City Council - Regular Meeting

I called the Wednesday, 05/20/2026 council business meeting to order. I met with the council members at 5PM in the 6th Floor Council Conference Room for a briefing to discuss tonight's agenda. At 05:30PM, we moved here to the 1st Floor chambers to conduct the council business meeting in person. And because we encourage community involvement, we invite the public to join us in person, attend via remote option through Zoom, or view on BCAT. For those attending the council meeting tonight, the council will accept oral public comment on consent agenda items and items items listed under general business.

At the end of the meeting, we'll accept community comment. This provides an opportunity for community members to address the council on topics not included on the agenda, but still related to the work of the city council. Each speaker will have 90 during each oral comment opportunity to address the council from the podium in the meeting chambers. And as always, written comments are also welcome at any time at city.council@bremertonwa.gov or via mail to be distributed to council members in advance of the business meeting. Written comments must be received by noon on the day before the regular business meeting.

If attending the meeting in person is difficult due to disability, limited mobility, or other barriers, you may request to provide comments remotely. To arrange this accommodation, please contact the city clerk at city dot clerk at bremerton wa dot gov or call at (360) 473-5323 by 2PM the day before the regular business meeting. These guidelines are applied in a viewpoint neutral manner and are intended to ensure this part of the business meeting remains focused on city council business. We will start tonight's meeting with an information only presentation.

Alright. Good evening, council. We, we were asked to present on our customer response program, which is Bremerton one. So, of course, I had to bring Chris Smith, who is our customer responder and field safety officer, and pretty much he knows what's going on around town. Next slide, please. So this is a real short presentation. I'll start out. Chris will finish off. So we'll give you a general overview, activity types of calls, reporting responses, process, questions at the end. So next slide, please.

Now our program is through an application that was written by our own IT department, and it's readily available off of all the various stores. So the Android store, the Apple pay Apple Store. And also, I believe we have it on our website. So you don't necessarily have to go to the store to get it. And we do support Android and iPhone.

The issues that we have around town in public works, basically, you can see everything from potholes to to water issues. And we cross lines a little bit with other things such as code enforcement, so compliance and zoning. So our people bring get the phone. They get phone messages, emails, whatnot, pretty much every day. And we dispatch that through Chris or directly to the department or division that actually can help the person who is bringing up the issue.

Next slide. So every year, we get well, in 2025, we got 4,300 requests through the program. We closed out the year with 71 remaining, which, you know, happens for various reasons. Sometimes people don't close the complaint or we are not able to satisfy it. So we leave it open until we can fully complete complete the issue or fix it however it needs to be addressed.

So everything from dead animals, fire hydrants, graffiti, stuff that you would expect in a city our size, they're they're they come in constantly. Actually, we appreciate the information that we get from folks so we can get out there and fix it. Chris is right on the spot as well as our other people in public works or DCD for code enforcement or zoning issues. Any department in the city that this needs to go to, we send it. So police and fire are also informed when they need to be.

So it's effectively kind of our own little sin calm that we operate for a resolution to issues around the city. Next slide. So to do this, we have three full time staff that part of the time is working through customer response, phones, emails, addressing issues. Sometimes they they are able to fix the problem just with a simple phone call. A lot of the times, not the case.

So when that happens, we send Chris out, he goes and takes care of the issue. Or our street department does, whichever the case. Whoever it needs to go to, they get informed, and then it's addressed. We have a feedback loop so we'd know when the complaint is satisfied. So some whatever was done, our our people know it.

That way, they can record it in our database so we keep track of all the details. Not every single detail, but the details we need to track so that we know how many responses, how many complaints, and what it is ultimately that was done to satisfy the issue. Next slide. So when you get a when we get a call or an email, it comes into our customer response or office staff at Public Works on Oyster Bay. And from there, we give it to Chris or whoever needs it.

When Chris is on vacation, we know because it takes three people to take his pot. Mhmm. That's just the reality. Chris is a dynamo. He's out there on top of stuff. Even when he's not required to go out and deal with something, he's loading up shopping carts or signs or pretty much anything that he finds throughout town. He brings it back to the to the headquarters. So a true a trooper for sure. But I'll let Chris talk about the rest of this. He's essentially how to get the get your issue into the Bremerton One app or who to call.

Counsel, thanks for having me out tonight. Appreciate it. My name is Chris Smith. I work I'm the customer responder, like Tan said, save field safety officer, and I work for pretty much public works utilities. The people that I work with, great part of it.

We kind of mentioned everybody. To get the word out, we try to have Dave, can we go to the next slide too, please? So our response, could three different avenues you could respond with is online. So we have through our city web page, you go to our look up customer response and enter the information. There's pictures, the location, choose the issue, there's a drop down box that has it, give you the information, submit it, and you can give your name.

So if you want feedback from myself or our staff that enters the information into our system. And then also we have the cell phones that you can the Android, here we go here, on the app, this is the Bremerton one app and so you could if it's a Camp Mcgarbage Graffiti, then it gives you a location and you can write a description in the comments and especially if you would like feedback because if you have feedback, I will usually contact anyone with the email or a phone that is entered in there. Next. And then we also have our just our regular landline at three 06:04 seven 03:59 twenty. That is answered by Hillary, Shannon, and Kara.

And they write down the information and document it into our cartograph system where it can be tracked and sent out to me, who is pretty much the field technician when I'm here, like Chance said, most of the time. So next slide, please. Just kind of let people know. So all requests for the Birmingham Police Department go to 911. We're the non emergent side, but usually people call us if there's some type of water break, sewer issue.

I mean, anything public works utility related, contact us. We will get you in line to whoever the controlling entity is to pretty much answer your question or give you a response to where we can put track with the city. So engineering, they respond to all app you know, all the request. Sometimes they take time for their team to go through them, but we always mention give us we give you a request number. Feel free to give us a contact back callback with that reference number and we'll see if we can get you a status update on that request.

And then parking enforcement, that goes through mPark, but our cartograph system is really tracks all the information and we can send it to all the different departments with the touch of button, which is

really nice. Okay. Next slide please.

Like I said, here we go. This is the best form form of communication for us is to the landline of 47 (360) 473-5920, bermerton1@ci.bermertonmoi.us. And feel always feel free to to write your name and your contact information. That's one thing that people do not do sometimes if they want feedback. So just to let you know, give your contact information if you would like a response

back. Okay.

Homeless response reporting. This is a large one that we deal with. We respond to homeless calls, garbage encampments. Usually, have to go on-site to figure out which is you know, what issue or entity that we need to make contact. We contract with Common Street Consulting who they have feet on the ground once we have a request that is sent to their department.

They have technicians that are in the field that I work with hand to hand in regards to, hey, once that they deem that there is, let's say, some garbage in the right of way that needs or a city property that needs to be cleaned up, then I make contact with our street team or the controlling entity, like if it's facilities and their team or just depends who it is. But we have to make that decision and then get on it and take care of it immediately. So work with BPD, work with all pretty much every department in the city with this with our program. But Comms Street is one that we do contract with. They it is reported, all documented.

We take pictures and tracked. And the once the resolution is filled out, then it's tracked for data points also.

Dave? I think we have

one more. Here we go. And this is just a graph on the different sites. We work real close with Common Street and they have a monthly shareholders meeting that I attend for updates on different projects that they are working with for return visits or if it's different camps or repopulated, I guess you'd say. So they they take care of that and I'm I'm always on-site to assist from the public work side.

K. Next slide, please. And then

So part of that tracking system is is something that we have to do so we can figure out how much money we're spending, cleaning up different things. But it's also the same one used for water main breaks, sewer overflows, sewer breaks. Any kind of public works action that or incident that could occur is tracked the same way through the cartograph system, which is, I guess, called OpenGov now. And that helps us reasonably budget for these incidents when it comes to our budgeting process. So we know how much time we're gonna we need to put towards whatever issues are in that in the app and in the actual database.

We track all of our time in there as well, so for all of our projects that we do throughout town. But it's a great tool. It's not just specifically homeless or cleaning up sites. It's it's everything that we track. But this here is a new app. We should say, woo. This is something that IT just put together. It is Bremerton Social. So, it's a spin off from the Bremerton One app, and it removed the social media aspect from the Bremerton One to focus on is focused on reporting issues. The social page is just snapshot of the city's social media sites and videos from BCAT.

The content is dynamic and only comes from independent social media sites and BCATs. The web page is for those who don't want the app itself. So I think it's a good resource to have if you wanna stay in touch with what's going on around town. And it's also a free app that's available on the city's website. And with that, we'll take questions.

Alright. Questions. So this Bremerton social that you have, is that just things that we confirm? Because a lot of times on social media, though, there'll be things that are are not correct. Right? So are we monitoring that so we're only giving out valid information to people?

Dave can answer that.

Bremerton Social only pulls the social media pages that are from the city. So it's only BPD's Facebook page. It's only the mayor's Facebook page. It's only council. It's those things. It's not pulling Facebook, just generic Facebook information.

Okay. I never heard of it, so thanks.

It was created because You

don't have that.

Two things. The we didn't want to over overload the Bremerton One app, but two, the way we have to get them authorized to be put on the stores is completely different, so it was easier to split them. Yeah. So what happened last year when we had that problem with getting it online, we split it so it'd be easier to get them both online at the same time.

So are we having any there were a lot of issues with especially Android phones not being able to download. That issue is all taken care of now?

They're on the store right now. Good. As long as they have the latest updates on their phones, they should be able to download the current versions.

Okay. Thank you. Other Anna? Thanks. Gentlemen, thank you for your presentation.

Just

to make things more clear for the public, the email for Bremerton 1, you can also do bremerton1@bremertonwa.gov. Right? You don't have to

Correct.

Okay. Thank you very much, and I look forward to checking out this Bremerton social. And thank you, mister Sorenson, as well. Katie?

I was intrigued with the use of it to track resources that you're allocating to certain areas or projects. And so is that something that you anticipate being more publicly used during the budget process so that we can educate the community about how you're spending your money, you know, and get community feedback. Is that planned on being that data? Because it sounds like we're gonna have data. Is that gonna are we gonna be able to use that when making decisions?

Well, the Cartograph OpenGov system, we've been tracking for, what, three years now? We're still building out certain areas, but we will be able to pull information out of the system. And so I think we have a good solid year, maybe two, of information that can be used to help for budgeting purposes. I don't know about the sharing part yet, honestly. I don't we're just getting into budgeting season, so we're gonna we're gonna be looking at that.

I know for the managers that have to come up with their budgets for this year well, for next year and the year after, it's an invaluable tool. It really gives us a good idea of where where the time and the and the resources are being used. So it is helpful. Very helpful.

