Town Council - Regular Meeting

Okay, we'll go ahead and call the council meeting to order. Please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance. Julie, roll call, please.

Robert Pope.

Present.

Steve Eisenbarth.

Present.

Greg Zuzan. Don Loudon.

Present.

Jason Puckett. Present.

Okay, next is the consent agenda. Any discussion? And if not, we'll entertain a motion.

I'll make a motion that we accept the consent agenda as presented. Second.

Julie roll call place Jason Puckett for Steve Eisenbarth for Robert Pope for Don Loudon for.

Next is public comment. The public may come forward and comment on the agenda that is not part of a public hearing or on a specific matter within the Council's jurisdiction. If you come forward, please make sure that the green light is on on the microphone at the podium. State your name and address and limit comments to three minutes.

Good evening. My name's Brian Nugent. I've been a part of the police department for just under 23 years, and I have had a very difficult personal time recently, and I'm looking to retire from the agency after what I would consider to be the battle of my life. I wanted to address the council. I know Greg is not here today, but I wanted to take an opportunity to thank the council members for their support over the years. There's a lot of different ways that you guys support our agency and our department that many people don't quantify. I know many of you are under the understanding that you're not to communicate with me and I respect that, but there's been an issue that I have tried to report privately and an issue that I have communicated through my attorney with the town as well that remains to be unaddressed. So in compliance with our policy, I have a formal complaint regarding misconduct on the part of our chief and the other two administrators that are involved in the agency. It is not my intention to anger anybody. This is information that I have tried to get to the council so they have opportunity to review that. I had again reached out to Don Loudon last week and tried to do so. These complaints are information regarding policy violations several. There's information regarding state statute violations that I believe have taken place, and there's also issues that I reported against racist activity in the agency that is not being addressed and being resolved. This has been the conflict of my life on how to handle this, and I have struggled deeply, and as I have found myself where I'm at today, I'm saddened. I'm just brokenhearted regarding circumstances in our police department. Our policy requires that this be addressed to the town council president. And so I'm here just to give this to you, Don, in person for you to take a look at. Again, I want to thank the council for all your support over the years. There's other things I could probably mention, but I'll just leave it at that. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you.

Good evening. I'm Sean Stoops. I'm the Chief of Police. In response to Officer Nugent's previous comments and remarks, we want to clarify that the implications presented are misleading and inaccurate. Our officers and employees are selected through a rigorous hiring process demanding high standards, and a criteria designed to ensure professionalism, integrity, and equality for all our employees. We take pride in diversity and commitment of our team. Officer Nugent, as you may know, was removed from his high ranking position last September. Officer Nugent is unhappy with me, the town council president, the other council members, as well as most of the other officers on our department for coming forward with information that ultimately led to his removal from that high ranking position last year. We are confident that you will see these comments by Officer Nugent for what they are. Thank you.

Is there anyone else that would like to come forward?

Town Council members, Chief Spooks.

Can I stop you right there? You were in the room when we said you have to state your name. Oh, I'm so sorry. Yeah, that's okay.

Yes, Tajay, hi. Okay.

