City Council - Regular Meeting

I call to order the Lakewood City Council meeting of Monday, April 20th, 2026. Miss Schumacher, could you please call the role? Council member Brandansteadard here. Council member Laura Cella, here. Council member Lindholm, present. Council member Pearson present. Council member Talbo present. Deputy Mayor Bell here. And Mayor Boi here. You have a quorum. Next is the pledge of allegiance.

I aliance 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.

Thank you very much. Uh there are no proclamations and presentations today. So we will immediately go to public comments. So public comments are accepted by mail, email, or by live, virtual or in-person comment. Send comments in advance by mail or email to Briana Schumacher, city clerk at 6000 Main Street Southwest, Lakewood, Washington 98499 or B Schumacher at city of Lakewood. us. Comments received up to 1 hour before the meeting have been provided to the city council electronically. The clerk will read the names of those who have submitted comments in advance. Miss Schumacher, do we have any comments in advance? Mayor, you received written comments in advance of the meeting from Wally Ror.

Thank you very much.

This is there is a public hearing tonight on the fiscal year 2026 community development block grant or also known as CDBG annual action plan for CDBG and home programs. If you would like to speak specifically to this topic, please do not do so under the public hearing portion of this agenda so we can get it into the record. Specifically, comments on the CDBG plan. Uh, the members of the audience may comment on items relating to any matter related to city business under the public comments section. Comments are limited to three minutes per person. Virtual comments. If you would like to provide live virtual public comments, you will need to join the Zoom meeting as an attendee by calling on the telephone uh 253-2158782 and enter meeting ID 86872632373 or visit zoom. us and enter meeting ID 86872632373. Upon entering the meeting, please enter your name and use the raise hand feature to call to be called upon. For those participating by calling in by telephone, to use the raise hand feature, press star 9 on your phone. When you're unmuted, please provide your name and city of residence. Each speaker will be allowed three minutes to speak. Outside of public comments, all attendees on Zoom will continue to have the ability to virtually raise your hand for the duration of the meeting. you will not be acknowledged and your microphone will remain muted except for when you are called upon. So we tonight are going to go on Zoom or phone first. So uh Miss Schumacher, do we have anybody who has raised their hand virtually? Look like we got two.

Mayor, first we have Judith Anderson. Great. Thank you very much, Miss Anderson. Welcome. You have three minutes. Is Anderson. I I think the wrong person got unmuted. Oh. Okay. We'll go with Tisha. Tisha Dunlop. Okay. Mr. Apologize. Mr. Dunlop. Uh, would you like to go first?

All right. Sure. Uh, hello. My name is Tamir Dunlop. I'm a resident of Lakewood. I am making a comment tonight to urge the city to actively promote a lights out initiative during peak bird migration and to take meaningful steps to reduce unnecessary nighttime lighting in our community. I've been watching birds in my neighborhood and on Pontoon Creek since I was small. Wildlife researchers are documenting a major surge in spring migration across Washington. uh across to excuse me. According to data from Birdcast and Purdue University Aeroecology Lab, hundreds of thousands and soon millions of birds are passing overhead each night. Artificial light is a wellestablished threat during this period. It disorients migrating birds, increasing exhaustion and the likelihood of fatal collisions with buildings and other structures. Public participation is essential, though. Residents are encouraged to turn off or dim non-essential outdoor lighting between 11 p.m. and 6:00 am during peak migration. National Ottabon Society recommends maintaining lights out practices from now through to the end of May to cover the full migration window. However, awareness in Lakewood appears to be very low. We have turned off our own lights and yet nearly all surrounding properties continue to keep their theirs on. To date, I have not seen any outreach, guidance, or acknowledgement of this issue from the city. I ask that the city use this website and social media to inform residents about migration and the importance of a lights out policy. Uh to provide clear, simple instructions on when and how to reduce lighting. Lead by example by dimming or turning off non-essential municipal lighting during peak migration. If nothing else, we specifically request that the new street lights on Waverly and in front of our home be turned off during overnight hours through this migration period.

These lights contribute to the unnecessary illumination at a time when reducing light pollution can have a real and immediate impact. This is a straightforward lowcost action and in fact it saves money since you don't have to use electricity that uh that builds uh environmental stewardship and uh community values. Other jurisdictions are already taking steps to protect migratory birds in this way. Why should Lakewood would be left behind? Thank you for stepping up to help the birds who are already in such trouble worldwide. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Dunlap. Uh Judith Anderson. Miss Anderson.

Hi. Can you hear me now? Yes, we can.

Oh, great. Okay. Hi. Um, I'm Judith Anderson. I live in Tacoma and I'm asking you to take a stand for the future and not allow the Gary Oaks to be cut down for a parking lot. I read the Tribune story a while ago and noted that there's a landowner involved and I was at an event that was also attended by the county assessor and um the event was about the county charter and it there's going to possibly be changes and I I piped up because I was thinking that if a a land owner having land that has precious trees on it and a wetlands. Maybe they could have reduced or eliminated property taxes as long as they keep the trees and the land to be beneficial for the inhabitants, you know, the the non-human inhabitants as well as for the humans. And and frankly, right now we're we're facing a a very hostile regime to things that are alive. There are plans to really cut down a lot of the trees in the Olympic Peninsula and in Oregon. And it's because it's, you know, public land and the government thinks they can do anything they want with it. And I'm I'm just stressing that the climate change issue is real and it is getting worse way faster than any of the predictions were made about it. And if we keep the trees,

they will absorb the carbon dioxide. If we get rid of them, the it it becomes an a um oh hell, I don't know what the word is. I can't think of the word. Anyway, it gets worse. And um I'm I'm begging you to look out for your grandchildren because they are going to have to take care of everything that is going to go wrong. And if at least when it's 150 degrees outside there's a tree to sit under, they'll thank you. So, um, that's I'm done.

Thank you, Miss Anderson. Are there any is there anybody else virtually who would like to speak? Mayor, there are no other virtual hands raised at this time.

Thank you very much. Then we'll go into chambers. And uh, the first speaker on the list is Mr. Joel Rea. Hi, my name is Joel Verona. I'm the president of the Eagle Point Homeowners Association on American Lake. Thank you for having me uh here again or allowing me to be here again today. You've got some packets in front of you, I believe. Um, and that will show uh petitions that have been signed from a growing number of shoreline residents that have become concerned with the water quality of American Lake as years have gone by. I have to let you know that I'm very appreciative that this chamber along with the city has worked together with other uh government agencies to improve our water level and that has helped a lot. and you've also worked a great deal with the mil foil which has helped a lot. But the bigger elephant in the room is really the amount of nitrogen and phosphates in American lake that's contributing excessively to noxious and nuisance weeds as well as bacteria growth and algae growth. So uh the top left picture on this if you have these in front of you is what the weir looks like. And uh for many years now it's been way below because they let the water out in the winter when they should be saving it. And uh we've got that corrected thanks to you. I appreciate it. But what I really want to show you is if you look at number three, you'll find that uh American Lake is kind of the universal recipient of pooh from Frederickson to uh Parkland and Spanway and through as the watershed that feeds American Lake comes from those areas. So you see the black on that is really um septic systems and then you'll see uh the red circle is

American Lake and you see where the water flow goes to American Lake and then it goes out to the sound from there. As a result, we end up in in American Lake with enough lawn fertilizer that it it's crazy. It's not actually lawn fertilizer. It's septic stuff. But you know, the nitrogen level is so high that we can't control the shoreline weeds and and all the other things that go along with that. So, as a result, um, every year we're adding more and more to this. It's becoming a bigger and bigger problem. So, these people that have signed this petition are willing and able to put money together to try and solve this problem at no cost to the city. I want to emphasize this, at no cost to the city. We will manage it if you will let us. But we need a permit that you have and only one per lake can be taken. And you have the permit that we have to work under. But we need your permission to do this. And I know your departments are very very busy. But we're asking for you to to put some pressure on accelerating this process because the algae is really in full bloom right now. And at the pace that we're dragging it, we're going to miss it again with the opportunity to get these weeds and algae under control. So we need your help on this. We really, really do. The department of ecology says that when phosphorus levels get to 20 parts per billion that an action must be taken. We end up routinely at

now I'd like to continue on as Joel Verona. Okay.

Concerned citizen. Um we get about 40 parts per billion uh as the as the lake flips over every year. and we don't do anything about it except that the county puts out these cyanobacteria or or noxious bacteria problem signs that says swimming is closed for now. That's our solution currently. That's not really a great solution. The bigger problem is the lake. So, if you look on uh the lower right and you see some of those pictures there, these are early spring pictures of American Lake. This is what the end of my dock looks like. The upper right actually is the end of my dock. every year. Nine or 10 years ago, I took my swimming ladder out because there's nobody that would ever swim in that. I have not put it back yet because it's not improved in the last 10 years. It's worsening. And so, we have a lot of people that are more than ready to do something about this. If you go to the next picture, seven and eight, seven is me picking the muck from the algae, the green filamentous algae off my shoreline that's probably 8 or 10 inches thick and it smells exactly like a dairy barn. You don't want to be near it. When the wind comes off the lake onto my deck at my house, you don't want to be near that. This isn't helping my property values. Believe me, eventually it's going to hurt your tax values. It's just full of everything. stringy weeds, everything. So, we have kind of a long-term and a short-term plan. The short-term plan is let's work with these shoreline weeds now. And we can do that with your help and your permission. We'll pay for it. And then while we're doing that, we'll study what the phosphorus levels are in the lake and see how we can control them better. There are very good ways to control it. We will put up the money again. We've got the people interested. We have people trying to give us money now because they want to do it now, but we can't do it without your help. We

need your permission and you just have to let us manage ourselves a little bit. We'll do it if you'll just let us. And so this is kind of a timely thing for us. We're three or four weeks into the algae bloom already. My shoreline is going to look like this picture from June 9th and about another two weeks because it's warmer this year than it was last year early on. I'll lose another summer. I'm tired of losing summers. Give us our lake back if you could just allow us to do this. And we asked for it last week or about two weeks ago. We didn't see much action happen from your departments. And you know, I don't want to be here every two weeks and you don't want to see me every two weeks, but believe me, we're going to keep working this until we can spruce our lake back up. This American Lake is a jewel of Pierce County, and we're letting it become very tarnished. We are willing to polish that tool if you'll just let us. So, I'll tell you, it's a safety issue. It's a health issue. It's a it's so many issues. And let's let's just get it under control. And I hope I can get your help. If you have any questions, give me a call or ask me now. Whatever you have. Thank you.

Thank you. Next up is Mr. Rick Wilkerson. Thank you, Mr. Wilkerson. You got three minutes.

You bet. I've got uh 10 quick questions to uh take up my three minutes. And this is in regards to proposed park to be constructed on Gravity Lake. What are the past and present crime statistics for the Lakewood City parks that are currently in use? How happy? Number two, how happy are the residents living in close proximity to these parks? Please provide complaint data compiled over the last few years. What measures will the council take to guarantee that the same crime levels are not realized on Gravity Lake? How will early and late park access issues be prevented? How will the city prevent visitors from leaving park property, the small park property that's proposed? and the lake to cross property lines, go on other people's property. Is the lake to be littered with no trespassing signs? How will noise issues be prevented? Drive by the American and Silicon Lake parks any time during the summer months and you will hear the boom boxes and bass uh beats from the music lovers with no sense of reason or civily. Is this what you have planned for us now as well? How will campfires, fireworks, and weapons use be effectively prevented or mitigated on these properties? How will the public health issues, including toilets, feces, drug paraphernalia, and trash be handled? Will water testing be completed at regular intervals to determine if the park is causing point source pollution, BOD, nitrogen, bacteria, to the lake? How will the city prevent motorboats and watercraft from being launched on the lake? State rules are strictly enforced by homeowners on Gralie and this will not be possible with visiting swimmers, canoes, kayaks, floats, and inner tubes across an already crowded lake. Approving increase in the use density on this small body of water. This is not American lake. This is not Stilikum Lake. Um, this is an accidental day

death waiting to happen. How will the city prevent unlawful overnight camping or homeless camps from using and overtaking the property? Will the city work with the Pierce County Assessor to reduce our property taxes once our home values are affected and quality of life will be unquestionably be adversely affected by this development? Homeowners currently pay to stock the lake with fish. How will the city prevent the general public from catching the fish we pay for? Who will enforce fishing bans, licenses? What are your plans for paying for a larger share of the periodic lake chemical treatments that the Grley Lake homeowners currently pay for right now? Those are the questions I have. Those are the same questions I sent to every council member last year when you're looking at buying another parcel. I heard back from no one. Not one response. So,

thank you very much, Mr. Wilkerson. Uh, Miss Barb Tucci. Hello, I'm Barb Tucci. I have been Grally Lake Improvement Club secretary of 503 nonprofit corporation established to preserve and maintain the quality of Gral Lakes water for 15 years. There are 87 households on Gral Lake. I am here to speak specifically to comments made in the Lakewood City Council Saturday 18th or excuse me, April 18th retreat about access for emergency services on Graly Lake. Although the video quality is challenging, I believe Deputy Mayor Bale or Belle, excuse me, mentioned her concerns about emergency services accessing Graly Lake. I might be wrong. Sorry, but it was hard to see. Um, I want to reassure the council that the fire and police department has access to one of five private boat launches available virtually on demand. All gate codes are available to emergency services as annual testing proves each year. I have contact information for literally every adult on the lake, 87 households. I understand that some members of this council council are determined to provide public access to Grley Lake without a reasonable or feasible plan to mitigate public safety and environmental concerns. Ambitious goals for city leaders who just increased the sales tax are operating at a deficit and are having to pay to comply to comply with a public defender mandate. Yet the council is still willing to spend time and resources to pursue a $2 million purchase. Question mark. Really? Thank you.

Thank you, Miss Tucci. Miss Tucci, just for clarification, that was not me on the video that said that. So, there's just

Mr. Curtis Clemens. Uh, good evening. Well, I'm definitely not the spokesman for the group, okay? But, um, I do live on Grley Lake and I have a little different perspective here. I've spent most of my life in the Federal Way area. Went through all kindergarten through 12th grade. If you're not really familiar with Federal Way, I'm sure you all know where it is, of course, but if you're not really familiar, you probably wouldn't know that there's actually quite a few lakes in Federal Way. Probably the biggest couple would be Steel Lake and Five Mile Lake, but there's actually quite a few of them, but the entire uh city has a no motors policy on any lakes because they're all the biggest ones are probably close to the size of Graly Lake and there would be deaths all the time there if they did that. If you were if if this proposal was about American Lake, you know, not because I don't live there, but I I would have no problem with it. American Lake is roughly about nine or 10 times, I believe, the size of Bradley Lake. Um there are deaths that happen on American Lake. There are deaths that happen on Lake Stilikum. There that I know of uh in recent memory anyway, there's been no deaths or tragic accidents on Gral Lake. Two reasons why. reason. One reason is that uh we don't have people from outside the lake there. It's basically a postage stamp size lake. Um the other reason uh the previous speaker Barb, I don't know her really well, but I know her well enough. And there's another guy on the lake and they take, as she said, she knows everybody on the lake and who they are. If somebody's parents go out of out for the weekend or something and their kids, their high school kids get on the boat, they're right on them on what to do,

what to not to do. But they're not going to have that authority if people from literally anywhere in the world want to come launch their boat there. They can't yell at them or go out there. They have no authority to do that. Um, and it it takes forever to get, you know, somebody there if there's a real problem anyway. But it it just mainly I'm here to tell you that not it's not a bunch of rich people and we don't want people on our lake. It's not it's not that I don't consider myself a rich person. This is the way I dress. I work six or seven days a week. Um I don't feel that I'm rich. Maybe I I don't know but I don't feel if I was rich I'd be on the beach somewhere instead of doing what I do. But uh you guys are going to make your decision based on whatever you make your decision on. But you are going to be responsible for some deaths if if you put motorized, you know, if you say, "Okay, no, therefore, nobody can be have motors." Well, that's going to really hurt us bad because one of the reasons we bought the properties is to be able to get out on the lake if we want to. But it's just not big enough. It's not It's not an American lake. It's not Lake Taps. Um, it's just not big enough to have these kind of things and have people I don't personally drink, but let's be honest, drinking and boating shouldn't go together, but it seems like it does. And on a such a small lake, I know my time my time is up. Such a small lake. Thank you very much. I appreciate it.

