City Council - Regular Meeting

Welcome to the January 5th, 2026 city council meeting. As per rules of the legislative body, as a senior council member, I will chair this meeting until the new mayor is selected. So, if you'll join me in the pledge of allegiance, please. I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation, indivisible, with liberty and for all. Thank you. Will the clerk call roll, please? Senior Chairman Bowman,

here. Council member McCoy here. Council member Ferrer present. Council member Kypers present. Council member Vale present. Council member Mson present. Council member Overberhozer here. And the clerk is present. That concludes the role.

Right. Thank you. We've got uh OA office tonight for four council members. So, it is my pleasure to announce that per the official election results of number of November 2025, Council Member McCoy, Council Member Kypers, Council Member Mson, and Can Council Member Vale have been selected to serve on this council from for 2026 to the 2029 term, finishing December 31st of 29. So, don't think you're getting out a year early.

So, the clerk will now administer the oath to office. So, we'll have them go down uh ad minister the oath office and then we'll take a about a fivem minute break uh to allow people to take pictures if they want. We're going to get out of the way.

No. It's

only ready. Okay. Please raise your right hand and repeat after me. I state your name. Do solemnly affirm that I am a citizen of the United States and of the state of Washington. that I will support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution and laws of the state of Washington, and will, to the best of my judgment, faithfully and impartially perform all duties of Council member for the city of Battleground, County of Clark, and state of Washington. As such duties are prescribed by law. Let's come on up. But you guys want to take pictures, do any of that stuff right now

and then we'll reconvene.

You're first in just in time. You're good. Good. Yeah.

Right here. One more. I'm gonna do one.

I want to go last. Do one first with her and then I want you. Yeah.

Thank you. This request Yeah.

All right, back in session. We will move on to the mayoral selection and appointment. Let me get my other sheet here. So we will now commence the mayoral selection process. Each member of the city council may nominate one person. There is no need for a second. Nominees who do not wish to accept the nomination must decline at the time the nominations are made. If there are multiple nominees, council members will vote using the ballot at their seat. So you should have a ballot for mayor. That's what we'll be using.

Okay. So, I'll ask the clerk to call for nominations, please.

I, City Clerk Elizabeth Haley, now call for nominations for the office of mayor with a term expiration of December 31st, 2027. I nominate Eric Overhauler as mayor. Nominate uh Troy McCoy. Are there any further nominations? Are there any further nominations? Are there any further nominations for the office of mayor? Hearing no further nominations, I now close the nominations period. All right, we can and all of your to the left for you. Are you reading them?

No, keep your envelope in case. Well, Yeah, in case there's a revote. Yeah,

sorry. I will now read the votes by order of council position. Council member Troy McCoy. Votes for council member Troy McCoy. Council member Bowman votes for Council Member Troy McCoy.

Council member Ferrer votes for Council Member Overhozer. Council member Kit Kypers votes for council member Troy McCoy. Council member Vale votes for council member Overhozer. Council member Mson votes for council member Overhozer. Council member Overhozer votes for Council Member Overhozer. By a vote of 4 to three, the council has appointed council member Overhoser to serve as mayor from January 1, 2026 to December 31, 2027. All right. Thank you. Uh, Council Member Overhozer, Mayor Overholdzer, if you'll step down and take your oath of office, please. That's good enough.

Yep. Thank you. Please repeat after me. I, Eric Overhozer, I, Eric Overhozer, do solemnly swear do solemnly swear that I will fairly and impartially that I will fairly and impartially perform the duties of mayor perform the duties of mayor in and for

in and for the city of battleground the city of battleground Washington Washington as prescribed by as prescribed by RCW RCW 35A 35A

13.13 Sorry. Oh, this

No, we're good. We're good. Can you hear me? All right. All right. Now, we will uh move on to the deputy mayoral selection and appointment. Liz, would you uh read us? Just go for it. All right. Proceed. I, city clerk Elizabeth Haley, now call for nominations for the office of deputy mayor with his term expiration of December 31, 2027. I'd like to nominate uh council member Amy Valley for deputy mayor.

I'd like to nominate council member Ferrer for deputy mayor. Um, I'll decline that. I would like to nominate Council Member Troy McCoy for Deputy Mayor.

I decline that nomination. Are there any further nominations? Are there any further nominations? Are there any further nominations for deputy mayor? I now close the nomination period for deputy mayor.

All right. With one single nomination. Um

Oh, my my apologies. Yes. Thank you, sir. As there is only one person nominated, the council has appointed council member Vale to serve as deputy mayor from January 1st, 2026 to December 31st, 2027. Right. Uh, Deputy Mayor Bale, can you uh step down from the DAS to take your oath of office? Just careful though.

Please raise your right hand and repeat after me. I, Amy Vale, I, Amy Vale, do solemnly swear do solemnly swear that I will fairly and impartially that I will fairly and impartially perform the duties of deputy mayor perform the duties of deputy mayor in and for the city of Battleground Washington. in and for the city of Battleground, Washington. as prescribed by As prescribed by RCW RCW 35A 35A

13.13 I'd uh I'd like to call for a quick two-minute recess just to let the crowd um disperse if they would like or uh continue to stay seated for the meeting.

Now we're going to move on to uh should I gabble this? There you go. All right. Uh moving on to agenda approval. I asked uh does any council member wish to amend the agenda as written this evening? Mayor move to approve as presented. I'll second. Approved by council member McCoy. Uh second by council member Far Ferrer. Um any discussion hearing? None. Um call for the vote. Yay.

What do you mean? Yeah. For a vote. Yeah. Yeah. Everybody I for yes. A for no. I I I. Sounds like the eyes have it. Motion passes. Agenda approved. Um going on to summary reports and presentations. Council member reports. Are there any uh council member reports this evening? I have hearing none. It's been a quiet holiday. I have one.

Oh, go ahead. Um, we had the Discovery Clean Water Alliance uh meeting and um quite a bit of stuff going on with the alliance right now. Uh we have because of the county's delay with GMA. The alliance is in limbo as far as what we can do because GMA, they have to pass their plan before we can implement our plan. So, we're at the tail end of that. So, the inefficiencies down at the county are not helping us with the alliance and and trying to get through some of the projects that that we're looking at and what we're doing. Um, one of the um projects that we are um responsible for is obviously the transmission the the parallel force transmission line for the city of Battleground. And um there's three different options that are being looked at if I'm correct there, Mark. Uh one, four. One of them is the same that it is right now, just bearing another line. Uh one of them is going out to 72nd and south and tying in. Uh one of them is going out to the freeway and tying in out at uh out at the freeway and the discovery corridor line. And the fourth option is do nothing.

Uh expansion of the EQ.

Oh yeah, expansion of the equalization basin. So um those are being looked at right now. Um that's a 40 plus million dollar project. Um something that was brought up that will potentially be coming back is um the city of Lenter is having issues with sewer and um they haven't come to the discovery clean water alliance. was asked by a PUD commissioner and which I don't know why because they have nothing to do with sewer but um a PUD commissioner and um one of the alliance board members to look into what was going on in the center. They did a program I mean did a PowerPoint presentation um and that could be coming back to us. it it's not really advantageous to the alliance to take on um Le Center. Uh basically those rates will be passed on to all of the rateayers in the district and um I don't I don't know that there's a benefit there for us but there is some probably some political pressure that could be coming that direction maybe in the future. Um the other thing because of the GMA issues and because we will be um it'll be last minute type stuff when we when we find out where the county's at with this and we're going to have to get stuff done. The alliance will be going to uh six meetings this next year instead of four. And so and there could be more um as as we go forward just depending on uh with some study sessions. So uh with that I need to make sure um that uh we have representation there. I know Mr.

