City Council - Regular Meeting

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All right. The time is 6 p.m. We'll go ahead and start the study session tonight. I'd like to introduce Public Works Director Mark Hersick.

Good evening, counsel. Give me a second. I'll bring up my presentation. all right tonight i'm going to talk about um 2027 city council priorities um so these are going to be options that are presented by public works and then as we go through the presentation i'll kind of ask for anything you might be thinking of um so really again the purpose is to gather ideas from council so that info can be presented during budget preparation I'm going to specifically talk about streets, parks, facilities, and capital transportation, and then we'll have end time for questions. After each of the different parts, I will stop and kind of get your feedback on that specific one too. So there'll be plenty of time to get that feedback. So the first will be streets. So maintenance of city streets was first on the priority list according to the community survey. So items to possibly consider is additional reconstruction or major preservation and then the work we do as part of our annual street preservation. Some things to keep in mind is that all general fund decisions should keep in mind other priorities. Those include Eaton and Grace, because they may have funding gaps, and then all other general fund departments. Some next steps we're taking are re-rating the streets. That's been completed, and I'm just waiting on the final report. And then we'll provide a presentation at the future meeting so the company that does it will come out and provide that information. The 2026 work got awarded, so that gives us a good idea on pricing. And then we'll learn some more information about construction sequencing as that goes along. So I'll pause right here and get thoughts on street priorities. And just for clarification, this is street maintenance and not capital transportation. There'll be a section later to talk about that. But what are your thoughts on our street for 2027? And can I answer any questions for you?

I probably have more of an opinion for you on that once we can see that street rating. Okay. So I'm looking forward to it. It's been a few years since I've seen one, so it'll be good to see what they came up with.

On that street preservation, are we going to score that for arterials too, like we talked about?

Yeah, I can do a rate that out and essentially make a calculation showing the increase in that particular on arterials, essentially.

With the projects we have in the works this year, I don't have anything that jumps out at me. You've got a lot on your plate this year.

One comes to my mind, Rasmussen.

And I assume Grace to Parkway?

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

I would actually also parrot what Councilmember McCoy said. I think it's going to be really important to have the artilleries or the arterials noted in that, as well as kind of seeing where we land after the street improvement projects that we've just greenlit. Also, while keeping into account, to your point, Eaton, Grace, and a lot of other public works projects that we have coming up.

Okay, I'll move on to the next, which will be parks. So in the community survey, quality of city parks is fourth on the priority list. Some items to think about, Remy Park, we're obviously gonna be doing a lot of work out there, purchasing of park properties and then parks maintenance. So specific to our PROS plan, there are several neighborhood and community parks that are in high growth areas. A neighborhood park is essentially three to five acres and a community park is five to 10. It's important that we acquire land for these parks prior to it all being developed. So you can kind of see here on the map, I listed out some specific ones that are in high areas that land is starting to become scarce. Again, something to think about. In terms of next steps, staff will know more about available funding. I've mentioned before we put in an RCO grant. We'll know later in the year if we're successful or not. We did receive additional state funding in the tune of 400,000 for Remy. Any thoughts on park priorities for 2027?

I don't know if it's premature, but I'd love to hear Councilmember Kuyper's weigh in on a potential idea.

well i do think i like seeing that you have on this um acquiring land while still available i mean obviously we've got some desires not just to address these high growth areas but also to look towards community requests for additional ball fields you know potential pool whatever that looks like in the future but we won't get there in the future if we don't focus on what we need to be doing today so I'm glad to see that you've got that on there. Looking for more specifics.

Mark, can you get us some information for a future meeting of land availability, southwest corner, northeast corner? If you look at this as the density map, it looks like there's some areas that are of great potential.

And that's the question I was just going to ask. I thought we had some land. When we looked at this last year, Was it the northeast that we were looking at potential parcel?

We had specifically talked about N5 and N6, sort of where that's kind of over by the 92nd Avenue pump station. So we know not only is there already approved subdivisions, but there's quite a few more in the pipeline. So that was one specifically I had in my mind and that we talked about. But, you know, there are other good examples. N7, N1, C1, we're all, there's quite a bit of development already there. We're kind of starting to run out of options if we don't jump on it.

Well, I know with PIF, I would agree. I would love to see a plan on land acquisition with our PIF funds sooner rather than later, especially as that urban growth boundary expands west. We're going to need to secure some open spaces.

I have another question. Mark, it would be great in the coming weeks as we get more information to kind of outline what what are those maintenance costs that you talked about but what are additional um kind of capital replacement things are there specific parks that still need upgraded um equipment um so it's kind of as i see it there's there's maintenance that's ongoing there's capital improvement and then there's acquisition so um really having numbers around what does that look like and a high, medium, lows, that would be helpful.

Yeah. Thankfully, we've had several years of having funding to replace. So a lot of the equipment is swapped out, but there's still maintenance needs. So I'll try to get a summary and put some cost to it. So you're aware of kind of where we're at.

Maintenance or capital improvement? Maintenance.

Yeah. I can also do capital improvement, but a lot of that comes from the pros plan. So it would just be sharing what's in there.

Okay.

it would be good to incorporate that into the whole plan yeah yeah sorry thank you i think that might be a also a great topic to have as a part of one of our retreats is part of the strategic planning going forward of available properties out there before it's too late um and also looking possibly outside of city limits of what to do with some of the parcels, especially thinking in three and east. We looked at some properties a while ago for other reasons, but potential there as well.

I agree, and I would like to say that, so I see on here community parks, five to 10 acres, neighborhood parks, three to five acres. I'd be also interested in looking for larger plots of land to potentially have a community development, a sports arena, sports parks, community pool. That's been something that I know has been very high on the priority list of this community as you stated the land is being taken very quickly so we want to make sure that we still have a chunk of land available to dedicate to a project like that in the future

all right i will move on to facilities so from the community survey satisfaction with major services was important sewer services drainage and water all got high marks all these services are provided from public works and housed out of the operations center that site needs to remain functional to maintain the high level of service so We've talked a little bit before about new facilities at the Operations Center. There's a range on that of 10 million to 30 million. Just kind of reminder of what it looks like. So I won't get too much in the detail, but there's new maintenance facility, new shops and warehousing area, new administration space, and then some covered parking and various other things. So funding is available to complete phase one, which like I said, is approximately $10 million. The funding is not currently available to complete phase two, which is about 20. Talked a little bit about bonding and loans. So some of the pros of that is, some of the pros of the bonding and loans is inflation is not likely to go away. So getting project done now contains higher future costs. The ability to keep operations going is only impacted once. Long-term temporary facilities like police storage won't be necessary. And then reduced and designed mobilization costs. Cons of that is debt has a cost. City has large sewer and water projects on the horizon, which may compete with that capacity. And then it's reduced budget flexibility in the future. So next steps, staff will be providing a presentation on procurement options. So we typically do design-bid-build. So staff or our consultant designs it, we put it out to bid, and then it gets constructed. There are actually two other methods that are allowed in the state GCCM and then design-build. those two options might be of interest for a project of this size so at a future council meeting regardless of what just gets decided on the phasing we'll talk about those other methods Staff is working to get clarity on future large money decisions for sewer and water. We're very close on sewer and then still working on water. So next few months, we should have more information on that. And then staff can provide additional info on the bonding loans if requested by council. So my various questions for discussion is, does council want staff to further investigate the bonding loan options? um besides the procurement options does council have any more questions about the ops expansion and then are there any other facility uh projects you have in mind for 2027

so um i know facilities isn't always a pretty topic but 10 years ago when i took my first tour you were in desperate need of upgrades then so this is a long long time coming and it's unfortunate that we still haven't addressed it so for me a priority facilities is my number one um I'm interested to see what you come up with for bonding capacity, but I'd also be interested in seeing if you could come up with a couple different ways to phase it. Maybe you can speak a little bit to the council and the public about your current situation and how vehicles are stored and what the weather is doing to your fleet. More specifically, I remember when your pump truck, half of it was sticking out of the bay during the wintertime. It only costs us more when our equipment is stored outside because we're replacing it sooner than later. So yeah, I know that you needed an upgrade before my first tour 10 years ago. This is definitely a long time overdue.

Yeah. And to speak to that. So our most expensive vehicles, thankfully, we have the facility for it now. So the two back trucks, the sweeper, they get the but the, you know, standard vehicles, trailers, some of the specialized equipment like our changeable message signs are available. Those sorts of things still sit out in the open, and I don't worry much about the trucks, but some of the trailers and other things, it'd be good to have that taken care of. The other thing is just facilities for stuff. I mean, we warehouse everything we use. We're responsible for water, sewer, storm, fleet facilities, parks, and all of that equipment that we use, all of the... meters and pipe and everything that we have has to be stored and a couple of the facilities that you've seen are you know from the 60s and um are falling apart so we're running out of room facilities are not in good condition stuff is out in the weather where you know it's just not good so well i'm gonna add to what you're saying our most most important asset is our people right and they're working in conditions that are unacceptable and you know we have an injury due to a known

safety issue, I mean, that's unfortunate for whoever gets hurt. So again, to me, for me, council, this is my priority.

I agree.

I would like to see if you can come up with some different unique options, but come up with what's a good long-term solution. I don't remember the buildings you were kind of looking at. Were they modular buildings or were they steel buildings or what were you looking at?

I always shoot for the cheapest that's going to provide the most life. And so I think it's probably going to be like steel construction. But as we move forward, we'll talk more with the architect to make sure that that's kind of the best bang for our buck.

so could we maybe late summer early fall maybe if mark shreddy have another study session focused on that project if you've got the information

Yeah, I'd love to get the, how we procure it in front of you, because that's going to be an important decision and that will help move it along because if we don't go with one of the alternates, then I can get the architect on board and sort of do the traditional process. If we do the alternate, there's a kind of way we have to do it. So I think that's, to me, the most important next step. And then, yeah, we can focus on more specifics and details about each of the buildings and what we're looking at and possible cost savings and those sorts of things.

Well, when you're ready, I look forward to seeing it. I hope we can get you the support you need.

And then can I just jump in one second? So with what Mark's talking about, this project, it has a very large contingency built into that because of where that backside, if you pull back up the map, Mark. Yeah. lagoon used to sit right there and sit where that back half where it's not already built and so they're concerned with the soil of what it's going to do and that was why it has i think it's a 30 contingency and so if we're able to be a little bit more creative and perhaps even flip it i know mark and i had talked about it we just don't have the cost estimate of what that would be so take that back half put it up to be kind of a front l if that can reduce that contingency and looking to make this a less expensive project while getting everything that we need and bringing that forward. We've known this project is coming, so we have a savings for it specifically set aside that council at the time had said, yes, this is the dedication of what it's going to go towards. And we've continued that. And so we're hoping that we can get by without having to issue a large bond issuance. And if we do make it smaller also with the sewer options that I believe he's going to touch on, it may actually save some costs on this based upon a sewer alternative that we're doing that will save rate payers as well as save taxpayers. So we're definitely trying to be creative, think outside the box, kind of think holistically versus just looking at this in a silo.

Thank you for being continually proactive and creative as the project and as the environment changes, you know, your basic plans may be the same, but the environment continues to shift. And so thank you for staying with it, even though it's been on the books for a long time, as you said. So, you know, data is only good for the day it is. So we'll just keep going.

Megan, while you're close to the mic, my question is more along the lines of as we look at phase two for this and the question in front of council is, do we want to bond for that or wait? What financial metric can you provide the council to better assess that decision or is there one? I know what it would be in the private industry. I don't know if internal rate of return or ROI. I mean, is there anything we can not use or what do you recommend?

I mean, if you think of it simplistically, it's kind of like when you mortgage your house, right? If you have your debt to equity ratio, you have your income, what can you afford and continue operations while setting aside the funds for that debt?

so that's that's not quite what i'm asking what i'm asking for is looking at the inflation risk of the project versus bonding it and building it now and and so unless inflation goes away suddenly uh so is there a metric you can put accounts put in front of council that says here's your risk reward as far as obviously you can't look in the future but like on based current inflation rates

yes so we can look at current inflation and push it out to when if we were going to do this when say 10 years from now what that would look like versus what it looks like now i can tell you this project has been on the books since before i was here so over a decade and at the time it was a 10 million dollar project and now it's a 30 million dollars i'm just talking about base two i'm not talking about baseball yeah

And don't we have some metrics on typical cost savings with the different build options? So design build, you get an average of certain percentage cost savings if you use that approach versus direct architect.

When the consultant comes in, they'll be happy to kind of explain through all that.

Yeah.

uh last one on my list is transportation um so uh transportation was not specifically asked in the survey um we've talked previously about northwest northwest fifth street and how to move forward with that and so um you've already heard some of the responses but funds can't be transferred to other city non-connecting Washington projects without legislative approval. I did find some costs for the roundabout from the ice that was done. So that estimates about 6.8 million. It included 30% contingency at 1.6, and then about 1.3 of that amount was design and construction management costs. um the roundabout is proposed for two lanes all the way to 502 and i'll show you on the next slide so you can see part of why that estimate as high as it is is it does take the two lane section um and essentially completes it to 502 and then uh some of the way north it has it so essentially on the what would be the southbound side it it uses that existing right turn lane to make two lanes and then it goes for it so it doesn't go quite all the way to onsdorf but it gets pretty close and then i'd have to look at the onsdorf project how far that's going so you're you're almost getting to that that two lanes for the the full way there that is part of that cost

I'm sorry, question on that. Just to go back. Back a slide, please. Back a slide. Yeah. Funds can't be transferred to other city non-connecting projects without legislative approval. So would we be going through a process to see if we could gain approval? Or would the door just be shut?

So that is up to council if they want to try that. What WSDOT cautioned is it sounds like the legislature, any cost savings that there's been in Connect Washington, they're moving to other priorities that aren't necessarily street projects. So you can always ask that question at the next legislative session. But at least the WSDOT staff I talked to didn't think we'd get favorable results.

They weren't hopeful.

They weren't hopeful, yeah. And that's just their opinion based on kind of what they know of the situation.

Thank you. It's the kind of thing where you ask a favor and they do you a favor by removing the funds and putting it into another pool. It's gone. I do have a question on that roundabout. Because I actually, and I don't know if we've talked about this in previous conversations, I knew we were going two lanes all the way to the roundabout from up 503. But one thing that I am slightly concerned about, I guess, is how it's a two-lane roundabout in the semicircles at the intersections of 503. Is that a full two lanes? Just to simplify, is it going to look like Camas and the two-lane roundabout by Costco? Or is it going to look more like Camas on the highway on 14, where it's a single lane that transitions around, the other one has to go right?

It's been a while since I've been to the Camas one, but I believe it's probably more like the Ridgefield one.

So that's my only caution is... That causes an insane amount of confusion for people say they're pulling out off of Northwest 5th and they want to transition and go 503 southbound. know what i'm saying so they're traveling say west on northwest fifth they come through the roundabout they need to get across that lane to get to the center and then they're going to be coming back out in you know is there a way that do we have an allowance to design that into a single lane roundabout with only turnouts you know what i mean so the right hand lane on 503 has to turn right the left hand lane gets to go through the roundabout that that would be more like camas's highway 14.

Yeah, we would have to look at it. This is, again, just a 30,000-foot view for an ice analysis. So it's a good question.

Somebody asked me about it the other day, and I told them, I'm pretty sure we're doing one lane. I want to make sure I'm not lying. Yeah, that's all.

But would additional design be done by your staff, or are we talking outside design that we're paying additional money for? I mean, not that it doesn't cost us money to do more designs, but...

Yeah, we don't have the expertise to design roundabouts, so anything would be from a consultant.

Using additional funds to design another option for a project we need to.

This isn't designed yet.

Right. Oh, this isn't designed.

You're saying this is like a, this is like a 30,000 foot. So yeah, it's not like detailed design. It's just enough to sort of be able to make a cost estimate. Yeah. Got it. Yeah. Thank you.

So question. I didn't know that us as a council has approved to move forward with fifth. I thought we had.

brought it back for yeah no nothing's been appeared that's why i'm asking about it now oh okay okay sorry i said i thought you're like this is this is what we have planned so no there were some questions about the round oh yeah there were some there were some questions about the roundabout when we last talked about it so i got that information and i just wanted to share it

And just as a reminder and for the public out there, what's the dollar amount of funds that we have to put towards this project that we could potentially lose if we don't?

I think there's going to be two point something left. we have the the and I think I mentioned that on the next slide is um the last project before this one the only other one we have left is going out to bid shortly so we'll have a price on that so I'll be able to give you a more exact number but I believe we have a couple million left for it but to be clear there there if we did not do the project there would be potentially

high potential that we might have to just give that money back or that money would not be available for the project. And if we did the project, the project would still cost more than what has been allotted to us and what is potentially in our budget. So we would be looking at coming up with potentially a couple other million dollars to cover the project. So that's part of our decision making.

Thank you. And please keep in mind, anything that we're talking about tonight does not set this in stone because we'll still go through the budget process. These are just thoughts and ideas for building next year's budget that we'll talk about.

Just continuing on with that, just a reminder, we looked at some alternates to that. WSDOT won't approve those. WSDOT won't require us to pay back the funds we've already spent on design if we don't move forward with the project. And then, Jeannie, like you were mentioning, there's a funding gap. So we'll know more after the last project goes to bid. so next steps will be dependent on ultimate council decision and so just kind of end the discussion any thoughts on that and then are any other transportation priorities that you may have and this again would be capital uh transportation type projects

I think this is a great time to plug what Mayor, or not, excuse me, Councilmember McCoy said earlier about the CPI and inflation. A lot of these projects go on the books a long time ago, and then today they cost infinitely more. So as we decide what we move forward with, again, those priorities, right? We have a funding gap on Eaton, funding gap on Grace, and then we also have a funding gap here as we move forward. So again, it comes down to the priorities of what Council would like to do.

Just mentioning Eaton, we did get the SS4A application. And so if we get that, we would have a full funding package for it. So knock on wood.

