City Council - Regular Meeting

on here. Okay. Uh let's see. We're going to call the Monday, February 9th edition of the Herman City Council and Urban Renewal Agency to order. Declaration of quorum. We have all members present. Would everybody please rise and join me in the flag salute? 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.

Okay. You're still on your side. Okay, just finished our public infrastructure meeting. So, trying to get stuff ready for y'all. Um, Mr. Smith, do we have any changes to the agenda? No changes.

No changes. All right. So, we're going to start off uh with uh our first uh opportunity for citizen input. Uh, anyone wishing to bring anything before the council that is not already on the agenda is asked to please do the following. Limit your comments to not more than five minutes. State your name and place of residence and direct your comments to me. Do we have anybody that wants to speak? Step up.

Welcome. I think I know you, Doug. We've met. Yeah. Maryanne Tangney. I live on the corner of Power Line and Bridge Road. Um just a quick um there's been several accidents in that in uh intersection there and almost when I'm out I'm out a lot in the yard and it seems like there's always near misses. There's all kinds of traffic that goes through there. It's hard to even get out of our driveway sometimes. So much traffic on the bridge road power line and the road is deteriorating. I don't know how it can keep up with that amount of traffic.

Well, unfortunately power line and bridge belongs to the county. I know. But isn't this to like redirect some of the traffic? No, not I mean or you're talking what what are you what are you asking about again? Well, because the bridge would alleviate some of the traffic. Oh, okay. So yeah, I understand what you're saying. Okay. So what I'm saying is that power line now is the main way to get to across town or bridge or it goes Highland then it turns into bridge when you cross the bridge and then it goes on to power line that if the bridge was built it would alleviate all that traffic I believe or part of the traffic on that road.

I'm picking that up now. Okay. All right. That's all I have to say. Any others? Seeing none. All right, moving on. Consent agenda items. We have uh items A, B, and C. Uh are there any council questions on items A, B, and C? Seeing none, do we have any public comment on items A, B, and C? Seeing none, council comments. Any need to remove any of the items? Seeing none, can I get a motion to accept council uh consent agenda items A through C?

Motion to accept. Second. A motion by councelor Hayward, seconded by Councelor Mc McCarthy. Roll call. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Motion passes unanimously. No items removed. Moving on. Okay. So, we are on resolution it uh 26 2406 in regards to uh the bridge at Punkin Center Intergovernmental Agreement. City Manager Smith.

Yeah. Mr. Morgan, please. Yes, Mr. Mayor, members of the council, this evening are considering resolution 2406, which is uh to approve intergovernmental agreement with Umatillaa County as well as uh the city of Umatillaa. So, specifically the resolution is only pertaining to approval of uh the IG with uh again the county and the city of Umatillaa uh for supporting construction and design specifically of uh the Umatillaa River Bridge. Um, additionally, it authorizes uh the mayor to uh submit a letter of support for uh federal grant funding application for the bridge design. Maybe there we go. Uh a little bit of background. So, uh a bridge to uh I 82 uh has been included in the transportation system plan uh since the '9s when we first uh uh had our first TSP. Uh since that time, uh we've shown two bridges. Uh we've had, uh the Punkin, we've had one, uh bridge shown as extending what would be Punan Center, um across to Powerline Road and I 82. Uh we've also shown Elm Avenue extending across uh to Powerline Road and I 82. Um, beginning in around uh 2022, uh, the city of Hermiston along with county and city of Hermiston uh, decided that if we were ever able if we're ever going to actually construct a bridge, uh, we needed to to get moving and we couldn't continue to, you know, just have both of them as potential options. Uh, we needed to pick which one we would focus on first. Um, and so we commissioned a study uh, a preliminary engineering report. Uh and ultimately that preliminary engineing report recommends that uh the first bridge that we should focus on is the pumpkin center option. Uh and so

