City Council - Packet - briefing

Morning. I'll call 730 packet reading into order. And please call the roll.

Mayor Morgan.

Here.

Mayor Pro Tem Stevens. Here. Council Member Lee.

Here.

Council Member Flores. Here. Council Member Fleming.

Here.

Council Member Ortega. Here. Council Member Montgomery.

Here.

All right. Citizen communication. Seeing none. Staff briefing D1. Consider staff briefings and council member discussion and or questions. Garden Nimes on the agenda for the May 28, 2026 City Council meeting. all right we'll do the administration i don't haven't decided if since there's not going to be any change if we take a little break like we usually do so we can take pictures i guess i'll get with sarah and kind of find out how the city wants to do it and we had we have to sign some paperwork so what i'll do is we'll get all get sworn in and then i'll let each of you say a few words to people that are here supporting uh You on that. Each of you on that. All right. Consent. Anybody have anything on the consent question? Council Member Montgomery.

I have one. On F2, I presume that the ability to make those decisions is driven by job title?

Here comes Kevin.

When that person changes,

Come on up, Kevin.

Good morning. Good morning.

Yeah, for item F2, this is a resolution of many of the officers and employees authorized to perform financial transactions to the city's tech school account. And these authorizations are actually by individual name. So each time we have turnover in our department, it necessitates us bringing forth a resolution to update our contacts. That's what this is. We've had Tam Tran, our senior accountant, start, as well as Matt Faust, who's our controller, just to add them to our authorized users.

Okay, but... Okay, thank you. Good?

I'm good.

Kevin, is there no advantage just to name it by title, or the title sometimes will not assume those responsibilities?

Yeah, for the authorization, the textbook requires both a title as well as a name of an individual.

Okay, thank you.

Any other questions? Anything else on any of the consent? Thank you, Kevin. G1, consider resolution authorizing the manager to issue a purchase order with Siddons and Martin. Chief? And Corey? Where's Corey? Just in case. Okay.

Good morning, Mayor and Council.

Good morning.

So this request is to purchase a stock engine from Sins Martin for the price of $939,950. This year in our strategic planning meeting when I was presenting to you all, we talked about the current squad program and that I would no longer ask for any squads that have pumps on them and that in the future if squads were brought up, it would be in the form of an SUV, a Tahoe basically. Amen. We have been, myself and two assistant chiefs, been running through the response models and how to plug the squads that we currently have, or the squad that we currently have, how to plug it into the responses. And in today's world, we have to label it as an engine in CAD so that it will get pulled for dumpster fires, car fires, and smaller fires. It is capable of pumping at a structure fire. It's just not ideal because of the very limited equipment that's on it. So this request is to abandon our current squad program, replace it with a full-size engine. In doing so, we would trade in a couple vehicles to help bring the price down. And earlier this fiscal year, y'all approved a PO for roughly a million dollars for an air truck, and for a second squad to come online. Working through Siddons, we would not be penalized for turning back the one that's currently under construction. The cost of that truck was $400,895. Some fire math here, but what we're really asking for is $539,055 in unapproved funds for a full-size engine. We've worked with Corey and his crew as well as far as the trucks we want to trade in. if that's going to create a deficit for us in our reserve fleet. And it's not, again, because of the stellar job that his troops do is keeping all of our trucks up and running. So it will not create any issues with us there. The staffing we already have with the remainder of the staff is currently in the new hire academy. So it wouldn't create any staffing issues for us. So we'll be happy to answer any questions.

Questions? Council Member Flores.

So Chief, just want to make sure I understand. So are we canceling an order and placing a new order or are we trading in equipment? So both.

Both, yes, sir. So we're canceling one order of the truck that's currently under construction. The squad that we currently have in place, they're giving us a trade-in value of $100,000 for that truck. So it would go away as well. It would be turned back to Siddons. This engine that we found is currently being built as a stock truck. So there are several... I know we've talked over the last three to four years and maybe even longer about the long lead times on fire trucks. So there's really three processes you can go. One, you can do a full custom truck, which is what we've done in the past. And part of that, we can continue to play in that role because of our replacement program. We know when we need to order. There's a second version where you have limited picks. So it's a semi-custom. And then there's the stock program. Typically, the stock trucks aren't even close to what we're looking for here in Round Rock. Fortunately, we did find one that, with some minor modifications, will be just like the trucks we've bought in the past.

