City Council - Regular Meeting

Sorry you had to break there.

It's no problem. I just want to um acknowledge the the fact that your team does draft this large document. Um not all of our clients do that. In fact, most of them we spend quite a lot of time assisting with the draft and that's an option for the city as well. Um, your team did the initial draft, most of the edits, most of the changes. Um, and they do take responsibility for this at the tail end, but there are not many teams that can draft their own financial statements um, here in the state of Alaska. So, I just want to acknowledge that accomplishment and um, very glad to work with your team. Um, you know, Dave and Jennifer and their staff did an excellent job throughout the audit getting information to us. You can see that at the bottom there that records were available for us. When we asked for it, they got them to us. They were responding to requests even we have to test subsequent events all the way to when we issue. So, they were putting up with us all the way through January and um were very quick to respond with what we needed. Uh, Clicker's not working, but maybe you can go forward a little bit.

Oh, good. Um, you did have a couple areas that we spend a little additional time on that's specific to revenue and what we call management override. That's the uh when something gets initially booked say into this account. If it gets later moved, there's a lot of reasons why you might move it. Maybe it's in the wrong period. Acrruels need to be changed or then you're now going to charge it to a grant so it gets moved into a grant fund. We look at those types of changes because they are more risky, right? So, these aren't things that we found errors in, but just areas we spend a little bit more time testing to make sure they're being done right. And revenue is just an important thing. You want to make sure money coming in the door is actually making into your bank account. It's being reported correctly. So, we spend more time specifically on revenue recognition. Um, here at the city, uh, we did find a couple of adjustments which I would consider to be very minor in nature. Uh, one was for some, uh, what we call a stale check. So, it was an airport check that was cut in prior years. uh but a second check had already been cut for that. So there were two checks sitting there as outstanding and not cashed by the uh vendor. So that was re reversed. Um and then there was an adjustment to increase your investment income. Your team had initially recorded it a little more conservatively than the standard and so another additional 149,000 of investment income. And then lastly, there was an adjustment that just was a reclassification related to your land sales. had no impact on fund balance. And we did not identify any what we call uncorrected misstatements or things that we found as errors in the statements that your team did not correct. So none of these adjustments we found were required to be corrected, but your team wanted to make sure that they corrected them going forward. There were no issues and they did that um correctly as they moved along. And so the last kind of thing I want to cover in here relates to internal controls. So, I I love coming in and looking at how cities run and what are the goods checks and balances to make sure from the time you

provide a service to uh the community that to the time the money gets paid to you or from the time somebody gets hired to when they work the job and they get paid for their job um that the money is being tracked properly and that there's good checks and balances in place to make sure it's right. Um and you know, we look pretty carefully at internal controls, specifically areas that might be more vulnerable to risk. So um cash areas for example or reconciliation of your bank accounts or who has access to be a check signer who has access to release funds via an electronic means on your bank account. Um and those are areas we spend more time looking at and audits a control but it's an external control. So we're looking at how is the city running so that throughout the year are you getting good reliable financial information. Uh we didn't identify any items that we need to report to you as a finding anything we think you as a city needs to take action on as a council. So that's really good news. We report things that um to you that would be significant or material that those would be things we'd want you to step into to say, "Hey, how is this getting fixed?" None of those this year. Um there were three areas that we have as recommendations really. do they line up with what we've either talked about in the past or we have already covered in those journal entries. One is just to look at those old checks, figure out um if there's some that need to be remitted to the state as a student property or if you can just cancel some of them if they were duplicates. And then the second one relates to um the access to your system and we brought this up last year and that the team really spent a lot of time thinking about this and correcting it from last year. So this is now you've got five people who have administrative level access to the GL. So they can they have the ability to enter and post entries themselves. Um but you do have good what we call compensating control. So other controls that come in to make sure that that isn't happening. Review controls controls are really powerful if they're preventive meaning nobody could

actually do something. But you can have very good detective controls which is what's here in place as it relates to this item. I do want to specifically address this because I would say um majority of my clients here in Alaska have administrative users. We call them super users just for fun. Um but it's very common just with a small accounting staff with a small administrative staff to have multiple users that have administrative level access. Um, you know, operationally it allows for you to be responsive, for you to to make decisions if you need to to add somebody or take somebody off if there's an issue without having to drag in an IT vendor or um call the the Cassell software company or whatever that is. So, I think that right now my recommendation is just that and you can see that in the last sentence, we recommend that you continue to apply those robust controls on the back end. Those review controls stay. So, as long as you have those review controls, I think operationally it doesn't make sense to hire an employee just so that they can u manage this. But it's something to just monitor and then continue monitoring at least once a year or more who has access to the system. Is it correct? Does those employees still working here? Um are those [clears throat] rights set up properly? Um, so I just wanted to bring that up because it is something that we've talked about in the past and I know that um, you know, IT systems in particular are an area that people want to talk about, but I think it's important for you to kind of balance the detective controls with the access and the operational efficiency that you do have here at the city. And then lastly, um, just those investments and note receivable adjustments. Um, I think you know your team really has good checks and balances over the year-end process. Those two things were minor adjustments that we found and we recommend they just kind of take another look at some of those reconciliations so that they can get them corrected and they don't have that issue going forward. So, I'm going to pause briefly because I know there's a lot on this slide. Do you have any questions that relates to this um

conversation or things that I've talked about so far? Council member Petty. [clears throat]

Yes. Thank you so very much for your report and you were speaking of and is it located here in this um document uh the outstanding did I understand outstanding checks that were not reconciled yet? Is that what I understood to hear you say please? So, um, you know, the real response to that is everybody has a bank reconciliation and you have list of checks that haven't cleared the bank yet or you've cut them and I'm sure you keep your own bank account and so you know that or your business or whatever. These are checks that some of which are kind of old that are sitting there dollar amount wise very trivial, not a large dollar amount, but um, this one just happen to be big as it relates to the airport, but the total of the remaining unresarch checks is very small dollar-wise. So, we just recommend those get cleaned up, you know, especially when you've had some turnover over the past few years. Nobody's just gone in and researched those. I think that's fairly common actually right now, but since co a lot of people haven't had a chance to go in and just figure out what happened, those so if you really try to check to a vendor and they never cleared it, they never cashed it. It technically goes to the state for um them to track it as a cheap property. So, trivial dollar amount, but just a a fun research project when you have nothing better to do.

We always have better things to do, but that is something that Yeah. will be considered. Thank you. So, um Oh, sorry. Go ahead. Oh, thank you, Council Member Daniel. Thank you, Vice Mayor. And this may be for the city manager. You mentioned um in the the accounting controls, the segregation of duties. Uh I do recall that being in a previous year finding. Did we make any changes from the previous to this year? Um and what what were those changes to help improve that?

Thank you. Excellent question. If I can. Um go ahead. So there's actually a document on your single audit where you have to address what we call the summary schedule of prior audit findings and how they were corrected. Uh those concerns were corrected. So, you did um change quite a few of the kind of access to your online banking portal as well as um changes within your your system itself to making sure that there's review of those access rights. I think last year there was a terminated employee who still had technical access to the to the accounting system even though their access to the computer system that hosts it was cut off. So, very minimal risk to the city, but some of that has been cleaned up and we did not report that as a finding this year.

Yeah. Any other questions?

