City Council - Regular Meeting

What's going on? Call the City of Iowa City Special Executive Section Council, Formal Council Meeting to order.

Roll call please. Here. Here. Here. Here. Here. Here. And say it's June 2nd, 2016. It is about 3.34.

The next item on our agenda is evaluation, item number two. Can I get a motion to adjourn to executive session to evaluate the professional competency of one or more individuals whose appointment, higher end performance, or discharge can be considered when necessary to prevent new and inevitable injuries to those individuals, but the patients and those individuals requested a full session. Can I get a motion to adjourn to executive session? yes yes

Thank you.

All right, we are just returning from executive session, and we're on item number three. We're back in open session. And item number three is a motion to adjourn. Could I get one, please?

So moved. Bergus? Second. Alter?

All in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes 7-0. All right. We are going to transition into our work session for June 2, 2026. And the first item is clarification of agenda items. Hearing none, we're going to move on to item number two, which is the information packet. We'll start with May 21st. We'll move on to May 28th. And there are two items, IP4 and IP5, that we do want to talk about. Are there any other items that council want to discuss before we talk about those two?

No, sir.

Okay, we'll start with item number IP5, IP4, sorry. And this is just the memo from the city manager on Orchard Court Occupant Transition Plan.

Were you saying, Jeff, that we weren't going to get like a presentation or anything?

Correct. I'm happy to answer questions, but I think we tried to lay everything out in the memo that you would need to make your decision, but happy to help you through that process if needed.

Do you guys mind if I jump in?

Go right ahead.

Okay. So I've met with some, was reached out to by some residents at Orchard Court. I think it was a late handout. Was it this morning or yesterday when it was given to us? But just the letter from some residents, did we read that? Yeah, and... I guess that I feel, I've met with some residents, it's a, I believe 37 tenants in total, or give or take a couple, and I think that when it comes to moving in Iowa City it's hard for tenants, even on a regular cycle. But on a cycle, outside of cycle, with short notice, it's extraordinarily difficult, especially when there's uncertainty about, from what I understand, some tenants got a letter that says, hey, something is gonna happen, but we're not giving you the notice yet, but be prepared, but, Not yet. So it's led to a lot of folks not understanding when they're going to be kicked out and trying to make arrangements and scrambling to find housing. A couple folks that I talked to are being forced to like move into houses that are too expensive for them. So now they are going to be more cost burdened, especially considering that a lot of the housing that's going to be demolished or potentially could be demolished because of the new development It's naturally occurring, affordable housing. A lot of it is, so I think especially since the precedent that was laid out, thank you very much for that very in-depth memo, Eric and everybody, about the past transition plans and the extra help that we've given folks. I think in terms of us coming in, showing good faith, especially since we want housing to, we know we're gonna have to build more housing. We know stuff like this, even though we don't want it to, will have to come up in the future. So when we do displace people, I think we need to be as fair as possible and listen to concerns. And especially since we have money in the affordable housing fund for stuff exactly like this, and we've done it before, I think I'd be heavily in favor of helping these tenants out. And I can also answer more questions and just give any insight on conversations I've had with some of the tenants. It's been hard because it's been like different groups of people, not like one cohesive organization, but getting like a, getting like a, there's overarching themes I would say.

Do you know, Councillor Weiland, if the tenants are aware that we do have a policy? I mean, that, like, this memo exists and that there has been a policy on the books, that the city does have a record and a history of helping with displacement.

Yeah. Yeah, I gave... After I met with Eric and... Or I saw the memo from Eric and also just talked to Jeff... I just communicated that, yeah, there's precedent. We have done this in the past. But it's just something that we'll have to talk about. And none of the instances looked exactly the same, you know, because there's different circumstances. But from what I see, it's... I'm having trouble turning on my computer, but with the letter, there was no specific dollar amount that was asked or, but I can tell you that themes I heard when it came to, there was this particular woman who said that with, well, you know, I'm gonna have to find like a storage unit and going to have to, you know, hire a moving truck because, you know, I have just a tiny sedan and I can't move all this stuff by myself. And between like, you know, $700 to $1,000 is like kind of like the thing when I asked like, hey, like when you like add all this stuff up like and you're having trouble getting from one place to the other, like that was kind of like a range that I was hearing. And I know it's difficult because there's not like a cohesive, like this is what everybody needs and wants, but I think in times like this where, you know, we don't want to displace anybody without having them them having the means to find a different place to live. If we want good faith with the community moving forward when it comes to building affordable housing, I just think it's a small price to pay. Yeah.

So the proposal is for the 37, people, that it would be roughly $500 per occupant at a total cost of $18,500, just to get to the punchline of the memo, right? Isn't that what's proposed? Right, that is what it is, yes. And in addition to that, it seems as though some of the members also have a buyout option from their landlord? Yes, so... Of a $500 buyout option?

That's what I read. And that was another thing, it's... a lot of the tenants are unsure because they saw this coming. They are the ones that have terminated their lease. And in the lease, it says, if you don't, if we terminate the lease, we give you this money. So there's a lot of fear that they're not going to get that money. So the $500 in their security deposit that was promised in the memo legally, it kind of looks like since they were the ones that terminated their lease because they foresaw being displaced in the first place. There's fear about that.

Can I ask a clarifying question? You said 500 in the memo, but were you talking about some existing renter's contract that promised 500 if they didn't terminate? Because the memo, I think the recommendation from staff was for all 37, right? Do I have that?

The recommendation from staff, yeah.

The city part of it was not contingent. Correct me if I'm wrong, please, city staff. The city part of it is not contingent upon whether or not they've already self-terminated their lease. So that part is what we have control over. The part that we have control over is not contingent.

What we want to give them, yeah. And when I read the staff memo, they didn't recommend a certain dollar amount. They just said if, for instance, it was $500, you can do whatever you want. I mean, so I can say that when I talked to people, it was like between the $700 and the $1,000 ranges when people added everything up and they were just like, this is me getting from A to B. This is me.

filling in the gap those are the numbers i heard on average and it does sound like they would have that opportunity if they they would be at a thousand if they were terminating their lease yeah i think they were talking about like additional landlord 500 landlord and 500 from the city we'd be boosting them from 500 from their landlord to a thousand correct combined

But I wanna also ask, since this is going to be teared down, I think it makes sense to get the full refund of the deposit. Isn't that happening or no?

In the lease agreement with them, they said that they're going to get a deposit. They said that they, we'll get their full security deposit back because they're gonna be blowing up the houses anyways, so how can you?

That's what I meant, yeah.

So yeah, that is in the lease, but again, I think that there is some concern with some of the tenants that have moved out and they were the ones that technically terminated the lease themselves, that they will not see any of that money. Which is why I thought that to, you know, since it seems like we have the money and I don't want to mess this up, that just kind of the additional $700 to $1,000 range is what I heard, is what people were saying. That could get them from A to B. So I don't know what that would look like in terms of increasing the $18.5 to, if it was $1,000 per person, it would be double that. 700 something in the middle, but yeah.

I guess I'm personally comfortable with the 500 given the fact that they'll be able to get their their deposit back uh... if they you know move out uh... terminate their lease they'll get five hundred uh... that was their concern is that because they had terminated their lease that they would not be eligible for that five hundred from the landlord the ones that terminated their lease they would be able to get the five hundred that's not what the landlord says the difference between who is terminating the lease so if

someone foresaw this happening. They got the letter that said we're not terminating your lease yet, but in the future we are going to at some point. I think a lot of the residents thought, okay, crap, now I have to look for housing because it's hard in Iowa City to find last minute housing. And so there's concern that the landlord will not be legally obligated or willing to give them that because technically they are the ones that terminated the lease.

