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HomeMy Public PortalAbout160_020_INFRASTRUCTURE COMMITTEE MEETING AGENDA7-14-11 INFRASTRUCTURE COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES CITY OF TYBEE ISLAND JULY 14, 2011 5:00 P.M. ATTENDEES: Paul Wolff, Diane Schleicher, Bill Lovett, Bob Whelchel, George Reese, Bill Garbett, Barry Brown, Joe Wilson, Mary Hogan and Kathryn Williams. Approve the minutes of the previous meeting – Paul Wolff called the meeting to order and asked for a motion to approve the minutes from the previous meeting. Bill Garbett moved to approve the minutes. Paul Wolff seconded. New Business: I. Solomon Avenue – Between McKenzie and Byers A. Reason Street Section is Closed – Joe Wilson states he closed it due to Public Safety. B. Needs Better Base and Gravel C. Cost to Improve II. Georgia Power Butler Avenue Cross-walk Lighting Agreement for Pedestrian Safety 11 Cobra Amber Flat Lenses Light Fixtures with Turtle Shields (150 Watt) -$1,518 upfront cost and energy cost of $147 monthly – Account #100-4210-54-1410 A. Diane Schleicher states she is hoping that you all will recommend to the Council at the next meeting to go ahead and move forward with this because it takes 8 weeks. B. Paul Wolff asks for a motion to recommend going forward with the 150 watt lights. Kathryn Williams so moved. Bill Garbett seconded. 1. Diane passed out an updated list of the tree removal and trimming. Mike from GA Power is here to talk about the project and where we are at with the project. 2. Mike (GA Power) states we are at the point where we would like to get started on this August 1st. If you would like to take a ride down Jones Ave. you’ll see the trees to be removed have 2 white paint dots and the trees that need to be trimmed have orange ribbon. We are going to set poles first. We also will start work at the sub-station in mid August. We are looking at installing 12ft. fiberglass white fencing. The “breaker house” will match the fencing also. 3. Mike presents a “set of plans” of the Jones Ave upgrades. There’s about a 1 ½ mile of line that we’re going to build down Jones to Tybrisa. The purpose of this is to make a more liable circuit down towards the south end of the island. Once we get this line in place, we’ll have a loop feed that will go down on the south end and you’ll be able to feed it from 2 different sub-station breakers. The poles will be 55 ft. poles. The purpose of the 55 ft. pole is to get above the palm trees. The palm trees along this route are about 31-32 ft. high. The poles should be right above the palms; we shouldn’t have to trim the palms. 4. Paul Wolff asks if Joe Wilson was working with them on the mitigation plan of the tree removal and what is coming back in. GA power states that it is really up for grabs, discussion. 5. Joe Wilson states that GA Power is just taking out 10 pine trees. They’re all in the right-a-way and half the residents want them out. They’re not significant trees; not by the City of Tybee. They will be cut down on August 1st. 6. Kathryn Williams states that they are addressing the tree ordinance tonight. States they still need to mitigate for the pine trees. I think in good faith, they need to mitigate. That’s what our Maritime canopy is; is pine trees. 7. Paul Wolff states he agrees with Kathryn; they’re still a significant portion of the canopy. 8. Kathryn states, Joe, my point is, I know what our tree ordinance says right now. If a private property owner wanted to take down a pine tree today, that would fall under that ordinance. But these trees belong to the City of Tybee; they’re in our right-a-way; they’re our trees; they’re a significant part of our canopy. We have already lost way too many on Jones, in my opinion. That’s why the tree ordinance is back on the agenda. So, I think there has to be some replanting of trees along Jones. 9. Paul states, that is what I was getting at, I was looking more for species type. Mike (GA Power) states that they can provide a list of those types of species of trees. We are willing to work with you on the replanting of those trees. Paul states he would like to see, rather than financial assessments, that you come down here and give us some trees that provide habitat, some canopy and not end up causing maintenance issues down the road. Paul asks that Mike bring that list to the next meeting. 10. Diane Schleicher asks GA Power if they would mitigate by donating to the concept by telling us what trees would be appropriate to plant under the power lines and let us work out a plan to mitigate on Jones. GA Power responds, absolutely. Bill Garbett suggests having an arborist at the next meeting. 