City Council - Regular Meeting

for the pledge of allegiance.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

And I'd like to call this meeting to order. Since no one has signed up for the open forum, we'll go on to the consent items.

Move to approve.

Second. Aaron Holtz? Aye. Sloan? Aye. Weitrich? Aye. Minkovan? Aye.

Under new business item A, is this time for a public hearing for the proposed ordinance regarding electric bicycles, electric scooters, and personal transportation devices?

So the police committee for the city of Jefferson has had several meetings trying to address a fair way to approach regulating your e-scooters, your e-bikes, motorized bikes in and around Jefferson. And most folks will have firsthand experience that these things are zipping around there pretty quick becomes a safety issue for not only the riders who are oftentimes pretty young but also the drivers trying to move around them and so what the what the committee has done has put together an ordinance to cover how these things are written where these things are written when these things are written and taking into account a lot of different Ordinances that other cities have done in trying to put this together, but trying to put something together that works for Jefferson because we're not an acne or not a walkie. Some of those towns that have already dealt with these things and not a lot of small towns that we've seen have. but try to put something together that's pretty fair for everybody. And so the ordinance that the committee came up with has tried to regulate where these things can be written. In fact, the ordinance says no sidewalks in the downtown business district, right? So you won't see these things on the sidewalks downtown. You won't see e-scooters on Highway 4, north and south, on at West Lincoln Way, East Lincoln Way, and also on North Grimmel Road, north of Clark Street on the way out to the school where you have a lot of young drivers. And again, those are for the e-scooters. It'll impact the way that these things are ridden, you know, no towing anything behind these devices, no letting these things be towed by vehicles, like by motorcycles and by cars. and also that they should be ridden in a manner that they were designed and oftentimes that's going to be one rider per device. You'll probably see this summer a lot of kids riding two to a pair on the e-scooters, on some of the motorized bikes and this thing curtails that. The teeth of this ordinance It's going to be much like the bicycle ordinance itself. I would imagine that there will be quite a bit of rollout. We wanted to get this thing done this summer with its readings so that by the time that school rolls around, it will be in place and that there will be a pretty substantial education process for people through the various media for the city of Jefferson. I'm probably not speaking on term, but I think Mark will in the Police Department will be involved in that trying to educate folks as much as possible so that you know, especially parents can instruct their kids on how to stay safe and how to operate within the ambit of this new ordinance. And I don't know if there have been comments that have been received by the Council in speaking with Scott beforehand. I don't think Scott you've had much, not much, no.

I've had several comments, all of them positive, save one, and the only encouragement there was to make it even more stringent. And we want to weigh responsible use, safe use, as well as not to inhibit any recreation that occurs in this town.

I think that's real well put. we the city does not want to make this overly prohibitive even though a lot of the comments that you probably have had have been we want this to be stringent but I mean kids are getting these things as birthday presents and Christmas presents and we want them to be used. We just want them to be used safely.

I think David did a great job explaining that. Just a couple of points I wanted to point out.

I think you're being asked to speak into the mic. So everybody can hear you.

Hours of operation, sunup to sunset, much like our golf cart and all the other ordinances. So that's merely for safety. As police officers, we look at any ordinance as a tool. It's something that we can use for safety obviously in this situation, but we do have under this ordinance the ability that if they're just not listening and their parents aren't being successful with teaching them how to write safely, we can impound their scooter and make the parent come and get it from us and then we'll educate the parent at the same time. So there is the possibility. Like I said, this is more of a tool, but there is a possibility of somebody that really is not understanding there's a municipal infraction that was about $100, Dave. But those will be extreme cases.

And just to counter saying your point, Chief, the hours of operation, those are on the e-scooters. Because there's going to be some safety equipment that's inherent with a lot of the other devices, your motorized bikes, your e-bikes, things like that. But on the scooters, there's just not that kind of safety there. So that's what the hours of operation are going to be for.