there was many many uh components to that analysis uh 400 plus page report looking at uh traffic coming from all different directions. Um and so looking at that, taking into account uh the upstream impacts, the downstream impacts uh on the entire transportation system, uh all the way from Umatillaa through Hermiston to 395 and all the different impacts that it would have uh at different components uh not just on the bridge itself. Uh total project cost uh for the Punkin Center option was around $44 million. Total cost for the Elm Avenue option was around $48 million. So, uh, the Punkin Center bridge, uh, is a lower cost. Um, but additionally, it just has, uh, a lot more, uh, positive impact in the sense that it's, uh, serving a lot more, uh, traffic, uh, needs, uh, as determined through the traffic analysis. Uh, but there's also just fewer negative, uh, downstream impacts. uh namely, you know, with like the the Elm Avenue option, um it would basically be funneling even more traffic uh onto Elm Avenue and ultimately going through the Elman 395 intersection, which is um already um at capacity or over capacity. So, uh again, without getting too into the detail, generally speaking, u we chose to focus on the pumpkin uh center bridge first uh because it's lower cost, um has more positive benefits and fewer negative uh impacts. Uh so what we're asking for this evening with this IGA is just simply to uh uh go in with the city and uh Umatillaa County on asking for grant funding for a federal build grant uh to fund a 30% design on the bridge. And so the difference between what we've done already which is a preliminary engineering report and a 30% design is that the preliminary engineering report again that was mainly to identify high level scope out what the projects would even entail identify what the key

challenges uh with uh that project would be and then ascribe a pretty highle cost um to that. So not getting into you know real detailed engineering analysis uh the 30% design uh that takes all of those aspects and actually begins to to provide some real engineered uh effort to it uh with the ultimate intention here being why we're specifically saying a 30% design uh one that is uh able to be funded through a federal build grant uh but two if we were to actually pursue um federal build funding for actual construction construction of a bridge. Um, we would have to come in with a 30% design because again, a lot of these more detailed questions that would come up in an actual construction application uh would be fully addressed at least by that point uh with a 30% design or at least as as well as you can expect when you're uh without having fully engineered plans. So, that's what we're uh looking at with a 30% design versus what we have already. So next steps are to simply apply for this federal build grant uh to fund uh that 30% design effort uh complete the 30% design effort and then in the future uh again important to keep in mind this IGA does not commit any of the partners it explicitly states it uh does not commit any of the partners to actually committing any funding uh for future construction. Uh so uh once we get through the design and we begin to head toward actually seeking funding to construct something uh that's when we would look at deciding uh what each partner's funding commitment uh would be or need to be for construction which that'll certainly be uh uh a big discussion. Uh but that's something that we'll have in the future when we get to that point. Uh and then ultimately applying for construction uh grant funding. So with that I'd stand for any

questions. All right. Council questions. It's not a question. Okay. Well, we'll get to the comments then. Okay. Wait. All right. Um Okay. Public comment. We've already heard from Miss Tammy.

Good evening, council. Uh my name is Tamara Mbot and I live on live on Zimmer Lane um which intersects with uh Punkin Center just outside the city limits just north of the urban growth boundary. I know some of you spent the last 35 years being a county planner and um I commend um city council and staff for the city city county three-way agreement. That kind of collaboration gets large projects like this um completed. What I'd like to do tonight is just encourage you to think about public involvement now early in the process. Um you it ends up with a better project. You get better public buyin and you can also um during that public involvement process consider impacts to um property owners. Uh clearly there will be uh several private property owners that will be impacted by a future road uh depending on the design. Um and lots of natural resources also. So um I know you have lots of committees. I just sat through my first what do you call infrastructure committee. Very informative. Appreciate that. So um I myself have been involved in um some other long range projects and I think you have a much better income um income and outcome uh with a project when you include uh residents both of the city and of the county. So, some of those residents might not even know that this is underway and we don't always read the um the newspaper or the legal notices. Um again, my primary message is twofold. Commendable that you're working collaboratively with Umatella and Umatella County, but please consider early early public involvement as you move forward with the process. Okay. Thank you.

Thank you, ma'am. Any other public comment? Seeing none. Okay. Council comments. Meer, you're up.

Well, this is just by way of a little bit of history on this project. Um, in the 90s about maybe 97, 98, something along that lines, we had a meeting in Washington DC with the Department of Defense. Commissioner Dohy, uh, Rod Harden, Ed Brookshshire, and myself were there and some pretty high level, um, Department of Defense people, and this was on their docket then and Pumpkin Pumpkin Center was always the main focus of where they were going with this. And since then then they've come up with a a few other options. But yeah, that's just by way of history. It's not new to the game here.

