Yeah, we're ready.

Yes, good evening.

Welcome to the committee on finance ranking room meeting.

It is Tuesday, February 10th, 2026.

It is 532 p.m.

I am the province councilwoman Joanne Ryan.

Chairwoman Ryan.

Thanks, Chairman Taylor.

Counselor and Wall.

Present Councilwoman Gray is asking Councillor Sanchez.

We have four present and one absent, we have a clock.

Thank you very much.

Let the record reflect that we are joined by Council Woman.

Jill Davidson, who is our newest member.

Thank you for joining us.

And we also have uh Kenny Shavarini uh our solicitor.

So joining us.

I've been here since okay.

Um may I uh please have a motion to take matters uh one and three wave the reading and take them out of order.

One and three.

May I have that motion?

So vote moved by uh councilwoman and section by councilman tailor.

All in favor, aye, opposed, aye, second motion carries.

Item one and three on item one to continue that, and that leaves both matters on uh by request of of council uh folks on may I have that motion continue.

Motion motion made by councilwoman and wall seconded by councilwoman Sanchez, all in favor, aye, all opposed, I have it, motion parties item one and three are continued.

Okay, so that brings us to item two, madam sir.

Could you kindly read item two into the record?

Resolution authorizing approval of the following contract award by the Board of Contract and Supply in accordance with section 21 through 26b of the Code of Ordinances, Lapfield LLC, 2,894,400, Department of Public Property.

So most of you know, um we have been working with PPSD on multiple phases of school construction and um to date our OPM, owner's project manager for that has been down to construction.

So you're used to interacting with Downs on the projects.

Downs has been managing all of the projects through phase three.

And I think we've talked previously about how the city was gonna put out an RFP to bring in an OPM for phase four.

Right?

Phase four construction is another you know, hundreds of millions of dollars of construction for the last phase of projects that hopefully will get us to a place that all schools have newer likeness seats for all kids in PBSD.

So we put out an RFP, we received nine proposals.

We led an interdisciplinary team of folks to evaluate those proposals that included my team from public property representation from PBSD, um Kyle of Dalbada from the council staff participated.

We all evaluated the proposals, we brought four veters in for interviews, um, and then we selected three finalists that went to price competition.

Um and so uh left fields, the group that has been selected.

I will let Chris, who is our kind of executive sponsor for the company, um, talk about their experience, but we're really excited.

Downs is going to continue to manage the scope of work that they are managing, um, but this will give us another set of resources as we advance this next phase of project score.

Um can I just ask is there any uh integration?

Downs does their thing, and then these folks are doing their project management.

Um there will be integration in that we have to manage budgets very quickly, very closely because um you know overruns in the first three phases of construction could affect phase four, and so one thing we'll need to be working on is making sure that doesn't happen.

Um there's also um integration as it relates to swing space because this team will need downs to stay on track with the projects they're managing to make sure that we can have swing spaces available for the new schools.

Outside of that, um they will generally work separately.

Okay, thank you very much.

Kyle, anything you want to say about the process before we move it over to Crystal?

Yeah, please let's swear pilot thank you.

I do pay for that.

Uh Kyle Go, right?

For the province of the council.

Um obviously town.

No, no, no, that's that's our uh chairwater, counselors.

Um I want to one thank uh Chief Walkins for our agent in this process being a member of or a deputy representative of the council on the Board of Contract and Supply, and as well as a member of the school building committee.

Um I was uniquely positioned to be you know part of this process, and I think Courtney was very open from the beginning on a looking in.

Um, you know, as early as formal questions and making sure council priorities were asked, such as the carbon control commands and our climbing goals, uh part of the gradient selection process, debriefing.

I was included in from the beginning to the very end.

Um rationale on the selection.

Um I personally felt that we had a finalist group that was very technically sound.

And any one of them would have been a great selection, um, but when we moved on to the call's proposals and we got the financials, um, I think Leftfield was the approving financial decision for the city.

And I think Crystal can get into that a little bit more, but from beginning to the end, I think so about stakeholders process, so I would support this decision.

Thank you very much.

Absolutely.

Okay, Mr.

Spiegel.

Good evening, uh, Council Chair.

You don't have to stand up unless you'd like to.

You know what?

A little Italian better standard.

My name is Bruce Spiegel, the project executive with Leftfield Project Management.

Latfield project management is an owner's project management firm.

That is all we do.

We are not an engineering firm, we know the construction firm.

All we do is owners project management.

Um a little bit of a different business model because we've never had offices in our 17-year existence.

We um generally hire very senior level people, and I'm proud to report that every single member of the team that's going to sign this project, has at least a decade of experience with the K-12 schools in New England.

The core team is here in Rhode Island with me working on projects such as from South Kingstown Province Bandington.

