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20-year civic center master plan contract OK’d by W.P. council

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This week, a contract with an architectural firm to develop a 20-year master plan for the civic center was given the official green light by the West Plains City Council, as was an amended agreement with Ticketmaster, which supplies the ticketing system used at the civic center box office.

Resolutions for both were presented by Civic Center Director Eryn Walters to council members during the council’s regular meeting Tuesday.

Walters asked the council to consider approving a contract with Sapp Design Associates Architects for services to develop a 20-year master plan for the West Plains Civic Center ahead of the facility’s 30th anniversary.

“This would carry us to our 50th anniversary as far as giving us a good roadmap to meet the needs of our citizens — not just today, not tomorrow, but trying to meet those needs for 20 years from now,” she said.

“The fee structure as far as what it is, is we are looking at a total of $69,900,” Walters said of the cost to execute the contract.

According to Walters, the civic center has budgeted $85,000 for the project, so with the fees being below budget, it gives staff a little wiggle room in case something comes in higher than anticipated.

The master plan will be completed in three phases: evaluation of the existing building, determining master plan services and identifying future projects and services, Walters said.

During the process, there will be three groups tapped for input on the process, including a core group that meets regularly, she explained.

“Then we will have a stakeholder group that is going to be a bigger group that will be well-representative of community members and different organizations that we regularly work with,” Walters said. The stakeholder group will assist in working through ideas.

She added that public forums will also be held to get a “real feel” from the community during the process.

“When we finish this project, we will be walking about with a roadmap for us to work towards serving current citizens better but to also work towards meeting the needs of our citizens 20 years from now,” Walters said.

The council, in a unanimous vote, approved the resolution to enter into the contract with the Springfield-based architecture firm.

The project will be funded through the civic center capital projects fund for the second half of Fiscal Year 2022. Walters said the core group plans to begin meeting with the architecture firm soon, and the process is expected to take six months.

“It should then be completed by the end of this budget year,” she noted.

 

 

TICKETMASTER ADJUSTS FEES

Walters also presented a resolution for the council’s consideration that would make two significant changes to the civic center’s current agreement with Ticketmaster regarding event ticket sales.

Ticketmaster is the ticketing system the civic center currently uses and staff are already familiar with the company’s software, she pointed out. The first of the two changes shortening the contract term to three years from six. The second involves a fee adjustment, lowering the amount of the service fee charged to buyers for tickets that cost $10 or less.

“Before we made an amendment, any time a ticket was sold, at least a $3.50 threshold was charged as far as a facility fee,” Walters explained. But with many events at the civic center, tickets cost $10 or $8 apiece, resulting in people paying more in fees than they were paying for tickets.

“So Ticketmaster was willing to lower their fee structure,” Walters said. “Any of our events that are $10 or under, we will only charge $1 per ticket.”

“There will still be a handling fee on top of that, which is when you buy multiple tickets, but it’s just once per order,” she added. In the past, facility fees were charged per ticket, per order, and now with the new arrangement, the fees are charged just per order.

Staff also negotiated into the hardware portion of the contract that Ticketmaster would provide updated equipment for the civic center’s box office.

“Some of that equipment is back from 2009, and many upgrades have been done, so going into this new agreement, they said they would procure us new equipment within 120 days from the signing of this document,” Walters said.

The city council unanimously approved the resolution to enter into the three-year agreement with Ticketmaster, which Walters said will have no direct costs to the civic center.

“Ticketmaster makes their money from fees charged on tickets,” she explained. “There is a 3% credit card fee charged for us for all credit card sales; however, this is to cover their credit card fees charged to them by the credit card vendors.”

The contract will run through June 21, 2025.

West Plains, West Plains Daily Quill, Quill, Civic Center, West Plains Civic Center, Ticketmaster, contract, agreement, deal, master plan, plan, West Plains City Council, city council, fees, tickets


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