City Council - Regular Meeting

Do do do do do do do. >> The mics are on. Hello. All righty. All right. It is 4 p.m.. Tuesday, May 5th, 2026. And I'm going to call the City of Iowa City work session to order. Uh, welcome to everyone that is in the audience and anyone that is joining online. Hello to you and hello to my fellow councilors and to city staff. We're going to move on to item number one, University of Iowa student government updates. Can't believe it's already May. >> I know.

, almost finals. >> Yes.

So we have two main things for me. Um we're having our lease gap form release soon. Uh, hopefully next week so that we can have that rolling by the time that it does get to the lease gap. And we're still partnering with the graduate. Very excited. We've actually expanded to 50 rooms this year from 40 last year. So it's, it's going to be great. Um, and then we do have an update on our knack house, uh, people have met with the university and right now there's a handful of properties that the university owns that people interested in the conversation can then pick from, and then the house will include all the old murals. If the Latino community chooses to go with that, and hopefully the project will be done by 2028. So before the whole bridge update. So yeah, and next week is finals. So this will be my last city council meeting until we come back in August. So.

All right. Have a good summer. Yes. Wishing you and all the students the best. All right. We're going to move on to item number two. Clarification of agenda items. Hearing nothing. We're going to move on to our information packets item number three. We'll start with April 23rd. April 30th. >> Um I did have a question regarding the, uh, Arpa update in the packet. Uh, specifically, I just wanted a little bit to make sure I understood, uh, when things are said to be in progress, the amount funded versus the amount expended, like specifically for eviction prevention when it's, uh, 1.137 million and it has been funded, set aside and only expended like 200 or $100,000 less than that. Uh, just walk me through where that money is or how it is. Like, what's the plan for reaching the amount funded generally for these items? Sorry if that's an not a clear question >> Uh, Tracy. Neighborhood Development Services Director So we have all that money encumbered. That means we've entered contracts with folks. They just haven't spent all their money out. So they have until, until December. >> Of this.

Year, this year. And then some of them are what we considered under that replacement revenue. So we can continue on and we will do that. We will amend agreements as we needed to. If they're under that category of funds. Okay. That makes a lot of sense. Why it's called amount funded. Okay. Thank you. >> Yep.

Mayor. >> If nobody else has anything I'd like to talk about the pending work session topics. Sure. Okay. Um, May 19th. Um, we have a review of the financial reserve policies. The state property tax legislation that was just passed this weekend that we're still working through, trying to understand, um, has some implications for city reserve amounts. I think it's going to cause us to have to change some of our approach when it comes to reserves. So I would ask for a little bit more time to work with, um, our team, our financial team here so that when we come back to you, we can not only have the discussion that you intended to have on reserves, but we can also advise you with that new legislation means for our existing reserves. >> Mhm. Yeah. Is that okay?

That's fine with me. >> Yeah.

Okay. Thank you. >> All right. Any other item? All right. We're going to move on to item number four, which is a presentation of the 2026 Climate Action Impact Report. Welcome, Sarah. >> Thank you so much, mayor and members of Council, it's always a pleasure to have a chance to talk with you, especially when I've got so much good news to share. Um, the report. Let's see if I can get it in full screen mode for you here So this report came about, um, for a couple of reasons. The first is that last year, as we were nearing the end of 2025, we wanted to do a comprehensive review of all the programs that we had been working on under the accelerating Iowa City's Climate Action Plan, which, as you may recall, designated things to start between 2020 and 2025. So we're starting to look ahead to what the next five years might look like by thinking about what had worked and maybe what could be improved in the previous five years efforts. And the other reason, big reason we did it. And I know you've heard me say this before, is that, you know, we do an annual greenhouse gas inventory that shows how we're making progress toward our emissions reductions goals. But a greenhouse gas inventory really is a much better compass than speedometer. Many of the things you're going to see in this report do have an impact, but that's an impact that accrues gradually over many years as we enroll more and more households into it. It's also really difficult to tease out which program had how much of an impact, um, in part because we're doing so many of them together. And of course, we don't want to take our time and roll out things one program at a time. So we have to do them all together at once. And I argue, I would argue any day of the week that that's a better approach to climate action. Um, but there are other ways of

capturing that value. And we wanted to be sure we were really fully reporting the benefits of this to the community that, you know, when you get right down to it, emissions reductions are good and important goal. But how many of us could say how many tons of air are in this room right now? You know, it's just not something you can easily get your arm around. So we wanted to put out a few other ways of measuring the value of these actions. And that really led us to this report. Um, and I will say, and you'll hear this later in the presentation that increasingly other cities are reaching out to us, our climate action staff. We were laughing just last week. Two of us had the weird experience of sitting in on a webinar for a national audience. And at the end of it, they said, and, you know, we'll be sharing out next week case studies from three cities Iowa City, Iowa, Madison, Wisconsin, and Portland, Oregon. And those of us who are doing what you do watching a webinar, right, answering email at the same time, we're like, wait, what? So we want to make sure that we have the best possible information about our programs out on the website so that other cities can be taking cues and borrowing programs. And I talk about this all the time. One of the things I just love so much about being a civil servant is that you can't copyright a program or patent a city street design. So we want to be sharing these things widely, which gets us to the report. Um, you all can read, I know, so I'm not going to go through word by word on this report. I'm just going to try to give you some broad stroke highlights and talk about some of the things that weren't in the report, because of course, we're doing so many things. One of the big difficulties was funneling all down into just a few key points. But the big thing I want to take away overall is that the way we have worked on climate action for the last five years now, now five and a half is really trying to create opportunities where every resident, every business, every organization in the community has the opportunity to engage with the climate action goals of

the city and help us make meaningful progress moving forward. And I will just say for me, when we were working on this report, I was thinking, it's not all that long ago that I was hired in at the city in 2020, when we had just adopted the accelerated action plans, and almost everything you're going to see in this deck did not exist at that time. Look how far we've come in the five years. I just could not be more proud to do this work in the city. I do with the colleagues I do, and with the support of you as a council. So let's go through some of those good programs. Um, as I mentioned, uh, one of the big visions is that every resident gets activated and the first part of this report really just looks at the community facing programs we offer. Um, one of which is root for trees, which you'll note in the report, it says we've planted over 1700 trees to date. We anticipate we will break the 2000 mark this year. If this last week has been any indicator, as people have been hurrying to get those vouchers before the redemption date of May 15th, it sometimes feels like we're going to plant 2000 trees in the next two weeks, but incredibly popular program. We've learned a lot. We get asked about this program a lot by other cities. And as you can see in this, we've noted a couple of things, not just the value, the increase in property value to residents. You know, obviously we're interested in the energy reductions that the shading for homes can be accomplished with trees, but there also is increased property value from it. Um, in terms of those reduced energy costs and the ecosystem services, which include cooling the air around the homes and helping with stormwater management. Um, you'll note one of the things we did in running this analysis was we looked at what were the ten most popular trees. And I want to point out here, we've got a big number of red buds. And just put a little pin in that because I'm going to circle back to that

idea later. Um, but you'll also see because we want to be fair and transparent that we did include a lesson that we learned early on, which was originally when we started the program, we had a list of trees that were highly recommended to plant. We have since moved to just having two prohibited trees, and that has proven much easier for the nurseries to manage. So that's been a good change to the program. Um, I put it in there in the report specifically because sometimes cities will reach out and say, oh, have you ever considered having a list of recommended trees? And we say, well, let us tell you what we have learned in the last five years. Um, you also are likely familiar with our home energy audits that are offered through the Green Iowa AmeriCorps team. Um, there too, we have gone to over 1200 homes, so quite a few homes have received this service service. It does a number of really important things that help us identify basic weatherization needs that the team will do while they're visiting that home. They also have detected a number of gas leaks. And this recently has resulted in some community services reaching out to us saying, hey, we've got populations that we think could really benefit from having this kind of service. How do we get looped in? And we're happy to say, this is a service we provide for free. And for the last two years, actually, we have been providing it in partnership with the county to widen the scope, recognizing that we often get calls from neighboring communities. So the county pays us for a certain portion of audits to be performed each year. Um, and one of the things I love about that I will say is that, you know, we could do absolutely everything right for climate change. And that does not mean the next flood that comes rolling down the river is going to say, oh, you know what? Iowa City checks out. Let's skip over this town. Like what we need is that broad partnership, regional action. And this program has been a great way to do that. Cedar Rapids now will be getting a team next year and has already reached out to talk to us about cross training the teams to help with their efforts up there. So that's great. The other thing I

want to note about this is I know the last time when I was talking to you for the budget session, we talked about the insulation grant program and how great that is for residents. One of the hesitations we sometimes hear from residents is they've heard that if you put too much insulation in your house will get too tight. Um, and that, you know, and it, it is a possibility. In all honesty, if you seal up a home too tightly, that can lead to mold issues. Um, we actually, through the insulation grant program also offer ventilation and air sealing. It's a comprehensive program that is just a mouthful to say when you're trying to pitch it to the community. So we just call it the insulation program. But we have found it is really helpful to say to the folks who sign up for that, the first thing we're going to do is send out an AmeriCorps team before you ever get insulation, to take a look at the house and make sure it's not too tight, and that's not going to be a problem. Um, and more often than not, what we find is that homes are just a little leaky. And so then we get to talk to them about things we can do to help seal that up, to make their homes more energy efficient. Oh um, so we talk about a lot how these programs are comprehensive. And I'm not going to dwell too long on insulation, which I know you're already familiar with from previous conversations. But I do want to point out this one resident who has participated in the program as an example of how comprehensive and interlocking our programs can be. Um, this is a resident and actually city employee now who had first encountered us through the climate ambassador program. As part of that program, he saw a demonstration blower door, uh, he blower door test. He signed up for one for his home. Um, this led him to the insulation grant program so that he was able to insulate his home. And then from that, he started down the path of getting an air source heat pump, which he put in. So, um, all down the line, he's been supported through programs that the city offers, including, you know, when he went to get that, uh, heat pump installed, he was

