COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF PHILADELPHIA PUBLIC HEARING AND PUBLIC MEETING BEFORE COMMITTEE ON PUBLIC PROPERTY AND PUBLIC WORKS - - - Room 400, City Hall Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Monday, September 28, 1998 11:10 a.m. - - - BILL No. 980528 - An ordinance authorizing the Commissioner of the Department of Public Property, on behalf of the city of Philadelphia, to purchase fee simple title to a parcel of real estate, with any improvement situated thereon, located at 3827-37 Whittaker Ave., Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and also known as 3901 Whittaker Ave., Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, under certain terms and conditions. PRESENT: COUNCILWOMAN JANNIE BLACKWELL, Chair COUNCILWOMAN ANNA C. VERNA COUNCILMAN MICHAEL A. NUTTER COUNCILMAN RICHARD MARIANO - - - VINCENT VARALLO ASSOCIATES, INC. Registered Professional Reporters Eleven Penn Center, Suite 600 Philadelphia, PA 19103 (215) 561-2220 I N D E X Commissioner Andres Perez. . . . . . . . . . Department of Public Property Peter Brown, Project Manager . . . . . . . . Capital Project Office 3 P R O C E E D I N G S
Good morning. The Public Property Committee will now begin its hearing on Bill No. 980528. With me, we have this morning: Councilwoman Verna, Councilman Mike Nutter, Councilman Rick Mariano, and myself, Jannie Blackwell. So for the purposes of a quorum, we are properly represented, and we will begin our hearing. COMMISSIONER PEREZ: Good morning, Council.
Good morning. COMMISSIONER PEREZ: My name is Andres Perez. I'm Commissioner of the Department of Public Property, and I'm here today to testify in support of --
One moment, please, Commissioner. Let us read the title of the bill first. Bill No. 980528, an ordinance 23 authorizing the Commissioner of the Department of Public Property, on behalf of the city of Philadelphia, to purchase fee simple title to a 4 PUB. PROPERTY & PUB. WORKS PUBLIC HEARING - BILL 980528 parcel of real estate, with any improvement situated thereon, located at 3827-37 Whittaker Ave., Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and also known as 3901 Whittaker Ave., Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, under certain terms and conditions. Thank you. Would you -- Commissioner, would you proceed again. COMMISSIONER PEREZ: Thank you.
Thank you. COMMISSIONER PEREZ: I'm here today to testify in support of Bill No. 980528, which was introduced in June 4, 1998. The ordinance is requested authorizing myself, as commissioner, to, on behalf of the city, purchase the fee simple title to a parcel of real estate and improvements situated thereon at 3827-37 Whittaker Avenue, which is also known as 3901 Whittaker Avenue. The department seeks authorization to acquire the parcel in furtherance of the city's approved capital plan for the replacement of the police department facility at 3300 North Front Street. The continuing wear and tear resulting from significantly increasing police activity has 5 PUB. PROPERTY & PUB. WORKS PUBLIC HEARING - BILL 980528 rendered the current facility undersized and obsolete. The new proposed facility will provide substantially more space for the 24th Police District, the 25th Police District, the East Detective Division, the East Police Division Headquarters, and an expanded new courtroom to support East Division activity. The intent of the project is to develop a modern facility which addresses the current demands in the division and satisfies police department's program requirements. I'm requesting that the rules be suspended so that the ordinance may be passed upon first reading at Council. And the urgency for this request is due to the expiration of the agreement of sale, which is due to expire on October 15, 1998. The ordinance was introduced last session but was not scheduled for readings. I respectfully ask that City Council approve this bill, and I'll be happy to answer any questions that you may have. Also present with me this morning is Peter Brown, a project manager from the capital project office, and Deputy Police Commissioner 6 PUB. PROPERTY & PUB. WORKS PUBLIC HEARING - BILL 980528 Thomas Nestel. Thank you.
Thank you, Commissioner. What is the purchase price of the property? COMMISSIONER PEREZ: The purchase price of the property is $160,000.
