City Council - Regular Meeting

Number 12. Heat up here. Heat up here. Heat up here. Heat. Heat. Heat.

Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat up here. Heat up here. Good evening. It's Tuesday, February 3rd, 2026. This is the Cordelane City Council meeting. The clerk will take the role.

English here. Sheckler here. Wood here. Evans here. Miller here. Gabriel here.

Very good. Tonight for invocation we have Theres Fandell from the Community of the Holy Spirit. Will everyone please rise? Thank you for the opportunity to give this invocation. Let us pray. Come Holy Spirit. We ask your intercession tonight as the mayor and the city council reflect on Celain's current issues and concerns. May they approach these issues with clarity and empathy. Give them wisdom to find solutions and the courage to see them through. May they collaborate effectively with our local citizens and businesses so that Celane flourishes as a community. Bless the conversations tonight with goodwill, sincerity, and truth. We humbly ask this in the name of God our creator, Jesus our redeemer, and the Holy Spirit, our sanctifier. Amen.

Thank you. Will council member Sheckler lead us with the pledge of allegiance. Ready, begin. I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Item D, amendments to the agenda. Mr. Mr. Mayor, I'd like to make a motion to remove the presentation on fire station location that is located on the agenda as item two under h other business. A future workshop will be scheduled to review this item. Excellent. Is there a second? Second. Okay. Any discussion? Right. All those in favor?

Okay. We'll remove that item and then as Amy said there will be a workshop on the 23rd of this month to uh discuss that study. Move on to public comments and Suzanne Kudson is making a public comment.

Hi, I'm Suzanne Kenudson. I live here in Celane. Um, first of all, I'd like to invite you all to the Sons of Norway Craft and Culture Fair. That is this Saturday at Trinity Lutheran Church at 812 North Fifth Street. Should be a fun day. Lots of things going on. Lots of Norwegian waffles and meatballs and mashed potatoes vendors and things like that. And second, I'm really excited to be here tonight. I'm a board member at Specialized Needs Recreation, and I am thrilled to what you guys get to hear tonight. Um, also I have a couple of friends with me and um, Ty will be giving you a public comment as well. Thanks.

Thank you, Suzanne and Tyron Wetzel. Wet is it Wetzel? Yes. Please come.

Good evening, mayor and city council members. My name is Ty Wetzel and I live in Querlane. I am a participant at special needs recreation. SNR means a lot to me. I love being active and I really love basketball. Right now I only get to play basketball when we go on field trips and to a court somewhere else. If SNR had a larger building with a indoor basketball indoor gym, I could play basketball every every day I'm at SNR. That would help me stay healthy, build confidence, and do something I love. The building belonging project would make that possible. It would give SNR the space to grow and support more people like me. It would mean it would mean more opportunities. Thank you for listening and thank you for supporting a community where everyone can be included.

Great.

Thank you, Ty. Jim Chapus, please. Mayor, council members, thanks for having me today. My name is Jim Chapkins. I live in Celane and I'm the current chairman of the Cordelane Parking Commission for the last eight years and a member for about the last 10. We've had some really great accomplishments the last decade. I'd like to share a few of them with you and then I'd like to see this thing wound down. First of all, um, a lot of this came from our long-term vision from our city administrator. He really guided us in the right direction and where our focus should be. We had a really good board as well that I gave them a lot of their own personal time to show up and attend our meetings. So, they were very much appreciated as well. So, we did complete a parking study back in 2016 with Rich and Associates, which evaluated the downtown core area, made some recommendations. The parking commission adapted some of those recommendations. One of them being increasing our parking presence in town of more than 50%, which we have done. Another thing we've done is we added Q QR codes to our uh electrical uh utility boxes. Most of them facing the sidewalk. Some of them I think were originally facing the street by an error. Um we also I wanted to bring up revenue. When I started on this board back in 2018, our total annual revenue was $728,053 for parking. This year, the close of fiscal 2025, we hit 1.8 million. So quite a quite a gain. And I believe 400,000 of that goes to parks, which is much needed. Uh we also introduced I our parking partner did that was um we introduced pay by plate which saved a lot of money

in replacing the gates in the parking garages and etc. It took a while to adapt the technology and some adjustments but it does work really well now. Um we also with the help of the downtown association we worked on wayfinding signage for both automobiles and cars. We were working on a a revision of those recently, but we just couldn't come to any conclusion, so we let that go, but there is wayfinding in place. There probably a little bit more uniformity in the future. There is some contradiction on some of the signage, but overall it does a good job. Um, oh, I wanted to thank Chloe too of the downtown association who kept our minutes almost every meeting. She did a really great job. Um, I did want to make a couple recommendations, and I probably brought these up during the board, too, but I don't believe we have a parking maintenance fund for the parking garage that we spent $7 million on. So, in my opinion, it would be very wise to put some of that money aside for that maintenance. I see some issues with the building now that could be fixed, some rust drips and things that are starting to show themselves. Next is the lights on top of the garage. Very rarely do we have any cars up there. My my bedroom faces that garage, by the way. So, when I look out my window, that's what I see. Those lights are on all night. They're not lighting anything. If there was some way they could be on a trigger and go on only when cars entered there for maybe 30 minutes, it would save some money. Um, that's my time, but I wanted to say thank you again to Mr. Thyson for helping guide us in the right direction. Really enjoyed the job. Uh, we, by the way, we couldn't get a quorum for the last two years. We had great difficulty pulling people together. We really had no focus. So, I think it's a good time to maybe unwind this. We did our job. I'd be welcome to come back if you fired up again. I did enjoy it, but um I think it was a great partnership and I think we did our job. Thank you.

Thank you, Jim. Any questions? Any questions? We might we might call you back during the uh please during that part of the

It was a pleasure. Thank you. Okay, so we got Jen Ellis. Is Jyn available? There she is. I independently retained a licensed professional to conduct an documented inspection. The inspection identified multiple deficiencies requiring correction with findings material broad materially broader and more specific than what had previously been acknowledged. During this process, I reviewed publicly available records through the state licensing system. Those records indicate that the most recent permit on file for this property appears to be from 2008. However, the home contains multiple alterations that appear newer than record, including remodeled areas, converted living space, electrical changes, and structural modifications that appear consistent with work performed between 2019 and 2020. This property holds an active shortterm rental permit. Yet there appears to be no structured process requiring verification that significant alterations were permitted, inspected, compliant with occupancy require owner occupancy requirements, and properly insured for use as a rental property prior to occupancy. Oversight appears to rely largely on an honor system. In my case, the absence of a structured oversight had real consequences. Independent findings identified multiple deficiencies and I sus sustained a medically diagnosed concussion while living in the home and injury directly tied to interior conditions. I'm not here to speculate or accuse. I'm here to highlight a gap in oversight that warrants review and correction. Specifically, I'm asking the city to review the opportunity for compliance with permitting and safety requirements. Coordinate with the fire marshall and building safety division to review conditions implicating fire life safety, including impaired egress and missing safety equipment. Clarify documentation requires for permits, rentals, including

permits for alterations, proof of adequate liability insurance, and owner occupancy compliance. Establish clear disclosures expectations for tenants in listings, leasy leases, and property rules. Given the nature of these concerns, I respectfully request an expedited written response from the city no later than 5 days from today by February 7th, 2026, outlining any follow-up actions or guidance the city intends to take. Tenants should not have to discover safety concerns only after moving in and permitted rentals should meet a higher standard of of oversight. Thank you for your time, consideration of this request, and continued service to this community.

Jen, have you uh contacted the city previously to tonight? I have emails with um I might say the name incorrectly. Kelly Suitor Setters. Oh, Kelly. Okay. Um it's my first that was my first attempt to So, so we have your contact information. Yeah. I will be in touch with you tomorrow. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Sean Kho.

Good evening, council.

I I may be premature coming up here. I really just wanted to listen to what's going on with the French Gulch uh um wastewater there. I live in the community. I had a couple of questions. I didn't know if I need to put my name on there if I had a concern or a question about what what's happening there, but I can present those questions to you now. Um, I moved in there about four years ago and built my own house. I'm a contractor, builder, and um, instantly kind of realized that the place was developed very poorly back in the day. I think people would kind of rush the whole development and um try to make a quick dollar. Um so the drain field that goes down through there, my question is there's multiple lines that run through my personal property as well as my neighbor's property. I don't know how this fix is going to happen. That's why I kind of wanted to listen and hear what was going on. Um, so I don't know if those affluent lines that are going through my property right now are going to be deceased and then run down to the main sewer lines at that point. So that's kind of a question of mine. And also there are a few other homes u mine included. The gal that I bought the property from, she was basically did all the booking and everything for the old drainfield association for years. Um, and there was more than just 7 to 10 homes on this. There was up to 17 homes at one one time. And my drain field I just put in for $40,000. It's about 3 years old. I probably have 20 years on it, but some point it's probably going to fail. So, where does that leave me down the line? If there's a cost to tie into this line, what is that cost down the line? And, you know, that was kind of it. So anyways,

thank you

Ben Drake. Good evening, uh, Mayor Ganin and city council. Uh, today you're going to be hearing from the downtown association regarding the three-year for the events they organize each year. that it's going to include Carter Lane, street fair, farmers market, lighting ceremony, fireworks, and the St. Patrick's Day parade. Uh, as downtown business owners, and Jennifer, who was also the co owner with me, is not here. Um, we support the approval of thisou. Uh, we really look forward to these events. Um, it definitely bolsters our business. Um, it allows us to, uh, be seen by people that we normally wouldn't be seen. at uh at either our pub or our sausage shop. And uh we really hope that you guys are able to look at this and move forward with supporting the downtown association, all the great work that they do uh for not only us, but all the business downtown and the impact that they make is huge. And I hope you guys are able to see that tonight.

That's it. Thank you, Ben.

Anyone else wanting to make public comment who did not sign up? Very good. We'll move on to item F, which is council comments. Any council member have anything to say? Kiki, please. Thank you. I just wanted to share that um I leazison to the historic preservation commission and they've got just a lot of activities coming up um surrounding American 250 coming up um 3rd of July and also um historic preservation month in May. So, there's going to be some fun stuff coming forward and some opportunities for council to get involved and um participate in those. So, I'll be sharing more.

Look forward to that. Thank you. Anyone else? Christie.

Uh just real quick, I am the brand new liaison to Panhandle Area Council and CDA Economic Development Corporation, two different agencies, and they will be meeting later uh this month. And so, I will do a report after we meet. I appreciate that. Anyone else? All right. I have uh something to say about alleys. We had an issue last month regarding our garbage service in the alleys and the uh contractor requested that the alley be cleaned and the neighbors did a fantastic job clearing up the alleys. I just wanted to remind everyone in the city that it is their job to provide clearance in the alley. If there's branches or other obstacles, junk in the alley, whatever, it's your job as a citizen to keep that clear. Let's not give our contractor another reason to not go down an alley. So, that is your responsibility. Just wanted to pass that along. Also, I have some appointments to make. So I'll be appointing Dan Sheckler to pedestrian bicycle committee, Tanya Copage to the library board, Will Ammer to urban forestry committee as student representative alternate Abby Light Lindsay

Shik Castell. Shik Castell. Thank you. And Satly Shortidge to the Arts Commission. So moved. Second. Motion and a second. Any discussion? Your time is up regardless. All those in favor? I I I Any opposed? Very good. Motion passed. Mr. Mayor, I'd like to make a motion to approve the consent calendar as presented, including resolution number 26-008. Second. Any discussion on the consent calendar? Very good. Roll call, please. Evans, yes. Miller, I. Gabriel, yes. Sheckler, yes. English, yes. Wood, yes.