So I want to through go through if it's okay with you on time. I want to be respectful of your time but a few highlights on the financial report um if we could. So that is um here just a lay down and then for those of you online it was emailed to you um and it will be posted to your website. So apologies that didn't make its way to you but this was released to your team or dated January 30th. I think you didn't get it till maybe the following Monday. Dave, so early February, but I want to cover just a few quick things. First of all, um, what's in it because this is not something we plan to talk about every single page today, 118 pages. But in the table of contents, you can see a lot of information about what's contained in the report. So, I just want to highlight a few things for you. One is there's a tab here called the management discussion and analysis. And I really encourage you to read that. It shows um the trends from last year, what increases there were, why they increased, and your team puts this together. We technically only audit it to make sure the numbers match. We don't audit what the explanations are. Um but I do read it and ask if there's something that seems inconsistent to me. Um Dave and Jennifer did a great job on it this year going through making sure you can understand the changes. So, if you do nothing else or if you want a good project when you're delaying studying for a high school math test, this is a really good read. I think it's a very valuable tool that your team has put together to describe those shifts. So, you can see, for example, on your governmental revenues, increases in um investment income and sales taxes are largely driving um some of the revenue increases. So, we can talk through some of those, but I just want you to know that that's there and encourage you to read that. Um, also the very beginning and the is the letter of transmitt. That's on page one. Uh, Terry puts that together and it does a great job just telling you who um

the city is, just a profile of the city, a little bit about how your economy works. So, that's another good tool for you if you're trying to explain to somebody here's my city and this is what we do. Uh, check out the transmitter letter. And then the basic financial statements start on page 20, go to page um 64. It includes a bunch of notes. So I'm only going to touch on a few highlights in the two minutes I have remaining, but I do want you to just know that um the notes to the financials provide a lot more context. So if you want to know what your cash and investments are, what they're held in at the end of the year, you can go to the notes to find that information. or if you want to know what your capital assets are invested in, the note on capital assets would be very helpful for you. There's also a bunch of required information related to your pension. And then the second page of the table of contents, you can see that you have specific fund level information. So if you really were to go in and see what was happening in the um Cone Memorial Trust Special Revenue Fund, for example, that information is here. This document's kept for a long time, so it's a good reference. So there's a lot of detail that's held. And then lastly, the statistical section. I'll highlight for you as well. If you're not familiar with the statistical section, it's got data going back 10 years on a lot of these tables. It'll tell you about your principal taxpayers, um even some um operating statistics, demographic and economic statistics. Really good information for you about your city in the statistics. So, um with that, I'm going to cover just a few key highlights. And you can probably turn that piece off if you want. Um, if you can turn with me to page 20 of the statements, it's your statement of net position. I'm going to cover just a few highlights here.

They're fine. Um, assets are things you own here as a city. On page 20, you can see the largest assets you have are um what we call capital assets, property and equipment, land, um, construction in progress. That's broken out between governmental activities and business type activities. for you business type activities is largely congregate housing. Um and so you can see there is largely in um capital assets but also in cash and investments. [snorts] And then liabilities are things you owe to others. Uh the largest ones being your net pension liability. That's the PERS system, your portion of the PERS under underfunded liability. Um you can't pay that off if you wanted to. gets paid off over time as those employees are receiving their pension and you're paying into the system. Um as well as a very little bit of bonded debt that's still lingering but um um very minor. And then what's left over is on the next page. We call that net position. So similar to an equity at a for-profit company, what you have left over is um some largely invested in capital assets. So most of your equity is tied up in buildings and infrastructure and equipment and pavement at the airport for example, right? You can't really sell it if you wanted to. You can't access that. And then you have quite a bit that's permanently or legally restricted for things like airport pensions or um your land sales permanent fund. And then lastly, you have your unrestricted net position. They are 26 million this year. If you could turn with me to page 28. And I realize I'm moving quickly, but I want to touch on a few other highlights. You can see here um on your governmental funds your major activity for the year. So instead of showing you on June 30th what you owned and what you owed to others, this is showing you the ins and outs. So revenues, total revenues in your governmental funds of 35 million,

expenditures of 29.5 million, so a total surplus there of 5.5 million. Keep in mind um some of this is held up in things like the land sales permanent airport land sales permanent fund which had a lot of investment income this year. So it's not as if you have 5 million of spending money for that. Um you can also see the water and sewer special revenue fund had a total increase there of about 1.5 million. uh largely um they are also you did spend quite a bit there down to a net change in fund balance of about a million when you account for your capital changes and then the airport fund is operating at a loss which is pretty typical for the airport just generally in the state uh because there's so many capital contributions from the FAA um but total transfers in there of a million dollars to the airport

[snorts]

um from the airport land sales permanent fund and then the general eneral fund. I'll just highlight for you there is a budget to actual in the back. I'm not going to spend time going through that with you, but the total general fund did come in positive $2.2 million. Um the general fund does have increases over budget in revenue for sales taxes and investment income. Keep in mind investment income includes realized and unrealized gains. So market fluctuation fluctuations can really impact that investment income number. So, just keep that in mind as well. Um, so the general fund, I believe, had a budgeted um final budgeted loss, but you ended up coming in at a a positive number of 2.2 million for 2025. And the last page I want to cover is on page 32, and this is congregate housing. I bring it up every year, just want to make sure everybody's aware. So, total co congregate housing is what we call an enterprise fund. So, in theory, it's designed for user fees to cover the cost. The um the Congret Housing Fund does operate at a loss this year, operating loss of about $58,000 offset somewhat by those investment earnings, which again are somewhat based on unrealized gains. So, it can fluctuate from year to year. You can't really be as predictable with that. Um but right now, this fund is not covering the cost of depreciation. So, your total depreciation there, $155,000. Um, keep in mind that's not cash. So, the fund is operating at a cash positive basis for 25, but not enough of a basis to cover the true cost of the building itself. So, the use of the building is not fully um being recovered in rates. Um, and again, I'll just kind of mention there's a lot more information in here. If you spent time pouring through this,

um, and if you have questions as you do so, please, um, reach out to me through Dave or through Terry. Um, and I'm happy to answer any questions along the way. I do, um, really appreciate it when I hear from my council members and they have real questions about things. So, um, my contact information is in the slide deck that you received and I'd always love to hear from you and just congratulations to your team. Excellent job again this year. Any other questions? Any other questions for Miss Mariner?

Thank you very much for coming and presenting. Um, next we have scheduled public comments. Um, Project Homeless Connect 2026. Um, Sherry Smith, the director of Leehore Center. Welcome, Sherry. All right. And we're going this way. Okay. So, uh we recently had our 15th annual Project Homeless Connect uh event in the community. And um we held it at the uh fieldhouse, which was the first time. Typically we hold it in the sports center. So the fieldhouse was gave us some more opportunity to kind of spread out a little bit more. So we had food intake doing intakes with people in the sports center and then all the vendors and all the other great things were in the fieldhouse. The goal of Project Homeless Connect, of course, is just to connect people to the services that they need that they probably don't have access to, whether that's transportation problems or whatever the case may be. So, it really is a a time for people who are homeless or at risk of being homeless to come in and get the resources that they need and make that connection. We also want to build a more compassionate community um and kind of reduce that stigma that people have around homelessness in our area and then get some good uh annual data which helps us try to secure funding for um homeless services in our area and housing. So, you know, as you probably know, in Alaska, what we're looking at for data, a full-time worker must earn an hourly

wage of almost $30 an hour to afford the average fair market rent of a a two-bedroom rental in the state, which average is 1,500. Locally, our average is about,515 all the way up to $1,900 a month. It is it's it's pretty large. Um to afford this rent without paying more than 30% of the income for housing, they've got to make about 61,000. Now, you know, people in our community average is anywhere from 40 to 60 65,000. Of course, you still have people who make much more than that, but that's that's kind of average typically for people who are working two income families. But somebody working a minimum age wage $13 an hour, they're going to have to work 91 hours a week to afford that. That's 2.3 full-time jobs. And of course, the extremely low-income house uh households are those that are below poverty level, which I've listed a few there. 19,000 for somebody that's single, 27 for a family of two, and 41 for a family of four. that's classified as um federal uh poverty guidelines. So the point in time count and I'm sure on an annual basis you have somebody here talking about this. Um it is a requirement from HUD that anybody who gets HUD funding or pass through funds for example through Alaska Housing Finance Corporation need to hold an annual point in time count. Um, so it's carried out usually the last week or so of January. And uh, it it's really looking at those people who are both sheltered and unsheltered. Um, sheltered, we'll talk a little bit more about that, but it could