The implementation of an ordinance like this was really underscored last October. The Blank Children's Hospital out of Des Moines reported that since 2022, there was a 1,000% increase in the number of e-bike and e-scooter related injuries. And the majority is kids. And granted, those came from Blank Children's Hospital. But there are quite a few adults also experiencing life-altering injuries involving these.

And just to clarify my previous comment on the Highway 4 and the Lincoln Way, that's riding on those two streets. Crossing it is still completely fine. So we want folks who live on the east side of town to be able to get to the swimming pool. We want folks on the west side of town to be able to get to Russell Park. That's not going to be prohibited. It's just going to be riding up and down on the street.

I have some concern on your e-bikes, especially when you talk about low-speed e-bikes and you classify that as 28 miles an hour or slower. I think that's way, way too fast to be on a sidewalk, zipping by somebody's house and they're backing out. They're either going to hit that car backing out or they're going to get backed over. That low speed e-bike needs to be a lot slower speed than that. Maybe wheelchair speed, maybe walking speed. You can't hear them coming. They're quiet. This kid has no experience in their own knees. They're not going to be required to have a license. They're not going to be required to have insurance. If they're going to go that speed, it needs to be required. They need to have a license. They need to have insurance. And they don't need to be on the sidewalk going that fast. It's just way too dangerous.

Thank you.

Yeah.

Is there anyone else?

Will there be any kind of age to this? Are we too young to operate these things on the streets? Has that even been considered?

Yeah, I think part of that's going to be balancing what a government can actually curtail as far as ages. You know, you're going to have by and large bicycles that can be ridden or regular scooters that can be ridden by just about any age. And a lot of this is going to fall on the parent to then say, when is it going to be appropriate for my kid to be able to utilize this conveyance? You know, there are for the motorized bikes. I mean, yeah, you're going to need your license for that, but for your E screws and for your, you know. e-bikes, then those are not going to be something that the city is going to be enforcing on the age. We would like to have parents be aware when they think that their kids can ride these things, just like with any bicycle and just like with any scooter.

So like he brought up, if they're doing 28 mile an hour, and per se, they run into the side of my truck and gave them the door, who's responsible for that? My insurance? Does he run into me?

Yeah, I mean, I probably wouldn't be able to give you a good legal opinion on, you know, a civil matter like that, but it'd be something where I definitely be looking to that child and that parent to be able to, you know, fix a vehicle that they ran into.

Because I'm just going back. I know it's a long time ago.

You know, when I was 14. That was the first time we could ride anything motorized on the road. You had to pass a test.

You had to take a safety course. your thing had to be licensed you had to understand the rules of growth well an eight-year-old kid they ain't never gonna get that yeah and i think i'm scared some old some old lady or something like that's gonna get some kid and then she's gonna feel terrible like rotten to the core i mean this is a tough situation that i i don't know how to address but yeah i think i just watched a kid last weekend when i thought the meeting was last week We come out of our camera, we're under depth and center, headed for a, I mean, that little thing was boogieing down the sidewalk, strictly the crosswalk, never bumped, never stopped, never did anything. And I'll say,

That's where the state of Iowa kind of left the cities hanging. They didn't do a very good job of identifying things, but they didn't do a very good job. So when the state comes in, And anything that they're writing, those little $10 scooters, anything that they're writing, they will be basically treated as a vehicle. They'll be stopping, stop signs. If not, then we have tools now for this ordinance. Before this ordinance, or currently, we don't have any tools.

Sure. You know, even my gas car is located with 49 CCs, which is 25 miles an hour.

I think it's going to be the first and best chance that we have to try and get something on the books. It will be a living and breathing document as more technology comes out because there will undoubtedly be new things that hit the road. that we'll just have to deal with. But I keep going back to the fact that this is gonna be a lot of partnership with the residents of the city of Jefferson. Hopefully parents can educate and I know that Mark and his team are gonna do a great job of educating just like they do when they have their days where they have the kids come out with the bikes and show them this is the best and safest way to do things.

