City Council - Regular Meeting

Okay, I think we're ready to go. I think they're all here now. So we want to acknowledge soccer team from Hoover High School, Hoover Huskies.

So if you guys all want to come up.

You just can stand behind. I'll read the certificate of special recognition. But first, I'd like to introduce a coach. If you'd like to come over and say maybe a few words about your team and what they accomplished, then we'll come have everybody come up.

First of all, we'd like to thank you for the invitation and for having us here and welcoming us. What these young men accomplished, they were the first city school in almost 30 years of soccer on both the boys' and the girls' side to win a state championship. So it's a huge accomplishment considering that The odds are long when you're competing against a lot of the suburban schools, and they traditionally have been powerhouses. But these guys were able to overcome a lot, get past two years ago losing in a state championship to Dallas Center Grimes in overtime, and then get back and win. We were actually down 2-0 with 17 minutes left to Norwalk and came back and won the game 4-3. So it was a pretty awesome game. And just briefly, we talked all year about wanting to be pioneers. It was a pretty cool feeling because we had another school, Roosevelt, that also made the state semifinals this year. So over the course of the last four years, we've had two Des Moines public schools representing in the state tournament. And these guys are from a variety of countries. We have a lot of Congolese players who are here. We have players from Burma. We have players from Vietnam. We have players from El Salvador. We have players from Mexico. We have players from Vietnam. Malawi, all over the world. And they've come together to be part of building a really, really strong program and representing both Hoover and the Des Moines community. So I'm really proud of these guys and everything they've accomplished. And as we talked about all year, they're pioneers. The first ones to win a soccer championship on both the boys' or the girls' side in the city of Des Moines.

I will read the certificate of special recognition presented to 2026 IHSAA 3A state champions, Des Moines Hoover boys soccer team. The city of Des Moines issues this certificate of special recognition to Des Moines Hoover boys soccer team. On June 5th, 2026, the Des Moines Hoover boys won the 2026 Iowa State Class 3A soccer tournament. This is not only Hoover's first state soccer title, but the first state soccer title for any high school in the Des Moines public school system. The team finished the season with an impressive 16 wins, with their final win being an exciting comeback victory in the state championship. The City of Des Moines congratulates the players, coaches, and the whole student body for this tremendous achievement. We extend our sincere congratulations for a historic season and look forward to continued success for the program. Presented this the third day of August, 2026. I just want to thank you. And I also want to acknowledge Matt Smith, who is a superintendent of schools came in to also support you and recognize all your accomplishments. So if all of you want to come up, we'll get a picture with a certificate. And if anybody, anybody wants to say a few words? I didn't think so. Okay.

Are you the captain? Captain.

One, two, three.

It's always fun to start a meeting like that with seeing our youth and the great things that they've been doing. So with that, I will call our regular Des Moines City Council meeting for August 3rd, 2026 to order. And please take the roll.

Bozen.

Here.

Simonson. Here. Voss.

Here.

Barron.

Here.

Westergaard. Here. Mandelbaum.

Here.

Gatto. Here. We have a quorum.

The next item is approving the agenda as presented and or as amended tonight. 55 was added the attachments. 65 is updated. That's the speaker's list. And then there was an extra item attached approval of the appointment of deputy city manager.

Move approval.

Second. It's been moved and seconded. Please vote.

Seven yes.

Motion carries. The next item is approving the consent agenda. Those are items three through 53. Tonight, number five, Voss, votes no. Number six, Voss, votes no. 23, Mandelbaum would like to speak. These are routine items and will be enacted by one roll call vote without separate discussions unless pursuant to council rules, council requests an item be removed to be considered separately.

Move approval second.

It's been moved and seconded please vote.

7 yes.

Motion carries. Next item. Start of our hearings. Item 54, on request from NMPD Holdings LLC, Adam R. Peterson, officer, regarding two irregular parcels in the vicinity of 1111 Southeast 30th Street and one irregular parcel located at 3400 Granger Avenue. to amend plan DSM creating our tomorrow comprehensive plan to revise the future land use classification of the property from business park to industrial and to rezone the property from limited I-2 industrial district and the EX business park district to limited I-2 industrial district to allow expansion of an existing fabrication and production intensive use. A is first consideration of ordinance above. B is final consideration of ordinance above. Waiver requested by the applicant requires six votes. First is the parties and interests applicant for rezoning and those within 250 feet of the property to be rezoned will be given up to five minutes to speak. Second, germane comments from the general public, two minutes per person to speak, 20 minutes maximum. Is there anyone wishing to speak?

Angie's here to speak.

Angie Fonku, 220 Southeast 6th, Suite 330. I'm representing NMDP tonight as their owner's rep. Don't have really anything to add other than this is just continuing NMDP, which is PDM Precast. So NMDP is the holdings. It's PDM Precast is who this is. It's just continuing their operations. They have since bought the lime pile that you guys may be familiar with and then bought the land at Sunset Beach as well. so this is just allowing us to have the same uses throughout all three properties and continue doing what pdm is doing we will be moving the hollow core work back from carlisle back to des moines so that they can do some more architectural precast here and expand the steel plant in carlisle so if you have any questions but just wanted to clarify thank you mayor i don't see anyone else i will move 54 a and b

Second. It's been moved and seconded. Please vote.

Seven, yes.

Motion carried. Next item. It's 55, our request from Nelson Construction Services, LLC, Alexander Geruch, officer regarding multiple parcels located in the vicinity of 1310 East Deal Avenue to amend plan DSM creating our tomorrow comprehensive plan to revise the future land use classifications of the property from community mixed use and low density residential within a neighborhood node and a regional node to community mixed use and high density residential within a neighborhood node and a regional node. and to rezone the property from N3A neighborhood district, MX3-V mixed use district, and MX3 mixed use district to limited NX3 neighborhood mixed district to allow the construction of a multiple household senior living apartment building. A is first consideration of ordinance above. B is a final consideration of ordinance above waiver requested by the applicant requires six votes. First of the parties of an interest applicant for rezoning of those within 250 feet of the property to be rezoned will be given up to five minutes to speak. Second would be germane comments from the general public, two minutes per person up to 20 minutes maximum. Go ahead.

Good evening, Alexander Gugerich, Nelson Construction and Development, 4056th Avenue, Suite 201, Des Moines, Iowa, 50309. Thanks for having us, or having our team tonight. We have owned, this is a total of four parcels on the south side, right behind Aldi on Southeast 14th. We've owned two of the parcels for years. We recently got the ability to acquire two more parcels that make up a bulk of the site. So now that we have all four, it justifies doing a project. When we looked at the project, we're certainly no strangers in Des Moines. We've done a lot of projects downtown as well as throughout the metro. But when we looked at this specific site, it really made sense for low-income senior. It's right along a bus route, and there's a lot of things going for it that really lends itself to low-income housing for seniors. We did our neighborhood meeting. and we actually have the support of the Neighborhood Association. I would be remiss if I didn't bring up there are neighbors that adjoin the site that are not happy about it. We listen to their concerns and we are voluntarily increasing the amount of setback and we are fine with that condition on the rezoning. Five feet is required. We're quadrupling that to 20 feet. We can't do any more or else otherwise the street extension of Porter doesn't line up and doesn't make sense. We also have to do a six foot tall opaque fence, which we will do on the backside, but we're actually gonna double the amount of trees required to add more foliage. And then the other negative feedback that came up was apparently across the street, Melbourne Apartments, a different developer years ago, sought a similar rezoning. There was no condition that it would have to be age-restricted. So after they did one project age-restricted, their future projects had no age restriction that were low-income housing tax credit projects. The neighbors did not like that. We said we have no intention to do a bait and switch. We are more than happy for you as a condition of the rezoning. Any of the housing on the site and what planning and zoning approved is any housing on the site would have to be 55 up. So we are voluntarily agreeing to do all of those things in order to try to work with the neighbors.