able to talk to a local contractor to do that work because we had been providing some contractor trainings related to heat pumps as a side effort. I will tell you, one of my love languages is well done spreadsheets. And this may be the other reason that this resident is on this slide. He has sent us spreadsheets tracking his own reduction in natural gas usage, which you can see he's reduced by 10 to 15%. And just last week, he sent me another spreadsheet following the installation of his heat pump, which he had adjusted for differences in temperature from last year to this year, showing the savings that he's been able to realize through the heat pump over the last year. So that was great. Um, um, you know, another really comprehensive and collaborative program we have is the hers incentive. And I know that I talked to you about this as well at the budget session. So I will just say high level, what has been really great about this hers grant program is not just the savings that we've been able to calculate out. We are speaking of much beloved spreadsheets. We keep a spreadsheet on every home that gets a Hers certificate, because those certificates come with a lot of valuable data that we can use to analyze the new housing stock in Iowa City. And one of the things we've been able to calculate, just adding up the projected energy savings, is that over the next five years, the homes that have participated in this program will be saving nearly a combined $500,000, which pencils out to about $7 for every $1 the city has invested in this program. I think that's fantastic. And last year was only the second year for the program, and we already had one out of every three new homes in the city being constructed participating in this program. So we just in the Climate Action Commission meeting, set a new benchmark of aiming for half of all homes, which I will say two more certificates came in today to be reimbursed. So we're off to a good start. And this year as well. Um, the other thing I

really love to point out about this program is this program really began with one of the items in the accelerated action plan that I will, I will fully own. When I got hired in and I looked at the plan, I was like 65 actions, Wolf. That is a lot. Um, and some of these I had never seen undertaken in a community, one of which was trying to get green designations and energy efficiency listed in the multiple listing service for local realtors. But we very gamely said the plan calls for it. We're going to start working on it. This led to conversations with iCar, the Iowa City Area Association of Realtors. That is actually how we ended up identifying the Hers certificate as something that would be of interest to the realtors, which we were then able to take to the Home Builders Association and say, the realtors are saying, if we can get more homes with this certificate, that they can do something with that. Would you be interested in partnering in this project? And that is how it came to be. Um um, the whole home energy retrofit program is one that I will say. I'm especially proud of. This is a relatively new program for us. It's meant to address a fundamental issue that you hear much discussed in the energy efficiency community, which is how do you improve the building stock in a community without driving up rents? Like how are we going to do this in a way that truly makes it more affordable to live in a community without just pushing that financial burden somewhere else? And so this program actually is a first of its kind for a community in the nation, um, where we offer a pretty substantial grants in return for agreeing to accept housing choice vouchers for the first five years after the improvements are made. We've currently enrolled four landlords. Our goal for the pilot was to enroll five. Um, and we're actually in conversation with the landlord right now, which is really great. I will say the other thing. And, um, I suppose it is not going to make me sound any more nerdy. Having already told you, one of my love languages is spreadsheets. But I will say one

of the other things I love to do whenever I travel is if I know I'm going to be in a city that has a sustainability office, I will reach out to my counterpart in that city and say, hey, I'm going to be in the city for a day. Would you like to have coffee and talk about the most exciting things you're working on? And I will talk about the most exciting things we are. This is a program that I took with me for one of those meetings. When I knew I was going to be spending a night in Lincoln, Nebraska, and Lincoln has since rolled out its own parallel program that's structured a little differently than ours, but is very interesting. And actually, we've been keeping track of both of our programs to try to figure out when we each move out of the pilot stage, which model is going to make the most sense. But I will say one of the things I love about this, and you know, I already talked about how you can't patent a city program is that, um, you all are aware, of course, that Iowa City was featured in the New York Times. For our fare free transit service on that same day, on that same page was a story about Lincoln's program offering pairing affordable housing requirements with energy efficiency. And so secretly, I feel like that is the day Iowa City had its thumb on the Iowa or The New York Times twice on one page, which is really great. Awesome.

Yes. I have a question for that. One is that, you know, the the three what do you call it retrofit program or something like that? Anyway? Is this for, uh, people who have housing only in Iowa City and they want to accept section eight. Or it could be like, house and want to accept section eight or I. >> It's it's in Iowa City now, um, in part because we're using Iowa City tax dollars for it. So we can't do it outside of our own jurisdiction, but that's certainly something we can be in conversation with Coralville about. I'm happy to share the program design. Uh, you know, I went to Nebraska to share it, so why not share it next door?

Yeah, it just because section eight is like, for us, it's just regional. And I that's why my question. Yeah, I know we have to spend dollars in Iowa City.

Yeah. No, no, it's an excellent question. I mean, in my heart of hearts, I would love to see all of these programs duplicated everywhere. And we are actually making some efforts toward that. So this is definitely one we'll want to highlight. Wouldn't it be great if the whole region got known for this groundbreaking program? Yeah. Um, as you also know, we do a lot of work with advancing EV adoption. One of the things that I feel most passionate about is making sure that we are offering opportunities for EV charging at multifamily residences. Um, we undertook in collaboration with several other cities, the Eastern Iowa EV readiness plan. Very early in my tenure with the city. And one of the things we identified in that is that we were well on track to meet our target for publicly available charging. And in fact, we have met and surpassed that. Um, we had set a goal of having 46 publicly available charging ports because that is what we found looking at the studies was the tipping point for EV adoption. Um, and past that, it's still good to put them out, but you're not going to get quite the same bang for your buck in terms of EV adoption per charger installed. But you know, a key finding there and elsewhere was that 80% of charging happens at home. And so fundamentally, people decide whether or not to get an EV based on whether or not they can charge at home. The charging stations in public kind of address some range anxiety, but actual purchasing decisions are based on what's at your house. And, you know, when you own an EV, especially the next three years, as we see more and more used EVs coming on the market, they're an incredible value for those households. They cost a third as much to fuel to get you where you're going. So we want to for sure, make sure that people living in condos and apartments in Iowa City have some opportunity to charge at the place they live. I will say this is another one where there's been some really interesting lessons learned. When we first rolled out this program, we were offering it just for level two charging, which is the kind of charging

that's available in our ramps. Um, the first condo association we worked with said, that's great, but we actually don't even have electrical outlets to support level one charging, which is the charging you can do with the charger that comes with the vehicle you get. And so we said, well, let's work through that together. We'd be happy to support that. So we worked on putting in the electrical outlets to support the level one charging, which was incredibly cost effective for us. It was great for the condo association because some people understandably think, ah, you know, think to themselves, why are we putting an EV charging if no one here owns an EV yet? It's a bit of a chicken and egg problem. But to say we're putting in an electrical outlet that every single person can access in their own parking stall is a clear value add for that organization, and it puts them on the path to being able to support EV charging for every single resident with a garage stall. So that was a real win. And as a result of that, we now offer support for both level one and level two. This is maybe my favorite slide. Um, in part because I just think there's such an incredible list of awardees who've participated in our Climate Action grant program, such a diversity of organizations and businesses and projects. We actually just finished scoring our next round of climate action grants applications this month and have just notified in the last week the winners. So they're going to be about ten more folks added to this slide in the near future. I will say, one of the things that I just love the most about this is we talk about the co-benefits of climate action efforts, right? The ways that it doesn't just reduce emissions, but it has all these other cost benefits. Um, it, it can beautify the community. It can support clean air. There's so many goals. And I know that Iowa City gets it just because you can look at this list and see how many different people have applied for how many different reasons. And I want to highlight just two from this list. One is actually on the list, and one is a recent

awardee. The first one is our Redeemer Lutheran Church, which applied to do a complete LED retrofit in their church and the school attached school facility where they offer day care and early education services because they put in that LED lighting retrofit, they realized substantial savings on their energy bill such that this year, when another daycare facility, um, lost its connection to a church, the church that had that had been housing it had decided to move away from that. This child care service came to our Redeemer and said, do you have space? Could you take us in? And our Redeemer sat down and said, you know what? We're saving so much money on our electricity bill. We think we can house another child care operation without concern about driving up our operational costs. And so as a result, these childcare positions were able to be preserved in the community because of light bulbs. Like that's amazing to me. Um, the other one I wanted to highlight is the Iowa City downtown district, which actually just applied for a grant. We were very excited to get for two electric cargo bikes. And one of the arguments they made in their application was having these cargo bikes would allow them to broaden employment opportunities with the downtown ambassadors, because right now they have to require all their ambassadors, have a valid driver's license to drive the truck. Their hope is to move away from the truck and move on to e-cargo bikes, which will not only be cleaner and less expensive for the program to operate, but it also means they no longer have to have that driver's license requirement. And I just think like those two co-benefits, um, it's amazing to me, you know, one of the things we talk about with our climate ambassadors is a favorite quote of mine from a climate writer who says, you know, the thing about climate change is you can be overwhelmed by the scale of the problem, or you can fall in love with the solutions. And I just love the solutions. And there's so many organizations on this list that

do as well. Um, some of them, we actually included one of the changes we've made to this program in recent years. We used to require a mid-year report and then a final report. Once a project was completed, it was very important to us to reduce the administrative burden as much as possible on applicants, so that we could widen the application pool. And so one of the things we've done for the last two years now is instead of asking them to do a mid-year report, we ask them to come and talk to the Climate Action Commission about their their projects. And I actually Zach Haralson our Climate Action Commission chair has very graciously come out today to hear this report as well. Um, I think it's fair to say that the commission those are some of the favorite meetings. Yeah, just so much. Great. So we wanted to include a couple of quotes and folks in here for you to see as well. Oh, this move so fast. Um, so part of the other thing we do with community facing efforts is we want to make sure that there are meaningful opportunities for volunteer engagement. We hear that over and over for community members. They want to do things out in the community. They want to be working on this together. I think that actually makes a lot of sense on many, many levels, not the least of which is climate change is a lot less scary when you're working on it together with others. Um, it's also a lot less scary when you're rolling up your sleeves and working on the solutions. And so one of the big ways we offer this, I know some of you have even participated in is our neighborhood energy blitz. We just two weeks ago completed our sixth neighborhood energy blitz. We reached nearly 450 homes. We collected about 33 pounds in used light bulbs, which, when you think about how light a light bulb is, it's a lot of light bulbs and about 140 pounds of batteries. Like every shape and size of battery you can imagine. Um, so there's another really fun event. A lot of the folks who come out and participate in the neighborhood energy blitz are our climate ambassadors, which is the training we offer for the community. It's a deep

