City Council - workshop

Test, test. Good evening, everyone. Sorry, we're having difficulties with our streaming services tonight, so we're going to go ahead and record, confirm we are recording. All right. Welcome, everyone. Tonight's August 3rd, 2026, City Council Workshop, starting at 510, almost 511 p.m. We're just short one counselor, but since this is a workshop, we're going to go ahead and start with a report on a possible urban renewal area for the Colwell Executive Airport. Our economic development staff who's here tonight Discussing the concept and then afterward there's gonna be time for council to ask questions with that. Thank you for everyone for being here tonight and Welcome economic development Good evening mayor council members.

My name is Ophelia Morales I'm the assistant economic development director for the city of Caldwell and as well as Executive Director for Urban Renewal. And my team today is Dan Torres, our Economic Development Director, Mark Hilty, our Urban Renewal Attorney, Scott Swanson, our Executive Director of the Airport, Brian Kitta, our Economic Development Specialist, and I do have a few members of our Urban Renewal Board here as well. So thank you so much for your time this evening. Again, we're bringing to you a possible concept of hopefully future urban renewal district for the airport area. So the airport should be viewed as a catalyst for economic development rather than simply transportation facility. Businesses rely on efficient air access to move people, goods, and services, making the airport an important piece of the community's economic infrastructure. Investing in airport improvements enhances the region's competitiveness, attracts new business, supports existing employers, and creates opportunities for future commercial and industrial development. Urban renewal can play a strategic role by helping finance the infrastructure improvements that encourages investment in and around the airport. However, it should be used selectively and in coordination with other funding sources. By leveraging urban renewal alongside federal and state grants, airport revenues, and other financing tools, the community can maximize investment while preserving flexibility for future projects. The goal is not to simply improve the airport, but use the airport as an engine for broader economic growth, strategic infrastructure investments that can stimulate business expansion, increase employment opportunities for our community, strengthen the local tax base and position The community is a regional hub for commerce, aviation, and industry. And I do have a PowerPoint there. And our economic development director will be joining me here at the podium to cover the financial component of an urban renewal district. So a little bit about how tax increment finance works through an urban renewal district. The district's tax value is fixed at the formation. Every existing taxing district keeps collecting on that base. And so urban renewal isn't new to the city. We've had a district, a 1998 district, that was a fairly large district that sunsetted a few years ago. So here at the city, we're a little familiar of how that works, where we capture that increment and utilize that increment only for that specific district. And then again here, the airport strategic asset for the city, like I've mentioned before, in many other places we've looked at airports that do have an airport urban renewal district. Haley, Pocatello being some of those examples on how they leverage their airport to again bring that investment into their community. And so why now again we're supporting the airport again we want to make sure that it is one of the greatest assets that we have here in the city that can help us again bring in that much needed tax base that we need and some of those businesses that will help support our community. And so we are again looking to capture that tax increment finance again to help in that area. Now I will make a note that I did let our urban renewal board know that we at one point had asked if we can create this district by the end of the year. There was a catalyst project there in that area that we were hoping to capture some of that increment in finance to help this district get a head start. We did meet with the assessor last week, the Kane County assessor, and he did let us know that that project is actually on the tax roll already. What we're asking for today here is just your thumbs up, thumbs down if we are moving in the right direction so that we can continue having that conversation in regards to this specific district. And so here's our proposed district boundary. It does, again, include some of that county area. And again, we will be having conversations with our stakeholders. Again, this is just early dialogue with you all to see if there's any interest, if we should move forward or not. And then here shows you, again, that area. And that area, of course, has been planned through our comprehensive map here. You can see where our employment center is. There's a huge employment center within those boundaries, as well as mixed-use centers. So I'm going to give you that. And then now I'll have our economic development director join me to talk a little bit about the project list.