Alexander, tell us about parking. And I know that was also a concern from some of the adjacent neighbors. And talk to me a little bit about that. Yep.

So when it comes to senior housing, parking, we... I have our civil engineer and our architects as well. They can speak to the specifics if you'd like the numbers. But our parking need, while this is our first low-income housing, income-restricted senior project, we are very familiar with senior living. We've done it in the Des Moines metro as well as around the Midwest. And it is very common for those projects to have a much, much, much lesser parking need. So our fewer number of spots compared to market rate multifamily here is directly due to the senior living aspect of it.

Thanks.

Mayor, I have a question. What's before us is a rezoning. The items that you described that you're willing to do to help satisfy neighborhood concerns as part of site plan approval. Does the site plan come back to us, this is a question for staff, or is that administratively approved?

no but but the senior the 55 and older will and the 20 foot setback will be part of the motion and part of the rezoning tonight um if it does get approved okay that'll be part of it thank you

And while I can respect, like I said, the neighbors adjacent to the site are the ones who have some negative comments. I'm sure we'll hear from them tonight. I can totally understand why they would not want that in their backyard. But we have gone above and beyond to try to do what we can to compromise. you know, voluntarily we suggested these things.

And maybe the engineer, what's the height? What are we looking at? I know, I think you can, you've talked about five floors, but then you said between three and five and wherever the sweet spot's going to be. Tell me how, how tall is that building? Cause that question has been asked also.

So the zoning would allow up to five stories. Right now we're currently in schematic design. Until we apply for tax credits and get them, we aren't going to go further in design and engineering. Right now we're planning four stories. We would still like that ability for the zoning to go up to five if when we get into design development and construction documents for some reason we needed to, we would like to have that ability to make the deal work. But right now, what we've laid out is a four-story building, and we intend to move forward with a four-story building. It would be the most economical, so it's in our best interest.

And then we looked at hazardous materials that used to be on the site, and I can have staff come up and talk about that, but I mean, you've worked...

and other sites that those have been found and you you now will have to correct that once you start moving dirt yeah um the neighbors had brought up the environmental issues on the site uh as you can imagine we have to do a phase one environmental to close on our loan to acquire the land in order to do a project there we would you know also have to show the environmental aspects um are satisfied for any lender uh What I would say is everything that the neighbors said, concerns around environmental, I have no disagreement with. But if someone cares about the environmental aspects of the site, the absolute best thing that can happen is a project. Because we will have to remediate. And if we come across anything and dig into anything, we will have to work with the DNR, remediate it. move forward. So if people do have concerns over the environmental and want to see it get better, which we do, the best thing that could happen on that site is a project. Otherwise, it'll just sit. And if there are things buried underneath, then they will continue to be a threat. But by doing a project, that's the only way to fix that if we find anything. Oh, and last thing, we do have experience, to your point. In fact, we have experience with even more intensive issues. When we purchased the land across from Mullets that became Beachy Flats, now it's called Residences at Riverview, that was actually an active monitoring wells were on the site. And so after our project, we were able to work with the DNR and sufficiently have those closed out and vacated because of the levels. So we not only have experience in exactly this, we have experience with even more intensive environmental than this.

Yeah, that's the site that I was talking about. I knew you had experience. I'm glad you definitely know. Yep. Yes, sir.

Hey, Alexander. So the number of units Can you go back to the parking? So how many parking spaces for residents? And then are there additional parking places for staff and deliveries and such?

Yep. I'm just going to pull up really quick our diagram. So right now we're planning 119 apartments and ad parking stalls okay staff that would be for staff as well um the nearby bus route is right in front of aldi so we do believe that will have an impact um but yeah those are the numbers for the project okay thank you hold this one hold just

We'll make sure these are already part of documents that should be part of the documents.

It says that 55 and older and the 20 foot setback were recommendations from P and Z. I would assume that is part of the documentation that we're going to do part of the same conditions. I won't boot up on my phone. Yeah, I thought they were.

I mean, that's what was passed at P and Z had those conditions and. we included those like when we came in that was not something that we were forced to accept um but those were part of the motion i remember yeah and then just sounds like i did i'm glad that cody came up because we do need to make sure that that is

part of the record uh because that's going to be very important of how we vote and i'm pretty sure it is part of it and then uh carl asked about parking and then talk to me a little bit about our requirements for senior housing compared to residential multi-family housing and parking

Yeah, so Mayor, members of City Council, Cody Christensen, Development Services Director. To answer the first question, there's three conditions associated with this rezoning. One is that the properties have a 55 plus requirement for the residents for any structure that has two or more dwelling units in it. The other is that the buffery yard setback has increased to 20 foot along the southern border of the property. So between this property and the adjoining single family residential lots on the south, and that those have double the amount of landscaping in them.

And you and I talked about before this meeting, we talked about like, hey, do they have, is there any room for them to push it back? And with them extending that street and putting the parking in, It wasn't just Alexander that told me. You told me that also, that we really can't do. I know the neighbors would like a 100-foot buffer, similar to what Menards did, but I don't believe there's room to do any more than 20, is there?

If you look at the site, this property is about 165 feet wide. You subtract 25 of that for the street extension along the north side. I think the building's about 60 feet wide itself. Figure another 60 foot for parking that leaves 20 feet for buffer space. Right. To increase that distance any further does impact the design of the structure and the required parking.

Okay.

Okay.

And then the parking that we typically require is less, right? Did you talk about that?

So when it comes to senior living facilities, there's typically fewer vehicles that they generate. You don't have the families with teenage children that are living there that bring additional vehicles. The parking requirements for this structure are half a parking space for each unit.

And my recollection, and I haven't had a lot of people come back after they built senior housing for more parking. We had a lot of those requests. I just, for me, and I've been here Alongside everybody, I don't remember that coming back and saying, oh, we need to add more parking to this senior housing. Is that typically what happens when we require them to have half, or is that usually significant enough?

I can't think of any off the top of my head where we've added parking spaces.

I can't either, and I've been trying, but I just have not... i can't think of any that have came up and actually the one at christ king would have came up is what i thought would because that was the biggest the one on the west side of southwest ninth when they built that senior living i mean they have only maybe 10 or 12 spots there and that was always the biggest complaint now i know some people park across the street there but Um, I think they, I don't ever see those, that parking lot ever full.