Yeah. It's a it it could be a wonderful tool for more transparency with the public. Mhmm. And so I just I encourage the powers that be to just seek out how we can use this to better inform the public of what the city is doing. But thank you. Great. It's great. Bremerton One app is super. My neighbors use it. They don't call me as much anymore.

Well, that's what it's there for. We encourage everybody to use it because it's the best way to get into the system and get stuff addressed.

Any other council members have questions? Okay. Thank you very much, and thanks for the work you do. I mean, I've seen Chris everywhere, including my street. So we appreciate your work. Thank you. Okay. Wrong page. Next, we have our consent agenda.

Thank you, council president. For approval on the consent agenda are the following items. A, claims and check register. Approval of the following checks and electronic fund transfers. One, check number is 414912 through 415066, and EFT numbers V46186 through V46276, and the grand total amount of $2,562,139.57.

Two, regular payroll for pay period ending 04/30/2026 in the amount of $1,271,344.13. Three, regular payroll for the 2024 portion of retro pay for Teamsters, police, lieutenants, and captains. This is for pay period 04/30/2026 in the amount of $107,081.77. Four, regular payroll payouts for pay period 04/30/2026 in the amount of $38,479.78. B, minutes of meeting 05/06/2026.

C, minutes of study session 05/13/2026. D, appointment of Nancy Zellers to the Bremerton Housing Authority Board of Commissioners, e, accept Washington State DOE design grant agreement, Oyster Bay Regional Treatment Facilities design, f, approve a goods and services agreement with Siemens for the purchase and installation of main service breaker at Eastside UV treatment plant. G, public works agreement withhold services, Inc. For well six r rehabilitation project, h, acceptance of FHWA grant from PSRC and approval of local agency agreement with WSDOT for the 11th Street corridor improvements project, and I, interlocal agreement with Kitsap County, K C 229 Dash 26 for reimbursable work performed and or equipment rental. This concludes the reading of the consent agenda.

Thank you. We had no request to comment remotely, but I would now like to invite any members of the public to the podium to comment on any of the items on the consent agenda. Speakers will have ninety seconds to address the council. Please remember to state your name clearly before providing your comments if you wish your name to be included in the meeting record. Are there any thank you. Go ahead, mister Camacho.

I'm Jose Camacho, friend of Smith's Cove, Rock The Block. This is regarding item four e, the stormwater project for Oyster Bay. So laudable, should be done, but I don't think that stormwater project is going to suck up benzene out of the air. There is a a streak of irrationality in Bremerton, it affects everything, including the futility of a public works project that doesn't do anything about a gas station spewing benzene over homes that's located in the state shoreline jurisdiction so it can poison the Salish Sea. It's a carcinogen.

It creates deformed babies. This is a Oyster Bay gas station, and it was approved by DCD. There were comments from the public, including a petroleum industry expert who, you know, tried to reform, and so he is now an advocate for stopping gas stations. All kinds of people commented against this gas station, including council member Mokler. We commented.

It's been a a bone of contention from me and Robin, a friend of Smith's Cove, that DCD is a bizarre agency. It doesn't care about the state law of the Shoreline Management Act, and that's why this thing was approved. No one should come near this gas station and act like it's proper. It should be barred under the Shoreline Management Act. Thank

you. Are there any other comments from the public regarding agenda items?

My name is Robin Weldon, and I just want to comment that you can find all about what's happening at Oyster Bay, above Oyster Bay. And again, I commend this update of the storm water or doing anything positive, but won't help what's happening there. And benzene kills. And it's allowed to to to to be built. That that gas station's allowed to be built, and that will go straight down the bluff into over homes and into the Salish Sea.

So you do one good thing and then the the counter to it. I I encourage people to go to Friends of Smith Cove YouTube channel to be able to find all of the details about that gas station. And please do good works that help the public like like the one you're talking about tonight and not things like that, please. Thank you.

Thank you. Are there any other members of the public who would like to comment on consent agenda items? Okay. I will go to the council for a motion. Move to approve the consent agenda as presented.

Second the motion. We

have a motion and a second. Seeing no further discussion, let's vote on the consent agenda. Council member Chamberlain?

Yes. Fry? Yes. Camerata? Yes. Goodnow?

Yes.

Mochler?

Yes.

Tift?

Yes.

Reboulowski? Yes. Motion carries unanimously. Next on the agenda is general business. General business item five a, resolution number three four one zero to authorize opportunity zone application for Census Tract 53035080300. Tonight, have DCD director, Andrea Spencer.

Good evening, president Rebelhosky and members of council. Thank you for this opportunity to be here, and we're here to talk about opportunity opportunity zone two point o and the potential to apply. And I have a PowerPoint presentation. And my clicker's not working. I may have to have oh, good.

So what exactly is an opportunity zone? It's a federal program that encourages private investment in economically distressed areas. And the program has been opened up again, much to our surprise. We thought this was a one off that happened many years ago. And the governors of each state have the opportunity to select from the pre identified opportune or the pre identified census tracks to designate them as opportunity zones.

And basically, what does this mean? The treasury has said they're gonna be available for federal tax and incentives that attract private investment to development ready communities, and it has most importantly, these are areas in deep economic need. And we had this program back in 02/2017. The city actually made an application for two different census tracts. We wanted to have Charleston designated as well as the downtown.

And at that time, the governor chose only to do one in in our city, and that was for downtown. And that program will sunset in 2028, and there's no extension available to to make that continue into the future. So the downtown designation will be ending here soon. They've created this new two point o program this year. They just launched it, and they've identified the census tracks that we can apply for.

And basically, they've established a regular ten year interval that they're gonna do this, and this investment window for this particular round will end in 2036. The benefits of having a zone designated in our community is that it would attract private investment into challenging redevelopable areas, supports job creation and business expansion, makes increased feasibility for housing projects, and it basically is long term impatient investment in the the plans that we've already established. The community goals have already been established in our comprehensive plans and our various sub area plans. Still not clicking. So what is the difference between one point o I'm gonna back up.

One point o and two point o. One point o, when we did this before, it was seen as a temporary program. They tried it out, tried to figure out what worked, and there was only no opportunity to redesignate what had been previously designated. And there was very limited reporting requirements, and this was a high criticism of this program. So what have they done for two point o?

They basically made it a permanent program. It's a permanent part of The US federal tax laws. They are federally gonna identify the census tracts that are available every sing every ten years, and the eligibility rules are much tighter now, and they're really focusing on areas that are distressed in our communities. And there's way better federal reporting requirements to help decision makers determine the success of these programs. And here's the six.

There was only six for the city of Bremerton that we are even eligible to put forward to the governor for their consideration. And basically, it's Jackson Park, we've got Bay Vista down into Navy Yard City, and good portions of East Bremerton. And those are the only six that we can actually apply for in this program. And of these, we we can apply for a per for the designation, but we have to meet the criteria that's been established by the Washington State Department of Commerce. Commerce is vetting all these applications, and they'll make a recommendation to the governor for his choice for the federal designation.

And of those criteria, I'll I'll just identify the one that we picked, and the one that's most logical and meets the state requirements is the area around the Harrison Heights. And it's basically can be described as Warren Avenue on the West side, Perry Avenue on the East side, bounded by Sheridan at the North, and East 16th at the South. And census tracts have a very long number, but you can generally refer to this as as Census Tract 803. It's a lot easier than reciting the entire name. And the diagram and and the aerial imagery is in your resolution as exhibit a, if you wanna take a closer look.

And as I said, the Washington state process requires that we do local government support, so that's why we're here tonight to determine if the council wants to move forward to make an application, and the application process has to demonstrate conformance with all the criteria established by Washington State Department of Commerce. And before you pass that resolution, staff is recommending that you take public comment on this proposal. So the three criteria that have been established by Washington State Department of Commerce is is there community need, is the investment in the market ready, and is there alignments in city policy? Well, there, we've done the research, and there is a lot of vacant and redevelopable opportunities within this census tract, including the seven and a half acre former hospital site that has been demolished. Is market readiness in the area.

We there's been a lot of public investments just within the ten minute walk shed of the Harrison Heights, so there's a lot of good resources that range from schools to boys and girls clubs to parks and the Bridge to Bridge Trail. There's a lot of community assets that make this an attractive place for development. And the policies have been aligned. You have adopted the comprehensive plan as well as sub area plan for Harrison Heights that has a market study and a planned action EIS that makes permit streamlining a whole lot easier and makes it so we're ready for this economic growth. And but despite the strong potential, when you look at the statistics of the data in the census tract, why this was selected is because the median income is low, the poverty rates are high, and that's why it qualifies for this program.

And there's often criticism of these kinds of programs that it only benefits wealthy investors. And really, what I'd like to point out is that it's a tool to get private investment that's necessary to carry out all the vision in your comprehensive plan and your sub area plans. This is a high economic need area, and this is a tool that can be utilized to make that vision actually a reality. And then further, opportunity zones aren't limited to wealthy investors. There is opportunity for anybody in the community to make investments in these kinds investment opportunities.

So it isn't just limited to the big investor. If you wanna buy money markets or some folks invest in Bitcoin, this is another opportunity that people local can invest in the growth of their community and the businesses within it. And again, I'll emphasize the vision that we've established. This helps implement the vision that we've already passed and identified, and that vision was identified and created through a community process. There's a pretty tight timeline for this application process.

The treasury just identified the census tracts in the very first part of April, and Department of Commerce just opened up the application window on April 28, and it closes on May 28. So if we're gonna make an application, we have to do so before the end of the month. The governor will be considering each of the requests that come in, and now he'll be doing that between July 1 and September 28. And then he'll put his final selections up to the feds, who will then implement the program on January 1. And I should note here that of all the census tracts that have been identified as these are potential, only only 25% of those census tracts can actually be selected to be implemented at the federal level.

I

keep clicking twice. There's basically no financial impact to the city. This costs us nothing. There's no local funding. It's just the staff time it's gonna take to submit the application to the governor's office.

The significant upright upside of all of this is that we could leverage private investment to make the visions in our plans a reality. We do have currently in hand, and it's in the council packet, three support letters, one from the Kitsap County Board of Commissioners and one from KITA, as well as from Virginia Mason, Franciscan Health, where they indicate their intention to sell the property and with the intention for it to meet the standards established in the sub area plan. And I heard this week that Puget Sound Regional Council will likely be getting us a letter by the end of the week. And just to sum up is the opportunity zone designation. It's not a guarantee of investment, but it's an important economic development tool that we can use to track potential investment.

