City Council - workshop

INDIVIDUAL WITH LIBERTY AND JUSTICE FOR ALL.

ALL RIGHT. THANK YOU, AND WELCOME, EVERYBODY. FIRST THING ON THE AGENDA TONIGHT IS PUBLIC COMMENT. SO IF ANYBODY'S GOT ANY PUBLIC COMMENT FOR THE COUNCIL.

Good evening, everybody. I apologize for my voice. I'm getting over a summer cold. So I have two points that I just wanted to kind of ask or bring up.

Just state your name for us. Oh, sorry. Sarah Kolb. Thank you. I know we know who we are. I know, I know. I'm so sorry. That's all right. Thank you. OK.

So I come before the council tonight in good faith. with an olive branch in hand. I am not sure if the council's aware of this or not, but I attempted to, in good faith, operate, as the council suggested, to speak with Planning and Zoning. And then Friday evening, I did receive a letter from our city attorney regarding my request and conversation that I had had with Doug Tarr a few weeks ago. And it led me right back here. And so since I received that letter Friday evening, I didn't have enough time, obviously, to put forth my proposal to the city council as just a suggestion, my own suggestion. Take it or leave it. Use it or don't. Pick it apart. Doesn't matter. Clearly I don't believe that the public comment is the correct forum to bring forth this proposal So I'm hoping that maybe the City Council once we move on to the actual ordinance measure of the agenda tonight that I would be able to come back up and just offer my proposal that may be able to solve the problem that the City Council is facing and and what property owners are facing and what Jim and his son are facing. And perhaps that this may be an answer or at least something to consider that might meet the needs of all parties involved. So I don't know if the council will allow me to come back up and speak on that issue or if I'm allowed time, because it's probably going to take up more time than public comment is allowed.

I think as the agenda item is, it's going to be basically discussing Jim Meyer and Matthew Meyer as their property, as it pertains to livestock, and we have a solution well okay so we don't really want to get into a lot of discussion about this and revamping and we've got this okay well then I would just suggest then since you know I don't have enough time to get this on the agenda between Friday and now

if there's a consideration for something called residential ag, which would be a hybrid between single family homes that are considered right now R1 designation and have a hybrid of agricultural uses I have supporting documentation that although R1 is the complete east and southeast portion of town, that clearly there's no R1 being developed out there. There's no infrastructure. There's no population demand. There's no residential demand. And so my suggestion was to put forth, allow planning and zoning to create a subdivision hybrid ordinance for residential properties that meet certain requirements. And that was my letter that was addressed to me by the city attorney that I needed to bring that proposal forward to the city council. If you guys then could allow a green light to planning and zoning to actually look into a hybrid ordinance. that could meet the demands of city council. It wouldn't be put forth to you guys anymore, and you guys could remove the ordinance as it stands per your request. It would protect residents that don't meet those requirements or aren't close to those types of requirements. We've already identified 12 properties within city limits that met certain requirements. And then, of course, it would allow planning and zoning to do what they need to do, which you council members have suggested over and over again. This shouldn't be brought forth to the council. It needs to go to planning and zoning. So again, under this type of ordinance, it would allow property owners that met certain specifications to go to planning and zoning. Because I tried that and I went to City Hall. City Hall sent me to Doug Tarr. Doug Tarr took it to the City Attorney. City Attorney turfed it back to you guys. And you guys want to turf it to Planning and Zoning. So you can kind of understand the roundabout kind of way. And I want to see if there's a different way that we can streamline this for everybody. So that would be my proposal, if the council would be willing to consider something like that during this workshop. Thank you. All right.

