Title
RESOLUTION AUTHORIZING A CONSULTATION AGREEMENT WITH URBAN ECOSYSTEMS LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTS, FOR PROFESSIONAL CONSULTING SERVICES ON THE WAABIZHESHIKANA CULTURAL INTERPRETION PLAN, FOR A TOTAL CONTRACT AMOUNT NOT TO EXCEED $100,000.
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CITY PROPOSAL:
RESOLVED, that the proper city officials are hereby authorized to enter into a consultation services agreement, substantially in the form attached hereto as Exhibit A, with Urban Ecosystems Landscape Architects, for professional services in cultural interpretation and trail planning, an amount not to exceed $100,000, payable from 452-030-5530-HANDHTAX-1501-06 (Tourism & Recreational Projects, Finance, Improvements Other Than Buildings, Western Waterfront Trail, SLRC Heritage Trail).
Statement of Purpose
STATEMENT OF PURPOSE: This resolution authorizes a consultation services agreement with Urban Ecosystems Landscape Architects for professional consulting services needed for the establishment of the Waabizheshikana (“The Marten Trail”) as a designated heritage trail.
Waabizheshikana consists of an existing 3.3-mile trail segment that traverses the western shoreline of the St. Louis River. The City underwent an extensive mini-master planning process that will extend the trail to over 10 miles of continuous recreational trail. The Mini-Master Plan also calls for the rebranding of the Trail as a heritage trail.
Urban Ecosystem Landscape Architects will coordinate a stakeholder-driven heritage trail interpretive plan that defines the specific details and significant common themes of interpretation along the current trail and the Trail extension. The interpretive plan will be cultural overlay on the existing and future physical Trail; it will not include engineering or design of the trail extension itself, but will focus on the themes, mediums, and stories of the people and its region.
The consultant will also put together a project team; host staff and public meetings, workshops, and a site tour; conduct presentations with the project team and stakeholders, advisory groups, or other targeted outreach communities; host regular check-in calls among key project personnel; contract for state and tribal historic preservation office reviews; and coordinate heritage trail plan development in two phases (draft and final).
The Waabizheshikana cultural interpretation plan is part of the larger St. Louis River Corridor Project to provide destination level investments to qualifying parks and is supported by the half and half tax fund. The project has received $50,000 in grant funding through the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Coastal Program.