City Council - Regular Meeting

Good evening, everyone. I'd like to call the Gig Harbor City Council meeting of Monday, August 10th to order and ask City Clerk Elliman to please call the roll.

Council Member Ahman.

Here.

Council Member Coronado.

Here.

Council Member Martin.

Here.

Council Member Rodenberg.

Here.

Council Members Eckberg, Stone, and Tessicini are excused.

Thank you. Please rise and join us for the Pledge of Allegiance. Before we begin this council meeting, we would like to recognize that we are gathered on not only the ancestral and traditional lands of the Squibosh Band of the Puyallup Tribe of Indians, but also on the site of one of the largest and longest standing historic villages of their people, the original inhabitants of the Gig Harbor area. Councilor, are there any changes to the agenda? Seeing none, I will now open public comment on the consent agenda. Please come to the podium or press the raised hand button if you would like to comment on the consent agenda. Is there anyone online? Okay, I will close public comment on consent agenda items and open it up for a motion from council.

I move that we approve the consent agenda.

I second.

It was moved by Council Member Martin and seconded by Council Member Ahman to approve the consent agenda. Please vote on your screens or verbally.

Yes.

Motion passes four to zero. Thank you, council. From my mayor's report, I just have a couple of things tonight. First, I am thrilled that tonight we're taking another giant step forward on the Fisherman's Home Port with the consideration of bids for the construction of the home port. I won't say anything more as this is later on tonight's agenda, except let's go. Second, at this Thursday study session, the fire department is joining us to discuss wildlife preparedness and preparation. This is part of our ongoing conversations with our partners at the fire department, but also an extremely important conversation because of the current conditions in our state. Please feel free to join us for this conversation this Thursday from three to five in the community rooms. This Saturday is Chalk the Harbor, which is a really fun family event downtown. And the Waterfront Alliance always puts on a fabulous event. This year, there are different Chalk Emeralds that will be drawn by everyone from beginners to experts. There's live art demonstrations, a community project that involves painting your name on some buoys. which is part of a larger community art project to be installed later. It's really fun and the weather promises to be very nice. So I hope to see everyone downtown. Next weekend, our fishing community is sponsoring an event from 11 to 5 at Scanty Brothers Park to help us all learn more about how their industry feeds the world. Come learn from all these folks about what they do and enjoy all the hands-on activities and evidently some wonderful food as well. And with that, I will now turn it over to City Administrator Katrina Knudson for her report.

Thank you, Mayor. Good evening, Council. I have two items on my report tonight. The first is, once it shares with you, because it's a pretty picture, I'm happy to announce that Gig Harbor's very own mayor, Mary Barber, was named by the Public Relations Society of America as the inaugural Women of Impact Awards winner for the Public Affairs and Government Awards. There, you can see her on the screen now. Mary was recognized for her leadership, innovation, and lasting contributions to the communications professions by PRSA in Chicago last Thursday. The awards celebrate women whose leadership, innovation, and influence are strengthening organizations, advancing the profession, and creating opportunities for others. want to congratulate Mayor Barber on this amazing award that she's received. And it's really amazing. We all feel to work with you and learn from you and appreciate your service to our city.

Thank you. It's my pleasure to and my honor to serve the city and to work with everyone here.

Thank you. And on another note, you may have noticed some chatter about traffic because of 38th Avenue has started. Stephanie and Jeff are here if you have questions about that. Just kidding. We did have an unfortunate series of circumstances last Tuesday that led to traffic coming to a crawl within our entire city. We had Harborview Drive closed down for National Night Out, and then there was a rollover accident just after, along 56th after our closure on 38th, which... tied up traffic on the west side of the city as well. Just want to reiterate to anyone listening that that is not expected or normal. Those were circumstances that happened on the same day and led to very significant traffic delays. Do want to continue saying we are trying everything that we can to get the word out we've talked with a lot of neighbors on 38th and surrounding areas that are well aware of. The construction that's occurring and what to expect for the local neighbors, we will be putting out. street signs with the qr code, so people can scan that we're looking at having. The QR codes on the back of all of our public works trucks so people can scan those and get information. So really want to commend Lori, the public works team, for thinking outside of the box on how we're going to communicate all of this. As we know, it's going to be a pretty long process. Currently, we're having alternating lane closures. that's occurring now. We do expect on Monday the 17th to begin the rolling closures and you can see on the screen up there how it's going to start near Hunt Street and the closures will then go down closer to 56th. We have been saying this for a number of months now that this is going to be an impact to our community. We do hope that they have listened and heard us. We will continue to say it wherever We can that detours are highly encouraged and those are on our website and you can scan the QR code and you'll be taken to some really helpful information. I do want to state that some of our additional communications that we're going to put out to the community, there's been several that have come phone calls either straight directly to me or going to the Marin Council, which of course is always a resident's right to do so. However, Stephanie, our senior engineer, and Dan, our construction supervisor on this project, are really the way to get immediate action on things that are potential issues and so their information is going to be more prominent than maybe the rest of ours and that is not intended to not have people comment to council or the mayor but when people are looking for immediate action it's best that they're going to the source and Stephanie and Dan are definitely those on our staff that are managing this project and can help folks much quicker in some cases than we can. So again, I appreciate everyone's patience as we all embark together on this construction project that will again lead us to vehicle safety, pedestrian safety, bicycle safety on this corridor. It's been budgeted for quite some time and underway. So appreciate everyone's patience. And here we go. That concludes my report. Thank you, Mayor.