Good afternoon. So a little background. The fact that Caldwell has an airport is a phenomenal asset and we really, the opinion is that we should be taking advantage of that. This initial project list comes from the airport capital improvement plan that was adopted, I want to say in 2020, 2021. What Scott and I did is we looked at projects within that master plan that scored a 70 or above and front loaded this project. We imagine that this list will probably change over time as we meet with the different stakeholders, as we look at items that would have a catalytic economic development impact or a life safety. The other thing that we brought on this project list was we looked at the transportation master plan, I think it's called the Caldwell Area Transportation System Plan, and looked at roadway improvements within the proposed boundaries. We included that in this list. We also plan on meeting with other stakeholders, both within the city and outside on the public sector, to refine this list further. But the initial list is about $110 million worth of projects. The idea of this district is to advance these where possible, to bring an additional funding source to bring some of these to fruition faster. As an example, for FAA projects at the airport, the FAA generally pays 90% of the cost of these improvements. The 10% is a split between the city and other agencies, usually the state. But you have to get on a list for that. And again, in order to help the airport become an economic catalyst, we want to see if we can advance these where possible. Some initial estimations looking at the assessed value within the proposed boundary is that there's a base assessed value of about $604 million. Using kind of a straight line guesstimation where we look at the increase of appreciated values as well as the increase in levy rate over that time that we project that there will be $157 million in tax revenue generated within this district. However, one of the things that we're here for you today is to help fund a feasibility study, which will dial in these projections, not just the project list, but also the tax increment that would be generated within this district. Some key assumptions here are that growth will occur in this area. Again, this is in line with what we believe to be in the comprehensive plan. As Ophelia mentioned, they are identified as employment centers and kind of a commercial corridor along Ustick. So we believe that we've done our land use planning correctly. We anticipate growth to happen in here. What we're looking for is a mechanism to help offset any potential costs, extraordinary costs to development and to advance identified projects and to address any life safety issues that we find in this area. SOME RISKS THAT ARE ALWAYS POTENTIAL IN SETTING UP AN URBAN RENTAL DISTRICT IS SLOWER GROWTH THAT DOESN'T HAPPEN AS FAST AS WE WANT, THE VARIABILITIES OF MARKET INTEREST RATES, COST ESCALATIONS. AGAIN, GOING BACK TO THAT CAPITAL PROJECT LIST, IT WAS THREE OR FOUR YEARS OLD ALREADY, AND AS WE'VE SEEN THE COST OF PROJECTS RISE. those are always subject to change. And then we also want this to be a living plan. So we'll start it with identified projects, but we will, the order that they're listed is not necessarily the order that will happen. They'll happen as development occurs and the need is presented.

Okay, so again, like I mentioned earlier before, the purpose of the district is a greater airport area strategy. So it's not just specific for the airport, but specific more to the area that will be identified by, again, working with our many stakeholders in the area so it benefits the entire community, not just the airport. And so, again, here what we want to use is we want to use urban renewal as a tool. Again, we'll continue to look at other state incentives, community improvement districts, revenue bonds, foreign trade zone, et cetera, just Again just making sure that you all aware that this is a tool that can help that area and many other areas in Caldwell. And then again here going back to that coordinated approach of development we will look at an airport area special area plan again just to kind of help guide the the infrastructure to help guide what that area would look like in the future. And here again, who are the stakeholders? City council, city staff, airport board, URA. And again, like I mentioned, I have presented this to our urban renewal board. I've also presented this to our airport board to kind of give them, let them know what we're thinking in terms of utilizing this tool. And then what are the next steps? So we'll fund a feasibility study. And the airport does have a retainer with a jub At the moment, so we're looking at potentially working with jub or others To do that feasibility study and then number three is really the district adoption process what that looks like again we're here just to kind of get your feedback if this is something that you want to move forward or not, then if there's something that you do want to move forward, then we'll go back to our Urban Renewal Board for, again, that ask, and then we can start the process of creating this district. And with that, I will stand for any questions that you may have.

Thank you, Ophelia and Dan. We really appreciate the work you guys put into this, and as we know, the airport has a lot of things in motion right now, so... This could be an important tool that we could utilize, but ultimately it's up to the council. We're serving a rural agency. And with that, council, do you have questions? Councilor Dittenberg.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Can you go back to a couple of slides? Let's start with the one that is anticipated benefits.

Right there.

So you have on here the benefits of the infrastructure, tax-based jobs. I understand those benefits. But then if you scroll back to your capital improvements list, right there. So I don't see anything on here for infrastructure, water, any sort of a public utility. Would those necessarily be included in this list?

We could include those in the list. As we're working with our stakeholders here, we will be able to identify what those projects look like and what projects could potentially benefit this area. So this, again, was taken from the airport list of projects, as well as, like Dan mentioned, the transportation list as well. So that's where this was taken from. But yes, we could include others as we're having those conversations with those stakeholders within that area.

And I understand urban renewal is one of your stakeholders in this. And they're going to take whatever approach to this that they take to it. But when we talk about those items that would be considered catalysts for development, are all of these items on this list potential catalysts for development? Or are these more maintenance issues for the airport?

No, they're not. And so I think Dan mentioned that they had taken that scoring from this list to see which rise above those projects that would impact the total area, not just the airport specifically.

Do you mind if I add to that? I think it's a good question. It's not an exhaustive list. We still have to look at parks needs and other needs. The thought here was to front load it with a clearly identified itemized known list of projects to help give the agency some guideposts of known projects. The other piece of the question, I think, was what are catalytic? And so we do want to go through that list. Again, the initial list was generated 70 and above, but we do want to dive deeper into that in consultation with the airport board to really look at, again, life safety. One of the things that's been talked about a lot is a tower that allows a greater, how do you call it, diversity of flights and times and safety and stuff. So we really wanted to dial it in to that piece. And the other side is we do talk a lot about economic development. One of the things, and I'll talk about this a little bit in my later presentation, but is how do we quantify need and how do we help the development community make the case for but for. I can't do this but for this investment. So, kind of change the narrative from giving money just because it's happening to reserving the money for things that are extraordinary.

