City Council Regular - Regular Meeting

My wife's going through the same thing, John.

You spoiled it. There's no hearing. That was on my... My dear.

All the meeting to order, please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Can we have roll call, please? Present.

Burke.

Present.

Vanescu. Here. Knorr.

Here.

Eschke. Here. Stolarich.

Here.

Von Heidel. Here.

Okay, this is the public's opportunity to provide comments to the council. While you may supplement your comments with handouts, electronic or digital aids to not be prevented during the public event. Please state your name and your city of residence. You'll have three minutes to speak. Please direct your comments to the council as a whole instead of individual members, staff, or audience members. Please come forward if you're in the chamber or raise your hand in the Zoom app. remember that public comments are not a discussion public comments are to inform the council of your views see the first person who's already stepped up name and rest randall friedman canvas and i'm not talking about former government like most people so i decided i would kick you off with something more upbeat um

At Camas Days, I had a chance to meet two delightful young women, Joy and Haley, that are a young author and illustrator and did a children's book about Camas. And they were selling them at Camas Days. And it's a lovely little book. On the back, it says, it's a love letter to one of the Pacific Northwest's most charming small towns. So I had to get it. And then I thought, I should get one for this city council. Because You should have this book in the library. And then I had them dedicated to you. And I'll just read to the Camas City Council. Let's remember Camas as the birthplace of Earth Day from the Camas Earth Day Society and the signature. I also decided I was going to get one for Dennis Hayes. So for Dennis, they said to Dennis, thank you for taking your childhood in Camas and creating the inspiration for Earth Day. So I'll be sending that to him. The reason I really wanted to talk about it is it became obvious that their wonderful book was a part one about canvas. And it was from the past to the present. And it talks about the mill and it talks about the closeness. And I told them what really needs to be done now is part two. And they have young kids and I was talking to them about the canvas they want for their kids and their grandkids. It occurred to me, and for the reason I got this, is that's your job now. That's your job in the next six months. You are the author and illustrator of a children's book that your grandkids are going to be reading. And it's about what happens now to Camas, now that we're at this situation with the plan. Now, I said I wasn't going to talk about former government. I'll just say, no matter what former government, you still govern. And in the zealousness to get a form of government, please do not forget your job is to govern. Either way, you have to write the second children's book. Thank you.

Thank you. Is there anyone else in the chamber that would like to step up for three minutes for a list of comments?

Good evening, Mr. Mayor and City Council members. My name is Lauren Colas. I've been a campus resident for 20 years. I remain unconvinced that the City Council would want to move from an elected mayor position with real executive authority to a system where an unelected city official, like a city manager who's probably going to be paid very, very well, would hold day-to-day power to run the city. while the mayor's position becomes largely ceremonial. So the current mayor city council system with a city administrator is not broken. It has delivered results. We have a AAA bond rating and we have a successful track record of growth and service. That's not a small feat. So this exact same issue was studied in 2002 and again in 2018. It never made it to the ballot. That history shows that there was insufficient consensus or urgency back then. The majority of Washington code cities also still operate under a mayor council form of government. So under our current system, the elected mayor is the chief executive responsible for managing city staff and overall performance. and voters get to hold that person directly accountable at the ballot box. Shifting to a largely ceremonial mayor type position and an appointed city manager reduces that direct link and permanently hands power to an un-elected administrator accountable only to the council and not we the people. I recommend stronger public engagement before advancing this kind of structural change. And I urge you to please vote tonight on drafting a proposal or moving forward at this time. Leave the current form of government as it is. Thank you for listening and your consideration.

Is there anyone else in the chamber that would like to step forward in three minutes?

Hello? Good evening, Mayor and Councilmembers. I'm Stephanie Millman, and I'm Black Amish Shores. I'm a past precinct committee officer and know a lot of voters. I'm a CAMAS voter and a taxpayer, and part of my income helps fund the staff and the administration and projects that you work on. And I hear a lot of people call it the city budget. And every time I hear it, I think, well, that's my checkbook, right? So I want a representative government, and I'm concerned about this change in structure. I want you guys as representatives to be good stewards of a checkbook and make decisions that reflect the will of the majority of the voters. I'm concerned that the change reduces the power of our elected mayor. Under the current system, voters choose the person who has real executive authority. And we can hold that person accountable. Moving to a more ceremonial mayor and an appointed city manager shifts the day-to-day power further away from us voters. That feels like a step in the wrong direction and away from strong representative government. We've seen this trend on the state and the county level, and I don't see, it doesn't seem like it's the best for us voters. I've seen how over time elected officials can spend more time listening to staff and small advisory groups and steering committees and hearing less and less from the residents. That environment of consensus can sometimes leave us regular citizens feeling kind of shut out. As a voter, I ask you not to let our representation slip away. Please vote no on advancing this change in the form of government. Keep the current structure so the people we elect continue to hold real authority and remain accountable to us. Thank you for your consideration.

Is there anyone else in the area that wants to speak, excuse me.

Camas residents since 1997 and I also do not support the proposed change in the form of government for the city of Camas for any of the same reasons that have been mentioned as well. By giving too much power to an unelected city manager, the control of citizens over their government is reduced. I'm opposed to any change that does that. However, I'll bring up another point. It is decided to put this before the citizens of Kamas for a vote. I strongly feel that the timing of the vote is critical. For such a major change, it should be done when the maximum number of eligible voters are likely to participate. I spent yesterday looking at the Clark County elections website. I found voter turnout results for all elections in Clark County from 2018 to 26 and those further back. I was not able to find specific to the city of Camas. But looking at the trend in Clark County overall in the past nine years, special elections held in February or March or April generally have rather low participation rates. These elections are often poorly advertised, and many people do not even know that there is an election happening. That happens every time. Talk to people, oh, there's an election? That's very common. The August primary elections, but in an odd number of years, are even worse. People don't know about the election, or they're distracted by vacations and enjoying their summer. So those are all very poor turnouts. The general election held in November is clearly the best time to maximize voter participation. People know there's always an election, first Tuesday of November, and a voter's guide is always mailed out so people can have opportunity to read it and understand it. Clearly, if the goal is to get the maximum input from CAMAS voters, any election to change our form of government should be held during the November general election. Well, it's too late for 2026. That means it should be held, as soon as it could be held, would be the general election in 2027. 2028 would be even better. Residential year, the participation is like over 80%. There's no reason to rush into this change. It was just mentioned, things aren't broken. We've got a very good bond rating, all that sort of thing. A push for an unnecessary quick election gives the strong impression that the input of the majority of campus citizens is not desired. That is something we should have.

Thank you. Is there anyone else in the chamber that would like to speak?

Hi, everybody. Hi, neighbors. Good to see you all. I'm Caitlin Lee. I live up by Benton Park. I was at the town hall last week. I really enjoyed it. It was helpful, neutral, generally respectful, and I appreciated how well you guys listened and took us seriously. The town hall and tonight is focused on a specific topic, whether the option to change our former government should advance to ballot. But people were talking about more than that. It was council accountability, whether voters have enough information, potential election timing, due diligence. And afterward, I saw remarkably diverse interpretations of what we'd all just witnessed with our eyes. And I realized that we weren't just talking about how people feel about the decision over our form of government. We're also hearing how people feel about the way our government makes decisions. MS has a trust problem between council and citizens. And I think it's a real tragedy because you all live here too. Your decisions affect you guys just as much as they do our families and homes. So I think it's worth understanding what may be driving that distrust and how we can solve that. Because I don't believe our state of democracy is under attack. I don't believe that anyone's trying to sneak something past voters by doing February or August versus November. I don't think that anyone sitting up there is acting with malice. And also, I acknowledge that I've only lived here for five years. I wasn't here for the pool bomb controversy, other moments that might have affected people's relationship with the council. So whether I personally share that this trust isn't really the point, it exists. And what matters is that we do something about that. And voters have responsibilities here too. I think it's both disingenuous and demeaning for any of my neighbors to say that Camas residents are helpless people having government done to them, rather than citizens who are responsible for understanding and participating in it. Camas has more than 20,000 registered voters. In the November 2023 election, so the general election, only 7,526 returned ballots. I did find the city data. In November 2025, another non-presidential year, it was 9,041, both about 40% of the census population at that time. We had trouble getting the vote out even in general elections. And if we're going to demand transparency and accountability from you guys, which we do, we have to show up, do our homework, and vote. And trust does need to run in both directions. Counsel, you have an extraordinary opportunity here to demonstrate not only your trustworthiness and transparency, but also your trust in our decision-making by not simply allowing CAMAS voters to participate in the decision, but insisting that we do. I urge you to advance the question to the ballot. Then use the next six to 14 months, whatever is decided, to aggressively lead us through the due diligence and build on the town hall. Bring us experts, people who have worked on their both systems. Show us what each model could do for a growing canvas in practice. Provide forums to challenge both sides. There are lots of ways to make it impossible to say voters were not given the information they needed to vote. And as a member of Strong Towns Canvas and a certified team spirit connoisseur, I would be happy personally to find creative ways and help you guys out with that, treat your neighbors. Ultimately, we are all neighbors. We have chosen you, and we trust you to be our voice on day-to-day matters. But this is not an everyday matter, and it deserves all 20,000 of our voices. Thank you. Thank you.

Is there anyone else who would like to step up? Sorry, minutes are up. Okay.

Thank you for the town hall. I learned quite a bit and the handout I thought was informative. For example, I learned that the mayor can veto a council vote and it would take five people to override the veto. That was interesting. I also learned that a city manager under the city manager form of government is not required to live in city limits. Wow. rules for me, but not for me type of a situation. So that was eye-opening. It mentions that the terms for a city manager are indefinite, and that was countered by saying, well, it depends on the contract. But they could be indefinite versus the four years that are tied to the mayor and council. So... those were some things that interested me. And also if the mayor resigns and the city needs a replacement, the mayor pro tem assumes the mayor responsibilities. And I was curious about that because we have two mayor pro tems now. And so if the mayor were to resign, who would assume the mayoral responsibilities? It's, it's, uh, wasn't outlined on this handout. And it seems to be unusual to have two mayor pro tems. At any rate, we should know who it would be or how it would be decided. If a council majority of four votes today to switch to a council manager led on the ballot, someone who doesn't even live here, perhaps the mayor will veto the decision. If this is put on a ballot, it should be the highest voter turnout, which are the November elections. And I stand corrected. The August primary is a bad idea after seeing the data. Not enough people participate in it. A lot of people out of town, a lot of people just miss it. So I urge you to keep things as they are with the city manager who does reside in the city limits and If you insist on putting it to vote, please do it in November general election. Thank you. Thank you.

Is there anyone else who would like to step up to give three minutes of comments?

Your name is Steve. I've been in Kamas for 25 years.

Last name?

Grundy. OK. Live over by Safeway. Warren and Stephanie stole my thunder. But they had to say, I agree with 100%. In fact, even the verbiage was exactly what I was going to say. I was reading, I came across this description of what the draft proposal might look like. And one of the descriptions is that for the people who are in favor of it, is that it would provide a clearer separation of powers. An appointed manager handles day-to-day operations free from election cycles, while the mayor focuses more on vision, leadership, and community interface. I was suspicious of that phrase, clear separation of powers. To my reckoning, it's not a separation of powers. This is a relinquishing of power. It's a handing over of power from the mayor to the elected officials to hired officials. That makes no sense to me. That's all I got.

Thank you. Is there anyone else that likes to step forward?