Thank you, Mr. Clemens. Okay, that's everybody who signed up. Um, so if there's anybody else who would like their three minutes to speak on any matter related to city business, just walk up there and uh you can actually queue up if you'd like. And uh how do I go ahead? You've got your three minutes. Please introduce yourself and your place of residence. And do I hit a button to start here or do you hit it? We'll start it. It's starting.

I'm David Clark. I've been on the lake for about 20 years. One of the crazy things about giving people access to Gravity Lake, it's a very unusual lake. Our houses are all incredibly high bank. We can't see what's going on on the beach. So, there was a guy who somehow got on the lake a couple years ago, lit the beach on fire, caught a Doug Gary Oak on fire, and almost burned that almost burned the place down. For us to be able to get, it's like kind of like what if we let all these people into your backyard because your backyard is not as secure as your front yard. And so it's, you know, I mean, it's that thought that we're going to have people roaming the lake with no ability to visualize them unless we install a bunch of CCTV cameras and alarms, which we're probably going to have to do. These alarms will be going off all the time to maintain the security because I think the only reason we haven't had more thefts and more vandalism there is because almost everybody on the lake has a gate. But if you give them access to our backyard, we can't see what's going on. We've already seen what happened. I think the other thing I'm concerned about is I think one of the city council members is lives very close to Ravaly Lake and he would uh he would have um um in increased enjoyment from his property. His property values would go up because it would be a four-minute walk to the lake while our properties go down. It seems just a little bit like Port Barrel politics. So that's about all I've got to say. Um, I hope that we can find a reasonable way to move forward. I appreciate your time.

Thank you, Mr. Clark. Anyone else who would like to speak? Please come on up. Mr. Dunlop, welcome.

Hello. My name is James Dunlop and I am a Lakewood resident. So, uh, the city has just increased its sales tax. So now Lakewood apparently has the second highest sales tax in Pierce County. I think it's at 10.3% although I understand that the increase that was made is in itself is is rel is pretty small. So uh to be specific about that Lakewood City Council as representatives of the people of Lakewood voted 43 in favor of the tax rise. I don't know whether that was a good move to raise the tax. I understand that there are budgetary issues and that there are things increasing the budgetary strain which are beyond the city's control. Yeah, I do feel that there was something wrong here. And you know, as I've mentioned on several occasions, the city council does have a a major distortion within it. And that distortion is simply the fact that out of the seven council members, four of the seven, including the mayor and the deputy mayor, are municipal employees. And so you might think that that is a good thing. I mean, if you're involved in local government, in city government, you need to know how city councils work. So, you would have thought as a municipal employee, you would be just the person to be running the city council. But, uh, that's not necessarily the case because I think that there is a bureaucratic bias there. And as city employees, city, you know, those four city councilors may be used to deferring. they may be used to serving the needs of a bureaucracy. And of course, something like revenue really does uh matter. It's

revenue is uh it's not just about uh one's own city council, but it's about everyone, you know, having a high having more revenue. It's it's good for everyone if you're working for the city. Now, as far as this vote is concerned, it it's kind of was quite incredible that four of those four city councilors who were direct employees of the city council, sorry, who were who d who were direct employees of the municipalities, um all four of them voted in favor of the tax rise. The three who were not direct employees uh voted against. So from a statistical point of view, the chances of that happening, I believe are84%. So that's a a 1 in19 chance. So it strikes me that you have here a systematic bias. And I think really from a moral perspective that really those four city councilors should have recused themselves or at least abstained.

Thank you, Mr. Dunlop. Is there anyone else who would like to speak? Hi, Mayor Bi. Hi, Deputy Mayor Bell.

Uh, Christina Manetti Lakewood. Um, and I'm here tonight uh just to mention something as simple as a name. It's about what we choose to recognize and what we choose to ignore. And it reveals a lot about our priorities as a city. across the country and around the world actually communities are celebrating Earth Day. It's a moment to reflect. It's Wednesday if you don't know. It's a moment to reflect on our shared responsibility to the planet, of course, to educate children, to confront environmental challenges honestly. But here in Lakewood, we substitute that with Parks Appreciation Day. That choice may seem harmless or even positive, but it sends a kind of message that we prefer controlled cityscripted narratives over broader civic engagement with with real and sometimes uncomfortable issues. This isn't an isolated pattern, though. We've seen the city stay out of things when they really mattered. Failing to fight for the fight for the library, arguably our most important and oldest civic institution, which could have been restored as a source of pride. We saw livelihoods disappear when the flea market was shut down and replaced by a warehouse that has sat largely empty. Decisions were made, but the human and cultural cost seemed to go completely ignored. And in our parks, appreciation too often means degradation. You know, paving, you know, for paths, cutting down trees. And at Wajop, a large parking area near the lake was paved over despite widespread understanding that increasing pvious imperous surfaces worsens runoff and environmental harm. That wasn't necessity. It was preference. Someone wanted to pave, so it was paved. This is what improvement has come to mean in the Lakewood way. Meanwhile, our schools

didn't meaningfully observe Earth Day when my child attended them. That's a missed opportunity. It's not just symbolic, but it's educational. Earth Day could be a chance to teach about stewardship, science, and civic responsibility. But instead, we organize volunteer cleanups, asking residents to pick up after the consequences of neglect rather than addressing root causes or fostering some kind of deeper respect. If protecting our only planet is considered too political, then we've lost touch with scientific reality. Environmental responsibility isn't partisan at all. It's fundamental. So, Lakewood doesn't need to avoid Earth Day. I hope this is the last year that we do not have Earth Day here. It needs to champion it. We have to be honest. You have to be courageous and stand up for something larger than some PR chance. For the city, the people of Lakewood and our own nature deserve this. And Christina Vanetti Gario Coalition Lakewood, we'd like to draw your attention to a problem in Lakewood that is only getting worse. Excess paving and its impact on our mo most iconic native trees, the Gary Oaks. We appreciate that the city has adopted code prohibiting pavement within the drip line of Gary Oaks. That's good obviously, but that does not go far enough. Arb arboricultural science shows that tree roots extend well beyond the drip line, often two or three times the canopy radius. So for a mature Gary oak, the roots can spread 50 to 100 ft from the trunk. Protecting only the drip line leaves much of the root system vulnerable to compaction, suffocation, and heat stress. I know there are roots all over the place. We can't protect them all, but it has to not just be the the drip line. It's what's also really concerning though is that there is a lack of enforcement about the laws that

we do have on Alpharetta. A property owner asphalted over critical root zones and right up to the trunks of three large Gary Oaks. The city has known about this violation since August 12th, 2025. Yet the pavement remains. I just saw it on the way here. As the summer approaches, those roots will are still trapped beneath the heat absorbing a asphalt. They've already been deprived of natural water infiltration during the rainy season. I asked the city to do something about it, you know, before it gets too late, you know, too uh too far through the rainy season and the coming heat will further weaken those protected trees. We're asking the city to expedite whatever process is necessary to require that that pavement be removed and replaced with a permeable surface. Paving is a widespread problem and most of it was of course done long ago. The city may say that because it was done before the current codes or under prior Pierce County jurisdiction, nothing can be done. But a protected species is being harmed every day, which means that now it's time for you to correct the errors of the past. Other cities are taking action. Portland's Deepave program has become a model, inspiring efforts in our own region by Deepave Puget Sound, as well as in cities like Chicago, Louisville, and dozens across Canada and Europe. Across Lakewood, Gary Oaks are encased in asphalt and concrete. They survived past decades under a wetter climate. This is no longer the case. Today's hotter, drier conditions make restoring permeability critical. We urge the city to incentivize deping uh remove unnecessary impervious surfaces on public land and educate residents about alternatives like gravel through its magazine, social media, and website. Imperous surfaces also increase polluted runoff 6 PPD quinone which is

incredibly toxic to salmon. Um we're a city full of former and potential salmon habitat. You are in charge. You have the authority to shape policy and public behavior to educate the public. Please use it. Act now while these trees can still be saved. Thanks a lot. Welcome. Please state your name and

Yes, this is Haley Ivy. Um I am a Lakewood resident. Um I live very close to Edgewater Park. Um and I just have some bullet points I'll try to keep concise. Um but I do want to sound off and um multiply the concern for our lakes. Um I uh I I just want to bring up the hearing for the um Edgewater Park master plan, which was the last time I was here. Um just in brief, I felt as if um our concerns weren't heard at that hearing. There were only three of us at that hearing. And I don't believe for a second it's that people don't care. It's that that they don't know. Um, and at that hearing, the questions that were asked by city council to the city planners were not answered. It was very convoluted, which was strange for a last hearing. There was no mention on time for the public comments. Um, and I I am trying to keep things more concise, but I was cut off without any warning of there being a timer. There was no timer on the screen. I left that hearing feeling defeated because as a person that goes to Edgewater Park which is um Stacum Lake, I am constantly confronted with the piling up of garbage. It's all on the water line. There's garbage, new trash there every single day. um which is uh a concern too in Celely Lake which is um you know on the uh front side front sign considered to be very important that is also completely taken over by invasive species um such as ivy covering the entire trees. This is all over Lakewood. It's not just our parks. It's not just our lakes. It's what Lakewood seems to be turning into is just pavement, invasive species, and

no more trees. I would like to say as a walking commuter, it is incredibly hot, even on a 75°ree day, because I'm surrounded by concrete on the way to the bus stop, which is usually covered in garbage. Um, so I would like for the city council to um address the um not behavior at the last hearing for the Edwater master plan, but I would consider um inviting the residents to be heard by the city council. I would like to thank Mark here and a few people on that council that were wrapped with attention and listen to my concerns, but I did not appreciate how that ended. It is Lakewood and we are losing the quality of all of our lakes in all of our woods. And when I joke to my friends from Tacoma or Olympia or Seattle, I say paved wood and they laugh and agree with me. Um, and I love it here and want to protect this place that I live. Thank you.

Thank you, Miss Ivy. Any other speakers? Welcome. Please stay. Please state your name.

Uh for the the record, Brett Jacobson, 12601 Gravely Lake Drive Southwest. Uh first, I'd like to thank the council for their time uh their energy to be here. Um and with that, my neighbors for being here to support uh our community. The one thing that I'd like to just quickly talk about is in looking at the the council retreat uh minutes or or video, it was pretty surprising to see that a study's been initiated for the property at the bottom of Hilltop Lane. Uh, I think all the council members should take a trip over before you start studying this thing because it makes zero sense. Number one, grade road with it's a fire lane. You've paved and sidewalked Nanza. So, the nearest parking outside of that small little driveway is on the other side of Nanza. So I would uh I would suggest everyone take a look before you spend a bunch of money studying this thing. Um secondly, I think that the council needs to understand some of the nuances of Gral Lake. A lot of the property lines go out extend into the water. So it's not something you can walk around on the beach without being on priv private property. Uh, I would invite you to come and talk to the community before you kind of go through lengthy studies. Thank you.

Thank you. I'm going to I'm going to ask that people not clap because for the people you don't clap for, I mean, so let's uh keep the decorum. Thank you very much. Please state your name and resonance. Hello, my name is Dan Hodgson and I live in the Tilicum neighborhood. I've lived in Lakewood for just about 30 years now, I think. And um so I had uh I had one thing that I wanted to ask city council's help with and uh two things I just kind of wanted to mention. But um a few years ago, Lakewood started uh putting in these these nice sidewalks with the hard curb all throughout the neighborhood. Now, all of my vehicles fit onto my property. I don't have this issue, but a lot of the property owners and the renters there, they used to park their vehicles um in their yard and they can't get their vehicles there now because of the curb and the sidewalk. So, that forces them to park on the street. Now again, this isn't a problem that I have, but when the fire truck or when the school buses are trying to get through there, there isn't enough room for two two lanes of traffic anymore because you have residences parking on both sides of the street. For the school bus, it's definitely a problem, but when the fire truck is coming, the firetruck has to wait for two or three vehicles to back up to the next block so the firetruck can get past. I think that's a pretty big problem and I would never bring a problem without a solution. It seems very easy to me to just make a lot of those streets one-way streets. You know, that would only cost a post and a sign and some city labor to put that in. Um, and seeing as how I've got a minute and a half left, a couple of things that I just wanted to to mention that um I've heard some scuttlebud about uh doing

some reszoning around Lakewood to hopefully bring in some some pot shops to get the tax revenue from that. And I've also heard some scuttlebud about bringing in some uh tiny home villages and stuff like that. I am absolutely against anything like that. You can't show me any place anywhere where that has ever worked, you know, and I don't think the city needs more money. Maybe the city needs to just spend less money. Um, anyhow, I like the idea of keeping Lakewood small, keeping Lakewood quiet, and keeping Lakewood clean. So, thank you.

Thank you. Are there any other speakers? Anybody else who would like to speak tonight? Please come up to the podium. I'm Chris Kaufman. Uh live at 6627 Hilltop Lane Southwest, not too far from Dresden. And uh I was uh conceived in a lake in 1943. No, it was 41. Um that was south of uh of uh Everett and uh that was quite a while ago. I still enjoy lakes and uh I've lived on Gravity Lake for over 55 years, raised three kids there and uh Gravity Lake is one of 7,937 legs documented in these books that I got published when I was wearing a different hat as head of policy planning and engineering for the state of Washington. Uh that was back in the 70s,60s and 70s. Um Lakewood has some 14 named lakes. Four of those lakes fall under your shoreline management act. Three of those lakes are navigable lakes. The bed and the shorelines are owned by Department of Natural Resources unless the uh upland owners have purchased uh an interest in them.

There's one non-navigable lake of those four and that's Gravity Lake. The upland owners own the shoreline and extend out through the bed. the waters of the lake are public except for those that are privately appropriated. Um, so it's a little little different. You need to know the difference between navigability and and non-navigability. And um, the owners on Gravity Lake pay for planting fish and for fireworks that we have each year on the lake. and uh distant family comes down and views the fireworks uh and they're fairly spectacular. Uh I think that the public should have rights to the lakes of Washington. Uh the 7,937 in here that are accepted from Gravity Lake. I think that Gravity Lake uh needs to stay the way it is in terms of uh ownership access to the lake and uh I'm biased. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Kaufman. Anyone else? Anyone else get your three minutes? Any other speakers? Anyone else who'd like to speak? Okay, I'm going to close the public hearing or the uh whatever we're in now. Thank you very much. Thank you very much for your comments. So, next up, Miss Schumacher, could you please uh read in the consent agenda? Consent agenda A. Approval of the minutes of the city council meeting of April 6, 2026. B. Motion number 2026-27 authorizing the execution of necessary agreements with the six remnant defendants related to the National Opioid Settlement. C. Motion number 2026-28 authorizing the execution of an amendment to the agreement with Facet Northwest in the amount of 50,000 for street end design services for the Westlake Street End project. D. Motion number 2026-29 authorizing the execution of an agreement with Salish Construction Company in the amount of 324,88 for the street light installation project. E motion number 2026-30 authorizing the execution of an amendment to the agreement with with EXP US Services in the amount of $137,515 to reflect state climate change grant funding. F. Motion number 2026-31 authorizing the execution of an amendment to the agreement with Pacific Point Defense in the amount of $86,000 for public defense services. G. Items filed in the office of the city clerk. One, Lakewood's Promise Advisory Board meeting minutes of March 5th, 2026. Two, Lakewood Arts Commission meeting minutes of March 9th, 2026. And three, planning commission meeting minutes of March

18th, 2026. Thank you very much, Miss Schumacher. Are there any items the council member wishes to remove from the consent agenda and no second is required to move any item? Okay. So we have no uh items removed from the consent agenda. I would ask for a motion and second to adopt the consent agenda. So moved. Second.