I'm a detective with this department and also a man of deep faith. I'm here tonight to dismiss concerns, not to dismiss concerns, but to speak truth. And sometimes truth requires courage, especially when it's uncomfortable and unpopular and misunderstood. I want to be clear that I'm speaking tonight of my own volition. No one asked me to say this, no one pressured me, and I have not discussed my decision to speak with anyone beforehand. I'm here simply to share truth as I see it. Earlier in January, former Deputy Chief Brian Nugent invited me to his residence. I did not know at the time, but once there, it was evident it pertained to these matters. I'll spare the details, but I left feeling a little extremely heavy in my spirit. It's an experience that I'd never had when being around Brian. And to put it plainly, he said, I plan to go to the town council meeting and drop a bomb. Since then, I had to carefully consider information before coming forward. Allegations of racism are amongst the most serious accusations that can be made against a person, a leader, or an institution. When they are true, they demand action, accountability, and justice. But when they are baseless, they are not just unjust, they are dangerous. They erode trust, they fracture unity, and they minimize the very real struggles that minorities have faced and continue to face when discrimination is real in the workplace. I say that as someone who has to be attentive to racism when it exists. And I'm telling you plainly, I've not experienced it here. Chief Stoops has been nothing but supportive and intentional with me from the very beginning of my career. Before I was even hired, he took the uncommon step of personally visiting me in Terre Haute just to talk, to listen, and to see who I was. He recommended me to the board, advocated for me, and continued to invest in me long after I earned my place in this department. He entrusted me with opportunities others openly disagreed with, most notably my assignment to the Indian and Crime Guns Task Force because he believed in my character, my work ethic, and integrity. He stood by that decision. He has recognized my work with awards and commendations. I say that without hesitation that I've always felt that I could go to him with anything professionally and personally. That is not the behavior of a racially complicit leader. It's quite the opposite. Deputy Chief Margeson has been a presence in my life longer than I've worn this uniform. I remember him in my schools growing up here as a kid and I admired him. I idolized him. He was approachable, kind, and genuine. As I grew into this profession, he became someone I trusted and someone I confided in during deeply personal matters. He listens, he gives sound advice, and he never once made me feel less than. I grew up in this town. My brother and I were among the only black kids in the school system. And yet, I never experienced discrimination from this department, then or now. In fact, Davis played a role in me choosing to serve in my hometown. I say that because it matters. Deputy Chief Steve Barton paved the way for me to be where I am today. When he had the opportunity to take the position with the task force, he declined it. I was the first he recommended to fill it. He has supported me consistently, advocated for me, and backed me in ways I will always be grateful for. His actions speak louder than any accusation ever could. And for his accomplishment of stepping into the role as deputy chief, he deserves a step into that role with joy and gratitude, not fear of retaliation. Excuse me. These are not just leaders to me. They are mentors. They're advocates for the vulnerable. They are men of high character. I want to take a moment to address the specific incident being referenced. The comment made by Deputy Chief Marguson in 2017 was not okay. Words matter. And if anyone was genuinely offended by it, that offense deserved to be acknowledged and not dismissed or mocked. But there is an important distinction that must be made. One inappropriate comment made years ago does not define a man's character, nor does it establish racism. We are all capable of saying things we later regret. That does not make us irredeemable. It makes us human. What defines us is a pattern, intent, and conduct over time. And there has been absolutely no pattern of behavior, absolutely none, to me that would suggest that Chief Marguson holds any racist beliefs or treats people differently because of the color of their skin. His actions, his relationships, his leadership, and his history with me and countless of others tell a far more complete and honest story with a single rather than a single remark taken out of context. Accountability and grace are not opposite. They must coexist. We can acknowledge something was wrong without condemning an entire career or labeling a man based on a moment that does not reflect who he is or how he leads. And also, if this incident occurred in 2017, and it was known at the time, and by his own account, Brian brought it to Chief Stoops' attention and was told it was handled, then that matters as well. Because if leadership was informed and corrective action was taken, then that is not evidence of complicity. It's evidence of supervision. And if someone knew about it, remained in leadership for years afterwards, and never raised it publicly until now from their own removal, then we must acknowledge and ask ourselves the uncomfortable question, why now? If silence then meant acceptance, and speaking out now is framed as moral urgency, we have to be honest about what has changed. Truth does not change with circumstances, but motives do. This is not about blame. It's about consistency. You cannot claim others are complicit while exempting yourself from the same standard, no matter your own justifications. But I want to be clear about something. Brian is still a friend in my eyes, even though I think this may change that dynamic for him. We're called to show grace and forgiveness and bear the image of Christ. So I pray he extends the same sentiment to me. When my extended family experienced sudden tragedy from the loss of a loved one, Brian graciously stepped in and helped fund the burial that my extended family could not afford. I will never forget that. And I believe his passion for this department and the people within it was once genuine. But passion when wounded can turn into pain, and pain when unchecked can turn into anger. And anger, when justified by self-preservation, can lead people to do harmful things. In recent months, while I was often a spiritual support during his removal from leadership, I came to realize that my own compassion was being leveraged and then realized my race was being used not to heal, but to provoke, not to pursue justice, but to seek validation and retaliation. He did not have to involve me in this, but he did. There's a biblical moment that comes to mind, Pontius Pilate. Pilate knew what was right in his heart. He knew Christ was an innocent man. But rather than stand on truth, he chose appeasement. He chose comfort. He chose self-preservation. He chose to wash his hands while allowing injustice to simply just avoid unrest. I cannot make that same mistake. God calls us to something higher than that. He calls us to truth even when it cost us. He calls us to forgiveness, not vengeance. He calls us to reconciliation, not destruction. Weaponizing accusations like this for personal grievance does not bring healing. It cheapens the suffering of those who truly endured discrimination. It divides rather than restores, and it undermines the integrity of institutions and individuals who are deserving of trust. I stand here tonight not as a shield of wrongdoing, but as a witness to fairness. If racism lived here, I would speak on it. If discrimination existed, I would confront it, just like I've done in the small and big moments of my life. But false accusations do not honor God, they do not honor justice, and they do not honor the truth. I believe in this department, its leadership and humility, not pride, not retaliation. That's what God calls us to. Thank you.

Is there anyone else that would like to come forward?

Good evening, council and anyone who's watching remotely. My name is David Margeson. I'm the deputy chief of enforcement, the Avon Police Department. I want to begin by saying that officers Nugent's allegations are absurd. I would like to note that during the time frame he is pointing out and the documents he provided to the town council president that he was the assistant chief and my direct supervisor. Then Assistant Chief Nugent completed four evaluations as my supervisor and there were zero negative entries or comments of any sort in my evaluations. Actually to the contrary, my evaluations were all scored very high and he even supported organizational structure change to request the Town Council President appoint me as the Deputy Chief of Enforcement. I find Officer Nugent's allegations to be reckless, an attack on my character, and totally out of line. I believe Officer Nugent would be better served to accept his own shortcomings to possibly begin to have an internal understanding as to why he was removed from the appointed rank of deputy chief and now holds the rank of officer. I have always cared for the community as well as the department, officers, and the town of Avon. My character is the same whether on duty or off. And I believe my coworkers and friends outside of this career would 100% attest to that. I am also beginning to prepare to retire legitimately. I have submitted the paperwork to do that and move on from here. A lot of those decisions were based on constant battles with then Deputy Chief Nugent and Officer Chief Nugent for the past year. I thank you for your attention and consideration.

