Tri-City Council - Special Meeting

Good evening. I'm going to call this meeting to order, the City of Kingman meeting of the City Council. We will have roll call, and then we will stand for the Pledge of Allegiance.

Mayor Watkins?

Present.

Vice Mayor Samely? Here. Council Member Dikins? Here. Council Member Savage?

Here.

Council Member Staley? Present. Council Member Walker?

Here.

Council Member Ward?

Here.

We have a quorum. Great, thank you. Councilman Dikins, would you like to lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance?

I pledge allegiance to the flag

All right, the council may go into executive session for legal counsel in accordance with ARS 38-431.03 to discuss any agenda item. The following items may be discussed, considered, and decisions made relating thereto. Agenda items, number 2A, public hearings, resolution number 5619, an adoption of fiscal year 2026-27, budget and capital improvement plan. The public hearing and adoption of the fiscal year 2026-27 final budget and capital improvements plan represents the last step in the formal budget process. The city council may make additional modifications prior to adoption of the final budget, but may not increase the budget above the appropriations set in the tentative budget 343,488,124. Staff recommends approval. Welcome, Ms. Moline.

thank you so much good evening vice mayor good evening mayor and good evening council members so we are in the final step of our budget adoption process and before we move forward with the public hearing i thought i could quickly recap what was changed from the recommended budget and ultimately approved in the tentative budget also i just want to state again that this is We can no longer increase the budget figure that was approved in the tentative budget. We can decrease anything. We can make adjustments between appropriations, but we cannot increase appropriations. But that is what contingency is used for throughout the year. So we certainly budget ample contingency for that. So just a quick recap. We made some changes to our public safety step plans. We made some changes to employee compensation. We looked at reducing capital projects, not just this year, but really over the five year period. And we did that by reducing funding specifically from the general fund for those projects. And then lastly, we also talked about eliminating the yellow line. Before we move on with that, we have over the last few weeks had some discussions and communications with several agencies who do rely on the yellow line for, whether it be for their patients, their customers, and I don't know, Manager Walsh, if you wanted to cover that at this time.

Yes, thank you. Vice Mayor, Mayor, Council, since last meeting, we have been diligent in reaching out to our stakeholders and other folks that utilize the Yellow Line and the transit system in general. We have been able to, working with Mojave County, specifically Chairman Lingenfelter and Supervisor Martin, they have committed you know, still has to go before the board, but they believe that they can secure 30,000 towards the yellow line to help support that. We've also worked with Mojave College and with Mojave Mental Health, and there's different avenues of being able to support it, some through advertising, some through just direct support. Total right now, we're up to $55,000 in committed contributions to it. Again, those still have to get the final approval from the boards or whoever the governing bodies are. But we are also continuing to work with other stakeholders to try and secure more funding, not just for the yellow, but for the transit in general. So with that, we're hopeful. TINA MENTIONED I THINK LAST MEETING, IN GOING THROUGH AND UPDATING THE BUDGET AND FINALIZING THE NUMBERS, BECAUSE OF SOME OF THE CHANGES THAT WERE MADE, EITHER PERSONNEL OR OTHER, WE'VE BEEN ABLE TO REALIZE AN ADDITIONAL ABOUT 50,000 IN SAVINGS. SO BETWEEN THAT 50,000 AND THE 55 BEING COMMITTED, WE BELIEVE WE CAN CONTINUE WITH THE YELLOW ROUTE AT LEAST THROUGH THIS FISCAL YEAR. really dive into the whole transit system, look at all of our routes, how we can be more efficient, where we can save money, and then also exploring opportunities with the on-demand service and modeling what Havasu is doing there. One of the asks that we did have from the county was in their contribution is if we could find a way to provide service out to the AMTC. So that will be part of what we're looking at as we go through this. But I'd be happy to answer any questions.

Council, do we have any questions? Yeah. Councillor Savage.

Thank you, Tim, for doing a good job there. With the 55K pending, when will we have an answer on that?

So I know with the county, they'll have to take it before their board of supervisors, the full board, to get that approval. We should know, I would assume, possibly the first meeting in July, maybe the second, we'll have that. With some of the others, it'll be a matter of working through advertising what we can do. And then, yeah, just working those agreements. But I would say within the next month, we'll have that secured.

My question being is that I definitely want to supplement that amount. And if we get more, great. With that teamwork, it would give us ample time to work to a longer strategy before budgets come out next year. So I definitely feel that we should pay the difference there. Didn't we not have money already kind of set aside for the yellow route?

