Council Moves on With Court Selection

The Fredericksburg City Council is one step closer to choosing a design for a new city court facility. The three remaining teams, featuring designs by construction consortiums Donley's, FirstChoice and W.M. Jordan, will be given the opportunity to prepare more detailed site proposals. The vote to narrow down the list was 6-1, with Ward 3 Councilor Fred Howe dissenting.

Why the City Council chose to move forward with those three design build teams is still something of a mystery. When the council reconvened in open session to vote on the matter, there was no public discussion of the motives or rationale for choosing the remaining teams. Afterwards, members of the City Council referred almost all inquiries about their decision to City Manager Beverly Cameron. 

"We looked at overall cost, how best to meet the long term needs, and that was mainly it," said Mayor Thomas Tomzak after the meeting, before referring other questions to city staff. 

"We are still in the middle of the procurement process, and all I can tell you is that the number has been reduced at this point," said Cameron after the meeting. "I can't go into explaining why the decision was made…but we took the vote in open session to confirm the consensus that was agreed on through the deliberative process in closed session."

The three remaining teams will be given the opportunity to prepare detailed phase proposals which will include more information and specifics about their design. Details on the future of the courthouse selection process haven't been worked out entirely, but Cameron says future discussion would likely involve both closed and open sessions. 

Last nights vote to reduce the proposals to the three options was criticized by Howe, who voted agains the measure. 

"At this point I can't support the largest capital project in the history of the city when there is no ability to pay and the assumption is the taxpayer will carry the burden in these tough economic times," said Howe after the meeting.

Also critical of last night's vote is former City Councilor Matt Kelly, who said the matter should have been explicitly included on the council agenda released prior to last night's meeting. 

"If the plan was to have a vote, then it should have been on the agenda so the public was aware of it," said Kelly after the meeting. "It's much easier to pull something off the agenda than to have something added to it."