Thank you for that report. Council member Martin. Yeah.

Thank you for the update on the project. When prior to starting the project, I think the team met with the residents there. I think the church was very accommodating. Do you have plans every so often to meet up at the church and just for people just to kind of give them some updates, you know, maybe every four or five months, whatever, just to do some level setting on the communication. Not everybody reads all the wonderful things you put out. Thanks.

At this time, we do not have any plans to do that. For the next three months, we're going to be having weekly communications go out to the neighbors because of the rolling closures. In fact, tomorrow we start door-to-door dropping off of over 355 notifications. So that will be going out starting tomorrow. And then as we move them weekly, we will be notifying the ones immediately adjacent to to the closure of the change so they know which direction, north or south, they have access to their street. But at this time, we don't not have any plans to do any more public meetings, but it's definitely something we can keep on our list that as things progress, we can look at doing that.

Yeah, I think that's great. And not just for problems, but just milestones of, gosh, six months in, here's the, you know, this part of the project's completed. Take a deep breath. We got through this one. And here we go for the other ones.

But thanks for the Yes, I will say to the contractors doing everything they can to compress the schedule as much as possible to get it down from that two year timeline.

Thank you. Sorry, our first business item tonight is a public works contract award for public works construction materials testing and construction support for the commercial fishing home port and I will turn it over to senior engineer stephanie cyber for the staff report.

Thank you. So yes, I am here tonight for the award of the construction materials testing and construction support contracts. The contracts in front of you tonight for award are for the final phase of the Anschutz Waterfront Park project. Anches Waterfront Park began in 2013, but this phase began in 2020 when the city began working with local fishermen, adjacent property owners, and the home port parties to develop and consider commercial fishing mortgage needs, impacts, benefits, and various dock layouts, alternatives that were considered as part of the commercial fishing home port feasibility study. The study results in the passage of Resolution 1210 in June 2020 that adopted the conceptual layout that became the final layout, as Jeff has up on the screen right now, for the commercial fishing home port. Since the adoption of Resolution 1210, the staff and design consultant have been working through the design and permitting process, and that concluded in June 2026. The project was competitively bid using the city's public works bidding process for six weeks. On July 28th, 2026, the city received five responsive bids for the project. Staff is recommending award to Redside Construction. We have reviewed their qualifications and have determined that they are both responsive and responsible. Redside is also the contractor that constructed the Maritime Pier project and produces a good product. After the award and contract paperwork are completed, submittals and fabrication will occur over the next few months. And during this time, you will see the contractor on site very little. I'm going to switch to the table. Funding of this project is completed through the Hospital Benefit Zone, Port of Tacoma Funding, Gig Harbor Civic Fisherman's Club Donation, Real Estate Excise Tax Fund, and the Stormwater Capital Fund. Previously awarded expenses, if you can read that up there on the screen, previously awarded expenses through design and bidding on this project was $370,646, approximately as you can see up on the table that Jeff is sharing. As part of these contracts, we're requesting the adoption of the budget for the mitigation credit payment to Puget Sound Partnership. and the professional services contract for Facet, the construction contract for Redside, and the professional services contract for materials testing to the materials testing and consulting group. We're also including a change order, construction change order authority of 145,000. These expenses do bring us over the already adopted budget of $4.9 million, but we have the money within, or sorry, not 4.9, of 3.68 million, but we do have the money within the hospital benefit zone fund to cover the additional requested amount of 1.6 million. Okay. And that's my conclusion of my presentation.

