City Council - Regular Meeting

Good evening everyone. Thank you for being here tonight. Thank you City Council and staff We're gonna get started with tonight's August 3rd 2026 regular call the City Council meeting is six o'clock I Call those the meeting order and once again, thank you for joining here I see a lot of folks in the room a lot of a couple things on the agenda tonight First on the agenda is gonna be invocation, which tonight will be offered by mr. Rod grub Rod correct. Yes And then we're going to follow with the Pledge of Allegiance. And would you please stand?

Well, good evening, Mayor Phillips, seated city council members when you are sitting, and community gathered. On behalf of Montana Baptist church, my pastor, Rob, uh, I'd like to, uh, say how humble we are. I am to be here to deliver this invocation. So, uh, I'll begin all man, almighty God, heavenly father. We thank you for the privilege of gathering together for the freedoms we enjoy in this city. We ask for your blessing upon this meeting and upon each member of the city council. Lord grant them wisdom to make sound decisions. Courage to withhold or uphold what is right, humility to listen carefully, and compassion towards every person that have been called to serve. Help us, Lord, to preserve and pursue justice, exercise mercy, maintain peace, and remember that all authority is ultimately accountable to you, Lord. Father, we also lift up the victims of the recent tragedy in Twin Falls. Lord, comfort the families and friends and all those who are grieving. Bring healing to those who are injured, and Lord, surround everyone affected with your mercy and your care. Father, strengthen the first responders, the law enforcement officers, medical personnel, and others who came to their aid. Lord, please grant peace, comfort, and unity in that city to the entire community of Twin Falls during this time of sorrow. Lord, I'd also want to recognize your gospel and the good news of Jesus Christ. The Word of God says in 1 Corinthians 15, 3, 4, For I deliver to you first of all that which I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the Scriptures. We confess that we are sinners in need of your mercy. We thank you, Lord, that Jesus Christ bore our punishment on that cross for our sins, and he paid the price for our sins so that we might have life eternal. May all who hear this good news repent and confess their sins and place their full trust and confidence in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. Please, Lord, protect our city, strengthen our families, encourage those who serve our community, and guide everything that is said and done in this meeting tonight. We pray all this in Jesus' name. Amen. And I praise the Lord. It's not a zillion degrees out there. to the flag United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation Indivisible with liberty and justice for all Thank you once again, mr. Rod grub appreciate that very much kind words All right.

Next item on the agenda is roll call madam clerk. I

Tillmont.

Here.

Stoddick. Here. Register. Here. Williams. Here. All good. Here. Dittenberg. Here.

All right, we have all counsel present. I just want to follow up real quick on some things that were said in the prayer. Once again, thank you for that. You know, this has been a trying time for not only our community, our valley, especially the state, more specifically Twin Falls with the tragic incident that just occurred down there. My heart goes out to them. That's why we issued a message. Additionally, we had Caldwell Police Department, which we have many in attendance tonight, did something what's called mutual aid, right? So for those not familiar, when there's things that occur, whether it be a police fire, we get reach outs for mutual aid. And with such a tragic incident that that city suffered, we did send some officers. So first and foremost, I wanna give a round of applause. if we could, to the police department. And then, more specifically, you know, to our fire department, too. They've been fighting a lot of fires across, or assisting, being on standby out across the community. So that's another realm of mutual aid. And just so folks understand, there's a lot of agreements in place, and it is a challenge. Our resources are stretched thin, and I know we have a finite amount of dollars, but You know, hats off to all of the agencies. We have agencies coming from across America and the world coming to help fight these fires. So I just also want to give a round of applause to our first responders, our firefighters, for doing what they do each and every day. And let's not forget, dispatchers are required to dispatch those calls. So whether fire, EMS, you know, there's a lot of different varieties of dispatchers, local, county, state, and federal. And our EMS and all those staff that are involved and all the volunteers that have volunteered to help, people that are bringing water, food, just a variety of things. So I truly want to give a shout out. And if you get a chance, thank those, anyone you know involved with that. We're just first responders in general. So thank you. Did you have anything else? No, I just wanted to make sure you remembered the dispatchers. Yeah, dispatchers are very important, too, because you've got to get the call with that. Next on the agenda is a conflict of interest declaration. Are there any members who have a conflict of interest to declare related to tonight's agenda?

Mr. Mayor.

Councillor Denver. Aye.

The old item business with the discussion of the sewer line to the county's proposed jail site, I'm going to declare a conflict because my place of employment stands to benefit from this project if it goes forward. And I've also been involved in some discussions that the rest of city council members have not been involved in. So for that reason, if there's a vote on anything, I'll declare a conflict of interest.

Thank you, Councillor Dittenberg. And just for those in the audience or listening online, that would just be for the old business item that Councillor Dittenberg is declaring a conflict of interest. And thank you for that, Councillor Dittenberg. Next on the agenda are special presentations, with the first being from Colville Police Officer Nick Guintana on possible law enforcement collective bargaining. So with that, thank you for being here tonight. And thank you once again for all the Colville Police Officers that are in the crowd, it's wonderful seeing you here.

Sorry, I just need to figure out how this clicker works. Thank you. Mayor, thank you very much for allowing me to be on the agenda today and speak before you. Council members, thank you very much for allowing me to be here and speak in front of you. Thank you guys for your time in allowing me to present my proposal for collective bargaining for our department. Real quick to kind of go over what collective bargaining is. Essentially, it is the ability or opportunity for the police department to negotiate with the city Referencing wages benefits working hours safety and grievances processes This is this ultimately results in a binding contract with the city Hence why I'm bringing this forward so that we can have a seat at the table and negotiate with the city Why this matters is That's what I was meaning to do I'm doing it on my laptop, but why this matters is So currently, Idaho law does not allow law enforcement to collectively bargain. It is up to the discretion of the city, hence why I'm here today. It specifically allows firefighters to do that. For the collective bargaining, the collective bargaining vision for the Caldwell Police Department is to establish and maintain the Caldwell Police Department as the premier law enforcement agency within the state of Idaho and the Treasure Valley. Through selfless service, boldness, and collaboration with the city of Caldwell, The collective bargaining, Caldwell Police Officers Collective Bargaining endeavors to be an effective advocate representing Caldwell Police Department officers for the overall benefit of the city of Caldwell and its community. Mayor, I understand that your vision is to establish the city of Caldwell as a premier city within the Treasure Valley and the state of Idaho. The same thing for all of you council members here today. The same is also true for Our chief of police, I understand that he endeavors and pursues to establish the Caldwell Police Department as a premier agency in the Treasure Valley. We also desire the same thing. Unfortunately, as a result of current staffing numbers, that vision and that mission is being hindered. Currently, our staffing numbers are the following. So as of last year, I was not able to ascertain the number of sworn personnel that we were authorized for. However, this year, I understand that we were authorized from 93. We're currently at 87 filled. Of course, six vacancies as a result of that. But the point that I really want to touch up on is the number of patrol officers we currently have, which is 43. While that number sounds robust, unfortunately, it doesn't factor in light duty. It doesn't factor in mandatory training. It doesn't factor in when an officer has a child or any other extenuating circumstances that would affect patrol officers. Patrol numbers and why this matters is patrol for any agency law enforcement agency in the entirety of the country Patrol is the backbone of an agency and that ultimately affects the vision that we talked about before Primarily because it affects our response times and our ability to service our community in an effective manner as you can see down there in 2025 there was about 25,000 calls for service that only factors in proactive police activity and traffic traffic stops so the number here is is actually quite a lot, it's a lot higher. I have our data analyst Marlon Leslie here to discuss those numbers if there's any ambiguity or confusion. Year to date for the year of 2026, we are looking at over 15,000 calls for service. That ultimately obviously affects our response time. Last year you see that the response time is about seven minutes. This year it's about six minutes. Again, that's year to date. We're currently over half of, we're projected to do double the amount of calls for service this year than there were last year, which means that our response time is going to increase. So I don't want that to be misleading, a five-minute or six-minute response time. Why that matters is when our citizens, and even if you ever required law enforcement assistance, immediate law enforcement assistance, well, we don't really have the numbers. Our numbers are diminished. to effectively serve our community in a very productive manner. Again, as we were discussing, or I was discussing the statistics earlier, here are those stats that I was referencing. Overall, as you can see, from the year 2020, from the year 2022 up until this year, and again, this only factors in proactive patrols and traffic stops, we're looking at over 62,000 calls for service that we have responded to. So our officers, they're doing their job. They're responding to calls for service. However, we're being stretched thin. That's essentially what I'm saying here. Is something wrong with the clicker? Sorry. All right, moving on. So that ultimately factors in, obviously, to competitive pay. So as it stands, currently Boise, Nampa, and Coeur d'Alene, our neighbors to the north, consistently from the year 2022 to even just last year, we have been the lowest paid agency in the Valley. And why this matters is, again, we are pulling our weight. We are doing what we have to do. We are servicing our community the best way we possibly can. And our officers legitimately and genuinely love doing what they do. However, considering that Idaho is, on the national average, a higher cost of living, has a higher cost of living. And considering that the average house price in this Treasure Valley alone is around $500,000 with interest rates of about 6.6%, it's unreasonable to assume and quite literally ludicrous to assume that an officer starting at $27 an hour is capable of making a living wage and capable of supporting their family should they have a husband or a wife or children for that matter. I know that there are officers that are currently paying for groceries on a credit card I know that some officers are living paycheck to paycheck and this matters for the city of Caldwell because we are losing officers to previous agents or to other agencies. One thing I forgot to mention is the, or can you go back again back? Why, why I bring that up is again. So this year we've lost five officers recently. Recently we've lost two officers and the biggest complaint for those officers, at least as far as, being able to retain them is over workload and, of course, pay. Can you go forward again? Again. So as it stands, currently it costs about $100,000 to hire one officer, just one officer. That doesn't include Percy and insurance. So that being said, we've lost, as that previous slide has shown, we've lost five officers. That means we lost out on $500,000. And I don't know about you, gentlemen and ma'am, But if there was ever an investment that I was looking at, putting money into, and there was going to be no return on investment, I wouldn't make the investment in the first place. Next slide, please. And last but certainly not least, officer wellness. Collective bargaining ensures officer wellness and accountability via direct collaboration with officers. We're able to directly communicate with our officers and see what they need and how they need it. And then, of course, it emphasizes accountability. It ensures prompt notice to an officer of any allegation with an opportunity to respond. This matters because a 21-year-old academy graduate steps out of the academy in arguably the most dangerous profession in the country. I would argue to say on the world. And not just that, but the most amount of authority with the most, and I'm very certain on this, with the most amount of liability. A 21-year-old officer is legally liable, is civilly liable, and then, of course, politically liable. We have seen what happened over the last several years when it comes to officers. And so establishing a collective bargaining association or just that agreement with the city allows us that representation to just be treated fair and reasonable. And finally, collective bargaining will establish procedures for employee grievances and allow our employer, allow our supervisors a reasonable opportunity to respond adequately. And members of the collective bargaining, or at least of the association or of our organization, would be obliged to adhere to that. So today, I say thank you again for your time. And I would hope that you would genuinely consider collective bargaining for our department. Thank you. Do any of you have any questions?

Just to confirm, that was your last slide.

That's correct, yes.

Okay. Thank you for your presentation. It definitely is an important topic. And having previously worked at Colville Police Department, thank you guys each and every day for what you do. Thank you. It's a lot, especially for the pay, the hours, all you guys have to put up with. So hats off to you each and every day. And thank you for your service to the city. With that, Councilor Stoddard.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Just curious bottom line is you folks want to get the same pay as Boise or what are you looking at?

So what I can guarantee for you, mr Static as long as I'm at least able to have a say in it That is not what we're looking to do whatsoever I think that is absolutely unreasonable and unfair to the taxpayers of our city To suggest that we are looking to be paid at the same level as Boise is entirely Or at least for us it would be very unfair and unreasonable and we are not looking by any means to to drain our taxpayers at all of their hard-earned money at all. We just want to be at the same level as our neighbors. That's it. And at least provide some sort of living wage where our $27 an hour entry-level officer is getting paid in a manner or in a level where they can at least maintain their cost of living so that they're not paying for groceries with their credit card or they're not living paycheck to paycheck or they're not having to fight over overtime to try to get paid a little bit more

The reason I ask that is because you had Boise, Napa, Coeur d'Alene up there comparing to Caldwell, so I just assumed maybe what about Napa then? Are you expected to say is Napa relative to population size because they have a lot more people than we do?

Yes, sir. I understand that, but however, this slide did not factor in the growth of the city. So I believe, if I'm not mistaken, because of Caldwell, well, just Caldwell in general, it's, I believe, the fastest growing city in the state of Idaho. And I might add, too, that even our vice president of our country is absolutely in favor of collective bargaining and has very much been an advocate for that.

Like I say, usually there's a reason for collective bargaining. That's because people aren't satisfied with what they're getting. That's the bottom line. And that's why I ask you, you know, which city do you want us to compare you to relative to pay and all the other things that are important to you?

So to guarantee you, sir, if you guys are absolutely satisfied We'll approve this. We can absolutely hire a professional market analyst or something to that effect to conduct a professional, forgive me.

Consultant or analysis?

Yes, yes. Something to that effect, yes. And that way we can ensure that all of you gentlemen and ma'am, Are able to get a very thorough market analysis?

for us to make reasonable adjustments and I guess the last question is that You know relative to time spent and the overtime and the you know a lot of times Benefits aren't included in what you're asking for so the amount of money you're asking for does that Include the benefits are you are you saying that the benefits aren't good enough either? What are you saying there?

