City Council - Regular Meeting

It is now 06:30 because now you can tell by the voice. Good evening, and welcome to the 05/19/2026 Kennewick City Council meeting. Will the deputy city clerk please state who is present and whether quorum is established?

Good evening, counsel. All members of counsel are present besides mayor McShane, and the quorum is established.

Will council member Beacham please lead us in the pledge?

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. No

one registered to provide tonight's invocation. People interested in giving invocation can find the information on our website or through the city clerk's office. Mayor McCain provided advanced notice of his absence. Is there a motion to excuse the absence? Mayor Pro Tem. Council Member Anderson?

I move to excuse Mayor McShane. Is there a second?

Mayor Pro Tem. Council Member Milbauer. I'll second the motion.

It has been moved by Council Member Anderson, seconded by Council Member Milbauer to excuse the absence of Mayor McShane. The floor is open for discussion. There being no further discussion has been properly moved and second to excuse the absence of mayor McShane. Will the deputy city clerk please start the vote? And that vote is unanimous.

Next, have honors and recognition. Our first proclamation is EMS Paramedics Week, and that will be by council member Milbauer. I'm sorry. Councilmember Clipperd. You guys are so close.

I confuse you. You look just alike. Councilmember Eclippert?

Thank you, mister mayor Bourque. Could the emergency medical service personnel who are going to be recognized tonight please come forward? Really not all of you? Just one?

One of them will come with me.

Get up here. Every one of you. Come on. We need you all up here. I'm gonna have you stand back here. You're the center of attention tonight. Oh, boy.

You're the tallest you get in the middle.

K. Real quick, if you just each of you just introduce yourselves.

Mason Osborne. Andy Streitich.

How is Albertus? You're doing it.

You're right. You're a driver. Excellent. Thank you, gentlemen. Proclamation, whereas emergency medical services is a vital public service and whereas the members of emergency medical services teams are ready to provide lifesaving care to those in need twenty four hours a day, seven days a week and whereas access to quality emergency care dramatically improves the survival and recovery rate of those who experience sudden illness or injury and whereas emergency medical services have grown to fill a gap by providing important out of hospital care including preventative medicine, follow-up care and access to telemedicine and whereas the emergency medical services system comprises various professionals including first responders, paramedics, dispatchers, firefighters, police officers, educators, nurses, physicians and trained members of the public.

And whereas members of emergency medical services teams, whether they are career professionals or volunteers, dedicate thousands of hours to specialized training and ongoing education to improve their lifesaving abilities. And whereas it is

appropriate to recognize the value and accomplishments

their of emergency medical services providers by designating the Emergency Medical Services Week. Now therefore, I mayor Jason McShane, that's not me, he's not here tonight. Jason McShane on behalf of the Kennewick City Council do hereby proclaim May 2026 as emergency medical services week in Kennewick, Washington. Ladies and gentlemen, please give these gentlemen a hand. You'll all step up here now, and I'm gonna present this certificate to you.

The Now time. Good luck with that.

Good evening, everyone. I'd like to present the public works and I would present it to, deputy public works director Jeremy Lesick. Would you come up? Utility service manager Caleb Shannon, development review supervisor Kristen Stowe, senior design engineer Ryan Durham, and contract office administrator Sandra Kwong. Close welcome everyone.

Thanks. All right. I'll try and read it as good as Councilman Clipperd. Whereas public works professionals focus on infrastructure, facilities, and services that are of vital importance to sustainable and resilient communities and to public health, high quality of life, and well-being of the people of Kennewick, and whereas the these infrastructure facilities, services cannot be provided without the dedicated effort of public works professionals who are engineers, managers, employees at all levels of government and the private sector, who are responsible for rebuilding, improving, and protecting our nation's transportation, water supply, water treatment, and solid waste systems, public buildings, and other structures and facilities essential for our citizens. And whereas it is the in the public's best interest for the citizens, civic leaders, and children in Kennewick to gain knowledge of and maintain an ongoing interest on and understanding in the importance of public works and public programs in their respective community.

And whereas the year 2026 marks the sixty sixth annual national public works week sponsored by the American Public Works Association slash Canadian Public Works Association. Be it now. Now, therefore, on behalf of mayor McShane of the city Of Kennewick and the city council, I do by proclaim May 18 to 05/24/2026 as, public works week in Kennewick. Thank you.

Next on the agenda is visitors this is the only opportunity for visitor comment at tonight's meeting Voters visitors are welcome to state their opinion on any topic except for election matters and items under a, pending public hearing. The deputy city clerk has informed me there are no online visitors signed up to speak. Folks in the audience, if you want to speak, you raise your hand, you'll be called on. But I'll go through the blurb first, which is public comment period is not an opportunity for mutual conversation with council members or for posing questions with the expectation of an immediate answer. Council members will listen closely to your comments but will not directly respond to you.

The city's clerk's business card is on the table near the door. If you need follow-up after the meeting, please reach out to them, and they will connect you with somebody who can help. When it's your turn, please come up to the podium and state your name and city of residence before beginning your remarks. Each person is permitted to speak once for a maximum of three minutes. A three minute timer will be displayed on the screen and will start when you come to the podium. A total of 30 is allocated for visitor comments. And the deputy clerk will start the thirty minute timer now. And audience members who would like to speak? We'll start with Warren. Good old Warren.