Is there anyone else that would like to come forward and speak? All right, we'll close public comment and move on with council calendar and liaison reports. Steve.

I'll try not to go on here, but we did have a meeting with RDC and I've got all my notes on it, but well, the redevelopment authority, as well as the RDC we met, And basically, we were working through the review of the TIF districts and went through the Avon logistics and discussed the diversity of those projects. What we've already talked about here, I just want to say that they unpacked it there. And I really, again, I do appreciate the way they go into that as a citizen board. They're into it. They're engaged quite a bit. So that was there. We discussed a number of things, Raceway Bridge and CSX, about having that, seeing if that could be worked through in the budget to try to work with that, and that's more of a federal project. In light of the discussions, I don't want to get into too much of this, but I was very impressed with both of these boards about the details they went through. And I'll say they're reviewing the bond statements very well, going through that. And other businesses, let's see, was there anything about, there was interest in the operation of planning, the planning commission and the BZA of one board member actually wants to be on there because of his involvement and he wants to get deeper into it, so. Again, I was very impressed with them. That's all. If you have questions for me on these boards, I'll be glad to answer those, but I'll leave it at that.

Thank you. Jason?

Nothing for me tonight.

The only meetings I've attended this week are the Hendricks County Recycling District, and just to update you guys, I know several of you have served on it in the past. We are looking at building a new facility. It will be at the County Highway Department's new property out there, and it looks like Garmong will be the person that will be constructing, I guess. And it's not yet voted for funding, but we're almost there. I think it'll be coming up in the next meeting. And that's it for me. New business, we'll move on. Introduction of zoning amendment ZA26-02, grand properties management, mixed use development.

Good evening, Town Council. My name is Nick Shrout at 170 North Perry Road in Plainfield.

And I'm Joe Calderon, 11 South Meridian, Indianapolis.

So we are here tonight to propose a development at the corner of 100 South and Ronald Reagan. We've owned this property for a couple of years, I think about 20 years. and have looked at doing a handful of different things. Most recently, you guys came out with the new comprehensive plan showing industrial, which is literally what we were looking at doing in a couple of other towns. So that worked out really well for us. A couple of issues we ran into with the site layout, but we can go down that road later. Which one of these moves it forward? Yeah, the lasers work. I don't want to blind you. You can go ahead and hit the next one. So the reason we chose industrial flex space is the need for it. We've been around looking at this stuff a little while. There's a couple of other people, developers that are doing it. Based off our conversations with them, it's filling up extremely quickly. And this is a little different than your typical incubator spaces like office suites or rise district. Dwayne Lane's got a couple of smaller spaces like this on the Prestwick Danville side. Those kind of top out at about twenty five hundred or three thousand square feet. We're not going below thirty two hundred square feet. We're also providing the ability to have a second floor for office, training centers, and things like that. Most recently, one of these products just got built out at Jeff Gordon Drive and 74 in Pittsburgh. Filled up extremely quick. companies like electrical companies and private locating companies, people who are outgrowing their incubator spaces, three to five, seven vans, not semis, more of a medium to large scale company, blue collar company. We also have designed these in a way that allows if one company wanted to take more than one bay, they could take a whole building. They could take two buildings. So you can take up to, we have a total of about 60,000 square feet designed in four different buildings. You can go ahead and hit two next. Hit it again, please. So this is our site plan. I believe each of you will have a copy of this as well. We've worked with TAC as of last week to quickly redesign some of this stuff based off the traffic study we had done. I think we've accomplished the goal that they wanted to see a little bit and some of the entries and changes. We have a really cool product design, but in order to make that happen, we kind of need an outlet on the corner. So that's where the marketplace comes in. We do want to look at something with a drive-through aspect, huge run on the actual home-cooked meals, everyday provided stuff, hot meals, more of a internal sales than an external sales standpoint. This also gets the Avon a 3% stay on their tax, as well as I believe the internal sales and fuel sales on tax. We looked at doing a fifth building. This gets you a much higher assessed value than us just putting a fifth building there with the same exact concept. You can go ahead and hit next. So these are the fronts and the backs of the shops. We've designed a couple of different color schemes, but glass entries, not so much for retail, but more just a nice look bordering the Ronald Reagan Parkway. You go ahead. We can get into floor plans down the road, but very open build design. So somebody comes in, they need something different, unique. We're open to doing that as we grow. And then these are kind of the two color schemes we came up with, kind of the blue and silver, changing and rotating. And then the next one, which is my favorite, is more of a barn metal with a wood paneling on the gables every so often. These would break up, again, office signage and stuff like that would all be unique and match as well. And that's pretty much it. You can go, yeah, there's a couple of renderings here that kind of show the full design. just different aerial views. The vacant lot you see behind there is the three acres of the Coleman property we purchased that gives us access to 1050 East. And yeah, that's pretty much our product.