What I'm saying, sir, is that currently as it stands, we do not have the staffing number to support. I mean, let me correct myself. We do not have the staffing number, sir, and we're losing personnel to other agencies because of where we're currently at as far as wages, benefits, and so forth. Other agencies are gutting our police department. And if any of our community members were in a life or death situation, six minutes, seven minutes response time, That is not sufficient. When seconds matter, that's not efficient at all.

Because we were looking at budgets this year. I know that the Chief Ingram and the operational cadre gave up their raises so you guys would have more money. And I don't know if you knew that or not. Yes, sir.

So the chief, I commend the chief absolutely. He's done a good job in doing that. However, while that happened this year, if we look at the historics, again, hence why I can go back to that slide, please. IF WE MENTION, IF WE GO BACK TO HISTORICS, WE HAVE HISTORICALLY BEEN, COMPETITIVE PAY, PLEASE.

I'M JUST TRYING TO FIND TO SEE OR KIND OF FIGURE OUT WHAT YOUR BOTTOM LINE IS AS FAR AS COMPARISON TO COLWELL VERSUS OTHER CITIES. THAT'S USUALLY WHERE IT'S AT.

SO, YEAH, SO I FULLY UNDERSTAND YOUR POINT, SIR, AND THANK YOU FOR YOUR LINE OF QUESTIONING. HOWEVER, AGAIN, IF WE REFERENCE HISTORICS, HISTORICALLY SPEAKING, WE HAVE BEEN THE LOWEST PAID AGENCY IN THE VALLEY. Again, going back to how much it costs for us to hire a new officer, about $100,000, where the city is footing the bill of $100,000 plus to hire one officer only to lose them to another agency because pay is so low.

Well, I think that's why we went out of our way for the last three, four years to try and bring us back up to something that's reasonable relative to pay. And, you know, it all gets back to what's available for tax money.

Yes, sir. And that's something that we as a collective bargaining organization would absolutely work with the city on. We would absolutely work with the city on that. I'd like to say we would approach it very reasonably and so forth. But at the end of the day, sir, if our staffing numbers continue to diminish, especially patrol, which is the backbone of every agency, then ultimately our community members will suffer for it because we just don't have the numbers. Case in point, last week there was two calls that came in back to back. One call was a man who was who was experiencing cardiac arrest in downtown. And then following that, there was another man who was found deceased. That completely diminished our team at that time. A couple of weeks ago, on a double squad day for Wednesday, I believe there was that incident where two officers were injured. And then following that, there was a traffic accident that completely killed that squad. And so our ability to respond to calls for service took a hit, a profound hit. And if someone was, let's say, experiencing a robbery or some other sort of domestic chaotic event, our ability to respond to that wouldn't have been sufficient, dare I say, probably at all, unless other additional officers were available. So while I understand the concern is primarily about pay, I bring up pay only because the retention of officers Is it's not there. We're not really able to retain officers because of the pay and ultimately that bleeds into our ability to service our community Do you have a racial Number of police officers per thousand I do not Unfortunately, I do not have that at this time. However, I have no problem getting that to you in the future. Okay.

Thank you Cricker if I'm wrong, I believe it's one per 1,000 for the Pam

I don't know that but one yeah, the police allocation point.

Yeah.

Yeah, just The reason I ask is I just was curious where they had another number different than what we're usually hearings.

Yes Thank You counselors thought of your questions comes Williams Nick thanks for being here and thank you for going to twin And being part of that mutual aid. Yes, sir You you and I have known each other for a while and we certainly agree on much more than we might disagree on so If my questions appear to be contrarian, I don't intend for them to be.

Yes, sir.

Were you able to... I didn't see you at any of the budget hearings. Were you able to go through them on video?

I looked at a few of them, but I would be lying if I said that I reviewed the entirety of the budget hearings. I do understand, however, that our budget is very tight. But again, this is... Our collective bargaining association would not bleed our citizens dry or the city at all dry of its resources of what we acquire. This is something that we would absolutely work with the council on and we endeavor to work with the council on. If we go back to the mission statement, can you please go back to the mission statement? We all share the same vision. We all share the same vision from the mayor down to all of you council members down to our chief of police. We all share the same vision, and that's to establish the city of Caldwell and the Caldwell Police Department as a premier agency and city within the Treasure Valley and in the state. And by doing that, we do that through collaboration with the council and with the mayor and whomever else is necessary to do that collaboration with.

So are you aware that your chief asked for extra things for you that this council wasn't able to give, like incentive pay?

I understand that the chief has absolutely endeavored to do that for the body. However, I would also like to add to that our chief has other chief duties, whatever they are, to attend to. And if we can lighten his load a little bit more and advocate for ourselves, because we know what we need down at the ground level. And that's not to say that our chief is disconnected by any means. However, he has many other things that he needs to address himself.

Nick, I hear what you're saying, but it's not connecting with me simply because we're not talking about the same thing here. What would we have done differently this year?

What would you have changed in this year's budget? Councilman, thank you for your line of questioning. However, I do want to divert back to what I was stating to Councilman Static here, that while this year our chief was able to obtain a $2 raise for us, historically speaking, if you can go back to the competitive pay scale, historically speaking, The police department has gotten the bare bones of anything, if I'm being totally blunt here. And that's not to suggest by any means that the city is not doing their part. However, that is to say that historically speaking,

it comes to competition we're just we're not even in the race but we don't have the money to do what you're asking us to nick i mean we we we have a general fund that we have to divide between essentially public service and and streets i'm super minimizing it but but where would we get the money from to do even to do uh even if we were to match nampa and say nick you've got it we're going to match nampa where would we get the money from well councilman again that is something that we would need to deliberate in the future

But I also want to emphasize, too, that this is not primarily about pay. Can you fast forward to the last slide? This is also about officer wellness and accountability. Officers, if we are at least somewhere in the running, morale will improve. Now, I don't know about you. If I ever needed an officer to my house, I would like an officer who has high morale, who hasn't been stretched in, to respond to my need if necessary. And I would venture to say that any one of these These community members would also would like the same thing. They deserve the best possible police service that they can possibly receive because their taxes pay for us. And it's as simple as that. Again, I want to emphasize the wellness and accountability of officers as a result of this. That is why I'm pursuing collective bargaining.

I think you would agree that I have an interest in officer wellness and might have even had something to do with that over the years. What is the FOP's response to this? Because the community needs to know we have an FOP. I realize that's a little different, but what has been your FOP's response to this? Is there somebody from the FOP here that could speak for the FOP or is that a separate issue?

So the FOP currently, as it stands, for the last several decades, the FOP had an opportunity to advocate for officers in a grand or in a more robust way. However, the FOP has not been doing that. And currently, as it stands, what I'm specifically What I'm specifically presenting is collective bargaining for our department. Whether that's through the Fraternal Order of Police or another organization, be it the Caldwell Police Officers Association, makes no difference to me. As far as the FOP goes, if collective bargaining is approved for the FOP, then I would present my candidacy for president of the FOP. And I would completely look to rehaul the FOP so that we can actually have effective collective bargaining for our police department.

Nick, again, please. Don't take offense to my questions. I'm not, sir. I'm concerned because as much as I would give you everything you're asking for, we just don't have the revenues to do it. And so to even enter into this assumes that we didn't do our best to bargain this year for the most we could do for you. And trust me, we tried really hard to get more, and there just isn't more water in the well. But thank you for being here tonight. Thank you for... your colleagues that are here as well, and again, appreciate everything you've done.

Thank you, sir. I appreciate your dialogue.

Just to inquire before we proceed, Councilor Allgood, would Council like a member or members of the FOP to come up now or after you finish your questions with Officer Quintana?

I'm fine with Nick here.

Okay.

Thank you very much.

Councilor Allgood. Thank you, Councilor Williams.

Just a couple of things. You're doing a great job. Thank you, sir. It takes a lot to be up here, and the fact that you are answering these hard questions is very admirable of you.

Thank you very much, sir.

Another thing, when you talked about losing an officer, an officer costs about $100,000 to replace. Yes, sir. You also lose a body for six months while that officer's in police academy. That's correct, sir. Field training. That's correct. You got six months. You're paying this guy. It's not of a value to the public. That's absolutely correct, sir. He's still learning how to find his way around town.

Yes, sir.

Secondly, I just want to clear up for the public, and we probably have a little bit different view on this, but you listed all these agencies that have incentives, but Caldwell did not. That's correct, sir. Caldwell has longevity. Caldwell has certification pay. And I'm sure there's after-hours incentives and things like that that we haven't met, but we do have some incentives. Am I correct?

So what I'm referencing as far as incentive goes, Officers, let's say, I'll give you a very clear example, the SWAT division or even the detective division. Specifically, we'll talk about SWAT. SWAT is required to not only attend mandatory training for the police department as a whole, SWAT is also required to be on standby. SWAT is also required to respond to any sort of tragic emergency, be it this agency or any agency that's overwhelmed, and we have MOUs for, Memorandums of Understandings for. And so that being said, When those officers are assigned to a special weapons and tactics unit, I believe it's conducive to the overall officer to remain in that unit, especially because of the profound need for us to have a SWAT division. We can talk about detectives as well. Detectives are over, we'll be totally blunt here, are very much being saturated with workload. We've actually lost a detective recently because of workload and because of the lack of pay. Great, great detective. Very hard worker. I would absolutely admonish her all day long. And so when I reference incentive pay, I'm referencing paying an officer or incentivizing them to remain in that specialized unit. Longevity pay incentivizes or it ensures an officer stays because of the time that they put in with with our department, with our agency. However, even with longevity pay, we are still losing officers to other agencies. So while I understand that we do have longevity pay, I mean, we can take a look at Boise, and please don't get this confused, Councilman Stoddick. Again, I don't want, I'm looking to be fair, but we can look at Boise and many officers, I know of one now currently who put in an application for Boise. And so, again, while I understand, Councilman Williams, I completely agree with you. Yes, the budget is tight, 100%. However, we are willing to absolutely negotiate with the city and with the council and see where we can find a happy medium for our officers.

Just a couple more things. Is this project you're working on supported by any union?

No, currently as it stands. So the collective bargaining that I'm pursuing is one to just see if, if you guys would allow us to have a seat at the table. And if you are, okay, great. Then we can see what happens from there. However, as it currently stands, I'm just pursuing collective bargaining for our department because I don't think it's ever been pursued before.

And then one last question for you. Yes, sir. When you're discussing bargaining, what phases of your work do you want to bargain on? do you have an idea of the things you would like to be able to bargain on?

Absolutely. Number one would be pay. Because we are losing so many officers because of the pay, that is something that we need to incentivize officers to, or at least increase for officers to stay with us so that we are not continually wasting money in training officers. More than that, I'm sorry, I just lost my train of thought. What things would you like to bargain? Definitely pay. Definitely I would like to look at officer wellness and accountability and see what that looks like, a grievance process for sure, and ensure that our officers are adhering, obliging to this grieving process so that our supervisors can absolutely have the opportunity to respond to a grievance in a good faith manner. And the same thing goes for an allegation against an officer. Again, I've stated previously that a 21-year-old graduate out of the academy has more liability than I would say probably the most liability out of any profession anywhere. Maybe, I hope that doesn't come off as pretentious or arrogant. However, the reality is true. And I think over the last decade, that's proven itself to be the reality, to be the matter of fact, rather than it being speculation. Thank you. Appreciate your presentation. Yes, sir.

Thank you, Councilor Allgood. Anything else from Council President Register?

Thank you for coming. I know this is very scary sometimes. You finally said it and I was waiting for you to say it. I think this is more than about money It's more about having a seat at the table and being able to have those discussions So I want to talk about that a little bit because they think you're very well aware that we the money we have is the money We have we can't pull money out of thin air, right? Regardless if we allow negotiations or not correct what I would encourage my fellow councillors It was not very long ago that we sat down with the fire department for half a day and talked about a district and we gave that Conversation the time that it deserved. I don't know that you're gonna have the time tonight That this conversation actually deserves so I'm wondering if that would be something that we could do is to schedule in a workshop what we did with the fire department is we just didn't give it a timetable and we have the we asked the questions and got the answers and something that we can prepare for to have an actual conversation. Because I honestly don't think this all comes down to money. I think the police department typically has safeguards in place for their training investments. Like, do we still hold officers accountable to a contract?

Yeah, so this is another big reason for my advocacy regarding collective bargaining. Yes, officers would absolutely be obliged, legally bound, to adhere to the contract, especially as it relates to grievance processes. And then, of course, officers being allowed the opportunity to have some sort of representation when an allegation is being made against them. And, again, that is solely to highlight and emphasize reasonableness and fairness for our officers who already execute a job or a profession.

But we have a contract that requires them to stay with the police department for so long. Is that correct?

I'm sorry. I didn't hear that.

Do we have a contract that requires them to stay with the police department for so long?

Are you referencing? Like new hires? No, not that I'm aware of. And that is something I'm very glad you brought that up. That is something that I would have liked to discuss with the council as well.

So that would be another thing that we would want to talk about if we had a workshop. I know years ago we had an officer that got hired, quit, got hired, quit, got hired, quit. And it is very expensive. And so I think we did institute a contract at some point. So I don't know. if that went away, but I think it was to protect from those things.

