Council is being asked to consider approval of a master Engineering Services agreement with Anderson Perry & Associates, Inc.

The City of Hermiston has had a contract with Anderson Perry & Associates, Inc. (AP) to provide general engineering services for the city’s water, sewer, streets, parks, and other departments since 2015.  The agreement being considered here is simply a renewal of the same contract for services.

City Staff issued a Request for Qualifications for these contracted services in Spring, 2020.  In addition to simply being a “best practice” to periodically re-advertise for major contracted services, many Federal and State grants require municipalities to prove that things like engineering services have been competitively bid recently enough to ensure that the services are still being provided competitively.

The last time the City issued an RFQ for these services was in 2015.  At the time, the City mainly received engineering services from another firm located out of Portland.  City staff felt that the community’s tax and rate payers were not being efficiently served in paying engineers for 6+ hours of round-trip driving time.  Furthermore, City staff felt that the existing level of service was insufficient to provide adequate oversight of existing infrastructure, responsiveness to short term issues, and long-range planning for facilities.  The existing level of service entailed one engineer coming to Hermiston from Portland once every two weeks to meet with staff and look at issues; the functional result, after accounting for a 6-hour round-trip, was only a few hours of actual contact time between the engineer and staff.  Therefore, the 2015 RFQ sought an increase in level of service, to require having an engineer available in Hermiston two days per week.

The 2015 RFQ received valid responses from AP and from Kennedy-Jenks, the City’s previous engineering firm.  AP was selected at the time for a number of reasons, but mainly because it seemed that they could most cost-efficiently meet Hermiston’s desired level of service.

Since selecting AP as the City’s general engineering firm, we have enjoyed a very positive working relationship, which has grown, and AP has shown a commitment to expanding their level of service regionally as a result of our agreement.  AP has been leasing office space in downtown Hermiston since approximately 2017, and continues to add staff locally.  AP regularly has had at least one engineer available in their Hermiston office four days per week as they work on projects for the City of Hermiston and other local governments as well, like Umatilla County and the City of Boardman.  Due to the work-load, the company recently hired a new engineer to be dedicated to the Hermiston office full-time.

Anderson Perry was once again selected through this Spring’s RFQ process, as it is Staff’s opinion that the company is highly qualified, provides excellent service, and is very cost-competitive due to its base of operations in eastern Oregon.

Approval of this contract has one direct, and several ancillary fiscal implications.  The contract is set up in a manner that guarantees all City departments receive a base-level of engineering service availability; which runs between $80,000 and $100,000 per year, depending on travel and specialty services necessary.  However, the real cost-efficiency is gained by the second part of this contract, which allows for the addition of individual engineering project work-orders for mid-sized projects without seeking interest from multiple vendors.  As individual work-orders are approved, the costs associated with that discrete work is coded to the individual department which generates the work.

1. Approve the Engineering Services Agreement
2. Reject the Engineering Services Agreement
3. Request changes to the Engineering Services Agreement

Approve Agreement

Motion to approve Agreement