Any other comments? Councelor Broom has been as has been mentioned in the public and to the city. Um I commend this project. I think it's uh decades of work coming into a front. Uh it sounds like there's still a lot of work to do with even a 30% design. Um but I am really encouraged that the city continues to look for partnerships and try to involve other uh agencies to help out in big projects like this. Um, you know, I'm really really excited for something like this to happen here soon, but as councelor Meyer has mentioned, this is something that's going to take it's going to take a while, especially for $44 million. Um, I I'm assuming it's it's going to be a bit, but I appreciate the city already starting putting its foot forward trying to mention this out. Uh, this would be a huge project once it comes to fruition. I can imagine I think we've even talked about it in the last couple of years about uh even semi-truck traffic being in analviation on that aspect. And so we're continuing to grow and I think the growing pressure is is kind of coming to a head with trying to find other alternative methods of transportation. So I'm excited for this. I think it's a big one for the city and for the area as well. I did want to mention that um or I guess was part of my questioning but or one one of my questions but it kind of came up more in the comments when I thought of it um is maybe even participation from the CDA. Um I don't know if they'd be of interest uh in this project but I believe that we mentioned that there might be some infrastructure that extends I don't know if if this is a street or if it's even further down south. So, I just wanted to throw that out there. If that'd be another agency that just barely came online that might be interested in in a project like this.

I agree with you. Ma'am, yes.

Um, I just wanted to say I wanted to thank you. I'm sorry I forgot your name for coming up giving comments about that and and uh hopefully we will be able to uh involve the community and the people that actually live over in that area. I did drive down both Punkin Center and also Elm Street just to scope out the area. Uh we have maps that we can look at, but I do better if I go there and look for myself. And also I want to thank uh uh city manager Byron Smith. I called him up. I had a few questions and uh he was able to answer the questions for me. So, I just wanted to say thank you for that and appreciate the the because I like to make sure I make a very informed decision and I see that this project has been talked about quite a few years and now we really need to get it going if we're going to do it because of the cost is really rising up and we want to be able to save as much taxpayer money as we possibly can. Thank you,

Councelor Hard. Um, I think this is a great Thank you, Mark, for putting this together. Explained it really good. Um, I knew a little bit of this like Jackie Meyer says and Bron I second what they said, but I do agree that we need to get the community more involved in this and just try and get them to at least be able to say their piece so when it does happen, they're not upset. Say, "Hey, we've given you guys plenty of opportunities like this hearing and everything." I think it's a great thing to have the public have their say. Any others? Okay. So, um yeah, lot you know we this this project if we're able to bring this forward even more. We're going to be looking at you know diminishing some of the traffic. You know what one of the most dangerous intersections we have is in this in the eastern side of the state is right down here at Elman 395. And so if we can get any traffic off of that at all is going to make a big difference. So I think moving for you know trying to find a way to move this forward getting as many partners involved in this as we possibly can is going to be to our best to our best interest. You know the CDA I I'll be real honest with you. I hadn't even considered that one. So that was that was good good on you for thinking of that. Also the port ports possibly. So any any any partners we can get involved in this that will benefit them I think is going to be beneficial to the city. So okay um so now I need can I get a motion to adopt resolution 2406 and lay upon the record moved

second. Um okay going to give that one to councelor Hayward or I mean councelor McCarthy as so moved and second was councelor Hayward. It's just switch back and forth. Yep. Just checking tally. Roll call. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Okay. Motion passes unanimously. Guess it's giddy up time, sir. Okay. Resolution 2407, uh, Agopy House Storage Building Contract Award. Mr. Smith.

Yeah, Mr. Mayor. members of the council. Um, early in 2024, uh, the city agreed to sponsor a community development block grant application for, uh, on behalf of Agape House to build some additional storage capacity, trying to separate their food operations from some of the other materials that they receive and and distribute through the community. Uh that grant was awarded and then in April of last year uh Columbia Engineering Group was uh given the contract to design the project and now uh we are here with a construction contract award uh request. Uh we received a lot of bids. It was it was great. We really appreciate it seems to be of late that that there's a lot of uh contractor activity on our bids. Uh the low apparent low bidder is Banland Construction and uh we are recommending award of that at at 1.213 million.