Washington and Vine. And I've seen at this time of the year I'm outside more than I am obviously in the colder weather. I've seen anywhere from four to six scooters go down the sidewalk on the Hy-Vee convenience store side, turn the corner and go through that parking lot and just spread out and go. I've had e-bikes come up through my yard where I have my propane filling station when I've been out filling propane. I've had up to six of them go through there and they were headed for the concrete alley and I know that they were between 25 and 30 miles an hour at least and no sense of where they were or how it affected somebody else. Larry brought up a good point about mopeds. My understanding of mopeds was if they ran 35 miles per hour or less, they were a moped. If they ran over 35 miles an hour, they were a motorcycle. They make electric motorcycles now. Zero is one model of them. And I know that some of these e-bikes will run up to 45 miles an hour. It's my opinion that they should be governed that way. If you can run 35 or less, you should know the rules of the road and be governed like mopeds were. If you can run up to 45 miles an hour, you should be governed as a motorcycle. And you should be licensed and educated accordingly because That stop sign of Vine and Washington, I can't tell you how many of these e-bikes I see go through that on a daily basis. And it's not all kids. I mean, there's adults that are riding these. And they have no sense that they have to stop at a stop sign. And one particular event, and I called it into the police department, and Mark will tell you, I call things in from time to time. I was coming down Grimm Road one night and it was dark. And I could see something up in front of me with a little red light in the back. It was an E scooter and it was dark. He was in the northbound Lane going South. No headlight. He was dressed dark. And when I went by him, I called him into the police department and I said, somebody needs to get up here and check on this because somebody's going to hit him. And there's got to be some rules and give the law enforcement some teeth to do something about this. Because otherwise, there's going to be some tragic accidents. And nobody wants that. I know what bearing a child is like. I've done that once. I don't wish that on anybody, so let's please put some teeth in this and get these people educated. And this is kind of off the subject, but as long as I'm up here, we also need to have people understand that when they are walking or if they're walking with their pets, you always walk on the left side of the road for the direction that you're headed. I can't tell you how many people on Westwood are on the wrong side of the road, and a lot of them have pets, and they need to understand that, you know, when you're walking, you need to walk on the left side.

You want to talk a little bit about the definitions and where those came from?

Yeah, just real quick, you know, anybody utilizing the devices that are contained in this ordinance, they still have to follow the rules of the road. You know, just because they have a certain type, you know, a motorized bicycle or something like that, they aren't exempt from any kind of speed regulations in here. Furthermore, they do have to, even during bad weather, inclement weather, we have provisions in here that they have to adhere to a speed that would be safe given the conditions too. There are teeth for the police to be able to enforce this thing. Now, it's only as good as when they see it because you're going to have a lot of public that'll see stuff that the police don't, just like your examples there. the best we can do is just like with anything else like with any kind of car or any kind of motorcycle is try and enforce when we do see it try and you know curb that behavior and then do actually enforce it when it gets to be a recurring problem you know

education of these people and what they should do and what they shouldn't do to be responsible for the vehicles that they're running, whether it's the scooter or whatever.

Yeah, I think you hit the nail exactly on the head, and that's something that Chief Klaus was going to be doing with his police department as they get into the school year, you know, passing the ordinance this summer and putting out education so that by the time the school year hits, then folks should have a good understanding of how this thing is going to work and what's going to be expected of them.

We may see some community organization like Rotary or something helping organize a day or two like this, I think.

Well, I'll tell you the right job, I'd be willing to help with the education. We need to do this before somebody gets hurt or gets killed. And the way some of this equipment is written,

Yes.

