Curious: who is responding to your questions, Tom? The city manager? Biss?
I’ve brought up this idea before, but it bears repeating. The city should partner with the District to put the new school in the civic center. If you add up the floor space the city actually needs and the size of the new school it equals the size of the Civic Center.
The District is given the building, has the city occupy part of it, and the new school occupy the rest.
You use the lease certificate money to rehab the civic center.
You get a fifth ward school, the protection of a historic building, right sized space for the city, and maintain fifth ward green space that willl be destroyed with the current school plan.
I don’t understand how the decision to move into 909 Davis was the first decision in the civic center process. We should have decided what our long term plans for the civic center are and go from there. It may require some creative thinking but we would be in a much better position to make a good decision. As an example, if we embark on a 3 year remodel, maybe we move some staff to other community centers and rent a storefront to provide services. If we choose to build a new center, maybe renting office space is the right move. But maybe we can get by with $3 million of buildout rather than $6. And maybe we go for a 5 year lease. We are stuck with this lease now in a no man’s land where any choice besides just staying the full 15 year term will incur massive penalties. I’m happy that it will be built out in a perfect configuration but depending on our next step we won’t know if that was a good use of funds or not.
Beyond that, acting like we had to take a 15 year lease was crazy to me. The market for these units is at a historic low. The city got fleeced on the term.
The secrecy and OMA violation is just one more layer to this sad story. The mayor and staff seem to have contempt for engaged citizens asking completely reasonable questions, and that terrifies me as a taxpayer here.
Thanks for your continued reporting on this and other important community issues, Tom.
It's like District 65/Foster School all over again - big plans designed by staffers who want to paid their resumes, with no overarching plans in place and an elected body that doesn't really want to even talk about it. Like, what's the long term plan for the Police HQ or the Fire HQ? I'm not sure anyone knows! We should've had this conversation before signing a 15 year lease, which is a long time!
The thing to really look out for is if Red River flips the property. They paid $27 million for the building and now have a tenant who is locked in for 15 years!
The really odd thing is that the Civic Center/Police/Fire HQ study had just been completed prior to signing this deal. Why wouldn’t we take a few months to decide the long term plan before signing this lease? We had all the information at that point.
It seems to me like the city will buy a piece of property- either the Farmers Market lot or the Northwestern building around the corner and construct a mixed Civic Center / Fire & Police HQ. This opens the door to redevelopment of 2100 Ridge as part of Envision Evanston. Just a hunch…
Also on your point about the study, they spent almost $400k on a study from AECOM to make recommendations for next steps and then completely ignored AECOMs report and just leased a property. I’ll post a link to the AECOM report when I’m back in front of my computer. I get the sense that certain staff members just hate the Ridge property.
I suspect there are people with plans in the works for 2100 Ridge that we don’t know about yet. Remember that it’s in the Fifth Ward TIF too for some reason..
How does this compare to a commercial lease with a similarly situated tenant? Calling it “wild” without that context seems inappropriate. Also, do the city procurement “rules” apply to all items it purchases (eg the components in the automobiles or IT applications it purchases)? I’m not suggesting that what happened here isn’t a potential abuse, I wasn’t involved and don’t know. But I do think the city should, like any other public sector entity, be able to purchase standard commercially available items in an efficient manner. Whether or not such a purchase is “wild” should be relative to what another similarly situated purchasers would be able to obtain. The city of Evanston is not in the same bargaining position as, say, the federal government of the United States. Many private sector organizations have greater bargaining power than the city of Evanston.
Isn't it curious that, while the base rent escalates, the taxes & operating expenses stay the same every year? Who ever heard of taxes and operating expenses not increasing?
If you increase the taxes/opex at the same rate as the rent increase, which seems reasonable, the total number after 15 years comes out to $38,229,952 - not exactly chump change and you could do a lot to 2100 Ridge with that kind of money.
Oh well, those are numbers I grabbed from the original bid paperwork and extrapolated forward. But yeah, the cost of those is definitely going to increase.
Biss made no effort to negotiate the new city hall lease and mocked those who had objections, telling us the process was“ not within a million miles of an OMA violation,” and “that's how the law works.” Well... I believe this lease was ruled illegal and is now in the courts.
Bad news! Lease was not illegal but some of the shenanigans they did with hiring JLL was an OMA violation (I was one of the complainants!). They eventually got around it by just having a vote in public on the JLL contract. As far as I know, it's not in court - but I'm all ears if you know others.
But yeah, there wasn't much negotiation as far as I know. They looked at three buildings, picked one and signed the lease
Per Biss...he wants another term as Mayor like I want a kick in the head. He's doing whatever he can until Jan departs and will make whatever maneuvers he can to make anything happen that will reflect favorably on him.
Per the building...I have been through the building multiple times to get a handle on options, and the construction materials, methods, and floor plan make any alterations to turn it into something else amazingly complicated and expensive. Of course, SOMETHING can be done, but that something would cost amounts that would make most folks gasp. For those not involved in the architectural or construction industries...it's complicated.
Per staff... I'm primarily familiar with staff associated with housing and building....and they're Incompetent and padding their resumes.
Per general decision making... Most folks would be quite surprised to understand that the folks making the decisions (council, staff, "consultants") have little to no relevant experience or history of making constructive and financially sound decisions on the bundle of concerns confronting Evanston. The machinations in the "affordable" housing initiatives show where decision making skills lay, i.e., not in the folks making the decisions.
Curious: who is responding to your questions, Tom? The city manager? Biss?
I’ve brought up this idea before, but it bears repeating. The city should partner with the District to put the new school in the civic center. If you add up the floor space the city actually needs and the size of the new school it equals the size of the Civic Center.
The District is given the building, has the city occupy part of it, and the new school occupy the rest.