Yes, I'm firmly in agreement with you. I do believe that a new hire coming onto the agency or even a lateral officer coming onto the agency, if we're able to orchestrate and establish a retention contract, then that's something that I would absolutely advocate for so that way we're not continually wasting money hiring new officers, going back to your point.

So those are the kinds of things, too, that a collective bargaining outfit can Talk about right. So those are the kind it's not just about your pay and I don't want to get it focused just on that because then it becomes Sort of an impossible conversation, but there's all these other things that you could do But I think having a seat at the table is one of those things that the police department has never had and that's coming from somebody who's worked at an agency without collective bargaining and an agency with collective bargaining and it makes a big difference and

That's correct.

The other thing I think it's important to point out is that during this process, you can build in protections such as no-strike policies, that if you can't come to an agreement, you're going to work off your prior contract. You may have to give something up to get something more. That's absolutely correct. Right. So it's not just about coming in and saying, we want this much money per hour. It's about you coming in and negotiating, too.

That's exactly what I'm pursuing here. Thank you.

And the fire department gets that, and I've always thought it was unfair that the police department didn't. And I'll tell you that when my husband was hired at Caldwell Police, I believe he was hired at $17.17 an hour. And when I went to dispatch at Napa Police, I was making more than him to start, and I was probably making $10 more than him when he died. And that, to me, seems insane to try to rectify. So, again, money is money. We cannot make it come out thin air however we are consistently asking our first responders and public safety both police and fire to do more with less and they feel like if we continue to do that and we don't we can't collect more property taxes and we can't increase your pay there should be something that we should be able to offer you and giving you a seat at the table is one of those things that doesn't cost anything so I want to make sure I hit all my points here So let me just make sure here. I also agree that I think that those kind of organizations do help with morale because it does give a certain sense of, I don't know if protection is the right word, but if you do have some sort of issue that you need a stronger association or a stronger FOP or however it is that you're going to build that into there, that helps I think the officer and civilian staff do their job better because they're not constantly afraid that they're going to get trampled on by, you know, and they're going to be treated fairly. And I think we can agree that people leave for other reasons besides just money, and those kinds of things could be addressed in these things too. So what I would like to see is if the council is agreeable is to have a longer conversation about this. Thank you. You maybe have some more research put together. We can formulate questions. You can get those answered, and we have a real conversation and not a 10-minute presentation, although I think you did a good job.

Thank you very much, ma'am.

So that would be what I would ask our council to do. And I guess something they would have to either nod and say they would be willing to show up or not, and then the mayor would have to probably come together with you to get a date and time and all that kind of stuff.

Thank you, Councilor Register. Anything else from Council? All right, well, unless anyone objects to a future workshop, I do fully support having continued conversation about this. Thank you. Obviously, as I told you, there's a lot of nuts and bolts to work out, and ultimately, at the end of the day, it's up to the will of the Council. You know, there may be some give and take, and at the end of the day, it's their decision, their legislative body. So with that, unless anyone objects, we can look at a future date and time meeting obviously we have work schedules to figure out and a variety of things but um thank you for your presentation tonight thank you very much thank you for all you guys do there's a lot of course we wish we could pay you boise wages we had that kind of money um we'd love to but we don't but with that we appreciate each um and every one of you and what you all do for city of caldwell protecting us each and every day so hats off again to you guys thank you gals very much All right, with that, the next item on the agenda is a monthly update from the Colwell Economic Development Director, Dan Torres. And thank you for being here tonight. And Council, just as a reminder, Director Collins had previously provided one of these presentations, so we're starting that back up just to bring you guys some updates and look forward to hearing from you.

Thank you, Mayor and Council. This is my first time to do this presentation to you. Couple thoughts, though. It is good to be back in Idaho. I started in April. I would say it was a breath of fresh air, but the last week has been difficult. I'd like to report that the conversations that I've had in the community from the outside have been refreshing. The one anecdotal story, I met with a group out of Corvallis, Oregon, and they were excited to open a branch office here in Caldwell. Some of the comments was, this reminds me of, in their words, of Oregon before things got a little sideways there. Um, I, I think we're, we're seeing that I think that's indicative of what, uh, what people are saying about Caldwell, um, in meeting with, uh, local, uh, re regional developers. Um, they're excited, uh, to, to be in Caldwell and I've appreciated on a personal note, the conversations I had with, with the majority of council, um, in the months of my kind of my onboarding economic development, um, reports, I think are a little bit. problematic in that we often can't divulge information. It's not because anything is secret, but it's more because it's confidential. But I think as we progress through these over the months and years, we'll find that correct cadence to let you know what's going on. As always our door is always open to To answer any questions that you guys might have about what's happening in Caldwell, but we do Have the practice of signing non-disclosure agreements with larger requests for informations or requests for proposals But we will do our best to let you know of the information that that is happening Briefly, the presentation's going to have a little bit of talking about what is economic development, a simple monthly business update, a little information on economic trends that we're tracking in the economic development department, and also an update on some projects that we're doing. So what is economic development? So my department consists of myself, Philly, and Brian. We have a... A concerted effort with business retention and expansion to support local businesses. That's Brian's job. Ophelia has been a great asset helping me understand everything that's going on. But her primary duty involves working with the Urban Rural Agency. Our professional organization is called the International Economic Development Council. And they define economic development as the intentional effort to impose and to improve a community's economic well-being and quality of life. And that's something that I take very seriously. economic development doesn't have the ability to tell any any one department what to do however we find ourselves being the spokesman and kind of the front door of the city and my experience so far in Caldwell has been very good we have a very competent professional staff our public works director received some great kudos from our regional economic development partner and it's been refreshing to be able to work with them and also to rely on their professionalism and Oftentimes we find that the complaints aren't necessarily as two-sided as they can be. They usually try to present a one-sided narrative. And the last couple things that we've had brought to our attention, we were able to work through with our public works department, and it was nice to see that the problem wasn't on our end. But economic development is about empowering the private sector to do what they do best and to help the city sometimes understand where we might be standing in the way, where there might be some impediments. And we really want to create that environment to create, retain, and expand employment, to build individual and business wealth, to strengthen the diversity of the tax base, and to create conditions in which businesses and communities can remain competitive and prosper. One of the things that I have tracked in my conversations with the members of council is the desire Um, to expand our tax base and tax, I feel sometimes as a four letter word, but it is necessary to, to fund the improvements in the services of the city needs, uh, to make a livable community for its residents. Um, and our job in economic development is to, to help spur that, um, working with, uh, the community development department. We, I've provided a list here of 12 businesses that uphold, uh, business permits, um, in the month of June through the end of July. One of the things that I have tracked is this is probably not a comprehensive list in that the compliance for pulling business permits or licenses I don't think is as robust as it could be. Not that we're looking to be regulatory, but there are so many ways that the city touches a business through LIFE SAFETY VISITS, THROUGH POLICING, THROUGH CODE COMPLIANCE TO MAKE SURE THAT USES ARE COMPLIANT WITH THE ZONING CODE, THAT WE REALLY DO WANT TO MAKE SURE THAT WE HAVE AS LIGHT A TOUCH WITH BUSINESS AS POSSIBLE. BUT DOING SOME RESEARCH, GOING BACK AS FAR AS OUR PERMITTING SYSTEM, has data, I've only tracked about 879 unique businesses. And a city the size of Caldwell should have a more robust business base. And so one of the things that we're going to be doing is doing a more conservative effort to reach out to businesses to get them into compliance, but also to bring a value add to them. Every time we talk to a business, we're taking time out of their day where they should be working on their business. We want to make sure that those are meaningful visits, and I'll share a little bit later in this presentation some of the data that we feel we can help businesses understand better. Some projects that we've been working on as we've started to, well, as I've started to get my feet under me, We really want to bring to council data-driven market analysis so you can understand what's happening not just in Caldwell but also regionally. We want to develop an economic development toolkit. We heard a little bit earlier today about urban renewal. Urban renewal is one tool that we have. I want to be able to bring to council and in our conversations with the development community and businesses a comprehensive agreed upon set of tools that can be applicable, that can be applied with fairness and transparency to help increase Caldwell's competitive advantage. We've been working with business and expansion efforts. We've been working heavily with the Caldwell Urban Rural Agency. We've been working with downtown tourism community identity primarily through the Chamber of Commerce and through Destination Caldwell. And we're working to define and create professional communications, presentations, and decision-supported documents. Please feel free to ask any questions as I'm going through this. Some data. So this is a inflow-outflow graphic provided by a service that's a combination of the Census Bureau and I want to say the Treasury Department. But it tracks, it lags a couple of years in the past, but what it shows is the number of employees in Caldwell. And if you were to sum that number, it was about 30,579 tracked employees that are working in the workforce in Caldwell. Of those, 5,596 remain, work and live in Caldwell. We import 15,364 workers to Caldwell, but we export 24,983 people. That has impacts on our services, on our roads. It has an impact on where these people, where these residents spend their money. Sometimes it's easy to pick something up on the way to or out or from work. Those are dollars lost for us. While those are significant numbers, I view them as an opportunity to capture and promote employment within Caldwell. Go to the next one. One of the tools that we have in the economic development department is a a service called Placer AI. They aggregate cell phone data and through their algorithms kind of extrapolate what people are doing. One of the things that we're tracking is for the last 12 months, if you take Caldwell, which has, I think, compass puts our population right around 80,000 people. They say that there was 21 million trips within 30 miles outside of Caldwell to spend money on retail. And I can provide additional details if you want. And these are averages. They don't track everything. They track what they track. And they don't track every category in in those visits, but for what they do track they They project that 101 million dollars is spent Missing some some commas in there, but it's about 101 million dollars that is spent outside of Caldwell And that's a significant number and again I see that as a as a positive in that that's 101 million dollars that we should be able to attract in here and we're starting to see that and We see the Fred Meyers that's going up on 2026. That's indicative of the outside world recognizing that there is a commercial base here that needs to be tapped, that retail services should be provided here. In addition to that, we are working to create and develop an economic development strategic plan. And the thought here is to create a clear and coordinated framework Um, that council can, I'd like to bring this to council so we could agree on that will help guide our economic development efforts. We want to be welcoming to any business, most businesses, that want to call Caldwell its home. But we do think that there are certain businesses that we should give a little bit more emphasis to. And those would be businesses that align with our economic strengths, that provide a living wage. And when we look at investment, that help to provide a more stable tax base for the city. So right now, this plan is being vetted through some department heads. And the mayor's office at a certain point I'd like to bring this and as a work meeting agendas to the council to have your buy-in and to get some consensus with that But that is my economic development report for this month.

I will stand for any questions Thank You councillor static Thank You mr. Mayor Mr. Torres if you were king for a day, what type of business would you concentrate on?

well, I would abdicate because I don't believe in Kings, but I So I inherited a very good economic development program from my predecessor within the The comprehensive plan, there's certain industries that are outlined or identified. One of the things that I did was I did something called a location quotient, and what that does is it looks at what a city should have, and you look at either higher or lower if you have a higher propensity business base, higher or lower than what the average is. That tells you what you should be looking at. Um, I don't have a specific one, but what I have, what we've identified is, um, obviously we talked about the airport. Uh, let me see. I think that aviation is, is a key, um, sector food and agriculture will always be, uh, important Caldwell advanced manufacturing, healthcare, higher education, professional services, tourism, and local, uh, serving retail.

Okay. Next question. Which projects. bring in the higher tax base versus services rendered? What type of business?

It really depends.

Residential or commercial industrial? I'll make it simple for you.

If you're looking just at dollars, it's anything that invests in a property tax base. In Idaho, we do not collect sales tax directly. It's indirect. And I think often we overlook that at a municipal level, and we say that sales tax doesn't matter. It does matter because sales tax at a very high level is a combination of population, assessed value, and spend. So money spent in Caldwell doesn't directly affect us, but it affects the state, but we get that back. The other piece of that is, let me call it, can't talk. The residents, you need rooftops to support any type of business. If we don't have those, people won't locate their business here. As an antidote, we had a conversation with one of the industrial developers here. His comment was, if I don't have, this is a great location, but where are my workers? So it's not as simple a question as A, B, or C. They're inextricably intertwined.

Well, let me ask you this, then. If you had a subdivision that went in that had, I'll say, 50,000 residents on their tax rolls, and you had, say, five commercial companies come in, which tax base would return the city more, the residential or the commercial?

I can't answer that without knowing some more specifics. But I would say, well, I don't have the data to answer that.

Commercial would be, in case you're wondering. Relative to your graph on leakage, I think that's a good graph that tells us that we better be concentrating more on commercial industrial versus residential. I mean, if you believe your graph. Right?

Yep.

Do you agree with that?