And how does this impact the response time model?

It doesn't impact it negatively at all. It's the same. It's just replacing one of our smaller vehicles to a full-size engine. And so on Fireside, it actually will improve The response times, no, but it will improve our capabilities. Again, for us, even with the squad versus an engine, you're not improving response times. Where you see a true savings there is just the overall cost of the vehicle. And that's why in the future, again, we'll be looking at the SUV model, and that's way in the future. Obviously, we have 10s about to open, 11s coming online, and hopefully this... October, November 27. And so our goal is to get the fire suppression and all those units staffed and where they need to be. Thank you. Yes, sir.

You got questions over here? Council Member Ortega.

You said this truck would take care of brush fires, car fires, things like that. Are they also designed to take care of the electrical vehicles? Because I remember many years ago a Tesla caught on fire due to an accident, and it took some time to get that battery under control. So is there a different type of fluids used to control that?

So that's an evolving art, trying to figure out what the best method is. Currently, we have very large tarps, and there are four electric vehicles. And it's where Williamson County and Travis County have adopted this to where you... You put the tarp over it, you basically have a big ratchet strap, and you suffocate it instead of creating more runoff from water. That's today's firefighting method. Obviously, there's new technology that continues to come out. There's a new fire extinguishing agent that's out. The problem is, specifically on battery vehicles, is getting to the actual battery pack. to get the agent on it. You know, the batteries inside the battery pack can start combusting, but unless the battery pack is exposed, really don't have a way to get the extinguishing agent on it. So that's still in process.

Okay, and I'm assuming that would be a lot more expensive when that time comes.

It's not cheap, yes, you're correct. But, I mean, even for, like, laptops and the smaller battery cells, we do have basically, like, a briefcase to put the battery in and close it, and then that will suffocate it as well. Thank you. Yes, sir.

Do you have a question, Council Member McGinnis?

The modifications, are those going to be done during build or will there be an additional fee to make those modifications?

So there's an additional fee, but it's already included into this price because we went through and worked with the sales rep as far as what we needed to do. And really it's two EMS cabinets to be placed inside the cab. So the truck, as it's going down the line, has two rear-facing seats, so one right behind the driver, one right behind the officer. Those seats will be removed, and then the EMS cabinets will be put in there so that all the medical bags, the refrigerator with the lock on it for narcotics can all be placed in there to where it's climatized.

Yes, ma'am. Any other questions? All right. Thank you, Chief. Thank you. G2, consider resolution authorizing change order number one with fog glass. Why don't you do both these? And Hensel Phelps on G3.

There'll be no fire math here, so it's all good. Good morning, mayor and council. As part of the construction manager at risk agreement between the city of Round Rock and Spallglass Constructors, excuse me, savings during the execution of construction are returned to the owners. This resolution is approved for the amount of $990,710 to be unallocated from the construction via change order number one. The total amount this change order is a result of buyout savings and unused funds from a tariff tax contingency that we had built into the contract. This is from package 3C APC GMP2, the resulting project savings on the Athletic Performance Center. Let's talk about what is buyout savings. In a construction manager at risk project, buyout savings are the cost savings realized when the construction manager awards subcontractors or suppliers contracts for less than the amount that they carried in the project budget or the GMP. This change order happens to have both buyout savings and the tariff contingency built in. So you remember back in the day when this was going on, tariffs were all over the map, right? We couldn't figure out whether there was going to be an increase or what. So we built some money into the project to cover this. Luckily, we didn't have to use any of that. So half of that comes back and the other half comes from buyout savings. So with that, I'd be happy to answer any questions. Questions on G2?

Council Member Tagan.

With these contracts and the bidding that comes in, do you guys verify there are subcontractors on them, if there are any?

Absolutely. So we are involved in the subcontractor selection. So we'll take a look at all the bids from each subcontractor and get the recommendation from the general contractor. And yeah, so we do have buy-in on that.

