City Council - Special Meeting

I pledge allegiance 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. Thank you, Teresa. Please take the roll.

Okay, Mayor Jones. Here. Keel. Here. Bowen. Here. Horacek. Here. Madsen. Here. Schilling. Here. And Carlson. I am not heard. Don't wait.

I'm assuming he'll meet. All right, we need to approve the agenda, and the agenda really for this special meeting is to discuss Kelly Avenue, so I'd ask for a motion to approve that as the agenda. I'll make a motion to approve the agenda as set forth.

Second.

Any discussion? Hearing none, we'll vote. Mattson?

Yes.

Mullin? Yes. Teal? Yes. Rochette? Yes. Shelly?

Yes.

All right, I don't know that we need public comment. I think everybody knows why we're here. So we'll move down to the discussion, input, comments. I want this to be very, Discussional bowl? What was that for a made art word? I looked that up before I came. See if I could even say it. Oh, Scott's here. Now we can go. Now we can go. You waited until we got done with the pledge and then you go. That's right. All right, so let's kind of just quick recap. We met with you guys a couple times, I think. We've had meetings off and on over the last short time. Gave you some options, decided to take a run at the one-way and see what you guys thought. And that's what leads us here tonight. We wanted to get you guys' input, see what you thought, see how you felt it went. talk about the street project in general. We asked our engineers from ISG to come and bring the same information we've looked at before so we can refresh everybody on, hey, this is what, you know, this is some options that we decided to move this thing forward or what we're going to do. It's no secret. I've said it in an open meeting. We're in a pretty good spot right now. We got a couple loans on our long-term debt that will be paid off in 27. We're at a spot where if we had to say, let's go get the money and move this project, we're probably at a pretty good spot. We know there's going to be some assessment for you guys. We want to talk about all that and all those options. We know there's going to be a little more, I'll call it, detail work before we would get to that point. I mean, we're going to have to get to a final number. This is what's going to, you know. So we're probably not tonight going to say, hey, this is the done deal. But we wanted you guys to have the chance to give us your two cents worth. This is what we think. You guys are on the right track, not on the right track. What do you want us to do? So there you go. How's that? Now I'm going to stop talking. Any thoughts? Anybody want to kick her off?

Yeah, there's no reason. The last guy here might as well get up there and do it. Scott Nelson, 109 North Kelly Avenue. He takes care of the books. The assessment process, you know, I'm familiar with that, obviously. What is the protocol for the assessment or reassessment? Because right now we're still at $250 for the linear form, right? Okay.

So if they decide to do a project and decide to assess it, basically we gotta pass a resolution of necessity, say we're gonna do this project, portion of it's gonna be assessed at the 250 linear foot, if that's what the council agrees to. Basically notice gets sent out to the property owners, It has to go to a formal council meeting for the council to pass this. If it passes, we move forward with the project. Once the project gets completed, then basically you get notice that we've done the project. We'll pass another resolution saying this is the final assessment, the 250 and whatnot. You get one year from when we complete the project to pay it. to basically to the following October 1st to pay it either in full or in part and then whatever portion doesn't get paid you get it it'll go on to the county on a payment plan a 10-year payment plan through the county so that's kind of the assessment process but when we complete the project you get like I said almost a year because we'll probably complete it mid-summer you get to the following October to pay, like I said, you can either pay in full or partial or none. Whatever's unpaid will go to the county on a 10-year payment plan.

Just to clarify, Teresa, like that $250 per linear foot, that's an ordinance. Is that our street? It's in the resolution, yes. That's where we're at right now. So that's not something we set up special for this project? No, no. So the last project that we assessed, we assessed at $250 per linear foot. Right. So that's kind of what it is.

and the council reviews that you know each year then so i mean it's a third every year they review and either keep it the same or decide to change it you know at their will but right now that that i just wanted to like be clear it's not something we're making up just for the project yeah it is and what it's oh yeah yes and then a year ago the um

Other piece of that is like that won't come anywhere near close to covering costs, it never does.

So if we were to do in this project, and you know it depends on what you all do But it's you know estimated around two million dollars total assessments are only going to be five hundred thousand so City's picking up that complete difference Hold on one second.

I got I want to clarify resolution of necessity What is the percentage that we have to have that?

Isn't there a certain?

60%. Right. 60% of the total land measurement has to say, yes, we're good with this going forward. I wanted you guys to know that, too. So when we say there's several steps in this, that's really one of the first final steps, if you want to call it that. Because if you guys all said, heck no, we don't want to do this, you can actually – they could – Then it's up to us to make the decision. Do we move forward without their approval and do as they did like with the pipeline guys? Anyway, just so you know.

You know, one thing I want to ask the council in regards to your request to consider, and I know you do it all the time, is that, you know, comparing to other neighborhoods, is that fair? No. Comparing it to other Communities, is that fair? Probably not. We're talking about a very short stretch of road. We realize that. I think everybody can say that. What do you mean by fair? Just reaching out to T, reaching out to Frank, reaching out to Humble. About the assessments? About the assessments that they currently have in place. Gosh, my understanding, Humboldt ended, you know, they have, right now they're pretty close to zero, but I don't know that for sure.

Anyway, all I'm asking you- Just put all their streets in that town. I know that. You know, we're talking reconstruction.

and so on and so forth. But you know, I guess, I personally, I'm not speaking for everybody else behind me, is that, you know, we kind of tried to take that into consideration a little bit, you know, and because we've kind of, the Hartford has been earmarked as kind of an expansive place to live sometimes, not always, I don't agree with that, but, because I sat right there for a long time. And, but that's really, I guess my two cents worth, probably something else will come to mind later, and I'll turn the phone over to someone else.