The residents.

The residents, yes. So I just don't want anyone to get zero, you know?

Well, nobody would get zero. Right, because it, okay, so I'm reading the numbers here, and tell me if these numbers are missing, because this is where I'm, so 37 current occupants, of which four occupants have leases that expire in July. The remaining 33 tenants have leased terms beyond the anticipated date. For simplicity purposes, staff suggest any relocation be limited to the 37 occupants identified. So, and you can read, I know your computer's not working, so if you want to read off my screen, you absolutely can. All occupants receive the equal, so Yeah, we can choose, you know, set our amount. So this is my question. Is the number 37, are there people that are missing from that number, or does that account for? 37 accounts for everybody. Mm-hmm. Okay, that's my question. So from our end, we're not talking about the contract, the lease agreements. We're talking about this, our help to these 37. Yes. We're not talking about whether or not all 37 would get the thing for the landlord. Correct. Okay, so we just don't know that.

We just don't know that there's concern, right?

Sure, no, I'd be concerned, too, and that's reasonable.

Because, you know, I don't, when I'm dealing with things in my lease, I don't consider things like, will they be nice to me? I mean... Will they follow the law is kind of the best we hope for a lot of the time. So that's where that concern comes from. So, you know, I guess the reason I say... the reason people, the $700 to $1,000 range per tenant was because there might, some people might get nothing from the developer or the landlord. So I just want it to be as equitable as possible. That's what I was thinking.

Sure. Yeah.

I don't suppose we have any communication with the landlord to answer that question by chance?

We have not, no. And I should clarify, too, no one has provided us with the leases. We haven't actually seen them. Councilor Weinlein has provided in these meetings the best information we have.

Can I ask a question? Is this, like, I never know, like, about this apartment. Is this, like, two bedrooms, three bedrooms?

It's a lot of different types. There's some townhome. There's some, like, single-family homes that, you know, have four bedrooms that have roommates. There's some townhome-type things. There's a couple smaller apartment buildings.

That means even their monthly rent is different, right? Like, everybody have different amount of monthly rent.

And I have no way of knowing what everybody's monthly rent is. So, yeah.

I'm just looking at their request. So, because they're saying the monthly rent and security deposit.

Well, I know that we are at 548 and we're going to have to pause. Do we want to pause here and just come back after our formal meeting? The other thing I would have suggested, because we don't have a lease, we don't know, because when I read this, it seems that the $500 payment from the landlord could happen for almost everyone, but we can seek that clarification. Maybe we should just come back to this. The other option is, We could do the 500 now, and then if we learn more information, we can change it at the next meeting.

We should just come back to it.

We'll come back to it, and it works.

We're going to pause. Mr. Mayor, it's on the consent agenda for the regular meeting, so if we don't finish the discussion here, how does that impact?

Well, there's, we had to kind of talk this through to get it straight ourselves, too, because it is a little confusing. So what's on the consent agenda is the approval of the occupant transition plan. And they've checked every box. I mean, I'm here to tell you that it's a compliant plan. So that doesn't foreclose you folks from doing something, you know, in addition. Yeah. Right. So you could, yeah, you could approve the transition plan as part of the consent agenda and still decide, you know, that you'd like to do more. All right.

I just didn't want to, like,

Yeah, this isn't your single chance.

And it wouldn't be, would it be germane for us to talk about this during that budget, or during that regular agenda item?

Well, I wouldn't want to go too far. I mean, you could just indicate that this is the subject of a different discussion, but I would really probably want this discussion to continue in a work session. Okay. Yeah.

Sorry, go ahead. I was going to say, and certainly, anybody from the public that wanted to speak to the item on the consent agenda and share information with the council, that would be the opportunity to do that. So, which will be coming up probably in the next 15, 20 minutes.

And one thing I do fear about, um, it seemed like there was anxiety that, you know, uh, so I guess, um, I would be okay with if people are on board with the 500 that was discussed, and then if we hear... Yeah.

After the meeting.

So what we'll do is we'll go to recess for the work session, and we'll be back after our formal meeting. Thank you. And we'll start our formal meeting at 6 p.m.

Thank you.

recording in progress

Thank you.

Thank you. Oh, perfect.

I was like, oh, that sounds crappy, but I'm just saying to you right now. It's a good thing. It's like a well-loved shirt.

Thank you. Oh, okay.

It's real. The microphones are on.

All right. Well, I am going to call the City of Iowa City formal meeting to order. It is June 6, 2026, and is just after 6 p.m. June 2, 2026. And it's just after 6 p.m. Roll call, please.

Alter. Here. Burgess. Here. Harmsen.

Here. Moe. Here.

Saleh. Here. T. Here. Wyland.

Here. I want to welcome everyone to your city hall that is here present in council chambers and to those on joining us virtually, welcome as well. We have proclamations. We're going to start with 2A, which is National Gun Violence Awareness Day. Whereas every day, nearly 130 people in the United States are killed by gun violence, and more than 200 are shot and wounded, with an average of more than 19,000 gun homicides every year. And people in the United States are 26 times more likely to die from gun homicide than people in other high-income countries. And whereas in Iowa, an average year has 362 gun deaths with a rate of 11.2 deaths per 100,000 people. A crisis that costs the state 4.2 billion each year, of which 53 million is paid by taxpayers, Iowa has the 41st highest rate of gun deaths in the United States. And whereas support for the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding citizens go hand in hand with keeping guns away from those who are a danger to themselves or others. And whereas in January 2013, Hadiyah Pendleton was tragically killed and shot at the age of 15, and on June 5th, 2026, to recognize the 29th birthday which she was born on June 2nd, 1997. People across the United States will recognize National Gun Violence Awareness Day and wear orange in tribute to her and other victims of gun violence and the loved ones of those victims. Whereas the idea was inspired by a group of Hadeah's friends who asked their classmates to commemorate her life by wearing orange. They chose this color because hunters wear orange to announce themselves to other hunters when out in the woods. And orange is a color that symbolizes the value of human life. And whereas by wearing orange on June 5th, 2026, people across the United States will raise awareness about gun violence and honor the lives of gun violence victims and survivors. And whereas we renew our commitment to reduce gun violence and pledge to do all we can to keep firearms out of the hands of people who should not have access to them and encourage responsible gun ownership to help keep families and our community safe. Now, therefore, I, Bruce Teague, Mayor of Iowa City, do hereby proclaim the first Friday in June, June 5th, 2026, to be National Gun Violence Awareness Day in Iowa City and encourage all residents to support their local community's efforts to prevent the tragic effects of gun violence and to honor and to save lives. And receiving this proclamation is Temple Hyatt. And there's a lot of other people that she brought with. So come on up, Temple.

Thank you for honoring Hadiyah with the proclamation in our efforts for gun violence prevention. Wear Orange is a time for groups, organizations, and communities to come together in our efforts to prevent gun violence. It is a time to recognize the grief, the anger, and the heartfelt sorrow. And tonight, our Muscatine neighbors are gathering to mourn. Where Orange can be a time to reflect on our progress. Johnson County is a Be Smart for Kids partner. During registration, the Iowa City Community School District promotes secure storage and educates parents about Iowa's child access prevention law. Where Orange is also a time to make connections so that city and county departments can work together toward a safer community. We know gun violence doesn't stop at a city border, so we must also build partnerships with our neighboring communities. In Iowa, 79 percent of our gun deaths are from gun suicide. The majority of suicides in Iowa, including children and teens, are gun suicides. We cannot talk about gun violence prevention in Iowa without talking about preventing gun suicide. And we cannot talk about suicide prevention in Iowa without talking about preventing easy access to firearms. I want to live in a society that normalizes conversations about access to guns, where we educate parents about including firearms in their safety conversations with kids, where we ask teenagers if they have easy access to guns, where we consistently ask gun owners to make a plan for removing guns in advance of a crisis, and where we normalize temporarily removing guns from a home, and where we provide options for out-of-home storage. I recently had a conversation with a candidate who told me his parents had a standing order that when anyone in the family lost a job or a relationship ended, they would remove their guns from the home. This is how we change the culture of gun ownership and normalize conversations about access to guns. Wear Orange is also a time to recommit our efforts. We must take ownership of gun violence prevention as a community. We need our leaders to fund education efforts and to create space for collaboration. So I ask, how will you ensure we work more efficiently and more effectively toward ending gun violence. If we truly want a future free from gun violence, it will take each and every one of us working together. Thank you.