Were there other sites involved? And why was this site chosen? COMMISSIONER PEREZ: There were numerous sites involved over a nearly-two-year process. This site was chosen subsequent to the police department's request to review some additional sites that had not been part of the original competition, if you will, for the site selection. The site was found to have some favorable qualities -- location, size. It's a vacant lot; there's nothing for us to demolish as compared to -- just about every other site had a large facility that we'd have to demolish. So, generally, I would summarize it up 7 PUB. PROPERTY & PUB. WORKS PUBLIC HEARING - BILL 980528 by saying that it was in an acceptable location, satisfactory to police for traffic-flow patterns of police operations. It's vacant land that we could begin building on as soon as our designs were completed. It's in a nonresidential pocket surrounded by play fields, hospitals, commercial structure, rail line behind it. And there are several nearby city facilities, a large sanitation yard. The major auto repair shop is -- they're all within one or two blocks of this facility.
When would it be completed? What's your proposed time line? COMMISSIONER PEREZ: I'll ask Mr. Brown to address that.
Good morning. I am Peter Brown, the project director from the capital program office.
The status of the project at this point is that in the springtime, the capital program office put together a request for qualification, and we prequalified six firms. We 8 PUB. PROPERTY & PUB. WORKS PUBLIC HEARING - BILL 980528 anticipate issuing a request for proposal in the next couple of weeks, as soon as the property has been purchased -- and to me, it is -- and at which time we will review the proposals from the six firms, and we'll select one. We hope to have the consulting team on board in six to eight weeks. We anticipate about a ten-month design phase and three months of bidding and award of contracts, followed by to 11 24 months of construction. 12 So, in general terms, the completion 13 and occupancy of the facility would take place 14 approximately between July and December of 2001. 15
Yeah. Mr. Brown, 18 who are the six firms that were prequalified?
The firms are: Ueland, Junker & McCauley; Cecil Baker & Associates; Ewing, Cole, Cherry, Brott; Brawer & Hauptman; Dan Peter Kopple & Associates; and Agoos & Lovera.
And do I understand through this prequalification process that information was sent out for a whole host of firms 9 PUB. PROPERTY & PUB. WORKS PUBLIC HEARING - BILL 980528 to respond to, or were these six firms picked to respond to the prequalification call? Or how does that happen?
The way it worked for this was, it was a -- because it was a large and prominent project, we put together a list of -- I can't recall the number, but probably or 30 9 firms that we sent a request for qualifications 10 to. 11 For smaller projects, we usually just 12 do a request for proposal and we send the 13 information to a handful of firms that we select. 14 In this case, we did a two-step process. 15 So we sent the information out to that 16 number of firms, they responded, and we put 17 together a committee that reviews all of that 18 information, both for the qualifications and for 19 the proposal portion. 20 And the committee, we use a scoring sheet where we rank each firm based upon their qualifications, their understanding of the project, their past history with city projects, and a number of different things like that. And those score sheets are added up numerically. 10 PUB. PROPERTY & PUB. WORKS PUBLIC HEARING - BILL 980528 And then we have a committee meeting with our group to determine if we have any questions or if we want to help each other to understand better. That committee's made up of architects and engineers in our organization. Then we forward a letter to the director of projects in the capital program office, recommending that we short-list six firms. And once we do that, we then issue a request for proposal to those six firms. We were prepared to do that in the spring, and we stopped because the -- although the bill had been introduced, the purchase hadn't been completed.
If you could forward to the Chair a list of the original 20-some-odd firms that you initially sent the notice out to, and then you can make a notation, I guess, on that list as to out of that larger list, who the six prequalified firms were. I know you read them into the record, but if you could make that notation, I would appreciate it.
Sure. 11 PUB. PROPERTY & PUB. WORKS PUBLIC HEARING - BILL 980528
Okay. And how much money do we have set aside in the capital budget for this project?
We have approximately $8.8 million that was allocated in Fiscal Year 1998. Let me, uh -- this is the exact number. It's $8,812,135.
Okay. And do I assume that the $160,000 purchase price is coming out of those capital dollars, or do we have a separate allocation for the acquisition?
Yeah, the purchase price of the land is coming out of that allocation. 12 PUB. PROPERTY & PUB. WORKS PUBLIC HEARING - BILL 980528
Okay. And maybe lastly, I seem to recall there being some controversy possibly about these two police districts. I don't know whether it was here in the chamber or through newspaper stories about community people up in this neighborhood wanting separate police districts for these two districts or what. Do I have -- is my memory serving me correctly or failing? COMMISSIONER PEREZ: I think your memory is essentially correct. That was in what I'll refer to as an "early policy decision" addressed by the administration with the various represented elected officials involved. Programmatically, we held back until that was resolved, and then we went forward with site selection.