Thank you. So follow up to that. On the county assessment, you probably can't provide an answer to this, Teresa, but what's their interest rate or finance rate for the 10-year plan?

On the 10-year plan, it's actually 10% interest. So it's not cheap to go to the county. I know people in the past have actually... to take out bank loans to pay just because it's cheaper interest than the county.

And I expected that answer, that's why I asked it.

Yep, it's a 10 year, 10% interest.

Good question. Can the city override that or is that a codified type law?

That's the most you can do. That's what we've kind of followed suit. If you want to stay consistent. I mean, you could adjust that.

It is adjustable. We can adjust that. Okay. Anything else? Anybody else want to throw anything else in? Anything goes? Well, not really. Street project stuff, anything goes.

Good evening, Lori Montes, 105 South Kelly Avenue. And so I am wondering, the one way I thought went okay from my perspective, I thought traffic flow was fine, didn't seem like a whole lot of traffic on that road. My one question would be if it would be possible to have a consideration of like paving Railroad Street, that one we go, right? Because you have to turn to go into Sioux Falls and then it's down that gravel road. Gravel road. Which isn't my favorite for my driving. I hear you. But just the thought that I had with that whole thing.

We have talked about railroad, I think, probably since I've sat here for 10 years. This is strictly my opinion. The engineers maybe can either back me up or not. That road gets so much truck traffic, it would have to probably be done as a arterial concrete road. I mean, which is, I don't think we can just go in there, as you say, I don't think we can just go in there and throw down a coat of asphalt. I don't think it's gonna, it wouldn't last. So that, I think that's probably been the reason that it's held it up whenever we've discussed it in the past, because it's gonna be really expensive. So.

And the majority property owner along there is the city. Yeah. The majority property owner along there is the city, right, if you think about it that way as well. Yeah.

But it is the farmer route.

It is. It is the, yes. Yeah. It is the truck.

A designated truck.

Truck route, designated truck route to town. Yes, it is.

Yeah.

But that's a very good point. Actually, I think we discussed that when we were putting the one way together because we assumed somebody was going to say, well, geez, now we've got to drive out and you're putting us onto a gravel road. Yeah. I get it.

Okay.

I get it. Great point. I don't know if I can fix that, but great point. Great point. Anything else?

I'm just going to stand real quick. Yeah. I don't know about anybody else, but I mean, I'm going to assume, and maybe I missed something, that, you know, the white lines were kind of the dividing lines, center line, right line, right side, left side. The yellow line is the curve together. Is that correct?

Yep. You got your pictures on it together? That would be the concrete apron for the curb and gutter. That's what I thought.

Okay. Did I miss something there? Did you know that? I just assumed that. I just thought to Craig about it. Okay. Yeah. I didn't know that. Okay. In the 31 feet, we're at 31 feet right now. Right now it's at roughly 33, right?

30.

The current road? The current road is where I'm at at.

Anywhere from 36 to 38.

36 to 38. Okay. Okay. The standard is 33. The standard is actually 37 in all new developed classes. Okay. Is there a prerequisite when we're talking about a one-way how and why you can go down to 31? Even though we appreciate the fact that you're going to 31 or the fact that encroachment is obviously one of the biggest issues that we have here.

31 feet was determined, or chosen based on typical driving lanes and parking lanes, understanding that parallel parking, call it a long curve and gutter, maybe even a little difficult, whereas a little bit on the property, wanted to provide a little space to maneuver, and then additionally in discussions with Craig, In thinking wintertime, plowing snow, if there are cars parked on the road, I'm sure that we'll be able to get plows past there without damage to vehicles, if possible, and going with that 31 plus little extra feet right there.

That'd be tricky, actually, if you have one exactly on the opposite side of the street. Yeah. It's going to be tight. OK. It would be better if it wasn't.

Right now, from yellow to yellow, we park two trailers on each side. FedEx and the UPS trucks and the prime trucks putting you to get through there, they had to wait until they came off and put the trailer down. They did it for a reason.

To see if it would be easy to get the panels through there. Sure. Okay. So you had a trailer parked on each side. FedEx trucks couldn't get down the... So that would lead you to believe that it's either got to be wider. It has to be wider. It has to be wider.

You must have illegal trailers because they're like eight and a half feet wide legally.

They couldn't get through it. Because one of them that was actually sitting there when we pulled out the other trailer from what I have for work, the other one was a shamrock truck that was sitting there fertilizing the neighbor's yard. And he was actually over on the yellow line a little bit. It's not as funny as what you think it is until you start driving down it and you have to carry the gutter and do everything on it. That's what I'm saying is you're going to have to go to a half-curb if you ever went to a one-way street, which I think you did on that street. You say half-curb like a rollover curb? Yeah. Okay. There's a lot of people that park there and you put football games that come over and everything on it like that. So they're going to have to park over there and get into the parking lot over at the high school. Okay. So you don't like the one-way?

I personally don't. That's good. Yeah. That's why I asked.

No, I mean, I think personally I'm very interested. Yeah. Do you like the one-way? Do you think something...

There's not enough traffic on that road for a one-way street. And if you live at the far end, you have to run all the way around the block unless you want to break the law and go 100 feet to the end of the road. Put a survey on there and see how much traffic actually travels on that road other than the people that live there. It's not very much. Other than January days when they shut the road down and forced everyone down that street. That's the only time. You can't come when there's not enough traffic or you can't wait two seconds to get by another vehicle. I just did it in Brandon where the road is smaller than that and you can park on both sides of the road. And it's a two-way street because it's a residential street.