So going through the budget process, that was one of the areas that we were looking to cut. So we did pull that out. So we'll actually, and Tina can probably speak to it more eloquently than I, but she mentioned the contingency funds. We'll have to look at contingency in order to cover that.

I'll share more later on.

Council, any other questions? Comments? Councillor Staley?

In the budget book, one of the goals for this year was to put out an RFP for an advertising firm to come in and take over getting advertising on the buses and I assume the bus stops as well. How long will it take to get that RFP out so that we can start realizing that revenue?

So we actually, just this past year, in this, I'd say about three or four months ago, and actually Sherry, appreciate it, Sherry. Sherry actually worked on an RFP for advertising on the bus stops itself. So I'll let her speak to that.

So good evening, Mayor, Vice Mayor, members of the council. We did put out an RFP. We had... One person had a question on it and we received zero responses. So unfortunately that RFP was unsuccessful. It doesn't mean we couldn't go back out again. But it is harder sometimes in the smaller rural areas for other agencies to feel that they can make a profit on that. But we can still continue to do our own advertising. We can do some more advertising uh... to promote our advertising program to try and get more people to come in uh... but as far as having a third party advertiser would there was no interest

So to speak to that, the approach we did on that was a third party to come in and sell the advertising, put the advertising up, but to Sherry's point, we will still continue to seek local folks or whoever to purchase that advertising and put it up ourselves.

Yes, and we do. We do have some people advertising. It's not as much revenue as we would like, but we can try and get that word out a little bit more

Try and get some more people interested in advertising so that we can increase our advertising revenue So if if I may on that same topic So if somebody wanted to come to the city and advertise they would just contact you direct Absolutely, okay, and they don't necessarily have to advertise on the entire bus There's actions or different different opportunities for advertising and I say that it you know to put it out there to the public that may be watching and that maybe somebody does want to advertise in their own way to, you know, maybe it's something that they can do for their business and they can also help the program too, so.

That's correct. So we do offer advertising inside the buses and then we do also offer advertising outside the bus. They often get their best bet by advertising with posters on the inside because then they're able to be on all of the buses. If they're advertising on the outside, then it's per bus and our buses do rotate.

Okay, great, thank you for that. Councillor Staley, did you have any other questions?

Yeah, just to follow up on that RFP, was that just posted on the website or did we reach out to advertising agencies to make sure they knew that it was there?

It was advertised through OpenGov through our normal procurement process that we do now that it goes out to all agencies.

I wonder if we should try that again and do a little bit more of a direct approach. I mean, if you have a professional that's doing it, then they have incentive to make sure that all the buses have advertising on them and really maximize the space. So maybe we should try it again, but just in a different way. I think that's all my questions about advertising.

I did have one request. Could we introduce this to our social media channels for like individual advertising for businesses and or, you know, when we have an RFP go out, if we can put it on social media, somebody might know somebody that, you know, is able to take advantage of that RFP and that might not have an opportunity to go to the portal?

We can certainly do that. And years ago, I did send out a mail or two. I got the... all of the chamber members and sent out a mail or an advertisement letting them know what we could offer. Unfortunately, we received no responses through that mailer, but we can certainly do something like that again.

Yeah, I'd like to see it on social media. Absolutely. We have a lot of avenues for that. Sure can. Okay, perfect. Any other questions, Council? Okay, thank you so much. Thank you.

I think we're there. Yeah.

OK. All right. Perfect. We do have a couple of people signed up to speak on the budget. So I will open up the public hearing. Thank you, Carl. I'm going to open up the public hearing. And I will go ahead and request that Dr. Rob Christensen come up, please. Good evening, sir.

Good evening, Vice Mayor, members of the City Council, and Mayor Watkins, wherever you're at. I just have some questions about the budget, and I've provided a copy of those questions that should be in front of you, and I believe Mr. Walsh and Ms. Moline has copies as well. I don't have a strong overall opinion, positive or negative, about the budget since I've been gone for almost four weeks in Europe. I know, poor me, but anyway. But I guess hearing what I just heard, I just have a question about the yellow route. So my question is I have faith in our representatives on the Board of Supervisors, but I don't necessarily have faith in another local governmental entity that was mentioned, and I won't go into the reasons why at this time. But my question is if one or more of these local governmental entities does not provide the funding that they promised, what will the Kingman City Council do in regards to the yellow route? Will it cut it midstream? What actions will be taken? And that's all I have to say. Thank you.