And my next question is here, because I see a lot of zeros under the interview total.

Yeah, this is the fire station. Well, you can have that question, just like that. Thank you. Any other questions with regards to G2?

Council Member Flores. Timing of the project, everything's still online? Everything looks good? We're good. When do you think it'll be delivered, if you were guessing?

We're targeting April, May of next year. Thank you. Yes, sir.

All right, G3, change order number two, agreement with Hensel Phelps. I'm assuming this is along the same lines.

Yes, sir. Same thing as part of the construction manager at risk agreement between Round Rock and Hensel Phelps. More buyout savings for the Bob Bennett phase two and five. $1,104,720. And again, this is just a result of, this is just straight buyout savings. It has nothing, we didn't put tariff contingencies into this project at all. So with that, I'd be happy to answer any questions.

Questions on that one? So that might just go back in the general fund or wherever. So, I mean, mostly, I mean, if I remember correctly, you do construction manager at risk on really big contracts, not smaller ones. Typically, yes, sir. Yeah. Okay.

G4 consider resolution term John King construction provides best value for fire station 11 Okay, this resolutions for is for approval that John King construction provide the best value for the city for fire station number 11 construction Competitive seal proposal is a method of construction that allows the city of Round Rock to hire a contractor based off qualifications low bid equaling best value The cost of the fire station is $10,507,372. Let's talk about fire station 11. We received 11 qualified proposals, proposers. John King Construction, after scoring and ranking by a selection committee, was found to be the best value. John King has constructed multiple projects for the city to include Rabb House, Kenningham, Fire Station 1, and most recently, Sports Center Expansion. proving themselves to be a compatible contractor providing excellent construction services, and staff recommends this approval. We'll go to the scoring summary that you see on the screen right now. Just want to throw out there, back in December of 2021, We had a resolution passed that designated the City Manager determining when alternative projects delivery methods will provide the best value to the City of Round Rock. Staff recommended CSP on this project and Brooks approved City Manager. All right, so you'll have the scoring summary right there. So let's talk about CSP delivery method real quick. CSP or best value determined by the contractor's company information, past project performance, staff experience, number of staff for the project, subcontractor experience. We also do proposal submitted and we look at the proposal amount, obviously, and we compare them to the other proposals. We used the 60-40 method, 60% qualifications and 40% cost. And there you have the 11 proposers that we had. So after we rank them, then we interviewed the top four proposers, and then it was, like I said, the committee, decided on John King as the best value for the city. Let's go to the next slide. Just kind of want to orientate you where this project is going to go. You can see A.W. Grimes right here, and then you got University down here. Obviously, we're sitting in the corner right next to Seton. So quick rendering of Fire Station 11. I just want to kind of go over some changes between Fire Station 10 and Fire Station 11. We've increased the square footage to about 1,400 square foot. One of the big drivers of that is PD will have a north satellite office out there. And the satellite office is going to have a separate and private entrance. isolated from the fire station. It's going to include bathroom, kitchenette, have a couple cubicles in there and a conference table. We also added a little bit more attic space to fire. You know, everybody knows when they build a house, they always want more attic space. So we went ahead and allowed that and built that in. And then we also increased the generator capacity on this from all the way from fire station three to one. We've always known that we needed to increase that generator size to have more amenities under emergency power. And then you can see over here, if you look at the picture, this little retaining wall, this Section of the building right here. That is where the satellite office will house and the entrance is on the back side There's parking allowed for those guys and all that stuff. So With that I'd be happy to answer any questions All right transfer and take it.

Do you have a question on this? No, I don't. Thanks Any other questions? Councilman floors

Just a couple of questions. Curious, the most recent fire station, I guess 10, what was the cost difference building that one versus this one? I mean, are we significant?

So fire station 10 came in at roughly about 9.2, and this one's coming in at 10.5.

And the additional areas that can be branded for police, is it going to be, are we going to put something out there that it's a police satellite office or something?

I don't think there's any signage that's involved in the project right now.

And then just curious, is there topography issues with that space? I mean, it seems like that land slants, but maybe I'm misremembering that.

That's one of the drivers on the price increase from 10 to 11 is because it's a heavy civil site. So that did actually increase the cost. Thank you.