Did we put that on our own singular? We didn't go in a package? Correct.

Well, just my thoughts. I'm not interested in pushing forward on Northwest Fifth Street. I'm concerned with all that money that we're looking at. And yeah, I'm not interested.

I'll be honest, I'm still wanting to stay pretty open-minded about it. I don't like the idea of leaving over 2 million on the table. Not to mention, I'd love the idea of alleviating some of that traffic off of Maine during high pressure hours.

I would be more open to this project if we could get the state to help out if we could collaborate with the state as far as the widening of 503 all the way to Onsdorf. So Mark, you got in there where you show we'll widen it from 502 to 5th. But if we could get the state to buy in, I know that that's not a priority for them, but if there was some kind of collaborative work to get them to take care of Northwest 5th to Onsdorf, that would help sell me on it a little more because really, I mean, you can go out there right now and look at that traffic and just a short stint of Tulane isn't going to help. It's actually going to make it worse because you add the roundabout. If we could get two lanes all the way to Onsdorf with some state help, it would push me a little more towards that.

I agree with that. I think we've already got problems at Onsdorf and 25th and this fifth street location just will add to that so it just pushes it out and increases what we're going to have to do in the future and i feel like those are priority areas over fifth myself i don't disagree with council member munson's idea there i can tell you and bring you up to speed on

WSDOT probably has a lower budget than we do on roads. The I-5 roller coaster ride that they're fixing, I think is $14 million. And I think their budget for the six county area for the year was 30. So my thought is they're going to say, We would love to be a partner, but the checkbook is full of dust bunnies. So I don't think I mean, it doesn't hurt to ask.

Well, yeah, I disagree with your estimation of that. Again, if we could just get the ask, I mean, if we go if we look at this project the way we were looking at it originally and then now with this modification, it shows the interest of us really trying to do what's right. So, yeah, the funding from them is going to be hard to get, but

if we ask and they say no then at least we tried i think the better i would go legislative ask yeah uh is what i would because wasdot they have the canvas slew bridge and that's a mess that we'll probably get money before this so chris could you talk to our lobbyists and see if that's something that maybe we can get on the books for first of next year and if we get that money great

If we don't get the money, then I think we need to really have serious conversation on priorities of what, how we are spending. We're talking about additional funds, no matter what. So what does that look like? Which, which street is the prior or which corner intersection is the priority then? Thank you.

I agree. I would say that I'm not excited personally about spending an additional 4 million for a roundabout that I see is going to impact traffic negatively. I see it as more of a bottleneck that we see sometimes in other roundabouts. So I am concerned as well about the price that will be spent here not to alleviate the traffic problem that we have. And I wonder if legislative ask as well to potentially reallocate to a different project would be appropriate.

That was the end of my presentation, so if there's any other topics, I'd be happy to answer questions, but I don't have anything else.

More holistically on the Fifth Street one, Mark, and I mean, if Council is not willing to look at this project. And I don't think we should do a legislative ask if it's not something we want to push forward to. I had a question for Mark maybe. What would the design portion of this project cost so council could get an idea, maybe not a full HAB-Jacques Juilland, full design, but what are we looking at I mean, is there a traffic study that would inform Council of yes that second lane on 503 would cut commute times or wouldn't or around about wouldn't you know there's not a lot of traffic engineers up here so. HAB-Jacques Juilland, yeah that would be something that maybe could inform Council so that a decision would be easier reached.

Yeah, I like that. And more data around what we are seeing at Onsdorf and 25th.

Any further questions? All right, Mark, thank you as always for your professionalism and thoroughness. That will conclude our study session and we will meet back here at seven o'clock for the beginning of the city council meeting.

Council Member Bowman, can you please unmute so I can check your mic, sir?

Can you hear me?

Yes, sir. Thank you.

All right, the time is 7 p.m., and I call this meeting of the Battleground City Council to order. Please rise if you are able for the Pledge of Allegiance.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

All right, clerk, if you could please call the roll.

Mayor Overholzer.

Present.

Deputy Mayor Vail. Present. Council Member McCoy.

Here.

Council Member Ferrer. Present. Council Member Munson.

Present.

Council Member Kuipers. Present. And Council Member Bowman.

Present.

And the clerk is present. That concludes the roll.

All right, we will move on to summary reports and presentations. But before I do that, can I just please ask that anyone that is in the aisle, which is taped off with the green tape with stripes through it, to please make sure you are not standing in the aisle. That is for emergency purposes and for fire exit. Thank you. All right, council council member reports, what do we got?

I have reported this. Okay. I have actually three. I wanted to take some notes because I have quite a few things to cover. On Wednesday, May 20th, I attended Clark County Regional Parks Funding Task Force findings presentation that was delivered to the Clark County Council. As a reminder, Clark County Council established this task team to identify funding mechanisms to address the critical county budget deficits to maintain the eight regional parks. Appreciation was extended to the task team for their work and support was given to move forward with the next phase of work, which includes ballot measure feasibility, levy price sensitivity, community support, and strategic timing for a ballot measure, a potential ballot measure. Um, in addition, the task force will be working with the cities and the counties to develop a framework for revenue sharing and draft the terms for interlocal agreements. That would include clarification of the intended use of the funds, mechanics and calculations of revenue sharing. articulation of autonomy within a shared purpose, and just a reminder that no decisions have been made. This is all feasibility, fact-finding, getting a flavor for what it could look like, and then cities will have an opportunity to determine if they want to participate at some level. I'd like to request that staff be directed to reach out to Ross Hoover, who is the task force lead and schedule a presentation either in June or July for a study session. The next topic I have is on Thursday, May 28th, I attended Columbia River Economic Development Council Board of Directors meeting, which was in Vancouver. It was a really good meeting and the executive director, the interim for the I-5 bridge project spoke and gave a really comprehensive overview on where the project is right now. And if anyone wants more details, I suggest that you go out to the interstatebridge.org project site for information. And there's also pictures and renderings In short, the current scope of the project includes building the replacement bridge, connecting the new bridge to I-5, building the Hayden Island and SR-14 connectors, building the tolling infrastructure, removing the existing bridge, and adding light rail infrastructure to the Vancouver waterfront. originally the plan went beyond the waterfront to evergreen and that part of the scope has been removed due to the shortage of but um budget the budget constraints construction is expected to begin in 2028 and the new bridge would be opening in 2034 435. Um, the third item I wanted to do, um, mention was I'd like to make a motion to suspend the rules for two minutes to make a council member statement.

I second that motion.

All right. We have a motion and a second on the floor. Any discussion? Hearing none. All those in favor. Aye. Any opposed?

Nay. Uh, council member Bowman, this is the clerk. How do you vote?

Aye.

Thank you.

All right. It looks like the eyes have it. Motion carries.

Okay. Thank you. I just would like to reiterate that proclamations are not city policy. They do not reflect a formal council discussion or a vote of this council. As such, proclamations do not result in changes to our city operations. However, it's evident that they can create division rather than unity, distraction, and unnecessary financial and public relation impacts. While the intentions may be good, I think that we need to reduce the temperature around some of the proclamations being presented today. So I'm requesting that the ICE and ANTIFA proclamations be removed from today's agenda and excluded from future agendas. I also respectfully remind this council that our responsibilities are to set goals, establish policy, and adopt budgets. I encourage all of us to remain focused on these duties, to consider whether personal or political interests may be influencing our action, and to remain diligent in fulfilling the roles to which we were elected. Thank you.

All right. We have a motion to amend the agenda.

Yes. Do we have a second?

second all right uh just to clarify the motion is to remove two proclamations from the from the agenda from the agenda for tonight and in future agendas and future agendas so to strike them completely yes okay and we have a second is there any discussion question you have 10 seconds i have 10 seconds that's where she got a two minute so you got 10 seconds Oh, I just had a question.

I have a question to the motion. How does that work? Because it's up to the mayor. It's his discretion on the proclamation. So we're going against our governance manual to remove something that it's his choice. So I don't know how that works.

I request weigh in from the clerk.

Liz, would you like to weigh in on this?

Thank you, Council Members. The Clerk would like to defer this question to Acting City Attorney Kenneth Harper.

Good evening, Mayor and Council Members. My response to Council Member Ferrer's point would be that the motion that is pending, it is a request, as I understand the way it is formulated, to remove the proclamations from the agenda. I think that motion is viable for a vote. However, if the motion succeeds, it would still remain the mayor's prerogative whether to issue the proclamations or not. So in other words, I think you could reasonably construe the pending motion as a request, but I do not believe that regardless of the outcome of the vote on the motion, it can override the mayor's authority. The battleground governance coordination manual is quite clear that this is the mayor's prerogative. So I think honorable mayor, at that point, it would be up to you to determine whether or not you want to follow the motion or whether you believe that you're entitled to continue with the authority that I believe you have under the governance manual.

Thank you. Thank you. Appreciate that, Ken. All right. Well, we have a motion and a second on the floor to strike. The two proclamations, which proclamations?

ICE and ANTIFA.

ICE and the ANTIFA proclamation from this meeting and all future meetings. Yes. All those in favor?

Aye.

All those opposed?

Nay.

Just waiting for Councilmember Bowman. Nay. Nay.

Okay. I'm sorry, but the clerk would like a show of hands, please, or ayes. And nays, please. Councilmember Ferrer, you're a nay. And Councilmember Bowman, were you a nay, sir?

It was pretty clear.

Yes, ma'am.

Thank you.

All right, motion fails. Thank you. Two to five. All right, moving on, council member communications. I see council member Brian Munson. Go ahead.

Just a couple meetings last week, committee meetings. We had our governance coordination manual meeting, and I think we got through the first third of it, which is probably some of the hardest parts to get through. So we'll be sending some stuff out to council to do some follow up work before we get any further. And then we had Friday city manager evaluation committee. We went over some of the council's goals that they'd like to see consolidation and just looked at the new format for review. So we're kind of we're getting started on some stuff. So some good action.

Any other council members have any reports? I have a bit to talk about. This is a carryover from the last meeting because I was on Zoom and traveling while I was on Zoom. I didn't have my preparations in line, so to speak. But this is a reflection of a CTRAN meeting that happened. The last CTRAN meeting, again, as everyone knows, The small cities now have a minority vote of two seats on the CTRAN board. And those two seats have been named Councilmember Tim Hine from Camas and Councilmember Ryan Davis from Ridgefield represented our interest at the last CTRAN meeting where there was actually, Jeannie, to touch on some of the things you were talking about, there was a resolution brought forward by the city of Vancouver to extend that section of light rail as part of the project where it ended at the waterfront. There has now been an accepted resolution to extend it to the Evergreen Station again, which would add over $1 billion to the project total. And they've got that in there. Again, as I understand the desire to extend that section of light rail, we all had concerns on who will be responsible for paying that estimated increase. of 1.4 billion for this addition. As the article outlines, we sought addendums to the resolution that would have included this specificity as a means of protecting CETRAN and the voting citizens. Our motions were all voted down. And, uh, in the end we voted to not approve the resolution, giving a lack of financial transparency. Uh, we lost our vote seven to two on that board, uh, but believe our comments and actions as reflected at the meeting and for the public record reflect our requirement to add financial accountability to a project that lacks it.

So when was the date? When was that?

Um, now you can put me on the spot. That was. second tuesday it was may 2nd i believe it'd be the second week oh i'm sorry may 11th interesting so they're approaching it from all angles they had the the topic came up um during discussion uh with council member mccoy at the rtc conversation yeah with you and now at c-tran and it looks like c-tran has got that resolution in place so um that's all i have uh just as a follow-up but i also wanted to thank uh council member kypers and uh council member munson for their input and i thought very collaborative work in the city manager evaluation review committee i thought that was a very productive meeting i thought we came out of there with a lot of good things uh jeannie thank you for taking notes yeah and uh thank you to uh our hr director uh tamara um gunter for helping facilitate the uh the bringing of examples of review templates and for helping gather all the goals put in from council members Before I move on, Council Member McCoy.

Yeah, your report just reminded me that resolution will be in front of RTC tomorrow. So having not heard any changes from Council, from Ridgefield, La Center, or Yakult, I'll be voting no on the resolution from RTC.

Thank you, Council Member McCoy. What's that? Okay, and Council Member Bowman.

yeah thank you mr mayor um since since the uh city of ridgefield is representing in the city of camas um can we make sure that that they are getting information back to us to present to us to know how we are voting on these things now that we don't have our own representation like we used to this is the way it used to be and so it takes a little bit longer because you got to get approval from all the councils um most the time we we align but but sometimes we may not and we need to figure out what that mechanism is if we do not align with Ridgefield and the center. I'm assuming it's Ridgefield or less center on that one. Yakkel, maybe, um, if we don't align, uh, how do they vote on those? So, um, if we can get that back to us and let us know how that would be, that'd be great.

Uh, yes. Uh, council member Bowman, I agree fully with you on that. Um, the way we have, um, divided it up till now, and we don't have an ILA yet in place, but we're working on one, is all of the technically six small cities, if you include Yakult, make up a comprised majority vote that the two votes will go in unison with the majority of those six votes. So that decision gives us a little bit more voting power to the board than having split vote one to one. It does pose a little bit of a coordination and communication issue. I will say, so far, Councilmember Hine and Councilmember Davis have done a very good job of communicating, at least to me as a representative to Battleground. And then I have to, in most cases, say I have to bring this back to our council after the agenda has already come out. So it will cause a little bit of a delay in the meeting and responses on our two votes. But so far, with the first meeting, they were able to communicate with us right after the agenda came out. We had a discussion. And I felt similar to Councilmember McCoy that our stance on light rail is pretty solid with a resolution in place from the city council. So I was a no on that extension. And then they gave us a review after the meeting by email. So we have our lines of communication open. We'll see what comes from the ILA and how it's truly formed going forward from there. But that's what we have in place so far. Council Member Ferrer.

I just have a quick question. Is there anything in there that's saying there's going to be a rotation of representation among the cities? Okay.

Yes, there will be a representation of what I believe every two years it'll be open rotate through the cities unless there's a potential for somebody to make a vice chair or chair position, then it'll skip that city. They'll retain and it'll go on to the next rotation of the cities. But again, I'll know more when the ILA is actually in front of you guys to sign. All right. Hearing no further council member reports, I will move on to the mayor's report. And I want to read a statement here. Where is it here? Oh, here we go. So first, proclamation is to get outdoors month, June 2026. I will announce tonight it is my pleasure to proclaim June 2026 as Get Outdoors Month and June 13th, 2026 is Get Outdoors Day. Proclamations are not statements of policy, but are a means by which the mayor can recognize an event, group, or an individual. As part of the ceremonial duties of the mayor, the mayor is charged with approval of proclamations at his or her discretion and reserves the right to decline any proclamation request as well as the right to make exceptions to these guidelines and procedures. Individual council members will not issue proclamations and requests for a proclamation should be directed to the mayor or the city clerk, Ms. Halili. This proclamation was requested by Jane Tessner-Kleiner, program manager of the Lower Columbia Nature Network. Miss Tessner-Kleiner and Evan Seidel, battleground area manager for Washington State Parks, will be accepting the proclamation. And you guys have already stepped forward, and I'll go ahead and read that proclamation. I will present it to you and then give you a moment to speak, okay? Got to clear my throat. All right, whereas Southwest Washington is home to some of the most diverse and magnificent natural landscapes in the nation, including the Gifford Pinchot National Forest, the Columbia River Gorge National Scenic Area, Mount St. Helens National Volcanic Monument, and countless county and city parks, trails, and waterways. And whereas National Get Outdoors Day, or Go Day, is celebrated annually on the second Saturday in June, this year, June 13, 2026, to encourage our community members, especially our youth, to connect with nature, embrace active lifestyles, and enjoy the physical and mental health benefits of the great outdoors. And whereas on June 6th and 7th, Washington State Parks celebrates Free Fishing Weekend, The Fort Vancouver National Historic Site and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service celebrate June 14th as Flag Day. Clark County Parks and Nature celebrate June 21st for the summer solstice. We'll waive standard day use parking and use fees to enhance public access and encourage first time visitors to explore our public lands. And whereas the many agencies, stakeholders, and partners across the Lower Columbia Nature Network offer events, activities, and educational opportunities to explore, steward, conserve, and enjoy our local parks, greenways, rivers, and creeks, trails, and open spaces. And whereas the residents of Southwest Washington recognize the importance of conserving these regional treasures, for future generations through stewardship and adhering to Leave No Trace principles to protect our forests, our waterways, air and views. And whereas during this great outdoors month of June 2026, we encourage families and individuals to take advantage of local recreation opportunities from hiking to Beacon Rock, fishing on the Lewis River, paddling on the Vancouver Lake and walking the trails at Columbia Springs. And now, therefore, I, Eric Overholzer, Mayor of the City of Battleground, by virtue of the authority vested in me, do hereby proclaim the month of June 2026 as Get Outdoors Month and June 13th, 2026 as Get Outdoors Day in the City of Battleground, Washington, And I invite all citizens to join in celebrating this day by stepping outside, exploring our public lands, and enjoying the natural splendor that makes our region a truly special place to live, work, learn, and play.

Thank you very much. Thank you. Good evening, everybody. And I'm so glad to see everybody's out for parks tonight. Thank you very much. Like a good meal, nothing brings people together like a good outdoor picnic and adventure together in the outdoors with your family and friends and bringing multiple generations together in a very welcoming, safe way to be together. My name is Jane Tessner-Kleiner. I'm the program manager for the regional coalition, the Lower Columbia Nature Network of over 50 partners stakeholders and agencies who come together to share our resources to make sure everybody has safe and welcoming access to the outdoors. Whether it's from the Columbia River, the Lewis River, up to the foothills of the mountains, we have some of the most spectacular spaces to be outside together. So we, the mayor said it best, let's all get outside and enjoy the outdoors. We thank all the partners who bring together these opportunities. I'd like to introduce Evan Sedell from Washington State Parks.