I'm Jess Lang with Johnson County CVI. I just wanted to take this opportunity to thank you for the proclamation and helping us spread the awareness of Wear Orange. One of the easiest things to do is put a reminder on your calendar for Friday, June 5th to Wear Orange to help spread awareness for gun violence. And I also want to remind people that gun violence is, we are not immune. Just a few short weeks ago, we had it happen right here, just a couple of blocks from us. We were fortunate that there was no loss of life and it's that easy and it happens that fast. Marcus Brooks and I work with CVIs, Community Violence Intervention. We work with people who are at high risk for gun violence. And we work to connect those people to resources and services here in Johnson County. That's employment, that's education, that's mental health services, substance abuse, whatever it is that those individuals need. We are very busy. I thank our community leaders for helping the residents of our county make us feel safe, but gun violence is present here in Johnson County and I want the residents to be aware of that. But I do thank you for your support and wear orange on June 5th.

Thank you.

Welcome. Hello. Hello. Excuse me. Marcus Brooks, outreach worker at CVI here in Johnson County. I just want to say thank you as well to the city council and the city of Iowa City and Moms and Men for the opportunity to come up here and just kind of say it's an experience for me to have this opportunity to understand how important it is to have these proclamations in place and having or being a victim of that as far as gun violence and friends of mine is definitely an honor to be here. And I just wanted to say that we're all a team. And even though Orange is for June 5th, we have to remind ourselves that every day we wear orange because every day humans are important. So I just wanted to say that. Thank you very much. Thank you.

And thanks to everybody that came for this proclamation. We're moving on to item number 2B, which is Pride Month, and this will be read by Councilor Josh Moe.

Whereas June 2026 is the 57th anniversary of the Stonewall uprising in New York City, which is recognized as a catalyst for the modern LGBTQ plus civil rights movement. And whereas Iowa City had committed to supporting visibility, dignity and equality for all its residents. And whereas Iowa City has been at the forefront of advancing civil rights for LGBTQ plus people, beginning with leading the nation in adding sexual orientation to a human rights ordinance in 1977 and gender identity in 1995, And while steps have been made towards full LGBTQ plus community equality, members of our national, state and local communities still face discrimination, exclusion and prejudice simply for being who they are and for whom they love. And whereas discrimination against people from the LGBTQ plus community around the world make it imperative for cities like Iowa City to stand up and show support for LGBTQ plus residents, And whereas Iowa City celebrates LGBTQ plus individuals this month while also recognizing the continued work necessary to build a more just and equitable state for LGBTQ plus people. And whereas June has been a symbolic month in which LGBTQ plus community members and allies come together in various celebrations of pride and during which Iowa City will recognize Pride Month by displaying the pride flag at City Hall throughout the month of June. Now, therefore, I, Josh Moe, on behalf of Bruce Teague, Mayor of Iowa City, do hereby proclaim the month of June 20, 2026 to be LGBTQ Plus Pride Month in Iowa City and encourage all members to participate in Iowa City Pride events and continue working towards a future where everyone is valued, respected, and included. And accepting this award today is Andrew Owens, President of Iowa City Pride.

Welcome.

Mayor Teague, members of the council, it's my pleasure and my honor to accept this proclamation today. This is my last year as president of Pride. I will be stepping down in August, and it really is my pleasure to be here and also to remind the community this is our 56th year of existence. We were founded in 1970, the year after Stonewall, and it's really something to, I will say, be a faculty member at the university and this year to be recruiting graduate students and faculty who always ask the same question, why would I move to Iowa in this time? And I constantly bring up the fact that Johnson County is one of the places that I've felt the most comfortable ever living in my life. I am not a Midwesterner by birth, but I could not be more proud of this community. And even though Unfortunately, the three regent universities have taken steps to not be able to support our communities in ways that we would like. Hopefully, we'll see change in that soon. And our festival is June 20th this year for, again, the 56th year, which we're very proud of and looking forward to. So, and one last thing I would remind, as I do all of my students, and as Councilor Moe brought up, Stonewall oftentimes sort of gets the facts wrong. People get a little bit of the facts wrong, and I would encourage folks to remember that the main catalyst of Stonewall were the efforts of trans folks of color. specifically a woman named Martha P. Johnson. And I would encourage us to, during Pride, to celebrate Pride in all of its capaciousness and in what that means in terms of not only sexual orientation, but also gender identity, in terms of race, and in terms of the intersectionality that we all celebrate. So thank you very much.

Thank you. All right, the next proclamation is 2C, Waste and Recycling Workers Week. And this will be read by Councilor Sala.

Whereas according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, the eradication of many disease in the Western world is due in large part of higher public sanitation standards resulting from effective garbage disposal. And we add the proper collection of disposable of waste recycling and organic waste are integral to preventing litter and dumps hips. And whereas the City of Iowa City values and celebrates dozens of workers in public and private trash recycling and organic waste industry in our community. And whereas the City of Iowa City promotes environmental sustainability through reducing waste and increasing recycling and composting. Therefore, I myself, on behalf of Bruce Teague, Mayor of Iowa City, Iowa, hereby proclaim the week of June 17th 2026 as waste and recycling workers week in Iowa City and urge our community members to recognize the value role that collections and remove services from trash recycling and organic waste play in our daily life. And here to accept is Jennifer Jordan, our resources superintendent.

Good evening, Mayor Teague and Council. As Celia mentioned, I'm Jennifer Jordan, the city's resource management superintendent. Thank you very much for the proclamation to celebrate Waste and Recycling Workers Week, which represents workers not only in the public sector, but also in our local private sector for trash, recycling, and organics collection. which, of course, I'm very biased in, but I think we do a phenomenal job here in the county, not just the public workers. Our division, the public workers, manage the city landfill, the compost facility, and the hazardous materials collection facility, as well as our curbside recycling program that serves almost 17,000 households with trash recycling and organics collection services. Our organics collections are a little bit different from most communities in Iowa in that we also have food waste collections, so we're very proud of that. We also offer a host of recycling centers across the community, both our full-service ones that you know about, like the Eastside Recycling Center, but we also have a great program of partner drop-off locations for things like batteries and light bulbs. So safety is a major factor in all of our work, so I'm going to talk a little bit about one of our programs and how we really focus on safety while we're talking about recycling and trash removal. According to Waste 360, which is a national trade magazine, Waste and recycling is the fifth most dangerous industry in the country. So let that sink in for a minute. Stuff happens all the time across the country. We hear about it in other communities. We occasionally have stuff happen here. It's all been very minor, which we're thankful for, but it does happen. So I'll summarize one of our programs to highlight how we offset some of those dangers. In 2025, we had 18 fires at the Iowa City landfill. During or in the aftermath of most of the fires, staff found batteries that were properly disposed. So to try and combat that, Our staff members have worked very hard to expand battery recycling programs and opportunities over the last several years throughout the county. We now provide 12 drop-off battery recycling locations around Johnson County, and in 2025, over 10,000 pounds of batteries have gotten recycled. We've also had, in this year, have only had two fires to date. So hopefully there's a correlation, and we continue to see that going in the right direction as we're able to recycle more. The program, besides attempting to reduce fires, also supports recycling of valuable metals such as lithium and nickel. This program is possible in part because of our amazing team of staff, but also because of the support of our partner locations, including both Iowa City Ace Hardware Stores, the Earl May Garden Center, the Iowa City Fire Department, and multiple Johnson County municipal locations, including Coralville, North Liberty, Solon, Lone Tree, Tiffin, Oxford, and Hills. And if some of those are a surprise to you, we've just added three more in the last few months, so we're very proud of that. So we greatly appreciate this proclamation to recognize the work we do in the waste and recycling industry. as we work to ensure our communities are safe and sanitary. And thank you again for this proclamation.