Thank you. Thank you. Are there any clarifying questions from council? I am not seeing any raised hands. So I will now open public comment on this agenda item. If you're in the audience and wish to speak, please come forward at this time. If you're on zoom and wish to speak, please press the raised hand button. And I will now close public comment and open it up for council deliberation and action. Council Member Rodenberg.

I'd like to make a motion to approve and authorize the mayor to execute a public works construction contract with Redside Construction LLC in the amount of $3,603,032.16. Further, authorize the mayor to execute a professional services contract for materials testing with Materials Testing and Consulting Inc. in an amount of $12,034. Further, authorize the city engineer to approve additional public works construction contract, this would be change order authority, expenditures up to $145,000. further to authorize the mayor to execute a professional services contract for construction support with the facet in the amount not to exceed $312,857. Can I second that?

It was moved by Council Member Rodenberg and seconded by Council Member Coronado to approve and authorize the information stated by Council Member Rodenberg pertaining to the commercial fishing home port. If you could please vote on your screens or vote verbally. Council Member Rodenberg, are you voting yes? Yes. motion passes four to zero. Our second business item tonight is resolution 1366, rejecting all bids received for the splash pad plumbing and rewiring pertaining to CIP 2506. And I will turn it over to Public Works Director Jeff Langham for the staff report.

Thank you, Mayor. Good evening, Council. Before you tonight is a resolution that will reject bids for the splash pad rewiring and replumbing project. The splash pad at Skansy Park was originally designed as part of the 2016 Welcome Plaza Skansy Brothers Park project, and it was associated when the Fisherman's Memorial was moved from the very edge of the waterfront bulkhead and brought back further toward Rosedale Street and raised up out of the King Tide level. The splash pad itself was an artistic water feature that was meant to coincide with the Fisherman's Memorial Statue. However, because the splash pad was publicly accessible, it had to be permitted, we found out, as a public pool. So because of that information during the construction, we changed some of the aspects of what the internal components and how that splash pad functioned. And so you see it before you today. It is a fully permitted, essentially public pool. And so we used the components that we had in the design and we put it into the middle of the plaza and into underground vaults. There's three separate underground vaults that are there. And when the work was completed, we started our operation and maintenance of the facility. And that was, again, about 10 years ago. And we realized a few years ago that the Existing equipment was deteriorating and it was not an optimal way for the equipment to be placed in those underground vaults. So that brought us to the 25-26 budget where we decided we needed to go through and do improvements to remove those controls and some of that equipment out of the underground vaults and put it into the adjacent building there at the Welcome Plaza. So we put that contract together, put it out to bid in June, and the bidding period was open for three weeks, and we received no bids. So we put the project back out to bid in early July, and we opened bids on July 22nd, and we received three bids. However, when we looked at the bids and did our reference checks, we found that the lowest bidder was not on the MRSC roster for small public works. And so that meant that bidder was non-responsive. So we are not allowed to use that bid. So we went to the second low bid, and that second low bid provided us a bid in an amount of about $350,000. The budget for this project was about $200,000. So we recognized pretty quickly that this was well above what our expected construction cost was. So at this point, because of the discrepancy from the low bid at $350,000 approximately and the budget, staff is recommending that we reject all bids. We'll review the contract documents and we'll, based on that review, put out another public works construction contract bid request in January of 2027. If the 27-28 budget is approved with this contract being reallocated in the 27-28 budget. So that's staff's recommendation right now. Reject bids, assess it as part of the 27-28 budget, and if approved, we would go back out to bid in January of 2027. So that's my report. Happy to answer any questions if you have any.

Thank you. And we'll now move to clarifying questions from council, beginning with Council Member Coronado.

Thank you for the background on the splash pad slash art installation. I'm just wondering if we've fully considered the long-term costs of delaying this project. I'm wondering what happens to pumps when they're not used season after season? What happens to seals when they're not used and water flowing through them? What happens to build up of the biofilm? What happens to the calcium deposits and mineral deposits in the piping? Are we looking at a much larger project? Should we delay this longer? and push it off another season or two, as opposed to just doing a relocation project.

We don't feel that delaying this project for another season is going to have impacts to the existing equipment because right after Labor Day, every year, we shut down the system. And so all winter long, since it was new in 2016, that equipment sits unused. And then we begin to bring it back to life in the spring, usually about end of April, first part of May. start up the system, do testing, take water samples, and then go through the permitting process to go in Pierce County Health Department. So the equipment was running earlier this year, but some of the nozzles and some of the control equipment were not functioning properly. So we shut it back down. So I think delaying it another season is not going to have any additional impact.

