In September, City of Phoenix staff approved moving forward with the negotiations with Roosevelt Housing Associates for the “disposition and redevelopment of City-owned property on Second Street between Roosevelt and Portland Street.”
Upon hearing this decision, there was a flurry of rumor and reaction that swept through the downtown community. We decided to dig deeper and get the facts straight about the underlying RFP (request for proposals) process and how the decision was made to move forward with Roosevelt Housing Associates.
Parsing the Process
In September 2012, the City of Phoenix Community and Economic Development Department (CED) issued the “Notice of Request for Proposals to Develop or Redevelop Urban and/or Mixed-Use Development Projects on Property Within Downtown Phoenix” (RFP-CED-2012-UMD01).
The RFP is identified as a two (2)-step process:
- Step One is a review of qualifications based on an executive project summary submitted describing the proposed project.
- If the Step One submittal is accepted and approved to move on to Step Two, such approval will be provided in writing by the City. Step Two is a review of a full RFP proposal, including specific business terms.
Step One
The RFP for the historic Leighton G. Knipe House (1025 N. 2nd Street) and surrounding area (RFP-CED-2012-UMD01-A4 – Addendum 4) was issued on May 9, 2013.
The deadline for Addendum 4 proposals was 12 noon, June 7, 2013. Four proposals were submitted:
- DAVIS (Mike Davis is an owner of an adjacent property)
- Rainey Development LLC/Butler Housing Company Inc. (Wayne Rainey is an owner of an adjacent property)
- Roosevelt Housing Associates
- Urban Sol Development LLC
The Step One Review panel convened on June 13, 2013. Four individuals served on this evaluation panel:
- Rob Cox – Project Management Assistant, CED, City of Phoenix
- Don Keuth – President, Phoenix Community Alliance
- Eric Johnson – Economic Development Program Manager, CED, City of Phoenix
- Kevin Weight – Senior Planner, Historic Preservation Office, City of Phoenix
Scoring Methodology
During both the Step One and Step Two reviews, scoring was reached using the consensus scoring methodology. How does the consensus scoring methodology work? Each evaluator independently reads and scores the proposals prior to the evaluation team meeting. This process affords each evaluator the opportunity to independently analyze each proposal, make notes relating to observations, strengths and weaknesses, and questions regarding a vendor’s proposal.
The individual evaluators then come together at the evaluation team meeting. This meeting is designed to allow the team to arrive at a consensus. Consensus is reached through discussion and debate that allows each evaluator to inform the team of the rationale for his/her individual scores and/or correct misconceptions of the individual evaluators. Once a consensus is reached, the results are documented with supporting comments. This document becomes the formal evaluation results representing the recommendation of the evaluation team.
Moving Forward
At the conclusion of Step One Review panel, two proposals scored high enough for the panel to recommend that they advance to Step Two of the review process: DAVIS and Roosevelt Housing Associates.
Upon review of this recommendation, city management and staff made the decision to send all four proposals on to Step Two in the process, which enabled all four of the original applicants to submit a more in-depth, complete proposal.
“In the interest of making this process as comprehensive as possible, we elected to allow all four proposals to advance and allow each proposer to submit their best ideas in a detailed proposal,” said John Chan, Phoenix’s Community and Economic Development Director. “The second step of this process provided the opportunity to assemble a diverse panel with broad representation including neighborhood and business community leadership in the evaluation process.”
Step Two
The deadline for the Step Two proposals was August 30, 2013. All four of the original applicants submitted more detailed proposals.
The Step Two review panel convened on September 18, 2013. Six individuals served on this evaluation panel:
- Dianne Barker – Board Member, Roosevelt Action Association
- Molly Ryan Carson – VP Development, Ryan Companies US, Inc.
- Michelle Dodds – Historic Preservation Officer, City of Phoenix
- Cory Kincaid – Board Member, Evans Churchill Community Association
- Jeremy Legg – Economic Development Program Manager, CED, City of Phoenix
- Dan Klocke – VP Development, Downtown Phoenix Partnership
- Jeff Moloznik – VP Development, RED Development
The panel reached a consensus to recommend moving forward with the Roosevelt Housing Associates proposal. Their proposal includes building a mixture of live/work housing for artists, senior housing, and workforce housing, and redeveloping the historic Knipe House as a craft brewery and art gallery.
On September 20, 2013 Scott Sumners, CED Deputy Director, made formal recommendation to John Chan to move forward with Roosevelt Housing Associates and enter into negotiations for the disposition and redevelopment of city-owned property on Second Street between Roosevelt and Portland Streets. The recommendation was approved on the same day.
Where is the process now?
As of today, the negotiations between the City and Roosevelt Housing Associates are in process.
We will continue to delve into more details as the negotiations and project moves forward.