McCoy I think is the alternative on that. Um I myself uh not sure where that's going to go. So I may be having to step down off of that board. Um and so someone Mr. McCoy or someone may have to take that over. So, uh, we'll bring you up to speed on it, but it is quite a bit of stuff that's going to happen this year with the alliance. Thank you.

Can I ask a followup on that? Uh, the EQ, which is the first time we've heard about this and expanding the equalization basin. Is that a sign? That seems like that'd be a significant cost savings, but it seems like it would not hit our capacity. So, is it more than just the basin?

Um, or is it just that much of a peak that the basin can correct? Essentially, um, what we're mitigating for is that peak. And so, um, it tends to be in the winter when we have the most ini going into the system. So, um, you can get, they're doing the math, but it sounds like it could get close to addressing the issue for quite a while. Um, so they're I think towards the end of the first quarter, we'll have more information about the the four scenarios. What would be the approximate cost of something like that?

So, the original construction was about 5 million. Um, so say 10. So if you doubled it, you know, doubled the capacity and probably doubled the cost with inflation, I'd say around 10.

Any other comments or questions? Uh just one, Mr. Mayor, there is a or do you want to bring this up in your reports? There's a meeting Thursday about GMA that we should have somebody probably present at.

Yeah, I can bring that up in my reports. All right, hearing no other comments or questions, uh we'll move on to the mayor's report. Uh we have a salary commission position number one reappoint. Um the term for salary commission position number one previously held by Neil Butler expired on December 31st, 2025. Um Commissioner Butler has expressed his desire to be reappointed. Um, I'm seeking the council's approval to reappoint Neil Butler to the salary commission commission position one for a three-year term ending on December 31st, 2028. I'll entertain a motion.

Second. Motion by uh Council Member Bowman, second by uh Council Member Kypers. Uh, all in favor say I. I. I. I.

Any nays. All right. The eyes have it. 7 to zero. Uh, Neil Butler. Congratulations. Reappointed to uh salary commission position one. Anything we need to do else than that? We're good. All right. And then uh we're also planning commission position number two appointment. Um the term for salary commission position number two previously held by Janette Chumley expired on December 31st, 2025. Uh as Commissioner Chumley is not seeking reappoint, I would like to express the city's gratitude to her for her service to our community on the planning commission. Uh thank you Janette. And I'm seeking the council's approval to appoint Gary Obermeer to planning commission position number two for a four-year term ending on December 31st, 2029. And I'd entertain a motion from council.

So moved. A second. All right. Um motion by council member McCory. I'm still going to get used to saying that. And uh seconded by council member Bowman. Uh do we have any discussion that we'd like to have on that? Hearing none, uh we'll move to a vote. Uh we get a the eyes. All in favor say I. All in favor say I. I. I. I. Any.

All right. Uh that motion passes seven to zero. Uh welcome to the commission, Mr. Overmmy. have them come up and say anything both of them that you just appointed. Would you guys like to come up and say a few words? Mr. Overber, Mr. Butler, thank you. Thanks. You're welcome. Thank you for your service.

Hey, we're still working this thing out. All right. Um, CRAN board of directors, council liaison position and alternate appointments. Um the council liaison delegate and alternate position terms to the clar county public transportation benefit area catran board of directors expired on 123125. The delegate position was previously held by council member McCoy and the alternate position was held by council member Pere. The delegate and alternate will serve one-year terms from January to December 2026. Members do not receive a stipen or a salary. Members of the cat board meet on the second Tuesday of every month and are responsible for providing policy and legislative direction for the agency as administered by cat's chief executive officer. Uh do we have any council members interested in serving as cat council liaison delegate? Mr. Mayor, I'd recommend that this is one this is an important board that the mayor, deputy mayor sit on. Um especially going through with what what's going on right now just to keep it um to get to know that that board a little bit more because this is one that's pretty controversial in the in the county and uh has a lot of stuff a lot of moving parts going on with that. Yeah, I was going to ask that too. Isn't it usually the mayor that sits on that board?

It has been. I mean, there's there's been times where like the mayor was no longer mayor and stayed on it, but it takes a while to get up to speed on a lot of the stuff that's going on there. And so, it's usually been the mayors that have sat on it from us. That's not necessarily from the county. Right, Mayor Oberer, I'd like to state my concern about having two brand new people um on such an important board. I'm just wondering if it would be best to have the mayor and council member McCoy, if he is willing to stay on. Council member McCoy, is that something you would entertain?

Uh I can be alternate. Okay. But yeah, uh I I will mention that when when the new board comp goes through that I believe the alternate would go to the city that's not present. So I don't know that the alternate necessarily flows to battleground. Yeah. So just with the way the board depends how we do the ILA and I would also wrap in the board composition committee in with that appointment. The mayor should sit on that as well. Yeah, fair enough. I'm just stating my concerns about the continuity that would be important. Do you have anything?

Yeah. Is there any reason that we can't have the existing member ride through to the next meeting so that we can table this motion until the second meeting of January? Uh there's a cat meeting before the next meeting. That's why this one's on the agenda versus the other ones. Hence my question. Is there any reason we can't have the existing member stay for the next meeting?

The appointment expires December 31st. Isn't I think there's other though I think that what he's trying to say I think he's trying to say that there's other boards too that are also so but we're not doing those tonight. So what's the urgency for this one other than does this one have specific bylaws for CRAN or policies whereas the other ones may not like RTC or something? I I can answer that if you want. We we have to let CRAN know by January 12th.

Catran needs to be informed by January 13th. The next council meeting will be held on Tuesday, January 20th. And I would also add with the lawsuits and everything that's going on with CRA, having somebody temporarily fill that role is not ideal. I think you you should nominate you should put the person in it now that's going to be in it for the year and and ride with that. And I'm helping to bring them up to speed as much as I can. Um but um although normally I would agree with you know let it ride for a meeting but in this case I don't don't think it works with what's going on over there.

Well I don't have any real issues with being on that um committee unless anyone else has uh any heartburn about it or any. All right. So um motion to go approve mayor overhoser as council leaison delegate to the cat board of director's term ending December 31st 2026. Second motion uh by council member Mson second by council member Kypers. Um any further discussion? All right. All in favor? I I I I

Any All right. Motion passes seven to zero. Council or Mayor Overhauzer will sit on that appointment. Um Mr. All right. Now we have the alternate Mr. Mayor on that. Yeah.

Can we can we look um in our governance and like in the past uh boards and commissions were mayor's appointments and did not need a confirmation from council. Um apparently we've changed that where cuz it used to be we just asked hey who wants to be on it? The mayor signed it. We never had to make a motion. I think Mr. months and you were here when we were doing that where it was just a mayor's appointment and we asked who wanted it. Is there a reason why we're making motions and seconds for appointments that are mayor's appointments?

I can speak to that. I was looking at the governance manual before this meeting to see about that cran board and it it did say that the mayor makes the appointments with the confirmation of the council.