Warren Hughes, City of Kennewick. I just wanted to get this on the record real quick. So we had the introductory meeting, I guess, for replacing the city hall last week. And there was a question asked about what we could potentially do with the old city hall in the event that we build a new city hall. And I didn't get a chance to say anything then, so I've been cooking on it for a whole week.

It sounds like from what the architects presented that the roof structure here is in bad need of repair. Without changing the use of the building or doing a full remodel, repairing roof makes the building somewhat solid for continued use, not as a city hall. And there are a lot of opportunities with the 30,000 square foot facility that could make it more useful to the community as opposed to a very expensive, and I suspect, hazmat remediation. I suspect there's some asbestos in here somewhere. There we could make this a creative arts center.

We can make it a municipal center. We can make an extension to the museum. There's a really nice basement here for archives. We could do a lot with just a roof on this facility and save ourselves the cost of demoing it and turning it into a grass lot. If we build a another city hall over there, it's within spitting distance. And it would make this a really useful piece for Kennewick and, hopefully, one of the organizations that moved in here, potentially, the creative arts district, HDKP, any number of nonprofits that could use a facility as a temporary home could eventually invest in building and upgrading this building, and the city wouldn't have to foot the bill in the future. Thank you.

Thank you, Warren. That's always an issue after Warren speaks.

I'm Misty Ayres Kennewick. Hello. I'm Misty Ayres from the Museum of Cape Canberra Inn. We are here because the city is considering a plan to build a new city hall that involves tearing down our building at 205 Keweenawick Drive. The East Benton County Historical Society built a museum for the benefit of the community. We are the keeper of the people's things. The pioneers, railroad workers, and farmers that founded Kennewick. We keep their history. Spinning wheels that came over on the Oregon Trail, petroglyphs from the Columbia Basin, and even a section of the old green bridge that once connected Kennewick and Pasco. We keep the family stories and collections.

We keep it safe for future generations. Our nearly 9,000 square feet building was built for monetary and in kind donations. Donations were collected from 110 service groups, individuals, and businesses to meet the 200,000 fundraising goal set by the site. Even more businesses donated services and materials for the construction and landscaping. Landscaping.

You may recognize the names of some of the donors: Mueller, Gravenson, Lamson, Bateman, and Spaulding. Glenn Ling, then the co owner of the Tri City Herald, gave the remaining funds needed to complete museum. The museum features 5,000 square feet of exhibition space. Our one of a kind petrified wood floor was donated in 1979 and was valued at $1,000,000 at the time. Our permanent displays include a vast projectile, point collection, Ken McMahon, Pioneers in Farming, medical and dental, printing presses, military, and more.

We host lectures and workshops for the community, free admission days, and fun events for our kids. Our annual trick or treat at the museum event brought over 100 visitors last fall, and 150 people visited the museum during our mammoth event. We host field trips, meetings, and birthday parties. We're a low cost family outing, community resource, and a tourist attraction. Over the last forty three years, we've invested in the building, spending over $20,000 to paint the exterior in twenty twenty two and thirty six thousand dollars earlier this year to replace the flooring. Losing our building wouldn't just mean a loss in that investment. It would mean a loss to the community that helped create it over forty years ago. Thank you.

My name is Gail Metcalf. I'm secretary of the board of the Eastman County Historical Society. And during the week, I am a volunteer under our administrator, mister Ayers. A community is made vibrant by its by its amenities to its citizens who they who can get away from different things and go and find enjoyment. Whether it's in the parks that we have, the walking paths we have, the swimming pool that has a boy.

But one of your great amenities is the East Benton County Museum at Keywayden, which serves not just here, but also communities throughout East Benton County. It is a place of enlightenment and a place of entertainment. That's a combination amenities that people can get. When you get old and you get older, you have a lot of negatives, you know, and mostly relates to health. But we give tours and those tours are our most prominent children and senior citizens.

And when senior citizens come in there and they they tour the museum and they see things and they are taken back to something, their eyes light up and they express it. It's joy. And it's in those moments that all the discomforts and all the pain and everything else goes away for older citizens. And if you wanna have an experience in life, you have to go and take second graders on a tour of the museum. You are going to be a combination of stress and overjoyed because they are something to behold.

You'll have a little girl there and she wants to an answer to a question and you're wanting to answer that question, you're trying to answer that question and her eyes are just wide open. But at the same time, you've got 10 hands in the air and they're waving those hands around and they're they're wanting their questions answered too. So you got that little bit of stress and then you get the joy of doing what you're doing there. But it's a marvelous experience. And we come to the building. When you build a building, it's it's a structure and it has things in there. But after forty four years, you've got history. And there's history now within history. The people that walked through there. Mrs.

Oliver, the very first president of our board and others that come through through the years. The Sullamans were both presidents and Bob Oleren and and so forth. And all the individual businesses and contractors and whatnot who were paid money to do things, but also gave in kind services. And somebody would drive by and says, my grandfather helped build that or my grandmother helped raise the money. Just kind of closed off here. Glenley and George Jones and Gene Spalding were major forces. Glenn Lee drove up one day in his car and he says and he's talking to Gene Spalding. I said, do you need money? And he says, yes. We need money.

