City Council - workshop

Well, hi, everybody, and welcome. I'll go ahead and call this meeting to order. Clark, will you call the roll?

Willis. Here. Halliburton. Morales. Here. Nash. Stead.

Here.

Willis.

Here.

Four present, two absent.

Thanks. First up, we have the Cross-Disability Task Force Recommendations. Welcome, everybody. It's awesome to have all of you with us today. And for those of you that have joined us as well, we have a list of presenters, but am I going to pass it over to you? Great. Okay. Thanks, Heather.

So Madam Mayor, city council members, thank you for having us. I'm Heather Zeitlin, the Community Accessibility Program Manager. So my job here at the city is to ensure our city programs, our services, and our facilities are accessible to the individuals in the city with disabilities. And vital to my job here is the work I do with our cross-disability task force. Today I'm going to share some background information on the task force. An overview of their accomplishments. The task force members will share their own key recommendations to improve accessibility for individuals with disabilities in the city of Boise. Just a quick background. Just want to point out that nearly one in six people live with a disability in the city of Boise. That spans every age, every background, and across all of our neighborhoods, making accessibility a citywide issue. The Accessible Parking Committee was first established in city code back in 2004, and they gave feedback on location, condition, and the needs for accessible parking downtown. And then in 2020, the city created this cross-disability task force, and it provides a broader expertise on issues facing the disability community. And through both the accessible parking committee and the task force, members have contributed hundreds of hours in meetings, trainings, project reviews and recommendations. So quickly, just some accomplishments. It spans public safety, like our Blue Envelope Program, Hidden Disability Sunflower Program. It also extends into improvements for our outdoor recreation and public spaces, like the Ridge to Rivers Trails improvements, playgrounds, and our 8th Street improvements. They've also done a ton of training and education on service animals, disability etiquette, effective communication, and they did a lot of work in our own personal human resources training videos that everybody watches here at the city. And in transportation, continue to give their input on downtown on-street parking. And we have the new technology of NaviLens out at the watershed, And we have also expanded that to the zoo. So our task force members are representative of a range of disabilities, experiences, and community perspectives. Their collective expertise helps the city identify barriers and develop practical solutions. And so each one is going to introduce themselves. So we can start with Jen. I can't see her, but she's there.

I am Jen Greshdale. I have a physical disability and I'm also a parent. So that adds a different dimension to my perspective.

My name is Diana Willis and I work for LINK as a vocational specialist and I'm blind and I navigate with a guide dog who is here with me today.

Jeremy Max and I'm the executive director at link and a board member with the Idaho access project and I use a wheelchair.

Hi, I'm Dan go over and I'm with the Northwest ADA center, Idaho. I also own my own business access concepts and training. I'm on the board of link and I'm also on the board of the Idaho access project. Eric.

Hi, Eric Kingston. I'm the Housing and Community Access Specialist with the Western Rural Development Center on the board of the Idaho Access Project and part of the Cross-Disability Task Force, and I serve on the board of the National Community Development Council.

Ian Bott, and I have been on the DD Council and the State Independent Living Council and several other and many other committees over the years. I am the representative of the spectrum community, and I also have several mental health diagnoses as well. And I have been a part of the task force since 2021 or 2022. I'm not really sure. It all runs together after a while.

Hi, I'm Carol Barron, and I have a dual sensory disability. I am extremely low vision and have a significant hearing loss. And I am a member of the Idaho Access Project Board, as well as being on the Cross Disability Task Force. And I navigate using a cane.

Hi, I'm Angela Lindig, and I am the Executive Director of Idaho Parents Unlimited. We support families who have children with disabilities statewide. And then I'm also a parent. My daughter, my 30-year-old, has a developmental disability.

Good afternoon, everyone. I'm Steve Snow, and I'm the Executive Director for the Idaho Council for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing. We're a state agency that focuses on public policy statewide. Like everyone else, I serve on a variety of councils and commissions. As you can see, I am deaf and I am an American Sign Language user.

So the task force vision is to make Boise accessible beyond minimum legal compliance. Accessibility affects whether people can live, work, and participate fully in the community. And the task force helps the city consider the complete experience of people with disabilities and helps create a city for everyone. In 2025, they updated their key recommendations, and so each task force member is going to present on those. And the first one is Dana, and she's going to talk about promoting accessibility for special events.