dive into the climate action plan, where we talk about the different sections of the plan, all the things the city is doing. We try to give them some training in climate communications so that they can go out and talk to friends and neighbors about things that are happening and things that they're able to do. Um, and then those climate ambassadors end up participating in the neighborhood energy blitz, among other volunteer events in the future. Um, one of the things we wanted to try to capture for this report was how many of those climate ambassadors remain involved after they go through the training? You know, you're always going to have folks who want to come and get the information, and that's great. We fully support it. It's good to be informed and it's great to hear what the city is doing. But also we want to make sure folks who want to do be doing those hands on things have an opportunity to do. So. When we tallied it up, um, of the 78 ambassadors we've trained to date, over ten cohorts, 69% have continued to participate within the first two years of graduating, which is phenomenal for a volunteer program like that. On the other volunteer effort we do over the last several years, as we've offered a number of opportunities to engage with data collection, um, here too, I suppose I am flying my nerd flag and saying that I like data collection, but so does Iowa City. As it turns out, we get great volunteer participation in these events as well. The first one started with Spot the Hot, which was a training where we, uh, equipped vehicles with special temperature monitors. We did it in collaboration with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to take temperature readings on the hottest day of the year in Iowa City at three different times a day to just map out temperature differentiation across the city. And this was shortly after the derecho, when we knew there were going to be some new holes in our tree canopy. And this would help us identify, among other things, places we should prioritize for new street tree plantings on that data is also actually now being used by our transit colleagues to help identify areas for future bus

shelters, which is really fantastic. That event was so successful. NOAA actually reached out to us and said, Iowa City, you've got great volunteers. What else can we do? And that led to a cocorahs training, which is a kind of precipitation data training where, um, people in the community can go out and report on the daily rainfall hail fall, which we've gotten a lot of this this spring and snow. And I was just telling the commission yesterday, if you go to the Cocorahs website and scroll in on the cities, you can see where all the stations are. Iowa City is dense with these monitoring stations, and that's in part because we have such wonderful engaged volunteers working on it. And that is really beneficial to us because it gives us hyper localized precipitation data, which helps with future climate modeling. The most recent effort we did was the bike and pedestrian count, where we trained volunteers to go and stand at key intersections and count the number of people going through the intersection who are on bikes. We also had them note who was and wasn't wearing helmets. That was very revealing. We thought the majority of people would be wearing helmets. Not so. Um, there are a lot of ways to interpret that, but it was an interesting data finding. Um, they also counted the number of pedestrians. And then, uh, use this data has already been turned over to the engineering team that's working on the Burlington Bridge realignment project, as well as being used to inform the bollard protected bike lane project, which I know you all have had some information on. Remember many, many, many slides ago, I said put a pin in the redbud data point. One of the things we're thinking about for future volunteer data collection is we've been looking at the National Phenology Network. Phenology is a practice of tracking natural phenomenon year after year, and it can be an important climate change indicator. So you will do things like say, um, when, when do all the redbuds, for example, bloom in the city? When do they put out fruit? And if you do this year after year after year, you don't

just have to say, gosh, it feels like it's getting hotter, you know, now you can actually go back and not just look at the temperature data, but see what the implications are for the area you're in. And so because we have distributed so many redbuds through route for trees, one of the things we've realized is we could be participating in the redbud tracking through this national network to help track the real time impacts of climate change. Um, so we can't say for sure that's the direction we're going to go in. Our staff are working very hard on looking at it and seeing what it would mean for us to enroll in the program. But I would say there's a better chance than none that we'll be doing that. And we're really excited about this as a potential new offering. Whew. All right. So that gets us to the climate fest, which actually, I will say I am proud of many, many, many things that our office does. But this is one of the things I am most proud of in that I think it is just a radical exercise in transparency and reporting to the community that over the years we've been running Climate Fest, instead of just having a fest. And not that these things aren't important, you know, the kinds of activities where people come and meet different organizations that are tabling or participate in some craft activities related to Climate Fest. We had the idea several years ago, what if we used Climate Fest as a kind of annual report to the community, where it could be experiential and where we're making sure that every member of the community, even if they don't come out for Climate Fest, has an opportunity to hear about what are the things we have spent your tax dollars on in the last year for climate action? And so we sent out a mailer to every single household in the city that includes our annual greenhouse gas update and also key milestones that we've achieved in the last year. And we tell them what we're going to be working on in the year ahead. And then we have events where we invite them to come out and experience those things themselves. One of which like was so popular last year with the art show we had out at the airport where we partnered with PS1 to have people come out

and make solar prints just using solar energy. They could make art. They made a banner for the airport using cloth that had been treated to allow for this, and then they had an exhibit of solar inspired art. And so many people came to see that. And also we created the opportunity for them to go out and put their hands on the solar array, which was, I will say, a very moving moment to see how many people went out and really did put their hands on it and make it real for themselves. I will also say, one of the things we took away from that is, you know, sometimes you hear concerns about solar arrays that they might be impacting groundwater or might be dangerous for wildlife. The minute you let people go out and touch your solar panel, those questions just evaporate. Literally, the Q&A stopped the minute they could put their hands on it, because once you know it's safe for you to touch, you realize it's safe in a whole bunch of other ways. So when we go out to put in future solar arrays, which I dearly hope to do in the coming years, that is something I think we will be mindful of and try to create that opportunity again Um, I had mentioned earlier that I'm so grateful to do this work all the time in the city. I do, and with the wonderful colleagues I do. And I really want to take a moment to acknowledge one of the reasons we had such great success in the last five years is we have taken a whole of government approach where every city department and every city division is empowered to help the city move forward on its climate action goals. And I know you've heard about many of those projects in your meetings, so I will just touch on them lightly. Um, but I will say one of the things we've done is we now have quarterly meetings set up with the facilities manager and MidAmerican energy to review all upcoming projects in city facilities. And we identify any energy saving measures that can be taken, and also any cost sharing that we may be able to collaborate on with Madame on that. And that's been really wonderful and has resulted in a number of projects, including you can see all these great LED projects that have taken place over the last few years. That's for our existing facilities, for our new facilities, as you

know, Ron Kivarkis here and is the proud owner of one of the nicest public works buildings in the nation. Um, I actually was just talking to the Iowa Energy Association or Iowa Association for Energy Efficiency about the potential of having a tour at that facility because it is so groundbreaking in its design, which is very exciting. Um, and as, of course, you know, we have two major projects coming up. One is underway, actually, they're both underway right now. One is our city park pool, which is going to be the first pool house in the state to use heat pump water heaters to provide hot water for the showers and the locker room areas. We're very excited about that. And then, of course, we've got the methane capture system going in at wastewater. And as part of Public Service Day later this month, we'll be showing a film highlighting, uh, how wastewater is one of the original environmental wins for cities across the nation. So we're excited to highlight the important work being done by our colleagues there. Our transportation programs, of course, are also well aware of. I know you've heard about Fair for many, many, many times. Um, so there's only one little data point I want to highlight here. And that is that the average Iowa household spends over $3,000 a year on gasoline. I know we talk a lot about affordability and what we can do to address affordability in this city. Um, and of course, it's going to take us a while to build out affordable housing. That is an important piece of the puzzle. But when we began offering fair transit service, we began offering a way for people to immediately reduce those household costs related to gasoline. And we hear all the time from nonprofits whose clients use that service, how valuable that has been for them. So I think each and every one of us in this room can feel rightly proud of that program and the positive benefit it has not just in emissions reduction, but in helping support other key goals for the city. As you know, we've also been looking at electrifying the city fleet. Uh, this is what led to

the case study, the surprise case study we learned about from the Electrification Coalition webinar the other week. Um, I do want to acknowledge the police department has been a wonderful partner. When we went through the EV study, the EV readiness study for the city, they were identified as a potential early adopter, in part because of some of the vehicles they had already purchased. And I cannot emphasize how unusual that is for a city. One of the calls I get all the time from colleagues in other places is, how did you get the PD on board? Um, and one of the great things we get to talk about is, you know, the values of our public safety staff who think very broadly about their mission, you know, that public safety also includes things like clean air, um, and being able to respond on an e-bike rather than a patrol vehicle. The officer pictured in this photo, it's kind of funny. We had to get this photo for a presentation we were going to give. And while we were taking it, he told me a story about, um, being sent out to respond to a community member who is in some distress in an area of the city that he normally wouldn't have gotten dispatched to when he had to do it entirely on people power alone to pedal out there. Um, and he talked about what a difference it made in that moment when someone was in crisis to be able to roll up on a bike instead of in a big vehicle, you know, and I just love also the humility of the staff. We work with that. That's a story I literally would not have heard if we hadn't had to reach out for a photo. So, so sweet. And of course, of course, their incredible cost savings. Um, we've been looking at early data coming in from those vehicles in that fleet and they're coming in at costing about $0.08 per mile to operate versus $0.20 for the older vehicles in the fleet. So a really nice move for us there. One of the reasons we've had such success in operationalizing this across city departments is we also offer a parallel staff climate ambassador training that more than 30 staff members have participated in, and for them, too, it's a chance to take a

deep dive into the Climate action plan and the goals and things we're trying to do, and also share across departments, things that they're working on, and ideas of other things that we can move forward. And this has led to a number of wonderful collaborations, including the induction cooktop demonstrations that we've been offering over at the senior center, actually, right before this meeting, I was talking to our engagement specialist who had just come from one of those, and she said there was a mother and daughter at the senior center who participated in the induction cooktop demo. And one of the things they shared was that the mother had been having respiratory issues, and she had done everything else she could in the home to address it, and finally decided to take out the gas stove and put in an induction cooktop. And her respiratory issues were immediately alleviated just from that change, which was such a powerful testimony. And part of the reason why she wanted to bring her daughter to the demonstration, um, there's also just a little note here. I think it's interesting to read. I won't go into too much detail, but the premium heat for your seat, which was a campaign we launched last year and used a bunch of learnings to try to help move space heaters, which are just energy gobbling monsters out of out of City Hall, and replace them with heating pads, which can be a tough sell. But in the first year alone, we were able to replace 36 space heaters with heating pads, which is a lot, and I was I will fully own. When we launched that, I was like, boy, we'll be lucky if we replace half of them. That feels like a good goal. But to have so many replaced, I think really speaks to the commitment of staff across the board to do even small things to help us move forward. Um, of course, I had mentioned earlier, we have cities increasingly reaching out to us asking, how are you doing the things you're doing? And so we put this slide in, in part to acknowledge that at the request of one of our Climate Action Commission members who felt it was important to just document how many different cities are reaching out or organizations asking us to share what we're doing. Um, increasingly, these are not ones we're putting forward. They're