Thank you.

All right, and thanks to everybody for coming for the proclamations. We're moving on to our consent calendar items, items three through seven. Can I get a motion to approve, please? And I also want to remove 6I for separate consideration.

So moved. Alter. Second solid.

All right. And anyone from the public like to address this topic? If you're online, please raise your virtual hand. If you want to address anything on our consent agenda, except for item 6i. Okay. Welcome. Please state your name and city you're from.

Hello. I'm Zoe from Iowa City. I would like to talk about 6n, the Orchard Court Occupant Transition Plan. I was here for your work session and I just wanted to give you some updated information on our situation and I know that this has to do with what's written in our lease and the situation that a lot of us are in right now which is that after I was the one that sent that email and then This afternoon, after I sent that email, we received our notice. And so we are over, in our lease, what wasn't stated before was that in our lease, the thing that they say is that if we are given 30 days notice, within the termination of our lease. So if they give us termination of our lease in a date that is 30 days from the notice or less, then they will give us full security deposit and the $500. We are 48-ish days away from the termination of our lease because they said that they would just not be terminating the leases that we had renewed and we have to move out at the end of our current lease date. so none of us are likely to receive any of that money um we have confirmed with the rental company that we will be receiving our full security deposits but um there's no guarantee that they would be nice to us and give us 500 because that's not what they legally are required to do um and unlikely to be honest with the way landlords act in this city um uh And I would just like to say that that security deposit that we are going to be getting back is going to be going straight into the security deposit for our next place, which is going to be more than we can afford. Because at this point in time, I know that a lot of you haven't been in the rental market for a long time. Most of you own your houses. It's pretty bad. Even if you are renting within the lease cycle, you have full notice of when you're moving. You decide when you get to move. We don't get to decide when we get to move. it is difficult to find a place that is within your price range, fits what you want, and is in the location that is appropriate for your work, your school, whatever you're doing. And so I think that it is important for you all to consider that I know that it isn't your decision to sell or demolish this property, but it is your decision to give them money in order to do that. And we are not asking for much. We are asking for a very small amount of that money. Because right now, as of Friday, I will be unemployed because I'm a school bus driver. So this is a terrible time for me to have an extra expensive moving that I did not expect. And I also know that relevant in the, sorry, they gave us notice, but many people didn't receive that letter. So I want you to know that.

Thank you. Welcome. Please state your name and city you're from.

My name is Grant Manoring. I'm from Iowa City. And I just wanted to add on a little bit to what Zoe got cut off from, which was that we only know about this because the Because we were able to actually receive a letter which was like to be hand dropped off by a courier from the annex stating the potential plan for the demolition to occur and that there may be some that we would eventually get the notice to evacuate. That was I want to say roughly a month ago. But it's very likely that there are several people who would be affected by this that never got that notification. And rather would only just be getting the notification now that we received today regarding the 48 days that we now know that we have until we need to vacate our homes. So in any discussion about how much money we may be allotted for moving, I just want to say that we're, the two of us are in a relatively although a bad situation in a relatively better spot because we at least got some more heads up, but it's very likely that several, if not most of the other tenants affected would not have gotten that notice. And that's all, thank you.

Thank you. Will you sign in right there for me, please? Thank you. Anyone else like to address any items on our consent agenda except for item 6I, which will be separately considered? Anyone online, please raise your virtual hand. Seeing no one, council discussion. Roll call, please.

Moe? Yes. Sala? Yes. Teague?

Yes.

Weiland? Yes. Alter? Yes. Burgess? Yes. Hermson?

Yes. Motion passes 7-0. Could I get a motion to defer item 6i indefinitely, please? The staff is requesting. Moe by Sala?

Second, Burgess.

All right. Any discussion among council? Roll call, please.

Sala? Yes. Teague?

Yes.

Weiland? Yes. Alter? Yes. Burgess? Yes. Harmsen?

Yes.

Moe?

Yes. Motion passes 7-0. Could I get a motion to accept correspondence for item 6N?

So moved. Alter?

Second, Harmsen. All in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes seven to zero. We are on to our opportunity for community comment, item number eight. And this is a time for anyone to address anything that is not on our consent agenda or not on our formal agenda. Is there anyone here that wants to speak on any item that is not on our formal agenda? Please raise your hand at this time. Seeing no one, we're gonna move on to item number nine, which is planning and zoning matters. 9A, zoning code tax amendment, code cleanup and state preemptions, ordinance amending Title 14 zoning code and Title 15 land subdivisions to clarify requirements and ensure compliance with changes in state law related to communication, tower facilities, and accessory dwelling units. I'm going to open up the public hearing and welcome Danielle.

Thank you, Mayor. Daniel Sitzman, Neighborhood and Development Services. This ordinance has two parts. In the first part, staff regularly tracks needed updates to the zoning and subdivision codes based on discussions and experience administrating those regulations. Most of the amendments in that first section in the memo are minor clarifications that improve understanding and consistency for residents, developers, and decision makers. The second part of this ordinance is the more substantive amendments, and those are based on requirements that the state has passed that we need to align our city codes with. So the code, the minor code cleanup items, there's 14 such items in this staff memo, and these include things that are fixing typos, so aligned in that yellow box. References to outdated department names, old mapping technology, and cross-references to outside codes, codes which have changed, so that accounts for those four items. Things that were missed when the code has been updated recently. Very typically when we make a code update, there are cross-references that we're also chasing down throughout our code. So we've missed a few and we're cleaning those up at this point so that all things align. And then there are a few items here that need clarification. And these are sections of the code that sometimes seem to conflict with another code section. We're clarifying them, mostly just amending words so it's clear and consistent how those are being applied. We often in our discussions amongst ourselves have to kind of sort things out, figure out what the words on the page mean. When we come to those determinations, we like to be clear so that those are consistently applied to everyone. In the second part of the ordinance, the more significant changes, there are only two. We did another major batch of code changes recently. We found that there was some changes in 2015 related to Iowa Citing Act, so cell towers, things like that, that conflict with our code language, so we're cleaning that up. And then the state of Iowa revisited the accessory dwelling units code that they passed the year before to just do some minor amendments on their part, so we're just catching up with that. Anytime we do text amendments, we always try to make the least change necessary to correct what we found or to line with state codes. So this shows you, again, where those ADU changes happened recently, where some of these other things that we are clarifying or amending came from, and that we're at this section here highlighted in blue. So staff recommended the adoption of the proposed zoning code text change and at their May 6th, 2026 meeting, the Planning and Zoning Commission concurred with staff's recommendation and voted to recommend approval by a vote of seven to zero.

I'm happy to answer questions. Is the language change around the ADUs anything very substance?