Daniel Cunningham, 505 South Maple. I talked to you previously about this. I did want to bring up one thing and that was I was a little bit disappointed under part 10 to not see anything about helmets. Before I came here, I spent 18 years as a healthcare chaplain. Seven of those were in a hospital in the Chicago area. When you become a chaplain, you know you're going to see things that you don't want to see, and I've seen a lot of things I wish I could forget, but I can't. It was always distressing when it was something in pediatric ICU or pediatric emergency room. I think I had about a dozen cases of traumatic brain injury with kids. And again, this would have been primarily bicycles, some mini bikes. When kids would come in and they'd break a bone, the bone would heal. I know one kid, he lost his spleen. Okay, you can live without a spleen, but it was the traumatic brain injuries that were just heart-wrenching and difficult to deal with, and one in particular where You can say in the accident he would have been severely injured anyway, but because he wasn't wearing a helmet, the injury eventually caused, to the brain eventually caused, the brain stem to her meat and it was brain dead and i got called to talk to the family he was 14 years old family wanted him to be baptized just in hopes you know that that's something they wanted um but it's hard and i just i hope you will consider as your i I don't think this is etched in stone yet, but if you would consider writing something in there, especially maybe for 16 years old and younger, something about helmets, I think would be a good idea.

And that is something that the committee did talk about, you know, the character of Iowa law is such that For whatever reason, the state of Iowa doesn't, by and large, require helmets. And so we try to adhere as much as possible to that same kind of character. My own feeling is that if it were my kids, they'd better have their helmet when they get out of the driveway. But trying to put down what is legally required is sometimes a different matter.

And I had people make fun of me and say, what's with the helmet?

I have one answer for them.

I say, you only have to wish once you got a helmet on. That's all I tell them. And you think about that. You only got to wish once. And if you want to say yes and no with your eyebrows for the rest of your life, then I guess that's your choice. But Dan's got a good point. Helmets are important. Bicycles, especially the electric stuff.

I don't think this is the speed you're talking about.

But if you can't legally put it in, you can at least make that part of the education a piece to say, parents, we recommend that you have it used.

Absolutely. And I think, Mark, you can probably speak to that. When you guys have your bike days, you do talk about helmet use.

Actually, Craig, the mayor, usually does the microbial stuff. We go to safety camps and different things throughout the year where safety is discussed. And yeah, that's always just like seatbelts. Obviously, we push seatbelts even when they're four years old. So I'm here as a part of that as well. And I hope that our parents will do their part in helping us keep our children safe in the next one year.

Anybody else? If not, I'd entertain a motion to close the public hearing.

I'll motion.

Second. Mikkelman? Aye. Weitrich? Aye. Sloan? Aye. Reynolds? Aye.

Item B is ordinance in the City of Jefferson, Iowa by adding a new chapter, electric bicycles, electric scooters, and personal transportation devices.

Move to approve. Second. Aaron Holtz. Aye. Dietrich. Aye. Sloan. Aye. Lincoln. Aye.

MC is hiring Glenn Hackbarth as a police officer.

Just one real quick point of explanation for the council and everybody then. So they proved that ordinance, but it's the first reading. There's two additional readings of the ordinance yet to come at subsequent council meetings.

Good evening again. I just wanted to introduce the council to Glenn Hackbarth. I'll let Glenn explain his history and family and experiences with you. I just wanted to go over a couple things. Glenn is a certified officer and Glenn has five years of service. through our committee members. I would recommend a conditional higher be offered to Glenn at the union contract. The July 1st of 2000 26 patrol level 3 which is 74,030 dollars and 25 cents.

Thank you, Chief. As you said, I'm Glenn Hackbarth. I have recently relocated into the community of Gowrie, just a small half hour away for those who aren't familiar. My wife graduated her PhD program as an occupational therapist and took a position here at the local hospital, so we had to relocate. I'm formerly from Fairfield, Iowa, where I served five years as a patrol division with three of those years as a liaison to the tactical and strategic response team as a hostage negotiator. So that's just a little bit about kind of my basic background. I spent five years on patrol with occasional dealings as a crisis or hostage negotiator.

Excellent. Move to approve.

I'll second. Lutrick? Aye. Sloan? Aye. Herkul? Aye. Lincoln? Aye. Thank you.

We'll start tomorrow like normally. It's going to start Thursday. Thank you.

Item D is a resolution of warning contract and approving contract and bond for the Westwood Sidewalk project.