What, what we find with development like this, the developers are, they're pretty on the ball as far as what parking needs there are to support the facilities that they're proposing. Um, and their, their analysis is usually much, it goes far beyond what our minimum requirements are. Yeah. So if, if they're saying that this is the parking they need to support that structure, um,

they're they have a lot of invested in these properties right so they're right they're on the ball with that okay thank you what is your investment in this project alexander what the first the first building itself and what what i mean how many millions is this oh i mean we're probably talking about a 40 million dollar plus project um

yeah and just to expound on uh if we get the parking wrong and we can't lease up we will be in a very difficult position as you could imagine but because it's litech we'll be in a difficult position for two reasons one we won't be bringing in the income that we need to make the project work but two with litech you need to get full within a certain amount of time after completion and so It would be very dangerous for us to play a game on parking. Very, very financially dangerous. And even if we thought we were right, the lender is also going to make sure that we're right. I think it's probably 75% or less of that will be a lender. So they'll have a lot of exposure.

Okay, thank you.

Now we'll open it up to... Yeah, just real quick, and not for you, and Carl reminded me, and I know that Steve neighbors here also, that we are going to do a... Because one of the biggest concerns was the traffic that's coming out of Maverick and coming out of Menards that is going westbound on Diehl. I mean, it's crazy how fast they go. So we are doing an analysis and hopefully maybe slow some traffic down by getting some speed humps there. I know that our guy got back this week, so we are going to get that started. I see Steve's shaking his head. So I did want the neighbors to know that as a city, we are going to at least look at that portion of it. yeah as part of not just the site plan but as as me i've recommended that they take a look at that as the as the ward councilman so i'm sorry i need to interrupt you but go ahead i was just going to say open it up for any other germane comments from general public you have two minutes okay yeah there's somebody coming okay please state your name and address or ward

My name is Chad Ogle Richelli. I live at 920 East Neal Avenue. Thank you for having me, Mayor and Council. I am opposed to the project in some ways, not opposed to development in this area, but I have a big concern about how close in proximity it is to our house. It's 20 feet off our back property line. Again, that's just, I know I still live in a common sense world, so I apologize. But five stories, four stories, three stories, 20 feet off my back parking lot or my back property, this wall to roughly the middle of this room, be a good guess. One story, roughly the tall, the ceiling height here. So we can imagine how much that is going to be in our backyard. Our street is heavily traveled, has been. I don't want to go into a lot of detail, but I was a victim of road rage. Person went to prison for two, excuse me, for a year and a half and got out. Can elaborate on that if anybody would want. But at the end of the day, we don't go in our front yard to play, to sit down, to have a picnic. We don't have that luxury because it is just horribly busy. There's constant people honking, screaming, this and that. Just stay away from it. Learn my lesson, too. All that was on camera, by the way. That's why you went to prison. now backyard's all we got so we're back there and having that facility or this building that close like i said i would like some due diligence of a hundred foot buffer and i realized that maybe the streets don't align the sewer system things of that but that's what engineers are for they have the ability if this is a 40 million dollar project you can't tell me you can't make a street curve another 50 feet or 40 foot or 25 foot pipe the sewers in and do the work needs to be done. My goodness, they've done it down there on Second Avenue and they've done it all over other places here in Des Moines. I'm not going to say I haven't lost sleep over this. I have. Okay, thank you. That's not enough time to voice my opinion.

Is that five minutes? He's 250 feet.

If he's 250, you have five minutes.

You have more time. You're 250 feet.

Sorry.

What was that?

Sorry. He gets five minutes.

Well, I'll take the last couple of minutes here. Thank you for letting me come back.

Yeah, thanks for reminding me. We normally...

You know, the parking, the overflow, all that, again, common sense world. And I realize engineers look at this and they say that's enough parking. But if we have 110 or 119 units, that means only half these people are driving vehicles. 55 and up, most of our 55 people, that age group, still work. Unfortunately, our economy is horrible and they have to work even if they are in retirement. So they're going to have to get to work, take the bus, this, that, and the other. A lot of them are still going to drive. I want to talk a little about the light pollution. Lovejoy School shines in our back windows, not during the summer because we have plenty of foliage, but during the winter and fall months and early spring, light comes right in my bedroom window. Now, I realize that maybe there's different lighting we can do with these buildings, but you're still talking 20 feet off our property line. There's no lighting in the world except for none. That will protect us from that. Noise. I have dump trucks, or excuse me, garbage trucks that go to Lovejoy School about 5 o'clock. They're only supposed to be, I think, there at 6, but they go on Thursdays. Dump the trash. I can hear Maverick down the street dumping their trash on, I believe it's Tuesdays. Sometimes as early as 3 in the morning. We're going to have traffic in that parking lot, whether it's um for you know maintenance dump uh garbage trucks people coming and going at all times a night and i realize again 55 but they're still going to be people coming out of that at night driving back there lights in our backyards opaque fence six foot i don't know i don't get it it just seems like it's all too close So again, I'm not against a development. I would just like to see a better buffer. I don't know of any buildings or apartments in our general area that is five stories or four stories. The closest ones to us besides Melbourne is down on Kenyon and Southeast Fifth. They are three stories. So again, we're changing the demographic of the general area of the perception of our neighborhood. Thank you.

Thank you.

hello my name is michelle olga richelli i live at 920 east still i've lived there my whole entire life um it's my home i think the south side has a lot of charm i've never thought of moving um i'm very involved in this um i am opposed but same thing i mean i know things can't stay like they are forever um i know that homeless sometimes is an issue um i was asked if i'd rather have that or the apartment complex behind my house and of course i'd rather have a homeless person here and there than an apartment complex and the thing with this rezoning can i put things down to see yes okay can i just put it like this i just have to go she'll get it turned on okay is tonight we're here about 13 Dill Avenue, but this overall rezoning is like 12 acres of land. And so eventually I think they said there would be four of these types of buildings, three to five stories high. So it's not just one area that this is going to affect traffic. We have Lovejoy Elementary School that's right next to it. I did mention I was 55 years old. I actually have a kid in college I have a junior in high school and I also have an eighth grader. So I do have potential drivers. Most of the people in my neighborhood are 55 and up. So I do worry about traffic. I know in the planning and zoning meeting, you know, it was talked about Southeast 14th. It's great to get through to it. It's going through Aldi's parking lot. And I don't know if you guys have ever been to Aldi's parking lot on the weekend. It is congested. You're lucky if you can even find a spot to park. So I don't think utilizing that to get to Southeast 14th is a good option at all. I mean, there's just a, sorry, that's the Aldi's parking lot. Through those cars is Southeast 14th. Another thing that we're using is a private drive. It's not a public street, and that's where the first apartment complex building will go, and it'll go through a private drive out to Dill Avenue. To the left is Southeast 14th, and to the right is our residential area, a street. And here's just kind of a picture. And this is like shared with Maverick. All these are in the background. You can't see it there.

Will you flip it the other way?