Okay. Council questions council room. Just a question on the CDBG grant. How much money is left in the grant? Do we have, I guess, enough to be able to cover everything that the project has or?

Now, we did we bid this with an an alternative uh bid to try to see if we could get some extra, but um uh the the Agape House has a little bit of fundraising money that they're going to put in and and I think that potentially uh that we will be able to cover this. Um there's money we haven't spent on the design. We we think we can cover this. Yes, a followup. Yes. Um, that's that's on LA. Anything that involves collaboration, especially with community partners. I'd just be curious to know if we do go ahead and cover how much that would be on our part from the city.

Yeah, we if if we do that would come up in the next budget because we wouldn't be spending all the money until after uh July. So we it it'll give us a chance to see if the contractor can you know save some money or do some other things. So thank you. Other council questions. Public comment. Seeing none. Okay. Uh council comments. Councelor Hayward,

I think this is great for agy house for what they do for our community. They give so much back to our community like fresh produce, helping people in need and everything. I think this would be a great thing to help Agopy House give back more into the community like they do. They give so much already. They've been they started here. I think this is a great expansion for them. Any others? Seeing none, can I get a motion to adopt resolution 2407? Motion to adopt. Second. Second. And motion by councelor Hayward, seconded by councelor Meyer. Roll call. Yes. Yes. Yes.

Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Passes unanimously. All right. Next up, January 2026 quarterly investment report. Yeah, Mr. Palasios. Sir, good evening. Thank you. Microphone difficulties. Um, for you tonight, I have the quarterly investment report for December 31st, 2025. Here we go. Uh, I was hoping it'd really mess up so I wouldn't have to say anything, but Well, you know, we know technology. We have some people down in our basement. Will's just that good. Yeah.

Um, see, there it goes. So, included in the the packet tonight is the investment report for December 31st, 2025. The new format provides a summary that provides um the city's total investment on a quarterly basis. I won't go through each of the columns um but basically for the next slide I have a summary of the activity for the quarter ended then um as of 1231 2025 we had uh approximately $ 35.1 million held in investments between the local government investment pool of 25.1 million uh with a remainder of a little over a little right around 10 million in um restricted corporate bonds and other uh investments. Of of that investment held at 1231, 6.8 million was approximately deposited into the LGIP fund rep representing property tax remittances for December and the Hermiston Urban Renewal Agency. Um the bulk of the investments held in the LGIP a large portion of those I should say are for the contin continued uh draw draw downs for the bond funds for the various general fund construction projects that we have general building construction projects we have ongoing in the city. Um interest earnings for the quarter ended December 31st 2025 totaled 372,000. um our investments outside of the LGIP are held in within in the Fidelity account that totaled about 125,000 and interest earnings for that quarter and the remainder was about 247,000 respectively. The average interest earned for the quarter was 1.3% but this just takes a picture of the three months

not over the lifetime of the investments. Those over the lifetime of the investments are approximately 5.2% 2% for corporate earnings. At the end of 1231, LGIP pool account earnings were uh 4.2%. They've been trending down um as the feds continue to cut interest rate on on interest. So, with that, I will take any questions. Council questions. Seeing none, public comment. Seeing none, council comment.

Broom. Thank you, Mayor. I appreciate the the report, Mr. Palasios. I just respectfully maybe ask if um if the next time if there could be something that might be a little easier on the eyes or for me to follow along. Um, I understand the summary, but just to kind of see a little bit more trends or just a little bit more information. I I think I just had a little bit harder time just to follow with the descriptions. And I would do a little bit better visually if you had something to pair with that like a more graphics, please. Sure. Council okay with having Mr. Place do that? Yeah.

Okay. All right. Any other council comments? Okay. So, you know, the the deal with re with our investments is that we're kind of limited on the way that we do it. It's not like a, you know, Joe guy down the street. He can't invest on who and what and where and forever how much. We have a specific set of rules that we have to go by. Correct. That is correct. Yeah. But we have our own investment policy that follows state statute.

