1.20.2026 Fall River City Council - Committee on Real Estate

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Committee on Real Estate will now convene. Uh the clerk will call the role.

Here pursuant to the open meeting law, any person may make an audio or video recording of this public meeting or may transmit the meeting through any medium.

Attendees are therefore advised that such recordings or transmissions are being made whether perceived or unpersceived by those present and are deemed acknowledged and permissible.

Uh we have uh three items. First is uh citizens input. Nobody's for citizens input. Secondly, minutes from December 18th 2025.

Motion to approve.

Second. All in favor?

I.

And third, we have an item that needs to be lifted from the table.

Motion to lift from the table.

Second. All in favor?

I.

So number three is mayor and solicitation proposal for request for proposals 26-03 sale of the former Devo school located at 112 Flint Street tabled on 121825.

Uh we have the assistant treasurer and uh purchasing agent here if you'd like to come to the table please.

Just state your names, your positions, address for the record.

Rebecca Pon, assistant treasurer, purchasing assistant.

Uh, Trevor Killo, purchasing agent.

Um, yeah.

Council Kadim.

Um, Madam Chair, I don't necessarily have any questions. Do you want to I guess do you want us to discuss the scoring sheet that we had?

You can dis you you can discuss your opinion.

Okay. Um so I I guess let me let me make a a motion to recommend the draft uh drafted order be referred to full counsel to be adopted.

I would second that. All in favor?

I I uh and just in terms of that motion that we just just approved, I you know I did submit it. What I what I will say and I was I was having a conversation um with the uh assistant purchasing agent is that the official title treasurer purchasing agent. Uh just in terms of the rubrics u moving forward I I know a lot of times these documents go out to bid with the um scoring evaluation

matrix that's here so everybody knows what they're going to be evaluated on.

Uh in terms of this one a lot of the information that was requested for the uh various categories was not submitted.

Um it's not that I I didn't feel that um you know the bidder uh was not going to perform what he said he was going to perform. It's just hard to evaluate something obviously based on the on the rubrics and and so I'll just go through the ones that I uh highlighted. So in terms of experience with redevelopment and urban uh sites, I did uh evaluate that as highly advantageous which um to

meet that category, you had to include three or more examples of projects involving the redevelopment of urban sites which uh there was a number of projects that that bidder had. Uh in terms of the financial capacity to complete the project, I did uh I put unacceptable. Um, now I I happen to know who the bidder is. So I I know the bidder has the financial capacity uh to complete the project. However, based on

the uh the bid documents that were provided, there was no information uh to be able to make a determination that that was um he was able to do that. I know there was a letter with regard to potentially um from St. Michael's Credit Union, I think, in terms of the bid, but we don't have that information.

Um I did I believe I forwarded that over from Attorney Kellerin's office. No, no.

I I meant the purchase price.

Oh, right. So I I Well, we if if once you refer it, we'll give you the um purchase price. We'll open the price proposals. We just want to make sure that the decisioning is solely based on the developmental proposal prior to revealing it. But we'll absolutely there's no prejudice because there was only one um single solicitation submitted and I I think the St. Michael's credit union was talking to the actual purchase

price. Um so the project budget uh originally um I had as unacceptable I put not advantageous. So there was documents that came over from attorney uh chlorian is that yeah I might mispronounced so uh it fell under the not advantageous category. So a project budget that ident identifies estimated costs for major components of the project but it didn't have funding um mechanisms associated

with any particular component. So that's why I evaluated it uh in that category likelihood to uh complete the project uh on schedule in a timely manner. again that I I did evaluate that as unacceptable just because the information uh was not provided uh to really discuss the um ability to or even a schedule associated with the with the projects the implementation uh strategy I did

rate that as highly advantageous. Uh the proposal did complete all the uh said that they will complete all the phases of the development process uh including the construction and leasing of this and sales of the units. Uh so that was highly advantageous. Uh job creation commitment was unacceptable. Um there was no information regarding uh jobs and job creation for the development plan.

And then uh benefits to adjacent development and neighborhood. Uh I did uh grade that as acceptable. Um so the proposal generally describes a connection to a development plan for the area that's fully compatible with a neighborhood. I know that there's not necessarily a development plan for the neighborhood, but I know that in that neighborhood we need housing and that's what we're we're looking for. So, I I

felt that was accept uh acceptable. So, based on that, my my recommendation is as we had made and and voted on was to forward this with a positive recommendation to the uh to the council.

And with regard to the schedule too, just because of some delays that we'll we will have to adjust some of the benchmarks. Um, so once we update those benchmarks, we'll make sure that we give you guys a copy of the new schedule.

That way we Yeah, that came along with the extension.

Yeah, because the original dates we've already gone past those dates. So, absolutely.