Oh, this way. Sorry. Yeah. Okay. So you've got all these like back here. The project's over here. The residential area is the street, Dill Avenue. And if you go out where this car is at, that southeast 14th across the street is bull ram lane so our street is very congested it's not a typically a connector street um the last traffic and i know you guys said you would do that but the last traffic study was 2009 and the figures were astronomical it was almost like 3 000 cars a day And the street I don't even think is your typical width either. It's a smaller street. There is parking. So back to the parking lot. If you've got two bedroom apartments and now it's raised to 80 parking spots, one thing we asked and we did not get a response to is where will this overflow park? Are they going to park on Dill Avenue? Because on a good day, a weekend, Dill Avenue becomes a one-way street. And, in fact, our mailbox was just hit the other day because it's so congested. So I do appreciate that you guys are going to have the traffic study done. And then I just wanted to put this out here, too. You know, us neighbors were asked to vote, and I was told this was more of a land ratio, and that's why we were only, I think, shy of 12%. But as you can see, we all voted opposed. We want more things done with this project. A lot of the ones that are blank, unfortunately, they did sign our petition, but they rent the house, so they don't have the actual voting card. Let's see. And then I know we talked about people not working. when they're 55 and up. I don't know if you'll be able to see this. But we did look into some statistics, and that's not true. I mean, 66% of Americans between age 55 and 64 remain active in the labor workforce. So people do work. No one is really sitting around watching TV. That would be great. um and then lastly back to the environmental thing again i've been there my whole life so i am very familiar i mean it was before my time too with kato drum kato industries um we did get more of the report from the epa and you know it was an unfortunate thing with how the person involved and the monies. So eventually monies run out. But it was said in the report that there is still subsurface damage and drums buried and so on and so forth.

Okay, thank you.

You're welcome. Thank you very much.

You're welcome. The next speaker.

Hi, my name is Teresa Dahl. I live at 1016 East Deal Avenue. My house is the very first one that this is going to affect. I just hope that you all will work with the local neighbors and Lovejoy School so we can come to a happy medium. Here are a few of my concerns. My main concern is about the buffers, how many feet away. I know they said 20 feet. I don't think that's far enough. And what type of a buffer, because where I'm at is going to be the parking lot. And if someone steps, accidentally steps on the gas instead of the brake, they're going to go right into my house. So I just was wondering what kind of, if the buffer is going to stop that, you know? That would be nice if they would stop someone from doing that. I really like the tall trees and foliage there is back there right now. Wondered if we could keep any of that. And I was hoping that we could have an eight to 10 foot fence. And you know, if you're gonna build a building that tall, it'd be nice to have a fence that tall. Not as tall as five.

Not five stories.

No, but just like eight to ten feet, if possible. And then, of course, like everyone else in my neighborhood, we're concerned about the water runoff. Also, if sewer lines are big enough to compensate the growth. And here's my last point, because I don't want a bad surprise of the sewer lines backing up in my yard or my basement. That's not cool. So I'm hoping that doesn't happen. And I just hope you all consider us neighbors and work with us, not just with him. And I'm kind of excited about it. No, I like the building being built. Just consider us too. That's all. Thank you.

Okay, thank you. Anyone else wishing to speak?

Hi, I'm Lisa Stocker-Ross. I'm president of South Central DSM Neighborhood Association. Plus, I actually live in this neighborhood. I'm only a couple blocks from where this building actually is. But I wanted to let you know that the Neighborhood Association does support this. And our main reasons are I hear complaints all the time about homeless people there. Lovejoy people, the kids see naked people walking around from the homeless camps. They see that all the time. It's a dumping ground. If you go down Canyon, it looks like a dump. People dump their stuff on there and that's basically what they use it. If you go down that private drive, it's a dump. I've seen washers and dryers sitting out there all the time. As far as Deal, Deal is busy, but it's not the people in the neighborhood who are making that street busy. It is the people that go and use it from Southeast 5th to Deal and they use that street as that. So it's not not the people in the neighborhood. And having more people they would go out if they are going east will go out to Deal. They said they wanted to extend Porter. That would give them a direct route to Southeast Fifth as well. It would be a nice thing for Lovejoy School. It's always nice to have intergenerational people. Maybe they could work with the staff at Lovejoy and get some folks to maybe help him read and do things like that. And also the developer, he has been awesome, giving him ideas. He's very willing to work with the neighbors. I think he is going above and beyond. So I did want to let you know that the Neighborhood Association does support them. I will also say that this task force does not participate with the Neighborhood Association as well. So thank you very much.

Thank you. Anyone else wishing to speak to this matter? If not, I will open it up.

Well, thanks, Mayor. First of all, thanks, everybody, for coming, Shell and Chad and others that have been here. Alexander, I've worked with you many times, and it's good to get the neighbors involved, and so we've got to hear a lot of their concerns. I think you've You've answered most of them that you can. If you could give them 100 feet, I think you would give them 100 feet. But it mathematically does not work with Porter there in giving the parking. Porter is going to make a big difference. Porter is a direct route that has lights on Southeast 5th. that i believe if you want to go west instead of going out on southeast 14th you will go that way you will not use deal avenue to go west there's no reason to do that and he will have an exit there so you will be able to do that um i think that will be very very helpful as far as the lights goes um know technology has changed and maybe we need to ask the school to at least take a look at their parking lot and make sure that their lights are functionally correct um if they're picking up garbage if they're picking up garbage too early then ankin me sanitation whoever's picking it up we need to privately take a look at that and put a call into them and make sure that they're abiding by our policies. Because we do have a policy that you can't go into a neighborhood, I believe it is, not before 6 a.m. It's either 6 or 7, but I know. I think it is 6. and and so we need to make sure that everybody's abiding by the rules that we've laid out there and so shouldn't be anybody picking up garbage at 5 00 a.m um and and slamming that you know that's that's not fair to anybody um so um i'm happy to listen if my colleagues have any other comments but i mean i will move 55 i'll move 55a right now depending on how the vote goes and then we'll look and see what b goes um i'm happy to hear anybody else's comments but I appreciate everybody coming.

Joe, I'll second that, but may I make a friendly amendment? I'm guessing that the developer is going to do this anyway, but on any building facade that abuts single-family homes, there will be no lights. And if there are balconies, they're probably going to be recessed, but any balcony lighting has to shine straight down. Is that acceptable to the developer? So we don't have security lights four stories up in the air that

Yeah, we're happy to do that. And we can have the photometric studies that show that the light will go down if we have any on the backside.

I don't know if we can make, can we make an amendment to this or do we have to continue the hearing? You would have to continue the hearing. Yeah, that's what I thought.

I'm satisfied with the developer making that verbal commitment.

I am too. I've worked with Nelson Construction. We all have. And I believe that if Alexander or Mike Nelson says they're going to do something, I trust that it is going to get done and they're not going to pull a bait and switch. And I can... can attest to that i've worked with them enough so there won't be any lights shining that way for sure okay thank you it's been moved and seconded 55a right now 55a please vote seven yes motion carries i'll move 55b just second

Sorry. It's been moved and seconded. Please vote.

Just a second.

In just a moment, you can vote.

OK. 7, yes.

Motion carries. The next item is item 56. the proposed 38th amendment to the urban renewal plan for the metro center urban renewal area council communication number 26-273 germain comments from the general public two minutes per person to speak 10 minutes maximum anyone wishing to speak to this seeing none mayor i'll move item 56. second been moved and seconded please vote seven yes motion carries next item is 57 on the proposed first amendment to the urban renewal plan for the carpenter urban renewal area council communication number 26-272 again general comments two minutes per person anyone wishing to speak to this

SEEING NONE, YOUR HONOR, I WILL MOVE APPROVAL OF ITEM 57.

SECOND. MOVED AND SECONDED. PLEASE VOTE.

7, YES.

MOTION CARRIES. NEXT ITEM IS ITEM 58. On the proposition to authorize a lease purchase agreement with Ziegler Inc. for the lease purchase of a tractor with boom mower for use in city operations. Council communication number 26-275. Again, germane comments from general public. Anyone wishing to speak?