Okay. All right. Then we've changed that. Thank you. All right. Um, one thing I would like to uh move on to is the alternate council liaison, even if it is a temporary position for the CRAN board of directors. Um, and I would uh entertain a motion to appoint the alternate. I would nominate Council Member McCoy as the alternate until something changes in that construction of that U board. Um, okay, we got a motion. Do we have a second?

Um, hearing no second. The motion fails. I will put out there, mayor, that I have no problem staying on as an alternate. Um I also don't mind if um going off of Council Member Bowman's suggestion that um our new deputy mayor Vale if she wants to sit on the board. Either way, I I don't hold anything personal. I'm here if you need me. Um or I am open to a motion at this time. If anybody wants to make that I will hear it.

I was just want you have on here. Yeah. Otherwise I just go ahead and appoint somebody but Okay. Do you have any interest in it? That' be mayor, I appreciate the um the input for other from other council members and since you have already been on that board, I would um I'm completely willing to step aside and allow you to continue. I think that that's great. Okay, if you're willing to. Thank you so much.

Yeah, not a problem. Okay, so I will move to approve the appointment of myself, council member Fraer as the alternate council liaison on the CRAM board of directors. We have to close out the original motion. No, it was never seconded. Yeah. By not having a second. Um, all right. So, we have a motion on the floor uh made by Council Member Ferrer. We have a second by Council Member McCoy. Uh, do we have any discussion? All right. Um, all in favor? I.

Any nays? All right. Motion passes seven to zero. Welcome as the alternate again. Welcome back. Um I I would also like to add one more position to our business here. Um and that is CREDC only for that same reason that we have a meeting coming up this Thursday at 1:30. And I think it'd be a great idea with a new chair at that CRC um that we have a new point person there um or at least have our ducks in a row for that meeting. So I would be open to any motions uh for appointment for the CEDC. Mayor, I'll make a motion that um to nominate Jeannie Kypers or um I guess not nominate but to appoint Council Member Kypers for the position of CRDC board.

Second. All right, we have a motion on the floor to appoint uh Council Member Kypers. We have a second by uh Council Member Vale. Sorry, the motion was from Council Member Ferrer. Um any discussion on that appointment? All right. Hearing none, um, go ahead and call a vote. Uh, all those in favor? Yeah. All those in favor, please say I. I.

Hearing no nazs. Uh, the votes have it seven to zero. Council member Kypers, you are the new appointment for CRC. We'll get you that information, Liz, and get you updated on that commission. All right, we are moving on to presentations. Oh, wait. Mayor, can we have a public comment? Uh, no. Later. But, um, I would I would move that we also we include the nominations to the cran board to be our representatives on the board composition committee as well. Composition board. They're usually the same people. So, I would make that motion that we also make that change.

Can I get a second on that? All right. Motion made by council member McCoy, second by council member Ferrer. Any discussion on that? All those in favor? Let's get the eyes.

I nays. All right, motion pass 7 to zero. Uh, Mayor Overhozer will be the uh, appointee of that committee and then um, Council Member Ferrer will be the alternate for that composition board. All right, moving on to presentations. We're moving along here. Uh, serving beyond the badge. Chief Flynn, you have a presentation. Well, good evening. Uh, I I hope I caught everybody as they were coming in, but if the following would like to please come forward, uh, Lori Lindberg, Max Booth, uh, Bev Jones, and Devin and Joselyn Bowen, please. I hope I didn't pop. So, as you know, one of the things obviously is the police department. Uh we do stick and whistle, right? We go out there and we catch bad guys and we slow down uh our speeders, but it's just important that we are guardians of our community, that we're servants, and we're continue to build our culture. And although we've already recognized the police officers internally for what they did, I thought it would be just a a good opportunity and thank you for allowing me this uh city manager uh to just uh to to state this. The Battleground Police Department proudly hosted its second annual service beyond the badge Thanksgiving edition. An event created to help a number of families in our community enjoy a warm traditional Thanksgiving meal. This year's event provided a fully cooked Thanksgiving meal to community members who may have not otherwise been

able to enjoy one. Thanks to the dedication of our police officers, our professional staff, and a team of committed volunteers, including Battleground Mayor Troy McCoy, city manager Chris Swanson, more than 75 individual meals were carefully prepared and packaged. Between responding to calls for service, our officers delivered these meals, bringing comfort and connection directly to the family's doorsteps. This tremendous effort was made possible by the generosity of local businesses and individuals who truly embody what it means to support their community. We extend our sincere appreciation to Playmaker Sports Bar and Grill, Summerland Catering Services, Maddox Industrial Transformers, Alan Ernie's Bakery Cafe, Utopia Salon, Castle Farms, Walmart, Bev Jones, and Lorie Lindberg, whose contributions helped turn this vision into a reality. These businesses and individuals helped make this year's event an inspiring success. Their generosity continues to strengthen the balance that makes the city of Battleground a truly remarkable community. Serving beyond the badge is more than a yearly tradition. It reflects our ongoing commitment to living our department's motto partners with the community. We're proud to stand alongside local businesses, volunteers, and city leaders as we work together to uplift and support battleground families during the holiday season. So, I just wanted to recognize them and say thank you to those that were able to come out.

Yeah, thank you uh all who were involved and those not present. Uh what an amazing way to serve your community and the less fortunate here. Uh it's people like that that make this city uh as great as Battleground really is. So, thank you.

All right, Chief, you're back up. Oh yeah, might as well steal the mic a little more. So, one of the things that uh we've did as you know um the vast majority of our agency, the police officers have less than 5 years of service. Uh and as you know, last year as the uh city council was kind enough to be able to help us acquire the new vehicles that we desperately needed that we updated our u graphic scheme on there. We looked at how can we continue to build culture throughout the agency. Uh one of the things that we looked at uh as you'll see is this is what our old badge looked like. Uh that badge is more than 25 years old. The reason I know that is the longest servant employee has 27 years on. He said we've had that badge for a very very long time. Uh as you know most of our officers wear the external carriers. Um this is what the car what it looks like uh on their chest. One of the problems that you can see obviously is nobody had any of the these designs because it was so old. How do we continue to let our officers uh feel that a spree to court uh that commitment to something bigger than them? And so we asked all 36 employees, our commissioned and our professional staff to help design something that this is going to be with most of them throughout their career. And this is what they came up with. You'll hit the center, please. So, it's I had to put the pretty graphics in there. It is a little Vegas-esque, but that's our new batch.