Yes, so on July 1st at 3 o'clock, we received bids for the Westwood project. The engineer's estimate for the base bid, which was the Westwood area, was $883,525. And we included as an alternate on that bid the Docks Alley. and that was an estimate of 65,181. We received seven bids. There were 37 plan holders, 12 listed as prime bidders, and we received seven bids. They ranged from the low of 748 to a high of 1.13. The low bid for the base bid was Cardenas. They were actually the low bid for the alternate bid also. Their combined bid for the two of 786, 502 is approximately 17% below the engineer's estimate. We reviewed all the bid documents and bonds and was satisfied with the information provided by all bidders. There were a couple of errors in the Cardenas bid and one in another bid, but they did not affect the order of the bids in any way. And they were just mathematical errors. Therefore, deemed economically feasible, Bolton Bank would recommend award of the Westwood Area Sidewalk Improvements Project to Cardenas Concrete for the base bid plus the alley alternate for a total bid amount of $786,502. Any questions?

I make a motion to kick this back to committee to discuss the sidewalk snow removal part by the city and to have a little more discussion before we award this contract.

We have 30 days to award. That's the standard amount.

Is there any other Any, has this, has the maintenance of the sidewalk, whether it be the snow removal, transfer of ownership to the homeowner, future repairs, has that been solidified anywhere else in, as a matter of practice?

It's not in this contract.

Right. It's not in this contract, but has that been solidified anywhere else?

Just through public meetings and interaction with the property owners. That the city would be responsible for snow removal. The homeowner is still liable for a sidewalk liable for future repairs.

Okay. But is that written down anywhere in concrete other than is other minutes to these meetings? From committee meetings, yeah. From committee meetings? And would any of that responsibility be kicked back to the council for solidification? I just have concerns over the and I've voiced them before, the maintenance of the sidewalk in terms of the city removing the snow and things like that. Where is that? set in stone where like where would where's the policy that handles that that addresses that if a homeowner comes in and says hey uh the snow hasn't been removed is that my responsibility is that your responsibility where is it written down where that could be pointed to to say one way or the other who has the responsibility of that is that to be found anywhere not any document i prepared I'd like to see something like that solidified somewhere, some policy. If that's the intent, which I'd like there to be discussion on it at least, at least at the council level, I'd like to see that.

What are the conversations been like with the homeowners so far on that topic?

I guess I'll tell you mine first. And Jim, of course, I think has more interaction. But the main point of interaction then would have been the public meeting when we had relayed this then and laid the groundwork for what the project would look like. So that would have been the time when this was discussed the most. And then Jim's had some interactions with individual folks then too.

Yeah. And for the most part, I mean, the Stonewall move was a positive.

How's that a positive? What about everybody on Highway 4? What about everybody else? I just, you know, maybe we do one year of snow removal that'll get everybody prepped to take care of whatever they need to for the next year, but I don't think the city has enough time and the manpower to take care of a sidewalk that we are already building for people doing the snow removal on it. I just don't think that is fair to anybody else. Anybody on Highway 4 that has estate plow trucks go down and I just don't think this is fair for everybody else. It's already fair for everybody else on Sunset, Rushview Drive and everywhere they don't have sidewalks. Are we going to build them sidewalks in the next few years? You know, I just don't think the city needs to do this. Remove the snow for everybody. We don't have a timeline on if the city is doing indefinitely forever. We don't know if we can just do it for, you know, one year or a time. I just don't think we have the snow removal part took care of and I don't think it's fair to everybody else.

There is a motion on the floor.

And I'd like to, personally, I'd like to wait on voting on this until I have that information solidified. So I'll second that motion to hang on to this.

Can we clarify anything? So the agenda item is to approve the bid, correct? To award. To award the bid. And your concern is you don't even want to see that happen until you decide what the snow removal is going to be? Correct.

Correct.

Go ahead and call it.

Okay. So what we're saying is that we want to discuss more. We're not going to.

To clarify, I think, Chad, you were saying to table this?

Table it.

We have a committee meeting next week. I would like to pan it out next week, and then we can still beat the 30-day deadline for awarding bids at the next meeting. I am not sold on the snow removal by the city. I don't think it's fair to everybody else that has to move snow. So I know we have people on Highway 4. They have the same problem.