This application aligns with all the plans that have been adopted by the city council, and it's just an opportunity to attract capital. We don't know if it will actually happen, and we request your authority to be able to move forward with an application next week. And the recommended motion that's on the screen is the same one that's in your packet. Thank you.

Thank you. With no request to comment remotely, I would like to invite any members of the public to the podium to comment on item five a. Speakers will have ninety seconds to address address the council. Please remember to state your name clearly before providing your comments if you wish your name to be included in the meeting. Item

I hope you don't include my time that took me to get up here.

No. The clock just

I'm Jim Klein, president of the Charleston Business Association, and I certainly know that Andrea and her team have worked very hard at this designation. I'm not critical of that at all, but I would ask that since the hospital was built in about 1997 or excuse me 1967. That since that time, Charleston has had redevelopment plans developed by the city and starting in 1997. Here it is in a couple years ago where a redevelopment plan was conducted, and what we need in the Charleston Business District is the same type of intensity to have the Harrison District revitalized and use the tools of seeking out grants. We really need to see that in the Charleston Business District.

We've taken huge steps in the revitalization, but now as as this the mayor has said, it's time every time the city invest in infrastructure, then developers will come in and we need that. We've submitted a list of projects, and to wrap it up, we love the city and look forward to even strengthening our relationship with not just the council, but also the great team that does all the work in this city. Time's up. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Are there other members of the public who would like to comment?

I'm Jose Camacho from Friends of Smith Cove and Rock the Block. At ninety seconds, I'm going to resort to this sign so that someone can anyone can look for themselves. The problem with the presentation for the opportunity zone is that there's a big gaping mystery. The opportunity zone was tried already. And the expert for that opportunity zone project for Sound West Group, hired by Wesley Larson, specifically because he's an expert, eventually, he cried fraud, and he sued Wesley Larson because the opportunity zone plan, which encompass Marina Square, Spyglass, Quincy Square, Evergreen Point, probably the Port Orchard projects, there was a lot of fishy business.

If you want to read the allegations from Gregory Genovese, hired by Wesley Larson, check out the Bitly link. There are pleadings there. They are quite specific. Some of them are quite damning. This has been a big question mark. So for anyone to come here and say, let's do it again with this mystery, that's appalling. General VC promised the public that there would be a cash stream from Arena Square to the homeless community. It's actually there. He said it. He cited to the CEO, Wesley Larson. So they promised the low income, and then they shaft them. And this is one of them.

Thank you for your comments. Is there somebody else who would like to speak?

My name is Robin Weldon. I would like to adopt Jose Camacho's comments as my own. I'm also friends of Smith Cove. And we started coming to the council back in 2023, I believe, after after an opportunity zone in front of us. We we found it found the permit on the ground.

And we started checking into it. Why aren't they using the Shoreline Management Act permit? Why why are why are they building a six foot 600 foot six foot sorry, six story building in front of this historical neighborhood that slopes down to Smith Cove. And so we've been asking those questions, and we've been gathering and compiling information. So if anybody wants to see all of that, the rig of the 2021 SMP, the Bremerton SMP that took them two years under the direction of Andrea Spencer, who is not staff, by the way.

And anyway, that's that's there. And people it's an opportunity zone. So people can invest into it, and they don't lose any money. There it's a dark money tax shelter. So they actually make money if they don't even build. And what's also interesting is that the Harrison Heights location

I'm sorry. Are there other members of the public who would like to speak on this issue? Okay. It doesn't appear anybody else in the public attending. Pardon?

One more.

Oh, I'm sorry.

No. That's okay. Hi, council. My name is Rema Schulte. I'm a homeowner and a business owner in Bremerton. My business is located in Charleston District represented by council member Goodnow.

I sent this by email, but

I also wanna say it in person. Charleston is begging for the kind of attention from developers that an opportunity zone would bring to the area. We have a community thriving on a limited budget, and we would benefit from the area becoming an opportunity zone. Making Harrison Heights an opportunity that's the topic right now. Right? I just walked in. Okay. Thank you. Making Harrison Heights an opportunity zone while in the middle of intense conversations about a shelter coming to the area seems like interesting timing. Have you talked with the housing conglomerate about this change?

What are their thoughts on their property being included in an opportunity zone? What are the anticipated effects on a hybrid low barrier shelter if you designate this area as an opportunity zone? I hope you'll take this time in the meeting to outline how this would impact our much needed our much needed shelter. As you know, we have six more months before the city would lose $1,000,000 in national funding, and we desperately need a shelter in Bremerton right now. Thank you.

Thank you. K. Oh, I'm sorry.

I'm sorry. My name is Tana Armintstad. I moved to this area recently, and I am just finding out about all these wonderful topics going on in our town.

Can have

a little bit closer to the microphone, please? Thank you.

We have the community leaders of Charleston begging you to stand up for them. They are doing incredible work down there. And at the same time, we're trying to short our most marginal people in Harrison Heights who we desperately need this shelter. It's an investment in our community. It's an investment in our people.

I mean, the studies go on and on showing where if you provide people with housing and support, they will thrive. And all this money that we're spending cleaning up homeless encampments can instead go to stopping the problem before it even starts. So please invest in our opportunity of Charleston and invest in the shelter that we so desperately need. Thank you.

Thank you. Are there any other members of the public who would like to speak on this issue? Okay. I'd like to go to the council for a motion. No. First we do the motion, then we chat. Somebody's gotta do it. So you make a motion, and then we're gonna Would

you please put the slide back up with director Spencer's suggested motion? Would you like me to read

it into the record for you?

Yes. That'd be great. Thank you.

The recommended motion is move to adopt resolution number three four one zero approving the submission of an application to designate Census Tract 53035080300 as an opportunity zone two Point o area and authorize the mayor or their designee to prepare, execute, and submit all necessary documents and materials required to complete and submit the application. So moved. Second.

Thank you. We have a motion and a second. Director Spencer, can you come up? And I've got a couple questions, and I'm sure some council members

Point of order. The person who made

the motion gets the first crack at it. Right? Right. But I would like her to come up so that we can ask questions.

Thank you for that clarification. Director

Spencer, would appreciate you reiterating the selection process and the fact that while chair Charleston may have been eligible in the previous go round, it is not eligible this Yeah.

So we applied in 2017 when we did this, and the feds did not have this program where they pre identified census tracts. So we pushed hard for downtown in Charleston and weren't successful with Charleston. And you can see here in this diagram, Charleston census tract does not qualify for the Opportunity Zone. Otherwise, it definitely would have been one of the ones we applied for. But because these were we only had these six to choose from, and of these six, only one meets all the state criteria for consideration by the governor, and that's the Harrison Heights one. And so that's what this map shows.

I'd also like you to clarify, are there are there any aspects of opportunity zone designation that would negatively impact the the well, we don't really have a a possible proposal for a a a homeless facility within that opportunity zone. Are there anything that would negatively impact the development of that kind

of To my knowledge, there's no detriment to a proposed and low barrier shelter in this area to having an opportunity zone designation. The two are not one doesn't it's they're not mutually exclusive.

We haven't received any

We have not received any proposals.

Yeah. Yeah. And I think if you didn't notice before, director Stanton was actually in the room earlier, knew that this was on the agenda. And I'm sure we might have heard from her if there were were challenges that she saw. So I I I feel it's important to reassure the community.

Charleston is very important to the city of Bremerton. I can remember a few years ago telling Jim Klein, this is the next, you know, big deal, you know. It it has so much potential. We're all just waiting for that right opportunity to apply for funding to to, you know, get some investment in that area because it's sorely needed. There's definitely the community support for it and engagement with volunteers and so forth.

So I I just want I wanna reassure the community. Also, one of the first questions that council asked was, will this negatively impact any plans or proposal for a shelter? That was one of the first questions we asked, and we were assured that has no negative impact to that. In fact, I I don't know. It might even qualify for funding at some point through Opportunity Zone.

I, you know, I don't know. But certainly, there's no brick wall that this or stop sign or even speed bump that this puts in any plans to suspect that the timing of this is somehow disingenuous. I'm sorry that that's the perception out there. This this opportunity came up, as director Spencer said, last month, and the the turnaround is very quick. I happen to represent Harrison Heights, and one of the reasons that I ran for office and was elected is because we have a huge crater and a loss of thousands of jobs in my district.

People don't go to my district to hang out and have a good time on Friday nights, so people don't recognize it. But it's a district full of poverty and full of potential. There's a crater. If you haven't been by, please look at it. It used to be covered with plastic, but the plastic started coming in seven acres covered in plastic, and the plastic was breaking down and going into our storm drains.

I'm very pleased that Virginia Mason or Virginia whatever they're called now, common spirit, was very quick to call out their contractor and that was cleaned up. We now have geese and eagles on that property. I'd love to see housing on that property. I'd love to see our district be reinvigorated with with housing and residents who can live and work there and work in Bremerton. So as as as much as there might be a coincidence in timing, you know, the Sheridan site has been talked about now for, I think, over a year.

Certainly, we've been talking about the need for a shelter for two, three years. The ball's been in the court of our partners now for two or three years. And so I'm in Char I I I need to advocate for my district. I love Charleston. Mister Flemester, I see you here.

And Jim Klein and I have known each other for years. I'd love to get money into that district. Let's work together to make a good Bremerton. And then the the resentment that sometimes is felt with people over, oh, it's only for big developers. I'm not a big developer, but I do invest in my community.

And some of the projects I invest in are development projects, you know? I don't know whether I'm gonna see a return on that, but I'm really proud that I do that. This gives people like me and others an opportunity to invest where we live. It really does. And for those who resent the tax benefit of this kind of an investment, If you own a home, you already get a benefit from the federal government.

These this housing is for renters, people like me who cannot afford to buy a home. So when we start talking about priorities, let's let's make sure that we recognize the needs of all of our districts. Thank you. And thank you, Director Spencer. Thank you, Garrett Jackson, for your work on this.

Jennifer?

Director Spencer, thank you for the presentation. It's lovely to have you back.

Thank you.

I appreciate all the work that you do for the city, and I also appreciate how knowledgeable you always are on the topics and the good advice that you give to us. So thank you for that. My understanding is that and one thing that I like about this opportunity zone is that it's not, and I think, and I don't wanna speak for you, president Reblovsky, but it's not a tax break that we have to shoulder. It's a federal tax break. And director Spencer, one thing that was interesting for me to learn was that we really have no way to track who actually takes advantage of this because and can you explain that for me?

Yeah. The one point o program had no tracking mechanism. So there's only kind of this big date, like broad across the entire country data about projects that are developed, and we have no specific information that I can obtain for just the city's program. And so now with the reporting requirements, and I'm assuming this is federal reporting requirements, that we'll be able to tap into that to see how the program is working.