Very good. Moving on to item H1 under other business. This is declaration of a portion of tax ID number 24207 which is public property located behind 3700 West Seltis Way. It's not used for public purposes. Declaration of the value and a portion of public property is $85,000. Setting a public hearing for March 3rd in order to exchange this property for improvements to Cordelane's real property to be completed and paid for by Glacier 3700 Seltis LLC. Staff report by Monty McCulli, trails coordinator, and Hillary Patterson, who's our community planning director. Monty,

good evening, Mayor and Council. So, I'm here to talk to you about a piece of property that we um purchased along with uh the railroad right away from the BNSF about 12 years ago. We spent about $2.5 million to get about 20 acres of linear um right away from them for the purpose of building parks and trails through that area to make sure that we had um land through there when it was developed. And so some of that land was nice and linear. Some was kind of chunky depending on how it was designed by the railroad. In this particular case, it was a it was a kind of a triangle piece that went to a a a a yard. One one section went to drop off logs and one section went somewhere else. Anyway, it's a big chunk that we don't maintain. um it would be tough to maintain and uh we were approached by Parkwood Property to uh to see if we would consider exchanging that property to them in exchange for um other values to the city. And so um they have um they purchased the US Bank uh call center and turned it into park um Heritage Health and they are going to um extend the trail from Grand Mill Avenue through Lance Douglas's property. Well, Lance Douglas will do that portion when he gets there and it'll eventually collect connect to Atlas Park and then the Centennial Trail and downtown. It's going to be an amazing connection from uh town, edge of town to edge of town eventually. Um but they are they are wanting to um annex this little not annex, take this little piece of property and they're going to give us some things in exchange. So um we have a presentation. We're going to give you a little bit about what that exchange is, but I'm here to ask uh the council should declare that a portion of tax number 24207,

which is public property located behind 3700 West Seltis Way, is not used for public purposes, declared the value of that portion of public property is $85,000 and set a public hearing for March 3rd, 2026 in order to exchange that property for improvements to the city's real property comprised of the completion of a portion of the Atlas Trail connection, substantial public improvements to the adjacent city- owned property, and the purchase of a permanent solar lighting for the skate park to be completed and paid for by Glacier 3700 Seltis LLC. And I'd like to introduce Chris Meyer to come speak. Thank you, Marty. Mayor and Council, um, thanks for your time tonight to entertain our idea. you're curious about creating a a really interesting win-win proposition we think here and working through city staff. My name is Chris Meyer. I'm a partner with Parkwood Business Properties. We're a family-owned real estate development firm. Been developing high quality projects in our community for almost 50 years now. We've got a really interesting opportunity in front of us to take an ordinary frontage improvement and make it really cool. make an amazing opportunity for the city to get some additional benefits, including taking some surplus rightway, potentially adding it to our adjacent ownership to offer new development opportunities, put a piece of property that's currently vacant, um, it's isolated forest, and put it back on the property tax roles. Um, as Monty mentioned, in 20 23, we had the opportunity to purchase the US Bank call center at 3,700 West Hilt East Way. It was a 60,000 foot concrete um building in great shape, but the functional use as a call center had really been eliminated post pandemic. All those jobs went home. So, the bank was really ready to get that um off their balance sheet. We had an interesting relationship with our local community nonprofit healthcare clinic called Heritage Health. Back in the

1980s, our family was a partner with them to put the original Lidman Durnney nonprofit health clinic in the basement of one of our buildings at no cost. Realizing this is an important community aspect, we needed to support health care for everyone in our community regardless of their ability to pay. We've been successful partners with them through several different facilities for the last almost 40 years. This opportunity here was a really special one. Mike Baker came to us and said, "Hey, Chris, I've got this great vision. We want to get a center for healthy living." Heritage Health had eight different locations around the community. If you needed health care for your head, you went someplace here. If you need it for your teeth, you went to another place. If you need it for your medicines, you went it for to another place. So, it was really hard for folks of limited economic means to gain access to all the kinds of health care they needed to develop healthy lifestyle habits. So, Mike said, "We want to make this great center for healthy living consolidate these eight locations into one location. So, when you come to town, everyone in your family can get the kinds of quality of health care they need in one stop." So, we jumped at the opportunity, partnered with them, and we're halfway through the development of the project now with 30,000 square feet of it being renovated and put back into service now with mental health counseling, um, psychiatric therapy, a whole bunch of other different kinds of of mental health uh, and addiction the therapy services that are now um, engaging with the community. We're about to start the second phase of the project, which is completing the other 30,000 square feet of the project, adding medical, dental, pharmacy, some other lifestyle oriented health education, how to cook if you have diabetes, how to start an exercise program. It just happened over the new year. Maybe you want to get back on that treadmill or get out on the trail, for example. So, we're really excited to do that and we have a construction project slated to start here in about a month to build these improvements. One of our obligations as a land owner is to complete frontage improvements

associated with the public right ofway adjacent to our property. So, we've worked with the city planning department to organize an additional deceleration lane off of Seltis Way um to allow for the regular to allow for an improved location for the uh City Link bus stop so that the folks who have limited economic means who might use that as their primary form of transportation can come along Sel Eastway and have a bus stop that's right next to where the health clinic is. Kind of makes sense. Those things go together. added an ADA ramp that um meanders down the hillside there and then have striped a crosswalk to allow you to safely come across the parking lot and access the healthcare clinic. So, we've kind of got this one section of of frontage improvement and access for the public to reach this amazing healthcare resource from the front side. On the back side, as Monty mentioned, we have the opportunity to sort of fill in the missing link of the of the trail network there that will now run from Atlas Mill Park through Lance Douglas's project that's currently under construction over the next year or two, to my knowledge. I'm not entirely sure of his time frame, which will adjoin our property on the right hand side of the image you see in front of you today. We'll create a pathway that runs through our property almost 1,000 ft long connecting to the Blue Fern Town Homes to the west which then dumps you out at at Johnson Mill River Park with public waterfront access. So the fortune of that the city and the the vision the city had back in 2014 to acquire the railroad wide of way allowing them to create that same kind of public trail access and the public waterfront access along the Atlas Mill River Park is is phenomenal and we're really excited to leverage that and build on it. So, our idea today is to take what is a normal obligation to do the regular 15t ribbon of asphalt down this rightway and add some enhancements to it to make this really cool. We want to take the trail using the dark shaded area on the graphic and put our regular asphalt path

through there. But in addition, we like some of the ideas that we saw the city develop in the Atlas Park area. There's a second trail profile for maybe slower walkers or other folks pushing strollers. maybe not a high-speed bicyclist. That's a softer gravel path access. So, you can have two different paces of users in the same rideway at the same time trying to minimize those conflicts. In addition, we feel like this section is a little bit unwatched. The blank area to the upper right hand side of this area is about 3 acres of undeveloped forest ground. It's great. It's the original old growth timber in the area and um it's a little bit unwatched. So, we worked with the Vista to partner to create the opportunity to add additional trail lighting in that area to make sure people who used it felt safe as they went through that area. Otherwise, it's kind of the the backyard. There's a retaining wall to the houses that face the river to the south up against the riverbank. So, we really wanted to make sure that the public accessing that trail could feel safe when they used it anytime, day or night. So, our hope is to add four A Vista light poles there, which are the decorative fixture that you'll find in the Atlas Mill District. So, matching the city standards we have there. In the middle, we're going to put a bike fix it station. Working with the the ped bike committee decided that, hey, if you get a flat tire, you're a long ways from help out there. So, it'd be really cool to put one of those things in as a public amenity as well. We'll put a bench because we all get tired when we ride our bike that far outside of town. So, that'd be another nice amenity to put there. And lastly, we're going to add four of the sort of concrete pullouts that we've seen done in the Atlas Mill district. Down here on the left is a picture of the ones at the Atlas Mill. This one has a piece of public art on it that was also originally designed from talking to Welch Comr in the early inception that that could be um public art in that location. It could be a picnic table. It could be a bench. A number of different ways the committee might want to engage with a space like that. Um, so our idea

is an additional one talking to Heritage Health. Maybe those are spots where someone could partner with Heritage with a philanthropic contribution to add outdoor exercise equipment. If you've taken the trail out towards Higgins Point, you've seen some of those Vita course kinds of things. Well, if the whole idea here is to help our community engage in creating a healthy lifestyle, wouldn't it be cool to have a place to safely do that kind of outdoor exercise? after you visited the the Center for Healthy Living, they said, "Hey, come on outside. Let's take a walk. Let's start your exercise routine here. Maybe there's a chance to do some small exercises." Really try to weave in that process of adopting a healthy lifestyle that really goes along with the ethos of this project. So, we've been working with Marty and his team to assemble those sort of basket of public benefits that we think is an economic uh trade-off with the value of the property, assuming the city's purchase price, assuming a fair market value escalation of that value of the purchase price of the rightway and proposing that for the $85,000 of improvements that we would create, and I can't forget the request Monty threw at me, which is, hey, the skateboard park uh needs an extra solar light so the kids can use it after dark because it's kind of unsafe down there. Sure, we'll add it to the list. All tallies up to $85,000. And so we think this is a great opportunity for a win-win with the city where you would take some property that's currently underutilized. Does not, according to the parks department, have any opportunity for a small pocket park. They already have investments at Atlas Mill and at Johnson Mill River. We would assume ownership of the property, pay property taxes on it, and offer to the city this package of trail enhancements to really make this section of trail a cool, desirable location that integrates with the rest of the center for healthy living and our partnership with Heritage. So, happy to answer any questions you have.

That's awesome. Thank you, Chris. Any questions for Chris? It's just really awesome. Well, first of all, Parkloid Properties has a long history of of uh projects in our community that benefit the community. This is just the latest thing you're bringing forward. But Chris, my question, first of all, I was really excited about the improvements to the property that benefit everybody that wants to use that trail section. But do you have a time frame of when you think those improvements would be done?

We're planning to break ground on these improvements uh this summer. So probably in March sometime we probably get to paving this section over the summer. Our plan is to get a certificate of occupancy by September to have Heritage open their second half of the clinic. These frontage improvements are tied to our certificate of occupancy. So this would happen this summer. Okay. Thank you. Yes, Dan Sheckler. Um I have a question is could could we see a map of kind of the larger area outside of this? Uh maybe zoom out a little further if you have that from GIS. There's some multifamily developments right next to 3700 Southeast Way. Is that correct?

Um to the west is a company called Blue Fern that acquired the property and zoned it into town homes which I believe are for sale. Councilman and then to the east is owned by Lance Douglas. Um there's about 3 acres of undeveloped in between that we do own that we would we don't have plans for at the moment but perhaps a future phase of the Center for Healthy Living. Across the property line is the um River's Edge Apartments there and uh I believe there's plans from my understanding to complete that build out in the next year or two perhaps. So just to the west of this parcel they're completing up a multif family development. Is that correct? Yes. And to the east they're moving land. And are they putting in a multif family just to the east of this of your parcel? Yes, sir. Not the west, the east up to the right.

Yep. The other east. Yeah. The empty brown ground there is owned by the adjacent property owner and I believe has entitlements for multif family residential there. And then that street I think to the left of that parcel that was just developed multif family. What's the name of that street there? A little further to the left. Grandmill Lane. Grandmill Lane. Going up and across Saltis. There's a lot of multif family housing up there as well. Correct. Mhm. Correct. Um I guess where are the access to parks in that area of the community? There's the mill the Johnson Mill River Park.

And Atlas Mill River is just a few blocks to the east through the Atlas Mill District. Um, and we have this half acre of land that's kind of a triangular shape. That sand lot area to on the eastern most southeast corner of uh your lot. And that's that trail is undeveloped right now. It's just raw land. Correct. And where it connects to the east is also raw land. Is that correct? There's a trail here currently. It just got installed last fall. On the west, the trail has been constructed. On the east, it hasn't been constructed yet.

Not yet. I believe those will be frontage improvements as that project finishes its phase development. As this area gets built out, how do you foresee the residents and community members using that trail, using uh Mil River Park and having needs for things like pocket parks and pocket parks and other outdoor opportunities for kids to play that are starting to use that trail? Do you think this project is mature for us to decide to sell land in a growing developing residential area when those residents haven't yet um started to finalize their lifestyles and and and when we haven't seen how this is all going to work, is it premature for that? And

I can answer that a bit. Um so we have a in our parks master plan and our trails master plan. Um of course the trail master plan does show a trail connecting all the way through to Hutter and uh at that point it'll connect it'll connect to a bike lane on Maplewood. But eventually when the railroad um gives up that land uh Post Falls will put a trail all the way connecting our trail into Celane into Post Falls connecting the Centennial Trail. It'll be amazing. No more streets for the trail. Um, at the same time, we have Johnson Miller Park here. It's a small park now, but we do have plans to change it to a larger park. It's it's one of our upcoming parks uh plans for parks capital improvement. Um, and that will um increase the park the size of this waterfront park.

