The leader of the lone locally based development group to submit a proposal for Vero’s Three Corners waterfront project charged last week that the frontrunner in the competition had submitted a “pie in the sky” plan which “will never actually be implemented.
“What it is, is a masterful bait and switch,” island resident Don Urgo said. “They knew they could never deliver on a $500 million project. It would be impossible to do that.
“But they knew, if they presented it the very way they did, it emotionally would get everybody involved – the (Evaluation) Committee, the city officials, the City Council …”
Given one final opportunity to sell his updated Three Corners vision to the Vero Beach City Council, the 86-year-old Urgo – a longtime and successful hotel developer who owns homes at John’s Island and Marbrisa – used segments of his allotted two hours to attack his competition.
He also criticized the city’s execution of its carefully scripted process to select a developer to create a dining, retail, social and recreational hub on 38 acres at the west end of the 17th Street bridge.
He said his group’s plan most conformed to the requirements outlined in the city’s Request For Proposals.
The city’s seven-member Three Corners Evaluation Committee wasn’t overly impressed with it, however, even after Urgo’s team made improvements to the plan prior to its May 17 presentation.
The $194 million plan produced by Urgo’s Vista Blue Vero Beach Resort & Spa group was ranked No. 3 among the four reviewed by the committee, which earlier this month enthusiastically recommended to the council an ambitious $504 million proposal submitted by Indiana-based Clearpath Services.
The rankings obviously frustrated Urgo, who has had his eyes on the Three Corners property for years.
He opened his presentation to the council – at its May 21 special-call, behind-closed-doors meeting at City Hall – by saying he had become so disillusioned by “credibility” issues in the process that he was fully prepared to withdraw from the competition.
“That’s how strongly I feel about what I’m going to say,” Urgo said, adding that he changed his mind after a morning meeting with his partners, who convinced him to stay in the hunt until the council renders its verdict.
Urgo would go on to voice his complaints, starting with the committee’s No. 2 choice, the Pompano Beach-based SuDa, CREC Capital, Madison Marquette partnership.
He said he and his partners “believe very strongly” the SuDa group, which entered the competition late in the recruiting process, should have been immediately disqualified because it had initially submitted a “seriously incomplete proposal” that lacked the depth required in the city’s RFP.
According to Urgo, the bare-bones proposal SuDa submitted on the Feb. 1 deadline “contained nothing but a rendering” of the site plan created by urban planning guru Andres Duany for the city’s Three Corner Master Concept Plan, bolstered by a promise to add to it before its presentation to the Evaluation Committee.
“So, in our judgment, they never should’ve been in the contest,” he said, adding that SuDa unfairly benefited from seeing the proposals submitted by the other three groups.
“They were privy to what everybody else did,” Urgo continued. “They had the architectural plans of all three. They had the site plans. They had financial information.”
SuDa used the data, Urgo charged, to craft a more-desirable proposal before making its presentation to the committee, putting its competitors at a significant disadvantage.
That perceived flaw in the process, however, wasn’t his biggest gripe – or the main reason he believes the council should disqualify SuDa’s proposal.
Urgo alleged that one of SuDa’s partners, CREC Capital, had a direct connection to at least two executives at Colliers International, which the city hired to market its RFP for the Three Corners project.
Among the Colliers executives Urgo identified was Vero Beach resident Ken Krasnow, who, as the firm’s chairman of institutional investor services for the Florida region, headed the city’s marketing efforts.
“They had the relationship for years,” Urgo said, adding, “It’s abundantly clear (SuDa) should have been disqualified as soon as that information was presented. They should be disqualified today.”
Urgo said he tried for a month, via memoranda to city officials, to inquire about the apparent conflict, but they never responded.
City officials responded to Urgo and addressed his concerns in a May 20 email informing him that the city severed its relationship with Colliers immediately upon learning of the conflict in March.
In that same correspondence, the city also rejected Urgo’s contention that SuDa’s initial plan was insufficient and should have been immediately disqualified, stating that “it was determined that all proposals met the minimum requirements outlined in the RFP.”
The city’s email to Urgo also stated that, after the Evaluation Committee’s first meeting, the questions raised during that session were sent to the four development groups in advance of their presentations to the committee on May 13 and 17.
The groups each had the “same opportunity to make clarifications to their original proposal,” as well as to “view the other proposals and make changes, which you did” prior to meeting with the committee, the email stated.
City Manager Monte Falls said last week that SuDa “did not get any upper hand because of the Colliers connection” to CREC Capital, adding that the conflict didn’t impact the committee’s rankings.
Reached by phone Friday, SuDa managing partner Gaurav Butani said his group had “nothing further to add” to the city’s response.
Krasnow, meanwhile, denied there was any favoritism shown to SuDa during the proposal-submission phase of the process, but he said the city responded appropriately to the perceived conflict.
“CREC was not involved when we first reached out to SuDa, which was our main point of contact,” Krasnow said. “SuDa brings in different partners for different opportunities. As soon as the bid was in, we saw CREC was part of the group, and we notified the city and said we should not be part of it.”
Krasnow said he knew “somebody might look at it the wrong way, so we stepped out.”
Clearly, Urgo looked at SuDa and saw plenty wrong – a no-frills, initial proposal that he believes the city should not have accepted, and a too-cozy relationship with Colliers.
Then, being forced to follow SuDa and its impressively revamped proposal on the committee’s schedule, he said, put his Vista Blue group at an undeserved disadvantage.
“It kind of sucked the air out of the room,” Urgo said, telling the council that the committee members, during their public deliberations, didn’t say much about the Vista Blue plan.
“It was all SuDa against Clearpath,” he added.
While Urgo praised Clearpath’s vision – “They did an absolutely magnificent job,” he said – he warned that the city will never see the Three Corners development as it is presented in the group’s proposal.
He also mocked the committee, saying its members were so enamored with Clearpath’s proposal that they became willing accomplices in what he believes will be an inevitable “switch” to a scaled-down version of the plan.
He cited the committee’s willingness to give Clearpath a chance to address during its negotiations with the city any concerns about the size of its investment and ability to deliver on its promise.
“This is such an aspirational opportunity, we have no choice,” Urgo said, mimicking the conversation of Clearpath supporters on the committee. “Yes, it’s considered the highest risk to us, but because it’s so aspirational, we have to try.
“And, in fact, if we don’t succeed – six months, a year from now – we’ll go on to the second one.”
Urgo was referring to the city’s plan to move on to its No. 2-ranked proposal if negotiations with the developer of its top choice fails to produce a lease agreement.
That’s likely another reason Urgo, who sees serious financial challenges in Clearpath’s plan, targeted SuDa, which currently stands between his group and the chance to be the city’s Plan B.
By going on the attack during his presentation to the council, however, Urgo might’ve harmed his cause.
“I think you would have best been served to come into this room today and take a positive tone on what you guys can deliver to the city, versus coming in and criticizing and taking shots at your competition,” Vero Beach Mayor John Cotugno told Urgo. “The best thing to do is sell who you are.”