We're still not there. Gene or Glenn, sit down and he wrote a check for $75,000 sitting in his car. You're not going to get history tied to a new future building. Please don't put us through that ordeal of trying to trade things off or move things out. Thank you.

Beth?

So you should never follow Gail Metcalf. Take that away. My name is Beverly Johnson Torelli. I'm a resident of Kennewick, a museum volunteer, and in full disclosure, the wife, Mayor Pro Tem Torelli.

I've never seen her before.

So as Misty pointed out, there was no museum in East Benton County until the city fathers and a multitude of donors got together and made it happen. They then donated the 9,000 square foot that's both levels building to the city with the agreement that it would be leased back to the museum for $1 a year. So any miss about the $1 a year, that's how it happened. The responsibilities of both the city and the museum are outlined in the agreement they made. It is for fifty years with the right of renewal for an additional fifty years.

Major donations continue to this day through the Wayne Smith State, the Columbia Center Rotary Club, the Kennewick Men of the Year, and many other entities and individuals.

Painting,

murals, and new flooring could not have happened without the generosity of these and many other community members and organizations. The museum displays artifacts. But even more than that, provides archives that are constantly updated. In these, research about events and people can be found, which may not be available otherwise. Harold and some others gave us the information, actually, when they changed building.

For example, information about Gerald Carmichael, who was the first soldier from Kennewick to be killed in Vietnam, was found by a museum volunteer, which Kevin Belke was the one who started that whole process looking into that. This allowed his three sisters to be contacted. They were thrilled to be present for the rededication of the memorial, which stands at the corner of Vineyard Garfield and Carmichael Drive in Kennewick. In another instance, law enforcement found information in the museum that helped them solve a murder that occurred in the '60s. And that didn't happen too long ago, actually.

In closing, it should be emphasized that the museum is much more than a building. It continues to be an active and integral part of our community's history. Please take this into consideration with any decisions you might make now or in the future. Thank you. Twenty seven seconds.

Kevin?

Hi, I'm Kevin Vellicki. I'm a resident of Kennewick. I'm a veteran and I've been involved for the last four or five years in the refurbishment replacement of parts at the four Veterans Memorial in Kennewick. And I'm here tonight to say on behalf of the VFW post here in Kennewick, we have petitioned the city to make the city of Kennewick recognize the city of Kennewick as a Purple Heart City. There are many cities in our state that are Purple Heart cities along with counties, the FW Post American Legion.

This is our first venture in Kennewick to make Kennewick the first per part city. And then with other VFW Post and American Legions, we're going to go to Pasco, Kennewick, Pasco Richland, the counties, and eventually end up with a Purple Heart recognition day in the future. I see on the discussions for later on, there is the World War two American Heritage discussion regarding signage. And again, in your packets, provided information that and signage that other cities have put signs up. They say cities are pervert cities.

And I think both can be done in our city, and I support what this heritage city. And it really tells Kennewick how we support veterans and how we supported the war effort, etcetera. So please consider signage for both projects. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Sir?

John Lehman from The Dalles, Oregon. And I have some information for the council, if I could pass that out. On ticking away already?

Yes.

Well, before I get started, if if you notice that I'm shaking, it's not because I'm nervous. Well, is a little bit because I'm nervous, but it's also because I have Parkinson's disease. And it shows itself in shaking arm, especially my left arm. So I just don't want you to get the wrong idea. I'm here to talk to you about proposal for a managed number of billboards in the city of Kennewick.

The information I I handed out is a proposal for that. We recently worked with the city of Pasco to allow 12 new billboards in their town. These billboards help local businesses. They bring commerce into the city. They bring dollars to local small and large family businesses.

They also provide public service. And we're in Pasco now that we've built a number of these billboards. We're able to advertise for the city events and other causes that they deem important in the city of Pasco. We wanna do the same here. And this packet, I I don't think I'm gonna have time to go through it.

But, it spells out there's a a code amendment that is pretty simple and straightforward to allow a managed number of billboards. It limits them to two fifty square feet, whereas the signs in Kennewick, on premise signs are 300 to 400 square feet allowed currently. And there's 11 conventional billboard signs in the city of Kennewick. We would propose 25 like we proposed in Pasco because they're very similar sized communities. And that would be capped, so there would be no more.

But it would allow us to add a few billboards to the city. Like I said, nine by 27. You can see examples in your handout. Hunter, do you have your handouts now? No. No. Okay. Look at them later. But there's some great examples of what these structures will look like. We claim that we are the and I this is truthful. We claim that we're the best little billboard company in the world. Our signs look great. Our copy looks great. They're kept up very nicely. Same thing if we're able to build some in Kennewick. Thank you.

Thank you, John.

Thank you for your time.

Anybody else? Yes, sir.

My name is Marty Robinson. I'm also from the museum. I live in Kennewick. I am a city of Kennewick, a historic preservation commissioner, and also on the board at the museum. It's we we all kinda have the same goals here.

