Berkeley Lab Update: Sign Up for City Session; Former Albany Official Hired to Study the Money

City meetings to collect public perspectives on whether Albany should one day host the second campus of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory begin this weekend, and the RSVP form has been posted online. 

Golden Gate Fields is for the project.

Meetings with are scheduled for Saturday, July 30, ; Sunday, July 31, from and ; and Monday, Aug. 1, from Meetings will be held at the .

According to Tiger's instructions, each of the four will include the same information; residents are asked to attend only one, and "each member of a household must register separately."

Non-residents hoping to attend are asked to fill out a separate form.

People are also invited to call 510-444-4567 to register for a session.

A meeting hosted by Berkeley Lab is to learn more about , and the developer's plans.

There will be  in the coming months. 

Tiger has a contract with the city, but will be paid entirely by owner .

FORMER ALBANY OFFICIAL WILL FOLLOW THE MONEY

At last week's City Council meeting, officials approved an agreement to bring on former Albany City Administrator Daren Fields, now a consultant with San Jose-based Management Partners, to figure out how the Berkeley Lab deal could affect Albany financially.

According to the July 18 staff report prepared by City Manager Beth Pollard, "The City currently receives a variety of taxes and special assessment revenues from GGF. As the proposal is developed, it is important for the City to have complete and accurate data and information on how the [project] ... would affect the budgets of the City and School District in Albany. Of paramount importance is how the guideline for at least replacement revenue from any future use(s) will be achieved with sufficient assurance."

Officials have said the track pays $1.7 million into city coffers, though these numbers may be slightly outdated. New figures are expected to be calculated in the coming months.

Fields will also look at the effect of possible revenue sharing with the City of Berkeley, because the racetrack property spans both cities.

The estimated cost of the consultant's services stand at $26,500, according to Pollard's report. The Stronach Group has agreed to reimburse the city for the fees and, according to Pollard, has its own economists on the case as well.

"The community’s guidelines for future use of the GGF [racetrack] property that emerged in 2010 from the City’s waterfront visioning process — Voices to Vision — included the desire for at least replacement revenue for the City and . The property owner is aware of this guideline. It is city staff’s understanding that the owner is engaging the services of economists who will analyze the projected public and private revenues from the project," Pollard wrote. 

According to Management Partners, while Fields worked in Albany, he helped spearhead the building of "a new child care center, teen center and joint Library/Community Center. The main shopping street, Solano Avenue, was also rebuilt during his tenure." 

The contract will allow for about 155 hours of consulting services "based on 110 hours of Mr. Fields (at $175/hour), 30 hours of a Management Analyst (at $75/hour) and 25 hours of my time (at $200/hour)," wrote Andrew S. Belknap, the firm's regional vice president, in a July 5 letter to Albany officials. 

The letter and Pollard's staff report are attached here as PDFs.

Read more about the process for selecting the second campus of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory on Albany Patch here.

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Everybody makes mistakes ... ! If there's something in this article you think should be corrected, or if something else is amiss, call editor Emilie Raguso at 510-459-8325 or email her at emilier@patch.com.