Thank you, I'll just add one or two things to supplement Nick's testimony. We filed the rezoning petition as an I-2 request. There is I-2 in the area. We did ask within our application that this property be removed from the overlay, however, What we did is with the rezoning application, we put in written commitments that essentially restate all of the overlay, but for the use restriction pertaining to the market with fuel that Nick shared with you. you're going to get all the setbacks and landscaping and everything else that's in the overlay. It's just going to be via written commitment, which would be recorded against the land. So just wanted to be upfront about that. As Nick mentioned, we had TAC last week. Prior to filing, we met with your staff and talked about our ideas. And TAP was pretty fruitful in terms of particularly the access. We've gone to write in, write out on both 100 and the Reagan. We talked a bit about how 1050 comes into play as well. So with that, we're happy to answer any questions you might have tonight. We look forward to going through the process over the next month. Absolutely.

So you're saying right in, right out. So it's not at the stoplight. It's further north.

Correct.

Yeah. Yeah. So it would be south of the stoplight if you're heading north about 350 feet and 1250 feet for both right in, right outs. And then as far as the one on 100 south, you're about 425 feet from the stoplight there. We looked at doing a full cut there. That didn't pass due to not being 400 feet from 1050. Totally understand. So we increased that curb about another 80 feet and make sure that nobody can ever do an illegal left turn there. Right out right.

So you said four buildings anywhere from 3,200 square feet to each building 15,000 square feet because you have a total of four buildings.

So each building will end up being about 14 to 15,000 square feet depending on the second floor additions that each person use. Each bay is at minimum 3,200 square feet with no second floor. So they can do up to about 1,500 square feet of addition on the second floor if they want. So you can get up to 4,700 square foot per bay, four bays per building, four buildings.

I've got a couple of quick comments.

Absolutely. First, I do like the access points you have. Since you did acquire that property, having that to the east is great. The write-in, write-outs. So are those also enforceable by raised median? I'm not real familiar if that extends that way.

Yeah, Steve asked us to do what, 12 inch? Yes, 12 inch.

Okay, perfect. Okay, yeah, no problems there.

It was hard to get that all displayed.

No, no, it's okay. It's just the reason I asked the question is that those pork chops are abused.

Yes.

I know that's a shocker, but they are.

And we've seen it at the Costco entry, and we've seen it at Plainfield entry on 267 where the McDonald's is. Everyone takes a left turn there, even though you're not supposed to. So that was one of the big talking points with Steve, and he made sure 12-inch concrete curbs, nice medians to prevent that from happening.

I have positive thoughts on this. That land, I know it's been sitting for a while, and it seems like it would go well. I guess if it's the best use is the only thing through the Planning Commission and checking to go through the criteria, that's the only thing I would say is they may want to scrutinize the use of the property there.

We've tried industrial wise. We tried to put a single hundred thousand square foot building there. But with that, you're getting a lot of semi traffic and there's not enough turnaround room. Plus, you're going to have to get rid of the right away and it'd be pressed way up front to actually make that fit. It's not it's not a great look.

The two and a half acres you have there in that blue section up there, is that any thoughts about who might be there?

No, we have no thoughts. We're totally leaving that open. Commitments to you guys to make sure that you're a part of that, obviously.

Trader Joe's would be nice.

Yeah. We're not rezoning it right now. Truth be told, it depends on May, whatever happened or not happened with that intersection. It is a heavily mature tree wooded area. So it'll be unique, but it'll be one of those things that we'll just have to be careful about. But we're going to kick that can down the road. We're not going to worry about that.

No, I appreciate the introduction. I don't have any other comments.

I will also add that we have worked with Ozaro to the south of us as far as drainage and easements, bringing sewer up that way. He has admitted he's got quite the issue with creeks there and bridging and everything else. So us doing this little intersection on our side that goes to his side, he's very appreciative of that. That's another access point straight to 1050 as well.

Did I understand you correctly this afternoon? portion that you have future development is not included as a part of this rezoning? It is not. Correct, not included at all. That will stay residential for now.

I think over the years we've had, I'll leave it at the term numerous, people bring us something for these parcels and And, you know, part of the problem has been the one way in, one way out. So I do appreciate the 1050 extra thing there. But the other issue for the particular council has been the fuel station.

Yep.

So...

My reasoning for that is the need. Not necessarily fuel. When you go to look at a Leo's or sheets, they go down in size of pumps, but more so it's the desire for something on the side of town. From Girl School Road to Prestwick on 100 South, there's nothing. On 10th Street, there's now eight. Pretty much same traffic count. On heading north from the airport, through Brownsburg, there's nothing on the east side of Ronald Reagan. There's four on the west side. So you got to cross and get back around and then come back out to the light. So as far as those two things go, there is a desire for it. You've got three or four different neighborhoods. And with the addition of 100 to 140, I think is what we guessed, employees in and out of there, it provides a good access point to the entry of Avon and walkable for several different people, thousands of commuters, hundreds of daily walkers. but I do understand.

We have so many gas stations.

Understood.

So many.

There's not really any that are very close to this location.

I understand, but there is within a half mile or a mile. I'm just saying you don't have to have something in everybody's backyard.

Understood. We appreciate that.

Yeah. So you talked about you could put a fifth building there.

