Rancho Santa Margarita to begin $3.1 million construction project in January ...Middle East

After multiple years of planning and designing, Rancho Santa Margarita is moving forward with its latest city improvement project.

The city is adding a raised decorative landscape median on Antonio Parkway and a gateway sign that will replace the one that sits in the middle of the three-lane road near the south end of the city. The city will also add plants, including kangaroo paws, blue chalk sticks, octopus agave and California pepper trees.

The new gateway sign will sit along the side of the road on Antonio Parkway with up lighting. The sign will be a stone veneered wall with the city’s name to welcome motorists into Rancho Santa Margarita.

The City Council voted 4-1 on Wednesday, Dec. 11, to approve a construction contract between the city and C.S. Legacy to begin work on the project starting in January. While most of the council expressed eagerness to begin this project — five years after it was first initiated in 2019 — a few residents and one council member are concerned about the price tag.

The contract between the city and C.S. Legacy was awarded for $2,767,430.30. In total, Rancho Santa Margarita has budgeted $3.185 million for the project, including $800,000 for just the monument sign.

The goal, according to a staff report, is to improve city aesthetics. The raised median will stretch about 0.6 miles.

“It is a large dollar amount construction project. It is certainly not a large construction project in terms of the grand scheme of things,” said City Manager Jennifer Cervantez. “Other cities have much larger construction projects that they approve on a regular basis, but for the city of Rancho, this is a larger construction project we have seen in a while.”

But some residents think the project’s price tag is still too high. One resident who spoke during the meeting’s public comment suggested that with a speed limit of 45 mph down Antonio Parkway, people won’t be able to enjoy a new gateway monument fully.

City engineer Joe Parco said the high prices are a result of the number of people needed to complete the project, inflation and an increase in working days.

The amount of time to complete the project has increased from 120 to 150 working days. Parco said this will increase time-dependent costs like bonds, insurance, construction inspections and more.

When the project was first presented up to now, the cost of materials has fluctuated, Parco said.

Cervantez said grants and special revenue funds will be primarily used to cover the costs along with additional funds that can only be used to cover roadway projects. A staff report for the City Council meeting earlier this month said the city is requesting $570,000 in general reserve funds for the project; the city has included the requested reserve funds in the $3.185 million budget for the project.

Right before the COVID-19 pandemic, Rancho Santa Margarita initiated the project and began creating designs. But after lockdown began and everyone was left with uncertainties of what the future may look like, the city deferred the project, Cervantez said.

The design review process began again in 2022. The project and designs were presented to the City Council over five meetings, Cervantez said. The plans were finalized in May, and the project was put out for bid in June. The council voted in August to rebid the project and reach out to more contractors.

The bid that the council approved with C.S. Legacy is about $1 million less than the one it received in the summer and is the lowest bid it has received for the project overall.

Rancho Santa Margarita’s current city sign sits in the middle of the road with no median, Cervantez said, and has been hit multiple times by motorists.

Constructing the new sign off to the side of the road will reduce the chances of needing to replace it and save the city money, she said. Replacing the sign cost between $16,000 and $20,000, she said.

Mayor Anthony Beall said that spending the money for the project will be a benefit for the city, adding that it is a one-time cost.

“When you think about it, and you take into account who are we spending that money on,” Beall said. “We’re spending it on 50,000 people. It’s benefiting every resident of this city.”

Councilmember Keri Lynn Baert was the only one to vote against the approval of the construction contract. This was her first City Council meeting after winning the race for District 3 against former Mayor Carol Gamble.

Baert said she was concerned about the cost of the sign and voted against the project.

“My council members made very good points about the project, but for me, coming in the first time, I wasn’t comfortable with it,” Baert said.

Construction on the project is slated to begin in January and is expected to be completed by October.

The construction is expected to cause traffic congestion, but two lanes in each direction will remain open, Parco said.

“Rancho Santa Margarita is home to 50,000 people, and I believe that these improvements are going to be a benefit to each of those 50,000 residents and business owners. And it will benefit them every day,” Beall said.

The City Council typically meets on the second and fourth Wednesday of each month at City Hall, 22112 El Paseo. Meetings are not streamed live online.

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