City Council - Regular Meeting

432. We're gonna convene the urban renewal meeting for 02/04/2026. We're calling this meeting to order. Is there any citizen input or community announcements? Anything online, ma'am?

Can you hold on just one moment? Sure. We need some Jeopardy music now. Are we good now? Yep. Okay. Anything online for testimony or, comments? Nope. Okay. Item on the next item agenda is the consent agenda.

Commissioner Waterman.

I approve the consent agenda that includes the minutes from 12/03/2025 urban agency. I'll second that.

Okay. It's been moved by commissioner Waterman, second by commissioner Stearns to approve the consent agenda that includes the minutes from the 12/03/2025 urban renewal agency meeting. All those in favor? Aye. +1, 2340. Oh, Jason? Can you

hear it?

I said I.

Okay. Thank you. 50. Sorry. I didn't hear you. Okay. 50. Thank you. Alright. Next item on the agenda is the old business. Consider options to deactivate the Canby Urban Renewal Agency. I'm going to kick this over to the Urban Renewal Agency director, Randy.

Thank you, chair Hinsley, commissioners.

I

think I got that right tonight. Appreciate the hour here today, to discuss, the end of the road. It's been twenty five plus years, and I think you all can be very proud of, the tax increment and the projects, the partnerships with our, our neighboring taxing districts, throughout that journey. A lot of good increment has come from that. And tonight, you're gonna hear a lot of different adjectives like deactivating or sunsetting or terminating, and those are nuanced terms.

And we have legal counsel here with us and miss Stickel, to help walk us through in a slide deck to answer any of your questions about next steps. You are a recommending body, I'm told. So the city council, when you take this hat off and put on your council hat an hour later tonight, actually February 11, February 18, you will be by ordinance making the decisions on the the choices on how to move forward with our next step. A very critical and important piece to that is a letter to the county's assessor's office, which I have drafted or I'm sorry, miss Stickel has drafted, and I will sign. This is well, this will be sent out after you make your decision.

This gets the process rolling so that the as you see when you on page five ten of your staff report, all of these revised dollar estimates that get returned to the taxing authorities, they have changed since the last time you saw these numbers by approximately a 100,000 for each the city of Canby and the Canby Fire District to the better. So in total, about looks like 4,600,000.0, and we'll get into that later as well. So that's a 50,000 foot view. Jamie and Emily have done a tremendous amount of work to tee this up, this conversation, and then please feel free as as normal, ask questions as they walk through the the slide deck. Anything else before you begin?

K.

K. Jamie. Thank you.

Great. Thank you, Maya. So tonight, we're gonna talk about the the closure of the urban renewal district. And as Randy said previously, there's lots of language that goes into this, and and it does mean different things. And so the first thing that we're gonna do and and part of this was also in the staff report, but we are going to talk about

my. Here we go.

Just some of the defined terms just to make sure that we're laying the groundwork, that everybody has good standing for what we're talking about. And if just especially for our commissioners, we've got them up there on the big screen, but we also have this small TV up here if that's easier to read. And so agency is the the city's urban renewal agency, and it's the governing body which oversees the use of the tax increment financing for projects as defined in the urban renewal plan, which brings us to the plan. The plan is what governs the urban renewal activities in the urban renewal area, also known as a district. So the district and area, those words are interchangeable, and it really is the geographic location declared to be blighted and covered by the plan.

In this situation, it's where properties are subject to the plan's funding mix mechanism, which is the tax increment financing. Tax increment financing is the funding mechanism used by local governments for urban renewal projects used to encourage redevelopment and leverage private investment in blighted areas. And then a couple of the terms, and this is you definitely saw this in the staff report, but also to kind of set the terms, terminate the plan. So that is for terminating the plan, which would leave the district or which would leave the urban renewal agency intact. Deactivate the urban renewal agency.

It's the process for deactivating the urban renewal agency, which has the effect of also terminating the plan. Or stopping tax increment revenue collections, and that's no longer collecting tax increment revenue. It's not the same as deactivating their urban renewal agency or terminating the plan, spending all the money in the special fund, or distributing any or distributing any remaining funds in the special fund. So, while we were queuing this up, we just wanted to make sure that we kind of laid the groundwork just because some of these are sometimes interchangeable, but not always. I also wanted to include a slide of the urban renewal district that was also featured in your packet.

The blue is the urban renewal District, and and, you know, just as as a refresher, some have been commissioners for a long time. Some of you are newer, so it's really just to, again, lay the groundwork. And we wanted to talk a little bit about the projects that were funded by urban renewal. And so, you know, I I'm not gonna hit all of these, but 1st Avenue development, this building that we're in today, industrial park development like Sequoia Parkway, that used to be a road to nowhere, and then it was a bridge to nowhere, and then all of a sudden we see development. So so projects in the industrial park, the Quiet Zone, partnership with the Canby Fire District, with projects, a couple projects with them, beautification and marketing, which you can see around town with banners and those kinds of things.

And and why the projects are important is because these projects help to make Canby what it is today or have helped to make Canby what it is today. And it really helps to then increase investment, private investment. It helps to attract business, attract attention, attract people who wanna come and live here and and spend money. And so all of these projects, whether they're small or big, whether, you know, you agreed with all of it or some in part, they all helped to make Canby the special place that it is today. I had a slide of just some of the pictures.

You know, I I remember when Sequoia Parkway was put in and and that bridge and not fully understanding what it could be and now to see the development that's there. We have Lampro Steel, Sequoia Logistics, American Steel across the street. It's really helped to develop that industrial park and make a connection to the South End of Of Canby, which has continued to grow in and of itself. I know the city administrator, noted these numbers, but I wanted to include this in the slide. And so these are the estimates that the taxing districts will receive once the tax increment revenue is no longer being collected.

So this is the money that is currently being used towards urban renewal. So in addition to whatever taxes that were frozen in the beginning that each one of these districts receives, they will then include an additional for the the city of Canby, for instance, $1,148,000. This number is based off of this current fiscal year, so it will go up, whether it's a little bit like or or a lot like we saw this past year. That that is to be seen, but this has increased since the, October presentation that we did for you all. We wanted to include a a sign a slide rather that talks about consideration for the future.

You know, there has been some discussion about what the future of urban renewal looks like in Canby. And the the options that we're gonna lay out for you today outline the ways to whether it's deactivate an agency or or terminate the plan. But but if there is consideration in the future, we also wanted to capture that there has been conversation about that, whether that's in this room or, for instance, you know, the the biggest circle on that page, that's kind of where the industrial park ends and where it it's anticipated that future industrial development will occur, especially as we look towards the urban growth boundary expansion. Some of the other areas could be highway commercial, hotel development, sports field or sports complex, or more. You know, these are just the things that a couple of things that I've heard.

But when the original 1999 plan came together, there was a task force that worked on it that that featured people from the chamber of commerce. And, you know, there was a downtown business group at the time. The fire district was involved. The school district was involved. And so it was a comprehensive plan that was put together with input from from lots of people with varying backgrounds and varying ideas on how candy was to grow, but acknowledged that we wanted to be thoughtful and to queue up that growth for the future.

So now I'm gonna go through the the three options that were listed in the staff report. And, you know, the more that we learn about urban renewal, the more options there are to consider. So we have the three options for the first one is deactivate the urban renewal agency. And so we wanted to do, you know, a flowchart of sorts that really just laid out step by step. So pay the last debt payment on 06/01/2026.

The city council can deactivate via ordinance. Deactivating the urban renewal agency, it terminates the plan, and it stops the collection of tax increment revenue. And I'm gonna stop right here to make sure that I note that all of these options, help the city keep the, promise that we made to the taxing districts that we are returning that tax revenue to the tax rules. So whether it's this choice or one of the others, it all helps to then bring those taxing districts back up to what their collection would be had there not been urban renewal. Although, you know, whether that all of that investment would have happened is is unclear.

Urban renewal will need to be reactivated, and a new urban renewal plan must be adopted by council. And then the urban renewal agency would send the the county any unspent unspent urban renewal funds to disperse to the junior taxing districts. So this is the the the first step, and, I'll lay out the three options, and then we can go back through and and discuss individual points. The second one is terminate the plan. So there are actually two ways that you can kick this off.

The urban renewal agency can terminate the plan via resolution, or the urban renewal agency could recommend to city council to terminate the plan. One of the things and and I have this on another slide, but I'll I'll just say it since we're on this slide. One of the things that, in our my conversation with Emily was, you know, is there a better way to do this or or a recommended way? And one of the recommend recommendations was that since the urban renewal, plan and the urban renewal agency were established by city council ordinance, that the most effective way would be then if you were to terminate the plan to do so by city council ordinance so that you're matching the way that it was made. And those ordinances were, you know, they were adopted in 1999.

It's, 10/31 and October on our ordinance. So we would, I think, essentially repeal those, should you go this route. The urban renewal agency, cannot act until a new plan is adopted by council. Terminating the plan stops the collection of tax increment revenue. So, again, that means that that money would be returned to the taxing districts. And then urban renewal agency must send the county any unspent funds to disperse to the junior taxing districts. Finally, the stop collecting tax increment revenues but leave the plan intact. So you would alert the county of the intention to stop collecting collecting tax increment revenue early. Flip this. Oh, thank you. Thank you. Thank you

very much.

Sorry. Alert the county to of its intention to stop collecting tax increment revenue early, pay that last debt payment on 06/01/2026, continue to implement the plan using tax increment revenues already collected, and then projects can continue until the plan's projects are completed or until the plan is terminated. So we included a recommendation, and and these are all good options to consider. Staff included a rep recommendation in in the staff report like we do with all of our staff reports. And the recommendation is that city staff recommends the urban renewal age agency issue a recommendation to the city council to terminate the urban renewal plan.

The reason for this recommendation is for the following, the current long term planning or long range planning that is that is happening currently about the urban growth boundary expansion. You know, while we talk about what the future could look like, there are also considerations about how we fund what the future could look like. Ongoing discussions regarding potential projects, and I noted that earlier on a slide. So hotel, highway commercial, industrial infrastructure, sports field complex, and more. The understanding that the development of a new urban renewal plan will establish goals, projects, priorities, and identify the boundaries for a new urban renewal plan.

And so very basically, a new plan equals a new district. And and I wanna make sure that that's clear because we've had some questions around that, of what does that look like if we were to terminate the plan? Does then the urban renewal boundaries stay the same? And the answer is no. You would identify new boundaries.

They might look similar. They could look completely different, but a new plan equals a new district. The requirements for public notice and public testimony, which are outlined in the ORS, as well as the requirement to forward the plan and report to the planning commission and taxing districts affected by the new plan, and and the, they also have forty five days to review and submit input. And that goes back to that, you know, what I noted before, the 1999 plan had had public input. The city doesn't work as effectively as it could if it works in a silo.