You could. But I don't know that our portion gets done this way without having some sort of outlaw there.

You know, we hear that all the time. Okay.

I understand that. But in this case, it's very true. These are expensive buildings. So the outlaw absolutely does help us get this job started and completed.

Those are my comments.

Understood. Thank you very much. Thank you, guys.

I appreciate it. Thank you.

Thank you.

Next, 2027 budget general fund presentation.

Yeah, this is going to really clear the room once I start talking budget 2027, so... Thank you, as you guys are aware, Greg Garitas was here at our previous meeting and kind of started this budget discussion. So I'm gonna work a little bit in backward order just to kind of introduce, and then I'm not gonna go through all the individual form ones. I'm gonna try to highlight the changes that are in the budget or increases that we've actually proposed. So the first thing I'm going to start out is, again, Greg talked about this, but I think it's really important to our discussion. Our assessed value is what really drives what we can do in terms of a budget. And so the last document, if anyone's following along online in the NAV document is the net assessed value. So again, I know we talked about this a little bit, so I won't talk a lot, but I think it's important. We do have a growing assessed value. You will notice the trend, which is, as you guys are aware, is a result of Senate Enrolled Act 1. It's causing reductions in our assessed value, even though we have strong assessed value growth. So you'll notice in 24 and 25, we had almost a 14% increase. Last year, when they made a change to the legislation, it was still up five, which we thought was really positive. We were hoping to be around 5% again this year. It did come in at 2.54%. Um, We did have very strong growth in our 3% category. In our TIF districts in particular, we had a 23% increase. Of course, the TIF districts don't necessarily positively impact our general fund. So again, steady, positive growth. We're doing well. However, that did give us some pause. And as you guys remember, Greg Garitas talked about that what Senate Enrolled Act One is gonna do is force our tax rates to go higher. and so you may remember when greg originally introduced uh the summary of budget recommendations he actually had the general fund at 10 10 million six hundred thousand uh after some discussion and actually getting at that time we didn't have the assessed value numbers And so now that we've had them, again, I think to be prudent, our recommendation is to go a little bit lower than the 10-6 and be at 10,500,000. So the general fund budget that's been presented to you tonight is 10,500,000. Regardless of that reduction, we're still gonna see a growth in our assessed value and there's probably nothing we can do to prevent that from happening, or sorry, a growth in our rate. So I kind of start there. So again, for anybody who may be watching and interested in budget, really our general fund budget revenue comes from two places. It comes from property tax and it comes from income tax. And then it comes from miscellaneous revenue that the town brings in. So a couple changes this year that are happening. One, the legislature has required us to create a building and construction fund, which separates out our expenses as well as our revenue that we receive from our planning and building departments. And so that has forced a little bit of a change. So as we go through these budgets and I kind of explain how you do it, you'll notice that there's a large increase in the town manager's budget. It's not because I am increasing my expenses significantly. It's because we've moved employees pay out of the planning and building fund into the general fund. The rest of the salaries are going to the building and construction fund. Again, I think the thought process from the legislature, and this is in my summary of changes, was they thought the opposite situation was occurring and that The town's planning and building revenue that we were getting was actually subsidizing our general fund. This is actually proof that the opposite is happening. I've moved about $325,000 out of the planning and building into the general fund. So our general fund has been financing around 30% of our planning and building departments. So I think that's an important note. That's something we'll have to kind of continue to monitor. The next one then, because I know Steve asked for more charts and graphs. If you guys look at the fund by character, this really tells the story of the general fund. When we talk about fund by character, we break down the budget into four categories. Character one is salaries. Character two is supplies. uh character three is other services and charges and character four is capital outlays so of our proposed ten million five hundred thousand dollar budget uh 7.9 million or just under 7.9 million is all salaries so uh most of what's in this general fund is all is all our staff and our people and so that kind of leads us then to the next one which is the budget by department um and what departments are actually paid for out of the general fund. And really there's only six of them. It's the town council, the clerk treasurer, the town manager, our facilities budget, our police department, and a little bit of public works, which is actually some of the things public works does for all the departments, like vehicle maintenance and things like that. They manage the fleet, and so some of those kind of costs are in the general fund. But of that, Of those, 76% of the general fund budget is our police department. So you have to keep that in context. In order to reduce the general fund, the only places you can really do it is to impact either employees or our ability to provide public safety in the community. That's kind of setting the stage for the general fund. Again, now I'm gonna kind of jump to the beginning and kind of go through the summary of budget changes. I'm gonna go through this relatively quick. I think most of these I've kind of shared with you guys already. But in terms of employee pay, last year we did shift to a performance paid system. And so I created pay grades, did a big analysis. I had told you guys at that time this would be a two-year plan. We'd adjust those grades. And then this year we would just do cost of living adjustment. And so the recommendation from our financial advisors was a 3%. So those pay grades edged 3%. That does not mean that every employee is going to get a 3% raise. Their raise will be based on their performance. Obviously, you guys are aware, we've talked a lot about liability insurance. We haven't had a very good year from a liability insurance, not because we're not doing a good job on our risk management, but we've had some workers comp claims and things like that. So we've been advised to do a 20% increase as a placeholder to