And is there any other is there are there any comments anyone would like to make about the consent agenda? I would just add there's a lot of lot of interesting things on here, a lot of different things like as we do for a city and and uh look forward to some of these things occurring. I think we're going to have some um discussions about some of the items in the future. So, all those in favor of adoption of the consent agenda, please signify by saying I. I.

All those opposed, signify by saying nay. The eyes have the consent agenda is approved. Next is uh Miss Schumacher for the public hearings and appeals. This is the date set for a public hearing on the fiscal year 2026 community development block grant CDBG annual action plan for CDBG and home programs.

Thank you very much, Miss Schumacher. Mr. Gum, program manager Jeff Gum to tell us about the um and this begins at page 47. So if people are watching at home um they can look at page 47 of the agenda and it's the start of a rather I believe voluminous. Uh well it's not all that voluminous tonight is it? Um and we do it looks like we do have someone to speak. So anyway Mr. Gum go ahead.

So good evening Mr. Council members, so tonight is the night um that is set aside for an annual public hearing. It it's done annually for CDBG and home funding. We receive those funds through the United States Housing and Urban Development. Um those funds are allocated each and every year to benefit low and moderate income individuals. Um the requirements for that funding is we hold um a public hearing, we hold a 30-day public comment period, and then those funds um when they're allocated um they're sent to HUD through an electronic system. They are allocated no later than May 15th of this year. Um so again, tonight is the the public hearing on the CDBG and home funding specifically. Um allocations that the city has published are as such um CDBG proposal to allocate $412,71983 to the major home repair program, $25,000 to the housing emergency, sorry, emergency assistance for displaced residents program, um $10,000 for CDBG emergency payments program, $12,000 for the CDB CDBG admin of home housing. housing services. Uh $96,000 for administration of the program. Uh one thing that I can say is since we've published this, HUD has come out and finally given us our city's allocation of of what our CDBG funds are. So they're slightly higher about 5%. So we proposed um a $480,000 allocation. The CDBG funds that we were said to receive are now $512,000. 512 $515,000. So about $32,000 more. So what we're doing is is we're moving forward with the advertised um funding sources and then adjusting them on a prora basis as

we approve them. So that's typically how we we do those. Typically HUD's kind of lagging this process on our on our allocation. So we have to kind of figure how we're going to allocate those and typically prata is the the process. So, for the home funds for fiscal year 2026, u we're proposing to allocate $347,146 to the affordable housing fund um and $38,571 to administration. Again, the allocation was received since we published um this notice. Home funds were looking to receive $251,791, so about $1,300 more. fairly insignificant amount. But again, that would be a a Pratta adjustment to the two funds that are proposed. So, moving forward, um this process does come back to council for May 4th for approval. Um again, it is to be proposed to go to HUD on May 15th. So, with that, any questions?

Thank you very much, Mr. Gum. So, this is a public hearing. Public testimony is accepted by mail, email, or live virtual or in-person comment. Send testimony in advance by mail or email to Brianna Schumacher, city clerk at 6000 Main Street Southwest Lakewood, Washington 9849499 or B. Schemacher at cityoflood. us. Testimony received up to 1 hour before the meeting has been provided to the city council electronically. Miss Schumacher, did we get any uh dealing with the CDBG? Mayor, you received no testimony in advance of this evening's meeting.

Thank you. Please and uh the testimony is limited to three minutes per person. Uh when called upon, please state your name and city of residence for the public record. So, I'd like to open the public hearing and uh first we will go to Zoom and anybody on their Zoom or phone calling in to speak to the CDBG public hearing. So, this is a public hearing on the fiscal year 2026 community development block grant annual action plan for our CDBG and home programs. Schumacher, do we have anybody on the line for uh public comment?

Mayor, there are no virtual hands raised at this time. Thank you very much. So, in person, um it looks like Mr. Kaufman signed up on this, but he's no longer in the room. So, my guess is he saw the public hearing thing and signed up for the other one and unless he's available. So, are there any other individuals that would like to speak to the CDBG home annual action plan for fiscal year 2026? Any speakers at all? Okay, I'm going to close the public hearing for that. Thank you very much, Mr. Gum. Appreciate it.

We will now consider ordinance number 849. This was May, I have a point of order. Y Mr. Council member Vansteader,

when we met two weeks ago, the action taken by the council was to carry forward ordinance to this date. And the constructs of that were that we we did that because a member or members of the council wish to propose an amendment to the ordinance, but they wanted time to have it drafted. Now, the ordinance that's in our agenda for today is not the ordinance that we voted to bring forward to today. It is a changed ordinance that already incorporated the the amendment that was not voted on, not debated, and and is inconsistent with the action that's there. So I would say that considering this ordinance in the as as it is published in the agenda is out of order. So Miss Walker, so what council member Bransetter is stating and I and I believe that it's true is there was discussion surrounding this ordinance when we continued it that there was going to be a an amendment offered But the amendment has now been incorporated. I believe we're talking Well, it's somewhere in there. I s we saw it earlier today. I thought I was in the right spot, but could you speak to that, please? And and well, actually speak to his his point.

Yes. Um, Mayor Bokei and members of the council, Heidi Walker, city attorney, and um, everything that comes before you is supposed to go through me as this did. And so this is a miss on my part as the last part in that chain. Um, I think it sounds like what you wanted to do was maybe have the amendment brought separately to discuss. Is that correct? And I'm at the meetings and I saw the document and I apologize for not bringing it before you in that way. Um, how we proceed from here is entirely up to the body. If, if the intent was to just discuss that piece separately, um, I might need a minute to maybe make that clear in our legislative record or we could bring it back at a different time. Yeah, I think we're talking about on page 56 of the packet. I believe it would be item number seven, um, accessory dwelling units located on the same lot as the primary residence and where the owner continues to reside in either the primary residence or accessory dwelling unit. And that adds to our list of exceptions to the uh to the plan. Is that correct? So, and and I believe that it was uh council member Pearson who was who was bringing that forward. So, um I think the intent of the council was that we would we would look at as a separate amendment because I don't know that that night we we agreed to put that in there as such.

Well, um I think that's what council member Brandansteader is stating. And Mr. Mayor, and my point of order is is that the ordinance that's in our agenda is out of order and we should not consider it tonight and that the the order the ordinance that we wanted to have continued can be put in a future agenda has continued to be able to to to go and and do that. But because it's was published the way that it is, it's uh you know it's it's it's not consistent with the action that we took two weeks ago. So

and and and the change was was not debated or voted on and I so so so you know it isn't one that that during the discussion there was consensus to incorporate it. It was I mean certainly I voted to continue it so that the an amendment could be drafted and then the the the draft amendment could be proposed tonight. But that's not what what is what has happened. And so I I would say that for tonight this is out of order and we should move to a future meeting where a proper ordinance is posted in the agenda and we can move forward with amendments uh any amendments to the ordinance that that any any of us might wish to bring.

Thank you council member Branser. So this uh council member Pearson. Okay. Go ahead, Council Member Pierce.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And and I I don't disagree with Mr. Branset's points here. I I would say that um this ordinance is the amendment that I had suggested that was included in um item number seven. Um, it it it would be fairly clean to make an amendment tonight if we wanted to strike that out, but I think it wouldn't be totally inappropriate to discuss it and just move forward tonight. I I although I do I do recognize that it is um out of order. Um, but in light of just moving things uh along, I'd like to have the discussion if we can and and go that route, but I'm open to whatever. So, this is where we get ourselves in a little bit of trouble because we at a lot of times at study sessions, we'll just throw ideas and and staff goes in and changes things. Um, some sometimes in a substantive manner, not just a lot of things. So we we have always sometimes in in this case I if it's on me I'm going to find his motion or council member Branser's motion to be correct and I'd like this continued until a date certain with the original ordinance that we looked at two weeks ago I believe with that amendment pulled out but the amendment being presented if if uh council member uh Pearson would like to do that and then we can debate they discuss it at that time

if I want to be completely clear. So what the council wants to see is the original ordinance and a proposed amendment that we incorporated here, but we would not incorporate it when it comes forward. You would have both things to look at. Correct. Right.

I I think that's where we're at. We're not talking about the amendment. So um we'll just do that to some. So I'll but we don't have the original motion in front of us, the original ordinance in front of us. So we'll we'll you'll just have to understand that that's what we're trying to do. So I'll look for council member Brandsteader to uh make that motion to to move it to Mr. Mayor. I I move to further advance uh you know the trying to think of the audience number but the the the ordinance to a date certain of our next meeting which I believe is May 3rd

two two weeks from now so I don't know what date that is May 4th May 4th May 4th May 4th to to actually bring back the motion that was on the agenda on on April 6th that we asked that that we sought to continue the original motion of April 6th, 2026 will now be continued further continue it to May 4th to the May 4th count lakewood council meeting. Um and that that would be the original ordinance. So we need a second. I second that. Mayor, I don't know if this has discussion on it or not. We just unless people want to.

All those in favor of continuing ordinance number 849, signify by saying I. I. I. I. All those in opposed signify by saying nay. The eyes have it. So, we will look at that first thing on on May 4th. And we'll bring you back something consistent with our discussion. Thank you. We'll now consider uh resolution number 20261. So, Miss Schumacher, please read resolution 202601 into the record. Resolution number 2026-01 amending the city's purchasing policies.

Thank you very much. And I don't know what page I guess that starts on page 60 of our packet. And who's going to speak to this? Miss Wter. Welcome.

Good evening again, Mr. Mayor, Deputy Mayor, members of the council, Heidi Walker, city attorney. This is a purely uh housekeeping um type of action. And I will have to tell you, I made a mistake on this one as well because I didn't highlight where the changes were going to be. What we're And I'll point them out when we get to that. Uh the first paragraph in the agenda bill, I explained that the small works roster language is being taken out because the state law has repealed it. So, we're cleaning that out of the purchasing policies. And then if you go to page 76 of your packet, section 27, that language is in response to um the state passing laws around um apprenticeship training programs and they are uh in tandem with us doing this, we are also bringing language into our different contracts depending on the level of the contract. So, this is just to describe what we're doing. And then, um, there'll also be language in in the contracts. The contract part is the part that's truly required. This is more just reflecting that we're aware of the law and trying to follow it. I'd be happy to try and answer any questions you might have.

Thank you, Miss Wter. Any questions for Miss Walker? Council member Brandsteader. Mr. Walker. Um I am trying to understand this is a completely new set of policies or is it a a a a set of policies that were making changes to?

Section 27 is new. Um what the state law now requires is that we make certain efforts depending on the level of the contract to include apprenticeship programs. And if we can't, we then have to demonstrate the effort that we made to include apprenticeship programs because we'll find instances where none of the responsive biders were able to meet it. And um so anyway, the law that we're now beholden to is something that came through. I don't think this most recent session I think it was before that but it's um it's now mandated that we do these things. So section 27 correct

in the document. Yes. It's is it a totally new section or is it a rewarding of what is our our current policy? And the reason that I ask is it isn't redlined. Yeah, I know. I acknowledge that when I made my opening statements that I had made that mistake here and not making it read. I believe it should be entirely read. We were not subject to apprenticeship requirements before this. There was law saying that we needed to make an effort and so forth, but now it's actually required. Okay. I again that's my fault. I understand.

Why did it become 27 instead of just becoming the next numerical policy? I think we decided that based on where it fit into the bidding world. So, as you can see, section 26 says alternative public works contracting. That's sort of something that has to do with bidding. Section 28 is bonds and bid security. It seemed like the right place to put it because that's sort of all things bidding. I think it's more art than science, but it seemed like it made sense there. Okay. And the fiscal impact note in the request for council action says that there's no fiscal impact

arguably

to adopting the policy. Correct. But is the changed policy going to have a fiscal impact on on what we we end up doing and on contracts and purchases that we make. It would arguably have a financial impact if we had a higher bidder that was better able to meet the apprenticeship qualifications than a lower bidder who couldn't. We would then be forced to go to that slightly higher bidder who has the apprenticeship qualifications because it's creating sort of a new bar that biders have to meet, right? And we're low bid. we typically would pick the low bid, but arguably somebody who's not meeting the apprenticeship requirements is not a qualified bidder anymore. So that's where it could cost a little bit more.

Okay. Well, I guess to say that if we approve this policy as as it changes, is that mean that when we are going to have to add some language when we are soliciting bids to that to to that process? Yes, the state law requires that we make it clear in our bid documents what would make somebody a qualified bidder and that could be considered uh the basis for a challenge if we don't do our bids correctly.

Okay. And um which consortium of folks on the staff then become responsible for overseeing that?

Um it actually um it's a process that's already in place. You have the city clerk who does the posting for bids and opening the bids and so forth. your parks director has already brought one of these questions to me a couple of months ago because it came up in the context of one of the bids. So, anyone who oversees contracts is now required to sort of understand that this is part of a contract. Okay. And but this only applies to contracts for capital projects, capital projects, public works, those types of things. Yes. Things that would be subject to bidding. All right. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Sure.

Anyone else like to speak to this? I think the other issue is it's it says we're getting rid of the small works roster, but section 25 isn't struck. So, should that be struck also? Do we need an amendment or is that just uh yes, that's the language that's intended to be taken out. The section 25 small works roster beginning on page 75 of the packet is struck out in its entirety. It goes down to

it. It appears that the city manager has been paying better attention to the packet than I have. He has shown me the March um study session item and yes, it's the entirety of that section that would come out. Okay. So, this is one of those now we've we've published this as as not. So, I think we should probably officially strike it. Correct.

I'll look for an a You're looking for an amendment that would strike section 25 beginning on page 75 of the packet in its entirety. So, it would go down to strike everything to the word cancellation right before section 26. I don't want to start striking things that we may regret. Kind of interesting. They're getting rid of the small works roster. That's been a mainstay of that made no so many cities, municipal governments for so long. It's so now you got to put up everything for bid or

anyway that's a different question entirely. I don't it went away. Oh, okay. Um, I was just making sure that I was tracking, but yes, everything under small works roster should come out. There's no new language that needs to be inserted in that. They they repealed it completely, the whole statute. Okay. I know it's a little bit surprising, but that's what they did.

Looking for an amendment. Council member Brandstead. Oh, wait. Have Mr. Mayor, I I move adoption of of of resolution number 2026-01. Thank Thank you. It's been moved and seconded. Now we can have council member discussion and amendments to this. Thank you very much, Council Member Brandstead.

Yeah. All right, Mr. M. Mayor, I I move to amend uh resolution 202601 by striking section 25 and then reumbering the following amendments uh appropriately to remain maintain sequential numbering. Okay. Second.