Any other questions? Are we going to, I mean, I don't know if they want it or not, but there's no windows for the police? The part of the, I mean, just they're going to be in a brick building? That's it. Chief, do you want windows?

I mean, I don't know.

I mean, I guess it's more for the public.

No, it's not. So what we did on this one, and thank you, Mayor, and Morning Council, there are windows on the opposite side. You can't see the windows in this picture. What we actually did is we actually have the windows up high for several reasons. One, safety. If anybody starts shooting into that building, we have the brick, and then shooting up high, it'll go high instead of down. So there are windows in here. The question asked, is there going to be wording or signage on there? And the question to that is no. This is going to be a satellite. This is really just an office space for officers on that north side of the city. This isn't going to be open to the public. We will not have admin in this building. It's just for them to go do reports. Instead of coming all the way down to the police department, this will give them the opportunity to do their reports, handle anything they need to. And if they have to transport somebody to the jail, they can go from there as opposed to coming all the way back into the city.

All right. Mayor Pro Tem.

On those lines, I'm assuming, since it's a separate side of the building, you will have safety measures tied in to get, I mean, it seems like a kind of isolating area out here. So communication back to your central station or anything, if any shooters or things like that should come happen.

Yes, ma'am. So thank you for that question. So a couple of things that we did. One is these doors are secured. There's only access by key card. There's a camera set on the outside of the door. So we'll know who's coming and going. Additionally, there's an alarm system set up in this building as well. One of the things that we did and we talked about with the fire department is we wanted to be isolated. That way it also keeps them safe as possible too. In partnership with the fire department, they are allowing us the access to their facility, working out kitchen amenities, et cetera. So we'll be there for them as well. Another reason, a thing that we had to take into consideration is we're right next to Ascension. And Ascension at some point and sometimes they also release those folks that needed to be ED'd, emergency detention. And what they do is they send them off or they call for police presence in there. We know that we have the potential to have some folks there that might cause harm or havoc. That's another reason why we don't want signage on there. keep it in the fire department. But again, 24 access to the police department. We also have access to the fire department and that partnership and relationship I think is absolutely important for that north side of our city.

This is a first for us having the two together. Is there a model like this somewhere else? Did we kind of come up with this on our own as a location need?

I wish we could say we're unique and we made up this model, but we're not. There's other cities that actually have joint police and fire department buildings. This is a first for our city. Very happy and very pleased with the fire department to allow us the opportunity. To utilize this this facility in this location as we continue to grow on that north side This is absolutely imperative that we have office space in this side just to help us when it comes to Expediting our cases handling calls for service and also call response to calls for service in that area.

Perfect Thank you.

Thank you, ma'am You're a question counselor for me

Knowing that it's 1,400 square feet, how many officers are able to use that area at one time?

Thank you. Great question. So we looked at that model. So it's actually larger than you think in how we also designed it. We spent a lot of time with general services and with the fire department designing that so it can utilize and maximize the amount of space. I think 1,400 square feet is ample size for at least three, four officers to be in there comfortably. to also have someone that's in custody that we're dealing with. So I wish we had the renderings of it. It is going to be a good use of space for three to four officers to fit in there comfortably. We have a small conference room in there. We have TVs in their bathroom. So it's a good space. We're very, very happy about it.

And you feel like it'll be enough to make a difference?

100%. Yes, ma'am. Thank you.

I'm assuming that we can, I mean, I know we're a little bit away from it, but the next fire station will be up in Mayfield Ranch area, I'm assuming. Right, Chief?

Yes, sir.

So we can have the same model up there because we don't really have, I mean, is that a potential?

I'm trying to get 13 satellite. They got 13 fire stations. I get 13 satellites. I mean, I'll keep working on it. It'll be something I'm sure city manager and I will discuss with the fire department to see what is the best use of those buildings. And I just don't want to put something up there just because we can. I want to make sure that it's for the purpose that's intended for. And that if we need it, then we'll have those discussions and make sure that we're able to do it. So thank you for that. Appreciate you, Mayor.