No, they... tried to define terms. When they first made their ADU amendments, a lot of the cities were trying to work through what things meant. So this is their hopeful clarification to help the cities implement. So no, there were not large changes.

I just had a question, Danielle, about the least change sort of standard. Is that in terms of, like, can you just explain what that means?

These are meant to be minor. These are not meant to be substantive. So if we're changing something, we want to limit it to we're just clarifying a little bit. This is not meant to rewrite any kind of substantive standard that we're applying. So, we try to have fewer words, honestly, most of the time. Fewer words, more succinct, keeping terminology the same throughout the code.

All right. Thank you.

Hearing no other questions, thank you. Anyone from the public like to address this topic? If you're online, please raise your virtual hand. If you're in council chambers, please come forth. Seeing no one. Before I close the public hearing, just want to know if council is inclined to vote with PNZ? Yes. All right. I'm going to close the public hearing. Can I get a motion to give first consideration?

So moved. Wiley? Second. Second Mo. All right.

Council discussion. Roll call please.

Teague?

Yes.

Weiland? Yes. Alter? Yes. Burgess? Yes. Harmsen?

Yes. Moe? Yes. Sala?

Yes.

Motion passes seven to zero. We're on to our regular agenda item 10. 10a is kind of a gas pipeline easement resolution conveying a gas pipeline easement on and under portions of city property near the water waste treatment facility to accommodate distribution of renewable natural gas. And I'm going to open up the public hearing. And I'm going to invite Eric Gores to lead us through this one.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I don't have a lot to add about this, only that as part of the renewable natural gas development we're doing down at the wastewater treatment plant, they needed to move the gas line outside of the right-of-way where it's located, as I understand it, at present to a different spot in our property. So obviously we want to accommodate that, and that's what we're doing here tonight.

Great.

Any questions by council? Hearing none. Anyone from the public like to address this topic? If you're online, please raise your virtual hand. If you're in council chambers, please come forth. Seeing no one, I'm going to close the public hearing. Can I get a motion to approve, please? So moved, Mo.

Second. Alter.

Council discussion. Still excited about this project, thanks to Public Works.

Yep. Roll call, please. Weiland?

yes alter yes Burgess yes Thompson yes Mo yes Sala yes Teague yes motion passes 7 to 0 10 be human rights ordinance amendment ordinance amending amending title 2 human rights chapter 1 general provisions section 1 definitions to add a definition of sex stereotyping and title 2 human rights chapter 2 Human Rights Commission section 3 structure to amend the Human Rights Commissioner terms to two years in accordance with state law. And this is the first consideration. Can I get a motion, please? So moved. Alter. Second. Harmsen. All right. We'll bring up Eric again.

Thank you, Mayor. Taking the second part first, as it's easier, there was a recent change in state code that changed and set the length of commissioner terms to two years. Ours are presently three years plus whatever time it takes to appoint someone new. So we have to comply with state code that way. The second and more substantive part of this is to address what council was aware has been coming from the state legislature. Over the last couple of sessions, they've acted to constrain city abilities to protect civil rights. I know that this council feels strongly about that and is well aware of that already. However, we want to make clear that protections remain. And this ordinance is an attempt to clarify that one such protection is based on sex stereotyping. That has been a protected classification and has been the law of the land that is that it's illegal to discriminate based on sex stereotypes since the late 80s. There's a huge body of law that supports that. And sex stereotyping is sex discrimination. And sex discrimination remains illegal under both the state Iowa Civil Rights Act and our local human rights ordinance. So this ordinance is just an attempt to make clear that sex stereotyping remains illegal. That's something that is not allowed and that folks who are gender nonconforming or don't, who don't adhere to sex role stereotypes still have protection in the city of Iowa City.

Any questions for Eric?

I guess I have a question about since we'll be required to go from three years to two years for our commissioners, if you can just explain what that looks like for the process.

Well, yeah, that'll be a little bit tricky. I think those who have already been appointed will serve out their terms. and then subsequent commissioners who are appointed will be for two years. I guess we'll have to spend some time thinking about the logistics to make sure that that doesn't result in a wrong number of commissioners, but I think we can manage.

Great. Thanks. All right. Anyone from the public like to address this topic? If so, please come forth. If you're online, please raise your virtual hand. Seeing no one. Council discussion.

Thank you for bringing this to us.

Thank you. Thank you very much.

Roll call, please.

Alter? Yes. Burgess? Yes. Harmsen? Yes. Moe? Yes. Sala? Yes. Teague? Yes.

Weiland?

Yes.

Motion passes 7-0. 10C, MidAmerican Energy Electric Franchise, ordinance renewing and continuing the franchise granted to MidAmerican Energy Company, its successors and assigns to acquire, construct, direct, maintain, and operate in the City of Iowa City. an electric light and power system to furnish, deliver and sell electric energy to said city and its inhabitants for a period of five years. This is the second consideration, and staff is requesting expedited action.

I move that the rule requiring that ordinances must be considered and voted on for passage at two council meetings prior to the meeting which is to be finally passed be suspended, that the second consideration and vote be waived, and that the ordinance be voted on for final passage at this time.

Moved by Moe.

Second by Sally.

All right. Anyone from the public like to address this topic? If so, please come forth. If you're in council chambers, please raise your virtual hand if you're online. Seeing no one. Council discussion. Roll call, please.

Burgess?

Yes.

Harmsen? Yes. Moe? Yes. Sala? Yes. Teague? Yes. Weiline? Yes. Alter?

Yes.

Motion passes 7-0. Could I get a motion to pass and adopt? So moved, Moe.

Second alter.

Roll call please.

Harmsen. Yes. Mo. Yes. Sala.

Yes.

Teague. Yes. Weiland. Yes. Alter.

Yes.

Burgess.

Yes.

Motion passes 7-0. 10-D. Mid-American Energy Gas Franchise. Orness renewing and continuing the franchise granted to Mid-American Energy Company. its successors and assigns to acquire, construct, direct, maintain, and operate in the City of Iowa City a natural gas system to furnish, deliver, and sell natural gas to said city and its inhabitants for a period of five years. This is the second consideration and staff is requesting expedited action.

I move that the rule requiring that ordinances must be considered and voted on for passage at two council meetings prior to the meeting, which is to be finally passed, be suspended at the second consideration, vote be waived, and that the ordinance be voted on for final passage at this time. Moved by Moe.

Second, Bergus.

All right. Anyone from the council, anyone from the public like to address this topic? Seeing no one, council discussion. Roll call, please. Moe? Yes.

Sala? Yes. Teague?

Yes.

Weiland? Yes. Alter? Yes. Burgess? Yes. Harmsen?

Yes. Motion passes 7-0. Could I get a motion to pass and adopt? So moved, Moe.

Second, Alter.

Roll call, please.

Salah?

Yes.

Teague?

Yes.

Weiland? Yes. Alter? Yes. Burgess? Yes. Harmsen? Yes. Moe?

Yes. Motion passes 7-0. 10E, Eastern Iowa Light and Power Cooperative Electric Franchise. Ordinance granting to Eastern Iowa Light and Power Cooperative, its successors and assigns the right and franchise to acquire, construct, direct, maintain, and operate in the City of Iowa City, an electric light and power system to furnish, deliver and sell electric energy to said city and its inhabitants, and to enact a 2% franchise fee on the gross revenue derived from the distribution, delivery, and retail sale of electricity by franchisees to customers within the current or future corporate limits of the City of Iowa City. Staff is requesting expedited action.

I move that the rule requiring the ordinances must be passed, must be considered and voted on for the final passage of two council meetings prior to the meeting, which is to be finally passed, be suspended, that the second consideration vote be waived, and that the ordinance be voted on for final passage at this time. Moved by Mo.