I believe that we wanna make Kennewick better. There's not just one rope to pull on. There's lots of ropes to pull on. But if we're all pulling in the same direction to make the downtown nucleus a better place for everyone to hang out, and we're we have a good team on the museum, and, you know, it's we just wanna build that sense of community and get that snowball bigger and bigger and roll down the hill and make a snowman out of it. And I believe that we're building a good inventory of historic properties in Kennewick as well, And that road now becomes a dead end if we start building structures and then tearing them down.

We wanna build structures, preserve them, make them important to the community by having people gather and building memories. And then we can put a stamp on that and say, this is a nice building. We're gonna make it last forever. We're gonna take care of it, and people are gonna wanna come here and hang out and spend money and and build the the community like it's supposed to be built. Anyway, that's that's my 2¢, and I appreciate your time. Thank you. Anybody

else? Okay. So that closes the public comment period. Next is approval of the agenda. Council member Trumbo has indicated he would like to pull item 4e. So that will be added to our new business. And I'm going to make a motion to add the city hall RFP follow-up discussion that was going to be in at the end of the meeting move that forward one of our council members has to leave and so I would like to have that person the city manager, go ahead and present the information now. Is there a second to that motion?

Mayor Pro Tem? Council Member Milbauer. I'll second the motion.

It has been moved by Mayor Pro Tem Torelli, seconded by Council Member millbauer to approve the agenda as amended that would include council member Trumbull's amendment and my amendment

just to clarify we will add the city hall RFP after the consent agenda and we will add the consent agenda item to seven b.

Thank you. Yes. That in mind could the city clerk start the vote?

Yes. Just give me one second. So with the where we're at now with the approval of the agenda, we'll amend the agenda for where it's at. And then when we move into the consent agenda, we should be doing an amendment for the additional item e. Is that correct?

No. Well, we're the the amendment on the table is to remove item e from the consent agenda as well as amend the overall agenda to add the city hall scope of work so it could be done under one motion.

Under one motion. Thank you.

Dylan, I'm sure I could have found a more confusing way of asking for that. I worked at it. And that has passed unanimously. Consent agenda is the approval of consent agenda is next. And I will entertain a motion to approve the consent agenda as amended.

Mayor Pro Tem. Council Member Milbauer. I'll make the motion to approve the consent agenda as amended.

And is there a second?

Mayor Pro Tem will second.

Council Member Beecham seconds. It's been moved by Council Member Milbauer and seconded by council member Beacham to approve the consent agenda as amended. Will you start the vote please? With that city manager if you wanna present.

Yeah. Thank you, mayor pro tem. Good evening, council. At last Tuesday's workshop, we received a status update from our consultant team regarding this progress related to the city hall RFP. The key objective of the workshop was to obtain some direction from council on which of the three master plan concepts we should advance to the final design concept.

During that workshop, that direction was not reached, but there were some good conversation and ideas brought forward. So the purpose of bringing this forward tonight is to try to get some consensus to make sure that we're headed in the right direction so that we can communicate that back to the consultant and kind of establish a new timeline. One thing I wanted to clarify that some of the I think some of the confusion came out is that these are not final design concepts. These are not we have not vetted any of this. I wanna remind counsel that at this point in the game, they are very high level concepts that we are trying to make a determination on so that we have a concept to start the design process.

As we heard from the museum community today, there's a lot of concerns. There's a lot of issues to look into as far as the size of that museum, what it would take to potentially replace that, some of those agreements that are in place. So as we decide on a concept, then we will go to and start going through figuring out what those agreements in place are, start the design process, look at costing, and that may shift what that design ultimately looks like based on what we find during that process. So I just wanna reiterate that. Because there was some conversation about there only being under option one being about 500 square feet placed for the museum should it be put into a new city hall.

And that was really just a placeholder so that if we decided to go down that path, then the design team would go back and look at kind of a little bit more in-depth of what that space should be, but not knowing if that was the concept we are gonna move forward, that was a placeholder at the time. Another good conversation that came out of the meeting was potentially broadening the scope of the master planning effort and the scope that we currently have under the RFP. One thing that came up was looking at the potential vacation of 6th Avenue. So that one was not included in our original scope. Since then, we've kind of drawn full circle back with the consultant, and I've asked our public works director and the rest of our department head staff to kinda put together what that would ultimately mean, and should we take a look at that further.

One thing a few things to point out, I think that would be a hard sell at this point. A lot of the design and discussion when they were rebuilding Kennewick High School was that access point. So that is a huge, route for, drop off, pickup for sporting events for this for the high school, and that was part of their design concept. By removing 6th Avenue, we would also create the lack of an east west connection between 1st Avenue and 10th, so almost nearly a mile. We would not have an East west connection, and those 1st And 10th are pretty busy anyways.

They currently carry approximately 12,000 vehicles per day. So all the traffic that is utilizing six would then be diverted off onto those streets as well. This would also, kind of go against what we're trying to do with the road diet on 1st Avenue and also looking at our police department in the way it's oriented and all the access for emergency response is facing 6th Street. So those are just some things I wanted to bring up. I've got a whole list of the of items that public works has put together should council be interested in going through that, and I can send that along.