Okay, all right. And you expect the folks to be in there somewhere in the July-to-December-of-2001 range? COMMISSIONER PEREZ: Yes.
Councilman 13 PUB. PROPERTY & PUB. WORKS PUBLIC HEARING - BILL 980528 Mariano?
Thank you, Madame Chairwoman. This police district is in my council district, and I was really involved with helping select the site. And maybe I can clear up some things for my fellow committee members. Councilman Nutter, you're exactly right; there was a concern about this police district way back in '95, before I was a councilperson. And the administration went on record as to say that they didn't want to break up the police stations. And the theory behind all of this is -- and, really, the actual fact is that the 24th and 25th Police Districts have changed, and part of what is now 24th was at once the 25th. The 25th has grown so much that -- the 24th was a pretty small district at one time, and they picked up areas in Juniata Park that was the 25th, which is now the 24th. Now the 24th is growing, and not just the crime rate; actually, the population and the density of the population. So when we go looking for this -- in a 14 PUB. PROPERTY & PUB. WORKS PUBLIC HEARING - BILL 980528 perfect world, it would be nice to have two different buildings, one in each police district, one in the 24th, one in the 25th. But the administration felt that -- or it was my understanding that they felt that if they did that, they would need to do that everywhere -- possibly down in South Philadelphia when they build a new police station there and wherever else they're together. I think most of them are together. I know I have one at Harbiston and Levick that houses the 15th and the 2nd. It's pretty much the same deal. But the beauty of this site is that there is nothing basically around it except for commercial space. I mean, it's a -- the 24th and 25th is a mess. I mean, I'm surprised that the police even come to work there. You know, it's been -- I think OSHA -- I'm looking at Inspector O'Connor, who's the commander of the division there, but I'm sure he could speak better on it. And I think OSHA declared the place a hazard. I mean, it's a bad place. My only question to you, Mr. Brown, 15 PUB. PROPERTY & PUB. WORKS PUBLIC HEARING - BILL 980528 would be: Did we find out anything about any hazardous materials in this ground? Will that slow up the process? 'Cause ten months for a design phase is -- they did the design phase better at -- faster at Two Liberty than that. I mean, these policemen are living in -- under terrible conditions for ten months for a design phase. 'Cause we knew this was going to happen. And it was probably my fault that this didn't get a hearing. There was some misunderstanding between the Chair of this committee and mine, but we knew this would happen. So, I mean -- but couldn't we have went along with the design before, to have this ready to go? COMMISSIONER PEREZ: We never have until there's actually been a site because the design is that site-specific. General program requirements -- general program requirements are already known. One of the first things the design firm would most likely do is re-interview quickly everyone that had been interviewed already through the earlier investigative process simply to find 16 PUB. PROPERTY & PUB. WORKS PUBLIC HEARING - BILL 980528 out if anything has changed significantly enough to alter the basic design requirements. And then they would set to work, coming up with a box to fit -- to fit the site, based on what that design criterion ends up being. To your first question, we've received the Phase I and Phase II preliminary report, which the Phase I required some additional investigation. The Phase II been completed. It is not in our hands. As we speak, we do expect it by the end of the week or very early next week. The summary -- the informal summary that was given to us indicates that there is some minor problems with some areas of the site, which could, for example, be nothing more than someone changed their oil and let it drip at the site that we happened to, you know, to put a booring into. The acquisition is absolutely conditioned on an acceptable environmental report.
Therefore, if the committee approves going forward, but the final report provides us details that are budget-busters, we won't go forward until we're satisfied.
But we -- the six 17 PUB. PROPERTY & PUB. WORKS PUBLIC HEARING - BILL 980528 firms knew that they're in the running. Now, I'm sure they have design plans already on blueprint to be able to go with this faster. I mean, why do we need ten months? Maybe this is a better question for Mr. Brown. Why ten months for design?
Well, ten months is not an inordinately long design phase for a new building.
I know ten months isn't a long design phase for a new building, but they've had over a year since we've been -- since these six have been selected, since we know who at least the six are.
I mean, just to give you a little background, the program -- a preliminary space program was developed about a year and a 18 PUB. PROPERTY & PUB. WORKS PUBLIC HEARING - BILL 980528 half ago.
And that is -- that is the one design project that you do first, that you can do prior to knowing the site. And that involves interviewing the various people who are going to be working in the facility and managing the facility and finding out what their needs are in terms of sizes of rooms and air-conditioning. And once you have that, you have what's called a program, "a facility program."
