City Moves One More Step On Downtown Parking Garage
By Arnoldo Mata
Edinburg TX – The Edinburg City Council voted to move forward with a next step in building a parking garage near the Hidalgo County Courthouse during last night’s City Council meeting. At this point, the city acted to qualify five architectural firms to work on and submit proposed designs and costs for the structure. The firms are not being paid for this part of the process and are doing it at their own expense.
According to city staff, this is part of a multi-step process to get through in making a final decision on actually building the parking garage. The Council has been working on this project for several years, including a bond package that was approved to finance the work in
In their recommendations to the Council, city staff said the city is seeking a Design-Build contractor to design and construct a new parking garage to be located at 201 N. Closner Blvd, just north of the new Hidalgo County Courthouse, on an existing surface parking lot at the intersection of W. McIntyre, N. Closner, and W. Kuhn St. The anticipated completion date is October 2026.
Five firms submitted their information for this part of the process. The five firms would then be allowed to submit for proposals. This would include architectural drawings and design plans along with cost estimates. From those five future presentations, the city would select one firm to sign a final contract with for the construction. Staff pointed out that this part of the work is being done at the firms expense with no commitment from the city.
The five firms presented by staff were:
1. Broaddus Construction
2. Catamount Constructors
3. Econ Group, LLC
4. Gerlach Builders, LLC
5. Holchemont, Ltd.
As soon as Mayor Richard Garza Jr. opened the floor for motions, Council member Jason De Leon moved to deny approving the request.
“I’m not necessarily against the parking garage for the County, De Leon explained. “Some of my concerns with the parking garage is that as soon as the County moves into the courthouse, they’ve already outgrown it. So to me, by having the parking garage there, it’s already clustered. I’d rather use the monies that we have allocated for parking, I’d rather buy a bunch of property and make extra parking for the community and use that county lot for the county to have more room to grow.”
“I’ve been thinking about this one for a while,” Council member David White said. “I don’t think this Council’s been transparent on what’s been happening with the parking garage. This started as a three-story structure with businesses on the bottom. I think it was Like 12 million dollars, we went out for bonds and money to be dedicated and all this stuff. Now all of a sudden, we’re talking about, and I gotta watch how I say this because a lot of this discussion is done in the back where it’s not open to the public.”
It was not clear whether White was referring to discussions in executive session or in private discussions.
“I can say this. that’s not the edifice that this council is looking at here today. And I think we have issues with what we told the public we were going to do. What we wanted to do and the funding that was going to be done and the facade that was going to be built. I think we’ve changed everything, and I think we’re wrong.”
“I think we need to bring it back out here in discussion before we bring this exactly. Let’s have a presentation on this next meeting so we can let everybody know what we’ve been talking about in the back.”
“We have a fiduciary responsibility to do something with (the funds)” Mayor Garza said. “I concur with Councilman de Leon in terms of what initially had been put out there, but obviously that was a design that we don’t have the funds for. We have to stay within our budget. From my standpoint, I think this method that staff has been proposing, which is a design-build, is probably a way to get there.”
Staff explained that this is a design-build process which includes a team of contractors and architects and engineers as part of the team that will be selected. The firms will have to work with the funds that are currently available from the bond package.
Garza explained that, “As part of this, if we were to move forward with this, we’re not signing a contract with anybody. We’re just essentially saying these firms are qualified to submit a proposal for us to consider.” Once the firms submit their proposals, they would be evaluated and ranked and present to the Council.
Garza asked what options were available if the Council did not proceed with the project.
“So if we don’t do anything, Ms. Ayala (city manager)? Garza asked. “We have six million dollars. So what’s going to happen with that money? We can’t do anything else with it. Bonds were issued to build a parking garage. That decision was made prior to me being on here and prior to Councilman Diaz and Councilman De Leon. What’s going to happen with those funds?”
Ayala explained that they would need to confer with the bond council to determine if the city would have any options for alternate uses.
Garza explained that the initial move to build the parking garage was done to entice Hidalgo County to keep the Courthouse in Edinburg when the County was considering moving it to another city. The city initially committed to invest $30 million. However, that commitment was reversed at some point by a prior council. However, in a subsequent agreement, the County gave the site to the city to build a parking garage, and the Edinburg Economic Development Corporation issued bonds for the parking garage.
“Personally, I just feel we have a responsibility to move forward it,” Garza added. “I really believe that this design-build services is a way for us to look and make sure we stay within budget. And there’s a process involved. Tonight, if we were to proceed forward with this, we’re just selecting firms to submit proposals. But, for those of you that are looking to deny it, what is the plan then? Do we, y’all not want to do it, or?”
“So, I guess my only concern is that I can only go off of what I see. So, historically here, it just seems like parking garages do not work here in the Rio Grande Valley,” de Leon said. “It might work in San Antonio, it might work in Houston, it might work in Dallas, but it does not work here.”
“I feel like it is already crowded in the parking garage. There’s lawyers who literally want to have their office away from the courthouse because they don’t want to be in the traffic and, uh, uh, going around the courthouse. The courthouse is already clustered. Give that, that land for the county so they can grow, so they can have more courts there.”
“We can buy properties up, build more parking with those $6 million, and that way the county has more room to grow. That’s my only concern. I’m not saying I’m against the parking garage. I’m not saying I’m against parking. I do think we do need the parking. We do need to address it But I feel like we need to also decide on what we want downtown to be. It’s never going to be an entertainment district with it being that clustered. By making more parking, more land spreading things out, we can get to that entertainment feel of a city in the downtown area, so I’m not against the parking. I’m just simply against the parking garage being there where it’s at.”
The Council discussed some issues with the design, specifically whether there would be commercial/retail space included in the design. Staff clarified that that was not part of the requirements, yet. That would come in the next phase. There was also a discussion about overall need for parking for the downtown area and whether there would be a charge for parking.
Edinburg resident Fern McClaugherty spoke to the Council on the issue, saying “My thing is, and originally there was gonna be shops down there for the people to shop in, which is a bunch of bull. Have you seen the ladies with their heels? They walk to the courthouse. They’re not gonna walk to the Citrus. They’re not gonna walk to what used to be Bealls. What shops do we have for the people to go shopping? That is a bunch of bull. The county has six parking lots. Five of them, they have locked down and a guard. ‘Why are you coming in here?’ Okay, the same thing with this garage. That is not for the citizens here in Edinburg. We will not be using it. I guarantee you they will lock it down. Mark that down so when it happens, you can say, oh Fern was right. So my thing is, I like the idea of finding some property somewhere nearby or whatever.”
The Mayor called for a vote on the motion, which failed. Subsequently, there was a motion to proceed to allow the five firms to submit proposals, which passed.