I do agree. And let me back up a second. So one of the reasons I'm equivocating is I'm looking through. One of the things that I have acquired since I've come here is a software called Data Impact. And it has a residential component to it. And I guess I'm running it through with my mind. Yes, on the face of it, commercial is important, right? But it's the spend and it's the ancillary benefits that comes from residential people living in the city that is hard to quantify. In one of my previous jobs, I was in charge of the census outreach for 2020, for the 2020 census. And it was interesting, the number there that's indirectly attributed to old It's directly but indirectly attributed to population. When you look at state funds, federal funds, what they bring back to public emergency services through grants, through Department of Justice, et cetera, it's directly tied to population. And I feel like I'm... HARPING ON POPULATION, I DON'T WANT YOU TO THINK THAT I'M SAYING IT'S ALL ABOUT RESIDENTIAL GROWTH. IT'S NOT. WHAT I WANT TO EMPHASIZE, IT NEEDS TO BE A BALANCED APPROACH. BECAUSE WHEN YOU PUT THE BRAKES ON ONE OR EMPHASIZE ONE, THE OTHER ONE EVENTUALLY SLOWS DOWN. SO IT'S AN INTERESTING BALANCE THAT WE ARE TRYING TO ACHIEVE HERE. AND SORRY, I'M TALKING A LITTLE BIT LONG HERE. BUT THAT'S WHAT THE VALUE OF OUR COMPREHENSIVE PLAN AND OUR ENTITLEMENTS ARE. is if we have done our job as your staff and as the council, then those things are in balance. And that's why it's important that we, as much as possible, follow those land use recommendations so we can maintain that equilibrium.

Okay. Talk about your balance. What's your ratio then, residential versus commercial? What's more healthy?

I don't have that, but I'd be happy to do some research and answer that for you. And I would say it's unique to every community, but I'd be happy to do some research on that.

Thank you Thank You councillor static council president register.

I just have one question Um, where do you think our best focus is for commercial like what areas?

Well, we did present the airport the proposed Urinal district around the airport. I think that's a strategic long-term play on I think Councilman Allgood asked about the U-Stick interchange. Leveraging that location would be important for our long-term health of the city to increase connectivity and also to have a commercial corridor and employment center that's easily accessible. It doesn't put strain on the existing accesses across I-84. The downtown remains a phenomenal asset. In that, lends itself to the authenticity of Caldwell. It's something that Caldwell does not have, or not Caldwell, that the other cities across the valley and region do not have. We field calls from across the country, and I think there's a group from Oregon coming later this month that wants to find out about our downtown. And so it would be that, also our Karchner corridor, as we continue to see that develop.

okay yeah because i think um a lot of people have noticed you know there's more now to caldwell than just the downtown so um carter 21st 2026 you stick all of those are in your You're watching them?

They are. OK. And again, one of the goals of the strategic plan is to help us identify and prioritize those. Another thing I didn't mention was our northern kind of industrial corridor around our northern district. As that continues to develop, that's going to be a key employment center and a driver of growth, tax growth.

didn't catch where you said that was so i'm still learning our town so i apologize um but our northern urban rural district is on i think it's on 44. okay thank you thank you council president register anything else from council all right thank you for that update and we look forward to next month this will be a monthly update probably not quite so extensive which great job by the way i'm not saying it like that but Just still have new businesses and such. You guys did a phenomenal job, and thank you for your expertise. So expect that every first meeting unless you just happen to not be here. Then we'll have a second. With that, the next item on the agenda is a program review of the Idaho Conservation Corps. The City of Caldwell's Forester, Mr. Corey Davis, will discuss the basics of the program and take questions. We appreciate you being here tonight and the wonderful young folks that are with you.

Mr. Mayor and council members, thank you for having me here tonight. I'm Corey Davis, your city forester. Thank you for your time this evening. I'm here with some members of the Idaho Conservation Corps, or ICC as we'll call them, and they'll be giving a brief presentation after I speak here. It's been my pleasure to work with the ICC since the beginning of my employment with the city less than a year ago. It's been a distinct honor and pleasure to work with various crews on a lot of different projects throughout the city. Without their help, which is totally free to the residents of Caldwell, by the way, many of our routine urban forestry tasks would simply go undone. They've been a huge help in our ongoing citywide tree inventory. They've maintained trees in several of our parks, and they've eradicated various invasive species throughout our parks, among many other things. And from a purely economic perspective, this work is is directly quantifiable and is no small sum. From the socioeconomic and ecological standpoint, the numbers are a little harder to crunch, but by no means insignificant. And they're representative of the incredible value proposition put forth by the ICC. Due to the nascent overall compact nature of my division, which is really just me, ICC is doing the lion's share of the urban forestry work in Caldwell. And it's for this reason that I bring them forward in front of you guys tonight for, um, a little recognition to laud their efforts and to just give them the kudos that they deserve. So, um, with that, I'll bring up the crew and Claire and Charles, they've come from Nampa where they just got off work, uh, at about five 30, I think. So they're here in their work clothes to give a brief presentation about the work they do and, uh, Yeah, super happy to introduce these guys. It's been awesome working with them. So thank you guys for coming out. I'll take a seat and let you take over. Thank you.

Yeah, thank you again for having us. My name is Claire Delay, and I oversee all of our urban programming here in the Treasure Valley. So I want to go to the next slide. Thank you. Just a little bit about what our mission is. Here at Idaho Conservation Corps, we want to provide a challenging education and job training experience to help young people We work with youth and young adults 15 to about 30. And most of these, all of these people in front of you are AmeriCorps members. So they get to work and learn that. And we want to just help them gain the skills in all of the different outdoor education jobs that they can work towards. So yeah. One more slide for us, please. Thank you. And then we are a satellite office of the Northwest Youth Corps, which was founded in 1984. Here we've been running as Idaho Conservation Corps by itself. for 11 years now. We started in 2015. We have three offices in Eugene, Oregon, Tacoma, Washington, and then here. Sweet until why Corey mentioned that this work has been free for the city of Caldwell is because back in 2023, we were granted a grant for 12 million, like under the inflation reduction act and 4 million of that was allocated to the treasure Valley area. So we first started our cruise in 2024. And with that grant, we work on, according to 2020 census data, what was called disadvantaged communities. So with that, we started back in 2024 and we have the funding list for about five years. So we have about a year and a half left under the grant for the money that we have allocated for the Treasure Valley. And then, yeah, just kind of a little bit what we do and like what this grant was for was to create a healthy urban forest here and work with young people to get out and working on it to clean for cleaner air, cleaner water, less energy consumption and all of that just in our communities ourselves. So we work in Caldwell, City of Nampa, City of Meridian, and then all around Boise as well with many different partners. Yeah, this is what this crew here has worked with this season. They are actually next week is their last week of their 13-week program. So we run them just for 13. And these crews right here are able to get a chainsaw certification, which is why they've been working in Curtis Park for the last year. Next week, they'll work again, but for five weeks total this summer of their session here in Caldwell. And then I'm going to bring Charles up to talk about exactly what this crew has done. Hi, Charles. Thank you.

Hi, everyone. Yeah, so this session, we've done a lot of work all over the valley. We've done a lot of mulching, especially in Nampa. We're actually doing that this week. It's been very fun. Some pruning out in Boise, some Caldwell, I think, Meridian, yeah, all over. A lot of chipping, so much chipping, especially at Curtis Park. We are removing a bunch of Russian olive, and we have been just dispersing it throughout the park. Yeah, we've done some tree surveying, a lot of tree surveying, some storm cleanup around Boise, a lot of invasive plant and tree removal. Russian olive was the We've also targeted some houndstongue, and I think that's it this session. And a little bit of biocontrol, and that was with Fish and Game out near Emmett. We had gall mites attacking White Top, which has been really fun. So just to get more into what we've done to the city of Caldwell, this crew, since November of 2025, we've ran two young adult crews One was a six-month crew that ended in May, and this one started in late May. Since then, we have removed 330 trees from Rotary Pond and Curtis Park, majority being Russian olive. There are a few dead smaller ones, a couple ones that weren't doing so well that we removed. But Russian olives are important to get rid of because they are highly invasive. They do really well in our arid environment. They have a huge taproot that goes way down, and they'll just take over an entire area. We have some before and after photos that we'll get to that are pretty crazy to see. We've also inventoried 3,329 trees all across the city using a database called Tree Plotter. And that's been some of our youth crews, right? That hasn't been just this crew.

And that number's gone up as of today. We have youth crews working on the street trees inventorying them.

Awesome. With the Russian olive, we have also carefully applied herbicide to the stumps of them just to ensure that they hopefully do not come back. If you guys skip over to the next slide, we have some before and after photos. So the first two were from Rotary Pond. That was our long form session back in around November. There were a lot there. That's honestly where most of our numbers came from. Rotary Pond had a huge amount. And I am very proud to say that those are no longer there. We've removed all trees surrounding the pond. We've been surveying to make sure that there aren't any sprouts again. But if there are, we'll come back and deal with them. The last slide there is, oh, sorry. Can we go back one more? Thank you. The last picture there, that's from Curtis Park. That's a before and after. There was a huge stand that we removed and put herbicide over. That was very fun. OK, thank you. Yeah, it's been our summer so far. It's been really fun. I know this crew has had an awesome time being able to work on their Sawyer skills and just urban forestry in general. So yeah, thank you guys for having us around. It's been great.

Thank you. We appreciate all that you've done, especially helping clean up Curtis Park, Lurie Park, and others. It's a lot of work, I'm sure. Appreciate you doing that. Councillor Stoddard.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I was just curious, what herbicide have you been using to kill Russian olive stumps? You know?

We've been using Tordon. Pardon me? Tordon. Tordon, okay. Supply by Corey.

Have you used that for quite a while, or is that something new on the market? Do you know?

I think it's been on the market for a while.

Okay. And what do you do? Drill holes in the stump and pour it in, or what do you do?

No, just around the new growth layer right after it's been cut.

I see.

And just a little bit in that one little layer Thank you Thank you.

You guys are static council or register.

I just wanted to thank you guys for coming by I just wanted to acknowledge how tan you are So that was I thought it was cool that you guys all came up here and you're so tan. I'm working outside.

Yeah That was it I Would agree Thank You council president register anything else from council Thank you all that you do. It's very important work. Keeps our parks and stuff looking wonderful. And hopefully you guys are able to handle the smoke outside very well and have your protective equipment. And thank you.

Thanks for having us.

With that, that concludes the special presentations tonight. So thank you for everyone that came here tonight. Next on the agenda is audience participation. This section of the agenda is reserved for citizens wishing to address accounts regarding city-related issues. Not on the agenda. Those who want to speak will have three minutes, and our clock's right up here. Comments related to public pending hearings, including decisions that may be appealed to city council or out of order and should be held for public hearing. Repeated comments regarding the same, similar topics. I'll just skip past that because we have one person. Comments regarding performance by city employees. Please direct them to me. This is not the appropriate time to make them, and we can follow up with that with either after the meeting tonight or a separate meeting, and just make an appointment with myself in order to ensure adequate public notice. Title law provides that any item other than emergencies requiring council action must be placed on the agenda of an upcoming council meeting. The council can't act on items raised during the audience participation at the same meeting, but may request additional information or that the item be placed on a future agenda. So first we're going to start off with Ms. Phyllis. And with that, once again, three minutes up here, and then Give us your name for the record.

Good evening. My name is Phyllis Estep, 2308 Terrace Drive, Caldwell, Idaho. Good evening, Mr. Mayor and council members. First, I would like to commend the members of this council who care and make decisions that actually help the citizens of Caldwell. Before the council before did not make the best decisions and didn't do a great job of taking care of Caldwell, so I'm hoping that you folks can do better. In the past, I remember some of these issues, and in that, those decisions were made by self-interest. Greed effectively neutered the mayor's decision-making and input on a lot of the council things by making him only a tie-maker, so it left him to kiss babies and shake hands. As a council, I would hope that you guys can do better. Second is for those of you who belittled and neutered the mayor That's never in the best interest. We are a group. We are not divided. We need to work together as For the last meeting you had before the hundred percent disabled veteran came before you I agree You did not care for what he had to say but for those of you who did not stand up for him and or stop the harassment, belittlement, disrespect, and humiliation that was allowed to take place in these chambers, I am ashamed of each and every one of you. Not only am I ashamed, but it was not professional, it was not judicial, it was not respectable, and it was not kind. We are better. For those of you who didn't stand up and support that veteran and say, you got your three minutes, good luck, shame on you, all of you. in this your best to do this. I know this job is hard. Listening to me gripe at you and not being able to yell at me back, I get it, okay? But I didn't run for office, you did. So stand up and be the people you were supposed to be when you were running for election. Lastly, you know, a board member that did this disrespect and offense also happens to be on the board of the Veterans Council. I would respectfully request that he resign because he doesn't deserve to support and serve the veterans of this city. We deserve better than to be treated badly. Pardon me, sir.

Thank you.

Last of all, um, and the Caldwell veterans council deserves better. They need somebody that actually cares about veterans. Besides that, I'm almost out of time. A city officer should not have to stand here and beg you for a pay increase to take care of these citizens. when you can spend $400,000 to shut up a trade. That's pathetic, it's irresponsible, and not in the best interest of Caldwell. Thank you.

All right, there's no further discussion. Sorry, no further members on the public input. Next on the agenda is a consent calendar. These are routine items that are grouped together to be approved in one motion unless a counselor moves. One or more of the items are removed from the consent calendar and considered separately. First, are there any motions to amend the consent calendar? Mr. Mayor?

Councilor Tillman? I move to remove item number nine from the consent calendar to be discussed at a future meeting.

Motion? Second. Motion to second. All right. Madam Clerk? We're voting electronically, just for those in the crowd. OK. Just confirm the motion passes 6-0. All right, I'll now entertain a motion to approve the consent calendar as amended. Mr. Mayor? Councilor Tillman?

I move to approve the consent calendar as amended. Second.

Motion and a second to approve the consent calendar as amended.

Madam Clerk?

All right, the motion carries 6-0. Do we need to take a quick break before we get into old business? Just let me go a minute. Would you like to take a quick eight to ten-minute recess?

