STUART \u2013 A June 23 update by Martin County staff and consultants on the planned funding and construction of a $74 million operations center west of I-95 revealed majority Commission support for the facility needed to replace current operations at Withan Field and that changing course now would do substantial harm to the county\u2019s AA credit rating.<\/p>\n
Officials have known for years they needed to combine the operations of several departments currently scattered around the county but that became more apparent last year when the Federal Aviation Administration began to threaten legal action for not removing those non-aviation related entities from airport property. Ultimately staff and consultants chose the novel P3 approach, a public\/private financial partnership allowed by state statute to bypass the normal municipal bidding process. Assistant County Administrator Matt Graham began the lengthy discussion that day.<\/p>\n
\u201cToday\u2019s presentation is an overview of the unsolicited proposal process, the independent evaluations performed, the Board actions, the financing decisions made and the current status,\u201d he said. \u201cFlorida statute authorizes local governments to receive and evaluate unsolicited proposals for qualifying public infrastructure projects. The purpose of this statute is to provide public agencies with an additional project delivery tool that can encourage innovation, leverage private sector expertise and potentially accelerate the delivery of needed infrastructure.\u201d<\/p>\n
Graham detailed the comprehensive evaluation of two such proposals the county received, first from Building Tomorrow\u2019s Infrastructure last Oct. 31 and subsequently from Florida Development Solutions. Staff ultimately recommended the former\u2019s 114,000-square-foot structure for $649 per square foot over the latter\u2019s slightly smaller structure because BTI\u2019s quote was $5 cheaper a square foot and two months quicker for completion.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe statute requires substantial public oversight,\u201d he explained. \u201cThe process includes public meetings, public comment opportunities, consulting evaluations, a public interest determination, Board actions, a negotiation of a comprehensive agreement, publication in the Florida Administrative Register and final Board approval before the project can proceed.\u201d<\/p>\n
Graham also highlighted the project\u2019s support by the non-partisan Florida Tax Watch organization before inviting CPZ Architects President Joe Berry to the podium. The latter recalled working on the operations facility project a few years ago before it got bogged down.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe were brought back in to do a peer review of a P3 proposal,\u201d Berry said. \u201cWe found that the proposal supported the objectives of the original project. The site plan generally aligned with the goals of the project, and we felt the programming was in line with how we left the project prior to the P3 proposal being offered.\u201d<\/p>\n
District 5 Commissioner Ed Ciampi immediately asked for clarification on the square-foot costs.<\/p>\n
\u201cCan you share in your professional experience how you feel these numbers are?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe found the dollar amount to be in line with what we expected,\u201d Berry replied. We just completed construction of a 13,500-square-foot fire station in Palm Bay. The calculated cost finished at $585 a square foot. We went out to bid on a fire station in Lakeland, and that price came in at $593 a square foot. We\u2019re in design in Bro ward County for a a little bit larger facility than what we\u2019re talking about today. That number per square foot is $563. Again, the P-3 proposal was very much inline.\u201d<\/p>\n
Berry emphasized that the finished structure would be much more than a shell.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is everything \u2013 the building, systems, interior build-out, all the finishes, walls [and] doors,\u201d he explained. \u201cIt is all the utilities brought into the site, the paving, wheel stops, fencing, fuel station, furniture, fixtures and equipment.\u201d<\/p>\n
Commissioner Blake Capps then referred to a presentation chart compiled by General Services Director Sean Donahue comparing other recent projects, all in the $500 to $800 per-square-foot range.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve had reckless charges out there on social media that buildings like this should be built for $200 a square foot,\u201d he said. \u201cI think that\u2019s outlandish. You have a professional staff overseeing this that deals in this world all the time. The evidence is here that this is a good and fair project.\u201d<\/p>\n
District 1 Commissioner Eileen Vargas, however, expressed the opposite viewpoint.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m really disappointed in my fellow commissioners,\u201d she said. \u201cThis is not the time to be spending this kind of money. I will go out and find rental property that will have bays and office space, and it\u2019ll be a lot lot less expensive. We need to hit the pause button hard on this.\u201d<\/p>\n
Since routing decades-old Commissioner Doug Smith nearly two years ago with her slow-growth platform and belt-tightening rhetoric, Vargas has earned a reputation for putting everyone \u2013 staff, developers and her colleagues \u2013 on the defensive. Earlier during the same meeting, Commissioner Ed Ciampi admitted he\u2019d begun to lose respect for her. Now she returned that volley with both barrels.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is a reckless spending of money,\u201d she continued. \u201cYou can build $200 a square foot. You talk about desks, electrical components, bay doors \u2013 some of the schools and fire houses have been built extravagantly \u2013 we don\u2019t need that. It\u2019s a smoke-and-mirrors-type thing, and I\u2019ve called that out. It\u2019s an unpopular opinion because some folks on the Commission have been here way too long. We are in an era when people demand accountability, and I\u2019m the lone voice up here.\u201d<\/p>\n
When Commissioner Vargas rambled on and referred to potential ad valorem property tax cuts coming down the pike this fall, Chairwoman Sarah Heard \u2013 at times her only ally on the Board \u2013 reined her in.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re not going to be using ad valorem to pay for this,\u201d the latter said. \u201cThis agenda item was at your request to gather facts about this project. Let\u2019s allow our staff to present the facts that you asked for.\u201d<\/p>\n
After Donahue tag-teamed a staff presentation with Budget & Management Office Director Stephanie Murley, the latter invited the county\u2019s contracted financial consultant Jay Glover of PFM to provide his professional insight.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe analyzed all the financing options, including doing financing through your P-3 partnership,\u201d he said. \u201cWe ultimately recommended the county isolate the financing mechanism in the public\/private partnership and do the stand-alone financing, [which] would allow for more cost-effective borrowing. Of all the available sources the county could pledge for the issuance of the bonds, we determined your half-cent sales tax revenues were a stable source. We received 10 competitive bids to purchase the bonds, and they were awarded.\u201d<\/p>\n
Commissioner Ciampi then posed a pivotal question.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019ve heard the suggestions that we should stop what we\u2019ve done thus far,\u201d he said. \u201cIn your experience \u2013 if it were to happen \u2013 what would happen?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe reality is, the debt is secured by half-cent sales tax revenues,\u201d he replied. \u201cRegardless if the project moves forward, you are responsible for repaying the debt. If you decided not to do that, you\u2019d be defaulting, which is catastrophic from a financial perspective. That would essentially limit your ability to access capital markets for a very long time, including for water and sewer projects the county has pending.\u201d<\/p>\n
After further back and forth Commission debate, Chairwoman Heard made her sentiments known.<\/p>\n
\u201cI am a true fiscal conservative,\u201d she said. \u201cI have voted against far more projects than anyone else on this dais has throughout the last 20 years for what I thought were compelling reasons. This isn\u2019t one of them: This is one I fully support. The people who brought this project to us are clear-eyed professionals who have thoroughly evaluated every opportunity and every option. We decided that the P-3 project, this proposal we got from Building Tomorrow\u2019s Infrastructure, was in our best interests.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"STUART \u2013 A June 23 update by Martin County staff and consultants on the planned funding and construction…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":337092,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[326,171,173,172],"class_list":["post-337091","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-port-st-lucie","tag-martin","tag-port-st-lucie","tag-port-st-lucie-headlines","tag-port-st-lucie-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/337091","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=337091"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/337091\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/337092"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=337091"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=337091"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=337091"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}