Hi, I'm Dana Gover, and we're going to talk about, Eric and I, about our recommendations for special events. As you all know, that is one of the huge things that the city of Boise is involved with. I got started with that back in 2010, and I did my first presentation as an organizer for Hands Around the Capitol. And what I found was, listening to a number of other special events coordinators, is that nobody had really thought about access. And when you're a coordinator for the big events, it really gets difficult because you really don't know what to do. Even as a person with a disability, that was my first big event to do that. So then I started working with the city. And over the years, and with Heather, we developed a guide to help different event coordinators do that. And that's what we've done with our committee. We also have developed an accessibility, I don't like really calling it an audit, more like an evaluation to help coordinators evaluate their events before they do it. So they're planning ahead, not behind. Eric, do you want to talk a little bit about some of the events that we have reviewed as a group?

Sure. I came thinking I was going to just blend into the background today, but now I'm...

Okay.

Great. So I guess what should I add to that?

Well, it's just like hands around the Capitol.

So the hands around the Capitol, we learned quite a bit. We used our 10 NaviLens demonstration codes that we purchased last year and put those up around Cecil Andrews Park to help people navigate. So we've been kind of working on that, and I just finished getting those printed so we can use them on 8th Street and other places in the city. Um, so, you know, working on that and it was also really instruct, you know, kind of instructive for me to see all the things that Dana had to organize from, you know, the port of Johns being, you know, the right size and the right placement, uh, you know, to, you know, all the, all the signage and, um, stage the stage that stages that need to happen. And, and, you know, you need to have accessible stages for performers and the same, I think applies to. conferences that we present at, you know, it's always a good idea to show up a little early because nobody really understands that some of your presenters might use a wheelchair. And so if you have steps up to your podium, that's a barrier. So I guess, you know, that's about it.

I think some of the things that we could continue to work on is to help the large events that the city sponsors is to make sure they're accessible. Because we still have, you know, issues. And we'd really like to offer our systems to any of the event coordinators to help them make their events more accessible.

And I guess the only thing I would add is, you know, I think ultimately we want to be seen as a resource and a partner, you know, to help prevent problems down the road so that we, you know, folks in different city departments can benefit from the lived experience of this team. And any kind of event coordinators around the city or people who do events planning can kind of come to us first and take advantage of that free resource.

Great. Yeah. I mean, one of their key recommendations was that I also start attending those special event team meetings, which I do do that now. And I've had the opportunity to not only attend the public-facing meetings, but the after-action reports. So if I get any information from the public that comes into my office, I can really give those event organizers that feedback right away because they do these events every year. So I think it's been a really good recommendation. Uh, next up is Steven snow. He's going to talk about, uh, codification for the top course.

Thank you, Heather, madam mayor and members of the council. I am thrilled to be here with you this afternoon. The city of Boise is wonderful. I have lived many places and I think this is definitely the right place. In regards to codifying the cross-disability task force, in my work with the Council for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing, I see such continuity in commissions and councils on issues all over America that is dropped when different committees are not codified. And there's such a critical need for those to really be established in a way that lasts beyond the term of an individual election. It sends a message to the community that we are well represented. Codifying does not mean that we would be establishing a new group or adding more government. As has already been expressed, the Accessible Parking Committee has been a part of city code. As the scope of our work has evolved and we have looked at more accessibility issues, we've realized that parking is a very important role, but there is more to being an accessible city than just parking spots. As we've become a cross-disability task force and looked across the board at ways in which this city can be more welcoming for all of the people who live here, it's more than just where people with blue placards can park. And we're looking at programs, we're looking at events, we're looking at facilities. It's really time to update the name and the scope of this group. Now would be the time for the city council to recognize the importance of this task force that makes Boise an even better place to live. I really wanna commend the other members of this task force. This is a volunteer position. The hundreds of hours that have been donated It really is just testament to the wonderful people I've been honored to work with. Codifying this protects the process and guarantees that this work will continue. Future city leaders and employees will continue to change. We know that will take place over the years to come, but codification will ensure that this level of commitment will continue. There's a famous phrase in the disability community, nothing about us without us. People who have disabilities deserve to have a place at the table and codifying the cross disability task force ensures that continues. Thank you for your attention.

Thank you. Next up is pedestrian pathway compliance and safety. This is Diana.