Just, you know, so that people don't think that we are, you know, we're just throwing money willy-nilly. We're actually it's it's a very detailed process and, you know, we can we can't invest on whatever whoever we want. We have to we have certain markets that we have to stay within. Okay. All right. Can I get a motion to accept the January 2026 quarterly financial report? Motion to accept. Second. And I'm going to give this the well motion to accept by councelor Hayward, seconded by councelor Dur. Roll call. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.

Yes. Motion passes unanimously. Wow. Burning through this committee reports. Have any committee reports? Yes, sir. Hey, uh the faith base advisory board met this uh last week. Um Stepping Stone was there to report. Um I am not going to spoil that. They're going to be coming and reporting to us here in March. She asked me not to spoil anything for you guys. Okay.

So, I'm sorry. Um some of the I love my city is coming up here in May, May 16th. Then also they have a planning dinner that's going to be February 19th at 6:30 at Living Faith Church. Um then I'll top it with the way the food um back in November when they came and report to us in early December about trying to get food out to the committee and everything. A lot of local churches stepped up there's um they have almost every week cover day of the week covered where you can go and get food. Um, one is on Fridays at uh, Living Our Lady Our Lady of Angels Catholic Church from 11:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. Um, it's a kitchen free community meal and stuff. They have the churches have stepped up and have one going around the city every almost every day of the week. And I'm trying to get that list so I can report that back to us. Um, I did advise them to reach out to the senior citizens to help and get the words over there so they can post the words for the community and everything. That's about it. Okay. Any other committee reports? Council Roberts.

I have several since our last meeting. Uh on the 28th the library board uh met uh reported that they have so far had a 20% increase in circulation. Um and also 12% uh uh change in ebooks. So overall uh circulation is looking good. Um surprisingly the computer use was down about a third. Um but they're speculating that maybe people are coming in and using other devices especially now that the the library is uh fully open again. Um, on that same tack, the, uh, volunteer hours are up because in the new library, uh, or newly renovated library, I guess, um, the, uh, volunteers have stuff to do and so they've seen a significant increase in, uh, in volunteers working there. Uh, budget's looking good. Probably the biggest thing that came out of that meeting was, uh, Mr. Rose is, um, looking toward retirement, probably sometime later this year. um a date to be set, but uh um the strategic plan is expiring. It's a three-year plan on the direction that the library is going to be going in the future. And so the talk was does Mr. Rose take on uh putting together the new strategic plan or should they wait for the new uh library manager? Uh the committee decided that uh it's better for Mr. Rose to take on that project. uh when the new manager comes in, they can hand that plan off to whoever's incoming um rather than waiting for somebody to get their feet under them and then come up with a new plan. So that is the library report. On the 4th, um I attended the airport advisory meeting. Uh we did not have a quorum, but we did get an update that the uh budget is on track for this time of year. Uh fuel sales continue to be down a little bit. Um but that's expected for this time of year. Uh just

less flying uh with some of the weather. However, exciting uh the new hangers are filling up fast. I uh think probably uh hopefully by the next report um all of the hangers should be full. Um so that's exciting. And then uh a fun fact that Mr. U Anderson shared um for the Super Bowl, regardless of which side you were on in terms of the outcome of the game. Um I found this interesting that uh the neighboring airports around charged parking fees and it was about $18,000 to park a uh a business-siz jet just to park the jet. Um, so the fees from a small single prop plane to a large jet range anywhere between like $3,500 uh up to uh some of them were up in the $30,000 range just to park the thing. So fun factoid. Um and then finally uh as the mayor said, we just came out of public infrastructure. Um, I will hit a few of my highlights and feel free to chime in if I missed something, but uh, we talked about the backflow prevention program. That's going to be probably a significant thing that's going to come before the council here soon. Um the Oregon Health Authority is pressuring us to get our compliance up and um there may be some uh changes to code that are needed and so city staff will be bringing that forth uh to talk about how we're going to get our compliance up and what that means in terms of costs. Um same thing for the pre-treatment uh industrial pre-treatment uh might need some uh additional code changes there. Uh we got an update on our fats, oils, and grease program. Uh one year in uh we've got uh some pretty good compliance happening. Um but we do have several uh that are not in compliance. And so

starting around May 1st, they're going to start uh if it comes down to it, looking toward enforcement to get people uh to voluntarily comply. But um I seemed uh to get a good sense from city staff that we're happy in the direction that that program is trending. And then the sewer treatment plant will be transitioning from chlorine um to UV uh to uh finish treating some of the water coming out. Um there's high chlorine not residue but byproducts. Thank you. Um that are trending in the wrong direction for us and UV will will change that so that we're not out of compliance um with our levels of chlorine and so uh they'll be coming to the council with some costs associated with that transition as well. So that is my report. Thank you sir.

