December 8, 2021– Amber Infrastructure Group (‘Amber’), the international infrastructure specialist, and its U.S. parent, Hunt Companies Inc. (‘Hunt’), are pleased to celebrate the grand opening of the $44.4 million Public Services Complex for the City of San Marcos, Texas (‘the City’).
The City of San Marcos celebrated the grand opening of the City’s new Public Service Center (‘PSC’) in November. The 105,000 square-foot development led by Hunt and Amber consolidates over a dozen City service teams from the City’s Public Works and General Services departments into a single location.
The opening event was complete with a big truck cutting through the ceremonial ribbon, guided tours of the new building, and a chili cook-off to celebrate the new development. The modern, centralized location will be home to about 180 city employees within various departments, including general services, traffic, electric, water, and facility maintenance staff.
The 20.6-acre development consists of an Administration building, Crew building, Utility building, Warehouse, Material Storage and Laydown Yard, a Wash Bay, a large surface parking area for City fleet vehicle and equipment parking, and an ~500KW photovoltaic system. In addition to the solar array, there are four 18,000-gallon rainwater capture cisterns, high recycled content building materials, low-flow plumbing fixtures, and drought-tolerant plants and grasses.
The new PSC will provide modernized, purpose-built facilities that will allow the departments to streamline their work processes and improve delivery of services to the City of San Marcos residents. This long-overdue asset is critically needed but the City did not have enough funding to initiate it under their existing bond programs.
The City engaged the Amber and Hunt team through a Progressive Development Agreement, which provides the City with a guaranteed maximum price to complete the project. By utilizing Progressive Development, the City was able to optimize the design and delivery schedule while significantly reducing the procurement risk and expense. Progressive Development is a specialism of the Amber and Hunt team, having successfully used this approach recently to deliver the Travis County Courthouse project.
“A Progressive Development Agreement also avoids unnecessary contingencies and prohibitive bid costs that have been a major cause of failures in P3 processes in the US over recent years,” said Rodney Moss, Senior Vice President. "It allows the government and the developer to collaboratively de-risk the projects and optimize the scope and cost of capital. The City of San Marcos has been an excellent partner during this project, and the public service facilities created here will serve the citizens of San Marcos for decades to come.”
About Amber Infrastructure Group
Amber Infrastructure ('Amber') is an international infrastructure specialist, focused on investment origination, development, asset management and in Europe, fund management. Amber’s core business focuses on infrastructure assets across the public, transport, energy, digital and demographic infrastructure sectors that support the lives of people, homes and businesses internationally.
Amber is headquartered in London with offices in Europe, North America and Australia and employs over 150 infrastructure professionals. Amber has had a strategic partnership with the Hunt Group of Companies (Hunt) in the US since 2015. Learn more at www.amberinfrastructure.com.
About Hunt Companies
Hunt, based in El Paso, Texas, is a diversified, family-owned holding company that invests in operating businesses, real estate assets and infrastructure assets. Since its founding in 1947, Hunt's size and scope have grown substantially while gaining considerable expertise across multiple real asset sectors. Hunt's reputation is built on integrity and performance. Hunt is committed to a culture of transparency for employees, clients, investors, and the communities it serves. Hunt and its affiliates employ more than 3,000 people across the United States and Europe. Learn more at www.huntcompanies.com.