be that maybe they they have a home, but it's they're they're missing something in their home, heat, electricity, water. Um, this is our 15th year, so we've got some good data, uh, which we'll get into in just a little bit. So we had 111 participants for this year's uh homeless connect. With those 111 people, they disclosed that one of the questions we asked is if they came in by themselves, how many people are in your household with you? And so there were a total of 241 people. Um uh out of those 111 uh participants, we had 43 vendors, 1808 83 volunteers, it is a big event that we that we do each year. 55% of those people who participated said it was their very first time. Project homeless connect, which always um you know, we we look at that over the 15 years that's pretty standard. um you're going to see a little bit over half the participants annually they've never been to a project homeless connect. So you know it makes us wonder are we having more people coming into our community that become homeless or are homeless. 80% said that they would use a cold weather shelter facility if we had one in our community. I think that's been one of the goals for our um housing coalition uh around here for many many years is is try to get something as a a cold weather uh facility for people um to use. And then of course during Project Homeless Connect, we also people come in with their pets. Um we did have a vet. We've been lucky to have a vet every year that kind of looks over the animals. We've got uh supplies for

animals that they can they can take with them when they leave. So we had 24 dogs and 12 cats. So some of the data we had 54% were female that came in and 45% were male. Age uh the highest was in the category of 35 to 44. The next highest was 55 to 64. So, we're seeing a lot more people who are homeless that are elderly. 71% were Caucasian, 20 uh 23% Alaskan Native. We had 9% of the people who came were veterans. Um, we asked a question of where did you sleep the night prior? So, our event was held on January 27th. We want to know where they slept on January 26th. 34% were on the street living in their car or in a shelter facility. Um 35% were friends living with friends and family. 20 uh 22% were in an apartment or house. But remember what I said just a minute ago. That doesn't mean that it's a it's an apartment or house that is that we all kind of live in. It could be that they are uh on the verge of being evicted. It could be that they don't have any running water or heat. So there's, you know, that 22% is uh take those things into consideration. But if you just look at the 34% street, 35% um family and friends, if you add those together, it's almost 70% of the people coming in didn't have a home. [clears throat] Living with friends or family, you don't have your own home to go back to. So that's a really high number. We also ask how long they've been homeless. So uh 41% less than a year, but 43% one year or

more that they've been homeless. And of course uh we also want to know the number of times that they've been homeless in the last 3 years. These questions are mandatory that we that we get from HUD. HUD is saying these are some of the questions that you need to report on. Um, so 24% was the first time they've been homeless. Uh, 31% they've been homeless two or two to three times within that three-year period. And then 27% four or more times in 3 years. So somebody's repeatedly maybe being housed for a short period of time and then go go back into homelessness. And then disability. 67 uh 67 people out of the 111 disclosed they had some type of disability. And that would include mental health, chronic disabilities, physical, um alcohol or drug, uh some type of of disability. We also ask about domestic violence. 55% of the 111 said that they've experienced domestic violence. 80% were female, 20% were male. Out of that 55%. The primary reason for homelessness uh lack of job or loss of job 10% substance abuse was high at 8%. The highest was other and uh because we don't have a category for that. Um we asked people what would that other be if it's not listed. Uh lack of money, the house burnt down, there was a death in the family. um they don't have enough money to pay for a house. There's no housing available in our area. So, there's a there's a host of reasons that people um um reason why they're homeless. We also asked, this is a supplemental question that we ask um because we're

kind of curious what was their last um um zip code of their last permanent address because we want to see where where are people coming from. Uh 40% were Sadata, 29% Kenai, 9% Casil. Then we had people from Sterling, Nikkiskin, and Nilcheek, Clam Gulch, Anchor Point, Anchorage, Washington, Oregon, Colorado, and Montana. Th those all of those make up that 111. So that's not unusual either. Typically, we get a small number from out of state. Um I don't know, you know, when we kind of talk with them about um you know, they're up here looking for work. they came up here maybe to visit family and friends and you know were asked to leave. So there's a host of different things that uh that go on with that. When we ask what they what they need at this point the big thing is food. That was number one. Food, employment, housing, money, transportation. you know, thank God we have uh the food bank because I think that that really helps a lot of people. Um, but it's still a it's still a you know, if we look at those basic needs, these are basic needs that they need right now. Secondary needs, of course, rental, utility assistance, gas vouchers, vehicle repair. We had a few people uh quite a few people that um u their vehicles were broke down. they just they don't have any transportation to get anywhere. Basic hygiene items, medical care, dental care, um winter gear, access to showers and laundry. You know, those are basic things that we all kind of take for granted on a day-to-day basis. We also um we provide a uh survey, an exit survey

uh for people who are leaving. 99% stated the event was helpful to them and of course 98% felt respected and supported. Um, which we really appreciate because that's the reason that we do this. We want people to feel welcome. We want them to come in and try to get the help that they need, make those connections. Um, so if we're looking at just a graph participants and households, I put this together just to show you after 15 years we started in 2012. We actually our very first event was held at the Kenai Merit. You guys know how small that area is. That's where we were at. It was very very small. Then we moved on to the um Kai Mall. Uh we we were in there for a couple time a couple times. Um so, you know, we're we're really blessed to have it at the sports center and now the fieldhouse because we need all of that room, especially with 43 vendors, which is wonderful. Um so you can see the number of participants number in households years 18 19 and 20 um the number in households was was quite high. We're getting up there again. Um so it's interesting to see it in GA in gra uh gaff form graph form. gender and disabilities, females, males, and and uh disabilities. You can see it's, you know, it's it's pretty consistent over the years. [clears throat] Uh housing status, friends, family, emergency, or uh not habitable. Um and of course that number is going up. It's just what I kind of said earlier. They might be living in in a home, but it's there's something that's uh that's kind of wrong. and and they're able they're really considered homeless and primary reason for homelessness we

kind of track loss of job domestic violence and then other and you can see other has kind of shot up there over the last few years. This is a different way of looking at the 15-year data comparison. And if we look at how many participants we've had over the years, um 2024 was a really high number for us. 2020, 140 to 148. Uh even in 2021, we didn't actually have an in-person event that year because of COVID. Um what we did is we tracked people coming into our agencies such as the Lee Shore Center, the food bank, um Love, Inc. Um and then we also went out into the community looking for people who were homeless to get the data that we that we got. So um yeah, just kind of gives you an idea of of what we've experienced over the years. And then of course our sponsors, our sponsorship has grown greatly over the years. We're very grateful. Um um typically we um um make enough to put on the event, have a little bit of carryover, not not a whole lot though. Um but as you can see, the the uh project the event is is well supported. Like I said, we have a lot of volunteers. We start meeting uh to plan for the following year. When do we do that, Kathy? It's October. So, we meet um Kathy is co-chair of our of the project homeless connect. Uh I'm the lead for the intake. Um so, yeah, I kind of short and sweet, but if you have any questions, does anyone have any questions?

Thank you, Miss Oh, Council Member Cassenna. Sorry to sneak it right in at the end. Uh first of all, thank you for your presentation. Uh I just wanted to ask if there was uh you know, if you had a specific request for either this body or the or each of us individually, what would that request for help be? Thank you both for the work you do and the teams that you have that do that as well. So, thank you,

Council Member um Nagstead.

Uh thank you, Vice Mayor Asen. Um thank you, uh Sherry, for coming and giving the report. U there's a lot of uh valuable information in that and uh something that I noticed last year and then it was good having the comparison and it and it always strikes me as odd and uh is that the number of uh female homeless on on the list. It usually it almost always exceeds the the the number of men. And uh I was wondering if uh and I asked last year, but this year if you might elaborate on on why that is. Um that would not seem to be uh what we would uh we would notice certainly on the streets and and uh maybe in our normal lives. So if you have an explanation for that, that would be great. Um, you know, it's there's a lot of some of that can be um women who've experienced domestic violence that have had to leave home uh that are now certainly the people that come to our emergency shelter for domestic violence. Those those women and men that stay there are um considered homeless. So, um, but we typically do see over the years a higher percentage of of women who are homeless, and that's pretty standard, I think, across uh other states. Um, you would you would think that it would be higher with with male population, but it but it really isn't. It's the females. I don't have a kind of an answer for that. Uh but it's something that we certainly, you know, experience and see.