Second.

Seconded by Sala. And anyone from the public like to address this topic? Seeing no one. Council discussion. Roll call please. Teague. Yes. Weiland. Yes. Alter.

Yes.

Burgess. Yes. Harmsen. Yes. Mo. Yes. Sala.

Yes.

Motion passes 7-0. Can I get a motion to pass and adopt?

So moved. Burgess.

second mo alter oh uh seconded by mo uh roll call please wildline yes alter yes burgus yes harmsen yes mo yes sala yes teague yes motion passes seven to zero we're at uh 11 which is announces a vacancies previous 11A is Human Rights Commission. One vacancy to fill an unexpired term upon appointment through December 31st, 2028. Applications must be received by 5 p.m. Tuesday, July 7th, 2026. Climate Action Commission, one vacancy to fill an unexpired term. Applications must be received by 5 p.m. Tuesday, June 9th, 2026. 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 a HVAC professional to fill an unexpired term. Historic Preservation Commission on Vixen for Brown Street representative to fill a 3 year term. Historic Preservation Commission on Vixen for Jefferson Street representative to fill a 3 year term. Historic Preservation Commission on Vixen for one Avenue representative to fill a 3 year term vacancies will remain open until field where item number 12 City Council information.

thanks to police, fire, public works, and ambulance for being at the farmer's market. There were a lot of very happy kids who got to climb into fire trucks and play around with big tractors and stuff. So everyone was real happy. So thanks for being there.

Also heard that the foot traffic was like much better there. So definitely it's something to consider for almost like a permanent spot for when these go.

The permanent playground for the market? Yeah.

Not permanent. I meant when you do the big open house, when there's the open house.

Congrats to all. Well, congrats to all of the high school graduates this past weekend in Iowa City, for City and West and Liberty and Tate, so maybe three in particular, but to all of them.

Yes. all right we're on to item number 13 report on items from city staff city manager's office not tonight to the attorney's office no thank you and city clerk office all right item number 14 can i get a motion to adjourn and we're going to go back to our work session um but can i get a motion to adjourn our from our formal meeting so moved wyland second father All right. All in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes. 7-2-0. All right. And Council, I think if we're for it, we'll keep going. Yep. All right. Sounds great.

Yeah.

We are returning to our work session. It is still June 2nd 2026. And we are discussing item number work session item and IP number 4 from the May 28th information packet. So we're on item number 2 and we'll just continue that discussion.

Okay.

Councilor Weiland and I had the opportunity to chat briefly with the residents in between meetings and going to be providing us with some additional information and my thought is one of, I'd be comfortable doing a couple of different things. One would be just waiting and getting that information, letting city staff take a peek at it and continuing with this discussion at the next work session or going ahead and say we'll go ahead and be okay i'd also be okay moving forward with the 500 and then depending on the information we get we could revisit that in the future so i those are the two things that cross my mind uh but you know that's just me is it appropriate or uh allowed to ask what that what where what additional information are we waiting on the actual letters and lease agreements so we have something to go off of what

Whether they're actually going to get the payment from the, whether the landlord would honor the 500.

Because they're not like legally, they don't legally have to. So I think the risk we run is leaving some people out to dry, you know. You know what I understand, I just think the worst that could happen is some people get a little bit of extra money then, but I think erring on the side of caution so no one gets completely screwed over. is where I sit. I'm comfortable with an additional 700 to 1K per tenant right now. But I would also be comfortable giving staff direction for 500 right now and then approaching it in the future after we get more information. Because another thing, sorry, in their letter was just to sit down to talk. with staff and I think maybe some of that information could be cleared up if that happened, whatever form that would take.

Is that, that wouldn't necessarily need to be contingent on, I mean, they could get, are you saying? Correct. Separate issue, yeah. Separate issue, yeah.

Right, okay, okay. I really think that, oh, somebody was talking. I hear somebody. Anyway, I think I've been involved with, like, many of displacement of residents throughout, like, even the one that we have it here, several of them, I personally been involved in that. Normally, I think the tenant should have also some kind of request from the landlord and say like, well, I'm not really, I don't know if I, stop me if I'm saying something that I'm not supposed to say.

Well, what I was going to ask is when you said you're personally involved, I just want to make sure that you're in your professional advisory capacity and not as a relative.

Yes, I was personally involved in my professional capacity as an employer at the Center for Worker Justice previously. And I was also dealing with this kind of thing. But the tenant will come to us to try to negotiate with us. landlord, and the tenant will come with demand, such as, there is $500 that in the lease, and because of this 45 days and 30 days or 48 days, as you mentioned, you know, sometimes you go there and tell them, yeah, this is something that has to happen, the $500, because you've been displaced. And also, I thought the city of Iowa City is matching. Like, all the time, the owner, the property owner, in many cases, they have to put something. Like, in one of the cases, the city matched the $2,000 for the city was doing something. Like, because the landlord put that. And another time, you know, it was... $1,000, the city gave out the tenant some kind of deposit and some moving fee. So we've been seeing something more than $500 in most cases that the city deals with. I just want to mention that. That's why I don't want us to just copy that, the $500. And also in the same time, I would like to make sure the tenant go to that landlord and say, you're asking those people suddenly to do that, and keep in mind, those people who are renting there for a long time, I don't know how much is the deposit. They put it a while ago, even if that deposit will be equal to today's deposit, because the market rate, like the rate is really high. I really think... we should do the same thing, we should have access for them for application fee, the same thing that we have access to as a tenant for application fee, and we should do like some kind of deposit or something like that, and also I encourage the tenant to go to the landlord and ask for something, for the 500 at least.

I think for me the main thing is to not wait. So I'd prefer we just decide and I would err on the side of maybe a little higher dollar amount if we decide tonight so it can just be paid out.

That's what I was thinking. A couple hundred bucks is a make or break for a lot of people.

I think 1,000 would be really good. So I was looking at this and actually did my little subtraction. Based on what's already been spent. So there's $50,000 that's been budgeted for 26 already. 14, let's call it 14,500 roughly has already been spent. So based on all of that, we could go 900 for the 37 tenants. How much is that? It come out to, it's a little less than doubling it because we've only, after we've spent the 1442, we've got... 35,558. So we could give them 900, which is really close to the thousand and have it budgeted. And I also completely concur that let's do this sooner rather than later, because as hard as it is to find something, if in fact some of these tenants find something, but then they're like, but you got to wait because the city's going to pay this out. I promise I'll get the money for you. They're going to be like, well, yeah, right. It's not going to happen. So let's give them the money that they can actually use. I mean, that's the whole point. And if it's dribbled out, that's not going to be useful at all. So that's my inclination.

I just had a process question, Jeff. You mentioned in the memo or you all mentioned in the memo about recommending going through a separate party to do this. Can you just run by me exactly what that would look like?

I think we just requested that flexibility, not knowing where you were going to go. So, for example, we don't really have case management capacity to assist people in finding a new location. If that's not part of the equation, then we're probably not going to need a third party to administer that. So I just left that in there, not knowing where this conversation would go.

Okay, I see, because this is a lot less capacity lifting if it's just cutting a check and not coordinating anything else.

That's correct.

Okay. I mean, I think fitting it in within the budget, Megan, like nothing else has to be budgeted is a really good idea and that's like.

It's close to that 1,000. I guess when I ask you, Jeff, on the Hakai Trail Park, where we get the money from, you kind of have the sources for many of them, but for that one, is this emergency?

It's the emergency portion of the Affordable Housing Fund.

Because we give those 10 households $2,000 per household. Mm-hmm. And in another, like, displacement, we get $1,000 plus the double security deposit. And right now, Jeff, if we're trying to give at least $1,000 per tenant, where do we get that money from?