All right. Thank you. We will have Ms. Moline come up and address everybody's questions at the end. Stephanie Williams, did you have anything to add?

I'm going to go over the numbers and all the other stuff.

Good evening.

I'm going to write a letter, or I'm going to read a letter I wrote. In addition to that, we do have a petition. There's about 732 people that have signed it and 21 letters from writers that are going to be affected. So good evening, mayor, vice mayor, council people. Tonight, I would like to ask each of you a simple question. Why did you run for office? Why do you decide to be a council member, a mayor, a vice mayor? I believe you genuinely wanted to make a positive difference in the lives of people you serve. Most people step into public service do so Because they believe they can help their community. They believe they can leave things better than they found them. They believe they can be a voice for people who may not otherwise be heard. And tonight you have that opportunity. The decision before you is not simply about a bus route. It's about people. It's about the senior trying to get to a doctor's appointment. It's about the disabled veteran trying to maintain independence. The blind trying to go buy groceries. the person in recovery trying to rebuild their life. You have the power to enrich lives or make them much harder. You have the power to be a cornerstone of hope or a stumbling block that stands in someone's path. You have the power to be a voice for families, not just popular families, not influential families, not just the wealthy families, but for all families. The measure of leadership is not how we treat those who have options. It's how we treat those who have none. Years from now, no one will remember a line item in a budget, and 100 years from now, they may not even remember your name. But the people affected by this decision will remember whether their elected leaders stood with them when it mattered most. Tonight, I ask you to remember why you sought public office in the first place, because right now you have an opportunity to make a real and lasting difference in the lives of the people who need you most. Thank you.

Thank you, Stephanie. Mr. Don Martin, Supervisor Martin.

Good evening, sir. Good evening, Mayor, Council, staff. I'm Don Martin. I'm the District 4 Supervisor for Mojave County. I wanted to say, first of all, from a personal standpoint, I have been supportive of the Yellow Line program. forever because I recognize the importance of it. And to be honest, my phone messages have increased about 30% when the word got out that it was possibly going to do away with the yellow line. So personally, I supported it from the beginning. But on behalf of Mojave County, I'm pleased to report that due to the efforts of Chairman Travis Lincoln Felter and County Manager David Strahl, and I had little to do with it, we are going to absolutely be part of this, and we're going to contribute $30,000 to this fund to keep that yellow line open. We recognize that there are citizens from both sides that live in the city and outside the city, and we feel that to be responsible to represent our people, that we should step up, and we will, and we are hoping that tonight you guys will agree to keep that line open. I think the use is there, and I surely know that the need is there, because the people I spoke to that told me why they absolutely got to have that yellow line to get them in and out of the city. It's just something we can't live without. So like I say, I'm pleased personally and professionally to say we are going to step up, and I hope that you all see the same thing and we keep this line open. Thank you. Thank you, sir.

Ms. Moline?

Are you going to close the hearing?

I am going to close the hearing.

I'm going to close the public hearing. Ms. Moline. Thank you, Vice Mayor. So I would like to address Dr. Christensen's question about funding. It's a good one. Certainly, the partners that we have at the table, we have strong relationships with those partners. And there's no reason to think that they won't provide what they've shared that they're going to provide. However, in the event that that happens, First of all, it's a policy decision on what the council would decide to do, but from a funding standpoint, can we survive one fiscal year by having to come up with $15,000 or $20,000, whatever that dollar amount might be for the current fiscal year, and I can say that, yes, we can survive one year to do so while we evaluate whatever those condensed routes might be, whatever an on-demand system might look out. But again, just as you're Uh, finance director, I do believe that there would not be an issue in needing to come up with those monies for one year. All right. Thank you.

I did have a question for you and I, I was going to ask it before you sat down. Um, the funding that we are looking to secure from the stakeholders, uh, I just wanted to know, is it recurring funding or is it one time funding?

Vice mayor, it's my understanding that that is recurring funding.

So they've definitely committed, I think it varies by each one. So you heard Supervisor Martin here, they're willing to do that this year. And speaking with them today, the indication was that it would be recurring coming from the county. As we continue to work with those partners, we'll nail that down, whether they can continue to plan on it annually or if it was just a one time.

Okay, all right. Because I definitely would see the need to make it recurring. Yes. Otherwise, we're just kicking the can down the road. Thank you, Manager Walsh.

And that would be, I mean, really as we do it this year, staff's intent is definitely get it in place for this year and then work this year to find those efficiencies, find where we can find savings. And then that way, as we go forward, we won't be in the same position.

