Item 25 - Approve Consultant Agreement with Avenu Insights

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A V E N U UTILITY USERS TAX CONSULTANT INSIGHTS d. AIJ6lYTICS RFP #20-137 Avenu's UUT experts will generate for the City reports that will identify services provider errors and omission and the report will analyze the City's Utility Users Tax Rate. Avenu will provide printouts, graphs, and comparative data on a quarterly basis, at a minimum, or other reoccurring basis that meets the needs of the City. Avenu is committed to the City of Santa Ana and will ensure the City is fully supported. Additionally, Avenu will provide written quarterly UUT reports and will attend quarterly meetings with the City to discuss the activities outlined in the reports. 1.3.4 Specialty UUT Audits [RFP Ill.c.41 i. Successful proposer will provide strategy, mechanism, and audit cost formulas for comprehensive audits of principal electric and gas utility providers together with large-scale utility service aggregators. Audits may include corresponding franchise fees where advisable. Specialty audits shall be included within contractually offered "contingency options" which the City, in its sole discretion, may elect to confront. Specialty audits, as such a broad term, may address a wide array of various issues which have been and will soon become the centerfold of compliance with local UUTs. The specific terms of specialty audits, when not fully detailed in the original agreement between the parties or under the terms of a subsequent amendment to said agreement, will be set out through a mutually agreed to change order process. Such audits could range from known issues arising from CPUC climate credits, the misapplication of tax exemptions related to clean energy use, developments of entities and technologies that Avenu has proprietary insight into and the legal and professional expertise to tackle and successfully bring into compliance absent litigation, or countless other measures. For example, Avenu has existing, proprietary, highly -advanced, and customizable software capable of providing enhanced services to the City for revenue administration for UUTs, Franchise Fees, and even 5G-related right -Of -Way ("ROW") annual renewal fees. While the 5G ROW fees remain in certain forms of litigation, Avenu's systems can remove the burden of monitoring annual compliance with the flood of applications, placements, and renewals for those entities involved to ensure compliance. These services provide for an expansive array of new, federally regulated fees which are ever-growing, existing administration of taxes which are currently processed through legacy systems within the City thus eluding the substantial costs and encumbrances involved with the development of new systems through external vendors; a process which can be both tremendously painstaking and extremely costly. Avenu currently processes and distributes, and even offers °Lockbox Services" for thousands of clients and distributes governmental funds in excess of $1 billion annually for local governments. As the provider of such services, Avenu is required to have the internal controls for its software systems and procedures subjected to an annual SSAE 16, SOC 1, Type II audit of internal controls by an independent certified public accounting firm to ensure accuracy and compliance. Such annual reports are always provided to clients which elect to utilize these services. ii. Successful proposer will provide contingency options for similar audits of principal telecommunications providers. Avenu will provide contingency options for similar audits of the City's principal telecommunications providers CITY OF SANTA ANA, CA 14