Hey. Brad Richardson, uh, canvas address. And I'm here on behalf of the port of Caymus Washougal to provide you an update of things that are going on over your port. So just to let you all know, the second airport master plan survey did close last week. So we're very excited to look through that material and see what the community feedback was. That's on top of you. that we did the initial survey and then broad outreach that we've done to the community with the community and if you're interested in continuing to put any information out regarding the report master plan there is a website that you can go to you can type in grow field airport master plan in google and you'll be able to find the site and you can put in comments at any time so it's a continuing process uh to be able to do that We have big news. The port was one of seven Washington communities selected for technical assistance from the Center for Sustainable Infrastructure through the state's Industrial Symbiosis Technical Assistance Program. And what's great about this is it allows us to look at new development and put in cost-effectively infrastructure that can help with businesses' efficiency, can help them save costs and also drive potential additional revenue sources. for businesses within our industrial park. So it's just a way of being able to think ahead of stuff before we put the infrastructure in. We're really excited about that. I know you guys have all been waiting. I've been boring you with these other two things. Yes, Wings and Wheels is next week. And I know everyone's waiting for me to announce that. So it's Thursday, August 27th from 4 to 9. Please come out and enjoy your airport. This is your airport. Come enjoy a wonderful evening and get a chance to see Grovefield, some wonderful planes and some wonderful cars. We do also have some stuff coming up that I want to kind of get in the pipeline on August, Friday, August, October 2nd. Our executive director, Trang, is going to go on a walk with folks and talk about the marina and Highest Point. And the reason I want to bring that up is that registration for that begins September 1st. So hop on that before they all fill up and you're not able to take a walk with Trang and hear about these wonderful things. And she, you know, for those who maybe don't want to go on a stroll, she'll also be sitting down for coffee on October 23rd with folks to talk about the work that the board's doing. And if anyone has been down by the marina and you've seen some activity down there, we have been able to address a good deal of the invasive aquatic weeds that were such a trouble for some of the boaters. One of the things that I heard the most about last year. And so if you see folks coming up with tubes and all that, they're actually vacuuming those aquatic invasive weeds up so that we can have a nice marina for the boaters and they're not getting all messed up with that. And so thank you for the opportunity and I'll give you 20 seconds back.

Okay. And what time is the wings and wheels?

Wings and wheels four to nine.

Thank you. Is there anyone else that would like to make comments?

Tyler Sanders, Camas. Good evening, council. Today, I and everyone else at Strongtown's Camas would like to extend a special invitation for all of our council members, as well as any interested community members to participate in our The Bad and the Ugly Viking Infrastructure Tour. Hope you found the flyer on your desk. Talk to me if you didn't. This will be on Saturday, September 19th at 10 a.m. There's been a lot of valuable discussion in recent times about bike infrastructure, you know, questions like what does a complete street look like? What counts as adequate bike infrastructure? Why do we need separated and protected bike lanes and similar topics? I think a lot of these conversations have been very productive, but to this point, they've mostly remained theoretical or discussing it from just an abstract policy-oriented point of view. And I just want to say there's a huge difference between discussing different kinds of bike infrastructure and feeling it for yourself on a bike as a rider. That's why we've organized this event for the community. At this ride, we'll experience riding on bike infrastructure from world-class separated and protected lanes to narrow painted lanes on arterial roads and just about everything in between. We want you to come with us to experience all the different levels of infrastructure for yourself so you can be informed on not just a theoretical but rather an experiential level. Now, I want to be very clear, this will be a pretty casual ride open to people of all experience and comfort levels. Um, I know some of you are speed demons on your road bikes. I think that's Tim and Tim and Marty over there. Uh, we, we want you there too, but even if it's been a while since you busted out your bike, um, we want you to dust it off or contact us if you, if you need help finding a bike and come with us and ride at our good, the bad and the ugly biking infrastructure tour in September. Thank you very much.

Do we have anyone else that would like to? It was three minutes of comments. Seeing none moving, do we see any hands raised in the Zoom?

Yes, Mayor, we have Brian online.

Okay.

Hi, Brian Wicklum, City of Camas. At the workshop, one of the counselors brought up uh the recent drowning at the lake and i think that the tragedy provides an important perspective as council discusses potentially putting the change of government on the february ballot at a cost of fifty thousand dollars we continue to hear about the city's budget challenges and they need to prioritize limited resources if that's the case then every dollar matters So I have to ask, what is the greater priority for Camas residents? Spending 50 grand to accelerate a government restructuring vote by a matter of months or putting that money toward, for example, training and equipping our firefighters to respond to emergencies on the lakes that are literally within our own city, as opposed to having to rely on calling Vancouver. This is just one of the examples that I think points to a lack of cohesion and prioritization that our city needs. needs to refocus on. It's clear we have waterways And they do pose challenges for residents at times. And yet our own firefighters can't really go in and rescue them without calling Vancouver. But yet we'll spend 50 grand or so to accelerate something that just doesn't need to be accelerated. So that's really why I wanted to call in is to address what was brought up at the last meeting in regards to what you guys are going to discuss tonight. So thank you.

Thank you, Brian. Is there anyone else who would like to step up? Chambers? Raise to the Zoom app.

Mayor, we have no other hands raised.

OK. Chamber, going on. OK. So with that, we will move on to the agenda. What would the council do with the consent agenda?

I move to approve the consent agenda.

Second. It was moved by Hine and seconded to approve the consent agenda. Any discussion? All in favor say aye.

Aye.

All opposed say nay. Are there any interventions? Hearing none, the motion passes. Thank you. Thank you. Next on the agenda, skip announcements. And while I am going to do my mayor announcements later in the meeting, the annexing 26-1007, Kuzmenko annexation, 10% notice and intent. And Madeline Coulter-Planner will make the presentation. Madeline.

Thank you. Good evening, Council Mayor. So this agenda item is the Kuzmenko Annexation File Number Annex 26-1007. I've just got a few slides here. There's a staff report, I think a vicinity map and a assessed valuation that was included in the agenda packet. But tonight, this is the 10% notice of intent. So this is kind of like the first stage of the annexation. Tonight, what we're looking for is either the council to accept the proposal as is, modify the boundary or deny it. If Council decides to deny it, the annexation won't move forward. If you choose to accept it as is, the next step will be to continue with the application. Staff will take it to Planning Commission, where they will recommend a zoning designation, and then it'll come back to Council for review and a public hearing. So this annexation, it's just south of let's move this real quick. It's just south of Camas High School there. It's outlined in red. It includes eight parcels. It's about 31.37 acres. It abuts city of Camas city limits on the south and the east side there. comprehensive plan designation for this this is going to be helpful when this if this does move to planning commission as they'll take a look at it the zoning excuse me not zoning the comprehensive plan designation is single family high that's in the blue area there as well as the remainder of the yellow the lighter yellow type cream color there um this i think this is the outdated comprehensive map so this portion right here is actually within city limits it doesn't show it on this but this is already city limits And then the last part that I have for you. So this part is looking at the assessed valuation requires 10% signatures for the entire area. That parcel there in blue, the application, there's a letter that was submitted and there's one applicant signature on there and that meets the 10% requirement. That one property owner that the applicant as well, they signed off and they equal 22%. So they're meeting the assessed valuation criteria. And that's all I got for you. I'm happy to answer any questions you have. The applicant is here as well, I think. Yeah, just in case you have any questions.

Okay. And I think I saw you raise your hand.

Council members will urge. Help me make sure I've got this clear. If we approve this tonight, that gives them the authority to try to advance it. Council still has a final say over it. It's back to correct.

You're not accepting. You're not proving anything. You're just accepting that you can continue to move forward and then it comes back later for final review and adoption. So we're not adopting anything tonight.

Just could feel on their part. They may not get to 66%, right?

Yep. So if you either accepted tonight, modified tonight, the next step is the applicant will have to get 60% signatures. If they don't get that, then they can come back.

Council member Elzengray. Thank you, Mayor. And thank you, Madison. It's nice to meet you. So should they get the approval, the number of signatures, we would have to put in some city services. Has Alan, have you guys looked into how big of a burden that would be for the city?

So this area is within our urban growth area. So within the urban growth area, we have contemplating revision of transportation and utility infrastructure in there. I don't believe there's any capital plans for new infrastructure along 43rd or 15th there. So typically in a project like this, the new infrastructure that would come in would be provided by the developer. So the new roads, utilities, all that. We would not be doing anything on our own to advance the development. It would again be driven by the landowners. Thanks, Alan. I appreciate it. Thank you.

Okay. Anyone else have questions or comments or motions?

Mayor, I move to accept the boundary of the proposed Cozumelco annexation as legally described with part of the adoption of subsequent zoning designation upon determination pursuant to RCW 35A 14340 and requiring the assumption of all existing city indebtedness for this area to be annexed. Second.

It was moved by nor and seconded to accept the boundary of the proposed, um, there's Mexico annexation as legally described to require the adoption of the subsequent zoning designation on the determination pursuant to RCW 35, a 14.340 and require the assumption of all existing city indebtedness by this area to be annexed. Um, Any discussion? All in favor say aye.

Aye.

All opposed say nay. Any abstentions?

Okay.

Thank you. Next item will be annexation 26-1008 Winchester Hills 10% notice of intent. Presenter Robert Mall, planning manager.

Thank you, Mayor, Council. Good evening. I'm going to say right off the bat that Madeline's slide shows way better than mine. Okay. So this one is a little different than what we had just seen and actually what we've seen with most of the annexations over the last certainly four or five years. The process is the same, however. The annexation for code cities, the statute is RCW 35A14. There's 10 different methods of annexation available to cities within that section. Predominantly, most cities use the direct petition method, which is based on evaluation, as she mentioned in the previous fixation discussion. The idea is that it provides sort of a supermajority voice for those affected property owners. And in many cases, like we've seen, they've been somewhat greenfield areas, maybe a farmhouse on 10 acres, 5 acres, something like that, or maybe even a cluster subdivision from the county. This one's more unique in that it is a built-out subdivision. It's been there in the city's urban growth boundary since at least 2008. And I do have a little history with Winchester Hills 12 years ago when I started with the city of Camas. Kathy Nickerson, our finance director at the time, figured some good sources of revenue would be both Winchester Hills coming into the city limits as well as Grand Ridge because they were built developments that were in the county, but getting some services from the city without getting the tax revenue for it. Um, the Grand Ridge, uh, for, I actually, I think mayor, you were the only one. Um, so, uh, if you recall, we had to, we had to surround it, so to speak, and it took a couple of years to get all that panicked in. Um, and when he says these were staff led efforts, uh, you know, once we finished with Grand Ridge and I started focusing on Winchester Hills at the time, it was predominantly, um, uh, renter occupied residence in there. I mean, I don't have an exact percentage of who were renters and owners living in stuff, but it was enough that, uh, after doing a survey on the 171, and I'll correct my staff report, it's actually 171. Um, it would have been far too great an effort to try to attract people across the country to get signatures for something like that. So it, it, uh, staff did not move forward with it. Um, but during that brief moment in time, uh, uh, The city attorney had also looked into doing some potential discussions with interlocals with the county and city of Vancouver and so forth. Good thing he keeps all his files, so that was all there. Throw anything away. But here's where things have changed. Last year, Alan and I were contacted by some owners of the HOA or members of the HOA and the neighborhood there. One gentleman is here this evening, Ian, over there. He's put together a ton of work as well as some of his partners who I believe are watching online, as well as some other neighbors. What had come to light was that they realized they were paying a surcharge on the utilities because we were providing water and sewer services outside of the city limits, so statutorily we could charge more. And that was, I think, kind of what started the conversation, but I'll invite Ian up in a moment to discuss further. their motivations. And they've taken it seriously. We've met probably a half dozen times. It is a complicated process. And they have gone through and gathered enough signatures to get that 10% threshold. And they believe they have enough to get 60%. There are other things to consider with an annexation like this, though, that is different from the Greenfield. Because as Councilman Rousing-Gray asked, you know, well, who's responsible for the infrastructure and those greenfield areas? Well, that comes on the burden of the developer who's going to develop the property to have to put in the infrastructure, which then does get turned over to the city if it's something that the city would accept. In this case, these are public roads that we would take over. Same with utilities. that we already maintain for water and sewer. And there are county storm facilities that the city would then take over, including French drains and things like that. And talking with the other department heads a few weeks back, wanting to understand what some of the impacts might be for them. Parks didn't really have anything, because the City of Vancouver still will own and maintain the park on the western end. Mr. Collins did have his stormwater crew go out there and TV the storm lines and they are in pretty decent shape. So he didn't have any major concerns on the stormwater infrastructure. Plus, once annexed, if annexed, we do have a stormwater fee that would be charged and assessed. Um, and then, um, you know, there's obviously existing roads that the city would have to maintain and, uh, pain, which is not directly within the neighborhood, but, uh, you know, a lector out there. Um, it does, it does need some help, um, to be clear. So there would be some costs coming into the city, uh, for, um, maintenance and things like that. And then we have police services, you know, and, and fire, but as we've discussed with any annexation areas, There's an emergency, and I'll let the chief speak more to this stuff, but, you know, they'll send an officer out there anyway. We're just not collecting the tax revenue for it. Mr. Peters did some quick calculations earlier, and, you know, we'd be looking at least on the assessed value of roughly about $208,000 annually coming off that. Plus, there's the car tab, you know, TBD that would also be brought in. Is it going to be exactly to be able to cover what sort of impacts and costs we might have? It's tough to say because we haven't done full depth analysis, like what would it cost to repave the whole neighborhood and so forth. But what I would encourage the council to consider this evening is approving the 10%. So that gives us some additional time to come back for some deeper dive information if needed on some of these greater impacts. It is within our urban growth area. that will bring in some of the tax revenues. And you've got a champion with the HOA, which is kind of a rare thing, because oftentimes you don't get that sort of support with the neighborhood that's engaged. So in terms of some of the other things to look at real quick, I mean, there's an aerial photograph. The open spaces are either part of the parks or critical areas, and that's no different than any other subdivision that we have within the city limits. And then the comprehensive plan designation is single family low. We don't have a zoning designation set for it yet, but I think by the time we get to a 60% stage, hopefully we'll have had everything adopted with the comprehensive plan update, which would have a new zoning designation for that particular area. But it would be something commensurate to what's out there now, so it would not create issues with some things like that. So I think those are some of the big bullets. Again, staff is recommending that council can move forward with it. Council member Solerich had mentioned earlier, you do still have that complete discretion at the 60% public hearing stage if you decide it's not worth listening, you can do that. Be clear for the record, you also can not move forward with it tonight. Staff is incurred. I don't know, Ian, if you wanted to say anything on behalf of the neighborhood.