people actually reaching out to us. And this commission member pointed out rightly, that the Climate Action Plan does ask for us to be leaders in this space. And so this is a clear example of how we are doing that Um, this slide ends. I promise there are only just a few more. I want to make sure we have time for any questions you might have. Just talking about resilience and adaptation in the city. Sometimes you will hear, um, folks nationally say, you know, which is it? Are we going to try to solve for climate change or are we going to try to adapt for climate change? And the truth is we need to do both, right? Even as we're drawing down emissions and trying to make climate change less bad. Realistically, weather systems take a long time to adjust. And so we know we are going to be dealing with the impacts of climate change. For the duration of my career and beyond. And so we want to be helping prepare the city for those new realities. Many of these efforts you are already familiar with, of course, that involves making sure we're moving households out of the floodplain whenever those households become available. Um, in addition to the root for trees efforts, we've also, over the last five years planted 4000 trees in public areas and 200 acres of prairie. We have a fun slide we sometimes take around when we talk about high heat impacts, where we show a thermal image of a typical city block. And you can see even in those natural areas that have just prairie plantings instead of trees, that the temperature reduction is substantial. It's almost as substantial as the trees just from the the prairie plants breathing in that area. So that is actually an important oh, skip to the end. It's bad when you're on slide deck is like, stop talking Gardner. Um, yes. So the prairie plants are very important for an adaptation measure. And of course, we also are increasingly distributing information about just personal preparedness, recognizing most people, given the choice, want to shelter in place in their own homes, you know, following the derecho. You don't most people don't want to sleep on a cot in,

in a shared space. They want to be in their own homes. And so we've been doing a lot of thinking about what does it look like to put things in position that can support people to do so? One of the ways we're doing that is through our resilience hubs, which are we've just now are nearing the completion of our pilot stage with this program. We have two wonderful community partners. We've been working with. And I will say, when other cities reach out and ask us about our programs, this is one of the programs they ask the most about. In fact, tomorrow I'm going to be participating in a discussion with other cities where a researcher reached out and said, I keep hearing from others in this space. Iowa City is doing something really special with their Resilience Hub project. You really should talk to them about their model. And I think one of the things that makes our model unique is that it's actually a three year program. So we're providing a lot of ongoing support for the participating organizations. And that first year is a planning process. So instead of coming to an organization and saying, thou shalt have solar panels, now you're a resilience hub, get ready to help others out. We actually go in and begin by saying, you know, this really should be called hubs of resilience because the hub comes first. You are already doing the work to help make Iowa City a more resilient community. So let's figure out what are the key ways you're doing so that you would like to continue doing so in the event of a disruption? And how can we make sure you as an organization are resilient as well, because we need you in the wonderful work you're doing. So we spend a full year, we bring in a facilitator who helps them develop their own resilience plan. And then for two years following that, we offer funding to help implement the top priorities identified in their own plan. You know, a lot of places talk about the importance of co-creating programs. This is one we're very clearly we've made a conscious effort to do that. And I think it shows just in how enthusiastic both of those partners are. You know, we start out by saying, we're not here to add to your mission. Both of these partners keep coming back to us and saying, we want to do more for resilience.

What else can we do? Which is really wonderful. Um, I had mentioned that we know there are going to be ongoing impacts from climate change. Some of the data points that were collected in that spot to effort showed that there was a 14 degree differential between the hottest part of the city and the hottest parts of the city, and coolest parts, which is pretty substantial when you think about it. A 14 degree difference means on a 90 degree day, there are areas of the city that are experiencing that as 100 degree day or more, and I use 90 degrees as an example, because one of the things we know from climate change projections for our area is that currently, historically, Iowa City experiences about 20 to 22 days a year that are over 90 degrees by the end of the century, we are projected to have 92 days a year over, and we use actually this graphic to illustrate it, to show what that looks like. Over the course of the three summer months. It means every day in the summer will be over 90 degrees. So right now we have initiatives under our Keep Cool Iowa City, which grew out of the spot. The hot efforts to start offering things like cooling stations at community events. You're going to see us at a number of them this summer, including pride and some of the some of the arts concerts, um, where we are bringing out misting fans and we're bringing cooling bandanas that people can dunk in the water and help cool off. And then we're providing information about staying safe in high heat situations We also in the coming year, and this is such a great segue to next steps, are going to be embarking on a new a climate vulnerability and adaptation plan. Um, one of the smallest sections in the climate action plan actually deals with adaptation. So we know there is more to be done there and more we need to understand, particularly about making a more resilient built environment to heat as well as flooding. Um, and so we're going to take a look first to see what is accelerating because climate models always lag a little. So we want to see with the new data

coming in, you know, is there anything we need to adjust. And what we know is coming down the road and then think about how we can better adapt to it. But of course, we have many other really interesting and wonderful things going on. Um, just last week we launched the first grow solar program that our area will be hosting since 2021. And I mentioned earlier, working on collaborative efforts is really important to us. Um, we are doing this solar group by program in previous years, at first it was Johnson County. It was Johnson and Lynn. We actually have been collaborating with Icgov.org now to offer this program in a six county area, which is great because it gets those resources out to more people, but it also helps Iowa City residents because the way the program works, the more people who buy the solar under the program, the cheaper the solar gets. And so it's going to make it easier for us by working together to achieve those milestones and help drive that cost down. And of course, as you may or may not be aware, um, the student build project, which is, you know, in the very final stages of completion is going to be our first net zero affordable housing unit built in the city. Net zero means that it will generate as much energy as it uses. So the folks who live in that home virtually will not have a power bill to pay. And I just think that is incredible. And it was built by students like that is the power of Iowa City. So, um, I did want to say on this last slide, it is important to me, I ask that this picture be substituted in because none of this work would be possible without the hard working colleagues we have across departments and divisions. But I do want to especially acknowledge the staff members. You don't often get to hear from in the Climate Action Division. The woman in purple is Diane, who handles a lot of our communications efforts and put together this wonderful report for you in the sunglasses is Danny. He provided much of the analysis that went into the report. He also administers our grant programs, root for trees. Insulation does a wonderful job. It's just a joy. Every time I

get to hear him talk to a resident on the phone, the kind of courtesy and kindness he brings to every single conversation. Um, and then in the striped shirt standing next to me is Megan Hill, who was our engagement specialist and responsible for helping develop a number of these engagement efforts. You heard about at the beginning of the deck. She has moved on to Parks and Rec, and we love having someone over there that we can continue collaborations with that department. Um, and now we have a wonderful, wonderful new engagement specialist named Kendall McMullen, who's been doing incredible work, including organizing the energy blitz that we just had and has been doing a lot of thinking about what the next ten cohorts of climate ambassador trainings can look like, including some really interesting hands on opportunities as part of the training. So just, um, I, as I said, and it's worth saying, again, I'm grateful every day that I get to do this work in the city. I get to do it in supported by the staff and wonderful colleagues I get to work with. And you all So I will take the cue from my slide deck which told me to stop talking three slides ago and just see if there are any questions I can answer for you about any of this.

Well, thank you very much. I appreciate the work that you do, and the Climate Commission does, and I'm really proud that we are, you know, getting recognition for all the work that you do. Um, and I have tons of notes here, including, quote, my favorite love language is a well done spreadsheet. Um, but I am curious about engagement across the community broadly and specifically. First of all, you're so good about easily switching between. This is good for carbon reduction and the environment. This is also good for cost savings. And I imagine that speaks to two different groups of thinkers. Do you know who's taking up the climate action program and who's taking up our programs across the city? Geographically per age, maybe. I don't know if we really would track any sort of political persuasion, but are we getting broad, whole community engagement in the programing that you're offering?

Generally speaking, we are. Um, Danny Bissell who you saw in the last slide does do some mapping through GIS for us. One of the things we did just actually just last year is we remapped all of the participants in the root for trees program and the installation grant program. And we identified a neighborhood that we didn't have as much uptake in, pardon me. So then we went and talked to to Shaylyn Harrington, our neighborhood services coordinator, and actually have worked with her to try to get some better engagement in that particular neighborhood. So it is something we keep an eye on. I will say, um, for a lot of these programs, they've been small enough that we have been sort of roughly eyeballing demographics. Um, I think we have grown enough now that that no longer works. We have so many programs to track. And so we have been in conversation recently with Latasha at the senior center about are there ways we could be reducing burdens for participation with seniors in our community, knowing that they are going to be a growing segment of the community here in Iowa City? And she had some really wonderful ideas and advice on data collection in that area. So, um, I will say one of the reasons we haven't formally tracked some things like age is because we're always, always, always thinking about how do we make it as easy as possible to participate in this? Recognizing some people do not want to fill out a form. Right? Um, some people don't want to go online to do it, you know, and so for many of our programs, we've tried to keep the form as simple as possible. One of the ways we want to work around this, because we want to start tracking things like age data for participants in the insulation grant program in particular is rather than having residents fill out a form, we're going to try an intake process where Danny will fill out the form for them, basically through a phone interview, and then have them sign off on it, hoping that

that helps reduce the barrier. So it's a it's an excellent question. We do think a lot about data. We do track it to the degree we can, especially using publicly and already available sources of data. But we are thinking about how to balance that and get a bit better data on some of these programs as well. >> That's great. Yeah. It's important that I think everybody takes in these programs, so they keep broad support because I think they do currently have broad support across the whole community. So thanks for the work you're doing already on that.