Hello, my name is Evan Seidel. I'm the Area Manager at Battleground Lake State Park, and I want to thank the Lower Columbia Nature Network, including me in this proclamation, and thank the City of Battleground for making this proclamation. I've had the honor the past 13 years to serve with state parks in various capacities around the state, both Washington and Oregon. Washington definitely is my favorite. But Southwest Washington, it really is a special place. The opportunity here for folks from all walks of life, from all kinds of backgrounds, there's a place for everyone outdoors. No matter where you come from, what you like doing, there's a place for you. I want to thank not only the City of Battleground, the Lower Columbia Nature Network, but all of our partners who work in maintaining and curating these special places. And I want to say a huge thank you to everybody that comes outside. And I hope to see you outside, not just this month, but all summer long.

And I'd like to, all the council members have a little flyer with our QR code for our event calendar. Our partners have put together over 250 activities for the entire month of June and well beyond. So we invite you to go to our website, check out the event calendar, and please come support the partners who love to help get you outside. Thank you very much and have a good evening. We'll see you outside.

Thank you. all right and we are moving on uh before i move on i just want to make a a real general announcement and kind of throw a warning out there to anyone um just a single warning loud or coordinated demonstrations are not permitted and that continued disruption will result in removal and that includes out of applause out of the realm of when applause should be issued. Also, we're not going to be doing the international sign for applause, just any display. I also want to ask that anyone who has any signage or flags That's fine. Just keep them in front of you. And during your public comment time, you are welcome to bring those up with you and display those at that time. Um, so we're just trying to keep the safety of everyone in this room as our first priority and be respectful to your neighbor sitting next to you. That's all that I asked. No, I'm sorry. We're not taking any questions. Uh, just like you guys all did at the issue of a proclamation. That's the text. no only during the acceptable time during the issuing of their proclamation when it's given you can applaud not during citizen comment not during the reading of a proclamation or any other time during the conducting of our regular business meeting and one more interruption i'll ask you to be removed thank you all right moving on recognizing the federal executive designation of antifa as a domestic terror organization and affirming the importance of public safety point of privilege mayor uh mayor a motion for uh recess for two minutes second motion passed chief can you please ask that person to leave thank you

I don't think we need to go.

Mr. Mayor, there was no vote on that motion, sir.

All right. We have a motion and a second to recess for two minutes. All those in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Hearing none, motion passes unanimously. We'll recess for two minutes. Thank you. If you guys want to go to the back, go ahead.

Don't ask questions right now.

mics are hot mics are hot all right the time is 7 31 and i will call this city council meeting back to order all right here we go proclamation recognizing the federal executive designation of antifa as a domestic terror organization and affirming the importance of public safety the rule of law and peaceful civic engagement And tonight it is my pleasure to issue a proclamation recognizing the federal executive designation of Antifa as a domestic terror organization in affirming the importance of public safety, the rule of law, and peaceful civic engagement. This proclamation was requested by Jesse McCarty, who will be accepting the proclamation tonight. Jesse, could you please come up to the testimonial to receive the proclamation? Thank you, Jesse. I'll go ahead and read the proclamation and then I will present it to you and then give you a moment to speak. All right. So in support of U.S. immigration and customs enforcement, whereas without a defined and enforced border, no nation exists. And whereas the United States is a nation founded upon the rule of law, and the consistent enforcement of that law is essential to national sovereignty, public safety, and democratic governance. And whereas U.S. immigration and customs enforcement, oh, I'm sorry, I'm reading the wrong one, bud. Boom. Okay, my bad. A little chaotic up here too, sorry. Let me restart. Recognizing the federal executive designation of ANTIPA as a domestic terror organization and affirming the importance of public safety, the rule of law, and peaceful civic engagement. Whereas the protection of life, liberty, property, and the rule of law is the highest obligation of government, And whereas communities are strengthened when residents, organizations, and public servants work together to promote safety, mutual respect, and civic responsibility. And whereas peaceful protests and lawful civic engagement are fundamental rights that contribute to a healthy and free society. Whereas the mayor of Battleground acknowledges growing public concern regarding incidents across the nation involving individuals and groups engaged in unlawful conduct, including violence, assault, vandalism, arson, intimidation, harassment, and obstruction of lawful assemblies. And whereas on or about September 22, 2025, the federal government issued an executive order addressing Antifa, identifying it as a domestic terrorist organization, and citing concerns regarding coordinated unlawful activity and threats to public safety. And whereas the Mayor of Battleground recognizes the significance of this federal action and the broader national concern regarding Antifa associated activity reported in multiple jurisdictions. And whereas such unlawful conduct, regardless of affiliation or ideology, undermines public safety, damages communities, imposes financial and social costs, and threatens the constitutional rights of all citizens. And whereas violence and intimidation carried out under any political ideology are incompatible with the principles of a free and orderly society, And whereas law enforcement officers and first responders serve with dedication and place themselves at risk to preserve public safety and uphold the law. And whereas the preservation of a free society depends upon the consistent and impartial enforcement of the law and the clear rejection of political violence in all forms. Now, therefore, I, Eric Overhalzer, Mayor of the City of Battleground, by virtue of the authority vested in me, do hereby proclaim the importance of upholding public safety, the rule of law, and peaceful civic participation within the community. And that violence, intimidation, and property destruction associated with unlawful activity in various jurisdictions constitute serious threats to community safety and civil order. And a reaffirmation of strong support for law enforcement and public safety agencies in the lawful prevention, investigation, and prosecution of criminal conduct. and that while peaceful protest and lawful expressions are protected rights, violence, intimidation, and destruction of property are criminal acts that will be met with full enforcement of the law. And I encourage all residents to uphold the rule of law, reject political violence in all forms, report criminal activity, and work together to preserve a safe, orderly, and free community. Thank you.

Good evening, and thank you, Mayor Eric, for your consideration and acceptance of this proclamation. The principles expressed in this proclamation have historically been assumed that political violence is wrong, intimidation has no place in a free society, and the rule of law must be upheld equally for all. When we look around our nation, there are many reasons to be discouraged. Division, hostility, and contempt for one another seem increasingly common. We see moral confusion and social decay affecting many of the institutions that once helped hold communities together. Yet one principle remains clear and is self-evident. When evil is committed publicly, it must be condemned publicly. Silence in the face of wickedness only emboldens those who seek to achieve their goals through fear, coercion, or violence. This proclamation sends an important message. There may be places where terrorist tactics and political intimidation are tolerated or even rewarded, but battleground is not one of those places. Our community stands for the peaceful resolution of differences, respect for the law, and protection of every person's rights. By and large, the people of Battleground support their first responders, value public safety, and strive to love their neighbors. We may disagree on some things, but we can unite around the belief that violence and intimidation are never acceptable substitutes for civil discourse. Mayor Eric, thank you for your leadership. Thank you for affirming these principles on behalf of our community. In a time when many are unwilling to speak plainly about right and wrong, you have demonstrated moral courage and conviction. You have planted your flag on the hill of truth and accountability, and I want you to know your community supports you in this decision. My encouragement to you is simple, remain faithful. Continue to do what is right, even when it is unpopular. Continue to serve this community with humility, courage, and integrity. And above all, remember that public office is ultimately a stewardship entrusted to you by God. My prayer is that you would fear God more than man. Seek his wisdom in your decisions and serve this community, having an audience of one. Thank you.

Thank you, Justin.

The gal find a seat. She did. Okay. Make sure everyone's got a seat here. All right. On to the final proclamation of this evening, supporting U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Tonight, it is my pleasure to issue a proclamation in support of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. And this proclamation was requested by Paula Otoa, who will be accepting this proclamation. Paula, if you could please come up to the testimonial to receive your proclamation. I'll go ahead and read the proclamation, I'll come present it to y'all, and then I'll give you a moment to speak. Okay, thank you. All right, you guys heard the first half of this already, but I'm gonna bore you with repeating it. In support of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, whereas without a defined and enforced border, no nation exists, and whereas the United States is a nation founded upon the rule of law, and the consistent enforcement of that law is essential to national sovereignty, public safety, and democratic governance, and whereas U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, is the federal agency charged by Congress with enforcing immigration customs and transnational crime laws duly enacted by the representatives of the American people. And whereas ICE officers and agents work daily to identify, apprehend, and remove individuals who have violated immigration laws, including those who pose demonstrable threats to public safety. Through involvement in violent crime, human trafficking, drug trafficking, and organized crime enterprises, and whereas the effective enforcement of immigration law protects citizens and lawful immigrants alike, and whereas ICE personnel routinely perform their duties under difficult, complex, and often dangerous conditions, demonstrating professionalism, restraint, and dedication to their oath to uphold the Constitution of the United States, And whereas attempts to undermine, delegitimize, or obstruct ICE's lawful mission erode respect for the rule of law and place both officers and communities at greater risk. And whereas a secure and orderly immigration system is not incompatible with compassion, but rather depends upon firm enforcement paired with lawful processes and accountability. Now, therefore, I, Eric Overholzer, Mayor of the City of Battleground, by virtue of the authority vested in me, do hereby proclaim that support for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is a reaffirmation of the rule of law, national security, and the principle that laws passed by a democratic society must be enforced. and be it further proclaimed that ICE officers and agents deserve respect, institutional backing, and public support as they carry out their lawful responsibilities in service to the United States and its people.

Good evening, Mayor Oberholzer and members of the council. I want to thank you, Mayor Oberholzer, for supporting this proclamation. As an immigrant, I understand firsthand the time, sacrifice, and expense required to come to this country legally. I follow that process because I believe in the rule of law. And I am grateful to live in a community that values and enforces, especially through the work of ICE and those responsible for upholding our nation's immigration laws. A just society depends on laws being applied federally and consistently. As a Christian, my position is not rooted in hostility, but in truth and love. The Bible calls us to love our neighbors while also valuing justice, honesty, and respect for lawful authority. Biblical love does not ignore the truth and rejoice in it. I have compassion for those seeking a better life, but compassion and love are not opposites. When we disregard immigration laws, we also disregard the sacrifice made by millions of illegal immigrants who follow the rules. Our nation can be welcoming while still speaking in laws to be respected and enforced. Thank you again, Mayor Oberholzer, for your support. I encourage you to continue standing for truth, justice, and righteousness. Thank you for your service to our community.

Thank you, Paula.

All right, and we will move on to the agenda approval. Does any council member wish to amend the agenda this evening?

Move to approve as presented.

Second. All right, we have a motion by Councilmember McCoy, second by Councilmember Munson. All those in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Hearing none, motion passes unanimously. Agenda is approved. Now we will move on to citizens communication. I will now open the meeting to citizens communications. As authorized under the council's adopted rules, the mayor may adjust both the individual speaking time and the overall length of the constituent comments period to ensure the orderly and efficient conduct of the meeting. And due to the number of individuals wishing to speak this evening, each speaker will have one minute and the total public comment period will be extended to one hour. We will potentially go over just by a few minutes. It looks like we have about 61, 62 speakers. This portion of the meeting is a limited public forum for receiving input from the public. It is not intended for dialogue with the council. To help maintain an orderly and efficient meeting, please avoid conduct that disrupts the proceedings. This includes speaking out of turn, exceeding the time limit, creating loud or coordinated demonstrations such as applause, cheering, the jazz hands, or other visible or audible interruptions, calling out from the audience or otherwise preventing others from being heard, While all viewpoints are protected under the First Amendment, obscene language, derogatory remarks, personal attacks, or campaign speeches can create disturbances that interfere with the orderly conduct of the meeting. Speakers are therefore asked to present their comments in a manner that allows the meeting to proceed efficiently and respectfully. Threatening behavior, intimidation, or any other conduct that substantially interrupts delays or interferes with the meeting may result in removal from the chambers to protect the safety and order of these proceedings. If your remarks relate to an item scheduled for the public hearing, please wait to provide your comments during that designated hearing. All comments should be directed to the mayor. The council may not be able to respond to individual comments or may refer citizens to a staff member for the assistance they may need. If due to time constraints, you are unable to provide verbal comments this evening, and at any time, I also ask, please submit written comments to the city clerk's office with the title public comment for disbursement to council. 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 printed materials to submit for the record, please hand them to the city clerk, seated directly to the right of the podium over here, Ms. Salili. Thank you for your cooperation and participation in the city council meeting this evening. And Liz, are there any members of the public on Zoom that wish to provide public comment remotely?

Yes, Mr. Mayor, we do have one person.

Before we go, Mayor, I'd like to make a motion just to suspend the rules and increase the time limit to three minutes.

right we have a motion on the floor do we have a second second all right we have a motion by council member mccoy a second by council member bowman to extend the speaking period to three minutes all those in favor and i have a discussion please oh yeah i'm sorry go ahead discussion so uh in the antifa proclamation these are your words uh peaceful public participation

uh protected rights i believe uh citizen comments hit both of those uh in the acceptance speech for antifa uh there was the comment rule of all rule of law equal for all uh last meeting we should have reduced comments to two minutes but we didn't so i feel like uh we created a slippery slope there

then finally and that speaks to the ice proclamation or and i quote consistent enforcement um let me follow up with that uh council member mccoy did you ever reduce your public speaking time below three minutes during your time as mayor

Uh, I did not make a, uh, I don't know that for a fact, but you did nobody in 2020, but you asked me a question. I'll finish it. Um, nobody made a motion to change it. And I would have considered that motion, especially if I had two proclamations and I quote protected rights, consistent enforcement, peaceful public participation.

Okay. Any, uh, further discussion?

yes mr mayor um so i would like to say that uh at the last council meeting we only had um i believe it was 14 different speakers and we did not go over an hour so i believe it was from memory i believe it was 46 minutes that elapsed with our time usually we give 30 minutes to citizen communication as we do want to hear from our community However, we can't allow that portion to derail the business that needs to be done in this meeting. So I feel like it is something that we do have to consider. I would like to hear from every single person, every single seat, although doing so on the dais is difficult because of the time. So I would encourage everybody to submit comments to this council because we do want to see what you have to say, your opinion, not only with what's on the agenda for today, but what's on the agenda in future meetings is important to this council. And I invite you to send comments to us directly. So in regards to this motion, I ask that it be limited to one minute.

Councilmember McCoy, would you also like to make a friendly amendment to your motion to extend our public meeting time past 1030 and suspend those rules as well?

I believe since the motion's not germane to the main motion, it has to be a second motion. I'm looking at our clerk.

I'm just asking if you would like to make that friendly amendment.

Once this motion is off the floor, if we get to 1030, I would. Oh, we will.

All right. Well, we have a motion on the floor. We have a second by Councilmember Bowman. Any further discussion? Hearing none, we will move to vote. And I would actually like to have a roll call vote on this, please, Liz.

Would you like a verbal roll call?

Verbal is fine, yes.

Councilmember McCoy, how do you vote?

Aye.

Councilmember Ferrer, how do you vote? Councilmember Munson, how do you vote?

Nay.

Councilmember Kuipers, how do you vote? Aye. Councilmember Bowman, how do you vote?

Aye.

Deputy Mayor Vail, how do you vote? Nay. Mayor Overholzer, how do you vote?

Nay.

Motion fails, four to three.

All right. Let's go ahead and continue with public comment. Liz, could you bring up the Zoom comment first, please?

To the person that I have just admitted into the meeting to speak, could you please state your name and unmute yourself?

Kimberly Goheen Elbin.

Okay. Ms. Goheen Elbin, you have one minute to speak beginning now. Could you please state your name and unmute yourself?

Yes, good evening. Are you there? Can you hear me?

Yes, we are here, ma'am.

Okay, thank you. Good evening. My name is Kimberly Goheen-Elbin, and I lived in Battleground as I grew up and graduated as a Battleground Tiger. I'm here to voice my strong support for invocation to open the City Council meeting as a Christian and... So I'm all for the invocations. Since you caught me a little bit off guard, I'm sorry. I'm going to go down my notes. And I only have a minute. I absolutely favor the three proclamations that you have. The citizens, you're using our harder or they are using our harder tax dollars for illegal immigrants here. But mostly I want to say also, I'd like to ask that you not allow bad actors who call in and disrupt the meetings to force this council to make it more difficult for those of us who call in to participate in hearing the council meeting while waiting on the phone.

Thank you, Kimberly. That is your time.

I did want to extend her the 15 seconds because she didn't realize she was actually live. All right. Now, the way I'm going to do this for the people in the crowd is I'm going to call your name up. You're coming up to the dais to have your one minute of public comment. I will also call the next person what I'll know as on deck. And there's a square taped off over in that area over here to my left. It would be your right as you're looking at me. So I will call the first person and then call the very next person, okay? So first up, we have Jessica Cole. Second up, we have Ali Strapazon.

Hello, my name is Jessica Cole. Thanks for the Get Outdoors proclamation. How much are the other two proclamations costing the city and taxpayers money tonight with records requests, extra police, and overflow room? The word Antifa now has two different meanings. It usually means being against fascism, but sometimes you will now use it to mean being a fascist. Mayor, why did you change the Antifa proclamation after you approved it? ICE has impacted some U.S. citizens by shooting, wrongfully detaining, and killing them. Their facilities have reports of withheld medical care and women and children being assaulted. It's hypocritical of you to deny a pride proclamation because you deem it potentially controversial, but turn around and issue these two obviously controversial proclamations tonight. So what is your criteria for approving proclamations? Lastly, happy pride.

Thank you, Jessica. Next up, Ali. Next up on deck, David Terry.

Good evening, council. My name is Allie Strapazon, and I am a resident within Battleground City Limits. Tonight, I am here to invite and encourage each and every one of you to engage in the process of introspection, which some may define as prayer, specifically in regards to how decisions are made individually and collectively by members of this council. May I suggest you earnestly ask yourselves the following questions and take the requisite time to truly reflect on all the answers that come, not just the ones that feel comfortable. One, what is my intention for the outcome for myself and for this community in making this decision and how would I feel if this decision was being made for rather than by me? Two, does the action that I am considering bring the community together or does it leave anyone out? And how would I feel if I or the group I belong to was the one left out? Three, does the cost of this decision result in the exclusion, the unwelcoming, and or the dehumanization of any member and or group, or will anyone feel like it does?