So there's supposed to be reporting mechanisms and and do most well, hopefully, that they will be in effect. Hopefully, they will work, and there will be reporting. Because I'm always you know, we always love to to know the data from that. Do people who purchase these properties but don't develop receive a tax break still from the federal government. I

will lead with I am not a federal I'm not a tax adviser. I'm assuming that the project has to move forward to have actually capital gains because that's what the program is

Okay.

Is that you don't pay federal taxes on your capital gains. So if you're not improving the project, there's no gain, so you're not actually seeing any benefit.

So there has to be some quarter some sort of capital gains on this particular developed plot of land in order for the tax benefit to be of use to the person who is applying for it.

Yeah.

I you know, and I'm not a real estate professional, but my guess, would be that the reason that our, housing folks got a good deal on the property is the same reason why we qualify for this opportunity zone because this is a blighted area. This is an underdeveloped area that has been abandoned. There's several abandoned properties. And and and I am going on record once again to say I have absolutely no issue with any kind of shelter being put near there. I don't think that putting additional housing up would be a hindrance at all to a shelter.

In fact, that's a wonderful model to have more housing surrounding a shelter to make it more congruent to the community, To have just a hybrid shelter standing alone without additional houses developed around it, would make it stick out a little more like a sore thumb, which we don't want that for our for our vulnerable folks. Right? I appreciate the work that you guys have done, and I look forward to the coming years. And hopefully, Harrison Heights will get some attention. Who knows?

I'm a business owner now. I won't be one day. You know? I'm not gonna be there forever. I hope that I can leave the community a little bit better and that the next person that comes along behind me will be able to continue to support the community, and to see it rise up like it deserves. Alright. Thank you. That's all.

Alright. Thanks.

Good evening, director Spencer. So let me see if I have all this right. Okay? So earlier this year, the feds created this program. Yeah?

Yes.

And then the governor designated census tracts with low median family income and a high poverty rate.

The federal government identified the census tracts.

But the governor designated them?

The governor is taking applications for his consideration, and so that's what this application window he'll be selecting from all the submittals between July and September.

Okay. So the feds picked the census tracts, the governor will select from among the applicants.

Correct.

Okay. You got the Department of Community Development is proposing one tract that is a, completely within city limits, because several of them are half and half. Second, it satisfies both the fed the federal criteria and, we hope, the state criteria as well. And last, it has clear concurrency with our newly adapted comprehensive plan. That's all correct?

That's correct. In addition to our adopted sub area plan for Henderson And we have a one

in four shot at being selected. Correct. Okay. So I have two questions. So there's gonna be increased reporting. Who's gonna be doing that increased reporting?

I'm assuming the federal government because it's a federal program

because

it's it's all through the US Department of Treasury. So I'm assuming the Treasury has to collect data from each of the financial folks that create these opportunity zone funds.

Excellent. And my second and last question is, will environment regulation environmental regulations now governing a couple of areas within this census tract be relaxed in any way to accommodate the opportunity zone?

No. They we have adopted regulations and the planned action EIS for the Harrison Heights. So everything has to conform to those.

Okay. Thank you for your answers. Thank you for your presentation.

Do you have other questions? No? Michael, do you have any comments, questions?

I'll reserve for maybe a second.

Oh, you wanna hear what everybody says and then

you hear what you say.

Oh, you wanna hear what I say? Okay. Missy, do you have comments you'd like to make? Sure.

So this entire thing has been a little bit of a journey for me because, obviously, I'm new on council, and some of this information or some of these things have been things that other council members have experienced over a long period of time. So this probably the last ten days or so, right before we got the study session packet to phone calls I was making early this morning, was trying to figure out what I should say today kind of thing because I have my own personal feelings, but I also represent District 3 in all of this. And, you know, we talk about tools in the toolbox all the time. My tools are limited. I just don't have as many people to reach out to and things.

So I spent a lot of time trying to wrap my hands around something that I didn't quite understand, come understand my own biases in this that I was seeing, and then try to challenge those, which was challenging this week. And I I thank you, director Spencer, because I had many emails that went to you, some of which started out nice and light and fluffy. And then as time was going on and I was not understanding things, they got a little bit more like, what is this? So I thank you for that. And I even to the point before study session, I brought this up last week, but I sent just a slew of questions over, and you redid your presentation so that they would be in the PowerPoint so that we could all experience those because they were pretty high level questions.

And a lot of it was, where do I find this information? So between last week and this week, it was, okay. You've given me this information. What do I do with it? So I will be very, very honest. This made me incredibly nervous. The first thing that made me nervous was the fact that it came from HR one, which is also known as the big beautiful bill. For me, that big beautiful bill, how it's impacted my own personal life was something that it had large sweeping changes with very little guidance. And so when we were looking at the time frame that we are here that felt very okay. You need to make a decision, and you have ten days. Go. And I'm like, okay. Well, then give me all the data. We find out that the data from the first census track, what is it? Opportunity zone one point o, there is no data.

And then I immediately put the brakes on and felt that this was not something I could get behind because if I don't have data, I can't make a decision. And then had to, again, look at my own bias with that of why. Why am I deciding that this is a no go? I also had a huge problem with the census track and the borders in it. I feel like we were targeting one single area, but in having to choose a census track, it was almost like you wanna shoot a target, but we're doing it with birdshot, which if anybody knows, that is messy.

And so that instantly was something that I'm like, well, this isn't even targeting what we're all talking about. This is targeting a very large group of lands. So, again, in my head, I was like, no. And then I had and you helped me immensely with this, language with the resolution stating that city council finds there's multiple paragraphs you'll see in that, resolution that says city council finds this because of this. And I'm like, what are you talking about?

And so for me, you know, at first, it was like, well, I didn't find that, so I can't you know, I look at the resolution almost like an attestation. I'm saying when city council is finding that one seventh of this, you know, collection of folks here that I'm saying, yes. I do find that if I'm agreeing to it. And so that kind of started my journey. But I will say after going through, honestly, the Harrison Heights sub plan and understanding that a lot more, which is available on the website. So all of these things, my journey, I don't want you to have to take. It was thirty some hours that I've spent in the last like, so don't take that journey. Take, like, take the notes. So on on the website, it's fantastic. Harrison Heights sub area has a lot of this information.

They also have, the SEPA checklist and mitigation measures document, which kind of hit some of those check boxes for me of what are we doing. Like, yes, we have a plan. Are we being detrimental to the environment, ourselves, and our area? And a lot of my questions were answered through that. So I highly recommend you actually go to the Bremerton website to look at that. And then I started in on the opportunity zone, funds. And because this was something that I found out too, that this opportunity zone is not for developers. So it's not the folks that are putting things on. It's a financial mechanism. So it's the investors, giving them a tool.

I instantly started to put the brakes on again because I'm thinking of the big 1% people, and I'm like, you get enough tax breaks. Shame on you. Mhmm. So I actually started calling different opportunity zone fund firms, and I started nationwide. And so I started calling them, and they were actually so much more helpful and nicer than what I thought.

I was calling ones in New York City, picturing, like, these really big skyscrapers and, like, business suits and then being like, no. And I called, and I just asked, you know, can you give me some information? And I found an amazing one that answered all of my questions, made me feel a lot more comfortable with this because my understanding that this is for the big fish, if you will, was not correct. It is a mechanism that a lot of little fish here in Bremerton can get together and actually invest in our own businesses that we have. And when they were explaining that to me, that changed my mindset because we have my fear is that we have the Harrison Heights sub plan.

We have these things. And if we get investors that may not live here, they may be international investors. I don't know. We're very fancy people. If we get that, you know, do we lose control of what we want as residents of Bremerton, our city to look like? And finding out that these opportunity zoned funds can actually just be a collection of people. So it could be me, my mom, my dad Mhmm. My coworkers. We can all get together and find a business that is also in this area invest in it. So that was actually kind of that felt really good about how do we shape Bremerton the way that we want it to be.

I also just started walking around and randomly asking people how they feel about opportunity zones because I don't know a lot of people. So I called everybody in my phone that I picked up anywhere along the way and was leaving messages with them of, hi. It's Christie, city council. Can you call me if you know anything about opportunity zones? And if you don't, can I educate educate you?

You? And people actually, some people called me back, but I also figured out how to airdrop information on my phone and started going around the city asking people in my district how they felt about it because they might feel differently than me. So in all of this, I did find that this is very different than what I thought it was, and that it does have a lot of opportunity that's there for us, the little fish in Bremerton, to get together collectively and shape the city the way that we've said we wanted to through these documents that we have. I will say, for finding out more information, the Washington State Department of Commerce has an excellent page. Just go to their FAQ.

It's a PDF file, lots of pages, answers a lot of questions. The other thing that I called, you're gonna wanna talk to a qualified tax adviser. That's what I have found. You can actually call them just ask these questions of, like, can we set this up? Is this thing there's a lot of people that are willing to talk about this.

So those were kind of the biggest things. And the other thing that I found out that I absolutely love is if you if we do get the designation for an opportunity zone, those businesses that want to open and do that are called opportunity opportunity zone entrepreneurs, and that is just like the cutest little title, and I love it. And there is an amazing amount of online information and more opportunities that are available to you as a small business owner in these opportunity zones. For that, I recommend going to the US Department of Housing and Urban Development. They have so many things, loans.

There's there's other things that are available to you as a business in these opportunity zones. So I went from no, no way, never to, this might be one of the tools that all of us can have in our toolbox, not just those really big fancy toolboxes. So that was that was my journey. Thanks for taking it with me again. I appreciate it.

Anybody else wanna do Michael, do you want a first round or Rick? Okay. Well, then it's my turn. So I have been aware of opportunity zones for quite a while. I subscribed to a newsletter from Jimmy of OZ, and it's it was sold to the country as a way to invest in not only housing, but businesses and of the money that was invested because there are people who are keeping records.

I think a lot of the opportunity zone people aren't keeping the same kind of records that others are keeping. But 75% of all the equity funding went into real estate market rate luxury apartments. Less than 3% were affordable housing. It's opaque, and it's a regressive policy. And I understand, you know, you're working to to try to to get more people to invest.

But frankly, I mean, I've lived here for thirty years. I keep my money at Kitsap Credit Union to hopefully help our community, but I certainly are not gonna be able to throw $10.20, $3,050,000 at an opportunity zone fund. The businesses that have been created under the opportunity zone, over 90% were self storage units. That does not create jobs. All it does is create jobs for the construction workers that are building it, and then it becomes an investment.