Nice. So uh let me just show you uh the the big difference that you see. Obviously uh technology has has done a quite a bit but we wanted to make sure that every piece of that badge needs to have a meaning behind it. Uh again uh the left is what is on their uh external carriers now. on the right is the updated version. So it just looks obviously much sharper which image certainly uh is important but uh we wanted to keep the shape. I think that it was important to recognize the legacy of the people that came before us. So we kept the same oval shape. But one thing that we asked them to add was the American bald eagle. There's a lot of representation with the American bald eagle uh certainly with our government, the executive branch, uh but also to uh the police departments throughout the nation. On this badge, you'll see Mount St. Helens is in the background. Battleground Lake is in there. The state tree, which I can tell you, I asked all the officers, nobody got that right. It's the western hemlock. Uh it's all pictured there in the background. Another thing that we thought uh was very important as Alicia is going to speak next. Uh this is our city's 75th year anniversary. I want to make sure that these were rolled out so that we could say this was part of that 75th year anniversary of the forming of our city. One thing that was missing was the United States flag. Uh I think it's

incredibly important that we recognize uh our nation and secondly that we include the city of battlegrounds flag to make sure that we have uh more ownership of this city uh depicted in our badge on the bottom. Uh each officer's badge number is uh inscribed in there and that's it. Uh I promise to be brief, but I just uh talking with the officers uh the ones that have been here for a long time, but more importantly uh so the their old badges uh we retired them. I also think that it's very important that the officers who wore those old badges uh that center of their badge I like to to think of uh something that collected all the the scenes they've been to, the goodness they've seen, the tragic parts they've seen, and they carry a lot of memories. Uh it is a hard job. Uh they're paid to do that job. Uh and they all raise their hand to do it. But I also think it's very important that symbol of what that stands for and that they know uh that the badge never makes the person. The person makes the badge and that we reinforce that with them time and time and time again. And what it means to wear the badge and wear it with honor because we represent every one of you when we when we suit up every day. So thank you for your time. Chief, thank you so much for your leadership and uh taking the time to craft such beautiful badge and getting your team's buy in in that effort. That's amazing.

Thank you.

All right. Up next, we have the City of Battlegrounds 75th anniversary celebration planning. Uh Alicia, you want to come on up? Present that? I decided it was more appropriate at the podium versus in my little corner over here. All right. So, this evening, council, thank you for having me. I am going to talk about a very exciting milestone in our city's history. As the chief mentioned, 2026 marks the 75th anniversary of our city's incorporation. The city council actually started this planning process when you allocated funds for this year-long celebration. So, thank you for getting us started. Tonight, I want to kind of talk about some of those highlights that we're going to look towards as we figure out how to implement that to make 2026 a really a big celebration. What makes this even more special, it actually coincides, as you well know, with our nation's 250th anniversary. So, we're going to make sure that we try and incorporate both uh celebrations, but of course 75 for Battleground is something we truly want to celebrate through this process. Okay, as I mentioned, there's going to be several areas of focus that we're going to want to make sure we're incorporating in every aspect of this celebration. The first is, of course, celebrating our city's history. telling our story through items like the website landing page, historic markers, and social media connections is kind of our beginning point of celebrating those uh historic occurrences. Uh the website landing page is a lowcost but effective uh way that we can create a hub where our visitors can learn about events and information throughout the year. Historic markers is more of an investment item. This is something that we're proposing uh to provide information about our history that actually people can interact with in

some way throughout our community. Whether they're scanning a QR code that'll take them back to a web page, they can learn a little bit more about that particular item. We're still trying to cultivate what those items are. Um but that's kind of the intent behind a historic marker. Some of the examples of that would be like parks or buildings that are named for individuals, but we might not know the story why. So being able to put those markers out there that people can learn that why when they're out enjoying our city is what the historic markers um would be intended to serve. And then a little personal side of things, my grandpa in his later years used to send us emails about little memories that he had about the family and he would send them out with the tagline, you know, a little spoonful of family history or one spoonful at a time. And so a couple years back I started a social media campaign called Way Back Battleground and it was just a fun picture or a story that we would put out to social media asking do you recognize this location or do you know the story behind this? So that would be ways that we can kind of pepper our history through something that people interact with every single day and that's just something we produce here in house. Um so we would share those via our social media channels as well as YouTube so people can go back and learn more about our history. Yes, everybody knows we're the battle that never happened. What are the stories behind the people who live here? And that's what way back battleground can accomplish. A very important focus of this program would be involving our community. The battleground of 2026 is creating the history of our residents for tomorrow and we really want to make sure we're celebrating that. So, a couple of the ideas that we're starting to float around is contacting our citizens, asking them to help share their story. Why do you call Battleground home? What's a significant memory you have here? Maybe we do a 75 stories for 75 years and assemble a video. Some way

that they can connect with telling that story of Battleground. Another idea is the Harvest Days parade. I would love to work with the Battleground Festivals Association to take all of our living former mayors, current mayor, and have them be an entry in the parade and kind of celebrate that history. uh right here in our roots. Um interactive murals is another concept we talked about working as you well we well know we had the artist who uh did our mural down at the skate park. I think that was something that was really really wellreceived by our citizens. So being able to kind of take that momentum and move forward, maybe do some business partnerships, have some interactive murals where people can pose in front of them. You've probably seen those with the big wings behind and people pose uh for pictures. It'd be a nice way for people to feel connected and give us something iconic that they they can connect to in our community. Um, street banners, that's another thing. We have a a monument street span uh sorry, a monu monument street light banner uh giving a visual display of our celebration. We've also uh discussed possibly doing a city fair, kind of like an open house where people can come in, interact with our staff, touch the trucks that they're out there working every day, learn a little bit more about what it is we do here, so they can connect with again the history that we're creating now, um, and have a better understanding and feel that deeper connection with their city. And then of course promotional items. I've been working actually this started, I think it was with former mayor Philip Johnson. uh he had done a a visit with third graders and he's like what can I give these kids and so I just created a coloring page for him to take to the kids and so that kind of got me interested in doing like a coloring book that again highlights the services here in Battleground. So some sort of promotional items that we can help again share tell that story um and connects people with our services and the great staff and council and members of our

community that are all around us. Um, a great example of a legacy project. You might not have noticed it, but when you walked in city hall, there is a big shadow box on the wall uh in the entrance of city hall. That's actually a time capsule that was created in 1976 celebrating our nation's bicesentennial that we unearthed in 2005 and created a shadow box. Um, we did put a new time capsule in the ground that same year. It's right located right in front of city hall. So that's something where the the staff and council of 2005 created something that the the city in 2055 will unearth. So kind of trying to keep that same feel where we can connect with uh future council staff and citizens. Uh a fun idea that actually came up from staff today is also maybe working with the school and helping them with a school dance. Maybe we do hometown homecoming and see if we can partner businesses to help. I know that they've had some struggles with, you know, refreshments at the high school dances and stuff like that. And that might be a way for us to bring kids in um and maybe grow their interest in learning more about the city. Uh there may have been a mention of the fact that we were incorporated in 1951 and sock hops were a big deal. So just some fun ideas that we've been throwing around out there. And then of course, probably the most important part of all is us looking towards the future. The city council's been doing this with investments in our roads and parks. Part of those road improvements we have been seeing um is roundabouts. Uh roundabouts offer a unique opportunity for art or some sort of creative installation that can also help tell our story. So trying to uh take advantage of those opportunities that might be coming down the line in 2026. Um but and all of that would be helping us create a legacy. Um, you can see here I've got a photo of a lady, Gloria Wal.

