council. ATTACHMENTS 1. Letter from SLOCAS dated August 6,2000 2. Sample of Other Curation Fees 3. Design of Proposed Facility at Camp San Luis Obispo Available in Council reading file: Letters of support SLOCAS Curation Guidelines Other Sample Guidelines Detail of fee survey ATTACHMENT 1 SAN LUIS OBISPO COUNTY ARCHAEOLOGICAL SOCIETY P.O. Boa 109 San Luis Obispo,CA 93406 August 6,2000 San Luis Obispo City Council 990 Palm Street San Luis Obispo, CA 93407 Dear Council Members; On June 20,2000, I appeared before the City Council and asked council members to grant the San Luis Obispo Archaeological Society (SLOCAS) $21,000. While SLOCAS has obtained a $172,000 TEA grant to upgrade the Society's Learning Center and Archive Facility located at Camp San Luis on the Cuesta College Campus, we are in dire need of matching funds to complete the construction project. Once complete,the facility will be in compliance with federal regulations and guidelines(36 CFR 79.9)and can be used to house archaeological collections generated from any local projects as well as those projects receiving federal funding. The benefits of maintaining such collections include the loan of artifacts for public displays,and use of materials and documents for teaching and research purposes. Although the society has long provided services at no cost to the community and various government agencies, we must have outside assistance to establish this facility. We now ask that the City consider their need to appropriately house and archive the historic materials excavated from the "Palm Street Parking Structure". While the Society will need to charge a standard fee in the neighborhood of$700 per cubic foot archive box to maintain and curate collections in perpetuity (a fee in keeping with similar facilities),we ask that the city work with us to make this facility a reality. The$21,000 in city funds will be accepted by SLOCAS as partial prepayment for the curation of the Palm Street collection. The size of this particular collection has been anticipated by Dr. Parker to be 100 to 150 boxes and will be assessed at a much lower rate of$400 a box. Please understand,that while the Society has outlined a business plan for successful operation of the Learning Center and Archive Facility, box fees alone will not cover our operating costs. We rely heavily upon and are grateful for the volunteer efforts of our membership. We have provided the City Staff with detailed information concerning standard archiving requirements and procedures, our interim collection guidelines, as well as, comparative fees being charged by facilities throughout the state. A representative of the City Staff visited our facility to evaluate its space,the current setup,and our planned improvement. I ask the City Council to support our efforts to keep local archaeological materials in the area and available to members of the San Luis Obispo community by voting to grant the Society this prepayment Thank you, O uther Ber=do, Chairman ATTACHMENT 2 V. Sample of Caration Fees Fee per Facility Single Archive Boa University of California,Riverside $1000.00 California State University, Bakersfield $ 800.00 San Diego Archaeological Center $600.00 Sonoma State University $ 750.00 University of California, Santa.Barbara $ - ** SLOCAS $700.00 Note: Facilities apply additional charges for collections that do not meet collection preparation guidelines and many levy supplemental fees to maintain fragile of sensitive items,to store oversized objects,or to access collections for NAGPRA compliance. *UCSB does not use a base fee per box, but assesses collections for overall space used and staff time required to process the collection; UCSB also regimes submitters to computer encode artifacts per a Catalog Code Guide. ATTACHMENT 3 " I _ N 0 � MEAN 517. I J N 4 _ c i i.0 r V . 77-4 Ana _ E LL > t I E Q o � y _r = co 16 4 I J I m j o ' O ea co O -•.7 I.. 3- VS r'� 1 CL N � r b. O E s, CL :xl�,AM Raj, r Y t y i Q.0 rat i Q.: .F