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HomeMy WebLinkAbout05-21-2013 c5 rfp building plan & building servicescounctL Àqenòa pepopt Date Ìem Numbetr -Lf FROM: Prepared By: CITY OF SAN LUIS OBISPO Derek Johnson, Community Development Director Doug Davidson, Deputy Director Joseph Lease, Chief Building Official SUBJECT: REQUEST FOR PROPOSALS BUILDING PLAN CHECK SERVICES, SPECIFICATION NO. 91200; PLANNING SERVICES, SPECIFICATION NO. 91201 RECOMMENDATION 1. Approve the Request for Proposals (RFP) to provide plan check and planning"on-call" services to supplement planning and building resources to maintain processing times, as follows. a. Building Plan Check Services (Specification No. 91200) b. Planning Services (Specification No. 91201 ) 2. Authorize the City Manager to execute agreements with the selected consulting firms. 3. Authorize the Finance Director to execute and amend Purchase Orders for individual consultant service contracts in an amount not-to-exceed the authorized project budgets. DISCUSSION One of the overarching strategies of the Economic Development Strategic Plan (EDSP) is to break down barriers to job creation by improving the development review process. On the heels of the EDSP, the Community Development Department's Organizational Assessment focuses on increasing the efficiency, effectiveness, and credibility of the Development Review Team. Part of that effort is establishing and committing to cycle time standards for permit and project reviews. A specific recommendation of the Organizational Assessment (#11.7) is to use consultants when staff cannot perform within the guaranteed time frames. Consultants can add additional resources during peak permit times when activity outstrips available City resources to timely process permits. Moreover, consultants can help ensure that high profile projects bringing multiple City objectives are processed in timely manner. City staff has recently used consultants successfully to plan check the SESLOC building permit plans. In that particular instance, building plan check time was reduced from eight to two weeks. It is anticipated that the building permit plans for MindBody will also be sent to a consultant for plan check. This is because plan review requires structural expertise that the City does not have available (i.e. a multi-level parking structure, etc.) and for the reason that permit activity is already exceeding available resources. Potential projects for planning services in the immediate future include the redevelopment of University Square, the McBride development at the corner of Broad Street and Tank Farm, and other potential subdivisions within the OASP, MASP, and AASP. c5-1 The pool of potential consultants would be too small if only one RFP was solicited for both building and planning services. Building plan checking services are technical in nature and govemed by the California Building Codes, which are applicable to all jurisdictions throughout the State. Planning services are more general and broad in nature and require knowledge of general plans, zoning, environmental review, development standards, and the entitlement process. The technical skills are distinct and separate from one another. Community Development staff is unaware of any firms that offer both of these services under the same roof. Two RFPs are proposed to recognize this and get a better response from consultants under each discipline. City Engineering, Fire and Utilities will be following suit and returning to Council with similar RFPs for plan check services in the future. The RFP solicits proposals from interested consultants stating their qualifications, experience, and proposal for timely processing of City building permits and planning projects. After evaluating proposals, the top consultant(s) will be selected based on their ability to provide the requested services. Once the selected consultants have entered into an agreement with the City, these consultants will provide services for individual projects as needed. Consultant services are avallable for use by any City department. The consultants will operate under the conditions of the agreement included in the RFP. For Planning Projects, individual work scopes and fees will be negotiated on a project by project basis. Once a project scope and fee are agreed to, the specific work will then be authorized via a Purchase Order through the Finance Department. The consultant's fees for Building Plan Review will be based on a percentage of the City Building Plan Review Fee. FISCAL IMPACT Issuing an RFP does not obligate any funds for consultant work. 'When the on-call agreements are executed by the City Manager, and projects are identified requiring consultant services, purchase orders will be issued and billed to the individual project accounts. ALTERNATIVES 1. Individual Project R,FPs. The Council could direct staff to proceed in a more traditional fashion, issuing RFP's for each individual Planning project. The use of consultant services has an excellent track record and has increased efficiency and productivity related to getting projects reviewed in a timely manner. However, RFPs for individual projects would not be an effective approach for assigning work quickly on projects to maintain the City's published cycle times for review of permits/applications. 2. In-house Approøch. The Council could direct staff to complete more of the work in-house. Consultants would be used thoughtfully and strategically on the larger project achieving multiple City objectives when existing staff resources are exceeded. Consultants would not be used to contract out the normal project reviews or day-to-day operations. c5-2 ì COUNCIL READING FILE Request for Proposals - Building Plan Check Services (Specification No 91200) Request for Proposals - Planning Services (Specification No. 9120I) 1 2 .-, c5-3 Page intentionally left blank. c5-4 R.