Thank you, Allie. That is your time. David Terry. Next up, Simon.

My name's David Terry. I'm a Battleground resident. I wanted to talk about, Mayor, this is not supporting the majority of our citizens. I wanted to remind you of some results from a 2026 January Mayor's poll. Americans have increasingly grown opposed to the actions of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, ICE. About two in three Americans now say ICE actions in enforcing immigration laws have gone too far. More than 6 in 10, that's 60%, believe that ICE is reducing the safety and security of the American people. Overall, the agency scores low marks among Americans, with 6 in 10 reporting that they disapprove of the job ICE is doing. I mean, so all of that just shows really how unpopular this is with the American people. We've killed citizens in our own streets. We've deported people without due process. And we failed to focus on criminals. I'd like to know, you're supported by Maddox. You're an employee there. Does Maddox support these same policies? Do you think these are good for the people in Battleground? I'd really like to know the answer to that.

Thank you, David. That's your time. Simon, you are up. I believe it's Susan Fredrickso. You are on deck. Is there a Susan Fredericso place of residence county? Okay.

Mr. Mayor, perhaps she's downstairs?

No, this is from the, well, possibly. I'll tell you what, I won't check her off and we'll work back through the list after. Simon, go ahead. Yeah, you're good.

First off, happy Pride Month. Now, Eric, I'm confused by your decision to issue proclamations about ICE and Antifa. Regardless of anyone's opinion on immigration, there have been well-documented reports of wrongful detentions, unsafe facility conditions, and abuse. Why did you choose an agency associated with so much controversy, especially when it goes against our city's vision? You said to me they should be focused on broad-based community recognition, and these proclamations are definitely not. You told me yourself that proclamations are to recognize our local community. How do these proclamations meet your standard while others that are actually community-based don't? Also, I don't support adding invocations to city meetings because you, Eric, have not shown that you can treat all residents equally. Adding invocations creates another opportunity for unequal treatment when fairness is already not taken seriously by this council. You talk about representing all residents, but all does not mean a majority or enough people. It means every single community member.

Thank you, Simon. Next up, I have a name, Liz. And after Liz, I have a name, Barbara. All right. Liz, you are up. Barbara, you are on deck.

Good evening. I want to speak briefly about the Antifa Proclamation. Like many residents, I heard claims that Antifa-related activity has occurred in Battleground, because that's a serious claim. I wanted to understand the basis for it. I have searched local reporting, emailed Mayor Oval Host and Police Chief Glenn, and submitted public records requests to both the city and the police department, seeking records of Antifa-related incidents within Battleground city limits. So far, I haven't found anything. This does not mean incidents do not exist. It means I have not seen evidence supporting the claim, and I believe we as the president have the right to ask for that evidence. I oppose violence, intimidation, boundaries, and threats, regardless who commits them. But I also believe we should be careful about labeling people or groups without clear facts. My request is simple. If there's documented incidents that justify this proclamation, please share them with the public.

Thank you, Liz. That's your time. And I will state that I think we just had an Antifa moment here earlier today. Jay, you are next up on deck. I have a Jay. Yeah, make sure you're talking into the microphone too. Thank you. Go ahead, Barbara.

Despite living in fear during the Cold War, I always believed in American democracy and in the lessons we learned fighting fascism in World War II and racism during the Civil Rights Movement. Today, I'm frightened by the growing divisions in our country, and tonight's proclamations fuel those divisions. The Antifa proclamation labels political movement as a terrorist organization. That's not the job of city council. Your role is to serve residents and address local issues. I wonder what those men who died fighting fascism, whose names are engraved on the World War II memorial down the street, would think about this proclamation. And whatever our views on immigration, many families including united states citizens are living in fear and uncertainty because of the unlawful ice enforcement actions publicly supporting ice is another divisive act that leads to distrust and division as a christian i believe we're called to love our neighbors and recognize every citizen these proclamations fall short of those values thank you thank you barbara

Next up, Jay. And following on deck, Mrs. Clark.

All right. Hi, y'all. Trans and queer people have existed for as long as there have been people. Malignant preachers and politicians tell you that we're new, wrong, and sinful, but what they really want is to control you. They want to separate you from your community and make you vulnerable to manipulation. They don't care who dies in their reach for money and power. They will wield you like a shield against your neighbors and then throw you aside the moment you don't give them what they want. Eric Overholzer is a Maddox employee, as is Amy Vale's husband. Maddox is an out-of-state, near-billion-dollar company that heavily profits off of AI data centers. They and their affiliates want to control our city as part of Christian nationalism, a movement that is rife with hate and misuse of scripture. These people are not fighting for the average citizen or for God. They are fighting for themselves. To all my queer siblings and friends, I love you, I love you, I love you. Nothing is wrong with you. We are real, we are human, and we deserve better than this. Stick together, stay informed. Happy Pride.

Thank you, Jay. Next up, Mrs. Clark, and on deck would be Greg.

As an educator, I'm responding to false information presented at the last council meeting. The studies cited are real, but they were misrepresented, and this community deserves accurate science. The 2011 Swedish study was cited as proof that gender transition causes suicide. That is not what it shows. The study compared transgender people to the general population, not people who received care to those who didn't. The data comes from 1973 to 1988, a period of severe legal discrimination and no modern affirming care protocols. The Brandstorm study was described as showing care worsened mental health. The opposite is true. The finding was that affirming care reduced the need for psychiatric treatment afterwards. Scientific and medical consensus is that gender affirming care improves mental health outcomes. 2022 study at Seattle Children's found it was associated with 60% lower odds of depression, 73% lower odds of suicidal ideation. Withholding care that reduces suicide risk is not a neutral act. Happy Pride Month, Battleground.

Thank you, Mrs. Clark. Greg, you are up. Next on deck, Christina Dowell.

ahead greg i have lived in battleground for nearly 20 years i am a u.s citizen i grew up i was born in the u.s and lived here all my life recently in battleground i have been in parking lots on the street where people have told me that i will be deported people have told me to go back home ufn mexican A car has tried to hit me and I heard as they sped by, go back to China. This is what divisive issues do. You say you do not want devices next with these proclamations, but this city council, certain city council members have done this to our community and has made it less livable. I hope you do better in the future.

Thank you, Greg. Christina Dowell, you are up. Next up, Vern Jeremiah.

Hello, I appreciate the attempt at removal of those proclamations from the agenda, and I'm here in my capacity as your neighbor to love you and call in the Christians in the room. I hear the ways you're merging the church and state, and it's my duty to comment on why you betray both by doing so. There are many ways to be a Christian, but the Bible prioritizes the same message. Love thy neighbor, welcome the stranger. When you change these words, when you say Christianity looks like dehumanizing your neighbor who opposes authoritarianism you happen to like, or blatant and boring but theatrical false flags to intimidate those speaking out and blame an imaginary organization for ISIS actual actions, you're quite literally taking the Lord's name in vain for yourself. This is what the Second Commandment warns of. So please, in your proclamations, remember the golden calf and the Wall Street bull, think and pray deeply about it, and keep your faith and country from being perverted by the other. Don't be so excited to hate that you forget God asks you above all else to love. Thank you.

Thank you, Christina. Vern, you are up. And next on deck is Justin Hornbaker.

Wish I could talk that fast.

I know, right?

I support what you all are doing, and I give praise to the Lord for your courage and your bravery. I know it's a difficult decision, and I think you are on the right side of God. We in the Christian faith community applaud what the Council's doing. In closing, I would like to, though, do a little prayer for our enemies. Now, when we talk about enemies, I was once an enemy of God, and I came to Jesus. And my prayer is for those folks that are opposing what you're doing. And I want to say I have been reminded of this often to pray for my enemy because I was once one of those. Here in the chamber, those outside, those in the community and nation who do not love Jesus, we were once like you, all still sinners, except we are now forgiven. I pray that the Holy Spirit will come overcome my enemies. overcome their darkness, shower God's truth and light upon them, what is written in the Bible, that they would come to know Jesus, the only path to salvation, turn from their wicked ways, repent of their sin. Amen.

Justin Hornbaker, you are up. Michelle Black, you are on deck.

Well, thank you City Council members for allowing me to speak. I want to encourage you to stay the course, to stand strong against several of the attacks we've heard tonight, especially against the proclamations. I think you guys are making fair proclamations and good ones. And I just want to recall back to the prayer one that you did. um it's not un-american to pray especially publicly by those who represent the people it's actually very american our founders not only prayed for the triune god's help to win the war that established our independence but they also went before the throne of christ daily as they met to form our original constitution And I'll just quote a few words from Benjamin Franklin. He said in 1857, therefore, I beg to leave to move that henceforth prayers employing the assistance of heaven and its blessings on our deliberations be held in this assembly. And he asked for that to be done every single morning. So stand on the truth.

Thank you, Justin. All right. Next up after Michelle will be Sarah Newhouse. Sarah Newhouse on deck.

Can I start?

Yes, ma'am. Sorry. Go ahead.

I'm Michelle. I've lived here 30 years in the area, and I'm a battleground voter. Instead of doing your job by bringing the community together, creating a more livable city for everyone with needed sidewalks, parks, walking and bike trails, and attracting businesses and industries to create jobs, you've decided to create division among people over controversial national proclamations that offer no benefit to battleground citizens. This is costing the city money and overtime for police to keep people safe tonight, money and increased administrative costs to address emails and letters, and money to research public records requests. You've also succeeded in ticking off about half of the voters in Battleground to whose votes you're going to need for a bond for an aquatic center that I know everybody here wants. it seems to be about the only thing that this community can agree on is the aquatic center this public works project would have employed people to build and maintain it and generate revenue for the town not to mention bringing the community together thank you michelle sorry i know a minute goes quick i apologize thank you sarah newhouse uh next up on deck would be emily craw or crow sorry

I oppose the misuse of proclamations to support ICE and oppose Antifa. I stand here to honor my grandfathers who both served in America to fight fascism and what we now call World War II. By the definitions being used in this space, they would likely be considered Antifa. I wonder why in 2026, I'm having to take a stand and ask you to take a stand against concentration camps in our communities. Why do you seek to condemn the citizens who speak out against such mistreatment? Every day, we are granted an opportunity to seek new perspectives. What a gift. to be able to change our minds when presented with new information. And I come before the council today to ask, please keep seeking. We can do so much better by each other. Thank you.

Thank you. And thank your grandfather for his service. All right, Sarah, new. Oh, we got Emily Crow. Next up, Tyler Long. And I apologize if Crow isn't the proper pronunciation.

Thank you.

Go ahead.

Proclamations are intended to recognize the city's people, groups, and events to bring them together. Instead, proclamations are being used in a way that's unfair, inconsistent, and based on personal, political, or religious agendas. It's fueling hate, division, and fear instead of bringing people together. I ask everyone in the audience and on the council to ask themselves if it makes some people feel good or safe at the expense of other people in this city, is this really the right choice? I'm also happy to share that denying a proclamation for pride won't make pride go away. It won't stop people from being gay or trans or loving whoever and however they do. But it does send a message that battleground recognizes some citizens over others and that it would rather create division than community. In a time when our country is extremely divided, I question whether that's the choice you should really be making. Happy Pride Month.

Thank you, Emily. Tyler Long, you are up. Next up, Beth Cooper. Beth Cooper, up next.

As a decades-long resident of Battleground, I come today with a heart of gratitude. I want to thank you, Mayor Overholzer, for your wisdom in leadership and making these two proclamations regarding ICE and Antifa. Each of these are 80-20 issues, if not 90-10. Firstly, these proclamations do not cause division. They merely reveal it. And it is very useful that they do, because a stark contrast is hardly possible to draw a starker contrast, and this contrast needs to be painted. In these proclamations, we have support for the enforcement of the law and the condemnation of those brazenly breaking it. That is it. And if this anger is a group of people, we need to think about that for a second. By these proclamations, you are telling your residents that they are protected by the law here, that neither ICE nor local police will be impeded by their own government, and those who wish to carry out violence against law-abiding citizens are not given license here. The proclamations communicate to the public, this is the worldview and moral framework through which I perform my duties. That is not pointless. That goes to the very heart of building public trust with the 80%. Thank you.

Thank you. Um, last call Beth Cooper and I will do this again for downstairs just in case. But is there a Beth Cooper here?

She was outside.

She might have gone downstairs. I'll circle her and then we'll circle back around to see if she's downstairs. Uh, Donna Kirkpatrick and next up on deck just Shia Green.

Hello, I'm here tonight in opposition of the Council of these proclamations. I also want to speak plainly about the message that this sends to the community when the Council denies recognition of pride proclamation and yet is willing to consider proclamations tied to divisive national political narratives. When pride is denied, many LGBTQ residents and families and young people hear that their identities and contributions are not worthy of acknowledgement by their own city. But when proclamations targeting political enemies are evaluated, sorry enemies and controversial national issues move forward it sends a very different message about whose voices matter here the city council should not pick and choose belonging in battleground it is going to recognize community values and those values should include dignity inclusion and equal respect for all of the residents public meetings and proclamations should bring people together not tell some neighbors that they do not know that is your time

Deshia Greene, you are up, sir. Laurie Schott, you are next.

Learn to do good, reprove the ruthless, seek justice. We have seen this today. Glad to see there are still commendable vestiges of things that are wholesome and a virtue amongst sympathizers of tyrants. I give thanks for the trajectory in pushing back the wicked, not shown cowardice. We tip our hats to you. You all have been given the delegation of instilling harmony in our society. Christ has given these positions to you and given the minds for knowledge and enact the righteous ordinances in this community. We are joyfully to encourage you to take more steps in that direction, to press even harder in what Christ deems good and right, to show boldness against this opposition. This alphabet militia won't rest easy. This is Christ's territory, not theirs. He reigns and as supreme, and they are his subjects. He has given man properly to cultivate, have dominion, establish justice, uphold order and righteousness. You have truly my support. It is not a popular thing as we are swimming in a culture of perversion who live by their own libertarian ideology and will dilute God's word to make it more easy to digest.

Thank you, Jeshiah. Lori Schott, you are up. Julie Coop, you are up next on deck. Julie.

Hi, my name is Lori Schott. Thank you for your time tonight. I am all for getting outdoors, but your other two endorsements of proclamations don't make sense to me. And like many others, I am wondering why these and why now, especially at the cost of all others, you could have chosen to strengthen Battleground as a community. I've been a part of many civic engagements, And I will say any kind of disruption was never from Antifa, but rather the harm was caused from other groups and individuals who felt emboldened and entitled to target and harm others who looked or identified differently than they did. I think of the civil commitment or the evil committed publicly, and I wish that same attack was for also what happened on our nation's capital. I've also seen the pain and harm on children and families and communities by the actions of ICE. I just implore you to be more thoughtful in your choices as they have a great ability to cause further harm. This is my community. These are my neighbors, even when we disagree.

Thank you, Lori.

Thank you.

All right, Julie, you are up next. On deck is James Townley.

Hi, Julie Koepp. Thank you for letting me speak this evening. I'm going to keep it short because mine were three minutes long. I recently attended a Clark County Council meeting where five proclamations were read celebrating women farmers, older Americans, the Asian American Pacific Islander community, and also acknowledging health challenges some people in our county face. and honoring the pain of losing law enforcement officers. They were a wonderful reminder of the people who sacrifice, struggle, contribute, and enrich our county. I felt pride when I heard these proclamations at all the people in our community. So I am dismayed by your two proclamations on Antifa and ICE that do nothing to highlight or celebrate what is good about the battleground community or do anything to inform or encourage residents to unite.

Thank you, Julie. Sorry. James, you are up. Caden Mizrahi-Priors, I believe, is up.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor, Mrs. Deputy Mayor, council members, and city staff. I appreciate the opportunity. And as a Battleground resident, I simply want to encourage you in the work that God has given you as a governing body in our little town. Your actions today through the proclamations and ones earlier this year that you've denied, as well as the possible invocations being added to these meetings, clearly show that you care about upholding law and order and gives me and many others in the battleground community confidence that it's a place worth investing in. Especially as I am a husband and father who cares deeply about the place which I lead and raise my family, the place in which we build community and the place where we can let the roots of my family and community grow deep. So may God richly bless you And may he continuously use you in the preservation of the good, the true, and the beautiful. I'm thankful for you. And I'm praying that God would grant you wisdom, courage, and peace. Thank you.

Uh, Caden, you are up next on deck is, uh, Joe Seda. Just say to Reno.

Just ADO.

Okay.

Perfect. Good evening, y'all. My name is K. Mizrahi Boyarsky. I'm here in regards to the two proclamations everyone's been discussing. And in the past months, Clark County has been the most affected county in all of Washington by the domestic terrorist organization called ICE. We have seen several detainments in Battleground. Kids getting off the bus being traumatized by the sight of their neighbors and classmates being kidnapped, children coming home to empty houses, and total community destruction is what you all have shown support for. Your inconsistent actions have shown us your lack of integrity, empathy, and education, as well as how much you value your BIPOC and LGBTQIA plus constituents. There is no place for fear and hate in Clark County or anywhere for that matter. But that being said, myself and many other residents, including youth who feel similarly, felt it was necessary to speak up and take time to protect our community. Your deviation from not only your constituents, but your country's values is beyond alarming. And to Mr. Eric over there, happy Pride Month, buddy.

Thank you. Thank you, Caden. All right. Cedra, you are up. Cath P. Cath EP? Cath P? You're up next.

