City Council - Regular Meeting

Good evening everybody. Welcome to your city council. Thanks for coming. I'm going to call us to order for April 27th. First thing we're going to do is shut off our cell phone ringers. Then, if you'll please join, we'll stand and say the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Now, is it time for uh business from the audience? Oh, no. First, Abigail, we do have an agenda correction tonight, don't we?

Yeah, I think I have two items to note. First, we have a zone change request for 1225 Wasco Street. That still will be a public hearing, but it will be a request for continuence. Um, so it will not be uh the full hearing tonight. And then on the consent agenda, um the Hood River Amateur Radio Emergency Services Agreement, those folks contacted me this morning and asked me to pull that. They had some follow-up questions with the county before uh that they wanted to settle before they came back to you on that. Um and then I'll just also note you know um that action item number two the resolution for the temporary moratorium on data centers uh the language of that resolution was updated today. So you got that in your email and it was updated online. So bunch of changes

bunch of changes. Thank you. Great. So uh is there anyone in the in the room who wishes to speak to the council tonight on a topic not not on the agenda? I have one sign up from Steve Lambert on Zoom. Uh, Mr. Lambert, are you with us? I am with you. Can you hear me? I hear you. Yes, Steve. So, my my uh plea was regarding the Wasco reszoning. Are we talking about that tonight or not?

Thank you. What I've just learned is that it's going to be continued for a month. So the second meeting in May is when we're going to be discussing that. We are not going to be discussing it tonight. Okay, that's what my my point was. So I will uh I I'll join next month. Great. Thank you, Steve. All right, your honor. Yes, there's a Jeffrey Hammer online. I don't know if he's signed up if he's wanting to speak. Thank you. Uh Mr. Hammer, would you like to address us tonight? Uh, no. Thank you.

Great. Thank you. So, I I I see no business from the audience. Am I missing that? I think I got it. Thank you. We have a couple of presentations. One is from lead Rebecca Shilling. There's a a red ring. You want to touch the white dot now? You're on share screen. Ah, think I did it there. Should I randomize that little window showing people or should I leave that?

Oh, that's Jen is control.

Oh, she's Oh, you got it. Okay, that's right. You said that. Thank you. All right. Well, hello everyone. I'm Rebecca Schilling. I am the uh program analyst for uh the law enforcement assisted diversion program um for both Hood River and Wasco County. Um so I'm just going to go over a little bit about what LEAD is. So BEAD is a defection program and what it's focused on is redirecting individuals that are involved in low-level crimes such as like drug possession uh away from the traditional criminal justice process and more towards services that would help them u stabilize their lives. And I'll go a little more deeper into that in a moment. Um, so for our deflection program, we decided to go between the two counties with LEAD or law enforcement assisted diversion. Um, it allows law enforcement officers to refer individuals, engage in the low-level offenses directly to case management and treatment and social services instead of arrest or prosecution in the traditional criminal justice process. And the reason that matters is it uh it reduces recidivism and addresses root causes um to the issues that an individual may be experiencing and also builds more trust between law enforcement and the community at large. So, our program is ran uh solely on the behavioral health deflection grant through the state of Oregon. Um just to be fully transparent, um in our first year, we had over 125k of funds left over and that is because

we were able to run the program for the whole entire first bianium. Um so we ended up with a surplus of funds that was returned to the state and then it was placed into an account pulled with other funds returned from other counties where it is currently earning interest to help continue funding deflection for the future. Um in the bienium that we are right now uh we had to follow a projection mostly projectionbased um when our request for the grant funds um I got a little lost there. So for the fiscal year of 2527 binding rules uh for the grant it was based on projections and very little on narrative. uh only 27 of the 36 counties in Oregon elected to do a deflection program which allowed the state to provide more funding to counties. However, Hood Wasco County was not awarded more funds. So, we only received the 150k per county per year which for the entire bienium equals 600k total which is sounds like a lot but it really is not. Uh so that does limit lead's ability to hire another team member. As of right now, we are a team of two, myself as the program manager and analyst, and then we have Nick Smallman who is our lead navigator who does a lot of work out in the field with individuals. Um, and just to explain what type of uh demographic that we're working with, these are going to be individuals that may be experiencing houselessness, substance use disorder, uh, mental health uh, issues, and those needs that they have are going unressed. And so, LEAD functions as that sort of middleman that collaborates with community partners to get these individuals connected to the services that they need.

The other funding that we have to help us in the meantime, we are getting the opioid settlement funding from Hood River County. And last that I checked, we had a little over 50K from that. We are expecting more. However, those dollars are finite and we have up to five years to use them. So, it's definitely not a source of continued funding. Um, though we are seeking other funding elsewhere. Um in the next bianium in 2729 the grant cycle will be more competitive. So we are compiling data to make it more competitive and show how well that the lead model works to the state so that way we could get more funding and and hire hopefully at least one more if not two more people to our team. So our program status right now, this is as of April 16th, we have received 76 referrals since March of 2025. New participants enrolled in LEAD were 23. Uh out of the 23, uh three of those did end up failing to engage with the program and were therefore removed from the program. I should emphasize that the program is voluntary. Uh so that's where it differs from traditional diversion. They have to want to engage and be willing to engage and take the steps to reach their goals and we essentially direct them and help them to get there. We um as of April 16th have six participants and out of the 23 we have diverted uh eight of those to other services meaning they didn't necessarily enroll in our program and we were but we were able to connect them to a community partner that

was able to provide them the level of services that they need at this time in their in their situation. We also have had six individuals reach what's called alumni status. And this is where I really appreciate the lean model over other diversion models is there's no such thing as a graduation date. You don't have due dates to finish different milestones. You are meeting the individuals where they're at in in their life in their stage of life. and alumni status just means they have reached a state of stability that is appropriate for them as an individual which looks different for everyone and they're ready for the next thing and don't need us to connect them to services anymore and they're more on their own. So, we've already had six of those and actually believe that number has gone up since since the 16th. And so, in all, a total of 20 individuals have either been diverted or have been diverted from the criminal justice system. Diverted in some fashion. These are our projections for the current bienium that we are in. We um actually lost little track. There we are. So the pathway type, I should explain that part first. So for the pathway type, these are the five pathways that the state has for deflection options. So that's self-referral, active outreach, um lock plus, first responder and officer referral, and officer intervention. And we are using all of the all of those pathway types as of now. And through those types, we do expect to get at least 433 that are eligible amongst all path or across all pathways over this bienium. A total enrolled in all pathways, we expect to

have about 50 and for current capacity for enrolled participants are about 50 to 15 to 20 people. So that is what we're estimating over this bianium to occur. Some new initiatives because we're still a very very young program. We only launched in March of 2025 accepting referrals. Since then we have launched a local website. I did provide by business cards um over there where Abigail was at. I'm not sure if she's passed them out, but on the back Oh, wonderful. There's a QR code on the back that takes you to our local lead website. Um, so there you can learn a lot more about us and that website does represent both Hooter and Wasco County. We also built a system that tracks hours spent during outreach and community interactions. So our lead navigator, Nick Smallman, he does a lot of performs a lot of proactive outreach out in the field at encampments or other areas with community partners. And we wanted to track how many hours is he spending doing that, how many hours is he spending with each individual, and how many individuals is he making contact with that he could possibly be diverting from the criminal justice system. So, we've been tracking those metrics. Also, we're in the midst of developing metrics for um money saved uh money and time saved for things like personnel. So, law enforcement, uh your court staff, probation, um how much are we saving in booking and jail intakes, emergency and crisis system use, and and we're also um this was actually this last line was supposed to be separate. We're also exploring more program funding opportunities for staffing as I mentioned earlier. And before I get into this uh part right here, just to give you a little bit of background on the lead model, it was originally started in Seattle back in

2011. And they've been doing they've been doing that for a very long time throughout Seattle and have expanded all across the city. And there is a lot of data showing how well it works with this demographic. And that is why both Hutter and Wasco County's sheriffs got together and agreed that they wanted to go with a model that had evidence showing that it works. This model also is very adaptable. You could still keep the fidelity of the model, the basis of the model, and adapt it to a rural area. So that's another reason why it was chosen. Um, so same as on the back of your card, I have a QR code on the screen to our website. Um, and I'd like you all to think about, you know, what metrics are most valuable to the council. What would you like us to be posting on there for metrics? We don't have any as of right now because we don't have enough history of builtup data, but we're starting to get there. So, any metrics that you want to suggest now or email to me later, I'm happy to hear it out. I see you naughty.

So, KPIs. Yep. Um, beyond that, that is all I have in the moment. Uh, any questions council?

All right. Uh, thank you for coming. I hadn't seen this presentation till now, so I was really curious about the program operations. And this looks a lot like the bridges to health pathways model that we have here in the gorge. So the number of referrals or your clients that you receive, are you receiving them from Bridges to Health? Like how do you two coordinate? So we don't receive community partner referrals at this time. Right now it's mainly from law enforcement and doing outreach proactively. Okay. So it's all internal referrals within the sheriff's office or the city.

So we so we actually work with all the law enforcement agencies throughout herco county. That's both sheriff's office, both police departments, Oregon State Police. Uh we do also do some work with intertribal police as well. Okay. And we actually have what's called an operational group that meets bi-weekly and that's made up of law enforcement and community partners such as Mid Columbia Center for Living, um, MCAC, One Community Health, both of the DA's offices, the district attorney's offices, and we essentially staff referrals there in those meetings, but we also keep everybody on the same page about where a client is at in their journey. So, we share that case management load.

Okay. Can you go back a couple slides because there was a slide around behavioral health and I want to understand the $125,000 that were returned back. Yeah, I did kind of just breeze over that, didn't you?

Yeah. So, do you have behavioral health providers within your team? I guess like help me understand the makeup of this staff. Um, so right now is just myself as the program manager and analyst and then we have our lead navigator Nick Smallman as I mentioned before. So think of it like a part peer mentor but not fullon peer mentor. A little bit of that but mixed with some case management and just peer navigation. It's helping them navigate systems. So whether that's legal advocacy, you know, making sure if you're on bench probation, you're getting your 40 hours of a community service done so you're not getting deeper system involvement. Great.

Or helping them navigate, you know, getting mental health services, substance use treatment, things like that. So it sounds like overall that you do work with MCAX staff, especially with the annex and the transitional housing that they have out there. Absolutely. A huge partner. And do you also work with the prevention department as well like internally within Hood River? We haven't overlapped with them very much yet but I have started meeting with that department to see how we can function more together. Is your primary audience I mean uh the individuals that you're supporting are they a mix of youth and adults or just adults? All adults. All adults. Okay.

Yes. Um, and then you already answered the houselessness folks or question. Are any of your patients within the Medicaid population? Yeah, everybody is on is within Medicaid. Yes,

there's a lot of similarities here to the Bridges to Health Pathways program which is now funded by the local CCO like the Medicaid insurance company. And so there's a lot of similarities. When you were asking about metrics to secure additional funding, I would highly recommend that you connect with the Bridges to Health uh Bridges Bridges to Health staff. Um and I'd be happy to chat with you offline and give you that information because uh there's a lot of similarities there uh especially when it comes to the pathways that are opened and and closed. Can

Yeah, I would really appreciate that. Thank you. Yeah. I mean, my last question is, you know, first of all, I forgot to start off with this. Thank you for being here. How can the city help support you and your efforts moving forward?

Well, that's a big question. I was not expecting that. Um um I think one of the biggest ways to to be quite frank is funding. We are definitely like everyone else and very short on funding. uh 150k per year per county is not enough. Uh the majority of that gets eaten up by personnel cost and then it doesn't leave much else for the rest of the program. And being able to hire more bodies is the is the biggest thing. Yeah. How does this support like what Lane McIll's project was a couple years ago? Uh this is exactly it. This is it. Yes. He's very deeply involved with this program.