Any other questions? Just want to commend Chief Glazer for locating the station up there at Seton and the partnership that we have with them. This could have gone at a free piece of land that we had, and that would have decreased our response time in the area. So just always looking out for what's best for the citizens. And then this will put all of the public safety projects as part of the 2023 bond under construction. And for the price that we went out to voters for, we're getting bonus space for the police departments. We're actually overperforming in what we're delivering to the public out of that bond.

Thank you. Thank you. I'll have a floor plan in for Thursdays to show you the actual space that we're talking about.

G5, consider a resolution authorizing the mayor to execute supplement contract number two. Michael.

Good morning, Mayor and Council. Good morning. Plummer is our engineer that designs the latest expansion to the regional wastewater plant. This item here is for, we're going out to the Water Development Board for funding, $60 million from their Clean Water Fund. This is a supplemental with Plummer for the 40 MGD expansion, which is here surrounded in yellow. Right now we're finishing up the 30 MGD. We're working through all that this year. And then we plan on the 40 MGD to go out to bid next spring. So this is all the paperwork that's required when you go through Water Development Board funding. This is $124,000 support from Plummer to help us through that process as we move forward. The $60 million is for Round Rock only. This 40MGD expansion will be Round Rock 90%, City of Austin 10%. Cedar Park and Leander are not participating in the next expansion. So low-interest loan, and then I recommend approval of this supplemental with Plummer. I'd be happy to answer any questions.

Questions? Okay. G7? G6, consider presentation regarding the resolution approving the semiannual report for roadway impact fees. Gerald, good morning.

Good morning, Mayor, Council. Mark and I had a little talk about this this morning, and I'm thinking you probably don't want to hear me do this whole report twice. I'd be happy to give you a quick summary this morning, and we'll run through the whole thing on Thursday night. Everything's still running well. We're in phase four, which everyone knows. We presented our update to the CIAC back on May 6th. As far as the money, which I guess is always the important part for us, from October to March this past year, we collected just over $1.94 million total. That puts us, our grand total is a little over $17.9 million, so we're getting close to $18 million. And in that time, we paid off $9 million worth of debt on our roadway projects. So things are still moving well. And I guess if you're driving around town, you still see that we've got plenty under construction. So if there's any questions, I'd be happy to take them.

Questions? Questions? So there's no changes to anything on them, really? I mean, they're working?

No, they're really, I mean, we're in phase four now. Unless one of our updates, you know, where we would actually have to go back based on either something in the state law changed or the little updates that we're going to have to do that are coming up. Here in the next year or so are when we've added some of these developments that are like the Briggs track that are just outside. They're in our ETJ, but outside our area right now. We've got to bring some of those in, so we'll be doing that. But other than that, not much change.

So, I mean, basically the whole purpose of these were... for development to pay for itself and not fall on the backs of the taxpayers, and actually we're saving the taxpayers about $9 million. That was paid by developers, not the taxpayer.

Is that correct? We've actually... Used about 9 million to pay off debt on our roadway projects. We have another almost 9 million sitting in the fund that when finance chooses to pay down more debt, they'll use some of that, I'm sure.

But the 9 million, if we didn't have roadway impact fees, it would have fallen on the backs of our taxpayers.

It would have to come from a different source, yes, sir. Right.

And we got 9 million more to set there. So, I mean, they're clearly working. Right.

You know. And I mean, just from, I'll say, Ed's dealings and my dealings with the development community, I mean, it's a pretty well-accepted practice now. I mean, we're not staying out there by ourselves. I mean, most cities use impact fees. Yeah.

All right. Any questions on it? All right. Thank you, Gerald. Thank you. G7, consider a presentation regarding wastewater, semiannual report for water and wastewater impact fees.

Very similar, Mayor and Council. I'll give the full presentation on Thursday night. This is the water and wastewater impact fee portion. We also presented on May 6th, like Gerald said, with the roadway. We did the May 6th presentation with the CIAC. There were no concerns on their end. We're coming up on no significant changes here, but we're starting our next process with water and wastewater. We'll start the master planning now and then next year we'll come forward with an update on any impact fee changes to the wastewater at that time. I will say the number of collections over the past six months have been a little bit down. It's based on when people come in with permits. It just ebb and flows, right? Sometimes there's a lot under construction right now and lesser starting construction, so it kind of ebb and flows. Both those funds are healthy on the water wastewater impact fee as well, where new growth is paying for itself. So we'll give a presentation on Thursday to kind of give you an update on the numbers.