Thank you. Anybody else with a public comment? If not, we'll move on. the next item is discussed 1208 Central Avenue East property as it relates to reconsideration of our ordinance file 411 amending chapter 5505 of livestock as we know is the the Amendment to the ordinance did fail on our last meeting. So we feel that we've come up with possibly a solution that is going to benefit the mayors and as well as let the city move forward with any amendments to our ordinances that are necessary or that we feel necessary. So I'm just going to read through some of the items that I put together. Again, after the council's vote denying the amendment, we feel that we have come up with a solution. And this should benefit the Myers and it should also let the city to amend their current ordinance as needed. So the recommendation from us is we recommended that the city allow the Myers 45 days from July 20th, which is today, to complete the property transfer from Jim Meyer to Matthew Meyer and record your deed. if that is your intent. We feel that this is a sufficient time to complete all phases of the transaction. At that point, then we would recommend Matthew Meyer immediately following taking ownership to initiate a request with the city council to have sheep on your property. You're going to own the property at that point. That would be under the current ordinance 5505 as it stands today. Because we allow with council consents. The city would place the Meyers request on the soonest city council agenda at that point to approve or deny the request. that we would request or recommend, I would recommend, and I believe the city as well, would recommend the council approve the request for the Myers to the sheep. This would be followed by a repeated first reading of a ordinance 411, which is the one we just voted down. The scenario we feel would satisfy the Meyers request to have the sheep on the property and provides the city with the opportunity to move forward with our ordinance 411. I also noted that the Meyers request for sheep, if approved, We'll have language included to specify what the request is for and scenarios that would deem it null and void. And this is the thing that came up when we were discussing this as a change of ownership of the property again. It's going to be, we're going to have to spell that out because we're going to try to get this taken care of for you guys. But we also need to, going forward, If we're not here as a council, other people are going to be here. And we want to be able to have something to fall back on and say, hey, here's where we're at. I think that's a good idea. I'd say that this should alleviate any misconceptions for future city councils, should the situation arrive in the future. I don't know how long you're going to keep the property. It could be 10, 20, 30 years. Who knows? We don't know. Right now, this is an immediate solution that I feel that we've come up with and that would work for both of us. Any questions?

Is 45 days enough?

As the timeline that I've looked up, You said you should be able to do it in 34 days. I think 45 is plenty and ample time to complete the transactions. If you guys got any input or comments, please feel free to come to the podium as well.

Hello. Again, Matt Meyer, in case I had to say my name. Thank you for letting me stand before you and talk again today. 45 days does sound doable. I would have to double check with Veterans Affairs and make sure that I could get the money within that time frame. The only thing I would ask for is anything to do with the government. It always takes time. I got pre-approval. I have authorization for the amount that we agreed upon. But I do need to talk to them because with this new ordinance that they're going to be, I should be able to get the full amount because it's going to say it's grandfathered in, and I should be able to have the property as agricultural. So I would just ask if I could just within that 45-day period, if I could come back to council and let them know if I'm having any issues, if I could get a temporary extension upon that time.

We hope that we don't have to go there. Yes, I also hope so as well, but I just request. But no, through the process, we would definitely appreciate you keeping up a prize where you're at so that we can kind of know where we're at at each one, at each step of the new way. Yes, of course.

And thank you again. That's all I need.

All right. All right. Any council have confirmation or comments, questions?

I guess I just want to, so Ed, I followed you through your first four steps. So the fifth step, let's say we pass the ordinance, then that they would not be able to have livestock if Matthew transferred the property. Is that correct?

Correct.

Okay. I just wanted to make sure I understood that.

This is a solution that's going to work for the Myers at this point with their sheep and sheep. and allow us to update our thing moving forward. Not hearing any opposition, questions. I would basically ask for a consensus of the council that you're okay with this solution for the Myers, for the city.

I think it's a great idea, certainly reasonable. I am concerned, as was expressed to you and also with Matt, that nothing with the government moves fast. But if we're open to working with them on that, if the need arose, then I'm good with that.

We can look at that if we need to, and hopefully we won't have to. All right, Bill? There you go.

Yeah, I think it's a very good solution to a problem we didn't anticipate when we entered this situation. So yes, I think we should move forward with it.

OK. Jerry?

I agree.

You're good? OK, Kristen?

I agree.

You're good? Mr. Lamos?

Can we legally tell them they have to close by this date?

This is a solution that we're recommending and paging for them, but I don't know that we need to have legal review of that.

Yeah, I'm for it.

Mr. Davies?

I think as long as we're flexible with that 45 days if needed, I'm fine with that. And I'm glad we're allowing the transfer or allowing the sheep after the transfer.

Yeah. OK. So the council appears to be in consensus of this. Again, as I keep saying this, we need to move as quickly as possible because we really want to get this done. but in the 45 days if possible so we don't really want to drag it drag it out if not if not needed so all right so we have a consensus of the council to move forward with the solution for the meyers and the city thank you guys thank you thank you matter as well DAVID BURRAGE. MOVING ON. DISCUSSED SCOOTER, BIKES, SKATERS, RESTRICTIONS ON TOWN DOOR SIDEWALKS, MOTORIZED BIKES AND SCOOTERS.