Thank you. So safe and accessible pathways are essential for inclusion and independence for people with disabilities. And it's not just about infrastructure, but is the foundation for equality. And what I mean by that is accessible pathways like sidewalks, street crossing pathways are critical for people to get to work to shop, to be part of civic life, to get to school, et cetera. And so it's a really important issue. And as a committee, we identified five most common barriers that are faced by people with disabilities in Boise when it comes to pathways. And then, information or education card was created with these five top issues and that has been distributed to code enforcement code compliance and then also the the downtown Boise association and Heather asked me if I could share some of my personal experiences in terms of what I encounter as a person who is blind and navigates with a guide dog. And there's some common threads with all of these top five barriers in terms of the information boards, the signage that block entrances to overgrown trees and bushes, snow removal, and e-scooters and e-bikes to vehicles and other objects blocking curb ramps. So the thing that's common with all of them is that as someone who's blind and navigates with a guide dog, they become very unpredictable and hazardous. And because if you could see across the street as you're moving to cross an intersection that there, you know, is a garbage can at the curb ramp or an e-bike parked at the curb ramp, then you could easily navigate around. But I can't predict that as someone who's blind. And so my guide dog is especially, you know, trained and attuned to keeping me safe and traveling from point A to point B. But what she'll do is try to figure out how to go around that safely. And that might mean keeping me in the street and and then encountering traffic. And so all these things could seem minor to someone who doesn't navigate differently. For example, in a wheelchair with snow and ice removal, if the snow is actually removed but put at the curb ramp, then that makes it very dangerous for someone to try to navigate around that when they're just trying to, you know, get to school or work or cross the stream. And then e-scooters and e-bikes continue to be an issue in Boise. Although there has been a lot of education campaigns to get people to scoot over, to be courteous, to have just basic etiquette, we continue to experience e-scooters and e-bikes being staged and left in curb ramps or in the middle of sidewalks. And it is very dangerous and very frustrating because, you know, I have always loved coming and traveling downtown and going to coffee shops or restaurants or just feeling that sense of freedom and independence to move with my guide dog. And it definitely has made me question over the years if it's safe for me to do so. And so our work will continue to educate and to promote accessible pathways in Boise. Thank you for your time.

Thank you. Next up is Ian and Carol, and they're going to talk about neighborhood association engagement.

I'm Ian. I prefer they, them, their pronouns. And for me, I have seen, I've been to several neighborhood association meetings and to varying degree, they've been accessible for my needs. I think the only issue I've run into with the neighborhood association is making sure that people don't talk too long or dominate, but From my point of view, it's walking distance from where I'm at. And I think that if I continue to go to the meetings, I'll have a sense of how they're run. And I think that it's helpful to have somebody who is in the disability community as a guest because A lot of people on neighborhood associations don't know how to deal with that in the community. And I'm looking forward to continuing to try to get to meetings when I can. And I'm hopeful that it continues being a positive experience. Thank you.

Hi, I'm Carol. And there are two things. Ian mentioned one thing in regard to neighborhood associations that is very important. And that is to have people from the disability community involved in their community associations, neighborhood associations. And one of the things that this task force has done is create a toolbox that is available on the city website. for neighborhood associations to go in and find out information about social etiquette, disability etiquette, and other things like the availability of grants, small community grants that neighborhood associations can use to hire an interpreter so that someone who is deaf or hard of hearing could also participate in these meetings. That money can also be used for things like providing written material in alternative format so that someone who's blind or has low vision will have the same access to that information. And the other thing that is not really a part of the neighborhood association, but I think it's important for the city council to, to recognize and understand is that as result of the work of this task force, when the new rewrite of the modern zoning code came out included in that our actual plans, for building ADUs and housing that is fully accessible. And I think that that says a lot about what the city of Boise wants to provide to communities throughout the area in terms of making housing accessible for people.

Thank you, Carol. And then the last recommendation is accessible parking. Oh, not the last one, I'm sorry. Accessible parking improvements is... I'll take it. Did I go backwards?