Now, that Part I that you're talking about's been done, right?
That facility program is done, but it's also a year and a half old. And at this point, whenever you hire a design consultant, you want to have a quick program confirmation phase.
So that the design consultant would be in a position immediately to go back and re-interview, as the commissioner said, the key people involved in the project. But beyond that, it's uncommon to 19 PUB. PROPERTY & PUB. WORKS PUBLIC HEARING - BILL 980528 proceed with the design of the project until you're firm on exactly the site that you're going to be building a building on.
Excuse my ignorance here on designs, but I mean, I'll bet that five years ago, we knew we needed a new police station here, and we knew what we needed. I'm sure the person in command of that, if it wasn't Inspector O'Connor, knew five years ago how many police he had, how many he projected in the next ten years, in the next twenty years, so that shouldn't have changed too much. I mean, we know how much -- how many -- what kind of electric service we need, and we knew what kind of air-handling unit we needed. That doesn't change; that's all a formula that's worked out, I think, right? I still don't -- I still think --
-- ten months is too long for this because what we have is people dealing with something every day. They put their life on the line every day out here. I mean, I don't know how many policemen 20 PUB. PROPERTY & PUB. WORKS PUBLIC HEARING - BILL 980528 there are in that district, but I'm sure there's a log, and it's terrible that when they come back, there's not a bathroom for the women policemen. And I know we finally got this going, but can't we speed it up a little?
Let me answer your question two ways. First of all, we -- although the need for the police station has been around for a long time, the finalization of the site did not happen until June. And because we still don't own the property, that's the reason we haven't proceeded with the design. Can the design be done in less than ten months? The capital program office would endeavor to move as quickly as possible but we feel that that's a good time frame to contemplate for a 40,000-square-foot all-new building. If we were doing an interior renovation or something smaller -- of smaller scope, it's a sophisticated and large building, and we wouldn't want to cut the design time, so we will move as quickly as we can, but I think it would be -- would not be prudent to attempt to promise an 21 PUB. PROPERTY & PUB. WORKS PUBLIC HEARING - BILL 980528 earlier target.
Can I ask you this? And maybe this is a broad, generalizing question. And I go through this every time there's a capital project in my district, be it a recreation center or a police district gymnasium or a library. But what takes so long? I'm sure it's not the capital project people 'cause I'm looking at Emily Bittenbender, and I know she's on her toes and knows what's going on. Is it the city charter? Do we need to do something for the city charter? 'Cause I can't go see Inspector O'Connor anymore and walk in that place and feel -- I'm embarrassed, I'm embarrassed to be a city councilman and walk in that policed district and look these men and women in the face that are putting their lives on the line every day, every day because of design phase. I mean, design phase is going to work in that district and not knowing if you're coming home at night. You know, design phase is not having a decent place to eat. Design phase isn't bringing a night court in there when the people from Town Watch are embarrassed because there's 22 PUB. PROPERTY & PUB. WORKS PUBLIC HEARING - BILL 980528 roaches crawling across the table. I mean, that was a great facility probably when I was in second grade. Okay, that's been a long time. And I know we knew this was going to happen. Can you tell me that answer? Is it the city charter? What is it, what do we need to change here to speed this up?
To answer your question, it's two different aspects of the fact that it's a government -- a city or municipal government project. The first is that because there are more users and more people involved in the buy-off and approval of things, it takes longer to get agreement from different user groups. We've been trying to speed that up in the past two years. The second thing is that because we are the city and we're a public agency, we have to involve people more in the qualifications and proposal phases. That aspect of openness and fairness takes time. And then in the construction phase, there's the fact that the city is constrained by 23 PUB. PROPERTY & PUB. WORKS PUBLIC HEARING - BILL 980528 the State Separations Act requiring us to have multiple prime contractors, which puts us in the position of acting like construction managers. That takes time, and it offers more opportunity for conflicts between contractors, change orders, and cost events. And to answer your question: Yes, because we're the government, it takes us a little bit longer. But in the private sector, to do a project like this, you could probably only shave six -- you could maybe shave six to eight months off it.
But that's -- we've tried very hard to do that. I think, on a project like this, it would be difficult for us to do so.