11. Paul asks GA Power if they are okay with paying the $9450 mitigation for the trees that are being removed and the City of Tybee will do the replanting. Also, have the arborist at the next meeting. GA Power agrees. III. SECTION 319 (h) GRANTS – Bill Lovett states that Paul sent us an application for a 319 Grant. It is not due until October 31st. A. Conference Call – Applicant must meet or conference call with a staff member. B. Typical projects – Bill recommends that we call the staff member with the EPD just to get a feel for what type projects they will approve. C. 40% local match – Paul Wolff states one reason he was looking at this is, I was thinking we could work this into some of George’s projects that he has had to budget for. We get bonus points because we are a Water First Community. So we would already have an edge on getting the grant. Old Business: I. Update on Georgia Power Substation and Utility Line Upgrades I. ULTRAVIOLET DISINFECTION SYSTEM A. City & HGBD meeting at WWTP with equipment representatives this week B. Plan of Action 1. Bid to include installation of pilot unit as soon as possible upon award of contract a. Units on hold by both suppliers b. Pilot unit to be installed jointly by supplier and contractor 2. Selected contractor to prepare for installation during shop drawing and manufacturing phase 3. New unit to be installed jointly by contractor and supplier C. Estimated Costs -$375,000 1. Includes 6 months pilot unit rental 2. Includes contingencies and engineering a. George Reese states that there are two manufacturers. We can ask a price from each one and pick one. Is that what you want to do? Paul Wolff states, yes, that’s my suggestion. b. Bill Lovett states that one of the manufacturers, Trojan, Tybee hasn’t had a good relationship with in the past. Their price is comparable now with Wedeco. Wedeco is the system that we would recommend because of the service. Bill explains that if you go out and buy this piece of equipment, give it to the contractor to install and something goes wrong with it, he says it was the piece of equipment that you bought. If you require him to go out and buy the piece of equipment and install it, then it’s his responsibility. c. Bill states that if you select the Wedeco piece of equipment, and write the spec around Wedeco, if you get a price from Wedeco, then we could put that as an allowance in the bid. Then you bid the contractors. So the contactor uses the Wedeco piece of equipment and that price is already established. Two things that will protect Tybee is one, you get the best price from the contractor (you’re doing the job at the lowest dollar) and two, he is responsible for that piece of equipment. So you’re protected both ways. d. Paul Wolff asks if George is happy with this process. George responds, yes I am. e. Kathryn Williams states that if we do a RFP and put it out for bid, then in the evaluation metrics that you do, you could include the service history where Wedeco would get more points than Trojan. Legally, we can’t authorize payment for a piece of equipment this expensive, that is truly not sole source, without going through the bidding process. f. Bill states that the “other” companies that make UV equipment, don’t have the experience, background, and back up that Trojan and Wedeco do. If that doesn’t matter, then you bid it and write the specifications around Wedeco. g. George Reese states, another thing is you look at the area; you see what everybody else in this area is purchasing. We can purchase the cheapest unit out there but you’re going to get what you pay for. h. Kathryn states, when you do a bid you don’t have to go with the cheapest price because you take all of that other into consideration. I’m not saying the end result of the project wouldn’t be that we would go with anybody other than Wedeco. I don’t think we can circumvent the bidding process. Bill Garbett asks, don’t you put in specifications as to how it is suppose to perform. Bill Lovett states that we can write the specifications around Wedeco equipment but if another manufacturer can meet those specifications you can’t toss his bid. And you must take the lowest, responsible, and responsive bidder. i. Diane Schleicher states that a RFP (Request for Proposal) gives you flexibility to rate the bidder, whereas a bid is just the lowest price, period. Diane says that Kathryn is talking about a RFP so we can rate weather the company has good experience and references so you can give percentages to that. So what you’re recommending is we go with a RFP, not a bid. This would be for the contract, contractor and equipment. So that way if the contractor says I want to put something in that you don’t want then you can also negotiate. You can talk to the contractor and say, we like you but what we want you to do is not put in a Trojan, we want you to put a Wedeco in. Then you ask would you be willing to do that. If not, you go on to the next person. When you do a RFP you can negotiate. j. Mary Hogan states she missed the part about the time crunch. We can shorten or lengthen the RFP process. George states that the crunch is, if that unit goes down, we have nothing. That’s bare minimum; we are having problems now. They don’t make any parts for it; Trojan makes absolutely nothing for what I have. The longer we wait, the longer it will be. k. Diane asks George if he can lease this piece of equipment and see if he likes it. George replies, yes I can but I have to buy their equipment. That’s what both companies have said. l. Paul Wolff asks Mary and Diane how long