Travis County Commissioners Court
January 30, 2007
Item 14
Number 14, consider and take appropriate, on the following exposition center issues, a, form license agreement, b, right schedule, and c, strategy for bringing in-house custodial services.
>> judge, last week we bought to the court these items and a and b in term of the license agreement. I think we went through that. If there's any questions, weeding willing to answer those. And then the second item was the rate schedule. And I think there were some questions that you had, judge, especially on the parking. And roger did some research and we've got some answers for you.
>> on the parking, we looked at a source of revenue on the parking and what is the one-third of the surcharge. Is surcharge is not a collecting fee and we have about 4,000 parking space over there. And we have to do some overlay or replacement of the asphalt there, which is the parking. And that has been used so heavily when we have disdivments right now we're trying to do one section at a time. Each section it cost about either over lay or replacement about five dollars per square yard. And every year we could do about 10 or 13,000 square yard, that's a cost of about 50 to $66,000 a year. So we're bringing that it would be the surcharge coming from the parking can offset some of that. I'm not sure that we can get all the 60,000 -- 50 or 60,000, but it would be part to offset the overlay or the replacement of the parking lot area. And this would be one source of revenue to fix the potholes or anything to that effect. The other one is to increase the rent for facility if the licensee would like to charge for parking. I think that will be complicated on that matter because the rate schedule states certain dollars. So it going to be lots of negotiation to that effect. So I think the best representation we have for you is to charng based on the replacement of and maintaining of the parking lot. And I think we discussed this one time in my office and I believe that it would be pefbly all right.
>> it's connected to the wear and tear and cost of the use of the parking lot being recouped by the surcharge on parking.
>> what do we do with the revenue receive from the parking fees matches what we need to improve the parking lot?
>> there was a large discrepancy when we were trying to calculate the annual cost, 50 to $60,000, and the types of events in roger's experience out there that do charge parking are the large scale, large concerts. And you would need approximately -- he said something like 20 to 25 such large events per year just to corral the amounts estimated to be spent each year on the maintenance of the parking. So there's --
>> it will be such that we know when we reach that point. If so, then we can have that discussion. Legally that's approachable.
>> yes.
>> any other questions regarding the form license agreement?
>> no. Move approval.
>> second?
>> let me ask, what we're doing today, would this allow us perhaps to do this contract with the rot rally -- say that 10 time in a row. Because I'm -- personally I'm of the opinion that we've made some sort of special consideration to sit down and work that contract, so I'm a little comprehensive about it. If we go forward with this, then we say here what have you to comply with because I do think that there are some things that are special and may take some different kind of negotiations with something that's sort of a different deal. Because this rot rally thing is --
>> this form license agreement does not imply in every case, right?
>> that's correct.
>> any time we want to taylor a contract, then basically we put that deal together, bring it to the Commissioners court, but this is to keep you from keeping to the court. But like on that one, really the size of it really sort of makes it an exception more than anything else.
>> I just wanted to make sure that's what we were talking about.
>> any special contract has to come to the court and one of them would be the rot rally, the low rider car show, those kind of evens we will bring back to the court. This is really -- we need to get it going.
>> that has been the history of the big, lajest events that take place at the expo center is the court has exercised its -- the staff out there has always brought those contracts that deaf 80 substantially from the form contract terms and conditions to the court.
>> the one flexibility that you are granting here is that on multi-year contracts and multi-year agreements that the director has the discretion of a 10 percent discount to the people. And sometimes you will not have formal contracts that are multi-year. Let me give you an example, shriner circus has been out there for about three years and they were out there before previously for about five years. They are a nonprofit organization. They have already been a customer of us for three consecutive years that we know of and before that. So we would like to provide them, for example, 10 percent discount because we know that that way they will come back the year after. The director, we would like the director to have some discretion with that. And also to provide 15 percent discounts if they use the entire grounds. It's not very often that someone will rent the entire ground, but again thoarz the sort of users that we want to come back. So we'd like the director to have some discretion and being able to provide the discounts, depending on the sort of business transaction that he has. Again, they're small discounts.
>> the other thing that we really probably need to keep in mind and is he that hopefully within the next 30 to 60 days we're going to have a new director out there. And I would think that that person may have some real input into some of these areas. I know that roger has worked really hard on this thing, but somebody that comes out of that profession may very well go, you know, we really need to change this. And obviously it's not in stone that somebody couldn't bring it back to the court and say let's alter this thing because it helps me.
>> do you think we could put the new m.e.'s office out there?
>> [ laughter ] autopsies and bikers may be a bad mix.
>> [ laughter ]
>> to clarify with respect to the lease, and that is in the current version of the agreement that you are presumebly going to approve today, the very last item on the rate schedule is that 10 and 15 percent discount so that the director would be granted by approving this agreement would be grant that had authority to grant such discounts at his or her discretion.
>> but it's limited to those events.
>> right.
>> motion covers the form contract. Any more discussion? All in favor? That passes by unanimous vote. And b is the rate schedule with the explanation just given. It's already on the schedule?
>> I move approval of 14-b, judge.
>> second? Discussion of that? Any other special events come to the Commissioners court, lay out the recommended term, points of agreement, disagreement, lay those out and we address them as a court.
>> we always do that in deference to the Commissioner in that particular district because of the neighborhood concerns and to the court because of again the neighborhoods and the community concerns.
>> okay. All in favor? That passes by unanimous vote. C is a strategy for in-house custodial services.
>> move approval of 14-c. I think I got all of my questions answered last week on this. So I don't have any difficulty with it.
>> will we know six months into this if it's working, and if it's not working we can always issue the r.f.p. Or the bid documents for -- to go out, right? Questions? Discussion?
>> do you wait for a second before we -- can we discuss it now?
>> second.
>> well, I'm nervous as heck about this pat of it, but I do like the fact that in six months we can come back and I'm sure that roger and his camp will be the first to raise the flag of hay, this deal isn't working. I really feel that this teeters into our being? Something that not only do we not want nobody it, we shouldn't be in it. And I think that we do have the pefb opportunity to say, let's find out what it cost s to get this thing cleaned the way that it needs to be cleaned professionally, and that's the price that we put in year to year to take care of -- because I don't think it's something that we need to be taking on, but I just don't -- hopefully roger is going to get this monkey off of his back because this is a deal that's -- there's a lot of work to this thing and a lot of specialization that goes into being in this business. And the last time I checked it wasn't the guy that had 14 engineering degrees beside his name. I'm willing to hold my nose and vote for it, judge, but I sure want us to keep a close eye on this.
>> we know that people will keep a close eye as well on the facility and they want to make sure that it's clean before they come back again.
>> let's make it a point to review the situation in six months. It's kind of hard to do it before then because have you to do a good group of workers and then have you to figure out how to coordinate them.
>> we'll come back in six months and give a report.
>> see how thing are going.
>> any more discussion? All in favor? That passes by unanimous vote.
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Last Modified:
Wednesday, January 31, 2007 6:55 AM