Yeah, I was asked to bring some information forward in reference to e-bikes and e-scooters as they have gained a lot of popularity over the last summer. And there's been some concerns come up, and so we've kind of put some information into a packet on what the rules are. Our current ordinance is a bit outdated, and it could be as simple as just adding e-bikes and stuff for the downtown business district, or you could go – look take a deeper dive into it as the trail goes the side streets etc so I put a lot of information in a packet today for you to kind of look at I don't know if we want to go over that today or if we want to set up for another meeting after everybody's had time to kind of digest it and come up with some ideas and come back but I'm open for whatever

I think it's going to be a longer discussion on what we want to do with that. I know we're looking at other communities, you know, what they're doing and how that would fit in Hampton and stuff like that. So, I mean, to me, I need to just digest it. Digest it.

Yeah, that's why I figured there's a lot of information coming all at once, and so kind of give some time to look it over and then go from there.

We can definitely get on another – I mean, I entertain any discussion this evening, yes. But I think we're going to have several workshops. I do want an opportunity to read through this.

Yep, you bet. Read page one.

Yeah, there's a lot there. Very good, yeah.

I read through all of it. But I had a question for you. How many citations do we have that are... regarding bicycles and scooters and e-bikes and whatnot?

I can't come up with that number off the top of my head. It's under five for the summer. A lot of it has been based on education and stopping people. I know at least last week six people were stopped and educated. Again, and those are on the basic traffic laws and, you know, courtesy type things like, hey, you need to slow down, you need to pay attention to the road, those type of things, not necessarily – blatant violations.

And have they been primarily e-bikes or just... Oh, it's a mix of scooters and e-bikes.

And one of the things is, which you kind of work around, is you can't civilly charge a juvenile. So it's how do you go about getting to the results you want and getting to the parents and their parenting...

exactly I do know as a downtown business the scooters are a big problem so I do want time to look it over and I know it's difficult to patrol I know it's difficult to to press charges, and I wouldn't go there either. But I think we need to start with a pretty good educational process for the families, for the families, parents and children together.

The downtown district would be the easiest just to add into the current ordinance. That could be done fairly quickly. Because the fine structure for it, if you've read through the packet at any length, is $5. So I don't know that.

Right.

I think this is all great with good intentions, but if I see somebody driving down the street erratically on an electric bike, they're never going to get caught. By the time I call it in, they're gone. I don't know where they are. I'm not going to chase them down. So I'm wondering if we could partner with the school as far as information.

We've done that. I sent the information to them towards the end of the school year last year. They had it part of their health and science program. And they put that information out. I also sent it to the middle school. But again, you've got to somehow get it to the parents.

Do they mention anything when they do driver's ed?

That I don't know.

Thank you. Yep.

Maybe we could have some out at the ED also.

Sure.

If we have like a one sheet or something like that. Yeah. Just when they have injuries.

Yeah, there's quite a bit of information out there on the Iowa DOT's website too. So I can get some of those graphics, get them to some of those places.

Yeah.

We can give them something. You think we can? Sorry. Do you think we can hand something out like National Night Out? Sure. That first Tuesday might be a good way to get to a lot of parents and family focus. I think we're handing out backpacks and school supplies again so we could easily put something. Now, whether they read it or not, that's another thing. And I know I'm concerned. I've had a couple people talk to me, and unfortunately it might take – you know somebody getting hit that's what i'm concerned about is that i think there's been some near misses that have been like that mentioned to me the kids just dart out and again we need to do education but i'm just concerned too more if anything the safety but then like what do we do yeah

And like everything else, you know, just because we put rules in place doesn't necessarily mean we want to stop at all. It's just like a speeding sign and the car is still speed, et cetera, stop signs. But we do what we can.

I just believe it all begins with education. Start there and hammer it out.

