TO: Mayor and City Council
FROM: Philippe Eskandar, City Manager
BY: Amber Shah, Parks & Public Works Director/City Engineer DATE: June 27, 2025
SUBJECT: APPROVAL OF AMENDMENT NO. 4 WITH ECONOMICS,
INC. FOR SOLID WASTE CONSULTING SERVICES IN THE
AMOUNT OF $99,304 AND APPROVAL OF A FY 24-25
BUDGET AMENDMENT IN THE AMOUNT OF $111,550
STRATEGIC PLAN CRITICAL SUCCESS FACTORS
Efficient, Responsive, and Effective City Services
Fiscally Responsible and Transparent City Government
BACKGROUND
On January 1, 2022, SB 1383, California’s Short-Lived Climate Pollutant Reduction Act, went into effect aiming to reduce organic waste disposal in landfills with new state-mandated solid waste regulations on all jurisdictions.
In 2023, with an existing solid waste agreement that was not SB 1383 compliant and set to expire before the end of the year, the City retained Economics, a solid waste subject matter expert, to assist with the negotiation of a new solid waste agreement with the City’s waste hauler at the time, Athens Services. As negotiations with Athens evolved from securing a shortterm extension to their existing agreement to working to negotiate a new SB 1383 compliant agreement, Amendment No. 1 with Economics was approved on October 11, 2023, increasing the compensation to $210,000. This enabled Economics to perform services crucial to the negotiations, including valuable analysis of the existing agreement and assisting the City with overall negotiations given the complexity of solid waste agreements, particularly a new agreement incorporating the necessary SB 1383 provisions. Amendment No. 2 with Economics was approved in December 2024, extending the term for an additional year through December 31, 2025.
Gretchen Shepherd Romey, Mayor
Tony Chou, Vice Mayor
Hunter Chang, Council Member
John Chou, Council Member
Calvin Lo, Council Member
Exclusive negotiations with Athens were ongoing for more than a year, with significant challenges in securing terms that met regulatory compliance and provided a defensible rate structure for residents. Therefore, at its February 28, 2025, meeting, the City Council approved Amendment No. 3 with Economics, for additional scope of services to include the development of a Request for Proposals (RFP) to allow for a competitive solicitation process for solid waste services. In addition to the development of the RFP, Amendment No. 3 also included providing assistance to the City with the rollout of various SB 1383 compliant programs that would be included in the new solid waste agreement. The table below provides a summary of the contract actions:
The cost for the development of the RFP included in Amendment No. 3 was provided with the understanding that the RFP process would take place over approximately 6-9 months (which was already a compressed schedule for this type of RFP compared to the industry average of 18-24 months) with the intent that the process would have concluded prior to December 31, 2025, when Athens Services’ contract was due to expire.
However, on March 24, 2025, the City received a letter from Athens Services stating the company was exercising its right to terminate its existing contract and would be ceasing all operations in the City on May 30, 2025. As a result, the City had to expedite the RFP process in order to secure a new waste hauling contract within eight (8) weeks, a substantially shorter timeline than originally anticipated, to ensure continuity of service. Due to the extraordinary circumstances and the significant amount of work that had to be completed in such a short time frame, greater costs were incurred than originally expected and an additional contract amendment is now necessary. However, the City will be reimbursed $225,000 under the terms of the new waste hauling agreement with Valley Vista Services.