it was no jeremy was transportation i'll take accessible parking oh i'm actually oh yeah sorry there you go i'm here i promise yeah so i've been on the parking committee since 2019 and we have done a lot of work since then um everything from surveying on street parking to making recommendations to parking garages. There's a variety of things, but the reason it's important is this parking is one of the first gateways to our community. Downtown parking in particular gives access to civic engagement, shopping, employment, all the things we do as a community. And so if we don't have those kinds of parking spaces available, and distributed widely across the downtown corridor, it's much harder for us to participate. And part of the reason too that distribution is so important is not everybody with a placard or plate uses a device. Lots of people with legal permits have them because they have a heart condition or have some other condition that means they can't walk a distance. And so clustering parking spaces in only one part of downtown doesn't really work for us. We need to have them distributed across the downtown corridor. And I have been very much involved in surveying those spots, making recommendations on where the next one should go. The downtown has changed. changed dramatically over the last, what is it, six, seven years. And we are continuing. So one of the things we have come established in my time there is a regular evaluation schedule of the downtown parking spaces and where they're at. The other things we've been doing too are consulting with the garages that CCDC runs about how they can make those more accessible. And we're in conversations about EV charging stations and how a few of those need to also be accessible to folks with disabilities because we can also buy cars that need charging. So anyway, I want to thank you for your time and I'll turn it back to Heather.

Thank you. And then last but not least, sorry about that, Jeremy, improving accessible on-demand transportation.

Yes, Madam Mayor, members of the Council, thanks for giving us an opportunity to present. This is no doubt the most, and I'm biased, but this is no doubt the most important topic because it really gets to the heart of Dana and Jen being able to go down to Penn Gillies and get a little snockered and get an accessible ride back home in a safe way. And today... Today, it's, I think, impossible to get an accessible cab in the city of Boise to take you if you need an accessible ride. In the past, historically, I think we've had that kind of access, but Uber and Lyft and those kinds of rideshare companies, although they've expanded transportation options for folks without mobility-related disabilities, they have inadvertently, I think, shrunk the number of fleet-based taxis and cab companies who would maintain an inventory of potential like vans that have lifts and things like that. So there's not a lot of levers to pull or laws that you can create to force these companies to do it, but you're in a really good position to ask their leadership, government affairs people, government relations directors and such to sit down and have a conversation with you all on how to fill that space that is currently empty when it comes to accessible taxis and cabs. And I think the cities that have seen like Uber develop wheelchair accessible vehicles or their wave system, those communities are ones that have engaged the companies in a productive way and asked them to help solve that problem. There's a little bit of throwing money at the problem that needs to happen, but I think that there just needs to be a consensus by our city leaders that this is really important and that you know, we expect them to step up to the plate and make sure that everyone has access to that type of transportation and not just folks who don't use wheelchairs, for example. So I look forward to potentially having that conversation with you all down the road to see if we can get that across the line. Thank you.

Great. And with that, we can stand for any questions that you might have.

We've got a couple minutes for questions if we've got them.

Yeah, Madam Mayor. Yeah, thank you very much for the presentation and providing us all these details of some things that we just don't consider in our daily lives as we move around across the city. A couple of questions I had. First, there was a comment on large events that could use work. Were there specific events that we were in mind? Pride. Okay. Okay.

Spirit of Bloom. Spirit of Boise Balloon Classic would be one. Hyde Park Street Fair.

Okay, great. Thank you. Good. Glad to hear that.

Okay.

One other question is there was a comment on one of the top five accessibility barriers on signage. Can I get a little more detail on that specifically? So those, you want to take it?

You can go, Diana.

Yeah, in terms of the signs being a barrier, that has to do with like sandwich boards, signs being placed in front of business entrances or even on like down on 8th Street on the ramps leading up to the businesses or in the middle of sidewalks. So just educating downtown businesses, not just downtown, but that is one that comes to mind. is important in terms of where those signs need to be placed and also following city code about getting them approved and then also having them being placed up against the building and not out in the public right away. Great, thank you.

I think one more is construction barriers. That's a huge issue. Construction's going on everywhere. I think it's been greatly improved. But just last night we saw some major construction issues on Main Street and blocking the sidewalk. So we really need to think about how not to do that and to make temporary pathways.

The last thing I want to say is that they sometimes have temporary bus stops and a lot of them are not or barely walkable for Me and I can walk miles at a time. If somebody is a person who is blind or a person in a wheelchair or a person who uses a cane, they can't easily get to them, particularly in inclement weather or hot weather. And I think that there needs to be better temporary stop places that are closer to where the other bus stop is and that being a focus on going forward.

Yeah, great. And thank you. Thank you very much. I'll take one more.

