2011-1020 Regular City Commission Meeting

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Summary Minutes: Regular City Commission Meeting October 20, 2011 City of Sunny Isles Beach, Florida of these items that are being presented to us as an after-the-fact item. Certainly Calvin Giordano and Associates (CGA) know the procedures extremely well as to what is required in a City contract. We had a meeting just a few weeks ago on the Newport Pier in which we were told at that time that we had nearly all or all prior expenses accounted for when we were making an amendment to that contract and now he finds that we are adding to that, certainly it could have been added at that time. Whatever the case, his recommendation at this point is to go back and talk to CGA, and as far as he is concerned, these are not approved, they were not pre-approved, take your best shot at negotiating a much lower number but at this stage he is prepared to say no to what is being presented tonight. Commissioner Aelion said that Commissioner Scholl had said he would sit in with staff and CGA because we were not given the final number for the Pier Project, and Commissioner Scholl sat with staff and fine tuned the cost. He didn't see a number that would exclude or include what is being presented here tonight. Commissioner Scholl said when he sat with staff and CGA, the one thing he asked for was an entire scope of what our outstanding liability would be to complete the Pier. We scoped that number and approved it at the last Commission meeting without any contingency under the thought that we would come back with any contingency items. Then he was told a few days ago that these bills came out ofthe woodwork, he has a meeting with CGA next week, and he asked that the item be pulled so we can discuss it with CGA directly and see where we are at. He has an ongoing set of meetings with CGA for the Pier Project but it blindsided him as well. Vice Mayor Thaler said we went through this at the Workshop, and he went through this with Assistant City Manager Minal Shah today. Every one of these bills are in the house, and in many cases these bills were in the house before the meeting last month. He really cannot understand why it wasn't presented to us at that same meeting. There are two principals here: 1) all of these invoices are supposedly over what the Commission had approved, why were they done in the first place without the Commission's approval; and 2) ifthey were in the house prior, why weren't they given to us last month. Commissioner Scholl said when he sat down with staff and CGA he gave instructions that he wanted to understand and scope the project on what is our outside number. He wants to understand why we have after-the-fact invoices that are coming up based on those instructions. The Mayor's issue is a separate issue and a good one. The Mayor is saying they are here because we didn't follow procedure and that is why we didn't know about them, that is separate and apart from the nuances associated with the Pier, and we have a seasoned vendor that should know better. Commissioner Scholl said what he is saying is that he gave instructions and he is getting blindsided too but in fairness he has not been able to sit down with everybody yet and he has a meeting scheduled anyway and that is why he is asking that the item be pulled so that he can scope it. He came to everybody last month and said here are the numbers, he sat with everybody and we scoped it and he gave very specific instructions and said the Commission needs to know our outside exposure and it was a million dollars higher than we thought it was going to be and we all said okay, we have all these mitigating factors and the cost went up since we did the bid in the first place and he put himself on the line for that too, and so he wants time to get to the bottom of it, but that is separate and apart from the Mayor's issue. Commissioner Aelion said that Commissioner Scholl was not present at the Workshop where 20