And I think that's what we're interested in hearing. I mean, you guys live there. What do you want to deal with? Do you want to go wider and have more room to maneuver?

I think it's fine how you've got it safe right now and still have the two-way street and you can park on both sides of the road. You can drive down it right now. There's one house that has two cars on both sides of the street. Otherwise, there's not very many. I've driven that for the last six years, and that's how it's always been.

There was a comment before just to help me get clarity. A 31-foot section roadway in other municipalities can be designed for other communities. I have designed them as two-way streets with parking on each side. But there was also a comment earlier tonight where with trailers parked on each side that there wasn't room. for someone to get down the middle. So I'm sensing just a little discrepancy here that I would ask for maybe some help with me from what you guys are seeing there.

Like you said, I drive it home every day. There's literally the daycare box. They're the only people that ever have two vehicles on the sides of the streets. Everywhere else, when people pull their vehicles in the street, it's mainly because they're working in the driveway. And then they remove them. Not very often.

So the daycare house would be my neighbor, and they actually have two kids home from college. Yes, the Mustang and the other vehicle. They're the only ones that are always sitting on the side of the street. Right, there's two kids home from college, otherwise they wouldn't walk there either. But they have been there also. Literally, that's the only vehicles I've ever seen that sit on the side of the road.

So standard two-way street is 37. So that, is that pretty universal? Next to the one-way, is there anybody who liked the one-way? Could we do a show of hands who liked the one-way? We'll do like instead of opposed and we're indifferent.

Like.

Like.

Who liked?

If you like the one way.

Let's see it. Nobody's going to like.

Well, then we have to think about the end product here.

Okay. Disliked. Disliked.

Disliked the one way. Okay.

Disliked. We got four and four. And indifferent.

I could go either way. Yeah.

That's indifferent.

It was a little bit more of a pain for me because when I left, I mean, I lived literally on the north side of the road.

So, I mean, I had to drive all the way around. Yeah. I mean, I accommodated just because the first couple of times, you know, I kind of had to park there and didn't update it.

I was here to play drinks and to worry about a tree, a little tree in the U.S. area.

yeah oh yeah we'll give you a replacement trees i actually would park my truck out towards the street as close as i could look up at the park and if the sheriff wasn't there i'd go that way yeah we told him to watch that he was sitting there one morning and i went around otherwise before 6am and i'm just going yeah

Can I ask a question? Go ahead. Can we do the same thing?

How many of you want something to be done?

It has to be done.

I don't want to see a raise of hands though, just like, do you want something? It has to be done, yes. Okay, who thinks that something has to be done? Needs to be done.

Okay, good.

I was just wondering, like, where are we at here?

So, Jim Worley, 103 North Kelly, I'm going to stand at the podium. So, the bottom line would be the infrastructure is 50 years old.

Yeah.

All right? Craig and the city crew has to replace that infrastructure. We're just gonna continue nickel and diming repair, costly repairs if we don't fix it, right? So we have to fix the infrastructure. As long as we're tearing it up, let's get this drainage issue fixed. I think it has to happen the sooner the better. Now, that's my opinion, not all of the residents on Kelly agree with that, but that's my opinion. Okay? My second comment would be city council's been working with us because accroachment is a big issue, right? So we are undersized as a residential street to normal city standards now, and we don't want you in our front yard, so to speak. So accroachment is a big issue. And to minimize that, you're putting one light in there to try and minimize that as much as possible. Appreciate that. I still say those are my two top objectives. Whether it's a one-way or a two-way, I don't have a strong opinion either way. I'm pretty indifferent.

Just minimize encroachment.

Correct. Right. Even where the stakes are now, you've got some significant obstacles in your path for your sidewalk.

Right.

For both sides. Yes, both sides. Right.

Both sides, yes. What's the game plan engineering on, you know, I mean, I know you want to go on the sidewalk on both sides. I appreciate that. I think we appreciate that. But, you know, I mean, obviously that's kind of a slippery slope, you know, where we do boulevard or curb to gutter, so on and so forth. That's kind of a tough call. Where do you guys end with that?

Because we do have short front yards. They're small front yards. I think that's how the modified section is staying within the right-of-way. Sidewalk would be placed one foot inside of the right-of-way on each side, and that would essentially set your boundaries, and then you'd build it. So yes, there are those tight boundaries, but that's the intent of looking at some of this revised design and presenting these options to you guys.

Because if we go one foot within the right-of-way, Justin, where's that?

Do you guys have pictures of that one-way with the sidewalk of what that would look like?

That's going to put it right again back in their front yard, so to speak. Right?

Yeah.

Thanks, Frederick. Yeah, you can't imagine what that looks like.

Is that a four-foot long one there? Is that a four-foot long one? Correct.

How far back are you going to go? Are you going to take care of the driveway? How far are you going to go for the garage door? How far are you going to go up to redo? How far are you going to go up or down? Are you going to come all the way up to our house and refill all that back?

Are we going to have to do that? So in a general sense, and I'll say general because, you know, a 30%, 60% final design hasn't been completed yet. Generally, you would stay within the right way and work your way inwards. There's going to be times that projects where some of that needs to go outside of it, and that's where we work with you guys as property owners. Also as part of these projects, which has been a standard again generally Doing those driveways after right-of-way line and then working it now if there's a joint line, that's one foot off You don't call it on your property We're going to go to that joint line because if we do just saw that concrete they put one foot section there That's going to crack and bust Just due to that poor joint system that we got there so there's going to be some of those generalities that come with it and Also with these projects, we always try to give the opportunity for those homeowners. If the rest of your driveway, you want to replace it on your own, that you can work with the contractor on site there too. You can have that done at the same time as you got your contract. That's what I was wondering. It's a very good scalability.