Second. It's been moved and seconded that we strike section 25 small works roster in its entirety and renumber all the other sections accordingly. Is there any discussion surrounding this? Okay, I'm looking at Miss Walker. Do you have anything else to add, Miss Walker? Um, well, we're trying to reconcile what I uh approved versus what you looked at in March. And that is where the consternation's coming in a little bit. Okay. Because this says we're You know what? Maybe we should just Let's just continue this item then. Yeah. And I apologize for not being prepared.

Yeah. Okay. So, um, let's move to Can I get a a motion to continue this item to We'll be ready to May 4th. So, moved. Second. It's been moved and seconded that we continue resolution number 20261 um to uh the May 4th meeting. All those in favor say I. I. I. All those opposed say nay.

The eyes have it. So, we've uh continued that to the May 4th meeting. And I think we're looking for the struck the appropriate struck section and and the highlighted portion of the new or however we do it, the red line strikeout. Thank you. Items for discussion. So, Mr. City Manager, do we have any unfinished business? Thank you. No.

Do we have any new business?

Okay. Items for discussion. We move into the study session portion of our meeting. the review of the first quarter 2026 police report. And there he is, Chief Patrick Smith, Chief of Police of the Lakewood Police Department. And it begins on page 79 of your packet. Did it sound good? Think she's The

floor is yours, chief. All right. Thank you, sir. Thank you.

Hey, good evening, mayor, deputy mayor, and members of council. Uh this evening, we'll be going over the uh first quarter of 2026 um police report and stats. So, as we start out the beginning of the year coming from um the fourth quarter, you'll see a reduction of about 10% in our calls for service throughout the city. Um which is more in line with 2024, slightly down even from that. uh as it relates to our calls for service. Our number of arrests uh on this report is down for as compared to 2025 is more in line with 2024. As we go through um all of last year, we had significant decreases in crime uh throughout the city and overall it shows a decrease in our arrest. At some point there's a course correction of um showing a lesser arrest. based upon the number of calls for service that we are receiving and activity in the in the city. In our crimes against persons, we're still showing a drastic reduction in um our aggravated assaults. We're down 46.7%. Our simple assaults were down 5%. and our homicides. We went um 15 months without a homicide in the city of Lakewood. Uh the homicide that's represented here is the result of a 2-year-old child based basically a um child abuse related crime, not a stranger danger type of crime. Our robberies are down 10% and our sex crimes are are slightly up at the start of the year at 55%.

And we have a total crime reduction of 12% in our crimes against persons. As you can see our year overyear in the lower corner, we're still showing down as compared to 2025 as well as 2024. Uh significant reductions as 2024. Our crimes against property and societal crimes, our total is down 30%. Burglaries were down 20%, fraud was down 41%, lararseny 39%. At the start of the year, we saw a our first increase in three years in our motor vehicle thefts. Um and um our property, our stolen property was down 47%, vandalism down 31%. And our weapons law, weapons laws, we saw them come up 26%. Once again, in the lower right hand corner, you see the drastic reduction from 2024 to 2025 to where we are now. um which is uh a significant drop in the number of crimes that we're seeing in the city. As far as our pursuits and elude activity, we were slightly up on our pursuits at 26.7% and our eludes were up 30%. But as uh you can see on both charts, we we're trending downward in those areas. This was a slight uptick at the start of the uh year in quarter 1. Our shots fired were we remain um even with 2025 at this time um at about 50. So we had no increase during that during this time frame.

our motor vehicle thefts. On here, it shows we were up 23.7% in the first quarter. And if you look at the sheet that I passed out to you, that's our our chief's daily report. It shows the correction that has been made in that area where we're down 3.8% in our stolen vehicles year to date. Our collisions, we're down 10% as compared to 2025. We're we've been trending downward in this area and hopefully we can have a very a stronger impact on our collisions and uh our major factor here is primarily speed within the city. This is our summary of all of the crimes that I went over. And um I wanted to touch on our the daily crime report that I uh chief's daily crime and incident report that I I passed out to you. Uh on there you'll see that we are continuing to show crime reduction in most areas. Our aggaults as of today were down 44%. Our sex crimes were down 20 25% and our total was down 31%. Our burglaries are down 10% as of today or 9.1 I'm sorry. Our lararsenies are down 29%. And our motor vehicle theft is down 3.8%. Our robberies were down 8.3% and our total for today was down 24% in our property crimes. Our shots fired have has come down from the earlier report and that's down 16 point. I'm sorry that it's up 169% as compared to last year. Um, so I'll go back just in case you have

any questions for me. Are there any questions for Chief Smith? Council member Lauris. Uh, thank you, Mayor Buffy, and thank you, Chief Smith, for this presentation. Yes, sir. Uh our uh our police officers are doing excellent work and that's reflected in all the the crime rates going down. Uh I see arrests are down and I know this is probably out of your lane, but in theory should we also see that the number of cases we're prosecuting correlate with that? Yes, definitely. Everything uh stays on track as our crime goes down overall our arrests are going to come down with that in addition to the crimes that we're prosecuting will definitely come down significantly.

Great. Thank you. And then my other question, uh, are you familiar with a tool called Shot Spotter? Yes. Uh, what are your thoughts on that as a potential thing we could have?

Um, you know, as it relates to the city of Lakewood, I think we would be better served placing that money into other things that uh would bring us u more value. Um, I I don't I can't recall a time we've had a um a homicide or anything of that nature where we did not get 911 calls. Typically, Shot Spotter is used in uh environments where people will not call the police or are in fear of calling the police. And therefore, Shot Spotter is a good tool uh to use in those areas. and it it uh allows officers to respond quickly to those calls. Uh I've been in jurisdictions where we we've used Shot Spotter and those without. Um if I were investing in additional technology, I would steer my money into something more significant that's going to reduce the crime specifically for Lakewood and not just a Shot Spotter type of um deal. If you'll if you uh look at our uh shots fired so far, we had been trending down in this area. Um and uh this time we remain uh pretty pretty much even. Uh but in this community when there are shots shots fired or something going on uh will usually get a 911 call.

Great. Thank you. Yes, sir. and Council Member Pearson.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Um, thank you, Chief, for the presentation. And, uh, kind of adding on to a little bit of Council Member Laurel's comments about um, case loads and things like that. There's been some discussion around the state about, you know, what levels we're charging at. you know, with the uh indigent defense, it's obviously kind of putting some scrutiny to that. And so, one of the areas that comes to mind is is traffic related. And do you do you think there's any potential um for us to look into um particular types of crimes that are, you know, maybe not as egregious or as heinous as others to look at um reducing case loads by chance? Um, and then what kind of consequences or challenges could that make for you and your department? Um, if things aren't charged and people are being let go and and not charged.

Um, so yours related to traffic collisions. It could be anything, but that one kind of came to mind as not a, you know, it would it's not like it's domestic violence or some other type of, you know, robbery and theft that would be a more of a aggressive um crime. So the the problem the problem for us when things are are not charged or um I is is that our concern is is the fact that it's going to occur again or is this a re repeat offender or someone else that we are going to have to deal with. Um I I think it's in incumbent upon us to put together very good cases so that um when they are reviewed at the prosecutor's office that we have sound cases that are put together that are prosecutable and uh that we're delivering uh all of the evidence necessary. Um I I I think that um quite a few of our cases do move forward. So, I think I that that one's going to be kind of hard because, you know, you would need someone from the prosecution side as well as here to really have a good analysis over on all of our cases to show the prosecution as well as um as well as uh based on arrest and what we do.

I'm not sure if I'm answering your question. No. Yeah, it does. I I that I really appreciate that because I think you kind of touched on it early on which is what I expected was that you're going to be seeing a lot of the same people over and over again with really nothing going on right there. There's no if you're there we're not continuing to charge. We're not continuing to prosecute. If if that's the case, then we're just kind of starting the process over and over. So, yes. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Pearson. Council Member Talbo.

Thank you, Chief Smith, for the report. Um, a couple months ago, I had the pleasure of of of uh being able to participate on a ride along, excuse me, also with um a tour of the station

from uh Sergeant David. So, I appreciate that. Um, one of the uh ex interesting parts of the tour was noting the forensics lab and it's my understanding that we've been um we've had a vacancy of someone that can run the forensics lab for some time. I just wanted to know if there's any update or status on the recruitment of a position that is able to uh operate the forensics lab so that we can use it um so that we can continue to use it or is it is it fun is it being used with the forens they say the forensics

I I don't believe that's accurate we have u uh we've had uh our same team and our our evidence and forensics, they've been pretty solid here the whole time. We've had one consistent team. Uh and so we a we are able to operate uh effectively. I'm not I'm not sure which particular part he uh he was referring to when he spoke to you. Yeah, sure. No, thank you. Thank you for clarifying that. That and that could just be my own misunderstanding. So yeah, our our team has been together for quite some time.

Thank you. Thank you. Um then I think the I think just as a just as a a layman's here looking at um just overall numbers that we have in front of us and seeing that that there is a a a nice drop um across years. I'm just wondering if you can offer any insight as to overall what if if we have seen or performed any just general analytics that speak to the reasons for the overall drop um in addition to the changes that we've made from beefing up the patrols in the in the in the town center. But um I guess I think what I'm trying to ask is overall are we also are are we experiencing um upticks in in numbers that we aren't seeing in these reports such as uh the number of investigations, digital fraud or cyber crimes or or other um less reported type of crimes? or really do the numbers in front of us give us a a best picture of of data that we should be proud of?

Okay, so I I can answer those questions. F first in across the nation, crime has uh has been trending downward for a good good time now. But fortunately uh in the third quarter of 2023 the city council approved us to move to um uh the flock system as well as other LPR systems. In fact we use grant money also to expand our system and that has been one of our our number one uh areas of um uh that has helped us to reduce crime here in in Lakewood. Uh secondly, we also increased um our um activity in the um town center. In the town center, we have full-time business district car that provides uh direct support to the businesses there. They have the officer's telephone number so that they can call 911. They can also call the officers who are here directly. They provide high visibility patrol with their lights on throughout the day and as well as in the evening while businesses are operational and uh assist the businesses at the end of the day as they are leaving as a high visit visibility presence. Um in addition to that we um also balanced the officer's hours. We looked at the officer's hours of operation based on the calls for service and we started to match and monitor the calls for service to that to ensure that we were matching the number of officers based on calls for service to ensure that we were reducing our response time to those those calls for service. So we have um

uh done quite a few things to um reduce crime here uh in areas where we saw um gaps in our in our service, gaps in our our uh areas such as in the parks and things of that nature. We added additional patrols to the park um even on overtime for a while. We added real-time cameras to the park through our our flock agreement and uh so we have cameras in some of the parks to make sure that we're providing a good quality level of service. Um just recently we were we added to our detective bureau which we call um mud days and those are mandatory uniform uh deployments where we have a special project special area or special thing that's going on within the community and we put full force on that particular problem or problem area to ensure that we are going in to try to clean up any problems or areas uh as they occur. as they start and we uh try to itemize each of the problems that we're trying to resolve. One good example is last last week I received a email from the city manager about um the library and saying that hey we we're having issues at the library. He sent me pictures etc. But we were our guys who were monitoring what's going on in the community. we had already set up cleanup for that day and and they were already in action as his email came through and we were able to pro provide him pictures back to show what we've done cleaning up the area um making sure that people were where they were supposed to be and not in the cities right away. So we we've been trying to do a lot to stay on top of of

what's happening with crime in the city. Um the best part about it with the the stark reductions in crime, what it allows us to do is to focus on some of the quality of life issues that we've had within the city uh that have kind of lingered but we didn't have the time to address. So now we're trying to address the quality of life issues that that uh have cropped up over over the years to make sure that we're addressing the needs within the community. Thank you, Chief. I appreciate that. But I was really just um wanting to understand a little more deeper under the hood of the lesser known statistics and things we don't see in the reports in front of us. And I appreciate that.

And and as far as the the ones that you don't see, we have not had the the same issue in the cyber related crimes or or things of that nature that have uh truly cropped up in in the neighborhoods. Thank you. Thank you. Um, Council Member Lynholm and then I'll go to Council Member Brandsteader. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Chief, thank you for this report. You know, one thing that doesn't show up in the numbers and something you and I have talked about before is uh homelessness here in Lakewood. Um, I wonder if you can give council just a brief overview of the standards and procedures of how you deal with someone or or interact with someone that you meet on the street who's experiencing a crisis who who might be homeless.

Okay. So, um, some of the homeless that that we have within the community, we um are fortunate enough that we have been able to identify most of them. We have a um um team that go out, our mental health professionals as well as our the officers who patrol with them. We go out, we talk to them, we identify them, uh try to determine what needs they have, what we can offer. Um there's probably one gentleman we've gotten him housing maybe three times, but he still ends up coming right back out to uh he'll abandon the housing and come right back out to uh 100th over next to the ram uh regardless of how many times we uh have gotten him housing. So, we continue to do that. Usually on I want to say Fridays, um we have one of our officers who go out and specifically deal with uh those who are are uh in some form of crisis or looking for housing so that we can try to match them with uh any of the uh available resources uh or uh if we can identify a place to get them. Sometimes it takes um couple of weeks, sometimes it may take months for them to finally agree to uh allow us to provide them some form of housing or to match them with some available housing. So, it's something that we are are constantly working on and constantly trying to improve within the city because we recognize um that we do have um uh an issue from time to time with homelessness. Uh we were just able to get an agreement with the library uh

here because uh the library area was, you know, pretty much hands off. uh they didn't want uh any enforcement uh um and so we finally got an agreement with them so that we can work to make sure that that area is is clean as well as the city's right of way.

Thank you. Just one very quick followup if I may. Um so if I heard you correctly, it is up to the person to accept services and if they say no then what? um if if they say no, then we'll we'll try to um move them along or we'll try to find out exactly what the issue is. We continue to work with them. We don't just walk away. Um like I said, we identify each of them. We try to identify the needs. We try to identify if it's mental health or whatever u the said issue is and we try to uh identify housing for that particular person or persons. Um but we don't we don't give up on that.

I know I spoke to an officer about a year ago and they say it's not uncommon necessarily to maybe visit the same person three times in a day. Is that still the case?

It it is. um our our officers um like I said here here in Lakewood fortunately we we we get to know um th those individuals and we try not to um we try not to be a stranger to them. Um and sometimes we have to take them out little care packages, little hygiene kits and things of that nature so that we can break down the walls and also try to uh gain some common ground and communication. so that we can we can um work with them to get them into housing and it's it's an ongoing process. Thank you, Chief. Thank you, Council Member Brandsteader.

Yeah, Chief, thanks thanks for being here this evening and and and for your report. But I I'd like to just ask you about a a topic that that doesn't appear in your report. Okay. But that is um virtually always in community association and neighborhood association meetings brought up and that is uh traffic enforcement particularly speeding uh thing that's over there and um they uh so your officers who go to those meetings are constantly asked

those questions.

Yes. and their accurate but standard response has been um well if you have an area that it is I'll report it to the sergeant who's in charge of traffic and he has himself and two people and that it gives the impression that um that's exclus exclusively the the team where other than for for photo enforcement that that traffic enforcement is is centered in. Um and that response is pretty standard no matter which one of your officers at which one of the neighborhood association things that it is. Um, and I and I I I but when I talk to to to officers, they they indicate that the the officers who are on patrol, they have the priority of things they're supposed to deal with, but they're not precluded from traffic enforcement. It's just that it often there's that things that they've already been dispatched to because of 911 calls or whatever is is is is that they that they don't don't do that. But, um, I I think if if you could perhaps talk about and take a look at what really is the message you want your officers to tell the community about how speed enforcement particularly, but

other driver behavior enforcements are uh are are being handled. um because that we've created the impression that there just aren't enough people to do it. Um but we're not really communicating how much we're doing. Like we're not saying we issued 80 citations to do that or the combination of collisions and citations is this do that. So, it's more of a messaging uh right

uh is issue that's there and it may well be that the weekly reports that you actually have published in the weekly bulletin if they could begin to address um traffic enforcement to to to show the level of activity that is actually there which is more than we're letting leading people to believe, I think.