I'll put you on the spot. Yeah, right. I don't have anything prepared at all. But yeah, I've talked to a lot of neighbors now through this process, and everybody is in supportive of it. A lot of people were like, we're not part of City of Camas yet. It was a surprise, right? And they're like, well, yeah, what do we need to do to make it happen? And found out it's just simply some paperwork and collecting some fees and whatnot. We came up with a whole list of reasons why people should join. And top of the list was the savings on the water, but also being able to vote in City Matters and being able to feel like you're part of the community. really resonated with a lot of neighbors as well so um I don't think we should have any problems getting the 60 percent uh for the next phase uh but and we have some enthusiasm and some some inertia right now so I was really hoping to be able to continue on through the rest of summer and then we can talk after that so thank you for let me put you on the spot yeah I don't know uh happy to answer any questions that Council has at this point any questions that uh Council member escape

Thank you. Thanks for the information. I used to live in that neighborhood. Oh, you did? 12, 11 years ago. Around the same time, cities were trying to annex both neighborhoods, as you mentioned, to the city limits. And I was in favor of that in that time. I am in favor of that. That was unfortunate that Winchester really could not get all the signature to the city. So anyway, I hope this time it moves forward. I say it benefits both city and the community.

I think so, yeah. It's kind of a win for everybody, yeah.

Okay, thank you. Did I see a hand down there? Yes, yes. Thank you, Mayor. Robert, thank you very much for the presentation. I have a question. So do we currently collect sales taxes? Do you guys buy a lot of Amazon stuff? More than most people. So we would also get that. Yes, that's correct. That's a good point.

Yeah.

Thank you. Thanks.

case i buy a lot yeah we'll take the taxes we need some members savari thank you robert thank you ellen i i know i've ordered some questions that you you touched on many of them today i'm very leery of the quote unquote french drains and it's very not specific on the plat drawing it says that when we use when we annex in the canvas they'll take it And I have enough anecdotal experience with undefined French drains. I don't know if they're identified. I don't know if that means everyone on every rock fence and one that a neighbor put in. I'm not saying I'm against considering this, but I think that's an answer, just like general condition of sidewalks. Are we going to get 100 phone calls saying, hey, come fix my sidewalk. I'm not accusing. I'm just, are we going to, you get 70% of the people to sign and we pass it. And the next day we get 30 phone calls saying, hey, what do you mean I got to move my boat out of the driveway? So I just want to know about, we provide water to sewer services for them now? Yes.

I wasn't here when those decisions were made, but it's all flattened out and it's TAB, Mark McIntyre:" You know the the the French drains, I would say that you know, certainly, at least from a staff perspective after doing this for 26 years you look at the plat first and there are definitely some drainage easements in the backs of lots like not all but. TAB, Mark McIntyre:" that's where I would suspect, some of those are, I have not seen the CC nurse myself but. and had shared that there's some language in there as well i don't know if mr collins is still on here but with regards to um i will say sidewalks it's no different than we handle it currently in journal today where dividing property in there is responsible for maintenance of sidewalks so the city doesn't all of a sudden become unilaterally you know responsible for those it would still be incumbent upon the property owner what's the general assessment of street conditions

I can answer that, Robert, if you want. We didn't have the information when I sat down with Robert. Our streets lead was out, but the sidewalks and the streets aren't in great condition, I'll be honest. The sidewalks aren't worse. They're buckling. But streets aren't that great either, but they'd be part of our pavement preservation program, obviously, and they'd have to get incorporated in. but from a utility perspective we already serve water sewer as robert mentioned we tv'd the lines i'll have to check if they tv'd any of the french drain lines in there but i was told that everything looked pretty good i think from a stormwater facility perspective it'd probably take about a day and a half from what i've told to get those facilities up to our standard so

One more question, and maybe this is for finance. Long term, is this a, you know, you said a couple hundred thousand dollars initially would probably be our revenue from this. Does it continue to build and go on in perpetuity?

Yeah, I mean, we add that to our annual coffers. I don't know if Kayla's on or not.

Yeah, I mean, so the neighborhood's basically built out. I mean, that wasn't clear. I wanted to state that. You know, so there is limited opportunity for increased and assessed value. But, you know, with remodels, additions, ADUs, perhaps that's something that would be allowed here. There'd be some additional building revenues and that could increase assessed values. But basically, you know, what we did is took the current AV, what they're paying in Clark County, they'd be paying in Camas to a general fund of about $208,000 a year. then the voted lobby. So EMS, the public safety bond, that's like another 73,000. There's the tabs, there's a sales tax. So I think one of the next exercises after there's a decision made, if it is to go forward, would be to try to figure out exactly what those numbers might look like and then project maybe what some of these are. So there's going to be some deferred maintenance. There's also going to be ongoing costs with police and fire coverage there. And so I think we can paint a fuller picture. And if there's any specific things you want us to look into, we can have that for you if there's a 60% meeting so you can see, like, does it make sense financially?

Thank you. Excuse me. Go ahead. Chief, do you get many, many calls that you have to respond to, even though that's the county?

I was not with that information. It's okay, but I can look into that to see if we have any that come up. I do want to add to what Robert said. Just to clarify, though, even though it's a county now, and even if we responded, we typically would respond if we were closer as like, you know, the first car to maybe get there quickly in an emergency, but then once County could show up, we would hand that off. And so it's not an even trade with an annex as far as what our responsibility would be on the police side. If we annex there's, If we have calls for service there and we respond, we own that and have to complete an investigation, or if there's a rest, there's added costs to the city for that. And, you know, as we're tied up on calls, then that means we're not responding other calls. So there are costs that are a little more nuanced and difficult to measure, but it is something.

Thank you for the clarification. Thank you. House Member Hines. Thank you, Mayor.

I appreciate the update on the financials. What is the status of the full water basin? Do they have any site?

I don't know. John Potter, yeah so i'm from water facility stormwater retention base, so those are county owned correct. John Potter, Yes, and those would then be transferred to the city, and those would be responsibilities, assuming we follow the same model right where it's only on to become city on to me, how many do they have.

John Potter, Well, at least one yeah now there's at least one they have they have two parcels in there, one of them, though it's well covered in a bunch of wetlands. John Potter, But the. It's like Scott's back on.

They transferred ownership to us, and that's a liability that we assume. Correct.

Yeah. We are checking on that, Council Member Hine. I know our stormwater project manager, Brian, he's checking in with the county because, like Robert said, it is county-owned, so we're assuming that they're likely maintaining it. And he is correct. There's one pond and then there's another parcel that just has vegetation. There's wetland that you can't actually touch out of there. You can't cut anything in. One stormwater facility that would likely need maintaining.

Thanks, Scott. It would be a good clarification on the status, what the cost would be to get it to standard and have that, if this moves forward, have it be a convention to fix prior to Mayor Mrakas, Advancing finalization. Mayor Mrakas, If it needs fixing if it needs anything.

Mayor Mrakas, and some moments.

Mayor Mrakas, I will say that. Mayor Mrakas, Since I have a lot of interest stormwater facilities have watched the county on that facility over the years that they did a rehab on it a couple years ago did a very nice job that they continue to do maintenance on it, so I think it'll be a. I mean, it's still a liability, but it's not one of those that has been abandoned. You know, it has dead car parts in it and stuff like that. So it's not a very big one either. I wish some of mine were that small. Okay. Thank you.

Thank you. Uh, any other comments or emotions?

I'd say this one's a long time coming in. I think a nuance that just because of the work I do, um, This is unincorporated county. It's an island. The state discourages islands of unincorporated, fully surrounded by other jurisdictions. I'm surprised it's taken this long. And much like Councillor Esch, I lived in that neighborhood back in 2004 while having a house built. I remember the rock pit behind it was active and the kids were like, Dad, what's that horn? Like we better go in the house and rocks might start from glass and you can feel it. But I think it's appropriate. I've watched our map for a long time. This little island sits out there and has for years. And one of the nuances and the chief touched on is they're The governance for that area is Clark County Council, but it's far removed from most of what Clark County Council does. Their police service is Clark County Sheriff's, and they are usually in Hazeldale or the northern part of the county. They don't come down here very much because it's not there. So we end up on a series call covering it. And if it's not a series call, people in that neighborhood wait a long time for service. And I think what I'm hearing is that they are saying, we're ready to step up and get the service. Where are we at? We put it in our boundary possibly as early as 2008. It's time to do it. I move to accept the boundary of the proposed Winchester Hills annexation as legally described, require the adoption of a substance building designation upon determinations with RCW 35A, 14340, or the assumption of all existing city indebtedness. Second.

That was the second bullet point. Yeah, thank you. Okay. And okay. So it was moved by nor and seconded to accept the boundaries. Winchester Hill annexation is legally described. Require the adoption of a subsequent. Zoning designation upon determination. Concerned to RCW 35. Yeah. 340 and require the assumption of all existing city indebtedness by this area to be annexed. Any more discussion? All in favor say aye.

Aye.

All opposed say nay. Are there any abstentions? The motion passes. Thank you. Next item on the agenda, this one will be a public hearing. It's a HSR development agreement and master plan. The presenter is Robert Small.

Thank you, Mayor. Let's see if it's going to share.

Okay.