Yeah.

So generally, we would just have the contractor work with you, set up a contract, and get that out. So if they're there, they're on site, it's going to be a lot easier than that.

So then right there, right under that 100 North Gale, right there on the curb, comes down there and we've got a path. The way the water runs now, we have to put in that extra fuel underneath our driveway, culvert, put it there so it'll run down the street. But then the rest of it, it doesn't run down there, it runs down that path, between the two houses on that path, and then it runs to the east.

school for the kids.

That's on the south side of your mom's house? Yes. It runs to the east there between. East and west. Right, that east and west. It runs to the elementary school in the middle of that.

And then that turns south towards the bus barn.

So city engineers, elevation wise, what do you drop in that street?

Two and a half feet, most of it.

I don't think you can get away with dropping it two and a half feet throughout the whole thing.

Well, you have to to make some of the drivers work. You're going to have to. Because on your plan, it says you'll catch 90-some percent of the water. Well, my driveway is two feet below the, so how are you going to do that then? And then the neighbor's is two feet above the road, so.

Yeah. Yeah, that's kind of where my question was going. At the north end where Scott's at, when you transition off the second, and significant drop, so I don't know what your angle is. I guess that would be your subgrade, I should say. Yeah, with your subgrade.

Yeah. But your pavement ground will interrupt a little bit, especially if you look at all of that. section versus the curb and gutter section. You can look at how back the curb is going to stay intact with your center line. Now that's assuming all drainage is perfect in there, which we know is. So we're going to start with the drainage and that's really going to dictate the design of that center line and what's being held. It's going to have to do a lot of this. You know, a lot of different

So just so I'm, this is probably going to sound like really kind of a goofy statement. We're not going to be standard anyway, right? I mean, we're not going to be standard anyway. So what we really are saying is, to meet the parameters. We don't want to be any more invasive than we have to in their yard. We want to have a street that they could possibly do two-way. We want to have sidewalks. We're not going to be the standard anyway. So basically what we're saying is we're designing a one-off, right?

I got a picture of one right here. If I could show it to that guy. They would understand probably because it's a drawing.

It could probably be replicated on Part T in the future.

This is the road we just did in Brandon, South Dakota. And it's a two-way street. You park on both sides of the road. Yeah, that's... What street is that? Is there a sidewalk there? It's called Needles Avenue.

Needles, yeah. Is there sidewalks on both sides? Yep.

It's only a two-foot boulevard, so that's the minimum they could go.

Two-foot boulevard and then a four-foot sidewalk? Five-foot. Five-foot sidewalk.

Yep. Because otherwise, if it's next to the curb, it has to be six foot sidewalk and six inches thick. But that's also, it's a narrow road. Right, right, right. It's not. Keohannes Avenue and Two Falls.

Right.

You know?

Yeah. And that's Needles. Is that over on the east side?

It's right behind Pizza Ranch and the Brandon Steakhouse.

Oh, right behind. Okay, right in there in the middle of town.

I'm on there right now. I don't see sidewalks on there. There's some weird stuff. That's an old picture. It's brand new. Oh, it's brand new.

Yeah, it's just right there right now. June of 24 is the picture on Google Maps. So...

That's the rule itself. There's a 50-foot right-of-way that shows you, obviously, the sidewalks. And that's getting worked on right now? Yep. It's going to be paved on Thursday if I'm done.

I would say what I saw real quick there, too, is generally the same principle that we're taking here, understanding where that right-of-way is.

And I talked to them about the traffic, and they said, The way we can do it is because it's residential. If you test how many cars go up and down the street, there's not enough to make it a one-way street. Justify it. Yeah. Right.

How wide is that? What's that? How wide is that?

The street itself from, so 5, 5, and 28. So 38 feet from the edge of the curb to the edge of the curb.

I mean, in a sense, that's where you guys are at, right? Pretty close. You're on that one-and-a-half-foot, four- or five-foot sidewalk. Right. Now, what's the five-foot one?

Yeah, so, well, City of Harper design standards say five foot. And so a wheelchair can turn around. Well, the AEA requirement, it's every 200 foot, you need a five foot turning space on there. What I've seen a lot of communities just go with the five foot all the way through, which I think is better.

We changed ours quite a few years ago.

So then, to Ryan's point, the real question is do we need that four-foot greenery?

You can shrink that down if you want to. Again, it goes to the point, this is one of my opinions, so take it with a grain of salt. And that was, you know, some of my hesitation. We talked about having the sidewalk in the back occur. If we do that, I just want to make sure that everybody's aware that, you know,

I plow half of my grass just so they can push it the next time when it goes in the grass and not in my driveway.

Something to keep in mind with the boulevard is it's a little bit of a buffer, right? If you've got little kids riding bikes, they get off the sidewalk, they get in the grass, kind of slows them down. First it's just rolling off the curb onto the street channel.

You know the good thing about the Boulevard, and I said this to Michelle and a couple of folks in Maine, you know, it's a Monday morning and Jim's already gone to work like everybody else has. He's the first one to work every time. I hear him go by. But anyway, you know, and I travel so frequently. Bottom line is, we've got that sidewalk there, and we're too close to that curb, you know, with the sidewalk, odds are my sidewalk's not going to be able to get plowed until I get back home, which could be two days from now. And if it's one of those nasty March days where it gets that good snow, sloppy snow, and then freezes, I'm going to have to call my neighbor Lee to get a bobcat out so I can get the ice chips off the sidewalk so I'm not breaking city ordinance. So, you know, I know that's a slippery slope there.