Okay. Yeah, I think that as far as funding where you can absolutely look into additional support is through, like I mentioned that bridges to health pathways program. Um, I'm not sure if all of your uh clients that you're serving are only English speaking or Spanish speaking, but I do know that there may be some potential funds. I don't want to speak for another organization to sustain some of these services given that your um demographic of the clients that you are serving are Medicaid recipients and that that can help especially if you have outcomes data to show that the program that you're doing is successful in helping them getting rehoused or um not going back into the justice system. So, thanks for being here and thanks for all the work that you do.

Absolutely. Thank you so much for sharing that information. I'll look forward to your email. Doug, uh, Council Rivera asked all the questions that I had as well. So, thank you. Um, but just wanted to thank you for your time and for coming to speak to us today. Absolutely. Thank you for having me.

Um, yeah, I think this program sounds amazing and so thank you for doing the work. Um, I'm just a little bit curious if you could share some examples or like levels of like what does lowlevel offenses mean versus like oh yeah where's the cut off of the offenses that you people you help with and then you the these ones you can't or something.

So low lowle is referring to what we like to call livability crimes. That's things like trespassing disorderly conduct, low-level theft, you know, these these things tend to happen when people are houseless or struggling with mental health or substance use disorder because, you know, the theft comes from lack of food, lack of necessities, trespassing comes from not having a place to go. Disorderly conduct can come from substance use or and or mental health illnesses. Yeah. Thanks again. Appreciate it. Oh, Anna, I'm sorry. Late breaking. Go ahead. Sure.

I'm I've had some conversations with um this might be just a deeper question, but uh with actual law enforcement and are they particularly supportive of this approach in your experience?

I have actually had wonderful experience. So, historically, uh, the Lead Support Bureau of Seattle, they're they're wonderful. They provide regular consulting as long as you need them for your site. And historically, they have said that law enforcement tends to be very hesitant. We are very fortunate that we are housed by the Hudbury County Sheriff's Office, and the Wasco County Sheriff's Office is our consortium. So, we already had a start of buyin there. And then it was just about educating and meeting with more of the deputies and then meeting with leadership at both police departments as well as Oregon State Police and Intertribal and then meeting with their teams and just educating them on what we do. And I feel like for the most part we have almost all their buy in and they've been utilizing us quite a bit. So, an example that happened just last week, we had a client that was um staying down um by Walmart, like right down below the Columbia River Bank, and we were working with the PD on maybe getting some people moved, getting it cleaned up because it was starting to build up with with too much stuff, right? And some phone calls for service had started coming in. Um, so we worked with them to get our client moved, but then there was also another individual that wasn't our client that we worked with that had also been staying there on and off as well. And turned out that client just, you know, really needed to get home to a completely different state where he could have more services and more support and more help. And we made sure he got there on a bus. We got him a bus ticket and got him there. And we worked very closely with the Hood PD on that. I really appreciate that. Thank you.

Yeah, absolutely. Thanks for coming. All right. Thank you for having me.

Next, we have the Craig Ratrats. Turn on the red the red ring there.

Yep, there we go. Starting at the top. Mr. Mayor, council, staff, constituents, thank you for having us in tonight. Um, I'm Dan Maher. This is my colleague Nate Kebard. Thank you.

Over there, we've got John Rust. And we are all volunteers with the Hood River Cragrats. So, the crag rats are here tonight to invite you to a party next month. Um, we are celebrating our centennial year this year. And so on uh Saturday, May 30th at the ruins, we'll be gathering from four o'clock until nine o'clock to celebrate the last century of search and rescue efforts that the Cragrats um have have done in the area here and uh celebrate the next hundred years of what's to come. So, I'll say a couple things about how the Cragrats were founded. Uh we'll hand things over to um to Nate. So, uh, back in 1923, uh, a a lonely hiker got lost on Mount Hood, and a group of, uh, orchardists in the upper valley gathered together to go search for this individual, and it was a successful timeout. They found this man, brought him back safely. Everybody lived happily ever after. Um, three years later, the same thing happened. A boy named Kelvin White wandered off onto the mountain, was gone for a couple days. same group of orchardists pulled themselves together, went out, found young Mr. White, brought him back. He survived. Um, the group garnered a bit of media attention for their efforts and so uh decided that they should they should consider making this official and so they chartered the Hood River craats um on August 3rd, 1926. As far as we can tell, we're the oldest search and rescue organization in the US, potentially even North America, and we believe one of the oldest um worldwide. And so um we provide search and rescue services on Mount Hood throughout the Hood River Valley and in the Columbia River Gorge in partnership with the Hood River County Sheriff's Office. Somebody goes out on the mountain, get lost, gets injured, they can't get themselves back to help. um we get called to go provide urgent medical

care and then transport back to um you know an ambulance or their personal vehicle depending on what the situation calls for. Um am I controlling slides here? Here we go. We have around 80 members uh right now. Lifetime the CRA rats is a I'm sorry. Membership in the CRA rats is a lifetime thing. Once you're in, you're in. um around 40 of us uh provide search and rescue um on on the regular. We have around 45 uh missions per year. Um overall that's a little over that's about 2500 total hours um spent in the field on rescues and uh for training we do about two times that. As you can imagine, interest in the outdoors has grown over the years as have our uh rescue efforts. In the early 2000s, we averaged around 15 missions per year. Um, current day, we're at about 45. Um, more people are interested in the out ofdoors. There's more access. There's more information. Um, a fun thing that has happened a lot in the last few years is folks will see a cool waterfall or a hike or a vista on Tik Tok or Instagram. They'll throw on their teas and they'll hit the road with a bottle of water and uh, sometimes they run into trouble. Uh, and that's when we get called to to go and uh and help them out. We don't mind. We don't ask how you got into your pickle. We're just interested in going out there and and and getting you out.

You want to take over here, Dan, please?

Uh, thanks, Dan. So, to celebrate our centennial this year, we've got several events planned, and we wanted to invite you officially uh to our uh event on May 30th. Um the weekend before uh the Kraats will actually be planning a centennial climb up the Cooper Spur route on Mount Hood, which is just for craats, and we're considering that sort of a training climb, but it uh it's going to be pretty exciting uh to climb the Cooper Spur route um with uh our membership. And then the following weekend, uh, we'll be celebrating at the ruins, as Dan alluded to, 4 to 900 pm. It's a free event for the general public. So, um, we hope to engage with all of the community. Uh, we're really looking at this as an opportunity for us to, uh, thank the community and engage the community, uh, in a way that we don't really get to very often. Um, some, you know, times it seems like the crag rats are just these people out there who are climbing the crags and they they come out of the woods once in a while to rescue people, but, uh, they're kind of elusive. Uh, but we really want to engage with the community. So, the first couple of hours of this event on May 30th are going to be really cool. We're going to have several stations set up with our um, search and rescue vehicles, a few other stations with historical artifacts, um, lots of great photos. There's going to be a short film running on repeat um inside indoors at the ruins. Uh we had a short film commissioned and made this year to commemorate our our history of 100 years. So um that'll be a great educational film for anyone who's interested. Uh we're going to have lots of beer. We're going to have live music. Um and there's going to be raffles and prizes. Uh you know, part of this is a celebration. Part of it is a fundraising endeavor uh which we'll get to in just a moment. But we're we're also trying to

fund raise for uh a training tower or training wall which will help us with our um high angle rescue training. Um and that's something that we're trying to get built in the next uh uh year to prepare for the next hundred years. Um so more on the ruins event in just a moment. We also have a bluegrass festival uh August 15th up at the Tilly Jane Amphitheater. Uh and we've uh booked several bands uh bluegrass and adjacent genres. It's going to be a one-day event and it's going to be an interesting event in that um the road to Cloud Cap is actually going to be closed to uh traffic. We're going to be running a shuttle, multiple shuttles, um, up there for the bands and equipment and stuff, but attendees are going to be encouraged to hike up the Tilly Jane Trail um, and spend the night uh, camp out the night before, the night after, or just make a day of it, hike in, hike out on the same day. Um, it's going to be a really special event uh, with lots of great music um, and lots of beer as well. Uh, by the way, the Craats are also working with Ferment. I forgot to mention this. Uh, and we're going to unveil our Cragrat Centennial Glacier Logger uh, produced by Ferment at our May 30th event. So, we're we're pretty excited about that. It's going to be in draft and and cans as well. So, it's just going to be a really fun event. We hope all of you guys can come join us on the 30th. We do have flyers that we don't have with us, but we're going to be passing them around, putting them up all over town. We can drop some off here. um at a later date. Um there's also hopefully going to be a plaque that we um install somewhere near Mike's Ice Cream commemorating the original spot where the Cragrats were chartered. It was the old Tumalum Lumber, which is approximately where Mike's ice cream is

now. Um let's see. Anything else about these events, Dan, that I'm forgetting? I think you I think you got it.

Should we advance one more slide? Uh yes, here's yeah, here's the advanced training wall. This is uh something that we are trying to fund raise for. As you can see, it's a fairly expensive endeavor. And so uh the May 30th event and other events in the future uh hopefully will will help us start fundraising for that to help us train for our high angle technical rescues. And here's the flyer that Dan put together. You'll start seeing these around town. My kids put these up at Mike's Ice Cream, so maybe you've seen it already. Uh, I paid them an ice cream, but hopefully um they'll start seeing these around town and please spread the word. Uh, we'd love to celebrate with you and engage with you and just uh give back and to the community. So, thank you again.

Thanks for 100 years of work. What a what an amazing uh thing to imagine back in 26 or 23 when that first rescue went up. buddy of mine grew up here and he learned to ski before there was a Mount Hood Meadows. So just imagining what that was like and then decades before that what what that I mean you're heading up the dirt road to bail somebody out. Good work you guys.

Thank you. I forgot to mention one other thing as well. Uh we're going to have a a formal presentation for about 30 minutes at the ruins event May 30th and we're going to have Arthur Babbittz, former mayor and uh you know history buff on all things Hood River County. Uh so he's going to be giving a presentation showing some old historical photos. And then our current medical director, Chris Van Tilberg, who presented at Sense of Place um recently, he's going to give a little presentation as well. Um, so we're excited to have Arthur Babbitz and Chris Manilberg celebrate with us as well. Great. Thanks again, Annie. Go ahead, Anna. The obvious question is, is there a dress code?

I don't know. Defer to our president. Is there a dress code? No. Black and white. I'm guessing black and white flannel casual. Okay, got it. correct about

book checks which was in I think a one of the wives got a whole bunch of stuff from Sears and made sure and there's still a few floating around the organization almost 100 years later thank you all for your service I did see this flyer at Mike's Ice Cream so I was fully aware of the presentation or the party before and just um I didn't realize that You were Mr. Rust. Your wife was my seventh grade home room teacher and I remember when she went up to climb Mount Everest. So tell her Glattus says hello. Uh thank you all for all the service that you do and yeah appreciate all your efforts. I did have an opportunity to join the sense of place conversation where CBT did give a presentation and found that incredible and what an incredible community that we live in where we have some of these resources here in our backyard. So thanks for all you do. Gentlemen, thank you for being here. I've been hearing all this from Nate. Uh I'm just a huge milestone. Super excited for you. Um you need any help evangelizing everything? Obviously, let us know. Few of us have social media accounts now for the city. Obviously, uh individual accounts as well. Happy to pass along all the information and get as many people there as possible.

It's a great idea. Yeah. Congratulations so much on 100 years and looking forward to the parties. Thank you. Thank you. All right. one to 90. We actually got a few members from Rome. So, it can be self- serving as well because we, you know, there's it's tough demographics in the river. It's hard to live here. So, we need young people to come and see what we're all about and then become part of the mission just helping others. Thank you. All right. Thank you. Thank you.

Next, we have the consolidated schedule of fees. Chris Very good. Thank you. Um I'm sorry, Chris. Sorry. Yeah. Procedurally the should I open and close the the the first item? Yeah. What how should we do this? Yeah, if you call on your planning director, he can lead us through that. Sorry, Chris. Chris. Good work, Chris.