You don't think any of those components will dry out and become brittle and more fragile and

Not any more than they already do every year when we shut them down for the season, no.

And then do you foresee us getting new bid bidders? I mean, we had zero on the first and then, I mean, I know those contracts aren't easy to fill out. You know, they're quite extensive. I mean, are we going to end up with a lower bid? Is that the idea or is it?

Well, the idea is that we will reassess the contract documents, see if there's something that needs to be adjusted to make it maybe more appealing for bidders. But also, yes, we could put it back out to bid and change our approach to maybe not just use a small works roster. Maybe you just put it out as a full public works bidding process. It's a little bit more... time consuming extensive staff effort required to do that, but we could do that and we can see if we get more bidders at that point. I anticipate we'll get more bidders next time. It's a tough time of year to do this kind of project because so many contractors are so busy already. And so in January, if there's, if they're not as busy, there might be more interest by more contractors.

Yeah. Just from experiencing conversations in this room and other rooms, Cost doesn't typically go down next year. So I worry that that's not gonna be the case.

You're right. It could not be the case. I will say the second low bidder is the same contractor that won the award for LiftStation 5. So that contractor was very busy already. So I don't know if that has anything to do with it. But like I said, hopefully in January, if there's contractors who are not as busy and are looking for work and their schedules aren't already full, then they'll be able to provide us with a price that fits within our budget.

Thank you, Dr. Langholm.

Council Member Rodenburg.

Thank you. I agree. I think summertime is probably the worst time to ever get a bid on any kind of water feature, because they're all so busy. Maybe come January, they'll be a little bit more hungry. Is there an expectation that if we did delay it and did allow a contract, that it would be working by next season?

Correct. We are looking into procurement of some of the equipment that typically has a long lead time. Our hope, and one of the things we're going to reassess, is if there's some long lead items that will not allow us to have it open by early June. before Memorial Day, that we may go ahead and order those pieces of equipment and have it ready to go for the contractor. So that's part of the assessment we're going to do later this fall if the budget moves forward and it's reallocated into the 2720 budget.

Yeah, I would think $100,000 over our initial thinking, given that there's probably only another couple months of the season left, and with the expectation that it would be up and running by next season. That's a very popular feature. When I'm down there, I really enjoy seeing everybody and enjoy the splash pad. So I guess I can support this with a hard expectation that it'll be up and running come next season. And I expect to advocate for it in the budget as we go through that process. Thanks. Thank you.

Any other clarifying questions from Council? All right. I will now open the public comment for this agenda item. If you're in the audience and wish to speak, please come to the podium now. Or if you're on Zoom, please press the raised hand button. All right. I will now close public comment and open it for Council deliberation and action. Council Member Martin.

Yes, I'd like to make a motion that we approve resolution number 1366 that rejects all bids received for the splash pad plumbing and rewiring project and direct staff to include funding in the project for the 2728 biannual budget cycle.

Is there a second?

I second.

It was moved by Council Member Martin and seconded by Council Member Rodenburg to approve resolution 1366, rejecting all bids for the splash pad. Please vote on your screen or verbally if you're unable to assess your voting screen.

Yay.

Motion passes 3 to 1 with Council Member Coronado voting no. OK. So moving along. I would now like to open public comment for items not on the agenda. So if you would like to comment on something that is not on the agenda, please come forward at this time. Or if you're on Zoom, press the raised hand button.

Mr. Williamson, this is your time.

You're not on the agenda, so you can come up now. I opened it up for public comment. Does one of you want to comment if, if you could give us your name, and whether or not you live in the city, and you have three minutes to comment.