Any questions? Just ironic that I'm going to go on my rant. It's just ironic that this is stuff like this that doesn't make anything in the news. or the state, you know, the state's attacking cities and all that. But here we are saving, you know, helping save taxpayer money. And so good job to the team and, you know, good job that these got implemented in the long term. I remember when I was playing on zoning and we had the highest.

wastewater impact fees and you look at these fees and then you look at our rates right there's two ways we collect money to run the water wastewater our rates are down there at the bottom and we're having that new growth coming in paying paying their fair share yeah yes sir yeah that's our thing yeah you get the benefit of rate payers i mean they're you know they're they not just not right right any other questions comments all right thank you michael yes

G8, is there a resolution except in the city's quarterly financial?

Good morning again. This will be our quarterly financial investment report for the second quarter, March 31st. As usual, I plan on presenting the full report Thursday evening. Happy to answer any questions you may have this morning.

Questions? Yeah. Council Member Flores.

I was looking for it right now, but don't we usually report hotel occupancy on this report or no?

Yes, come Thursday night's presentation, we'll talk about hotel occupancy taxes. I think sometimes in the past we have talked about rates, but Thursday evening I'll be happy to walk through our hotel occupancy rates and our average daily rates and kind of what we're seeing as it relates to our hotel occupancy tax revenue. Thank you.

Anything else? Okay. Anything? All right. H-1, consider an ordinance, adopt an amendment number one of the fiscal year 25-26 budget.

We have a proposed mid-year budget amendment to the current year fiscal 2026 budget. Four different items over five different funds totaling $605,000. I'll walk through them in order that they are in your packet. First, impacting both the general fund and our law enforcement fund, the city continues to participate in the Motor Vehicle Crime Prevention Authority or MVCPA grant. The timing of this grant doesn't necessarily line up well with our fiscal year, so this is the second year in a row we're bringing forth a mid-year budget. The grant awards were approved, but due to the timing of the approval, we do need to amend our current year budget to spend those grants. So this is totally offset by the grant funding coming in, general fund. will be increased by $360,100. Law enforcement fund increased by $154,000, both just to continue our participation in this grant. Second item is for utility fund proposing one new position in our utility billing division. Some of our zones for billing, we have four zones that all of our customers are split into for billing. Some of them have grown so large that it's difficult to have this software system process those billing. So we'd like to split the zones to increase more. Splitting the zones would necessitate one additional billing coordinator to make sure we can continue to oversee the increased number of zones with the same accuracy as we issue those billings. So for the rest of this fiscal year, that's $35,000, an additional one full-time employee in the utility fund. Third item is for our Hotel Acme Tax Fund. Due to a reorganization of our CVB, or Convention Visitors Bureau, The proposed amendment includes an additional one full-time employee for a marketing manager who will focus on promotion of sporting events. That will be offset by hotel occupancy tax revenues, $45,900. And finally, the fourth item is our library special revenue funds. We do our best job of trying to guess what expenses will happen in the fiscal year as we set the budget for our small special revenue fund budgets. This one, the library received a donation from the Friends of the Library. So we have the money, we just don't have the appropriations in that special revenue fund account. So this is increasing the appropriations to spend the grant proceeds we received. Happy to answer any questions.

Questions? Council Member Ortega?

On the general fund grant, is that something that's provided every year?

It is something that over the past several years we have applied for it and have been granted it. But we have to take action. Council does approve the acceptance of those grants each time they come up.

And those grants come from where? The state or CAPCOT or what agency?

This is the Motor Vehicle Crime Prevention Authority grant. I don't have this. I don't want to misspeak. I don't have that in my information. We'll definitely bring it Thursday evening. Some more information on the grant. All right. Thanks.

Any other questions? Nope. All right, Kevin. Thank you. Anything else? All right. With that, we are adjourned at 8.05. Ding.