Well, sir, just so you know, the traffic traffic report, the I'm sorry, traffic citations and collisions are included on the weekly report that I put out on Fridays. And so that's over in the um right column, the right, the lower right, and this section just above that. Uh I give the weekly statistics for all all traffic citations as well as traffic collisions within the city and that comes out every every Friday. Uh and we place it on our Facebook page and it's it's the normal blue uh deal that's there. And so to go back to answer your questions at the meeting, what they're referring to is the traffic section is uh and traffic coordination is done by the sergeant in the traffic coordination uh unit. And so they basically set the priorities. They receive the um 311 information as well as calls related to traffic within the community. And they set uh the priorities. They also do um uh direct enforcement in those areas that we receive um information about. And so, but just so you know, traffic enforcement is every officer's job. It's not just the job of those who work in the traffic particularly traffic unit. Um, so those who worked the traffic unit previously that promoted, they still come back and they ride motors and they still do traffic enforcement. Uh, in the mornings we have even one officer uh, Officer Danley, if I'm not correct, if I'm not mistaken, he's written over 500 tickets just this uh, past year on his own. And and uh, so has uh, Officer Valley or Sergeant Valley now. He wrote

probably 500 citations um last year on his own and those two gentlemen primarily focus in the school zones where uh we have people coming through all the time if they don't have a camera there they are primarily focused in in those schools districts and school zones and so uh the when I think it's kind of confusing because people are thinking just these two people or or this sergeant is doing it. No, that sergeant is is the one who's taking in all the information and setting out the priority of areas that we need to to hit. Also, all of the direct enforcement and things of that nature. So, every officer is responsible for traffic enforcement.

Well, and and and you and that has been my my understanding, okay, to do that. It's just that we're somehow not getting that message

out to the out to the to the community. And um from time to time uh different officers of yours who are dealing with certain specialized things uh do go to neighborhood associations and and and and talk but I can't recall one of where the traffic sergeant has gone and actually gone and explained the bigger picture about how traffic enforcement works. works. Uh, and he and he and so he suffers from the fact that the other officer that they're they're it's easier for them to default to say, "Well, the traffic section coordinates that and but it's only three people." So may maybe there is a strategy to to to to perhaps have a a more comprehensive presentation made to selected neighborhood associations that that would that might like to have that.

So now the traffic sergeant does go to the neighborhood association meetings. He rotates to uh each meeting to ensure that the information is getting out and also to talk about how he coordinates uh traffic within this within the city. Okay. I guess I guess that that I've never collided with him. Oh,

in that regard to be able to go and do that. But then on a on a similar thing, um you know, the council asks the uh public safety advisory committee to uh assist and work with you regarding some locations of where we may increase our our photo enforcement options. Uh how's that process going? I is is it progressing? Yes. So, uh at the last meeting they went through and um approved the areas that were um that were selected for uh additional enforcement uh camera related enforcement.

All right. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

Thank you. Any more questions for Chief Smith? Well, thank you very much, Chief Smith. We appreciate the information. I really do and I think all of us appreciate the weekly reports that come out. Um really giving us a good idea and we just express our our our deep our deep appreciation for the men and women in in our department who have done such a good job. I think it's really noticeable. I I know the perception of crime Yes. always lags the the actual numbers. I I mean, I've had discussions with with people in years past. Um, but I think it's it's pretty clear out there, especially in the town center area, that that crime has has dropped, and I think more and more people recognize that. So, thank you very much for you and your team's efforts.

Yes. Thank you, sir. you. So, up next, review of the 2025 transportation benefit district annual report. This is required, I believe. Uh, and Miss Krauss is gonna is going to lead the way on this. Thank you, Miss Krauss, and welcome.

Good evening, Mayor and Deputy Mayor and Council members. This is the 2025 annual report. It is a required report that we submit on an annual basis. So in 2025, there wasn't a whole lot of activity. I'm showing is our vehicle licensing fees came in at about 805,000 and that's been consistent where the revenues have been for the past couple of years. On the expenditure side, um we have used the funds to pay for the debt service. So pretty much you have committed the TBD dollars uh for debt service payments, but you did have some monies that were left over from prior years and those funds were used to pay for um new LED street lights, some minor capital and major maintenance funds and chip seal programs. So, not anything major in 2025. Um, and moving forward into 2026, we'll continue these programs, particularly the new LED street lights, which will have a budget of about 428,000 if you approve the rollover of funds in 2026. Minor capital projects will continue at 392,000 in 2026 and chip seal program of 638,000 in 2026. So, it's a brief report this year because we've uh already committed the dollars. So, that concludes my presentation.

Thank you, Miss Krauss. Any questions for Miss Krauss? Council member Laura Cella. Thank you, Mayor Voki, and thank you, Miss Krauss, for the brief report. And this may be a question better suited for uh another portion, but talking about LED street lights, um I know there are systems out there that have motion sensing street lights. Uh so they will dim when there aren't people going by at night and those from some quick searching say that they tend to pay for themselves in three to four years. Is that something we've looked into at all?

We have looked at reducing the hours that the lights are on. Now whether we have looked at them in terms of the on and off I am not sure but we can follow up with that and I can give an update at our next uh at the public hearing. That would be great. Yeah,

council member Talbo. Thank Thank you. Thank you. Um, Miss Deputy City Manager or my question is um regarding the the GEO bond debt service um is there language in the GEO bond ordinance that specifies that um projects and that CIP projects or or projects spent out of those funds have to be specified in writing. somewhere or um is there or is the language such that uh the the funding can be distributed at will?

Sure. So, the city council adopted an ordinance and updated that ordinance to identify specifically the transportation benefit district projects. In terms of the bond projects, it speaks to the projects that are to be funded, but it is broad enough to cover any transportation benefit district project. Thank you. So, I think what I'm trying to poke at a little bit, and we haven't seen the upcoming um six-year TIP yet, but should there be any projects in the TIP that are receiving TBD funds, um is the the are those projects would those projects have been decided through adoption of being listed in the TIP in some prior cycle or would those projects have been decided of being listed in the GEO bond.

The projects would have been identified as part of the projects that the city council authorized to be spent with TBD dollars. So, because our TBD funds are about $85,000, that's what the revenue has been coming in at. Our debt service is just about 700,000. So that leaves on an annual basis of what a h 100,000 115,000 and the projects that are ongoing that could receive the TBD dollars would be things like your minor capital major projects um LED street lights if there were any new street lights and the chip seal program. There is also funding for um that have been uh designated project to be used uh TBD funds. it's for those uh professional service engineering services. So there is still a little bit of money. I will also point out that at the end of the year we will have surplus funds of about 450,000 and I shouldn't say surplus funds. It is just the extra amount after we refinance the 2024 GEO bonds and because we had anticipated higher amounts for our debt service payments. So, those are still all set aside um to be used for TBD funded designated projects. I will tell you that from a real estate excise tax, our real estate excise tax hasn't been coming in at such healthy levels as they had previously. So, in the past couple of years, it's been more of the 2.4 million. So, it's always good to have a little bit of money set aside to fill those gaps if those other uh project dollars aren't coming in.

Okay. So I think I I I I think I follow. So not necessarily surplus but just unassigned to correct. Yes. Unassigned is a better word. Thank thank you. And then as far as um mitigation fees collected in the down is there a balance to report or is has is everything just so new because we adopted the planned action not long ago. We actually have set it aside and you'll see in the carry forward budget adjustment. So all mitigation fees have been earmarked for a project. Got it. And and we can get into that a little later. Yes. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Are there any other questions on the on the TBD annual report? And this has to come in front of us.

Yes. For a vote. Okay. Yes. It'll come back to you on May 4th as a motion. So the the the debt service because this doesn't show debt service of it doesn't show for the new debt service. You'll see the new debt service uh in quarter one. Okay. Okay. So the new debt service the new debt service. Yeah. The new debt service um budget adjustment is in the carry forward. So I've made an adjustment to reflect what our new debt service will be.

Okay. Great. Thank you. So, Miss Krauss, on to this just it's just your lucky night here. Um, the 2025 beginning on page 91, the 2025 financial report, which yes, takes us exactly halfway through our bienium.

Yes, it is my lucky night because there at least there's still money in there. So, I'm going to uh turn your attention to page 93 of the report. And this is the summary for the general and street fund. And the reason why those two funds are combined is they are the main operating fund of the uh of the city. So, the general fund provides over 60% of funding for the street fund and thus they are combined. But on page 93, I just want to highlight that our operating revenues came in at about1,868,000 more than we had budgeted. And on the expenditure side, we also had spent a million dollar more $1,117,000 more than we had anticipated. But at the end of 2025, just looking at the 2025 actuals, our ending fund balance came in at $11,800,000. And that 111 million includes the $6,700,000. That is part of the city council's financial policies where we maintain 12% reserves in the general fund. Um, it also takes into consideration a set aside of about $78,000 for the property tax that we have been collecting to support the debt service on the tax increment financing. So, I've kept that aside so that it doesn't get spent in any way. Um, so we can have good accounting of it. So, left at the end of 2025 is about $5 million. What you'll see going into the carry forward budget adjustment is those funds will be spent um if you approve the carry forward budget adjustment, but it does leave about a million dollars left that has been unallocated. You'll see that again in the carry forward budget

adjustment. I do want to highlight a couple uh you know I on the revenue side what is contributing to our 1,868,000 increase over budget is sales tax came in very healthy so we did a an adjustment um during the mid bianium I think we increased it like maybe two or 300,000 but we came in at about 510,000 over the estimate utility tax came in at a hund $161,000 over um but that also included some back taxes. We did an extensive audit of one of the um phone providers and received some funding back. Not only that, but now we're going to be receiving future uh revenues as a a result of that audit. So, it's bringing them into compliance. development services uh permits and fees came in at 395,000 from where we had estimated. And then our police contracts came in and this is the extra duty came in at about $835,000 more um than anticipated. But I do want to highlight that with that $835,000 comes the increase on the police side. So, police's budget was uh operating budget spent $1,116,000 more than budgeted, but $918,000 of it came from extra duty. And the reason why you're seeing the extra duty expenditures uh exceeding the budget by 918,000 whereas the revenues is only 835,000 is because the medical portion of the officers are not being reimbursed by um by the extra duty since those are already part of their base. And then the

other piece of it um is that caused the increase salaries and benefits was above the budget by 642,000 but there were a lot of retirements and those retirements the payout so they can cash out their uh you know PTO that came out to $382,000. Um so a good portion is uh I guess I would say it's sort of one time in the sense that you know when officers are allowed to cash out their leave bank it can be at times 40 to $50,000 um that is paid out. And then the other department that exceeded the budget estimate is planning and public works. But a good portion of that is covered by the um additional revenues that came in. So that's the quick summary of the general and street fund.

Thank you very much, Miss Krauss. Uh and and I just there's a lot of information in here, right? And so you you can council members can entertain themselves for hours really over the next few weeks to to really I can spend an hour right now if you want me to.

We're not going to ask you to do that but we will we we may have some questions here and I'm going to ask just a specific question. Can you and I'll jump ahead right now because it's more a question of just what's in there rather than ARPA. Can you talk about our ARP expenditure? I I don't know what page it's on, but I sure I just want to make sure that we're on track to either spend the money or we still have the ability to fold it into the general fund. Correct. Because you can do it up to 10 million. Yes. And um what page are we looking at?

Yeah, I'll get to that page. It is on page very very close. It is on page 163 and that starts off with the history of the ARPA funds. Um but to look at the spreadsheet that shows how we spent the money. So there is a combination of funds on page 164. The biggest portion is about the $13.67 million that we received in ARPA funds. Those dollars have an expiration of 12312026. So there's what maybe eight months left to spend. Although those funds are less than eight months. But then there was also some funding that came in as u general fund dollars of about 872,000 and that was specifically for the downtown and edgewater parks. And then through 2025 uh there was uh interest earnings of over a million. So at the end of 2025 there remains a,191,132 in the ARPA funds um or or in the ARPA fund. Not all ARPA dollars but in the ARPA fund. So, ARPA grant balance that still needs to be spent is $1,79,000 and the interest earnings is $111,000. The city council had already authorized that any unspent dollars in 2026 as we go along in 2026 can be spent for downtown and Edgewater parks. So as soon as uh projects are closed out um and we've been working with Tiffany Spear who is like uh oversees all of this and the projects we we have identified in

the carry forward to be carried over rolled over are anticipated to be spent but we'll be monitoring and whatever is not we will definitely apply it to the downtown parks. Uh we do have some invoices that have already come and they're currently in the general fund, but we can always move it uh back. As for the interest earnings, there is no deadline and there is no restriction on how those funds could be used. So at the end of 2026, actually prior to 2026, during the year-end budget adjustment, I will be bringing back a number to the city council to close out the project. So, we'll make an estimate on what is to be remaining in terms of interest earnings. Close out the fund, ARPA fund, and move it over to the general fund. We will still ask the city council your direction of how those dollars should be spent and if it's still to be spent on downtown and um Edgewater parks. We will do that, but that'll occur during the year- end budget adjustment.

Okay. So, let's just so we're all on the same page. The ARPA regulations that that came out from Treasury allowed anybody, any entity, even if you got less than $10 million to take 10 million to the general fund. We haven't taken much that even and and then all the interest money can go into the general fund also. Is that is that correct? Yes. So, we're really under no danger of having to send money back to the Treasury because at the end of 2026, if if we have any money left, and I don't know that we will.

If we have any money left, we'll just move it over to the general fund. If it's interest earnings, we have enough expenditures that if there are project savings out of the $1,79,000 at the end of 12 at the end of 2025, we have charges that we have been incurring as it relates to the downtown parks that we could apply to the ARPA funds. Okay. Okay. And there's no further action that the city council needs to do with that because the council already committed those dollars.

Okay, great. Thank you. Um, any questions for Miss Krauss on anything in there? We're going to do a lot of budget stuff. We're writing a budget at the end of the year. So, I guess we don't have any questions. Yeah, we got to go to the carry forwards next. So, Miss Krauss, you got off easy tonight. Okay. Well, carry carry forward budget adjustment. You're still here. I'm still here. Uh 200 beginning on page 232 of our packet. Yes. Carry forward adjustments.

And this carry forward budget adjustment, you'll see that we spend a lot of money or we're requesting to spend a lot of money, but at the end of the day, there's still some money. So the 12% um general fund reserves, we view that as the floor. At minimum, we need to keep that 12% reserves. And if we end up with additional funds beyond that 12%, that's a good thing. We've done that in the past where we've taken those excess dollars and they're not really excess, their better word is unassigned dollars to fund other programs. And in this budget adjustment, you'll see there's about a million dollars in the general fund. and that is earmarked for future public defender cost increases that we're expecting to see and that is based on the analysis that our assistant to the city manager Michael Vargas presented to you on a number of occasions. So on page 232 um this is really this budget adjustment is to true up what our um beginning balances are for 2026 based on the 2025 year end balances. It also incorporates items that city council had previously approved. And so we're just capturing that here. And then appropriate projects that are funded by grants and contributions and continuation of capital projects because capital projects are on a project length basis. And then there are some new requests as well. So skipping over to uh well on the next page I still left in the city council's goals and objectives and other commitments. The um page 234 is the kind of the higher level of where we will be if the city council approves this budget adjustment. And at the end of 2026, if the budget adjustments were approved, there would still be uh ending fund balance of about $31 million. A good

portion of that is in the uh surface water management fund which has $11 million. general fund is going to be roughly $7,600,000 and that is to keep the 12% reserves plus keeping any excess or unassigned balances of about a million dollars. And then the other about $3 million is special revenue funds. So they're for specific purposes. Miss Miss Krauss. Yes. I'm looking at page 235.