Continue on or you want

Okay. So we had additional talks about that. We we talked about how where the uh the aquifer storage uh reservoir is they're basically done with stage one building built over the top of it. We're going to start pouring water down it here before too very long which will build the bubble as it's referred to underneath so that later on in when we're start ready to start pulling water back out of it for the customers it'll be ready to go. Um talked a little bit also about the uh discharge from the cooling from our some of our customers. Um Kieran Harper is out going out to bid. Yay. Um, still working on some parts of the Gman Road extension. Uh, the G one of the big things coming up in the near future is the Orchard Avenue water mane uh redo. Um, that's going to be from 7th Street to 11th Street. Uh, a lot of lot of changes going to be happening there. Um, going to be a lot of work, a lot of dirt being moved, a lot of pavement being replaced, and some sidewalks installed. So that'll that's that stretch of city be a little bit safer once this the sidewalk portion of things has been fixed. And that was the basics of the public infrastructure. Any others?

Council Brun.

Thank you, Mayor. Sorry, I was pondering right now the streets and how that was going to look like for the next time. I was getting myself confused with Hermison Avenue was the one that we recently did. Um I do have an update from Eotech. Um Mr. Kelso and I both attended the EOTech committee meeting and there was a couple of updates. So uh please Mr. Kelso or Mr. Smith if I missed anything please let me know. Um we had a we let off with a heroes update from Mr. Swanson. Um the I think the big news that kind of came out of that was that Hermison Lacrosse is going independent. They were a part of a a conference and were able to be a part of that conference and play with a lot of teams within that conference. But the the pro of going independent is they can now host their own tournaments. By being a part of the conference, they were kind of tied down to certain dates and time frames that they were able to do certain things. And so by going independent now we can kind of schedule our own tournaments and hopefully be able to schedule more tournaments here at home uh to bring more people in. So uh that was the big update from from Heroes are going to continue working and trying to complete the project continuing to work with parks and recck to try to see if we can land uh the grant this year uh versus last year where we weren't successful. Uh so that's looking up. Uh, as far as operations update, we had an operations and kind of a financial update, but these kind of kind of came together uh because we had some discussion um and brought up that we need an update to the master plan. As I'm sure the council's already aware, we just approved uh two RV parks going in there, which was kind of completely different from what the master plan had a couple of years ago. Um, I guess I shouldn't say completely different, but now it opens up some more space, some more real estate in what we already kind of had allocated. So, um, we are going to look at that here in the near future. Uh, I think it's either going to be our next our next meeting or the meeting

after that, but uh, we're looking forward to that. Uh, we also welcomed a new member to our EOTech committee from the hotel years. As we know, we've had members of the hotel years come before the council um asking for a voice uh to participate uh in in the process. And so uh they now have filled in their seat that they have at EOTech. Uh and Miss Holly from Oxford Suites is is representing uh and she's come in, she's had some pretty good questions, and I think that's kind of how we started talking a little bit more about the master plan. So, uh, look forward to kind of updating the whole entire committee, uh, with what EOTech is going to look like in the next few years. Uh, we also had a discussion on water rights update. Um, and so we're still continuing to move on that, working with IRZ, uh, and trying to see, um, a path forward and trying to secure uh, some long-term rights. uh with the property acquisition that we've done as a city with the airport. We do have a little bit more water rights, but trying to uh find long-term uh water rights is still what we're working on. Uh we did have an update on the RV park that was presented before the EOTech committee. Um and so it's everything kind of that we've already kind of seen as a council. Uh the only thing that I noticed uh when we were doing the presentation is it looks like there might they're going to pave the northern part of where um where EOTech is at. I think they had like a roadway that they would use. I think it's primarily more for the function of our um EOTech management team. Uh but they're going to pave that as a result of already paving the event RV park that's going to go in the north the upper upper right upper east. Yes, up east. Um, and with that that that's that's what we got. We had a quorum. We had a good conversation. We were able to move forward on a lot of things. And I