Just to clarify, Councillor Denton, would you like to see infrastructure projects in there?

Mr. Mayor, I'm not saying I need to see infrastructure projects in there, but we just had a discussion a couple weeks ago about electrical needs, you know, and would the electrical needs of the airport fall under a capital improvement list that could be addressed?

It's an excellent question. Urban law is kind of circumscribed by the state, so it has to have a public benefit. Any more you cannot give money to something that does not have that public benefit nexus. So I think at this point, since we're in the feasibility, well, potentially the feasibility side, it's identifying all the known needs and then finding out which ones are actually statutorily able to be addressed.

We'll definitely take a look at those. Thank you, Mayor and Councillor Tillman.

That kind of falls into my question. You're including the control tower and this may be a question for Scott. I'm not 100% sure. How would urban renewal, would that then fall all the cost on the tower if it is allowed? Would that then fall under urban renewal and not on the taxpayers that we're looking at right now? And how would that possibly affect any grants or funding that we might get for the tower?

Mr. Mayor, Councillor Tillemont, Scott Swanson, Director of Aviation. With that question saying if the use of URA funds were used to construct the control tower as opposed to, like, the general fund or allocated funding from the taxpayers in the community?

Correct. I mean, when we talked before, you were saying that it may cost us upwards of $3 to $4 million to build the tower if we got the grants from the FAA. It's now being listed as a $6.5 million project, and I'm just wondering, would that then fall under a URA project, or would that fall under... You kind of see where I'm coming with this.

Yes, I do. Absolutely. Councilor Tillmont, so this project list that was put together by Dan, myself, and Ophelia is kind of just a first go. This was taken out of the 2020 Airport Master Plan, where at the time you could do a control tower for $6.5, $7 million. At this time now, that is... A LOT OF THE PRICING ON HERE WOULD NEED TO GET UPDATED BEFORE IT WAS FINALIZED INTO A LEGITIMATE PROJECT LIST. AND A LOT OF THINGS I LOOK AT IS KIND OF LIKE COUNSELOR DITTENBERGER POINTED OUT IS, YOU KNOW, THE UTILITY OF THE AREA AND WHAT'S THAT BEING LOOKED LIKE. FOR ME, ONE OF THE HIGHEST PRIORITIES WOULD BE A CURB GUTTER SIDEWALK ALONG THE NORTH SIDE OF AVIATION WAY, AT LEAST FROM USTIC TO LINDEN. JUST GET SOME WALKABILITY IN THOSE AREAS AND THEN THAT ROAD ON THE NORTH SIDE FOR ACCESS INTO THE UNDEVELOPED AREA, THE AIRPORT AREA KIND OF AREAS. This was taken to populate the project list. I would not look at the pricing on this project list as finite or, you know, never changing because we know that's not the case. Back to your question, though, if we utilize URA funding to meet a federal grant match, I have found nothing in regulation that says you can't do that. URA doesn't have it within the state code. Federal guidance doesn't talk anything about it. I think really it's whether or not the sponsor has a match capable, and I think that would be a deeper discussion with legal on whether a urban renewal agency counts as a sponsor for the city if they're an agency for that city that owns the airport. So that would take some looking into it. on whether or not that would even... I do not expect to be able to use URA funding for a control tower. I would expect it to come how it always comes, and then we'd get that 90% to 95% match from the Fed to do it. Okay. That was my question.

Thanks. And with that, Councilor Tillman, we can follow up with a grant coordinator and stuff for the FAA just to clarify if that's an allowed option. Councilor, all good?

Yeah, I'll fill you in. I realize this is very early, but just my two cents. Going along the lines of what Councillor Dittenberg talked about, things like the Ustick I-84 interchange, those kind of things, I see those as much more important, much more of a catalyst to that area than doing runway lights or, you know what I'm saying? Runway lights are something we can budget for, but something big like an interchange at Ustick would change the entire environment out there. Absolutely. And so as we move forward, I would like to see that kind of stuff move up on the list. Thank you for that comment.

Thank you, Councilor Palgood, and I agree with that. Anything else from council? All right, thank you. And that concludes. Thank you, Economic Development, for putting this together. Obviously, this is a working list. This is not an action item tonight, just a workshop to give council some information. And with that, we'll go ahead and conclude at 5.31 tonight's workshop. And we'll see you back at 6 p.m.