OldGray 320i I was thinking the same thing. In my state Professional Services are exempt from the competitive bidding process, so I checked and sure enough they are exempt in California as well. Given the exemption mentioned above the county board was well within the law to do as they did. One may not like it but they did nothing illegal.
I'm not trying to be disrespectful of the journalists that are reporting on this story but they either didn't take the time to find out details they should have or omitted the information because it makes a better story. As I don't know them I'd prefer to think it was the former.
Anyone here consider the possibility that the county wants the track to fail? How better than to hand it off to incompetence?
Does anyone know if there are live explosives on the Western edge of the track that was part of the military base ?
I think there were signs saying do not enter......
Like many places the people who bought the new expensive houses around the track were probably told by the real estate agents that the track will be gone soon !
That thought ahd crossed my mind.................because I'm cynical......maybe they do want it to fail so that it can be sold to a developer so the county can reap in more tax dollars. The more logical me says if that was so they'd not have contracted with a insider.
Coupla things:
First off, how do we know this guy is an enemy of racing? After all, his kid died at a race. He didn't die from a racecar falling out of the sky and hitting him in his back yard. If my kid died from a preventable accident at Dodger Stadium, I might sue the Dodgers but it wouldn't make me hate professional baseball as an institution. Perhaps he feels his group can do it better and prevent reoccurrence.
Secondly, any group of rich property owners grousing about their proximity to a racetrack will scream bloody murder at the prospect of developers building 100 "luxury estates." Any developer wishing to exploit that property would face a juggernaut of red tape and town meetings. They would need deeeep pockets to keep themselves alive while waiting possibly more than a decade before the first shovelfull of earth gets moved. So many state and local agencies plus citizens groups would be involved.
Lastly, Laguna Seca spends most of its time empty. Think about it. There are perhaps 250-300 days a year where nothing happens there. So, while locals may grouse (and don't think all of them are), they know it's not going to become truly open space. It's either gonna be a track or a development. In my opinion, most of them will choose the status quo. I wouldn't jump on the "death of" bandwagon yet.
In reply to Jerry From LA :
I could be way wrong, but if they are 250-300 days of being a ghost town I would be surprised. Just a quick glance at their events calendar show a ton in November and December.
captainawesome said:
In reply to Jerry From LA :
I could be way wrong, but if they are 250-300 days of being a ghost town I would be surprised. Just a quick glance at their events calendar show a ton in November and December.
Laguna Seca is basically never empty. Christmas Day, New Year's Day, stuff like that, but the track is booked pretty much every other day of the year. Ballpark, I'd guess 10% of the year is pro racing events, 10-20% is major corporate stuff (AMG/Mercedes have rented it a lot this year), 5% is special one-off stuff (the Turkey Trot on Thanksgiving, there are a couple bicycle events), there are some days it's closed for track maintenance (they're resurfacing it next year so it'll be closed for a month or so) and the rest of it is club racing and track days.
Blank spots on the calendar are usually private days that they're not advertising who has it.
The Camping area is also a State Park , not sure how much more is State park but thats probably a "hands off" area for development.
captainawesome said:
In reply to Jerry From LA :
I could be way wrong, but if they are 250-300 days of being a ghost town I would be surprised. Just a quick glance at their events calendar show a ton in November and December.
I'm talking about events of the magnitude that would cause a disruption, noise and/or traffic-wise. A road test or a PCA meet would barely register as either.
In reply to Tom1200 :
There are several problems, one being what appears to be a conflict of interest with the board member who received thousands from the A&D guy. Ethically a government official should "recuse" themselves from the vote.
The guy apparently has ties with several of the board members, which, while not illegal in any sense, nevertheless creates the appearance of a conflict if they have any influence in selecting the bid.
Finally, the 2nd article notes that a competing bid was only $109k higher from the group that puts on the Long Beach Grand Prix.
I didn't catch what type of solicitation it was, or what the criteria were for selection, but given that environmental and safety concerns would have to be part of the SOW, I have a hard time believing selection was based was lowest cost. As a professional services agreement, how are they going to administer and comply with regulations with which they have no experience? This isn't occupancy or F&B, it's dealing with track safety, hazardous chemicals (oil & gas, etc), noise regs, training and certification for course workers, etc. Those are all things management has to oversee, and A&D will be clueless.
The liability to the county if anything is missed would be too high to have an inexperienced firm run the track.
There is WAY to much out of kilter for it to be a legitimate award.
Jerry From LA said:
captainawesome said:
In reply to Jerry From LA :
I could be way wrong, but if they are 250-300 days of being a ghost town I would be surprised. Just a quick glance at their events calendar show a ton in November and December.
I'm talking about events of the magnitude that would cause a disruption, noise and/or traffic-wise. A road test or a PCA meet would barely register as either.
Trust me, the locals definitely care about noise even from a PCA track day.
amg_rx7
SuperDork
11/22/19 12:03 p.m.
Jerry From LA said:
Coupla things:
First off, how do we know this guy is an enemy of racing? After all, his kid died at a race. He didn't die from a racecar falling out of the sky and hitting him in his back yard.
