Accountability: Communication with Consultants for Vallco Project Should be put on Record by BC

From: Better Cupertino
Date: Tue, Oct 6, 2015 at 10:29 PM
Subject: Follow up to Oral Comment on Agenda Item 4 Contract with M-Group
To: City Council <citycouncil@cupertino.org>, City Clerk <CityClerk@cupertino.org>, David Brandt <davidb@cupertino.org>, Aarti Shrivastava AartiS@cupertino.org

Dear Mayor Sinks, Vice Mayor Chang and Councilmembers,

Thank you for addressing my concern in today's meeting, which requests that the City Staff is cc'd on all communications between the consultants and the project applicant.

And thank you, the City Manager for pointing out that the agreement with the consultant already covers that. I hope the agreement with PW&A for Vallco EIR also covers that.

However, the consultant selection process is not well documented in the staff report as in other project.

In the past, the staff report usually mentions when RFQ (Request for Qualification) was sent out and when was the deadline.

For example, on Aug. 18, regarding the Consultant for Citywide Park Master Plan, the staff report states:

"A consultant selection process was initiated to select a consultant team to provide the professional services needed to develop the master plan. A Request for Proposals was issued in June 2015. Proposals from interested firms were received in July and reviewed for qualifications. The most highly qualified firms were interviewed and evaluated based upon selection criteria in early August and then references were checked. Based upon this process, the firm of RHAA (Royston Hanamoto Alley & Abey) based in Mill Valley, California was selected as the top choice for this project."

But the staff report for Agenda Item 4 today (Oct. 6, 2015) did not mention such selection process. And the City web page for "Open Request for RFP & RFQs" does not show any RFP or RFQ for this particular project management work for Vallco.

http://www.cupertino.org/index.aspx?page=659

Similarly, on June 16, 2015, when Vallco EIR consultant was selected. The staff report did not mention any RFQ/RFP or the selection process of the consultant. From City Records, we did not find any RFQ/RFP for Vallco EIR work either.

This calls into question the qualification, objectivity and independence of these two consultants for Vallco projects.

The agreement is signed between the consultants and the City of Cupertino. The EIR especially need to provide an impartial evaluation of the project.

 

The developer should not be allowed to communicate directly in private with any consultant who signed an agreement with the City. All communications should be cc'd to the City Staff. The City Staff should be present on all in-person meetings or phone calls (through conference call).

 

If this is not already covered in the consultant agreement, we would like to request that the agreement be amended to ensure the accountability and transparency of the process. The consultants should be accountable to the City of Cupertino, who signed the contract agreements.

Regards,

Liang