I see none, Your Honor. I'll move 58. Second.

It's been moved and seconded. Please vote.

7, yes.

Motion carries. Next item is 59. the proposition to authorize a lease agreement with the industrial scientific for the lease of esmus atmospheric monitoring devices and services for the use by the public works department and to continue to the august 24th 2026 meeting move item 59 your honor second it's been moved and seconded please vote seven yes motion carries the next item is item 60 A request from Heart of America Chris Whalen officer for an appeal of the Planning and Zoning Commission's decision regarding a public hearing site plan for type 2 design alternatives for property located in the vicinity of 100 Southwest 11th Street. Choose one alternative below. A is denied or B is approved. first parties and interests applicant for rezoning and those within 250 feet of the property to be rezoned will be given up to five minutes to speak second would be germain comments from the general public two minutes uh per person to speak 20 minutes maximum we do we have you know you would like you state your name in your association

Josh Rickstead, Civil Design Advantage, 4121 Northwest Urbandale Drive, Urbandale, Iowa. Mayor, council members, on behalf of Harbor America Group, we're requesting the approval of the Type 2 design alternatives for the Hyper Energy Bar site plan, located at 100 Southwest 11th Street, more generally located at the northwest intersection of MLK Parkway and 11th Street. Just a quick little overview, if I can get access to... The monitor.

Yes. Sorry, it takes a second to switch.

No problem.

Is it on?

I didn't have a button, did I?

it's on yours okay there we go it's on yours if you hold it there i'll zoom out okay now i've yeah it took a minute to get on mine does everybody have them it's yours all share with mike okay

Um, the total site is 2.1 acres. However, the subject property is irregularly shaped as you can see with a long narrow overall orientation. It's surrounded by roads to the south and east and a railroad to the north. Um, and cannot be assembled with other properties for development as shape. Isolation and encumbrance of existing easements. Make it limit the options for development and make it traditional urban formats. Not really viable ultimately. Yes, it's a 2.01 acre site, but as you can see, the only develop a portion is point 65 acres. So that's the main reason I want to present that. Without going into being specifics, I would like to kind of give you a quick summary of the proposed site. Ultimately, Harbor America Group is looking to build a 1,029 square foot hyper energy bar with dual drive-throughs, one for the driver pickup and one for the passenger pickup. Access is provided for vehicular off of Southwest 11th Street, public sidewalk improvements and access off of 11th Street, and also a trail connection to MLK. And to mention MLK, the applicant's also willing to put in 1,000 linear feet of trail all along MLK as part of this project to further extend the MLK trail corridor. Parking, I would like to note there's 13 parking stalls for a typical development like this. Only one's required. So where they are trying to bring in the pedestrian and And, uh, bike traffic, um, there's 7 onsite parking stalls, which is another does not type 2 design alternative. The reasoning for these 7. Parking stalls is mainly for staff only the closest on street parking to the site is over 600 feet north of it. So there's a typical staff level of 3 to 4 employees. So just do this shift change is why they wanted 7 place spaces. Um. As for that, I won't get any other details on the utilities and trash enclosures, but they're kind of tucked behind as far as we can. I would be happy to answer any questions. There is a representative of the applicant here as well, Chris Whalen. So we'd be happy to answer any questions.

Just for clarification on the electric easement. Yep. I can bring that back up. And that would restrict...

I as well, because that's transmission lines correct that that the only thing that could be developed underneath there is something like a parking lot without raising the height. And 1, 1 thing I forgot to also mention is this site is actually an existing detention basin. Where we did have to maintain volumes for the city's existing regional detention, which is occurring underneath this. Transmission line. in this vicinity but yeah so ultimately that electrical easement yes cuts it off can you could you go back to that um so that uh where's the egress for that now let's see i think yeah okay so the entrance is right here off 11th street and this has been coordinated with city traffic for also even a future development towards the east to coincide with that

so the in and out are both at that um area you pointed to right yep correct right here and so yeah and so they're crossing the southbound bike lane right correct okay so southwest 11th street is being revised to include just a left turn at oops

Sorry, my hand's not on there. Left turn at the intersection of MLK. And then just north of that, that's going to turn into a two-way left turn lane just to accommodate traffic coming in, as well as to accommodate future traffic coming into the property to the east or yeah, to the east.

So both the bike riders and the motorists are going to have to be paying attention right there, right?

Correct. But bicycle riders can also come from the MLK corridor from either south of MLK or as MLK gets extended. I believe the trail is, I can't remember how far to the east it's extended on the north side of MLK. But I imagine at some point, both the north and south will have that trail, grade separated trail.

And those red column triangles, that's like your shade structure? It is.

Here's a perspective, just to kind of give you guys an idea. And that would be looking at it from the, looking towards the northwest.

Okay.

Just to the to you, you said the developers willing to put in 1000 feet of trail extension, right? So is there not trail on the north side of MLK? Right there? Nothing, correct? Not on the north side? Yeah. What does that can would that connect to anything that's existing right now?

No, it will it connects to the existing sidewalk ramp. And there is actually a trail crossing for the trail on the south side of them. Okay. But for now, no one is just kind of give you a quibble. I do have a sidewalk on that side of the street, though.

Yeah, it's kind of I'm trying to figure it out.

So that's where I land to connect to the get across the parking lot located over here, which is I think under they're looking at redeveloping at some point. Yeah, there's not sidewalk in front of that. So as that got redeveloped, then you'd be extending it to the east. But this is kind of give you a perspective of what that thousand linear feet looks like. But I mean, we're putting that in to nowhere.

I think it connects across the street. You said that it connects across the street.

It connects across the street, and it's providing the possibilities to put it in in the future.

Can it carry to the west? I see where you kind of stop it, and I see the railroad track there. Is it not allowed to carry farther than that?

Well, that's the limits of the actual property. This little corner right there. Yes, sir. North. That's why it's terminated there. But it could it could continue to the west and maybe it out to tighten up on the right away. But yes.

Okay.

Appreciate it.

Any other questions? If not, or anything else you need to add?

No, but I can happy to answer any other questions as they come up. Okay.

So the next would be anybody that would part is then just I would like to speak germane comments. Is there anyone here to speak to it? Because if not, we will

My name is Carol Maher and I live in downtown Des Moines in Ward 3. A double drive-thru restaurant does not fit in downtown Des Moines. You know the reasons why. One, no concern for our zoning code. Since their first site plan submission in December, through two official reviews and comment letters from the planning department to the P&Z presentation in June, the applicant's plan has always requested 10 Type 2 design alternatives, 10. What does that say about the applicant? It shows disrespect for you? for Des Moines residents, our rules, and how the city is run. Two, the Ames and Iowa City hyper-energy bars are walk-up only. Three, approving this site plan is precedent setting. Dutch Brothers already has a drive-through project pending in the planning department, downtown, a couple of blocks away. Four, We have 1,800 miles of street, 30 miles with bike lanes. Less than 2% of our streets have a bike lane, most of which are paint only, which provides no protection for riders. But we celebrate that because that's what we've got. We take it. Is it enough? Of course, we always want more. But on Southwest 11th Street, a paint-only bike lane where 50 drive-throughers per hour, 100 crossings in and out through the bike lane will come with this project. 100 conflict points per hour. Don't believe me? Read the traffic study. This number is from actual from hyper's actual sales volumes from their suburban locations. Please send the applicant back to the drawing board. Deny this site plan. Thank you.