And if anybody has a storage unit, you know it's a pretty good investment for people. And it prioritizes investor returns over actual community development. Our we already have rules in place for what we wanna see. So by us saying we'll have more control over what gets built because now we have an opportunity zone, I I disagree with that. Because we already have the rules that supposedly any developer has to follow.

Right? So the tens of billions of lost tax incentives is the reason why community block grant money is drying up. Money for section eight housing is drying up. And we may think that, oh, well, it's a federal tax. It's not a local tax.

But federal taxes are what keeps us running. I mean, look at the shipyard over there. That's all federal tax. So if they're getting less money to to invest in their people and in their facilities, that affects us. So just because it's federal tax relief only, it's federal taxes affect us strongly at a local level.

And in order to help all the residents and people that, including possible investors in Bremerton, I would like to see us instead invest in tools that speed up permitting, including deferred submittals. And if we need more staff to get that going faster, I think that's gonna bring in development and investors a lot more than a couple bigwigs being able to not have to pay federal taxes. And taxes are the price we all pay to live in a good society. So I don't really wanna just say that, well, this is an opportunity for some because I'm only aware that of a few people that took an opportunity in our current opportunity zone that's about to expire. So I would like to prioritize our investment in actual community development and not in investors.

So round two. Denise?

There is no community development without investors. Mic drop. No money, no mission. Same thing with nonprofits. To say market rate luxury housing, a three story market rate apartment building with parking, you know, spread out and which is not what I consider luxury.

No elevators. You know, finishes that certainly are not luxury. It's called workforce housing. Bremerton doesn't have luxury apartments. I'm sorry.

We don't. I've lived in places that do, but Bremerton doesn't have them. There are there's a large apartment complex called Blue Ridge in my district right up at the border of Riddell. That is market rate. Shipyard workers, blue collar workers pay market rate rent.

Do I think it's too much? Of course. Of course. But but it's it's a standard of of of living. When you can when you can rent a one bedroom apartment for 16 or $1,700, that is not a luxury apartment. Okay? That's workforce housing. They're small. They're they're they're meant for shipyard workers and for others who cannot, like myself, afford to buy a home. So and and the federal write offs I wanna remind everybody in this room, if you own a home, you already get a tax benefit through the federal government.

So to find fault with a program that's meant to inspire people to invest in their community, to build housing, because it's gonna have a federal tax benefit on capital gains. And for capital gains, you have to make a gain on your investment, and that's what you pay on. So it isn't gonna remain vacant land. I really encourage all of you to to drive up Cherry Avenue and see what we're dealing with here. Those aren't gonna be if we do get a developer in there, which I hope we do, those are not gonna be luxury apartments.

They're gonna be the three, probably the three story, you know, apartment buildings that we can afford here in Bremerton. So I I the this this sense of it's gotta be affordable housing. What you're talking about is not affordable housing, it's subsidized housing. And there are other programs for subsidized housing. We have MFTEs.

We have a HUD. We have and we have a lot of it. We're going to be coming to the public soon with some data on how much of this Bremerton does, especially compared to the other districts in this county. So to deny this city and my district an opportunity to bring in much needed development, I think that's unethical. And so let's let's try to put our biases aside, you know.

It it it's thinking haves and have nots. We could be doing that all day just with the people in this room. What's best for Bremerton? Okay? And I think that this is a wonderful opportunity. I didn't want to leave the discussion on a negative note about the incredible work that you've done and the great opportunity that this is. Thank you.

Anybody else like to make any comments? Yeah. Jennifer?

So council president, I would love, I mean, I would love if you could send us your data. So send us Here.

I'll send you I'll send the website. Cited.

I cite yeah. And I'm sure she will. She's not gonna just drop random data.

That And if if I could add just a moment. In one of the slides, there's a link to an economic development overview of the program. And within there, they have diagrams that talk about nationwide how this program has resulted in more housing. They're not speaking to affordable housing, but they talk about how Oz program has led to the creation of more housing, and it has a graphic in there. So I'd be curious to see the data that only led to storage units because the data that they're showing

That was the businesses, not the residential.

Okay. Because it was It's like two different things.

Okay.

Just a general search says, twenty seventeen eighteen, I believe, was a $1,600,000,000 tax savings for the opportunity zone, all altogether. I don't know what the annual budget is for the community development block grant or for section eight, but I think that it's I understand council president's point. However, I think it's a wide reach to find that correlation without, like, showing data. So to to prove because correlation doesn't equal causation. That's a basis.

That's a basic fact of data analysis. I would like to know how much staff time will be used for this application.

Well, in the last couple weeks, it's a significant amount of my time that I've spent about, you know, attending the seminars that Commerce has put on, identifying what kind of materials we need to put together. I've had Garrett make some maps and do some analytics and pull some of our permit data. And so we've kind of I prepared the council packet, made the presentation, and we're holding pat because we don't know what the vote is gonna be here tonight, and then it's due by next Thursday. So most of my time between now and next Thursday will be spent doing this.

Do you have an analysis of how much time it would take you to do to revamp your entire permitting process to create expedited permitting?

I I I can't even speak to that right at this moment.

Okay. I I just find that not to be even germane because they're two completely separate topics. I don't think that anybody disagrees that expedited permitting would help them.

And and really, the expedited permitting is about staffing, and you know the financial condition that the city's in, and adding staff to community development is not realistic.

And and I and I'm not the expert on how to revamp a permitting process. I definitely think that, you know, there's lots of different ways to do it. I'm not the expert. So that I don't even wanna speak to that. I just think that it just didn't have a place in this conversation, and it was it was I felt like it was a disingenuous moment.

Like, I just didn't feel like those two things went together. And then, I just, again, I I would like to see the data. I mean, I could be swayed if I had had the data ahead of time, but I believe this is coming up for a vote tonight. And without sources cited and surprise information, that's just that's not that's not fair to us to pull. And I I I just would hope that in the future, if you have good information for counselors, that it could be provided ahead of time for us to review. Thank you.

Well, like other people on council, I did my my research. You saw the research Christie did. I've been doing research on opportunity zones for quite a while. And this the facts that I was stating about housing, I wasn't trying to say that an opportunity zone only gets luxury and market rate housing. I'm saying that is what the opportunity zone one point o got.

It only got 75% went to luxury and high end market rate housing. So that is the point that I was making that you were disputing. So, I mean, it's it's pretty clear to me. And then the expedite what we're talking about here is an additional tool, right, in the developer toolbox. So when I said, I think a better tool that would help the entire community, anybody trying to get any permit, is to look instead of just helping investors and look at helping

I don't think this is point of order. I don't think that the conversation around, expediting permitting is germane to this.

I'm responding to councilor Chamberlain's comments, which I am allowed to do. So she didn't think it was Germaine. I was telling her what I my response. So

Counsel president, would you entertain a fifteen minute recess so I could review the data that you proposed to us here on the dais?

No. It's pretty obvious to me where

It's it's obvious to you.

Send you websites, but it's not gonna be I think it's gonna take you more than fifteen minutes to go through the websites. So are there any other comments? Michael?

First of I just wanna say that the word luxury is a marketing term. If I build some market rate housing and I want to charge what they charge around here, I'm going to call it luxury. You know, I I I don't love the opportunity zone. I don't love how restrictive it is, them sort of dictating what maybe communities feel is most important. I didn't love it the first time around, but it it is what the current administration it's the only bone they're throwing us, to attract development.

I don't know if it was successful. One of the things I think about is there's probably people who invested in a business and an opportunity zone that didn't even know that maybe their capital gain realized was, you know, able to for some relief. The big thing is somebody has to spend the money. It has to realize the project. It has to generate sufficient gain for the investor that they can even get a percentage of that, you know, geez, I'm drawing a blank.

I wanna call it a win. But the profit the thank you. Thank you. I I need a profit. And, anyways, you know, even if one project happens, even if one luxury building goes in over there, we've got construction jobs.

We've got folks that are gonna take care of that building, and we have housing. And we do have to realize that we have to build housing at all different levels. And there's reason why rent is as high as it is is because there's folks who can pay it, and a lot of that's our our our navy and our federal workforce because they look at what the market rate is, and then they adjust their allowances, and it's kind of a a crazy thing. But going back to the time we had where no housing was being built in Bremerton for years, no new construction was really happening, hardly any buildings were being built, and that's kind of what got to this. So we we need to to build at at we need all levels.

We need subsidized. We need affordable. We need workforce, and we need shelters. We we need everything. And, you know, we are at the mercy at developers and investors to develop and invest what they that works for them.

Just like I have a job and I do what works for the organization that I work for. And so but again, it's a tool in the toolbox, and it may not get used at all. Somebody else down the road may have just a little bit better of an opportunity zone as far as what the outcome would be, and we may have no interest. And so I just I I and and you president Przybylowski sort of alluded to, we have all the rules in place, so we're not gonna get the Harrison Heights self storage, emporium. We're not gonna you know, we're we're gonna get things that are zoned for that area, and we did very thoughtful planning around the sub area plan with which I think actually is attractive to the investment because we're talking about mixed use.

We're talking about creating this whole walkable kind of basically, creating a whole new community overlaying in the area that's there. So I I think that's the main points that I was gonna make. I mentioned oh, you know, and then, you know, in during construction and after, you know, we're gonna have stuff that's gonna create sales tax and things like that and and property tax because we're not doing NFTE.

We are. Are.

Well, we could. We could.

We're not doing as

many as we could. So alright. I'll I'll leave it there. Thank you.

Rick?

Just a brief comment. I believe that the sub area plan for Harrison Heights did envision housing. And as council member Goodnow mentioned, new housing in Bremerton is desperately needed and it's at all levels. Neighborhood retail was another aspect of that. Anyone in audience may have grown up here may recall Sheridan Village, which was a very vibrant retail, it was a grocery store, a clothing store, a music store, there was a lot of that was secondary to essentially downtown Sheridan Village was your if you were an East sider, which is what I was, we went to Sheridan Village.

So I think the bones are there for both vibrant community as well as retail and it's on the Bridge To Bridge Loop, which is develop developing quite nicely actually in that area. So opportunity zone is maybe another tool in the toolbox as council member Goodnow mentioned, but, you know, who someone may use it and someone may not. The the property itself is, fabulous views. It's really an extraordinary. The Harrison property is an extraordinary piece of property that could really be developed into something quite nice for the city.

So that's my comment. Thank you.

Thank you. Any other? Just one last.

One last.