Okay, so HSR Capital Development Agreement. We're finally at a public hearing stage. This is something that we've workshopped with council twice. A little bit of history for those in the audience who haven't necessarily been following along. We have adopted the North Shore Subarea Plan back in 2023. It was one of four different sub areas that are authorized through our comprehensive plan. And with that particular area, the big reason was several fold. It was, you know, economic development opportunities, zoning that really had never come to fruition since its incorporation in the city, you know, in the 2011 area. And there was, you know, no desire from property owners in Grasse Valley to work forward on a delivery plan and so forth. and certainly engaged in the downtown, as you well know, and Eastside Commercial just isn't ripe yet. But what came of that, you know, is what we see here on this map. This was the preferred alternative that was adopted. You know, Council to recall, we did do a development agreement with SunCal last year for the 300 plus acres owned by the Johnston family. They'll launch dairy and HSR Capital, several projects in the air at North Shore area. And so as a reminder to the sub area plan was informed by a strategic sub area plan that was done back in probably a good six, seven years ago now. But it was a guiding kind of led us to this. So a development agreement is something that is authorized by the state. It's a contract between and it's voluntary. We don't have to do this. But it's something that's done between a developer and often giving you a little bit more specificity in how an area might develop at a larger scale. We did several development agreements in the city over the years. Green Mountain PRD, 289 acres. That was one of the first things I did when I started here. It was a 15-year term. It's taken just about that long to build out fully. They're almost at the tail end, but really what's left are just a couple of parcels. So it helps, you know, doing something of that size and scale, it helps keep some certainty in for the developers because Planning and developing can be very expensive. Plus, it gives certainty for the city to make sure that we see what we want in continuity for development. It provides flexibility and design. It also, I think, sets the table very clearly who is responsible for what financial obligations and so forth. We talked about the vesting event. This particular agreement contains a lot of these, and they're all exhibits that are contained in the packet. There's the master plan phasing the transportation, really, which has been the largest focus, I think, in the conversation with staff comments from the community and with council on what these cross sections are going to look like. Because as I go forward, this is a pretty good illustration of after having that subway plan. really how much that was a catalyst for all the development you see that's out there. So Camas Woods is under construction as we speak. Oliver Terrace recently received its approval from the hearing examiner. But with the HSR North Shore Village, you know, it is tying into the larger development of SunCal. And, you know, the staff has spent a considerable amount of time not only with SunCal but with also HSR trying to figure out the best way to align uh you know the the public infrastructure that's going to go through there with north shore boulevard um just as a reminder this is what the suncal master plan looks like and this is the master plan for hsr Here's the cross section that was envisioned with the plan. We really want staff really wanted to stick with a lot of the principles in there. It has been leaked and modified throughout the process with and has worked with us diligently to make sure that there's continuity throughout. Of that, so I have. brought up the cross circular, the cross sections for what they're putting for Sunkow here. You see that's where the separated bike lanes and the cycle tracks, that was a big issue that wanted to be taken care of by some of the constituents that we have in the area. And this is really, I think, the most illustrative graphic here, seeing the entire length of North Shore Boulevard going all the way through. So a lion's share of what is going to be built is going to be built by the development community. And then that helps provide that through access and helping entitle the rest of it. And it also is going to provide access to legacy lands and things like that. There will be a couple of sections that you see like in red and the furthest blue section off to the east that there would be a capital project as we've discussed. But what's in orange and green will be HSR and then the upper blue is SunCal. And then so, you know, there was some concern at the last council meeting about the cross sections and what that might mean in terms of, you know, emergency vehicles and so forth. So, you know, this is the orange second section that's in there. There are some limited on street parking throughout the commercial area, but the rest of it will be the travel lanes. And it does show, you know, the planner strip in the middle or the median. And I think there's concern that it's not going to provide enough cross-section or ability for emergency vehicles to pass or for other motorists to get out of the way. The reason why the median's in the plan is because it's been a policy direction from the City Council to have medians in capital projects and in private development that are going to build the public infrastructure that will, you know, for the arterials and so forth. So this is commensurate to what is in our adopted transportation master plans and planning documents. But that said, it doesn't mean that we can't plan for sections that have those areas for better maneuverability. And this is the other section that's in the orange off to the north and south of the green section there. But I did go out and take some photographs of like here's on 38th. I was not driving. My wife was. This is by the tennis courts. And, you know, you do see the section here where there's a little bit longer, but medians with multiple trees and shrubs and the lights and so forth. But there's really no access point right there about where the car was. We were just passing the gym. And then you see further up though, there's a much smaller median and places in the asphalt where motorists or other vehicles can get out of the way for an emergency situations. And I will say on this case though, it's, they aren't, you know, you see the painted bike lane. It's not the cycle track like in the others. Moving a little bit further west, this is when you go past Brady Parker. median stretches are going to have a lot more space in between. So the point here is, and then you can even see when we get back by kind of the storage facility and tennis courts, you got a really long stretch of just nothing but asphalt until you get to that signalized intersection where Fisher's driving. So the point is, is that staff does work with the fire marshal's office during engineering review either with the private development without having to do a development agreement or with the development agreement. So we do want to make sure that we make things safe as possible. Staff did meet with both chiefs to talk through it. Their preference is not to have any medians at all, but we're trying to weigh the needs of what is in the adopted plans also with what we need for safety reasons and so forth. And here's another option that's down by Canvas Meadows Drive. In this case, instead of just asphalt, at least it's a rolled curb scenario. Emergency vehicles will know more to use that than, I think, general motorists. But it is something that is a tool that can be employed if needed. And here's the master plan. What this is showing, there was comment received in the past about the connection down to Leadbetter. That's where the water and sewer infrastructure is. It's always been anticipated to have some sort of an extension up into the North Shore area. The reason it has more of an arcing design to it, so it doesn't, you know, earlier on with other interested parties, they want to just do a straight shot up there. It would be a much more invasive cutting in that case. This way, it helps the aesthetic aspect of it, but importantly, it also adds a pedestrian pathway down to We'll have better when it becomes a trail network permanently once North Shore Boulevard is entirely built out. And it's something that vehicles will not be using. It will be an emergency access only if fire department or police needed to in those situations. But this was something that goes way back to when the city had acquired this from the Mills and CJ Dens and so forth. And even design started with train land before she left. John Potter, I will happy to get to some questions I apologize, I was going to put in a graphic for the connection from between some cow and hsr just realizing I didn't put that in there today, but there is a nice design that actually does have that so it's. John Potter, It's not a T intersection be happy to share that with Council after the fact, unless I could find it really quickly. This is a public hearing. Staff is recommending that you approve the public hearing after taking testimony, but staff feels that a lot of these issues have been taken care of. Or if you have concerns and modifications, we take that into consideration as well. The applicant's representative is here, and if we get to that stage, then the staff recommends that you direct the city attorney to prepare an adoptive resolution for the second meeting in September.

Okay, so is it now time to open public hearing?

Yes.

John? That's correct, Chair. Okay, thank you. Public hearing is open. This is time to state your support or opposition to this item, and if you are in agreement, previous speaker's statement. You can simply state that as your entire comment. So if you just walked out... Make an announcement that I agree with that person that just preceded me. We will count it as a comment. Repeat that comment that was done by the previous person. We'll take the in person comments 1st, and then the comments from the attending those attending remotely. If you're here in person to comment, come to the table, state your name and your city of residence. If you're a remote and want to make a comment, please raise your hand. In the Zoom app, Sydney will enable your audio. Unmute yourself and state your name and your city of residence. Is there anyone here who wishes to comment? Please come forward and state your name and city of residence.

Randall Friedman, Camus, I'm opposed to the development agreement, but it's just one point. And it's one point that was touched on, but not touched on deep enough. And that concerns the road, the emergency road that led better to the South. I want to go back to 2020 when there was discussions about purchasing that land. And the Mills agent said there would have to be an access road to the Mills family remainder lands from Leadbetter because without fairly immediate access, the value of the Mills family remainder lands would be dramatically reduced. Now, the staff in those discussions could not do that, but what they said was, and this is recorded by Kimball Logan, the agent, the net result of negotiations was that the staff not commit to make the changes requested by the Mills family because each change required due process through the standard city planning. However, the city staff led by Pete Capelle and Phil Borkin, agreed that the city staff would use good faith effort or best efforts. And that was to get that road that's now being shown. So let's look at the road. I heard somewhere that it was just going to be 20 feet wide. Well, I was driving up Brady this morning and took a look and I got home and did Google Earth. And Brady has two 11 foot traffic lanes and two five foot shoulders. What they're really talking about, if you talk about a road that a fire truck can come up and buy, you're talking about putting Brady Road through there. That's the reality. And the thing that is most bothersome is once it's on this map, the decision in the future will be made by a hearing examiner. And this council will just tell the citizens, well, it's out of our hands. So what really irks me is, This is giving the developer access road through legacy lands that we paid $37,000 an acre for after being told this land was critical to stop the development of it. And now what we're hearing is, well, because of this little on the side agreement made six years ago, we're going to let them have an emergency road. And we're going to put gates at the top or bottom that we control. And there will never be a situation where, you know, five or six years from now when that east section of North Shore Boulevard still isn't built, that the fire department comes to you and says, we can't safely serve that neighborhood. We have to open that road to meet access because we're not sure that other one's ever going to be built. And a hearing examiner is not going to say no to the fire department. You're not going to say no to it. So be honest with us. You're putting in a Brady Road from that. I actually don't have a problem with it being put in. I have a problem with giving that land without any mitigation by the developer. I remember talking to that developer saying, God, if we could get that road in, we'd improve the area at the bottom. We'd do some development. Nothing like that now. And there should be. This agreement should include compensation for the city, for the value of those legacy lands, the impact of that road, so we can finally get some recreation down at the lake. Thank you. Thank you.

Glenn DeWilly, Camas. Good evening. some time ago when SunCal was in this room and uh responding to some of the comments made about the first entree in the North Shore we talked a lot about green infrastructure and I heard a lot as their as their plans would mature that we'd start to see some of that come to light As I look at diagrams and documents that keep materializing as the design ripens, what I see instead is a bunch of impervious surfaces in a town that relies on groundwater for its water supply. And I'm wondering when we're going to start demanding more of these developers that come in and obstruct and destroy really our ability to recharge our aquifers. I think it's due time that we really start taking into account the idea of recharge and protecting critical areas and especially, but also a lot of these strips that we see that have pavement on them now that have been done in the last 10 years. There's plenty of opportunity there to make that impervious surface porous, whether it be through asphalt surfaces that are porous, whether it be through graded bricks, stone, anything that could safely pass an emergency vehicle, but yet allow us recharge because land development that's happening alone and the lots that we're turning over that were beautiful forests and green space, that's one aspect. But when we can control that, we need to ask more of the developers, especially for paving, and going from an impervious service to a pervious one. That's all I've got. Thanks for your consideration.

Thank you.

Darcy, Camas, Washington. I echo a lot of what he had said. But here it says, in Camas, Washington, standard fire access roads require an unobstructed minimum width of 20 feet. And with the width increases to 26 feet in the immediate vicinity of any fire hydrants and 30 feet for aerial fire apparatus access. My thing is, as it is on all of the development within Camas, number one, we don't have infrastructure, period. It's done. Number two, that legacy land we paid for, we paid for in our property taxes and have for over 25 years. If they are going to be using it, they need to pay us. If I'm going to be using somebody's property, I'm going to pay. Just this summer, we put in a new fence with our neighbor. It's still down there that, you know, property lines are the same. But they had offered to pay for using part of our property. No, just leave the line as it is because the fence can come down. Because, see, we paid. the property. We paid for the legacy land, all of us, anybody who's been a homeowner here. I am all for advancement within the city and big time with advancement for business. So my husband is super concerned on the police having adequate resources available to them for adding in extra space. So, thank you. Thank you.

Margaret Creek-Hammets. I'd like to reiterate comments I made previously. I thought it was rushed through the cross-section, but I agree with the fire marshals. regarding public safety and their preference for no medians. The city for too long has been installing dangerous medians that do cause motorcycle and car accidents in the middle of the road, making it impossible to pull over if you hear a siren at certain points in major roads. So I believe that homeowners would want to protect their investment and make their home easy to access for any emergency, whether it's a medical emergency or a fire emergency. I 100% agree with the fire department on that point. I don't think the median's do anything for us on 38th there is a section that's a wide median and the section that he showed was more of the narrow median which by the way they when they built it they built it wide and then realized that they had made a mistake and they then they filled it back in and narrowed it up But at any rate, the thing that's maddening about that, it has irrigation installed. Do you realize how expensive an irrigation system in the middle of the road is? It's so expensive to maintain, you shouldn't be considering it for financial reasons. Regarding the sidewalks buckling, part of the reason they buckle is because of the city requirements that planter strips, these are something like five feet, as I recall, are planted with trees in between the sidewalk and the road. that invariably results in buckling sidewalks, just like you heard has happened in Winchester Hills. In many other neighborhoods, including the neighborhood I'm living in, Holly Hills, we see it all the time. And then homeowners are surprised. That's my responsibility. Okay, we don't have to do the planters in between the road and the sidewalk. If you have your planted area at the side, then it could be a homeowner's responsibility or it could be a HOA's responsibility. But you just don't have the interruption and you definitely reduce the sidewalk buckling if you simply have the planters on the outside, not in a strip. And again, the city requires irrigation. expensive for the developers. It ends up being expensive to the homeowners too. I hope the city will seriously revisit this whole median issue and the irrigation planter strips that are disastrous for Buckland Sidewalks. Thank you. Thank you.

