City Council - Regular Meeting

Good evening, everyone, and it's June 24th, 2026. It's 6.30 p.m., and I'll go ahead and call this meeting to order. By answer, Dr. Katie Williamson, would you please take the call?

Francie? Here. Dakin? Hodgkin?

Here.

Hubbard? Here.

Moynihan? Mipper? Here. Credo?

Here.

Radjic?

Here.

Shaw? Here. Swart? Here. Taylor?

Here.

Wilson? Here. Orr? Okay, thank you.

And if you would please stand if you're able for the Pledge of Allegiance.

Pledge of Allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation,

under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

And being that I am acting as Mayor Pro Tem this evening, I will now accept the nomination for Council President Pro Tem.

Okay.

Councilmember Brancy has been nominated. Any other nominations for Council President Pro Temp?

All in favor for Councilmember Brancy stepping in as Council President Pro Temp? Say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed?

Okay. On to you, Councilmember Brancy.

I move that we approve the agenda. Second.

Second.

person seconded is there any discussion all in favor aye aye aye any opposed we'll go ahead and open it up for public comment please limit it to three minutes yes excuse me sorry is there a second second been first and seconded. Is there any discussion? All in favor?

Aye. Any opposed?

Okay, that motion passes. And now we'll move on to public comment. Please limit yourself to three minutes. Provide us with your name, the ward you live in, or the city in which you reside.

I am not learning board for I just wanted to share. We're doing a clean up on July 5th. With months to invite city council members to be on the South side of the bridge to the West side of the jail is great along that walkway on the waterfront. Council member Francie has said he's going to join us like he has for every single other thing that we've done and he's putting you all the shame. I'm just saying come on out 11 PM. The day after the 4th of July, help us pick up fireworks, anything else that we see. We've got the bags courtesy of the Public Works Department. Just bring enclosed shoes and some good gardening gloves, and we'll take care of the rest. We've got a sharps container and everything else. So hope to see you there. That's July 5th from 11 to 1. If you're into the social media, there is a Facebook event. You can go and click on Come and And get that social proof, and then take lots of selfies with all of the garbage. I guess. I don't know. I just tried to start. So I think we got 500 people coming out so far. We'd love to have some more specifically. Council members you all are gloriously invited. Thank you.

Thank you. Anyone else for public comment assuming.

Let's pull some more tour.

At the last council meeting, you all approved the mayor signing the contract with History 9520 to manage your collection. I want to thank you very much. Tonight, we've got the next vote that needs to happen, and that is to vote to create a museum transition team and to populate that team. History 9520 has been notified that the city wants to move the collections around the steel fire-resistant warehouse that the collection is in right now into the 118 building by the end of October. That means less than 100 days from now, we've got to have a plan and be ready to implement. So we'd appreciate it if we could get your vote to approve that. Thanks.

Thank you.

Casey Morrison, Ward 1. I just wanted to, on behalf of myself, Patty Comis, and Jen Sannas, thank the council for finally considering our direct application. That was one. And then the second thing I noticed on the agenda, I was actually kind of pleased to see that you guys are forming an AMC review committee. That's a good thing. There's a lot of answers related stuff in our municipal code, as I'm familiar with. This also has the potential to be a little contingent with people. So my hope is that As Council President Suar has mentioned to all of you numerous times, as far as the committees that you sit on, to please report back to the council what's happening. I hope that you would also consider that that's a benefit to the public. And so as you move forward with this review committee, I hope that you take into consideration that the public would like to know what's going on with that and you report back to us as well.

Thank you.

Is there anyone else for public comment tonight?

Okay, seeing none, we'll go ahead and move on to the consent agenda with council president for San Francisco.

All right, consent agenda includes minutes from the June 10th meeting and accounts payable. Nobody accepts this consent agenda. Second.

All right, the motion's been first and seconded. Is there further consent agenda? Is there any discussion?

One thing. He's going to speak up later. I couldn't hear anything he said. Yeah, I'll try earlier.

That's what happens when I try to turn the volume up.

Sorry. There's been a first and a second. Any other discussion?

All in favor?

Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes. As far as a mayor's report goes, not too much to share. I attended the State of Grace Barber function by Greater Grace Barber yesterday. Council Member Wilson joined me there as well. It was very interesting to learn more about the changes with annual wages, what our unemployment rate is currently sitting at, the difference in taxable retail sales, and a number of other things. So more of a detailed report to come out on that at our next council meeting. Council reports.

no any other council reports councilmember on june 12th i went to the grand reopening of harbor blooms and morning's pedal pushers they have now moved to the old color time so please go on down they had a great time it was actually a two-day grand opening i did not know about the ribbon cutting but And then yesterday I had the opportunity to give a group of students from Harbor High a tour of City Hall. We went over to the police department and over to the library. They asked some great questions. It was actually a pretty good group of kids. There was about 13 kids and five staff members from Harbor High.

