The City of Santa Fe issued a Request for Qualifications (RFQ) in August of this year to study the feasibility of establishing a public bank for the city (see City of Santa Fe issues RFQ to study a public bank). As outlined in the following article from today’s Santa Fe New Mexican, the submissions will be evaluated by the following six-member selection committee:
• City Manager Brian Snyder
• Kate Noble, acting director of the city’s Housing and Community Development Department
• Katherine Miller, Santa Fe County manager
• Kris Axtell, president of Luna Capital Advisors, a business advisory firm that helps clients find the lowest cost, most efficient commercial loan options in the Southwest
• Randy Grissom, president of Santa Fe Community College
• Mike McGonagle, president and CEO at Century Financial Services Corp.
Today’s story from The Santa Fe New Mexican:
Five groups seek city contract for study on public banking
Posted: Friday, October 10, 2014 7:00 pm | Updated: 8:51 pm, Fri Oct 10, 2014.
By Daniel J. Chacón
The New Mexican
Representatives of an organization that has traveled to Santa Fe at least twice in recent months to tout the benefits of public banking are now vying for a chance to conduct a feasibility study for such a bank in the city.
The Public Banking Institute is among five groups that responded to the city’s request for qualifications for a feasibility study of public banking in Santa Fe.
The institute, which is partnering with The University of New Mexico’s Bureau of Business and Economic Research, says it brings a “diverse, experienced team that meets all the qualifications and requirements outlined” in the city’s request.
The other respondents are:
• Santa Fe-based Building Solutions, which has partnered with the Arrowhead Center of New Mexico State University in Las Cruces.
• The Center for Applied Research Inc., which is headquartered in Denver but has an office in Santa Fe.
• Rhode Island-based PGSS Group, which has partnered with an affiliate fellow at the Gund Institute for Ecological Economics at the University of Vermont.
• Claret Consulting, a small business consulting and financial advisory firm that has teamed up with Planet Partnerships. Both are based in Washington, D.C.
A six-member committee will meet Oct. 22 to discuss the five submissions.
“By consensus, a path forward will be determined at that time,” city spokesman Matt Ross said Friday in an email. “We would expect that the most likely scenario is that a contractor to do the study/feasibility will be selected. Staff will then negotiate a scope of work, measures and deliverables for a contract.”
The contract would be under $50,000, he said.
Talk of a public bank has been percolating in Santa Fe for years, but the concept has gained traction since the election of Mayor Javier Gonzales, who has said the city needs to take a “slow, methodical approach” to determining the feasibility of a public bank.
Santa Fe played host to a national public banking symposium in September that drew a large crowd including residents, bankers and elected officials. The symposium followed an invitation-only meeting that Gonzales organized in June to introduce city councilors and others to the concept of public banking.
Gwen Hallsmith, executive director of the Public Banking Institute, spoke at both events. She said the institute’s involvement in the two events shouldn’t give it an unfair advantage over the four other groups that responded to the city’s request for qualifications.
“I’m excited about the project regardless of who gets the award because no matter what happens, it will help move the interest in and dialogue around public banking further,” she said.
Katie Updike, managing partner of Building Solutions, which teamed up with NMSU’s Arrowhead Center, said it’s easy to get excited about the concept of a public bank. But the city needs to be “very mindful of creating something that is right for us and brings everyone to the table,” she said.
“I think the city can really be a stimulus to the financial institutions that already exist here,” she said. “I don’t view it as a competitive approach. I view it as something that really will allow the other banks in town, the credit unions, the foundations, to more easily deploy their capital in the region.”
Contact Daniel J. Chacón at 986-3089 or dchacon@sfnewmexican.com. Follow him on Twitter at @danieljchacon.