Yeah. Thank Thank you for that. I just thought it was uh worth uh pointing out again. Thank you. Thank you. Seeing no other questions, thank you Sherry Smith.

We'll go now go on to unscheduled public comments. Is there any members of the public that would like to speak to any item not appearing on the agenda? Seeing none, we'll go on to public hearings. The first public hearing before us tonight is ordinance number 3504-2026 accepting and appropriating an increase in the title 3 grant from the state of Alaska Department of Health, Division of Senior and Disability Services for Nutrition, Transportation, and Support Services. Pleasure of councel.

Thank you. I move to enact ordinance number 3504-2026. I'll second you. Is there anyone from the general public that would like to speak to ordinance 3504-2026? Seeing none, we'll bring it back to council. Discussion from councel. Um, city manager Eubank, would you like to speak to this or should I go to

Miss Roma? [snorts]

Thank you, Vice Mayor Asen. So, um, this was, uh, our budget last year, as you know, was cut about 40,000 from the state of Alaska. Um, part of that was because there was no ARPA. There wasn't any ARPA funding. Uh, and they chose not to increase funding on uh, statewide. Ageet is a um America is Alaska Geriatric Exchange Network that um is is uh made up of uh providers, senior centers and senior uh agencies throughout the state and um they went to Juno last year and our own administrative assistant 3 red Piery has been part of that in her previous work at Frontier Community Services and when she came to the city. Um we she continued with age. They went to the state, they lobbied for an increase and uh the governor did an increase across the board for that. So they got an increase the year before in Medicaid waiver and him not realizing that that was strictly just Medicaid waiver. So they went back and asked for uh and so the grants, the senior grants across the state board got that. We believe this is sustained funding that this will continue this next two years uh through this uh last RFP cycle.

Thank you director Roma. Is any other discussion? Seeing none, clerk, please call the role. Council member Petty, yes. Council member Cassenna, yes. Council member Sonart, yes. Mayor Nstead, yes. Council member Daniel, yes. Vice Mayor Asin, yes. Student Representative Bowling, yes. You have six yes votes. Ordinance number 3504-2026 is enacted.

Thank you, Madame Clerk. We're now on to item E2, resolution number 2026-12, authorizing the use of the fleet replacement fund for the purchase of two Ford Bronco SUVs utilizing the state of Alaska equipment fleet contract brought by administration. Pleasure of councel council member Cassenna. I move to adopt resolution number 2026-12. I'll second request unanimous. Is there anyone from the general public who'd like to speak to resolution 2026-12?

Seeing none, we'll bring it back to council. Discussion from council.

Mayor Nagstead. Thank you, Vice Mayor Asen. Uh just a question u when we could expect the delivery date on these two vehicles to be because it sounds like could use them

or thank you. Uh May said the typical lead time we've been seeing through the state fleet contract is about six months. Thank you. Council member Petty, uh, with that lead tub being so long, uh, would that mean that we're going to be deficient of two vehicles in our, uh, operating opportunities over at the senior center?

Kathy can speak to this better than I can. Um, I know we are, one of the vehicles was wrecked years ago and we've been down a vehicle for a while. looking for a replacement, but I'll let uh Miss Roma speak to the usage. Director Roma,

uh Council Member Petty. Um through the vice mayor, uh we have our fleet replacement. Our fleet plan for the senior center is five vehicles and so two are meals on wheels dedicated meals on wheels vehicles. two now you know are 15 passenger vans which we were were received uh last fall uh when the Subaru went down um we opted not to replace that Subaru or to have it fixed and to go after uh more of an ADA accessible vehicle and how we've done that is through a DOT grant 5310 funds through the DOT grant uh we went tried to go out after it last last year and uh decided to learn more about the process. This year we went after it and were voted uh through the burough assembly number one project for the Kina Peninsula to receive this and DOT expects a you have to prioritize that. So we're waiting in April we will find out whether we get the funding for an ADA accessible vehicle. This would be a low riding, something like a minivan. Um, not a large handicap vehicle, but an ADA, something that could handle a wheelchair or two. And that would be the fifth vehicle that we would replace. In the meantime, we do have uh one of the red bands. Uh, in the event that uh any of our vehicles go down during this time, we do have the red bands which will be put into auction. One has been permanently put to rest. The other one will be going permanently put to rest as soon as we get another vehicle, the fifth vehicle in place.

Council member Petty. Yes. Um, in order to get these vehicles through this process, do we have to use that fleet replacement opportunity or can we go local for purchase of that? So, we are going local. They're being purchased through Kendall Ford. Um, but it's a it's a competitively big contract that the state puts out. So, it goes through Ford, but it's essentially through Ford wins the one the uh state equipment fleet contract. So, we can just purchase directly from that, if that makes sense. And there's still a six-month lead time.

So, the way that these fleet contracts work is that they're um essentially ordered from the factory. So, you don't get to purchase something that's already on the stock. So once you put in the order, it essentially goes in a queue at wherever the fan manufacturing plant is for the Broncos and you're kind of in the queue for that. Um so this is the same process we went through when we ordered um some trucks for utility and fire last year. Um that just takes a long time to get through their queue because this is how they're supplying vehicles all around the country through these fleet contracts that are essentially barebones vehicles. Thank you for that uh explanation. I appreciate it. Thank you. Council member Sonart.

Thank you, Vice Mayor Asen. Um, I think I know the answer to my question, but I'm just going to double check with somebody who knows. Are these the full-size Broncos or are these the smaller Bronos Sports? I would assume the fullsize Broncos. Council Member Sonart through Vice Mayor Askin. We uh they are the smaller SUV Broncos. I believe they're the sport version. Actually, uh they um they're not too far off than the standard uh Transit van that we currently use for Meals on Wheels. You'd think they'd be taller, but they're not. They're very similar in size and how they ride to the ground. So, uh, they are, uh, they are the smaller Broncos.

Okay. I was just wondering, um, actually, they'll do fine for wheelchairs and whatnot. It's one of the reasons I got mine. Thank you, Miss Roma. Is there any other comments or discussion? Unanimous consent was requested. Are there any objections? Hearing none, resolution 2026-12 is adopted. We go on to resolution 2026-13 amending the city's schedule of rates, charges, and fees to add a metered pressed septage affluent rate brought by administration. Pleasure of councela. [clears throat]

I move to adopt resolution number 2026-13. I'll second. Unanimous. Thank you. Is there anyone from the general public that would like to speak to resolution 2026-13? Seeing none, we'll bring it back to council. Um, city manager Eubank, can you give us a little info on this?

Yeah, thank you, Vice Mayor. Uh, I'm going to touch on the easy part and if we get real technical, I'm going to pitch it right over there to Mr. Fry. So, um, basically what's happened is the city's been approached by a local business. They'd like to um start a a new service here in town. Uh, what the service will be able to do is um take uh the pumpings from septic tanks and we'll create a new way to dispose of that waste. Um, currently I think there's only one licensed pit that that's able to take these things uh in the central peninsula area. Uh, what this does, we will uh they will install a machine that will take that waste, we'll press that waste and remove any solids from it. Um, the liquid will be discharged into our sewer system and then they will deal with the solids through uh another process likely solid waste over at the burrow. So, it's going to provide a new um uh outlet for the companies that do like portaotties or septic tank pumping. Um and um so uh one of the things that they requested in doing their due diligence to to start this company is they wanted to know if we would a accept that waste uh into our system or and b what the cost for uh would be for us to accept that. Um this is certainly a much more concentrated waste than say it comes out of your house which is gets diluted with a lot of other waters. So it does have um some increased costs to the city. And I'll let that's where I'll I'll stop talking and let Mr. Fry explain if you guys have any more specific questions about that side of it.