Any other council members?

Okay. How many staff reports for us this evening? All right, good morning.

All right, so, as we mentioned at the last council meeting, I wanted to give you guys a quick rundown of our city's mass notification system. That way you guys have some good information as far as if you're getting any questions or if I spur any questions in there. But this is something that the city did as part of our movement into doing our own emergency management and breaking away from the county is we had to have some form But only to be able to communicate to the community in the event of an emergency or disaster. And not be able to, you know, we couldn't really rely on the county more with us breaking away from them. So this is going to be 1 of those integral things that we had to. To go with when I think about this, and it's not just an emergency platform that city has, but it's just a general. platform that we can communicate with our constituents out in the city as well. So a little bit of information on this as we go through here is, again, it's to help improve that community engagement that we have, to be able to provide good timely information, not just in an emergency, but even just for general city information as well. So like I said, it could be either an emergency or non-emergency notifications. And that can be based on the individual themselves as they sign up to what type of alerts they want to get to this system. And it is free of charge to the citizens to sign up. But with anything like this, you know, standard text messaging rates may apply, you know, the tagline and so on. With that again, what we can send out is emergency alerts and flood warnings, whatever might be there general public safety issues. Maybe we've got a fire somewhere and we want to stay away from the area. General community alerts going out of activities around town. A great tool for parks for parks activities or softball season rain outs, things of that nature. Public works might be able to utilize it as well to, hey, we've got a broken water main over here or streets closed. You know, just again, just a plethora of information we're able to push out to the community. As subscribers get in and they can choose how to receive the messages, very wide array of ways to get those messages, texts, emails, regular phone calls. They get information off the website, of course, and there's an app for that as well, that they're able to download the notification and go right to their phones through the apps as well. So to sign up for it is a really quick, easy process. If people want to visit the city's website, that's the starter. Or if they happen to see the app floating around on social media, snap the QR code. It will take you right to the city's website to be able to register for it there. Not a great picture because the website's kind of big on the front end. But right under all the tiles and banners is a little blue button there. Sign up for the alert system right there. So if you're going to take that, take your right to where you need to be, you do have to register to have an account on the website to register for the alerting system. But once you do that process, you can choose just to do this and none of the other stuff on there as well. Once you get that account, then you go through this whole process again and choose the level of notifications and what you want to have come to you. We did get a question about this at the fire department about, well, I don't really have an email. I just, you know, I just have my smartphone and there is a way on here. You just text and it's on this page right here. You can just text to a general number and you can just do it all by your phone without having to have an email address. And going through there, pretty straightforward, but just wanted to give you guys a quick overview. of what the system can do for us and how we plan to use it as a city. And if there's any questions, I'd be glad to answer those or you can call me later when you think of them.

That's the MyAward app?

Yes, yes.

Thank you.

And there's links on the registration page to get to that app as well.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you, Chief Foley. Are there any other director or staff reports tonight? Okay. We'll move on to presentations. We have a presentation tonight from the Downtown Aberdeen Association by Will Russell.

Hello, everyone. I am Will Russell.

Do I have to hold this down when we talk?

Nope.

It says push. So I hit a button. I want to introduce our president, which is Bobby McGregor, and our vice president, Betty Worth. You probably know them as B&B. So, oh, thank you. Well, we got a new logo, so you'll start seeing that.

Next slide, please. I have more than one, I think. Okay, there we go.