It's a problem everybody has. Yeah, yeah. You're not alone.

I mean, we don't right now.

It won't be a problem when you're retired, hey?

Yeah. You know, you dynamite, you get it off.

You just do the best you can. City of Sioux Falls just uses a broom, so all you got to do is make it look like you tried. Okay? That's all you got to do, but...

So again, in general terms, you guys are of the, I feel the consensus is you feel we need to do something.

Yes.

We know we need to do the sewer and the water, it's gotta be done. I mean, that's a given. It's crazy to do that. And not do the- And not do the stream. And not do something and do it right. And we'd rather do it right if we can. As I said, I think we're probably at a point right now where this is a little easier for us to have this discussion from a paying for it standpoint.

Yeah, it allows the residents to plan for it. capital outlay, so to speak, for themselves. Right, right. So if Waterline breaks in January, then you're at the mercy of the excavator.

Right, $12,000. That's how much it's going to cost you.

Yeah.

And I have a pipe at my house right now because I fixed my own. It's terrible. You could just go like that, yeah.

So when we do our water, is that something that they have the option to do on your own too? So if you need yours replaced still and you haven't just done it, that's also something when that water's going in, they could change the service line.

Right up to the house, right? Right up to that house. Service line? Service line, yep.

That would also be an option if that's maintenance that people need. maybe look at that i i don't find our new place twice okay oh boy because when the city came over and followed them back in and then they busted again that's all brittle because i tightened the fittings up thought i was done and i over tightened it and it snapped the line right off again i had to read the whole thing yeah i mean it's a nice neighborhood and i think you know that road is so old when i look at the pictures i mean i think you're just visually your neighborhood is going to look beautiful

And there's another problem with the one-way is all these people come to town for jamboree days and they're going to come down that street and go, oh shit, this is a one-way street. And they're all going to be coming their own way because they all go around that way, come up this way, and vice versa. From the high school, from railroad. Because that's the fastest way to get to the park.

I don't think any of us are married to it.

I would say I think the feedback to try it came from the community, from us. So we're supportive of the fact that you did say the idea.

I think we had to figure out, yeah. And the trailer deal, we did talk about some. Even when we went to the one way, we talked about the trailer deal some, but not... What if there's two parked right across one of the shamrock properties? You know who we can take care of on that.

Well, no, that's just temporary.

What's the ordinance, Laurie? You're not supposed to be parking in the same spot for three days, right?

Yeah, it's something like that. Right? Yeah. That's what they say.

That's what it says. Get the truck out.

Well, does that give us enough information to kind of, because our next step would be, if we're going to do that, then we really need to dial a number in, correct? That's going to be our first step.

Well, we need to figure out what we want to do.

Yes, what I'm going to do, and then we're going to dial a number in. So if we say we're going to go to 32 feet, whatever, pick a number. Since we're not going to be standard anyway, what do we want to live with?

right right now you're at 39 right yeah i'm just talking street width i'm just trying to the way it's marked concrete sidewalk yeah their stakes are at the back of the sidewalk that's not always 49. and that's where the stakes are right now is the back of the sidewalk yep okay how is that how is that so yeah i didn't know that i was expecting worse Okay. Yeah, it's pretty good actually.

Don't get me wrong, you've got some obstacles and some trees and some fire hydrants and all that, but I was expecting it to be worse than it is.

Right.

Essentially, how much of a dragway do you lose then to park it? None. Well, depending on where your sidewalk is. Wherever that stake is. I'm going to lose about four feet.

Do we require that somebody on the street circulate a petition to get the 60%? Well, that was my next argument. Do we do that first before we continue to wrestle with the design and all of that? I think that's an excellent point.

You've got a 40% population here, and I don't want this to be a consensus for the entire community.

Right.

I think... most all street projects will start with a petition. You want way in from everybody.

I think we've taken it to a point where now the folks on that street need to really bring it to us. That's my opinion.

That's how most of the streets got approved within the city is by petition. Otherwise we do it.

If we drag it to that point, then we're going to essentially force you to do it, right? So my preference would be that a couple of you have circulated a petition, you get 60% of the property owners, then we can figure out how to finish this thing out.

So that would be the step before figuring out the design of it? Yeah, I think we have some.

I mean, we don't have the details, but I think we can outline kind of what was the case.

I think we're at 85%. I really think that's what we were intending on trying to find.

We wanted to see what you guys were thinking, really.

Because I hope you think that we weren't sitting up here thinking we're going to jam this. We want you guys to, you know, because at some point, guess what, we're going to send you a bill. Scott's going to get a big bill. The rest of you are normal.

Normal. Just send ours to him.

Scott, did you get a bill when they improved 2nd Street? Yeah.

Yeah, of course.

Did you get a bill when they did the improvements on 2nd? Yeah.

It was under a grant at that point. It was $50 for a linear foot.

$50. And maybe was the ordinance written then that you still got a 25-foot credit?

Yeah, and he'll get a break. Yeah, you're on the corner. Any corner of the lots will get a break. Yeah. Because we know they've got two streets.

That's why everybody else can send theirs to you. You get a break.

Yes. Does that affect like our property taxes at all, like in the long run? Kind of like the bulldog on the sidewalk, would that like up the property value per se?

Would it up the property value? I would, having the street to the west of me be improved since I purchased my home, I think it changed the property value by about $10,000. So, but a minimal amount of actual, you know, tax.