What's the approximate acreage of that waterfront park? Uh, currently it's probably I can't remember off the top of my head probably three acres. It'll probably be like nine acres after that. Um, and then we have and the trail will come through and we have Atlas Waterfront Park which I believe is I want to say 12 acres and it has uh I think 1500 linear feet of shoreline. And then right next to that we have Riverstone Park, believe 16 acres if you include the pond and and the trail connects all the way through. So we do have quite a few parks here and we have quite a few trails connecting all these uh multif family um units by trail to all these parks and and it's amazing um uh place to be if you're going to be in apartments, right? You're going to have all these trails and parks. Now, in regard to this, if getting rid of this and turning it into a pocket pocket park, the only access to it would be by trail. And so, we wouldn't be able to get power, water, anything to it. I mean, we could, it would just it would cost a lot. We don't really have it in our plan at all. So, we used a um a GIS program to determine populationwise where we want our parks uh at buildout. And we're pretty good down here on the river. Um most of the uh the analysis pointed more here where we're actually getting parks out there at Corta and somewhere around here uh where the forest service nursery is and I think a few others down in this area but we aren't really lacking down here uh in the waterfront if that answers your question.

So are there any carrying costs? Does do we have any maintenance costs that we're currently spending to maintain acre? As soon as uh we get a trail through there, then we will. We'll have to mow it, pick up trash, um clean it up, any kind of vandalism, we'll take care of, but now Parkwood properties will be actually taken over the maintenance of it as part of this agreement. Okay. Um the the improvements that are being proposed um it's $85,000 of improvements that are pretty much adjoining the part of the trail near the 3700 while Seltis property owned by Parkwood or the LLC.

Um those are depreciating. Um they would cost to maintain is do we have an idea of what it would cost to maintain those improvements? I I believe that they would maintain them, but I don't know if you have an answer to that. I

I don't have a depreciation schedule on that one, Councilman. These are going to be brand new concrete paths, asphalt paths that have a lifespan probably of 20 to 25 years. We did agree to take over, and I forgot to mention it in our comments, but it's in the packet, take over the annual mowing and maintenance of that, including also paying the electric bill for the Vista Lights that are there. But yes, at some point, like all parks or trail improvements, I believe eventually this is now called the Atlas Trail, and it should be at some point flipped over to the Centennial Trail Foundation. And I have to be honest, I'm not entirely sure of the long-range funding and replacement schedules for those kinds of public improvements.

Mr. Meer, one of my concerns was that there isn't an appraisal for this piece of land and that we used basically the acquisition cost and at from 2014 kind of at the bottom of the market and added 2.89% for inflation to come up with that $85,000 figure and that there wasn't an appraisal done. It it's my understanding that the 3,700 um West Southeast Way property is approximately 10 acres. Yes.

And um when I checked the tax records, it it said that that valuation of that parcel was $15 million. 5 million more or less for the land and 10 million more or less for the improvements. And so this half acre of land would um would increase the land footage assembled into that economic unit of that 10 acres from 10 acres to 10 12 acres. An increase of about 5%. Um, and that's 5% of the land value of $5 million tax assessed would be about $250,000 more or less. Um, so my concern about this project is the value that's being provided to the city of Celane in part and um, I'm wondering if Parkwood would be open to have uh, an independent appraisal done and pay for that prior to going forward with this application.

I think it's it's an open question and we're open to the conversation. We've been working with the parks department and the city leadership for six months trying to come up with a fair market value for this and assemble a basket of benefits that everybody thought was was a fair project. The concern is that the the parcel has no public access, no public utilities and and the relative value on the free market is is questionable. Uh we can certainly uh pay the cost for an appraisal. It's difficult for us to absorb that cost and not have to reduce the basket of benefits we're offering to the city. So the thought was amongst the early conversations that if we found a fair market value that was equivalent to recovering the city's original cost including escalations that was the best exit opportunity potentially otherwise that that land will stay there and it will continue to serve potentially city benefit as an undeveloped forested site. And so we thought this was an opportunity for a mutual gain to offer a fair price. Um, and yes, it's entirely possible to go through the third party assessment of of an appraisal and be happy to visit about that, but it it seemed like it would be adding extra cost to define a value that may not be um one that's that's going to facilitate a transaction to create public benefit.

Okay, I think that answers my questions. Any other questions from council? Um, thank you for this presentation and maybe you can clear up for me in your calculation of um, the trade you came up with 85,000 um, in amenities, but did you calculate what the cost savings for the city would be to not have to maintain, mow, pay utilities and all of that for the extended period of time?

No, I don't I don't have a number for that, but it's into perpetuity. Um probably mowing four or five times a year, trash pickup a couple times a week, snow plowing. Well, we'll snow plow anyway. Um but we're you're talking, you know, tens of thousands of dollars every season. Yeah. Yeah. I'm just wondering if that offsets some of the maybe questions that councelor Sheckler had on the value of the land when you look at the city not having to take care of any of that maintenance and having it be provided all the way. Right. And it might not make 10,000 for that one part, but for that whole system. Yeah. Right. Yeah. Right. Okay. Thank you. Just out of curiosity. So check, do you have something to add?

Sorry. Do do we are there other right now that half acre is trees, sage brush, weeds. Um it it's not maintained at all. It's it it's unllandscaped. Are there other parts of city property that property that we own that are completely unmaintained? And uh what do we do that or do we maintain all of our properties?

Um we have it depends on what you mean by maintain. I mean we do are responsible for any tree that falls and hits somebody or if there's some unsafe situation out there. And that particular wooded area isn't very smooth and it was railroad um cast off the trees grew in. So it's not not level and easy to maintain or mow and it would probably get weeded and dirty and have homeless camps in there most likely. Um so but there are places like that but we try not to tubail. There's lots of places we don't put hands on but we try to make sure it's clean and and when something gets reported we'll go out there and take care of it. And it's that that sort of thing. It's not just the your daily picking up trash and mowing and what you see. It's also reports. You know, you have a tree that fell down in a storm or a tree that's leaning or a dead deer carcass or a homeless camp or um things like that that we'll go out and take and take care of. So, these the some of these little areas that we don't put hands on and aren't really of value to us as a park system or even a natural park. Um, we would we don't have any issues at all with uh exchanging it for a a better piece of of of amenity for the city.

Yes, Dan English. Well, just say that um everything considered, I really like this plan and um I like the idea of the kind of the like the two-lane path like some of the others with, you know, cuz we use that a lot and and appreciate, you know, the difference between them and um and again tying in that piece of the trail. So um you know while I appreciate the other concerns I I think this is a good you know equitable tradeoff and will give a lot of lot of value for it and it's and it would be very hard to get an exact match to match. So

right and and I I know exactly what you're asking too because there'll be lots of other times I'll come before you and say I want this piece of property for us to develop into a pocket park. uh this particular spot just just doesn't work for us in the parks department. So, and I also want to clarify one more thing. The skate park lights will have a timer to go off at 10. So, Christie,

thank you, Mr. Mayor. I I really appreciate the work you did on and your questions. I think they're I think they're um really important. A lot of things that we do up here come down to a value judgment. what's the value to the city versus what could we possibly get out of this property? Maybe we could get more. Um, I tend to like the project, too. I think that it's a benefit to the citizens and a benefit to the city. So, I guess I'm I'm willing to um go along with what's been proposed, but I I really do appreciate the deep dive by Councilman Sheckler. And I think that in the future when we come forward with these kind of projects, it really would be good to have an appraisal that would be helpful. Randy, I have a question for you and I'm apologize that this just popped into my head during Council Member Sheckler's um his questioning. So, are we selling property and isn't that dictated by code? uh this transaction is dictated by code, but it's not a sale of property. It's an exchange of property.

Okay. And that explains why we didn't have to go out to bid or get a appraisal and all that stuff. Okay. Correct. And and even even with the sale of property, Idaho code 50-1402 says that the city may provide for an appraisal if it so desires, but it is up to city council or within your power to declare the value. Very good. Thank you for clearing that up. I am charmed, of course. I think it's delightful, but let's see what they think. So, any discussion or a motion?

Mr. Mayor, I would um move to approve resolution number 26-009 declaring that portion of tax number 24207, which is public property located behind 3700 West Seltis Way is not used for public purposes, declaring the value of that portion of the public property to be $85,000 and setting a public hearing for March 3rd, 2026 in order to exchange that property for improvements to the city's real property to be completed and paid for by Glacier 3700. 00 Seltis LLC. Second. We have a motion and a second. Would anyone like to enter into further discussion?

I just want to say thank you to Chris and Parkwood and Glacier LLC and Monty for all your work on this. A lot of creative thinking that's going to be a big benefit to the community. So, I appreciate the work. Love the lights. Good idea. Very well. We'll take a roll call, please. Miller. Hi. Gabriel, yes. Sheckler, no. English. Yes. Wood, yes. Evans. Yes. Very good. Thank you, gentlemen. Thank you.

Uh, item H2 has been pulled. So, we'll move to item H3, which is resolution number 26010, approving an agreement authorizing wastewater service outside city limits with Steve and Tammy, David and Bridget Anderson Dunn, Casey McCormack and Julia McCormack, Tim and Melissa Frink, Brian and Tammy Vandergrift, Garrett Thorough, and Andreas and Michelle John in the French Gulch area. The staff report is by Mike Anderson from our wastewater utility.

Thank you very much for having me. Uh and yes, so tonight I bring to you an agreement uh for wastewater services outside of city limits. Not with the French Galuch Sewer Drainfield Association. Too late to change that. French Gulch Sewer Drainfield Association. So, what we're bringing forward is requesting your authorization to provide wastewater services to seven residential parcels that are outside of the city limits. And the reason I'm here is because we don't allow that. We don't allow wastewater services outside of the city limits with the exception of former approval from city council. Hence our reason for being here. So, where are we looking? It's in general here in this uh uh hopefully you can see the mouse. Uh this green line is the city boundary. This side is is the city. This side is county. So we're clearly outside of the city. Uh it's generally this blue area shaded here. Several uh contiguous and non-ontiguous parcels that are looking for uh wastewater service. They currently have septic system out there. They're in the county. They're un septic and they have a shared drain field. So every every house has its own septic tank and then the effluent that leaves that septic tank goes to a drain field that they all share and it's a failing drain field. Uh I have uh Eric Elum and Tim Frink with me here who will go over some of the more uh and go on the details. I basically give you the history part of what's happening over there because they know a lot more about it than I do. Um, but what we're looking to do is along French Gulch Road, you can see here there is city infrastructure. We've got a wastewater line that runs through the county there. And the houses, like I said, are sprinkled up in here that are on this. Some some houses have a working uh septic system and their own private

drain field up there as you heard earlier in public comments. Um, and some do not, and those that do not were on this shared system. uh and the intent is for them to connect up to uh the city infrastructure here in French Gulch Road and that is where the city's responsibility would lie. Okay. So without any further ado, I'm going to bring forward uh Eric Elum and Tim Frink who will give you a little bit more detail on exactly what's going on over there. So give me a moment. And that is not it. There we go. That's Mike. Much better. The second time we're in.

Eric and Tim. Welcome. Good evening, mayor and city council. Thank you for taking the time uh to meet with us today. And which one are you? You're, as he mentioned, you're Eric or you're So this is Tim F. This is Tim. Tim F. I'm the president of the association and then he's the lead engineer. Thank you. On the project. That would be my concern.