Madam Mayor, Heather, I just quick question would be this task force is doing an excellent job, but there's nothing we can't do better. And some of these issues that we're talking about also involve cooperation with partners. We're talking about Valley Regional Transit or ACHD. How's the task force interacting with those partners? Is it through Boise staff? Is that something that still needs to be figured out?

so we meet quarterly as a group and then we also get called up uh if like a certain department might have a specific issue or a topic the blue envelope program was the one that comes to mind like bpd had a request to do the blue envelope we also have heard it through our channels as well and so then we called a special meeting and kind of joined forces to get that to happen. It's going to roll out on September 11th. It's this Saturday, correct? And we're going to launch that program. So it's a good example of how we can all work together across the city, not only with BPD, but we're at like Nampa, Garden City, it's all the other policing agencies is on board with that as well. But yeah, we're People can come to me and I liaison with this group and then we can work together and even extend with ACHD and CCDC. They've come to our meetings as well.

Thank you. And Amira, can I just add, I just want to thank you all so much for lending your voice to our city and our community. I think it is so valuable, not just for us up here, but for everybody you're advocating on behalf of. I'm so grateful. I even after I got a preview of this from Heather, my sister works in policy for Waymo, I immediately messaged her and was like, What is Waymo doing for access? So I think it's just this is just a one drop in the bucket of all the work that you're doing that will, you know, continue to help our community. And I'm so grateful for all the work you're lending towards every aspect that you all are focused on. It's really a huge benefit. I'm grateful to have you here. Thank you.

Yeah, I just want to close by also saying thank you. You are here and on this task force for a reason. And I deeply appreciate how intentionally you've shown up for this work and shared with us recommendations on how we can better serve Boiseans by making sure that everybody has more access to what makes this city so wonderful. There are things we would never think of that you share with us, and it does. While we can't always do everything all at once, your recommendations, ideas, and suggestions really have had an impact and will continue to have an impact. And it's so wonderful to have all of you here together today in council chambers. So thank you all very much and have a great evening. We are going to start transitioning to our next topic. Oh, Zach is here. Great. So Zach Clark, Deputy Chief of Staff is here to present on impact fees. He's not been well, so he is presenting from home, but I'm glad you're here. I wasn't sure if it was going to be Zach or if Hannah was going to step in. Zach, just give us, you can start sharing your screen. Give us, I'll let you know probably about another 30, 45 seconds and then we'll get going.

Great.

Oh, he has his little doghouse shoes on.

That's cool.

All right, Zach, go ahead. Oh, and I just want to acknowledge we have County Commissioner, Chair of the County Commission, Rod, back here, and his team. Welcome. Steve, and I'm sorry. Richard, that's right.