So in all of this research, I do have to say I did see a lot of the items that you were bringing up today, some of those in all of the research I was doing. What I had to do more for myself in in seeing those same things and seeing this hard. Because this is a nationwide program, so you can take any one of these census tracts or, you know, another state that has different priorities or different areas, and, you know, there are those those horror stories that you were bringing up, and also the percentages, you know, of the multifamily housing was about the same ballpark that I was seeing that there was a significant amount of multifamily housing that was done all market rate. So I was seeing exactly this the same kind of information with that. What I had to decide with this was this is a ten year commitment, and the way that I look at this is I'm renting this chair for four years because the people of Bremerton allowed me to do so.

So being faced with a decision that's going to impact for ten years when I may only be in this chair for four was something that gave me incredible heartburn in this. If you would have asked me on Sunday, it may have been a different answer than what I had, you know, today in the research that I've done, because I saw some of that same exact information, and it was this horror, you know, that is not happening here. Oh my gosh. I can't believe this is how this program was utilized. What I had to do was take a step back and find that I have to have a little bit of faith, that I can't step into this.

I am new. I am learning all of this. I cannot come in with a level of arrogance that is like, well, this is going to happen because I read it. I have to have faith. I have to have faith in in your group, in community development, that the zoning that is there, the things that we have said as a community that this is our main plan, we have to have that faith that that is there, and we have to continue the plan that we have. You know, I was reading through this at the Harrison Heights sub plan. There were things that I loved, and there were things that I was like, not so much. It's not for me. But there was a lot of thought that went into that and years of research. It was from 2020 to there was amendments in 2025 that it happened.

So that's where I came to the soul searching of what I can do in the next four years is ensure that every single time there's a decision that's put before us, that we're pointing back to those things, whether I personally love them, hate them, nod anything, that doesn't matter. It's the fact that, you know, when you're in this chair, we're ensuring that we are meeting the standards of the codes, that we are doing, you know, these plans that we're constantly thinking about them, including a lot of the multimodal that's in there and some of the walking paths that I was like, oh, that would be great. I want that. That's the commitment that I can do in this chair because I can only control myself in this. There are going to be things that happen in this.

There are going to be zoning changes that happen over ten years. There is going to be best laid plans that end up changing. But I do know in this position in the next four years, the only thing I do have control of is that if there are decisions that are placed in front of me and we do we are successful with this opportunity zone, that that commitment is that we continuously look back to the plans that were in place when we made this decision and try to get what we have on paper into our community. And so that that was something that if I was going to say yes to this, that that was something I knew that I had to make that commitment to continuously push towards that.

Are

there any other comments from council? Okay. Seeing no further discussion, I call for the question.

Council member Fry. Yes. Camerata. Yes. Goodnow. Yes. Mochler. Yes. Tift. Yes. Chamberlain? Yes. Brobawowski? No. Motion carries. Six yeses, one no.

Uh-huh. Thank you, counsel. We'll work on that application.

Thank you for your work. Whatever. Next is the mayor's report, please.

Alright. Good evening, council. Got a couple slides for you this evening. Alright. Just a quick update.

Part of the the effort to spruce up our our downtown, making in the investments that you're well aware of why we are probably making them. We expect a large amount of visitors coming into our city with the two two activations occurring at the same simultaneously. One, first full year of Quincy Square as an as an outdoor event plaza, and FIFA, the fan zone coming. So this is the location you can see up there near the sewer lift station C E 4 at the 2nd Street down by the boardwalk. This is the before and after of the restroom.

Again, not just for visitors. This is for us to enjoy also the entire experience that city of Bremerton is hoping to create in partnership is for all of us. So it's a quick before and after here. Next slide. And proud to say, once again, for the fourth time, the Bremerton Police Department has received the WASPUS accreditation.

And there's there's a lot that goes into this. If you look down at the the very last sentence or the last second to the last bullet, 144 standards across 19 major areas of law enforcement operations were examined by a WASPUS accreditor. And so the certification does show a high level of transparency, accountability, and efficiency. Proud of the amount of work that goes into this is commendable. Only 25% of agent police agencies, law enforcement agencies in Washington state achieved this accreditation.

Wanted to share this this outstanding achievement with you. Of course, those are some sharp police officers up there out of uniform, including our chief. Alright. Next slide. So the the city staff, you know, what you see out there in the community with mini excavator works, skid steers, just different different operations in the street department.

We we in the community, collective we, the folks in the public works field, put together what we call a rodeo. So just you'll notice the play on words there. Right? So just a contest held at the Kitsap Fairgrounds, and these are a couple of award winners from our department. Doesn't you know, just a little bit of time to showcase skills, proficiency, safety, and of course safety is even a consideration in this contest.

So I wanted to share some fun, but also some level of skill and proficiency as mentioned earlier with with many in our department. So this is an example of that work. And pride, actual pride in their the jobs they do for the city. Alright. Next slide. And there was Dave, if you could just back up real quick. Appreciate that. There's just some names up there just for your You know, we've got Nick, Josh, Caden, Anthony, Tim, Logan Roussell, Josh, you know, Josh Fredrickson, of course, Nick Hall Press. Just a lot of folks here in our in the streets department. Just wanted you to see those names.

You'll see them out in the field. You might you might mention this to them. Alright. Next slide. So today, the this was it it's a fun milestone to have the neon whale tail unveiling happen today down in Quincy Square. I appreciate the count council members Goodnow and Camarata coming down there. And what this this is a symbol of the fan zone activities coming to Bremerton. So it's fun. It is emblematic of what we have taken on to be a fan zone. And the main part of it actually is fun.

Getting ready for the tourists and visitors, and of course us as our own our citizens and residents of Bremerton to go down there and participate. So just one more little milestone before the actual event occurs middle of next month. Alright. Next slide. And the Waze Goose. This this awesome this awesome festival is just is coming once again. I I don't know if anybody's ever attended this. This yeah. This I mean, the the talent we have in our community, and this is a festival. There'll be music.

There'll be food. You will you can talk to the artist. They'll be developing the art as we are down there joining in the fun. So you'll you'll actually see it happening. So I just I just wanted to share that this unique art artistic experience is happening in our city, June 6 at Sheridan Park Community Center, And do invite as many people as possible to come down and and just to check this out. It's really neat. So that is it tonight, council. I hope you have a great evening. Thank you.

Thank you very much, mayor. Okay. Now we're going to move to council reports. This is an opportunity for council members to provide an update on any issues or events taking place in their district, announce any events they've recently attended, or plan to attend, or to speak on any other city related topic. Since this is the last council meeting of the month, we will start with District 7, council member Rick Tiff.

Okay. I have, I believe, one slide. Yes. There you go. So, the community bill for the, new place structure at the Kitsap Lake Park happened on May 1, and you can see that there were many volunteers that came and assisted with the final finishing touches on the play structure.

It's open now. It's had a soft opening about a week ago, and I think there'll be a formal ribbon cutting at some point in the future. But my personal observation of it is that it's already heavily used. I actually I've driven by on many occasions. On Mother's Day in in particular, almost every picnic shelter was full with families enjoying Mother's Day, and their children were enjoying this play structure.

It's quite impressive, and it's it's it's really a nice addition to the Kitsap Lake Park. And so thanks to the mayor and to the Tim Barker and the Parks Department for the grants and everything that went into acquiring that and putting it at that location. So and that's that's the only item I I have for tonight. Thank you.

Thank you. Next, we have district six council member Anna Makler. Thanks.

I don't have any slides this week. There was a lot of ill health happening. A couple of things. The first one is, if anybody's been by 15th And Lafayette at Lulu Haddon Park, you will see that the prayers and thoughts of many have finally been answered. Crosswalks.

And we have a four way stop with crosswalks, is just great. And I'm particularly grateful to community members to whom I've been saying for three years, send me an email. Otherwise, counsel thinks it's all in my head. So she finally did send an email, and this seems to have triggered a reaction which is just fantastic. Yesterday hang on here.

At the oh, Bulldog Bish. Yesterday at the Public Works Conference Committee, I I learned that District 6 is slated for a few things that are gave me a great deal of hope. The partially funded we're not on the funded list, the fully funded. We're not on that list. But we are we have one thing on the partially funded list, which is the 11th Street corridor improvement project, and I am told that this will involve making 11th And Callow, having a dedicated left turn on all four arms of the intersection.

So possibly, perhaps, let us hope, school buses will no longer have to cross Kitsap Way, make a left turn onto 13th Street, but they can go make a dedicated, protected, better for school kids turn. We we are we are well represented on the unfunded list. Safe Routes to School phase two for Crown Hill Elementary, fixing reconstructing North Wyckoff 24th To 26th. Bink. Bink.

Bink. Bink. Bink. Well, I have half of Shorewood Drive, so they're improving Shorewood Drive through the NAD Park to Jackson Park, which I have to say I've never had a complaint about the other things quite a bit. They're gonna connect the sidewalk down at you you know that park, like, you know Matane Park, which is in council president Reblovsky's district now? Well, there's right across the street, there's the Alice And James Walker Lillian. Lillian and then James Walker. It's like basically an amphitheater. It's a very, very, very small park. So they're gonna get some sidewalks.

For me, I'm I'm just really thrilled about many of these things. They are things that I've And here, we have, like, the cherry on top, which is sidewalks for Snyder Avenue. And I'd like everybody in the audience to really focus on Tinker Bell here, because Snyder Avenue sidewalks has come onto documents and then vanished away. And then it's come onto documents and then vanished away. So let's really be hopeful.

Final thing that I have is on May 22 at Olympic College from 8AM to 4PM is the human conference, which is stands for BUFF. Helping Help Us Make a Neighborhood. And it's a it's gonna be a bunch of, like, role playing and practical labs using actionable strategies that will strengthen people's ability to build, not just build community for a one off, but to build community for the long term. So all of council has been invited to this for weeks, but I'm just letting the whole public know about it. And for the rest of it, thank you guys for coming.

Thank you guys for presenting. Look forward to hearing what you have to

say in public comment. Thank you. Next is district five council member Michael Goodnow.

Alright. I don't think I have any slides. I will say, Anna, I think the partial funding on 11th Street is just my side of the street.

No. The the malls are

I'm kidding. I'm kidding. I'm sorry. You

know it's just for planning. Right?

I I have nothing to report. Thanks.

District 3. Council member Christie Camarata, please.

Oh, boy. I was gonna say it's it's been a minute, so I can't remember what slides I

have. Alright.

So the first one, the Burlington Community Farmers Market opened up on May 7. So the family and I got we were lucky enough to be able to walk down. It was nice weather, so we headed down. And just such a really, really cool event, and it was packed. It was amazing to see that. Because sometimes it takes me a couple of weeks to figure out what day it is, what time it is, all of that packed. And so that was just incredible. And my children have already been asking if we can go back because they got the steamed buns that were down there, and it oh, it was

The panda.