Um that was a great explanation from Terry. Um, so I can add a little more detail if anybody wants or get super technical, but I mean that was a a pretty good definition there. So if anybody's questions, I'm I'm happy to answer. Council member Cassenna.

Thank you. Yes, I do have questions. Lee, uh, thanks for including its street name pressed Septage Effluent in this memo. So that's good to know. Uh but my questions were uh uh what what was the process being done for these types of businesses before they had the ability to squish it into a brick I guess. Uh and then uh do we have an estimate of how many thousands of gallons we would expect in this next year and how would that affect your operations?

Thank you. So, uh there is only one um pit essentially that takes septage right now. Um it's an open lagoon um that does a treatment in that lagoon. Um it's permitted through DEC. So that's the only area that is essentially permitted to take septage right now. Um so this would be um an alternate way of doing that. Um as far as flows go, it's going to depend on his business and how much he's able to pick up. Um, as far as our flows go for our treatment plant, we're permitted for 1.3 million gallons a day, and we only average like around 500,000 gallons a day. So, uh, we have plenty of capacity for treatment at our plant. Um, and taking additional flows isn't going to be an issue for us.

Thank you, [snorts] Mayor Nstead. Thank you, Vice Mayor Aken. Um, yeah, kind of along those lines. Um um I realize that the the effluent we'll be receiving will be you know of higher um greater strength and I was just wondering what if we know what kind of treatment the uh the wastewater will receive at the plant will it have some digestion through aation first is there a time period or is it pretty much just a separation from the from what gets pumped out of the truck

here. So essentially it's just a pre-treatment system. Um all they're essentially doing is grinding and screening um solids out of the system. Um so that is going to reduce organic loading a little bit from what we would see down at the treatment plant. Um the primary benefit of that screening is that we don't have to worry about it going through our lift stations and possibly causing clogs down the line. Um so that's a plus side for that. Um it is a higher strength wastewater um like city manager Eubank said. So um the plus side of that also is that you know we we are kind of an underloaded plant as far as um a lot of the domestic waste water flows that are going into our plant. So um having a high strength waste water isn't going to necessarily be a bad thing for a plant um because it's essentially providing more food for the bacteria and things down at the plant to keep our processes moving the way that they're supposed to.

Okay. Thank you. And uh if I could follow up then uh basically having a a if it comes down in a slug, it's not going to upset our our system in any way that you see.

Uh no, this is similar to um the way we're doing the when we have the leech coming in um where we had that come in at the a lift station that's pretty far down the line. Um part of the reason that that was going on is because it helps dilute the waste water before it hits the plant. Um, this is looking at being installed in the commercial district off of uh, Trading Bay. Um, so by the time it gets discharged there and goes through several lift stations um, and other mains, it should get pretty diluted and mixed with everything else by the time it hits the plant. So we shouldn't see a slug coming through. Thank you, Council Member Petty.

Yes. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Mr. Fry. Um, have we made provisions in the fact that if our rate of $50 doesn't substantially cover all the costs to the city, um, would you be coming back so that we could increase that so that there's not any negative impact to the city? Sir, uh, I don't believe we did in the ordinance. Um, so I suppose we could look at adding an amendment or something along those lines to allow it becreased by future rate changes upon mutual agreement or something those along those lines, but um, we did not discuss that.

Thank you. Is there any other Oh, Council Member Petty, you had another question. So, with that being said, um does that need to y'all already made an agreement with the the vendor for this cost and that your contract would have to be uh updated. Is that what I'm understanding?

So, we don't have any formal written agreement. Um the way we decided to do this was um by putting in a fee schedule. So, if somebody else um increase then somebody else wanted to do something similar, they could come in. here's the rate already established that they would just be agreeing to. Um they said that this rate would be feasible for them to uh make a successful business. It's what they believe. Um and we're comfortable with the rate as far as covering our costs. Um so that being said, it would go in the fee schedule. And I suppose if we were looking at rate increases in the future, that would be done by adjustments to the fee schedule. So I'm not sure it's not something that we would necessarily need to adjust, but I would lean towards a legal and city manager to confirm that. Thank you.

Any other comments or discussion? Unanimous consent was requested. Are there any objections? Seeing none, um resolution 2026-13 is adopted. We have no unfinished business. Um, under new business, item H4, Peninsula Oil Oilers Baseball Club special use permit for use of the Challenger Learning Center to temporarily house players and staff of opposing teams for the 2026 Alaska Baseball League season brought by administration, pleasure of councel, council member Cassenna.

I move to approve the uh special use permit uh for the Challenger Learning Center. uh to the Peninsula Oilers Baseball Club.

I'll second. Thank you. Um are there any public members present that would like to comment on this item? Seeing none, discussion from council. request unanimous consent. Thank you, Mayor Next. Is there any discussion? Council member Daniel.

Thank you, Vice Mayor Askin. Um, just a quick question. I know we've been kind of mulling over multiple uses of that facility. Um, if we approve this, are we I guess I may question more for the city manager along the lines of uh have we gotten anything back yet from uh that contract in regards to programming for that facility for public safety? Would that impact us in any way or would you feel pretty good about we could do this with Oilers and continue our discussions with using that facility for something else in the future?

Uh, thank you, Council Member Daniel through Vice Mayor. Um so we are still waiting on that report from the architect. Um we did we did consider um all those factors. Uh included within this agreement does give the city the right to terminate it. Um I think with two weeks notice in case something did come up. Um it's definitely a one-year situation. Um help the Oilers kind of get back on their feet and and get back um the AL back here in Kenai. Um, but no, it's not envisioned to create any problems and we did provide ourselves uh the option to terminate if we needed to because something did come up. Thank you,

Council Member Petty. Uh, yes. With this opportunity that we're affording the Peninsula Oil Oilers, um, is there a cost involved that they pay the city, city manager, Eubank? Yeah, thank you, Council Member Petty through the vice mayor. um included in the um draft agreement that's in there, there's a $1,000 fee that they would pay the city um to help, you know, mitigate um I think there's probably likely to be a little bit of extra utilities and things like that for for this limited use, but so there's a $1,000 fee included. Any other discussion?

Council member Cassenna. Uh, I I think the I just wanted to comment that I think the memorandum that Terry wrote captured it really well. Um, I think this permit would support the successful return of a 50-year-old Kenai institution. Um, and just affords our city the ability to bring baseball back to town. And so I think that captures it well. It's an opportunity for an unused building to get used um for a thing I think a lot of us do enjoy and that's Oilers baseball. So, I appreciate this uh creative use of the space until we find a permanent idea. Thank you, Council Member Cassenna. Is there any other discussion?

Is it Diane? Did you say Diana? Did you want to comment? Hi. Yes, this is actually Michael Ty with the Peninsula Oilers. Um, just want to say uh uh thank you to the council for considering this proposal and this this will allow us to operate baseball this year and and it's something that we probably would not be able to do without this help. So, thank you.

Very good. Thank you. Is there any other discussion? Unanimous consent was requested. Are there any objections? Seeing none, um the Peninsula Oiler Special Use permit for use of the Challenger Learning Center is approved. Our next item is the Kenai Peninsula Economic Development District Strategic Asset Partner Designation Pipeline to Pipeline Initiative brought to us by administration. Pleasure of councel. Council member Cassenna. [gasps]

I'd like to just say I'd like to move to approve this one, but uh I move to approve the uh Cape Heads Strategic Partnership Designation. Maybe how I'd put that. I'll second request unanimous. Thank you. Um is there any public members present that would like to speak to this issue? Cassid's online. Cassidy, are you online available for comment?