Yeah. So, definitely that would have to be updated.

Um, I think through looking looking through all of these um more or less every everybody was in line. I mean there were some people had uh different uh opinions in a couple of categories but I think basically it was pretty even across the board. Um I think for our part it's do we believe that this person um financially can move forward with this will complete the project. Um I think probably the most important thing

is is it advantageous? You know is it going to help the neighborhood? Is it going to help the city? um and will they follow through? And I I agree with Council Kadim. I believe that um that that will happen.

So, at this point, anything else you'd like to add?

Yeah. And and the only thing I I really do just want to I guess stress is the fact that had there been another uh bidder that potentially if the bidder actually submitted some additional documents that that individual would have been ranked higher than than this person who we know uh has a good track record in the city. So, it's just it's important for anybody that are bidding on any of our buildings or submitting

proposals that they just follow and and read and review the uh bid documents and the especially the comparative evaluation criteria because that's really what's going to drive a lot of our determination in terms of who we're going to give this to. So, um you know, outside of that, I I do feel like the individual has the ability to to deliver on the project as presented.

Yeah, I think in the past we've seen it as well when there's only one bidder um it's somewhat lacking. Um maybe that's something moving forward that could be stressed to that. You know, that's something we don't want to see. We want to act see we want them to respond appropriately. Everything is very well spelled out in the RFP. All the requirements, all the necessary documentation. So there's and and these

people aren't brand new to the game, so to speak. So I think moving forward, they need to um yeah, step up and and do it accordingly.

That's all I have.

So, we will uh be sending this to the uh sent sending the order to the full council to be adopted at the next city council meeting. Nothing else.

Motion to address.

I'm sorry.

We We certainly Did you want Do you want to open the price proposals?

Oh, do you have it?

We do.

Yeah. Get Get that on the record.

I obviously had to check to make sure everything was awesome.

You always retain the

Is that it?

Thoughts?

Thoughts?

I mean, ideally, um, property needs to be developed. Um, I mean, I can speak to some of what I think some of the concerns were behind even building a price for this and getting an evaluation done, the appraisal is that, um, compare comparatively um there hasn't been too many schools that have been sold in the area. So, um, it was challenging uh, just for the appraiser to to build a

quality appraisal off of that. The other part of that was at some point in time there was some um asbestous remediation that was done to the property and there was um some question as what had been done once the property was turned over to the private owner and then come back over. Um, so there's quite a bit of uh work that still needs to be done to the property and um

so do we know if that's going to um include more remediation in terms of asbestous? So we we aren't going to know we don't know and he was and the bidder is willing to assume that risk.

Do you want to just read what the evaluation was of the bid?

I was going to say the second page expenses. Mhm. If you can just read, I guess read the dollar amounts just so that the public is aware of what we're talking about.

Okay. So, the uh proposed purchase price for the school is $150,000 and the um property suggested minimum bid price. That's based on the evaluation that you folks that was based on the appraisal.

Um that's Yeah. So, 355,000 was the minimum bid price that they were suggesting on the appraisal. We and we did ask that if they were going to go lower than that they attach um the reasoning behind it.

Okay.

Madam Chair, if I may. Yes. So I'm not I'm not overly concerned. I mean typically when we start seeing a lot of these buildings going out for uh bid, you know, they always tend to come in lower than what the uh assessed appraised value is typically. Um especially the schools.

I remember a number of the schools that we had sold 5 $10,000 $25,000. we didn't get a whole lot for uh for those schools. So to actually see a I guess a proposed purchase price of $150,000 is significantly higher than what we've seen in the past, which um I'm actually pretty happy with. So, and there will be a substantial investment in um repairs and etc. So,

and they're prepared to move forward basically immediately. All but pretty much immediately.

Yes.

Okay.

So, the only thing I would ask uh through you, Madam Chair, is if can we just get a I know this is a little bit of a side uh but we did have another parcel that was actually uh sold in a very similar fashion. Can we just get a Can you request a status update on the purchase and sales for that? Because I'm I'm just curious on how long it's taken

us to turn around the purchase and sales so that we can get the property into the uh you know the the proposer's hands to actually start doing some work on the properties.

Okay. Please because I I don't think the um the last school on Hotwells has actually exchanged hands yet. I don't know that the PNS was actually completed. So um we could we could check with corporation council on that. They were they were executing the PNS.

Okay.

Yeah. because if not, that's something that they definitely need to uh I know you folks wouldn't have that that information, but through corporation counsel.

Yeah, we can send that to um some communication to corporation council in that regard.

Sure. U so moved.

Second. All in favor? I I just for clarification, we're requesting status update report.

Does anybody have anything else?

Motion to adjurnn.

Second. All in favor?

I.

Committee on real estate is adjourned.

Thank you.

Thank you.

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