So some of the things we track is downtown movement, for example. If you look at the large line on top, those are the businesses that have come in and out or into our downtown. And our downtown is 32 blocks. Most main streets are only about six or eight. So it's kind of an interesting way to look at this. However, I wanted to put it up there because I do get a lot of calls and I see them on Facebook. You know, so many businesses have closed that everyone's heard that, right? So what we track are not just the ones that have closed, but we also people are retired and people that actually moved out of the area. There's a lot of retirements in our business. The reason you had a death, that was very sad. And we also have businesses that are more office generally, they serve more of a service, not retail or restaurants. And so they ended up working, a lot of them, some of them went home to work. So as it is for this year, You know, right now we had six new businesses move in and I'm so glad you mentioned that the harbor blooms because they did relocate to still in our downtown. And I do encourage people to go there. Many, you know, that buddy moves also expanded into our downtown. And so, yeah, please still have some of their ice creams and then. I suppose spoiler alert, right? Feed your belly. The bakery is just going to open, she hopes, on July 1st. So that will be a lot of treats down there and some places to eat. So anyone had the half-hour lunch, talk to your boss. We're giving an hour one. We really support our downtown. So anyway, though, and there was four of them that actually closed this year. So again, I can tell you that I know all of them, and none of them actually went out of business. As I mentioned, I mentioned some of them that passed away. Well, that peak. is when the mall closed. And so we were able to put an incentive for businesses to move downtown. And the DAA gave a small amount of money to each business that would relocate into Aberdeen. That year we ended up with 31 businesses that moved into Aberdeen, but not all from the mall. And some of them were still here. Some of them just couldn't make it work because they were trying to do a collector and stuff like that. You know, that's cool. We spent a lot of time directing some businesses there, so I'll keep moving. You'll never see this, so I'll read some of the two. This is where I have to track my time. And so I look at like, this is really not about emails. It's about people I meet with businesses I meet with. So this year, I'll just look at this year, which is the very top one you can see. Some of them are much bigger at the end of the year, but this year, I've worked with 68 businesses downtown. I've had actually the same amount of consults and board meetings, 68. City, county, state, all those, I've had 36 meetings with them. Main Street and the projects that we do, I've had 111 of those meetings. And consults, businesses, outreaches, those kind of things, I've had 26. then speaking engagements uh interviews meeting with visitors working with out-of-town businesses and governments and then believe it or not i'm kind of your film liaison working with the films and you'll soon be a film coming out i won't give you any idea what that is but it's in the festivals now um so i've had 41 of those this year uh my average because this is incorporating since 2018 i average about 120 of these a month And so they're not all for our meeting some universe, a quick thing where someone wants to talk to me at a business or, you know, that kind of thing and passing or that or any other way. I mean, it's a, we've been pretty flexible about that kind of thing. Next slide please. All right, I want to thank the city for this because really you guys, um. given our downtown businesses what we call microgrants, and that has allowed our businesses to do things that they just didn't have the money to do. Sometimes the building owners will take care of something, and sometimes the business needs to do it. And we've come off some, you know, it's been winter and all that kind of stuff, so they really appreciate, well, this can happen. So in 2024, we issued out 15 grants, and in 2025, we issued another nine. Uh, and so the aggregate of that is 24, then now some of them are wrapping up. I'll show you some pictures in a minute. And also that means that the city has invested 64. well, the aggregate is 13,100. I'm sorry. The aggregate of that is 19,594 dollars in micro grants to our businesses. We also. Excuse me, also do something called lighting up. So a couple years ago we talked about how we want to see our downtown more brighter. And so that is what we've been trying to do. We have help. It looks like 15 projects that we got going. We have spent an aggregate of that is 1644. The cool part is that we've had Home Depot step up and save us 1174 and so we'll hopefully can do more of that. There's actually a bunch of businesses out there that have lights and you'd be really surprised how wonderful they're going to look when they're up. but they're electrical and their roofs are bad. So I'm trying to figure out a way to help them fix those things so we can go ahead and get some more lighting up. So again, I appreciate the city. This is really you guys. Thank you, Council. Thank you, Ruth, for listening from somewhere. Next slide. All right, these are a couple of micrograms you can see here on the grand Heron. We were able to help them get those awnings on the side. Also paint a lot of their building black in front. Another business that they kind of retired. Great, great place for another business to come in. We have some Intel on that. You can look over there at the senior building. You can see there's paint on that. You can look at the spoon building. There's paint on that. If you haven't really driven along Market Street from that block, I would encourage you to do that. That block is looking really amazing. I mean, super amazing. And I bet there's a few people here that can agree with that. So anyway, the other one is throwback threads. We help with that paint job. Sorry about that. I'm too slow. And then we also, some businesses just need a little sign. And so we help them do their storefront with a little decoration, a small sign. And as you know, we have this business in town called The Music Project. And so they've been working on so many things. So we were able to help them with what you see right there, that light lit up sign called the unplugged. And then below that, there really should be huge pictures about this. You have to go online to find these. But History 98520 has done such an amazing job with bringing history downtown and putting our vacant buildings and putting them in the windows. I can't tell you how many stories I've had Aberdeen students coming down and wanting to know what it is. And unfortunately, we might have Washington State history in school, but we probably don't have Aberdeen history. And I think that's up to us, right? And you. Next slide.

I'll turn this over to Betty and Bobby.

We have a little program. I'll start now.