would it take to put together a RFP. Can we do it within 2 weeks? Bill Lovett states we can put the RFP together in 2 weeks but I don’t know what the legality is with the bidding process for a RFP. A standard RFP would be be 30 days. We could write the RFP in 2 weeks then advertise it. Mary says advertise for 10 days –2 weeks. m. Bob Whelchel states he has spent 3-4 weeks trying to pull these suppliers’ information and pricing. It has taken every bit of that time. They are prepared now to move forward. I know they are going to need more than 2 weeks to size the equipment, price the job and get ready to bid. n. Bill Lovett states that, because you have an ocean discharge, your NPDES permit is not based on fecal coliform like people in Savannah. You’re based on enterococci. Cleaning up enterococci is a lot more expensive than fecal coliform. There is a base line for enterococci levels that we have assumed to be, for giving to the equipment suppliers to base their price on. We don’t know what your influent enterococci levels are. George is running tests and we have made assumptions on that but I want it on the record and in these minutes, that if that level comes back higher than what we have assumed, your costs are going to be be higher. I just want everybody to understand that. o. George states that we just got our new permit. We are now testing for enterococci. I started this month and have to continue for 6 months. Then they’re going to take the fecal away. From now on that’s all they’re going to test for. George states he should have the first test results back in about a week. p. Paul Wolff asks if we did a RFP and it takes 6 weeks, 2 to put it together and 30 days for the bids to come back with their response, and assuming a week to approve the winning contract, is that going to be enough time. George responds, we’ll have to. The only other thing we could do is see if we can find a pilot unit to go in temporarily. George states that HGBD can make an inquiry to what we can find. That way we don’t have to sit and rely on one of them to set it up. Paul asks if he has a recommendation from the committee on how to proceed. Kathryn Williams recommends that staff, with assistance from HGBD, prepare a RFP for the needed equipment at the Waste Water Treatment Plant, with a time frame, based on our conversation, of a maximum of 10 days to get the RFP together, then advertise it for a maximum of 30 days. Bill Garbett seconded. Bill Lovett states he wants to clarify with Kathryn what we want them to do. Bill states you want us to write a RFP for a contractor to supply and install this equipment. It’s a RFP not a bid. We will establish points and we will be able to make judgment calls on that RFP. The price will be included but will not be the deciding factor. II. HISTORIC BUTLER AVENUE PEDESTRIAN SAFETY PROJECT A. DOT Submittals 1. Construction Plans a. All review comments received July 11, 2011 b. Comments to be addressed resubmitted to DOT not later than July 18th. c. Mowing and Maintenance Agreement will be required – Diane Schleicher states this is on the agenda for tonight. Paul Wolff asks for a motion to approve the mowing agreement. Bill Garbett so moved. Kathryn Williams seconded. 2. Utility Certifications a. Comments received from DOT b. Resubmitted to DOT 3. Construction Agreement a. Submitted to DOT 4. Mowing and Maintenance Agreement Approval B. Meeting with Jeanne Kerney, DOT’s Representative 1. 5% DBA goal 2. Pre-qualified contractors only a. Pre-bid conference 3 weeks prior to bid opening 3. Federal funding NOT approved 4. Construction agreement not sent to DOT until funding approved 5. Ms. Kerney knows we are requesting an August “letting” date 6. DOT has a little leeway in authorizing City to bid the project before all paperwork is in place C. Proposed Schedule 1. Begin Advertising August 11, 2011 2. Prebid Conference August 30, 2011 3. Bid Opening September 20, 2011 4. Award by Council (subject to DOT September 22, 2011 Approval) 5. DOT Bid Approval October 14, 2011 6. Notice to Proceed October 20, 2011 V. MCKENZIE/HWY 80 CROSS-WALK A. Reinforced Concrete Median – Change Order – Diane states the order is $250. Comments by Joe Wilson are not audible. Paul Wolff asks for a recommendation to approve change order. Bill Garbett so moved. Kathryn Williams seconded. B. Project Scheduled to be Completed – August 15, 2011 IV. WATERSHED PROTECTION PLAN A. Work Underway 1. EPD approval date – December 15, 2011 2. Plan to be reviewed and approved by: a. EPD b. Infrastructure Committee c. Full Council B. Chimney Creek/Spanish Hammock Influence – Bill Lovett states that “influence” is one of the control points that we are not going to put in the plan. We are going to leave that out of the plan so you don’t have to test in that area because that’s not influenced by the City of Tybee; it’s influenced by an area outside of the City of Tybee. With no further discussion, Kathryn Williams moved to adjourn. Bill Garbett seconded. A quorum of city council members may be present which would constitute a meeting. Respectfully submitted by Karen Reese on 08/10/11