But wanted to kinda just briefly go through some of those concerns with looking at 6th Avenue. One of the new priorities that I think is worth taking a look at is when we did sign off on entering into the scope of work for the city hall RFP, that was prior to our last council retreat where we really kind of prioritized 27, 28 capital expenditures and looking at trying to do a pool replacement with our capital reserve. So I think it is worth knowing, you know, the discussions that we've had, can we utilize our reserve funds to replace the pool, and can we do that design concept and construction at the same time we're doing a city hall? And with that in mind, I think it would be good to have the consultants put a little bit more effort and energy into placing that city hall or aquatic facility and taking a look. Does it make sense to rebuild it in existing space or put it on a different location within Civic Campus and do that in conjunction with the options that we're looking at for city hall?

So with that said, based off of kind of the conversations that have happened with the consultant this week with the department head staff and the individual conversations I've had with council members, staff is recommending that we provide direction back to the consultant to stay the course with the existing city hall RFP and the current scope, authorizing the consultant to extend the project timeline modestly to allow additional time to vet the three master plan concepts, add focus emphasis on pool replacement siding within the campus master plan. And with that, we would then return to council on June 23, was originally scheduled. At that time, we were going to vet the final concepts, but we would take a step back, bring back the options that were on the table at the last meeting, talk through those a little bit more, taking a look at how the aquatic facility could be included within those options, ask counsel at that time to make a determination on which option we would like to forward to the final, and then we would have them vet that and bring that back for final consideration in July. So that is kind of where what staff's recommendation is at this time, and what we're looking for tonight is to get consensus from counsel that that is the path we would like to move forward with So then we can communicate that back to the consultant and make sure we're on on track and continuing to move the project forward.

So I will turn it over to council if you have any questions.

Any questions for staff? Council member?

You said a lot. Could you just take thirty seconds to tell us exactly what staff is suggesting we do and that you're asking us to get consensus on tonight?

Yes. We're asking not to completely expand the scope of service for the RFP, so redoing what we're having the consultant focus on. But to extend the timeline and take another look at the options in June, add a little bit of focus into adding the pool facility into the master plan process. So, ultimately, we would come back in June, look at the options that we looked at at last Tuesday's workshop with the addition of the pool added into those, make a determination at that point, and then that would give the consultant direction to hone in on that final concept and bring that back for a final presentation in July.

Got it. Love it. Thank you.

I don't know if that was shorter, but

Councilmember Chombo?

Aaron, have a real need for a city hall, and we have a real need for a swimming pool complex that is vastly approved over what we have now. On June 23, if we go

to

do that. Of the ir city hall replacement And proceeding in some manner with attaching a pool project to it. Is that what I'm hearing?

Yes. That is a possibility. It sets us up to be able to do those simultaneously.

One When

UNIDENTIFIED

we talked about how we would finance this, we talked about bonding for the City Hall. And then we talked about utilizing our reserve funds in capital to be able to do the pool expansion. Now that's gonna come down to as we enter into that over we'll get an idea of cost from the city hall when we complete this RFP process, but that will also be determined as we go through that design process what we can and can afford and figure out funding sources.

We won't know that on June 30. No, we will not. We are setting

the stage. We giving ourselves a place to start.

Any other questions? My comment is simple. I appreciate staff recommendations. And I, for one, would go along with staff recommendations.

I will as well.

John?

Okay. I'm fearful, but I'll say yes.

All right. Well, you. I appreciate the consensus, and that's what we will work with the consultant to bring back.

Thank you.

Next, we have a docket of three ordinances to the municipal code transitioning powers and duties of the block grant advisory committee to the Planning Commission. Due to their interrelated nature, it's necessary for counsel to adopt or deny all the items in one shot. They cannot be separated. So if a council member is opposed to one or more of the ordinance, he should cast no vote on the motion to adopt the docket. All matters in the ordinance docket have been distributed to each of us and are considered to be routine and may be enacted by one motion of the council.

Following staff report, council may request additional information or speak to any of the ordinance in the packet. Will the deputy city clerk please read the ordinance titles for the docket items?

Absolutely. So item six a one is an ordinance relating to block grant advisory committee establishment and repealing section two point one six point five two zero of the Kenoick Municipal Code. Item six a two is an ordinance relating to block grant advisory committee powers and duties in repealing section two point one six point five three zero of the Kennewick Municipal Code. Item six a three is an ordinance relating to planning commission powers and duties in amending section two point one six point two one zero of the Kennewick Municipal Code.

May I approach him?

Councilman Nertrandla.

I believe this was stated as ordinances one, two, and three as five(one), five(two) and five(three). Can we get a corrected reference? No, excuse me. I correct myself. It was all stated 6A, one, two and three when in fact it's 5A, one, two and three. Can we get that just corrected on the record?

We kind of corrected that on the fly since we added the City Hall RFP to the agenda amended that to item five which pushes the ordinances to item six.

Thank you for that clarification. I apologize.

No worries.

Mr. Moohi, would you like to provide the staff report? I would.

Thank you, mister mayor Pro Tem. Good evening. Members of the council, the block grant advisory committee reviews proposals for community development block grant funds that are provided to the city from the US Department of Housing and Urban Development. The committee meets once a year to review applications and recommend award amounts for applicants who've applied. Recommendation makes up the CDBG annual action plan, which is then forwarded to the city council for approval.