Mr. Mayor, maybe it would be appropriate to recognize our county officials that stepped in the room before we take a break.

Yes, thank you. Both of our commissioners are here tonight and county staff, so I appreciate you being here for the meeting and our partnership together. Thank you. Would you like to take a quick recess? Yes. before we get into old business. All right, we'll take a quick 10 minute break. all right welcome back thank you for entertaining our brief break so with that we're going to move on to old business tonight there's an agenda item under old business consider a sewer line and infrastructure agreement with canyon county for their property located near highway 44 That is proposed, I would say, of a combination of things, and they can explain that. Tonight, we're going to hear first from legal and then Canyon County staff and elected officials, if you would like, to discuss the county's new location and infrastructure and development process for that. With that, we'll start with our city attorney.

Mr. Mayor, Council, just very briefly to give a little backdrop, this is an item that's been put on old business because it is a continuation of the joint meeting that took place with the county officials earlier this summer. There's been some updates and developments on their jail project that I think for them to be able to present to council, this is an opportunity. So it's listed as an action item, but the council doesn't have to take action tonight if the council chooses to continue this for a future meeting at the end of the presentation or at the end of the discussion that takes place tonight. So just with that backdrop, I'll turn it over to the county representatives.

Thank you, Oscar, for that. Would the county like to come up? Good evening, Commissioner. Thank you, Commissioner, for being here tonight.

Pardon me?

Just said thank you, Commissioner, for being here tonight.

Oh, my pleasure. For the record, I'm Chairman Brad Holton of the Canyon County Commissioners. I have with me Zach Brooks and then Rick Britton, our facilities director.

And our contractor. Andy Eales of Bennington.

So the mayor shared with us some questions that had been circulating around and we made our legal made a response back to your legal on some of the specifics. Again how we got into this is we owned Pond Lane. We still own Pond Lane. Pond Lane is in an urban renal area. You will not make a dime on that piece of property if the county builds at Palm Lane. So your prior mayor came and asked us to start looking. We went through this whole general this whole discovery. They had two other properties that the city brought to us. Both of them had significant failures that didn't even meet the requirements that Palm Lane was able to meet. I had Commission or councilman static call me about how the highway 44 property came about Highway 44 property was targeted by our solid waste For decades for the last 10 years we've been on off trying to negotiate the purchase of that property for whatever reason the owners of that property became very enthused to sell that and so it happened within a matter of days and So we didn't do that to do something secret behind the city council's purview. Its primary purpose is for a transfer station. It is big enough to either sell off the rest or do what we propose is to build the county jail there. And we would also bring up several of the other entities such as weed and pest, mosquito abatement, and several others that we would build buildings for there besides the jail is literally and the sheriff assures me of this. You don't build jails nowadays bigger than 2000 beds so it will not be bigger than that. We would choose and go to a different jail site and start construction of a different jail if if and when that comes into the future. So we hear your pain. We experience ourselves about not having enough money. We are willing to propose, and we did in response back to the letter, that we would pay for the construction and the installation of the sewer main, starting on the south side of that canal, going underneath of that canal, and making its way up into our property. We would work with, what is it called? Housing Authority We we would work we would work with them as it passes by their IR their RV site We're really excited about them being able to get that put in and and and equipped and make it all the way up to The transfer station will be our far north most Site that we're going to deal with we would pay for the installation of the of the road all of this and will be built to your standards that will be built in the county as a county project to the city of Caldwell standards because the idea and the goal is to transfer them to you in totality. So why would we build it to something you wouldn't be able to own and operate. And so we want to be sure that this is conveyed in the public that we want to do. We believe that this is can be done the cheapest way to do it to do it in the county not that the city of Caldwell is incapable of handling it. We believe that this is the least expensive to the taxpayers. Now for the city of Caldwell you are a county resident taxpayer in your city of Caldwell taxpayer for Everybody else that's outside of the city limits of Caldwell. You are a Canyon County taxpayer We all use the same County jail and if we can build it the cheapest we can possibly build it Again, we need to build it to the standards for the connection to the water to the sewer for city standards the jail We believe this is the the best dollar for performance that we can get to do it this way. Then all of these buildings, including the jail at some point in the future, but the other five buildings that we'll build, as they're built and they get occupancy, that ground, that building gets annexed in. The street will be annexed in when it's done because your sewer runs under that. You have to control that. That's your sewer. That's your water. And so that's our proposal. The letter was, who's going to build it? We already have the contractor under contract for both the design and the performance. Who's going to inspect it? It will be like any other construction project the city has done for them that they don't do, that you can either have your city come and inspect it as it's built or you can contract or we can contract with inspectors that we can assure you as it's installed and the dirt's covered over what's underground, it has been built to your specs and to your performance requirements. This is not a us and you. This is us. We are proposing to build this for the future for you and we're gonna build it down in the county and then as it gets occupied, annex it in. And so there probably is other questions. I was sure that the facility director is here because some of them were mechanical or construction questions that were in the communication. And I'm not that expert. I'm just the chairman. So I brought them along. So we're willing to stand for questions for clarification. I think that I think what we have proposed is is the best for both of us. If there's something that we're missing or there needs clarification we're more than happy. Let's talk about it and let's let's figure it out. This county desperately. Desperately needs a jail. I'm not going to go into all the specific because it doesn't need to be Aired in the public, but believe me when I see desperate I am not exaggerating so I'll leave it to you mayor Thank You commissioner appreciate the information.

Would you like to have either Bennington or your public works director talk briefly?

Sure My name is Rick Britton. I'm the public works director at the Canyon County and I just want to kind of reiterate a little bit what Commissioner Holton just stated. We have been working hand-in-hand with Benetton Construction for a while, kind of just looking at the best way of options, like for, you know, keeping the cost down and for all the taxpayers and everybody that's on this. Not only will we be working hand in hand, there were some questions like, okay, who's the design of it? We will take care of the design. We already got the designer on in contract. We already have the contractor in contract again, Benetton. Not only that, there were some questions on some right away, some easements and stuff. That will be something that Benetton and myself will work on. We'll be working through the process of okay, what easement, where is the sewer line gonna run, making sure whatever owner of the sewer line is gonna run, we have that easement approved and authorized. One of our biggest things that we're tasked with right now, as this time is kind of the issue on this, is the permitting for, to get the permitting process started for under the canal, the co-op, getting that started. The permit process takes a few months. So once we get through that, then you have a short window to bore underneath that canal. I know City of Caldwells did their water line a couple years ago under there that runs north and south. Again, we have from like November, first of November through the end of February, so you have about a three month window to get that bore in. So that's our biggest window and our biggest push for Benetton and myself is to get that permit going and getting that pushed through. That is our biggest time-sensitive area. Besides that, again, the roadway, we will oversee everything. We'll design it all. And like Commissioner Holton stated, it will be handed over to the city with the annexation. So I got Andy Els here with Bennington. He's done multiple projects for me. We are running this as CMGC. So again, they have a contract construction manager and we just work hand in hand together. So I'll hand it over. Andy has a couple. Thank you council.

Appreciate you guys. And yeah, Bennington construction, you know, familiar with the city. We've done projects with you guys too. A lot of different entities throughout the Valley. And we're the construction managers for a lot of different school districts. And we've worked with Canyon County for a long time and great, great clients of ours. and we are under contract with them to build the jail, and so that kind of facilitates the infrastructure, getting it to the project. We have a design team and engineers already contracted, so a great engineering team already in place to get this designed and going. Again, we'll be under the city standards, and we'll build it accordingly. We've done many, many projects through the valley, and, yeah, we're ready to roll the ASRIC state of that timeline to get under that canal as soon Super important. We're trying to move as fast as we can to make that happen. Do you have any questions?

Thank you for the information. Councilor Allgood.

I just wanted to ask Commissioner Holton something real quick. Just for the public's edification, we've had the conversation. Would you kind of discuss the phasing, how big a jail you're starting with and what your plan is start to finish on the phasing of the jail, please? Okay.

So the phasing of the jail is starting with a literally, it's going to be 292 bed women's facility, women's only facility. And it will be built in a 100 by 200 foot, will look like basically a warehouse from the outside, a metal building. It's quick to build up, full concrete floor and plumbing inside, and then all of the cells are prefabricated steel jail cells. And so they're very quick to install and get up to full operation. Actually, the office and the restrooms for the staffing will take as much time as the actual installation of the jail cells. And so it will start with that 200, you know, Caney County has been through it on jails everywhere from something elaborate to something that was not really going to meet the immediate needs. We're doing this as a pay as you go. I can't forecast when we can choose to build the next 200 beds, but as soon as we can basically break loose with about another $9 to $11 million. Depends how you build that building. You could do another 292 beds. If it's a different high security, it would be less than that. And if it's like we do the, I call it the tent facility, it would be a lot more than the 292. So it really depends what the sheriff's immediate direct needs are at the time for the next one Again, the sheriff assured me that they will never end up building more than a 2,000 bed facility on this site. And this site, we're basically talking between 25 and 30 some acres for the jail site. So in round numbers, but it's gonna be over to the east side of the property up against the freeway. So the road that we're posing to put in is between between that and the other offices.

And this is a single story facility?

Single story facility. Very few jails anymore are built on two stories. And so this is going with the current state of the art.

I know you have restrictions on what you can talk about, but I hope the public understands how important this is. I know what you can't say, but I hope they know how critical this is that we get this done.

I do not. in any way, form, or fashion want to threaten the public, but I will say it this way. If we choose to be lackadaisical about moving forward, we will spend more money in different avenues in the legal side of it than we will ever spend on the physical side of it. So we're at a Y in the road, and if this can't be put together, A protestant can have a fairly good argument in court. Yeah. Thank you so much.

Thank you, Councilor. All good. Councilor Tillmott.

This may be more for Public Works and the engineer or your builder. My only concern would be making sure that in this process, and I just want to make sure that you guys don't have a problem with working with the city so that we at least have eyes on it. So through the design, through any of it, I mean... Commissioner Holton mentioned Inspection, but even beyond that just the rough design just that we know what we're getting long term where it's at what kinds of things we can do to help facilitate it and That kind of thing. Are you willing to work with us in that respect?

Yeah, Tillmont. Yeah, I work hand in hand with the public, works with Haley all the time. This isn't the only project we've worked on together. So we work hand in hand, not only just with Haley, the other staff, with Morgan and so forth. Yes, I mean, this is something that we're going to have to work together to get this accomplished. Again, we want to meet. a lot of your guys' standards at the beginning process of design. We did have pretty much a full design completed for Pond Lane. We are starting over to a certain point. Again, we want to make sure we're good stewards, good partners here, and work together on getting this accomplished. So I have no problem working with City Council staff. Thank you. I just wanted to make sure that that was...

And just to that point, I would imagine we could not only set up the working group, but to give updates to council as this progresses along, if we were to ever go in this direction. Thank you, Councillor Tillman. Councillor Stoddart. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

Just for Chairman Holton. Yes. Do you have any plans for Pond Lane if this shot is fired out there at Highway 44 at all?

Well, it won't be a fire sale, but it will be liquidated.

Okay, so it'll be up for grabs. Yeah.

We've already been approached by several investors who are very interested in picking up the parcel. So unless that is an incorrect perspective, it looks like it's a very viable piece of ground that people are wanting to do something with. And so we have no desire to hold on to it. We do have a desire to work in unison with the city that if we can work together and agree what's the best and highest use to sell it to, we would more than want to do that, rather than just sell it to whoever and then it's a headache for you guys. We are not interested in doing that. But currently, that property still lies in the city. So there's some different avenues we all can do in doing that. So that's our plans, liquidate it.

Good to know. Thank you. Yes. Thank you, Councillor Stoddick. Anything else from council? Councillor Williams.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I think this question probably is more for legal than anything. Just, and to be perfectly honest, some of this document came to me late in the afternoon. I haven't had a chance to go through it. But there seems to be a question about the legality of waiving connection fees. And I'm not a lawyer, so before we enter into an agreement, we need to be sure of what is and isn't possible. So that's my biggest question that I see at a glance here. We need to iron that out and what that would mean and whether or not that's doable. I see a comment from our staff and I see a reply, but that doesn't resolve it for me. And so before any agreement is entered into, there has to be a resolve in what is possible and what the outcome of that would mean to us. Because there's some things in this response to us that it's not clear to me. So I don't know if there's any more clarity today to be had or

If if we need to get clarity But we we've certainly come a long way and I appreciate you being here tonight Thank You councillor Williams would public works or legal like to Mr. Mayor, I do think that's still an outstanding issue that we're looking at from from the legal side here Which we will will be able to brief the council and the mayor on as that develops. I But as of right now, and especially in open session, we don't have advice to give yet.

Thank you. Anything additional, Councillor Williams?

No, if that's the case, I'm trying to prolong this, but I would need to speak with my council before I could move ahead, simply because he's just suggested that we can't discuss it now. But that's the hang-up.

Thank you. Commissioner?

I think that that's very prudent, Councilman Williams. I think that pretty much a city council is a policy setting board by state statute. The only thing that you can't do is you can't indebt a future council. You have to go through legal means and ways to do that through bonding and whatever it has to do. So we have, and you have, Good legal counsel and I have been a mayor. I have been here. There is some technicalities to be sure Depends on how your sewer money has been bonded or if you loaned against it But there you can you can do many things So I would I would encourage both of our legal staffs to put their heads together and open the books because it is not an impossibility I've been a mayor for 29 and a half years. I have a clue about this. I am the only city in the state of Idaho that completely built their collection system and a brand new sewer treatment plant. The only one in the state of Idaho so far. That took some pretty creative financing and some pretty creative maneuvering, both for state law and for the city ordinances. It can happen if we're motivated to do it.