I've built a sweet canvas since 1997. We've lived in the Holly Hills neighborhood since 1997. And I agree with my wife, Margaret, see the uh the planter strips and they're usually full of weeds they're ugly they take a lot of maintenance it's a lot of cost the city for what reason i'm not really sure um like along 38th there they're just kind of ugly and everything's kind of dying and weeds popping up and and a lot of maintenance costs for no particular reason and it does narrow the street and i agree with the uh fire department and the police eliminate those for safety to get emergency vehicles through and it doesn't cost anything to not have those but it costs something to build them and maintain them if you do and then also on the pervious surfaces there is apparently not sure exactly how there is pervious concrete and asphalt something like that that can help allow. It is okay. There's expenses to maintain. I don't know the details about that, but certainly something we looked into for the purpose of talking about. Otherwise, just get a lot of runoff, further pollution and lack of a slake, etc.

Tyler Sanders, Canvas. This will be the second time you hear me talk about bikes today. I want to come up and say that I'm sincerely grateful for all the care that has gone into the protected bike infrastructure and these HSR capital plans as well as other North Shore plans that we've seen up till now. I've spoken many times about the transformative power of high quality bike infrastructure And I really believe that this level of infrastructure that is so safe you'll let your kids ride there is going to be a huge boon for our city going forward. That's the kind of quality we see in these cross sections here. So sometimes it's easy to fall into the trap of current ridership as indicative of the total demand for biking. The reality is most people just aren't comfortable with historically, but would be happy to ride if they had a place to ride that was safe and comfortable and connected to where they need to go. And that's, again, that's the kind of standard that we see in these documents. That's why it's so powerful that we've set these high standards here and are following through with them. We're building that safe, comfortable, connected network from the outset, and that will be transformative. I just want to give my two cents on the median thing, too, as well. I know there's been discussion about emergency services and safety and all that. Um, and, and ultimately we're going, I, I trust that we're going to have expert opinions from fire marshal from engineer experience with the matter. So I, I trust that whatever, whatever solution we come up with, you know, be serviceable, um, because of that, um, Wide roadways are consistently associated with higher traffic speeds or crashes, deadlier crashes. Medians are an effective tool of traffic calming, of narrowing the roadway width. They help urge drivers to drive more safely, drive lower speeds, be more attentive. And so I just want to make sure that we're not compromising our roadway safety in the name of safety by completely eliminating that option. Again, just want to really appreciate the protected bike infrastructure work. and I hope we maintain these high standards throughout the future of North Shore development as well. Thank you.

Marshall, BMS Washington. Yeah, I would like to... I agree with the previous speaker in terms of the safety measures that I see in this development. In general, I'm supportive of this development. I thank HSR and staff for hanging in there. You know, there were some changes on the bike lanes to get that safer, and they've done that. And keeping it consistent through SunCal all the way through, I think, is going to make for a much more valuable development. On the trees, I understand the frustration with some of the earlier plantings around town. I think a lot of that developers and landscapers know what to do now. We have root barriers. A lot of that is actually in the implementation. When you see something drawn up, it looks great, but then getting the you know, the developer or the builder to actually do it right. And, you know, it's about picking the right species of trees, again, putting in root barriers so that you don't get buckling. But I just want to speak up for the trees because the trees are really valuable and they're going to make that development very valuable. And with a valuable development, that's going to mean less tax burden on the rest of us. So we should encourage the tree planting and trees in both planting strips and in the median are, from what I understand, practice for traffic calming. They narrow the field of vision. Fairly effective bollards, right, to protect pedestrians and bikers, but they also prevent head-on collisions because you don't have the ability for traffic to collide. The only thing I would add is, you know, this is a phase development. And in the later phases, we're going to get the mixed use of the commercial parts. And I would just make sure maybe looking at some flexibility there on the parking requirements. And maybe we could even get a little higher value development. It's pretty parking heavy, and I can envision more residential, which might be more active in that area.

So anyway, thank the developer for hanging in there.

It looks consistent with what we've been asking for for the last six months, and I look forward to some high-value development out there.

Thank you. Any other comments? Dave? Thank you. Water here.

Thank you.

Bryce Hansen. I'm with AKS Engineering and Forestry. I do live in Camas. Of hsr rep here as well and you want to thank Robert staff on the project today. But I also wanted to address a few of the comments that were brought up. Regarding the pedestrian paths and the use of that area to come down to the lake for the utilities. There's three different utilities, the water, sewer, and also stormwater that are going to come down through there. That with a wider path to allow the emergency services and the gate. And then as Robert mentioned, the meandering pathway to help kind of alleviate the sight lines, we've looked at very closely with that. Regarding the green infrastructure. With the stormwater management rules, we are required to look at that. A challenge in this area is the rock. It's very shallow, which means there's not the ability to infiltrate. And so that's where it does come into a challenge to try to put pervious surfaces John Potter, In the infrastructure we do it, it just goes down and then it's going to hit hit and go to the same area, otherwise so it's actually not recommended to do infiltration type systems on a rock under light base. John Potter, let's see I also wanted to talk about the Center medians as Robert mentioned. we've been working with the city to help develop some options to have breaks in the medians or vary what's out there. So I know the developer is open to continuing that conversation as this moves forward to make sure that meeting the city code and safety standards. And also on the, excuse me, the sidewalks and the trees as was brought up, there's root barriers that are now installed for any of the street trees. And then with the implementation of them and the maintenance that should minimize, prevent the buckling of the sidewalks. And also on the parking that was brought up for those later stages. I think that's a continued conversation for, you know, those site plans that will be developed later on in those future phases and as the parking requirements are looked at or changed potentially that the developer is going to work with the city to accommodate that need.

I don't I appreciate you guys' time and all the collaboration we've had with you guys.

Thank you. Is there anyone else in the chamber that would like to comment? Do we have any hands raised in the Zoom app? In the chamber, one more time. Anyone want to make more comments before we're going to close the public hearing?

I would just like the HSR and AKS to say why the public should give you the land to put. This is not appropriate public comment. He actually asked if he had covered all the points. You want to address your comment to the council, you're free to do so. Well, I already did.

I was also looking at the water department today and water conservation. And again, um, irrigation systems in the middle of the street and on, on the side of the road, uh, can be very expensive for the foreign HOA or for the city to maintain. So I think something that does not require irrigation systems is good, not only from a financial point of view, but a water conservation point of view. Um, Although, you know, maybe we don't have the route guards in our area, but when sidewalks buckle, there's another safety concern, and that's for pedestrians. When you encounter a raised curb or, you know, a two-inch raise that you're not expecting if you're not looking down or watching for it, that can definitely be a tripping hazard. And I've known people that have taken falls like that. So I think that's a concern, too. It's bicycle safety is one aspect. Pedestrian safety is also important. So I hope you'll consider that. So again, just the cost of irrigation, water conservation. And if you haven't considered no medians at all, maybe narrower or something that curved would be better than a planted And I don't know when the city will or can look at that, but I'd urge the city to look at more cost-effective things, not only for the developers, but for the HOAs, for the city. Wherever the city is maintaining these, why have a standard that is so high to meet that it becomes a burden to homeowners, HOAs, and the city itself? So thank you for your consideration.

Thank you.

Darcy Camas. Myself, my only thing about anything with this city is about don't mess with my budget. Period. Work within a budget. You're going to use the legacy lands that we bought. Pay for it. Intermediates don't care. Be smart. Do concrete. Put great big boulders in the middle of the concrete. You know, this is a very rocky town. Very rocky. And, you know, appreciate homeowners having to pay for this stuff. And as far as sidewalks, it took me over a year of complaining to finally get one done on division. And it's not just the homeowners to fix them. It's the homeowners who get sued. I don't even have a sidewalk in front of my house and I have a $2 million umbrella because there's still the easement. Somebody gets hurt, I got to be covered. And the solution on that sidewalk racked me up. It is seriously a peak. Kids love riding their bikes over it now because it is elevated seriously a couple feet up to a direct point with a 19-inch gap on the side. So I don't know. I know whenever they put in sidewalks at my house, do not put a tree. is I will throw a bet. I'll put little baby roses on their something that won't break the sidewalk. Thank you.

I can only canvas. First of all, I just like to say how we've also noticed that division fix. It's so fun to like, even as adults, we run up it and jump off of it. And it's just it's just silly. The kids must love that. Just a really small comment about the landscaping. I lived in California for five years. I grew up in Seattle when it was much rainier than it is now. And when I was in California, they were really big on xeriscaping down there, right? So like crape myrtle trees are really beautiful and don't take a lot of water. Lavender, rose, like a big fan of xeriscaping if we can do that and avoid the long-term ramifications of irrigation because we got reclassed to zone 9A last year. That's crazy. That's the same thing as Sacramento. And it's hot and dry down there. So looking ahead, you know, we only have more of that to look forward to. So I'd say in general, developments in city landscaping plans, it'd be great to consider longevity in xeriscaping and less water. That's all I wanted to say. Other than that, thanks for the great bike lanes. That's all.

If there's nobody else in the chamber that wants to talk, do we have a hand raise and zoom in?

okay well then with that we will close the public hearing council judges comments motions just want to uh have no question moments uh we had a lot of great inputs tonight from everyone thank you for that um i just want to put also my engineering have a little bit bear with me for I tried to make it short. But the emergency response, I also brought it up last time. That was a concern. I want to make sure we work with our fire department to address that. Thanks, Robert, for giving us more information tonight. I would say mountable curb is one of the great options we have or have opening between the median you were talking about. That's another great option. way to address that making the median short narrower also maybe something you want to work with engineering see how that works. So the good news is the fire department has to approve when it comes to engineering plan approval, the engineering department approval is needed so definitely in that time i'm sure they're going to look at it, making sure the access works for them. I said median is actually doing safety and aesthetic. Everyone really, we heard a lot about a small town feeling, have landscape. It brings, it addresses that need. But also I heard great input that let's make it cost effective. So not only low maintenance, but also maintenance in narrow road would be hard. For staff to do it, so if we have it less maintainable type of vegetation or land that would benefit everyone. Talking about. Plant industry nationwide the study shows that where we have plant industry between the roadway and sidewalk it brings more. safety feeling for pedestrian to use sidewalks think about uh in vancouver 164th avenue with the sidewalk attached to roadway versus 192nd that we have trees in between roadway and sidewalks just think about it which road you would prefer to walk on the sidewalk and that's the reason nationwide recommend planter street PB, Lupita D Montoya, Also previous concrete or asphalt. I sometimes PB, Lupita D Montoya, It's helpful for storm weather and other drainage, but it's very expensive almost double of regular just want to share with us. PB, Harmon Zuckerman, Thank you.

I can remember.

Hi.

PB, Harmon Zuckerman, Here, I'm like, thank you. Ready for the dialogue tonight and answering the questions of why the explanations help a lot. You have a question, just escape me, regarding emissions requirements, state emissions requirements. Your requirement by the state with emissions requirements in order to plant enough trees to take in emissions from vehicles?

That's a great question.

So there is a requirement to have an element that has a goal to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and vehicle miles traveled. The trees, you know, could capture the carbon that's already emitted. It doesn't reduce the emissions, but that's a strategy for sure.

That was one of the things I wanted to make, was my understanding that we've got climate goals, state-mandated climate goals that we have to try to achieve, or else we also have to build in, part of the infrastructure has to build in, vegetation can help capture emission. So it's my understanding that that's what some of this is for.