So the Downtown Aberdeen Association began back in 2018 and that we were awarded a Main Street designation. And so what we have tried to do is model our tax, everything that we do with downtown with a four point approach. And we'll discuss that in time, but Bobby will start with a little bit of information about Main Street 9520.

There are four key points to the success of a Main Street organization. Organization, design, economic vitality, and last but certainly not least, promotion. Motion is the process of selling the image and process promise of downtown Aberdeen to all audiences. It involves marketing the district's unique characteristics to shoppers, investors, new businesses, residents, and visitors while forging a positive image through advertising, retail, promotional activities, special events, and marketing campaigns. Through monthly promotional campaign highlighting for local businesses like Grace Harbor Stamp, a business that has been on the harbor for close to 100 years, organizing events that draw visitors downtown like I Heart Aberdeen in February and Are You Feeling Lucky in March. In addition to creating successful events that have brought visitors downtown, the promotion committee recognized the importance of supporting businesses that form the heart of Aberdeen's downtown district. To encourage communication, collaboration, and mutual support, the 98520 roundtable was established as a monthly gathering place where business owners come together to share ideas, discuss challenges, celebrate successes, and learn from one another. And these pictures are from some of those meetings where businesses and legislators come together and share ideas.

I think the middle one was done at the police department, thanks to the police department during COVID. We had all of our meetings there. We really appreciate that.

The roundtable quickly became a valuable forum for strengthening relationships with the business community and fostering the spirit of cooperation among downtown stakeholders.

Bobby mentioned local civic vendors, elected officials, and community partners were also invited to participate, providing business owners with opportunities to voice concerns, ask questions, and engage directly with decision makers. These conversations helped build stronger partnerships, created a greater understanding of the needs and opportunities facing downtown. it was really nice whether they um people came on through zoom or attended we always had our police department police officers there occasionally we would have people represented from our city um most of the time we had realtors there and then we also had businesses um most recently we're starting to feature um a business they come and they talk about Their successes, their difficulties, their challenges, and then the other businesses and other people there kind of give some input in what they can do to possibly help. Another thing that our downtown association has done is recognizing that starting a relocating business can be a complex process. and our committee or downtown developed a welcome packet for new and prospective owners. The packet was designed to serve as practical resource, providing information about available services, permitting processes, local contacts, business support, organizations, and opportunities to become involved in downtown events and activities like 98520. So, together the 952 a round table and welcome packet and everyone city council, everyone is invited that many make it in MailChimp. Every month inviting inviting into that meeting, whether it's the city council members, members of our local legislature. So if you aren't on that list, please let us know and we'll make sure that you get on that list. So we create a welcoming and supportive environment for businesses, encouraging investment and strengthening Aberdeen's downtown business community. Another thing that we have done is partner with the city on some events. an event that was done by the Parks and Rec for years was spectacular. And they asked us to take that event over. And so with the support of the downtown businesses, it's usually the last Saturday before Halloween, you'll see all these kids in costumes in front of businesses and lots and lots of candies been delivered. So we thank that opportunity to work with the city and with that. And our most recent partnership with the city, and not actually partnership, taking over an event is Splash. It is obvious or evident that there weren't the funds to do it. I guess that there's the diminishing amount of people attending Splash. And so they asked us, they approached us to see if the Downtown Aberdeen Association would do that. So we've changed the name. It's now called Red, White, and Boo. It's taking place in downtown Aberdeen on the 4th of July from 11 to 4. You've got a fire in front of you. If you are not doing anything between 11 and 4, come on down. There will be carnival-like games, food vendors, live music, a classic car show culminating with a spectacular firework display celebrating our nation's 250th birthday. And the fireworks This play is being hosted or sponsored by five star, which they have done over the last. I don't know how many years at Morrison part.

of think your slides are going to keep coming up but let me just say something about the 98520 work round table is that everyone has a voice there betty and bobby run it it's kind of like what you did public comment you have to kind of get through some of this stuff but there's been some wonderful moments in there for like we want a new project for we want to think like do we want to do this in our town and so we have businesses and other people feed into us as to what is the priority, what should we do? And so that gives us a little bit of groundswell, if you will. And I think that's really important to me that many of you in this room that's been to those meetings. And the other part about it is too, is that like the police, one of the things that I love about it is every time we have an official like you or the police or anyone that comes there that runs this city, it gives people like us so much information. Because we have the visitors showing up. We have the phone calls that say, what are we doing this for? And so a lot of times we're able to do that. And I just wish everybody in Aberdeen would do the same thing with their Facebook and not put all that negative stuff on there. Because we spend a lot of time having to explain these things to folks. And we've lost businesses. If you're out there listening to me right now, I can tell you businesses that moved to somewhere else because of what they saw on Facebook. So please,

Please, love everybody like we do. I think you're still up.