Gotcha. I just want to make sure that we're doing the right job and how we're paying it. You know, it's not three grand a year for property tax. Oh, no, no. Right.

No, that's a great question. But, again, if you look at everything, so you put a new driveway, you know, if you do all the stuff that you could possibly do with this, yeah, is it going to increase your value? Absolutely. So...

Then also, I was just doing some quick research. Scott, 20 year points. Because right now, is it $2 a linear foot, or is it $2.50? $2.50 a linear foot? $2.50. $2.50 a linear foot, okay.

You haven't paid for a school.

Hey, you can go back to the previous city council meeting minutes and see my opinions on that. Yeah, but... but we've been dragging our feet about changing the price of that too you know that's a something we annually review and we've kept it i know for sure the last couple years we've kept it last two years the same i would like to see that because i know i was looking through my emails i know in the past that we had all the surrounding communities of what they charge

That's the street assessment. Are you talking the street maintenance fee or are you just talking the assessment?

Our street maintenance fee that we throw on. I might be talking of the street maintenance fee. That's the difference. And that's something completely separate from what an assessment would be. Okay. I just wanted to be able to comment on his point that it was unfair. It may or may not be.

Why did you say it was really unfair?

Well, you use those exact words.

I asked you what you meant by saying it was unfair.

To be fair.

Is there a chance that at your last budget meeting you guys approved a, I can't remember the word exactly, sidewalk subsidy fund going into 2027, if my understanding correctly? Yes. Is there a chance that that fund could be implemented towards this project?

I'm going to say maybe. That gets me a little breathing room. Our committee is going to meet again Monday, right? Monday. I think we're going to look more not at new sidewalks, but at repairing the ones that are really shot. So I think this first bunch of money is going to go toward figuring out how we can get the sidewalks fixed that are just terrible.

I'll throw my opinion in on that. we're essentially subsidizing the cost of everything on that street, including the sidewalks. So in my opinion, yes, just not. Exclusively out of that budget. Right.

Okay, so I have a question. Yes. So since it's not just a drainage problem anymore and you're going to redo all the infrastructure, would you guys look for a grant to help pay for it? Because now you're not just doing drainage problems you're improving everyone's living.

Correct.

Which, that's how you get a grant.

We always look for grants.

We're always on the hunt for grants. I'm just saying, it went from just a drainage problem to now we're going to tear everything up.

So we don't even really, so the answer to that is yes. We look for grants, but we're at such an early stage in this. Correct. Yeah, so I would say if we were to approve this project, the engineers over there, the gentlemen over there, are looking for grants.

I would say we're taking one step to just, with some of the optimism through the state, you know, arm and grant, some of that stuff, that was really popular. We're putting a... an application together to get it on the state water plan, which is through the state. It's where some of the grants and funding comes from. So just being proactive in that matter. That line's October 1st. Understanding we'd like to have everything figured out by then. We just want to set ourselves up. That way, if everything needs to be repaired, if there are some grants available, then we can capture those while everything else plays out. Yes. If there were grants that were applied, yes. That would be part of the funding package if you look at the overall deal.

What's your name, sir? My name is Justin. All right, Justin. So I'm going to put you on the spot. So you're an engineer. You can do this for a living. You're a professional. This is your neighborhood. How do you want to lay it out? That is putting me on the spot.

That's a fantastic question. Everyone else's house gets tore out, right? No, I like neighbors. I like community. From my perspective, I echo your statement on infrastructure first, especially with this project. So sanitary, water, storm sewer would be the top three things, right? and not lose sight of what that impact is on everyone else, right? Furthermore, going further, me personally, that 31-foot back-to-back section, that is a good pavement section in my opinion. I like that 4-foot boulevard. That adds the ability to increase within the boulevard if you want to, understanding that some large streets may be taken out as part of this project. That gives us the space to put some of that in there. We were able to point that out to six foot. That would be better in my opinion. Pushes the sidewalk off the street as well for some of the snow removal stuff. It's always my concern that you have it right on the back. I'm not a big advocate of that. You know, I don't like the snow. I don't like the snow on the driveway. So that's creating some of that separation. Obviously, with this project, the challenges with large streets getting taken down, potentially to get some of these improvements, it is in the right of way. That is one of those tough things, and that's going to take some of that conversation back and forth. It was me, personally, taking it down to get the benefits here. It would be a short term. short-term pain for that long-term gain. My perspective, right, I'd go out there and get another tree in the front yard. I do like the comments that you brought up, though, something to keep in mind. And I would have to go out there and sit there a little bit and look, but understanding that it will feel like it was a little bit of your driveway. I think that's a point that everybody should be aware of and understand where those stakes kind of are. Because that's something I don't want you guys to be surprised about if you go forward with a project like this with sidewalk. There's a space called from that front of the sidewalk to that curb back of the gutter. It's nine foot right now. That's going to feel like lost driveway space because you're generally going to want to park in front of that. So if you've got a truck and you've got a boat, that's going to be something to consider. Especially with the smaller front yards in this neighborhood, it may feel just a little bit tighter. But at the end of the day, I still am a believer of this section, sidewalks on both sides. I know sometimes we go back and forth and say, well, sidewalks should just be on one side. There's not much traffic there. I can almost guarantee that you'll see pretty good traffic on both sides of the sidewalks on either side of the street.

The neighborhood, as I view it, is turning. So you asked me this 10 years ago. I said all the young kids were grown up and gone. And now we've had a turn home for those young kids. For the safety of the mayor's initiative, I don't have a problem with that. A little long-winded answer. No, I put you on the spot. I appreciate your courage in answering the best. So the discussion today was a little bit about does it stay one way or can it go two? What are your thoughts on that? My thoughts, they can, right?