But working with other agencies, other partners, people who are are working on similar or complementary efforts, it you want that sort of input and and public notice, public testimony, and then specifically with our partners at the taxing districts. It's like my point of saying, you know, we want that money to go back to the taxing districts. It's it's because we wanna be good partners, and we want their input. And then finally, that recommended best practice to follow the process originally used. So since the urban renewal plan and the urban renewal agency were adopted by, ordinance ten thirty one and ten thirty two respectively, then, we would recommend that the council terminate the urban renewal plan in the same manner.

And I've got just one point on the recommendation to add. So you can't deactivate the agency until the agency's debt under the current renewal plan is fully repaid. And I think the schedule for making that last payment is June 30 of this year.

Was it thirtieth?

I thought was June 1.

June 1.

It's in June at some point.

Mhmm.

So if you wanna terminate the agency, that termination won't be effective until that date. So if if the commission's yes. If the commission's goals are to stop collecting collecting tax increment revenue now if we are still collecting and then to disperse any remaining funds to the junior taxing districts, the fastest way to do it is by terminating the plan.

K.

And we have met with the, this was in the staff report as well, but we met with Clackamas County assessor's office, to talk through these steps and make sure we're going in the right direction. I know that we also have been, you know, communicating with the agency that, as we move forward, we'll need to have a letter that goes to Clackamas County, and and they've been extremely, helpful. I we sent a draft, and and, you know, you might be shocked, but it came back that maybe I used too many words. So they helped to kind of give a template and say, this is how we can move this forward. This is really all that we need, and and they wanna make sure that we're giving them what they need so that it can close on time so that we're able to fulfill our our promises in the community. Can

we terminate the plan so that we can do the taxing districts sooner and then later terminate the agency? Certainly. So you could you could I would like to I would like to see us deactivate the agency for a couple of reasons. I mean, it's no secret that I don't like urban renewal, so I don't even have to go there. Everybody knows that.

But if if this body or whatever configuration of this body in the future would decide to enact a new urban renewal agency, I would like a much more public process, much more transparency in reactivating it, which would have to then and if we deactivated the agency, they would have to reactivate the agency. And perhaps it wouldn't be the city council like it is now. Oregon City's urban renewal agency are different people. Right. So I I would like more discussion, more transparency, more robust discussion about how that agency would look in the future if we were to go that direction.

So I am for deactivating the agency, but I'm also for getting those tax increments back to the junior taxing agencies as fast as possible. So can we do this in a two step process?

Absolutely. So you can terminate the plan by resolution or by ordinance. And then at a later date, you can once the debts all paid off, you can terminate the agency itself. And that's a you know, I was I'm I'm glad you explained that because that's a that makes a lot of sense to me, that policy objective, you know, going through the extra step of reactivating the agency would require extra process and extra thought. Because from a staff level, my thought was, why not just terminate the plan and leave the agency alone because it's one less step you have to take right now. But I'm glad you explained that to me because that makes a lot of sense.

Thank you.

I was also gonna say and and, you know, it would be dependent on let's say we terminated the plan, the agency goes dormant, then either it's completely terminated or deactivated, or there's the public process to then include a whether it's a a completely public board or, you know, I'm thinking about the meeting that's gonna happen at the city council tonight where the budget committee is our city council and people from the community where it's it's a good mix, and and that doesn't have to be decided today. But, also, you know, I think that the and and not a knock to any legalese, but there's also there's always, rules outlined in in the ORS and those kinds of things. But, also, there's being good partners and good neighbors. And, tonight, at the city council meeting, the city council, with their hats on, is gonna hear about a noise variance. And one of the things that you'll likely hear about is that in addition to that noise variance, which is which is being brought forward by the city, we held a neighborhood meeting, and we invited the neighbors to come out.

That's not required. That's in fact you know, it it might have even been not the best idea. Right? You're saying, come come and yell at us two nights in a row or something. But what we did is we had a neighborhood meeting so we could make sure that we we did better than just what was required and that we engaged the community better.

And I think that can be, especially, as we grow, we get better at identifying ways that we can bring people of all different backgrounds in or voices from all different agencies, whatever that looks like. And so, you know, just something that I wanna put out there, so that it makes the official record is that, you know, it it it doesn't have to be all or nothing. It doesn't have to be city council or just a community group, but it could be that we identify exactly what we want an urban renewal agency to look like, and we spend time doing that as you know, with city council hats on. And then either you let it stay dormant or you terminate or deactivate fully, or if there was a plan or we were working towards a plan, that then that's where that community involvement comes. And the development of a plan doesn't happen in a silo, and it doesn't happen upstairs in my office or in Randy's office with two people and, you know, this is what we think.

It's really based on the the kinds of projects we hear about in the community, whether that's, you know, public comment here. We've heard about with, you know, Don Hardy and his planning team with the comprehensive plan efforts. And then in the community work that that we all do, everybody here looking at at this agency has different ways of being engaged in the community. And I think that, you know, you all do a very good job of hearing voices of lots of different people. And so helping to identify what exactly this plan needs to be, it should be more engaging and and even more engaging than the 99 plan, which I think they did a pretty good job of of having lots of different groups involved in the creation of that plan through that task force.

And the plan formation process required by law already has, like, as a base level, a pretty significant forces the city to engage with the community at a pretty significant level. Public hearings, conferring with taxing districts that would be impacted by the implementation of a plan. And, of course, the council is able to add more process to that base level process as it wants to.

Yeah. I think that if I I still believe we should deactivate the agency. And if in the future, it's decided we want another urban mill, we reactivate with a new agency. And I would like to see it. I'm saying it for the record. If that were to be the case, I would like it to be modeled more after the budget committee where it is the council plus an equal number of citizens. So it's a larger committee, a larger larger number of voices at the table, and not just us switching hats.

Certainly.

So so that's my And I'm looking to see if nope. Commissioner Patton does not have his hand up. So commissioner Davis, I have to turn behind me. My computer's dead.

Okay. Staff, Jamie and, Emily and and Randy, thank you for, the work you've done on this, and, thank you for the way it's laid out as well. I agree with the recommendation by staff but also to include the deactivation of the agency because one way or another, we do get public input, but by deactivating, it's clean and we start all over again Mhmm. And by having and go through the rules for creating a new plan. So I would like to see a sleeve here worth of recommendation, follow staff's recommendation, and add in the deactivation of the plan.

Commissioner Valenada.

I I'd like to echo that. Again, you guys have done great on all of this, but I I believe deactivating it's gonna be the best best course of action. And I do agree with chair Hensley that an equal number of citizens with counsel would be very beneficial. It's it's not us being more than them. It they're gonna have a better input, and we can have our input in it as well.

I'll just go around the table. Commissioner Waterman, do you have anything to weigh in?

Don't mind.

Oh, yeah. Hit your mic.

That I think definitely more citizen input is good. So I think I would go along with that same plan.

Okay. Commissioner Stern, do have anything?

I think it's good what what we're proposing to do, obviously, and let's kill the old one, then we'll talk about what's the new ones looks like after that time. It's my it's my opinion on the subject. So

Okay. So are you supporting in the staff recommendation and deactivation? Yeah.

That's

Later a later deactivation. But Yeah. Okay. Commissioner Patton, I see your hand up.

Yes. I also am for the staff recommendation. I I will say that it is all well and good for us to it is fine for us to express our interest in what will be done in the future, but the fact of the matter is is once this is closed, then that is that. These recommendations will get folded into the to to the analyst of history, and it will be

for

future councils to make that decision. So there is there is that aspect of it. I am for that is not to say I'm not for a more robust process and more people involved as long as that group that larger group is representative of all the voices that make up our community. I feel that at times, some of these groups that are put together are very one-sided for members of our community. And if we really wanna hear the voices of the community, we need to make a concerted effort to ensure that we're hearing from all of those people and not just those people who were most most verbose and connected with certain people in in the system.

I will ask one question. Several meetings ago, and I spent some time trying to find this list of projects and was unable to. We had agreed on completing a certain number of projects like the logging road connection down to 99 E, which I believe has been completed. But there were some other projects on that list that was decided that we would tackle before completely closing things down with what tax increment was still in the system. Have all of those projects that we agreed upon been completed?

The, the project that has not been completed is the North, let me make sure I'm saying this right, North Fir Street and Northwest 2nd. That project is underway with the engineers. It came before you, I believe, in December. I was out of the office at that time. So it came before you in December.

That is moving forward. And one of the questions that we clarified with the the county assessor's office was, you know, does that mean that that full project has to be completed by June 30 year? And what, Clackamas County Assessor's Office explained was that, that project would be able to be finished, then the disbursement to the taxing districts would occur. So she said that there are times that the disbursement, you know, it doesn't necessarily happen July 1. It could happen months later, depending on when that final project and I think that is tied to the fact that, when an urban renewal agency closes, the the you know, they use certain terminologies, the facilities, but essentially the projects, the information, all all of the things that go into the urban renewal, itself is then transferred over to the municipality, and so it that last piece of the the funding piece being dispersed back to the taxing districts, including the municipality, happens, once it's all finished, it is not uncommon for that to happen at a later date than July 1.

I'm just gonna cut in real fast.

Do we know what monies are being spent on that project? Are we using urban renewal funds for that project?

Yes.

Mhmm. Okay. So don't terminate the plan until you're done spending money of out of the urban renewal agency. So if you terminate the plan, then you can't spend any money on any urban renewal projects. Jamie, do we Okay.

That's that's that's what I was worried about because we're

moving No.

That's new information. We'll have to explain that. That's not what that's what Jamie just said.

One at

a In time contrary to what Jamie

I think I think the taxing district was looking at or I'm sorry. I think the county may have been looking at it from a purely timing standpoint of when in the county's tax process they're able to make the disbursements. But, I mean, the the rule with urban renewal is that you have an agency. It has to adopt a plan. It can only act in accordance in accordance with the plan. It can only perform projects that are in the plan. It can only spend money authorized and provided for in the plan. If the plan goes away, you can't spend the money because there's no plan to govern how the money is spent.

So where are we

And that's No.

On the timeline of those projects.

It's not right. We'll check.

We'll yeah. We'll offline it. That's that's new information tonight. But

Okay. Well Did you have my

it isn't necessary isn't necessarily new information because when I was reading through the various recommendations

Yeah.

The reason I brought this up is because based on the ordinance recommendation, it seemed very clear that if the plan was closed, then there could be no more money spent. And so it it that's why when people started saying to move forward with closing it with with closing the plan, that that raised alarm bells to me because then it would mean that whatever projects we may be in the process of working on would then not be funded. So that that's why I brought this up. What if we did what I that is the read that I got from that information that was that was presented to us.