All right. Madam Mayor, council members, good evening. Thanks for having me here to talk about Ada County impact fees. And yeah, appreciate Commissioner Beck, Steve Rutherford and Richard Beck being there from the county. Steve and Richard have been really helpful in getting ready for this presentation and answering my many, many questions. So really appreciate them participating. And if you have questions for them at the end, I think they're willing to come up to the stand and answer those as well. So hopefully you can see my slides. In terms of agenda, I plan on giving just a little bit of background, talking about the feed collection process itself, going over a few other considerations that came up from previous conversations between the city and the county. And then in my conversations with city departments, talking about the implementation steps, if you choose to proceed with adopting the Ada County impact fees, and then request direction from Marin Council. So as a bit of a background, this is a follow-up to the Joint Council Ada County Commission meetings you had on February 3rd. I watched that presentation a few times and hoping to address many of the questions that came up during that meeting. But as you'll recall, Ada County requested that the city adopt Ada County impact fees and collect them on their behalf for emergency medical services, jail and coroner. And I will talk through some of the details there. And then in preparing this presentation, worked very closely with our planning development services department, finance department, legal department, as well as getting input from fire and legal departments. One key note or update from the last time you met is that many of the other cities have made progress and Eagle, CUNA, Star, Garden City, and... or well, they're already collecting and then Meridian is the only one pending and they have decided to proceed based upon when we choose to proceed. So they have made progress on the fees. here is a brief chart just to show you comparison of the various impact fees and i really just want to point out two things on this chart first of all is that the city has experience collecting impact fees on behalf of the county specifically with achd so this is not an entirely new process however you know if you look at the table you can tell that all of us charge fees on a different basis so we use different formulas so for example the city is charging Residential impact fees based upon what planning area the project is in and the size of the home. ACHD charges the fees based upon whether or not it's a single family or multifamily home. And then it's traffic impact. then the county would charge based upon whether or not it's a single family or multi-family home so once again not not big differences but enough difference to add a little bit of complexity in the process if we learn the county fees and that's really just important when we talk about the administrative burden or the level of effort we'll put on city staff which will come up in one of the next slides um there are two there are two ways for us to collect these fees either the city collects them directly on behalf of the county and then transfers the money to the county or the county can collect the money directly and then notify the city once they've received payment. After internal conversations, we've landed on the recommendation that the city collect the fees on behalf of the county. And this is primarily for two reasons. The first is that we believe it'll create a more seamless process for fee payers. They're already coming to the city to pay the city impact fees as well as the ACHD impact fees. And so this will facilitate that ease of payment as they'll only have to go to one location. And then additionally, it aligns with other cities in the county, including CUNA, EGLE, STAR, and Meridian. So we would be in line with them. Additionally, as I mentioned in the previous slide, this will create additional level of effort, primarily for our planning and development services department, but then also for finance and IT. Other cities have negotiated a cost that is paid by the county directly to those cities. So it's not the developer or the builder that's paying the fee, but actually the cities to offset some of those costs on a per application basis. So STAR, EGLE, and CUNA are doing this, and it's something that we could consider as well as part of that process. And then, yeah, finally, we would just determine an interval for transferring that money to the county, most likely on a monthly basis. So that would be our recommendation. If you choose to proceed with the fees, that is. A few other important considerations came up. The first is regarding coroner fees. The Idaho State Code definition of a facility does not specifically mention corner. And so Meridian and Garden City have determined that they cannot collect those fees. And in consultations with our legal department, we made the same determination and do not actually recommend proceeding with the corner fees for that reason. The county is in conversation with the state legislator about having corner added to that definition. And if that happens, then we could revisit those fees at a future date if you desire. Additionally, in that February 3rd meeting, council had asked that we consider the city's affordability initiatives and how those would be impacted by the county impact fees. The county has been and will continue to set aside $300,000 per year for the city affordability initiatives, which is equal to approximately 600 housing units. And we believe that this would be sufficient to cover the impact fees for affordable housing initiatives. So we don't see an issue there. We also looked at how we treat accessory dwelling units and tiny homes on wheels and consulted with the county and we would be in alignment with them on how those are treated. So we charge impact fees on accessory dwelling units or ADUs, but not on tiny homes on wheels and the county would treat them the same way. And then those are the primary issues that we looked at in terms of conformity. I know that was a major issue in that February 3rd meeting. I talked to PDS, others, and we didn't identify any other types of conformity issues. So we think that we're in alignment with the county and how they treat the fees. One other issue that came up was just around making sure that we're being as responsive as possible with taxpayer resources and opportunities for co-locating in the future EMS and fire stations. In Boise, we don't have any co-location as far as I'm aware of between EMS and fire stations. Some cities, including Meridian and CUNA do. and the county has agreed that we could in the future look at opportunities for co-locating those facilities. The next one that they have on their plan is for out near Micron and could be an opportunity for co-locating with the future fire station as well for the city. This is the exact same information that was presented to you on February 3rd about the actual implementation steps. We believe that those steps will take us approximately six months to complete. A lot of the work for these will be completed concurrently, so they don't necessarily have to be done, everything doesn't have to be done sequentially, but it'll start with the city adopting the Ada County capital improvement plans into our comprehensive plan, thereby making these Ada County fees more or less our fees, so the city's fees. You would need to adopt an ordinance and city code that would establish the fees for jail and EMS. You would need to execute intergovernmental agreements, outline the administrative responsibilities between our organizations, including things like whether or not we charge that cost for the effort that we have in collecting the fees. And then the last piece is, and I can't actually see it because the screen is covering it, one second here, is to conduct the public fee hearings and amend our fee schedule. If you choose to proceed, so more or less today, I'm seeking your direction on whether or not you would like us to form a working group, start working with the different departments and executing those steps I just mentioned and queuing things up for council. And that's really the end of my presentation. I'm here to answer any questions that you might have. There's others in the room as well who are experts in these areas. And so we can try to get you the information you need. And I'll stop sharing. There we go.

Zach, if this is you not feeling good, I am very impressed.

Really, really well done.