And I know it's a installation program. It looked like similar or maybe it's part of it, like the hiccup is doing. Is that the same thing or >> Um, no. So hey, cap can provide some funding toward it. And they also tend to go to those dollars because they're limited, tend to go to things like mechanical systems that when they break down, really a immediately need to be replaced. And we will link in folks who participate in our program to Caps program. If we identify these additional things to be done. Um, one of the reasons we identified insulation as a key program for us was that there just was not much being done in the insulation area, even though it can make a big difference. Um, you know, if you have a choice between making sure your furnace functions are getting a little more insulation in your attic, you're going to go for the furnace. So we wanted to make sure we were filling that gap.

Yeah. And the programs people apply for it, or you identify people. >> Know they apply for it. It's an income qualified program. So we have them reach out. Although we do go out in the community and talk a lot about the program. And this is one of the other great values of having the AmeriCorps program, because we will have them mention it in households where they're at. They will go up and take a look at the insulation and say, it looks like you could use more insulation. The city has a grant program that could potentially pay for this in full. Here's who you contact and how you get enrolled. And then sometimes they'll even reach out to us and say, this person seems a little reluctant, and we'll try to reach out directly and say, we've got this great program. I know it sounds too good to be true, but we actually do do this, and we would love to do it for you.

And do you do it, for example, like, is it as you work with certain organizations to refer people? Because I know that a lot of people in the community, even though we offer a lot of resources and programs, sometimes they don't necessarily know about it because they don't know how to navigate the system. How do you reach out to those people specifically? Do you work with another organization to do referral? If somebody's come across like somebody and they think, oh, this program at the city, they work is really good with them, can they refer or.? >> Yes, we do work with a number of organizations to make sure that they're aware of the program and know that they can refer folks to us. One of the things we do with our Climate Action Grant program is we ask every grant awardee to host an education event. And one of those education events, particularly with churches, we ask them to host a fair where we can hand out energy saving devices and supplies and talk about things like the insulation grant program. We also do that with nonprofits that participate to make sure the word's getting out to their residents. Um, we also have a pretty robust marketing campaign around the Climate Action Grant program. You may recall, we have a climate action mascot that we use, and we will do print ads throughout the year. We put information in utility inserts. We have paid for radio advertising, including with a Spanish language program or a Spanish language radio station that reaches Iowa City. So we are always thinking about ways to bring in more folks to make sure they're aware of it. Um, but certainly I want to say, Councilman Sala, if you have other organizations that you think we're not reaching, we are all ears and would love to work with them to get the word out.

Yeah. I really just talk about the immigrant community because I feel like they don't even do basic recycling. So if this is one of the basic things that the people know, because they are not being educated about this, or they not necessarily know how to do it, I know a lot of people recently, even myself, I wasn't aware where we can recycle oil, you know, like, and all this like, I feel some of the immigrant community I come across, they just dump it on the, uh, the, you know, the thing, which could lead to a lot of things. So like those kind of things like education like this to the community, basic education, uh, for those people in different languages would be amazing.

Wonderful. Thank you for the suggestion

I had a question. First of all, thank you again. Um, I know we met pretty recently, but I enjoyed hearing all of this again. Um, I had a question about the, uh, you know, the goal of reaching net zero and a potentially impactful thing that I've heard talked about for a long time is the potentially going to be proposed solar park in unincorporated Johnson County. I, I'm sure you're aware of that. Um, you know, because as far as I remember, I think, you know, Iowa City's energy is like 60% wind generated, but there's still like 30% coal or something like that. And I just think of, uh, you know, I'm just curious about like what we know about that project. And it just seems like from what I remember, you know, it's, uh, the capability of a place like that, a solar park of that scale could provide full energy, full electricity for like 100,000 homes. So yeah. >> Yeah, it's a very big project. Um, we have been keeping our eyes on it. Of course, it's in the jurisdiction of the county. Um, and I do believe it's an important project for our area. I will say MidAmerican energy because they generate so much by wind actually have been able for the last couple years to credit Iowa City and all the cities in Iowa within its service territory with 100% renewable energy. That has changed as of this last year. Um, we have been in a really nice position as a state for the last 15 years or so. We've had flat energy demand, energy demand has recently started going up as a result of some developments in the state. And so we noted this year, for the first time that the demand outstripped what Madame was able to provide with renewable energy, which just underscores the importance of adding more renewables to it. I will say this will show up in our

greenhouse gas report this year. We are anticipating that our emissions will go up. Um, and by by a noticeable amount for 2025 as a result of that demand growth outstripping the renewable resources. >> And what would you say the demand growth is from? >> We all know.

Um, well, I don't know all the ins and outs of MidAmerican customers. So I want to acknowledge that I don't know everything about this, but I did note when they sent out the recent fuel report, it also included an attachment talking about the importance of data centers for for Iowa. So I imagine that is a substantial part of the growth demand that they're seeing or projecting there too. Maybe a question that is better for Madame, if you want more specifics and a more certain answer.

Okay. Um, uh, I very rarely let, let, let the vegan discourse out in, in city council, but I was wondering if you've ever done like a citywide, what if we tried Meatless Mondays? You know, I. >> We actually one of my favorite things we did in the last five years is as part of Climate Fest, the very first year we had a veggie Taco Tuesday where we shared out recipes and invited people to share their favorite. We actually created a map of every single place in Iowa City where you can get a veggie taco, which was a lot of fun. Um, we have hosted vegan potlucks over at the greenhouse and actually we were featured recently on a podcast talking about these efforts, in part because the induction cooktop demonstrations we do are all plant based, which is a lot of fun. I will say one of one of the reasons I'm always so glad to talk about plant rich foods is that there's this wonderful study. We refer to it a lot that looked at five different kinds of climate friendly diets. One was buying locally, one was embracing vegan, one was reducing food waste, and it analyzed which one of these would have the biggest impact on climate emission reductions. And what it found was, yes. Of the five, a vegan diet was the most impactful. But then it went on and said, did further analysis and said if instead of, um, some people doing or a substantial number of people doing a vegan diet, 100% of the meals, everybody did one of these five things half of the time. So just half of the time you eat, you're trying to reduce food waste, or half of the time you sometimes you try to buy locally. If you do these things in combination, the impact is much greater than it would be just from a vegan diet alone. In a subset, which I think is just such a powerful way of looking at climate action across the board and why I think it's so important that we're actually doing 65 actions at once, right? Because when we do

multiple things together, we get a lot farther than if we try to concentrate on the one perfect action. Yes. That's nice. >> No questions. But thank you as always. >> Yeah. Thank you. Good information. >> Thank you.

You do an excellent job, as always. Thank you so much. All right. Um, well, Council anything on that any other. >> Actually I'm going to hop in simply because I was able to. The cog met just last week and two of their presentations actually tapped very much into um what we just learned about, um, through the presentation, one of them was from the Linn County local food systems and they were talking, they presented their report and it's kind of makes you blanch because for as much acreage as there is of farmland in, um, they have over 300 000 acres in agricultural production, only 312 of these acres are in production for vegetables and fruits. So despite being the largest county in the state of Iowa, Linn County ranks 10th in vegetable sales. So that's just one highlight of many. And actually you can go out onto their website and it's Linn County. Um, local food systems report. It was fascinating as well as a little bit horrifying. Uh, but the, the takeaway from it was about an initiative for local food and so buying local where possible and actually talking about bringing more and more, bringing food to people. And they said at first they, they made the assumption as they were going into this report, that or doing the work to generate the report that it would be like, well, we need more farmers markets. And actually, because of gas prices and transportation needs and everything like that, more and more farmers are like just kind of, you know, hang in there, shingle out on a neighborhood corner or somewhere like that. And that actually they were getting better profits and more people coming more regularly as the foods were available. They could

just go. They wouldn't have to schedule it per se, or they could arrange their own schedule. So that was something that was incredibly interesting. Um, as part of this, they also, um, were directing people to, and I actually just got an email on it. Um, the Iowa local food challenge and you can get badges and little rewards and you click to sign up and then you can actually start there's activities and things that actions you can take. You don't have to be perfect. Um, but you can kind of just contribute to it and you can kind of see how your progress goes, which is pretty cool. So that was one thing that was, um, really fascinating. The report. They went into much more detail on what Linn County was like. And I actually did a quick peek, um, in terms of Johnson County. And there is no such assessment, different county, different sort of configuration. But there is of course the local food, the Johnson county local food. Um group. So anyway, that was one piece and then the other was actually, uh, it was an agenda item saying as far as an accomplishment that goes Icog helped launch along with Iowa City and Cedar Rapids and Coralville. No, I would have to look, um, number of partners to actually launch this Grosolar that was mentioned. And in this, it's about just to repeat what was said about, um, property owners in the region can pool your buying power to secure to get discounts, um, on getting so that installing solar can be more affordable. And so regionally, there's been a launch for Grosolar. And if people are interested, there is actually a kind of a power hour on Tuesday, May 26th at 530 at Big Grove where Grosolar will be speaking. And you can hang out and find out more about it. So those pretty cool takeaways. >> Great, great.

And again, thanks for joining us, Commissioner, and we really appreciate the work that you all do and this Council rely on that. The expertise of those that sit on that commission, as well as the lay members that have learned a lot, um, to really represent the voices of some of the just real life, sometimes, uh, realities that people in our community face to make sure that you all are doing your best that really, um, looking at the entire scope of how you can best move climate action forward. So thanks for being here as well. And thanks to the entire commission for what you all do. Thanks. >> All right. We're going to move on to item number five, which is council updates on assigned boards, commissions and committees.

And I jumped the gun. So I'm done.

Yeah. >> Sorry about that. About speaking out of order. >> The comprehensive Plan Review Committee met on the 22nd. So immediately after our last meeting and reviewed chapters, I think through 4 or 5 and six, I think we're through chapters one through six now in review. Um, we should have the complete report soon. I'm looking at Tracy in the audience because I think the initial schedule was June, but we're, we're close, we're close to have a presentation to council. Hopefully this summer yet. So, um, but everything is progressing nicely as far as like the content and this was a culture and placemaking and economic development was the last tranche of information that was discussed in the meeting.