Okay. Okay. We did. We got a panda, and we got the seafood one. Like, we there was, like, five or six of them. Amazing. And that's all they've asked for all week long. Really, really good. Additionally, I will say this is all new for me, as you guys know, and I'm not really one of those ones that's, like, in the front. And, you know, I'm I'm more of the the back of the room kinda kid.

And so this was something that, the the mayor saw me lurking with my family in the back and called us up and actually brought my kids up too for the ribbon cutting, which was a really special moment for us and even better when he was done with the big scissors, handed them to all three of my kids who took photos with the giant scissors that they now wanna put up in our house. I will say I'm very proud of my children because I would have run with the scissors just to do it, and they didn't. They just they did cute pictures with them, and that was that. But amazing event. Most important part of this is that it is Thursdays at 4PM, and it runs, May 7 through October 8.

I recommend looking at the website, though, because I know in the fall, the hours shift slightly. So when it starts to get darker earlier, look at the website to see. Next slide, please. The Kitsap Water Festival. So this one was fun. I got to go down. I wore my name badge because I was representing the city as well as I was a parent on a field trip. So I had my own little group, and we got to go through and experience it, from that lens. It is an amazing day. There were over a thousand kids that were there.

So this is third and fourth grade classrooms. It was at the Kitsap County Fairgrounds and just beautifully put together. Because if you can get a thousand kids to get excited about learning where their water comes from in different modules and in different ways, it is it's an amazing thing to see because my the this was now my second time going. I went with my, middle son when he was in third grade. And when I signed up for a water festival, I did not think this was gonna be a happen in time.

And I was so wrong that when Rocky got to do it this year in third grade that I was one of the first parents to sign up. And, apparently, the fish down on the bottom has been here forever, and there were a lot of adults who were talking about their time that they got to go and be in the fish. And we had multiple adults that were like, okay. I just gotta get one quick picture in the fish to send to their own parents because they had those photos. So it was really, really cute.

Next slide, please. Oh, this one. So the annual law enforcement memorial ceremony was May 15, and this was one that if you ever have the privilege of going, which it is completely open to everybody, and I highly highly recommend, we all know I'm a bit of a crier. I really thought I was gonna keep it together there. I most certainly did not.

I backed up into a bush in the corner and had myself a little, like, that straight stiff upper lip style where it's just coming down, and you're like, I don't even care. And on my bingo card for 2026, as it turns out, I got to readjust my makeup in the side mirror of a hearse. I did not see that coming for myself. Very exciting, but this this ceremony is beautiful to be able to see, and so they do this annually. I I highly recommend that you, if you're available next year to go ahead and and go to that because it's very, very well done and respectful.

Next slide, please. The Armed Forces Day Parade, and you can tell which slides I made and which slides were made for me. If you guys notice, this is, like, way higher quality. So I'm gonna stop making my slides, and it's like, this one, such a cool opportunity, and I I can't believe that I had this opportunity to actually be in the parade with my name on a piece of paper that, yes, that piece of paper is up in my house right now. It is it was such a neat experience, and I think I had a very unique parade experience because I was lucky enough to have my husband driving me and the kids in the back.

So that antique firetruck, which there'll be I think there's another picture later. But just an amazing opportunity that I got to ride with the Bremerton Fire Department on a firetruck from 1930 that is still fully operational that I was like, you guys are they're dusting it off from their lobby. But this is another thing that our departments take care of what they have, that this was something I was shocked. It fired right up, and we were parading. We, you know, drove it down. It it was amazing. Another shout out to my husband because he can drive a stick shift. I cannot. I did not know what this thing was, but he did it. He drove a 96 year old stick shift.

Also important because I feel like we need to bring a little levity to tonight in this. I got a lot of comments on the dress. It was a lovely dress, very comfortable, highly recommend. At about 03:00 in the afternoon, I figured out my dress was on backwards. So the entire day, I got comments on this dress, but I am gonna I'm telling you all this right now, again, to bring some levity to this day, but also because the universe brings you up, and then it humbles you. And so that's always nice to know that, yes, you were in a parade, but, yes, your dress was on backwards backwards the whole day. Next slide, please. Yeah. Right? So this is the fire truck, and this it it is absolutely beautiful, and it it ran incredibly.

And so that that is a picture of my husband there, who did a fantastic job driving not only a stick shift, but the five miles an hour start and stop. And, actually, fun fact, it should look very, very familiar to Jennifer.

Yeah. She rode in it.

And he drove you. Yep. That so that was the funny thing. He was like, I'm just used to this. I'll just put a new city council member in it. Have you? Have you been on that? Oh, there we go.

Know, me, nobody's ever asked.

Most important to me on this slide was we were actually coming back on the parade route there down Pacific, and we were heading to Park. And it was absolutely lined with school buses backed in that only had enough space to, like, open the doors and get the kids out. I have never seen that many school buses in one place, and that, to me, let us know that we have an Armed Forces Day parade here in the city that kids drove from all over on the Peninsula, and that is so neat to be a part of something that that many students we all collectively whether you're in the parade or you're watching the parade, we all collectively shared that memory that day. And to see that many school buses was it was such a neat experience. It was probably one of my favorite parts was driving past all the school buses.

And then do I have I think I have one one more. Alright. So this was in the mayor's report last week, but I'm just throwing it out there. This one is actually it is an open house, but it is Fire Station 2. So that is the one over by WinCo. And so this is just a reminder that, the open house is happening Saturday, May 23 from 11:30 to 1PM. And if you are a parent, this is a really, really good experience to have, not only because you get to go and the front of that fire engine, by the way, there's a little lip on it. You can sit. Fantastic family photos. Perfect Christmas cards, so bring them all down.

But in addition to that, most of the time, you see these firefighters at an absolutely horrible moment in your life, that they are there in an emergency situation. And so bringing children to the fire stations and showing them actually different outfits that they can have on because that is something that is very different. You know, they have uniforms, but they also have bunker gear. And so these are the things that you know, when you bring your kids down, you're normalizing what they may experience in the event of an emergency and kind of letting them know that these are the faces to what could be a really bad day for anybody. And that is actually a really valuable experience that they found that, you know, having kids not be fearful, especially in those high intensity moments, and having this be something they they recognize and is normal in their community, goes a long way.

So I highly, highly recommend bringing your kids out, so that they can see and experience all of this. Because a lot of times when you see a firetruck, it's just hopefully driving past you really fast. On your worst day, it's pulling up in front of your house. So, you know, having those moments that you can share with those firefighters, and experience that with the kids is a really good thing. And I think that's it. I'm out. Right?

Alright. You're out.

Five minutes per slide.

Yeah. Next is council vice president and district two council member Denise Fry.

Thank you. Well, there wasn't just an old fire truck in the parade. Our new fireboat was in the parade. And the ambassadors, which the Chamber of Commerce, they award scholarships, and these are all high school students. And that happens to be, I think, Karen Beaver's daughter down there in the front.

She's an ambassador this year. But our new fireboat was in the parade. That was really exciting. I'm looking forward to when council can actually get a ride on that fireboat, still putting putting that out there. And riding on the old fire truck is one thing, but I remember a year during COVID, I think, when we got to ride in the ladder truck.

And I think the ambassadors were a little disappointed this year. I wouldn't have been because I've been asking for a ride on that fireboat for months now. But really proud, I do wanna say, council member Kamarata, I was in the audience this year viewing with my grandchildren. And I was really proud to be a city council member, as you drove by, on the fire truck with Benny sitting next to you. It just it really shows you how connected our community is, you know?

Armed Forces Day is important to Bremerton. And I really want to thank you for showing up and representing counsel in the parade that day. Next slide, please. Yes. The mayor talked about this. This is Waze Goose. It's one of my favorite festivals. I've been going to this for years. I own a couple of the prints. I love this type of thing.

Didn't mention I think we're gonna have a steamroller down there, aren't we, Mare? Yeah. It's really fun to watch these being made. And so I encourage everybody, come on down to Sheridan Community Center on June 6 for Waste Goose. It's really a great event. Alright. Next slide. I mean, the colors on this thing, you can tell I didn't design this. We send our ideas in, and all of a sudden we get slides like this. But this is great.

It's another slide for Waze Goose. If you're into art, if you're into equipment that make things happen, like public works, you know, come on down. It's a really fun day, and you can spend time down there. And hey, walk up Cherry Avenue and see the redevelopment area while you're there. Yeah. Alright. I think that might be it.

Okay. Thank you. Next is District 1, council member Jennifer Chamberlain.

Oh, it is the same thing I advertised, which I don't know. Counselors, has any other any other counselors taken part in this? I haven't. Oh, this is an invitation to you. I mean, we can ride on trucks. We can ride in ladder trucks. We can ride on boats. But but can you show up for a cleanup, for your community? There's the challenge. And and I say that, but I know several of y'all have.

So I'm I'm I'm not really calling you out. You have your own areas. I know that, you take part in those things too, and I appreciate the work you do. If you are interested counselors, there is this is a lot of fun. You get a free doughnut, a free t shirt, a free coffee, all incentives for just, doing the right thing for the community and picking up garbage every once in a while, which happens. We just had ours on, the, sixteenth. I, do not know how many bags of garbage. I wish Sally was here to report.

She did.

She'd tell me how many bags of garbage, and probably a lot less than the first go around. But I encourage you to come out. The next one's gonna be in June, June 20. And I have just a couple other things I wanna chat about. Next next council meeting, I'll have a couple of, more reports.

I I got to visit Kitsap 911, and that was a really wonderful opportunity to see how things are done. I used to be an inbound customer service, representative for a call center, and just seeing the, the way that they facilitate their calls was amazing because it's not, people aren't calling to get their cell phones fixed. That's for sure. They're calling for, you know, emergency situations. The officers need specific information quick.

They need data analyzed and and cut down immediately, fast. And just to watch actually, my friend who used to go she used to be my she used to roast coffee and work at nine one one, and now she's just working at Kids Kids nine one one. But to see the way that she works so efficiently and and quickly and professionally, and the way that they take care of their staff there is amazing, and and and I'm, you know, proud to be on I'm on the Kitsap nine one one board. I'm proud to be part of that board and, amazingly impressed with the staff that works there. I I I have something, you know, I wanna check-in about, which is, I'm on the public works committee as well, and, we had a little briefing of our, the city is getting ready is working right now on a six year transportation improvement plan, and there are some really great projects on there.

