Fargo committee debates site control, budget and criteria for convention center RFP

FARGO — City staff, commissioners and local stakeholders spent most of a committee meeting refining the request for proposals (RFP) process for a proposed Fargo convention center, debating how much to require from developers up front, how to weigh financial feasibility and whether site control should be a pass/fail requirement.

The committee discussed a two‑phase approach in which developers submit conceptual proposals first and only shortlisted teams are asked to deliver detailed pro formas, site studies and design work. Tom Hysinski, president and managing director of HVS, described a scoring system that ranks sites and criteria numerically and allows the city to reweight priorities depending on local concerns.

The conversation matters because the committee must decide how much detail to require at each stage, how to account for land and parking costs in a roughly $40 million–$45 million financing estimate tied to lodging‑tax revenue, and how to protect the city from selecting a proposal that is attractive on paper but unbuildable or underfunded.

Committee members and stakeholders pressed for clarity on budget assumptions, site control and evaluation weightings. Jim Gilmore, City of Fargo staff member, urged the group to require basic team…