ËCËTVFU MAY 21 2013 RKcounctl memoRânò TO May 20,2013 FROM: AGENDA c Date City Council Derek Johnson, Community Development Director VIA: SUBJECT: Agenda Item C5 - Requests for Proposals (RFP) for Building and Planning Services This Council Correspondence file addresses a request for clarification regarding the proposed Request for Proposals for Building and Planning Services. Question 1: Will CDD still require large projects (i.e. Chevron) to cover a portion of a staff person's salary to facilitate an EIR and other planning services? rüill this consulting-fTrm RFP process replace that requirement? If it does not replace that requirement, how will it be determined whÍch of the two strategies will be applied? In the case of Chevron, this is a unique project in which entitlements are being processed concurrent with the consideration of a Development Agreement. The complexity of the project demanded a significant amount of dedicated planner time (i.e. nearly 0.5 FTE) and Chevron was agreeable to fund the costs to dedicate the resource to manage the project and all of the planning components that are interrelated with the Development Agreement. For this particular project, the time and effort to coordinate this complex project in combination with the Development Agreement created planning work exceeding what the City would normally recover in standard fees to review the application, coordinate the preparation of the EIR, and provide complex project management services. This is not a standard requirement, but one that Chevron and the City felt could facilitate the timely review and coordination of this multifaceted project. Consultants will only be used when workload exceeds available City staff resources and only when funds are available as recommended in item C7. Question 2: This process successfully reduced the time element for SESLOC' please note the funding of this previous work and fees charged, and consultant fees? Revenues received from planning and building applications are deposited into revenue accounts. Currently, fees which are paid and deposited into revenue accounts are not budgeted or readily available in expense accounts to retain outside consulting services. On the expenditure side, the approved budget for the 2012-2013 Fiscal Year includes $9,000 to retain outside plan check services. The City recently managed the building plan review for SESLOC using V/illdan whom specializes in building plan check services and frequently supplements cities and counties throughout the state when plan check workloads exceed municipal Katie Lichtig, City Mana ,", M,,/tr C-5 Council Correspondence-Planning and Building RFP Page 2 resources. Willdan charged the City 55% ($10,207.43) of the standard plan check fee of $18,558.96t. The remaining 45% ($8,351.53) was retained for inspections and supervision of the consultant's work. No other additional fees were charged to receive this service. The $9,000 of funding allocated by the City Council was augmented by other Community Development Funds that were not going to be spent in the current hscal year to ensure that the review of the extensive building plans would be timely processed. The purpose of item C-7 is to provide a funding source to hire outside resources when permit activity exceeds available staff resources with revenues that are in excess of budgeted revenues. These two RFP's will provide two on-call consultants to process building and planning applications during peak permit activity with applicant generated revenue. How will the costs of bringing consultants up to speed on appreciating and understanding our General Plan be factored in? Will follow-up, supervision of same be provided in early assignments? The review of planning applications as compared to building applications is a more customized area of plan check services. In comparison, the building code is generally uniform throughout the state, with exception of limited amendments to account for unique local topographic, geological, or climatological conditions. The City of San Luis Obispo has adopted such amendments and building plan review consultants are required to encompass any amended building codes into their plan review. In contrast, the review for planning applications is based on the adopted General Plan and Zoning Ordinance which is unique to the City of San Luis Obispo and reflects the community's values and adopted development standards. There are local land use flrrms (i.e. PMC, Rincon, and Sage Consulting) whom are familiar with the City's policies and standards as a result of preparing environmental documents for projects. These hrms are required to become familiar with the City's policies and development standards. Rincon Consulting currently acts as the contract planner for the City of Guadalupe and provides both the review of development applications and long range planning services. The Community Development Department will likely limit consultant review of planning applications to larger projects. This is because there is generally a clear beginning and end of the review process and their effort would focus on the unique issues associated with a project rather than smaller projects which demand a broader understanding the City's land use policies. The Deputy Director for Development Review Division would be responsible for supervising and ensuring that the review of projects meets adopted City land use policies and standards. Consultants reviewing building plans would be supervised by the Chief Building Ofhcial. ' The SESLOC plan set included over 200 sheets of structural details and plans C-5 Council Gorrespondence-Planning and Building RFP Page 3 The fact that purchase orders will be issued and billed to the project accounts seems to indicate the business/developer picks up the consultant costs. Is that in addition to other standard SLO City planning fees? No additional fees would be required should the City determine that a consultant is needed to review a building or planning application and achieve established permit processing times. Applicants will pay the same fee as if City staff was reviewing or processing an application. Consultants would be paid out of the account proposed under item C-7 and consultants would only be used when funds are available, It is expected that consultant proposals will be paid a percentage (e.g. 55% of City fee) of the building and/or planning fee as was the case with the review of the SESLOC application, the remaining portion of the fee will be retained for inspection and supervision. Please contact Derek Johnson at 805-781-7187 should there be any questions. t:\æuncil agenda reports\2o13\2013-05-21\authorize issuance ofrfp on-call building-planning plan check 0ohnson-lease)\council conespondence docx