Due to the infrequency of meetings, difficulty in filling vacant positions, and in order to create efficiencies. In the process, it's proposed that the block grant advisory committee be dissolved and the duties be assigned to the planning commission. This restructuring will alleviate the need to recruit for an additional board and will potentially create more applicants to choose from when filling other boards and commissions. In preparation for the the solution of the committee, existing members have been contacted and encouraged to fill to apply to fill a vacancy on the planning commission, giving them the option to continue to provide service to the community in another advisory capacity. For the sake of efficiency, as stated earlier, individual ordinances have been prepared for the council's review under one docket rather than considering them separately.

And so with that, I guess I should should add this or I guess repeat what Dylan said. If if there are any ordinances that council's not wants to vote no on, they'll need to vote no on all the ordinances. So they'll be adopted as a group or, denied as a group. So with that, I'd be happy to answer any questions that you have related to these three ordinances and the proposal in front of you.

Any questions of staff?

Councilmember Clipper. Thank you, mister mayor Pro Tem. So the Planning Commission then would have the time, and they are supportive of this idea to accomplish these tasks that would be put on them in addition to what they already are working on?

Yes. K. We've had the discussion with the planning commission. We've given them, I guess, a heads up, letting them know that it is there's potential that this would happen. And should council adopt these three ordinances tonight, we will we're prepared to give a work hold a workshop with the planning commission, explain the new duties related to CDBG funds and the annual action plan. And there is adequate time and availability for them to do that along with their other regular duties.

Any further questions? So with that, I'll entertain a motion. Mayor Pro Tem. Council Member Milbauer.

I make a motion to adopt the ordinance docket items five a one through five a three as presented.

And is there a second? I second that. Council Member Anderson seconds. It has been moved by Council Member Milbauer second by Council Member Anderson to adopt the ordinance docket items five a or six a.

We're gonna do six a.

Six a one through six a three as presented. The floor is open for discussion. Seeing none, it has been properly moved and seconded to adopt the ordinance dockets items six a one through six a three as presented. Will

unanimous.

Next is a discussion regarding military honor designations throughout the city. And after staff report, council will have an opportunity to ask questions or request clarifying information or discuss the merits of this initiative. May we have a staff report, please?

Yes. Thank you, mayor pro tem. As mister Velicky had indicated during the visitor comment section, the veterans of Foreign Wars post number 5785 is advocating for the city of Kennewick to officially be recognized as a Purple Heart city. The Purple Heart city serves as a formal tribute to members of the armed forces who have been wounded or lost their lives through the acts of war. In order for the city to be recognized, the council would first need to adopt a resolution that would designate the city of Kennewick as a Purple Heart city and then authorize a ceremonial proclamation for August 7.

The information of how that would kind of some additional information that mister Velicky provided was in your packet along with some ideas about some signage that could be placed. I know that we the one thing we wanted to add to this too is as this request was coming forward, we have also been working with Visit Tri Cities as we have been, from the Tri City region, been designated as a World War two American Heritage City. That's typically done from a from a city standpoint. In this case, this Tri Cities was recognized back in 2022 because of our work through the Hanford and Inlet for the Department of Interior. So they hadn't really moved forward with any signage, but they are in the process of working with all of the the Tri City region right now to do that.

So I just wanted to make sure that was on your radar screen that that is happening in conjunction with that project at the same time as we're starting to review the Purple Heart designation. So if you I'll turn it over to council if you have any other questions. But what we're looking for tonight is if council is interested in moving forward with being recognized, then that will give staff the direction to pull together a resolution, bring that back to council for adoption. And at the same time, we would add a proclamation to recognize August 7.

Is there any questions of staff?

Thank you, Mr. Mayor Portem. So who actually makes this designation? Who is the federal government declares us a Purple Heart City or we declare ourselves? Or who makes that declaration that we are, in fact a Purple Heart City?

I believe it's a five zero one(three) that has the is conjoined with Department of War we'll first to And Veterans of Foreign Wars, they will do provide the initial signage. They will pay for that. However, the city will be up for maintaining those signs and installation of those signs.

So we would be applying to them asking that we would be designated as a purple heart city. Correct.

Awesome. Councilor Mayor

Anderson. So we're not being asked to vote on this, but we're being asked if we support it. Is that correct?

Yeah. We're looking consensus to bring this forward for resolution I support that

yeah I support it as well

council member Trumbo I'm in

and that makes me unanimous

all right we will get a resolution drafted in a future agenda thank you

okay next councilmember Trummel you asked that item seven or 4e be removed from the agenda and you now have the floor.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem, Chuck Tarelli. My concern here is not intended to bring any negative thoughts or understandings toward the performance of the city manager. I'm wholly appreciative of her service. I think that her performance has been excellent. But I have to say that I am very concerned that our current situation likely to get worse as we have been informed on council with the deficit that is likely to be 10,000,011 million dollars here coming up in the next cycle.

Yes, we've heard that we can reduce that perhaps, thanks to the excellence of our city manager by much as half. Good on her. But the problem is the money has to come from somewhere. And people who do a good job deserve to be thanked, to be appreciated in the best way that they can be publicly and privately. But sometimes the money priorities are such that there's not a whole lot to share in that appreciation.