I'm so sorry that you don't feel good. None of us would have known that. You're very coherent, very complete. So thank you. And thank you for showing up when you don't feel good because I know how hard that is. I just wanted to clarify something. A couple of the points, and first of all, just another thank you for helping us dissect this in a way that's easy to understand. One of the things that I had brought up in February was about the coroner fees. And what I think I heard you say, and I want to double check, is that Meridian, and I think it was CUNA, also had questions on that. And so the city of Boise would not be administrating coroner fees under this proposal.

Madam Mayor, Council Member Willits, that's correct. Meridian and Garden City have also made that determination that it doesn't meet the definition. That's up to Council and Mayor's discretion, but our recommendation would be not to collect those fees at this time. If the state legislator adds that corner to that definition, then that would be something we could bring back to you at a future date.

Yeah, that makes sense. And then... Any other things that you found that weren't presented that other cities made changes to that we should be aware of?

Madam Mayor, Council Member Lutz, no, not in particular. We have the intergovernmental agreements that the other cities have looked at. We've looked at their processes. We've been in close contact with. Steve and Richard from the county as well. And it seems like there's, you know, while every city isn't doing this the same, there's quite a bit of overlap and we would more or less follow the same process without a lot of deviation. Adopting them to the city is needed for things like affordable housing, set asides, and maybe the specifics of our process, perhaps the amount that we charge the county for the per application fee that we process as well. But nothing else stood out.

Madam Mayor, Zach, let me ask this question a little bit more clearer. Is there anything else that our sister cities are asking of the county in terms of changes or additions that we are not?

Madam Mayor, Council Member, well, it's nothing that I'm aware of. I can confirm with Ada County as well afterwards, but nothing has come up. So nothing on my radar.

And also, super cute puppy. I think that... Very distracting.

I can't get her not to sit there. Apologies. That's okay.

I hope she sits there all the time you're on the screen. Adorable.

Madam Mayor, thank you, Zach, so much for the information and all your work on this. I certainly support all the recommendations presented to us from staff. I particularly am grateful for the recommendation to collect fees here rather than sending um our customers to multiple places to to take care of their business um i think that definitely will reflect well in our you know in our way of doing business and the process from the customer standpoint um also appreciate the recommendation offset administration administrative fees um so yeah generally in alignment and appreciate your work madam mayor

Zach, thank you again for being here today. I just have a question if we've considered any kind of trigger or contingency abilities to draft this in a way that allows for future collection of impact fees for coroner if the legislature takes action and essentially be able to take care of that in this initial setting and not have to come back later?

Madam Mayor, Council Member Morales, we have not. I think that would I could work with the legal team to see if that's an option. I would need direction from council that you would indeed want to adopt those fees, even if corner was added to that definition. I know that there have been some questions about whether or not we wanted to support that fee collection for other reasons. I'm only weighing in here on the legal aspect of the fact that it's not included, not whether or not I think council members should adopt those. I can explore with the legal department if there would be a way to craft the ordinances in a way that we could have that trigger if you decided to go down that road.

We thought it was simplest and cleanest just to pick it up after the legislature deals with it.

Thanks.

Madam Mayor. Zach, thank you very much for the presentation and for keeping us on track here. Can you go back to the slide and remind me which cities are currently collecting the fees themselves and which ones are having the fees going to Ada County? Well, they're all going to Ada County, but they are paying at Ada County.

Right. You're asking who's collecting like we propose to do.

Correct.

And then who's... who's not collecting. Right.

Yeah, so Madam Mayor, Council Member Corliss, yes, so this process would align with CUNA, Eagle, Star, and Meridian. Garden City is the only one that would have the county collect directly.

Okay, great. Thank you, Zach. I agree. I think it's a lot cleaner for us to go ahead and collect those fees where you don't have to send... builders and others to one place and then to another to pay a separate fee. So definitely be supporting that today. Thank you.

All right. So I would like to just confirm direction that, yes, we move in this way. And let me make sure. I don't think we're taking action. No. So I'm getting nods from everybody. And I think the comments make that clear. Zach will now take this and get it ready to move on to the next step.

And council members. Sounds great. Thanks, Zach.

And I appreciate that. And I just want to say before you guys leave, I appreciate your work with Zach and my team and also appreciate your continued willingness while waiting for us to do this, to hold those fees, the set aside funds for affordable housing so that developers that get the offsets from us can get them from you too. And then also looking at and being in alignment with us, how we're doing tiny homes on wheels also. So thank you for that. All right, with that, we'll recess and then reconvene at 6.