Yeah, mayor. uh procedurally uh it would uh it would be necessary to open the hearing, read the script, and get to the point where we can continue it. Uh part of this is it has been notified to occur today uh not no sooner than 6 p.m. So, in order to preserve the opportunity and set a date certain, uh we'd like you to start this off knowing full well that uh when the applicant presents, they will be requesting continuence. So,

great. In that case, I call to order the April 27th, 2026 meeting of the Hood River City Council land use hearing. Right, Dustin? Tonight, the council will review the record for file number 2025-32, take testimony, and determine whether the application meets or does not meet the approval criteria of the Hood River Municipal Code. Second, we are required to render an render an impartial decision on each application. This means we cannot have a personal financial stake or bias that would prevent us from making an impartial decision. Before we begin, I will call for the disclosure of bias, exparte contact, and conflict of interest from each counselor. Anyone in the audience will then have the opportunity to question any of us about those disclosures. Our decision on the zone change will be final unless appealed to Luba, the land use board of appeals. To appeal our decision, you must participate either orally or in writing before the record closes on the item you are interested in and raise any issues you would like to preserve for appeal. Once we close the record on an item that will end your ability to raise new issues or present evidence, let me describe the order of events for the hearing on tonight's agenda. Shall I continue to continue? First, we will hear from the applicant, but we will not because we are continuing it. Next, we will hear from staff. Then, we will take public testimony. Finally, we will hear the applicant's final rebuttal and remarks. After everyone has had a chance to testify, we will close the record, deliberate, and may render a decision tonight. May render a decision tonight. Our decision, however, is not final until it is reduced to writing and officially issued. Here are some basic rules for presenting testimony in the hearing.

You you could probably skip that part. I'm going to skip that part for tonight. and the disclosures to the extent you have any that would be good to get through tonight and then the applicants request.

Great. So uh does anyone in the uh a quorum of the city council is present? I will now ask all counselors to disclose any exparte contacts, conflicts of interest and bias in this matter. Anybody? I went to an unrelated event at uh Crush Cider the other day and saw a map there. I did not honestly have my reading glasses on, so I'm not sure that I gleaned any meaningful uh exparte information. I certainly heard some opinions, but I don't think I was prejudiced or conflicted in any way in in that in that encounter. Uh does anyone in the audience or council member question any counselor on any disclosure or otherwise challenge the participation of any member? In that case, ordinarily we would hear from the applicant, but but in fact,

we we will hear from the applicant so they can make their request to you to continue this matter. Applicant, good afternoon council. Hello. I am Hayden Wooten, senior land use planner with the Mario design. I am representing the applicant tonight, Capsule Development. As already mentioned, I would like to request a continuence to the May 26 city council meeting. Thank you, Hayden. Thank you.

Uh this one ask uh before we set a date certain uh couple of you have mentioned that uh I will not be here. However, there is also two other dates uh June 8th and June 22nd your regularly scheduled meeting. It is important to set a date certain. It is also important that you all at least some of you are available to have this matter. So before before we set that date, it's good to check. So the date we've referred to is a Tuesday, right? Because it's the day after Memorial Day. We do not meet on the holiday, but we're talking about our second meeting in May, which is which is on Tuesday, May 26. Am I not do Am I right? That's correct. I'll be here.

I don't think I'm going to be here. Okay. I'll be here for all three of those dates. Thank you. And we don't know about Papa Grant. Um, do we have any information from Ben? One of our counselors has like a two day two two-day old baby. We we do not have the information. Um, however, the last time we uh checked in with with all of you, they were available this summer. In fact, Council Mitchell had said summer was a better time. So I do want to give a minute to the city attorney because his availability is somewhat limited. He has a strong preference.

I'm going to be on the road from miday to mid June. I can I can zoom in if I have a cell signal driving to Alaska. So you know how that could be. Um so June 22nd I'll be back. I know that much. Um so how does that set with you? And you would also whatever the date is ask the uh applicant to extend the 120day rule to whatever is needed to accommodate a hearing on this thing.

I hate to delay for the I can't imagine the applicant is like super interested in a long delay. One month and two months are kind of different. Um I don't have a problem with 20 seconds. Good for me. What a reason. Council, you got a preference? Can we do the the June date when we know Dan's here? Yeah. Is Hayden is June 22nd. Okay. That will work with our team and then we'll coordinate with staff to submit a formal uh letter approving an extension to the timeline to accommodate that extra month. Are we all in order? Thank you.

Great. Thank you, Dustin. At this time, am I suspending continuing? Look for a motion to continue to the 22nd, no sooner than 6 p.m. I move that we continue this hearing until June 22nd at 6 p.m. No sooner than moved by second. Second by Doug. Any discussion? All in favor? I opposed. Chair votes I. It is continued. And I note also I think we got two written comment letters uh tonight that would be part of this record as well. So, just we should get those. Make sure the applicant gets those and they go into record for the council's consideration.

The hearing has been continued. Thank you everybody for your help on that. Chris, let's try again.

So, this is also a public hearing. I believe there's a script for this as well.

Joy, go ahead. I call to order a public hearing relating to resolution 2606. Resolution adopting the consolidated fee schedule for the city of Hood River for the 2027 fiscal year. Let me begin with a description of tonight's hearing. First, staff will provide an overview of the consolidated fee schedule. Then we will take public testimony and finally we will close the hearing, deliberate, and render a decision on the proposed resolution. Final adoption may occur in the regular portion of tonight's meeting. That's tonight's procedural introduction. And if anyone has any questions about the process as we go forward, feel free to raise your hand and ask them during the public testimony portion of the hearing. A quorum of the council is present. Do any counselors have any conflicts of interest to disclose in this matter? May we now hear from staff?

Um so at our last council meeting, uh we reviewed the consolidated fees. Uh in review, many of the adjustments are inflationary adjustments. That's a process decision goes through every year to make sure that fees are keeping track of inflation. Um there were some fleas fees that were increased um for other reasons. Those were reviewed uh with council at a previous meeting. Um resolution 20260 uh is presented to council for formal adoption which adopts this fee schedule. Um there are some additional changes uh that were based on feedback from council at the last meeting. Um, in the planning section, uh, the parking in L fee, there is no change from prior fiscal year. Um, that was, uh, that was requested pending future council discussions. Um, additionally, in the planning section, there's an adjustment to the street the street trees fee. Um, uh, that has been corrected to provide for a 3% annual increase. um TNC licensing which is in the business registration section of the fee schedule. Uh there is no change from resolution 202504 which is the resolution that was passed by council and outlines the TNC licensing fees. Um there was a question on building fees with regards to the demo fee. Uh the demo fee was uh raised to $110. This is an intentional increase. Um, and it's calculated as $50 for inspection, $30 for intake, and $30 for permit issuances. Um, and lastly, on Stratton Rose Garden, uh, there was a, um, inquiry with regards to the three-hour rental, uh, and whether or not, um, that should be addressed or changed. Uh, the, uh, at this time, um, staff is not recommending a change from the three-hour time rental. Um, the recommendation is to maintain the three-hour rental consistent with past and current practices. The parks

intended as a small venue to gather for a short period of time, and the fee increase was to address more frequent use and maintenance required thereof. Um, under current operation guidelines, the city does not experience complaints from neighbors, staff, or park users that would indicate any immediate need for change at this time. Um, so it's recommending this the same throughout the moment. Uh the uh the completing schedule is attached as an exhibit to the resolution and uh the staff is recommending adoption. Thank you Chris. Do any counselors have questions of staff before we take any testimony. Thanks for the followup on each of those items that we called out last last time. Okay.

Uh Jen, has anyone signed up to speak online? I do not have an indication that anyone in the room wishes to speak if I missed that. Does anyone wish to speak to us about our fee schedule? In in that case, I will now close the public hearing and open council deliberation.

Doug. So, Chris, thank you. Um, remind me so procedurally if there is something that's in this fee schedule after coming out of the budget cycle that we say, well, maybe that should be higher or lower or whatever, how are those types of singular changes addressed? uh sever several options. Um there can be a discussion and there can be a request for a change. Uh we can make an amendment to the fee schedule. I would assume that the uh the um motion would be to adopt right the resolution with the amended changes as discussed by council. So if it's something that you want to immediate change for, you can discuss that here. Um uh and then obviously it it can you know any fee at any time can be adjusted subject to an updated resolution.

Okay. And I'm just thinking about specifically the the TNC's we decided to keep the same versus making changes because we want to talk about what changes might be better. There's a couple parking things we talked about. So those we can speak at a later date, go through our normal agenda setting process to to disclose those. Okay. Yes. So the TNC actually that's a that's a that's an example of how that process was done. Uh that was something that was added to the fee schedule. Um after the adoption of the fee schedule, it was passed as separate resolution. So something along those lines could be as a separate. Okay. Thank you. Eventually I'm looking for a motion but I I don't want to rush this along. Go ahead.

Thank you. Okay. What happens if after the budget cycle, Chris, we decide we're not going to make any changes to the fee schedule for this specific section at this time, but definitely something to put on the parking lot for our next year for 27. Oh, and again, that would be I mean discussion with staff, right? We can make sure that that gets addressed uh in the future free schedule. Absolutely. All right. Well, I move that the city council adopt resolution 2026-06. Moved by Rivera. Second. Second by stina. Further discussion. All in favor?

Yes. I opposed. Chair votes. I motion passes. Thank you all. Great. Um just one quick other note. This was not part of the fee schedule, but there was a request with regards to an update um on tribal parking usage. Um and so uh in 2025, this would be the first year um after tribal parking was passed, um 15 passes were issued to uh to eight tribal members. Um in 2026, uh 26 passes were issued to 16 members. Um and in in general, the the project has been uh received positive feedback from from all passholders.

Remind me how we're marketing that. Is it that we're connecting directly with like Cric for example or Dawn at the next store? How are we marketing? Yes, I think both of those are correct. Also, uh when it was launched, it also appeared on our website. I believe there was still a link to them. So, and Don was frankly quite involved in in formulating this. We had some good conversations there. She's such a val for me a valuable uh connector to a whole different part of our community. And it Oh, sorry. I thought Can you just repeat that stat again? What did you say in 2026? It was 26 people. 16 members. Correct. Multiple vehicles.

Oh, that. Okay. Okay. Wanted to make sure I heard that right. I would also add to those statistics that if someone has a tribal issued license plate, they don't need a pass from us. We already know to watch for those vehicles. So, the actual number of users may be hollow. moving on then. Thank you very much. We have the revised consent agenda. There's no uh amateur radio. There's minutes and the third quarter fiscal financial report that we have discussed previously. I move that we pass the consent agenda. Moved by Stino. Second. Second by Gakei. Discussion.

All in favor? I. Yes. opposed. Chair votes eye. Motion passes. Thank you. Two action items. The Merurl.

Thank you, mayor and city council. Um as a reminder, this is the uh state grant program that helps support moderate income housing production. So housing that's affordable for um uh households earning up to 120% of AMI. uh which is that uh kind of 80 to 120% has been that donnut hole of affordability that's been really hard to fill. And so the state uh started this grant program uh financed by 0% interest loan from the state that is then repaid by tax increment produced by the subject housing um that received the grant. So the um city of Hood River uh was uh asked to uh consider this by the big big river community land trust and we expect that they were going to be the first applicant uh for um a proposed housing uh development over on Avalon Way. Um the council uh city council then contracted with the urban renewal agency to administer the moral program citywide on behalf of the city which is why I'm here and we adopted the enacting ordinance for the Merurl program on March 30th. Um so what we have uh for you today is supplementary um program rules in the form of a resolution. And the reason why it's in the form of resolution is some of the u these are the uh auxiliary aspects that we may want to revisit more regularly um than what was required to be in the enacting ordinance itself. Um so uh some of the key aspects of the program rules in the resolution uh in front of you tonight resolution 20 uh 20268 um basically revolved around making this as simple to administer and low cost to administer as we can. So we place the burden uh on income verification and much of the compliance on the applicant. Um we uh in uh include providing the grant uh amount in uh tanches based on

construction milestones which limits our risk. Um and then I also note in here that um we uh include a 20% penalty uh which is the what is the maximum authorized in statute um for false uh statements um knowingly false statements from applicants. Um, those are some of the high level um, pieces, but I'd be happy to dig into it deeper if you'd like or just um, answer any questions. Dana,

I have one question, but it's not about the resolution. I think it's good. I just I think I've asked you this before and I I can't remember what the answer was, so I wrote it down again. Um, how does the Merl program impact special districts? Again, how does that work? Just like an urban renewal uh district, it's basically a single parcel or single development urban renewal district. Um that uh only lasts for the term of the moral loan, which is assumed to be 10 years, but can be as much as 15 years. Um and so all the tax increment that's generated by that development is redirected to repay their Merurl grant at 0% interest to the state of Oregon, which will then be recycled for more more merl grants. Um so for instance if we did this with Big River Community Land Trust the initial taxable value would not uh go to would not acrue to any overlapping districts for probably the first 10 years.