think we're just going to kind of hit a restart and kind of be able to really see what we have to work with in the near future for a master plan. And so that way everybody understands with our new members that we have on our EOTech meeting, our EOTech team. So that's what I got. Any others? Um, I'll report on the vacancy review. We've had several uh folks that have signed up for some some of our different committees and uh some are on the approved list and some are so they'll be coming to you soon. So, yes, sir.

Sorry, mayor. I forgot one one last thing. Um, we are there's also a widening widening of the road that's going to happen. So, the road that leads to EOTech, um, the road where you turn into EOTech, if you were to continue down that road, which I don't really go down that road, but I guess that road's going to be widened out where the new property acquisition is going to be at. So, that should allow for more flow of traffic back and forth. I wish I had a visual to show you, but there's going to be a road that's going to be widened as a result. Something tells me that we'll probably see a lot of that in the near future. So, okay. Any other uh committee reports? Park and on Thursday.

Okay. Parks and w coming to you live on Thursday. All right. Mayor's report. Um let's see. Last couple of weeks. Had a meeting with the uh assisted Mr. Smith and and folks from parks uh with a meeting with the senior center. Had a very very productive conversation with those folks. I think we're going to see some some actually good uh good come out of that. And so um we've we presented them with with the new an updated contract and uh they are looking it over for you know to see how how it affects them and you know any changes. Um we you know there's a little give and take given there and so I think uh I think we're all going to be real happy with the with the final result. Um, don't have a lot else other than saying the Seahawks won the Super Bowl. It might have been loud at my house, but it wasn't me. But anyway, council president report.

Thank you. Um, just wanted to remind everyone, I know it brought up the last meeting, but the chamber again has their speed networking lunchon event on the 18th, which is a Wednesday at 11:00 a.m. um at the community center. So, be sure to um talk to them about getting set up for that. And then also, I don't see a member of our youth advisory council here, so I'll take a moment to say that on the uh 20th and then again on the weekend of the 27th, the Hermanson High School will be performing Greece. Um on Sundays, um on Saturday, I believe it's at 7:00 and then on Sundays, they have a show at 2 and 7. Uh they did a lot of work to put in a custom fiberglass grease lightning car. Um which apparently they're going to be renting out to other productions of of the musical Greece as well as they perform that.

It's um it's Friday night the seven and then Saturday 2 and 7. Right. Perfect. Not Sunday. Not Sunday. And I can't remember the name of the person. Yes. Uh something pope. Roger Pope. Right. Perfect. There we go. So be sure to check that out. Great. Thanks, Roger. Okay. Uh, council reports. Anyone? Council Roberts.

Uh, two quick things. On the 4th, I had the, uh, opportunity to attend the, uh, board of commissioners meeting and there were several awards to, uh, a number of our dispatchers. Um and uh so just want to take a minute to to say um take a look at that meeting if you get a chance and you can hear the wonderful things cuz it's it's a long list um of of things that they've accomplished. But just a reminder of of what our dispatch center does for our community and that they're working hard for us. And then additionally um last week I was able to attend the DPSSST uh graduation of some of our uh local police officers. So, congratulations for uh Officer Cody Sherman and Natalie Casares for Hermiston PD um for completing their basic training and then coming back for field training and also Deputy Lance Barus with the sheriff's office. So, we've got some new faces uh going to be patrolling our community.

Sir, any others? Councelor Hayward. Um, me also went to the Hermanson education fundraiser dinner that is that was this last Saturday. It's for raised for students uh scholarships for students that apply for it and they actually added quite a bit. I couldn't remember off the top of my heads how many they added this year more and stuff. It was a thing that I didn't know was going on and was invited to it. Something down here. Yep. Yep. Okay. Thank you, Council Jerome.