Thank you, Commissioner. Councillor Dittenberg.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor, Mr. Holton, Commissioner Holton. Thank you for being here. There is no doubt that our county needs a new jail. And I got to applaud the county and the sheriff for doing a remarkable job of keeping people in the jail. Because that's what what jails do My my comments are for your for your contractor and for mr. Britton having been Having been and then maybe John our engineer also having worked at that location for 20 years and have been bored underneath that canal twice and knowing the pain of boring underneath that that canal There was no local contractor capable of boring under that canal. Those contractors had to come from Seattle, Wisconsin, Nebraska. Is that still the case with regards to somebody boring under the canal with...

We've reached out to some of our contractors that we have worked with in the past and kind of laid out the plans and the size in that specific canal. And they've taken a look at it and thrown some rough numbers at it. But without a design in place, we don't want to go down that road until we have a clear path forward. But yes, we have reached out to local contractors that have put eyes on it tentatively. And yeah, but without that design in place, it's kind of hard to say for sure.

Okay. The other question that I have, knowing the work that takes place there, there's a lot of prep work that needs to be done prior to doing what they call a jack and bore. Two or three months worth of site prep work, quite possibly four to six months of mobilizing equipment, getting it on site. So based upon the timeline, you're under a really crunch timeline and I appreciate your comment about being under a crunch timeline. So John, my question for you is, if I remember correctly, that sewer line at that location is probably eight to 10 feet underground. So how would a, a horizontal Jack and bore at a certain depth, uh, come into a steep drop into a existing sewer line.

Mayor and council manager didn't bury. That's a excellent question. Um, so you guys said you had started your design on this project. Did you, I think the primary point I'm trying to get at is just that you have enough slope from the location to where your discharge point is, which would be, uh, much to 2026 so that's going to determine your depth of crossing the canal so when you're preparing that agreement with whatever irrigation company that is that you'll have to define the depth but being that's gravity sewer main you don't have the luxury that you have with water main water mains pressurized so you could do any angle if it's gravity sewer you have to have it perfectly at the angle because your carrier pipe within the casing is going to follow that So I think that's my biggest concern is identifying the depth that you need crossing the channel and identifying that the slope is correct. You guys made some very valid points of getting that irrigation crossing in in the right timeframe. So I think in your design is establishing your slope, finding where you're crossing that canal and the depth that's needed. Did that answer your question?

It does answer my question, but I think the sewer line is required to be what they call an inverted siphon, which means it's got to go underneath the canal by, 15, 20 feet underneath the canal to maintain the structural integrity of the canal, which is the farmers cooperative canal. And if I'm not mistaken, they have some of the oldest water rights, if not the oldest water rights in the state. So, um, so it's a pretty, it's a pretty deep, a deep bore. And I would hope that if you plan on doing that, that you start the planning process really soon.

Very soon.

Yeah. I just have one more thing that Mary and councilman or Denver, um, when, you're doing that crossing the casing size that you're using. So I know there's some back and forth and I'm happy to work with you guys on this stuff. I just checked our master plan. So we have master plan 10 inch main there. I'm just giving you a ballpark. I think roughly the numbers you're throwing out there, I think 10 inch would be adequate to serve this development. Casing gets amplified pretty quickly. So you're probably looking at like a 24 inch casing and potentially you're looking at 20, 30 feet deep. I think the Moab fees, that was an excellent point by Council Member Dimbre as well for contractors. Your bore pits, they can get constructed, but it's a depth question, so you're looking at shoring. All these things add into the equation of cost. So that's my last comment.

Thank you, Your Honor.

Thank you, Councilor Dimbre. Councilor, all good?

I was going to make a motion, but... Oh, Councilor, President Register.

Well... Don't know if this will help you or not. I am Really excited to get this done. I really think that we need to get a better jail and Move it out of the downtown and all the reasons I just had a question about the connection fees as well and how that worked And I don't know that we have that answer yet. So is that kind of work into your motion?

Yes Anything else comes president.

Yeah.

Thank you comes all good

So for John and for legal, if we set this out for our next meeting, which is August 17th, can we have the answers that were lacking by that time?

Uh, mayor and council member all good. I think there's, that's a multi-part question. There's legal things. Um, I have some things here. I'm basing my estimates off of certain numbers. If you guys can get me your gallons per day usage of the building at full build out, that would really help. I estimated a certain amount just what our wastewater flows are, and this is just a standard sheet. And I also base the traffic impact fees off of that as well. So understanding those numbers will impact what we're requesting. But I think there's a potential for reduction. I was estimating on 2,500 beds. So if you guys are only doing 2,000.

It's 2,000 beds. It will not be 2,500 beds.

Okay, so there's potential here. Really, I'm more concerned with the gallons per day load. I think that's something you can work with Benetton on, and they can give me a rough number, and I can base these numbers and adjust those off of.

We've been basing everything off our EDUs, the equivalent dwelling unit. We're going 2,500, but that accounts for all the staff workers for all the other facilities and everything else too.

Yeah, and that's a good estimate. I could run through these numbers with you also as well. I'm fully transparent on how I'm calculating these, and if you guys see something that you don't like, I want to keep it as honest. We have our standard fee schedule, but as long as you give me accurate information, I can base it off of that.

Yeah, and we will comply with your standard rates for sewer water like we do with all the rest of our facilities. I mean, we're not asking for that. But yeah, John, I'll work with you on that.

So I'm not trying, I want to continue this, but I would like to have a date certain that we continue it too. Whatever works for you guys, just let me know and I'll make that motion.

Mr. Mayor, Councilor Allgood, I think if you wanted to continue it to the next council meeting, that's fine. We can see where we're at at that stage. With direction for staff to be able to work with the county representatives to find an agreement to be able to make this project work.

Council good to make a motion to continue this agenda item Until the next council meeting which is August 17th for further discussion and possible action All right, that's a motion.

Do we have a second? Motion is second madam clerk Sorry discussion on the motion Thank You councillor static

Uh chairman holton does that meet with your satisfaction or are we talking about a timetable here between now and the next mean that you can't live with No, we can we can live with that and and I think you know commissioner our commissioner council owner Williams is is correct.

I wouldn't want to be making decisions that that I had a legal question that needs to be answered I think two weeks I say this too often. This is not rocket science. This is sewer and water and street. And we have an MSA down a pond lane. So you're not creating great big new sewer impact on your system. So it's not like something new. This is just we're negotiating changing this. We believe it's for your best benefit and it's for our best benefit. And it's certainly for the best benefit of the taxpayer. So I won't even say that. The details are important. And I think two weeks is a reasonable length of time.

Good. Thank you. Thank you, Councillor Stoddart. Any further discussion? All right, Madam Clerk. We had one abstain for clearly explained reasons. Motion carries 5-0 to continue and we will make sure that we have a follow-up for council by the August 17th meeting, regular city council meeting.

Mr. Mayor, that's correct and I just want to clarify there is direction for staff to be able to work with the county to make this work, to work with this.

I think that's a unanimous. Thank you commissioners and staff for being here. We appreciate it and look forward to Whatever that end result will be. Thank you. Appreciate it All right, the next agenda item is considering a resolution accepting the envision Caldwell 2050 Plan and Robin was not here tonight. So Morgan, would you please come forward?

And of course answer any questions council has I'm good evening mayor and council Morgan visa planning and zoning The item in front of you is, as the mayor mentioned, Resolution 18526, Accepting the Envisioned Caldwell 2050 Plan. We are not presenting the plan this evening. If you remember, the plan was presented to council last month. This is simply a resolution accepting the plan. There has been a slight modification to the resolution since it went out in the council packet, and those are provided in front of you. The primary change is simply changing the word adopting to accepting. So if there are any other questions on the resolution, both myself and Economic Development are here.

There was also a typo where Section 4 was not on the agenda item.

Mr. Mayor, I would just like to ask why the

In adopting versus accepting I guess Oh council president So I asked for some of the changes I appreciate you guys getting that done Some of it was just to be consistent with what we with the other wording in the document there had been a back-and-forth between adoption and acceptance also the message that we've been giving the community is that we are not a adopting a plan that we're putting into action. So it's more of an acceptance of the plan that was created that's now brought forward that's non-binding and that we can refer to if needed, but we're not required. So it just has a little bit of a different connotation to it, but it doesn't really change the intent of what we're doing tonight. So that said, I wanted to kind of let the community know exactly what's happening because I do think that there's been An intention behind what we're doing and then it's kind of gotten changed out there in Social media land and I kind of want to bring it back around to make sure that it makes sense to everybody But for this council, we we keep telling the public that we are only accepting this plan. We're not adopting it We're not making a decision. We're not saying that we have to use it so some of the clarification and the words was simply that and to keep it consistent and changing the word plan to document, changing the word adoption to acceptance, it just makes things a little bit cleaner. And then, let's see, for the public, I wanna go through this just a little bit with some of the changes that you may not have seen yet. So if we change the beginning part to a resolution of the city council, um, accepting the envisioned downtown document as an advisory guide for future planning and development, um, that's just one word there. Um, the public should know that it does say in here that the city council desires to acknowledge and accept the downtown vision document without creating any binding commitments or obligations. It further goes on to say Under section 2 that this is an advisory in nature that it's an acceptance of the downtown vision document does not modify the comprehensive plan zoning code or any urban renewal plan capital plan or any adopted budget and then section 4 Was there there was not a section 4 so it was added To say that the downtown vision document does not create any standards or criteria that may be applied To current or future property owners or future applications the rest is exactly Also for the public so that you know the acceptance of the downtown vision document in section 3 says that there It does not authorize the expenditure of public funds nor commit the city to undertake any action on described in the document. And the rest of it is, I don't think that there's anything else that would be something that anybody would have any questions about. Basically it's just descriptions, what it does, but it is very clear that this is an acceptance of a document that can be used in future planning discussions and that's it.

Just to further clarify this was advised to me earlier by Director Collins that clearly we can in the future make changes to the comp plan zoning code renewal plan capital plan or the adopted budget. It just has to come back through a public hearing. So that was the clarity to do that and any suggestions we would then circle back. So there's different elements in their variety of things that if council wanted to entertain those we just come back through through the legal process. to bring those to fruition, if you so choose.

Also, one thing I'd like Ms. Bissau to just clear up is that if the council decides to look at any of the projects that were created in this plan, what that process is, we cannot just pick one out and say we're going to commit funds to it or do something with it without what process? This doesn't authorize that, I mean.

I guess it's a... Sorry, a little bit hard to say the process, not knowing the type of project. But yes, almost anything that you'd want to do would come through here, whether it was for a land use application or to assign funds or to budgets or to adopt a particular project. Just not knowing what type of project you'd be interested or speaking of, it's hard to give specifics for exactly how that process would flow.

Well, let's say the Whitewater Park or a convention center or a parking garage, would those things require a public hearing at least?

I mean, absolutely. If the council was going to put any money toward a project, the council would need to review that and agree to it.

So our community can be assured that this document is not going to start any kind of project without whatever process it needs to go through for council. That's correct. Thank you.

Councilor Sladek.

Mr. Mayor. I see the chamber in the audience and some of the downtown businessmen. You folks have any problem with the change in the language? More notice would have been nice, but... What was that?

I didn't... More notice would have been nice, but...

So did you get, have you seen these changes in the wording?

Did you want to continue it so you can look it over? There's, I think there's three or four changes, one of which is a word and then one's just for consistency. Is there a reason why you weren't?

because we're already missing an item number four that once we identify that on the resolution. So that was with, we discussed that with legal public works and director Collins today to make that modification. So we are, the motion is up to accept the document tonight and then just any follow up plans and stuff would come back through and whether the wording was different or not, that would still be the same process.

Well, I guess the question is why didn't they see this before tonight is what I'm asking.

When was it drawn up? That's why we had to make the modification today because when we looked at the agenda, it was inquired why it went from number three to number five. So that's when we had the staff make sure that they got item number four in there.

So if you look in your packet, there was... Was there any reason why that wasn't transferred to the chamber or these other folks?

Just because we got it done before the meeting today.

Mr. Mayor, Councillor Stoddick, the changes that came today were Scrivener's errors or just they were non-substantial changes to the document. They were, there were a couple of numbering errors that were corrected and then consistency and language acknowledging that it's an acceptance and not an adoption. So there was, there was nothing substantive that was changed in the resolution. It was cleaning up the language on a, on a draft that that snuck through previously that we wanted to have captured and changed before being adopted by the council.

I hate to be accused of being grumpy, but you know, we brag about our transparency. That's why I brought up the question. And I'll still question the Chamber and the other folks. Do you have any problem with these changes? Mr. Palmer, would you like to come forward?

Good.

Thank you very much. You know, it would have been nice to know that there were some changes just to have a look at it. At the end of the day, What we promised was to deliver any and all results that we got from the year-long project and the study. At the end of the day, what the city does with those results is really up to you all. So whether you change the language in how you adopt it, whether you throw it in the trash can, or whether you follow and treat it like a plan and do every bit of it, really, it's up to you all. I would hate to see the amount of money and time and energy that all of us contributed, especially the city, um, go to something that just gets shelved. That would be truly sad. We hope, and our hope has always been that this would create a vision and an additional tool that the city can use in conjunction with the master plan and to work with potential projects to say, look, this fits, or no, this doesn't. It might be a great idea, but it doesn't fit the vision that we've selected or that our community created together. And so I guess what I'm trying to say is, We don't want to stall this any further. We would love for the city to adopt it or accept it in some fashion. I just hope that these language changes don't take away any of the teeth to what we're trying to do.