Anyone else wishing to speak?

Hi, my name is Anne Crotty. I'm in Ward 3. Hyper's plans call for a one-story building, surface parking lot, and two-sided drive-through service, features that are generally prohibited under our downtown zoning. The developer explained that this drive-through service is essential because downtown Des Moines lacks the pedestrian density to support the company's walk-in locations. They requested an unusually high and unreasonable 10 exceptions on things like building height and double lane drive-through, zoning requirements that are essential to encourage population density that we value. This admission tells me that there are fundamental problems with this design and would encourage fixing the problems directly rather than asking for multiple exceptions. Although this area is not currently as dense as we would like and is surrounded by surface parking lots or green space, the mixed-use development across the street at 900 Vine Street will add thousands of square feet of ground floor commercial space and 160 apartments. This will pull more shoppers, diners and residents into this sidewalks and bike lanes, which could create additional safety concerns for them along an already difficult area. If this auto centric design is improved instead, I would support eliminating the double drive through and possibly adding a second level or third level if we can figure out what the electric easements, um, And then that would allow indoor seating as a possibility and possibly a rooftop space which would make it really cool with overlooking views of Gray's Lake and the downtown skyline. I'm also concerned that this project will create an expectation among future developers. Thank you.

Anyone else wishing to speak? I'll turn it over to the council.

Mayor, I'd like to make a motion to approve 60B for approval. And if I could have a second, I'd like to make a couple of comments.

Second, please.

I was a little bit skeptical when I first heard about this project. But the more I thought about it, it's on an eight-lane divided road. And there's a bike path on one side only. Okay. This is an opportunity that that whole MLK was designed to move cars. And I remember when it was first designed, it was designed to be an elevated roadway with columns and a roadway on top. And if I remember correctly, Fred White's out of his own pocket paid to have a model done to say this needs to be brought down to the ground level and not do these overhead roadways anymore. And that was that was enough to convince folks at that time. Having said that, it's still an eight lane divided roadway. I went out and looked at the Ankeny facility because when I looked at Google Earth, it's on a bike path. I was amazed at how many bikers were parked at the bike racks and having a drink outside. So it's certainly going to attract cyclists. And might it open doors for other more auto use facilities? Maybe. When I look at that roadway, we have elevated roads, 9th Street being one. What are we going to put between these roadways? If there were one or two more type functions that allow for cars to use them, I wouldn't be opposed to that. But I think this is a good use, and do I understand that this applicant is not asking for any city money? They're paying for this land and they're not asking for any TIF, they're not asking for any tax abatement. And therefore that's why I support this project. Thank you. Any other comments?

I've got some comments and I will say this is something that I struggle with, but I am prepared to support. so long as it is not precedent setting. And I want to be clear, I think this is a unique site. It is an awkward parcel to start with. And then you layer on three different types of utility restrictions. You have railroad, you have transmission, which impacts height. And by the way, the same transmission lines are impacting the design on a much bigger parcel across the street. And we're getting more density across the street, but that is because It's a much bigger parcel and it's limited even the density on that parcel because of the transmission lines. And then you layer detention on. So I do not think that we could get in any near term and maybe ever a more dense proposal on this site. I just, I don't think the economics work. I don't think the space on the site work. I share the concerns that folks have raised about generally these type of projects are not appropriate for a downtown use. And I would agree with that. And one of the things that I would hope, particularly Council Member Simonson, your comments gave me pause in terms of my vote, just because I wanted this vote to not be precedent setting. And if I have colleagues who are viewing it as precedent setting, I may reconsider where I was at, because I don't think it is appropriate. And my hope was to secure commitments from others that this doesn't become one in a series of exceptions. Given the constraints, I am willing to vote for this, but I would like some assurance from colleagues that this won't become something that becomes a pattern in downtown because I don't think the, I can't think of another parcel in downtown that has these type of constraints and where I would be willing to consider an exception like this.

I certainly do not anticipate this roadway being lined with auto-oriented businesses, but I am open to ideas. I spend a lot of time in Philadelphia, and there's a beautiful five-story apartment building, and it has a fire station on the first floor right on the corner with big trucks going in and out, and there are apartments above it and apartments on the side. You can have density with a little creativity. I agree with you. there's no other use that i can think of for this odd piece of property but to say zero ever i can't say that but i would not support a row of auto oriented businesses that's not what the goal is anyone else

I just, I want to just briefly hit the precedent side of this because that's really the main concern for me is, you know, understanding what we're intending to do and where we as really the trustees for the city are setting lines for what's important and what's not important. And so we haven't had drive-through and, in downtown until this point. And I think I will vote against this, the motion to approve, because I am worried about the precedent and want to be on the record against that. I do appreciate the work that the developers have done to this point and the uniqueness of this this plot and what can or cannot be done there. But I think I'm looking at this five, 10, 20 years out and wanna make sure that it's on the record that this council is concerned about potential similar development like this in our downtown.

Anyone else? Because I as far as setting precedent, every one of these, every plan would have to come before us, right? It goes before planning and zoning. So we will have every opportunity to say whether we think it's the right fit or not. So I don't think as far as saying today, right now today that nothing will ever happen. I doubt that there'll be anything. But we'll have that opportunity to say we don't want it or we do. So until, you know, unless you have a, you know, I don't know how you. I think the rule is not to. This is an exception. They're asking for a rezoning. We will have the opportunity to look at if somebody would bring something. This isn't a regular size. We know that's why we're saying yes. And if that's a precedent, but we're approving this, it's not a precedent.

The challenge is that the next one of these is not potentially that far away from us since we have a proposal. We have a proposal for that Dutch Brothers that is also downtown in a lot where I think we could do better. So that is my concern from a precedent's perspective.

but our vote is on this item. I don't think we're taking a vote to set precedent.

I apologize, I even said anything. This is the right use for this piece of property.

That's what we're voting on.

There is a motion. We are voting, right?

Yes, please vote.

Six yes, one no.

motion carries next item is 61 on skywalk exterior improvements phase one resolution approving plans specifications form of contract documents engineers estimate receiving file bids and designating lowest responsive responsible bidder as an intern inc clinton m rhodes president for 1 million $45,700. Council communication number 26-270. A is the approval of the contract and bond. General public make comment only to the plans, specifications, form of documents, engineer's estimate, or low bidder designation. And those will be the only comments to be considered germane. Two minutes per person, up to 10 minutes max.

I have some comments and maybe start with a question for our attorney to see if I can understand a piece of this, because I know this was bid with one bridge is kind of a, that could be separated out. And I'd like to see if we can just go forward and approve the contract, but kind of hold back on the piece that separated out where we have approval to do that. maybe have to come back after some additional due diligence? And is that possible?

Not unless it was bid that way. So that's probably a question for...

It was bid as an adder. Like, it was bid separately.