All right. We can consider ourselves adjourned. And we will be back at 6 p.m. For our formal meeting. That's early

Mikes are on Mayor Teague >> Mikes are on. We'll get started less than a minute.

We're going to get any practice. Video. There's gonna be. >> Somebody on. You can always text. Can you. >> Can.

Phones are on silent. All right. It is 6 p.m. On May 5th, 2026. And I'm going to call the city of Iowa City to order. Roll call, please. >> Alter. Here. Bergus. Harmsen. >> Here. Mo. Here. Saleh. Here. >> Teague. Here. >> Weiland.

Here. >> All right. I want to welcome everyone that is present in council chambers to your city hall. And to those that are joining us virtually. Welcome as well. We're going to start with item number two, which is proclamations. Two. A is Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month. Whereas the month of May is designated as Asian American, Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander Heritage Month, a time to recognize and celebrate the rich traditions, diverse cultures, and profound contributions of the A, a NHPI community to the United States. And whereas, the 2026 National theme Power and Unity Strengthening Communities Together encourages us to leverage our Collective strength, tell our stories, and act as build as bridge builders in our communities. And whereas a NHPI individuals have historically and continue to shape our nation's identity. Excellent. And and bringing leadership to fields such as science, technology, health care, education, business and the arts. And whereas we honor the resilience and achievements of the a NHPI leaders who work towards building a more just, inclusive and equitable society for all. And whereas this month allows us to reflect on the historical contributions of Asian Americans, Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders whose commitment to advancing equality has strengthened our nation's prosperity. Now, therefore, I. Bruce Teague, Mayor of Iowa City, do hereby proclaim the month of May 2026 to be Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage

Month in Iowa City, and we have, um, two groups that are present here with us today. We have the a p a p a Eastern Iowa chapter, as well as the Asian Culture Alliance that is also present. We're going to receive, um, we're going to have the Asian Culture Alliance come up at this time. To give some remarks, yes >> Yes.

And we have the a e a e a. Yeah. So we'll have you speak first. >> Thank you. Thank you mayor. >> Yes.

Good Good afternoon, Mayor Bruce. Honorable Iowa City Council members, members of Human rights commissions and community friends, thank you for recognizing. May as Asian American, Native Hawaiian and Pacific American Heritage Month Recent statistics show that. 7.1% of Iowa City residents are Asian Americans. This figure is significantly higher than the state average of 2.5%. Your formal acknowledgment of AA and h p Heritage Month means so much to our diverse, vibrant community, including myself. As president of East Iowa chapter of Asian American, Asian Pacific American Public Affairs are. Papa. I am honored to accept this proclamation on behalf of the Asian community Asian American community as um on our history in Iowa City has evolved from a small number of 19th century Chinese entrepreneurs and to a diverse population bolstered by the southern East Asian refugee resettlement in 1970s and among that, we also have ongoing student migration today, Iowa City's Asian community has a strong and growing presence, marked by cultural preservation and

academic excellence. This proclamation is a powerful message of inclusion. It affirms that our history, our story, and our presence are an essential part of Iowa City. I want to thank my Asian American friends in Iowa City area, and that, um, your hard work in building this city and for your contribution to our local economy, schools and cultural heritage. I also want to thank to our many non-Asian airlines including this here in the hall this evening. Your unfailing support and commitment to inclusion make this community a better place for everyone. Thank you again for your support for standing against hate and for recognizing that our diversity is our greatest strength. Thank you.

Thank you And we're going to have, uh, a PAPA eastern Iowa chapter, uh, come and receive this proclamation at this time.

Good evening. >> Good evening. Mayor and City Council members. It's an honor to be here tonight. Thank you to the Iowa City government for recognizing AAPI Heritage Month and to Stefanie Bowers and the Human Rights Commission for the kind invitation. I'm Abby Guo, and I'm a freshman at the University of Iowa majoring in finance and business analytics, and I will be serving as the treasurer for our new organization. >> Great.

And my name is Jesse Lee, also a freshman at the University of Iowa majoring in neuroscience. I am proud to serve as the president of our newly established nonprofit, the Asian Culture Society. We are happy to join with Apapa for this moment. Since elementary school, we have participated in events like the Asian Festival in Cedar Rapids and the Lunar New Year Gala is here in Iowa City. At West High, we led the K-pop dance club, fostering belonging and unity through cultural performance.

As we celebrate, we must also honor the diverse AAPI history that built this nation in the 19th century. Thousands of Chinese laborers built the transcontinental railroad connecting this nation from coast to coast. Beyond the rails. Chinese, Japanese, and Filipino immigrants worked together to transform the American West. They pioneered the irrigation and labor that turned barren swamps into fertile farmland, feeding a growing nation

From South Asian scientists, pushing the boundaries of medicine to Pacific Islanders who have enriched our military and cultural landscape. AAPI individuals have been a bedrock of American progress. This spirit of resilience inspires our mission at the Asian Culture Society to promote intercultural understanding and community engagement.

To us. AAPI Heritage Month is a reminder of the importance of visibility and representation. It is time to honor the generations who came before us and to recognize the diverse voices within our community. >> We are deeply grateful to Iowa City for creating a space where all communities can be seen, heard and celebrated. Thank you again for this opportunity. >> Great. Thank you both. All right. To be the next proclamation is National Public Works Week, and this will be read by Councilor Weilein.

Whereas the professionals of the city, Iowa City Public Works Department focus on infrastructure, facilities and services essential to a sustainable and resilient community and to the public health, high quality of life and well-being of the City of Iowa City. And Whereas, the infrastructure, facilities and services could not be provided without the dedicated efforts of our public works professionals who are responsible for maintaining, improving and protecting our transportation, water supply, water treatment and solid waste systems, public buildings and other structures and facilities essential for our community. And whereas it is in the public interest for community members and civic leaders to gain knowledge of and maintain an ongoing interest and understanding of the importance of public works and related programs in Iowa City And Whereas, this year marks the 66th annual National Public Works Week, sponsored by the American Public Works Association with the theme rooted in service powered by community. Now, therefore, I Oliver Weilein on behalf of Mayor Bruce Teague of the City of Iowa City, do hereby proclaim the week of May 17th to May 23rd, 2026 to be National Public Works Week in Iowa City and urge all community members and civic organizations to recognize the substantial contributions which public works professionals make every day to protect our health, safety, welfare and comfort, and advocating quality of life for our community members today and for generations to come. And here, accepting is our very own Ron Knoche Public Works Director. >> Welcome.

Good evening, mayor and Council members, on behalf of more than 160 dedicated public works professionals across the Iowa City Public Works Department. Thank you for this. National Public Works Week proclamation and for your continued support. The skilled team members in our Engineering equipment, resource management, streets, wastewater and water divisions embody this year's theme rooted in service powered by community, the roots of service run deep in public works. It's what has propelled public works innovations that have helped our community evolve into a place where people can lead lives of purpose and possibility. Some work like building roads and bridges, is highly visible, while other public works contributions like maintaining water and sewer systems, are sometimes hidden from view. Together, these efforts form the foundation of our community, reminding us that every project, seen or unseen powers the connection between service and the people it supports. Our public works professionals are motivated to serve this community we love, and that powers us to do our best. Whether responding to water main breaks, providing regular waste pickup, or making roads passable after a winter weather event, Public works puts forward puts service at the forefront of our community. This year, the public works, police and fire departments will spend a City Services day at the farmers market on Saturday, May 30th from 7:30 a.m. Until noon. The event will feature a touch a truck display of city vehicles and equipment, educational activities and refreshments for all ages. We invite you and all community members to join us on May 30th. Thank you. >> Thank you. Our final proclamation today is to see Older Americans Month, and this will be read by our very own mayor, Pro Tem Megan Alter. >> For a moment there, I thought you were going to say our own aging.

No >> Our own aging representative. Whereas Johnson County livable community for successful aging trail of Johnson County and the Iowa City Senior Center seek to collaboratively celebrate the lives and benefits of older adults in the communities throughout this county. And whereas May is Older Americans Month, a time for us to recognize and honor the older adults of Iowa City and their influence on every facet of American society. And. Whereas older Americans improve our communities through intergenerational relationships, community service, civic engagement, and many other activities. And whereas the older Americans 2026 theme Champion Your Health focuses on prevention, wellness, and personal responsibility as cornerstones of healthy aging, it encourages taking an active role in managing your own health, advocating for yourself, accessing preventative care, and making informed decisions that support independence. Join us in highlighting the importance of evidence based approaches, self-management, and community partnerships that empower individuals to lead their healthiest lives. And Whereas, the City of Iowa City must ensure that older Americans have the resources and support needed to stay involved in their communities, reflecting our commitment to inclusivity and connectedness. Now, therefore, I Megan Alter on behalf of Bruce Teague, Mayor of Iowa City, do hereby proclaim the month of May 2026 to be Older Americans Month in the city of Iowa City and urge all residents to celebrate the profound positive impact of meaningful interactions and social connections with seniors for the entire community And we have a number of representatives from the Johnson County Livable Community for Successful Aging Trail of

Johnson County, and I'm not sure if we have the senior center commissioner here and present. Um, but at any rate, Bill Quinn from Johnson County Livable Community for Successful aging will come and have a few remarks.