Okay. My name is Jim Broderick. I'm here with Don Kepler. And Gary Williamson, all three of us live over at Mallard's Landing, the lodge over there. And we are, the address there I guess is 7083. Anyway, long and short is we travel down to the Tolman Trail Park and walk way down there a lot. I used it for my cardiovascular rehabilitation. And so I've seen over the last two years, almost on a daily and weekly basis, trials on the trails, what's there, what's happening. We reached out to Jennifer Harbo, and she came and met with us twice, walked the trails. And what we're trying to do is, even though it's our very small part, one of 28, I think, parks in the town, is to get it a little bit safer for older and younger people to walk on the trail. nothing really major, but we found that in talking with Jennifer and when we've had trees fall down and become dangerous on the trail or things need to be done, that just a quick call, they get on it, things have been taken care of. What we're looking for, because at the lodge at Mallards Landing, Most of us are above 65, so therefore getting out and walking safely and stuff is important. I walked the Cushman Trail and I had the trail there. What I found is that other people, when I talk to them, when I'm out of this area, come over and try the Tallman Trail and find it an interesting natural habitat just tucked into the community. So some of the issues that we were looking at is because tree roots over the last 20 years have grown up and made an uneven surface is to fix some surface areas, some drainage, tree overhangs and dangers. Well, in doing this has been pointed out that we have to have an arborist, a water person, good Lord, who knows how many other people need to verify before we move in to a natural area. But the first thing we want to do is make sure the walkway is safer. The second thing is maybe add some additional things to it. And then some suggestions have been made from some scout leaders and others with permission from the city to label as an educational trail. names of the trees and Bona in the park to add nesting boxes for the wood ducks and other animals, but just to make it an enhanced park. And so we three are the three amigos that use it a lot and appreciate having a nice place to go on a year round basis. So we came today, I did in particular, I haven't been to a city council meeting like 25, 30 years. And so I wanted to see how this works here. And I'm very glad that I've been able to get to this meeting and plus work with Jennifer and the parks director or maintenance man. So that's my general comment. And we'll just kind of keep working on seeing if we can find funds and have ideas to get them prioritized over the next couple of years. Well, I was getting older. We'd like it tomorrow, but.

Well, thank you for being here tonight.

All right. Thank you.

And Jennifer Harrow is a fabulous contact for you guys.

Yes, she is. She lets us know for sure what's available and points us in a different direction. So I appreciate it very much. And peace be with you.

Great, thank you. Is there anybody else who would like to comment tonight? Is there anyone on Zoom? I'm not seeing any hands raised. So I will move to, are there any reports from council tonight? Council Member Rodenburg.

I have just a general comment. When you give public testimony like that, it's not a two-way conversation. But what you mentioned really struck home with me. I think that's the only place in the city where young people or anyone can actually observe wood ducks. I don't know wood ducks anywhere else in the city. And the fact that there's nesting boxes there ought to be preserved. And I think... I'd really like to see this get done, and I hope my council colleagues agree with me.

Thank you. So any other council comments tonight? Council Member Martin.

So first, thank you. Hopefully it won't be 25 more years before you come and talk with us, okay? We appreciate that. I had the great opportunity to go over to a very smoky Leavenworth last week, unfortunately, but municipal budgeting and fiscal management workshop, I actually found very interesting. Some may think I'm a little crazy on that one, but it was good. We had discussions of all sorts of items. I forwarded all of the presentations to council and staff. So they have those as well, but they talked about just property tax 101 and how difficult our property tax system is. The only other one in the country is New Jersey. And so ours is extremely difficult to understand and work through. I thought one of the interesting things is 1970 cities were getting approximately 85% of their funds from property taxes. 2007, it was just shy of 58%. And in 2007, the legislature mandated that we could only increase property taxes by 1% a year. Also spoke with some of my colleagues, and it was interesting when I heard council member ask the question of, well, how do I get budget information prior to one hour before we have to vote on it? And I just smiled and proudly told my table mates that we have a great team at the City of Gig Harbor and we are actively working along with them on the budget process and we get great information upfront so we make good intelligent decisions when we vote on this budget. And they were very envious of us in the City of Gig Harbor. Lastly, what I wanted to talk about was there was a lot of discussions about grants, how to write really good grants. I know we've been fairly successful, both the State Auditor's Department and others who were speaking about grants. And if you're doing federal grants, there's a whole other, and I'm sure you know all of this. I'm looking over at everybody. There's a whole other book of things that you have to go through and really question whether or not federal grants are worth going after because there's so much that can happen. You make one mistake, they could take all the money back that they had originally awarded us. So again, all of that information is provided to you. I thank City Administrator Knutson for making sure there was room in the budget for this, and I would recommend this meeting to anybody else. It's going to be held next year on August 4th and 5th, I believe, in 2027. Thank you.

thank you i'm not seeing any other hands raised for council comments so i want to announce that there is a list of upcoming meetings attached to today's agenda and also just make sure for everyone who's listening this is our only meeting in august because lots of staff and council go on vacation in preparation for the school year that begins next month and so we will not be here two weeks from now so with that is there a motion to adjourn I move that we adjourn all those in favor say aye aye meeting is adjourned thank you everyone