Sure. And you have um you have the estimate for the general fund fund balance proposed revised for 2026. Does that include council member Brandsteaders Christmas in April pronouncement that we're getting the refund from the south 911? No, it does not yet. That go into the will that be a general fund item?

That is a general fund item. It's in the south 911. um that's what is going to be uh reimbursed or actually it's not really even a reimburse when we get our assessment in August that I will make that uh actually the 2026 is already done I believe that $636,000 that is coming back to the city maybe 27 I haven't seen the memo to know the details of it but if it is something that is applied to 2026 which I kind of don't think So it's typically planning for the next bianium. You'll see a reduced amount um that will be paid to south 911 and we will document that as part of the budget so that you don't see a $636,000 reduction and then next year it's more than $636,000 increase.

Thank you. Sure. Continue, please.

Okay. And so, um, while we're on page 235, you'll see at the very bottom what I've included in this budget adjustment is the $700,000 for the onetenth of 1%. So, that tax would go in effect on July 1st and the estimate is about $700,000. But I wanted to be very very clear that's what that uh that this budget includes that. And in the top portion of the table, you'll see the excess shortfall one time. That's $999,000 that would be saved and accumulated for future um public defender costs. And um on page 236, just a reminder that we still have limited term positions that expire at the end of 2026 and that equates to 6.75 positions. Um I I'm not going to cover the public defender um case load compliance because I think Michael Vargas did a good job with that. We still have on page 238 the commitment to Edgewater um park um as a condition of accepting the grants that city manager previously signed off on with the approval from the city council. Just a reminder also that we had the Axon camera system in the tune of about $510,000 as well as flock safety cameras for consideration in the next budget. And we are um still have collective bargaining agreements that are out there that are not incorporated in this budget. They will be incorporated once they are settled. So um on the proposed budget adjustments, there's a lot of uh detail in here, but I think what I'll do is

I'll skip over to page um 263. And this is really just a summary of the proposed adjustments. I'm happy to cover any areas that um you would like me to get more details on, but I think what I would do is focus on the ones that are identified is new. There is an $85,000 request for the public um defender primary contract. I think in the item that came to city council this evening was $86,000. We have included uh friendship and sister city relations uh funds of $50,000. the city council retreat facilitator of $8,133. Um an operational uh analysis of $125,000 and um we have a new grant but it's uh offsets each other so I'm not going to spend much time there. Um our citywide replacement reserves impact to the general fund. This is for the accumulation of reserves to vehicles increased about $108,000. Um we are recognizing Pierce County is currently leasing a boom truck from the city and we're just recognizing the revenues that come um to the fleet and equipment fund which means a reduction in the M cost to the operating departments. I am adding in here an increase a request for increase in the fleet maintenance and operations cost just overall costs are higher when it comes to parts as well as the labor portion of it. But then we also are experiencing some older vehicles though more uh cost for that. We have a number of items related to the

facility here at city hall that includes the garage door that just gave out probably about a month ago or so. And so the estimate to repair that is $65,000 repair or replace it whichever way. We have also additional costs for the fire alarm panel at city hall of 14,000. municipal court needs a portion of the roof repaired or replaced and that estimate is $150,000. And also we have additional um police station HVAC system controls of $35,000. I put police generator controls as a new item. It's actually not a new item, so I'll correct that. And then the sound station, sound transit station has some elevator maintenance that needs to happen to be in compliance. And that's uh $45,000. Um on the information technology side, we are needing to um add back our current financial system. So we couldn't just cut off our current financial system while we're implementing the new. Um once we implement the new we will not be paying the maintenance fee on the old system as we'll just be um setting it up on a different server and um not have any maintenance on it. Uh I think you talked about this some during the council retreat but there is a $10,000 for the audio visual maintenance. This is actually bringing in the consultant that we used to set up this system. And so every time they come, there's a cost to um do that. And this gives us the ability to cover those costs. But we also recognize that there is some additional equipment upgrades that needs to happen. We don't have an itemized

list. Um right now, we're still evaluating, but the the hope is that the city council will add some funds to this so that we are able to replace if that need um comes up. the microphones that was set up in Saturday's retreat, those were just temporary. I mean, there are, but it's not a perfect solution or yet to be determined. We're also requesting um to put in here really as a kind of earmarking the funds just um funds to look at the overall um audiovisisual system in city hall. So we have the council chambers but we also have some um conference rooms too where meetings or public meetings are being held. We don't have an idea of what needs to occur. What we will do is bring all parties involved and have a very transparent process in terms of what are the needs, what are we looking at. um so that when we bring in vendors, we'll know exactly what it is that we're hoping to have and um maybe they'll share more information, but we need to start with the base. And then uh you heard about uh website accessibility and the good news. So, April 24th is just next week and um what they have done is extended it by one year, but that doesn't stop the city from moving forward if the city council approves this funds. we do need to have it done um for ADA compliance reasons. So that's about I think the number is actually a little bit higher with the signed contract, but I don't think it's enough where we'll have to change it, but I'll take a closer look. And then we also have some funds that we're requesting for safety supplies. And these are those little, you know, those red white boxes for band-aids and

such. Those have been coming for the past couple of years. Um, consistently higher. We've shuffled some dollars around, but the 1870 is what is needed. And that's really what covers the general and um street fund. Um, and then the rest of them are a lot of them are housekeeping in nature. So, as I mentioned, the $20 vehicle licensing fee, um reducing the estimates and also reducing the amount of the debt service payments to reflect um with the latest bond issue. We're just realigning the hotel motel lodging tax with what the city council approved back in November of last year. We're carrying over balances from the property abatement fund, which includes the abatement program, rental housing safety, and the 1406 affordable um housing. These all come in one fund, but we treat them as three separate funds and are keeping their balances separate. Um the funding for the public arts, we've traditionally have just earmarked the any balances. So this is the funds that go into the public art is coming from the McGavic Center from the days that the city rents out and any balances left. $2,000 annually goes to the arts commission and the remaining is set aside for a major art project and um for this bianium we did put some uh funding in for a major art project but this is going to be in addition to that. In the next funds is our narcotics or seizure funds and we have three of them. Narcotics felony and the federal. These are restricted. There's specific purposes for which they can be used. So those are set aside as a special revenue funds and we just carrying the balances to be spent for things that actually qualify for those types of expenditures.

CDBG is also a restricted fund can only be used for certain things. So we've carried that over. uh neighborhood stabilization three is a grant and for a very specific purpose um I don't know if I need to go through the rest of these um because they're very specific like SSMCP can only be used for SSMCP u public safety grants it's net effective zero the ARPA funds which we just covered the debt service we just covered and then the other ones are continuation of capital projects but I do want to highlight that for the westl street projects There is a request for 240,000 and um this is still an estimate you know as they're refining um the first uh set of information but there could be savings there. I mean it's kind of a better estimate than the 500,000 that was thrown out as um as a placeholder. So

thank you very much Miss Krauss. Any questions for Miss Krauss? Thank you for that. That's really, really helpful. Um, did I hear that we're paying $10,000 for an AV consultant? Is that to purchase any equipment or is that just someone helping us understand what we might want to buy or implement? I'm sorry. What was that for? If I heard correctly, there was a $10,000 line item for paying an AV consultant, an audio video consultant. Is that right?

It's not actually an audiovisisual consultant. It's um it's the vendor that came in and set up the audio visual that we have. the the vendor is actually Jark and there's not many vendors that do this type of work but typically when there is an issue they will come in and they will test the different systems they will work with staff um but that's what we're paying them is for services not a consultant I shouldn't have used the term consultant is it an annual service that they provide or how often are they coming in it's an as needed basis so when they come in they'll charge us for their service and how much is that service per visit um it really depends depends on how long they're here, what they're trying to troubleshoot.

Okay. So, we're just establishing a bucket of $10,000 to apply toward that as needed. Yes. Okay. I'm happy to come with additional information as we get into the public. No, no, that's fine. That's helpful. Thanks, Council Member Talbo.

Thank you, Miss Krauss. Um, so you mentioned I thought I heard you mention that that there was um about $300,000 or so that we um that was maybe an unexpected or an uptick in used to pay out used to pay the cash out of sick and and PTO for retirees And um perhaps maybe this is a comment or or or a question for budget timing, but I guess do we currently have fiscal policies that um either put limits on uh the amount that uh the amount of sick or vac or PTO that uh law that employees can carry over um on a year or put some sort of caps so as to take preventative or proactive measures to avoid um these high spikes uh for retirees especially when we especially if we know that there are going to be that there is going to be a year with more or planned retirements unfortunately no and because they are driven by the collective bargaining agreements so the nonrepresented groups so a lot of our employees the ones that you're seeing Those are coming a lot from our police department as I mentioned and a lot of them are in the say the um the police guild. So all of that is driven by what they negotiated. Not much that we can do and once you put it in negotiations it's going to be very hard um to bring it back down. So

understood. And so we haven't signed that um we haven't renewed that union. It's in negotiations currently contracts at all. Right. Yeah, it's under negotiation. Excuse me.

And then um yeah, I guess just my final comment along those lines is uh at the at the beginning of the packet noting the six FTEEs that are at risk for expiration at the end of the year. It's really hard for me to swallow that, you know, we are affected by the ability to retain or even recruit permanent or um other FTEEs in general because we are straddled with including accommodating budget for uh employees that have plans to retire and you know are hanging on and bulking up on that type of that type their leave balances which which then affect the budget cumulatively in that in in one sense. So that's just a comment. Thank you

council member Laura Cella. Thank you Mayor Boi and thank you T. This is another great indepth coverage of all the funds. Um I'm going to go back to something that council member Lyn Holmes started with uh and that is in the IT budget. We've got three line items for council chambers audio video equipment. First one is maintenance, the second one is upgrades, and the third one's a replacement. Uh I want to make sure we're not planning to upgrade something and then replace it two months later. Right? Uh so how do we differentiate between those three categories?

So first of all, our immediate need is to have the equipment running so that the city council could have a council meeting in the manner in which it needs to be. So that would be our first and a good example of that would have been those microphones. Taking a look at upgrades. If I'm just going to make this up, if that fails, that screen fails, we would want to be able to replace that. Our idea is not to upgrade something and then immediately look at revamping the whole system. And um what you're going to see when we get into the 2728 budget, which is we're starting that like in June um is a strategic plan that is actually more strategic rather than oh we need to upgrade some servers. We're going to be thinking more strategically taking a look at the number of servers we have and are those servers needed. taking a look at consistencies overall, you know, like how are we um issuing laptops or uh computers and devices, just even our general devices. I remember when I first got here and I was surprised that there was a a a personal printer in my office. Granted that I was on crutches and all, I still couldn't understand. So really really is taking a look at um really efficiencies and cutting down costs where we can and this is something since I've been here I've had it under me and that is something that we've consistently done. Now on the other end of it if you go too cheap and go for all the freebies there can be some detriment to that. So, it's really taking a look at the city holistically and making sure that operations are um occurring kind of across the board in the same manner. Taking a look at new requests

and so really trying to do away with, oh, you know, oh, this came up and so our department needs it. No, it's this came up. How is it going to affect all of the different departments? And I use that as an example because even when we're looking at replacing the council chambers, it is not going to be like, well, I need this because I had this meeting. Okay, let's just sit down. Let's evaluate. Let's take a look. How are departments using it overall? And um yeah, it will not be two months late. I can guarantee you that. Um you know, we I wouldn't do it personally for my own finances. um if I know I'm going to get a new um couch, I wouldn't be recovering my couch and then two months later to get a new couch. So, yeah,

I appreciate that. And having a robust IT strategy is important as we look at all the assets. And yeah, you're going to see something different than you have ever seen in any of the budget documents. And I think when we first labeled it as an IT strategic plan, it really wasn't a strategic plan. It was just more of a six-year plan on some things that we were going to be doing, but it really was no different than, oh, we have a one-time request. So, we're going to put it into a package that talks about the strategy where we want where we are now, where we plan to be.

Uh, just one other question. Uh so you mentioned uh for the Westlake uh lakefront street end project uh last year we had forecast that it would be 500 grand right uh and I think it was um mostly ARPA funds and uh there was some other grant fund that made that up. Um now we're looking at 740,000 so we're you know 50% higher than we initially anticipated. Yeah. Um, are we keeping a close enough eye on that so that we don't continue to grow and also recognizing lessons learned for our future street end projects so that they're not um potentially off?

I I think here's what happened is we had a pot of money and it was ARPA funds. How are we going to allocate those ARPA funds? And so there was a desire to do some street ends and the amount of money that was available came out to be $500,000. It was probably prioritized amongst the 13.67 million. There was no work that was done in getting that $500,000. And over the summer, um even before our city manager arrived, there was discussion about, you know, hey, how can we get some um uh some street ends? um you know just because there was some volunteer groups and so there was an interest in doing that um but I believed I I don't I don't recall any discussion that there was any you know um engineers estimates or any consideration other than let's identify some of this and that's how the $500,000 came up. I don't remember any mathematics or any of that.

Gotcha. So essentially it was a placeholder. Yes. So we had better data. I'd be curious to see if our other projects on the same topic are also placeholders or if we have better data on them.

Yeah. And we're actually pretty much um done with the um the ARPA dollars. Um and I'm trying to think if I did anything else. The only other one that I could think of is the Camp Murray master plan, but I don't I don't think there's any increase in that. I know that our uh new parks uh director is very conscientious about the cost and her and I just had some conversations about you know I don't know but you know we'll we'll be watching it. So

thank you. Yeah is best we can do to rightsize the costs to what we need sort of a minimum viable product. Let's stick with that. Thank you. Any other questions for Miss Krauss? Ryan, Council Member Pearson.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Just to kind of add on to Preston's comments about Westlake. I mean, that it's a bit concerning that the total cost of a single street end is already at 740,000 and we haven't done any litigation. We haven't done, you know, this is an estimate at this point and we all know how these things work. This, we got an estimate for the H barn and now it's doubled what the estimate was. So, I have some real concerns about how much we're going to be putting forth and impacting the general fund with these street ends. Um, I would be a huge advocate for having these things volunteer ran and not putting a ton of effort into them if that's the way these kind of if our lessons learned are that it's going to cost us a bunch and we're going to be in litigation for these other ones that are more complex and they have, you know, encroachments and all these things. I have real concerns about that because we're, you know, we're the access is there. people can hack down some bushes if we give them some permits that we're going to be doing um to get access, but it's not access for a ton of people. It's it's a handful of folks that are using these versus us putting forth a million or two million bucks for a major park improvement that thousands and thousands of people would be using on a weekly and, you know, monthly basis. So fundamentally just have some concerns with as we kind of move through Westlake and and see where these things go. So thank you.

I think the one thing that I will say that if we are going to do a street end and for this particular one it has to do with um the slopes and shoreline requirements. I think we do need to be mindful of our assess our liability as well. So, any more questions for Miss Krauss? Well, thank you very much, Miss Krauss. We appreciate all that information and um it gives us something to work with going forward and thank you to you and your team for all that. Thank you.