Right. Okay. Thank you so much. Any other questions? Mayor, did you have anything that you wanted to say?

No, actually, thank you, Vice Mayor. I am great. I appreciate the discussion, and I think you've covered, all of you have covered all the topics that I would have thought of, so thank you.

Okay, great. Does anybody else have anything for, Councillor Dykens?

I don't have a question, I've just got a comment. Okay. In regards to the yellow line, which I'm now able to discuss, after here first off knowing that we do have funding that is available through multiple resources and after hearing the the individuals that came up uh... month or so ago talking about how devastating losing the yellow line would be and then I took the opportunity to ride all of the lines last week or the week before. I don't know. It's gone by. And although what I rode was not exactly a good representation because it was just one day, one hour on each route, I still was able to see a lot. I saw some of the people that are relying on the bus route, and literally all the testimonies that were given are not exaggerated in the least. And with all of that, just for myself, I'm 100% sold on maintaining and keeping the yellow line not only this year but the future as long as we can continue to find resources and commit commitments from others with donating to the cause.

All right, thank you for your comments. Councillor Staley?

I just wanted to ask a few more questions. The transit system as a whole costs the city about a million dollars, a little over a million dollars a year to run. But the revenue from ticket sales is only about $120,000 per year, which is a big gap. And then I know we do get some grants that are applied, but then the rest is coming out of the general fund. So I'm curious about a rate increase. It's currently, I think, is it $2 to ride the bus? Yes, $1.50? If there was an increase, you know, even if you went from $1.50 to $3, that would... double, you'd get over $200,000 in revenue, which could help make up this difference. There's also maybe an opportunity for some adjustments in cutting hours where the bus isn't being utilized. The buses do run for extended amount of time, six days a week. So while I'm fine with giving the city another year to cut hours, figure out how we can make this work and still be able to give our police officers and firefighters those increases that they need to stay fully staffed and to hire those open positions that I've been so worried about. I'm fine with going another year, but I don't want to wait an entire year and then be right back here, like the Vice Mayor said, kicking the can down the road. So I'm wondering how long will it take to come back

and talk about some of these other things that could address that shortfall uh... for this year it's good question i'd say i think you know what we are already looking at you know a number of things uh... looking at ridership looking at uh... you know, places where we have two routes covering the same stops and different things like that, looking at, you know, where we have stops that are located, you know, pretty close to each other, maybe eliminating one here or there. I think we can, I think we could easily come back with an update in, say, three months. Give us three months. We can start looking through different things, bring that back, give you an update as far as what we found, where we're headed, and then maybe in another three months keep bringing it back until we have that plan in place.

I'd also like to see updates on the marketing. If we're making any progress with that, that's definitely a missed opportunity. And, you know, maybe some updated numbers on the ridership on each route, that would be helpful as well.

Will do.

But I want to thank everybody for their work on this and definitely finding those sponsors to help bridge the gap.

Councillor Savage?

Marketing's vague. Are we looking exactly for a agency or are we looking for advertisers?

But both yeah, I this is my forte So yes, so primarily we were looking for an agency a third party that would Do the work go out put the ads on maintain them look at all apps options for advertising such as the benches, the shelters, any advertising opportunity, they would bring in the revenue and then we would receive a percentage of that. That's what our goal was with the advertising so that we could have somebody dedicated to being able to actively seek out those opportunities. But in the meantime, we are offering our own advertising. So the way how that works is the advertiser, the person who wants to advertise, would then work with the vendor of their choosing, as long as it was approved through us. We do have a couple options here in town. And they would work with them to get it set up. They would pay for the advertising to be printed and installed. Cover the cost to have it removed later, and then we would receive a monthly fee for each month at that of our chasings on the bus So that's our current option that option Would go away if we did have a third-party Advertiser because then we would want to be able to give we would need to give them the opportunity to generate that That revenue for themselves the agency to do the online portion and would that be internally I? to do the online portion.

If there's advertising online or anything, is it gonna be all tied in with an agency concerning print and online?

We wouldn't advertise on, it would be just strictly on our vehicles or in our vehicles.

Exactly, so the city.

We wouldn't have a separate, yeah, that would be separate.

Okay, thank you.

You're welcome.

Any other questions? All right, I will entertain a motion.

I'll make a motion to approve resolution number 56 and 18.

We have a motion. Do we have a second? Second. We have a motion and two seconds. All those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Any opposed?

Aye.

Thank you, sir. All right. Number three, executive session. We don't have anything on the agenda to go into executive session. This meeting is adjourned.