our liability insurance. And you guys will recall that last year we had about a 16% increase. So that's a fairly substantial increase for us over a two year period for our liability. Also, you'll remember that our health insurance has been incredibly stable. We've been very happy with the AIM Medical Trust. The AIM Medical Trust actually puts guardrails on what the increases are. And we're paying a little bit this year because we benefited last year. Actually, our plan performance last year wasn't very good, but the whole plan as a whole for the trust capped it at 3%. And so we only had a 3% last year. our impact was actually substantially more than 3%. We got lucky because we got caught by that guardrail. However, this year, we also didn't do well. The guardrail was 9% and we were actually at 9.1%. And so again, we're benefiting a little bit, but we're also paying for the fact that that increased. And even at 9%, I know 9% is a shocking number, but anyone in the private market, they're telling people 16 to 20%. So The trust still continues to prove itself to be a good, stable option for us. The previous year, we had 0%. In the year before that, you'll remember we had a negative 3%. So again, our last two years of claims has kind of resulted in that. We have budgeted for one additional police officer position. The police department has proposed a $5,000 increase, and I know Chief Stoops has prepared an analysis that he'll share with you if you guys want to get up and ask him questions. Again, we're trying to do that to remain competitive and compete with our other agencies to make sure that we're drawing the best talent we can to Avon. The next one is, and again, you guys have heard this too, is the state pension, the police retirement fund. It went from 20% the previous year, last year, which is actually this year, it went to 23.3%. And next year, it was increased to 26.5%. So again, when we talk about our entire payroll for our police department, that kind of a 3% increase is fairly substantial for the officers, but it is required by statute. Again, Chief Stoops has recommended that we do an increase to longevity as well. So we are currently at $200 per year of service, and we're recommending to go to $250 a year. And again, this is a good recruiting tool for us to try to keep employees here who've been here for a long time and have proven themselves to be good employees for the town. We have continued to cap that at a 30-year cap. We also have money in there, as you guys are aware. The planning department has asked to be able to do some long-range planning. We just got done with our comp plan that recommended some area plans. The everyday planning that kind of ties up our staff, since we have a small staff, prevents us from doing some of the long-range planning. So we do have $40,000 in there to use consultants to assist us with long-range planning. help and revise the UDO. And then as I mentioned, how to help create those overlay districts to create specific standards for those areas that we identified in our comp plan. We're also continuing to try to digitize our documents as we're moving into our other buildings. So there's still a little bit of money left. It's actually been substantially reduced from what we've spent over the last two years. We kind of, we're at the end of that. We think we're kind of wrapping up. We may not even have that, but we do have $20,000 in there to continue doing that. I already talked about the planning, moving to the town manager's budget. I know the town council also brought up the idea of potentially hiring an HR consultant or an HR person for the town. I did look into an HR person. It probably cost us $120,000 in salary, plus all their benefits. And so my recommendation in talking with Sean and talking to Julie and Dan, is that we do some kind of an HR consultant and that we do some kind of an analysis to determine if there's gaps in our processes and our policies to help improve our processes, we can always get better. And so the thought would be we would do an RFP, hire an HR consultant who would then review our processes, make recommendations. There are also HR consultants out there who can also assist us on day-to-day issues as well. And so I did budget $25,000 for us to use an HR consultant to assist us in those kind of things. I'm having a conversation with a company as well about a new national citizen survey. If you guys remember, we did this actually in 2017. It was really good data. We talked about it, doing this a few years ago. We didn't really have money to do it. I think this budget does accommodate that we can do that. So I'm having a conversation about doing that. It'd be 20 to $30,000. The thing that really becomes interesting, which we didn't get when the first time we did it, is we can't benchmark against how we've changed because we only did it once. But when we do it, this National Citizen Survey they do, they'll benchmark against how we did last time, but they'll also benchmark us against other communities of similar size, which helps us determine how we're performing as a community, where we have room for improvement. And it is a statistically valid survey that's done. And so again, I think that's interesting. I think that gives us information to figure out how we can continue to improve and to get better. I also said in here, we've funded a lobbyist the last two years, so we do continue to maintain that funding. Again, I think this is really important for us to proactively advocate for legislation versus waiting till the end and fighting against legislation that we don't particularly like. And so I do think that's important for us to continue doing that. I know Steve has brought up at previous meetings, we do, our agreement with the Youth Assistance Program was for that to end after two years. I've left funding in there at the same level we funded it previously. We have not gotten official ask from them to do that yet. So again, that may be something if we wanna take out or we wanna leave or we may wanna reduce, that's up to you. The council can give me direction on that. And then the final thing, This does include the full operating costs for us to be able to maintain and upkeep the new Civic Center once it opens. And as you guys recall, that's the facilities budget. When you look at this, that facility budget is particular to that. It's also been shared with the school corporation. Our agreement with the school corporation is that we will jointly agree to that budget, and then we split that. The town's share is 55%. The school's share is 45%. That's fully funded next year. And again, we do expect, obviously we're hoping to move into our building in December. So we do expect utilities and all those things to start hitting us next year. So that's my summary of the budget. Sean may want to get up and share a few things and then we're happy to answer any questions if you guys have them.