The same source, the emergency deposit. portion of the affordable housing fund so that fund was used for hawkeye the hawkeye trailer park as you mentioned the 2024 displacement was related to housing choice voucher program so that those funds were not from the affordable housing fund those were from the housing authority but in this case we'd be looking at that emergency fund and even when we created this affordable housing fund back in the 2016, 2017 timeframe, we have always set aside 5% for emergencies, and those have generally been displacements that the city's been associated with in some way, shape, or form, or non-profit emergencies.

Yeah, and since the displacement will happen in a new physical years, isn't that means we have $50,000 sitting there?

Come July 1, there would be a new $50,000, yes. Our intention would be to try to get these checks out before the end of the fiscal year, though.

Yeah, but plus this one, right?

Correct, yes. So come July 1, there would be another $50,000.

I really encourage at least to give out $1,000.

I feel like everyone here is going to try to one-up everyone.

I did my final offer.

We've been giving people more than that.

Right, and they're all different situations, and the cities, I mean, getting moved out of a trailer that you own and can't take with you is different, but I don't know. I just feel like there's one entrepreneurship happening here that I think we should be thinking a little bit about. Also, we want to help. We all want to help. But I think we're all just kind of deciding what the correct dollar is. I like the idea of fitting it in our current year budget and spending it right now. I was very attracted to those two things to get money to people right now.

i think too that and also just being prudent because every dollar we spend now is the dollar we don't get to spend on permanent affordable housing in the future well i think another way to think about it um and draining that fund now knowing that it will reset in less than a month yeah actually makes me comfortable draining it right you know um as opposed to like if we were doing the same conversation about draining it in august you know and knowing that we'd have then 11 months left before before the reset

And for what it's worth, actually, I mean, it could even be, I mean, we could truly drain it down because, and get close to the $1,000 because after the initial spend that we've done thus far, thank you, so it'd be $961.56. $962 actually.

There's a one-offsmanship.

Anyway, the difference is not that. Let's drain it.

Let's give it.

Let's do it. And whatever that divides out to, is that the direction? That's what that was divided to.

I do agree that at the same time that we're going to reset in July, The way all this goes is that there's gonna be a need for us to have emergency money for housing next year too. So I like the idea of being able to do very close to what Oliver had proposed and on the upper limit and then in one batch.

And I appreciate or I understand that you know just one counselor having meetings with a distangled group of folks is you know which you had a little bit more solid stuff but I can just tell you like that that is definitely fits within the range of like what people were asking for, you know. So, you know, that's like the most concrete thing that I can bring to it. So I think that that is agreeable for sure. I think I would make it less of a headache for staff. I think that would provide the relief people are asking for. And I really do think, you know, we can always wait like, oh, will there be a worse emergency in the future? But, you know, I really do think that this type of stuff is really important if we want to continue to be bold about affordable housing like we have been. like I was saying earlier, things like this are gonna have to happen, unfortunately, and so if we, in good faith, treat tenants with respect and see that when things like this happen that we're not gonna screw them over and we're gonna be compassionate and treat them well, then I think we'll see less pushback and I think people will trust the city more.

After I did the math, I really thought it's 700 because he was saying 700, but I think 962.115 is not bad.

Not bad.

Close enough. Close enough. So, yeah, I think, yeah, it is close to my 1,000. I feel good about that, but I really... Is there any way, if that's not good, tell me, but can the city just encourage the developer to, like, fulfill the, regardless, encourage, regardless of 30 days or...

48 days to Give them that is there is a way the city can say something like that landlord is different than the developer is The other thing that's complicated is some annex group is someone we've been discussing there They're the buyer by the time they buy and close on the property. There will be no tenants there There's a different current landlord

Who give out the money?

Well, if you're talking about the landlord money, it would be the current landlord. I mean, I don't know if there's an arrangement between Annex and the current owner.

Or maybe encourage Annex to encourage the residents to encourage the current landlord to do that. Something like that, like, since we have, like, some kind tiny involvement, and those are our residents. Those are city residents. So if we can do, like, some encouragement... Not binding by anything. Just some encouragement.

We can ask, but I want to be clear that this isn't like a wink-wink, like, you know, you sure have a nice property there. I hope nothing happens to it. We would just be seven identified occupants. So if someone shows up and says, oh, I live there, I'm not on the lease, like, sorry.

The 37 that's in the memo.

The 37 identified occupants.

Yeah, I think that's the... Oh, but you mean like the 37 is the people who have lease?

Well, that's how many people have been identified by the annex group who in turn I'm sure got that information from the current owner of the property I'm asking because You know sometimes paramours stay over I mean the Housing Authority deals with this kind of issue all the time or somebody Leasing to somebody was who's not on the lease and I just want to be clear that that those folks under the discussion that I've heard from council tonight would not be eligible because of the math. It would just be the 37 who have been identified who are presumably those are the ones who are on the leases and that's it, right?

I shouldn't say that's it.

I mean, I think you folks are being very generous.

Yeah, that makes sense. Thank you. And yes, I think that is what we are talking about.

So it sounds like staff has direction, 962. 961 something, because I did not look like 5.42, like 442.

So can we just do 962? Yeah. 961 if that's better. Wherever it is, don't go over the budget.

Stay within budget. I want to do 962.

Yeah, let's do 962 and that's it.

Are people wanting, I think the intent is for the council to stay within the budget.

You would be $1 off. You would have $1 remaining in the emergency fund if you do 961 per tenant.

How about we do 962 and we'll still be within the affordable housing budget that we set. It's not uncommon for us to flex a little bit on the emergency versus opportunity versus security. Sometimes we flex a little bit.

Also to make it clear.

Go with 962.

Also just one more question. This is something that will be voted on before payments are made. It will be voted on at the next city council meeting.

Is there a need?

I think we have everything we need here. We'll work with the staff team and figure out a plan to contact the residents. We may enlist the help if folks have already been engaged with the residents. We have all that contact information in terms of the physical location. We'll just arrange a process for them to stop into City Hall and pick up a check.

And the check will be cut before July 1st.

Yes.

Okay. Perfect.

All right.

Our hope is to do that as soon as feasible. Correct. Right? Okay. Yes. Thank you. Okay.

Any other discussion on this? We're going to move on to May 28th, IEP 5. And this is the memo from Housing Authority, Executive Director. So any comments you want to give any further on this item? And this is for the targeted local voucher preference for unhoused Households welcome.

I appreciate you sticking here with us to get to this You all had expressed interest in learning a little bit more about what other communities have done Cedar Rapids has a local target preference for vouchers I've spent a lot of time reading HUD best practices really an entire career leading up to being able to be confident in this memo. And HUD best practices, what other communities are doing, what our partners in the COCs across the country are doing and what we're looking for, combined with the local knowledge we have of what we've seen with a real cliff dive of losing benefits resources after COVID funding is over. And I've been in conversation with many affordable housing providers, homeless service providers in the community about it. Chrissy's here tonight because I've spoken to her about it. And I really think that this is my best foot forward of the best practices throughout the country combined with the local knowledge we have of what we need here. And if you have any questions, I'd be happy to answer them.

describe what a three-year pilot program looks like for us and what kind of feedback and when we would get?

