Former city attorney recommends action given multitude of commission questions this week
Shortly before 5:30 p.m. on Monday, March 17, the Sarasota city commissioners voted unanimously to continue — until no later than their May 5 regular meeting — a decision on an agreement that would allow planning for a proposed new bayfront performing arts venue to proceed.
That followed their approximately two hours of exchanges with representatives of the Sarasota Performing Arts Foundation and hearing a recommendation from their recently retired city attorney that he would not recommend they approve the document that day, as it was written.
Additionally, the commissioners listened to public comments for close to two-and-a-half hours. Altogether, by count of The Sarasota News Leader, 29 people spoke, including former City Manager Marlon Brown, who is serving as the governmental affairs director for the Greater Sarasota Chamber of Commerce. Brown read a letter of endorsement for the proposed Performing Arts Center (PAC) that Chamber President and CEO Heather Kasten had written.
The speakers offered a mix of views on the plans. Many expressed enthusiasm for the project, while others voiced concerns about its potential expense.
Much of the commissioners’ discussion this week focused not only on new information that the representatives of the Sarasota Performing Arts Foundation presented to them just before the Foundation team began its presentation, but also on contrasting projections regarding how much money might end up in a trust fund dedicated to paying for amenities in the city’s Bay Park. (See the related article in this issue.)
The total project cost, as cited in documents provided to the commissioners by the Foundation, is $407 million. The figure had not changed since the commissioners conducted a Feb. 11 workshop with Foundation representatives, including members of the team that has been working on the PAC.
As the News Leader reported last month, the estimated construction cost of the new complex within The Bay Park on the city’s waterfront is $365 million. That is in 2024 dollars, as the Foundation group and Jennifer Jorgensen, director of governmental affairs for the city, have noted. During the Feb. 11 workshop, Jorgensen explained that a ”hard cost escalation” of 4% a year through 2028 would add $42 million to the $365 million, resulting in the $407-million figure.
Before the commissioners voted on March 17, Tania Castroverde Moskalenko, CEO of the Foundation, did ask that they consider holding a special meeting on what is called the Implementation Agreement between the Foundation and the city.
“I think we should try to [do that],” Mayor Liz Alpert responded. “This should be just a meeting by itself. This is —”
“Too big,” Commissioner Jen Ahearn-Koch finished Alpert’s last sentence.
Retired City Attorney Robert Fournier — who joined the board members at the dais because of his long involvement with the PAC process — did say that city staff would work with the commissioners and the Foundation representatives to try to schedule the subsequent discussion earlier than May 5.
Vice Mayor Debbie Trice ended up making the motion, with Commissioner Kathy Kelley Ohlrich seconding it.
Given the length of the focus on that agenda item this week, Alpert also told her colleagues, “My suggestion is … please ask as many questions as you can prior to [that next] meeting. … It would really, really help our meetings go a little more smoothly.”
Ahearn-Koch asked that the Foundation representatives not wait until the day of that second discussion to provide the commissioners any new materials, as they did on March 17. “I can’t read these things right her at the table,” Ahearn-Koch added.
During the March 17 discussion, as part of the regular commission meeting that day, Jorgensen explained that an exhibit that had been provided in the agenda packet for the meeting had been updated. She noted that design images had been removed from five pages of what was designated “Exhibit A.” Then she said that slides showing a medium theater in the PAC complex had been removed from another five pages. That theater — which was indicated as a future, potential building when the commissioners conducted their Feb. 11 workshop on the project — “is not included in the ‘Project Total Cost’ and the concept design,” Jorgensen added.
A few changes
During her opening remarks, Jorgensen pointed out that the City Commission seated in April 2022 had approved what has been called a Partnership Agreement with the Foundation that provided numerous details about the process that would lead to the construction of the PAC.
As a result of two amendments to that document subsequently receiving commission approval, Jorgensen continued, the Foundation was to provide a proposed Implementation Agreement to the board members before the end of this month. That document would include the total project cost and other details related to the financing and construction of the PAC.
Foundation CEO Castroverde Moskalenko told the commissioners that the new performing arts center “has the potential to elevate Sarasota’s profile as a cultural and arts destination on the regional, national and global stage.”