She's actually one of our Battleground University graduates, I think of 2024, and she's standing in front of a photo that's actually hanging over at the police department right now of our former mayor and town marshal, Ever Eaton. Well, we didn't know this until she came for BGU, but she said that that's her uncle. So, being able to put up wall art in city hall that people can come and connect with is something that I would hope that we can do as part of this project. Many of you may know Louise Tucker, longtime resident of Battleground. She's also the author of Battleground in and around. I had a nice conversation with her a couple years ago and she shared with me that she always aspired to do a Battleground history museum somewhere. So, kind of incorporating that living art that we work in and amongst every single day uh could kind of be a nod to that dream of hers while also kind of encapsulating the history of our city. Um, students and government. Um, this kind of goes along the line like I mentioned with Battleground University, kind of expanding that program, connecting kids, whether it would be high school students, middle schoolers. Obviously, we'd have to work with the school district to pull something like that together, but giving opportunities for students to connect with the city would be uh something that we would like to do. And then you see on there's one that's called a bee garden. You might wonder why bees. Well, if you probably saw on the previous slide where we talked about making our mark, these bumblebee stamps have been something we've been working on for the last two years. Uh, as we've been putting in ADA ramps or new sidewalks, our uh construction inspectors have actually been going out and stamping the the bumblebee into the sidewalks. So, we've got several dozen out there right now. And the significance of the bee actually ties back to that volunteer spirit that the chief spoke with about in his previous uh presentation. The battleground rose float used to it was all a volunteer committee. Uh they've since disbanded, but every year they built a float. They hit a bee. Sometimes small, sometimes prominent.

They put a bee on their float every single year. So to kind of keep that volunteer spirit, that teamwork that is a beehive, I thought it was just a really powerful symbol. So we've been doing these stamps and what's really cool about the concept of doing a bee garden. Again, that's something that could be giving to future generations. Um we uh would honor that history with the rose float. uh we could potentially partner with local beekeepers uh supporting small businesses, of course, the tiny vital pollinators, the bees themselves, and our environment while also possibly creating educational opportunities within a program like that. And possibly a far-fetched idea, but something that I would love to see that ultimately go to is maybe having harvested honey be distributed through the North County Community Food Bank. So, just kind of a cool way to bring all aspects of service through one civic program. And finally, as I said before, some of these ideas might just be dreams, but those dreams can hopefully inspire a fitting way for us to celebrate Battlegrounds 75th anniversary. With that, if you guys have any questions, comments, thoughts, I'd love to to hear from you. Alicia, I just want to say that this was amazing. I love the history and I love that the love that you have for the city is so evident. So, thank you so much for this preparation and this display. It was wonderful.

Thank you. All right. Uh Alicia, can you go back to I think your second slide? And it's got a list of different that right there that that very top one that citizen stories I think that was that could just be so impactful because there are still a lot of people with a lot of history here. So it's exciting to see the ideas you came up with. Um I look forward to seeing what you're going to do with all this. I just wanted to mention that I really appreciate you had that up there because I think it's so important for our community. Absolutely. Thank you so much.

Alicia, I have a question. you mentioned somewhere along the line, I think it was when you're talking about promotional items, you said something about or alluded to the hometown um feel or hometown culture is I know at one point you several years ago hometown was kind of a option for a logo or something for the city. Is that still on the table or is that still open for conversation?

I think you might be talking about the rebranding that was something part of our city's vision and absolutely I will say rebranding is a very complex process. It's something that's on our to-do list. Whether or not we can achieve that with 75th anniversary might not happen, but we will certainly um we do have interest in pursuing that a little bit further to see if we can get a bonafideed timeline. Thanks. Absolutely. All right,

Alicia, that's great. Thank you for all the time that you put into this. Uh I am looking forward to the coloring books. Uh uh former mayor and myself, uh Troy McCoy, uh for the last two years, we've gone to a a local school and uh just spoke about local government and the the way government is structured. And uh you know, they didn't really hear a whole lot that we had to say. they were more focused on the coloring books or coloring pages that we brought with us and and the uh the merch and so I'm looking forward to some new coloring pages. That'd be phenomenal. Thank you for all that hard work though. Absolutely. Greatly appreciated. Thank you.

Can I just add to that really fast for Alicia? Um she is looking for ideas. So if you have ideas, please email her because again this is once a history 75 years. So, it's pretty exciting. So, share your ideas with Alicia. Yeah.

Yeah.

All right. Now, I will uh move on to citizens communication. Um I will now open the meeting for citizens communications. Individuals are limited to three minutes to provide comments. The total time for public comment shall not exceed 30 minutes unless extended by the mayor. This is an opportunity to hear the members of the public in a limited public forum, not an opportunity for extended comments or dialogue. Please refrain from derogatory remarks, personal attacks, campaign speeches, and applause. Although the city council desires to allow public comment, the city's business must proceed in an orderly and timely manner. If your comment pertains to any item listed on the agenda as a public hearing, please reserve your testimony for the designated public hearing period. All comment should be directed to the mayor. The council may not be able to respond to individual comments and may refer citizens to a staff member for assistance. The city manager has placed her business cards at the podium. Please feel free to take one if you would like to contact her with any questions. If you have handouts, please hand them to the city clerk directed to the right of the podium. Thank you for your understanding and participation in the council meeting this evening. And uh Liz, are there any um members of the public on Zoom that would like to comment remotely?

No, Mr. Mayor.

All right. Thank you very much. We will go inhouse here. Uh first up, we have uh Win Gersuch. My name is Wing Gersuch and I came here tonight to congratulate the new mayor and vice mayor. I'm so proud of this town. This is unbelievable. And one thing I want to invite everybody is to go tomorrow at 10:00 to the Clark County City Council. The city council is very important because uh what they're going to be talking about is upgrading their wastewater treatment plant and about using the human feces that they put on your crops. And this is farmland. And that that poop is poisoned. And if you don't know what poison is, that's the sign. So, what I'm putting on in public record is the fact that if you look up harmonic residence water purification, this talks about if we can put something that causes this um sound in the wastewater treatment plant because they're upgrading it tomorrow. That's what the the thing is about that this actually can take the stuff out of the poop. So, when they put it on your farms, they don't even have to tell you that this poop is toxic. And it's very important that people know and share this, but it's called harmonic um resident water pur purification. It's by Mark Davies and it was written May 28, 2024. This article and I'm putting all this on public record and people should check it

out with these sounds. They can take heavy metals. They can take all kinds of um at certain frequencies. They said lead is at 10 to 15 hertz. Mercury's at uh 20 to 25 hertz. cadmium 15 to 10. But the thing that's most important is when you see the pesticides and the glyphosate, the Roundup, which they not only put in the vaccines, they put it in um weed killers and things. Glyophate takes 25 to 30 hertz and DDT is 30 to 35 hertz. So they talk about E.coli is 50 to 60 hertz. And because I moved up here 5 years ago from the Bay Area, most of the people in the Bay Area have E.coli E coli from their recycled toilet water. And hepatitis A virus is 70 to 80 hertz. That is the highest one in there. Hepatitis A. So chlorine they can take out at 40 to 45 hertz. Ammonia 35 to 40. And this goes on and on. And I'd like people to really look this up because this is the answer to the wastewater treatment plant is that if we get this the the county to put this in at the water treatment plant when they put this poop on your farms, it's not poisoning just the land and the crops that we eat. This will help neutralize everything. And they can do it because we have the technology of today. They also use frequencies for clearing blood clots. you know the things that the COVID vaccine caused blood clots. So these things are very important plus the fact if you need to read anything on biosledge look up naturalnews.com they have article after article from way back when on how toxic this bioolids are. So he calls it, they call it bio solids, but um Mike Adams calls it biosludge. And he's done all kinds of um he's done

videos and things that you can watch. Most importantly, you all need to get this book, Sustainable, the War on Free Enterprise, Private Properties, and Individuals by Tom Dwise. Read the last four chapters first because this book will tell you how they're implementing the depopulation plan and this bioolids. If we don't clean it up, that land's going to be contaminated forever and so is our food. And you're the farmers. I hope that everybody, if you can't be there, get somebody to call in, write letters to the editor. Uh do whatever you can to get the word out that we need Risonic. Anyway, this this frequency, but it's 10 o'clock tomorrow. Bye.