One last question. Um is there a prepayment penalty if they were to repay the loan ahead of time there? Is that allowed? Can you pay? There's no mechanism to do that and it's also at 0% interest. So, I couldn't imagine the motivation either to do it. Okay. I'm just curious. Thank you.

I forgot my packet, but thank you, Jen, for giving me another one. And on that one, I wrote a question around the grant trenches. So, this is um given upon construction milestone. So, does Big Riverland Trust have the initial money for like phase one to start that before the first milestone where the loan starts to pay out?

Um, they will uh when they're uh get a lift grant that they've applied for. Um, that's really the missing puzzle piece there. Um, yeah. Uh so we just we kind of uh that's really big compared to this little piece. So

So then given that they are they're gonna have lift funding, is that something or additional language that we should add here like for phase one before a milestone is reached? Does the city would the city like front money to that builder developer until milestone one and then get reimbursed for example? Um no I think well so we've set this even though Big River Community Land Trust is the catalyst. We've set this up to be um a uniform program that any qualifying entity could apply for. um whether or not the city would want to get involved um kind of outside of this to to supp I I think that's a different question than the moral program itself um the resolution in front of you tonight if that makes sense. That's kind of a question. No, I hear that. And I'm I guess I'm really not suggesting that the city be responsible or liable for that, but sounds like they have not secured lift funding quite yet.

Correct. This is our first charter or pilot, which I understand as well, but as we continue to move forward, how are we mitigating risk that they have enough money for the first milestone before this kicks in? um uh we haven't taken any direct role or direct responsibility in making sure that their project meets any sort of specific timeline. um you know we were asked to do this moral program and so we're doing our part but it's um

guess a little different than Maraposa village where it was a city sponsored project but um if the city wanted to get more involved I I think that's a a much larger question probably um and has with budget um you know within the context of budget constraints as well

this I mean this is incredible work well thank you so much for for getting us on board and and for big riverland land trust for being the pilot. You know, uh I know that you were present at the Tucker Road, right? So, it's so exciting to see that they've made this work. Uh hopefully fewer bumps in the road for this project as we continue to hopefully have more in the future. That was just one question I was thinking of is this is based off of milestones. What if for whatever reason this individual organization doesn't receive additional funds upfront? like how would they move forward and not necessarily saying that the city should be liable financially for that but as we think about next steps moving forward. Yeah, I would u maybe just add that um our toolbox will be much bigger on uh so say this had happened in the westside district um where we have westside urban renewal funds that's a whole different toolkit to bring to bear and then um if the housing bond uh as it develops and moves forward if it if it is referred to the ballot and if it's ultimately successful that would certainly be a big chunk of flexible funds where we could take a more active role certainly. I I think your questions um gladis are kind of helping me think some things through. So I think the land trust came to the city and asked us to help put this program together so that when they're ready to begin that I mean I know that they're like starting that program but they'll they'll actually we're just putting up the framework to have the program um for that particular project that they would hope to utilize this for. They'll come and apply to for it when they're ready. Right. So, they probably won't apply for it until they actually have the the lift grant.

Oh, yes. So, we don't have to worry about like we're not actually putting any money out or doing anything in or doing anything. We're just setting up the the mechanism by which the program can be implemented for anybody that qualifies for this particular program at this point. But then, yeah. Is that correct? Absolutely correct. I'm sorry if I was missing that. It was really a timing question. Okay. Other questions for for Whip. Resolution. Yeah. Suggested motion in your packet.

Like to make a motion. I move that the city council adopt resolution 2025-08 instit. Oh, it says 2035 near. Let's make it 2026. Well, let's get it right. it my my my line 26 26. Okay, great. Okay. So, I move that the city council adopt resolution 20268 instituting supplementary moderate income revolving loan program rules. Moved by Stina. Second. Second by Gakei. Uh any further discussion? All in favor? Yes. I opposed. There motion passes. Thank you. data center.

Thank you, mayor. At your last meeting, you had a conversation about moratorium for data centers. So, we've come back today with a uh proposed resolution, and I do want to turn to the city attorney. Uh I think this is kind of an unus unusual use of moratoria and just want you to kind of understand uh the unusualness of this um uh before you take this action. So, I'm gonna turn it over to Dan.

Sure. Um, what I have to offer, it doesn't uh suggest that you don't do this, but understand state law regulates in a pretty comprehensive way local governments adopting moratoria. Um, it's a land use matter. So, it's covered in chapter 197, which is the statewide comprehensive land use planning statute. Uh and the statute anticipates that most moratorial will be based on uh lack of public facilities, sewer, water, streets. So it's kind of like we'll shut this down because we don't have water. And it anticipates a limited duration, maximum of two years to fix that problem. And then it says also there's another uh kind of general category compelling need. So in these kind of moratory that that you've suggested for data centers, it's akin to a common model that we've seen in the past decade or so, cell towers and short-term rental moratorium and kind of a new uh thing, development thing that was launched out on the American market and local governments don't have the code regulations in place to address them in a way that the local government wants to. So they said, "We're going to shut this down," meaning we won't accept applications, process or approve applications. So remember, it's a land use type thing um for these until we get our regulations in place. And it requires a certain amount of process, a certain amount of handshaking with DLCD uh prior to doing that uh which we haven't done yet. we could kind of stall this and go through I think it's a 45day prehering notice and requires a public hearing um uh prior to adoption and when I've done these in the past it's been kind of a more pressing concern so for

example a lack of public facilities in one case so you're shutting a door and and uh as developers are trying frantically to get in this case you you don't have that problem you don't have a land rush of cell towers wanting to site uh and in this case data centers. You don't have a land rush. So um you also have in the near term maybe by the end of this year the uh adoption of your comprehensive revision to the development code in which would be the vehicle for addressing standards for these things. Um

so as Dan and I reviewed um I definitely heard from you that you didn't want to make this a big project. you weren't looking to add workload. You really just wanted to be clear kind of on your stance of data center. So, uh Dan and I are comfortable with the resolution that's before you um and not going through the full process. If someone were to challenge the mortoriia, then we probably need to go back and follow the DLC process or uh you know or take some other action. So, I just wanted you to be aware of that. Um we both think that this resolution is appropriate uh in response to your request.

Thank you. uh if you don't mind I'm I'm going to preach a little bit here. So I mean I don't I read some newspaper like there is a head spinning amount of investment occurring in this area. So while there is perhaps not a land rush of cell towers there is an awesome amount of uh investment happening in AI data centers computing power etc etc. big piece in the Times this week about the insufficiency of our electrical grid backbone to meet the needs like nearly right away. Um I I was approached by two different individuals unsolicitedly about this. One of whom said basically you guys are silly for doing this because data centers are always 40 acres and you don't have a need. And another person who said the second floor of the sprint building, the county administration building is a data center by by any definition. And I realized, well, I don't really I I can't refute that. Like, I don't know what a data center means. But, um, in my opinion, break neck speed is not an inaccurate description. And it just seems like before somebody figures out a way to squeeze it into what we do have, I'd love to have a moratorum.

Well said. I agree with what the mayor just said. Um and Dan you'd mentioned that sort of the impetus for this was we were discussing as part of the development code changes uh you know uh language to be in there to reflect this without you know a moratorium being needed but given the breakneck speed of what's happening and the amount of money and investment that's going into this uh and out of the abundance of caution I think it's it behooves us to

last time the pause button however ever. If if we if that's more difficult than changing the code, I'd say let's change the code. The the timing matters because not so much that um you'll have the new code in place before um uh you know relatively quickly and the and the industry can address that. my view, you'll have the code in place before any uh legal challenge gets heard through LUBA or through a DLC enforcement order, you know, before you by the time that comes to fruition, you'll have it adopted. So, that's kind of the time frame I'm looking at. um not that you you're going to have a land rush of development proposals. It's any potential uh enforcement order and what they but my work with data centers is limited. I represent uh Moral County where there are a lot of big data centers. They do need a lot of space. I I think what you're referring to Paul is a what we call a telco hotel kind of a switching center. Um but data centers need like you the Dows one is 30 acres, another 40 acres and another 90 acres have three of them. Uh in Mororrow County they're much bigger than that. So that gives you some level of what they're looking for. Also what they're looking for is love from the community and this would express lack of love which is I think the message you want to send.

Thank you guys. But what about So I think what what we're saying is let's put a pause until we have our code put in place, right? And I hear you saying like that could cause a potential issue issue. So then do we add language to say that, you know, we will re-evaluate during our code review because we have other things in our work plan that we're trying to take care of. I hear the points that both of my peers are bringing and absolutely agree. But what is to prevent like a private property owner to that has 40 acres of land to say, "Hey, I'm going to build a data center with this." Um, with the revised resolution has a provision that says during the term of this moratorum, the city shall undertake analysis and public process necessary to develop appropriate policies and regulations and standards governing data center development. So that's what you're going to do.

We're just policy. Yeah. And it it kind of tells the industry like you know to the extent you want a site in Hood River you know we don't have 40 acre industrial sites and I wouldn't recommend you sacrifice them for this use that you know go somewhere else until we get this figured out and I think it sends that message that's the message I think you want to send and um you know I don't think you're going to get the cell tower cell industry would sue you to get a moratorum lifted I don't think that data center industry is and they'll go to the Dallas where they're loved. They go to Primeville where they're loved or these counties where they have uh port districts that love love love them.

And um I have a question for Justin. How many uh center applications have we received today? I think I know

uh we have not received any data applications or data center applications today. However, uh we have included in the draft code uh some placeholder because of its you know it is it is becoming a more prevalent use that is conspicuously absent in your code. That was drafted at the time that the Rotary vote and was the number one data center that were made by Mobl. Um, so trying to bring that up to up to speed is important, but no, we have no applications pending. Have you have you had any pre-applications or any inquiries about this as a a potential use?

No pre-application. No one who was outrightly stating that they want a data center. And I'm I'm curious to to um Glattis's point of like a private home uh land owner if they wanted to um put a private a data center on their property, they'd still have to go through all the right zoning and permitting and have like, you know, you couldn't just throw one up. Yeah. This is not I don't think under even under a current code would be considered a use by right. Okay. Yep.

Okay. Thank you. Um it I I think I had said at our last meeting like I it doesn't if if our legal council is telling us it doesn't hurt to have it in place um I'm not opposed to it but I I'm you know based on the research I did and I'm not an expert either but you'd have to have for a small data center 10 to 20 acres um and then for like anything for AI or cloud it was 100 to 300 acres Um the other kind of key aspects that a data center developer would want is access to high voltage transmission lines um nearby or new electrical substations with long-term power contracts uh fiber connectivity and cooling and water. And I think that I've learned actually that there is fiber underneath the Columbia River. Um which is one reason why they like our area. But I would think that um or I guess the boards in general and we're talking about Mororrow or um I I think they you know yeah some of these other places but um I I don't see this as a particularly immediate threat. the resting council thinks this is a good idea.