I believe if parked correctly, there's enough room to get some trucks through there, even when trailers park on the other side of the roadway. We have 31 foot back to back. Even if we look at 10, 10, and 10, you're not going to get two cars through the center i'm not going to promise that but you will be able to maintain that access through there a lot of these yeah yeah a lot of these standard street sections which i said 31 foot is a standard section in other municipalities other communities elsewhere biggest thing from the engineering side that i look at is making sure that we can maintain emergency access So if I wouldn't be able to guarantee with two people parked on each side that we won't be able to get emergency access through there, I wouldn't have presented this as an option.

So I'm not saying it won't get tight, right? It will. Again, thank you for your input. I appreciate it.

I will share this with you guys. So I live on Patrick. This time of the year you wouldn't notice it. During the summer when all of our college kids are home, We have to pull over to the side. We can't have two cars meet on Patrick Avenue. We have to wait every time you meet a car because there's so dang many. All the college kids are home, and they're parked alongside the streets. So I hear you. When you talk about the trailers and stuff, all summer long it's that way on our street.

I've driven down Main Street, though, and one guy's Got to miss a car by 10 feet. I mean, come on.

Yeah, Main Street's a whole different deal here. Let's not even go down that. When we get our parking ramp built, then we'll be all right.

That narrow field should slow traffic down, too. That's a positive. Yes.

Yeah.

Okay, so earlier I heard you guys say something about we need to issue a petition for the community then.

For you guys. Circulate, yeah. property owners along the street, one or two or three, however many could circulate a petition, to get 60% of the property owners along the street to basically vote in favor of moving forward with the street assessment and improvements. Right?

And that's as it's marked today.

For me, that's the point that then pushes us to get the final design hammered out. Right. I feel like we've taken this thing to your point 85, 90% of the way there. Seems like we've got some positive feedback from the folks that showed up this evening. Yep. Now reinforce that with that petition that says, yeah, let's drag this thing across the finish line. Yeah. My opinion.

Yeah, I think, I don't know if anybody answered you. Clearly that's the intent, is the way it's marked today, correct? That's how it's marked today.

It will be finalized after the petition. That's right.

What I'm hearing, the final design would be two-way traffic, parking on both sides, boulevard. Two sides. Yeah. called the General Scope.

It's one of those things. If we move forward, you guys won't hear from us yet. It won't be the day when we show up with excavators to redo the road. This is what we're doing. So there will be a process.

We do that at night. You've been there before.

We do it at night.

We send the excavators in.

Well, I mean, it's a big investment in your neighborhood. I think that's a claim. It's painful claims, but it can be really positive.

People get very upset when they don't have a driveway for months.

Yeah.

I understand that because I do it for a living.

So is that? That good? So you guys can kind of, amongst yourselves, kind of hammer that out if two or three of you want to, and you come and talk to Teresa, right?

So I can put together a petition because basically you've got to list all the people and the legals and all that information. I can put together a petition. Just need to figure out if somebody wants to pick it up and circulate it. And basically it's going to be a petition you're asking people to sign to move forward with. A street project with street, curb and gutter, water sewer, sidewalks.

And they know that they would be committed to $250. Yeah, it'll lay out the assessment. That's the assessment price. It lays that out in there.

Yeah, if they have questions about exactly. And that you would submit to the city. It would be taken to the city council. And they would decide if we're going to move forward with. a project, and then they'll work with the engineers to hammer out the final design, like you said, of how wide it's going to be, where the sidewalk's going to be placed, and all those details. So once you get a final design, that's the assessment resolution. There's a lot of steps going to it, but the first step is for a petition, just to make sure the consensus of everyone on that street is.

I'm sorry, go ahead. You first.

I just had a question. So would it be possible to know how many linear feet we have?

Yeah, I think it'll... Oh, yeah, yeah. It says that right on the sheet.

It will say it, yeah.

It says that. She'll have that all broken out. I circulated the petition to get Vandermark approved.

Yep, yep, yep.

And that's all broken out by every property owner. You know, the biggest one was Great Life. You know, that was a big bite. Yeah, you'll know.

When you're signing, it'll tell you how many feet you have. And it'll explain the corner guys because they, on the two sides, they get a different... 25-foot deduct. Deduct because you're on the corner lot.

Would the addresses change? No.

No?

No, that's a postal thing.

Only if we want to mess with people.

Yeah, it's a nightmare because they're deliveries.

I think that would be, that's a postal. We don't. The post office dictates that, from my understanding. Are you in North and South, Kelly?

Right?

The path is North and South. North and South. So there's two 100s right next to each other. Oh, okay. All right. All right. So to get your package, you usually got to walk up to it.

We get more of these groceries all the time. Yep.

That really helps with the food bill. I try to get more of these groceries, but I must not get there at the right time. I must not be watching at the right time.

So I'll put together a petition. Give me this week to do that, and then, like I said, if you guys decide whoever wants to circulate a petition, come in next week and I should have it ready.

Can they have a couple pages, or does it all have to be one? Like two of them want to circulate?

Oh, it's not like an option one. It'll probably be more than one page just because there's a lot of problems. But multiple.

There could be multiple petitions, right? So not just one person has to go and get all the signatures.

They could break it up. Oh, that's right. We could do that. We could do that. Yeah, I could do more than one copy. That's a good idea. That's a good idea.

Let's pick it up in the storm.

I have to double check.