What if we just transfer the money to the general fund for the project?

Can that be done, Emily?

I don't know. I can ask.

Where

are we

think in the timeline

We haven't

even started. When checks would be cut for these projects.

This puts us out another year or two, this information, to shut it down.

Well, we were told that we could shut it down as soon as the Mhmm. Debt service was done in June. So this does put a different spin on things. I see you assess that. Just a second. Commissioner had concerns.

Could I get clarification from Jamie? What did the tax assessor tell you?

Well, it was it was my understanding that it was my understanding that the project we could finish out the project that was underway and that once that project was done, then the leftover money in the special fund would then be dispersed.

And and Is it possible that the staff person you're talking to was just thinking about stopping collecting tax increment revenue. Because if you you can tell the county we're done collecting tax and the permanent revenue and leave the plan and the agency in place. And what that would mean is that you're not collecting any more revenue, but the plan is still there so you can spend the revenue you have collected up until that point.

I think I think, like Randy said, maybe we need some clarification on that and that that clarify you would said you would look into it and we'll talk with the county assessor's office as well just to make sure that we have a very clear, concise, and direct answer on that question. So because I I I just wanna make sure that that I'm clear and and that we're not trying to mislead or or anything. You know? It's not this is not that. We're just trying to present the information. It seems like we maybe heard it differently and and need to clarify. And, you know, considering also what councilor or commissioner Patton's comments of of making sure that that if we were to terminate the plan, that we're able to still move forward with finishing that project, we can clarify with the count

credit We could be looking at

a three step process. Stop collecting, then terminate the plan, then deactivate. We could be doing all three potentially.

Yeah. If you don't want to bring any more rent tax tax revenue and you're you just want to finish out that last project based on the revenue you currently have in your special fund, then I would say that the commission tonight can direct staff to tell the county to stop collecting tax and print revenue, and that'll handle that part. The plan would stay intact so that you're able to spend money through the plan on that last project. And then once that money is done, you can terminate the plan.

Okay. Mister Stearns?

Oh, I kinda my thought kinda go along with what you were saying, Emily, that we can the purpose of stopping the plan is to stop getting the money out of the return the money back to the the junior districts. So I think we can accomplish that without having the agency closed right away, and then we can wait till the checking account's empty or the or the or the project's done, I guess, to to do the final closing. So I think that would be a good a good issue. One thing I just question and and I think it was brought up earlier is whether or not the ATD can transfer funds directly to the city for the purpose of finishing a project so that that could be Mhmm.

Sort of

close out that way.

Yeah. That's a good question. I'll look into that with staff.

Thank you. Commissioner Patton, you still have your hand raised. Did you have more?

Yes. I did. So to go along with what I was saying earlier, I am not for even if even if we are allowed to transfer transfer money from the urban renewal district into the general fund Yeah. I am not interested in doing that. And this is the reason why.

Many people in this community have tried to give for the urban renewal district a black eye, and I want to do everything in my power to ensure that the the the use of urban renewal in the city is as is as little tarnished as it possibly can be. The last thing I want is for it to come up in years from now to say, oh, look. The city pulled a switcheroo and took money out of the Urban renewal district and moved it to the general fund to try and save some money and try and, you know, move shells around. So therefore, I am not for moving that money to finish that project into the general fund. Now what I would be for is saying, okay.

We're making it very clear that we're gonna close this whole thing down, figure out what the remaining cost of that particular project is, figure out what a contingency amount would be of a certain percentage over the cost that is currently budgeted, and then say, once we have that much money in the urban renewal bank, we'll say, then we will come forward with a ordinance or whatever to stop collecting funds into the into the into that bank account, and then that money can go back to the junior taxing districts. Once the project is complete, based on what I've heard from all of this and what I've read, if there is any money left over in that account once that project is done as part of the contingency, once it's finally closed, that money would go back to the county, and then the county would spread that out over the junior taxing districts at the rate they would have normally gotten it. So that way everything is above board, nice and clean, all can be tracked. That is what I am advocating for.

Anyone else on the commission have comments before I call a couple of citizen comments? Commissioner Sterns.

My understanding is that the city will be the successor to anything that the agency does anyway. Correct?

Yes. That's right. So all contracts, liabilities flow to yeah. But the bank account doesn't go to the city. Okay. Once the plan's terminated, you can think of the bank account

just liability.

County goes in, grabs everything out of the bank account. There will be no URA funds to spend once you terminate the plan.

Okay. So you only you can only give them the viability on the

It's the short end of the legal stick.

Yes. Okay.

Alright. Do you have a couple of I do have

a couple

public testimony comment cards. The first one that came in, just gonna go in the order that they came in. We have Steve Thurman, and we're using this table tonight.

Thank you for hearing me tonight. My name is Steve Thurman. I'm, on the board of directors for Canby Fire Districts and have been for the lower 12. This is kind of a momentous occasion for us because this is something that we plan on and work with in order to close out this district, and I can't tell you how appreciative of staff for their recommendation. One thing I would like to remind the district of is that we actually, in order to close this plant, this agency expeditiously, was that we gave up well over a million dollars of money that was promised to us in the plan to get this out of the way.

So this is all the other thing I would like to remind you of is this needs to be taken care of fairly expeditiously because this is the month that we have to close out the district if we're to receive any kind of tax revenues from in in November. And so I would like to encourage you to to completely terminate the district, and as as we've worked with you before, we we appreciate the way you worked with us through this because you you made some compromises too. And so does anybody have any questions for me at all as part of the junior district?

That's not a thing here.

Thanks. Okay. All set.

Did did did Jason say something?

I thought I heard something on

the computer.

Okay. Okay. Thank you. Alright.

Thank you, mister Thurman.

Thanks, Steve.

Thank you. Thank you.

Chief Dale.

Thank you, chair URA. Matt Dale, Canby Fire District fire chief. I wanna recognize the work that the city council, the urban renewal agency has put forward in bringing forward the meeting the goals of the urban renewal district over the last twenty five years, bringing family wage jobs into Canby and growing Canby in a in a a manner that's controlled and well thought out. This is, as director Thurman pointed out, a momentous occasion for the fire district, to move forward with the the funding that was dedicated to the fire district for fire protection, which are the same as I wanna recognize the same constituents that that we all serve. The point I wanna make is that it is, my understanding, the fire district's understanding, that any projects that were made under the URA, not new projects, Any projects that were current with funding transfers to the, city council when the urban renewal district would be terminated, and those projects continue until finished.

That is it. Appreciate your time. Thank you for allowing me to speak. Alright.

Thank you, chief. Okay. So, there isn't an actual resolution or anything to vote on here, so I guess I would like a little guidance on what the next steps are. Commissioner Waterman. If

I can I bring up another question? Sure. Okay. So one thing that we haven't talked about and I have I'm not this project that we're talking about that's the 1st Street, etcetera, it's the last project.

Mhmm.

Is there any reason that we couldn't cancel that project? The last project that over twenty five years, like, do we have to do that project right now and then return the money to the faculty districts to be able to meet the needs?

Fair question.

I suppose we could, but there's there's been a lot of talk about that project. It's an important project. It's a safety project. We've actually had a person break their shoulder because that project wasn't done. So I'm thinking that maybe we should probably get the project done.

Because if that one project pushes us out for another year, then Mhmm. We're not gonna be able to meet

the needs.

Yeah.

Or that I can say that if we can explore ways of transferring the project to the city itself, you know, accomplish that, have it however that works out, you know. So it it could I know this money's already been spent correctly on some engineering Mhmm. On the on that project. And so it's been started, but maybe you guys can think about if there's a way of just ending the

Mhmm.

Agency and having if there's a functional way of transferring the money to

the to To the streets fund.

To the streets funds or something to to complete it.

Yeah. I heard commissioner Patton's concern on that. It would have to be there would have to be, for me, some guarantee that it would be spent on said project to do that. Just second, commissioner any us, I saw commissioner Patton's hand up on the screen.

Yeah. So I guess my question is, what what I think we need to do is, in light of in light of this, is figure out how much money is in the bank for the urban Renewal District currently and how and and where that money lines up with the cost of this particular project. Because it could be that there's enough tax increment built up in that account right now to cover this project with a contingency. And if that's the case, then we can go forward with closing things with with starting the process of closing things down and saying that starting x day, we are no longer gonna take tax increment, which from what I understand of all of this means that that tax increment will start to go towards the junior taxing districts. I think we need to die like, so I need think we need to identify how much money is in that account.

Do we have enough money to cover this project? And if not, how much more money would need to be put in in order to meet the project cost and contingency? And then that would set our date for when it would close. I'm not for switching this over

to the city.

We we just went through a budget situation where we do not have the money to fund this project. The reason this project was coming out of urban renewal was because that is where the funding was for such a project. And if memory serves me correctly, this project has been on the urban renewal plate for some time. It is not our fault nor is it the urban renewal district's fault that it has taken this long to get this project done. And then the people who will benefit from this project, it is not for them to suffer because of these delays.

So that is why I'm for my recommendation of figuring out how much money we need to fund this project and if we can and then use that to figure out what the contingency is to then set the date of when the money can stop being collected for that account towards this project and send it back to the taxing districts.

Good. Commissioner Davis, you want something?

Thank you. So, Emily, where are we at? Do my understanding is this group has to make a recommendation back to the city council. Correct?

Yeah. And that's that's gonna be my recommendation is make recommendation to the city council about whether to close and in what way. And then based on that recommendation, we can get something on the schedule for the council meeting next week. Staff can spend that time looking up the answers to the questions that have been raised and then make a recommendation on whatever's on the agenda for next week based on that information.

Okay. Jamie. Oops. Jamie. So not to completely throw a wrench, but I'm listening, you know, to the agency and then also to the fire district.

And and, again, I I cannot express enough of wanting to make sure that we're holding true to our promise. But maybe it's that the recommendation from the Urban Renewal Agency tonight is to instruct staff to let these the Clackamas County assessor's office know the letter that we intend to pay our last debt payment June 1 and begin that process because that way then we can look into those questions around, does the plan need to be in place? If the plan is still in place, but we're not collecting money, then that money goes back to our taxing districts. And so that way, it gets our first step. Any way that we we slice it as far as these recommendations go, there still needs to be a letter that's sent to Clackamas County assessor's office indicating that we're gonna stop collecting the the tax increment financing.

So I I see that as being a very good first step as we navigate some of these more, you know, interesting questions that have come up. And and I think I said this when we started, the the more we dig into this, the more questions that arise, and we're all learning a lot together. But by maybe my by maybe recommending or issuing a recommendation to staff to start with that process, we're sure that we're alerting the Clackamas County assessor's office. And and in our follow-up call with her, Dina is her name, she was saying that, actually, the letter has to go by the March. So we do have some wiggle room, but they would like it in February.