Yes. Good evening. Um, thank you. Uh, and I apologize for not being there in person. I did have um quite a drive and I didn't want to do it in the dark. I live down in Nelchic. So, um, I thank you for allowing me to attend virtually. And then my co-orker, Caitlyn Corson, she's our programs manager. I think she's in the audience there in case uh, you wanted uh, face to face. So, I think we have we covered our bases and we're the best of both worlds right now. Um, but I wanted to thank you uh, Vice Mayor Asin and and Mayor City Ma Man Manager Eubank and the members of the city council for this consideration. Um, as the executive director for Cape Head, we have been um, focused, laser focused on workforce development opportunities on the Kai Peninsula. And we feel that the timing of this opportunity is um ideal in terms of all of the stars and all of the stakeholders aligning at the same time with um an impending LNG project that is impactful to so many of our communities and community members, but also industry um as a as a um vocational and workforce development opportunity to attract people to our area to live, work, and thrive, which is one of our um biggest values at Cape Head. And uh in front of you is the proposal that you um have been given in your packets. And then also, city manager Eubank um wrote the memo on there. But we are formally requesting the city of Kenai to become a strategic asset partner for us to pursue um an EDA uh public works grant

opportunity that would um strategically align city of Kenai's assets with uh workforce development programming along with our anchor industry partners um that include oil and gas uh energy uh construction, plumbing, all of the vocational uh trades that AFTECH utilizes and pro and provides. Um we would really appreciate your consideration of of this request and it does um does not commit you forever. Um this is contingent on whether we are successful in our application um to the EDA, but [snorts] I feel like it is a step in the right direction when we are looking at workforce development opportunities for our region and for our communities as well as um attracting people to our region um that are ready to enter the the labor force and um move these projects along that are going to be so impactful to our region. Um, I'm open to questions and I appreciate your time and consideration.

Very good. Thank you. Um, is there any comments or questions?

Council member Cassenna. Thank you. Uh, I just wanted to say thank you for being here. Thank you for uh the brief that you just provided. Um, and uh, this seems like a really simple and tangible way for us to engage with local organizations uh, to kind of meet the the needs that were identified in our latest survey. So, seems like a smart, easy choice for us.

Thank you. Is there any other comments? Unanimous consent was requested. Are there any objections? Seeing none, um this action is approved. The city of Kenai is now a strategic asset partner in Kenai Peninsula Economic Development District's pipeline to pipeline initiative. We now move on to um request for council direction to prepare legislation to determine a portion of city-owned land track woodland subdivision part 4 is no longer needed for a public person uh purpose. Open for discussion. Council member Cassenna. Uh move to open for discussion. Okay. I will second that. Any question? I guess it's discussion. I'll second it.

Thank you. Is there anyone from the public who would like to speak to um this item?

Yes, I would like to speak to it. My name is Elizabeth Cooper. I am the one that is propelling this motion and I am adjacent to this piece of property. Uh it seems like uh my 46 year old house has a fence that is encroaching on city land and going over this little tiny corner of your property and I would like it but there's a process and currently it's not available to be sold because of its designation. Um Mr. Bubix has written out a I'm not sure what these are called memorandum sorry and I wanted to address some of those issues. Um he had sorry you had uh put some things in there that would make it not uh benefiting the city and that's true it benefits the homeowner but it doesn't not benefit the city either. some of the points that you pointed out um were like it's it's not something that would be developed, but when I looked at the sale procedure, it doesn't necessarily require that it be developed. It says or use in that [clears throat] um point that I was looking at and you guys know these codes more than I, but uh 22.05100 05100 pointb says it needs um sales of parcels must be appropriate size to meet the needs of the proposed development or use and um I just would like your consideration and I thank you for your consideration to um possibly redesate it so that it makes it available for sale. We'll worry about if it can be sold later on. Um, yes. I would just like your consideration and if you have any questions, I'd be happy to answer them.

Thank you, Miss Cooper. Is there any questions for Mrs. Cooper?

Mayor Nstead. Thank you, Vice Mayor Askin. Yeah, I was just just briefly the the the fence I understand it was there before your house was built and I think in the memo it said it was in disrepair. What what kind of fence is it and what kind of disrepair is it?

Yes, it's it's a typical 6-ft cedar fence you would find around a house in Woodland subdivision and um not this winter but the previous winter a big windstorm blew part of it over in the middle of winter and yeah it's kind of a fire hazard and a security issue. Um, also that fence and the bigger issue for me in um, propelling this forward is that the gate to my backyard is on the city property. So if um, you know, this doesn't go through and I have to move the fence, I don't suddenly have access to my backyard, which I am the the corner of Woodland subdivision. Um, there is nothing behind me. There's a ravine. There's just nothing there. pretty much the property on the other side of me is used for people to run their dogs and um it's just like a little tiny piece of property 2700 square ft. Um, so that fence has been there forever and that's a loose term. Of course, the city of Kenai has never addressed the issue in the I don't know 30 years the fence has been up and the only reason um it's happening is because I as a citizen went to the city to see how to make it right. I kind of feel like there's a a light on it all now, which is fine. um I just want to go through the procedures to make sure that we um exhaust all of them and everybody's happy with the outcome. You know, it's done right. So, that was a long answer for your what kind of fence question? Sorry about that. Are there any other questions? Council member Cassenna.

Uh I'm not sure if this is the right time or if we would do it after, but um I was just curious if we could explain how we would come to a fair market value for this. And um I guess the next steps if if we were to make it available for purchase. Director Bner, could you answer that for us?

No pressure. Thank you, Vice Mayor Askin. Um, if directed to bring legislation to remove the public purpose, um, there are still provisions in code, um, it would require a subdivision and appraisal for the for that section. So that we because we would have to determine a sale price of that. Um the way code is written now um both of those both are required and uh as it stands now the appraisal cost would be returned to as a credit at at the time of closing. So um there are still hoops to jump through but the very first one is um if there is a public purpose that disqual disqualifies it for sale if that is lifted then the sale procedures outlining code would take effect.

Thank you. May I add something to that? Um there was some comments from Mr. Eubanks about not the city not um I believe crediting money back to me or um the financial benefit being uh not offered to me that is offered to other people in the sale of um property and I don't see anything in there that would disqualify me from getting those same benefits. So I would like to have those benefits when all this consideration is done just like other people have that opportunity for us. So

Jul [clears throat] city manager Eubank.

Thank you Vice Mayor. Um so I guess I'd just back up just a little bit. So January 14th, we received an application requesting to purchase this 20 2700 ft² piece of property. Um we deemed it not eligible for sale because currently it has a public purpose designation of parks and recreation that was applied to it uh at the time the city acquired the property back in 1983, I believe. Um, so until that gets lifted, the property is ineligible for sale. Um, I did not feel it appropriate to bring legislation to lift the public purpose designation because I likely would be recommending against a future sale for a couple of different reasons. Um, one is I don't see a public purpose um for the city crediting the cost of an appraisal um uh in this case um because I I I don't see any value to the city in selling 2700 ft² of property. I think it it predominantly um is to the benefit of the property owner. Um and currently in code we're required to credit the cost of that appraisal back. I think most importantly, there are four criteria within our code that allow for a non-competitive sale. Two clearly don't apply in this case. Um the two potentially that could apply um one is saying that the the lot size is of such smaller dimminimous um size that it only has value to the adjacent property owners. I I don't believe that's the case in this case and I don't ever think it was the intent of code to force the city to subdivide off a piece of property to create a dimminimous lot. And I think that's a dangerous precedent

that we could set where anybody could come in and want an extra 5 or 10 ft of city property to add to theirs. And I don't think the city ever envisioned or or or intended to get in the business of subdividing off dimminimous portions of land um just for the adjacent property owners. So based on those reasons, I didn't feel appropriate to bring legislation to remove the public purpose designation. Um if council, if it's the pleasure of council and the direction, we absolutely can bring that legislation to remove that public purpose and then we can start those sales procedures like um Mr. Bner intended. I just wanted to provide council some background on why I likely would not recommend the sale if we go down that path. Um uh just like to be fully transparent. I don't want to uh kick the can down the road to bring those issues up at that time. So that's the reason for a lot of the items in my memo and happy to answer any other questions.

Council member Petty.