The recent actions taken by this council and mayor on inventing increasingly partisan and policy-orientated proclamations and unequal treatment across communities is shameful. The matter of ISIS presence in Clark County and Battleground has been acknowledged by the county by its extreme and unconstitutional practices within this and surrounding cities that include practices of detaining those of legal residency, running over community members, and causing unjustifiable deaths nationwide. To push these proclamations over the celebration and support of Trans Visibility and Pride Month makes me question the values of this council. Pride is not hate. And continuing to reject the proclamation, you're also ignoring and refusing to represent your residents whom you serve. And I'll be honest, I am extremely uncomfortable in this room. This is an atmosphere created by you and encouraged by you. Even one glance outside and within this room, you have your residents recording and dehumanizing each other. This is more than disagreement, but hate fostered by you and this council. You stated you want to move Battleground in the right direction, but a city where a proclamation and building division takes priority over one that celebrates love is a direction of hate.

Thank you, ma'am.

Thank you.

All right, let's go. Come on now. I don't want to do that. Gideon Falconer, you're up next. Kath, go ahead.

Throughout American history, there have been other moments like this in which the people of this country have been called upon to stand up against hatred, against intolerance, and against fascism. When we look back at the removal and the murders of the indigenous populations, the horrors of slavery, the Chinese Removal Act, Japanese internment camps, oppression of minority groups, and suppression of rights, they are seen as devastating stains upon our nation's history. And this moment right now is no different. what is happening in the united states right now is shameful and deeply disturbing i support the liberty and freedom for all people our constitution requires such and our moral compass through the lens of love and acceptance should guide us there i oppose the proclamation proposed by battleground city leadership the lawless violence of immigration and customs enforcement must be halted in a real pathway to citizenship for all must be established No more concentration camps under the guise of safety while corporations and oligarchs rake in billions at the atrocious expense of human suffering and denial of inalienable rights.

Thank you, Kat. That is your time. Gideon, you are up. Christopher Broden, you are on decks.

Hello, Council. I'm here today because I and many of my friends in Battleground in Clark County are scared about the movement in our country and in our community towards authoritarianism. ICE as an agency has carried out countless violations of people's civil and human rights. A proclamation supporting an agency most notable for cold blooded murder, breaking apart families and keeping people imprisoned in inhumane conditions is beyond concerning. I'm here to voice my dissent and say that I firmly believe the proclamations being considered will take this city away from the Christ it supposedly desires to emulate. The book of Leviticus says in chapter 19, verse 34, the foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the Lord your God. And Jesus said in the Gospel of Matthew, For I was hungry, and you gave me something to eat. I was thirsty, and you gave me something to drink. I was a stranger, and you invited me in. If the goal of city leadership is to make Battleground a Christian city, I ask them to reevaluate what it means to follow Jesus in the way that they govern.

Thank you, Gideon. Christopher, you are up, followed by Chris for Compass.

Hello, I'm Christopher Breeden, and on behalf of my family who worships, lives, and works in Battleground, I want to thank the City Council for the work you do for our community. I appreciate the care you have demonstrated through your efforts to make Battleground a great place to live and raise a family. I'm praying for you all that God will grant you wisdom and courage as you lead our city. Thank you, and God bless you.

Thank you, Christopher. Chris, you are up, followed by Joey, who runs the Roots.

Mr. Mayor and members of the Council, I rise to speak in support of your work. I will keep my comments short. I grew up 10 minutes north of here almost my entire life, and now I'm raising my family about 10 minutes south of here. We spend most of our time in Battleground and the surrounding area. We greatly appreciate this community and your efforts to keep this a great place to live and raise a family. I believe that public safety, the rule of law, and peaceful discourse are important for maintaining the community that we know and love here. I believe this is self-evident and should be uncontroversial. So I appreciate and support the Council in what you've said in these proclamations and in your work. Thank you.

Thank you, Chris. Joey, you are up, followed by Judy Blevins. Judy Blevins.

Thank you. I too want to encourage you and to remind you that the fear of man is a snare. So be careful. Scripture has been quoted. Let's do some more. Why do the nations rage and the peoples meditate on an empty thing? The kings of the earth take their stand and the rulers take counsel together against Yahweh and against his Christ. saying let us tear their fetters apart and cast away their cords from us he who sits in the heavens laughs the lord mocks them then he speaks to them in his anger and terrifies them in his fury but as for me i have installed my king upon zion my holy mountain i will surely tell of the decree of yahweh he said to me you are my son today i have begotten you ask of me and i will surely give the nations as your inheritance and the ends of the earth is your possession You shall break them with a rod of iron. You shall shatter them like a potter's vessel. So now, O kings and magistrates, show insight. Take warning. Serve Yahweh with fear. Rejoice with trembling. Kiss the sun, lest he become angry and you perish in the way. Thank you, Joey.

Judy, you are up, followed by Shirley Watts or Waltz. Sorry.

What I'm for. I'm Judy Blevins, born a farmer's daughter in Bend, Indiana, Kansas. July 23rd will be the 34th year that I've lived in a home that is six houses away from Captain Strong Elementary, where my grandchildren are now going to school. We pledge allegiance to the flag under God. What type of God? It isn't defined, it's still a mystery. We're a nation. We're tribal, Caucasian, Black, Latino, Asian, Muslim, trans, All of us vulnerable as a suspect, the flag and the pledge are to a nation undivided with liberty and justice for all. But it is not here. It's certainly not in this council.

Thank you, Judy. Shirley, you are up, followed by Shannon Clarno.

My name is Shirley Waltz. I have lived in Clark County since 1975. I worked out in battle, had a job where I had to work out in battleground part-time, so I've really watched everything grow. My dad spent 20 years in the Navy, starting in 1938, retired in 1960. Right now, I think if my dad knew what was going on with ICE, he would have a fit. ICE is not following the law, the law requires, and they've had. been caught in court doing it that they did not they says that you have to have a a real subpoena or excuse me you have to have a warrant with the person's name on it they're doing it without that's why they're able to uh take away u.s citizens and they don't care that's wrong and to support that i would support ice if they actually followed the law but they don't thank you shirley

Shannon, you are up, followed by David Valment.

Sorry, I'm terrible at reading handwriting.

Go ahead, Shannon, your time is up.

I am anti-fascist. I am also a pansexual. Happy Pride Month, by the way. I am also a Navy veteran. I served during Don't Ask, Don't Tell, and one of my best friends did not come home during Iraq. He was gay. He was also an immigrant born in the Philippines and brought here as a child for a better life. I was also a military spouse for 16 years. And those immigrant spouses that are getting detained off the street on military bases, those are still my friends and they matter. When you publicly express support for ICE, an agency that immigrant communities and citizens both fear because of detention, family separation, and public executions, you send a message of hate. We are not great when hate chooses our steps for us. Our neighbors, our friends, and our kids deserve better and need to know this is a safe place for them no matter who they are.

Thank you, Shannon. uh david i'm gonna butcher the last name about bow mitten he left i'm gonna circle him just to go back just in case uh jennifer heinie withy jennifer all right there you are next up on deck jay allen

good evening we've heard a lot of talk about feelings i want to talk about some facts antifa operates behind a black mask of anonymity using fascist tactics to terrorize intimidate and destroy they don't care about the rule of law or respect for authority they have no problem with terrorizing innocent in innocence including mothers children and elderly ICE is upholding the law, protecting our communities from foreign invaders, including rapists, drug dealers, human traffickers, and murderers. Let's be clear. If you get in this country without permission, you are here illegally and have broken our laws. The government has every right to deport you. If you get in the way of ICE doing their job, you are also breaking the law, and agents have every right to remove you, arrest you, and protect themselves if you pose an immediate threat to their safety. I am in full support of these amendments. Thank you.

Thank you, Jennifer. Jay Allen, you are up, followed by Fia Alves.

we are blessed to live in a country where our freedom of speech and free peaceable assembly are guaranteed by the highest law of the land and where our inalienable rights are memorialized in our founding document to be endowed by our creator We're told by our founders that our rights must be practiced within the confines of the moral code derived from our religion. May I suggest that any person or organization who advocates the disruption of peaceful public discourse is acting in a manner which is antithetical to the success of our nation and ought to be chastised. and that our federal government has declared Antifa to be such an organization. Mr. Mayor, thank you.

Thank you, Jay. I don't see Fia here today. Sorry, your name's, I know who Fia is. I'm gonna, what's your name? Fia.

All right, go ahead. I'd like to read from the Book of Kings. And he went up from there to Beth El, and he was going up the way. And small youths went out from the city, and they jeered at him. And they said to him, go up, Baldy, go up, Baldy. And he turned around, and he saw them, and he cursed them in the name of Yahweh. And two bears went from the woods and they tore up them 42 of the boys. And he went from there to Mount Carmel. And from there he returned to Samaria. It is ridiculous to base decisions that we are making on some weird stories from a crazy book that a lot of us don't believe in. That's it.

Thank you, Fia. Next up, I believe, man, this one's going to be tough too. I think the last name's Halgren. Halgren? First name, I'm having a hard time. Allen? Allen Halgren.

Mr. Mayor, who's on deck?

And next on deck is Darlene Cooley. Go ahead, sir. Floor is yours.

i just heard about this meeting a few hours back and i thought it was worth coming to i'm thankful that i came i'm encouraged by i'm encouraged by seeing how a council really should work uh respect for each other on the council. I see diversity there. I see respect for the citizens. You're doing a great job. I love this country. I love my God. And I would recommend, as has been said already, and I heard that you considered it already, but I would recommend in addition to the pledge of allegiance to pray our founders did and we're here thank you alan thank you all right darlene is up next up uh daniel estrada

Hello. I just want to thank you guys for supporting ICE, recognizing Antifa as a terrorist organization and affirming the importance of public safety and rule of law in our community. It's so important that we think about our children. and what they have to deal with. It's confusing times and it's important to understand the history and not be swayed by the loud minority voices and stay focused on the truth and common sense. Remember, we don't fight against flesh and blood. And God bless you guys all and stay strong. So thanks.

Thank you, Darlene. Daniel, you're up. Next up, Bruce. Bernix? Bernice?

hi good evening city council thank you for a vibrant night of civic engagement the city governance explicitly states that ceremonial proclamations are meant to honor local service raise awareness and unite our community yet under this leadership we're watching a blatant double standard that does the exact opposite Where's the proclamation for the victims of the explosion in Longview? Where's the proclamation for our public schools who are slated to lose their middle school sports? Where's the proclamation recognizing our neighbors, our local volunteers, or the LGBTQ plus community who just wanted to feel safe and seen in their hometown during Pride Month? Where's the proclamation honoring the historic small business owners on the main street trying to revitalize Old Town? Where's the proclamation recognizing the 40 local high school students who just signed on to enter the skilled trades and build our local economy? Where's the proclamation recognizing it's our local battleground student who won the regional ESD 112 leadership award for making our schools more inclusive. Instead of addressing issues with real needs, local needs, the mayor has approved highly partisan nationalized proclamations backing ICE and targeting Antifa issues that have zero operational relevance to the daily lives of battleground residents.

Thank you. Bruce, you are up, followed by Troy Raspin.

Good evening, Council and Mayor. Thanks for the opportunity to speak. My name is Bruce Barnes for the record, lifetime Clark County resident. My dad was a pillar in Clark County. One of the things he instilled at me is think past yourself. My mom also had a saying, it says, tell me who your friends are and I'll tell you who you are. i'm here tonight because i'm concerned i've seen seattle i've seen portland oregon businesses diminished family wage jobs go away because of actions of a very few people i've also been to clark county council meetings where they've lost control so i appreciate your control of this meeting for everybody here but i've also got friends of all different cultures and i've also been able to travel the world through my job as an electrician and i know one thing's for sure i've got to have a passport when i leave here i've got a passport when i come back here i've got to have a work visa when i work there and i would encourage our country to go into some kind of a different process because it is very difficult to get people into this country that really want to be here and be a productive part of our society thank you thank you bruce

troy you are up followed by charles the proclamations passed tonight by this council are un-american and will only serve to create more division in our state and promote hate in our communities these aren't mere proclamations but a red carpet invitation to christian nationalism in battleground but I'll cut to the chase. This council has denied proclamations for Pride Month, Transgender Day of Visibility, and Non-Binary People's Day on the grounds that they were too political. My question is, by what standard are these proclamations being considered apolitical?

Thanks. Happy Pride Month.

Thank you, Troy. Charles, you are up, sir. Followed by Dave Barella.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor and city council people. I come before you today because I want to see proclamations that build up people. I saw your first one with the people with the farm and getting out in the community. and enjoying the comfort of this beautiful area and the parks that was affirming that appealed to everyone unfortunately the last couple uh were were things that are only only going to cause divisiveness in our community and you can tell by that by what's the the difference of opinion here and how people are shown with respect or non-respect. Now, you're respectful, I think is important, and it's respectful that we provide that as well, but they must be positive and constructive.

Thank you, Charles. I know a minute goes by so quick. I wish I could limit my time to a minute. Can I do that?

uh dave you are up next up uh gene or jen mccray i believe from clark county all right uh mr mayor city council thank you for doing what you're doing thank you for the control you guys have thank you for these proclamations um us in the city we appreciate that we appreciate your willingness to step out and and in these things that seem like they're going to cause problems but this is this is what this city needs is real leadership mr mayor so we appreciate your leadership here and i got 30 seconds and i've challenged myself if i can come up here and if i can give the gospel in 30 seconds through the book of romans that would be a good thing so it says for all of sin and come short of the glory of god for the wage of sin is death but the gift of god is eternal life that if you confess with your mouth Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For whoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are on Christ Jesus. Thank you.

Thank you, Dave.

Jen? Jen McRae? I could be butchering the name, but...

nope okay we're moving on to win gersich followed by gary obermeyer mr mayor i believe warren gersich will be in the citizen comments room downstairs okay we'll sample her and she is actually being brought i believe at this moment by yes i think

Followed by Gary on deck.

Yes. She is coming into this room now. I would just like to ask if you guys can vocalize when the time starts and stops because it gets pretty small down here. We can't see that.

Yes, ma'am.

You can see yourself. All right. When are you ready?

Hi, my name is Gwen Gersuch and I came here tonight because I'm very proud of Battlegrounds Council making these proclamations. I've been at a couple of events where Antifa was there and one of them was in Vancouver and it was the move on group and they had LBGQ and they had Antifa there and they were encouraging people to burn Teslas after that thing was put on. And that's probably one of the most hazardous things that you could do. The other thing I went to was there was a senator down at the, it was in Vancouver on the waterfront, and he was interviewing the Republican, he was the publicist. And this man came up that was like six foot something with, it was 80 degrees. He had a black mask on and a hat. and a backpack and he walked up to the window and he's pointing at all of us. And the fact is we got the security to get rid of him because he looked like Antifa. What was he going to do? Have Antifa come and pull us away?

You did, Meg. Please. Thank you. It's got to be tough when you don't have the clock in front of you. Gary Obermeyer, you are up, sir, followed by Max Kohanova.

My name is Gary Obermeyer. I'm a resident of Battleground. I'm here to express my displeasure at the proclamations. And I do that because the revised code of Washington requires city elections and primaries to be nonpartisan. Battlegrounds governance coordination manual states that proclamations are ceremonial recognitions, not statements of policy. How these guidelines are applied and when acceptance are made reveals whether our city leadership is committed to serving the entire community. Battleground belongs to all of us. Whether we are religious or non-religious, LGBTQ+, or straight, long-time residents or newcomers, we all share a commitment to this community and its future. The role of the City Council is not to choose sides in divisive political debates. It's to serve the whole community. Proclamation should be used to unite, recognize, and celebrate our neighbors, not to exclude or marginalize them. Thank you.

Thank you, Gary. Max, you are up next, followed by Christine White.

Hello, you do not know me, but I am here to speak today because your refusal of certain controversial proclamations and acceptance of others will not make me go anywhere. I am a trans bi child of immigrants who has dedicated their life to activism. And while you choose to ignore my existence and the existence of so many others by refusing a proclamation for Trans Day of Visibility, Pride Month, and International Non-Binaries People's Day, I am still here. I am still studying for my exams. I am still proud of every aspect of my identity. While you take from my community, we are expected to keep living our lives. While I am able to speak out, others are not. And I will continue to speak out so I can make sure you don't forget the faces of the people your words affect. Proclamations are meant to recognize personal, local, or national days, weeks, or months to help build awareness. What you have done with your ICE and Antifa proclamation has taken away that meaning. Your ICE proclamation talks about a national agency and policy, and so does your Antifa proclamation. Antifa simply stands for anti-fascist, and there is no organized group for it. If you are not anti-fascist, then the Founding Fathers, the drafters of our Constitution, and the reason...

Sorry, thank you. Christine White.

Hi, my name's Christine. My father fought in Normandy. He was a anti-fascist. I want to take some lines and lyrics that speak better than I can. If love and peace are so strong, why are there pieces of love that don't belong? All of you mothers, brothers, sisters, fathers, and everybody walking this land, Your church, no matter your race, your church, your faith, your creed, your tribe, or your sign, you defend this nation with open hearts and open minds and lend a helping hand each time. Believers, pretenders, sinners, racists, fascists, nihilists, and bigots, I'm calling you out, my friends. Your actions will not stand. You can change. You can change. I pray for you.

Thank you, Christine. Next up, Brent Heinrich, and then followed by Stephanie Adams. Go ahead, Brent.

Hello. My name is Brent Heinrich, and I'm here today because these proclamations are damaging to the people of Battleground and those beyond. Recognizing ICE as a positive force means failing to understand the shocking amount of harm that has happened to the community, especially our immigrant community and people of color. Understand, council, that their attacks have been indiscriminate to the point that even legal immigrants and citizens have been unjustly incarcerated and physically and mentally harmed at their behest. We cannot stand to endorse that as okay, let alone expressly support that. As for Antifa proclamation, what frustrates me is the rhetoric has been weaponized to demonize anyone who does not follow a specific way of thinking. My grandfather fought against fascism in World War II. We as a country once stood united against fascism. Being a Democrat and being called Antifa is a badge I will wear proudly within our history. But hearing it used as an attack is anti-American. We should all stand against fascism.