So kind of our executive summary here. Uh so the problem is legally permitted drain field has failed with surfacing affluent and water quality risk. Uh the solution would be connecting the affected properties to the city's system um on French gold road which Mike was mentioning. And then the decision we've requested here is to approve a connection outside of the city limits um where home own homeowners will pay the construction connection all the ongoing costs everything. So we're not asking for any financial or anything like that from the city. we we'll be paying all the fees and everything. So, as Mike mentioned, here's the project location right here. So, we're just east of downtown area, a little north of Fernand Lake. Um, and then just south of Cherry Hill, and it's just outside the uh the city limits there. So, the drainfield location. Um, so this is a map right here of all the sensitive areas where um the aquafer gets recharged. So this area right here that you can see highlighted orange, that's where the drain field is. So right now it's located in the second highest area where we're adding water back into the aquifer. And the aquifer is charged by or recharged about 16% of it is recharged by these recharge areas. Um so there's there's a significant impact right now from the effluent that's surfacing on the ground. So, the affected properties right now, there's seven homes currently connected and adding effluent to this drain field and surfacing on the ground. There's also three vacant lots that have vested rights to this drain field. Um, and then some of these homeowners that have recently purchased um they purchased these homes without any knowledge. There was no disclosure um when they were purchasing the home. So they this was kind of all new and it's a pretty significant cost. So it's a it's a pretty big burden for some of these homeowners and they just got blindsided

by it. So just a little bit of background. So the 1980s this was when the uh the association was established. It was first built for 35 homes. Um, but later on we'll see that that that was I I don't mean to uh uh disagree with Mike so publicly, but uh a lot of the effluent that is pumped down there ends up surfacing on the ground at a rate of 15 20 gallons per minute. It's you really need to watch your step out there as the photo there indicates.

Yeah. So in um 1983, the first members were connected. And then in 2007, this is when we started to see some early warning signs that things were not going well and that there was no way that this drain field would last, much less be able to um meet the amount of homes that they thought were going to be be connected to it. Um and then present day now, so the the systems reached a critical point. It's it's beyond failed. um it's causing a lot of health issues. Um and that last picture there, that's that's another picture of where the drain field currently is and that's the effluent there surfacing on the ground. So this is just a uh a statement from PhD. This was specifically for um the the failed drain field system. This is just a statement to them basically stating that this drain field has failed. You have to figure out some solution for this. Um so this is kind of going over the water quality risk. So the French Gulch Creek uh is within about 100 ft of the drain field. Um the drain field is adjacent to the raft Spokane Valley aquifer and we'll look at some other pictures of that later as well. Um there's multiple streams that run throughout the site through each of the properties where the drain through the properties and then also where the drain field is. Um and then the closest city well is approximately 1,800 yd away. That last picture there on the right, you can see um the yellow pens and that's where we're pulling water from the aquifers and the flow is actually going here from the east to the west. So it does go it's essentially downstream from where that drain field is um and where that recharge area is. And could you clarify what what the 1,800 feet away is from what to what?

Yeah. So, the closest city well is about 1,800 ft from the drainfield site. Okay. Okay.

So, this is just a zoomed in picture of that aquifer um recharge area, the sensitive recharge area. So, that little red uh circle there is right where the drain field is. Um so, just a zoomed in picture. um to kind of get a better idea of that. So, why on-site options are not feasible? So, we have a lot of site constraints. Um there's a lot of uh steep hillside terrain here um with shallow basalt bedrock, multiple streams at surface water proximity uh and compact parcels with limited suitable drain field or surface area for a drain field. And then DEEQ evaluation here. uh the criteria wasn't met because of topography, soil capacity, groundwater conditions, and then uh surface water setbacks. And so this picture on the right kind of shows some of the different soil types, which we'll actually get a better picture later on, but just as kind of a an illustration of the uh the soil types that we have there. So this is a better one to see the soil types. That red is right where we are looking at the aquifer recharge. That is the same area and that uh green area is where most of the homes are. So the drain field is where the red is but the green is where most of the homes are. And that bedrock or fine grain sediments. It essentially allows water to come through too quickly. Um and so it doesn't allow enough time for for air and things like that to um to make it safe uh essentially. So, it's just getting to the aquifer much much faster. So, here's some of the options that we reviewed uh with PhD. Option one was to repair or replace the existing the existing drain field in the original location. And basically, PHD just said that this wasn't possible. It's not going to happen. Um option two was

install a new central community system in a different location. Um well the problem is same reason why we can't have uh one on each of the properties the same reason we can't have a community one. Um so there's no suitable identifiable no suitable areas identified that meet uh the PhD requirements. Option three was individual on-site systems on each parcel. Again not feasible for all the same reasons. And then option four was to connect to the city system. So they believe that this is the best long-term option for property owners and for water quality. So this is just an example of one of these site evaluations that the uh PhD that the PhD did on one of the uh properties that we are mentioning, one of those seven that's currently connected. So the recommendations and support we have uh we've mentioned PhD um they recommend that uh we connect to the city sewer system. The Cordelane tribe says that we find it important to support the efforts of the association in requesting that the city grant the approval to connect. And then Idaho DEEQ has also express expressed their support uh for this. This is uh just a statement from one of the recent um uh plans from the from Cornelane. um on February 15th they they released this and basically it says that um they acknowledged that this land was the tribes a while ago and that they plan to um adhere to some of their values. Two of these values are stewardship which is caring responsibly for the land and the water and then guardianship which is protecting our natural resources water quality for future generations. So the the sewer service outside city limits. There's just some precedents here that that have been confirmed from some later projects going way back to

the late uh 1970s. Um right there where Fernand Lake is, they're obviously very close to the lake and so they had some similar issues. So they were actually connected to the city sewer and they're not currently annexed. Uh the city of Dalton Gardens, um I believe it's right up government. Uh just on the right side of that there's a um there's a kind of a a bunch of businesses essentially that have been connected to the city sewer um that are not currently annexed. And then the one that uh clo most closely resembles us is the uh 281 East Murphy Road. So this is just on the other side of East French Gold from where we are. Um and that was basically very similar. It's 718 hardship. Um, we do believe they did have some options to do a drain field, but it was very, very expensive. And so, while they did have options, it was very expensive. And so, they were able to um get an approval under that 17 718 hardship for this. So, some of the similarities here um annexation for that property was not feasible uh due to several reasons. Um it's outside city limits, but it's it's pretty close to the city limits. Um the city sewer um main is right there, which is actually the same one that we would be connecting into or that we're requesting to connect into. Um there's no main extension required. So both circumstances, we're not asking for the city to do any additional infrastructure building or anything like that. Um and there's no uh cost or capital cost or any ongoing cost uh to the city. So we'll be taking all that on. Um some of the major differences is uh again for this situation it was more because it was cost prohibitive. It was going to be really expensive for them to do a drain field. Um and then obviously that was a

single household and we're requesting uh multiple. So here's uh just a couple other examples. These are kind of precedences not really. um they are in in the sense that uh these people were able to annex into the city because they were right next to it. Uh but they they had the exact same issues going on. So at 2735 Fernand road um they had no drainfield solution and so they were able to just ask for annexation and connect to the city. Um and then the Bran Brown annexation which is actually right next to that Murphy Road property um they had the same issue again. and they were right next to city so they could just ask to be annexed in and connect to the city that way. Um, this is just uh another map getting a little bit better idea of where everything is located. So again, this green is going to be your city limits and then these orange here are all of the lots that are currently connected to it. The blue is the empty lots and then the tractor is right where the drain field is. It's it's working on our fertilizer right now connection to the city. Um so I will let uh Eric discuss this and kind of the more specifics on the engineering portion of it.

Thanks T. So we've looked uh at dozens of options to find the best route. Uh we've worked with the uh city of Cordelane's uh sewer district to find out how best to uh to handle this. And uh believe it or not, it's it's all the way down. So this um there would be two main branches. So essentially these two homes would then go down Galina Drive. And uh we're hoping to be able to include these two vacant lots as well um to help spread out the uh uh the financial burden. Um and then the other one uh other branch would be these top homes would then go down the property line here of the two lots that have the drain field on and um and then we would transfer over here and then go along the side of the road. We've also made sure to not harm uh the highways uh or the roads out here. The highway district worked very hard to get the funding to resurface and treat these roads and we are not going to be harming those. Um, so what we will do is we're planning a bore underneath this road here and a boar underneath um I want to call that a French gulch creek, but I wasn't able to confirm that on on any of the maps that I saw. But what we would do is is bore underneath it so we wouldn't be causing any harm to the uh to the creek to the bank stabilization or anything. We're just bypassing all of that to make it nice, quick, clean, and easy. Uh, however, French Qu Road isn't going to fare as well as Galina or Hill Drive. Uh, and that will be taken up, and we

will be adding in a um an additional uh manhole with a uh sewer main for all seven, hopefully 10 um grinder pumps to uh to be connecting into. Um, so each residence is going to get a uh 2 horsepower grinder pump. We're all going through 1 and 1/2 in um high quality polyropylene pipes. Um and uh as I was saying before, uh down here we'd be adding in a second manhole. So this is the manhole down here that is owned and operated by the city and that's what we'd be connecting into. However, everything beyond that point um will be privately owned. Um uh so we're also um just trying to keep this as as qu quick, clean, and easy as we can. Though uh already noted, it's going to be a big unpleasant and very expensive process for these uh for these homeowners. uh with the three empty lots. Um DEEQ, Panhandle Health, they it's kind of a an interesting uh question, but vested rights um that these homeowners have access, they've been promised uh the the lot owners are promised access to this. And that's part of what we're asking of you today also is to include the three home uh empty lots uh onto this also. Um and being that the homeowners are taking on all of the financial burden paying cap fees that this will help distribute the cost over over a wider base as well.

So I'll pick back up here on covering some of the costs. So, um, if we continue the project here and we have seven homes, uh, it's going to be approximately 75K, it's probably going to go up from that. That was the first number we got and some of the, uh, excavators and construction guys have said looks low, but this is a number we have right now. Um, estimated cost if we have, uh, the if we add the three empty lots would go down to about 4550 per household. So, it's a significant decrease in costs for um each household. Um so, these costs, these do include, but at each home, it'll be about $20,000 um at each site specifically. And then total construction cost would be about $250. So, um everything we got to do with boring and connecting to that city sewer and all of that stuff, that's kind of what we're calling all the construction cost. And then at each site for the for the cap fees um for the grinder pumps, new septic, all that stuff uh would be included in that 20,000 per home. So uh roughly about 450 for the whole project. Um really depends on whether we do seven or 10 on that. So we are asking here that uh that we include um the empty lots as well because they're the value of that land is essentially nothing if they don't have um a a sewer or septic option. We already know they don't have a drain field option. So without connecting to the city um it's essentially worthless. But then also um you know just for the seven homeowners as well significantly less cost um to take on for each household if we allow them to join. So kind of just closing up here um we are not requesting you know any any subsidy or anything no free ride from the city. Um home owners will collectively pay to connect. Um this

will also be all um it will be all private up to the manhole which Mike had mentioned. The association will um it will remain open. Uh there will be a restructure of new bylaws and things like that if it's not a new entity. Either way there will be an ongoing association with member dues. Um we will be responsible for maintaining repairing everything on everything up to that manhole that Mike was mentioning essentially. Um so we will pay all the uh individual cap fees. Um and then that's just the cost again uh that we had on the slide before. So um closing statement. to respectfully request city approval to connect the um municipal wastewater system to the public uh to protect the public health and regional water quality. Thank you for your time.

Thank you, Eric. Tim and Mike, I have a question for you, Tim. So, you're or could be for Eric. So, at an inch and a half pressurized poly pipe, your capacity is full, right? You can't add anyone at that. I'm sorry. So each uh you've done your engineering assuming that you will never expand the system. Oh, the existing drain field itself. No, the uh what you're proposing to put in here with a grinders and you're putting um poly pipe from all the houses and it's pressurized pipe 1 and 1/2 in, but that assumes no increase in capacity. Am I correct?

So that's each each home will have that identical setup. So then each home will then essentially have have a long service to the uh to the manhole uh at French Gulch. So are you building into the system any uh potential for increased capacity? No, each it's just one house and then each one uh each line would be for each lot and each home. So if my name was Sean and I lived in the neighborhood and I wanted to hook up in the future, that's not possible. No, at least not with this one. Uh we'd have to come back to the city council and uh ask for permission on those. Well, you'd have would have to ask for permission to join us. But your system I'm sorry,

but your system though and I mean that's a question for Mike too. So they have their system their system is assigned to 10 lots maximum. They cannot add anyone else to their system under our policy. So yeah, that is the question that came before originally. This was brought to the subcommittee, the public works subcommittee as seven and then it was discussed about 10 and I don't know that actually public works landed anywhere but except wanting council to discuss whether it's going to be seven or 10 but yeah at the moment what we're bringing forward is seven or 10 if council wants to approve those three uh vacant lots for the reasons discussed.