Um thank you uh Vice Mayor Asen. Um, I'd like to ask the city manager, um, I know that this is currently, uh, listed for parks and wrecks. Is that what you said? Do you see that 27 square feet is ever being utilized for the benefit of the city for parks and wrecks? And, um, Okay. And the the fence that's on it currently, it's in disrepair, that belongs to the city. And should should the city consider um making sure that the fence that's around that piece of property should be in good repair if it belongs to the city? I know that that's two questions, so I'll I'll wait for your answer. City Manager Eubank.

Thank you, Vice Mayor. Um, Council Member Petty. So, a couple couple points of clarification. Um, one, and I'm I'm trying to find it here. Maybe Mr. Bner could help me. Um, the part the this entire parcel was designated for um a community purpose of parks and recreation, and it represents How big is the entire parcel? I believe it's just a little over five acres if I'm not mistaken.

So, it's a much bigger parcel than just this 2700 square ft. As far as the fence goes that's on it, it was not constructed by the city. I don't believe it was constructed by Miss Cooper. It was there when she bought her residence. It was installed on city property by whoever built it. So, it's not a city fence that we've let fall into disrepair. It was put on encroached upon city land when it was put up. Um, again, we're not out actively looking for these. When Miss Cooper came in to inquire about reconstructing this fence, it raised the issue. And, you know, I I hope you can appreciate that we just don't advise people to reconstruct on on encroaching fences on on city property. So,

I failed. Thank you. Um I I failed to recognize that sir and so I I appreciate that clarification. Thank you. Any other discussion? Council member Daniel. Thank you. U Vice Mayor Asens. So the question before us really is [clears throat] if we want if this body wants to ask administration to put together legislation to so they can sell so we can sell it. That's the question tonight. Yes. Correct. So no not tonight. I'm trying to get the clarification of what we're being asked to do right now.

City manager you bank.

Thank you. So what you're being asked right now is whether you would like um to begin the process for a sale. In order for a sale to occur, the first thing that has to happen is by ordinance, the council has to determine that the entire 5 acres is no longer needed for a public purpose for parks and recreation. Then if you decided that was the case, then we would remove uh the parcel would then be available for purchase. Then it would need to be subdivided And then it could be sold uh to the applicant. Appra It needs to be subdivided, appraised, and sold to the applicant. May I interject something here? I don't understand your process. Could I do that? Oh, the public comment portion is closed. So, it's in front of council.

Vice Mayor Nagstead or Mayor Nagstead.

Thank you, Vice Mayor Asen. appreciate. Um, well, I I know that what we're really discussing is a is is the first step and a and a small part, but we really have to consider in making that first step the rest of the steps. And I think the city manager in his memo has has done that. And uh um and the I kind of want to just repeat and point out that the administration doesn't recommend uh that we move forward with that and primarily it's because of conflict. it conflicts with our code for non-competitive um sales and it also sets a precedence and in in my opinion um when when we're going to do that and we can uh but to do that it sets a really high standard and um that high standard has to provide good justification why this is a unique situation why uh we would want to go against code and set set a precedence which would we would we would be And uh I have haven't really heard anything that that in this particular case sets a high standard to sell a piece of property with a dis off fence and disrepair um on city property and going through this. I I in this particular case um I just currently would would would not not support it moving forward. um for all the reasons I just stated and what I what I saw in the city manager city manager's memo.

Thank you. Thank you, Mayor Nstead. Is there any other discussion?

Council member Daniel. Thank you. Uh Vice Mayor, um yeah, I don't know. I'm not sure either way. I think I might want to postpone this to our next meeting until the mayor can get back. Um, I don't know how you all feel about that. So, this is this isn't time sensitive, is it? I don't believe it's super timesensitive. I don't know what we would accomplish having the mayor back or full, you know, we can vote on it tonight or

Council Member Cassenna.

Thank you. Uh, first of all, I'd like to thank you for coming in and and, you know, pleading your case for this. I think that's who wouldn't do that. Um, I think I'll echo some of the other comments. I think it's a it's a tough decision in the sense of, you know, you hate to I think we could all say it'd be nice to regain that section of our own property, but to stay consistent with code and to prevent us just kicking the can further down the road for you or or for the administration, I think making a decision today is probably more effective for everyone. Um, So whether it's a hard decision or not. So any other discussion did was unanimous consent requested or did we

There's no motion. Okay. So at this point it I guess I don't know what to do. If there is no further discussion and no motions entertained, we can move on to the next order of business. Okay.

So no motions have been made. Um no other discussion. We'll move on to the next item of business. Thank you for coming in, Elizabeth. We're now on to commission reports. Um, Council on Aging. That would be me. Um we met on February 12th at the Kai Senior Center and um discussed the summary report work plan from 2025 and um discussed work plan for 2026 with um added items. And the next meeting is March 12th. um airport commission. I filled in for um council member Sonart and um they met also on February 12th at 6:00. um they voted to move forward their um HDL engineering provided a discussion on the runway reconstruction project and um they discussed and move forward their work plan goals from last year to become 2026. They also discussed and recommended um that a special use permit to Rainbow River Lodge Aviation be forwarded uh for approval. And they also recommended a second extension to the airport security contract and their next meeting is also um March 12th. Uh, Parks and Rec Commission, Miss Gy, who did someone fill in for her.

Oh, okay. She's not here to report. Planning and zoning. Council member Cassenna. Oh, hello. Um, sorry. Planning and zoning commission report, I believe. Yes. Uh, [snorts] we there was no meeting since we last met. Uh but the the commission will meet next Wednesday at 6:00 p.m. for work session and then immediately following at 7:00 p.m. they will hold their regularly scheduled meeting. I unfortunately will not be able to attend. So my great hope is that someone will help cover. Oh yeah.

I can probably cover that for you. Remind me. Yeah. Beautifification Committee. Council member Petty. Yes, there was no meeting and our next meeting is April the 14th. Thank you. Um, Mayor Nexstead, do you have a report for us?

Well, uh, kind of kind of briefly. Uh, yes. I just want to thank, uh, you council uh, Vice Mayor Aen for again handling the meeting and doing what you do. Much appreciated. I wanted to uh congratulate uh uh David Sworner and everybody down there at the finance department, you know, for uh coming out with a a great clean audit that uh is very good for the city. Um, I wanted to uh uh thank the administration and public works for last week uh jumping on that water main um leak that needed immediate repair and was and was quickly taken care of and very professionally. And then and then lastly, I'd also like to to uh thank the the airport and streets department uh for handling um all of that snow we've been getting. um um over the last week or so. Um it was pretty significant and and from what I gather it was done very well there. So that is that's all I have. Thank you. [clears throat]

You mayor Nagstead. Um we are on to administrative reports. City manager Eubank.

Thank you Vice Mayor, members of council. A couple things to report on here. Um, [sighs] right now I think the only active recruitment we have, that's not true. I think we are still in the process of uh recruiting for uh an open firefighter position, but uh the airport manager um recruitment closed um here early in February. We had 50 applications. Um we have seven interviews scheduled um beginning tomorrow and we'll conclude those next week. So, um hopefully we're able to to find a candidate in there. Um [clears throat] I did meet with uh board members of the Kenai Chamber of Commerce, talked about the results of the city survey and laid those um survey results out to them. Um highlighted the importance of economic development and support for our local businesses that were present in that survey. And um we had we I think we had a really you know uh it was a good conversation and a lot of ideas were thrown out. It was more you know I presented a little bit on the survey and then it was just a fact of sitting there and listening to um those folks uh give us some ideas and things that they saw. So really appreciate that time with them. I did want to let council know that we have received uh one complete application um for lease of land and pore space. Um uh this is over off of Marathon Road um for potential uh construction of a new gas storage facility. Um publication of that will start on February 27th. Uh it'll run for 30 days per code. So we're starting through that process. Um we have a number of other applications we're working with um different developers and things on also. So when those get complete, we'll get you a

