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Committee recommends multiple on-call engineering, geotechnical and architectural agreements to provide specialized services
Summary
The committee recommended City Council approval of multiple on-call agreements covering water/wastewater/recycled engineering, geotechnical/materials testing and architectural design; staff emphasized these are task-order, not-guaranteed contracts to access specialized expertise as needed.
The Public Works & Transportation Committee on Jan. 28 recommended that the City Council approve several on-call professional services agreements that allow the city to issue task orders for specialized technical work as projects arise.
Staff presented three grouped categories: - On-call professional engineering services for water, wastewater and recycled water systems (initial term Feb. 5, 2025–Feb. 4, 2026, with up to four consecutive one-year extensions to Feb. 4, 2030). Several firms were listed in staff materials; AECOM was discussed as an existing on-call vendor used for electrical engineering support. - On-call geotechnical engineering, environmental materials testing and inspection services (initial term Feb. 19, 2025–Feb. 18, 2026, with options to extend to Feb. 18, 2030). - On-call architectural design professional engineering services (initial term Feb. 19, 2025–Feb. 18, 2027, with options for three consecutive one-year extensions to Feb. 18, 2030).
Tim Beaman, assistant director of public works, explained the on-call contracts are not guaranteed sums; they establish pools of prequalified firms available for task orders. Michael Wolf and other staff said historical usage across past agreements varied — some firms saw limited task orders while others had multiple — and task orders range from small preliminary studies to full design work. Morgan Kessler, city engineer, said the city lacks in-house capacity for certain testing and materials labs and needs outside firms for quality-control testing and specialized geotechnical analysis.
Committee members asked about not-to-exceed amounts, procurement response rates and the benefits of on-call contracts versus hiring full-time staff. Staff said not-to-exceed totals are available in the staff report for particular agreements, that some RFPs drew many proposals (architectural design RFP received 11 proposals) and that on-call contracts are the typical approach to secure intermittent, specialized expertise without creating full-time positions.
The committee voted 3–0 to recommend council approval for the on-call agreements and the associated procurement approach.
