[NOTE: These minutes are made available to the public prior to Artificial Surface Football Field Advisory Committee acceptance.]
The meeting was called to order by Chairperson Jon Cathcart at 7:32 pm. In attendance was Brian DiCicco, Sheila Suppicich, Ron Rodd, Bill Dest, Tony DiCiocco, Bonnie Therrien, Town Manager, Kathy Bagley, Director of Recreation and Parks, and Michael Turner, Director of Public Works. Councilor Matt Forrest came into the meeting for about 10 minutes.
Bonnie handed out copies of the responses to the Town's Request for Proposal (RFP) to each Committee member for their review. She explained that the Committee must determine a date for interviews, who will be interviewed, interview questions and a schedule for when they wish to make their final recommendations to the Town Council.
Tony DiCiocco asked that the Town staff review and speak to all of their references and give these comments back to the Committee. He also asked that the staff ask where these companies put in their fields in the New England area.
Ron Rodd discussed the lights. He would like the Committee to have a good faith discussion of whether there is going to be money for the lights, so that the Committee knows before the interviews whether lights will be a recommendation at all to the Town Council. He felt the Committee needed to make a decision on whether they were going to just concentrate on the fields or also pursue the light issues during the interviews. Bill Dest agreed with Ron.
Councilor Forrest said that the Town Council had asked the Committee to look at and make recommendations on the fields and the lights and the Committee should follow through on their charge.
Michael Turner explained a typical interview process for the RFP process and a possible timeline for the Committee.
It was agreed by the Committee that the group would meet again on April 22nd at 7 pm to decide who would be interviewed and that the tentative interview date would be April 28th at 6 pm. This would give enough time for the Committee members to review all of the proposals and make recommendations for who should be interviewed.
The Committee also discussed the need to have someone from the outside help them compare the proposals, as it is important that the members are comparing apples to apples and the proposals can be hard to compare. Bill Dest will look around to see if anyone he knows who is in this industry would be willing to help the Committee with this work.
A motion was made by Bill Dest to adjourn at 8:07 pm; seconded by Jon Cathcart. The vote was unanimous.