You mean, so if it was bid as a separate add-on, council decides now whether they want to award it or not. They can't hold the bidder to that bid later on if they decide not to award it now and then say six months or later want to come back and say okay we changed your mind we want to have you do it so we couldn't cancel if we were to it's it yeah the contract gets executed based on council's award this evening

because I have some level of concern with this particular bridge because there's some redundancy there and I think there's an opportunity for some efficiency if we worked with the property owners. And I think we've started the process, but we haven't got all the way down that process. This is a section of Skywalk that requires capital investment beyond just the 80,000 for that bridge. There is 150,000 in HVAC that is going to have to be an investment that's going to have to be made pretty much right now. So there's an opportunity to avoid $230,000 in capital investment. In addition, on the west side of this bridge, The building owner is very much open to having the skywalk closed, and it might actually provide some benefit to the building owner. They have a tenant that is looking to expand, and there's limited office space. The corridor divides up what could be used as office space. So we could provide some real value to the tenant as well. If we have no option other than to go with the existing contract, we can either do it as bid with the adder or not. We have, this is I think according to the staff memo, the first of three phases of downtown bridge renovation. So we would have another opportunity in the not too distant future to address this bridge. I would prefer that we take advantage of this opportunity and look for some efficiency and see if we can work through this. So I would move approval of the contract minus the the adder for the Fifth Street Bridge.

I think, well, first of all, we don't know if this company wants us. Second of all, if you look at the pictures of this bridge, it's probably one of the most needed to get repaired. So I appreciate that. But if we end up taking the bridge down, we're still talking, I don't want to quote numbers, like 500,000, 600,000 probably. So I think that we have an obligation to at least make it safe. But when you see gapping holes... in the part of it. So I mean, I think the other things are all the unknown of whether they're taking it over whether we don't need it. We don't know. But we do have an obligation to keep things up. So I would not be supportive. I don't know if anyone else. No.

Did we move it?

No, I moved it moved it minus this bridge. Oh, I'll second. It's been moved and seconded to remove this bridge from the contract.

So, Mayor, if some of us vote no, may we make another motion?

Yes.

Then I will be voting no.

Okay. We will let everyone have the opportunity. It's been moved and seconded to not include this bridge in the contract.

WHICH COULD ALLOW US TO SAVE SOME MONEY.

IT COULD ALLOW US TO PAY MORE MONEY BECAUSE IT'S NOT, IF THE REPAIR WORK IS NOT BEING DONE IN CONJUNCTION WITH THE ORIGINAL PROJECT, WHICH MEANS YOU START ALL OVER AGAIN, YOU SET UP SCAFFOLDING AND IT'S GOING TO COST MORE MONEY.

BUT WE MAY NOT NEED IT.

let's have some remember members of city council just i want to clarify one thing the 150 000 as i put in my email that is for the hvac in the private quarter that's not a city expense that's that's that's the the hotel plans to replace it they've had some staffing they're aware of it and so they're trying to work to so the cost to repair this bridge This bridge is $73,000. $73,000 for the city of Des Moines. Yeah, and that includes the fact that we had a city water drain break, and so it's caused water damage. It's caused the bottom of the soffit. So if you go out there right now, there's a hole in the bottom of the... We got the picture there, and then the other concern with it also is then, of course, when you have water damage, the water is now now dripping down onto the sidewalk instead of going into the drain. Like, it's supposed to and then obviously water damage can lead to other issues as we know, in buildings as well. So, yeah.

Yeah. You know, if we were to take this down, there would have to be some private sector investment, right? Because there is building repair on the facades. The $150,000 that the private sector would save would maybe be what would cover their investment. Is there... Well... When is the next phase of this work going to be done?

It'd be over a year from now, so then you'd be looking at... This work we intend... This actual bridge is the highest priority because of the issues we have, so we would have the contractor do this work within the next four to six weeks if this is awarded tonight. The problem is if we delayed it to the next contract, you're looking at... you know, over a year to have it sit that way.

Well, how long has it been sitting this way? You know, I'm not sure I can answer, but you know that, I mean, it's been sitting this way for years. I mean, we have urgency now, but it's been this way for quite some time.

So we have an obligation to not have things falling off of the bridges. I mean, that's my concern is that it's not good.

Yeah. There's a motion. Why don't we just- Okay.

We're voting that we would not include this bridge in the bid that's been on the Skywalk exterior improvements.

Right. We're voting not to fix this.

It's not a not fix ever. It's work with the property owners and see if they're I mean, because this would be the time if this bridge was ever going to at least for another 20 years and this is a one of the few places that is completely redundant in the in the skywalk and not going to any particular destinations except for the hotel that for the parking is that who you said is it the most well but the owner of that parking garage is okay with this and there's also closer parking it's actually a city lot that is the closest parking that they don't use

but that is if the owner of the place wants to expand so i'm just saying we have a motion on the table okay then two yes five no motion fails so we will now entertain a motion on the skywalk 61 second

Yes, second.

It's been moved and seconded. Please vote.

7, yes.

Motion carries. The end of the hearing is at 622. The next item is number 62, amending chapter 114 of the municipal code. Oh, we did. Okay. Well, I didn't know if they were going to do this first or we can go back to 23. Okay. It was added. They didn't have it in their records. Yeah.

I had asked us to speak briefly on 23. Yes.

item 23 is a recommendation from council member mandelbaum to appoint blank blake clyde to the des moines civil and human rights commission seat six with a term expiring april 3 2028.

so i wanted to just highlight a few things one i want to thank cameron middlebrooks for his service on the civil rights commission i wanted to call out blake who's kindly sat through sat through a our meeting this evening uh and thank him for his willingness and interest to serve and wanted to to highlight this particular moment um You know, we have a great history in Des Moines from a civil rights perspective. We were early champions of civil rights. This happens to be the 75th anniversary of anniversary year of the enactment of the Des Moines Civil Rights Commission. And we were early in recognizing the damage that discrimination and prejudice can do and to actually be proactive about doing something to address that. I wish those issues were gone today. They are not. We still have to be diligent. We still have to work hard. And while the form may sometimes be different, It is equally important that we as a community stand up for our values, that we acknowledge our history and we celebrate the work and the value of our Civil Rights Commission. And one of the reasons that I'm excited for Blake to be joining at this moment, one of the things that the commission will be working on is a celebration of that 75th anniversary and of that work. Um, and wanted to just call some attention to that because the work is not done. And I'm grateful that we have folks like Blake willing to step up to do that work. So with that, I will move item 23 second.

It's been moved in a second. Please vote. We got you.

Okay, go.

Welcome to the commission. Okay, the next item. Is 62 amending chapter 114 of the municipal code regarding traffic regulation changes as follows. Council communication number 26-262. A is turn prohibition of the intersection of Hull Avenue and Oxford Street. B is corner clearance parking restrictions. Southeast 30th Street and Easter Lake Drive. Two, Lay Street and East Sheridan Avenue. Three is Lester Lane and Southview Drive. Four is Northwest Drive and Merle Hay Road.

I move 62 AB1234 and pursuant to rule 42A I'll waive the second and third readings.

It's been moved and seconded. Please vote.

7 yes.

Motion carries. The next item is 63. Receive and file requests from Broadlawn's Medical Center Denise Cundy, officer for a vacation of approximately 2,792 square feet of right-of-way in the vicinity of 1826 Hickman Road, which includes segments of north-south alleyway and a portion of Excess Francis Avenue right-of-way. to allow the vacated area to be assembled with adjoining parcels to facilitate construction of a parking lot. Choose one alternative below. A, receive and file the communication from the Planning and Zoning Commission, or B, receive and file the communication from the Plan and Zoning Commission and refer to Engineering Department, Real Estate Division.