And one of the things that wasn't mentioned was shading. The trees provide shading, both for pedestrians, but also that shade helps preserve the road surface a little bit better. And then obviously, in the more planting areas, the less road surface to be able to monitor. There's a balance, certainly, that we're going to be addressing in the engineering phase. That's all, Mayor. Thank you.

Okay, thank you. Council Member Burke.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you, Alan and Robert, as usual, great presentation. And I want to thank all the people who spoke tonight and offered testimony. My goal remains the same, and that is ensure, I love the idea of a zero escape planting strip. I do realize that's a traffic calming measure. I understand the fire department will have to approve the design. I'm still really focused on separating the bike lane, the bike and pedestrian lanes from automobile traffic. And I saw a couple of, I saw a lot of things go by. And so I saw a couple of designs where that was the case. And so I just wanted to express strong support for that. Thank you.

Thank you. Council Member Elzengray.

Thank you, Mayor. And Robert, thank you very much for the presentation. This is a point that I brought up earlier. I just wanted to check and see where you guys were on this. And that is the access to the Anderson parcel. Because without that, then traffic would go down Benton Drive, which is a non-starter. So where are you guys at on getting that, the easement or purchasing the property from North Shore Boulevard?

It said he has a question for us and a question. OK, thank you. When I chose a full network, yeah.

It was right here. As long as you show that, yeah.

Always a danger if I stop sharing. I'm gonna get it back. Okay, so the slide that we have here, I don't know if you could see my cursor, but there is right-of-way that was dedicated to the city from Lynn Johnston that will provide some access up to third for the HSR piece until such time that, you know, coming from the other end, the bookend would be, you know, through SunCal site because the Clearly, the city capital project, while it's underway with has his team, they're going to go out to add for proposals. and get into some design work. It is something that's been in our budget. It does take time to design and permit and build that kind of infrastructure, especially when you're dealing with a bridge. So there will be access to the HSR site through some of the county existing infrastructures out there, and there will be some off-site requirements to update some of those, given that they're substandard. So That is something that would happen through the development process. I'm working with the county. The county will have, and the state for that matter, will have an opportunity to provide requirements on what they want within their infrastructure needs. But the long term plan is to have the continuity through the all repeat. So there are two points there if that helps. And to be clear, we're not building Brady. It is just a 20-foot path that we've been discussing for emergency access. And then the benefit to it is the pedestrian trail long-term. The city's actually not going to be building the developer. So there is a little bit of a trade-off and return on value there. It may not be for square-foot value that some may want, but there is some value to the parking system.

Thank you. Actually, I had a question about that, but you just answered it about that, Terrell. Where are you at on getting through the Anderson property? Because when we last spoke, you guys didn't have an easement?

Oh, yeah. Dale Anderson. No, we've had conversations with his legal counsel. Dale and his family do have a desire to develop the property in that sort of triangular piece at the southwest corner. it's a benefit to them to dedicate the right-of-way to the city so knowing that we will be building that section of the road um you know but we haven't we haven't made the deals yet with them and we don't have a subdivision application yet but the and we've discussed this with them would be as part of that subdivision to get a dedication great thanks guys appreciate it thank you mayor okay any more comments or questions promotions

Mayor, I move to direct the city attorney to draft an ordinance for council's consideration at the September 21st, 2026 City Council regular meeting.

Second.

Move by Swalage and seconded to direct the city's attorney to draft an ordinance for the council's consideration at the September 21st, 2026 City Council regular meeting. Any discussion? All in favor say aye.

Aye.

All opposed say nay. Are there any abstentions? The motion passes. Thank you. Next item on the agenda. Five minute break. Sounds like it. We will have a five minute break.

Okay, we're back.

Next on the agenda is the form of government ballot decision. And the presenter is the city council. So I will open it up for anyone on the city council to start the conversation. Go, Tim. All right. Give up the guns.

Anybody else here tonight? Just a few thoughts. Given now been about a month for all of us, a lot of feedback, little conversations, emails, recent town hall. So first I want to thank all citizens for their time, attention and recommendations on this issue. to include in town hall and the communication afterward. A few questions. What is the problem we're trying to address? The city is in a solid position with its AAA rating, strong strategic plan, which was developed by citizens as it's being acted on. What is the compelling need to change from this hybrid form of representative government that reflects our state and federal forms of government The topic has taken a lot of time to date. It's taking time away from other important priorities we have, such as a potential structural budget deficit, addressing city assets and economic development, and there should be a compelling need to change. There is a compelling need to change. and it be addressed by amending Hamas Municipal Code as per CMC 2.04 or 2.06, the responsibilities and authority of City Council and the City Administrator. Amendments towards CMC is similar to amendments to the Constitution. We haven't changed the federal form of government. We've had 27 amendments. How is amending the CMC any different? As per CMC 2.04, Council has the responsibility to confirm the City Manager appointment, termination, contract, and controls the fiscal spending in line with the budget. Council approves or does not approve or may amend the Mayor's budget. Council has the authority now, and if needed, needs to exercise anything in its power as a check and balance to the Mayor's authority. respecting, Mr. Mayor. The change in government will not change this, but will only give a council authority by eliminating the executive branch of CAMA's government. Consolidation of power concentrates more authority than a person counseled, safe manager. The result is less check and balance to roles, responsibilities, and authority since the executive branch of government has been eliminated. It also reduces the spirit workload that currently exists with the mayor, city administrator, and city council. It increases the workload with the city administrator and council while making leadership less accountable to the citizens for a fractional seven-member council. The consideration is how will this impact city staff, especially the directors? With strong council, shared management and accountability, from council to the manager includes accountability and provides direction to the city manager. Council needs to have, this group will need to have skill set, experience and time to agree to and manage performance objectives to the city administrator. This leadership by committee tends to have inconsistency and multiple personal agendas. This form of government reduces direct power and accountability to the electorate. Given that, recommendations. Most important, and we heard this last week, leaders are the most important, not the form of government. Problems aren't going to go away. They're not different. They'll just be addressed differently. Maintain the current hybrid form of government as it provides a structure of government that understands and supports the current and future needs of the city of Canis, establish checks and balances for each executive leadership role within the city, and mitigates risk during times of challenges. There should be transition while providing the participation and accountability to the electorate. Things I think can be improved as per CMC 2.04. and 2.06. Mayor, define the roles, responsibilities, qualifications, and expectations for the mayor. This is important for any candidate and electorate when voting. Do the exact same thing for the council. We're no different. As per CMC 2.04, reinforce council's authority to approve the mayor's choice for city administrator, as well as require council requirement to approve any termination. Important for stability in this position. For council accountability, require a roll call vote for every vote that is summarized in all meeting minutes. Also define council responsibility qualifications for candidates. City administrator, recommendation to hire locally in the Northwest as they know the area. can have deeper ties and accountability to this area. It reduces the risk of the unknown for the city and the administrator. If the decision is to go ahead and look to a change, here are the consistencies I've heard in conversations and seen in email. In email, to maximize the time for citizens to be informed and ask questions before voting, maximize voter turnout, cost, put on the ballot as low as possible. One, no rush and maximize community input and feedback. Consider the following actions and timing. Earliest ballot initiative, November, 2027. Couldn't be November, 2028 as it will have the biggest turnout with the presidential election. For that time, Two additional town halls similar to what we just had with a focus on but not isolated to government. Yeah, a good turnout. There was a desire to have more topics covered. It would be important to keep that going. Have a community survey to pressure test the interest in form of government change and timing. That recommendation came from a few citizens. Feedback I just have received and seen today reflects 60% against and 40% for, but we don't really know. Surveys currently being planned for distribution in two weeks and could add a form of government question added with education content from the recent town hall. The results that get back to us in December, that would provide additional information and feedback on questions the community has and their appetite for this potential change. That's what I have just to kick it off. I'll be quiet. Thank you.

Next.

So I'm going to repeat a few things I talked about at the town hall. But one of the things I'm going to talk about the most is that I have to deal with people a lot every day in my job. And I know that most of you do also. You understand that, right? And I work with some very strong groups of people with very strong opinions. And one of the things that I always pay attention to is when somebody pushes extremely hard on something, I seek to understand why they push that hard on something. And so I have always been a strong advocate of putting things before the people. Just as I mentioned during the fireworks portion, if we can't decide it here, then put it to the vote of the people. And they get incredible pushback from people who don't want it to go to the vote of the people. And so as I listen here to a lot of folks who say, don't do anything, don't change it, I seek to understand all of the reasons why. So even the questions I continue to ask and will continue to ask is, why not put something before the people if it's something that I'm hearing a lot from people that are divided on it, right? So that's a good time to do it. Another thing that I keep hearing about over and over again is accountability. And it would imply that only the mayor is accountable. And I will say it again, I said it at the town hall, we are all accountable. We're all accountable to the voters. And if people don't like what I'm saying here tonight or at any other night that I'm here talking or things I support or don't support, they will vote me out. And so we all are accountable. and to suggest that the mayor has a higher level of accountability to the voters, I think is incorrect. Another thing that, and again, I ask people to listen, listen with an open mind because I try to listen to people with an open mind and seek to understand where they're coming from. And I hear repeatedly the suggestion that should only go before a general election because that's when a lot of people vote. I would offer that for those people who pay attention to every single ballot, who always vote, who always read the voter pamphlets, whether online or mailed to your house, and who have paid attention to what's going on in the city. it seems a little offensive to say, hey, we have to wait till a lot of people vote. If people care about the community, they inform themselves. They will ask the questions and they'll know what's out. To say only a vote that has a lot of people who show up one November every four years to vote doesn't seem like a good way to go. So that's why our system allows for multiple elections per year. to get things before the voters. And I think that on something that appears this split, it's probably time to let the voters. And that's where we come into it, to say, what am I hearing out there? And do we want the voters to weigh in or not? As opposed to holding this decision just to ourselves.

Any other people want to speak?

Can talk next. All right. I think I shared my opinion, one of the most among you all. I always like to think out loud maybe, but I would say we heard a lot of great concern. We heard a lot of good comments over the last few months, lots of good emails. Everybody shared their perspective, their requests from us. I am in support of taking this decision to the general to vote and decide if they want to keep the current form of government or change it. What I want to talk more in the time we have, not only if this council wants to take it to the voters, but also if yes, the timing of that is also critical. We all read and saw or heard the comments on the timing. A lot of people are saying This November of 26 lot saying November of 27 and some are in favor of February or anytime. I just want to explain my opinion, why it should be February of 27 and here is why. November of 2026 is too, we don't have time for public engagement. There is no time for the council to decide to move forward with the election. There's no time to prepare the measure. So November of 2027, in fact, I want to pass it to Sean to explain more, but there are so many new ballots PB, Lupita D Montoya- That's why, even though I was thinking. Yeah. PB, Lupita D Montoya- If the form of government decision in that balance. We also have the mayor position and also as Lord counsel position in that balance. which if the public, the majority size new form of government, in the council manager form of government, I think we saw one of our community member emails too, the at-large council position is not actually needed. Because the seventh seat of the council is going to be the mayor position. Maybe I'll pass it to Sean to talk more about it.

So, The way this works is you have the default basically is the general election. That's kind of the starting point. And general election, as defined in the statute, is under There's a whole lot of statutes. Here it goes. 29A04-330, which is all city, town, and district general elections are held throughout the state of Washington on the first Tuesday following the first Monday in November in the odd-numbered years. So general elections, for the purpose of that timing, really means November 2027. But the statute also indicates that you can have the election, the special election prior to the general election, So if you're with me so far, November 27, special election before the general election. And that means essentially that you have those options in 2027 because you're more than 180 days out of the general election, November 2027. So those are three dates there that are available to you, February 2027, April 2027, and August 2027. Technically, August 2027 is not a – It's the primary. It's not technically a special election, but I think I did a memo. I indicated that historically in the way it's been interpreted, you can use August 2027 also as a special election. And so long story short, this November election technically for purposes of determining when the city can hold a general election is not this November because that really would be a special election within a general election. The true general election is next year. That's November, 2027. But the statute for purposes of allowing this ballot allows if you make findings that you want to use a special election. And I did some research and there's a few jurisdictions that have done it during a special election. You have those dates available to you, February, April, or August. Does that help? And you're also asking about putting on the ballot the issue of how to fill the chair position.