And I just don't think it's fair to everybody. So I think it's a motion to table then. until it can be adjusted.

Until the next committee meeting that's next week and we can still go over it then and I invite everybody to go to it with your concerns on it.

So that doesn't impact if we put this off to the 28th to award the bid? Does not impact the process?

Not specifically. It would delay it a little bit. And they don't plan on starting this till next year? No, they were coming in in August. It was the last I had heard from them, tentatively. So if it was awarded tonight, we would send out contracts tomorrow. Usually that's a three to four week process to get the contracts, bonds, the insurance all addressed and then set up the pre-con and then start. And they were looking to start in first part of August.

Is there really a reason to not award this and still be able to figure out the snow removal though? I mean, does that really need to delay the entire project?

I believe it does.

Call the roll. OK. Aaron Holtz.

No. So again, the motion is to table it.

OK. No. No.

OK. Sloan. I vote to table it, yes. Dietrich. Nay.

Winkleman. So what do we do with the two and two?

So we have a motion that did not carry. We have, I mean, lucky Harry, right? Unless you want to wake him up in China. So motion would carry, or it has not carried. If you look to then call the rule on the resolution, I don't know how anybody's going to vote, but you might find that you're at the two and two, right? In that case, that would then fail, right? And so it would not pass at this meeting. There's nothing saying you can't bring it up at the next meeting, which is effectually tabling. But since it has not been called yet for the resolution yet, Scott, if you wanted to pull it until the next meeting, you certainly could, or you could certainly hold the vote.

It's not my decision here. It would be a decision of the city council. But the fact of the matter is I don't think it looks good if we would not choose to enter into the contract. And no action is better than a negative action, I would guess.

Does Scott have the authority to draw it?

No, no. I'm just explaining how he's had the agenda drawn up. So the council could decide not to take any action at this meeting. which is essentially tabling it for the next one. Or you could call your role on the resolution to try and pass it three to one or four to zero if Chad changes his mind.

The mayor, I believe, presides the meeting. What do you mean? No?

So unless there's a motion to pass the resolution.

Is there a motion to pass the resolution?

It's pretty arbitrary at this point. So otherwise it's like removed off the agenda? Exactly.

If there's no motion to take action, then there'll be no action taken. And then... Just save Roxanne some writing and not do this. And then, yeah. And then I think it would be up to the mayor then to move on to the next agenda item unless there's more discussion.

And when is that? Is it the streets committee?

Street committee on Tuesday. So, you know, the understanding would be whether this would be an agenda item for street committee. We'd have that discussion on Tuesday. Further understanding that the issue would come back to the council beyond the next council agenda.

Very good. What's the location and time for that? Tuesday morning, 8 a.m. here. Perfect. Thank you.

OK. Let's move on to item E. Item E is resolution setting time and place for public hearing concerning the grant of an electric line easement and gas regulator station easement to Reliant Energy.

Can I discuss the process on that then, Dave? Yeah.

So the city is looking to acquire property over next to the telephone company. Part of that agreement is the city giving an easement on that property to then allow interstate power in line. Acquiring property by a city is done very simply, by resolution, and you move on with the acquisition. If you're going to divest yourself of a rental of three or more years, or of property and fee simple, or of an easement, then you're going to need to follow the code, which is setting a public hearing, holding that public hearing, and then resolution. So the city can't just simply grant the easement. So this is being done this way in order to do everything at once. So at this meeting, it would be setting a passing resolution to hold a public hearing for an easement that would then be on land acquired by the city. Everybody with me so far? Yeah. All right. So that's the only so it's not agreed to do anything other than hold a public hearing at this point.

Okay. I'll make that motion. Second.

Aaron Holtz. Aye. Sloan. Aye. Weitrich. Aye. Winkelmann. Aye.

Item F is resolution accepting grant from the Iowa Economic Development Authority for 111 North Chestnut Street project.