I will move approval of 63B.

It's been moved and seconded. Any comments? If not, please vote.

7, yes.

Motion carries. Next item is 64. is the consideration of a request from Joppa Village Project represented by James Hagberg to demolish the former Chesterfield School at 2501 Morey Street pursuant to Section 58-70 of the Historic Preservation Ordinance. Choose one alternative below. Council Communication Number 26-259, A, is referred to the Historic Preservation Commission for further study and review, or B, approve the request to demolish.

If there's no comments all all move 64 B.

It's been moved and seconded any other please vote.

7 yes.

Motion carries. Next item is 65, request to speak from the following. Each speaker will be given three minutes to speak and will be muted at the end of those three minutes. We provide speakers under the public speaking portion the opportunity to address a council for up to three minutes each for up to 20 speakers for a total of one hour agenda. Speakers will be called forward individually and we ask everyone to please state their name, address, or ward prior to providing the comments. Please keep comments germane and avoid references to personalities or character attacks, as those types of comments do not contribute to the purpose for which this public forum exists. As a reminder to the council and the public, this public speaking time is to hear your comments. And if there is a need to follow up, we will get a set up an appropriate staff meeting or meet with the council after this meeting. So thank you for your input. First one is Kathy Burns.

We have something to display. This is cool. hi i'm kathy burns 735 19th street in des moines i'm here representing myself and my husband ed fallon as birds and bees urban farm as a lot of you know we've spoken to council frequently on the importance of raising food in the city and making sure that we not only encourage but accommodate people to grow food where they live or where they can so they can feed themselves and their families. It's come to our attention recently that part of the code maintain about maintaining the border area has been changed and it happened last year it was in June of 2025 and language was added to an ordinance that was addressing some needs to changed the, it was item 102-2 in the code to make some more things allowed in the right of way. But what happened in this ordinance that was presented to council on June 30th of 2025 was that three words were added to the ordinance that put the growing of food in the border area on the naughty list instead of having it stay on the nice list where it's always been. I've got a little diagram for you about the series of events that led to this change, but the part of the section 102.2, now .21, Subsection B and number one, instead of just reading that noxious weeds are not allowed in the border area, and that's the area between the sidewalk and the street. the words or edible plants was added. So suddenly a right that people have had to grow the food that they need to feed themselves has been taken away in a space that a lot of people do use and do need to use for that purpose. I'm hoping, I'm imagining that those three words did not get noticed when this was passed 7-0 last June, a year ago this past June. So I would like to see leadership take a look at this to see how that got in there and why, discuss it and have some means to restore the rights of people to grow food where they need to. Thank you.

Okay, thank you.

And I have these if you'd like.

Okay. The next thing, Alejandro Bermudez. Well, we can, we can, we'll.

We could, could we have Steve come up and address it? Because my understanding is that that wasn't, it wasn't a prohibited use before.

Why don't, if you want.

Or it wasn't an allowed use rather, like we did not make a change on edible plants. It wasn't. It wasn't allowed before it wasn't allowed after that change. There was no change on that.

We can why don't we bring it back? Yeah, why don't we just come back? We'll get some information on it.

Yeah.

Is Alejandro here? If not Robert Carter?

uh lori jones good evening my name is lori jones and i live in ward 3. i am a track member, that is the Transit Riders Advisory Committee for DART. Two years ago in October, I donated my car to Iowa Public Radio, and I use the public bus, DART, almost daily. Up until June 14th of this year, four DART buses entered and exited the Merle Hay Mall in the East parking lot. now no buses go into merle hay mall the 4a and the 4b run up and down douglas and let people off and on there and if they they get in on the south side of douglas they have to cross if they want to go to the merle hay mall very dangerous as there are no walkways uh i mean there are very few uh people uh pedestrian uh sidewalks around the mall um okay so and then also the number five bus runs up and down uh Merle Hay Road okay and um and so But I do take the bus and I talk with people at the bus stops. I talk with passengers and they are frustrated because of the crossing these dangerous roads here. And I believe, I understand that some of the DART people are working, the DART staff are working with maybe some of you about the Merle Hay Mall. But anyway, so this is, it's frustrating for people. Like, I was standing on... the Merle Hay Road, waiting for... A man was standing there and he had pushed the walk button, waiting for the walk button to cross the street. And we waited for about a minute. And then these people, they come out of the Merle... They come out and they don't... It's just like they don't see pedestrians. It's just maddening. So... Let's see. And so... what what we need is uh it's scary the drivers seem you know both douglas and merle hay roads clearly we need the we need the well-defined crosswalks we need the walk signs to even audio i talk to blind people across those roads they have to have assistance So we need the...

Okay.

Thank you. Thank you.

I will move 65A through D. And obviously we're going to have engineering look at her comments. Right, Scott, you've got some of her comments. Engineering is going to look at that. And then engineering will get back to us about some of Kathy's comments.

We have a DART meeting tomorrow.

Yeah. And you are the chair of DART. So I'm sure that we can get that.

For Kathy's comments, it was suggested that it that be referred to the food sustainability advisory committee to look at that.

Okay. So Going to the extra item.

Well, we still have to vote on this. Oh, sorry. Somebody has to second it. I move 65A through D. Less track of the time.

Motion carries. Okay, so the next is an extra item. Approval of the appointment of deputy city manager. I'll turn it over to our manager.

Mayor and Council, I am very excited to present to you this next item, the promotion of gentrality to deputy city manager here at the city. I'm going to take a few minutes, Jen, and appreciation for the work that you've done. I believe it's been 10 years now. And obviously Jen started out in a different role and has taken on and volunteered to do additional responsibility that oftentimes came with extensive training. Jen has overseen nearly half of the departments most recently over the last several years. but not only is her work ethic and relationships with city staff important to the city, but she has a very extensive community professional relationships too. And those come into play quite a bit as the city needs to get different things accomplished, whether that be legislative or nonprofits and even other government entities. She has taken on progressively more difficult tasks over time. And I really appreciate that I can rely on her advice in areas of expertise that I clearly do not have. Thank you, Jen, for that. Appreciation. I want to spend time because we've got John and the boys here. Appreciation to the family. as she has had to sacrifice, no doubt, time away from the boys and John for not only work, but then the calls that disrupt her private life. So I appreciate the sacrifices that you guys have made. And boys, I think we're all proud of your mother in this promotion as well. So thank you for hearing me out. And thank you, Jim.

I'm happy to move item one. Jen, thank you for your dedication to the city. I've watched you grow into this position and I think you'll do very well. Matt, thank you so much for everything you've done for the city. I know you're not going anywhere and she's going to lean on you a little bit for some training, but we sure appreciate both of you and John and your kids. We know it's a big sacrifice.

um and uh just thank you for being here and we appreciate your dedication jan do you know this is an ultra marathon is there a second somebody got a second it's moving second and i also want to acknowledge congratulations jen on the possible vote but also to matt anderson who will be retiring in january Please decide to leave the city and maybe go run more. What all do you run? Anyway, with that, it's been moved and seconded. Please vote.

Seven, yes.

Motion carries. Congratulations, everyone.

And with that,

I will accept the motion to adjourn. Motion to adjourn, Your Honor.

Second.

It's been moved and seconded. All in favor? Aye. This meeting is adjourned.