Job, Mayor Russell or Mayor, please call on city manager. Mayor Russ reports by the city manager. Congratulations on your promotion, Mr. Russell.

Yeah, that threw me off there for a bit there. The first thing I need to say is as much as I appreciate our city attorney jumping on the sword for two continuences, as you'll see on those memos, my name's on there as coming through. So, um, take accountability for that. Coincidentally, I can't remember the last time we've had a continuence based on the materials and the agenda in in my career. So to have two of them in one night is like a personal record. Not proud of it, but I do appreciate the council taking the step to continue them. It's really easy to try and just keep moving forward, but that's usually when problems arise. So if there's a matter of confusion like we were experiencing, especially with the red line stuff, thank you for making the right decision to continue it so we had the right information come back to act on. that's just much more challenging if we have to come back with a correction for something we did before. So, as much as it's a humbling component right now, I really appreciate that that's the action council took. Um, Chief Smith did leave some year end reports on the counter here. That was the last component. I just didn't want to disrupt our flow anymore and pass those out. So, they are there on the table. Looking forward on a few items coming up. Um, we did have the Whispers of Korean uh art display from 5 to 7 uh today, which was great. Um, coming up tomorrow, uh, ECU ribbon cutting 3:00, Fort Silicone neighborhood, uh, association meeting, downtown neighborhood association meeting on Wednesday, master builders association on Thursday, and then parks appreciation day, and uh, the Woods Lake grand opening on uh, Saturday. So, uh, gets us through, uh, basically the end of the week there. And I looked ahead

and didn't look like there was much in that next week. So, those are the items upcoming. And that's all. Thank you very much, Mr. City Manager. Um, council member comments. So, who should we start with tonight? Oh, do you have any questions for the city manager? Apparently, council member Pearson does.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor, so we had some comments tonight um and some information presented about American Lake and and what we're doing there or not doing there and and stuff. So, I I want to they've got a ton of support. It sounds like they've activated a bunch of folks that want to do something and I understand that there's only one permit that can be had and we have it and so I really want to make sure that we're putting forth a good effort to work with them to get whatever they need done. And it sounds like there's I don't know I guess what it sounds like but they've identified some issues and it's up to us to work with them to allow them to collect more money from their own folks that live on the shoreline. I don't really know all the details but I'd like to get more of a understanding on that and and figure out that sooner rather than later I guess.

Yeah. Just briefly. So the American Lake District is ultimately where those things need to belong to change the assessment component. One of the things they're asking is to jump on our current permit. Not there's some challenges with that based on liabilities and procurement and how the city does it because they want their own contractor on our permit. And we typically wouldn't co-join those types of things. I think the best thing though is um we'll get a document out to council kind of explaining what the process is and what it's gone through. Um remember they're talking about sense of urgency but that's been a known component and we've been talking about the American

I understand it's been going on for 10 years but at some point in time you know it'd be nice to be able to yeah the ultimate answer though along with and what state law provides is the lake management district in terms of the assessment and the dollars and has to come through you you know the district establishes a work plan the assessment rules that ultimately is the long range. Do we manage do we manage that for like silicum that I believe came through a court order which I believe American Lake homeowners can go that route as well. They'd have to petition county court or superior court to get that same process but that's available to them as well

or we can give our permit to them. I mean like we can force them to take it I guess through a court order or we can somehow work with them to there's multiple variables there. Yeah. Okay. You got the one is they've asked to have this you know manage their own lake. Well that's what Lake Silicone did through a court order and they can initiate that process if they really want to go that route and manage it themselves and go through that process that's identified in state law. The other thing is we the have a permit through the work plan of the lake management district. The the treatment they're planning is not on that permit.

I understand. Yeah. So can can we amend that with their recommendation and getting you know that's where I guess but one of the challenges is the liability component. You know we go through a procurement that brings it in. They don't want to go through any of that from my understanding. So you're not going to have the liability is going to be all on the city for a contractor that's does hasn't gone through our procurement program. So again, I think the best thing to do is draft up some information for council so you can see what we're looking at and the challenges that are there. Okay. Yeah, that's fair.

Thank you, Mayor Bokei. I'm going to follow up on Council Member Pearson's request as far as what goes into that packet. I'd like to understand where the city's responsibility lies on this and how that's different for the different lakes in the city. Uh and then as council member Pearson said, can we get away from that responsibility as just another property owner that has that lakefront treated just like any other folks on the lake? Yeah, I think they have to come up with some money if they want more services and that's one of the but they have to do it as the lake management district. They have to do it all together. So what we're hearing is from one group of people who want who want something but the vehicle is the lake management district that has to vote on the dues and and that kind of thing. Is that correct or can

essentially that's how it's laid out but again you know we want to answer some of the questions and what some of the challenges are with you know the request as it relates to procurement and liability the permit component and just kind of have time to go through all those which I know legal and engineering is already working on some of that stuff so it'll be easy to get that information uh when it's assembled. Yeah. I just I want to understand why we're in the lake management business instead of the local government business. Right. Well, we don't want to be in the lake management business. That's why Yeah. I think that's why we have all these and that's why we have a lake management district. Right. Right.

That's a committee, but it's all well we do we do grants forum as part of that um for the miloil treatment. So yeah, there is a little bit of our own involvement in there. Um but there but that is a tool and a mechanism through state law that's available. Yeah. I just question whether we want to continue doing that. Council member Talbo. These are questions for the city manager.

Right. And along those lines, it's my understanding that um there is a large sense of dissatisfaction with the lake management district. And I I would just like to understand that when you bring when you bring your information to us, can you help us understand what excuse me what our role is if any in liaisoning with either at a staff level or not uh with that lake management district to help I think bridge some communication that maybe is falling through some major cracks between what's understood stood by the homeowners that want something and what the capacity and what the lake management can do and what the process and the steps are for them to do the things that the lake owners are asking for. It sounds like whatever the process is there's some gaps in communication in the groups and and that's my and and I think that those homeowners are looking to the city to help because they are our residents and so they're they're looking to us for some leadership but I want to understand what our role is because I also understand that we have a limited role of sorts. So just a comment for that future presentation.

Well, yeah, we can get that information in there and go, you know, long story short, the council does approve the work plan for the lake management district. Okay. Any other questions for the city manager? That that see Yeah, we're just going to have to get this resolved at some point. And if but it seems like the vehicles the lake management district and the amount of dues they're paying if they pay enough they can get as much treatment as they would like and we'd have to get in the work plan. But adding it to the work plan but not having funding doesn't accomplish anything. Right. Well, now I'm stepping above my skis, but uh it could be in the work plan to set that up as the assessment role if you know council so desires to provide guidance to the lake management district to investigate the addition. We're we're making the assumption I mean when when people show up here there's an assumption that there that if they had a vote on higher dues that it would pass and and I think it was mentioned at a previous meeting if they saw what the people in Lake Stilik are paying they might not agree to that right so there's there's more to the story I think but anyway hopefully we can get this resolved I'm sorry it's using so much staff Um, okay. Council member comments. Let's start with the council member Laura tonight. Uh, thank you, Mayor Bokei. Uh, start out I I appreciated the retreat we had on Saturday. Uh, getting used to to seeing you guys almost every day. Nice. Uh, it's unfortunate that we had to miss the youth summit because they were

cutting at the same time. So I think we've all said before uh in the future try and balance those so we can attend both. Um at the end of the retreat I mentioned uh we may have a need or a desire I have a desire to do something similar on a quarterly basis. Maybe it's a fourth Monday four times a year where we're able to kind of sit and break bread and and just talk about the stuff that's important to us uh like we did at the retreat. And I think that helps us stay on track. So, I'm curious to see the feedback from other members of council. Uh, I know we used to meet four times a month. We dialed it back to three. Uh, but our agendas have looked pretty full and some things are getting pushed out farther than we may want. Um, so that might be a way to address that as well. Uh looking forward to this week uh on Wednesday I'll be attending an Earth Day presentation uh that they're going to go over the state comprehensive comprehensive climate action plan. Uh I'm excited to hear about that. That's at the environmental services building. Um I will be at the downtown neighborhood association meeting here on Wednesday evening. uh looking forward to parks appreciation day and uh last year I went to Stringbrook Park and there was a good crowd there doing some important work including uh our county council member um and then Wards Lake Park ribbon cutting is going to be exciting. Uh next week uh I will be attending the Pierce County Opioid Abatement Council meeting. Uh it's our annual one on Thursday. Um and then some other comments. Uh, so I appreciated the police department quarterly update. Uh, I wonder if there would be a value to getting a similar update from our courts folks, uh, about the case loads they're seeing, what the trends are, and how we can have an understanding of that. Um, I recognize that, you know, we're the executive branch. They're the judicial

branch. You guys are um, uh, the legislative branch, I guess. Or maybe that's a maybe you're executive, we're legislative. I don't know. I got to watch Schoolhouse Rock again. Um, but I think it might be valuable for us to see that. Okay. I'm going to ask is does council want us to set that up the presentation? Of course, I know they've done it before. Yeah. I don't know how long it's been or what type. So, f first look at do we have them planned anyway. Do we bring him on a regular basis anyway? Okay. We haven't heard from them for a while. I mean, I think the judge was here. I think is is in between June of last year and August. Okay.

I think is in that period. I'm not positive, but I think it was before I started. Okay. So, it's been a while. So, we're coming up on a year probably. It's a hot topic right now, right? So, I think Yeah. relevant. Yeah. Set something up for June or something.

All right. And then uh a couple more items uh from public comments, just things that were brought up. Uh so I mentioned Tata the motion sensing street lights and she said she'd get back to us with that. Um we talked about uh the city's responsibility for American Lake management. Um and then uh I really kicked a hornets's nest with his Grley Lake staff. Uh and I'm I'm excited that we got people to turn out and talk about what's important to them. Um, so Gravity Lake, Lake Stilikum, American Lake, Lake Louise, they all belong to the people of the state of Washington, right? Not just the residents of Lakewood, not just the people who live on the lakes, but to everyone in the state. Um, and so as as a community, we uh we owe it to folks to allow them to use our property on those lakes to be able to get to it. Um, per the 2023 study, Hilltop Lane is not feasible to develop. Um, which I understand it's super skinny, super steep. Uh, doesn't make sense. But for that same study, Lynwood Lane on Grley Lake is a better candidate. And they had sketches of what that could look like. Um, and barring those, uh, as I brought up at the retreat, we can look at other available properties that may be a better option. um whether they are affordable for us at the time. Uh we can make those decisions as they come forward, but I will continue to keep an eye out for those opportunities as they come up. Um so I I appreciate homeowners around the lake um stocking it with fish, stocking a state lake with fish. That's that's very nice of them. Uh but it doesn't give them exclusive rights to harvest those fish. So um I appreciate everything they said. uh and look forward to continued discussions as we um provide

opportunities to all the residents of Lakewood and folks in the state that own these lakes. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Pearson.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Um one of the other public comments had to do with parking issues in Tikcom and folks on the sidewalks. And so I think we've we've heard that come up a few times. Um, and so if nothing else, I guess if we could get some some sort of enforcement or some one to go, you know, try to get some folks that are not parking on the sidewalk and or out in the road um illegally parked out in the ride ofway uh at least give them a a heads up that they can't park there and um get them moved along. So, um, the, yeah, the the Graly Lake folks that came out, I I appreciated the the various comments kind of highlighting some concerns. I think one of the concerns that was raised at the uh, council retreat was about the public safety and access to the lake. And so, it sounds like fire has some sort of definitive agreement. Um, it'd be nice to get an update from our police department if we have some sort of uh agreements with some folks. It sounds like there was a number of fi five kind of shared boat launches or whatever um around the lake and that people have through their community, you know, the rights to to to do that. So, um that that would be that would satisfy my um interest in that. I, you know, as it relates to street ends, I I, you know, I'm I'm concerned about the cost on on Westlake Park. Um, you know, we had 500,000 in in ARPA contributed to that. And outside of ARPA funds, you know, anything more than a volunteer program to me is like too much money to be spending on street ends for what we're getting for the community. Um, so I,

yeah, I I'd be very cautious about acquiring um, one of these multi-million dollar uh, properties to improve a street end or something. So, um, just my comments on that. Um, let's see here. Later this week, I am going to be going to the Master Builders Association uh housing summit on Thursday morning, and I regrettably will not be able to attend any of the festivities this weekend. I'll be gone. So, Council Member Lindholm.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Um, I share fellow council members urgency and concern around American Lake. This is something I've heard about since I came on council all of, you know, four months ago. Uh, but there's there's some real if there's confusion on council about what the process is, we can expect that there's confusion in the community. So, I think it's important that we get the information that city manager has kindly offered to provide, but also that we communicate that information to the community. uh and we maybe together in a collaborative way establish a way forward that feels good and makes sense and all the things. Uh one way or another they certainly want and deserve a certain amount of say and maybe even ownership in the process. So that's a good thing. I really appreciate council member Laura Cello's idea about them the motion lights. Um it's a great question and we heard some concern in public comment tonight about light pollution. Um I don't want to turn off the lights in Lakewood. I'm concerned about the safety concerns I would bring, but I think that's a really thoughtful thing to explore. So, so thanks for bringing that up. I share council member Pearson's concern about uh you let's watch our dollars as we explore not just street ends but everything. Um I think we're entering a time where um that's going to be more and more important and uh and I too am going to try to attend the MBA summit on Thursday. That's all. Mr. Council member Brandansteader. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Um, first of all, to just clarify the what the South Sound 911 board did in regarding the $636,000 that come here that the uh the uh there were two options that were put out there that cities like Lakewood can choose and and one is to get a check

and the the guidance to the South Sun 911 staff was if if a community wants a check for what they're what they're owed, uh, do that by June 30th. U, the other option was cities could just have that in their account and use it against future uh costs or invoices that are there. Um, and in fact, the uh, executive director of South 911 really was encouraging all of the municipalities to take the checks because it'll that that'll that'll all get done before the next budget has to be done and and it'll be more more more complicated. Uh I I do plan to go to the um the master builder housing um uh event thing in in Puallup on on on Thursday morning that um regarding the the the folks from Graly Lake that came to speaks They certainly took our discussion on Saturday and and and and extrapolated it going forward. And the the truth is is that our comprehensive plan as it is currently written has a policy to investigate acquiring lands for parks. Okay. And and that's all we really did on on that day is to take a look at what's there because we're trying to see what's what's going on. And as we've learned from Edgewater Park

and as we've learned in in in in in a in a couple of other parks when you when you try to add and you and you're trying to do things that the master planning process gets intensive and involves community things and going to be able to go and do that. Um, so while I thought that they were way ahead of us and and we're we're not looking to something to do that and and with respect to the the property that we've asked the staff to just sort of take a look at what it might be, you know, one of the uh u uses or or or or recreational uses of of of of property that's near parks is is is view and so a parcel that's that's going all that and an unusable street end I think perhaps changes if you also acquire a parcel adjacent to it so that instead of 14 feet it's 114 feet of shoreline But the but I was encouraged by the fact that they all came out because it indicated that like on Saturday we were sitting here in a room with about this attendance. uh but that people were tuned in and pay paid attention to what we do either in real time or subsequently on on YouTube and that's that's a good sign. I think I think that it is I think I think it means that that folks are doing that and when we do bring up something that resonates with

them, they'll they'll they'll they'll marshall their forces and come and talk to us to to be able to go and do that. And on American Lake, you know, the the issue is um we we have a permit. it said we'd have to go and get the permit amended to to to to do address the specific problems that they want. And our permit is to deal with problems that are lakewide. And and and the way that we fund our activities is we have to have a vote of property owners to say that they will do that. To have someone come and say we'll give you the money. That's not the way that a a lake management program is allowed to be funded if you because you end up with unequal contributions to to to something that's there. And you know the current work of the lake management district is done with the 60 cents per foot that is assessed to every property owner on the lake. And now to have a group of property owners that say, "Well, we'll give you the money, but we only want you to do our shoreline." Is um but you the city have to be the contractor. is as a city manager indicates creates us for liability both with a contractor but also is that really what what we're allowed to do by state law. So I I look forward to getting something fairly comprehensive on both the legal side and the and and and and the ecology position on on on on what they want what

they want to do um to go on off. And then uh for those of you that are going to be um um traveling to Gimhi, I I I I wish you a good uh you know, a good trip and a good kind. you know, the the the the event that we had in the in the in the city hall today, the the arts thing, I think, is um was uh a very good event because it was not look at art on a wall. It was there were there were art on the wall. There were descriptions of the of the items on the wall from the from from the painter that that were actually insightful about what they were, but that there but there was also music. Okay. And there was and there and and there and and and there was dance and it was clear that there was an intention to integrate into American society but not lose touch with their historical society and and then that's that that's the way that they were going going to go about it. So I I I really appreciate both the arts commission but also the the the Korean arts commission that that we worked with for this one to do something that was u well worth attending.