February would be great or as soon as possible. So by instructing staff to take that first step, we stop collecting. We make good on that promise. We navigate what those rest of the questions so that we're not necessarily moving money from urban renewal to city council and and the optics on that or that we're not, putting ourselves into a corner of saying it's the money all has to be spent by the state. It that allows us to come back with some more, answers to those questions, and whatever questions were to arise and ensures that that first step on making good on our promise and and stopping the tax increment revenue collection, starts effective July 1.

And if I could just tail on that. So if you wanna read more about what that process looks like and the effect that it'll have on the plan, etcetera, That's, number three on page four of your packet. And we're running short on time, so I'm not gonna talk about it. But please look at

we We are coming up on nine, 07:00 pretty quickly. Do we, commissioner, I'm gonna ask my colleagues here. I see your hand, and I see Jason's as well, but I wanna throw out a question for you guys to noodle. Are we prepared to make a recommendation tonight, or do we want some more of these answers and perhaps have another urban renewal meeting prior to the council meeting next week or next in the next meeting to make that recommendation when we have these answers. Mhmm. Councilor commissioner Maldonado.

One of

those hats.

I well,

to answer that question completely, I would like to know. So we can essentially start start the process of killing it off by sending out the letter. Mhmm. But in the same sense, we need to get we do need to get more information on if this is gonna be a route we're able to take.

No. You can you can always stop collecting tax increment revenue whenever you want to. You have to stop collecting tax increment revenue when you reach your maximum indebtedness under

the But what I mean is our we're sending out this letter of intent isn't going to hurt anything.

It has to happen

Well, I think one of commissioner sorry to cut you off, but just keeping in mind, I think one of commissioner Patton's concerns was do we have enough money in the bank right now to fund that last project?

And that's what I'm that's

what I'm putting out there.

If we

put this letter of intent out right now and still search that out, can we change our mind at a later date if we have to? Can we change or how we're how we're going about it?

I so I I don't know for sure. I would not tell the county to stop collecting tax increment value for the URA until you know that you don't want to stop you want to stop doing that.

Okay.

I wouldn't say, hey. Could you start the process for this? We might walk it back. I I don't know if that would work with the county's process. I'm skeptical that it would.

Yeah. That that's why I was wondering if we wanna wait off on sending that letter. Commissioner Waterman or sorry. With with Pavin and then One one second. Sorry. Finish up and then

Jamie had had something

to say.

I wanted

to hear from her.

Okay. I was just gonna sorry. My point and it somewhat disagrees, and I I'm not seeking to disagree with our attorney. Obviously, we look to the attorneys for the for our answers. I just was gonna say that, like, with this letter, it says to terminate the collection of tax increment revenues for this plan effective July 1.

So it's not stopping now. It still allows us to pay off that last debt payment June 1. It it stops collecting the revenues in the new fiscal year, returns it to the tax rules for our taxing districts, and then, you know, the sequence of when the plan is terminated and the agency is either deactivated or terminated or or however about that is, that those those questions but regardless, it is my understanding that the agency would like to term you know, stop taking those tax increment revenues effective July 1. So in my mind, especially in light of more questions, I I was gonna recommend issuing a letter that indicates that as we navigate those other questions. But if if that is not sequenced in the right way, then obviously,

I defer to Here's the one other thing that you can do just from a process standpoint so you don't have to keep scheduling meetings after meetings. The URA and the city council can sit as simultaneously as both bodies. So you don't have to have another meeting to officially issue a recommendation to the council. You can sit as both bodies and adopt a resolution, for example, at a properly noticed public meeting. So if the concern is we're gonna have one more step, which before getting to actually doing something, just know that we can condense that.

Similar to the county commission when they are the housing authority, they just have the urban renewal portion on

the agenda. As the local contracting board

Okay.

As well as the council.

Okay. Okay. Commissioner Patton and commissioner Davis.

Thank you, Jamie. Thank you, Emily.

Yeah. So I will just say that if the decision tonight is to move forward with this letter, making it clear to the county that we are going to stop collecting tax increment in in June or July 1 or whatever, and there is not enough money in that account to pay for this project, I will be very interested and be very skeptical of where that money comes from to finish that project out of the general fund considering what we are going to see in our upcoming mid year budget review. It's sink or swim time, folks. And so before we move forward with this, you better think through it real carefully because we can end ourselves up with a project that's half done and not money to finish it. So just think about that.

Thank you.

K. Commissioner Davis?

Did you have a question or a statement, Randy?

I said we could use the week.

Okay. Just to bring this to a close, I agree with the staff recommendation on terminating the agency. However, we have some questions that are unanswered at this point. I would go along with the recommendation that we move forward, sending the letter to the county, as written in front of us and to make that recommend and then secondarily would may be the after the the intent would be to terminate the urban renewal agency. Mhmm. And then once we get the questions answered in regards to the financing side of things that we brought up tonight at a later meeting then, totally what's that other word?

Put a bow

on it. Deactivate?

Put a

bow on it and deactivate the agency.

Yeah. Deactivate the agency. Okay. That would be my recommendation, for staff.

Okay. And, commissioner Stearns, and then we need to come to a consensus here.

The, I like I say, I I totally agree.

I actually was making that in a form of a motion.

That was a motion. Okay. Do we have a second?

Second.

Okay. Now discussion. Can you repeat the

the actual motion again? I think I got the gist of it, but just to make sure we're

Who is documenting the motions? Can I send the letter, support staff recommendation,

and then the follow on that came up, which is to end the deactivate deactivate the agency? That's correct.

Three different Three step process.

Three step. Okay. I agree with that three step process. I think that we do need to terminate the collection of property tax for the district. We're all here. If we vote for the project, we all are on the city council. I think it would be completely dishonorable for us to say we will do the project, but if money ran out, we wouldn't afterwards. I think it'd be silly. There's nobody else voting for this project other than those who are voting for the district to to to close. And so if there's like a couple, you know, a little bit of money left over, then I I I think we could work can be mad enough to have the city run anything extra. And so I I agree with the motion.

Okay. So the motion is made by commissioner Davis and seconded by commissioner Maldonado to, all dissemination a three step process. All those in favor?

Aye. Aye.

Pat? Aye.

Okay.

Thank you.

Motion six zero. Okay. Before we close out, I'm going to read this, at the council meeting. But since we have so many folks here from the fire district, and I don't think they're gonna wanna watch us for another hour, so I wanna say this. I'm gonna end up saying it twice because I wanna say it to their faces.

But in the face of yesterday's industrial explosion, we witnessed the true strength of our community. We are truly grateful for our community and the regional partners, Camby Fire, TV FNR, Clackamas Fire, Aurora Fire, Kapoose Fire, Camby Police, Camby Utility, Camby School District, the city of Canby with the Public Works, Jamie, and and Canby Area Transit, Clackamas County Emergency Management, CECOM, Northwest Natural Gas, American Red Cross, Clackamas County Building Department, and the Kitty Hawk owner management and building equipment man manufacturer. Your coordination and commitment to this community made a real difference when it mattered most. This is the best example of the Camby way, and I thank you all.

Thank you, Jennifer.

And with that, I'll take a motion to adjourn. We have one minute till the next meeting. Alright. It's an undebatable motion. So we are adjourned.

We'll see you in ninety seconds. Good evening, Camby. Welcome to the February 4 city council regular meeting. Please rise for the invocation of pledge allegiance. Dear heavenly father, I wanna thank you for this community, all of us regional partners.

We've had a really rough couple days here, and it's really nice to see how everyone has come together in a time of trouble, have have everybody's back. You've blessed this community with some great first responders and community volunteers, city staff, and we're all working together is what makes this community work, and we are grateful. I am very grateful. Thank you. Please keep our first responders safe and get them home each night and ask all of these things in your precious name.

Amen. Amen.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of The United States Of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you all. Alright. I'll call on the recorders for a roll call.

Councilor Patton. Present. Online. Councilor Maldonado. Present. Councilor Davis. Present. Councilor Stearns. Present. Councilor Waterman.

Present.

And council president Hensley.

Present. Thank you, Myra. Next, we have Rand. Do you have a staff introduction for us?

I think we do.

Alright.

Council president. Don, you wanna come up? Right right here is a live mic and

Yeah. Next to chair Wiggin here.

I'm just gonna stand here, and we have a new planner, replacement planner, Max Taylor. And he's our new associate planner replacing Emma Forkolo. Really excited to have Max here with us. He has experience both in planning and conservation. He has a master's in science and environmental management.

He's also been a a middle school teacher, so he's battle tested to help in this process of planning. I'm very excited. He has GIS experience. He's been really a good fit and looking forward to his use in the long range planning work we're doing and also current planning. He's already dove in and done a bunch of mapping for our comprehensive plan, for our post acknowledgment plans, middle for Department of Land Conservation and Development this week. So, Max, welcome, and I'm really glad you're here. And, just I'm really thrilled that you're you're onboard now.

Thank you very much, and it's wonderful to

meet all of you. Welcome.

Yeah. It's a bigger group. For the viewing audience, this isn't the normal format. We are actually going to later in the program here have a joint meeting with the budget committee. So that's why you're getting to meet so many faces at once, Max. Alright. Welcome.

Thank you.

Don, before if I might, chair. Don, before you leave, can you break the news of the nice, amazing news you got from the state today?

It was great this morning. It's always good to get a good email in the morning on a Wednesday and from the Department of Land Conservation and Development, and it was for our housing production strategy, which we received conditional approval for with two minor conditions. And it's a pretty major milestone. Most jurisdictions are not faring as well. Some of them have had rejections in their process, and some of them have had substantial more conditions of approval. So, really good to hear. It's I know I've aged a bit in that process. I'm going through housing production strategy, and I appreciate counsel and your support in that process, but that was a really good piece of information this morning. So Alright. Yeah.

Thank you.

Alright. Thank you. And welcome, Max. Alright. So next item on the agenda is citizen input and public comment. I have no cards before me. Maya, do we have anything online? Okay. Moving right along. Proclamations and special presentations. I have here a proclamation, and I believe we have Irene Breshears here to receive it. That will be our auxiliary president, Larry Bord. Oh, Larry. Hi, Larry. Well, I'm going to read said presentation here real quick with this proclamation for the Iwo Remembrance Day.