Yeah, so what we would do just to start off with, because I know some people have had some questions about this, we naturally have attrition through the program. People In HUD speak, it's called an EOP, end of participation. We naturally have those throughout the year. That isn't us terminating them. In an ideal situation, it's people being successful enough that they don't need housing assistance anymore, and that's the vast majority of what we have. And our average over the last five years, the average would be about 160 a year. that just naturally fall off. We have had a very low attrition year in the last 12 months. I'm not willing to say that that's the trend going forward yet because one year is not a lot of data, but what we know is we could take those vouchers as they turn over. Say in March we had 16 vouchers turnover and this pilot program would say we're going to take 25% of those. So in April we could say we have four vouchers to dedicate to the homeless response system. So for the course of the three years we would, as they're available, be able to issue those through coordinated entry and track them. So coordinated entry, and Chrissy can speak much more eloquently about this if we ask her to, Coordinated industry is tracking all the things that we want to see already through the homeless management information system they use. It's called Service Point here in Iowa. And we would be looking at rates of return to homelessness or for the vouchers we would dedicate to homeless prevention services, rates of engagement with further homeless prevention services. We can go more in depth to the Housing Authority. We collect a phenomenal amount of information because of the federal requirements. and we recently transitioned to new software, and I survived it, so we have a lot of great tracking options now. I would suggest we track things like moves, if people are moving. One of the things that we really see in stable households is they're not moving every year, and that's kind of an indicator for us in the Housing Authority that when you're moving every year, it probably means you haven't found the spot that's working well for you. So moves, income, wages, types of income. So we have a lot of options, but I think that the big things would be return to engagement with homeless service providers or homeless prevention services, length of leases, wages going up. Those are a couple of the items that I think would make sense.

And then that would be in some kind of presentation to us in the future. This program is working effectively or it needs tweaks.

Yeah, I think that we should evaluate it at least annually throughout that project and see where we're at. It's hard to get, three years was really the minimum. I thought that we could get a good picture of what this is looking like because it really does, it takes just a little bit to stabilize. And when we're talking about year-long data, I want to make sure we have a good amount.

Thanks. My question was? Yeah, this kind of voucher going to be treated as regular vouchers? Maybe you said this, but I did not notice it. Anyway, like sometimes people get the voucher and after that move to another state. Is this transferable too?

Yeah, we couldn't limit it to anybody staying here, so people would still be able to port. So if somebody chose to port, that certainly would be their option. I think that I would like to create a special release of information in those situations and ask the family to keep in touch with us so we can kind of see how things are going. I obviously can't guarantee that someone will do that, but I would try to keep that. You know, we see really very fast math in my head. Our port rate annually is like 3.2 or 3%, so it'll happen some, but it's not a ton.

I also want to say thank you very much for all this, like the work you've done on this and bringing all this information to us. This is really amazing. Thank you so much for your work. No, I appreciate the opportunity.

I was just going to ask if you can just highlight some of the huge barriers that you believe that this three-year pilot program would alleviate specifically for the population that we're targeting.

Yeah, certainly. This goes without saying, but I'll say it anyway. We know that the cost of housing is prohibitive. And what we also know on a national level, on a local level, is that the number one predictor of someone being unhoused, experiencing homelessness, is not having a home. It's not substance use. It's not mental health. Certainly, we have a lot of those that are comorbid with being unhoused. But the number one predictor, the only thing that every person who's unhoused has in common is that they don't have a home. and this is an opportunity to address that in a powerful way. I think that I recognize, I know you all recognize and take it very seriously that this is a finite resource and we have a set number of vouchers and this is an incredibly valuable and life-changing resource. Every one of us probably knows somebody who's received a voucher that it has changed the course of their life. And so we wanna make sure that we're not taking that lightly And that we are giving those to the populations of people who are most likely to benefit the most from it. Kind of in homeless services, which my previous career was in, was we wanted to give services to people who are most likely to suffer negative mental or physical health effects as a result of being homeless. And this is an opportunity to push our vouchers into that direction, which I think is a national trend that may be a little bit slowed down right now, but I think we'll pick back up in a couple years. And as far as the vouchers allocated to the homeless prevention services, we're seeing people who, you know, they're not doing anything wrong. This isn't a choice. They are low income. And we live in a community that's wonderful and has a high cost of living compared to other places in Iowa. And this is an opportunity to stabilize them before they enter the homeless response system. So that does two things. It stops a flow of unhoused households into the homeless response system. So shelter house is ideally having fewer literally homeless households to deal with. and it's helping stretch homeless prevention dollars further because we're not going to the well repeatedly for the same family and perhaps we can provide that limited intervention. It's essentially increasing the intervention level to try to be more equitable in providing services.

I echo what others have said. Thank you. I'm a bit of a nerd. It was a wonderful memo. It was, yeah. And I thought I'd been kicking around the proposal and the proposed solution by balancing various pros and cons, and I thought it was elegant. So thank you.

I appreciate that. Did the Mayor Potem tell you to be nice to me? No, I did not.

It's really cool that we're having this sophisticated of a conversation as well. I don't know that at least, you know, not to speak for my colleagues, but I think even a few years ago, this would have been a heavier lift for us to even comprehend. So thank you for laying it out so well. And thanks to all our staff and the community providers who've been educating us as well.

Built into the pilot, are we expecting some types of like updates like through the years like it's been a year like here's how it's going or is that up to us or?

It would be up to you but I think that that would be very reasonable. Okay. Yeah. Yeah.

I kind of want to ask you about the priority being given based on documented engagement with the local homelessness prevention resources, including but not limited, even though you said included but not limited, to shelter house, Johnson County General Assistance, eviction prevention programs, and repeated housing crisis intervention. Why don't you just say documented through the coordinator entry instead of naming some organization?

Yeah, I wanted to clarify Johnson County Social Services doesn't necessarily put the people they help with homeless prevention dollars or run assistance into coordinated entry. And oftentimes those are households that we really need to be reaching. So I wanted to make sure it was inclusive of that piece. And in the future, they may utilize coordinated entry, and then that would be, you know, a moot point, everything would be in there. I just wanted to make sure, when that is one of our go-to spots for rent assistance, to make sure that we are including involvement with them.

Yeah, because some of them would be sort of DVIB. Some of them would be, like, granted action of use. There is many. Yeah, for sure.

Any other questions? All right. Thank you. All right. So, um, just, I guess the direction, um, that count of that staff is needing is, is this kind of, um, something that the council is wanting to go for?

Yes.

All right.

As the memo outlines, we'll plan on an annual update after, a year after it's launched. All right. Sounds great. Sir, what is the timeframe? Sooner if they want. Yeah, when is the launch? If there's something exciting, you can always tell us. We're probably looking at mid-fall launch, October, about October launch. Okay. Cool.

Great.

Yeah. This one is better. Thank you. Again.

Yes.

Thank you, Tracy. Thank you.

Yeah. Thanks to Shelter House also for being here. Thanks. All right. Any other discussion on IP5? We're going to move on to item number three, council updates on assigned boards, commissions, and committees.

We had a Better Together 2030 meeting recently. That was a really, really great engaged discussion that ended up kind of focusing on how with going back to the original vision of the organization and how it came about and talking about who are our really solid community partners now, is there more we need to be doing for continued collaboration, reaching more people, and one of the themes was trying to get better buy-in from the University of Iowa because they, you know, at the beginning we're all in on the vision and now maybe not so much so it was a very robust conversation and very direct straightforward and really interesting so last week there was an mpo meeting so everyone i think other than the mayor yeah so um tap plan is approved meetings or minutes are recorded great

And there was a meeting, right? I did not, I wasn't able to attend last.

I think the MPO GC meeting is what Councillor Moe was talking about, and I stood in for you.

Yeah, you were there as him.

Right.

You were covered. You were good.

And I think the other thing is their polls close in 44 minutes. It is election day. So if somebody's listening and hasn't voted, you've still got a little bit of a window.

all right hearing nothing else we are adjourned from our work session and good night everyone