Welcome. >> Thank you. And thank you to the council and the mayor for this proclamation. Um, this is becoming an annual affair for us. So we're we're happy to be here. This year's theme as Megan indicated, is championing your health. And one of the things I think for each of our organizations that we're there to provide services for aging individuals and, um, our website for Jclc, which is Johnson County Livable Community for successful Aging, you'll understand why I use the acronym, um, has a wide range of resources that will connect individuals through whatever transition may be going through as they age. Um, so livable community.org is our web address. It's really easy to get to tons of information there. Um, to help folks out with whatever resources they may need. Um, also I'd like to highlight four events that were, uh, sponsoring this year to celebrate older Americans month. And the first one is the fiance over at Riverside Theater. If you haven't had a chance to go see it, great storyline about two older individuals that move into a retirement home, fall in love and get engaged to be married within a month. And all of the dramatic fallout with the family. So I encourage you to go see that it plays through this weekend on Thursday, May 7th. That's this Thursday film scene will be doing a screening of I Like It Here, which is a documentary made by a filmmaker about his aging process and reflecting on life has some very funny moments and poignant moments. Not to be missed. This Thursday, 630 film scene on Wednesday, May 13th, we'll be hosting down at the Johnson County Health and Human Services Building in room 203. Uh, Susie Roberts, who is a dietitian, and she'll be talking about eating well,

simple nutrition strategies for healthy aging. And then finally, we have an art talk with Mandy Lensing, and she'll be talking about senior artists and their success in their later years. So that's another one that's also on going to be on Zoom. So again, livable community.org. If you want more details about these four events, you can go there. And we've got tons of information up on our website as well. The Jclc will also be participating in Solon's Aging Well Expo this coming May 19th, and that's from ten to noon. We hope to see folks there as well for that. And then finally, um, our board is finally wrapping up the community survey that we did on the AARP Domains of Successful Living. And we'll be reaching out to you folks to maybe set up a time to review some of those results and the impact for our work and maybe our work for the aging population in our communities. Thank you very much. >> Thank you. And thanks to everybody that came to receive a proclamation today. Thank you all. All right. We're going to move on to our consent agenda, which is items three through seven. Uh, could I get a motion to approve, please?

So moved. >> Second. Mo. All right. Anyone from the public like to address this topic? If you're online, please raise your virtual hand. Seeing no one in person or online. Council discussion. Roll call. Please. Teague. >> Yes. Yes. Alter. Yes. Harmsen. Yes. Mo. Yes.

Yes. >> Motion passes 6 to 0. Now we are at our consent agenda, which is item number eight. And this is an opportunity for um. Any comments that a person would like to address that are not a part of our agenda. If there's anyone in person that would like to come forth, please come now, at this time. Community comment. I'm sorry. Community inadvertently said consent agenda. Just so it's clear for members of the public. Community comment. >> Yes, there was a little commotion going on. >> Over there.

All right. Seeing no one for community comment, we're going to move on to our regular formal agenda, which is nine a fiscal year, 27 utility rates ordinance amending title three, entitled finances, finance, taxation and Fees. Chapter four entitled Schedule of Fees, rates, charges, bonds, Fines and Penalties. This is the second consideration. Can I get a motion, please? So moved. >> Second.

All right. Anyone from the public like to address this topic? Seeing no one in person or online. And if you're online, please raise your virtual hand. Seeing no one in person or online Council discussion Roll call please.

Yes. Alter. Yes. Harmsen. Yes. Mo. Yes. Yes. Teague. >> Yes. Motion passes 6 to 0 nine. B purchase of 1725 North Dodge Street. Resolution approving a purchase agreement for 1725 North Dodge Street for the Iowa City Community School District. Can I get a motion to approve? >> So moved. Alter second. Salih. >> All right. And then this is um we're going to get some comments from our city manager, Jeff Fruin. Welcome.

Thank you. Okay. Mayor Council excited to be here presenting this item to you. This is a property acquisition. 1725 North Dodge property currently owned by the school district. But before we jump into that, I want to remind you of where we have been on the space exploration journey here. So back in July of 2024, we presented to you a space needs study for this entire downtown campus, which includes City Hall, the police department, and fire station. Number one. I'm going to recap that a little bit and then move into the opportunity that's in front of us. So just focusing on the police side of things, um, what the study pointed out, which we're all very well aware of, is that the existing conditions are not great in the police department. There's a cramped workspaces. We have employees working out of areas that are really not intended to be offices, but we can't really shoehorn them in anywhere else. There's little to no daylight in that building. Um, and there are accessibility challenges not only for staff, but for the public. You can see the main entrance there on the top left picture. And we've had an increasingly, uh, high amount of maintenance challenges in that, in that facility from a square footage standpoint, I want to recap what the survey results said. So the top, uh, line there, the top bar is our current square footage in the, amongst the city hall, police headquarters and fire stations. So you can see 65,600 total square feet. The police is indicated in blue there. It just shy of 14,000ft.. And then the needed square footage is represented below

there. And that's based on not only current needs, but looking out about 20 years to see what needs may exist as the city continues to grow from the police standpoint, we're showing about 38,000, a little over 38,000ft. is what would be ideal for the department. So again, current about 14,000. Ideal 38,000. Um, how does that compare. Um this on the left just shows you the police square footage that I just went through without the fire and city hall components. But we also wanted to look at, um, how does that stack up to other communities around us that have recently built police stations? So you can see the Iowa City number there for the population of 75,000. We're in that 14,000 square foot department, North Liberty, which just built a new police department in 2020, has 16,000ft. for their, um, their community. When you get closer to our population, Marion is about half our population, population a little bit more at 42,000, they built a 42,000 square foot police station and Waukee, which was under construction, is now open but under construction at the time of the 2024 study was building a 46,000 square foot. So the 38,000 seems well in line, if not a little bit low compared to what other communities are building at this time. I want to talk about this property a little bit again. Um, we are focusing on property acquisition, but it's important to know the, the ripple effect that this acquisition has. Um, when we look at the history of this, the police and fire station, uh, was built in 1959, uh, along with the Civic Center

in 1960. There was some major expansion done in 1989 that you can see depicted on here, uh, followed by two additions for City Hall in 92 and 99. There really hasn't been any significant work done other than maintenance and esthetic type of work since 1999. And, uh, we're projecting again, almost needing to, to double that square footage as we look out into the 2030s. So, um, definitely one of the things we're looking at is how can we increase capacity on site? So what we landed on with this study and what we discussed with you back in July, um, was that, uh, both police and fire are probably going to need to leave this campus. We saw the opportunity for police to move first. Um, you know, that we explored that location on Riverside Drive with the county. Um, we moved on to that, and that's going to lead us here today. Um, but what this does is once we are able to move police and fire, um, then we can start to work on renovating that portion of our downtown campus to be the primary hub for, uh, city hall in the future. Um, that building is, was determined not to be suitable for repurposing. I think we can do that in the short term. When police leaves, we can relieve some of the city hall pressure that we have. But long term, that area where police is needs to be demoed and reimagined. Um, as part of our City Hall campus going forward. So this was the slide from 2024, just showing you what we said we were going to do and where we're at right now. At that time, we were looking at a new construction option for the police facility at Riverside Drive, and the cost at 400 zero square foot was estimated to be about 32 million. That was pretty consistent with what the estimate was with the joint

facility that we explored with Johnson County. Um, as we started to look at alternatives, um, uh, post the exploration with the county, uh, we became aware that the school district was vacating their property at 1725 North Dodge. And as we started to look more closely at that property, uh, we began to realize that it could potentially be a really nice retrofit for our police operations. So we hired, uh, OPN architects and a team of their subs, uh, to look at this property. Uh, last fall. So this, this report is dated November 14th. So we started to look at this sometime in the late summer, early fall of, of last year. And really what we were doing with this exercise was to see whether the space needs that OPN had worked on in 2024 for the police department, how those would be translated into a facility such as this, um, so let's look closer at this facility. It's an 11 acre site that's largely surrounded by Hickory Hill Park, but you also have some, uh, residents on Hickory Heights Lane and some commercial development there on Scott Boulevard with our fire station, uh, just partially on the screen on the top right there. This building was constructed in 1990, and then it was substantially renovated in 2011 when the school district purchased that building. It is a single story, um, with no internal changes in floor elevation. So really nice from that accessibility standpoint, there are some mezzanine spaces, um, that, that exist in the space. And as you look at this property, there's kind of two different types of properties, uh, combined into one here. This was the old press-citizen building here. So you've got a large office building component,

which we envision would be repurposed into the police station, but there's also a warehouse component. Um, to this building as well. So the split of the 400 zero square feet, uh, that roughly that exists in this property is about 30,000ft. of office and 10,000 of that warehouse space. And, uh, actually fits our needs. Those two combined uses fit our needs really well. I won't go through this in detail, but one of the things we did with OPN and their team is we, we had them check out all the building components. So look at the roof, look at the mechanical, electrical, plumbing and make sure that things were in good shape. So these were some of the findings that OPN had. Their overall. Draw your eye to the conclusion piece of this slide on the on the lower right side. Um the building is in very good shape. The school district, um, uh, did again, did substantial renovations in 2011 and has maintained that building very well. And it fits our space needs almost perfectly. Um, you can see some of the exercise that they went through there on the left hand part of the slide where we have kind of the area in the plan and the area in the study. Basically what they're looking at there is when we looked at this building independently and we looked at our police department independently, um, here's what we think we need. And then they actually did some test fits. They took those components and they laid them out in this building. Um, and I'll kind of walk you through that here. So this is the existing floor plan for the for that school district property. Um, towards the left is a, is the warehouse side of things. And then the right side is more of that office component. So what we looked at is what would it look like on day one to move police operations in there? How could that fit work? And this is the diagram. You don't really need to see all the fine detail there. But this just

goes to show that there is um, certainly at a very high level. Um all indications are that there's a, there's a good fit here to be able to transition our existing operations in there. And then when we look at that full build out scenario, we're thinking maybe 20 years down the road. Um, and anticipating growth in the department. Um, how could that look as well? So they took that scenario where they actually expanded uses a little bit, reconfigured those interior spaces and, um, showed us how we could work within that space. Also identified opportunities to expand the building if that was ever needed, that that could be done efficiently and effectively. Um, what's really nice from us and what you can't really see at this level of detail is this, this left side here fits very well. That warehouse portion with our evidence storage needs. So over time we can incorporate evidence storage into the police department. And that's going to create some nice synergies that we don't have with this site right now. So we've been working with the school district for, like I said, probably a better part of a year in evaluating this property. Um, these are the general terms that would be part of the sale. The purchase price is 3.2 million. That's based on a 2023 appraisal that the school district secured at 2.9 million. And then we worked with the Iowa City's assessor office to determine the average commercial reevaluation rate between that appraisal date and the sale date, it's about 9.5%, a little less. And that takes us to the purchase price of 3.248. We would anticipate closing here in about a month. Um, that date's not firmly set, but we're looking at May and June. And then the city would lease back this property to the school district for two years at no cost. So the school district still has operations in this building. Um,