Thank you, Brent. Stephanie, you are up. On deck will be Missy Pham.

Thank you, Council. Reprayer addition to the meetings. The council has come this far without prayer. It's not really necessary. Because of this, this idea, along with the two proclamations, feel like divisive signaling. And for whom? Voters, pastors, employers, political leaders, all the above. Words from local pastors with direct ties to Maddox remain unaddressed. Concerning words remain unaddressed and therefore unalleviated. The council's inclusion of Maddox spouses, family members, current employees does not feel coincidental. The highest power I'd like to hear acknowledged and upheld in a council meeting is the collective power of the roles that you all hold to serve our community. Prayer is welcome and appropriate in a lot of spaces, homes, churches, some businesses. Please leave it there and focus on the job. Thank you.

Thank you, Stephanie. Missy, you are up, followed by Don. Don't you? Don't you? Go ahead, Missy.

I got a minute. This is weird. My name is Missy and I'm a battleground taxpayer, whereas Jesse McCarty, our author of the Antifa proclamation, is not. I was not aware non-battleground residents could submit proclamations here. In 2024, Amy Vale wrote to this council arguing against the pride proclamation, stating that the city should stick to infrastructure and refrain from making proclamations that delve into highly personal and contentious topics. Yet tonight, you're issuing a deeply partisan and virtue signaling proclamations. You are condemning Antifa, a phantom problem that does not exist here, while ignoring the far right extremism that is present. celebrating ICE, an agency whose operations actively tear apart local families while personally participating in Christian nationalism. By your own standards, why is this council diving head first into divisive national politics while denying local LGBTQ plus residents a simple message of safety and belonging? You cannot claim that the council must remain neutral just to exclude neighbors you disagree with while using your power to push political statements you favor. Hold yourselves to a single fair standard and represent all of Battleground.

Missy, that's your time.

See you at the Rainbow Walk on Sunday in the center.

Dawn. Don Dochu and then Jan Pollen. Jan Pollen.

In Citizens' Comments, I believe we have Don. And your time begins now.

My father fought the fascists in World War II in France, and I, like him, am against fascism, making me anti-fascist, antifa. Of course, most of us here oppose violence, no matter who is the instigator, even the armed mass ICE patrols. In a time when we are faced with so much instability and uncertainty in the world, these proclamations seem designed to foment more division in our community rather than less. Indeed, we would like instead we would like improved communication amongst our neighbors enhanced safety and demonstrated respect for each individual living here in fact i would suggest even the process of proclaiming echoes the smoke and mirrors of the wizard of oz rather than making proclamations the council and mayor could focus their energies on supporting community unifying events Likewise, demanding that all council meetings begin with prayer seems designed to divide again. And that's my mind.

Next up, we have Jan Pollen.

Anyone after Jan?

yeah i'm going to read back through the circled list that i have just in case we missed anybody from downstairs and then i will go on to the people that i know are downstairs uh susan frederickson did you get jam poland i'm sorry mr mayor one moment please and citizens Susan

I am here in opposition of the proclamations. Antifa has become a dirty word. Antifa is short for anti-fascism.

Fascism is typically a dictatorship. My father fought in World War II and was at Pearl Harbor when it was bombed. I also served as a Navy nurse for four years and would gladly wear an Antifa T-shirt. This country was built on the idea to freely protest in a nonviolent way. And the day that freedom is taken away is the day this country is no longer a democracy. As for ICE, this country was built on the back of immigrants. as a nation are long overdue in acknowledging their work. A multicultural society may have its difficulties in coexisting, but the benefits far outweigh the disadvantages. As far as prayer being conducted prior to meetings, I would impose this. The U.S. Constitution states that church and state should be separate. It is my opinion...

Susan, go ahead, ma'am. Thank you. Our nation was founded on many important principles. Certainly one is the separation of church and state. People of all faiths or no faiths have been honored to be Americans. I'm saying shame on you for promoting Christianity in this way. I am a Christian, but I honor friends who are not Christians. I honor friends when I lived in Turkey who are Muslims. This council as a whole really disappoints me because you are promoting a very narrow form of Christianity. And I ask all of you to pray about it. What are you teaching people? How narrow are you making your faith? Thank you. Thank you, Susan.

So next up, Beth Cooper. And if Beth Cooper is available downstairs, we will follow that up with Linda Clywer. Beth Cooper is not present.

We do not have a Beth Cooper down here.

Okay. Alicia, Linda Cleaver or Clywer?

Linda Cleaver I believe did leave.

Okay. We will roll on then.

um jen mccray or mcnay i do not see anybody responding to that call either i'm down here oh we can are you okay linda is here we are here just shut this off yes please go ahead and shut that off because i'll be back in the room How does this work? We'll go ahead and tell you when your time begins and you'll have one minute and I'll let you know when that time is over.

All right. Welcome, Linda. Your time will start now.

I am very concerned about your recent support of two proclamations and would like to comment. First of all, Antifa is not an organization. It's just a label Donald Trump used for a group of people protesting his policies that he didn't like. People in this country have a right to peacefully protest policies and unfairness without fearing government violence in response. This current administration is corrupt and trying very hard to become fascist with Trump as the king. To be Antifa literally means to be anti-fascist. Does supporting this proclamation mean you are pro-fascism? Are you aware that 460,000 soldiers from the US died defending freedom from a fascist government with Hitler at the helm. Yet you seem to want to support this corrupt fascist government and its efforts to take over our country. This is shameful. Second, we should not be supporting ICE in its current form. Trump has weaponized it to the extent that it is killing people that stand in its way and sending individuals to concentration camps. Thank you, Linda.

Next up, if we have downstairs or in the room here, David Bowman.

Alicia, can you check to see if you have a David Bowman?

We do not have someone by that name.

OK, we're going to go John Parsons followed by Beth Lowell-Vigson. Lowell-Vigson.

Hi, I'm a farmer. I live about 15 minutes away from here. My family has lived in this farm about over 100 years. So as a farmer, I have a job that's statistically several times more dangerous as a police officer or an ICE agent and several hundred times more useful. Someone said that ICE protects us from rapists. Last night, and I looked this up, everyone else can do this too, there's around five rapists who have convicted sex offenders two miles within Chief Umtuk Middle School. Five of them are specifically with children and minors, and eight out of nine of them are with white men, and they're all registered US citizens. So I'm wondering, how is it that a crime that is categorically considered only within white culture is going to be protected by ICE? anyways these proclamations are out of touch and i'm very concerned about how so many people in this room clapped when they the mayor kind of put the reading the writing on the wall that when some ice agent shoots you in the back of the head he's going to ask did you comply fast enough thank you for your time thank you john uh beth lowell vixen and then followed up by jacob smith on deck

Beth, your time starts now.

Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to speak. I'm Beth LaVixen, resident of Battleground. I have grave concerns for the appropriateness, professionalism, and legal ramifications of some of the following items. The first item is the appropriateness of adding an invocation prayer to the start of council meetings. The founders of the United States were very clear that the government of the United States was not founded in any sense on the Christian religion. Please do not insert Christian nationalism into yours and our civil duties and identity. I am a Christian in my whole life, and I find it abhorrent that you would try to abscond with our civic roles and duties in our democracy. The last objection is tied to the first concern of the council trying to insert private political agendas into our city governance and community identity with the proposed proclamations. Battleground is an open, caring, loving community that helps and serves those in need. Both of these proclamations have been fulfilled.

Finally, Jacob Smith. alicia do you have a jacob smith downstairs it doesn't appear somewhere no mr mayor okay that concludes our citizens communication um and we will move on but before we do i uh would entertain a motion for a brief recess

No, Mike. Motion for a recess for 10 minutes.

All right. Let's take a brief 10-minute recess.

Do we have a second, Mr. Mayor?

Second.

We have a second. All those in favor of a brief recess say aye. Aye. All right.

Community Development, please state your name. Community Development, could you please state your name?

Sam Cremit.

Thank you, Sam.

So,

hot mics are hot are we all right the time is 9 18 and we will uh reconvene the city council meeting is that sour chris no all right we will move on to the consent agenda mary moved to approve the consent agenda as presented second all right we have a motion and a second all those in favor aye aye Any opposed? Hearing none, motion passes unanimously. All right. And now we're moving on to public hearings. Liz, is there any public testimony submitted for the public hearing that has not yet been provided to the council?

No, Mr. Mayor.

OK. And. All right. I would like to introduce the community development director, Kristen Lato.

Good evening, Council, Mr. Mayor. This evening, we're going to ask council to please hold a public hearing for the grouping of Battleground Municipal Code updates that are related to directives based on Housing, Growth Management Act, and our city comprehensive plan update. I do want to share that we are joined by Sam Crummett, our planning supervisor via Zoom. If there's any questions regarding the ordinance content, these changes have been reviewed by the Department of Commerce, and there were no concerns from them. And then there's just one item I wanted to draw attention to on page 27 of the ordinance. There's a new section being proposed to be added, section 17.133.072, titled Residential Parking Design Standards. Currently, I'm so sorry. Councilmember Ferrer had asked about letter A. The wording of it as it reads was a bit confusing. So we would like to propose if there's support after the hearing and questions, et cetera. that we actually reword A to match what is listed in the RCW and that would read parking spaces may not be required to exceed 8 feet by 20 feet except for required parking for people with disabilities. So just wanted to bring that to the attention of the Council and the Mayor because we'd already printed the ordinance for you the way it's worded, and we would propose you consider perhaps if you adopt this ordinance making that modification. Are there any questions about that?

Amy Nunez, Can you just show them on the screen, so they can see it because we're trying to flip and you're trying to talk and it probably just easier to see it sorry.

Amy Nunez, No problem give me just one moment sorry I was a little unprepared given. Amy Nunez, it's page.

Amy Nunez, The last seven of the agenda packet if that's how. Amy Nunez, Thank you.

Amy Nunez, What about the age of the ordinance.

Amy Nunez, yeah it is paid yes 27. Amy Nunez, I will bring it up my apology.

Amy Nunez, A. are you going to show them the change of a language yes i can bring that up as well please please please hold my apologies And I will just say as she's looking for if it's okay, Mayor, that I looked this up and they just adopted the language from RCWs. So I guess we're just doing kind of like the presentation part of it, like showing the amendment changes first.

Sorry, I'm almost there. Yep, I'm so close.

Right at the top of that page. Okay, so my apologies.

So this is the ordinance as presented. You'll see again in section 17.133.072, A is what we had written. And if you will bear with me as I bring up the correct chapter, which I swear I had open. Oh my goodness sakes. Apologies.

I just pull up the email you gave me.

I'm going to reshare now the RCW language. And I'd like to draw your attention to letter E. If everyone can see that, I'll try and make it a little larger. Is that okay? Yeah, that's fine. So again, staff would propose if you would consider that we reword A to match the language that you see here in E. Again, parking spaces may not be required to exceed 8 feet by 20 feet, except for required parking for people with disabilities. And apologies for any confusion. If there's not any questions about that, I would ask that we open the public hearing for this topic.

Do we have any questions? Feel free to queue in.

Not this time.

Megan, you did it. All right, seeing none in the queue. I would like to open the public meeting. I will now open the public meeting at 9.24 p.m. for public testimony. Individuals are limited to three minutes to provide testimony on the G. M. A required battleground municipal code amendments as stated in ordinance 2026 dash 13. All comments should be directed to the mayor and Hold on. Let me split my page here. Are there any members of the public on zoom who wish to provide testimony list?

No, Mr Mayor.

All right. Are there any members in the public here who wish to provide testimony? Come on up, sir. And please state your name and place of President.

Certainly, Mr Mayor, Derek hugel with Wolf Industries Inc. Right here in Battleground. Go ahead. OK, super. So you have in front of you the proposed code language that staff has worked diligently to put together. And I back all of that wholeheartedly. There's a couple of points in there that with my experience I wanted to just point out. 17.106.060 speaks to how many units are in a cluster. And there's a minimum of four with a maximum of 12. Other jurisdictions mentioned that you can have multiple clusters. I've worked with Sam on this, and we left it like this, not totally clear, saying that it should be one or more or dictating how many clusters you can have in a cottage setup because I've done these where you have multiple clusters. So it's important to maybe have that clarity that if staff has changeover and they're just looking to see who would be So if you have different people reviewing the code, you want it totally clear. So all I'm saying is throw in a little sentence that there may be more than one cluster on a project. And then same section, but Section L talks about condo versus single lot. The Planning Commission really wanted to push and emphasize homeownership, which I support and uphold. Our strategy is to build these condos and hold them for a short period of time and then slowly release them so we don't get hit with income tax. And so it's important for us to hold that for a period of time. well i just went through the process of conduizing a project just to test the project process and understand how it works my tax is doubled because the taxation realized that oh you these are now valued at a single family residence And so I did the math, worked it backwards, and each rental will be $122 more each month when we do that condo process. So it's fine if we do it. It just means that the rent is going to be that much higher. So I suggest that it would go fine if you don't require the condominiumize process when you do a cottage cluster. Um, because that was the planning commission's concern was they wanted to promote and push home ownership. So, um, yeah, that's my two cents on this and I'm fully support and back up what you guys are doing here. So thank you.

Thank you, sir. We have any additional public comment for the hearing at this time? Okay. Seeing no further members of the public wishing to speak, I now close the public hearing at 9.28 p.m. And I ask the clerk to read the title of the ordinance, 2026-13, for the second.

ordinance number 2026-13 an ordinance amending battleground municipal code 17 zoning chapter 17.103 definitions chapter 17.106 residential districts chapter 17.118 commercial districts chapter 17.120 light industrial employ employment campus and Westside Employment Districts, Chapter 17.122, Mixed Use Districts, Chapter 17.133, Parking and Loading Requirements, Chapter 17.135, Supplementary Regulations for Specific Uses, Providing for Severability, Providing for Corrections, and Establishing an Effective Date.

OK. Do we want to open it up for discussion or call for a motion? Council Member McCoy?

Brett KenCairn, yeah I would like to hear, so I would like to hear what are the risks of the issue that came up that Mr people brought up if are the reason for having the condo. Brett KenCairn, Regulation in there, what are we trying to protect from versus his issue of that right raising property taxes, I mean what's the trade off. Brett KenCairn, From a city perspective.

So I will attempt an answer and then I'll ask Sam to add if he'd like to. So that language has been existing in our cottage housing section. We're not proposing a change to that. It's my understanding the options would be each cottage located on their own separate lot, which enables homeownership. private parties to own each parcel and then said unit or to be a condominium. And in that case, it would be a structure where, for example, like the common spaces are controlled by that condominium. It's regulated by an RCW. So I believe it gives it the platform or the structure that if it is each unit is not how to say, Sam, please, please help me out here.

Why couldn't you just use an HOA instead of a condo structure?

Good evening, Council. Sam Crummett, Planning Supervisor and Yeah, Kristin is correct. The ability to condo-ize has always been in our cottage housing regulations, as well as several of our other residential development code language, such as apartments. So I don't think we would want to take that out. It could even be legally concerning if we prohibited the ability to condo-ize. I think we'd need more legal review if that was entertained. I think the main discussion, at least at the Planning Commission level, was whether to eliminate that each cottage home be on its own separate lot or whether we could allow multiple cottages on a lot. And the concern with that is without them being on a single lot, then we would get into a scenario where you'd have a single landlord uh managing multiple units which other jurisdictions do as i understand vancouver allows for that clark county but it was the planning commission's um desire as well as in our housing action plan that the city the city supports home ownership so i think that's one thing that uh where the planning commission you know planning commission had a healthy discussion on that wanted to keep it at um at the single lot level. And they really didn't, at least from what I remember, we didn't talk about condoizing much at all at that level.

It's clear as mud.

Could somebody put clarification here?

So I'll stay high level that RCW 6490 governs condos, creation, governance, et cetera. Quickly, when I look up the difference between condos and HOAs. So a condo owner owns their individual unit and shares ownership of common areas, while in an HOA, the homeowner owns their property and their lot, but the HOA itself manages the common areas. So I believe the way the code is written allows for home ownership, either whether it be on its own individual lot, and in that case, an HOA would likely be formed to manage those common areas,

or if it's condo-wise they still own their unit but let me bring this up to a higher level the the comment was increasing home ownership and the testimony was maybe i'm misunderstanding a testimony maybe we could have somebody else take this i'm obviously off base here on what we're trying to get at well so my understanding of

so my understanding of uh so like why we have hoas with shared drainage spaces and things like that is so they can have a an hoa that covers the dues and pays for that collectively within the neighborhood of the hoa correct like common spaces parks drainage all that kind of stuff like maintenance and oversight of shared spaces so wouldn't could could not that same you know uh apply to condos where it is truly nature way they own their lot in their home they're still homeowners but they pay the dues into the common shared spaces that allows the maintenance and care of that to be done versus just raising everyone's rent i mean what's

So I think the main difference would be if the units are not condoized, they can't be owned individually. So if they're not going to be on their own lot and the goal is to keep them on a parcel or a few parcels, multiple units or clusters, there's no way for individual home ownership without them being condoized, which allows for then that owner to own that unit. I believe what the planning commission was trying to avoid is more of like a landlord tenant scenario where, you know, code doesn't allow for it now, but if we were to change the language to allow for multiple clusters and multiple units to exist on one parcel, there's no way for someone to own that unit individually.

unless it's kind of wise. Correct. Yes. So then it becomes more like a like a trailer park where you own the the building, but you don't own the land it sits on.

So some of the conversation at planning commission level was about the concern of that model exactly where especially fixed income or age restricted manufactured home parks, they own their actual structure. But the the rent on the space can increase exponentially and it's out of the

the tenant's hands they have they have limited control correct um deputy mayor thank you mr mayor so i believe that i'm understanding this situation correctly um but developing these into a condominium then raise raises the rates or the rents pretty significantly so i'm wondering i guess my view is i think that this If we take this section at 17.106.060, that would give us time for legal review and for us to look into this issue more thoroughly to see if there's other options that can be explored beyond just the two For example, listed in L, each cottage should either be located on a separate lot or shall be a condominium. Is there a potential, is there another third option? Is there a way to divide a single parcel into small lots without it being considered a condominium? So this is something that I would like to explore more personally and understand more so that we are making City Council Chambers, Are the correct decision with us, I don't want to bring municipal codes back again and again and again, if we can help it so that would be my my thought.