I know councilor Moffler is pretty excited about a couple of them that have moved up in phases. And, you know, as we focus on more on our multimodal, capacity in our city, there is just a glaring omission, from priorities, and that was Pine Road. If there's one section of, of road that my constituents continually ask for changes for. It's it's the section between Sheridan and Sylvan on Pine Road. This is a section of road that, a lot of elementary school students that attended Armenjar, which we're gonna have a new school there, around the same area soon.

They walk there. There's an elder care facility at the top and a con and our only convenience store, down at the bottom. This road is also pretty locked. The section of road there's not, a through road to get to the other end. It has uneven services, for walking on just one side, and it has, some crumbling, road on the other side crumbling into the ditches. So I encourage everybody to maybe just take a little walk. Just take a walk facing traffic on Pine Road, whichever direction you wanna go. See how it goes for you. If you don't like it, get out your Bremerton one app. We just learned about it today.

Take pictures. Send them up. To because, you know, I I hear that Chris is pretty fast at responding. If that's the way we're gonna get Pine Road fixed, that's what we're gonna do. I'm happy to take a group of people walking anytime. Just get a hold of me, and and let's make a field trip out of it. Maybe even once a month, we could make a field trip out of it. Take lots of pictures until that road is fixed appropriately for my constituents. So please pay attention to Pine Road a little more, folks. If you take a walk on that section, you'll see it needs some help. I was

we had

a little heated discussion tonight, didn't we? And I appreciate the opportunity to have discourse with my colleagues. What it really was reminding me of was I'm a get a little vulnerable. I used to live in District 2, back in the day, and, I had my first my first apartment where my children had their own bedrooms in in this area. I had never had my own apartment where my children had their own bedrooms before, and I moved into a duplex near Cherry on Chestnut Street, which is parallel to Callahan.

Callahan. Yeah. And I was thinking back to those days and thinking to back to all of my neighbors and and so many, you know, people who were low income lived in that area. A lot of us were like like, these are kind of like some of us the first time we had apartments that were affordable that we could begin to have a community around you know, in with our neighbors. And it was it was just a really good place to to do some healing for me and my little family as well.

I was also there when when the hospital left, and things did start to change. I was there when Albertsons left, and that was I thank goodness there's a grocery store now, but there wasn't for a while. It became quite a desert. All of the businesses down in, Sheridan Plaza left, and, we just had like a teriyaki place. And that was pretty much it in that area.

And so for a long time, it it was it was it was just a dying area. There's been a little bit of growth since then, but there's still, just it's still, there's a lot of empty space to fill. And I'm hopeful for that area, whatever tools are used. We didn't sell out our city for a tool in the toolbox. We're just trying to get a blighted area filled back up with people and families and community and maybe a little bit of shopping and maybe, you know, a little bit more of an opportunity to have a walk able community.

It's a beautiful vision, and I appreciate, the way that it was crafted for us, because I really do believe that the neighbors in in that area, this this little community that I was able to heal with my young children who grew up into teenagers in that area, it it just deserves more than what is being given. Alright. That's my soapbox. I'm gonna hop off now and let president Rabalowski have her time. Thank you.

Thank you. I think I have a few slides, Steve. Puget Sound Energy, I know lots of people have been hit with huge unexpected bills since they got their rate increase, and they are having an event at the Southern Way Library on June 6 from 10AM to 2PM, and they're going to give you billing assistance, give you information on energy efficiency. Supposedly no, not supposedly. They say they have programs for people of who aren't making a whole lot of money.

So let's see. Five times 12 is 60. So if you have one person in your household and you make 60,000 or less, there may be help for your utility bill. I know my neighbors went from a $130 a month to 300, and they don't even have electric heat. So I don't know what's going on.

So anyway, I hope anybody who can go there between those hours is able to get some assistance. Next slide, please. So Kitsap 911 has a new phone line. It's AI operated, but this gives people an opportunity to call and leave messages for things that you wouldn't consider an emergency or most people wouldn't consider emergency, such as fireworks, if there were dogs running in your neighborhood, you know, obviously not biting dogs. This isn't for emergency situations, but it's for everything else.

And it's a way for us to get real data on things that are are being harmful to our community too. So I hope people utilize that. The new number is (360) 328-7711. Next slide, please. These are the meetings that are coming up next.

We have parks finance investment and parking committee on the twenty sixth next week. Council study session is next Wednesday. Public safety committee is on the June 2, and our next regular council meeting will be on June 3.

I'd like to ban AI.

Well What happened to our face?

I was gonna say, that's not my face. I

didn't do the slides. So so you guy you can talk to our office manager. Okay. Alright. So that's it for council reports.

Since I had announced this at the last study session, the planning commission meeting previously scheduled for Monday, May 18, was canceled after the Bremerton Housing Authority withdrew its application for a code amendment related to the proposed temporary encampment. Bremerton Housing Authority has indicated its intent to revise and resubmit a proposal. However, at this time, the city has yet to receive any applications. So next, I would like, people to come up with community comments. We didn't have any requests to comment remotely.

This is an opportunity for the public to comment on items not listed on tonight's agenda, but still related to the work of the council. Speakers will have ninety seconds to provide their comments. Please remember to state your name clearly before providing your comments if you wish your name to be included in the meeting record. And if you have an issue that may require follow-up from city staff, please leave your contact information with the city clerk after you've finished your comments. Does anybody have any comments for community comment?

Jose Camacho, friends of Smith's Cove, Rock the Block. We heard earlier talk of opportunity zones and how it's not just for the wealthy, but that's pretty much what Gregory Genovese said it was for. He had podcasts talking about it. Steve Siegel talked about it. And within two to three years, he was suing San Westoop for opportunity zone fraud. He's the licensed securities expert. Wesley Larson isn't. They hired him for that expertise. When they settled and, unfortunately, the terms are not disclosed, General VC's license remained intact, and Larson stopped selling SoundWest Group as an opportunity zone expert itself. Zone.

And Denise Fry knows. You see her giving a pivot award to Sound West Group. It's literally in photos. You have the dates. Go to friend of Smith Cove at the Bitlink, and you will find out more information. At the time she gave Sound West Group the pivot award, it is the height of the fraud allegations that general VC lays out. He said Soundwest Group was threatening investors. He was putting them at risk. They were using inflated developer fees. There was an allegation that Larson pressured the accountant to falsify his income so he could qualify for loans for the Marina Square.

It's replete with shenanigans, and no one here talked about it after I brought it up. You can't. You're afraid of some West Group.

So I would like to make one thing clear. I didn't stop you tonight, mister Camacho, but if it's something that has been on the agenda already, community comments is not the time

I get to speak however I want. Free speech.

That is actually true.

My name is Robin Weldon, and I adopt Jose Camacho's comments. I am also with Friends of Smith Cove. Friends of Smith Cove is on the invented Smith Cove at Evergreen Park YouTube channel. We have been compiling basically an evidence trail. We just can't even keep up with the city corruption.

And anything can be spoken about in a in a public comment. It's part of our protections in free speech. So you can't create these rules around our democracy that are so undemocratic. Another thing I would like to actually say thank you to council president Reboulowski for for voting no to the opportunity zone. We all know that the first opportunity zone was brought by Trump.

It's a way to for the tax shelter to hide money. It's also a way to revitalize and displace a population. So that Harrison Heights property or area is going to be revitalized, and people will be displaced. It's also the place where the hybrid shelter was going to be. We was planning on being until you gagged us and they nobody could talk about it and you started this misinformation campaign about it. Go to the go to Friends of Smith Cove.

Didn't get that.

Okay. Madam president, council members, mister mayor, city staff, my name is Shannon Turner. And I just wanna say this, first off, thank you. Thank you for what you do. Thank you for your service. It's not easy by far. You do the best you can with what you have and the information provided. You have great staff. I appreciate you guys. I thank you for what you do because you sit, you take it, and you proceed to move forward in the best interest of your districts and the city.

And on that note, I stand up here today, and I wear many hats. But this time, my hat is with the Paulsboro Historical Society. May twenty ninth, the thirtieth, and thirty first, we're actually doing a festival, and we have a pop up ferry that will actually take you from Bremerton to Paulsbo and back for a small donation. And so this is why I'm here, and I would love for you guys to attend, have fun, enjoy, take a boat ride, relax, put your feet in the water and just just enjoy it. You know, it's not very often that you get an opportunity to do that.

And and you guys as well. Please, everyone, come and enjoy it. It's a great time. It's right after Memorial Day. So thank you.

Can you repeat the date?

The May 29. This is for the thirtieth. The pop up area is May 30. On Saturday. Okay. So thank you.

Can you leave us a copy of that?

I can give this to you. Okay. Under this one.

Are there other members of the community who would like to speak?

Hi. This is Jim Klein again from the Charleston Business District. I just wanna say that first of all, thank you to the council for all that you do for this city and you do it in a positive manner and we appreciate that. I'd also like to mention this is the first time I've been at a meeting since Chance has taken his new job. I found him over the years that I've known him to be an outstanding representative and extremely helpful, and Michael you know that.

We we've had a great partnership. A lot of exciting things happening down on Callow. We just expanded our board. We're a five zero one c three organization, and certainly, we have a great relationship with the mayor. Mister mayor, I'd like to thank you for delivering the dictionaries to third grade students, and that was just a rotary event, but he was right there, and he's been a friend of Charleston forever.

So that's much appreciated. In the last twenty six seconds, I just wanna tell you that we have one in 8,000,000 Washingtonians in the audience who was just selected as the recycler of the year. Yeah. And that is our friend from Pellow, Rima. If you'd stand up, we'd like to give you a round of applause.

That's it. You can't top that.

Thank

you.

My name is Rima Schulte. It feels silly to introduce myself every time. I think I know all of you. On that note of recycler of the year and all of my efforts to keep Remmerton Green, I really encourage you to step away from AI flyers for your slides. As you saw tonight, they really aren't serving. I saw the picture, the resemblance was faint. So I would really encourage you to talk to your city staff about just who cares if your slides look crappy? Christy, I thought your slides were fine. They

were great.

Yeah. Who cares? You're speaking to your neighbors and your friends. It's okay to have slides that are made by you. I would also encourage you to consider your phone a tool when you're up here, not a distraction.

I know that it can be easy to fall into the black screen of your phone when things are tense, but we have to listen to each other and make eye contact with one another and be a community. So when you're up here and we're here, it's just a respectful thing to do. And to each other, I saw some of you on your phones when one another were speaking. And if you're supposed to be a counsel and listen to each other, please do that. I really encourage you to just pay attention. I know a tool is fine, but a distraction is another thing. So you all for your work for Bremerton. I do love to live here, and it's in part because of you. So thank you.

Thank you. Is there any other community member who would like to come up and give a comment? Okay. Well, that concludes tonight's business meeting. Thank you for attending.