Um, a little bit about me personally as a project executive.

I'm a father with two children in the Rhode Island Public School system.

I grew up in New York City in the environment in a small apartment.

Um I love would absolutely love to be working with some confidence.

Um I have dinner here, I'll always park my car.

Um I just had dinner at Parkside the other day, and I parked my car all the way on Dorms just so I can change the wall for the city and get a little bit of that energy that the city gives you again.

So I'm super excited to hopefully be working with you guys out of this project.

Our focus is pretty simple, it's deliver the best value for the constituents and the taxpayers to make sure your goals are being met.

We would encourage you to contact any of our princes to vouch for how hard we work on your behalf.

And I'm happy to answer any questions at all about our business model, about these projects in general and how we're going to do that.

Great.

And ask any question you'd like to anyone who's a business point.

I also want to well I did pre-ask Kyle's question, but I'll just ask it again.

Kyle's Jen's.

Can you talk about your ability to comply with our carbon neutral buildings ordinance and like your experience student carbon neutral buildings?

So sure.

So we we actually have a net zero building that we're currently built in Brooklyn, Massachusetts that we wrapped up.

That was done with one of the design build firms actually that's working on the project.

Of course, all of our projects have to comply with the Northeast Collaborative for high performing schools as part of the Library University process.

We have a track record of the under 30 for our energy use index with all of our projects right now.

We are doing a geothermal well in South Kingstown as part of that project.

And even though that project will not be able to be fully geothermal due to cost, we it's we developed a scope that would allow that geothermal to power one of the CTE classrooms as a teaching mechanism for this project.

So we also, as part of our staff, are mechanical, electrical, and funding expert.

MEP systems are incredibly technical and complicated.

I will never pretend to be an expert, which is why we have one on our team.

And we've actually been very successful just recently in South Kingstown, being able to pull federal tax incentives into that project to allow us to program money into the education program in the school.

So we have experts on our staff that this is what they know how to do.

I'm not one of those, but I'd love to introduce you to Brendan and Brendan can walk you through some of that over the end.

Awesome.

Sounds good.

Thank you.

Thank you, Chairwoman.

Um, no questions.

Thank you.

Um, what was your name again?

Chris?

Chris for coming and presenting and sharing information about your company.

Um my only comment is to the administration.

I think uh this was a good decision uh to get possible new eyes on the work.

Um thank you, obviously to Dow Constructions for all the work that they have done and continue to do.

Uh this is uh massive projects uh that are going to impact and hopefully help a lot of students uh of our city and um anything that we could do to make these projects uh more efficient and more responsible for the uh people that put us in these positions the better for all of us.

And uh if we could be of any assistance, definitely uh don't hesitate to reach out with this.

Good, we'll start.

Question good?

So you had uh mentioned a number of uh municipalities that you've worked in on East Greenwich, South Kingstown, Barrington is what I wrote down.

I missed the others.

Uh we are currently in North Providence, wrapping up construction on the schools there.

Those will be done in time for opening this year.

We are working in Barrington, Rhode Island on uh three or four projects there.

Those will be wrapped up for 2029 school year.

Uh we're also working in South Kingstown.

We're currently in Steele on that project.

Just one we're happy to report that we just signed a guaranteed maximum price there for two million dollars on the budget.

We are working with East Greenwich, we've just signed a GMP there on your budget as well.

We are working in Warwick, and we are working in uh Westworld, who recently uh had successful bond referendum for the West River projects.

Great.

And just a timeline on when you anticipate getting started on this point.

Yeah, so we're eager to jump in with both feet.

There is a lot of work here on very tight structures with the rest of the backgrounds that we need to manage very closely.

I have spoken with J Sante at Downs, he's a colleague of mine, and uh Joe's going to be helpful in helping us sort of fast track the approval figuring out how to handle the approvals, how to get through the boards, things like that.

I have a lot of respect for Joe and what he's gonna be able to build here as I'm trying to do the same thing, do a successful deputy.

Wonderful.

And you have obviously contemplated on community engagement, same kind of model that uh Downs has used.

So with no disrespect to my to my colleagues at Downs, I'd like to think that's one of our things that we do best as community engagement.

Uh perfect example would be South Kingstown.

South Kingstown is a town that uh previously rejected several bond referendums in that town.

We uh we had a grassroots community engagement uh work that we did there.

I once spoke to booster groups that we spoke to uh the Elks Club, I once spoke to the athletic boosters.

I once spoke to the athletic posters, however, I could to make sure that we were getting the right feedback to make sure that they have the right project that they wanted.

Members of my staff are also bilingual that we've assigned to this project as well, so we'll be able to put all of our information in our meeting notes in other languages in order to help out, making sure that people understand what we're trying to put out there.