So I just want to clarify this. Currently, that section exists in our code. So if we, whatever the council decides, if we were to remove it, then we wouldn't have any regulation or language around cottage housing standards. So I just want to make sure when we determine the direction to give staff that we're clear on what you'd like us to do with it.

I personally think we need to leave it as is and review it separately to. Consider whether any amendments need to be made to it that way it stays in place. It doesn't get pulled, so we don't have anything. And then we can have it reviewed, um, at a later meeting. Um, that shouldn't necessarily affect. the purpose of this public hearing is to review the amendments and this one is not included in that amendment. Definitely a topic of conversation. To the other point though, I don't think it would be that hard to amend. It would be 17.106.060. I think it would probably fall under C. is to the gentleman's point just adding that there can be more than one cluster just to simplify for staff and any kind of.

yeah so for see currently reads a minimum of four and a maximum of 12 cottages are allowed in any single cluster and development and it sounds like we would just want some additional language that says. More than one cluster would be allowed correct her project just to simplify that okay. We can definitely add that.

I don't disagree with that at all. Does anyone have any heartburn over that? No. Yeah. Any other further discussion? Go ahead, Councilmember Ferrer.

Thank you, Mayor. I actually would like to make a motion to remove the permitting of apartments in R7 on the table. It's in R7 zones in table 17.106-1. Does anybody want that?

Before we go there, I just want to ask, is that state law now?

No, I will let Sam speak to this more, but that change there. So on page four of your ordinance, which I will bring it up here and share currently apartments is an allowed use in residential zones are ten and higher. We are proposing to also now allow it instead of by conditional use to permit it outright in an R seven zone. And the reason for that was in order to hit our housing target allocations. Per the comprehensive plan, we need more density. And so our consultants, and let me just share, are recommending that we allow that in the R7 zone. Sam, did you want to add to that while I bring up the page here?

Sure. Under our comp plan, we not only need to provide for a variety of different types of housing, but we have to demonstrate that all income brackets can be afforded the opportunity of a home. So the way to do that in essence is we needed to add more attached type housing products in our city rather than single family home development. And so there were a few adjustments we made. One of them was a slight adjustment in our R7 district to allow apartments as permitted outright rather than conditional use permit. And then other things like duplexes in all of our districts, accessory dwelling units throughout our districts. So yeah, I think if that change was made, I'd probably need to go back to our consultant and see if that changes our land capacity analysis. And I think for like to interpret that as I just wanna make sure that we still can be in compliance with GMA.

And that was just wanting what I was wanting us to maybe look into is are there any other options, rather than allowing our sevens we have a lot of our sevens in our area. And just to allow you know apartments that come in, I just want us to be able to take a look and see if there's any other options that where we can still meet the needs of the gma requirements.

I will also note that we have a motion on the floor currently um. John Potter, I have not heard a second sorry I just want to bring that point up. John Potter, So we've gone into discussion without it with a solid motion. John Potter, Not hearing a second.

John Potter, Motion and I replay state my motion to see if. I just, I'm asking to remove this little, on that table 106.1, just remove the, and I'm not saying like pull it, I'm just saying, sorry, I'll make it easy. I would like to make a motion to remove permitting of apartments in our seven zones stated on table 17.106-1 in order to review it as a council for other options.

PB, Harmon Zuckerman, Okay, we have a motion on the floor. Do I have a second.

Second,

All right, we have a motion and we have a second by deputy mayor rail. Now we can have this discussion. From what I'm hearing, and I want to give. You know what? Council member months and go ahead.

So, I do have concerns having this in there because I mean, it's an ease of use for the city and for a developer when there's smaller. Parcels of land and somebody wants to build apartments there. The challenge that I face with that is in the past when we've had rezoning and developers have requested to change something to like R10 or R12, R16. By doing our due diligence to have a conversation about that for each kind of parcel, it allows homeowners around there that come in and have a conversation of what they think is gonna happen to like their property value, et cetera. So, I think it's more efficient this way, but I don't think it speaks to the public on what they want. So if we were to pull this change out and just leave it the way it is, where we have small chunks of land that maybe a developer can't build 40 or plus houses, but maybe it would fit an apartment, it allows them to go through the process to come through a public hearing, let the neighbors around them have their voice, their concerns for us to make a better informed decision. By having this read the way this reads, it just allows the streamlined process for a developer to put an apartment in. I'm not against an apartment going in. I just think that the people around there should have a voice. So I would agree with Council Member Ferrer that we have to have a little more in-depth discussion before we can make a decision on that. So that's where I stand at, Mayor Overholzer.

OK. Council Member McCoy.

just have a question so let's say i have a one acre lot zoned r7 how many apartments can i put on that seven so in other words no more living units than would be if they were single family housing correct so how does this densify yeah that's a great question

I think what a conditional use permit does is it is another layer of process. I think it allows for more neighborhood scrutiny. I think it's possible to deny a conditional use permit if they don't meet the criteria. But theoretically, it would be the same density if the conditional use permit criteria was met every time. I think what this change does is makes the process less cumbersome without having to go through a conditional use permit hearing. Okay, thank you.

Council Member Kuypers.

Karen Hollweg, Thank you so just just to clarify for myself here. Karen Hollweg, By adding apartments to our seven for apartments. Karen Hollweg, It basically gives a less expensive option. Karen Hollweg, To have an apartment structure versus all individual residents. And that is part of the problem that we're trying to solve, not just numbers, but housing that is less costly. It's more affordable. It's an alternative. So if there's other things about that, then I agree, open to having more discussion. If there's not really other things about that, it seems like it's a good thing to have that flexibility.

I'm still at a loss of if we can put seven apartment units on the property, but you can put seven single family homes on a property, why would we need to rerun the density assessment on that by our. Is it a wetlands issue.

mm hmm.

I mean, I get the cost, like easing the process of development without the conditional use permit. I understand that fully. I just don't understand the comment where it was like, well, we might have to go back and redo our density study.

Yeah, I think Council Members Kuyper's point is important. I think this does streamline the process more. it probably is in the direction of more kind of stripping off more encumbrances to building and creating housing. I think a lot of governments are heading in this direction. Another example would be, you know, design review boards can get excessive and create encumbrances to building and housing. Conditional use permits can be seen that same way. I think to your point, Mayor, You're right, the density can be the same, however, practically, yeah, wetlands can be an issue. I found in many of our districts across the city, wetlands can prevent a development from achieving the density that they otherwise could be authorized. So what that then allows for is if you do have apartments that are permitted outright or essentially you build up rather than going out. But in terms of, you know, running the model, is that going to change our density a lot? Probably not. I'd still want to kind of check that out or at least talk with our consultants more as to some of the reasoning behind that.

Okay. Thank you, Sam. Council Member Munson, if I can go around.

Good evening, Sam. Two questions for you. Our target density is supposed to be 25-75, is that correct? 25% multifamily, 75% single family?

No, you're right. That is what it was in our old comprehensive plan. Now it's broken down into those income brackets, low, moderate, high, and I don't have that memorized of exactly where all that would fall.

Hey, I would like to see where we're at at some point. So maybe if you could get that to Chris so I could see what that looks like. The second question, has there been a current request by a developer that's triggering this? Are we holding up progress for somebody? Or is this just kind of a generalized approach to doing this?

A generalized approach. What we did was we did a housing action plan, probably worth a read if you haven't read it yet, a few years ago. And I mean, just trying to speak generally, we're trying to... create less red tape in the city, try to allow for a more builder-friendly environment. And we had a committee actually that was made up of a diverse group of people, including home builders. So that was a lot of the policy work we did. And then, yeah, essentially just trying to streamline things a bit more. Thank you, Sam.

John Potter, All right, seeing no further discussion, we do have a motion on the floor. John Potter, To remove that change to the R seven for apartments to maintain it as conditional use to review it further is that correct. uh victoria did i did i state your motion i was listening i was in the box but i hear shakes head so yeah i feel like i i did okay um so we do have a motion on the floor uh let's move to a vote on that um all those in favor of uh removing that conditional use and leaving it uh or i'm sorry keep keeping it conditional use and not making it just approved for our seven apartments

correct yeah but then bring us back some yeah and then to bring it back to review we can learn more about it before we just jump the gun on it all those in favor say aye aye aye aye all those opposed say nay nay nay where's shane and boy are you guys on it oh did you oh okay

I didn't catch.

So I have the nays as Councilmember Kuipers and Mayor Overholzer.

Okay.

And everyone else as I.

And did we get a vote from Shane on that or is he still online?

He is no longer online.

He's on Hawaii time. Okay, so we have a motion that has passed 4-2. John Potter, In favor of that. So we will maintain that as conditional use and review that are seven for apartments. Okay. John Potter, Well, we still have an ordinance on the table as well. John Potter, We, we did make an amendment. To modify the language on the 17.106.060 to add more than one cluster possibility. We have stricken the R7 condition or the change to the R7 for apartments and left it a conditional use to re-review. Is there any other edits or can we move forward with a motion to go ahead and approve the remaining ordinance?

So moved.

Second. All right. We have a motion. We have a second. Any discussion? Hearing none, all those in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Hearing none, motion passes unanimously. Look at that. We're doing it. It's time. We're doing all right. Mayor Mrakas, Liz were there any communication submitted regarding business items that have not been provided to the Council yet, and if so, can you read those prior to the Council discussion for business. Mayor Mrakas, I know, Mr Mayor right Thank you ma'am all right, we move on to invocation at City Council meetings presented by city manager Chris swanson and deputy city manager Robert barrier away.

council during council communications portion of the may 4th 2026 council meeting the city council by motion from council member ferrer and concurred with the city council asked the matter of including invocation for a future meeting and place up on that agenda and that's what we're here to discuss tonight this matter has been discussed by council over the last 12 to 18 months On November 4th, 2024, there was a discussion during council communication portion. Council members requested that staff provide information and sample policies for prayer at public meetings from other cities. And staff provided communications or staff provided council members with information curated by Municipal Research and Services Center. which provides legal and policy guidance specifically on this topic of prayer, pledges and land acknowledgment and public meetings. um subsequently on january 6 2025 under administrative reports portion of the city council meeting the topic of moment of silence was discussed by city council and as part of that discussion city attorney harper who's on the line tonight responded to questions from city council and a consensus was reached to ask the city attorney to further look into any legal issues regarding a separate pre-business meeting gathering to hold a moment of silence or prayer with or without a quorum present That legal research and opinion, um, was provided to the city council on January 22nd, 2025, and then shared again with this council by myself on May 5th. Um, and then again this week. And so with that, I would turn it over to council, um, to have their discussion on invocations.

All right. We open it up for discussion. Mayor Mrakas, Anybody competent the bit to get on this thing all right Council member for.

So i'll just read. A little bit from MRC so we're all on the same page of our understanding legally. Prayers and invocations. Opening a public meeting with a prayer or invocation is a common but also a legally permissible practice. The U.S. Supreme Court addressed this directly in Town of Greece v. Galloway in 2014, ruling that legislative prayer does not violate the establishment clause of the U.S. Constitution. I do apologize. This is very tiny. It's hard to read. The invocation itself does not need to be non-denominational, but the opportunity to give it must be open to all faiths. and no particular region religion excuse me like i said small may be advanced or disparaged um let's see if a governing body chooses to include an invocation at its meeting the following practices are recommended the body should adopt a written non-discrimination policy making clear that the opportunity to deliver the invocation is open to any faith tradition there should be no advanced review or approval of the content of an invocation Attendance at the invocation must remain voluntary. Members of the public should be free to arrive late, step out, or remain silent without consequence. Legal counsel should review any invocation policy before it is adopted. And then I went and looked at how the county does it. And they did a resolution, which you can find on the website. And they do have a simple little statement. And then just anybody who wants to do a request, it's just put your information in there. And it says the Clark County Council invites clerical representatives of all faiths to deliver an invocation to open on its meet. It's Tuesday public meetings. Invocation shall be the purpose of seeking wisdom and guidance from a higher authority as the counselors engage in critical issues that affect Clark County residents. And then they have a little thing that says their guidelines.

Thank you also remember for air any further discussion, I know i'm going to throw it right again so. council member oh no you want to wait okay you go ahead so uh before before i do anything i know uh ken there's a reason you're on here tonight uh sir and thank you for your help you've already been in uh so many ways but uh i would like to get your opinion on invocation for the city of battleground uh the pros the cons and and just give your legal opinion of that yeah thank you mr mayor and uh council members i

I think what you've heard so far from Chris and your colleague at the diocese is largely correct. The concern that this office expressed in January of 25 related to, as Chris points out, it related to a pre-meeting moment of silence or a pre-meeting prayer that's complicated because that involves uh what could pretty easily become a violation of the open public meetings act because the the way it was presented for our opinion it was based on the idea of a non-convened meeting uh as the uh as the predicate of the of the moment of silence what i believe council is now uh debating this evening is an actual legislative prayer opportunity in other words the council would convene and then have an invocation that is that is acceptable uh we've heard uh quite a bit of comment uh tonight and and it's not hard to find uh a strong line of thought that under the establishment clause there is a strong sense of separation of church and state however as councilman referrer points out the supreme court has been very careful to identify invocations as an exception to that rule so we can respect the general idea of a separation of church and state so long as we follow constitutional requirements for legislative invocations. And what Councilmember Ferrer recited from MRSC is a pretty good guide. It is not is not particularly complicated to develop a policy on this. The basic parameters are pretty simple. You can't discriminate. You need to make this opportunity open to virtually any and all faiths. There have been cases that have pushed the limits of what is a faith. So I'll just mention to council that this can be somewhat difficult in the extreme cases. And generally speaking, courts have allowed nearly anything, any system of beliefs, even if they would not be well recognized as faiths and certainly would not be well recognized as part of the Judeo-Christian tradition. Nevertheless, they would very likely qualify as faiths. And so the city council would need to be prepared to accept a very, very different types of invocations. It's also important, as Council Member Ferrer points out, that the moment of invocation be noncoercive. This is often a distinguishing characteristic when, say, a school board might promote an invocation with a student recognition scenario that's a little difficult because kids don't necessarily have the same ability to get up and leave if they don't wish to be a part of a meeting as adults do there are a couple of other details that you find in policy statements around the country around the state but i submit that we can work those out And the direction that I think I would be asking for from council is really just very broadly. If you wish for us to prepare a policy, then we can certainly do so. And then that would probably. present a a good opportunity to evaluate uh some of these factors that i've just described i mean you're absolutely right between i think washougal um clark county uh undoubtedly some other communities in southwest washington we can find nearby examples i don't know if those are necessarily going to be the best ones to pick from but that could be an evaluative process and we could do it in a manner that is consistent with the constitution if that is this council's wish thank you ken open the discussion still just

Yes, I would say I move that we do direct staff to draft a resolution to amend the governance manual to place invocation on the agenda of every council meeting to occur immediately after the convening of the meeting and prior to the Pledge of Allegiance.

Do we have a motion? Lower?

Open to a second. I will second that motion. I also want to be sure Now we have a motion in a second. I want to be sure that we are following MRSC guidelines. It is non-discriminatory. There's no advanced approval. It's got an ability for anyone of any faith to sign up or belief system, I should say. That way it's inclusive. I want to be sure that we're clear about that.

Council Member McCoy, I see you're weighing in here. yeah just a couple questions uh one for staff um how are we doing on our legal budget this year we're at 80 000 of 130 so we're well over 50 percent uh second point being that when this came up two years ago the reason why this council decided decided uh not to do uh invocation was exactly what uh mr harper said as far as we can't restrict what is set and uh meaning and you can see it from the citizens comments tonight uh we're gonna have a wide variety of invocations given and i know clark county has had a wiccan prayer um i this council needs to be prepared for that if this is something you want to use the power of government and our legal resources to do just realize that that aside from the part of uh you know your personal opinions on it um be prepared for that uh and does that just diminish the intent uh of what you're trying to do and I would submit that it that it does and I think we will I think especially after tonight and everything that's gone down um I believe we have just incentivized a lot of alternative faiths or maybe non-mainstream. I'm trying to be very careful in my word choosing here to not denigrate anybody's beliefs, but it may not feel like the church you go to on Sunday is all I'm saying. And so when you take something as personal as prayer and you put no guardrails on it, Just be prepared. And if that's really what you want to bring into this meeting, we have yet, as a council, to talk about aquatic center. We have yet, as a council, to talk about sports fields. We are over budget already on legal. I mean, we're halfway through our legislative agenda. And this is the most important thing in front of us.

That's all. Thank you, Council Member McCoy. Any further discussion? Council Member Ferrer.

Is it a possibility to save on. Instead of using our legal to draw something up, could we just have staff pull from Clark County and or we can diligently look to see what Clark County is doing for their policies and also Washougal and decide if that's something that we would like to see. Staff could easily put that together for us at a future meeting saying, this is what they've came up, this is what they're using. And then once we say, yes, we like it, then it would be for our legal team to do a quick, you know, it wouldn't be as lengthy and as much time as what I'm thinking. Could that be an option?

Thank you, Council Member Ferrer. Council Member Kuyper.