Yeah, so this is a a catalyst grant from the state of Iowa. It's a $100,000 catalyst grant to this building at 111 North Chestnut Street. Skyler and Lauren Bardoll are the owners and proposing complete renovation of that building then. So they have been awarded the grant. The city is the fiscal agent then for the grant, and the city contracts then directly with the state. We will have a separate development agreement between us and Bardol's in the future. But this would be to approve the contract for that grant.

I'm to approve.

Second.

Second. Aaron will say second.

Winkerman.

Aye. Lietrich. Aye. Sloan.

Aye. Aeronauts. Aye. RMG is to authorize referendum regarding the local option sales tax.

Yeah, so our local option sales tax has a sunset date on that and that is June 30 of 2027. So in order to reauthorize the tax, it needs to go to a referendum. So the timing on this would be that the referendum would occur at the general election this fall. So in November, this would go to the populace and they would vote on the referendum about continuing this. So a couple of things need to happen. We need to show our intent to take this to referendum. And that'll be what the action we will ask of the council tonight is simply to to show the city's intent that we would want to take that to to referendum when we're instructing the the county to work towards that referendum then the next action that that would be taken at a subsequent meeting is determining the revenue revenue purpose statement and then if there would be a sunset date what the sunset date would be or if you would would choose to take it to the referendum as a perpetual tax then That would be an option, too. So, you know, Green County had done this over the past couple years, and they changed their revenue purpose statement, tried to change it, that they also took off that sunset date. So the Green County one for unincorporated areas is perpetual now. So you look at our revenue impact revenue purpose statement right now. 100% for the repair, maintenance, placement, and improvement of Jefferson's infrastructure. That's 100% of these local options sales tax dollars have gone to. We'll have further discussion and some preparation of a resolution to be considered next time. But the action for tonight is to just simply show the city's intent to take a referendum.

In the past projects that this has funded, I believe, being on the finance, that was streets. A lot of streets. Yeah, streets.

It's been streets, streets, water. But we've been trying to focus a lot more of the dollars on streets here the past couple years.

About how much money does it average out a year?

$600,000-ish? $600,000?

I move to approve it.

I'll second.

Winkleman? Aye. Aaron Holtz? Aye. Weitrich? Aye. Sloan? Aye.

Item H is approval of Tree Assistance Program applications for 305 East Lincoln Way.

I will abstain from this.

Yeah, this was just something would normally be in consent agenda, but as you look at the contractor, Winkleman Tree Services contractor on this, so be considered as an individual item so that Luke could choose to vote or not.

Move to approve.

Second. Ann Holtz. Aye. Sloan. Aye. Weitrich. Aye. And Winkleman abstained. Okay.

And there is quite a bit of funds left for people with this uh tree assistance program that's that's there for people to use and I encourage people to use it.

Yeah you know we've we know that there's still quite a few few dead trees out there on on private property and again just a basic reminder of course to the private property owner is that it's your responsibility to take care of your own trees. Now for folks, especially folks who would have any financial difficulty with that, this program really helps. The city basically fronts the money to have the tree removed and then the homeowner pays that back over the next two to three years at a very affordable monthly payment. So I encourage the public to stop by City Hall, see Chad Stevens about it, and there are funds left to be used.

Item I is resolution approving a 2080 agreement with the city of Sheridan regarding the animal shelter.

Yeah, same 2080 agreement. Sheridan has entered into that and paid their $200 and it's recommended for approval. Second.

Winklewood. Aye. Sloan. Aye. Weitrick. Aye. Aaron Holtz. Aye.

Item J is resolution amending cemetery rules.

So we do have this resolution, and it references amending the cemetery rules. As you look at the resolution itself, all of the rules are attached to it. But the one amendment specifically into the cemetery rules deals with planting trees. Okay, and this has been past practice. We just want to get that down as a rule so that people certainly know that this is the case. So it reads that trees may be planted only as approved by the cemetery operator and only on an empty four-foot space owned by the person or family requesting the tree. Okay, so we get these requests every so often. I'd like to plant a tree next to the grave. So past practice has been you can do that but you got to have four feet and you need to own the next spot next to it basically. The four foot spot in order to be able to plant the tree there. Okay it's been past practice we just want to get the rule to read accordingly. So that comes from the cemetery committee and it's recommended for approval.