Yep, I think the piece that you put in here about the rolling prairie trail etiquette is key. Because, I mean, I've ridden bike trails, and I kind of know what they've got to do. Some of these people have never been on a bike trail. They just ride their bike wherever it goes. And if we get this etiquette out to them, the communication is huge. The one that I'm hearing a lot about is the scooters and the e-bikes on the trail. And... they come up behind somebody and they're trying to alert them, but they got earbuds in, headphones on, they can't hear them, so here you go, now you got another issue. But I think, and then in the next paragraph she talked about, as you guys keep educating the community, I think that's the council's responsibility responsibility as well you know if we see it say something to them you know prop politely of course I don't tackle them or anything like that but but you know let's let's say some people hey and in a nice way you know let's let's get it out there that's the starter and education is always key on a lot of these pieces And I think, same thing, I want to really digest this and kind of take a look at what you've sent over. Sure.

In the meantime, I can put some stuff together for the national night out, and then maybe they always have the pre-conferences at the school, so maybe I can get some stuff to the elementary, middle school, high school before then. That's how we should be. And of course, Facebook.

Go ahead.

I did have a chance to visit with, Doug at length today, too, about it. And I was very impressed. Today, today, I saw a dad and two children get off of their bikes and walk it through the downtown district and then get back on their bikes at La Frontier and proceed on. And I wanted so much to shout thank you to them. But, you know, it was a great idea. I don't know, run out and give them a $5 chamber buck and say thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you so much. Instead of focusing so much on the negative behavior, maybe focus more on the positive behavior and reward people for that.

Yeah, if you see something like that happening... I'll go up to people and say, hey, thanks for doing that. Thanks for fixing your house up. Thanks for doing that. Just do it. Let them know that we're seeing it, and we appreciate it and stuff like that, too. Anything else this evening?

Just one quick, is there any signage that we could have that might help, like particularly in the downtown area? Because I know what you're talking about.

Yeah, we'd have to redo the signage downtown because it doesn't, it says nothing about e-bikes or scooters.

I mean, yeah, at some point that should be a part of it. Yep, absolutely.

I do really think we could probably take, it says something like bicycles, skateboards.

Rollerblades.

Rollerblades. I think it's outdated. Rollerblades are from the 80s, so you don't see much of those anymore.

I think there's a sign on the tennis courts, too, because they would do skateboarding on there, and I think there's like no... of what you were talking about on the tennis court. So there's signs out there. Yeah, for sure.

The rollerblades are still out there. Two kids in my neighborhood that go up and down the street. And they're not even motorized, which is really kind of cool.

And I don't think it would be a bad idea to have more of the signs either. I drove through downtown a couple times today looking for the signs and had to really look for them to see them. English and Spanish. Counting them.

Yeah. Yeah. There's a lot of stuff that's going to have to come together on this, and it's really updating type stuff. Yeah. Yeah. I think if everybody can really dive into this and let's put it on our next workshop again and let's keep it moving forward and see if we can't come up with some solutions and some ideas and what do we want to do. Sounds good. All right. Thank you.

next item is discuss proper process for disposal of vacant plots at a prior workshop we were talking about disposal of some of our lots that we've acquired through the courts for nuisance demolitions and to get them back on the tax rolls as privately owned and so there was a question about what the city has invested in some of these Lots that are upcoming to be disposed of the 120 First Avenue Northeast which it was a Sanders lot the old Milton Heidi property About $11,000 we have in that. 202 3rd Avenue Northeast, about $10,000. 25 6th Street Southwest, about $23,000. And then 321 5th Street Southwest, about $5,000. So quite a variance just depends on what we did and how much asbestos it had and how much that cost to abate and things like that.

Does this include the expense for the labor from the fire department or anything like that? Let's say 321. That's a bare lot. What would a bare lot be assessed at?

A few thousand, sometimes five. Depends on the size of it. That one, that particular lot, is pretty small. Yeah, I could have looked up the assessed value on each of these, too. I can get that. It's easy to find out.

So do all of these properties, Ron, do they have utility hookups at the curb if somebody wanted to develop a house on that property?

Utilities?

Do they all have utilities available to them at the curb?

Yeah, I mean, there's water and sewer nearby. I don't know about the service line, if that would need to be replaced. It just depends on... the situation like let's say if someone acquired it and put up a small house depends on how the house would be situated and whether they would use an old existing service line or run a new one but yeah the mains are are near okay so that'd be a good advertising thing for these lots if somebody was out of town or something and was interested yeah anyone else

Looks like, you know, we get rid of these properties or take care of or take possession of these properties and we take the houses down and people think it just happens, you know, and there's a lot of money tied up in this stuff and so hopefully in our blight reduction we can have less of these going forward and get people to help fix up their properties and And we don't have to tear them down. Anything else on this property or this subject this evening?