Uh I'll just say counselor um that the speed in which this is being implemented throughout the country is break neck um unprecedented uh industrial revolution 2.0 sort of stuff. Um, and a lot of the things that you just mentioned about, you know, data centers requiring this, this, and this, uh, they're violating themselves, such as power grids. You know, we're seeing the potential use of generators, diesel fuel, that sort of thing to be able to operate these these data centers. They're trying to get the infrastructure put into place uh, in in the AI race. So whoever wins that, you know, in the estimation of everybody that's out there sort of uh in the accelerationist camp that's saying we should, you know, whether it's Oracle or other businesses that are doing this right now, um they're trying to get as much land as they can, spending lots of money doing it and not making the wisest decisions in a lot of cases just to sort of put the stake in the ground. So, um, yeah, that's, so for me, that's why it's not quite cart before the horse because the the speed is just just unprecedented. So, for me, yeah, that is if there was somebody that was making an application tomorrow, all that sort of stuff, like Dan said, I'd want them to know that Hood River uh is not a community that's willing to bend over backwards, reszone, do things to take land that we have to be able to accommodate the data center. there's a there's a lot of cities that are really interested in this model because it's a lot of funding that they'll get, you know, in terms of tax revenue and whatnot. So, failing cities that are put in the position um that have budget lows to say, yeah, let's let's do some resoning because man, we can make a whole lot of money here. And I think for us uh based on conversation so far, I don't think ethically we're we're there to to do that sort of thing. So, abundance of caution. I'm personally fine with if it gets challenged, let's

let's cross that bridge when we come to it. But, you know, definitely looking forward to the development code having language in it like it says here in the resolution to uh more accurately address modern technologies like this.

My um I I I understand that and I appreciate that perspective and you probably have done a lot more on this than I have. I also think, you know, beyond just data centers, what what is the message that we're sitting at sending as city council of, you know, to businesses that want to be established here? Because, you know, we've all heard about our budget deficit for next year. And, you know, I I think that maybe it's worth at least stating for the record that we're not opposed to any businesses coming to River. Um, and I like I just think that that that um we might enjoy not or not enjoy a reputation of being a place that's not particularly easy to build or develop or um plant your stake and start a a business here. And um I just if if it's if it's not an immediate threat, I guess my mind is going to if this is not an immediate threat, are we inadvertently telling uh industry that we don't want them here at all? And that's not the case. I think we we probably would want responsible, you know, good industry to come here because as much effort as we're trying to make in putting in affordable housing, if we don't have jobs here and we don't have industry here and we don't have like if if people aren't here investing in business, then um you know, yes, we we'll we'll still have demand for housing because people want to live here, but we're we're trying to promote a vibrant community with with businesses and schools and housing and all of those things. So that's where I was thinking about

then.

Thank you both. I understand both perspectives, but I think this is really just a let's put a temporary pause on data centers. I I do agree and understand and agree with you that we don't want to be a community that um doesn't welcome business, but I think with this one specifically, we've seen examples of the secondary impacts to the environment overall. And until we get our code up to date that it's just let's put a pause on this until staff has more time to dedicate to additional work to figure that out. And um there has been evidence of you know smaller data centers and larger ones. So I hear both perspectives but I think this to me is really clear that we are saying let's put a pause on data centers and not all businesses overall.

Yeah that's the same point I wanted to make. It's about data centers. I'll also make the point that personally I don't think any business should be able to do business here and we should be uh not not uh uh what's the right word I'm looking for not peacemeal look at every single business and say yes or no or yes or no but we have you know for example big town here you know that was put into place so there are some businesses that were saying no to um but specifically this is data centers it is a resolution There is a suggested motion in the packet and and a revised resolution for your consideration. It came

right that was sent to the Do I need to note the revised resolution? Does it have a different number than what's in the packet? Same number. The motion is still the same. Okay. Um, I move that we adopt resolution 2026-07 establishing a temporary moratorum on data center development within the city of Hood River through December 31st, 2026. Move by second. Second by Rivera. Thanks for your good conversation and discussion. You guys appreciate you. Uh, all in favor? Opposed? Chairside. Motion passes. Thank you. Okay, debrief.

Thank you, mayor. Uh, thanks to those of you who were able to attend last Thursday's town hall. Um, I think folks appreciated the opportunity to speak to you directly. Um, I think maybe to open just uh your thoughts and comments. you all um those of you who were there had an opportunity to give comments back to the group and then I had kind of identified three categories of what I think I heard of uh potential areas where the city can support the community and then of course I want to hear from you and then uh if you have any action for me to come back at a future meeting. So um I guess I'll if it's okay with mayor to just say maybe start with debriefing and then turn it back to me for kind of action items. Sounds great.

Anybody want to kick off? Uh yeah, and forgive me if I step over or if you if you feel like some of these things that I talk about that's that is one of the three buckets, please let me know. Please I'll take notes as you speak.

Yeah. So um couple things. Number one, I think that uh one of the overarching themes that I recognized that that uh TA also called out was just like a better framework for working with the city and how you know in this this example, the Hood River Latino Network and some other organizations that we work with just respected that the city was working with with them, reaching out to them. Um I think as we want to speak more about our you know framework for community engagement this falls under that bucket but I I would just imagine you know going forward because you know I don't think we pass a resolution or something like that and then this goes away right we we have to keep uh evolving as the federal government changes tactics uh as surges come and go much like inclement weather right which is I think an emergency declaration is still pertinent here, right? Um, so I I think that in the spirit of that and just reaching out more to these community organizations, I would recommend something like a like a committee uh to to meet with the city uh with, you know, having a couple counselors present like we do for other committees on this particular type of topic. so we could engage those community partners uh in a in a more structured way um versus uh kind of haphazardly going out. Um I think the amount of work that was done to to sort of do that in the absence of a engagement framework was tremendous and I applaud the staff and all the organizations involved to sort of get together and just not wait for some giant community framework to be to be developed. I think this serves as a an example of what we could do and I think maybe one of the actionable items we could have is something like a committee that that meets uh regularly um until this

threat goes away um and through that uh be able to build some good bridges to these organizations that do work on so many other things other than you know dealing with this ICE issue. Um so that that was one of the thoughts that I had uh that I wanted to open with. Um, I want to acknowledge the work that Jackie did to make that come together with our partners and I really appreciate all that you did, Jackie. Um, I was I have to say the most positive takeaway um that I had was I really appreciated the opportunity to listen to our community without the three minute, you know, con time constraint. Um I I was a little disappointed and it's not in anything in the efforts that our partners did or that Jackie did, but uh we had um I think four people speak and two of them were actual community members that talked about their specific experience. Um and the other folks I are are um Gorge community folks that I really appreciate and valued their input as well. And but I have to say that my very favorite part about that whole experience was really just getting to um to hear directly from the people that are in our community. So what I'd love to see is, you know, maybe something a little less structured um and just a a town hall opportunity where, you know, um we we have an opportunity to be somewhere together and allow people come and and speak to us. To that point, Anna, uh, I was with Commissioner Phil Brady from Moscow County this morning at another meeting and he's so impressed with what we did and he thanked me and I so I passed that along to us and he's excited to work with the next door to set up, you know, some sort of a similar communication opportunity for his his commission. So,

our our ripples are spreading outwards. And the second thought I have as both you guys were talking was what if we kind of fold in my equity advisory council to a more kind of like a councilwide group. I on on the regular have an opportunity to sit at a small table and chat with folks from you know less represented minority demographics of our city and it's very valuable to me and let's let's broaden the access for that perhaps. Yeah, I want to thank Jackie and staff for for all the efforts to to get a town hall going and for the listening sessions overall. Like I mentioned at that meeting, really grateful for this council for doing something, for saying something. Agree with both of my peers that would love to better leverage some of the committees that we already have and all the other community groups that are already meeting to continue having these discussions. there are a lot of resources out there that are available to those individuals and and services that the city for sure doesn't uh have the capacity to house like mental health support for example. Um the other piece is you know just really excited to to start talking about how do we cocreate policy together and that I think last Thursday was the first step in being able to do that. We all are, you know, connected to constituents and have a general understanding and assumption, but it's really important that we are bringing our public into this into these conversations whenever possible so that we're we're writing policy uh together. And the other item that I was going to bring up is just the importance of really leveraging our partnerships that we have. Um, you know, we could all visibly see in the crowd that we did not

have a lot of Latino representation, which I think we all expected to do so. But as we message this, could we have taken opportunities to message more with our community partners to ensure that we are inviting and even if that meant one of us creating a video like, "Hey, you're invited. We'd for like to invite you." whatever it may be, so that folks continue to want to engage with us and to understand this is an opportunity. So, I look forward to future community engagement framework conversations where we can talk about what town halls or community engagement looks like or outreach in general in the future because I think it's really really important. So, thank you.

Great. Back to you.

Thank you all. I think um the things that you said reflect uh my own experience there and I very much appreciate you being there and again for Jackie and uh the folks at the next door who really put that together and uh the superintendent uh Newton and um the person from uh Center for Living and Leslie from MCAC uh who all represented their agency's experience, the clients they serve and the and their employees. I thought that was a great um perspective. though as I um and Jackie debriefed this kind of identified uh three kind of buckets or categories many of which you've already touched on and I think the first one um I have Janet's uh comments here as well so I went had a chance to go over them and there's a number of comments about just wanting to connect to city council more directly. So I think that is one of the action items we can think about. Um could be uh chances to meet people on Zoom or in person or in places around the community making you a bit more accessible. So thinking about what that might look like. Um I know councelor Cavaleri has at times mentioned uh office hours. Uh Mayor Blackburn has held pie with the mayor. So uh think about that and maybe uh Jackie and I can create some of those opportunities or publicize some of those opportunities. The other piece of that would also be um going to places where people are already gathering, right? Not expecting them to come to us, but for us to be where other people are. So that was the first piece, council's direct connection to um to our Latino community, to our immigrant community, to those that are never, you know, might never come to council. Someday I hope they run for council, but uh aren't here now. The second was uh to connect with organizations who are doing the work. we are not the social service providers or the legal experts or the mental health experts and so really looking for ways that uh we can support them. Um and that can be through council's presence by being serving on their boards by you know approving letters of support for grants that they make. um you know uh hearing from folks. You know certainly

we can invite them in to do formal presentations but also you uh in the community, talking to um people that you know who are who work or on boards for uh nonprofits. Um uh providing personal support you know in your own personal life if you choose to. Um or you know coordinating as just said uh meeting with folks finding out what they're doing and where we can be helpful. Um, and then also could be uh financial support if the city chose to uh to do that under the emergency order. Um, and I think the other piece that councelor Rivera said to me earlier today was just a who does what. And so um being able to communicate so that we know if someone came to us, I'm looking for legal support. uh you know I'm I'm looking for um food delivery that we have a better sense of where we can reasonably send folks and know that they'll be able to do that warm handoff of like I know such and so and so at such and such a place will be helpful as opposed to well I don't know I can make some phone calls um and then the third category I think uh identified was that people really appreciated the chance to get together and talk like they came to talk to you but they also in particular in the listening sessions got to talk to each other and I think particularly I heard in the youth session. Um the participants really appreciated the chance to talk about their fears with other people who were going through the same thing and understood that I don't know if there's a particular city role in that um except if there was opportunity to be convenor or an amplifier of those kind of events as they happen. So maybe just an awareness of that. So those were the three kind of areas connecting with community uh count connecting council to the community connecting the city to organizations and finding ways to support the organizations. And the third one is to build community or create spaces where people can connect with each other. Um so those were the things I identified. I don't know if you have other thoughts on those or specific action items you'd want to see in any of those categories.

Did you have your hand?