No. One of his sons died driving his suv on the service road. Not racing. The other son was apparently traumatized for years from the accident. Imo he has an axe to grind. I’d say that he wants to run it to the ground and then sell off to a developer.
By the way, we are working on the (entire) story. Details to come.
Dave M
HalfDork
11/22/19 4:24 p.m.
In reply to amg_rx7 :
All it takes is a small amount of cynicism or exposure to local politics to see how this is going to play out. It doesn't end well for the track!
OldGray320i don't get me wrong on what I'm saying. As I said this is why we are adamant about doing an RFP because you at the very least will end up with the appearance of a back room deal. The fact the California exempts professional services from the competitive process allows the county free reign.
As for the in and outs of managing the track I suspect they will end up hiring the majority of the existing staff. Think this through, when Roger Penske builds a new dealership do you think he knows the minutia of local building code? Of course not he hires people who do.
In reply to Tom1200 :
I guess I'm not quite following; the article says multiple bids, 3 for final review, and objectively (by any reasonable standard) they chose the least qualified.
It may be legal the way they did it and how they categorized it, but it doesn't look ethical (and if I follow, you agree with that statement, or are at least not opposed to it).
Re: hiring out to perform the work, I get it, but they have to manage it, and if they don't know what they're doing, cost creep. Like a GC hiring out subs. I look at it like a restaurant firm trying to hire out subs vs. a real GC. I think you look at it as the restaurant firm hiring the GC.
I look forward to what Wallens and the GRM Gang report.
Btw, that's a good name for a band, "Wallens & The GRM Gang"
David S. Wallens said:
By the way, we are working on the (entire) story. Details to come.
Looking forward to reading it.
There have been a bunch of well documented issues around the running of Laguna Seca, especially over the last few years. My understanding is that SCRAMP ran into a bunch of financial issues thanks to the Great Recession and it took them a while to dig themselves out. Didn't exactly please the county as the flows of money weren't to their liking because of that.
The other issue seems to be that the county wants more investment in the track (like double digit millions to bring the facilities up to decent), but also didn't appear to be willing to lease the track out long term and wants to have more say in the day to day running. From my vague memory, that's how SCRAMP ended up with the track lease again after the last set of bids, because the company that won that bidding process ended up walking away from the negotiations.
For me, the main lesson is "don't build a track on land that doesn't belong to you". Not that I'll be building anything but maybe a Scaletrix track anytime soon.
OldGray320i yes we are in agreement they "look" unethical. Why I don't quite get is legally they could have simply just picked a supplier without ever having to ask for proposals. Perhaps they thought it might look better if they asked for proposals.
The only thing I can think is perhaps the county wants someone to make Laguna more of a destination than just a race track. Naturally this is wild speculation on my part.
I'm not sure what you're imagining. It's a state park, but not one that can grow much and it's not really all that compelling compared to what's a few miles away. Monterey is already a bit of a destination for some reason.
The track definitely needs a rework in how it's run. If you've ever tried to run an event there, it's frustrating. That's where my podunk track comment came from - trying to get the WiFi working in the garages is a matter of not accepting "oh, it's down for maintenance and we'll have it up in three weeks". Facilities? If you're not running those super gas lines in the 20 garages, there's one cheap Home Depot compressor with a leaky air hose available. I have no idea how you deal with actual spectators.
In reply to Keith Tanner :
Interesting, and makes that choice seem even worse than I thought; a hotelier is NOT going to see things the way a professional race organizer does, no matter how competent a hotelier they were.
While it's been de-bunked several times for Laguna Seca in this thread, people keep commenting on noise complaints. While I agree that at many tracks (this one included) where noise is an issue it's frequently due to NIMBY's or newcomers it doesn't matter. I have zero sympathy for people who struggle with noise issues. Race tracks have been in danger due to noise for 30 years now. There is zero reason, especially for track days, that anyone should have an issue with noise requirements now, unless it's to the point that tire noise is creating an issue. Loud exhausts are not an excuse, especially if you started modifying your car any later than 1990.
Kieth's comments are enlightening; when I say destination I mean in the sense that a track has the amenities that people are now expecting.
When money is tight you either have to cut expenses or increase revenue; cutting expenses is a short term solution for most businesses and you can't increase revenue if the facilities are sub par.
I too am keenly waiting for the inside scoop; as we discuss this more and more I'm left with the impression that the county wants someone to run the place as a venue and not just a race track. Living in what is pretty much the hospitality capitol of the world I can see how the county might have come to a very logical decision in hiring a hotelier versus a track operator. (disclosure: I'm not saying I agree with them just that I see how they could have got there).
At the Porsche show last year they had a loud band after the races one night , no idea who it was as I was on the other side of the track but I wonder if concerts would also be in the mix ?
Adrian_Thompson said:
There is zero reason, especially for track days, that anyone should have an issue with noise requirements now, unless it's to the point that tire noise is creating an issue. Loud exhausts are not an excuse, especially if you started modifying your car any later than 1990.
100% stock Corvettes and Mustangs fail sound at Laguna Seca on cold, damp, 90 db days.
