Harrison Avenue Project Moves Forward

Mayor Hal Cole summed it up as "the biggest facelift this city has seen in quite some time." In Tuesday's South Lake Tahoe City Council action, the final steps of the Harrison Avenue Project were unanimously approved after 20 years of planning, discussing and talking by the City, business owners, property owners and residents.

The project will start this spring with substantial completion by October 15, 2014. The wrap up of the project will be complete by December 1, 2014.

The Council took five different votes concerning the project:

1) A time sensitive vote was needed to either approve a low interest loan of $3,000,000 or to use reserve funds. The vote had to be made by noon Tuesday in order to lock in the 3.99% loan rate. A unanimous decision was made to get financing.

2) Since the vote on #1 was made the council had to convene as the Joint Powers Financing Authority to approve the other end of the financing decision which involved the structure of the loan by using the street as collateral. Unanimously approved.

3) There were six bids received for the Harrison Avenue Project. The highest was submitted by Prism Engineering for $4,352,060.45 and the lowest was from Sierra Nevada Construction for $3,814,007. The engineer's estimate was $3,335,000 so the lowest bid came in at 13% higher. The Council voted unanimously in favor of awarding the contract to Sierra Nevada Construction for $4,806,247 which included an additional $992,000 for five additives to the original plan.

4) The council also approved unanimously to award a project managing contract to CardnoENTRIX of management of the Harrison Avenue Project for $544,638.

5) A small portion of the land involved in the project is actually owned by El Dorado County and not the city. This will be used as "Champions Plaza" and located near Lakeview Commons. A Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) that construction will occur on the property was approved by both City Council and the Board of Supervisors.