Um, so I went to the um League of Cities Board meeting on January 30th and it was a very productive meeting. I don't know how much you would like me to share but um they talked about a survey where um that went out to find out how members felt about services course core services survey and 70 70% participated and they said that um they're not able to attend like small cities programs because of capacity constraints um lack of awareness and don't know how to participate. So um what they what that survey also indicated is that they would rather have like one to two hour virtual trainings in the morning on land use budgeting and other training topics. And they also said that the uh there are going to be 264 measures that they will be looking at during this legislative session. And so they're going to be um busy looking over that information like House Bill 4138, House Bill 44001, um Senate Bill 1586, um the jobs act, House Bill 4084, um Governor Cotex Prosperity Roadmap package, House Bill 405, the water professional um appreciated week, appreciation week, sorry, water professional appreciation week and Senate Bill 1585 which reduces the grant matching requirements for small cities. Um Senate Bill 1526, the fund for Oregon Resilience Growth and Energy Act or Forge um to expand energy infrastructure and House Bill 4015 um is currently a placeholder.

And so there was some discussion about the transportation package, but obviously there's a lot that is writing on that transportation package. So um of course that was the 30th and I'm sure that there will be a lot more information coming our way, but I did miss the update that is provided to us on a on Fridays. I don't know if any one of you sat in on on that the you know when they give the legislative updates on Fridays. um I missed it. But anyway, we had a lot of discussion about that and um they're also planning planning is already on underway for the spring conference that will be held here in Pendleton and hopefully some of us will be able to attend.

Okay.

Any others? Mr. Kel. Yes. Thank you, Mayor. Um, I wanted to start off by giving some kudos to our new code enforcement officer. I've had several discussions with citizens um, in our town and um, they have nothing but good things to say about what our new code enforcement uh, person is doing in that role. So, it's a night and day difference and uh, I just want to give the city some kudos. That was a a good hire and apparently the uh, the gentleman is doing a fine job. So, thank you. Um, additionally, I don't know if we've received any applications for the Hermiston Advisor or the Hispanic Advisory Committee, but if we have not, I would encourage anybody who's interested in serving um their community to join that committee. It's it's a great community. It's a great opportunity to speak uh and represent the Hispanic population. I happen to be a board or a council representative with councelor Jeron and uh it's probably no offense to the EOTech committee which is super exciting but uh it's it's probably my favorite committee to sit on if I'm being honest. So yeah uh please please consider serving on that committee if you're a member of our community. Um, on Monday, which is President's Day, at 8 a.m., the Good Shepard Health Foundation and the Hermiston Quantis will be putting out flags on Main Street and we'll meet at 8 o'clock in the morning in front of Hermiston Drug. If you're interested in participating, that's always a fun and patriotic event. So, come on out and join us. And finally, the uh Hermiston Amateur Radio Club held its annual winter field day exercise at EOTech and the city um was kind enough to give us the use of that facility, part of it for um our annual exercise in which we try and contact as many people around the world as possible. Um and we had contacts in Europe again this year and and kind of all around the world. So, it was very exciting and a very good opportunity. And I just want to say that it it behooves the city and I think the city knows this to to build relationships

with people who can help in emergency uh situations and the Hermston Amateur Radio Club is a group that stands ready to do that should we lose other communication means. So I just wanted to say thank you for the the city for allowing the use of EOTech and uh it was a great event. Excellent. Any others? Mr. city manager. Yeah. So, um, councelor Brone, it's Carrie Schaefer is the hotel year's representative. Sorry.

Um, just a few items. Um the charter review committee held a meeting recently and part of their the resolution that you adopted creating that committee gave them a charge to hold kind of a town hall type event. Uh that's going to be March 4th at 5:30. So we've already have a kind of a marketing plan to try to get the word out as much as we can related to that. So uh you there there will be some uh social media posts. We're created a web page on the website to carry that information and uh so have you know encourage people to take a look at what they're proposing and then uh potentially at the end of that meeting they would make a recommendation to the council and then the council would take the next steps uh after that if the council wanted to proceed. Um let's see. Yeah, I would remind you about the um the legislative call from LLC uh on Fridays at noon. If you don't have a link to that, we can get you that. Um you should have received an email, I think, with that link at one point. Um and that is all I have, Mr. Mayor.

Okay. Does anybody else have anything? Seeing none, we are adjourned.