Sorry. Uh, I love all that and I would add that uh and I have had a chance to talk to Dan and Abigail about this that in this last session the Oregon legislature did create eight new laws. House Bill 4138, 4114, 4111, Senate Bill 1570, House Bill 4079, Senate Bill 1587, House Bill 4123, Senate Bill 1594. There are already eight laws that really talk about masking and ensuring that if you're going to receive care at a healthcare entity, right? So, there's already a lot that's put in place, we should adopt and update that language into our sanctuary city policy to align with state policy as well or state law. The the second piece around the messaging is I think I it might be better if we're a little bit more directive that to convene these groups together and decide who is going to be the focal point for the peer support groups or for the uh grocery support pickup that is needed. Right? So I think we do need to be a little bit more intentional to direct staff to convene folks or else I don't feel that this is going to happen and that it's really clear like this is a message from from the council from all of us to do that. Um so yeah agree with the video we're getting connected with our partners in the listening sessions that I was in. I also really heard the importance of um building trust and rapport within our police and we already have a video that identifies what our current police looks like that we don't ask for you know social security numbers or any of that for tickets and all that. So I think we need to replay that video that has already been created and as Abiga mentioned designating like a single point of contact or maybe two points of contacts that can help with

all these wraparound services that we've mentioned. And lastly around the financial pieces uh we're in those budget conversations right now. So I think that we should extend this emergency declaration to the end of the year because we know that this isn't going to end tomorrow, next month or in two and that we talk about what are those funds that we could potentially give to a nonprofit organization to support more peer support groups like this for example in the future. So those are three pieces that uh I would like for us to to think about and discuss and that just clearly direct staff um to ensure that we are helping convene a meeting not that we provide mental health support but that you know who's going to do what moving forward and who is that point of contact that either front desk staff are connecting individuals to when they call the city. The last piece, sorry, just the importance of of these actions that this is how we build trust and rapport within our community because there is a lot of distrust in the government and that means us as well. And I know that that's not this council's intention, right, or that we don't want to support folks, but this again continues to show that we are we are saying something and that we are doing something.

Thank you guys. As you were talking, I was thinking about there's some sort of an INR function 211 that I don't feel has like much presence here, but so much of what you're describing should be what they're doing. Is there any way we can get more more mileage out of our efforts in in that way? Does anybody know about how that works? Go ahead.

My understanding is that those resources are not uh up to date to what is here locally. And so I think it's better for us to work directly with the partners that provide these services and that again we have an organization that's connecting and with these wraparound supports because that has uh historically not been kept up to date and given all the financial constraints that the state is in I don't think that's improved. Thank you. I would agree. I think 211 in this area is uh not wellmaintained.

Well they should give us the money then. I think I also want to appreciate um those of you who brought up the framework because that has as you know Jackie had started a framework. She's I think met with each of you about what you'd like to see in an engagement framework um I believe has taken that or is taking that to the mayor's equity advisory group and is also meeting with other stakeholders. So I have that penciled in for uh a meeting in June if that is okay. Anything else? What?

Um, maybe we can chat some more offline, Jackie, because I think I would love to either go with you when you go to the mayor's group or have another follow-up conversation specifically about the engagement framework, please.

That would be great because it's a um the framework is uh will be helpful for this issue, but is not specific to this issue. And so, we want to be thinking about all the ways that the city um you know engages with the public and seeks input. So awesome. Um so I think I heard as um uh kind of some action items were continue work on the framework. Um uh take a look and I'll lean on the um city attorney to help me with this is to review the new laws that were passed by the state legislature and um which of those might impact the city um and and then perhaps bring you a updated resolution if if appropriate. Sounds like some of them are not city specific. there um not for local government from but from hospital or school districts but certainly we can take a look at what um may be involved with us um I think we'll work on a video we can um work with our community partners on that and then just look for opportunities where we can either convene or attend or support um organizations that are meeting and then uh after we finish the budget conversation this is what I heard from councelor Rivera so I'm checking in with the rest of you after we finish the budget uh look at uh potential for financial support That sound Did I capture that? Anything else I'm missing? This is of course an iterative topic. I have no doubt we'll be talking about it in a couple more weeks. So, uh if you have additional thoughts, please let me know.

Is it while we're looking at the budget we're going to look at financial options or after? Uh I think I heard Rivera was after, but um after. Okay. Just when we have a sense of where we are. Yeah. I think yeah when we understand like where we are then at when we bring this back up then Chris will tell us hey there's x amount of dollars that you have I know you gave us a grim picture last week but right like here is what you could potentially give these are the funds that you have available super thank you all um we'll keep working on these things I appreciate it update own council work plan

and mayor I need a minute I forgot to give the PowerPoint to the city recorder so I'm going to join the meeting by Zoom on my laptop so talk amongst yourselves thanks we do I see that you have Teddy Grahams

nice job keeping I'll be right Okay. Where the best remember? Those were the best. No, I not seeing that. You still have So why not?

tons of questions. Uh if I can make it work. There we go. So you'll remember in December of 2024 uh the current council and the previous council got together and decided um the goals you really reaffirmed those same goals that you've had but then identify these projects and they're identified in three different categories critical significant and other critical being if if we've got the resource the first priority for our resources are those critical projects. Um the second if we have uh time, ability, resources, funds, uh the significant projects and then the other projects are often projects that are near completion or aren't completely baked um or we don't have identified resources for them yet. So um as I talk through this uh I have kind of the status but you'll see they're broken up into that critical significant in other projects. So the first one is the good news. Here are the projects that are on track. Um SDC's you completed that last year. uh development code update on track, although it's taken longer uh than we had hoped. We've had some planning activity that has taken that staff away from that. Right now, the Heights jurisdictional transfer uh is a bit on track. We had hoped to get a big pot of money from the legislature for that. That didn't happen. So, we continue to negotiate with directly with ODOT uh bond funding. Um in fact, I believe a survey is going out this week for

software. It's live.

It's live right now. So, a community survey seeking feedback on uh bond funding and we can share that link with you. Um the facilities with police, you know, as part of your bond, your possible bond in November, so that one is on track. Uh and then energy plan. Uh we've had a number of significant pieces. Uh dehydro is almost ready to come online. Um we have electric cars. Uh they are Teslas, not the city's choice. Uh but that was what was available. uh using um funds that we received from the state for those. So, uh those are your critical projects that are on track, they're um while they won't necessarily be done by December 2026, they will make significant progress. Um other significant projects, uh as many of you know, there's a group that's been meeting for more than a year to identify a permanent shelter uh location that is on track. Um, our HR manager continues to do excellent work around employee investment and and then Jackie leads an internal group on belonging as well as we um are working on lots of ways to help folks feel connected to their city. Um, and then the development review process improvement that is like looking at the whole development review process and finding opportunities to streamline that, make it uh easier to understand. Um, so we have a couple different studies going on right now specifically around the building and the engineering parts of development review. And then finally, uh, youth outreach. A number of you have attended, uh, projects and, uh, events with Jackie, uh, to reach out to youth, and I think we've had a good response to that. Any questions on these?

Thank you. um around the youth outreach. I know that I had chatted with the mayor about potentially having youth join his equity group. Um moving forward, will there will there be an ask like or do we know the schedule for when the youth meetings take place at the high school so that we could all potentially attend in the future? Like what are the

I'm gonna phone a friend. Come on up. Yeah, I think every time that we've had um an opportunity pop up, I have reached out with an invite. They've all been at the exact same time, which I understand uh may not work with everyone's work schedule because it's during their uh win period at school. Um but I'll continue to let you guys know as more of those opportunities arise. Um we did invite folks to the mayor's equity advisory group and we do have a um high school student who is planning on joining us at our next meeting. So, we're really excited about that. And yes, when when do they typically take place? Was it like a Wednesday at 10:00?

It is Tuesday from 9:50 to 10:20. Tuesday. And we have been asked to just go and during this period just go to the library and set up like a count like a council kind of office hours. Um, but I need to work out how that works exactly because lots of students are with clubs. So, I'm not sure like exactly how that works. Um, but that one we might have a little bit more flexibility. Is there one coming up for the month of May, for example, where I don't have one quite yet. This we are getting towards the end of the school year um where students are really really busy.

So, we might have a little bit of a lull and then um pick things back up in the fall. Um, I've been in contact with two other groups, so we're trying to get in on their schedule, but it's only a half an hour once a week, and so they have other things going on, too. No, I hear that. Um, if if there is one for this month and you know the date, like, please let me know and I'd be happy to I have a high schooler and so I'm happy to go to school with him even though I don't think he'll like that, but I I can I can do that. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Thanks. Um, I'll try and get one on the books for May. Any more questions about that? Oh yeah.

Um I just want to tag on to that and the youth thing. I know some folks that are participants in the scouts and I' it's been communicated to me that they might have an interest and it might be young. It's younger than the the high school level, but it's still youth in our community. So um I'd be happy to connect them with you if that's okay with you. That'd be great. Yeah. But they've been told to come to one of our meetings. They're waiting for one that's not going to be four hours long. So thanks. Yeah, that'd be great. Great. Do we have um any like estimated time when the jurisdictional transfer might be done?

Yeah. Uh counselor, um it's in the anticipated next steps in uh the packet that we're targeting July of 2026.

Super. Well, that was the really good news. the things that were on track. Uh so things with slight delays um in fact some of them you might actually say are on track um the outreach and equity frameworks. So uh Jackie is working on those and they will be coming to you um you've had an initial conversation with her. She's met with student um with the mayor's equity advisory group or just have some other pieces to work on with that before it comes back to you. And then a new housing project uh really is the amorphous um we called it Mariposa village 2, but I heard that was not the title we should use. So uh a new housing project, whatever that might look like. And at this point that could be part of a um bond measure. Um it is kind of connected and tied to the sale of the Sherman parcel. It could be looking at the Westcliff development. There are lots of different pieces that kind of fall under that category. Um, so they're underway, but they don't really have a timeline or specific action right now. Or lots of different actions, but not necessarily like uh um going to be accomplished in the short term. Um I put taxi cabin rare code update under significant delays, which is a little bit of a misnomer because you have completed the code. Um where this sits is we um have had some conversations with Uber last year and then early in 2026 they objected to the fees that you adopted. Um even though they were fees very similar to another city we had modeled against um and so we kind of lost track of Uber and uh and have made contact with Lyft but not with the right department and keep getting kind of bounced around. So, we have done the regulatory work, but I anticipate at some point coming back to you with some fee information once um Uber Lift or other transportation network companies re-engage with us. So, I'm sorry that's been taking so long. Uh and then just the other projects here with uh slight

delays. The Columbia River Historic Highway. Um this is uh I'm trying to remember it's a ODOT TGM total uh

transportation grant growth management grant uh which is on track but ODOT is a little bit slow in their evaluation. Um I believe they have selected a um contractor for this but it's um it's a little bit slowgoing so which we knew going into it but um it's taking longer. And then the Columbia Cascade Urban Renewal District closeout has been a goal for a while. Um that is simply waiting I think until we um find the final number for the storm water project. So you might remember the waterfront storm water is such a massive project that we've designated some of the um the downtown urban renewal funds for that. Uh we're waiting to see how that pans out before we make next steps on the actual closeout of the district. So those things are on track but they are slower than this your impatient city manager wants.

I have a question around the taxi cabin and ride share. So I do see commissioner Moretti here. So would love to uh are we at some point going to have a conversation with the county to adopt the code that has already set in place? One of the pieces that I learned is you know Hood River is really small. we have a really small demographic, but with the county that is more feasible for them to come and join. And so I'm really curious like we already have a code that's been adopted.

Are we going to have a meeting with the county at some point to say can you just adopt our code or how are we going to move forward with that? So that hopefully that is what brings transportation networks to Hood River. And that's definitely a piece when I have connected with them is, you know, the city is, you know, 8,000 people, but in the summer it can be a lot more than that and the county is 35,000 residents. What we talked about with the county administrator earlier in this process was when uh we were finished and we had the wrinkles worked out that they would create some kind of reciprocity so that they would recognize um those who had been licensed under the city's code. So not necessarily that they would need to adopt our code because if we made changes then they would also have to make changes. But there could be some kind of reciprocity agreement. Now, that will be up to the county attorney and the city attorney to figure out those details if that's the right approach, but that was where we were headed previously.