You use the lease certificate money to rehab the civic center.
You get a fifth ward school, the protection of a historic building, right sized space for the city, and maintain fifth ward green space that willl be destroyed with the current school plan.
City PR people
I don’t understand how the decision to move into 909 Davis was the first decision in the civic center process. We should have decided what our long term plans for the civic center are and go from there. It may require some creative thinking but we would be in a much better position to make a good decision. As an example, if we embark on a 3 year remodel, maybe we move some staff to other community centers and rent a storefront to provide services. If we choose to build a new center, maybe renting office space is the right move. But maybe we can get by with $3 million of buildout rather than $6. And maybe we go for a 5 year lease. We are stuck with this lease now in a no man’s land where any choice besides just staying the full 15 year term will incur massive penalties. I’m happy that it will be built out in a perfect configuration but depending on our next step we won’t know if that was a good use of funds or not.
Beyond that, acting like we had to take a 15 year lease was crazy to me. The market for these units is at a historic low. The city got fleeced on the term.
The secrecy and OMA violation is just one more layer to this sad story. The mayor and staff seem to have contempt for engaged citizens asking completely reasonable questions, and that terrifies me as a taxpayer here.
Thanks for your continued reporting on this and other important community issues, Tom.
It's like District 65/Foster School all over again - big plans designed by staffers who want to paid their resumes, with no overarching plans in place and an elected body that doesn't really want to even talk about it. Like, what's the long term plan for the Police HQ or the Fire HQ? I'm not sure anyone knows! We should've had this conversation before signing a 15 year lease, which is a long time!
The thing to really look out for is if Red River flips the property. They paid $27 million for the building and now have a tenant who is locked in for 15 years!
The really odd thing is that the Civic Center/Police/Fire HQ study had just been completed prior to signing this deal. Why wouldn’t we take a few months to decide the long term plan before signing this lease? We had all the information at that point.
It seems to me like the city will buy a piece of property- either the Farmers Market lot or the Northwestern building around the corner and construct a mixed Civic Center / Fire & Police HQ. This opens the door to redevelopment of 2100 Ridge as part of Envision Evanston. Just a hunch…
Also on your point about the study, they spent almost $400k on a study from AECOM to make recommendations for next steps and then completely ignored AECOMs report and just leased a property. I’ll post a link to the AECOM report when I’m back in front of my computer. I get the sense that certain staff members just hate the Ridge property.
I suspect there are people with plans in the works for 2100 Ridge that we don’t know about yet. Remember that it’s in the Fifth Ward TIF too for some reason..
Things the City could have done but didn't:
--negotiate an option to buy;
--sign a shorter lease with option to renew
--go through the usual competitive bidding process
--postpone the revote on the contract with JLL after Illinois AG Kwame Raoul found that the vote to approve had violated the Open Meetings Act
But this is our leap-first-and-look-later City government.
How does this compare to a commercial lease with a similarly situated tenant? Calling it “wild” without that context seems inappropriate. Also, do the city procurement “rules” apply to all items it purchases (eg the components in the automobiles or IT applications it purchases)? I’m not suggesting that what happened here isn’t a potential abuse, I wasn’t involved and don’t know. But I do think the city should, like any other public sector entity, be able to purchase standard commercially available items in an efficient manner. Whether or not such a purchase is “wild” should be relative to what another similarly situated purchasers would be able to obtain. The city of Evanston is not in the same bargaining position as, say, the federal government of the United States. Many private sector organizations have greater bargaining power than the city of Evanston.
With D-65's new school costs and now this, doesn't it get tiring to see Evanston digging a deeper and deeper financial hole?
Isn't it curious that, while the base rent escalates, the taxes & operating expenses stay the same every year? Who ever heard of taxes and operating expenses not increasing?
If you increase the taxes/opex at the same rate as the rent increase, which seems reasonable, the total number after 15 years comes out to $38,229,952 - not exactly chump change and you could do a lot to 2100 Ridge with that kind of money.
Here's my math:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1l1jy4HukIrN9xR_ELIEcjriFpzXcXMrtP9sN6iDYfVI/edit?gid=0#gid=0
Oh well, those are numbers I grabbed from the original bid paperwork and extrapolated forward. But yeah, the cost of those is definitely going to increase.
Biss made no effort to negotiate the new city hall lease and mocked those who had objections, telling us the process was“ not within a million miles of an OMA violation,” and “that's how the law works.” Well... I believe this lease was ruled illegal and is now in the courts.
Bad news! Lease was not illegal but some of the shenanigans they did with hiring JLL was an OMA violation (I was one of the complainants!). They eventually got around it by just having a vote in public on the JLL contract. As far as I know, it's not in court - but I'm all ears if you know others.
But yeah, there wasn't much negotiation as far as I know. They looked at three buildings, picked one and signed the lease
https://www.foiagras.com/p/909-davis-leasing-agents-to-make
Per Biss...he wants another term as Mayor like I want a kick in the head. He's doing whatever he can until Jan departs and will make whatever maneuvers he can to make anything happen that will reflect favorably on him.
Per the building...I have been through the building multiple times to get a handle on options, and the construction materials, methods, and floor plan make any alterations to turn it into something else amazingly complicated and expensive. Of course, SOMETHING can be done, but that something would cost amounts that would make most folks gasp. For those not involved in the architectural or construction industries...it's complicated.
Per staff... I'm primarily familiar with staff associated with housing and building....and they're Incompetent and padding their resumes.
Per general decision making... Most folks would be quite surprised to understand that the folks making the decisions (council, staff, "consultants") have little to no relevant experience or history of making constructive and financially sound decisions on the bundle of concerns confronting Evanston. The machinations in the "affordable" housing initiatives show where decision making skills lay, i.e., not in the folks making the decisions.