DISCUSSION
As a result of Athens Services termination of its agreement with 60-day notice to the City, the necessity of securing a new waste hauling agreement that would go into effect on May 31, 2025, required the City to complete the Request for Proposals process in a significantly shorter timeline than is generally the case, given their complexity. As such, Economics’ efforts related to the development of the RFP were drastically compressed from several Contract Action Date End Date Amount Total NTE
Entered Professional
Services Agreement
05/22/2023 12/31/2024 $30,000 $30,000
Amendment No. 1 10/11/2023 12/31/2024 $180,000 $210,000 Amendment No. 2
(term extension)
12/11/2024 12/31/2025 $0 $210,000
Amendment No. 3 02/28/2025 12/31/2025 $198,910 $408,910 months into several weeks. In addition, the streamlined RFP incorporated a modified Q&A process that consisted of additional meetings with each of the six (6) prospective haulers who submitted letters of intent to participate in the RFP process and resulted in 160 questions that the City responded to during meetings and in writing and made certain revisions to (a) the draft contract contained in the RFP and (b) certain proposal forms via the issuance of seven (7) addenda to the RFP, all of which took considerable time and effort in the shortened timeline. The extraordinary circumstances and the substantial workload required within a short timeframe led to higher-than-anticipated costs, necessitating an additional contract amendment. However, under the new terms for the waste hauling agreement with Valley Vista Services, the City will be reimbursed $225,000.
As the RFP process has now concluded, the support of Economics services is still necessary to assist the City during the transition period with the City’s new waste hauler, Valley Vista Services (VVS), and with upcoming regulatory compliance matters such as the City’s required annual reporting to CalRecycle.
The amount originally included in Amendment No. 3 for services related to SB 1383 compliance is not changed by the proposed Amendment No. 4 but the scope of services has been revised to prioritize critical items needed during the initial implementation of the new agreement with VVS, and in particular to update attachments to the new agreement to align with the City Council approved two-stream collection system.
When drafting the contract and issuing the RFP it was not envisioned that a proposal would be received and approved for two-stream collection and processing. For most jurisdictions, CalRecycle requires a three-stream collection system for SB 1383, however a jurisdiction may implement a twostream collection system if the collected materials are brought to a CalRecycle designated High Diversion Organics Waste Processing Facility (HDOWPF). A two-stream collection system was approved with all collected materials from San Marino being transported to Valley Vista’s Grand Central Recycling and Transfer Station, a CalRecycle designated HDOWPF, for processing. Therefore, Attachment B (Scope of Work), Attachment N (Charaterizations of Divertable Materials and MSW) and other attachments to the contract need to be updated to include a two-stream collection system. Economics will update Attachments B and N, as well as other related attachments, to include the parameters and requirements for Valley Vista’s implementation of a two-stream collection system in San Marino through the use of the City-directed change in scope provisions of the agreement.
FISCAL IMPACT & PROCUREMENT REVIEW
The adopted FY 2024-25 budget includes $240,000 in Account #101-40-4104- 0000 (Contract Engineering Services). Of this line-item total, $200,000 was budgeted for Economics’ services, prior to the accelerated RFP process needing to occur. As a result of this process, a total of $111,550 must be appropriated to cover the costs associated with the accelerated RFP to Account #101-40-4104-0000 in FY 2024-25. Ultimately, these costs are reimbursable per the City’s agreement with Valley Vista Services up to $225,000. As such, there will be no net impact to the City’s funds as a result of the budget amendment.
LEGAL REVIEW
The City Attorney's office has reviewed and approved as to form.
RECOMMENDATION
Staff recommends that the City Council approve Amendment No. 4 to the agreement with Economics, Inc. for solid waste consulting services, increasing the contract amount by $99,304, and approve a budget amendment to the FY 2024-25 budget appropriating $111,550 into Account #101-40-4104-0000. If the Council concurs with staff’s recommendation, an appropriate motion would be:
“I move to approve Amendment No. 4 to the agreement with Economics, Inc. for solid waste consulting services increasing the contract amount by $99,304, authorize the City Manager to execute the Amendment on behalf of the City, and approve a budget amendment to the FY 24-25 budget appropriating $111,550 into Account #101-40-4104-0000.”
ATTACHMENTS
1. Draft Amendment No. 4 with Economics
2. Original Agreement with Economics and Amendments No. 1, 2, and 3.
3. Proposal from Economics Inc. with Revised Scope of Work