Yes. So if it's, uh, if it's doable to have the form of government, same ballot as we have the mayor position and the at large council position in the same.

So the way that works is used to be, you had to do it in two separate elections. And then in 2022, they had changed the statute to indicate that you could do what's called a combined, um, resolution. And so you would combine the determination as to change the form of government and then concurrent with that indicate, and should you also designate council position one as the chair of the council? Because remember the default position is if you say nothing is that if you go to council manager at the first meeting in January, you folks elect a chair, right? So that's the default. If you don't say anything, that's the way it's supposed to work. Okay. And that person serves out a term. And I think you probably switch seats. But if you want to have a designated position, council position one is the chair of the council becomes essentially the mayor basically, right? Then you have to include that or you can include that in your form of government resolution. I'm presuming the other way you could do this, the way we used to do it, which is you'd have your original election form of government. And then at the next special election, you could have, we want to have the designation of council position one, be the mayor. The trouble with that is that that election doesn't occur until the next general election. So you wouldn't technically have that position filled until the next general election. So that's the kind of the twist there that you would get into because that person doesn't take the position as chair until they're sworn in, not sworn in until they're elected into that position. They're not You have to be certified, and then generally, you know, you start January 1 of the next year, right? And so you'd have that gap between your special election date, say in February of 2028, for example, and you still have to wait out the time before they would be certified by the November election and then come into office in January. So it's cleaner to have the combination, I guess, of what I'm trying to indicate, if that's the will of the council. Otherwise, your default is you meet every January, you pick one of you to be the be the chair. Does that help? It's fairly convoluted. I think I did the best I could to explain it without doing a memo.

You did a good job on that. I mean, seriously. You brought up some points that...

I would like to finish a quick thought on the effect on the officers. So If this is adopted, then officers means council members. You're elected, right? You fulfill your terms. That's all it is. The mayor becomes essentially an eighth council member. So the remainder of the mayor's term is... HAB-Jacques Juilland, Is whatever it is, it becomes a council member their eighth council member and then of course you've built that position with at the beginning of the next term either by call selecting a chair right when the mayor steps down. HAB-Jacques Juilland, Our eighth council member or you've had that election you've had the designation of the. HAB-Jacques Juilland, Of the Chair of the Council position number one to be the Chair so. That's the effect on you folks. There's really no other change. You don't change your position titles. We're not changing the classification. We're still a non-charter code city operating under Title 35A. You're just changing your form of government. You're going from strong council, strong mayor council to a council manager. Mayor, can I have a question for Sean?

Yeah.

Could you clarify, the eighth position, is that just between the election and January 1? Yeah.

So it takes to certify the election. In other words, you say you have it in February. You pick February. They certified it. They certified it in, I don't know, it would take two weeks?

It's probably a month.

Well, yeah, it takes a month, whatever it takes. Bainbridge Island did it. And I think I sent you their, they kind of had a cheat sheet that they followed. They adopted it. OK, the voters have spoken. We're going to adopt this council manager form. the mayor becomes an aid council member. And then you wait out the general election to see who's going to be the new chair, right? And that person can, as of August, they can decide they want to run for the new, the council position, number one position. But anyway, that's how it works in practice is the mayor position becomes a council member.

Council member, Sean. My understanding or belief was that, If it was passed, that mayor would serve out his term as mayor because the former government wouldn't change until the following January.

I'm not seeing that. That's not the way Bainbridge Island did it. They changed it upon if the buyers... I don't think I saw that. I'll find that. It's highlighted.

You didn't send it.

Well, I think Marilyn.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Several thoughts. On this particular issue about January 1st, If we decide to move forward, we can write a resolution that determines what the effective date is. The resolution could include a change of form of government, a designation of position one as the mayor, the large position would go away, and then it would be effective the date that we choose. So that I'm very clear on after talking with MRSC. I wanted to add some thoughts to the discussion Um, I'm also in favor of a February election if we get the votes to move it forward for many reasons. I think that someone at the town hall talked about chaos and don't, you know, let's not create chaos. If we did an election in November, which we can't do in 2026 because we missed that filing deadline. Well, we didn't miss it. It just, it already went by. Um, There would be some some chaos if if the form of government change is approved. Right. Because then we'd only have six weeks to do all any kind of background work that would need to be done. Legislative actions that designate a city administrator, not a not a I mean, a city manager, not a city administrator. There's just a lot of things that would need to occur very quickly. And I don't—that feels chaotic to me. So I support a February election. I want to know—I believe that they came up at the town hall that many— Several people, I think, said it doesn't it shouldn't matter what form of government you're running for mayor for. Right. You want to be the mayor. You want to serve our community as a leader or you don't. And so I do I do agree with that. I think that there is some chaos that would occur if we have elected a. an at-large representative, and then our form of government changes. That eight-member thing, I mean, it was done in Washougal. Molly Koston was, they changed the form of government. She was the mayor, but she became an eighth council member, and she did that for two years. So there are precedences for those types of things. I concur with Councillor Knorr when he talks about accountability. We're all accountable. I mean, we all get emails. We all, you know, we all, you know, are accosted, not accosted. That sounds like a judgmental word, but we talk to people all the time because we're out on the streets all the time. We're in the grocery store and we're at the park and we're doing all of these things. You know, I've made a, I've gone on record as saying that I am in favor of shared governance and, you sharing the responsibility for some decisions, I think, is something that I believe is important. I agree with Councillor Hine. We had already discussed having at least two more town hall events. I was very pleased with the way it went, as I said earlier during our council comments, at different times of day. We had one at 5 p.m. Now we should have one at noon for people who are working, want to, you know, tune in or you know, maybe early afternoon for parents whose kids are in school to try to get at the people, as many people as we can to really hear what they've said. Now, based on, you know, my email and our email and comments at town hall, it was a preponderance by a small margin nonetheless, that wanted us to take this to our residents, that they want an opportunity to have their voice heard via their vote. We vote with their feet. And so I do support taking it to a ballot. I do support having a ballot in February, not waiting until November 2028. As Councillor Hines said, we have a lot of business that we need to conduct. And we've been distracted by a number of things in the last couple of years. But I feel that we're in a good place now as a council to move forward. Let me just look at my notes, if you don't mind. I think that's all I have for now. Thank you.

I could chime in. Sure. The statute is 35A06030. It says if a city with a mayor council plan of government is reorganized with a council manager plan of government, the mayor shall serve as a council member for the remainder of his or her term. So there it is. And then also to follow up with Council Member Burke's point, and I'm going to probably have to spend a little time with this because I haven't seen a resolution with an effective date, but here's a statute, 35A06040. which says that upon the passage of a resolution of the legislative body of a non-charter code city, that's us, proposing abandonment by the city of the plan of government under which it is then operating and adoption of another plan, naming such plan and its effective date. Those there, I can't say that I've seen one before, effective date, but it's certainly something I'd sort of, you know, We went with a motion today. You know, this, we could try, but my point is that the effective date is in the statute. And it's certainly something that we could explore. Second thing I want to note is that to the extent that once this council decided, again, just as we're not at the voting stage yet, but to the extent the council directs the option of a resolution and you adopt a resolution and that resolution says, send this to the county elections division to schedule it. That point you have an elections issue. And there's a prohibition against campaign activities. There's limitation of what you can and can't do. And I think I mentioned that a memorandum about what you can and can't do to be pro or con on a pending matter that's before the vote. And so if there's an impetus to say, well, we'd like to have some more town halls, you might want to, again, if you have 60 days before February, right, to put this on the ballot, which I think is December 11th, I gave you a sheet from the county. You might want to think about deferring the actual adoption of the resolution until you've had consideration of the adoption of the resolution until you've had these town halls. But that's just, can we get past that? Have we had informative get-togethers in relation to pending ballot measures? My recollection is I'd have to go research. I think you can have one printout in relation to an objective review of the facts associated with the pending ballot measure. But point being, you're very limited on your public outreach and use of public facilities for campaign-related matters once you have this essentially forwarded to the county for placement on a ballot.

We did multiples with the RFA, didn't we? Multiple town halls?

Was council present? Some were. The point is, it's what you can and can't say.

Correct.

And so caution is warranted. I've expressed a lot of caution about how PDC is there for a reason. PDC has a complaint division. All they do is get complaints. So my point is, it's worth at least a consideration on your part. path forward if you have sufficient time to do it perhaps in a different way that you won't have those considerations.

Council Member Burke.

I can hold my comments for a moment. I know that Councilor Sonescu and Councilor Elzingre are likely to want to speak and I've already spoken once. Thank you.

Council Member Sonescu.

Thank you, Hogan. Thank you, Council Member Burke. I'm oddly quiet tonight. This is basically trying to convince my colleagues how to vote differently than how I know they're going to vote. So I've talked to the citizens about how I feel. I feel if you're in touch with what our citizens want, this is going to fail. And I think we're spending a lot of time on something that's going to fail. As far as the accountability, And you said it's not a higher level of accountability. It's a different level of accountability. It's the chief executive officer. I mean, I want to be able to fire that person as a citizen. The council, to get an agreement by four people on council, that's a little trickier. I mean, but when you have a community that wants to have an election to determine whether they want you there or not, that should be their right. So I'm not talking to my colleagues here today because I know where we're all going. But I would be in favor of taking a vote. I don't know that anyone's going to change their mind at this point. And then moving forward as to when it would be on the ballot if the votes go that way.

You up? Sure. Thank you, Councilman Peirce, and ask you because I think you're 100% right. Everybody knows where they're going on this. But in general, I do appreciate all of the comments and I really appreciated the town hall. I think either form of government can work because it's more about who we elect than the former government under which we operate. As I said during the town hall, the 10 largest cities are split five to five And the 10 cities that are around our population are also split five to five on form of government. So either form of government can work. And before the town hall and before today, I was definitely against putting this on the ballot because I'm a finance guy. I'm on the finance committee. I don't want to spend 50K on an election. I'd like to give it to Chief Jones. So I've been against it, but oddly enough, Understanding that the towns are evenly split on form of government, I have tallied all of the emails and discussions that I've had with people. Believe it or not, it's evenly split. It seems crazy. And I didn't want to put it on the ballot because I thought there's no way this thing can pass. I don't want to spend 50K on a wild goose chase. But I don't think my opinion is important here. I think half of them want to do it. And therefore, I can't predict the outcome of the election. So I don't support doing it in February. I'm going to be outvoted, which is fine. That's why we have seven. That's why we don't have one councillor. Um, but I, you know, I've changed my stance. I think we should send it to the people and let and let them decide. I prefer to have more time. I prefer to be able to talk to people more. About it and educate more people, and I would prefer the last election. We had a 39% turnout. And I don't necessarily agree that we should have an election. We know we're going to have less people because those people are more involved. I think we should do everything we can as counselors to get more people involved. I think we should have more town halls. I think we should have more discussion. I think we should have Brian Rochelle putting out more information about this to get more people involved. But be that as it may, I won't vote for putting it in February, but I'm all for putting it on the ballot. That's all I have to say about it. Mary would like to make a motion.

Can I make a comment? Okay. Okay, you want to talk, Marilyn? Yeah, you can talk before me.

Thank you. And a couple of, really, it just boils down to one more question for Sean, and that is, or Councillor McPherson, sorry. Until a specific resolution has been drafted, a specific resolution, right, we still can share our opinions. It's the resolution, once the resolution has been voted upon, if we go that way, we can still engage with our community. Isn't that correct, sir?

Absolutely. I see a form of motion, which is practice for us. The motion directs the city attorney to draft a resolution. And until the resolution is actually voted upon, we don't know the result of that yet. There's nothing still speculative at that point.

Thank you. That's exactly what I thought. I'm sorry to interrupt. Well, I'm not sorry to interrupt. I have a handout.