And we also engage a company to produce videos.

We've just recently done one for Barrington, Rhode Island, which talks about the RAM process, which talks about how decisions are made in these projects, and eventually as you go through the project, it talks about how the students are affected, where they will swing.

We found this to be a really good tool that allows council members or anybody else to kind of get the word out to their constituents.

We believe in meeting people where they are.

It's very difficult for most people to attend a committee meeting, especially during the workday, with everything else that's going on in most people's lives.

So we try to meet people where we are.

Some examples of that that we did in Barrington, where they would have part of the fall fundraising, they have an approval class and they have 5K.

I was out there with the video board plugged in, willing to talk to anybody that wanted to come up and talk to me and show them the plans.

That's the type of things that we do.

And I really believe that in order to get a great project.

Everybody needs to be rolling in the same direction, and the way to do that is by doing honest and transparent communications.

Great.

You spoke about integration with Downs.

How will you integrate with Ride?

How does that work?

Well, we have a lot of experience with Rod.

I've been building schools here in Murano for seven years.

So our anticipator, our anticipation is working with Rod every step of the way so that they are well aware of the decision-making process and that our approvals don't get hung up by them not being included.

We found that lessons learned in other projects that if you do not include Ryan early and often and allow them a voice at the table, that they have the potential to hold up your projects, putting them in a place where you might be schedules.

And of course, when we're talking about 400 million dollars, every month of escalation costs hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Real money project.

So the sooner we can get in the ground, the sooner we the sooner we can get a ride approval means the sooner we can get in the ground, means the better value we're getting for the downside.

Well said.

I can just speak to my experience with Downs on through this process.

I've had two uh schools on Pleasant View, which is completed on Mount Pleasant, which we're in the middle of, and their engagement has been wonderful in the community on that project.

And it makes a world of difference.

And I expect that you're stating you testified today that you uh wonderful.

You're on the that you can beat down, so I'm gonna hold you to that one.

Um coordinating, integrating with Ride, coordinating with uh Downs on their schedule for um swing space, as well as as the finance department, the city and province.

We all need to be working hand in hand.

And my experience with Ride, our finance team in Downs has been wonderful.

And it is the integration and the team's work that has been forward, that's been a measure of success.

Um I will look for the same thing with you.

All right.

Um anybody else?

Any questions, concerns?

Sure.

May I ask a question?

This is unusual, but yes.

If I may.

Um Chris, if you can talk a little bit more about your portfolio that's currently active in other districts that we're in the state.

Can you talk about your staff model specifically for province and dedicated staffers specifically?

Yes, that's a great question.

So we have a full-time um senior project manager sign to this project.

You have three project executives that are assigned to different phases of this project, myself being the one who's in charge of engagement on the project.

We have another one that's only overseeing the RIG process because of how cumbersome that can be at times.

And we have another project executive that's covering the design process as well, because they're a former architect, so they have a good idea of how they can do that.

Our senior project manager, uh, Andy Vowe is a 20-year veteran of building schools here in New England.

Um, Andy is incredibly detailed-oriented, and he's going to be able to asset to this project.

We also have a project coordinator, a junior project manager assigned this projects full-time as well.

So, between all of us, really, it's more than four full-time equivalents, but in terms of basic full-time equivalents are about three and four.

Any other questions?

One more final chair will move.

So during the process, we received technical bids.

Again, we ended up with a group of finalists that were in proximity and go, oh great.

Okay, before we go there, before we go there, if I may.

Thank you.

Mr.

Spiegel, thank you very much for your presentation.

And I just had one wrap-up question for you, and that is you stated that you're excited about Providence.

You parked at Darwin's and walked over to Parkview.

We've all made that trip.

But tell me why this project is an exciting opportunity for you and your firm.

So, first of all, it's a challenge.

We like to think that we handle the most challenging projects in New England.

All of our work here, with the exception of one project in the bowl, is a multi-project program.

Some of them as meant to stop projects at the same time.

So these are the types of things that seasoned 20 years here as project managers with myself, we vote to do as a challenge and do that for our careers.

But more importantly, I grew up in the city.

I love being in the city and the New York City school system.

And I know how important these spaces can be, especially when for some students, you know, these eight hours a day that they're in school, it's really where they get to be kids themselves.

So that's my personal opinion on it.

And then I said one last, but I got another last one, and that is you mentioned that you've got a couple of other municipalities that you're currently working with, and I just want to make sure that the staff and the capacity that you have to direct toward our projects will not uh be compromised in any way.

So your full time equivalents are only assigned to this project, but we're not assigned to others.

Okay, awesome.

Thank you very much.

Anything else from Mr.

Spiegel from committee members?

That's great.

Okay.

Council members?

I will make may I just uh thank you, thank you, Chairman.

Um