I believe I had in the budget, for approximately twelve to fourteen years, monies appropriated for the 1st Police District for a new building. We finally got it 24 PUB. PROPERTY & PUB. WORKS PUBLIC HEARING - BILL 980528 erected, I believe, last year, Commissioner? COMMISSIONER PEREZ: Yes.
And it's absolutely beautiful. And I just hope that yours comes out as nicely as the first did. I think they did a magnificent job.
Because you're going to wait a couple more weeks because this hearing is going on too long. That's probably another reason why they can't get started immediately.
Well, if I'm here in twelve years and this thing still isn't built, I'll be pretty sad, but I appreciate it. But just let me say one more thing before I -- and please oblige me. We looked hard for this place. It's definitely needed, but the beauty of this particular spot on Whittaker Avenue is, there isn't anything around it residential, so 25 PUB. PROPERTY & PUB. WORKS PUBLIC HEARING - BILL 980528 it's not -- it's actually in the 24th but it's closer to 25th. The highway and stakeouts stay on the street, sanitation's across the street, the garage is around, so we don't really need to build a filling station and all for there 'cause it's all there. I mean, it's just a beautiful spot. I hope it's all right and it comes. I'm just a little anxious to get it going 'cause, you know, when I go down there, the other one's a mess, and I just want to see it happen. Thank you.
Councilman, take comfort in knowing that this is the largest and most important and prominent project on my team. I have assigned some very good staff to it, and it's the project we're most interested in getting going as quickly as possible.
One quick question for Commissioner Perez. Commissioner, you mentioned about Phase I Phase II. Who's responsible for a remediation based on what comes out of the Phase II? PUB. PROPERTY & PUB. WORKS PUBLIC HEARING - BILL 980528 COMMISSIONER PEREZ: Well, it's a two-sided answer. If it's nominal --
Take as many sides as you have. COMMISSIONER PEREZ: Yeah, if it's -- I'll use the words "a nominal cost," if the estimated remediation of the conditions is going to slow the project down because we will need more money, we have to consider that and either agree to come up with the additional amount or start all over again with another site search. If it's a nominal amount --
Are you say saying that the current owner will not participate in remediation -- COMMISSIONER PEREZ: No. 18
-- as a part of the sale? COMMISSIONER PEREZ: No. That was -- it was part of the terms and conditions of the sale.
Okay. What was the site? COMMISSIONER PEREZ: (No response.) 27 PUB. PROPERTY & PUB. WORKS PUBLIC HEARING - BILL 980528
What was the site? COMMISSIONER PEREZ: I think it's had various uses.
There have been buildings there? COMMISSIONER PEREZ: The most immediate use -- there was a small business office on it. And the environmental concerns comes from preceding use. It used to be owned at one time by Gulf Oil or a Gulf Oil, you know, predecessor corporations.
Wonderful. COMMISSIONER PEREZ: And it may have been some storage tank on it other than your usual, you know, household fuel tanks and things of that nature.
All right. So the bottom line is, remediation is on us, and it's a question as to whether or not it's small enough that you can pay it out of the dollars that you have available? COMMISSIONER PEREZ: Yes.
Or you may have to seek additional dollars, depending on what the 28 PUB. PROPERTY & PUB. WORKS PUBLIC HEARING - BILL 980528 price is? COMMISSIONER PEREZ: Yes.
But, in any event, we have to take care of it. COMMISSIONER PEREZ: Yes.
Are there any other questions? (No questions at this time.)
All right, this will conclude our hearing part of the committee hearing. - - -
We will now enter into the stated meeting. I'd now like to ask for motion, with a suspension of the rules, from Councilman Mariano.
Madame Chairwoman, I make a motion that Bill No. 980528 be approved, with the suspension of the rules, so it can be read at the next Council section. (Duly seconded.)
All in favor? Opposed? (None opposed.) 29 PUB. PROPERTY & PUB. WORKS PUBLIC MEETING - BILL 980528 That concludes the public property hearing. Thank you all. COMMISSIONER PEREZ: Thank you. . (Adjourned at 11:43 a.m.) - - - 30 C E R T I F I C A T E I HEREBY CERTIFY that the foregoing proceedings of the Council of the City of Philadelphia of Monday, September 28, 1998, were reported and accurately by me, and that this is a correct transcript of same. RE: COUNCIL COMMITTEE ON PUBLIC PROPERTY BILL NO. 980528 __________________________________, JOSEPHINE CARDILLO, Registered Professional Reporter