Sandy Springs renews parks, courts service contracts

Children play at the Abernathy Greenway Park in Sandy Springs. The city has renewed the Parks and Recreation service contract with Jacobs Engineering Group Inc. CITY OF SANDY SPRINGS

Children play at the Abernathy Greenway Park in Sandy Springs. The city has renewed the Parks and Recreation service contract with Jacobs Engineering Group Inc. CITY OF SANDY SPRINGS

Sandy Springs, a city that pioneered outsourcing many of its municipal operations, has renewed contracts with Jacobs Engineering Group Inc. for Parks and Recreation and Municipal Court services.

The City Council approved staff recommendations to award the work to Jacobs. It was one of four entities vying for the Parks and Recreation contract, and one of two, for the Municipal Courts contract.

For both contracts, Jacobs was the only contender given a performance confidence assessment of “substantial” by the city’s evaluation team; the incumbent also had the advantage of requiring no transition period.

The first-year task orders of $1.09 million for the parks and $821,310 for the courts were “reasonable and realistic against the city’s independent estimate,” the evaluators said. The current contracts expire June 30, and the new, five-year contracts take effect July 1.