Consideration and Approval of Contract:  Professional Services for Materials Testing. (Approve contract to test materials during construction).

1) Approve the contract with ATL, Inc. for a total estimated annual amount of $172,940, which includes a $10,000 contingency.  The contract will be for an initial term of three (3) years with two (2), one-year renewal terms. 
2) Authorize the City Manager to execute the necessary documents.

The contract will authorize an annual materials testing services agreement, which provides quality assurance for all permitted City infrastructure improvements.  Within the three-year term, the contract shall be subject to annual renewals contingent upon a successful annual performance review.

Revenue is generated through Engineering Permit Fees (100% recovery level estimated to generate $215,000 per year).  The $172,940 contract amount is proposed to be funded in the first year of the three-year contract with unspent FY14 Testing Program funds, Engineering Section salary savings of $30,137 and the proposed FY15 base budget for the Materials Testing Program in the amount of $142,803 (Acct. 001-05-102-0315-4). 

1) Regional Plan (2030) - Planning; Locating Facilities (PF.2):  Provide sustainable and equitable public facilities, services and infrastructure systems in an efficient and effective manner to serve all population areas and demographics.   

On July 16th, 2013, Ordinance 2013-17 was adopted by the Mayor and City Council amending Title 3-10-001-0001, Planning Fees, Section 3-10-001-0002, Engineering Fees, and Section 3-10-001-0005, Recreation Fees; providing for a savings clause; and providing that all ordinances or any part of the Flagstaff City Code in conflict with the provisions of this ordinance shall be repealed upon the effective date of this ordinance.  Specifically, a new Engineering Fee was established for 100% cost recovery associated with Materials Testing as a percentage (2.15%) of public improvements construction cost.

At a Work Session held on September 17th, 2013, Staff presented results of a Request for Information (RFI) procurement process which demonstrated that private-sector materials testing service providers could be competitive with budgeted cost of similar City services.  Council supported a procurement process to seek qualified professional service providers through a Request for Statements of Qualifications (RSOQ) selection process.

1)  Approve the award as recommended. Approval will allow ATL, Inc. materials testing field and laboratory personnel to be setup and ready for the 2014 construction season.
2) Reject the approval of the award and provide additional direction to staff. This option would impact the ability of the City to perform quality assurance testing for infrastructure improvements in 2014.

As part of the FY14 Budget process, the City Manager established an initiative to explore ways to reduce staff burden through use of private sector service providers.  By the end of May 2013, the Materials Testing Program was faced with one (1) vacancy and one (1) pending retirement in the two-FTE work group.  In order to continue providing excellent customer service to our permitted contractors, we immediately hired Speedie & Associates (Speedie) from the On-Call pool of professional service providers.  Also, at this time we initiated the RFI/RSOQ procurement process.  Speedie has been paid $61,332.50 for services rendered from May 21, 2013 through January 15, 2014.

Four (4) firms submitted their Statement of Qualifications for performing materials testing.  A five-person evaluation committee independently reviewed each submittal and scored the firms on the following criteria:  the firm and their assigned personnel's qualifications, expertise, knowledge, experience and service strategies as related to materials testing.  The initial evaluation results are based upon a total of 500 potential points. 

Two (2) firms tied in their initial evaluation point totals and were chosen as the two shortlisted firms invited to interview with the committee.  The interview component provided for an additional 50 points, giving an aggregate total of 550 points.  The scoring results are shown below and on the attached scoring tabulation document.
 

Company	SOQ Score	Interview	Total Points
ATL, Inc.	438	45.25	483.25
Speedie & Associates	438	38.00	476.00
Western Tech.	405	-	405.00
Ninyo & Moore	397	-	397.00

 

Engineering fees have been established to generate approximately $215,000 per year based on estimated volume of permits issued.  The Materials Testing permit fee is 2.15% of the public improvements construction cost.  The recommended annual contract with ATL, Inc. in the amount of $172,940 (Level 1) leaves approximately $42,000 to cover indirect costs such as Program administration (Level 2), Engineering/ Community Development administration (Level 3) and other City Section/Division administration (Level 4).    

FY14 expenditures to date for the Materials Testing program are approximately $67,000 for Speedie & Associates (on-call services) and $33,000 for the City-run program, totaling $100,000, leaving a balance of approximately $43,000.  We anticipate that Speedie will earn approximately $20,000 by the end of FY14.

Infrastructure improvements that become the property of the City are built to standards established by the Office of the City Engineer.  The quality assurance verification that infrastructure improvements are compliant with the City's established standards is achieved through the use of materials testing protocols using trained personnel and approved laboratory testing methodologies. 

The elimination of the City's in-house materials testing personnel and laboratory initiated the need to hire a private-sector firm that will be managed by the Office of the City Engineer and will report directly to assigned City staff.  This provides the necessary quality assurance required to ensure compliance.

Inform
The award of this contract assures the public that infrastructure improvements, which will become City assets, were built to meet and/or exceed the standards established by the Office of the City Engineer.