and, uh, they will use that two years to plan their exit out of the building. And during that same time, we will be planning the renovations that are needed. Uh, so that the police department can begin those renovations in 2028, roughly and potentially move into this building in 2029. I'm going to go back and explain this last piece. Most of the school district operations are in the warehouse side of things right now. They have storage throughout the entire building, but most of the their concentrated activities are still in this warehouse portion. So again, for two years, they would lease this whole property from us at no cost. Um, for the next three years after that initial two year period, they would have the ability to use, continue to use a portion of this warehouse, um piece. They would pay us a market rate which has been predetermined if they decide to stay in that property, but this would just give them additional runway to um find alternative storage uh, needs for their operations. At the same time, it would allow us to occupy the office portion of the building, which is our most critical need. That's what we have here at City Hall. That's what we need to, um, secure as a top priority. Um, so we would be able to do those renovations while the school district is still operating in that more warehouse space. So potentially could have a situation where after two years, we share that space with the school district for a maximum of three years And that is all I have. Chief Liston is here. If you've got questions that you would like him to answer on the the fit, either the existing spaces or the fit of this property. Um. >> I don't know whether this is for you, Jeff, or for Chief Liston, but could you speak a little bit about how current operations work, how patrol works, who's actually in the police station with keeping in

mind that we had a shooting two weeks ago and we would be potentially moving the police department away. I think I've talked to both of you about this, but I think the public should hear that, how patrol really works and how this impacts or doesn't impact response times.

Right. >> Dustin, listen, the police department, we have talked about that before, I think specifically with you. And that's it's a great question. Police department doesn't work like fire department. We don't typically respond from the station. The officers are out and about They're assigned to specific districts and they're out in the field. So when a call comes out, like the call a week and a half ago, there wasn't a response necessarily from here. Now, if there were some officers that happened to be at the station working on reports, but the way the cars are set up, they really don't need to be at the station that often. The patrol officers, typically the people that are at the police department are more the administrative staff or the investigators. >> Okay, thanks.

And that was part of a something I was going to follow up on, which is related, which is, um, because it is out there. Um, I don't know, uh, what, if any thought there has been into, uh, people have brought up concerns about like substations, you know, if it is out there kind of far away because I know, um, you know, there was a community push to remove the substation from the south side of Iowa City and everything. So that's some things that people have brought up. But because of what you just said, you don't think that that's something that is being planned for or necessary. >> I do think there is the likelihood there might be a small presence somewhere downtown because of the downtown district. And we have a downtown liaison officer. I think it'd be appropriate whether it be here or maybe with something with the university or something like that. But, uh, I do think there would be I'm not sure we'd give up a complete presence here or in the downtown area. I do think it would be responsible, especially during the daytime, because that officer, our downtown liaison officer, is spends his entire time downtown. And I'm sure it would be. And he typically on foot or on his bicycle. And it would be a nice, nice to have a spot for him to stop and work on stuff and also maybe a spot for people to pop in.

Mhm, mhm. Um, another question I had, uh, uh, we talked about this, um, before, but, uh, there's been some questions about, um, is in some communities, police stations have some type of, uh, carceral capacity, but that is not currently within this plan. >> Correct? No. >> Yeah. That's correct. The on occasion, someone might come in to do some processing or an interview, but no one would be housed or it's not a jailing facility or, or a holding facility.

No. Okay. Thank you. >> My question for Jeff. You know, right now, you said that the, the the way it works, they're going to continue using the, the storage sections of the building is this means why two years is they are still using the offices right now, or they only using the storage right now, or they use the whole building. That's what my question. >> Right now, most of the activity is in that warehouse portion, but they. They have storage throughout the entire building. We're not ready to move in within certainly the next year anyway, because although we engaged OPN to look at how we could fit in this, um, these are very just high level concepts. We haven't done any actual design work. So it's going to take us a good year and year and a half to put together the, the design package that we need, and then bid the project out and renovate. So we felt it was just best to allow them to use the entire property. And hopefully by then they've identified space. And come year three, um, there's no need to share it anymore. But we wanted to provide them that extra kind of security.

In this case, we are not even ready. We're not ready to. >> Move in. Yeah, that's fine. All right. Hearing no more questions. Would anyone from the public like to address this topic? If you're online, please raise your virtual hand Seeing no one in person or online Council discussion

Very happy to support better space and more space for public safety. >> Yeah, looks like it's a great building that has been well maintained and it can be retrofitted to the needs. And it's kind of nice to kind of use an existing building than, you know, creating something new. Um, so I think, yeah, this would be a great opportunity. >> Yeah. I remember when we visited the police station. Yeah, that's really neat to be changed. Yeah. Yeah. The tour of the police station and the rest of city hall sort of has that. >> Domino, the whole city hall. But let's start with the fire. >> This helps all.

Of that. But there is a lot of, uh, things need to be upgraded in the whole city building.

Absolutely. Thanks also to city staff for finding being able to find another location which is almost as good as the Riverside location in terms of centrality to the to the city. But, uh, as Chief Liston has, uh, has explained that the physical location is important, but it's not the same as with the fire department. So that's, that's good to hear. That's very comforting. Also good to hear that, you know, we're still talking about a physical presence in the downtown area. I think that's also something important for the public to know and, and to know that those discussions have already those thoughts have already crossed our minds as well. So thank you for all of that work. Um, and thank you to the school district for, uh, working with us on this project. So this is going to be kind of a win-win for, for both of us. And for the taxpayers for that we all share. >> So exactly.

Yeah. >> I would second all of that. Um, I just want to emphasize again that I really like the fact that for the rest of City Hall, even though there will be major work that needs to happen in the future, that there is an immediate or close to immediate, in the next few years, there will be a loosening up so that people have an opportunity to spread out. And, um, that's just so important. Um, so I, I really do think that this is a very good solution all the way around. And I'm very pleased that we've been able to come to it.

And I think that, uh, especially with the police and fire, just, they are going, they will have to physically, for physical reasons, need to move from this location. So I think, uh, I'm glad that we were able to find a place with such a good price and existing infrastructure to where we're just not spending. If we wait a few years, we could spend millions more dollars, you know? So yeah.

All right, roll call please. >> Alter. Yes. Harmsen. Yes. Yes. Yes. Teague. Yes. Yes. >> Motion passes 6 to 0. We are on to item number ten which is announcements of vacancies. New. Um and this is Climate Action Commission one vacancy to fill an unexpired term upon appointment through December 31st, 2027. Um we do have correspondence that was included in our council packet. Um can I get a motion to accept that correspondence please? >> So moved. Alter. Moved by alter. >> Second. Second by Mo. All in favor, say aye.

Aye. >> Any opposed? Motion passes 7 to 0. That Climate Action Commission application will be must be received by 5 p.m.. Tuesday, June 9th, 2026. Item number 11 is our announcement of vacancies. Previous 11 A is the Airport Commission. Two vacancies to fill a four year term. Historic Preservation Commission two vacancies for at large representatives to fill three year terms. Historic Preservation Commission one vacancy for a Longfellow representative to fill a three year term. Historic Preservation Commission one vacancy for a North Side representative to fill a three year term. Housing and Community Development Commission two vacancies to fill three year terms. Parks and Recreation Commission one vacancy for unexpired term. Planning and zoning Commission. Two vacancies to fill five year terms. Public art Advisory Committee one vacancy for an at large representative to fill a three year term. Applications must be received by 5 p.m. Tuesday, May 12th. Airport Zoning Board of adjustment one vacancy to fill a five year term. Airport zoning board of adjustment one. Vacancy to fill a five year term. Board of appeals. One vacancy for a licensed electrician to fill a five year term. Board of appeals one vacancy for Hvac professional to fill an unexpired term. Historic preservation Commission. One vacancy for a Brown Street representative to fill a three year term. Historic Preservation Commission one vacancy to fill a Jefferson Street representative to fill a three year term. Historic preservation Commission one vacancy for a Woodlawn Avenue representative to fill a three year term. Vacancies will remain open until filled. We're at item number 12, which is City Council information >> Um.

Shout out to the Johnson County Affordable Housing Coalition and the affordable Housing bus tour. Um, that, uh, mayor pro tem and the mayor and I were all on yesterday morning, uh, to Jessica and Dino and her staff for setting that up and making that work, as well as, um, the various partners and our city staff, um, was very happy to hear them explain to the various people there, some of the highlights of the work that we've got going on all the way from all across the city, starting at the very northern edge and going down to the very South District and places in between, um, and a really nice way, actually for the public's. We did a tour actually took us through Iowa City, Coralville and North Liberty, looking at various projects and all three of those communities, some of which were group projects between our communities, as well as with numerous nonprofit and other partners. One of the stops was the student bill that was discussed earlier tonight about during the climate action. Um, and we got to see the see that in progress and even meet one of the students. So, uh, thanks again to Jessica and Dino and the Affordable Housing Coalition. >> Um

I am looking for the details right now because of course, I got it in my email and I can't find it now, but I know that on Saturday, Dream City is having a pop up shopping experience. And I want to say it's from four to nine. Or am I wrong on those hours? >> It's not quite nine.

That's not right. So that's the problem with getting excited about something, but not having all my details. Um, but I do know Dream City has it advertised on their Facebook page. So this Saturday there will be pop up shopping experience. Um, and if you want to go to somebody else, anybody has, I can look it up but it's just a cool experience in Dream City is so active these days. There is something going on with the parking lot full every day, and it's just wonderful to see. Absolutely >> Okay.

All right. Anything else? All right. I didn't notice it there. All right. We're going to move on to our next agenda item, which is number 13 reports on items from our city staff, city manager's office. >> Not tonight. Thank you, City Attorney. >> Not for me. Thank you. City Clerk. All right. We're at item number 14. Can I get a motion to adjourn, please? So moved. >> Second. Moved by Salih. Seconded by alter. All in favor, say aye. Aye. >> Any opposed? We are adjourned. >> We are breaking the record. Right? >> Yeah. This is the first time for 7:00. This is. I think this is the earliest.

One.