It's deserving, to be sure. But I can tell you that I am very concerned as we go forward. You heard audience heard it. Staff knows it already. That we have a city hall and a pool that are weighing heavily on our needs list.

And the dollar bills are but we don't know where they're all coming from yet, do we? And I would also point out that we have to support our labor union contracts, which I personally prefer to have negotiated in a transparent and observable way, but are not. And that's not the fault of the city council as much as it is the squeeze that we are in with Olympia and labor unions do have the final word on that. So we are in a financial squeeze, and it's only getting worse. And I can tell you that I'm also much in favor of using bonuses, not percent increases in salaries because that's when we do that every year or two years, it compounds forever, whereas a bonus is a one time shot.

If you like it again next year, you can do it again. And you can do it again and again and again. But it's not locked into the base pay. And that troubles me because that is what I call contributing to inflation. And for this reason, in the time of financial austerity that is coming toward us, I will thank the city manager very much. But I feel in good conscience I owe it to the taxpayers to do the prudent thing. And the prudent thing for me is not to support a 3.75% addition to her salary base. Thank you for the time.

So because this was not a staff report per se, I'm going to go ahead and entertain a motion to I will make a motion to increase the city manager's compensation by 3.75% from her current salary effective 05/06/2026 in accordance with her employment contract due to favorable performance review. I will ask for a second and then after that we'll open up for council discussion.

Mayor Pro Tem, I second.

It has been moved by Mayor Pro Tem Terrelli, second by mayor pro increase city manager's compensation by 3.75 from her current salary. And the floor is now open for discussion. Councilmember Clifford?

I think many of the comments that Councilmember Trumbo made are true. We, as a city, have a deficit that we need to overcome, and it's prudent of us to not forget that that and fix it. However, we as a council had extended conversation. In fact, we had to extend it over and over again concerning this matter. And we, at that meeting that I recall, thought that we have a city manager who is doing a great job and that our city manager is someone that we want to keep on the job and that we thought that the 3.75 that we voted on at that time was fair and balanced considering our current deficit and our need to keep on our staff a highly qualified city manager who is doing a great job and feel will do a great job in the future.

So I support Consent Agenda Letter E.

Any other comments?

Mayor Pro Tem. Council Member Trumbo. Just a quick note here for those who may not know, history has a way of being forgotten. We had a city manager once who waived her salary increase because of financial constraints here at the city of Kennewick in city hall discussions. Just saying that has happened. And I use that as an example of doing the right thing when it's necessary for a higher reason. Thank you.

Any other comments? Councilmember Beecham. I didn't even have

to say anything. Thank you.

Yeah, it's hard to reach.

No, I just want to yeah, we had some good discussion on this topic and we spent a lot of time. It's one of those things that I always enjoy with this council is we do it openly with everybody, then we do the same thing when we're closed doors. We talk it through and we have great conversation. Just our overwhelming support for the job that's been done. Everything we I think most of us were on this council when we hired you, and we had a list of things that we were expecting in a new city manager, and you've done a tremendous job on hitting those with tough times and a lot of big ass very quickly.

Hey, get here next day, let's just start building everything and doing everything. So a tremendous job. I think somebody made the comment that we wish we could give you 1,000. It just with the constraints we have, we felt that was a responsible decision at the 3.75% of where we are. And that's not necessarily because of your actions where we are. These are long things that we're dealing with now. And so just from our end, I think appreciate all the hard work. Doesn't reflect necessarily how we wish what we wish we could do, but that's just where we are currently.

Council Member Millbauer. Thank you, Mayor. I would just ditto that and thank you and I will be supporting this motion.

Council member Anderson?

Just a thumbs up.

You're doing awesome. Eric. Thank you.

I second what he said, only I'll do it longer. I'll take a little bit more time. No, I won't. But thank you. So with that, no further comments. Could we have a vote please? And City Council comments. Council member Anderson.

Attended the meeting of the focus meeting with the police officers in the school district. I think it's testament to how well our police force is run and the coordination that we have with the schools. We talked a little bit about the opportunity that we've had some of our officers to attend meetings across the state and how surprising it is for us to have the officers in the school and the programs that we have with the retired officers in our elementary schools. And I, for one, am super proud of to have that and to see that we are protecting the most important assets we have in our in our community as which is our children. I think the focus group is great.

I'd like to see more activities with the focus group doing because I think the ones that they do are great. Anyway, it's a good meeting to be able to attend. That's all I have.

Thanks, sir. Councilmember Beecham?

I appreciate it. And then I'm going to get up and leave, not to be rude, but I do have a family thing that I cannot be late for. BFT this past week, we did ask the interim manager to take the job and he was readily accepted. I think he's on for another couple of years and he'll do kind of a succession plan as we work out of that. He has been here, I believe, for four years. I don't know how long I've been on that Board, but for a while. And I think he'll be he's a great calming voice. He already speaks to kind of both sides of everybody and has the respect of everyone out there at this point. And so I think we'll feel a little bit of calm and maybe make some headway. But that's all I had to report.

Thank you.