The question was raised at public comments about adding to this system in the future. I guess that's not possible. So that individual or any other home in the area who qualifies for the policy would have to do it directly according to the policy.

They have to Exactly. If an 11th person came in in August and said, "Hey, I want to do this too." we'd be in front of you in August saying this one person wants to come forward and do this and then ask permission to tie into their because they've got one shared area of public infrastructure or or their infrastructure not our infrastructure but their infrastructure that they're all sharing. They'd have to uh ask permission I'm sure from these guys to connect up to that. Um yeah, but that was brought forward. We're only bringing forward seven or 10. Nobody else has that to my knowledge has come forward yet. Very good. Questions from council. Kenny.

Thank you. So Randy promised access. Heard them mention that they the people had promised the other three lots had promised access. Did I hear that right? Vested. Vested rights to the drain field. To the drain field. Not specific to the system. That's correct. Okay. Thank you for clearing that up. Second, Eric, I asked you this at public works, but the difference in um requirements from panhandle health to then to now, it seems like then you could do it, but now you can't.

Yeah. With the uh surface water setbacks, uh the depth to soil, the there's so many different reasons why this won't work, right? Uh from that standpoint, maintenance from the house to the system is it's primarily going to be an at each house each individual homeowner is going to be responsible for for the majority of it.

Yeah. So we'll we'll keep an association for you know all of the So essentially I'm going to back up a little bit. We will have individual lines. So, we're sharing trenching and certain connection points, but from each house to the city sewer, they will be individual lines. So, the old system and lines that we have now, which uh Sean was asking about. So the answer to that is none of those existing lines will be used. They will all be new lines and they will be individual one house to the city sewer, but we will be sharing, you know, cost of construction, trenching, a bunch of other things, but they will all be individual lines. And so we'll we'll keep an association open to do repairs, maintenance, and everything on those lines. Um because it makes sense economies of scale. If you're going to do it to one, they're all in the same location. Do them all together. Um, so we'll have it open for that. Um, most of the repairs and maintenance will be on the site of the home, the grinder pump, the septic, those sorts of things. It's very unlikely anything happens to the lines, but obviously we want to keep the association open to be able to cover that if it does happen. So,

Mr. Mayor, one more if I could. Yeah, go right ahead. Right. Have the floor. I do. And for Mr. Anderson, I think I asked you this at public works as well. Is does this open the door? Mr. Kio brought up a good point. If they get to do it, do I get to do it? And does this kind of open the door for more and more of this to happen? What's your appetite for that to happen?

Per policy 718, no, he can't unless he comes to you. Nobody can do this unless they come to you. I mean, everybody can do this as long as they come to you and you say yes. Uh, I'm not a fan of of utilizing city services, our infrastructure, the the the sewer infrastructure that the city built and and and maintains through rates. Yeah.

Uh, I'm not a fan of of utilizing that outside of city limits. In this case, obviously there's a there's it's pretty disgusting what's going on out there. No offense to anybody who lives there, but you know, just what's going across the ground. I mean, nobody wants that. Environmentally, we can all agree that this is just a hot mess. And we're in the in the in the business to make these people good neighbors uh where they where where it's not making a mess on the ground. Aside from that, I wouldn't be a big fan and I wouldn't be a proponent. You can see here Amar I'm I'm stating I I would suggest seven. There's a reason I brought forward seven. I would suggest bringing forward seven if it's council's infinite wisdom to uh grant the other three parcels to make it easier for everybody else. No, it's not going to be a huge burden on the on the wastewater department. But I'm I'm in the business of restricting this as much as I can. If somebody came forward and said, I want to make money without coming into the city and build a condo over here, I'm going to say I don't recommend doing that. But they have every right to come forward and and ask your your if you be willing to grant them usage of our sewer.

Thank you.

But uh I'm sorry if this gives me a good opportunity. I just want to make sure I'm sure everybody read it, but just to make sure it gets on record. Uh a housekeeping item. Part of the agreement does stipulate that as soon as they can annex in and the only restriction to annexation is bordering on is the city limits getting to their property. Once they canex in annex into the city, they will. So, it's it's not like they'll be living out there on their own forever. This area is on the uh weight the sewer master plan to eventually sewer up there. We knew we were going to we came up with a rough number of what it would cost to sewer some of it. Um so, we knew we were going to be coming here eventually. It's just they need it sooner than we were able to get to them.

Mike, if they do annex in, then are we in charge of their drain field system or do they remain an independent association? No. Well, we wouldn't allow um the sewer to run as it's being suggested to be run. And I will also state that I don't know that the way it's designed here is really in the agreement. The agreement is really just about sewing. So, if that were to change between now and the time they sewer, that that could be done as long as the stipulations of, you know, it's still private up until here, all that. The rest of it's theirs and we didn't have any real say in it. But that being said, we would require uh more shared lines like you guys have discussed, you know, where it's um down there. You probably I we haven't thrown an engineer at it like they have. They put a lot of effort into this, but you probably do have to pump it in that valley area there. You probably do have to pump it up the French Gulch. This probably really is the only real way. There's no other infrastructure that would even work. Uh some of the other homes, there's one home on Hill. Our intent is to run a line straight up Hill Drive and uh everybody who's along there can tie into that. It's an expensive project and one homeowner is not going to drop 3/4 of a million dollars to do that. Um but down in the in the in the area there, they will need to pump it. We would just probably require them to have a shared line rather than everybody having their own individual lines. They pump into a bigger shared line.

Thank you. Question Christie. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Uh, Mike, you started to cover annexation, but I'm curious, why is there no request for annexation? Yeah, because they don't meet the requirements in order to annex in they they do not meet our requirements. Our requirements are uh that they must uh abut the city boundary and they do not. Gotcha. So, my other question I guess is more for the gentlemen. Um the letters from Panhindle Health and the tribe, those are four years old. What's been going on for four years? You talk about the affluent and that it's a health hazard. What's been going on for four years?

Yeah, it's uh it's been it's been uh a lot uh to get to get through this and figure out what's possible, what can we do. Um it wasn't until um you know somewhat recently that we even thought there was a chance of connecting to city. It got brought up and then the annexation got brought up. Um so it's it's been a whirlwind. Then we started working with uh Eric to kind of draw up some plans. How can we do this? Uh we're looking at you know how can we get lines? How can we get easements? Um there's just a lot that's that's gone into it. Um, it's been uh passed on through several people of becoming the president and then that president sells their house and then no one is and then you got to find someone else and then you got to pick up the pieces and figure out where did this thing get left off. Um, there's no shared emails or people copy on emails. So there's just a whole lot of context and things that are that are missed. Um, so I think we have it set up in a good manner now where we have more than one person copied on emails. We have a drive system with every document and email and things like that. So hopefully this won't happen again, but I think we're pretty close to the end here. So um, yeah, it's uh there's not one specific thing. It's it's been a lot of domino effect uh that's just taken a long time.

Thank you. Any other questions? Kiki. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Um, just wanted to clarify one thing. I was a proponent of all 10 lots coming in at one time. Um, I think it makes sense for the for the system itself, for the association itself to take care of the M trenches are open, get them all done at one time. Um, but one thing I don't recall if we talked about this and Mike you may be able to answer. Will they be paying just a regular utility? I mean, h how is that working? just regular utility build from the city.

From the wastewater perspective, we'll treat them just like anybody else, just like they were in the city. They'll pay a cap fee to come in, which is their portion of the share, as well as monthly rates just the same as everybody else. No more, no less. And at one critical factor though, we will be maintaining that line that's in French Cultural just like we always do though. We'll be maintenance will not go up at all. We'll just get a little more flow. Okay. There's no other questions. I look for a motion. I don't want to read that one. It's too long.

Well, Mr. Mayor, I will make a motion to adopt resolution number 26-010 approving the agreement authorizing wastewater services outside the city limits with Steve and Tamara Meyer, Dave and Bridget Anderson Dunn, Casey McCormack and Julia McCormack, Tim and Melissa Frink, Brian and Tamara Vandergrift, Garrett Thorough and Andreas and Michelle John in the French Gulch area. Second motion and second. Any further discussion, Mr. Mayor? Sorry, does that list of names include the 10 the three extra vacant lots or do we need to put do we need to add and the three

if you want to add the three vacant lots you need to put that in motion to your motion and add the three vacant lots second concurs I agree second concurs with that and Joanne you have the update on that any further just discussion.

I guess I'm a little disappointed that it it's so critical right now. We're really kind of, you know, we we have to address the groundwater and the environmental hazard, but it's very disappointing that it gets to that point when it comes to us. But obviously, we need to support it to um take care of the environment. Further discussion. Very good. We'll take a roll call, please. Gabriel, yes. Sheckler, yes. English, yes. Wood, yes. Evans, yes. Miller, I.

Thank you, gentlemen. Okay, we move on to item H4, approving a memorandum of understanding with a downtown association DTA for special events for a three-year term 2026, 2027, and 2028 and approving the third amendment uh to the host venue agreement with the World Triathlon Corporation and the North Idaho Sports Commission for the Iron Man registered trademark branded triathlon event for 2026. There are two resolutions associated with this item. We're going to start with both or one or whatever Ranatada would like. Ranata mention

Thank you. I would like to present this at one time and then you can make two different motions for two different resolutions. Um it's not the norm to bring Iron Man and Downtown Association at the same time. But this year we have a a reason for that and that is Cardellane weekend. So um when Iron Man did their three-year agreement, they picked their dates three years out. When we were working with the downtown association, we did a two-year agreement and that did not include 2026. So neither group realized they were scheduling for the same weekend. So we don't have a current agreement with the downtown association. This one would cover the 2026 season. Uh so I'm bringing it forward here tonight to explain all of that to you. Uh so the downtown agreement traditionally in the past we've entered into with them was for St. Patrick's Day, Cardinal Lane Street Fair, um, and the lighting parade. They've requested this year to add in the farmer market. Um, that wasn't one of our large scale events in the past. We were trying to kind of scoop in all the largecale events. So, we are asking to include that this year because that would be the one and only other special event we do with the downtown association. So, we'd have all of their items in one agreement and it would kind of help us keep organized. So, the Iron Man agreement that they entered into provided for them to have their third-year event June 21st, 2026. Um, that is the Sunday of Father's Day weekend. The downtown association traditionally holds their Cardellain event on Father's Day weekend and um the Iron Man had already started taking registration for that weekend, so they're tied to their date and didn't want to change their date. Um the downtown association really wants to have that Father's Day weekend event and

requested to keep that date in their new agreement. So that started staff kind of discussing this option with those two parties. They worked together to come up with some ideas to try and make that work. It's going to be a busy weekend, but they are on different days. So Iron Man kind of comes to town the week uh before their event and starts setting up in the park and getting organized for their event. Um but their event happens on Sunday. The um Cardellain event has their Friday night event which is the car cruise event and then Saturday is their shine and show which is on Lakeside Avenue and they show cars that day. So those uh groups worked together to say, "Let's work together." And Iron Man agreed to bring all the barricades in at the request of our street department. So their barricades aren't getting mixed up with our barricades. So they'll start setting up on Friday, staging those barricades, and our group will still put them out in the correct location according to those um uh street closure requirements. the downtown association and world triathlon corp will work together to do joint marketing and public notifications. Um and they've agreed that in future agreements they will not have conflicting dates. Um so they'll they'll work together to ensure that in their uh Iron Man or World Triathlon Corporation is their organization. Iron Man is the event. Um they are moving their finish line from Sherman Avenue so that it opens up those streets sooner and into our parks. our parks department is amanable to that and they really kind of like this new idea. So, it opens up that downtown area a lot sooner with any of those traffic controls. So, traditionally, the finish line would kind of have Sherman Avenue locked down till about 5:00 p.m. So, with this new route, they're going to be able to open it up around 10:00 a.m. So, it gets traffic and people able to move around

downtown a little sooner. Um, Iron Man's gonna test it out this year and maybe in their future agreements we'll request to keep it in the park if it turns into a good thing. So, um, that was kind of where they are at right now. Um, the one benefit that happens is that no special events are scheduled for that next weekend. So, it gives our staff a nice little break. So, this is kind of the map of their downtown area. There's lots of arrows and lots of directions, but for people that are involved and come downtown for the Iron Man event, um you can see that normally their finish line is kind of right here in this area. And um that's where the street closures usually kind of last all day, but right now they're going to be traveling them down this way into the park. And the finish line will be over here near the band shell over here. So, there are costs associated with all these events. The downtown association um last year spent about $50,000 on all the traffic control that we've put into the agreement for all these events. Um they're estimating their cost this year will be about $58,000. For the city of Celane, um we can't by law charge more than our actual costs for these events. So sometimes when we're looking at our costs, it's kind of hard to divvy out um everything that happens for our overtime for staff because sometimes the event may end like St. Patrick's Day 4:00 in the afternoon, but a lot of the law enforcement and special needs kind of happen in the evening because there's so many more people in the downtown area. But uh Katie's here, she can answer more questions if we really want to get into the uh meat of those costs. but she put together a little spreadsheet for us of all the overtime um looking at our averages and kind of seeing where we're

at. And for all those events put together, we're at about 43,796. Now, you'll know that's a lot less than in past years because we've really looked to push more of the traffic control costs on to the downtown association. So, here's where it kind of breaks down for our cost and you can see um our big one is Cardellane weekend uh because it's a couple day event. Uh there's a lot going on there and then um the street fair kind of comes in next and one that we kind of thought would be higher is the lighting parade because anytime we have those fireworks at night, it's a lot of law enforcement and traffic control. But again, we're bringing in a lot more for higher traffic control that the downtown association is paying for. So hopefully I've answered all your questions. I will stand for more if you have any. If I've missed something, uh I am here for you.