All right. Okay, next up we have Jessica Cole. Come on up, Miss Cole. Hello, city council. My name's Jessica Cole and I just wanted to say welcome um sort of welcome back to um Jeannie Kers and Troy McCoy. You were already here, still here. And um uh Brian Mson, welcome back. You you've taken a break and are back. And welcome um Amy Bale. And um congratulations to both um Eric and sorry, I'm going to use first names right now. Eric and Amy on your um positions. So, um I look forward to um coming to the meetings, hearing what's going on, being updated on all the different committees that you guys committees, boards, whatever that you're on. I appreciate all the work that you all do to keep the city running and um the staff also and there's some really good highlights with, you know, like we have low debt and all kinds of things. So, I went to Battleground University, so and I come often, so I I learned a little bit, you know. So, I'm I'm very um appreciate all that um you guys do to try to make Battleground a good place for us all live. And um I'm super excited about the 75th anniversary. And my favorites of Alicia's presentation are the roundabouts. And I've mentioned this before and I just hope you don't put a whole bunch of trees and stuff in it where you can't see through to the other side. Um I hope that's not you don't don't tell me, oh you do that for safety. I'll that'll make me frustrated. But um I'm also looking forward to the coloring pages. I I wasn't going to say that, but since you did, I did too. And I'm really

really really most interested in the um bee garden. that seems like such a great thing for our whole town. Like it's very comprehensive of how it could connect with all kinds of parts of our community and do good for our environment. So, thank you so much. Thank you, Miss Cole. Uh next up, we have uh Ed Stanton.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor, I'm here representing the Battleground Area Pastors Group. Uh, and uh, we just wanted to express our appreciation for all of those who served last year on the council and staff. You were a great blessing to our churches and we thank you very much for that. And congratulations to the new members. Uh, we appreciate your willingness to serve our city. And, uh, congratulations to our new mayor and deputy mayor as well. And um so I bring the congratulations from our battleground area pastors. And then uh I'd also like to thank you for meeting with us on a regular basis. and we look forward in the next couple months to meeting with you, Mayor uh Eric and uh Chris and some from staff uh to find out how we as churches and pastors can continue to serve our city uh that we love so much and our area as well. And then finally, I just want to let you know that our pastors pray for you. We pray for the city of Battleground. We pray for our city uh fathers. Um, and we ask God to give you wisdom and and strength as you do a very difficult job. And then on a personal note, I want you to know that I I have all your pictures. Well, the new pictures that'll come out are at my desk. And uh whenever I sit down to do the business uh that I have to do in the church, I see your faces and I pray for you because I know you have a difficult job. I especially pray for you when I have to pay the water bill. But that's another issue. But uh no, in all in all seriousness, we thank you for serving uh the city that we love and the area of which we're a part of and for the staff and all the blessing you've been not only to Landmark to other churches as well. So,

thank you and God bless you.

Thank you, Pastor Ed. Appreciate that. Um next up, we have Richard Oliver. Thank you, mayor, city council. Um, I don't normally do this, but apparently there's a a city order ordinance that has been uh starting to be enforced recently that has created a financial hardship for myself and quite a few other people. Um it's uh for trailers or boats that are parked on your own property um that have to be behind your house apparently. So, and there's a $250 fine that goes along with that. And then u the appeals process is very confusing. And apparently if you don't move it, you can then start being fined $250 a day. Now, I would I would not be able to move my trailer behind my house without paving over my front yard, which I don't really want to do. Um I have heard that these ordinances um are in Richfield and Wugal, but they were um the city councils there were able to um make exceptions in certain cases. And I would ask that perhaps that's something that could happen here. Thank you. Thank you, sir. Let's uh let's try to refrain from applause. Thank you. Um next up we have Brian Leesque.

All right. Thank you, Mayor. Um, so my name is Brian Lec. Um, I moved to Battleground with my family 21 years ago. Um, I currently work at Battleground High School. I've been there for 12 years. I'm in my eighth year as a special education teacher at Battleground High School. Um, I coach football at the high school for 10 years. Um, I currently run a fishing club at the high school. Um, we're the second largest club in the school. Um, we have major support from Marlon Lef Fever who runs Addicted Fishing, a Battleground alumnist. Um, we have a lot of students in my at the high school who love the outdoors and do all that type of stuff. Um, I'm here with my wife. I have six children. Um, we love living in Battleground. Um, my wife and I walk around the streets at night and thank you, Chief. We feel very safe walking around. I love that. Um, one of the things we love is we walk around and what do I see in the driveways? I see boats. I see trailers. I see RVs. Is this a community of people that appreciate where we are on the doorstep of the Gford Pincho and having Lewisville Park and having all these places where we can go out and enjoy what it means to live in Battleground and live in Southwest Washington. Um, and I'm very confused. I know something's been on the book since 95, I guess. Um, and I fully understand that. Um, you know, I've had a RV that I've had in my driveway for seven years. So, if you're going to back be find me most of that time um that I take out um no one's done anything about it before. Um and I just I don't understand. So, if you maybe in 1996, if you go to some of the older parts of Battleground um where they the city allowed people to come in and build houses, there's room on the side where you could, you know, back a trailer or back something in there. Um but as my wife and I walk around mostly in Northwest Battleground, um I am a math teacher. I didn't do the true math. maybe 5% of the houses actually have space on the side. Um, but we built all these houses that are compressed. I can't put a trailer on the side of my house even if I wanted to, unless I took down the fence and took half of my neighbor's side of the yard. So, um, I

know we live in a time where everything's cheap and free and, you know, like things are getting cheaper, so we can go out there and just pay to store it at a storage unit. Um, that's sarcasm, by the way. Sorry. But it's not easy, right? So, I don't understand why we're out there choosing this time to harass citizens. I feel like we're being harassed um to go have to pay to park something that fits in our own driveway. So, I would encourage you guys to somehow figure out how to do something about this. Either get it off the books or somehow I don't know, this just seems ridiculous in my mind and I don't know the answer, but I really don't feel like all of us who choose to live in battleground. We're not living in Lake Oiggo. We're not living in communities with HOAs. We live in battleground. We love living in battleground. We're celebrating all this stuff. And we can't have a little boat in our yard. We can't have a small RV in our driveway. I mean, so anyway, thanks for your time. Appreciate it.

Thank you, Brian. Again, please please hold your applause. I appreciate the enthusiasm, but we're we're trying to move on here. Um, next up, Jim Dryhorst. I might have butchered that in my apolog.