Luck at the family event. Council member Milbauer? Thank you, mayor Pro Tem. May 7, I attended the adult drug court graduation as well as the visit Tri Cities open house. I had a great turnout there to visit Tri Cities Building.

Attended at the Grange Building with mayor pro tem Torelli, the comp plan update. 05:12, the Burke Consulting Zoom meeting on housing. 05:13, went to the mental health court graduation to watch two individuals graduate. Attended with mayor pro tem, the Kennewick Fire, Department strategic plan update, and, as well as doing the Tri City Regional Public Facility District meeting by Zoom that evening. 05:14, did the Tri City Local Government, Leaders' Hanford tour with, Aaron and, councilmember Clifford.

It's good to see. There's a lot of cranes and new construction, and construction is still continuing out there. Also attended the ribbon cutting for ink drink e drinkers bookshop downtown Kennewick. So it was a cozy little place that they redid, and they have books and do different arts things down there as well. I'd also like to bring up John Lehman, who spoke at the visitor section with the billboard signs. I was hoping to see if we could get some sort of consensus to get that to the planning commission so the planning commission review it, and if need be, bring it back to a workshop for the council. I'd like to see if we could do that tonight, if that's alright.

I'm perfectly fine with doing that. I think getting it before the planning commission, it's a new type of business, a lot of good information, full transparency, I've talked to John before. And so basically we just need to get it before staff and have some focus on whether these make sense or not for our community or not so if we can get consensus on that just to get it to the planning commission, this is not a yay or nay vote. It looks like we have consensus. There's a thumb going up here. He nodded. Kind of waffled. John's looking at me like crazy. Oh, he did a thumbtaste, so we're there. Okay.

We will start that process.

Thank you.

So John, that will get to the planning commission and thank you for bringing it forward then.

That will end my report. Thank you mayor.

Council member Trumbo.

Get rid of plot materials. And the political sideshow that goes on with

Councilmember Clipper.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor Pro Tem. Attended several of the events already spoken of and didn't attend as many as I wish I could have. A couple of them that I want to speak of is that no one spoke about yet is the Law and Justice Committee meeting that's chaired by Chief Guerrero. It's such a pleasure to be there, to see judges, prosecuting attorneys, defense attorneys, all facets of of the criminal justice system working together in the interest of public safety and justice in the Tri Cities area.

So it's just an honor and a pleasure to be there and see the collaborative work, everyone working together. It's just awesome. And then also went on the Hanford tour with several of the people here today. And I work out there as a sheriff's deputy. I helped build the Columbia Generating Station.

I worked at 100N when it was an operating nuclear reactor producing electricity. Every time I go out there to this day, I think of the heritage that we have. And I am so thankful for the visionaries who made that place happen. It's absolutely historic and associated with World War two and the part that we played in our victory there. And I just want to thank every Hanford worker, past and present, for the work that you do there.

And I also was very excited when I heard them talking about future modular nuclear reactors that could go out there, and I hope that's much sooner than later because we certainly need the energy. In every meeting I've ever gone to about nuclear energy, it is the safest energy that we have. It's zero carbon, so it's just fantastic. I can't wait for us to produce more of it right here in the Hanford Nuclear Reservation. Thank you, Mr. Mayor Proctam.

And I'll go ahead and go through mine real quick. I attended the Joint advisory board. Did another tour of the interior. Really looks good. They're really moving along there. Attended the Hanford community's town hall. So that was well attended. Attended the SWAT meeting. There's going be an issue coming down from the state considering concerning organics. That's your leaves and kitchen waste.

And how do we dispose of that? And I know on certain communities already have passed forward. But it's going to be another issue with Well, let me put it this way. If you thought the garbage can rates were hard, this will be a lot harder. We've got about two years, I think.

And we're looking at getting an exemption for that two year period. So Martin, out of public works, is really working hard on this. We expect maybe there will be some legislative relief, but that's something to be pushed on. Did a couple of proclamations ink and drinkers and security first, and I did not win anything. Participated in the interview committee for opening on planning commission.

And couple things I did wanna bring up kinda independent. So if you get a chance go to Kennewick Police Department and they have their monthly statistics and this gets sent out to council members. But these are really good numbers. It gives you a sense of where we are in the community as far as crime. Out of the SWOC meeting also, they collected the information.

Over the last seven months, 47 tons have gone through medium risk facility out on Ely. Out of that 47 tons, because it includes the entire Tri City area, 31 tons come out of Kennewick. So they're looking at maybe adjusting hours also. Wednesday used to be their busiest day, but now it's coming Friday, and Saturday is catching up. So that's coming forward too.

One of the last things, city manager sends out a legislative report that's really important, but it's a lot of information. The highlights out of the interim legislative report, Moody's revised Washington's per 100 rating from stable to negative, we're sure to do And to this legislative session, I think, is top of mind And for everyone. Legislatures, lobbyists, everything else. So everyone is kind of looking at that. But the interim legislative report really does provide some really good information for everybody.

That's all I have. Ms. Erdmann?

You guys effectively covered everything I had on my list. I'm

good. Thank you.

You have a very sad little list. That's all I'm saying.

Well, main one got added to the agenda.

Oh, okay. Show off. So with that, it is now, whatever time it is, 07:43, and the meeting is done.