We did a... Like I said, this is my house here. And then right up here, like I said, over on this side is where Shamrock was parked. So I said, okay, I'm going to do a little experiment here while he's over there doing his shit over at the neighbor's. I'm going to pull my trailer and my pickup that I had to park and pull it up there to see what they would do with it right against the yellow line. Yep. and that's why i said it was tighter i i think you could have got through there but you could have got a car through there but a fedex truck that's a fedex truck because i didn't know this before when we seen it together last time here was that so how far down would the storm drains go obviously all the way down to the curve uh no but but spaced out

I don't know if they double-checked the analysis we did, but there's several sets up the street to capture flow as it makes its way down.

Right here is the path. Right here on the side, that's the path. And that's where the other water. And like I said, our yard is sunk over three feet. Because the water runs there. Has some. And then right there is where the path goes. And then where the rest of it goes through, it runs down to the east. And then it runs down. It's supposed to go all the way down into the backside, to the bus line. Yeah. Because then whatever runs down from the west down here, then that's what runs in front of the bus line.

She's impressed. You guys have those? Thank you. Thank you.

and then how far down on the other side? You're down by Ryan's and stuff out there.

It all depends on the flow. That's in a further design stage where they need to know the flow and the slope of the road before they can adjust where the boxes are going to be then. All right.

Everybody good?

Speaking of design, so with the petition, Would you have some form of hypothetical design maybe, even though it wouldn't be finalized? That's not what the petition. If you look at us, we can do that, and we're just sitting here with a piece of paper and line items.

Could we shrink this information to all four of them? Maybe what I would suggest, I have something written up here that I can give Teresa just to accompany the petition, which I call kind of like a project scope, because some of the things that I want everybody to be aware of. You know, we can generally put in there about 31 foot wide street, two five foot sidewalks, you know, within there. So I can scope up that, work with Teresa, that way it's part of that. Because to your point, Scott, I want to make sure that everybody's kind of aware of the conversations and what we had here, you know, to that 85-ish percent, right? instead of just looking on its head and saying, hey, we're going to do a 37-foot-wide street with sidewalk and back curve, right?

Does that include cross-sections by chance?

The final design?

Or profiles?

Yeah, the final design, well.

Well, yeah, of course. Dang it.

All right. So is there a chance that it gets wider as you design that? No.

Based on what we're hearing today,

Not while I'm sitting on the city council. I mean, you guys have spoken pretty loudly about what you want and what works and what you're willing to work with, in my opinion.

Yeah. Well, it's definitely something that needs to be done from the north part all the way down to the south part. Yeah. I feel for the people on the island on the north side, so it doesn't necessarily affect me in the drainage part, but I can definitely see.

Well, nobody can come off of Second Street and you jump up about three feet. So, I mean, that's how much dirt has come out of the road. Yeah, there's definitely a higher altitude. To make it so you're not transitioning up the hill, you're going flat like a normal road. Right.

Well, it's like what Justin on the spot of and goes through, is this something you guys would consider budget year 27 or are you looking past that? Is that already in? 27. It's already in?

Yeah, we put money into the budget so we'd be ready. That's what I thought you would say. Yeah.

Last vote on budgets tonight.

Let's just say, we were hoping we'd get to this point and you guys, and really it's just in the budget, but we were hoping we'd get to this point and you guys would say, hey, we think you're going down the right path. Let's look this way.

so ideally everybody agrees with 45 of the property owners here but consensus is you are so yeah now we just get that petition out for everybody and we go from there yeah because we you know and really the petition what that does it gives you a chance to talk you know

Really, you're going to talk to everybody on the street. So nobody's going to be able to say I hold. Well, we didn't know what was going on.

Because the goal is, as the guy who was circulating the petition, you take your biggest property owner with the most footage first. Because as soon as you get to 60%, you're done.

My opinion. Yeah, tell the lake for them what that is. My opinion.

And that's how Travis did it. Work smarter, not harder.

Is there a standard slope, like a 10 to 1, coming off the driveway from the right-of-way line to the street itself? Is there a standard slope?

A 10 to 1 is 5 to 1. And it's going to depend on some of their, and how big a slope you have, too, right? So 10% slope is pretty good.

Yours is going to get steeper.

Yours is going to be 25 or 30.

That's where the dirt's got to come out of the road.

I've never had a chance to pick on Scott.

They'll make it work. That's what they do. They just take the crowns of the roads and they just tip it. That's what you've got to do to make it work. I've done the same thing in Gerritsen where that house is four feet off the ground. That house is four feet under the ground.

Yep.

They got lasers, that's what they do.

Yeah, if you're over on the east side of Gerritsen, that's how the, yeah, yes. We just did that road back two years ago. On the east side of Gerritsen, it's a mess over there. Anyway. Anything else? We appreciate your time. Thank you for your input.

Thank you for hearing us out.

This has been kind of fun. It's great that you guys showed up. Thanks for the invite.

We just appreciate not getting yelled at. Usually when there's this many people here, somebody's yelling at us.

It's usually how it works when they come to yell at us. I appreciate it, Scott.

Thanks, man.

Sorry, I don't mean to get in the way. Thanks, you guys. Keep up the good work.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thanks for all your good work on this, Keith. We're going to make you the chairman. Thank you very much.

There we go. I suck at that. He does such a good job.

Jim does that. Thank you. You bet. I like the director of all of our office. Is he a maintenance guy?

He's got the Hutch building. He's got the Pentagon. I would say he's a facilities guy.

Do I have to adjourn this meeting? So we can turn off the...

Okay. Motion to adjourn. So moved.

Second.

All in favor?