Can I seek a clarification of what you just said? I want to get it clear. I want to see clearly. So, in theory, if it were to go, as has been talked about the February ballot, the last date that can be put in is 12-11, as you said. So, if City Council met on 12-7 and voted one way or the other, I know that's a tight timeline, but really what you're saying is that...

I wouldn't do that. Okay, the one before that. I wouldn't do that, too. Probably with, yeah. Okay. County auditor resigning after 25 years, and I have a good relationship with him. I want him to, yeah.

But it is the vote of the council to either vote to move it forward or not vote to move forward. Not at some point, because we can say bring back a resolution, but it's nothing until there's a vote to either move forward or not. Correct.

The resolution has to be, you know, if we have a vote, it's certified by the clerk as being adopted, then I... certify the resolution over to the county. And so once that occurs, then we're in election mode.

Thank you. Thank you. I'm going to make my statement now. So the reason I ran for mayor is because the city was in turmoil in 2022. And frankly, I was one of the few that wasn't working. I had retired. So I had been on the council for 18 years or whatever, but I stuck my hand up and said, okay, we need to stabilize the staff and the employees. And I think at this point, Those days are over. And I've announced that I'm going to step out at the end of 2027. So, whatever you guys do, whatever you do, I legally have the right to go through 2027. But, if you're going to change the form of government, then I'll happily, as soon as you have the vote certified, I will happily retire from the job. So you don't need to actually worry about eight people being around the city. It'll just be one that would take a mayor's position. So have that in your pocket. as you're writing up a resolution, if we do get a resolution. And I'm going to be happy either way. So that's on the table.

Yes. Thank you, Mayor. For sure, your sentiments. And I'd like to add a comment where I am in full support of physical and go vote. That's the way it goes. That's the way it goes. I'm not in support of going in February because I don't think it's enough time. Since I stated before, I still have a question lingering that I've led with that I really want to understand from everybody. What is the problem that we're trying to solve by changing the form of government? And given what that problem is, change. Why can it not be changed with changing Kim's municipal code within our current form?

I'll answer both of them.

Sometimes people say, if it's not broke, don't fix it. When in fact, I think this particular system is broke. We are one election away from chaos, always. And when you have a seven-member council directing, I've answered your question, but I'm supposed to talk. When you have a seven-member council Directing a city manager, you have a better form of control over that than one person who can go rogue. And so you could have two candidates, and if one candidate got sick the day before the election, and the other candidate was a very poor candidate, no way in heck was ever going to win, unless the candidate drops out, dies, dies, it's not them.

We've got that.

That's the only other person on the ballot. That's your mayor for the next four years. You cannot recall him. You could say four years from now, we can elect somebody different. That person can wreak absolute chaos on this city for four years with very little control other than all we have the power to do. We don't even set the budget. We can vote on the budget and we can vote on some things. But the things that happen outside of this chambers in the city hall back there, we would have no say in anything that happens there. And that concerns me very much. And so I'm less likely to want to put all of my eggs into the basket of one person any longer, what I've seen over the last several years. So that's the answer to the first question you asked, why? Because I believe while it may not appear broke today, it could be broke at the next election. The second thing is, and you brought up some good points, but I don't see as there is a way to amend the campus municipal code to give different powers to the mayor or different powers to the council, because some of those things are outlined in RCW. So that is something that could be explored. I never thought about that before, and I'm willing to look at that. But in the meantime, I'm not willing to delay that. other things that need to be looked at while looking at that. I've not seen anybody that actually takes the powers of council and the powers of mayor that are specifically outlined in RCW and change those up a little.

So I want to address the statement you made. So as an elected official, you always have the right to say, I'd like to hand in my resignation. And there's a process by which in particular for the mayor, we've had the mayor pro ten step in, and then there's a period of time where you have to tell the county, here's, we've gone through the process, we've replaced the mayor, we've replaced the council member, you know, there's a process for that, right? And it depends kind of largely on how close you are to the next election. And there's a whole process, we've gone through it. So to the extent that it's your stated intention that you would just step down. I can't guarantee that there wouldn't still have to be a process by which we have to somehow fill in your term. And that's why I'm just telling you I haven't done that research yet. So I'm kind of hedging my bets on it. If it votes yes, if you decide to step down, then I'd have to figure out I can't fill your position anyway, I guess, is a point I'm trying to make. So I just wanted to be sure about that that's out there, that that's kind of an unknown. And I'm happy to take a look at that. The other thing I would note, and again, I think I kind of know where this is heading as far as the motion is, to the extent that the form of the motion that you have in front of you simply relates, direct me to draft resolution. Here's the date. Did you... There needs to be consideration as to whether you want to be a combined resolution as well, because that's that's a different form of resolution and that's just for direction for motion drafting. Purposes that I can certainly help with.

Mayor, I'd like to resume my.

We can have discussion.

I'd like to move to direct the city attorney to draft a resolution. What is the form of government change?

the february 9 2027 election with an effective change date of the form of government of 1-1-2028 it was um it was moved by nor and seconded to have the city attorney write a resolution uh to change the form of government um and that the change be aimed at February 9th, 2027, for a vote on February 9th, 2027, whatever you said. Correct. Okay.

And an effective change date of the form of government of 1-1-28.

And an effective date... of forming the new government on 1-1-28. You're not including a combined?

My intent was to combine the mayoral election into that.

John Potter, So election is this what is that your question you're seeking a question yeah so that would be the terms that motion that would say designating Council position number one as chair as part of a combined proposal per the rcw if that's the intent. John Potter, Was that your original intent yeah.

John Potter, Yes, okay.

John Potter, I should have stepped in earlier, I said, I said, I could help with it. John Potter, Just say it, I thought. Presumed that maybe you didn't mean to do that. Okay.

It was the, it was the combined, so it's 1 election. And the mayor, the elected mayor, and that is the. That makes sense.

Now, we have to amend the motion. 2nd send it. So, we need to restate it. So there's been a second, the motion belongs to the council. And so we need a motion to rescind the motion and restate it.

It wasn't seconded. It was seconded. It was seconded. Oh, here we go. She removed her second.

It's easier just to motion to rescind.

Mr. Mayor, I move to rescind the previous motion by Councillor Knorr and restate the motion.

Second. OK. Give me help Sean.

It's just a motion to rescind the previously stated motion. Really no motion to restate it really at this point.

All in favor say aye.

Aye.

All opposed say nay. Any abstentions? Okay.

So now there's no motion.

Yeah.

Anyone's free to make another motion. But we'll look over here.

I'd like to make a motion. Yes. Move the directive for the attorney to draft a resolution in place in the form of government change on February 9th. That the resolution should combine

designating council position number one as chair as a combined proposal per RCW 35A-06-040. That's the date of January 1, 2028.

I would like that to be part of my motion. Do I need to say that?

You need the RCW one more time.

35A-06-040, sub two if you're getting a call.

35A, do you have a question?

06040, sub two.

Sub two. Sydney, can you confirm? Did somebody second that?

Second.

Okay. It was moved by Noor and seconded to draft, to have the attorney draft a form of government... to go on the ballot for February 9th, 2027. Under 35A.06.04 sub 2. Am I missing anything? What am I missing? The effective date of January 1, 2028.

With an effective date of January 21, 2028.

28.

The resolution to be a combined proposal.

The resolution to be a combined proposal. Just do this like you're swearing me in.

Designate council position number one.

Council position number one.

As chair.

As chair.

For RCW 35A 06040. Sub two.

RCW 35A 06040. Sub two. Sub two. That's it. You're done. Thanks. Let's take a fork in me. Okay. Any discussion? Any discussion? I have a roll call vote.

Eschke? Yes. Larich? Yes. Burke?

Yes.

Van Eskew? No. Something great. No.

No.

And nor.

Yes. The motion passes.

Four to three. Thank you.

So I'm thinking second meeting in September is probably when I would shoot to have the resolution draft ready. Because again, I want a little time to review some of the moving parts. So thank you.

OK, we can. We have another opportunity to invite comments to the council. you may supplement your comments with printed handouts electronics and digital aids will not be submitted during the public comment please state your name your city of residence you'll have three minutes please direct your comments to council's phone phone individual members staff or audience members please go forward or raise your hand please remember that the public comments are not a discussion public comments are to inform I see that there is one person there. Name and city of residence.

Margaret Tweed, Camas. At the 2025 hearing about whether Camas should continue to add fluoridation chemicals to Camas water, relevant documents about the contents of the fluoridation chemicals and potential hazards to human and environmental health were not fully revealed to the public in advance of the hearing and should have been. The 2025 city water report still states that the Washington State Department of Health changed the fluoridation requirement to a targeted 0.7 milligrams per liter from the previous target. When in fact, there is no state requirement, as I mentioned last year, and yet it remains in the water report. There is no state requirement that any city must add these harsh fluoridation chemicals to city water. It is a city choice. These unnecessary chemicals are expensive to purchase. A new hearing should be scheduled right away since these chemicals pose a potential serious health risk to our vulnerable populations, babies, children, and adults. These chemicals are difficult and costly to filter out for residents and businesses like semiconductor businesses. Citizens who do not want to risk their health or use them in business operations. The states of Utah, Florida, cities of Pasco, Washougal, Aberdeen, Linden, Clark Public Utilities, Los Angeles, and cities across the country do not add fluoridation chemicals to the water. Clark Public Utilities states no fluoride or other chemicals other than the required level of chlorination are added to the water supply. They further state that they regularly test more frequently than required by the State Department of Health. They test for heavy metals, bacteria, organic compounds, and other contaminants. Fluoride is listed as a known contaminant. Both the state health department and independent laboratories conduct these tests. I do not have not seen any independent lab test results from the city of Kamas, although I did request all information like that. I'll resubmit my request just to make sure that I haven't missed anything. Again, I asked this city council to consider a very pressing an important issue to the citizens of Camas, that is the quality of our water that you can control. The thing that you're adding without our consent, without any vote of the people, without hearing from us, except at a hearing where we weren't fully informed. So please consider when you might be able to schedule a real hearing with all of the information that every citizen should know and have in advance of the hearing. Thank you.

Anyone else in the chamber that would like to give three minutes with the comments? None. Anyone on the Zoom app with their hands raised?

We have no hands raised.

Did I hear the council say they didn't have an update? Council Member Burke.

Thank you. I know it's late and everybody's tired. There were two things. First thing, I wanted to celebrate the Chamber of Commerce luncheon is back after a summer hiatus. That is to be held on August 26th at Washougal Times from 1130 to 1. And the port will be making a present. Well, the port will not. The port is inanimate. Representatives of the port will be making a presentation to the assemblage at that luncheon. So I hope to see you there. Second thing was Mr. Friedman mentioned a book and showed us some copies of that. I'm pleased to report that that book is available in the library if anyone wants to check that out. And then I wanted to just make a comment on Councillor McPherson's statement about bringing a resolution back the second meeting in September. I personally was hoping for more time to conduct some more public outreach. So I just wanted to state that for the record. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you for comments tonight. Perhaps we can get the floor right on the February ballot since we're going to have a February ballot anyway. That's it. Thank you, Mayor.

Any other comments? I would like to make a comment. Today in the mail, both I and Quinn got a mail uh mailing from the consulate general of japan announcing that he was going to be retiring for the second time in last few decades he's been in seattle as the consulate general of japan and he's retiring And so he wanted to thank us for being one of the 38 sister city relationship cities with Japan, including, and basically saying he enjoyed the relationship with Kamis and Hamamatsu, in a partnership since 1981. There will be a new Consulate General that will come in on, I believe it's about October 15th. And when I sent you an invitation for a dinner with a Japanese delegation that was bringing students to Camas High School, they will arrive on October 10th. We will... have a farewell dinner on the 14th. I believe it's the 14th. We'll then say whatever that day is, and it will go up to really well from the news, possibly as general, and even the city will see it that way. Seriously. Well, there was a question as to what was taking place, and the voter arrived telling us, what that's about so i've invited the council to come to dinner when they are about ready to leave and that's it for me so with that i'm going to close this uh meeting