Do you know if the cemetery committee has any limitations on species? A four foot is not a large space for roots.

No, no limitations from the committee.

Okay. Move to approve.

Second. Sloan. Aye. Aarhus. Aye. Munkerman. Aye. Lutrick. Aye.

Item K is resolution adopting updated cemetery fee schedule.

So this does propose changes to some of the cemetery fees, okay? It does not propose a change to the purchase price for the, to purchase a space. It's been $500 for a four foot space and it would continue to be $500. Grave openings fees would go up currently at 575, go to 650. and other changes then deal with after hours. And so if there's Saturday, there's an extra charge of $200, which is standard, but if it's afternoon, it's $300. And then also on Sundays and holidays, there's an extra fee at $700, and that would go to $900 if this occurs afternoon. Again, this comes from the Cemetery Committee and recommended for approval.

Move to approve.

Second. We check. Aye. Eric Holtz. Aye. Sloan. Aye. Woodpoint.

Aye. Under reports, Jim, tower inspection, still trying to get a date set for that, so hopefully that'll happen here soon. The water plant risk and resilience assessment was submitted to the state on time. The emergency response plan is under our final review and then we'll be given to the city review, to the city for review. That's not due until the end of December. High School East Trail Project, we're waiting for a grant or for word on the grant on that one yet. The airport project, the new fuel tank farm, the aviation gas is up and running. The card system is up and working. They have a few parts needed for the jet fuel to get that working, so that one's not quite ready yet. Once all that stuff is done, they'll schedule a final walkthrough and go through everything and i think we'll have a pay request at the next meeting and then other than that we're still waiting to hear on the state grant for the additional paving around the existing fuel tank area to address the the slopes there and hopefully we'll be hearing on that relatively soon so that's all i have roxy and that was part david no report

Got a couple things on this for solar projects. You see the solar projects are starting to come together now and yeah, we won't see any panels around around town quite yet, but a lot of the brackets are are here and being installed on the roof and encourage folks that is as you leave the window. Just look out at look out the window at the top of the fire station. You'll see what the brackets. look like and how these roof mounted units work. So you'll see the brackets and it's just held down by a block and it is not attached to the roof. Everything just sits there with gravity and some additional weight. So the city hall has begun, animal shelter has begun, and then the library has begun. They've started working on the brackets on those three sites. Fire department, just an interesting new asset that the fire department's going to have, it's being installed today and tomorrow, is a system on one of the trucks that allows the trucks to be run from the end of a hose. Okay, so what that does is reduces the number of people who are needed to respond and be able to utilize the truck. So very, very important for response, especially response during the day when the number of respondees is down quite a little bit. So just bring that up as far as just another unique thing that the fire departments do and really applaud their efforts to find ways to make things work. But the other side of that is that it's an expensive addition to the truck. but it's also funded exclusively by the fire department and the donations that the fire department receives. So thanks to the public and everybody who donates to the fire department, they're being put to really, really good use. One other cemetery notion, and to bring this up and really we'll be looking, this will come back to the cemetery committee and I know they'll want some input from folks. In the southwest part of the cemetery, there's a section of the cemetery that has gravestones that are only flat. They're ground level stones out in that area. The cemetery committee has begun discussion on the idea about, in a certain section of the flat area, allowing regular headstones there. The sales in that area are slow. They just don't move those spaces nearly as quickly. And one of the reasons why is because you can't have any wrecked headstone there. So just expect to hear some more about this discussion going on and bring this up and really bring it up then to the public too because I'm sure we'd be interested in hearing from folks if there's any strong feelings, yay or nay, about that. And then my last thing is it's the city manager's summer conference here this week, so I'll be out of office for the remainder of the week.

Okay, moving on to economic development. I see Greg is not here. Mark, anything?

No report.

Chad?

No report.

Harry? No report. Matt? No report. Chad? No report.

No report.

And I have nothing, so we're done.