Thank you. I'm concerned about using additional dollars out of the budget, whether it is legal or whether it's staff. I'd be interested in seeing how much we've spent over the last month, two months in additional staff time, overtime, police time, and what that impact is going to be on our budget. We don't know those numbers, so that'll be interesting. And personally, would I like to have prayer? Yes, I would. But I'm also gonna say that in light of what we've heard on both sides, in light of trying to walk that line of separation of a state even though i'm i'm very faith-based and i i want to support that and i want to be able to do that myself I am representing 23,000 people here in the city. And I would like to suggest that we not look at invocation process that's going to take additional staff time every meeting to figure out okay who's who wants to do it this week and make sure we only have one and what do we have five requests come in um so i just think it makes it more cumbersome and that's where the the intent gets diluted i feel and i also think that in lieu of that option i would like to see us allow um you know a 30 second moment of silence we haven't really talked about that option again um obviously it should fit within the parameters of what's allowed based on MSRC and legally, but I can weigh in on that. But I feel like that's an approach that a Christian, a non-Christian, a Muslim, anyone should be able to respect and appreciate. So those are my thoughts.

Thank you, Councilmember Kuypers. I'm going to weigh in for the first round because I had my round and I know I got some other people that want to go for a second. First of all, I feel that it should be very important for every Councilmember to understand truly what the separation of church and state was meant for. And I think an invocation being open to all people of faith is inclusive, not exclusive. And so that's my opinion. Second, there's a reason our legal is over 50% of the budget right now in June. And it has nothing to do with any actions here on the council except for maybe one council member. And I'm not going to go any further into why. but it's definitely exhausted a fair amount of legal fees for something that we, as a council, had no control over. So that's a wash to me. So the fact that we're directing staff to draft something and we're asking our legal representation, who is an extension of our staff, to look it over and make sure it's a legal document that's approvable and follows within the MRSC guidelines is applicable. I don't think that's out of bounds at all, in my opinion. Councilmember McCoy, the floor is yours.

Yeah, I just wanted to quickly, Councilmember Ferrer, you mentioned just use, grab a resolution from another city, but if I recall, when you read the MRSC's opinion, it said, please have your legal look at it. um so i i think you know if you're gonna do it you should you should do it the right way and uh the second thing i just wanted uh i would we need to go back and read the legal opinion uh regarding moment of silence that's all i'll say to that yeah agreed

Mike Noce, Mgmt. Okay, any other further discussion that we want to have about this, we have a motion on the floor, we have a second to direct staff to. Mike Noce, Mgmt. Look at drafting or drafting an invocation with the assistance of our legal advisor in again in accordance with the mercy guidelines and making sure that it is. non-discriminatory. There is no advanced approval that it's inclusive and that it is in a written form and available to the public. Council member, or I'm sorry, Deputy Mayor Vail threw me off.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I would just like to say that this is from the Office of the Chaplain, United States House of Representatives, and this is the first prayer of the Continental Congress from 1774. It's available on .gov sites, but it's two paragraphs. I'd like to read it. oh lord our heavenly father high and mighty king of kings and lord of lords who doused from thy throne behold all the dwellers on earth and reign us with power supreme and uncontrolled over all the kingdoms empires and governments look down in mercy we beseech thee on these our american states who have fled to thee from the rod of the oppressor and thrown themselves on thy gracious protection desiring to be henceforth dependent only on thee to thee have they appealed for the righteousness of their cause to thee do they now look up for that countenance and support which thou alone canst give take them therefore heavenly father under thy nurturing care give them wisdom and counsel and valor in the field defeat the malicious designs of our cruel adversaries convince them of the unrighteousness of their cause And if they persist in their sanctuary purposes of own unerring justice, sounding in their hearts, constrain them to drop the weapons of war from their unnerved hands in the day of battle. Be thou present, O God of wisdom, and direct the councils of this honorable assembly enable them to settle things on the best and surest foundation, that the scene of blood may be speedily closed, that order, harmony, and peace may be effectually restored, and truth and justice, religion and piety prevail and flourish amongst the people, preserve the health of their bodies and vigor of their minds, shower down on them in the millions they here represent, such temporal blessings as thou seest expedient for them in this world and crown them with everlasting glory in the world to come all this we ask in the name and through the merits of jesus christ thy son and savior amen and that was by reverend jacob duche so i would state that if we asked our founding fathers they would agree that invocation is very appropriate uh council member bowman i see you have your hand

thank you uh i appreciate that um but the the difference is you can't ask your founding father so um i'm not going to go with that i'm going to go with this and i'll tell you my opinion on it i'm the only one on this council that spent two years two years proselyting two years on a mission i paid for no one else paid for i spent two years out walking people out christ and in a place choose okay so I can speak at this maybe a little different than you guys I don't need that for my council meetings for me outreach and stuff I don't need to sit up there and quote pictures so that people I don't need that I just thought tonight in our meeting I literally sought to ensure I was in a council meeting or I was in church. I choose to keep church in church. I choose to keep those things that are sacred to me and my relationship with my Lord and savior, my relationship with my Lord and savior. I don't need to, I don't need to get up in front of people and pray and, and push that part of it. I spent two years doing that. I spent two years talking to people about Christ. So I understand what it's like, but government shouldn't be doing that in my opinion. So if you want to have prayer, have prayer. There's many times I've sat on this council and had prayer. There's many times today I had prayer going, what the heck are we doing? And why are we doing this? And why are we so divisive in the things that we do? You know, I wrote something down. We did a proclamation today because of Antifa. Because one person, one person got up in a meeting And said a bunch of stuff that I did. I find, you know, offensive myself, but it was their right as an individual to do that. And we did a proclamation against Antifa today because of one person, there's been no other things that have happened in our city that have to do with Antifa that we have any record of. And if we do, it's never been brought to this council. So we made a proclamation shutting someone down. And in the first time in 15 years, since I've been on this council, the first time in 15 years, we've kicked someone out of a meeting. And so, you know, I look at that and I go, what are we going to do if someone comes in and says a prayer that we don't like? What are we going to do? You're going to do nothing. You're going to sit there and you're going to take it and you're going to. It's not worth the speed. We want to turn. I watched it. It's interesting to sit on this side of it and watch faces of our council members as stuff happens and look at the reactions. This is not the church. This is governing our city. Now, you can bring church into it in your own personal ways and keep it personal. But I don't need anybody to appear and pray for me because I know they are. And I've been reached out to multiple times this week by a meeting. shane when you're breaking up really really bad can you just ensure you can you hear me better now a little bit yeah but i reached out to by pastors in this community that don't multiple pastors in this community and they feel the same way prayer is good but

prayer is also personal and so i think we're stepping in something we shouldn't be stepping into and that's just my opinion thank you thank you council member bowman uh seeing no further discussion unless there is any love to hear it okay we have a motion on the floor we do have a second all those in favor aye aye all opposed All right, motion passes four to three. Okay, we're moving on to administrative reports. Staff, are there any administrative reports this evening?

We don't have any reports, and I know that we only have eight, nine minutes left, but I'm not going to let this opportunity go by without thanking the staff in this room who really helped make this meeting successful and safe. And I want to give thanks to them. They did a lot of work with logistics, technology, and not just individuals in this room. Public Works had a role in this, bringing all the chairs over. everything from lining this up and ensuring the safety of not only staff and council members but those in the audience so i am grateful to staff for really stepping up these last couple days and making sure that we were able to have a meeting that i think we probably broke a record and also facilitated downstairs with public testimony without having to burden people from walking up and down the stairs so that's all i have mayor

Thank you, Chris. I will move on to Council communications. Is there anyone that wishes to have any Council communications this evening? I'm seeing Council member Munson. You are up.

Okay, I got 2, but I see there's a queue for so I'll just do my first one. I'm going to make a motion to make a budget amendment in the amount of $50,000 for our mayor to hire an independent counsel slash investigator for review of city departments. So I'd be looking for a second.

Second.

Okay, we have a motion on the floor and a second just to clarify budget amendment $50,000 for a third party auditor for investigator independent independent.

To audit to look at the city review the city departments city internal departments.

Okay, you're my question.

uh well i was just going to open it up because sorry so you go ahead council member kuypers let's go ahead and streamline this we got seven minutes yeah um could you offer clarification on what the audit consists of what are you specifically auditing uh department budgets processes one more clarification of what you're looking for so yeah i'm looking for a review of our internal functions to find if there's any deviations that need correction

that we're not aware of.

Could you offer a little more clarity on that council member Munson?

Well, okay. So we've had some issues in the past and I need to find some answers for those issues that have resulted in legal actions against the city. So I'd like to find a little more about why we're having this problem.

OK. All right, we are still open for discussion. We have a motion on the floor and a second.

I just have a question maybe for Mr. Harper, if I could. It sounds to me like maybe it's a sensitive issue, and I just wonder if this could come under the umbrella of exec. If I'm, no.

No, not as formulated by the motion. My advice to cities is, as you may have heard me in the past, is very conservative regarding use of executive sessions. And I don't think I... So let me, because we're short on time.

Go ahead. Is there a way that the motion could be formulated to allow us to discuss it in execs?

Really, no. I mean, the gist of the motion is to make a commitment of funding regarding a proposed scope of work. That topic, first of all, asks for action, which cannot be taken in an executive session. And secondly...

Thank you.

Okay, very good.

All right, any further discussion? Roy, I'm going to strike you if you want to queue back up when it comes time to council communications, please. It's quick. I saw you chimed in. Council member Kuypers.

Thank you. I would just want to go on the record that I would not be supporting that motion, and I wanted to say why. I think that... Whatever the issue is, I would like to understand specifically more where that comes from. I think there's... some clarification that we need before i would want to put not only the money but the time in to for all the different departments and an independent investigator um to address something at this point in time i just feel like let's get a little more specific about what we're looking at i appreciate the fact that we don't want to repeat issues going forward or we want to call out things that need improvement but i'm also going to be wondering what what are the Can we be better served by how we're going about our goal setting and our expectations through strategic planning to get better reporting and have more visibility and transparency to things ahead of time? I'm not working under the assumption that something's been done wrong. um more i work under the assumption that we try to do things right in and there's always room for improvement but i'm a little concerned about putting extra money and extra time in kind of this broad format so i just need more point of order mr mayor i don't know if we need to move to ex i said the rules of the meeting for the time

I was actually going there. I just want to let everyone have their time. First, I'd like to suspend the rules to extend the adjournment of the City Council meeting beyond 1030 time period.

Second.

OK, we have a second. All those in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Hearing none, motion passes. Liz, do I need to give a time frame, or can I just suspend the rules? Okay, thank you. Yeah, okay. Well, we're open to discussion still, but we do have a motion on the floor. Anybody else want to chime in on this one?

Can I ask a question?

I suppose.

I want to make sure. So we are independently audited by the state auditors required by state law. Those are financial and accountability audits. So I want to make sure that's not what we're doing. They're not investigators. There is a difference. They will also, if you get on a list, I believe do some performance audit. So I'm not really sure exactly where we're going. They also have a special investigations unit for fraud or missing public resources. I just want to throw that out. We are in the midst of this audit as we speak. So if that's not what you were, okay.

Okay. Everyone said their piece on this. We're going to move this motion to a vote. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Mayor Mrakas, Any opposed. Mayor Mrakas, name name. Mayor Mrakas, Your name. Mayor Mrakas, yeah for you okay 42 motion passes, can I have one second I would just like to.

Mayor Mrakas, make this will follow up with a official ordinance it'll be on a budget amendment ordinance because legally, we have to put it to a public hearing, etc, so it will be forthcoming.

Thank you, ma'am. Appreciate that. We also had a couple other people queued up for council communications. If anybody wants to chime back in, I have already cleared the board. So Councilmember Muntz or I already did one.

So I do. Oh, yeah.

Sorry, Councilmember McCoy.

Yeah, I just wanted to publicly give thoughts and prayers to the people affected in Longview. I've worked at that mill. I've been in that mill. I know some of those people. And I'd like to maybe direct, maybe we could have the mayor write a letter of support, offer anything we can locally. My heart's breaking for him.

I will absolutely draft a letter of support to the Nippon Mill and the Longview residents affected. I don't know if I can offer financial assistance. We're kind of dipping into the budget already, but I think you could look at the resolution we wrote for Molly. Okay, I'll have that pulled up so I can use that. Thank you, Councilmember McCoy. And yeah, absolutely. Councilmember Kuypers.

Thank you, Councilmember McCoy, for bringing that up. That was on my list and just wanted to reiterate my appreciation also to staff and chief, the whole team. I know it's been a very stressful week, a stressful time and a lot of extra hours and it hasn't gone unnoticed, but we continue to do what we need to do. And so thank you for that.

all right um council member munson all right i just would like to um let council know that i attended the battleground police awards and wellness ceremony it was a fantastic opportunity chief thank you for that um i heard about it unfortunately from the community i didn't hear about it from staff and so i guess i'm curious as to why we were not invited that was such a phenomenal thing for us to be there to support our police department and i had a great time thank you but i'm just pretty sad that we didn't have the opportunity to have seven of us there all right um i have a couple think what

Was it in the form of a question? I thought it was a statement.

Staff, I'll let you guys take that.

I sent an email to a couple council members that asked about it. My understanding is you received that, and I would entertain, if you have questions about what was written in there, I'm happy to talk about it.

You said that you sent a couple council members an email inviting them?

um shane is one who called councilmember bowman called about it um and then i had a mayor's meeting you know where i talked about it with the mayor and passed that on to him as well i will clarify that that wasn't prior to the award ceremony that was after the award ceremony that we received the emails um but i mean i will say in there as we Chief Flynn and I were talking about it, there are bullet points where I pointed out if council members are, as a whole, invited to that, it creates a public meeting. It would have to be noticed and public would have to be able to attend.

Yep. I will point out, I will second that, though. It was an honor to be able to attend and support the police. I found out about it the day of. Unfortunately, I was only able to really attend for a few minutes because I had a previous scheduled engagement. But what a neat thing to be able to do. And I'm looking forward to seeing more of those and hopefully with a little bit more strategic planning on that. I understand that it again when we posted it becomes a public meeting. And I think we can probably navigate ways to go about facilitating that without the public necessarily being able to have the food that the officers and the families are able to have and you know. I think we can navigate and find creative ways around that to allow council to be able to celebrate that award ceremony to the same way that the mayor and a council member from Ridgefield was there, able to celebrate their officer being awarded. But nonetheless, it was a great event. It was really neat to see all the officers and their families together. And I'm also looking forward to another event coming up soon where another award ceremony will happen for the Battleground staff. And so looking forward to that. It's already, yeah, I'm sure, yes, there will have to be a, No, there will be a posted quorum for a public meeting, I'm sure, as Liz has probably already done it. If not, she knows exactly when she needs to post it, I'm sure. Okay, I wanna say some, wait, Deputy Mayor Vail, you haven't spoke yet, go ahead.

thank you mr mayor i wanted to begin my comment by thanking staff as well for your diligence and professionalism and running this meeting efficiently and protecting the safety of every single person here and all of the protesters that were outside that people that were in this building may not have known there was a large group of people that have gathered outside and so i just wanted to appreciate each and every single one of you for the diligence and professionalism um and i also want to follow up of what was pointed out here already is that uh i found out about this award ceremony honoring our police officers here in battleground after it already concluded it was actually multiple days later the event was also included in the reflector newspaper and featured even a 16-year-old that heroically tackled an intruder and pinned him, I think it was in the bathroom. And so she was honored at the award ceremony. Many of our battleground police officers were honored at this ceremony. And I feel like this is something that council absolutely should have been given notice of because I, for one, would have been the first person at the door ready to celebrate our heroes. through the city so i was extremely frustrated and i'm saying this on the record i was extremely frustrated that we were not given an opportunity to attend this this award ceremony because we were given an opportunity to attend an upcoming staff appreciation day and this city has incredible staff absolutely incredible we are so lucky to be surrounded by people that make this city move this council might look like the public face of the city but it's our staff that is diligent and working so hard behind the scenes to make everything happen. And so I am so thankful to be given an invite to that because I'm looking forward at recognizing all of their hard effort that they've put in this past year. I would have appreciated the same diligence and the same opportunity to recognize our police officers they are also extremely important and they go out and they put their lives on the line every single day to keep us safe and i know that i was a criminology major in college and i will say you can make a lot more money in a lot of other fields uh rather than working in law enforcement and so it takes dedicated personnel to keep us safe every single day and i just want to let you know chief that i am sorry for not attending this and had i been known been made known that this existed i would have been there and i'm sorry that my presence was not there and so please thank all of the officers on my behalf for their professionalism under fire and the great work that they're doing for our city thank you

Council Member Kuypers.

Thank you. I think in general, we all agree that we would have loved to have been there, would have been great. And there are other events that we would wanna be part of. I think the message is a couple of things. let's make sure that we're bringing up these things in our biweeklies so that we don't lose track of that opportunity and we have time to discuss it more than just here at this time of night. And just, I think just making the general statement that obviously we all have the heart for being part of these things. There are other opportunities of attending things that may not necessarily come through staff, but we might have awareness of. I'm thinking of, you know, uh when the council member um mayor from uh camas passed away of what six months or so ago you know if i hadn't been behind the eight ball at that time i would have gone and represented the city as someone there i think we have a lot of opportunities to do those things long view do we need to go up and show up someplace besides i appreciate the letter but do we need a face up there so just let's all kind of keep our eyes open for opportunities and reach out to each other and if it requires a quorum um you know if it takes a quorum and we have to open public meeting then so be it but let's all use our resources to reach out to each other as well

okay uh last thing and then we can wrap this bad boy up unless somebody else has anything else uh just a heads up the appropriations committee on transportation came out last week uh and uh uh our congresswoman marie glusenkamp perez's request for eaton boulevard stayed on the bill that's a million dollars for eaton uh there are quite a few more uh steps that are needed uh to see this cross the finish line um But the Senate subcommittee, full Senate, full Congress, but it nonetheless is progressing through on this bill. Final steps, if we were to see it cross the finish line, would be taking place late 26, early 27, with the funding being available by summer of 27. So that is just some really good news. And thank you again to our Congresswoman, Maria Glusenkamp-Perez, for her efforts in supporting this community and our projects for transportation love it uh with that i believe we can pretty much wrap this up um the next regular city council meeting will be held monday june 15th at 7 p.m with the study session scheduled at 6 p.m on legacy standards this meeting is adjourned