Whereas on 02/23/1945, this country's armed forces were engaged in one of the most strategic and bloodiest battles of World War two, the battle for Iwo Jima. And whereas the Cambia Aurora Veterans Of Foreign Wars Post and auxiliary sixty fifty seven of The United States has have deemed it fitting to erect a flagpole at the Camby Adult Center in remembrance of those who took part in this great battle. And whereas each member of the each year, the members of the Camby Aurora Veterans of Foreign Wars post sixty fifty seven, their auxiliary and their fellow veterans organizations and service organizations, for example, Lewis and Clark Young Marines and the Camby Adult Center, have conducted a ceremony to rededicate this memorial and replace the flags on the flagpole. And whereas the flagpole located at the Canby Adult Center is the only memorial in the city of Canby dedicated to our veterans who made such a significant personal sacrifice during World War two in defense of this great nation. Now, therefore, it says Brian Hodgson on here, Maya.

It's oh.

It says hi, Brian. I, Tracy Hensley, by virtue of the authority vested in me as council president of the city of Canby, do hereby proclaim 02/07/2026 as Iwo Jima Remembrance Day. I further call upon all members of this community to join in commemorating the great event and celebrate the end of the World War two and the Cambi Adult Center on February 7 at 10AM given unto my hand this February 2026. Larry? Do you have any words you'd like to share? Here's your seat.

Council president, I'm switching brains here because yeah. Thank you. Picture.

I

wanna say thank you very much for the the opportunity for doing this every year. If it wasn't for my father, my grandfather, and all the fathers and grandfathers that has served in this beautiful country that we have, we would not be able to do this. So I wanna say thank you very, very much. And thank you for the city of Canby. You guys have always been behind us 100%.

I really appreciate it. Thank you. We are having a flag raising at the Dole Center at this Saturday on the seventh at 10AM. We're gonna have the young marines there. They will take pictures of, like, bringing up the flag. Do we have any World War two people there this year?

We might have Okay. We're not sure.

He's We have sand from the beach.

98.

And they the the veterans will pour it onto the stone, the rock at the adult center. I have fires. I would like to hand them out if that's okay.

Absolutely.

Okay.

How many you

got? I don't know. I'm just gonna do this and then we'll find out. That's Irene. I don't know.

Why don't you hand them to Randy and then they can just go down.

I I I don't I don't argue with Irene.

I don't blame you.

But anyway, thank you very much.

Thank you, Larry. Okay. Moving on to the consent agenda.

I move to approve the

consent agenda to complete the approval of the January regular amendment.

We need a minute. Second.

Alright. It's been moved by councilor Maldonado, seconded by councilor Davis to approve the consent agenda that includes the approval of the 01/07/2025 city council regular meeting minutes. All those in favor? Aye. Aye. Move six zero. Thank you. Okay. This is new. We're doing the appointments separate.

Normally, that's in the consent agenda. Okay. We're gonna do appointments. We have on the agenda the appointment of member Ron Yarborough to the CAMU Utility Board and member Ron LeBlanc to the CAMU Utility Board. I will accept a motion.

Council president, I move to approve or I move to approve the appointment of member Ron Yarborough to the Cambia Utility Board with a term ending 02/28/2029 and the appointment of member Ron LeBlanc to the CAMBA Utility Board with a term ending 02/28/2027.

Second.

Alright. It's been moved by councilor Stearns and seconded by councilor Maldonado to appoint member Ron Yarborough to the CAMBA Utility Board with the term ending 02/28/2029 and the member of the appointment of member Ron LeBlanc to the CAMBA Utility Board with the term ending 02/28/2027. All those in favor? Aye. Six zero. Thank you. Alright. Moving right along. We still have a little time. So resolutions and ordinances, we have, to consideration of ordinance sixteen sixty one. This is a second reading. Randy, do we have anything new to add to this?

Council president Hensley, the this is the same information as you received in the during the first reading. Nothing is different.

Okay. Are there any additional questions? Alright. Councilor Davis.

I move to approve ordinance sixteen sixty one, an ordinance authorizing the interim city administrator to amend the personal service agreement with Kern McCloud Inc, Consulting Engineering and Design and Construction Phase Engineering Services for the extension of the Walnut Street to Highway 99 E.

Second. It's been moved by councilor Davis, second by councilor Maldonado to adopt ordinance number one six six one or ordinance authorizing the interim city administrator to amend the personal services agreement with Kern McLeod Incorporated Consulting Engineers for design and construction phase engineering services for the extension of the Walnut Street to Highway 99 E. Roll call vote.

Councilor Patton? Aye. Councilor Maldonado?

Aye.

Councilor Davis?

Aye.

Councilor Stearns?

Aye.

Councilor Waterman? Aye. And council present Hensley? Aye.

Perfect. Thank you. And now oh, good. The script's right here.

I don't have to get

it out of the drawer. Alright. We're going to move to a public hearing considering approving order two six zero two. It would be an order granting a noise variance application to DeWitt Construction for continuous boring under the Union Pacific Railroad at 1852 Teakwood Circle for approximately seventy to eighty continuous hours, February 2026. The matter presently before the hearing body requires a public hearing.

All interested persons in attendance shall be heard on the matter. This public hearing was noticed, and those who wish to speak were instructed to contact the city recorder. We did not receive any requests to speak. Those people that are interested in testifying as either proponents or opponents, please indicate your desire to speak by raising your virtual hands or your hand handing in a card to our city recorder. Any any proponents or opponents wishing to speak?

Anybody online, Maya? I will just continue the script for the sake of being proper. For longer presentations, proponents and opponents may buy time from one another. In doing so, those either in favor or opposed may allocate their time to a spokesperson who will pre represent the entire group. All questions must be directed through the council president.

All evidence to be considered must be submitted to the hearing body for public access. All written testimony received bore for for bore or both for or against, sorry, shall be summarized by staff and presented briefly to the hearing body during the staff report. The public hearing will be conducted as follows. There'll be verbal over overview from the city administrator, Randy Ely, questions, if any, from the hearing body or staff. Then we'll open the hearing for testimony. Proponents will have more not more than three minutes. Opponents, not more than three minutes. Close the public hearing. Then there'll be questions if any by the hearing body, discussion by the hearing body. A decision shall be made by the hearing body at the close of the hearing or the matter will be continued to a date certain in the future.

This will be the only notice of that date you will receive. Does anyone have any questions about the procedure of this hearing? Saying none, I will open the public hearing. Great.

Thank you, council president Hensley. I'm gonna call Don up to just sort of help me sorry.

Okay. Yeah. I'm happy.

No. I'm wrong noise, variants I had in my head. This is the

Walnut Street. Yeah. I'm happy to speak on it, but

if you No. No. We've got our project manager here, Neil and Spencer. So I had the wrong one in my brain. Person.

That's next

to your head. Okay. So this is the Teakwood Circle.

Yeah. One week. Yep. Neil?

We got them back to back. So, Neil, come on up. Sorry, Don.

Right. Here's your mic. It's hot already.

Oh, speaker. Hello, Spencer.

That mic is live.

Go ahead. You're on a sec.

I wanna thank these guys and the contractor and, Jamie, as she mentioned earlier tonight, for having a little town hall earlier with the neighborhood. With that said,

go ahead.

So our overview.

So this is phase one for the Walnut Street extension. It's a sewer bore underneath the railroad. This has kind of been going on for quite some time. We've tried to work with the railroad to get other avenues not to do a noise variance. They will not allow us to break up the work if they continue 24 continuous bore going under the railroad.

So so here we are. We've we've had the town hall meeting. We laid a lot of the concerns that the citizens had, and we didn't really have any adverse nobody was really against it by the end of the meeting last night. So I don't know. Is there anything any questions?

No. Councillor Dates.

How many people showed up for the townhome?

We had six people showed up representing four homes. There's 12 homes that are affected directly. We put out flyers to 24 because it was kind of a, you know, a loop. So I spoke to one gentleman on the phone. He had questions. He was outside of the the noise area that that required a letter. Mhmm. But yeah. So we had I guess that would be, you know, a third of the people showed up.

And and in general, were they okay? What was what was their input?

So we had the one home they were really concerned about, Their driveway is gonna be partially blocked and they were kind of concerned about noise and vibration. The contractor was there and he explained that, you know, there's gonna be noise, but the vibration isn't there with the type of whore they're doing. So they seemed kind of now that we've allayed some of their fears by the end of the meeting, the HOA president was there and and she sent out an email that I saw, but, you know, I don't have that with me. But she kinda encouraged everybody to, hey, this is for the good of the city and, you know, you know, it's an inconvenience for a few days, but she felt like, you know, we we got positive support,

I think.

So no overall opposition? No. No. Okay. Thank you.

Okay.

Spencer, anything else from your perspective?

I think it was a very well, meeting. There was some concerns at first and I don't think anyone is super excited for the noise, but I think that they're all understanding of it. And we we're very upfront that if they have any issues, even if it is in the middle of the night, that they can call either one of us and we will be down there immediately. So we don't anticipate that, but the contractor is very hopeful that it won't take the full time period, but they wanted to make sure that they have that just in case they did run into some sort of complications.

K? Okay.

Commissioner sorry. Wrong hat. Councilor Patton.

Yes. Thank you. I was just curious based on the other work that's been going on in that area, do you is there a suspicion that there might be some hidden boulders or something that could cause a a delay or a road, sort of like a roadblock essentially in completing this bores? I'm thinking about the situation that we had over on 10th Street where they ran into some pretty large boulders that they weren't quite expecting. Is is there any indication that there might be those sort of pitfalls over there in that area?

Right now, no. They were able to do a fair amount of work kind of last fall when we were still trying to figure this piece of it out. And they said that the soil conditions were very favorable for where they were working, which is about 200 feet away. So we're all hopeful that they're not going to find anything, but someone that's dug a lot in this town, I've gone 20 feet and run into different soil conditions. So we're hopeful and, we're ready to move forward.

Okay. Thank you. Okay.

Any other questions for staff?

Thank you.

Seeing none, I will open the public hearing. Appointments? Appointments. I will close the public hearing. Any minor discussion amongst the hearing body before we make a motion?

Alright. I'll take a motion.

Oh, just a second.

Sorry. Yes?

Yeah. So I just wanna say this as I was reading this, it kind of brought up my my my memory of the debate that we had regarding the noise variance over in the industrial park a few months ago with the pouring over there.

Mhmm.

While I am cognizant that this is for an extended period of time, to me, the reason I'm gonna essentially vote for this is because I find the two situations very different. This is for a much shorter period of time compared to extended period of time, I should say, compared to the folks over there, and our hands are really tied. From what I understand of the situation, the city has tried to work with all the individuals involved, specifically the railroad, to try and minimize this. And the railroad is the rail road, and we must do what the railroad commands us to do. And so we there's really no other option.

So that is why I'm I'm willing to bend on this a bit and and, you know, allow this.

Okay. Are you making a motion? Anyone?

I move to approve order twenty six zero two, the noise variance application to DeWitt Construction for continuous boring work under the Union Pacific Railroad at 1852 Teakwood Circle for approximately seventy to eighty continuous hours February 23 through the twenty seventh twenty twenty six. Second.