Just real quick, just want to give a little bit of an overview. That's paper that I put there before you. Kind of looks like that with all the different colors and lines on it. That top portion there, you'll see that is the salary comparison of all the agencies in this region. that participates in PERF, our Public Employee Retirement Fund. The reason that I picked those agencies out of the whole state is because they're right here in our area. They deal with the same criminals. They deal with a lot of the same crime. And we compete for the same employees to come work at our agencies. The information that's on there is always kind of a year in arrears. So you're looking at 2026 information, including ours at the top. And that's going to spell out the base salary for each agency, the longevity pay, and then what they certify as their PERF salary, which is what that percentage that the town and the employees have to pay every two weeks at that pay period. I've also highlighted the lowest paid department and then the highest, just for quick reference, so you can see the dramatic difference between some of those agencies. That next block down, you're going to see I broke it down into averages, the highest of each category, the lowest, and then a median range. And then in that yellow highlighted area, I just kind of repeated what our current status was just for quick reference so you don't have to keep trying to go up and down the page there. Below that in the pink, what you see there, That's kind of where we fall in relation to that first line in relation to the overall averages. The second line is where we fall in the overall medians. And as you can see, we're below average on pay and we're also below the median on pay. We're several thousands of dollars below the longevity average as well as the median and so on with the PERF salary. At the very bottom there, what you'll see there is just some examples. This is not something that we've written in stone in Form 1s or in the budget, but that just kind of gives you a quick glimpse of what the proposed salaries might be with the 3%, 4%, or 5% that would show you what that base patrolman pay salary would be in comparison to what it is currently in 2026. And then at the very bottom, there's just a few footnotes. Other agencies that Deputy Chief Barton and I have been talking with, they haven't been able to give anything in concrete because they're doing the same thing we are. They're just kind of putting together their budget. But what they're trying to look at doing is anywhere from 3% to 5% raises for their officers in 2027. The second footnote, some of the agencies are currently paying 3% to 6% of the employees' contribution So not only are they paying the employer's contribution, but they're paying some of the employees to try to recruit and retain people. Very expensive. It's just a footnote, not something that we have in our budget. And then some agencies are providing 99.9% paid medical coverage for the employee and family. Those are some agencies right here in this county that are doing those things that we just can't afford to do. but I just want you to know what we're up against when we're out there recruiting and try to retain employees. So happy to answer any questions about that. It's just kind of a addendum to put with your budget so you can reference salaries or any other information related to that salary if you want. Thank you.

Thank you. Anything else on the budget?

I may just offer one thing. When you guys, again, I will always offer, if you guys want to sit down and go through the Form 1 with me, I'm happy to do that. But if you're going through them yourself, I've tried to make them easy. Anything that's in blue is something that has actually changed. So if you're looking through the document, you see something in blue, that means it's increased. You see something in red, that means it's decreased. Then when you get all the way down to the bottom, It shows what last year's budget was, and it shows what this year's budget was, and what percentage increase to each of those departments it was. And then there's also a total general fund one that shows for the entire general fund. That may help you. I know looking through those formal ones are difficult, but if you want to look at numbers, that may help you in terms of looking at that. And we'd be happy to meet with you guys and go through it with you if you want to as well.

a realistic number for the HR consultant? That seems pretty low to me. That's why I'm asking.

I don't know. I actually have a meeting in, I think, I don't think it's next week. I think it's the following week with an HR consultant to get that information. So that's a starter number if they make a suggestion. That was based on a conversation I had with someone else who did something similar. That's what it cost them. Again, that organization was a little bigger than ours. So I would hope that I can do it for that. But again, it may depend what actually comes of it. It may be, it would obviously be something ongoing or if there's substantial things process-wise that we need to change, the cost could be more as well. But that was just a starting point, but I don't have an actual proposal from anyone. So it's just a placeholder at this point.

Okay. So we'll readdress that once you know. Okay.

Or if you guys have suggestions, please, I'm open to- I just think it's an important thing.

We've talked about it for years and I think it's important that we make sure that we have enough money in there to be able to actually do the task. So, and 25, it's hard to get anything done for $25,000. Okay.

I've got, just got a question on the police one, I saw that on exhibit B that, Sean, you can be proud that you earned a green color for priority 13, program two, police technology. It's just that I'm just trying to figure out on, Oh, no, no, I'm sorry. I absorbed that right away. But these ones that when we budget $50,000 per year, can you tell us just in a nutshell what type of on the technology, you know, what we can expect maybe coming up for this coming year for the budget?

Yeah, so a few years ago we established a contract with our IT company for a monthly fee because we were – Doing it basically all a cart and it was costing us like triple because of each project or emergency it resolution that we needed to have addressed. So we entered into that agreement. So a lot of that is the monthly fee and I want to say it's around. $3,500 or $4,500 a month roughly just for that. So that eats up a lot of it. And then, of course, any kind of hardware or unexpected service that we need. So I know this last year we've had a couple servers that had to be significantly upgraded. That cost us quite a bit of money that we weren't expecting. And so Julie and Ryan both had to kind of help us find some revenue to help pay for that.

Yeah.