I've I've already uh started well back a year ago communicating with Lisa Knight Davies about this. We really thought we were going to be able to cross this one off some time ago. Ready to go, but hurry up and wait. Yeah. Yes. So, is it like I mean I see you're saying like if the county's on board then Uber and Lyft might be quicker to start acting here. Are is that going to happen before or is the county waiting for Uber and Lift to come here before they Well, I think they're also waiting for us to figure out the fee part before they worry just fee part.

Yeah, they're standing by in monitoring. I think it's the fee piece that's not having the policy is why I feel like they're taking a long time to respond to us because we are a very small demographic just the city alone. But if we were to say, hey, the city and the county, so you're looking at 27, you know, close to 30,000 people, that might be enough for them to say, okay, well, we are willing to invest X amount of dollars for our licenses for a city. So I think both of those conversations need to happen simultaneously in order to bring them on board.

We every time I talk to them I do try to say this is not like as soon as we get this figured out then you know I'm bringing the whole county with me but what you just said made me think I wonder if uh my partner at the county contacting them would actually hold some weight. So let me give that a try as well. I'll put that on Allison's list on her very long list I'm sure. uh when can we expect to discuss the fee structure for the taxi cab ride share?

So where we had gotten stuck was uh they had suggested a fee schedule that was really much much lower than yours. We had offered them one last um kind of compromise before we brought it to you and that's when we got radio silence. So, we had hoped to bring you a recommendation of like here's where uh Uber andyft feel comfortable and this is where staff um are also generally okay and we haven't heard back from them. So, we could bring it back to you but without their input I'm not sure that the conversation will move anything forward. So, if you know anybody uh who's connected to the organization let me know. Have we I mean I I feel like you have but I just want to double ask

Portland right does this like I'm do they have like a little headquarter office out there or a central office out there for both of these transportation networks where we might just get our Portland folks to try and help us connect. I think we um I mean we had connected with the Portland piece about like how people like get their bars inspected and their background check done but um I don't think we've ever reached anybody who had any kind of decision-making or policym um I definitely have reached out to other city managers to say how do you connect with Uber andyft and generally it's through a portal website now they don't have a human being to talk to I thought could we as elected officials connect with our Portland city councilors for example then

I Portland had a staff person who is a staff person on this issue dealing with as was a liaison to the uh service networks which you and I talk okay offline maybe and there's an Uber office in my neighborhood well that's great that's where yeah but I think that's where people get their cars yeah so I'm hearing the urgency I promise we're working on it all right back to the red slide

okay these are the pieces that have significant delays, some of which are um expected. For example, uh facilities. I said police is on track because you're looking at bond funding. Public works. Uh we recognize that our building is kind of at end of life and we have people working in trailers that uh are not ideal. Um but we don't have an identified plan or source or or you know funding source or anything for that. So that's just significantly delayed. Um other ones uh infrastructure to enable housing. I think believe this was a um thing for public works to kind of take their CIP, their capital improvement uh project plan and um their master plans and to really integrate into what what infrastructure do we need for housing. And so that's just a work that we just need to sit down and and do. Um future parks and open space is really an opportunity based um project. This could be uh you know the Brookside Campbell property which you are in the process of acquiring. Um, so to finish that trail, it could be um opportunities through the urban renewal district to purchase property. Um, it could be, you know, donations of land or or other things that come forward. So that didn't have a specific action item. It was just as opportunities came up. Bike improvements in the transportation system plan. Um I think they are I'm looking at the planning director to say they're I think the some of the safe routes to school no uh the heights were incorporated um and I think safe some safe routes to school projects were incorporated but I think this was a little bit more ambitious than that and I don't think we've done a lot of forward work on that. uh downtown open space. We had one meeting with uh downtown merchants about what it could look like if we were to close a street or or do some community building downtown. Uh we haven't taken more on that, but I have uh been in communication with the Visit Hood River executive director Katie Cadlub just about keeping that conversation or

looking for opportunities. I've met with a number of um business owners who have suggestions on how to make um downtown more attractive, more clean, feel safer, uh you know, attract people um both visitors and residents. So, that one is doesn't have a clear path forward, but we continue the conversation. And then mobile home park preservation strategy. Uh it's on the to-do list. This really, I think, would probably some code work. It might uh end up in some of the code. um not knowing if you want direction. I guess when we get to the code update is do you want that just incorporated in the code or do you want some specific different code but um when we get through the code update I hope that we can start working on that one as well. Right.

I mean can I just for me right and then whatever my peer think peers think the the mobile park mobile home park conversation um should absolutely be included and how do we have those conversations simultaneously so that we can ensure that we are preserving what we have uh here.

Great. Thank you. And then the final ones uh fat oil and grease. This is a really important but difficult project. This will be uh working with businesses big and small about what they pour down the drain. Um the staff at the wastewater treatment plant and our public work staff have been really involved in some of our significant industrial users that and that has by necessarily uh delayed this. And then levels of service for parks. Uh we have not um defined that. I think this was a piece of like if we were to consolidate uh you know different parks, what levels do we want, you know, we currently use Crystal Greens and these are our expectations. If we were to um you know contract with the parks district or someone else to maintain our parks, what level do we want our parks and prioritizing like these are our marquee parks, these are the parks that our neighborhood and maybe get a little bit less um dayto-day maintenance work on them. You know, these are the parks that are more passive and perhaps they don't get intensive maintenance. Um so that is a project that's a little bit academic in nature and we just haven't had the bandwidth to start that.

Um usually during the budget cycle we'll hear a little bit about some of the projects that are related to what's going on in the parks. Y um will we hear about that this time? because I know part of this was like um we talked about for example like the waterfront and tons of use which was awesome but like things got worn down pretty quickly so like uh we we like talked about that during the budget cycle last year um we expect like some of the updates on what's going on with the parks. Okay.

Yep. And uh your public parks director Adam Smith is online so he definitely heard that and we'll work on that during his budget presentation. I would also note you have a parks reserve fund that it's general fund dollars so it's really limited but we do have a capital improvement plan for parks. So I think you know um beach restoration and waterfront uh playground equipment is on this year's list um some updates to the basketball court at um children's park and a new fence um uh gosh and I think there's one more oh Collinsfield fence. though we do the significant big projects for parks are included in a capital improvement plan. And Adam, I love your presentation if you're listening. I'm hoping for look I look forward to that one every single year.

I hope there's some sewer videos because those are my favorite. Great. So that Oh, anything else? Sorry. No, I was just going to say that's those are all of your projects in um in those categories and then I'll stop for questions because then I just wanted to do a retro of the last five years and a quick overview of departments. I'll I'll keep it brief. Yep. I remember that at the last conversation with Adam and when we talked about the waterfront park and and councelor Stpina mentioning just triggered this memory that

there was going to be a conversation with Visit Hood River around you know how are we um if we're going to have concerts downtown right for folks like what does that look like and how is Visit Hood River helping us with the funding of that? I'm curious if if if any of those conversations have happened at Visit Hood River or meetings with Katie, for example, just that triggered a memory or thoughts. Nothing significant in a while, but I can revisit with Katie. Yeah, thank you, councelor.

Great. Uh, as I've mentioned, um, many many projects take way more than a year or even two years to accomplish. So, I thought I'd take just a minute to um recognize things that have been on the plan in the last 5 years um and have reached uh completion um because often they can fall off your list, but they're still underway. So, um for example, uh dehydro uh is not on your list this year, but staff continue to work on on that piece, and we hope to have it come online fairly soon. Um uh the height street safe gam was a huge uh workload. You can see that was that had one, two, three, four, five years of being on the work plan and then was uh you know really accomplished and adopted by council in 2024. So um many of these things span many years and I just want to acknowledge council and staff for sticking to it. It's really easy to get distracted by other things but um these things take time and I really appreciate all of your work. So then we're all good. I'm going to keep going because I know this is so much information. Uh just a quick update on um by department things that are not on the work plan. Uh just kind of the day-to-day work or kind of project work that doesn't necessarily rise to council policy level. So um some things you have seen response to immigration enforcement was not anywhere on anybody's bingo card. Uh but we have spent and you have spent significant time on that. We updated new employee handbook safe routes to school projects. Um, collective bargaining agreements are a major lift. You've heard me describe that as my second job sometimes. Um, uh, and then as I mentioned, a building program study and an engineering program, uh, engineering team study. So, uh, any questions about ad admin? I'm gonna keep going. uh finance, budget, audit, uh and then dehydro, which is such a fantastic project uh and doesn't cost the city a lot, but it does um in funding, but because it comes with a lot of different

grants, requires a lot of grant compliance and reporting. Um I'm really thankful to Chris who has uh led an IT and cyber security assessment. We're just trying to figure out how that fits into the budget. Might see some big numbers this year. Um, and then franchise agreements, the payroll change, as you know, we currently have 24 payroll pay checks a year. We're moving to 26 because of new IRS rules. That is a major train change for finance and for all of our staff and all of the training that goes into it. Um, and then uh a utility rate review. We've been doing storm water. We've

done we're looking at water. until we do a comprehensive water storm all enterprise funds for this next year.

So just as last year was the first time that the city had done all of its SDCs together were um looking to do I think utility rates we have done traditionally done together but looking to do that holistic piece as well. Any questions on finance? All right. If you don't ask questions they're not going to think you love them. Uh fire has a small list at this moment but these are big pieces. Uh the ambulance service area agreement, again, one of those things that's not on your work plan, but was a major lift uh for our fire department and for the county. Um and that is coming to fruition. The agreement, I'm not sure if the county has passed an ordinance on that yet, but that is coming up. And then the ongoing maintenance of the um agreement, including a committee there, the county will have a committee that we will be be a participant on. Um not listed here, it's on the police, but I should have included it. here is um computer aided dispatch which is the 911 system is going through a software upgrade that is a major workload for the county and for um our first responders as well. Collective bargaining agreement very happy to have a new fire chief but you can imagine that was a bit of work um and we're happy to have him on board and uh he's learning a lot. Uh and then we have firefighter paramedic recruitments. We've had a couple people who have moved um out of town and out of state. Uh and so we have some vacancies and it takes a long time to train somebody up. We we have um we're a competitive hire uh employer. I think we'll get a good pool of applicants, but it definitely takes time to bring them up to speed. Uh planning. Um sorry, I should have not started reading all of these because we'll be here all night. Uh but uh Asella is the what the county and the city uses for building program. Um there are some opportunities to share that information more widely with the public so that people can see the status of permits and um other ways. So we're looking at how we can integrate those pieces um and create dashboards. Um the DEEQ space efficient housing grants,

those were the dollar, they were $20,000 a door for smaller, more energy efficient units. Um it's money that the city can bring to the table for the right project and we continue to um uh work with developers in hopes that someone will take advantage of this because it's big money. Um the FEMA flood maps updates, you know, you all watched a little bit of that. Uh parking l is something that you've asked for. It's coming soon. Um parking program analysis. We're always monitoring our downtown waterfront and heights parking just where they are and and what um what we may need to do to um manage them more effectively. Um the RV residential option, that's the tiny homes on wheels that uh just asked for and we will bring that to you soon. Uh short-term rental litigation, in fact, I could tell you now Panabaker will be heard on July 7th in Portland. So mark your calendars. We'll have more detail about that.

9:00 in the morning. I think it's at the old Pioneer Courthouse, but I'll confirm the venue. I think that's what it's 9:00.

