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"Don't let perfect be the enemy of good" has been a phrase stated in government as a reminder that progress over perfection is important to the greater good of the community. In practice this mindset can help us as a city focus on our goals and ensure long-term success, whether it be for a planning tool, policy or a significant capital project.
In particular, public construction projects are by far the most complex and challenging and often where we receive the most disagreement on whether the project is taking the right path forward.
Some of the reasons we have extra scrutiny on these types of projects is due to the very public nature of what we do. Compared to residential construction, public construction projects tend to be more regulated, involve more people such as through committees and public input and in addition, funded through complex and varied revenue sources such as tax revenues, bond measures, grant funding or combinations of these.
Far differently than private work, for most public work, the law requires competitive bidding with sealed bids and low-bid selection with the following steps:
• Project gets advertised publicly
• Contractors submit sealed bids
• Contract goes to the lowest qualified bidder (not the most experienced or best qualified)
Public projects mean extra consideration because when the city is spending taxpayer dollars, there are laws governing how that money gets spent to ensure transparency, fairness, and accountability in how public funds are used. Thus, public projects are constantly under the public's watchful eye while managing the delicate balance of tax dollar expenditures. Budgets, timelines and any changes in the project are publicly documented.
When any community takes on a major project, there is a natural expectation that the finished product will look exactly like the original plan. In reality, that is rarely how large construction projects unfold. The City's new aquatic park, The Splash! is a great example. Along the way, there were changes, challenges, decisions, adjustments and unexpected circumstances.
A change and challenge that the city faced early on was receiving initial bids that were higher than originally estimated. On Aug. 29, 2024, the city opened bids for the Marshall Aquatic Center project. Due to higher than estimated bids being approximately $6 million over the estimated budget, the City Council rejected the bids and gave authorization and direction to staff to explore construction management services for the aquatic center and pursue a complete re-design of the facility.
This resulted in the lap pool being changed from an 8-lane lap pool to 4-lanes, the separate mechanical building was combined with the concessions/ticketing building and overall, the site was compressed to reduce the amount of pool piping necessary to pump the water to the different pools.
After a successful re-design and re-bid, the city's responsibility was to make thoughtful decisions, protect the public investment and keep the project moving forward. That doesn't mean every decision was easy or that every change was welcomed by everyone. Yet the city worked through the challenges and kept our focus on the ultimate goal: creating a new aquatic park that will serve our community for years to come.
And by that measure, we believe the project is a success. In the first 20 days of operation, The Splash! had nearly 12,000 patrons. Overwhelmingly, those who went through The Splash! entrances were highly positive of the facility and proud of what the community accomplished.
The aquatic park did in fact change from when the first plans were developed to the final blueprints. But most importantly, the aquatic center is no longer simply a plan, a concept or a construction project. It is a place where families gather, children learn to swim, people exercise, memories are made and our community comes together.
We owe our residents progress, not perfection. The new aquatic park is a great example of making thoughtful decisions and keeping the project moving forward without waiting for every detail to be perfect.
While not everyone will agree on every aspect of our city work, we do try to make decisions with the best information at hand, taking action after thoughtful consideration, evaluating the results, and improving along the way.
-- Sharon Hanson is the city administrator for the city of Marshall