It has been moved by councilor Waterman, seconded by councilor Davis to approve order 26Dash02, the Woodnoy's variance application to DeWitt Construction for continuous boring work under at u Union Pacific Railroad at 1852 Turt Teakwood Circle for approximately seventy to eighty continuous hours, February 23 to twenty seven twenty twenty six. All those in favor?

Aye. Aye. Aye.

60. Thank you. Okay. It is 728. We are the next item on the agenda is the mid year budget review. So we're going to take a brief recess, and Randy will explain the dinner situation.

Thank you, council president. First, I'd like to ask for council consent to excuse our city attorney tonight from the rest of the meeting if that's if that's okay with council so she can get on her way.

Okay? It's just an option. I don't have a mic, so I'm yelling

a lot.

It's just an option. You have to excuse me from something you don't think I need to be at. I love hearing about budget stuff, but if you don't think I need to be here for this Yeah. Then you could let me go and save yourself a couple pennies.

I will entertain a a motion to excuse her.

I move to excuse

the city attorney from the subcommittee. Second.

Okay. It's been moved by councilor Matanava, second by councilor Davis to excuse city councilor, city attorney for the duration of this meeting. Well, she's our council. All those in favor?

Aye. Aye.

Six zero. Enjoy the rest of your evening, Emily.

Thank you. Thanks, everyone. See you next week.

Okay. With that, we are going to call a recess, and we'll be back in, let's say, what, fifteen minutes?

Yep. Alright.

Welcome back. We are going to the next item of the agenda, which is the midyear budget review with the budget committee. I'm gonna introduce chair Kim Wiggin of the budget chair of the budget committee, and we're gonna go around the room just so for the record, everyone who's in the room and introduce we have a couple new budget committee members, so I just want everybody to get familiar. So we'll start with Randy.

Good evening. Randy Ealy, interim city administrator. Paul

Waterman, city councilor.

David Hayes, budget committee.

Felipe Thompson, budget committee.

Katie Joyner, financial analyst.

Denise Larue, finance director.

Scott Cantonwine, budget committee.

Herman, counselor Herman Maldonado. Jim

Davis, city council.

Jack Pendleton, budget committee.

Daniel Stern, city councilor.

Okay. Let's start with the staff back here.

Marissa Ely, library director.

Brian Potter, planning manager. Don Harding,

planning director. Spencer Pollock, public works supervisor. Patrick Mahoney, wastewater supervisor.

Nathan Templeman, quality manager.

Pete Wood, HR director.

George Trove, chief of police. Cloudera and transit fleet IT.

Jamie Simple, economic development director and communications specialist.

Todd Neiser, economic development and tourism coordinator.

Maya Benham, administrative director and city recorder.

And we have some guests

and staff also back there. Heidi, you can't hide. Freddie Willers for the operation. Our guests? I'm Jennifer Thomas, current

president of the fencing board. Perfect. Abby Mulligan, treasurer for a friend. Excellent. And I'm Tracy Hensley, city council president. I think we got everybody in the room. So I will

Did we get Jason too?

Oh, Jason is on the screen. Wave.

That's alright. I understand with my personality, I'm totally forgettable. You're I'm Jason Patten. I'm a member of the city council.

Thank you, Jason. I apologize. You have to understand. We don't have our screens in front of us and I keep forgetting to look up into the sky for you. Okay. With that, we have everybody introduced. It looks like we're turning it over to Denise then. Is that right? Yeah. Alright. Our new finance director, Denise Larue, you're up. Good evening. It's great

to be here tonight with all of you for the mid year budget review. Thank you. Thank you for being here. Thank you for giving your time to the city. I am a citizen here, so I really appreciate all that you all do. And thank you, all the staff that is here to support and answer questions as we go along. Are you ready, Maya?

To to pick up on that, Denise, thank you for recognizing the staff. I wanna make sure they recognize the department head team, the directors. A lot of hard work into the budget, building, team chemistry, and just, really appreciate this opportunity to show up and share out our budget architecture at City of Canby through Denise's lens with the support of Katie. And feel free to ask questions as we go through this slide deck. Be interactive.

This is a mid year budget. I understand you haven't done too many of these, but this is a good opportunity as we lead into May, the budget season, that we get feedback, direct feedback, open and transparent feedback on the direction as so that when we get to May, as we present a budget that we've built in February, March, and April, that we're on track and there's no surprises. So with that, go ahead, Denise.

Great. So we'll get started. So first of all, the topics that we'll talk about tonight, the information that we're providing is actuals through December 2025. So we're halfway through the fiscal year. Anywhere that we talk about f y twenty five projection, it's still a projection because we're still in the audit process for f y twenty five.

So while those numbers they won't tie back to your budget book because, obviously, the projections in f y twenty five at budget time were done several months before. These projections are actually done through the end of the fiscal year. There's just any year end adjustments that that would affect that. So that's why you would see a difference if you look at that. So we will also start by just kind of a quick review of the gen of the fund structure of the the city just as kind of a reminder and to get us all back into, you know, that budget brain of of how we're set up and how we operate.

And then dive into a few general highlights, mainly cash, personnel, FTEs, and capital projects. Then we'll talk about estimated ending fund balances, which is probably why everyone is here and listening. Thank you. And then we'll talk about the budget process and the schedule and some considerations approaching the f y twenty seven budget process. And so, yes, please, as you have questions as we go along, please feel free to interrupt because the more information we get from you, the more better prepared we are going into the budget process that we're starting here in February.

So, the more information, the better. So let's start with the general fund. It consists of administration, human resources, finance, court, planning, building, police, cemetery, parks, and economic development. And these are for financial or these are for operations that are not accounted for in any other fund. And these are departments that may bring in some revenue, but they don't bring in enough revenue to to support their full department.

And some departments don't bring in any revenue, but they're here to support the the services of the city. An example I'll I'll just throw throw myself out there. An example is the finance department. We don't make money for the city, but we process revenues that come in. We process payroll.

We pay bills, and we do a lot of other things. And so, I just wanna recognize, yes, I know we do a lot of other things, but we won't go through that long exhaustive list today. But somehow, we have to pay for those costs, and so those costs are charged out to, other departments and other funds, to support the general fund. So the principal sources of revenue are the property taxes, franchise fees, court fines, and state and county shared revenue. And the primary expenditures are for public safety, general government, parks, and cemetery services.

Moving on to the special revenue fund, we have the library fund, transit fund, transient room tax, swim center, street, system development charges, cemetery perpetual care, and forfeiture fund. And these are funds that have specific designated revenue to support the services that they provide. Just two examples are the transit fund, provides the public transit services. And their primary sources of revenue are from grants and transit payroll taxes. Another example is the Street Fund, which accounts for the construction, repair, and maintenance of the city streets, And their principal sources of revenue are street maintenance fees, gas taxes, and vehicle taxes from the Oregon Department of Transportation.

And next, we have the internal service funds, which are facilities, fleet, and tech services fund. And these are are funds that provide services to our city departments for maintenance and repair of all city rolling stock and equipment, the majority of the city owned structures, and the repair and replacement of all city owned computers and servers. And so their revenue is charged out to other departments who receive their services. For facility, it is based on a prorated share of square feet, I mean, for our facilities. For, fleet services, it's based on the ratio of actual cost for the fleet services for the different types of fleet services.

And then for the tech services, it's based on the number of computers, phones, and work orders that are processed. And then last but not least, we have the enterprise fund, is really the sewer fund, it's the wastewater treatment plant, the sewer collections, and storm water. And so their primary sources of revenue are the sewer, revenue that we have coming in and then the system development charges that are transferred for capital construction projects. Are there any questions before we we move on from our oh, thank you. Any questions before we move on?

Okay. Then let's move on to our cash overview. So on this slide, on the top portion of this slide is our cash balances for December 2425. And the reason I chose December 31 is so that we're at the same point in our property tax cycle every year so that we're actually comparing apples to apples to to clear up any confusion there. Most of our cash is held in the local government investment pool or the LGIP.

And as you see from '23 moving on up, our cash balance has increased from 56 or about 57,000,000 to 59,300,000.0 and on to 61,300,000.0. And, yes, in 2025, that is the highest balance for our our total cash that I have found going back in history. In the bottom of the slide, it talks about the cash allocation, and it talks about major funds. And so the major funds are are dictated by accounting rules, and it it just gives a little bit of guidance about where in our funds are our cash, how it's trending throughout the the three years. Any questions on our cash balances?

Okay. Moving on to personnel FTE comparison. So keep in mind, one FTE is two thousand eighty hours. It so it's not a body, it's a number of hours. And so if you have two people, for example, working one thousand forty hours, those are each point five FTEs bringing you up to to one when you add those two employees together.

So on this slide, f y twenty through f y twenty five are all actuals. Those are the FTEs by department that we actually had in those time periods. Just a note that the FY twenty five budget was for 109.4 FTEs. And so the FY twenty six budget, which is a 103.7 FTEs, is a decrease by 5.7 FTE positions. Those reductions in the budget for FY twenty six were were at the swim center, one at parks, one at library, and two in streets.

And those are offset by increases. There was one at PD that was the police department that was approved for in the f y twenty six budget and two at wastewater. So we currently have six and a half open positions here in the district. Actually, I'm thinking we had a new possibly a new hire today, so we might be at 5.5. But at the time that this slide was done

we've lost somebody in parks sometime Oh. Even even now.

So

Okay. We're still at 6.5 then. So so this is these are the trends by department. Do you have any questions about that?

Okay.

Moving on. So let's talk about, capital projects, and Maya will bring up a different slide, so we'll give her just a moment to do that. It's a little easier to read. And, also, in your hard copy, there's a much larger version. So on this on this slide, it's it's showing three things.

It's showing our capital budget our capital projects that were budgeted for f y twenty six by project and the dollar amount that was budgeted for that, the projected percent of completion anticipated for the end of the fiscal year, And then the next column, the projected FY twenty six spend is what that calculates out to. So so if it was 50% of a $3,300,000 project, then we're anticipating to to spend $1,650,000. And then on the far right column are notes about the capital projects, if they're being delayed or any any information about that. As far as capital, projects, we budgeted for $30,000,000 of capital projects to be completed in f y twenty six, and we are anticipating that we will complete $9,200,000. You know, there are a lot of reasons for that.

There are outside, forces with, permitting and and other challenges. There's there is bandwidth, challenges. So that's where we're really looking like we're going to come out at the June. So there are quite a few projects on here that are rolling over to next fiscal year. Also, some of the projects automatically span more than one fiscal year either based on timing of weather or they're just longer projects, and so they they take a longer period of time.