So when you advertise these, Ron, I know the intention is to get them off the city rolls and also hopefully have them developed. As part of that advertisement, instead of just asking for a bid, is it possible to ask for a request for a proposal plan on what they're going to do with the property so that when we review their bids we can see Do they plan to put a structure on that? Are they just going to leave it vacant? Are they just going to hold on to it for a few years? Can we ask for that?

We can. We can ask for that. We could set a reserve minimum bid. If all the bids are below that minimum, then we reject them all. We also have the reserve to reserve the right to reject any and all bids. There's a wide array of things we can do. When we start looking for a request for a proposal from bidders for development, then now you're getting into an area where what do we do if they don't do what they told us they were going to do? what type of clawback do you want? And then if we do now, we need to have that in writing and that's a development agreement.

And so visionary clause we need to put in there.

Yeah. And so that's a written, uh, agreement that will, you know, if you want to do these on properties or on certain ones, we would have to have an attorney draw them up. Um, But, I mean, we certainly can do that. Okay. And you can do it on one. You can do it on all four. It's just what the council wants to determine.

Can we put these on Zillow or, like, for sale by owner?

I'm not real familiar with how Zillow works, what their rules are. There's a few home sales pages. Yeah. Could look into that.

Isn't Zillow a bidding process, though?

I don't think so.

It was when I was on it.

No, it's just a listing site.

It's a what?

It's a listing site.

Yeah, but you have to bid on it. No. You have to bid on the property to purchase it.

If it's in foreclosure, it's your doom. Okay.

I mean, if you can find a listing, then you would go to the realtor, correct, to purchase the property rather than do it through a little zillow. That just helps you locate it, I think.

Okay. When the house in my area was up, they were accepting bids. Put in a bid for 35 and got it. you had to put in a bid. I put in for 25 and I was too low, so I put in 35 and got it. So it's a bidding process on the level.

That might have been specific property, though.

Right, so there's a lot of stuff that needs to happen with this stuff. I think we've mentioned that we don't want to become a real estate company. Right. And also, I don't want to be a Zillow expert either, but we should.

And I agree there. That's my concern, that if you put it on Zillow and it's a bid process, you lose control of that bid.

Right. That's a good point.

Thank you. That's where I was going.

maybe between now and the next workshop I can look at assessed values and give it some more thought maybe drive by these again these addresses and and come with your view on how we should dispose of it, whether we should do sealed bids and just take the highest bid we get, period, or if we should do sealed bids and have a reserve minimum of $3,000 or $5,000 or $10,000. So I would like to have that input.

Well, my input is I think we should have a reserve amount, and I also think we should be able to refuse bids.

Okay. We should have a reserve amount, but do you want the same reserve amount on all four of these lots, or do you think that some of them deserve a higher one?

Some of them, I think, are higher than others, definitely.

Okay.

One other thing, Ron. I know that there's tax abatements and things for somebody that develops the property. Do we offer any type of abatements just to purchase that property to get it off of our rolls? Is there anything like that in the...

The incentive for someone to purchase it is the low price we're selling it for.

That's just the low price. But, I mean, there's nothing.

Well, we have tax abatement program for construction that would increase the valuation. So on that increased taxable valuation, they could apply for tax abatement. which I would remind the council that I mentioned this the last meeting that cities across the state are now some are eliminating that program because of property tax reform because if the state is selling us we we are charging too much in property taxes and so and then on the other hand we're giving abatements you know no taxes on new construction so If the state's going to cut us, then we're going to cut programs that have a financial incentive. So I'm just saying some cities are considering cutting those programs. But yeah, we do have the tax abatement program for new construction or development. Yes.

All right. Anybody else? All right. Thank you guys for your input on this. I think we'll move forward on this. Ron's got some homework for us. And get back to us. And we will keep moving forward on this. Yeah. I think it's an important piece that we need to take care of as well. All right. With that, I don't have anything else. So we will adjourn this workshop. Thank you.