Good evening, city council. Congratulations to the four of you that have your new seat and the two of you that have now taken over the new mayor position and the vice mayor position. So I too am here tonight to discuss uh BM BGMC 17.135.150 that is regarding um trailer and both storage in residential districts. I received a warning a couple of weeks ago uh because I have my RV parked in my driveway as well. Um, I have done a little bit of research and looked into some things with the city of Camas and the city of Ridgefield and they both have made amendments through the city council to allow for up to one trailer in their driveway if you cannot access your property from the side of the home or the rear of the home. My property, there's no way that I could get around behind it and I butt up against a uh a wetland. So, that being said, I am asking city council to draft an amendment so that way taxpaying citizens like myself and the rest of the individuals that are here to speak to you guys tonight are able to park their privately owned property on their private property. Thank you.

Thank you, J. All right, last but definitely not least, Eric Young. Great name. Love it.

Thank you, council. Uh, I'm here also in regards to the trailer. Seems to be a popular issue. Uh, I did receive my letter uh that I got. I actually thought it was a joke uh on the 14th of uh December. Uh we have a code compliance deadline now of the 13th now uh with the $250 deadline and we're just now being able to do it. There were 400 letters sent out. Uh it's been quite a topic of conversation in the battleground community forum. Uh I view that the compliant the I think it's punitive what's basically going on. Evidently this ordinance has been in place since uh for 15 plus years. I've had a a utility trailer that's non- derelct. I have a three-car garage that has space in front of it. My trailer does not impede the sidewalk in any shape, way, or form. Uh blocking any type of uh you know, ability for people to transit in any way. Uh but I do view that basically a $250 fine, which I'm going to be basically assessed as of the 13th, uh this is the first opportunity to get this done is uh kind of ridiculous. I also do not have the ability to set or move my trailer to the side of my house. My subdivision where the houses are built, they're built on elevated lots for that to happen. We'd have to basically remove the uh the ADA walkway on the corner, which would allow for basically an ingress to get into the backyard for that one to happen. So, that's not a possibility that we have as well. Uh there are six people on my my street alone that have received these letters. Um we just have we're found out about basically that the council meeting today was going on that I was the only one able to make it. Although there's quite a few are listening in are hoping that basically something can happen. I'm hoping that you guys can amend it or get rid of it where basically, you know, if it's on your property, it's not derelict. It's not housing homeless people. It can basically be on your property provided it does not impede

basically sidewalks or ADA uh compliance. Um I'm hoping you guys can get this done. Uh obviously you guys are seeing that it is a pretty uh important topic that a lot of people are here for. Uh welcome to your new job and I hope you guys can get stuff done hopefully soon. Uh especially by hopefully the 13th so that way I'm not going to get charged 250 bucks. Thank you. Thank you, Eric. All right, moving on to the consent agenda. Uh, does any council member believe any items need to be withdrawn from the consent agenda?

Mayor, I'll motion to approve the consent agenda. I'll second. All right. Motion to approve uh by council member Herrera, second by council member Kypers. Uh, do we have any discussion on this? All right. Hearing no discussion. All in favor say I. I. Any nays? All right. Motion passes 7 to zero to approve the consent agenda. Moving on to public hearings. Um we have uh I now open the public hearing. Uh I will now open the public hearing at 8:30. Do we Oh, sorry. Does she have to read it?

Does she? Um go ahead. Go ahead. This is the clerk. I believe we may have a presentation from public works director Mark Hersseg regarding this item prior to opening. My apolog I'm sorry to skip over your uh presentation public hearing motion. Uh I now introduce public works director Mark Pers.

Thank you. Give me one second to get the presentation. Um, so since we have a couple new council members, I'll go back over the presentation from November. Um, it's fairly quick, so it won't take long. Um, what I'm talking about tonight is a easement vacation on the Kinder Care property. Uh, so Kinderare built a new facility at Scotenway Plaza, which is the northeast corner of Scotton and 503. Um, and they've requested to vacate a sewer and water easement. Um the process that we're following, it's there's not a specific process in state law or city code. Uh so in working with our attorneys, we decided to follow the street vacation process. How that works is the owner's petition, the legislative authority. Um it's signed by twothirds of the owners of the property. In this case, it's a single owner. Um there's a resolution that goes to council to set the public hearing. Um that happened at the November 17th m meeting. So that's the meeting we're having tonight. Um so then city council will hold the public hearing on the petition and then the council may accept or reject the request. Um so kind of what's going on is there were some utilities a sewer and water uh that belonged to the city that were abandoned as part of the project. So you can see there there's that kind of northern spot is where the sewer and water line used to be and those were removed by the project. they were moved a little bit to the south where the new hatched line is. Um, so there are no longer city utilities in that area. Uh, so the council request for tonight is to hold the public hearing and then you can approve, reject, or request more info on ordinance 20261. And I'm happy to answer any questions. If not, we can move to the public hearing. Uh,

do we have any questions from council? Hearing none, I will now open the public meeting. Uh I will open the public meeting hearing at 8:36 p.m. for public testimony. Individuals are limited to three minutes to provide testimony regarding ordinance 2026-01 Kinderare Utility Easement Vacation. All comments should be directed to the mayor. Uh clerk, are there any members of the public on Zoom who wish to provide testimony? No, Mr. Mayor.

All right. Thank you. Are there any members of the public here present who wish to provide testimony? Seeing none, I now close the public hearing um at 8:37 p.m. And I will ask the clerk to read the ordinance type. Ordinance number 2026-01, an ordinance of the city of Battleground, Washington, vacating a portion of a utility easement located at 910 Southwest Scoten Way in the city of Battleground.

All right, I will entertain a motion. Mayor move to adopt ordinance 2025-18, I'm sorry, 2026-01. We have a second. Second. All right. Motion uh by Council Member McCoy, seconded by Council Member Pere. Uh do we have any discussion on the topic? All right. Hearing none, we'll move to Oh, we do need to roll call vote.

Council member Kypers, how do you vote? Yay. Council member Ferrer, how do you vote? Yay. Council member Mson, how do you vote? Yay. Council member McCoy, how do you vote? Yes. Council member Bowman, how do you vote? Yes. Deputy Mayor Vale, how do you vote? Yes. Mayor Overholeser, how do you vote? Yay. Motion carries unanimously.

All right. I don't see any business on the agenda currently. And we'll move on to administrative reports. Are there any administrative reports from staff this evening? Yes. Well, first congratulations to the newly elected council members. I look forward to working with you and all of council in the coming year. Uh just a couple quick reminders. Um especially for the newly elected, we hold bi-weekly meetings. I'll be sending out those invites probably tonight or tomorrow morning. And um it'll three council members at 9:30, three at 3:30. Those are always the Wednesday before the council meetings are held. Uh, and Mayor Overholster, I will set a meeting at a time that's convenient uh, for you for you and I to have our uh, one-on-one meetings. I'll also be working with all of you to set a date for the upcoming retreat which will be held uh, in March and we'll just do sort of a poll um, to try to secure that uh, future date. But it is in the next eight weeks, 8 to 10 weeks. We'll set that probably on a Friday. I'll reach out to each one of you to see which date works best for you. Um, and also if you haven't done so, I had sent out an email to all of you individually asking for your um interest in council leazison uh positions um that you'd like to serve on. And we are I guess we'll be discussing that on January 20th, our next council meeting. So, if you haven't responded to me, please do so. Um, if you can in the next week, week and a half. Please note that January 20th is a Tuesday because um, Monday, January 19th is a holiday. But I will see all of you on Wednesday, I believe January 14th, if

not sooner. And um per let's see it was mentioned earlier this this meeting uh there will be a public hearing that will be held on this this Thursday January 8th at 6:30 I believe is what the published time is at the public services center in Vancouver uh for the county council will be holding a public hearing for the 2025 comprehensive plan update. Um during public comment at this hearing, the public will be offered up to three minutes uh each for testimony and each city will be offered up to 10 minutes each. Our planning supervisor does plan to be present and offer comments, but I would strongly encourage you, Mayor Overholster, to um attend and speak at this public hearing as well. And we can talk more about that uh tomorrow or Wednesday, whatever is best for you. That's all I have. It concludes my reports other than happy new year. Thank you, Miss Johnson. Appreciate that. Um, again, our next meeting due to the uh Martin Luther King holiday, the next regular city council meeting will be held Tuesday, January 20 20th at 7 p.m.