So that's something we'll talk about in the when we talk about, considerations for the FY '27 budget is what to do about that and and how can we how can we address that issue. So are there questions about any capital projects?

Are

these capital projects all funded out of restricted funds or basically money that's not spent there to be spent on other projects, or are these all all restricted?

There's a it's a combination.

Yes. URA specifically for those projects that we have planned has to come out of the URA fund, and then parks, whatever parks project is gonna be out of the parks on streets or so on. If some projects are not going to be started or completed, funds could be available if it's in the same fund.

We counselor, we we pulled a roll up of all capital outlay across the budget for the slide visualization. So if that gets to your questions in in the budget capital outlay, and that's if you look back on a couple couple slides before, that this correct me if I'm wrong, but the 30,000,000 is baked into some of these ending fund balances. So the less we spend on capital outlay, the higher that number gets. Does that make sense? The more we spend, the lower it gets.

That is that is correct. And that's we'll we'll have that

slide. But Yes. So there's a there's a cause and effect relationship with how much work we can get out the door in our ending fund balance, which is what was the keynote of your meetings last year, as I understand it, was getting to the pending fund balance, which we're headed in that direction. I'm not trying to jump there, but that's the relationship with those two slides.

Why are we rolling over so many of the sewer projects to next year? Are we kicking the can down the road, or do we need do do we need those now?

Patrick, would you like to to come up and

Great question, mister Pendleton. We've had some turnover turnover in that department, and Patrick just got promoted to be the manager of that department. So

Hi, everyone. So the reason we have so many delays on the wastewater projects is that, we had a long transitioning period from the last supervisor to myself. And without that kind of force there, it just was hard to get the momentum we needed to get those projects going because we were starting those from zero. They weren't projects that we, had contracts for or anything. We're starting to build those projects. So, we're we're currently still down two people at wastewater. So we're a small team down there, and, we're just trying to get things going again. Now that I'm supervisor and we're we're currently hiring for another op one to fill that position and get things going, hopefully, year, we'll get everything going on on that goal.

Yeah. Because we we do have funds in the sewer enterprise fund. We do have enough money there to do them all. So it's just a question of getting the work done then.

Yeah. Absolutely.

Yeah. Absolutely. Spot on. Yeah. That first one, that UV system replacement, 1,500,000.0, that is top priority, and, we're just changing out the way we're gonna bid that job. It was gonna be a design build. We scrapped that. Now we're just gonna do it direct.

Okay. And none of this is

gonna get us in any trouble with with DEQ or anybody about not being able to treat the wastewater properly?

We're we're more than, able to still treat our wastewater. The one thing we're really needing is approval from DEQ for system design. So we have to give them a lot of information for DEQ to give us back approval on sizing the appropriate systems that we're gonna be replacing with. So we make sure that down the road, this is gonna suit the city for a long period of time until we need to further replace it again. Okay.

That's yeah. I'm good.

Thank you, sir. Thanks, Patrick.

Before we let us go back to the city?

No. Okay. Thank you. No problem.

Moving along?

Any questions on any other projects?

Okay.

Okay. So moving on to our projected ending fund balances for FY '25, '26, and then '27, which which is a bit of a rough projection because keep in mind, that's the third projected year in a row since FY '25 is is still projected. So the top part of this slide is talking about the general fund. So it talks about the operating revenue and then the anticipated ending fund balance and then the ending fund balance over the operating revenue, which reverts back to the financial policy number five, which requires the general fund ending balance be between 2025% of the annual operating revenue. So in the first column or in the first two columns of numbers, these are actual numbers for for f y twenty three and f y twenty four.

The projected column for FY '25 is slightly higher than what was in the budget for the projected 2025 column. I believe that was 42%, and I'm projecting 44% based on, again, my job was a little easier because I had actual numbers through the June. I wasn't trying to do it a few months prior to that. In December on the seventeenth, there was a presentation made to counsel regarding the general fund forecasting, and the comments, made in that presentation were that all things were looking positive in the general fund from both a revenue and expense perspective for the most part, and I absolutely agree with that. It's it's very on target and and is looking great.

So, again, looking at that top section, that's general fund. The projected for 2026, because of the capital projects that are delayed and will be rolling forward, as as Randy was speaking, that does that does shift our ending fund balance. It's leaving money in the ending fund balance because with the projects not getting done, then we're then we're not spending that money. So I'm projecting that the 2026 will be at 39%. And then as a rough estimate, for 2027, I'm looking at 25% for general fund.

And my assumptions there are an increase of about 2%, which is pretty on trend for the revenues, an increase of about 5% for personnel services and materials and services because, unfortunately, that's sort of the world that we're living in now. And then also the rolling forward of some parks projects and then picking up part of the what's in the CIP plan for FY '27 in addition to that. So, you know, I think we really have to consider bandwidth and what we're going to be able to finish and even phasing projects from what will be in which fiscal year is a really good way to help try to manage that ending fund balance rather than looking. It's great to be positive, but it's also better to be realistic. And also, if we're phasing projects, if if something happens that's, you know, somewhat miraculous and the project is moving along much much quicker, we actually still have the ending fund balance there, and we can do a supplemental budget and keep that project rolling.

It doesn't keep us from moving forward, but it does keep us looking at our budget every year at a more realistic plan rather than the the really, really positive, not so realistic view.

Okay. Councilor Patton, you have a question?

Yeah. So this is just so I just first wanna qualify what I'm about to say. The chair and I had a chance to preview this presentation with the finance director and and such in preparation for this meeting. So this is the second time I am we are seeing these numbers. And this goes back to what I mentioned during the urban renewal meeting earlier tonight was that based on these projections, assuming that a project from somewhere else can be brought over and be scooched into these numbers is not recommended because we are going to be cutting it very tight to the 20 to 25% goal that the city likes to keep for reserve.

So this is why I had some consternation about hanging our hat on being able to do such a thing.

Okay. Thank you. Any other questions for Denise before she moves on?

Okay. Okay. So the bottom the very bottom little section of this slide talks about the total city ending fund balance. And, again, it shows the trend. I'm projecting total city that we will we will end this year at about $48,200,000.

The same concept with the capital is the same for the general fund or the total city. So my projection for ending fund balance for the total city for 2026 is really 43.9 versus the 22.9 that was budgeted, and that goes back to that capital slide. If we budgeted for 30,000,000, we're really looking at about $9,200,000 being completed. Now if that rolls completely over to f y twenty seven, it's just the reverse of that. So it's just that that fund balance is just rolling from year to year.

So I noticed on the operating revenues, the dollar you're right. Oh, sorry. I pushed the button, but not good enough. Okay. Notes from the projected 2026 revenues and the 2027 revenues were only up by about 200,000 if I'm reading this right. And aren't we supposed to get some more money because of the urban renewal district closing?

And I did not I did not build that into this because I I'm I'm unsure and and waiting for those that direction. So I did not include that in this.

But you're right.

Yeah. Yeah.

But we also have FTE to come out of that, and we have a budgeted for in previous years as we requested. We have urban renewal people that are going to then come out of the general fund, so we'd have to remember that too. Any other questions?

Okay. Okay. So moving on to the FY twenty six twenty seven budget schedule. Staff will be starting in February to get the to get the budget going. The more the more effort that goes in upfront, the better product we'll have. Hopefully, this will be a a good process, and it will be very productive. But the dates that really affect this group are in May. So the intention is on May 7 that you will all have a proposed budget in your hand. May 14 will be the first meeting. May 21 the second, and if there needs to be a third meeting, that would be on May 28.

And then June 17 is the public hearing and adoption of the budget. I've I've heard that it would be a very positive thing to get the budget two weeks prior. Can't guarantee that for this year. We'll we'll kinda see how this goes. This is my first year through it, but that's something that we will work towards in the future.

If we happen to have it done a few days earlier, then we'll definitely get it out. Okay. Another point actually about the budget schedule is as you're getting the proposed budget and you're reviewing it, if you can submit your questions in advance, then we can make sure we have answers to your questions that everyone gets at the budget meeting, and it will hopefully clarify and move that process along, quicker.

Yeah. And to clarify, those emails should go to Randy. You can copy, Denise, but they need to go through the city administrator. Okay?

And then on the next slide, it's considerations approaching the f y twenty seven budget process. But, actually, I just want to point out that these are not considerations just for the FY twenty seven budget process. They should be considerations for any budget process. You know, it's our job to be fiscally responsible. So every year, it's our job to to look at everything and make sure that the money is being spent in the places where it needs to be spent.

So standard fact, all costs are increasing. They'll continue to increase. This is the world that we live in, and, so we need to keep that in mind. There's there are options for that. One is to increase revenues, and I have attached on the back of the packet, a document from the League of Oregon Cities, which I think is a really great document that just lays out options, and we don't have a slide for that, but it's on the back of your packet that you can can peruse.

But it's options to increase revenues along with the pros and cons of each. And it really lays it out very basically. If you're increasing revenues, who's paying? I mean, it's it's just a chart that just gives very pointed information. So food for thought.

The second option is to reduce costs and consider service levels. You know, we should always look at what are the must haves and what are the nice to haves. And so what is it that the city really wants to support, and where where does the city want their funding to go to? So it's always it's always best practice to take a look and make sure that you're spending responsibly. And then third is the capital projects.

And we I think we really need to work on that during the budget process this year to realistically look at the timing of the projects along with internal capacity, what items are within our control, what items are not within our control, and then what projects should be phased over time so that the end product is a realistic view of what the plan is for the city, and that gives us a really true picture. May I answer any questions? Councilor Waterman?

So going back to the the schedule, is our current schedule the recommended or kind of what people actually what most municipalities do as far as timing wise and where we start and when we're trying to finish up. Some places seem to maybe start a little bit earlier so that they're not rushing right at the end and getting stuck trying to cram something in right before we're ready to we have to get to June 1. So are we in the norm, or is there room to give us some more time and leeway to get the work done?

Randy, would you like to could you address that? I you have much more experience with cities than I do. So

This looks like a pretty Councilor Waterman, thank you for the question. So it's like a very traditional schedule that I'm familiar with. May is when most of budget cities do budget committee meetings. We have a lot of work to do internally to build that budget for you, but there's no reason, that we can't offline this with my, leadership staff and talk about, you know, every week is precious. So if we get something even a week or two earlier to you that was mentioned earlier, that would be most helpful, it sounds like.

Yeah. I was just noticing that this this last page of our packet Mhmm. From the League of Oregon Cities wasn't in the email. So could you possibly, Maya, send this to counselor Patton so he sees what we're seeing right now?

Yes. It's already planned.

Okay. Thank you. Any other questions, mister Tate and then miss Thompson?