report on those. Um today the Kai Chamber hosted their um small business symposium and uh had a lot of good speakers there. Uh our planning director, Mr. Bner, was one of those. Um, and it was it was pretty well attended by um, you know, current businesses and some potential businesses uh, looking to open up. So, I was glad to be a part of that. Uh, I want to point out and say thanks to public works. They're finishing uh, the city's applications into the capsus system, which is the state's um, it's the way we request state funding for capital projects is through CAPSUs. And also, they're going to do some um, uh, CDS submissions for us. sets at the federal level federal level for um congressionally uh directed spending grants. So, appreciate the department getting those in for us. Uh little shout out to Miss Hannah Meyer over at the uh library. Uh Hannah applied for her first grant. Uh first one she's written by herself. Uh she was awarded or the city was awarded an $8,000 grant um for uh digital pathways online health literacy programming for um adults and um you will be seeing legislation on the March 4th packet. It's going to require a double reading just because I think we have to respond to the grant by March 5th. But, uh, I wanted to give a little shout out to Hannah for some good work. And, um, she's batting a hundred, so we're gonna throw a whole bunch more at her. Um, uh, last thing I was going to report is, uh, this week we received a check, the city received a check for nearly $180,000 from uh, Premier Blue Cross Blue Shield, which is our uh, our health and dental provider for our city for our city employees. Um what that check

represented is um if if council remembers were in a they deem it a self-funded light type um scenario. What what that means is that uh we pay a premium a set premium every month for our employee coverage. Within that premium they have a predetermined amount that they've allotted for claims. If during the year uh our actual claims, medical claims exceed their estimate, we pay nothing. So our our contribution is capped at what our what our premium is. If however um the actual claims come in below what they estimated, they share 50% of that savings back with the city. So, our claims experience for calendar year 2025, we ran about 93% of what they projected. So, we received thisund about $180,000 um refund. [clears throat] Um we're still uh talking about that internally, maybe bringing some things back to council to consider with that, but uh I thought that was uh some great news. shows you uh I think a little bit of luck probably in there, but I think it also is represents some level of effort by employees to to be doing the right things as well. So, um with that, I'm happy to answer any questions.

Any questions for city manager Eubank? Council member Penny. Yes, it it is wonderful to hear that that came back to the city. Um, does that go into the general fund or does it go into a special insurance fund? And do we have any is there any um way to um maybe do a drawing to put everybody's employees name in the hat for that excellent health movement for the city? I'm just thinking outside the box there. City manager. [clears throat]

Thank you very much, Mayor. Council member Petty. So, um, we have an employee healthc care fund, so it will go into that fund. Um, we're looking at, like I said, we're talking internally about some options we might want to bring back to council with some ideas. Um, you know, the other benefit that I didn't say in my original report there that I think is important, too, is that, you know, I think council got to see their first glimpse of this when we got our renewal for um, our coverage for this calendar year. And, you know, our renewal was substantially below what the market is seeing out there. And I think it was, you know, also predicated on, you know, our lower claims experience. So, it it's kind of it's it's kind of continuation of good news. Any other questions? Mayor Nagstead.

Thank you, Vice Mayor Askin. Uh for the city manager, I was uh wanting to know if there is any updates on the rightway standards, roadways, city manager, Eubank.

Yeah, thank you, Vice Mayor. Mayor N said, I know public works is we're working on it. Um, you know, I think we were targeting um trying to have something before council at the March 4th meeting. Um, uh, I'm I'm hoping that may still be the case, but I think it may get pushed. I I really want um once the department gets the final touches on it, I really want to get it out to um some folks in industry to have them look at it before we bring anything before council or anything and gets the the input of the ones that actually build those roads and make sure they have a chance to um uh point out things to us and um that we'll be able to consider those. So, uh we're targeting March 4th. Um but uh we'll uh that that could be a little bit fluid.

Very good. Sounds like it's getting closer. Thank you. Is there any other comments or questions? We'll move on to our city attorney, Mr. Bloom. Thank you, Vice Mayor Askin. I don't have anything to report, but I'm happy to answer any questions. Seeing none, we'll move on to Madame Clerk Sainer.

Thank you, Vice May. I have nothing to report available for questions. Any questions for our clerk? Additional public comment. Are there any members from the public who would like to address the council at this time? [clears throat] Seeing none, we'll move on to council comments and we'll start with student representative bowling. [clears throat]

Good evening and thank you Vice Mayor Askin and council members. Um the Kina Central High School Nordic Ski Team is competing at the state championships in Palmer from February 19th to the 21st. We wish them the best as they represent our community at the state level. Today our culinary class hosted a lunch recognizing our February students of the month. They celebrated our students alongside their families. Our drama department will also present the Adams family on February 20th and 21st at 7 p.m. February 22nd at 2 p.m. February 27th and 28th at 700 p.m. and March 1st at 2 p.m. KPBSD students look forward to working in businesses around K9 Satner for our annual job shadow event. Thank you all and have a good day.

Thank you, Council Member Cassenna. Uh, thank you. I, uh, just wanted to congratulate Dave and his team for their efforts on the audit as well. Nicely done. Um, thanks to Lee and his staff for their quick response. Um, sorry for trying to ruin your Super Bowl Sunday. Um, but, uh, it wasn't much of a game to watch anyway. So, uh, then also wanted to congratulate Mave on her appointment to the parks and recck commission. I had the opportunity to meet with her a couple times to discuss inclusive park equipment and so I'm excited to see what she does on parks and wreck. And then uh we don't talk about it a lot, but thank you everyone um who submits a staff report or a midmon staff report. Uh I'm sure those take time and effort, so thanks for doing that. Um I don't always read them, but it's always nice to have them.

Thank you. Um, Council Member Petty. Yes. Um, thank you for the finance department and the good reports. Thank you, Mr. Swer and your staff. Um, thanks to the um, administration and all the department heads for the uh, stellar work that you do to make our city uh, such a beautiful place to be and live. And that's all my comments. Thank you. Thank you. Back to Mr. Cassenna.

Oh, thank [sighs] you. I forgot the really cool one. I mean, they're all cool, but like uh uh I really want to congratulate our our 10UA uh KPHA team for their win at the Tampa Bay Power Play tournament. Um as far as I know, they swept the tournament. And then also a congratulations to our 14UA team who also won at the Tampa Bay Power Play Tournament. So, um congratulations to all of them. Thank you, Council Member Daniel.

Thank you, Vice Mayor. Uh, speaking of more hockey news, thank you, Council Member Cassenna, for that. Um, uh, the 12 UAS, my son's team, felt like a Mighty Ducks story, took second place in the President's Day tournament this last weekend, which was awesome. Went from hardly winning any games to all of a sudden winning. It's like crazy what happens when you work as a team. So, that was really exciting for them. And they're looking forward to state at the end of the month and Homer. Uh I too also attended um the small business symposium briefly. From what I saw it was well done, put together, learned a little bit. Uh really excited to see what the chamber's doing and working with all of our local businesses in the community and uh trying to um make this a better place for people uh to live and work. It's very very exciting. Um and I'll keep it at that.

Thank you. Um, Council Member Sonart.

Thank you, Vice Mayor Ascin. Well, my first my second thank you is to you, Vice Mayor Asen, for covering the airport commission meeting. Thank you very much. Um, also, thank you to Dave Sarner and his team for their work on a successful 2025 audit. That is a great reflection upon the city and I'm sure hours of work and effort went into that. I am excited that we have seven people to interview for the airport manager position. Yay. My fingers are crossed and that's all I've got because most anything else has already been said. Thank you. Um I too attended the small business symposium today. I thought it was well put together and actually learned some things that I didn't know before. And I I can't say enough about our departments, our um our staff, um Mr. Sworner and Mr. Fry and Mr. Butner and Ms. Roma and everybody. Our roads are wonderful. It's I'm really proud to be able to say, "Yeah, our roads are better than everybody else's." and um and the audit. It's always it's always a feather in our cap that we can say such good things about our audit, our audit and our accounting staff. Um congratulations to Mr. Bowling. I understand you were appointed to the Alaska School Advisory Board. Is that correct? Yes. Congratulations. And that's all I have. We have no executive session tonight, no pending items.