Council communication. Oh, my apology. I was moving on. I actually have one more. Oh, you do? My apologies. No, I apologize. I'm going to turn this over to public works director Mark Herbs. Oh, again I jumped Mark.

No worries. Um, so on the Parkway and Maine signal replacement project, uh, we're ready to start making offers for the property that we need. In this case, it's two small partial acquisitions and three temporary construction easements. Um the offers that we make on the property will be based on fair market value um as indicated in appraisals or waiver valuations and will be negotiated per city's policy. If we can settle within that policy, we'll bring the approval back via consent. If we receive a counter offer that is more than policy allows, uh we'll bring that to executive session uh for discussion with council. And all I need tonight is just a thumbs up that I can move forward with those offers. You got my All right. Are there any additional administrative reports? Going once, going twice. All right. Council communications. Are there any council member communications this evening? Uh, we have Miss Ferrer.

Thank you, Mayor. Um, I just have some quick questions. Sorry to put staff on the spot, but it came to me today. We're going to our council meeting. Um, do we have any updates on the was dot decision on that 35 mile per hour zone? They were going to be re-evaluating that. Um, don't know. I know it's not in our jurisdiction, but I was just kind of curious if we've got any updates on that. Are they still Just to clarify, you're talking about Dollar's Corner. Yeah, I have not heard anything from them about that.

Okay. Okay. Um, next I wanted to um give an I had a a citizen reach out and let me know that the skate park lights haven't been on since the storm. I didn't know. I went by there um the other day and I didn't know maybe if they were off because they would interfere with the Christmas lighting, but I just wanted to check in with that. Maybe you guys just aren't weren't aware of that because I know I wasn't until Citizen made that comment earlier today. Yeah, no one's reported that till this second. So,

okay. So, I'll let him know, right, that you're on it. Yeah. Um, and then lastly, um maybe you guys can um fill me in on the best way to do this. But, um based on what I heard here today in regards to the RV, I'm kind of asking council if that's something that we could bring up in the near future to go over council and uh see if that's something that we would like to amend, take a look at it. Um, obviously you guys set agendas, you know, two weeks out. So, I would be, you know, seeing if, um, council would entertain that, um, being placed on the agenda in the future, near future,

are we just looking for a consensus on whether we're going to discuss this further? like if we if if council would um okay us putting it on um an agenda sooner. Um yeah, go for Yeah.

I I thinking along the same lines, I think it would be great if we could take a study session or something and review what the ordinance is currently, what some of the other municipalities are doing. Um, are there areas that we need to make a change? Are there areas we're going to just stay the same? But I do think, you know, regular review is what we're supposed to do. So, I think obviously there's a need to do this. And I would just like to put it on the, you know, either next agenda may be full, but maybe the first meeting in February if we could have a study session and have all the documentation that we need to look at or at least a little presentation. Yeah.

I don't think it's a big ordinance. I think it's like three lines. Yeah. But I would be interested in that.

Maybe some data also from code um uh from chief as far as what the code officer has been uh seeing and finding and the time and also maybe an outline of what the communication process has been. And I know we've talked about it and you've been open about it and I know there was communications um over the last year that have been on the website and and that to update the community, but that's, you know, not always the only way people get the information they need. So, I think we need to just take a look at um making sure we've covered everything.

Council member Kypers, did you have anything additional? I noticed that you'd keep

Yes. I wanted to first of all say thank you to Mayor asked pay Mayor McCoy and Deputy Mayor Bowman for all their work. Um previously um I've learned a lot. You've worked hard. Um you've done your best for the city and you I know you are going to continue to do that. we we have a need for all your um history and your relationships and it's going to be good to see how we're working differently now but all still together so it's good and congratulations to um deputy mayor Val and mayor pardon me bale sorry I would say Val and uh mayor overhaul. Congratulations.

Thank you, Miss Kypers. Um, Council Member McCoy, do you have anything you'd like to say? Yeah, I'd like to add on to the uh the RV discussion. I just have one question for staff. Uh, that used to be a complaint driven system and I heard 400 complaints. Did that change? But there is still a complaint driven system. Did we have 400 complaints last month or was that number inaccurate?

I I would have to go look. I can tell you that uh allegedly someone had drove around and made numerous numerous numerous reports uh and that code was responding to that. Uh so to get you exact numbers, I I'd have to go back.

I just wanted to know if it changed. Um uh with that, Mr. Mayor, uh, if council is going to, uh, reopen this ordinance and look at potentially changing it, and I don't know if it's within the authority of this council, I would recommend that we have a fee holiday if we're going to um change this ordinance. And the gentleman that was here that has a January 13th deadline, um, th this body doesn't this body doesn't move that quickly. I don't know if that's when our authority or if that's direction we can give staff is that is one I don't know if it's possible but um I'm I don't believe we need a study session for this but I believe that you know whatever meeting you want to put it on the agenda I'm also willing to talk about it but until we talk about it I think a fee holiday would be in order

I second that idea

um so I guess we can direct staff to just uh try to get this on one of the upcoming agendas soon. Nothing um right away, but I I would like to see a moratorum on those fees. Um at least say for the last uh month, try to stall that out a little bit unless any collected fees. Two months. Two months. For the last two months, we should uh go ahead and put a moratorium on those and uh revisit this uh during a council meeting. Good. All right. Any other council communications? I I will say something um to this effect uh kind of to mirror what uh Council Member Kyper said. It doesn't go without saying the uh time and effort uh that was spent um by our previous mayor McCoy and our deputy mayor Bowman does not go unnoticed. was greatly appreciated. Um, as a matter of fact, I learned a lot and uh now that I'm sitting here, I learned I have a lot more to learn. Um, but I I just really do appreciate uh those two gentlemen and the work that they've put in over the last many many years and uh I just wanted to say it didn't go unrecognized. It didn't go unnoticed and it was greatly appreciated as a council member but also as a citizen battleground. Thank you gentlemen. Um, and I will do my best to uh fill the role and fill the shoes as best as I can. Um, and just do it honorably and do uh in my best opinion and best judgment what is right for the citizens of Battleground. Um, so thank you for the opportunity council and and the trust that you have in me for that. Um, all right. Now, due to the Martin Luther King holiday, we'll go back to this. Uh,

the next regular city council meeting will be held Tuesday, January 20th at 7 p.m. And currently, no study session is scheduled. I will adjourn this meeting at 8:52