Yeah. Back on your cash overview, is it possible to just get the details on the

all other funds? Yes. I can break that out further. And Is

that appropriate to ask? Yeah. Okay. Of course. Yes.

I can I can, get that together and have, my assembly? Okay. Ms. Thompson.

Thank you. Touching back on councilor Waterman's question about the timing, and I think some of that, as I recall, could be based on the last budget committee meeting when there was a lot of issues and things that needed to be researched and questions. But in looking at this considerations approaching the fiscal twenty seven process, it it appears to me that the city administrator and I'm I'm just wondering that these options you're gonna present

a balanced budget.

So if you need to touch on one of these options like increasing revenue as a proposal to the committee and and the council or reducing costs if there's cuts that need to be made. In other words, that's going to come to us as a fait accompli, and that that might be a component then perhaps in the budget because it seems like every year, there's there's been some, you know, some talking about what to do in those areas to make the budget bounce. Would that be correct?

I think so. That we need to really dive into all three of these options that are laid out here with the the leadership team and and finance staff so that we get some of these recommendations that we're looking at in terms of must haves versus nice to haves. I've heard that from numerous of my bosses, like the city councilors. And then the capital projects, really projecting those, moving that money out the door, getting those projects built. Gonna take you know, I I have I have the leadership team has produced a we call it a needs list, but I'll pass it out just for your our own edification.

Just some things that we are looking to chase federally, state, and even locally in the technology space that will help us here at the city that we can't currently afford with the current budget. Hopefully, that's enough handouts there. There's some staff. And then people. My previous employer had 24 project managers, and we don't have one here.

And I think that's a really finite skill that's critical to move moving capital projects along. People go to school and get trained up to be a project manager. Very important. So I've put that on the sort of needs list as well as a few other positions. Mrs.

Ealy is here from our library, wonderful director. She's down positions and, you know, we really pride ourselves. If you're here during the day, you can hear the the kids singing down there and the and all of our wonderful Cambians enjoying the library. It's just packed, she's trying to do that on a shoestring with thin staff. So I've asked each of my directors to kinda take a look at what might help move some of this money out the door for us since we do have it and developers have paid for it in the form of contractors.

We wanna do some asset map mapping of our infrastructure. We don't have that position. Many cities enjoy that for water and sewer help with the water, but mostly sewer and storm streets. Procurement, all of our different departments, you these people up here are trying to do their own procurements, which is a very highly specialized when you go out for bids. You can contract that out to a third party.

There are vendors that'll do that for you to save money or there there are people that do that job for a living. So this is just sort of a a roll up of where our heads are at as we as we head into another budget season. Major projects are listed there. Pine Street is huge, and we have no capacity really right now to to address that, to start working on that. Spencer's doing an amazing job just trying to, you know, get an engineer on board, and then we gotta work with Canby utility coordinating with them.

It's a major project. It could go all the way from territorial all the way down to the Fairgrounds, and it involves a land swap. So there's a lot of different pieces, and we have no really capacity to put manpower on that project right now. So this is my answer to my long answer, miss Thompson, to your question of the case we'll be trying to make at the upcoming budget committee with you all.

Okay. Councilor Patton.

Yeah. So first, I just wanna thank city staff for putting this together. I have long advocated for a midyear budget review back before I was even on council just as a member of the budget committee, as a citizen member. And for the last year or so, we have been working towards this, and I really appreciate the fact that we were able to get the budget committee and the city council all around the same table at the same level and really start to dig into these numbers to see where we're at. I'm hoping that in the future, we'll be able to develop this even further and get into more detail about these sort of things and where different things are tracking and such.

But this is an excellent next step, and I really appreciate all the effort. The last the next thing I will say is that when it comes to funding and such and rep revenue, it has been made clear to the council for several months now, that we have a revenue shortfall, and we are going to have to make some decisions on how to possibly increase that revenue. And I think that is something that is gonna that we are, as a council, going to need to take that seriously and start to prioritize looking at those ways, both small and large, to help raise the funds to provide the residents of the city with the services that they expect and demand. So that's just something I'll throw out there for the good of the order. Okay.

Thank you.

Councilor Searns.

Yeah. Going off of councilor Patten's comments, looking at these actual and projected numbers in the revenue, they seem to be actually kind of declining. Object to 2027 is going to be the lowest projected revenue with the exception of '26. So it seems like we have a downward trajectory on the I know some of that was was artificially high earlier because of the funds and such. But I think that with the with the trend seems to be that the expenses, especially personnel costs are gonna exceed the growth there is gonna exceed the growth the revenue if there is is any growth.

And so I would just sort of request that we have some meetings about either revenue, ideas that we can focus on for revenue growth or if we don't want that, then we have to go for the other half of the

Mhmm.

Of the budget equation. But I think we I think that much rather have that. It seems like we're fine for the next couple of years, but I'd much rather have it happen while we're still fine instead of right at the end of a budget cycle where we have an emergency.

Yep.

Councilor Roth.

Kind of following up on like some of the questions about the capital projects about how many of them are restricted funds versus not, etcetera. Because if we're not and then we're I understand the the capacity, etcetera. Yeah. But if we're not even meeting practically 25% of the cup of completing these projects, but that money is being held up that could be used for other things instead of just sitting there on something that's realistically never gonna be done and planning out that better, understanding how much of that money is, you know Restricted. Restricted versus that if we're planning better, gives us more room to actually provide services instead of just sitting there collecting dust on something that's realistically not gonna get done in that year. Thank

you. We can do that. You.

Budget chair, do you have anything to query?

No. I think Denise did a great job putting this together.

Thank you, chair.

Alright. Well, if there's no further questions, thank you, Denise, for this. We kinda threw the fire right out of the gate. You pulled it off though, so thank you very much for this.

Thank you. Okay.

Yes, Randy.

Thank you, council president Hensley. Thanks to the directors who are here. If anybody has anything urgent that they would like to message to the budget committee, the tape the floor is yours or otherwise, we'll I'd let the council president adjourn, but I wanted to make sure we thank you for your time and your work helping build this upcoming budget, each and every one of you. So it's a great team.

Thank you for being here tonight. I know you have much more exciting things probably to do than this. So thank you for coming. Okay. Then we will move on to the next agenda item, which is we're we're wrapping up here pretty quick.

Council comments, it's early in the month, so I don't have any council liaison assignments just yet, but I do want to say in the face of yesterday's industrial explosion, we witnessed the true strength of our community. We are truly grateful for our community and regional partners. Canby Fire, TV FNR, Clackamas Fire, Aurora Fire, Scappoose Fire, Camby Police, Camby Utility, Camby School District, the City of Camby Public Works and Jamie and Camby Area Transit, Clackamas County Emergency Management, CECOM, Northwest Natural Gas, American Red Cross, Clackamas County Building Department, and the Kitty Hawk owner manager and building equipment manufacturer. You came together swiftly and unwaveringly professionalism. Your coordination and commitment to this community made a real difference when it mattered the most.

This is the best example of the Cambie Way, and I thank all of you. That is all I have in my liaison comments for tonight, so we will start with councilor Patton.

Yes. Thank you. So because of travel, I have not been able to attend, some of my things, but I would have a few things I do wanna point out. One, I do, wanna echo council president Hensley's sentiment towards all those involved in yesterday's, crisis. It was a monumental task to try and keep all of that under control, and I think everybody did a fantastic job.

And I also wanna thank Randy for his efforts to keep us as counselors all in the loop as to what was going on as well. I've had the ability to work with several city administrators over the years, and I can say that, I've not experienced that level of communication from him from the city administrator to to the council in some time, so I appreciate that. I will say that I think this brings up a good question. The building in which that business was in was very inconspicuous. I drive by there quite often, and I would never have expected that that was in there, and that building had the potential for that sort of thing to happen.

And so I think it might make sense to start to get an understanding of where different businesses that have the potential that have such a huge impact on the community are located and what sort of things can be done to help mitigate that if that should occur and whether those folks living nearby should be aware of what is going on in their backyards or not. I think that is something that will come out of all of this. Some of the pictures that I've seen of people's bathrooms destroyed by falling debris and stuff, I think it's going to start to cause people to to wonder a question, and I would prefer to be ahead of that rather than behind the eight ball on such a thing. I will also say that this brought up something that we have talked about several times. I brought it up several times, and that is when we are receiving texts and stuff from city staff and and others as council as a whole, it is imperative that we not reply all to those messages because it creates a serial meeting.

Now I have done it myself in the past where I accidentally do not realize that there are multiple people on that chain, and I will shoot something off to the originator of that text or email or whatever thinking that it's going only going to that one person, but it's actually going to all the others creating a serial meeting, and and I try hard not to do that. But especially people giving directives in those sort of things creates a tremendous amount of liability for us. And I would like to just reiterate to my fellow counselors that you are that you really need to not do that. We have talked about it multiple times, and it really needs to be need to be cognizant of this, and it needs to stop. So I think that's it for me.

Thank you.

Mhmm. Councilor Maranato.

I I do not have any reports. I do have a couple comments. One, again, I wanna echo your sentiment on the issue. I live very close to there. Think between all of us, I think,

councilor Davis and I live

the closest. Yeah.

It did knock pictures off of my wall. It sounded and felt as if somebody was driving into our house. It was pretty bad. With that being said, I shot over there very quickly to see if there was anything that I could help. Fire department was there immediately. They were on top of it. As I'm coming down the road, they're already there. So, huge, huge shout out to them. They are amazing in everything that they do. Second thing I would like to point out, very much the opposite.

In light of the temperature of the country at this point in time, unfortunately, it was brought to my attention that one of our local businesses has been berated with emails of threatening their business, threatening their livelihoods, and even some threatening on their lives. I urge I urge the citizens of CAMI, please. This isn't about following everybody's beliefs. This is this is literally about just you gotta go back to loving your neighbor regardless of what you believe. Mhmm.

You're gonna you're gonna believe differently than I am, but I'm still gonna love you. I'm still gonna have a tape spot it in my table for you. It doesn't matter. But for us to go and try to ruin somebody's livelihood and threaten their lives because they don't believe in what you believe in is ridiculous. Luckily, this this business has stood their ground.

They've made a public statement, and they will be making another. And we value them tremendously. So I urge everybody, please find it in your hearts to start seeing each other as human beings and not as opponents.

Amen. Thank you, Herman. Counselor Davis.

Thank you, and thank you to the budget committee for your time tonight in going through this with us, and thank you to the finance department, too, for a great presentation. Just very briefly on Park and Rec, just a reminder that Barry Johnson has resigned from the Park and Rec Committee, so we need to fill that position. Also at the next meeting they'll elect a chairperson. They wanted to have the entire committee there to elect the chairperson for the Park and Rec Committee. On the on another note, I just wanted to thank Melissa, Eli, and Tyler?