So just I also want to point out that the original Roger Brooks plan when talking about the plaza did not have a resolution at all and it was still used. My intention was to clean up language and make it consistent. The motion as written is to accept the... Let me go here. Consider resolution accepting the Envision Caldwell 2050 plan. It just makes it consistent. The intention is not to shelve it or push it away. There are a lot of things in this plan that I like, that I've heard good feedback on. I just don't want to have competing plans. We have a... regular comp plan we have a sub area plan we have URAs coming we have all these plans and they just want it to be the same message tonight that we've been giving to the community for the past year yeah and I agree with that and I you know I'd we and I'll go on record we have never wanted to do anything that contradicts our

any of the current plans, we've only wanted to add something that gives them even more ability to preserve what makes Caldwell special, yet continue to polish the gem that it is.

I agree. This is not a fight. It's not an argument, and I don't know how it's going to be taken. I just think that we've been giving this message out since Roger came back in town that this is what it is, so let's just make the language line up with that.

That's all. If this language change is what gets it to you all to vote on and approve, then make it so. We're happy to have it done.

Clarification for legal. Accepting still means we can do each and everything in the document. We just go through the process as described, correct?

Mr. Mayor, that is correct.

Councillor Dittenberg.

Mr. Mayor, thank you. So I think there's a couple more questions that need to be answered. Who was the, who originally drafted this resolution? Who was the original author of it?

I believe Director Collins was.

Okay. And so at some point it went through legal review. Who, did you recommend, did legal recommend changing it from adopt to accept?

No, that didn't come from legal. That was what the document, I believe, and I think Director Torres was involved in the drafting. I think that was the intent of the draft.

Yes, there were several iterations, so I can't tell you exactly when it happened, but to Travis's comment, the discussion's always been we're going to deliver this to the city. What we were looking for was what was the correct term to accept it without obligating the city to act on it, which I think has been consistent with the messaging from the steering committee.

Because I'm looking at the word accept. When you handed me this big binder of 200 pages, I accepted it. I accepted it. I think we should adopt it, meaning it's a little bit more teethed. It's a little bit more we're committed to honoring, recognizing the work that was done into it, or the work that was put into it. I think accepting it is kind of a way of saying thanks for your effort, but we really don't want it. So I would hope that the motion to adopt this resolution would come forth soon.

Thank you. Counselor Dittenberg. Um, council all goods next.

Um, I agree with counselor Dittenberg. I, I realize we're playing with words here, but I really feel like this, first of all, just as counselor Stotic said, this is the first time I've seen this, um, five minutes ago when it was handed to me. But in this brief time that I've had to digest it, I feel like the documents watered down and watered down on purpose. And, uh,

Yes council can make a modification to that it was a late request council register earlier Council register so um I was prepared to to support this with the with the one word change I

If we're going to push it through with adoption to give it more teeth and do more, then we are doing exactly the opposite of what we've been telling the public for the past year and a half while Roger Brooks has been in town. We have said over and over and over and over again that this plan is a vision, that it is meant to assist us in conversations, that it is not going to be forced, none of that. So we've changed one word because the motion says what it says. Section 1 says acceptance. We're changing one word to make it more consistent. And instead, now we're saying that if we're going to ask every board And member of the public for their opinion on a resolution we need to do it for every resolution not just this one. And we need to stay consistent with what we've promised our constituents because if we do it this way because if we need quote more teeth we have once again lied to this community for a year. We don't need a resolution to accept this plan. We're creating and accepting the resolution to give everybody assurances, but we don't need it. We've already created an entire plaza without a resolution to a plan, nor do we create a resolution every single time somebody gives us a suggestion of what we might do in the city, paid or not. So with that, I'm going to make a motion that... My paper here I Will make a motion considering the resolution accepting the envision a couple 2050 plan With the document we were given tonight with those changes It's a motion we have a second

I'll second it, but I think you need to include the resolution number, don't we?

All it says on here is consider resolution accepting the Envision Caldwell 2050 plan. I've added with the changes that we just talked about with the new document with the change of words, and it's resolution 185-26. Okay.

Motion to second. Madam Clerk? Discussion? Correction.

Any further discussion on the motion? I don't think, you know, Perhaps the schematic of words is that much of a problem. It's just that again. We're submitting something that nobody else has seen And not even the council until the last minute. That's what sticks in my craw all the time And we got to stop doing this is all you know Just it's not right period and our folks in the chamber hasn't seen it the downtown business people haven't seen it That's just not right period so that's all Thank You mr. Mayor and I think

with no disrespect to the process. I think that is an issue to be considered. And is anything harmed in postponing this until the next meeting? We don't have to go through a lot of discussion. We can disperse this. I have mixed feelings on it, because I understand that adopt does carry more weight. But I also understand that just because we use the word adopt doesn't mean it's not going to change. Travis, to your fear, they could still throw it in the trash and shelf it even though we adopted. And so there's a part of me that says I agree, because adopt does have more force. We've adopted this, but it doesn't change anything about accept or adopt. And so it's... Honestly, I could go either way with this one, but I think in fairness, it just might be wise to...

put this out there but I'll let you decide that I think at this point I want to go through with this motion and just kind of see what happens I my whole intention is just to stay consistent with what we've told the public that's all yeah I totally resent the idea that it's being said that we're lying to the public I've been to three of these presentations with Roger Brooks

And in every single presentation that he has made, he has been very clear that there's no force upon anybody to do anything. This is just a plan. I don't think anywhere at any time, the public has been told that they're going to be forced to do anything. And I believe every member of this council would also agree that nobody has any intention of forcing anything. And as, as Morgan said, any project, just like any other project that comes in the city, If we spend over $50,000, it has to come before this council. And so the idea that we're somehow being less than truthful with the public is ridiculous. It's been said over and over and over again. There's no force.

I want to respond to that.

Hold on a second.

Three Roger Brooks presentations.

I'm talking about what was said tonight.

Well, no, but what I'm saying is Roger has been clear in every single presentation that there's no force of anybody, and nobody disagrees with him. We all agree that there's no force of any kind being put on anybody. Nobody's spending a dime. Nobody is taking anybody's property or requiring them to do anything. That's not the intention of this document.

I don't think that's Roger's intention. That's not what I'm talking about. he has said exactly what I'm trying to say tonight is that there's no force that it's just a vision. It's just a document. And then counselor Denver said that he wants to use the word adopt because it has more teeth because it gives more, I don't want to misquote him. I, that's the part I heard that it has more teeth. I don't know what else was said. I don't know why we have to have something that has more teeth when we've been telling the public all this time that that's not what it is. And so that's the part where I think that if we use the word adopt because it has more teeth, that we're not being truthful to the public.

I believe I said more teeth. And the reason I said that is what I don't want to happen is for us to adopt or accept and then this thing disappeared and never gets looked at again.

That's my concern. I mean, I think it runs a risk either way.

Thank you, Councilor Alderman. Just to be clear, there's a lot of great things in the plan. I remember Caldwell High getting to vote for multiple items, so any shelving is not going to be a thing. This was a late request from our council president, but with that, it's up to the council to decide if you want to approve or deny this motion. Additionally, if it is denied, then you can come back with a follow-up motion.

Councillor Stoddard? Yeah, Mr. Mayor, I just want to remind everybody all the complaints we had with the previous administration about these last-minute deals, and nobody's seen the document, and here we're doing it again. So, I mean, we need to pass it. We need to get busy with this, and part of the reason we can't pay these policemen properly and the fire department is because we don't have enough commercial industrial development, and this plan addresses that issue, especially when you don't take up ag grounds. Some of the other important parts of our community.

Thank you Councillor Edinburgh Mr. Mayor, thank you. Just so the just so the public knows that the resolution as it stands. I'm voting no on and That doesn't mean I don't firmly support Roger Brooks plan I I think our city made a commitment over a year ago that we were going to invest money in Roger Brooks we were going to listen to Roger Brooks and And I think that my no vote today does not in any mean, does not by any means say that I don't support the Roger Brooks plan.

Thank you, Councillor Dittmer. Anything further? All right, Madam Clerk. All right, the motion carries for acceptance. That was the motion, correct? The acceptance of the Roger Brooks plan. And with that, carries four to two. Next item on the agenda is considering a notice of award to Ewing Construction for Construction of a Kimball Alley mini plaza improvements. This was presented by City Council Economic Development staff. Correction. City Engineering.

Good evening, Mayor and Council Members. John Probonik, City Engineer, Caldwell. I've been in charge of the project management for the bridge project downtown Kimball bridge so when this URA project became known to me I Kind of took that over as well. So just a little history on this This is the alley and the vineyard area next to the bridge project The background on this project it was it's going to be funded through the urban renewal agency and it represents the final phase of a long-term development of effort that has been planned and communicated to stakeholders over several years. The writing's small on this one, but it kind of just gives a brief overview of the timeline for this project. So this goes back to 1998 for the downtown revitalization project. In the years leading up to this point, we have undergrounded the power utility poles downtown. We have also already grubbed the area where the vineyard's at. And that whole area right now is kind of shut down. So I think it's a really good opportunity to complete this last piece of the park, as well as the alley from 9th to Kimball. I do have some renderings here. This it's a tiny, tiny photo. So this is just showing the alley from 9th to Kimball right now is kind of destroyed per our undergrounding project, as well as some commercial development downtown. It has left it in pretty poor shape. The local businesses down there definitely could use some improvement in this alley, specifically the Amana drive-through. This project would give decorative pavers throughout the whole alley as well as concrete. And I do have some pictures of the current state of that project. That is the lesser of the two parts here. It's the ones that's less expensive. The more expensive one is what you're seeing before you here. This is the mini plaza. So this is going to be a retaining wall structure as well as a trellis structure and this will be right along the creek bank. I do have a rendering of that and this would be a place for the public to gather public open space as well as business activity. I think it would encourage some downtown walking and kind of be a continuation of the walking paths that are already present behind those businesses along the creek. So this is the rendering of it. If you could see, there's one large kind of circular structure, and then it steps down. There's retaining walls on either side, and then it goes to the creek where the walking path is currently. I believe there's three seating places kind of in that circular pattern, and then there would be one fire location, which would be controlled by Destination Caldwell. Um, so the, the state of this project and why we should move forward with it. Now, uh, this whole area right now is within fencing downtown, um, where the bridge project currently is. Their construction fence has pushed it all the way to the alley, um, right up to the alley between, uh, grit to see there. So this would be the improvements all the way from the Creek up to grit to see, and that would carry over to, um, white dog. So that would include all of that there. Um, I think the timing right now is essential because that being under construction, that commit date for that bridge contractor is November 20th. If we start now, I typed the contract up and had a contract awarded for it. We would give them 60 days. That is Ewing, uh, the Ewing company. Um, they would have 60 days complete the project for substantial completion and 70 days for final completion. So they should have this complete before the bridge would be close to being. Or open, I should say. with about a month or two grace period in there. I'm picturing probably about mid-October when they would complete this. So these are some pictures of the current alley. So what you're looking on the left is Amano, and that's their drive-through window. And then the right is the building that is the commercial building that was just put in. All the way down that alley is in pretty rough shape to 9th. And then this would be the improvements of that alley. So it would be continuation of the decorative concrete that you see downtown currently behind those businesses along the creek your picture the picture on the right is the current state of where the vineyard was the bridge contractor we knew we were kind of moving forward in this direction with this project and the bridge contractors grubbed it out and they're using that as like a staging zone right now but they don't have that committed if we want to come in there and do this project now we we have that ability If we don't do it now, what would happen is the bridge reopens and then we come back and then shut down that street again. I really don't want to do that to local businesses. They've been more than understanding of everything that's been going on with that project. And I'd really like to give this to them kind of as just a token of good faith for just continued effort. And we've kept them in the loop with everything and we'll be continuing to do so through newsletters and RBCI. So here's the numbers. When I originally bid that project out, I was under the assumption we had about $600,000 roughly with the URA funds. I did bid this, and this is the lowest bid. It came out to about $875,000. Within that, I had a $20,000 contingency. So if any changes were encountered, we would be able to offset that with it. And this... The bottom part there is kind of how the why I'm bringing this to you today is how we would make that project whole to get to that 875. So you already would be able to support six hundred forty thousand and then the remaining quiet zone money, which was one hundred seventy three thousand and then budgeted funds that we've worked with finance that would make us whole and be able to get this complete with having a contingency built in there for anything that happens throughout the project. Again, so this final slide is just the recommendation. The site's prepped. I bid this out. I have a contractor. They're ready to go. I have a pre-con scheduled, so if this is voted on now, I'd have to cancel that. But everything's ready to go if we want to do this, including the money and the allocating. We have worked with finance. And that concludes my presentation.

Thank you for that. Council? Councilor Tillman?

Mr. Mayor. John, okay, so basically you have $75,000 that's going to need to be found, correct?

Yeah, I think I'm going to let Dan talk about the funding mechanism for this. I just bid it out and gave him the number.