She, like Jorgensen, proceeded to offer new details to the board members. Among those, she said, the project team has begun evaluating the potential of moving the two-building complex — the structure housing a 2,700-seat theater and a multi-purpose building with a 300-seat room and space for educational programming and patron and support spaces — south of the 10th Street Boat Canal, instead of one structure being at the head of that canal, as noted during the Feb. 11 discussion.
The key issues that will have to be addressed in regard to the new proposal, she said, will be the Climate Resilience Guidelines in the city’s 2017 Climate Adaptation Plan; the theater design requirements for Broadway and other touring productions; and height restrictions in accord with a View Corridor Easement that representatives of the city and the Sarasota Renaissance II condominium association signed in 1999, which is related to Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) flood design elevation.
Yet another change in the materials since Feb. 11, Castroverde Moskalenko reported on March 17, were new graphics showing the entrance to The Bay Park from the 10th Street roundabout. Vice Mayor Trice had requested that, Castroverde Moskalenko noted.
‘I’m a little bit disturbed’
Following the public comments, Trice was the first commissioner to address the Foundation group, zeroing in on Castroverde Moskalenko.
“Tania, you and I had a long discussion on [March 12], and we looked at the actual text of the Implementation Agreement (IA) that preceded Exhibit A,” Trice began. “We made some edits,” Trice continued. “Are we going to see the revised wording?”
One area of concern to which Trice pointed was on Page 2 of the Implementation Agreement (IA). No. 2 in that section pertains to the City Commission’s acceptance of the concept design. “I am not happy about [that sentence],” Trice stressed.
In executing the IA, Castroverde Moskalenko replied, the City Commission would be agreeing to allow the project’s Executive Board to approve the concept design. The parties acknowledge that the concept design is subject to further change, including the final location, she added.
Later discussion indicated that the Executive Board would comprise the city manager and the Foundation CEO.
“That implies we are approving the concept design,” Trice told Castroverde Moskalenko, “and … it appears to be ceding the final approval of the concept design to the Executive Board.”
Recently retired City Attorney Fournier pointed out that, as he read the IA, no implication was implied. Instead, he said, the IA made it clear that the Executive Board would approve each phase of the project, not the City Commission.
“I’m a little bit disturbed that the results of our half-hour discussion aren’t reflected anywhere,” Trice told Castroverde Moskalenko.
After Jorgensen of Governmental Affairs suggested that City Administration and the City Attorney’s Office could work with the Foundation’s attorney on revised the wording — with the goal of getting the IA back to the commission as soon as possible — Fournier reminded everyone that, in accord with the April 2022 approval of the Partnership Agreement, the City Commission had no deadline to approve the IA. The only deadline, he added, was in regard to when the Foundation team would present the IA to the commissioners.
Trice also gave the Foundation group what she called her “list of functional requirements,” which included the need to move 2,700 people “from a street level arrival area into the large auditorium within a 45-minute window.”
Although images that the Foundation team had shown the commissioners included photos of elevators and escalators, Trice emphasized that those photos were taken in museums, not in theaters, “which need to serve a large number of people in a short amount of time.”
Later, Cortez Crosby, a project manager with the Paratus Group — who is a member of the Foundation’s PAC team — explained that the architects with the Genoa, Italy-based Renzo Piano Building Workshop would be consulting with the Foundation group and Mary Bensel, executive director of the Van Wezel Performing Arts Hall, and her team to ensure that the PAC would be functional. “Our careers rest on delivering functional and beautiful buildings,” Crosby added.
Taking her turn to ask questions, Commissioner Ahearn-Koch expressed frustrations about another Implementation Agreement paragraph, No. 3, which Trice had noted, as well. It was headed, “Scope.”
The April 2022 Partnership Agreement between the city and the Foundation called for the Foundation to provide both a project concept and a preliminary site plan in the Implementation Agreement, Ahearn-Koch stressed. That is one of the most important facets of the IA, she added.