Thank you. Uh Council Member Talbo.

Okay, I'll try to get through my just quick bullet points here. Um, first I wanted to acknowledge in the um materials in the written materials that uh we received in our packets tonight before us, I just wanted to say thank you to the management at the Village Green mobile home park for opening your guest parking to um to the public for the Wards Lake event this weekend. I just I'm really appreciative of that and their willingness and openness to work with the city. So, uh, just wanted to acknowledge their generosity. Um, planning commission met last week and they have made some progress on helping us um, assign their uh, planning commission volunteers to each of the four task forces that we've talked about in the creation of this um, neck neck program to help our our obligation to complete our climate action plan. So, um, I they happily kind of stepped up and so I'm just really thankful and appreciative to them. I want to acknowledge that their their time for that and it really amounts to one extra meeting for them um for simply two months, but their regular schedule is is generally unaffected. Uh, one of the other topics that that came up at that meeting is that the Best Western property and owner um at the Colonial Center has applied for uh historic preservation designation status. And so they are applying to be a heritage landmark because the age of the business and the structure and the building um generally meets the criteria to be considered eligible to apply

uh because it's over 50 years old. the the hotel was built in 1965 and um and their uh case to be considered is that they their architecture fits with the colonial um even though it is midmodern but a colonial representation in a mid-modern interpretation of style. So um that will be so there was some discussion among planning commission members and questions. Um generally our our so the director of public works is the designated historic preservation officer that would make the determination and the planning commission will be holding a public hearing on May 6th uh for that um application status. But then it would proceed through um the department of public works for ultimate approval and certification. Um that's that for planning commission. Uh touching on council member Laura's comments about um potentially meeting on the fourth Mondays. I I do understand and I do acknowledge that it is nice to have some additional time when we need it to I suppose get group together a little bit more informally but still discuss business. Um, but also at the same time if we I do feel like it sometimes it can feel loaded, excuse me, that we have a lot of, you know, we can take on a lot of um or we'll have a lot of thicker agendas presented in study session and so it's harder to get through those. So I would only say that I would be open to

potentially a fourth meeting during the months where we have five Mondays. So, there's only a few months in the year that have five Mondays and um at least in 2026, I think those months are June, August, and November. Um I don't know how easy it will be to gather people in November during the holidays, but perhaps if there's feeling or consensus around those other two months, I I wouldn't object to that. Um, I also wanted to touch on my fellow council members comments about the lakes. Um, thank you for all of your concerns and and all your sentiments expressed. I I think it's I'm happy and I'm grateful to see all of us getting these um different thought different thoughts out. Uh I I do distinguish the matter of access and the p and the preservation and the process for considering access very different a separate conversation from the cost of developing and building out these street lake ends. And I can I can I can understand and agree. I think it's a legit concern and sentiment the cost of um adding these of the cost of developing these street ends. I think that I didn't get a chance to say at the retreat that um yeah I do think that developing one every bienium is an ambitious plan. So if there is a thought to um be more strategic in lakeends that that serve a specific need for access then then the cost of the way that we um incorporate those in our park cip is should be

should be incorporated very thoughtfully and strategically. But the process that we move forward in dealing with the impediments, impertinances, encroachments and other legalities of the street ends is a is a separate thing. So finally um I it is my intent to be at the master builder association event on Thursday. I did RSVP and now some um events have come up in my day job. So, I am tentative and I will be at Fort Stilgum Neighborhood Association tomorrow. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Deputy Mayor Bell.

Thank you, Mayor. Um, no need for me to reiterate everybody's points again. You all made wonderful points, great presentations. I appreciate it all. My quick comment is is I was going around the new opening at Nyanza. Um, I guess it was Saturday was when after our retreat, so everything was very fresh. I saw a family out there riding their bikes, other people walking their dogs. There was probably like, I want to say six to seven people, and this was about 7:00 at night. It was gorgeous. It was great to see and they all looked happy and I was very happy to see a project um that I had a little bit of say in I guess I when it five years ago so it just came in things were already in motion but it was nice to see something come to fruition. I talked about it with to Mayor Bokei that it just it was really nice to see something happen because we work on really long projects. So that was my little fun part. Thank you. So, I just have a couple items. First, I I I appreciate Council Member Lauris getting all his neighbors out here tonight and really helping us. I I would say no matter how how the feelings are, I I I will just tell you I hadn't over over our time on the Lakewood City Council, probably the only parks expansion that didn't get vicious opposition was in the Spring Brook neighborhood where they actually wanted a park. People thought they would use it. Charles Ames is telling me tonight how how great it is. And even then, we had to fight with one of the land owners to get rid of him before he he wanted to stay there, I don't know, in perpetuity. So, I'm sure there were people who thought Central Park in New York was a bad idea

that it that it would be much better to, you know, cover it with buildings and houses. When we talked about Chambers Bay, there was serious discussion. And there were people who seriously said, "Hey, we should put sell it for houses." Okay, I mean, they they could have done that. Now, forgetting that it's next door to a sewer plant, but but there there are people who who who seriously believe that, serious people, and it wasn't, you know, they were they were trying to convince people they should sell property. There was a state legislator years ago who wanted to use Fort Silicon Park for housing for the mentally ill because she hated Lakewood or didn't believe that it should ever be a park. You're always going to hear this, right? I mean, that doesn't mean we we don't take public comment to understand it, but just the expan the the the keep in mind what's going on at Edgewater is a tiny expansion of the park. It's it's one lot, right? Most of which we already owned, right? We own most of it already. And fixing up the rest of the park that had been neglected forever, right, since the county opened the park. And I they might have come through there and mowed it once in a while. And you would have thought given the opposition to the park, you would have thought that we were like I I don't know. we're just committing some major crime. I think we were accused of of criminal activity. It in an urban area, if you want to expand a park, it's game on, right? It's just game on people. But yet, yet I will also say in direct

contradiction to what some of the people said, I have never seen property values go down when a park was built or improved. Never. I I I dare you to find it. I mean, go ahead and look, but and and maybe I'm wrong, but I don't know that there's a city or county anywhere that put in a park and the adjoining property is all a sudden like, well, there go the property values. Now, there's things that will destroy people's property values, but I don't think building parks is one of them. So, I I I went on an editorial. I shouldn't have done it. It's too long. I do need you right now. Um, Executive Melo called me the other day and said, you know, as you know, Sound Transit has budget issues, um, severe budget issues and and they are seriously considering not extending the light rail to Tacoma. there. There's some variations of different themes. And he asked me if we would send a letter to Sound Transit dealing with this issue that we expect that their obligations under ST3 be met or in in some combination of you received the letter. Um, my name's been changed, I guess, to now Don Bokei. Um and um

but I do I do want to I do want to hear from you. The the the executive has asked us to and I and I said well come up with a letter um something I can work with and and I'll bring it to council and and I sent that out to you guys or the the city manager sent it out on my behalf. And then I have um so I so I need to hear from you. Sound Transit is is actually important to the city of Lakewood in in several ways. Um they're located here. Pierce Transit, that's a local business, does all their work on the buses here. Um I mean they they are they are basically sound transit when it comes to the buses. Um we have for a long time supported the idea of of various expansions of the sounder train. So this is an important it's important how we if we agree that we should write it. I believe we should. I think we need to play ball with with folks locally and if we want to be a regional player, I I think we but I I'm not saying this letter will go forward. In fact, I'm not I will tell you right now this if we agree to send something the letter this letter will not will shorten it up considerably um to to make it work better. I think it just I think they they they threw in a lot of stuff because they didn't know what we would be saying. So, I think they expect that we'll edit it a bit. So, at that, I'd like to hear from the members as to are you okay with sending a letter on behalf of the city of Lakewood in

support of the ST3 implementation, specifically the Sounder, anything under ST3, the Sounder expansion, Tacoma Dome link right light light rail, and the Dupont Sounder extension. Council member T. I'll start with Council Member Talbo.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Um, this is a this is an issue as much as I as much as as much as Sound Transit issues and overbudget um and and just gets the brunt of it. Well, in many cases deservedly. But but I I this is an issue where I think, Mr. Mayor, I think you're right. I think we need to play ball, but play ball for Pierce County because our res because Pierce County residents, whether they're Lakewood, Palop, Tacoma, whatnot, we all paid taxes into this transportation tax. That transportation tax is the biggest reason why our sales tax is double digits. And Pierce County for so long has I'll I'll just I'll say it has gotten the shaft since ST1. And so I recognize that that the city of Seattle has um has has built a lot and I recognize that they do have a writership that that wants that that Ballard link, but I think that now is not the time to get on Sound Transit for now. Now is the time to advocate for to to be a player to be a player for Pierce County, especially because this is a a a regional thing. So, um I you have my support. That's I'll

Thank you. Mike.

Well, Mr. Mayor, I think you should send a letter, but I don't necessarily know that it has to be the letter that is the Pierce County draft. Um, in the there are um three things in ST3 that are particularly significant to Lakewood or the changes that are proposed impact us. Uh the first is we've we've constantly had this uh extension of the maybe date for the sounder to get to Tikcom and we have been required to do certain land use act actions because eventually there's going to be a sounder station in Tikom and it's caused us to have to to to do things that because of the the state legislature saying if you've got a proposed transit center, you've got to allow this, this, and that. And and I and and and so I think one thing in the letter is is we should say we we really need to get to a firm date for sounder expansion from Lakewood to the southern end of Lakewood and JBLM. The second thing in their budget crisis that they're proposing is the um there is an express bus that runs from the Lakewood Town Center to CEC and they're proposing eliminating that. Okay. to so that it that that they'll and that's really a pretty significant

piece of what is primarily used by by Lakewood residents and I think that we want to we want to keep that you know and their rationale is well people don't need to go to the town center they can catch a bus at the Sounder Station or 512 and take it to Federal Way and then transfer to a light rail thing that and they'll and they'll eventually get to see which is a lot of lugging around of luggage if you're a tourist or if you're just trying to get to work at at Seek, you know, um it's it's you can't take a bus from Lake City or uh Stelum or somewhere else to the Sounder Station. So, so, so, so how you got to find another way to get to the Sounder Station whereas right now you might be able to in a bus from your house to to the town center and then go. So I think that that is a that is an area to for for us to look to mention uh the uh the extension of light rail to um uh to Tacoma idea essentially to to Tacoma Dome station which was which was sort of sort of sort of sort of the plan. I I think that that's becomes the most visible Pierce County um slight if that if if that plan is abandoned or is pushed off 20 plus years isn't a way to do it. Um and then the last thing is um

even though we send a letter with a with a tone of saying don't do this, don't do that, I I think your letter should include thank you for sustaining the state the Lakewood station access non-motorized and motorized transportation improvements that that we're we're currently partnered with and that we we're glad that we haven't heard of those being on their proposed chopping block. Thank you, Dylan.

Yeah. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I want to make sure we're a good partner to the executive. I do not claim to be an expert in Sound Transit in the way that some of my fellow council members are. Um, and it's hard to approve a letter when I don't know what it says, but I I would be very interested to learn more and to see what the draft is. Preston. Uh, thank you, Mr. Mayor. Uh, I I agree with what fellow council members have said and as I understand it and I may be maybe misinformed, but ST3 the monies that it raises in Pierce County have to be spent in Pierce County. That's what I was told by our previous city manager.

There supposedly is a regional equity, but it's loosely defined. The issue is Sound Transit has divided itself into zones and so it isn't Pierce County isn't a zone that that the south zone is actually like federal way down through Pierce County to be able to go and do that. And so they they look at at saying that that's where they are and they and so they're talking about expanding. We already got it to Federal Way and we're so so it wasn't Pierce County but but there there is a south zone and there's a west zone that goes out towards Belleview and that and then there's a north zone that runs from the top end of King County up to a homeish thing and there's even a zone that that covers Breton but

Okay. Yeah, that that helps. Uh yeah, when it was explained to me earlier that was part of the reasoning for Sound Transit helping with all of our improvements on the east side of Lakewood. Uh it wasn't just out of the kindness of their hearts, which we appreciate, but it was because they needed to expend some funds in our area. Um with that said, I wouldn't want to compromise that work that's being done to do this other stuff, but this other stuff is also really important. Um, I took the light rail from Federal Way to go to the Seahawks parade and it was a great experience, right? They said, you know, million people, but we got in and out of there easily without any challenges. Uh, if that could come down to the Tacoma Dome station, that would be wonderful. Additionally, our folks in Telecom could really use a sounder station, right? That would help connect them to the rest of Lakewood and to the rest of the Puget Sound region. Um, so I would hope that they're not going to cut that possibility as well as the the terminal station down in Dupont. So I I support the letter, but I agree with Council Member Brandsteader that maybe it needs to be customized for our specific needs.

And I I would wholeheartedly echo Mr. Brandset's comments and totally so definitely on board with all the points that he mentioned about Telum, the bus route here um from the town center up to the airport and then um yeah,

thank you. Um and thank you, mayor. From the beginning, you said that you were going to look at the letter and edit it and make sure that it was very tailored to Lakewood. So, I appreciate my fellow council members bringing up those points. Um, so I support you and I agree with you and I agree with my fellow council members. It's a little hard, but um, in an effort to move forward and keep our partnerships going, I think that we should go with the letter.

Great. Thank Thank you very much for all your comments. I was just looking at at what ST3 was about and and in the in the commuter rail, it was ST3 would extend Sounder commuter rail service to Tikcom and Dupont from the Lakewood station in 2036 and additional capacity improvements. So, you know, and we and I do want to put into the letter that I appreciate their presence here. They're it's they're a good employer and and they're a major part of what Pierce Transit does. So, I mean, they're they're people making their living from uh um sound transit in in our community from from sound transit work. So but but it is about you know um what was said elections mean things right what was what is said during elections mean things so I will I will tailor it as as best I can I'll run it by uh the applicable folks and um it'll be much shorter right I think it'll be um just well I'll I'll work on it a little a little bit um and I'll I'll ask for some help also. So I appreciate that very much. So with that uh we are adjourned until May 4th whatever whatever date that is May 4th.

Saturday Saturday Awards Lake Park noon right? Okay. And where can we park? Where did you say we can park? Okay. Okay. Thanks.