Let's see if anyone has any questions. Starting with Dan English.

Okay. Well, just a comment is that actually I like the idea of these combining. So I would say keep an open mind to that. In fact, I would advocate because I think it's it's good to have them stacked and then have a free weekend. I know that we've had different, you know, input from downtown merchants that some think it's great for all of that and and some get, you know, squeezed out of it. So, um I would say yeah, don't put anything in ink until we're done and get some feedback on this cuz it it might be that we want to promote this idea. So,

we'll see. Christie,

thank you. Um appreciate your comments. I think that's a it's going to be a big burden on police and fire and streets this year, but they're professionals. I know they'll figure a way through it. Um, Ranatada, of course, we all love these events. The whole town loves these events. Downtown Business Associate, they do a wonderful job. My question is always going to come back to the cost. And when you look at the cost just for the car to lane for one night, because that's not the next day is a static display. You don't need law enforcement there for the next day. So, that's 26,000 27,000 for one night. And we've talked about trimming some costs. We did so with Iron Man and the So I guess I don't see the the overtime. Is that all overtime or is that traffic control?

I'll let Katie tell you where she came up with this.

Okay. So, um especially the police department. I spoke with our interim chief and he outlined how these events are staffed and how you can quantify the costs. those costs actually came from um our police department. And so that would be specifically related to those um events, not um when I put together the original averages, they included perhaps maybe some overtime that was occurring later in the evening, especially St. Patrick's Day. Uh there would be more activity patrolling uh in in the evening on that weekend. But these are specifically attributed to those events. Our police department does a good job of actually tracking what what's going on with those events. So, okay, that I think it's just hard for you to delineate what's traffic control versus what's overtime. I can I can appreciate that. I just um I would hope that we would continue to have discussions about traffic control where we can eliminate some of these costs in the future. Further questions from council

and I do have Emily here from the downtown association if you have anything specific for her. Okay, I'm not seeing any other questions. So, we do have two resolutions here. The first one is approving a memorandum of understanding with the downtown association for special events for a threeyear term 2026 to 2028. This does not include Iron Man. I'll make a motion to adopt resolution number 26-011 approving memorandum of understanding with downtown association for the special events for a three-year term 2026 to 2028. Second. We have a motion to second. Any discussion on this part? Joanne could take the role. Sheckler, yes. English, yes. Wood,

yes. Evans, yes. Miller, hi. Gabriel, yes. And part B is to approve the third amendment to the host venue agreement with the World Triathlon Corporation and the North Idaho Sports Commission for the Iron Man registered trademark branded triathlon event for 2026. Mr. Mayor, I'll make a motion to adopt resolution number 26-012 approving third amendment to host venue agreement with World Triathlon Corporation and the North Idaho Sports Commission for the Iron Man branded triathlon event for 2026. Second. Motion and a second. Is there any discussion? Just one comment. Um, RNA, I may have missed this, but I think in in in general services, we talked about

the fact that World Triathlon Corporation is managing all of the barriers for and moving all of the barriers and using theirs rather than our staff having to do all that. They're using theirs, but our street department will place them according to the traffic control plan. There's some liability issues with them placing them in place. So, yeah, we'll still place them benefit. Okay. Thank you. Very good. Further discussion. All right. Roll call. Shackler. Yes. English. Yes. Wood. Yes. Evans? Yes. Miller? Hi. Gabriel, yes.

Very good. Thank you, Ranada. Uh we're off to H5 resolution number 26013 which is approving a memo which is approving a memorandum of understanding with specialized needs recreation for the reservation of property Cherry Hill Park for the construction of a recreation facility. We have a staff report by Adam Rouse recreation superintendent and also will be our interim parks director. Congratulations Adam. as well as Lindy P Lindseay Patterson who specialized in needs recreation executive director.

Yes. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Council, uh, as you stated, uh, here to seek approval for a three-year preliminary with specialized needs recreation for the, uh, dedication or not dedication, but reservation of a portion of property there at our uh, city property at Cherry Hill uh, for the future use of a recreation facility. As some of you might know, our partnership with SNR started in 1984. So 40 plus years of a partnership uh where we've supported their organization. Um and the proposed facility really will allow them to grow more programs uh for an underserved uh demographic and also allow us use to uh utilize the facility to grow our recreation stuff or cityrun rec programs. So uh no additional cost at this point for thisou uh as it's just to reserve the property itself um so that they can start their fundraising campaign. Um and then of course once they raise the funds we'll come back to council with a very detailed uhou or contract proposal um that'll talk about the use um you know maintenance costs those kinds of things. So, uh, with that, I'm going to have Lindsay come up and give you a little presentation. Good evening, Mayor Gan and city council members. I'm Lindsay Patterson, executive director of Specialized Needs Recreation, SNR. Specialized Needs Recreation was founded in 1984, and through that partnership with the city of Cordelane Park and Recck Department, we ensure individuals with disabilities have access to therapeutic recreation. As Adam stated, for more than 40 years, the city has remained an essential partner with us, and we are very proud

of what we've been able to build together. While our programs have grown, our mission has not. Accessible recreation is essential to our community's health and well-being. And as Cordelane grows, the need for inclusive year-round indoor recreation grows with it. That need led to the building belonging project, a shared use, fully accessible recreation center designed to expand capacity and ensure individuals with disabilities are not left behind. The memorandum of understanding before you today provides a clear framework to move forward, uniting the city and SNR around a shared vision and allowing us to begin the work of raising the necessary funds. Guided by our four core mods, you belong, you matter, you are strong, and you are enough. SNR shows up for our participants every day in ways that reflect Cordelane's values of community, inclusion, connection, quality of life, making building belonging a meaningful investment for our city. Together, these programs serve children, teens, adults year round, creating a continuum of support that meets individuals where they are and grows with them over time. For many families, SNR is so much more than just a program. It's a lifeline offering consistency, confidence, peace of mind, and the kind of rest bit that only families living with a disability truly understand. The lifeg groupoup program calendar you see here provides structure, purpose, and recreation for adults who thrive in a supportive and social environment. Each morning, our participants are dropped off at SNR, serving as a

launchpad, bringing everyone together before we head out into the community. We provide the transportation for the daily outings, where participants build life and social skills through hands-on recreation. They volunteer and share experiences that spark joy and last build lasting friendships together. Beyond our walls, the transportation component is essential and we are deeply grateful for the city shop and their ongoing care of our vehicles, ensuring that participants can safely engage within our community every day. Camp Allstars Allstars meets children where they are as a critical stepping stone intentionally preparing them for what comes next. As they age out of traditional school camp all and camp allstars, they are prepared for a smooth transition into the SNR adult program where they are familiar with routines and expectations and our community-based approach. Our center is full of energy. We welcome individuals from across the region and with a wide range of abilities. Within our four walls, we rely on the very small, very small, I'll emphasize that 2,000 square ft space to deliver our meaningful, intentional programming. 435 people are actually or excuse me, are actively registered at SNR. In just December, we grew an astounding 5.5%. We were closed for 2 weeks. So, we're averaging more than 10% growth month over month. SNR is where people with disabilities gather. It's where they build routines that and and friendships that matter. Last year, SNR was visited 5,897 times.

The 15th Street property presents a unique opportunity to strengthen this long-standing partnership between SNR and the city of Celane. It checks every box for us. Location, accessibility, visibility, align and alignment with the existing recreation and transit infrastructure. The site supports a shared use community centered facility with SNR serving participants during the night during the day and parks and recreation gaining valuable indoor recreation space in the evenings and on the weekends. We are already working with H2A architects who are leading the SL site design to thoughtfully plan a facility that aligns with our mission. The building belonging project proposes a 20,000 square foot facility designed to complement Cherry Hill while meeting the growing needs of our community with a permanent inclusive year-round indoor space where partnership will deliver a lasting impact for generations. We envision this purposebuilt facility designed with intention featuring indoor basketball courts, outdoor courts, large kitchen, sensory rooms, an art and creative space, yoga studio, gardens, walking paths, program rooms, and functional staff and storage areas. These spaces will be thoughtfully designed to support everyone's needs: physical activities, creativities, life skills, and social connections. This vision is already being embraced by individ in by individuals, families, and community members. Early champions have already stepped forward with leadership gifts and multi-year commitments, laying the foundation for what's possible within our founders club. Their support sends a powerful message. This project matters.

This community truly cares. And the need is so very, very real. Our participants are ready. Our families are hopeful. And our staff and volunteers, well, we're all very committed. The new facility allows us to move beyond making things work. It allows us to expand services and to meet the growing needs and the diverse needs of our community. Being on the city link route is crucial. providing reliable transportation for individuals who do not drive and who rely on caregivers to get from place to place. Simply put, we are busting at the seams. We need more space. We are deeply grateful for this opportunity that was brought before us by Bill and Adam, and we are excited for what lies ahead. Moving forward with theou allows donors to envision a project that strengthens our community and gives us a clear, responsible, and transparent path forward. As I said, for more than 40 years, SNR has been honored to serve the people of our city, children, adults, families who deserve to be welcomed wholeheartedly. This 15th Street property offers a once in a generation opportunity to build that space together. And together, we truly are building more than just a building. We are building a community where everyone belongs.

Thank you, Lindsay. Any questions on this one? Yes, Kitty. Mr. Mayor, Lindsay, you've been looking for a while for space, haven't you? And there's not a lot out there, is there? There's not. There is not. Not that that meets all of our needs so that we can truly support those that are most in need. Mr. Mayor, two weeks ago, I got to attend an event with Miss Canutson and Lindsay where we saw the runner up for Mr. North Idaho was there representing special needs and it was incredible. So, thank you for all your great work. Thank you. Further? Yes, Christie.

I I would just note that Suzanne's done an incredible job of keeping us aware as a council of what the needs are and I don't think there's a moment she's not talking about special needs and uh we appreciate that. And so with that, Mr. Mayor, I'd make a motion unless there's other Yes, Mr. Mayor, I just want to say I'm so grateful for what you do for the community and how you've pulled this together. It's needed and I'm excited to see it and so thank you. Thank you. Please go ahead.

All right. I'll make a motion to adopt resolution number 26-013 approving a memorandum of memorandum of understanding with specialized needs recreation for the reservation of property at Cherry Hill Park for construction of a recreational facility. Second. Any further discussion? I just want to say how exciting this is. I see some familiar faces out in the audience. Um so thank you for being here tonight and um championing this great cause. Very good. Joanne, roll call. English, yes. Wood, yes. Evans, yes. Miller, hi. Gabriel, yes. Sheckler, yes. Thank you, Lindsay. Thank you all for showing up to support organization.

Marvelous. Adam, you're still with us for item H6, which is resolution 26014, approving a memorandum of understanding with North Idaho College for use of Memorial Field soft ball facilities for a term of 3 years.