Yet, a concept plan and a preliminary site plan are two different things, Ahearn-Koch pointed out. Holding up the page in the backup agenda material showing the “Concept Plan,” Ahearn-Koch added that she had served six years on the city’s Planning Board and has been a city commissioner for eight years. A site plan, she continued, has elements such as boundaries; directional orientation, such as an arrow pointing north; setbacks; notes about location of utility lines; transportation information; and landscaping features, for examples. “This is a legal thing that we’re supposed to be referring to,” she emphasized to the Foundation group.
The concept plan the Foundation team provided the commissioners that day, which included a red box indicating the potential, alternate location for the PAC, “is very far from a preliminary site plan concept or intended design,” Ahearn-Koch stressed.
At another point, Commissioner Ohlrich talked of her distress over the fact that, in accord with the latest version of the IA, the “Executive Committee,” comprising the city manager and the Foundation CEO, would have the authority to make changes to the process related to the design and budget.
Ohlrich did note that Doug Jeffcoat, the interim city manager, had promised that he would present any proposed changes to the City Commission before he would agree to them, but Ohlrich added, “It’s not in writing.”
The Executive Board details are in the Foundation’s agreement with Renzo Piano, Castroverde Moskalenko replied.
“I’m still nervous about that,” Ohlrich said.
A lack of ‘timely information’
Yet another issue that Vice Mayor Trice raised was the need for the commissioners to have more regular updates about the work related to the PAC plans.
“What I am feeling,” she said, “is that the City Commission really doesn’t get timely information” until the Foundation team is nearing a point when it needs the board’s approval for another step in the process. That leaves the commissioners “scrambling to understand what happened before,” Trice stressed.
She called for more specific language in the IA regarding the distribution of regular reports to the commissioners, including information about the decisions of the Project Management Board.
As shown in a graphic that Foundation CEO Castroverde Moskalenko provided that day, the Project Management Board would comprise Jorgensen of Governmental Affairs; Bensel, the executive director of the Van Wezel; James L. “Lynn” Singleton, president and CEO of Professional Facilities Management, on behalf of the city; and three Foundation representatives, including Crosby of the Paratus Group.
When the city manager comes to the commission for approval of any step related to the PAC, Trice continued, the commissioners should have been advised of what to expect “well in advance.”
In fact, she pointed out, in their routine one-on-one discussions with the city manager, the commissioners would be able to rely on the information that they had received to provide their thoughts to the city manager on specific details.
“We’ve been in the dark,” Trice emphasized to the Foundation team, “and that, as I see it, has been a problem. … I would like to see information flow and monitoring in the [Implementation] Agreement.”
At another point, she told Jorgensen, “I don’t remember this commission ever really having a say on the budget [for the PAC].” (Trice was not elected to the commission until after the April 2022 signing of the Partnership Agreement.)
“Was there a budget number given to the architect?” Trice asked, referring to the Renzo Piano Building Workshop.
Jorgensen explained that the Partnership Agreement included an estimated budget of $185 million “just for construction costs.”
However, the final version of the Partnership Agreement excluded an estimated expense. The April 4, 2022 draft had a section that put the amount between $300 million and $350 million.
The ‘off-ramp’
Commissioner Ohlrich also inquired about when “a [project] termination clause kicks in.”
A clause in the agreement with the Renzo Piano says that if the city terminates the plans at any time for convenience, Jorgensen responded, the city would pay 10% of the total of any expenses for which Renzo Piano had not been reimbursed.
Further, she said, the commissioners could cancel the PAC plans before they approve the Implementation Agreement. However, she added, “You have to pay for all services rendered to date.”
Former City Attorney Fournier pointed to Paragraph 5 of the proposed Implementation Agreement, which pertains to what he called the “off ramp.”
That part of the document said that at any point the Project Executive Board “does not approve a subsequent design phase, the parties shall have no further obligations under this IA,” Fournier noted.
A portion of the preceding language noted that the “four approval phases include: (1) concept design and PAC [Performing Arts Center] Implementation Agreement Services; (2) schematic design; (3) design development; and (4) construction documents. By execution of this IA, the parties are authorizing the Project Executive Board to approve concept design and this IA and otherwise continue to the schematic design phase for the Project. The parties acknowledge that the concept design approved by the Project Executive Board is subject to further change as the design and development work for the PAC advances, specifically including, but not limited to, adjustments to the final location of the PAC.”