Thank you, Dan. Uh, that was brand new today. So, we're excited to have a hearing date. Um, short-term rental and, uh, transient lodging tax compliance software upgrades. You might remember we changed to a new software system to make things easy, but easier for everybody, but it has been a bumpy ride. Software often is. um planning staff are the city's representative to Tri County Hazard Waste and Recycling Board. In fact, I believe there's a um I'll check this and let you all know. I heard on the radio that there's a hazardous waste day coming up in May. So, um you have to register ahead of time. So, make sure to let people know. Um and then, you know, probably the favorite of the day, Western Hood uh subbasin uh TMDL, which is um a study we have to do every five years. This is about Indian Creek, I believe. All right, on to police. Uh, Axon taser upgrades and implementation. Um, CAD, as I mentioned, computer AED dispatches 911. Uh, Lexipool um policy upgrade up updates. Um, many of those have been um about immigration and I anticipate, you know, the Senate bills or the legislative bills that you just mentioned will um be in a future update. Uh we have new vehicles uh which I always think like gosh we should just drive them off the lot, right? You don't but you don't just buy a police vehicle then you have to put your equipment in it and you have to um you know really customize it. Got to put the logo on it so people know it's us. Uh it is a real workload to replace those vehicles. Um patrol recruitment as you know we've um struggled to keep officers so recruitment is constantly working. Police facility um we are looking for a speed uh funds for a speed trailer. I've definitely heard from some of you that it'd be great if we had um you know a trailer that like that could display your speed and we could put that in different places around town. So, we're looking for some outside funding for that. You know, ongoing um mandated trainings both for officers and for our

executive leadership. Um and then traffic grant programs. All right, public works. We're This is the last one, but I gave public works three slides. So, uh this is the first one. These are like ongoing pieces. They might be in the capital improvement plan, but they're not gigantic projects. As I mentioned, uh basketball court, collective bargaining, um elevated sidewalk, uh we don't know where that is going. I'm still waiting. I believe we have a meeting with ODOT May 5th, uh to find out the status of that project and what it might cost for us to exit that project. Uh pavement management, safe route to school improvements. Um 17th is the middle school and then Main Street is um Main Street Elementary. uh the storm water master plan. You heard a presentation from that about that I think back in December. 14 years in the making. We're so close. Uh water system uh pressure zone mapping. Um and then waterfront the two items for waterfront. Um one is the beach renovation. Yes, we have money in the budget to buy sand and it all blows away. Um playground repairs and then the waterfront storm water project which as I mentioned also affects the downtown urban renewal district. uh bigger kind of capital projects. Um all of these are um or almost all of these are line repairs, right? We're going to tear up the street in front of your house and inconvenience you to replace that pipe that is probably, you know, 50 to 100 years old. So routine, but um those are a workload that aren't necessarily um reflected in uh your council work plan. So, I I don't have dates on any of these, but if you have questions about these, I can definitely ask Adam or he can jump on. Um, elevated sewer, that is the sewer that runs along 84. Um, you've known about that project for a while. And then, um, the Hood River bridge sewer water line re relocation, that is a ODOT bridge that goes over the railroad. We run our water and sewer lines on that. And because ODOT is repairing that bridge or

replacing that bridge, we have to relocate our pipes. So, that one is a project that we did not choose, but um we're on ODOT's timeline for that. And the last one, you know how much I love the wastewater treatment plant, and if you haven't been there lately, I would love to, you know, arrange a tour um because this is the time of year to go, right? Don't go visit it in the winter. It's way too cold. Uh big words that I'm not even sure what an anti- degragation analysis is, but we're going to do it. Uh the facility plan that has been completed. I think we're just waiting for um DEEQ to sign off on that. Uh the mixing zone study office upgrades, they just like our city facilities are really tight. So, we're looking at a trailer or an additional building down there for the staff that they house. Um the primary clarifier repair and then um solid treatment improvements. All right. And then my last one here, urban renewal. I think um you are um Will does a great job of keeping you in the loop on these pieces. So the sh we're looking for to sell the Sherman property. Uh development strategy for Westcliff. You approved a contract for us to study whether we can bring sewer to that property. Um bond projects which I just said the community survey uh went live this week. Um the moderate income revolving loan program which you just uh took another action on today. Wow, this feels so up to date. Uh the westside district uh the um modest housing construction incentive. This is to really bring that that multif family and smaller homes, you know, make them even with the larger homes. Uh, and then Mount Adams roundabout design and permitting, trying to slowly slowly slowly move that project forward. Um, and then Heights Jurisdictional Transfer I talked about. And then, uh, the big open house we just had a couple weeks ago. Thank you for those of you who went, it was really well attended. Um, just about Tyler Avenue and and just the ABC streets and what the vision might be there. Um, and then the waterfront close out as I mentioned.

Those were all of the projects. So, just a like I'm exhausted just thinking about all of those, but here's, you know, what you have on your work plan and then a little bit always think of the iceberg, right? You've got this on the iceberg and then down below is all the other stuff. So, just wanted to give you an update on where we were. Uh, answer any questions you might have or any other action you wanted to take based on this. Remind me when we will receive the go back one slide for Westcliffe that report the strategy. Uh May May. Okay. Thank you.

Just a typo. I'm gonna in honor of Ben. It's not the Taylor bike and bed. It's the bike and pen. We're not going to be including any bed place. A bike in bed. In bed. That does sound fun. Thank you. Thank you, Abigail. It's so easy to with all the it's happening to forget all that's happening. Great. Thank you all. Uh and uh thanks to the staff who make it happen every day. So, while it looks like we're near the end, we have three executive sessions. So, we're going to take a little break and then we're going to finish out our agenda.

All right, we're gonna start again, y'all. Ready? City manager comments. You're right. I was I went straight to the executive session.

Let me see here. My comments today are you already know about Pan Baker on July 7th. Uh you know about the bond community survey that is on the line. Um we have a budget meeting on Wednesday. So, please send your questions uh anything you've got ahead of time so that we can respond in writing and get that sent out to folks. Um I'll also note that we're we will I think tomorrow morning we'll try to send you we received a couple letters from different agencies also asking for funding from the city. So, we want to share that with the budget committee. We'll get that shared out in the morning. Um and then thanks to those of you who could go to the Big River Community Land Trust um ribbon cutting that was really special and uh felt really great to see that project come to completion. So, Those are my comments. Madison,

you're beginning to meet the owner. I think that was really incredible. Is new occupant. You know, you we we see it come here, but to walk through it and to see the homeowner present, his name is Brandon, who's really cool. We both like Star Wars. Um, that was just incredible. It's just this full circle moment. And like we did that, you know, through through partnerships, like we all did that. It took a really long time and it just I don't know I felt like really hopeful like we can continue to do more and more and they did uh Big Riverland Trust did have the 42 unit um display of like what would it what it would look like. So yeah like

onward onward. Thanks. Committee reports. Anna, nothing for me.

Yeah, give me one second. Um, okay. Um, the county is having county planning commission is having um conversations around the 49,000 square foot Amazon package delivery center at the lower handle mill. Written testimony has to be submitted no later than 5:00 PM on Wednesday the 29th and it has to include appeal number 26-000035 uh for any individual that wants to give any written testimony for the Amazon packaging delivering center. The MCAC is close to ramping up potential permanent location for the Hood River shelter. The goal would be to have a yearround shelter that would hopefully be open by this winter. MCAC staff is working with the realtor and they are also halfway uh at the halfway point as far as cash and will have a kickoff capital campaign here soon. I also want to mention that the first five units at the annex have been completed for permanent housing and permanent tenants will be moved in on May uh May 1st. There's a total of 21 units there that will um sorry only five of the units will remain permanent. All the rest will continue to be permanent housing. LOC had their midyear conference in Pendleton on April 23rd and 24th. I did miss that one, but the annual conference is October 15th and 17th in Salem. I think that's it for committee comments for me.

Thank you, Doug. Uh there was a Sera board meeting on uh the 21st that I wasn't able to attend. I'd meant to get with Kevin to get uh updates. Um, however, they will be about like more or less recapping what happened in March, right? So, we had a bunch of events happen in March. It's kind of a debrief, but they were going to discuss like the upcoming summer uh student trip as well. So, I'll get uh an update to everybody on that at the next meeting. I got a nice letter from Mayor Awa thanking us for our gracious hosting in March. Amanda, nothing for me. Uh, council comments. Amanda,

I don't think I have any of those either. Uh I just uh want uh to say congratulations to Grant. Uh we don't have to talk about what that means or anything, you know. Um but congratulations Grant and family. Yeah. I have no mayor comments, guys.

I have a couple comments. I just want to thank Jackie, Abigail, and Will for the Hood River Heightscape update at Working Hands. uh we were here talking about the bond so we didn't attend the full uh meeting but my understanding is that it was really well attended in the beginning. So thank you so much for uh all your hard work to get to that together. Uh we already talked about Big River Land Trust, but that was awesome to to get to see and to uh be invited and you know thanks to Abigail and and the rest of our peers including councelor Cavaleri who were there. um you know, opening day for Little League took place and it was incredible to see, you know, there's sometimes that as community we don't agree on things and it's so important to find those commonalities and I just love how sports really bring folks together and you know appreciate councelor Stpina and his time for um coaching. I know it takes a lot of work and thank you to all of our partners um including our very own Eric Foster who is the president for for Little League. Um yeah, it's was just great to be out there. I got a nice little tan while I was out there, so that was cool. Um I also want to talk about wildfire prevention or preparedness. You know, we all know it's going to be a really hot year. So, there is going to be an event that's going to take place on the 29th at the same time as our budget committee at the Columbia Center for Arts from 6:00 to 8 where it's going to talk about, you know, the wildfire risks here in Hood River and learning more about the Firewise program. Um, so we'll hear from the wildfire preparedness in the county, some of the efforts along the Indian Creek drainage to reduce wildfire hazards and then there hazards and there's going to be a meet and greet with some of our wildfire agency partners. So that is on April 29th at

the Center for Arts from 6 to 8:30. and something for us, you know, all to think about. And I know that technically the county leads a lot of these efforts, but how are we collaborating with our county peers to talk about um emergency preparedness overall, but specifically like wildfire prevention given that we already know it's going to be a really hot year. This council has already ban fireworks. Um how do we continue that partnership on, you know, how do we continue working together um for for our community? Uh that's it. Santa,

um I have a lot of the same that Glattus said too. Um it was a really busy couple of weeks since our meeting on I think our last meeting was I don't even remember but um just to name a few was uh the April 16th um Macak supporter appreciation tour at the warming shelter that was really amazing and um the Big River Community Land Trust Tucker Roadhouse tour that was incredible. Uh we had a town hall. We had um the bond commission uh communications training and the budget season kickoff and like all these other things. The last couple of weeks were nuts. Um oh, and I was going to mention to you all that I will not be here for the budget meeting next Wednesday. I'll miss you, but I will watch it um before our meeting on the 6th. And then, um, I just wanted to, you know, given how crazy the last couple weeks were and what we're heading into with with, um, you know, with budget season and stuff, uh, just acknowledge the time and the bandwidth given by our mayor, our city council, our staff. Um, and I also want to recognize the work that entities like Macak and the Next Door and the Land Trust and um, Fish Food Bank and Little League and all of those I mean what really makes our community incredible is all these other organizations that contribute their time and individuals that contribute their time. Um, so I have a quick message to our community is talk to us, talk to your counselors and uh bring us concerns, but also bring us ideas for solutions and improvements and take a turn, participate, volunteer, run for office like you know um that's what makes this really an incredible community is that we're all engaged and involved and um I heard Coach Stpina was awesome at little league. So thank you Coach Stina. Um, that's it. That's all I have.

Thanks.

Okay. Now, it's time for executive sessions. We have three. I'll read the script. City Council will now meet in executive session pursuant to OS192.661D and A and E. to conduct deliberations with persons designated by the governing body to carry out labor negotiations. To consider the employment of a public officer, employee, staff member, or individual agent. And to conduct deliberations with persons designated by the governing body to negotiate real estate transactions. Representatives of the news media and designated staff are allowed to attend the executive session. All other members of the audience are asked to leave the room and we will end the public broadcast. Representatives of the news media are specifically directed not to report on any of the deliberations during the executive session except to state the general subject of the session as previously announced. No decision may be made nor final action taken in executive session. The executive session is anticipated to last 30 minutes. At the end of the executive session, the city council meeting will be adjourned and no action will be taken. We will now discontinue the live feed and recording.