Uh, so first I just wanted to throw a shout out to Sean Noel, their athletic director at NIC, and also Alex Harris, who I believe his official title is the dean of students. uh they they were very instrumental in in um crafting this newou very supportive um and and that partnership with those two at NIC has been uh much easier to navigate for us as a city staff. So uh yeah, what we're looking for is is basically just putting uh an agreement an official agreement together for for a service that we've provided for them over there at Memorial Field for I mean as long as I can remember. I've been here for almost 22 years and it's been long before that. So, um basically just laying out their uh specified use uh for the spring and and uh fall seasons uh with fees attached um starting with $4,000 this initial year and then and then 5% increase each year after that. uh and then uh within thatou has a option for another three-year renewal and that 5% would just carry on and and escalate up to that. So I'm just seeking approval for that.

Very good. Any questions for Adam? I'd like to make a motion to adopt resolution number 26-014 approving a memorandum of understanding with North Idle College for use of memorial field for softball activities for a term of three years. Second. Excellent. Any discussion? Play ball. Look at that. Easy. There you go. Roll call, please. Wood, yes. Evans, yes. Miller, I. Gabriel, yes. Sheckler, yes. English, yes.

Very good. Now we move on to item H7, which is council bill 261000, which is a repeal of chapter 2.66, the parking commission and approval of the amendments to section 4.15.0. 040 parking regulations for all public facilities. Cordelane Municipal Code Staff report by Troy Dyson, city administrator. Troy, good evening, mayor, council members. I bring before you a reduction in city code, if you approve it. The city's parking commission was established under chapter 2.66 in 2005 by ordinance number 3227. Functions were to analyze the parking needs throughout the city. Educate the public on the availability, the value, and the location. Serve as the public's forum to address parking issues and concerns. Ensure that parking is managed in a manner that is userfriendly, visually attractive, and maintains the value of the asset as well as addressing issues that arise regarding enforcement of the ordinances and address appeals of those ordinance. keep the council informed regarding the issues and make recommendations to council on maintaining and/or improving parking. Prepare policies and procedures working with the city administrator. So what we have done is we have progressed over time. Your parking commission had been very active until about October of 2025 when we struggled to get a quorum. In fact, we have not had one since that date. So worked on commissioners, worked on getting commissioners there and then the agenda items continued to lessen because of a number of positive steps and Mr. Jim Chapus addressed a few of them. Let me give you one big one that really has helped as I studied this one more time. The ticket that you get on your first goaround is a courtesy ticket. And when

we implemented that, we took a lot of thunder away from people that didn't know about parking. They'd been there for 2 hours and 30 minutes downtown. And then the really big ticket is the fact that you need to move your vehicle more than 300 feet. Well, not everybody knows how far 300 ft is. And with technology, we can exactly measure 300 ft. It's pretty much one block, but you can go over a half a block north or south of where you were and the GPS will note that you did not move 300 ft. So, we get the opportunity to educate and that has really lowered the number of appeals that we have. Uh I'll give a shout out to Diamond Parking who is managing the on street as well as the parking lots. They have a phenomenal manager and that has helped a whole bunch. So, we've worked with Diamond since 2003. They have a two more years on that contract. So that is not up at this moment in time. And they help with all of our parking lots. Obviously, it's a partnership with our central business district and our downtown association. Downtown association receives revenue from our parking fund to help offset our costs and manage that area. And that partnership has continued to be strong. So, I share that with you because you have not heard a lot about parking in the last few years because it's really calmed down. The other piece to this is those kiosks that were sitting in the parking lots for so many years have become antiques and we're happy to move them on since the phone and the smartphone has helped us so much. We do not have gates that are taken down. We do not have people that are trapped in the Cordelane Avenue parking garage because there are no longer any gates. So being the historian on this subject, I will move on. So we weren't able to get a quorum. We have not had a meeting in over a year that we're able to get

the minutes approved for. So we're proposing to you to eliminate that code section and make some much needed clarifications in the code. So, we can do that. Specifically, the amendments that are in your packet clarify that the payment of the hourly fee for parking, possession of the monthly permit, it's necessary. City facilities except for city hall and library parking lots. They have places you can park at no cost. So, technology has helped. Our parking commission isn't excited based on our agendas because we couldn't get a quorum. So, city administrator works on this along with diamond and the downtown association. Permits have come a long ways. You don't have to put them in your car anymore because we use your license plate. That also has eliminated maybe a decal or parking permit slipping over to some other car. And that has gone away because we use your license plate now. And we have license plate software that recognizes it when you're parked in the parking garage and you have your monthly permit. we don't have to live by the end of the month. You can buy a permit for midmon through midmon and keep paying that way. So those clarifications in this ordinance are for you to look at uh hourly and monthly all those good time all those good times. So basically our parking commissioners have done that at no cost. So there's no real financial impact to modifying this. I do know that the parking situation will not be solved. However, you could put together a small group to work on things. We talked about an update to the downtown parking plan. We had brought in a consultant to do that back in 2016. That could be refreshed as well, but that only happens every 10 years, nine years. So, that's something that can be

looked at. The parking situation does not go away. So, it's kind of fun to share with you all the progress we've had. That courtesy ticket was a big one. Um, two hours free is always a great way in which to have your downtown be accessible. We don't have parking meters. We don't have any of that going on downtown and we still get the turnover in car parks which helps business. So, I would stand for any questions at this time. Questions for Troy Christie. Mr. times and it's going to be so weird not to be able to pepper you with questions in the near future. You can send me a text message.

Okay, I I will do that. Uh just real quick, I'm I get I get the staff report, but just real quick at down at the bottom it says all the tasks of the parking commission are currently being performed by others. The others I think you are saying are Diamond Parking, Downtown B Association, and yourself. Correct. Do we have an appeal process through th through those three entities that you feel is fair and balanced for everyone?

It really has improved. So thanks to technology, we use diamond as the first round of looking at the appeal and based on the criteria. If they say they've paid, they probably did and they just input the wrong plate number. I never hear about those. Those are automatically accepted because the software is so smart. You have to be exact. Go and put in the wrong license plate number and pay. It will accept your money and when we come around, we'll issue you a ticket because you put in the wrong plate. Deal. Yeah.

So, Diamond's been able to work through that with the right people and handle all that. I don't see I haven't seen an appeal in months. Good. And you haven't heard about it because I haven't heard from you. So, in days gone by, it was much different than that. Oh, yeah. All right. Thank you. Question. I just have a comment. I remember my first days on council and I was the parking commission liaison and then I think it went to Dan English and then Dan Sheckler was going to be the lucky one. So, I just don't think it's fair honestly. bring them back. And back in those days, I got a lot of phone calls.

Very good. With that, I'll make a motion. Please. I'll make a motion to dispense with the rule and read council bill number 26-1000 once by title only. Second. Very good. Motion to second. Any discussion? Joanne. Evans. Yes. Miller. I. Gabriel. Yes. Hen. Sheckler, I would that would not be. Yes. Yes. English. Yes. Wood. Yes. We all looked at this agenda and we missed that one. Huh. All right. Will the clerk please read the title?

Council bill number 261000. An ordinance of the city of Kurdane, Kudney County, Idaho, repealing Kurdane Municipal Code Chapter 2.66 66 entitled parking commission and amending Coreline Municipal Code section 41540 to clarify that the hourly fee must be paid or a monthly parking permit must be obtained in advance to park in city facilities requiring a fee to remove the requirement to display parking passes to clarify that payment or a permit is required at all times and to make housekeeping changes. repealing all ordinances and parts of ordinances in conflict here with providing a severability clause providing for the publication of a summary of this ordinance in an effective date thereof. Thank you.

I'll make a motion to adopt council bill 25-1000. Second. Any discussion? Please take the role. Evans, yes. Miller, I. Gabriel, yes. Sheckler, yes. English, yes. Wood, yes. Very good. Motion passes. So, we're going to enter into executive session uh with a motion, but I want everyone to know if you want to hang out, we will be coming back out here for deliberations on the contract.

Mr. May I'd make a motion to enter into executive session pursuant to Idaho code 74206 section 1A and F to consider hiring a public officer, employee, staff member, individual agent where in the respective qualities of individuals are to be evaluated in order to fill a particular vacancy or need and to communicate with legal counsel for the public agency to discuss the legal ramifications of and legal options for pending litigation or controversies not yet litigated but imminently likely to be litigated. Maybe second motion in a second. Roll call, please. Miller, I. Gabriel, yes. Genin, sheckler, yes. English, yes. Wood,

yes. Evans, yes.

Okay, very good. We're in executive session. Heat. Heat.

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Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. We are back in regular session. The final item on the agenda is item number well it says eight but it's really under H. So could be I1. I don't know. We

won't we won't split that hair. So this is uh regarding a contract with Ron Jacobson to appoint him as interim city administrator. I wrote the staff report. So Troy is going to be uh stepping down effective February 20th and this will create a leadership u vacancy. So what I would like to do is to uh appoint or uh appoint Rand to serve in the capacity of an interim administrator. This is a contracted position. um he has negotiated a contract with the uh with city staff in order to compensate him for the time that he'll be here. The um compensation does not include Percy retirements or medical and he also insists that his uh contract end at the end of uh June. So there's a time limit on this. He does not intend to apply for the permanent position which would be uh activated. will be uh putting out a request for that soon. He has extensive experience with city government as well as banking and you should be very familiar with him if you've been around the area. Um the uh point is that uh we can have Ron go there with his experience and his knowledge and his intimacy with the with the community to carry out the tasks of city administrator until we get a full-time administrator. The um the consequences of not hiring Ron would be that the duties would fall upon statutoily fall upon the city clerk and the city attorney who are both very busy at this time. Each one of them would receive extra compensation for taking on these duties and I have those amounts if you're curious. Uh Katie and Melissa provided them for me. The my purpose for this is not to save money in the budget. In fact, Katie asked me the other day specifically to remind you that this is not a budget saving that often times in vacancies like this,

there is no budget savings. It's just it's just going on the city's business. There's other things we can do that have more of a greater impact. Um there's some savings, but that's not what's motivating this decision. So, if any council has any questions for me or city staff, I would be open to them. Mr. Mr. Mayor, I' I'd like to make a motion then maybe discussion, please. Would that work? Okay. So, I'm going to make a motion to adopt resolution number 26-015 approving a professional services agreement with Ronald G. Jacobson to perform city administrator duties. Excuse me. Um, there is one change to the agreement. Yes, we do have to modify the contract

a little bit and that and section four of the contract uh the starting date is going to change from the 17th of February to the 13th of February. And the reason for that is that um we have contract negotiations on or not contract negotiations, we're doing interviews for police chief and fire chief and uh by our code or by the uh contracts. The city administrator must be part of that. Troy Thyson will be here for the first two meetings, but I've decided to invite Ron if he's available, and he is, but if he's going to be going to the um fire chief interviews, we need him on the 13th. So, we have to have a start date of the 13th and I was told that by Melissa today.

Okay. I would modify my motion to recognize the start date will change in the contract to February 13th. Thank you. Did you have a second? There is no second yet.

I would second it for purpose of discussion. Okay. discussion. Mr. Adams, or may I ask a question? You're on the floor. Mr. Adams, if if if you had to absorb the duties of the admin, city administrator together with um the clerk, I know you're short staffed in your office. Do you think assuming those duties would impair or affect the quality of legal representation the city would get?

Good question. Uh we are short staffed in the prosecutor's office. Uh and I have declined to help them. Uh we have been staffed uh in the civil office at this level for four years. Uh like any other job, there are there are days I wonder if I can get through all the work and there are days when I uh am able to do some other filler work. Um, frankly, uh, if I were doing city administrator duties, there may be some slower response times in some areas, but I don't believe that uh, uh, the response times would uh, impair the city or uh, violate state law.

Have the floor again. Uh, Mr. Timus. Um there was mentioned about there being some negotiations and perhaps there would be an interruption in the um uh leadership from the city during this period of time. Um how do you see that uh whether or not there is a dedicated city administrator would affect the city um in those negotiations?