That is correct. Okay, and that is something that we do have in the budget, though, that we can pull from somewhere else, correct? Correct.

Our finance director is on vacation this week, so we met last week. We came up with a couple, we identified a couple funding sources. We were working with legal to make sure that one of them is not encumbered by a prior MOU. We have two thoughts, and I apologize, counsel, to bring this to you without a firm source, but like John said, sort of time is of the essence in order to get this done. But we had two thoughts. We'd like to try and find funds available in this fiscal year. If not, the thought would be to put this into the next budget discussion workshop you have and identify funds for fiscal 27. That would allow us to substantially start the project this year and address it next year. Does that make sense?

Right. And so we're only looking for realistically $75,000. Correct.

And it doesn't sum correctly.

Apologize for that. There's always over just I'd rather ask the question that right. I'd rather it be 248 as well Just have a little extra and then the second question is even though you haven't pre conned yet What is the time frame that the contractor is this something that they're going to be able to do before the bridge opens or will they still be carrying over after the bridge yeah mayor and councilmember Tillman I just want to clarify too when I kind of helped out started helping off this project

I was told that there was $600,000, and we fully intended that basically that money has to get spent by the end of fiscal year. So if there's a huge rush on that, I probably should include that in the presentation. But that's kind of where the driving force. The second part of your question, is the contractor ready to go? Yes. So this whole bid, I actually pre-qualified bidders for this project. I didn't want to do the project and then get potentially a contractor that doesn't really care So I really opened it up to pre-qualification So anybody that would potentially care these two contractors that did bid the project their local viewing company. They're based out of Meridian They've done a ton of work for the city of Caldwell. Well 17 Off of Indiana and Moss. That's who did that project. So that was a pretty large project. I've worked with them They're ready to go. They understand the commit timeframe the 60-day window they're gonna sign the contract that says they'll have 70 days to complete this project and

Okay, so they are signing a contract sting. They will be done before the bridge.

Correct. Well, 70 days from the time that they start, so the faster we do the pre-con. I could see this getting started as early as the week of the 10th. Okay, perfect.

Thank you, Councilor Tillman. Councilor Stoddart. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I just need a nod from Chairman Porter there. Is this okay with you? I have been on the board this long, on the DRA board this long. I didn't realize that. Okay. So we're good with it? Yeah. Thank you.

Thank you, Councillor Stoddart. Anything else from council? Thank you. Do we have a motion? Thank you.

Mr. Mayor.

Councillor Drummond.

I move to approve the notice of award to Ewing Construction for the construction of the Kimbell Alley mini plaza improvements.

Second. Second. Any discussion? Seeing none, Madam Clerk. All right, that is unanimous. Thank you for your presentation, and we do look forward to that Mini Plaza, it's a great design. It'll be a great addition to that area. It'll open up so there's more standing room, especially since we lost the covered area over by Kimball and Blaine Street. So thank you, Council. Next item on the agenda is an action item. Consider annexing Valencia Village Subdivision Phase 2 into the Caldwell Municipal Irrigation District. Does the Council have any questions on this item?

Mr. Mayor.

Council, all good.

I'll sponsor bill number 27, ordinance number 3761, the annexation of Valencia Village subdivision phase two into the Caldwell Municipal Irrigation District.

Thank you for that motion. Councilor, all good. Do we have a second? Second. Councilor Tillemont, motion to second. Any discussion? Seeing none. Madam Clerk. All right, with that, that carries unanimous. All right, the next item on the agenda is considering the finance report.

Mr. Mayor.

Do we need any clarity or are we good?

All right. Mr. Mayor.

Councilor Tillemont.

I move to approve accounts payable in the amount of $3,397,805.82 represented by check numbers 194813 through 195193 and electronic payments and payroll of the amount of $931,091.10 represented by check numbers 40905 through 40923.

Direct closets be accepted payments approved and vouchers filed in the office of the city clerk second Thank You councilor Tillman for that motion, and then Thank You councillor static for the second any discussion Seeing none go ahead and vote that carries unanimous all right Get caught up here all right counselor so now we're gonna move into council mayor comments by the way we do have the fire chief here we're gonna have Have some brief discussion in my comments. So thank you for being here tonight, but comes to my Councillor Stoddard councillor Williams Sorry, I thought you're gonna go last sorry comes president. I apologize.

Thank you pause I just only wanted to say thank you to the fire department police permits for all you're doing during this Season Drove from Northern Idaho to back here and it was it's just awful all through everywhere So kudos to you and your teams for being out there and protecting our own city while that's going on Also the police department for lending a hand in Twin Falls. That was a very difficult situation for Everybody including the officers and I think it's very important when other agencies can come in and help alleviate some of the stress that those officers are probably also feeling so Thank you, and I wholeheartedly agree with that.

So thank you council Williams.

Thank you. Mr. Mayor My comments are intended to stand up for staff and appointed officials and and nothing else but I'm concerned and there was a an email and a description of a specific public record request that was made for a very specific time and a very specific location inside City Hall for a video. And what concerns me about that is it appears that certain employees were targeted. And I'm concerned for the degradation and defamation of these employees. And so I would ask that an audit be done of our video system to see who actually accessed that because somebody had to have communicated with the individual that requested that public records request. Otherwise, he wouldn't have known to request that specific segment of video. And so it concerns me for our employees who are embarrassed by social media posts that are outlandish and unnecessary and I would I would hope that that would be taken seriously for our employees benefit and whoever leaked that to that person that got it would Be made known and so I know our IT can audit that and it would be helpful to know how that gets out so that we can Stand up for our good employees and appreciate them for all the work that they do Thank You council just information.

There is currently a personal investigation on that so I'll continue working with HR on those aspects. Councilor, all good? Councilor Dittenberg.

Mr. Mayor, thank you. I dispatched a letter to you on July 22nd a couple weeks ago, and I asked if I could read this letter, and you gave me permission to read this letter. This letter also went out carbon copied to all of the council members. And it reads, Dear Mr. Mayor, I want to take this opportunity to apologize for my unnecessary dismissal of a citizen at the July 20th meeting. Like others on council, I was offended by the purposeful insinuation that the mayor and council fell short in our responsibilities in the aftermath of a serious weather event. I was especially offended knowing that the actions all of you took to mitigate the damages. I should have closed...

Councillor Dentonburg, please proceed. Sorry.

I should have chosen my words more carefully, and for that I apologize. That said, I did not need anyone to apologize for my comments or otherwise reconcile my expressions. I am fully capable of apologizing for myself. However, if we are beginning that as a standard, we should establish a routine agenda item in order where we can take turns apologizing for each other's harsh, Uninformed or unnecessary comments of fellow council members directed towards staff or presenters or the citizens respectfully Councilman Denver, so Mr. Weiss stepped out and I was going to look him in the eyes and apologize to him Thank You councillor dinner here apology.

I Know that takes a lot to do that. So we appreciate the follow-up through that with that tonight First and foremost, thank you once again to our police and fire department. They've been going through a lot. They've been putting up with a lot of extra work, time away from their family, time away from home. There's a lot of stress, a lot of burnout. But without them, we wouldn't have the safe and secure Caldwell. that we continue to have, not just Caldwell, but the surrounding area, all the way down to Twin Falls, a variety of other areas, out in the Waihees, I believe up to Weezer, possibly. And with that, we just thank you guys. As a follow-up to, well, first of all, the State of the City is this week, August 6th, right? From, I believe it was 12 to 2. So we'll have some great opportunities to learn from staff. We'll have some booths set up, and then at 1 o'clock we'll begin the ceremonies. Hopefully we'll be done by 2 and get everyone home. With that, following up on the fire and police living, I know council had expressed, and fire chief, if you'd like to come up, we'd had great discussion, had a lot of, you know, between joining the district, the fire district, that didn't work out. We're looking at putting our own fire district together, which would be potentially on a May ballot, and there had been an ask to look at the police and fire levy this November. So just to be clear, uh, madam clerk advised on some very, very tight, um, timeframes, uh, you know, to get that on the ballot, which would be a rush. Additionally, we don't, there's gonna be a lot of other things on the ballot that could be very confusing to voters. And there was some challenges with that after meeting with legal, with fire chief, police chief, several other officials, including the wonderful Justin. Thank you for all the information. Um, what we're looking at is especially with the timeframe, And we want to make sure we're at least successful with one of those things. And we feel, after discussion, the most confidence we have is that if we go for the fire district, so call the fire district within our own city limits this May, that would be our best bet instead of potentially failing at one or more of the items. And we don't want to confuse the voters or give them voter fatigues with that. I'm going to go ahead and turn it over to Fire Chief just to explain that ask.

Sure. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I want to go back to a couple of months ago when we started talking with our rural district partners about being annexed by the rural district, them basically taking over the city fire services. That fell apart. I think I've been pretty clear about their decision and that we should respect that as a governing body. We had continued through our budget workshops up until about two weeks ago where the idea was Floated out there that we should pursue a public safety levy joint jointly with police and fire And immediately my my ears perked up because prior to that conversation being Had that day at the budget workshop. We had already started press briefings and Messaging about our pursuit to form a fire district and that was our best avenue to reflect on growth paying for growth the city being at its 8 percent cap capping those additional dollars and that EMS and fire districts by statute are the only ones eligible to go above that 8 percent cap. And so I thought the fire district mission was pretty clear on on the heels of that conversation happening with a public safety levy. My concern is in the middle of us marketing and already having the conversation With public outreach and several media interviews about our desire to become a fire district to capture that additional funding. With council's direction two weeks ago. To hire a consultant to help us with that initiative. I felt that in the middle of our public outreach our open houses our road shows. Between now and let's say April of next year. While we're saying everything about fire district, we're going to put something on the ballot in November that says vote for this public safety tax or this public safety levy. I felt that that would be very confusing for the voters, aside from the fact that we haven't messaged that correctly. And Madam Clerk, you'll have to help me with timelines, but I believe absentee ballots go out in October, which effectively gives us about two months worth of messaging. And we have tremendous allies with the fire department, with the fire department's union, with the professional firefighters of Idaho and the international associates of firefighters that can help message correctly our public and actually do some door knocking. They have a political action committee and they can help us deliver that message. This short timeline doesn't really give us that advantage. And so it was my request to have a meeting with the mayor, Madam Clerk, the legal department and our finance director to talk about the strategy. And in the end, marching orders are marching orders. We'll pursue or push through with whatever is necessary. But it's my belief that we will create some voter confusion, some voter fatigue if both initiatives are on the ballot, and that we should pursue one option. to focus on fire first. I selfishly hate to say it that way. But this seems like the better path forward for our agency and for the city and allows us with that intent to capture that unrealized or that cap that the city is hitting right now. And so by not pursuing a fire district we're genuinely leaving money on the table. I just wanted to let you all know that I respect your decisions. Having been through this in prior agencies, voter fatigue and ballot saturation is a real thing. And in the middle of this marketing, I would just ask for your support to continue with pursuing a fire district with a May initiative ballot. And I'll stand for any questions.

Thank you, Fire Chief. We appreciate it very much. And Once again, we had a great discussion. It was tough, but we definitely want to see how we land and then reanalyze what police looks like if voters were to approve this, see where we're at budget-wise, and continue moving forward. Council President Register.

I just wanted to say that I share your concerns about trying to get the information out there accurately in the amount of time that we have. I would hate to do it and have it rejected and then try to do it again later because then, I don't know, people get tired of seeing it. I agree.

Councilor Dinberg.

Chief, thank you very much for the presentation, and also I want to thank you for the good work that you did during the fire negotiations. And sorry we weren't able to approve that this evening, but I have a feeling that you're going to provide some explanations to some people who had some questions about that agreement and where we're at. So we'll get there. So with regards to that, I'm going to trust you on the levy stuff and voting for the district. I trust you there. There's no problem or no concerns about postponing the approval of the contract tonight, is there?

No, mr. Mayor councilman Denver There was a request to have some union for representation here tonight to discuss How we got to a finalized contract? unfortunately members of our union weren't able to put a presentation together in that short notice and so I Asked for that to be delayed for weeks.

Thank you Thank You counselor didn't bear anything else With that national night out is tomorrow

National Night Owls tomorrow. We're giving away a couple dozen bikes that Walmart donated to us. We'll have some really cool junior firefighter stickers and some plastic helmets if you want to come on over. We'll be in the plaza, and we've got some other National Night Owl events planned throughout the city where our fire prevention folks will be headed up some educational booths and just spreading the good word of the fire department and the city overall.

Thank you, Fire Chief. Appreciate it.

Sorry. No, thank you, sir. Thank you. All right, we're good.

Council, just to be aware, I had a board meeting with the ERT today, tomorrow, so I will be a little late to the national night out, There is a board hearing for VRT tomorrow with the changes in Nampa and the proposed routes in Caldwell. So we'll have some results from that. And then as soon as we get back, I'll hopefully join everyone down at National Night Out. And thank you to Destination Caldwell for that. You guys put on great events. So we look forward to that. And please tell everyone you know that would like to come down. We'll have that tomorrow night. With that, nothing further for tonight. We talked about the levee, the fire district, Such and we're gonna go and move to executive session. We have a motion.

Mr. Mayor Councilor Denver I make a motion that we enter executive session pursuant to Idaho code 74 dash 2061 sections D and F Second motion is second And I'm clear We have two logouts

Councilor Stoddick? Councilor Register? All right, that motion carries. Thank you. We are now in... The regular meeting is over, and we're now in executive session. Thank you all.