Knock on wood, next year we should have the contract. We should have our normal wear and tear and updates and so forth on all of our mobile data terminals in our cars, as well as our desktops and our servers in our buildings. Like I said, most of those have been upgraded with a huge amount of expandable memory. So we're hoping that those are going to at least get us through the next couple of years without any significant major repairs or upgrades that might be needed.

Very good. No, thank you.

Thank you.

And Ryan, you said the things in red went, they decreased?

They decreased, correct.

So I do have a question. The chaplain stipend went down. Are we not going to have a chaplain now or?

No. I think that line went down. There was something else previously in that line. So I'll double check that and make sure that's right. No, we still have a chaplain and we still budgeted for a chaplain. I'll double check that one.

Okay.

Well, it's showing it went down 7,500. It shows it's in red and it shows 7,500.

So.

That may have been me, Sean. I may have messed it up. Sorry.

Just checking. I just think we need one. So that's why I was asking. It's showing clothing allowance going way down too. So, or down. Is that? I don't know. You might want to look at yours.

Yeah, let me double check. I was going to say, so the police department gives me their budget and then I entered in there. So let me double check that I did it properly from what they did. Yeah, I want to say they went down, that Steve cleaned some things up when we did the budget, and so the overall dollar amount went down, and we tried to put things in different places, so the overall number in that line may have gone down, but it doesn't necessarily mean that the actual number went down either.

Okay. Is it possible that it's Steve Moore's fault?

It could definitely be Steve Moore's fault. Highly likely it's Steve Moore's fault. Poor Steve.

If you could verify.

I'll double check all of these. I will, I will, absolutely.

I can give an attaboy to Steve Moore on the preemption upgrade to GPS, Project 11, or Project 30, Priority 11. That was, I'm with you there. So Steve, you're doing well.

Look at him smiling. All right, moving on, ordinance introduction 2026-11, establishing building and construction fund. Brian, you spoke to that briefly, Dan.

As Ryan mentioned, under the new Public Law 73-2026, you're required to establish a fund and set aside the monies that you collect in fees in your building and construction-related programs. So that's what this new fund does. As you can see on the second page of the ordinance, the source of the funds will be the fees assessed and collected for approval of building and construction-related fees during the year. This is a non-reverting fund, so it sets by itself and stays there to the end of the year. It's a statutorily required fund. This is first reading.

Any discussion or questions? Thank you. Moving on to introduction of Ordinance 2026-12, amending the speed limits.

Yes, this ordinance would change the speed limits on a segment of 900 east and also on a segment of 150 north. Please come at the recommendation of your public works director. And this is introduction only.

Just want to clarify that this is a typo. It's not from County Road 20 north to Stony Meadow. It's 200 north.

That's correct. You are correct. I already made that change. Steve pointed it out to me when he reviewed it. I did want to point out one other change as well. There'll actually be a third amendment to this when you guys see it, but I want to at least put it out there since you guys are doing the introduction. We intended for a reduction on the speed limit on Avon Avenue between 100 south and 150 south. If you guys recall, there was a section there that was the counties, and we were working with the county to relinquish it. And so, Steve, do you remember what the speed limit is? It's 45, and we're going to recommend reducing it to... 40 or 35. So that will be at, there'll be a third one on there when you guys see it at final reading, but I wanted to at least get that out there and make sure you guys were aware of it. So you're not surprised when you see it next time. Again, all these traffic speed reductions are require an engineering analysis and that becomes the recommendation of the reduced speed. And so certainly we have lower speed limits on either side of that section. So it makes sense for it to not be 45.

Any questions? If not, legal counsel report.

We don't have anything.

Thank you. Okay, second public comment period. Anyone that would like to come forward? Same rules as previously. Counsel comment. Council Callender, Ryan.

I just got one. Sorry. So Ryan or Steve, either one. The bridge aesthetics on Dan Jones Bridge, I was just curious what those were because I didn't know. And I like it because I remember the stimulus funds that we had back on the other CSX bridge on Ronald Reagan. We were stuck with that because of the stimulus money. So I'm glad, but I just want to know what are those?

Yeah, you're exactly right. So if you remember when we did the Avon Avenue Bridge, the county gave the town the money and we did the bridge. We disliked Ronald Reagan Parkway. So what we asked the county when they were doing the Dan Jones Bridge, we asked them to match what we did on Avon Avenue. So the aesthetics are actually the same exact stuff. It's including lights. It's including the decorative handrail. It has the coloration so that it actually, the two bridges will actually match when they're done. So it'll make it look exactly like Avon Avenue.

Perfect, because the lighting, that's what I was hoping to hear. Yeah, the lighting coming over that bridge would just be consistent with what's there to the south, so that's great. Yep. No, thank you. That's all I have.

Do we have an update from the county on the completion of the Dan Jones Bridge?

Yeah, they really have till the end of 27 to complete it, but the information we're hearing is it should be ready in November, so hopefully by Thanksgiving. They have until 27. They're on schedule to complete it by November of 26. The county gave them three years to do it.

So we're going on public record that November.

No, that's the information we've received from the county is that they believe it'll be ready by November of 2026.

That's okay. Everyone's tuned off by this time after you go through the budget.

After I talk about the budget, no one's listening.

All right. Meeting adjourned. Thank you.