Great question. And thank you, council member. The city attorney and the city clerk are amazing individuals. I would highly recommend that since, you know, Mr. Jacobson is awesome. It's a shortterm opportunity and that's not setting us up. So, we need to get recruiting for the full-time position because we have negotiations on, you know, employee contracts coming forward. Unless we outsource that, which we haven't done in 20 years, we'd like to have the captain of the team, which would be the administrator, be full-time building that team. So, that would be why I would think we'd want to get recruiting to get that position filled because we have police chief, fire chief, and a soontobe parks and recreation director position that are opening up. As we look at fire, we have an assistant chief position that's opening up. So that the team building is essential with the right captain in place. Does that answer your question?

Yes. Thank you. Yes.

Um I shared this initially when um it was floated and I still have some concerns with the impact to the budget. We recently passed a retirement incentive with a goal of having some salary savings. This does chip away at that potential which is an ongoing concern because it's definitely a nice to have but it's not a need to have. So that's I'm struggling with that. I do want to say that I had a really great conversation with Ron Jacobson last week. Um he's a fantastic individual. I shared my con budgetary concerns with him. I also encouraged him to apply for the full-time position um when that is um posted. Um we also currently have two employees who have the coverage of the responsibilities in their job descriptions. I've met with both of them as well as our current city administrator and I'm confident that they can cover those responsibilities um while we recruit and hire um a full-time city administrator. So, I'm just for me, it's purely a financial place that I sit at and um I don't want to chip away at the potential savings that we just incentivized our employees to take early retirement with.

Kenny, Mr. Mayor, thank you. You said a few minutes ago that soon would be the timeline to open up. Do you have a better idea of when you want to start that? Uh just talked to Melissa the other day and she's already busy with uh police and fire recruitment. Um I believe we're able to hold parks open for a while with uh with Adam in there, but yeah, city administrators obviously a a top priority. Um and I asked her what kind of burden that would put on her and that we probably need to be working on it right away and she is working on it right away. So that uh process will immediately be going forward.

Mr. Mayor, if that was to happen and we get this process done a little sooner, is that date that's on there, is that we have to get through then or up to then? It's an up to then. Basically, he doesn't he doesn't want to be here longer than June. And if we were able to pull off hiring an administrator in May, I'm sure he would move on to whatever it is he wants to move on to. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Certainly, Mr. Mayor.

Uh, please, Kiki. I um I wrote my notes down because I I had different notes and I knew that there were going to be some some other thoughts here. But I think um my biggest thing with this is trying to make myself believe that this has the value that for any price that has the value to the city that we need. Um I agree with the fact that there's other people who can manage this job. It's in their job desript description. I also um know that in the administrative staff budget they have up to $50,000 that they could use if they needed some some sort of clerical support or that type of thing they could hire a temp to bring uh you know someone else in if that was something that they felt like they're falling behind in their day-to-day tasks. And then um I feel like the onboarding period for an interim room is it's inefficient and it's going to really require um Ranada and Randy and and this the same people to be at the table to get Ron up to speed. Uh I know that he knows city government but not except for from the elected side, not the administrative municipal director side. So I believe that trying to get him up to speed on what's happening within the city of Celane, this is not the city of Post Falls. Um, and what our ongoing process is, it's going to duplicate that work. And so I feel like this is also um, adding someone in here sometimes is different than replacing the city administrator who was Troy Thyson. So the department heads relied on that city administrator position for advice and for guidance and for connection. But to have someone new who doesn't know the inner workings of the oral history of what's gone on within the city walls, I don't feel like they're going to be as effective. So, I don't see the value in that there. And I

just feel like just for those reasons and the fact that I do think we have people who can do this job and we can get a city administrator on board faster and then they won't have to duplicate all of the work that they did to get Ron up to speed with another administrator when they come back in. So I feel like it's inefficient in a lot of these ways and it can be handled by people we have. I think that I believe I spoke with Renat, I'm not sure, and asked if there were people from other departments that could be pulled in that are cross-trained that could manage some of the the workload if it became burdensome. And there are. So, I feel like we have coverage enough to get this done and to move forward with getting the administrator who's going to manage these department heads.

Any other discussion? Uh, you've already gone and Dan English, do you have anything to say? Um, no. I'm, you know, kind of really wrestling with the, um, you know, because it's not just, I mean, the dollars and cents as part of it, the job stuff. Um, yeah. So I I yeah I'm kind of on the fence but I appreciate the discussion.

Thank you Mr. Mayor. I would just like to kind of dive into some of the discussion that's taken place as far as the budget concerns. Um this position is already budgeted for it. We at the time that we budgeted for this position we didn't know that Mr. Thompson was going to retire. and you have um recognized quite a bit of savings per month for uh the interim. Um he is willing to come and work for us without any of the benefit package and he's at a mid-range rate as compared to Troy who was at the top of the salary. So I think there are clearly budget savings there. This is not a position in my opinion that you try to farm out to internal people and say take on these additional duties. This is the the most important position in the city which Troy has held for 25 years. Troy, is that correct? 26 years. Um, so this isn't something First of all, I don't like the I guess the mechanism, two people. You need to have one person making these kind of final decisions. So I regardless of which way we would go, I wouldn't want it farmed out to two people. would be one if we weren't going to approve Ron Jacobson tonight, which I sure hope we do. Um, the budget concerns, again, this position was not identified as uh trying to find more salary savings by leaving it open. Um, you know, just the last council meeting, we without really a whole lot of discussion, except maybe from myself, we approved um, you know, $56,000 a year on going into our our fire budget. So, this position is I'm an approximate $60,000 one-time money, maybe, maybe less. So, I don't think the budget is our concern with this. As far

as experience, we've hired a guy from Post Falls before to be our city administrator. He was great and then he became our mayor. Ron Jacobson has the experience and the wealth of knowledge. He's from Cordelane. He certainly would step into the role quite easily and I think he would I think he's the kind of person that would work well with our staff. Uh they would immediately feel comfortable with him. He he he would be doing everything he could to set us up for success. And I think a new mayor um would lean on that kind of leadership and um would also learn a lot from him and it'll be beneficial all the way around. So, I strongly support uh us approving this contract tonight.

Thank you, Christie. And so, I'd like to say a few things um regarding budget savings. There are some savings, but that's not why we did this. Regarding the onboarding, that was a question that I had of city staff when this came up when we were talking about the contract. Um, and Katie said something really interesting cuz she's been through this onboarding process with superintendants. And I said, "Well, we probably want to have Ron on board for a couple of weeks so that he can learn the ropes." And Katie said, "No, these these guys, they know what they're doing that when they get to that level, they need a day, they need two days, whatever. We're giving Ron four or five, which um should be enough, I'm thinking. But I also want to remind council of one thing. The city administrator is my employee. The city administrator works for the mayor, not for you guys. You guys set policy. You can offer directions, but the city administrator is my employee. And it is my choice to have Ron Jacobson do it because I am in city hall every day and I see what all these people do and they're all busy. Every one of these people is busy. I get a copy of Troy's schedule every day and he has meetings all the time. He's meeting with people on the outside. He's negotiating with people. He's talking to developers. He's talking to bankers. He's talking to movers and shakers throughout the town. When he's not doing that, he has interviews with all the department heads every month. He this morning I came in, he was at the DRT meeting. Um then he had a meeting with me and then I don't know where he went for lunch, but he was gone at another meeting. And then um

there was a meeting with uh the CDGB people. So, this stuff is going on all the time in city hall and Ranada is busy and Randy is busy. And while statutoily it says that they take on the duties, my opinion is that's more of an emergency. That's like we don't have a city administrator. We need one. This is the backs stop. This is not designed to run the city. I think it would be incredibly inefficient and it would be problematic for me to do my job when I have two employees who are basically halfime half time. So they're splitting their duties 50/50 and then they're splitting that with me. So my preference as your mayor is to move forward with an interim which is why we're doing excuse me we're doing this. Um, and I think that's the best way to go. And Kenny, we're going to get right on the ball to try to find a full-time city administrator. And, uh, just to let you know, I I don't have any restrictions on that. If that's an internal, that's an external. Troy told me or Melissa, someone told me that when it's above a certain pay grade, we always go way out because we want to make sure we get the best. And in order for me as your mayor to deliver the best quality services to the city of Celane and ensure that this is uninterrupted, I think we need to move forward with Ron Jacobson as our interim. And that's just my bit. If you wanted to say anything else, I'd be happy to hear it.

Mr. I have a question. who would be uh if there was a disagreement between the clerk and the um attorney and um or they they couldn't agree on how to go to a meeting or which person would represent the city and do the negotiation. How how does that get resolved if we don't have a city administrator to make the final decision?

That's a great question. one that I have not thought of because it's my hope that we have an interim who can be the one who just is the my one employee who is that one point of contact who can handle the job. Um my guess is and I don't know if this was a discussion or if I'm making this up but that they would be splitting the departments among themselves. So a certain number of departments would report here a certain number would report there and that would be the way that they would have to manage that situation moving forward. And of course then following that is how do I interact with that at this point in time with them splitting that up and me having to relate at that level. So it becomes a a real Randy did you have something to say? I was going to say that in the city administrator's job description, it says the city administrator is the agent of the mayor and council. And I think in a situation where you have the city clerk, city attorney acting as doing the duties of a city administrator. If there's a disagreement, the mayor makes the final decision.

And and that's actually the the way it could be now, too. And it would be it would be the way uh if you have if you approve this memorandum of understanding if the mayor disagrees with the city administrator the mayor wins. So that there's that but also this just to go back to my point referring to the city administrator as my employee is that that is the one position in the city that I appoint. Well, no, you you would appoint the city uh clerk, city attorney, city treasurer are all appointed officials under state law. Uh so you appoint and council would would approve that appointment or reject that appointment. We're splitting hairs here. Anyway, does that answer your question?

I think so. All right. Very good. Any other questions or comments? Please,

I really appreciate your um your passionate um sales pitch and drive for this person. I can tell that it's important to you and um I I I really do. I I also think that whether Mr. Thyson did this astutely to leave at this particular time where we don't have um an election going on, we don't have contract negotiations going on, we don't have um some sort of operational crisis going on. I I I just feel like that we have a procedure in place where two people have it in their job description to do this job and it's just my feeling that there could be more chaos added to the team um with an interim in a short period of time regardless of how stellar he is. And I agree with Christie that we we did get some some some great uh great blood out of Post Falls that came over here. Um that was and no doubt he would be the same. I just feel like we need to tighten up our team. We can get through this and we can get a permanent city administrator on sooner with that focused effort in that short period of time.

Mr. Mayor, yes, sir. You have passionately asked this council to support you for your very first appointment. You've told them that you need this level of support um with a interim city administrator. Um, I can't I can't imagine why we would say no, we're we're not going to do this. Um, we all know that he comes with all kinds of experience. We know there's a job that needs to be filled for at least the next five months, four or five months. I can't imagine why we we would just flat out say no. Um, I think it's justified. Kenny, did you have a question?

Well, I love the discussion. I think we should have the discussion. I think it's fair to have the discussion. Sure. I absolutely do. But and I think what we need to do is these two folks sitting in here, what we need to do is thank them because of course they're going to step up and do the job. They absolutely will because that's the employees that they are. My concern absolutely is that this is a very busy city and putting that burden on them I think is almost unfair. So I personally appreciate having the conversation. I don't care what time it is. I think this is our jobs and we need to be doing this. So, thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you, Kenny. Dan English.

Sure. Well, just yeah, having heard this discussion and on the fence, but now I'm jumping over is that um couple of thing is I think that um I am going to support you in this. I think this is um reasonable and uh and it's something you know I think we should support the mayor and and trying to do this and also I mean that's one thing so uh and I think you've earned the the trust of that the other thing when I think of you know having you know two people who are split up but somewhere there's got to be you know you can't have to um you know, somebody's got to make that final call. I mean, you make what a final call at one level, but there's got to be somebody in that, you know, kind of administrative. So, um anyway, you know, I appreciate again the discussion, but I'm going to support this.

Thank you, Dan. Any further discussion? All right, we will do a roll call, please. Ranatada. Gabriel, yes. Sheckler, yes. English, yes. Wood, yes. Evans, no. Miller, no. Thank you, councel. Now we need a motion to adjurnn. So move. Second. All those in favor? I

I adjourned. Thank you, councel. Thank you, staff. Heat. Hey. Hey. Hey.