The Tuesday discussion raised questions about the face of the developers and how the review team can properly evaluate their qualification and ability to transform their vision of downtown into a reality.

Pat Wolf, a member of the Council of Neighborhood Presidents, said he wants the developers to fill in the parts of their proposals they left absent when listing their criteria.

“The question is then, how do you evaluate someone who has essentially provided no information,” Wolf said.

Members worried about accountability with the seemingly unclear leaders of the proposals, and Wolf was not the only review team member who expressed concern with the lack of information the developers submitted.

“They weren’t necessarily careful about giving full information about the prior projects they had done,” said Doug Jester, chairperson of the Park District Planning Area Review Team. “We couldn’t look at it and give them credit or not much credit accurately. We need more information from each of them.”

The review team based their ratings of the developers on numerous criteria, such as their experiences in completing projects of the complexity envisioned for the site, and their history of utilizing high-quality designs and materials in past projects.

The ability to build environmentally-friendly structures and meet LEED certification requirements also determined whether developers received full marks in the report.

The total criteria points possible for a developer’s qualifications is 65, with the experience of completing complex projects being weighted the most with 20.

The report discussed at the meeting did not review the developers’ ability to access “sufficient capital to complete the project as conceptually proposed, as well as reasonable estimate of project costs and uses of funds,” which accounted for a possible 15 points.

Out of the remaining 50 points, all of the developers ranged in between the high 20s to high 30s, with the highest score at 37.3 for Lurvey White Ventures and the lowest score at 26.6 for The Parkside Project,LLC.

The comparison will be re-evaluated as team members receive more information on the proposals and the potential developers.

The April 10 meeting originally was scheduled for the committee to review and score the proposals, but the meeting now will bring in the developers to answer any unanswered questions.

“(We will be) really digging into how they’re going to work together, who’s going to be playing the lead role versus more of a supporting role,” East Lansing Planning, Building and Development Director Tim Dempsey said. “There’s only so much you can put down on paper. I think having people actually have a conversation about it is a different perspective entirely.”