By Ken Jackson

Staff Writer

The Osceola County Expressway Authority has an aggressive schedule set to attract a developer and possibly break ground on the Poinciana Parkway, the first in a four-road loop around the perimeter of the county’s population bases, in 2013.

At its regular meeting Oct. 18, the authority laid out dates in the process of getting qualifying bids from construction firms and then narrowing the list of responders down to a final cut of three or four.

Request For Qualifications (RFQ) documents are already out, and the board expects responses back by early November. Submissions will be reviewed against a list of technical criteria until Dec. 7, when a review board will release a ranking of the respondents. By Jan. 10, the authority will release a short list of qualified firms and issue them Request For Proposal (RFP) documents, which will be due by April 11.

Following another review period that will conclude on or near May 29, firms still in the running for the job will be asked to propose their price to build the road.

“This is a really aggressive schedule,” OCEA Chairman Atlee Mercer said. “In the realm of road building, that is light speed.”

Osceola County will issue a stipend of around $50,000 to firms who produce an RFP to defray what Mercer said would likely be a six-figure expenditure to produce the extensive and detailed proposal required. The firm earning the contract would not get the stipend, as it will eventually be paid to build the Parkway.

County Manager Don Fisher said staff supports issuing the stipends as a reimbursement for extra intangible work it is asking of the firms to draft the proposals.

“Stipends are usually associated with projects of this size,” he said. “Plus it is good relations for future projects we put forth, and at the end of process we own those proposals and ideas.”

The county also will complete some geotechnical work, much having to do with the road’s planned traversal of the Reedy Creek swamp, ahead of accepting the proposals, an idea that board member Bill Folsom called, “proactive rather than reactive and a fabulous idea.”

At the meeting, county staff also presented the parameters of the goals for the project, which will establish the minimum scope and maximum price of the Parkway project. Part of that includes preparing a budget that will include any funds the county will advance the authority to pay for work ahead of the funding date, such as the geotechnical work, and any other funds the county must front before the road is what Mercer called a “viable revenue-producing project.”

Since the OCEA must make a motion to request those funds when needed, board member Bob Healy asked the county’s staff to closely scrutinize those costs and eliminate any waste.

“I’d like to be sure, when we do our funding request, we’ve been able to capture all those costs so then the committee can go forward with the budget,” he said.

The project to build the Parkway is a multi-organizational agreement between Osceola and Polk counties, the OCEA and Avatar, which purchased all the land and the right of way for the project. The two counties are providing $6 million each ($3 million of Polk’s share comes from FDOT), and Osceola will issue financing bonds and cover cost overruns. OCEA will design, build and operate the road.

Poinciana Parkway will connect Cypress Parkway via Marigold Avenue to U.S. Highway 17-92 via Kinney Harmon Road where it intersects with County Road 54 in Polk County. Using C.R. 54, commuters can connect to U.S. Highway 27, Interstate 4 and State Road 429 northbound. Staff noted that constructing a two-lane roadway would cost, at minimum, $65 to $68 million.

While the Poinciana Parkway represents the beginning of developing the county’s master plan for expressway building, work is already ongoing for what should be one of the last projects. Interim authority director Jeff Jones presented details of the Project Development and Environment Study already underway for the Osceola Parkway East project, which will conceptually connect with State Road 417 in Orange County south of the Orlando International Airport.

Jones noted that public meetings for those living close to that road’s proposed corridor will be held in early 2013.