Yeah, we do some crazy things. With the success of Winterfest during its first two years and encouragement from Washington Main Street program to develop an additional signature event, plans began for a Summerfest celebration that would bring families and visitors downtown during warmer nights. The result was the creation of Summerfest 2018, a good old-fashioned family event held on August 11th, designed to showcase downtown Aberdeen businesses while providing a free family event. The event combined shopping, community engagement, and classic summertime fun. The day began at the Arts Center, where participants picked up a map identifying 30 downtown businesses taking part in a community-wide scavenger hunt. Downtown merchants also hosted sidewalk sales, creating additional opportunities for visitors to shop and explore local businesses. The inaugural Summerfest was successfully established, what would become another beloved downtown tradition, demonstrating the community's desire for family-centered events that celebrated both downtown businesses and hometown pride. And attendance and interest grew, organizers looked for ways to expand the event and attract visitors from outside the area. Inspired by a popularity of Western-themed festivals, Summerfest evolved into Summerfest Goes West, bringing a new level of excitement and regional appeal to downtown Aberdeen. The addition of a barbecue competition featuring a $3,500 prize purse became a major attraction and grew competitors from across the Pacific Northwest. Food vendors, craft vendors, live music, barbecue tasting, Raffle drawings and family activities transformed the event into a full-day destination. Over the years, new attractions were added, including cribbage tournament, classic car show, magicians, dancers, jugglers, and other live entertainment. Some of that is studying. And barbecue competition. Attendance has averaged approximately 2,500 people annually, making Summerfest one of downtown Aberdeen's largest community events. Thanks to the generous support of sponsors, donations, vendors, and competition registration fees and lodging tax committee funding, Summerfest has remained financially self-sustaining while continuing to provide a free and welcoming experience for the community. What began as a simple scavenger hunt and afternoon in the park has grown into an annual event that celebrates community, supports local businesses, and showcases the welcoming spirit of downtown Everton.

So we spoke about Spooktacular. Oh, I'm sorry. We spoke about Spooktacular, and there's a picture of us in our outfits at the museum, and that's where we housed it before. Let me see some other. I think most of that is Spooktacular.

Okay, next slide. And then our other,

event that we do is called Women Best. Women Best was created to kick off the holiday season on the first Friday in December and to foster community pride and excitement through the downtown corridor. While Aberdeen had long celebrated summer traditions such as Founders Day and Splash, community leaders recognized the need for a signature winter event that would bring families, visitors, and shoppers downtown during the holiday season. In 2016, Winterfest was born out of a desire to build upon the annual Christmas tree lighting at Salasper Park and Santa's arrival on a fire. From the beginning, the vision was to capture the charm of an old-fashioned Christmas. Strolling carolers wandered the streets while downtown businesses kept their doors open late to welcome visitors and encourage holiday shopping. The event quickly became a community favorite. I want to emphasize, both with Summerfest, Winterfest, and all the things that we do is to support the downtown businesses and encourage people to go down and see what we thought. A number of people didn't even know some of those businesses existed. So that's another thing that we try to do. The following year, we had live reindeer added to the festivities along with prize drawing featuring gifts donated by local businesses. These additions encourage families to explore downtown and visit participating merchants. In 2018, when Aberdeen became a designated Main Street community through the Washington Street Main Street program, Winterfest expanded into a two-day celebration. New attractions included Santa's arrival on Friday evening, breakfast with Santa on Saturday morning, a gingerbread house competition, and a holiday market featuring local vendors and artisans. Over the years, Winterfest has continued to evolve with new activities designed to enhance the holiday experience. These additions have included a trolley tour showcasing Christmas lights throughout the community and a co-sponsored holiday musical event at Grace Harbor College. Thanks to support from the Lodging Tax Advisory Committee, grants from the Windermere Foundation, and sponsorships from Grace Harbor Title Company, Breakfast with Santa has been offered free of charge to children age 12 and under. These partnerships have also enabled Winterfest to award cash prizes to participants in the Gingerbread House competition, encouraging creativity and community development. Today, Winterfest remains one of downtown Aberdeen's signature events. Guided by the mission of the Downtown Aberdeen Association, the celebration provides a free, family-friendly holiday experience that brings people together, supports local businesses, and creates lasting Christmas memories for residents, and visitors alike. Over the past decade, Winterfest has grown from a simple tree lighting celebration into a cherished community tradition, attracting thousands of residents and visitors to downtown Aberdeen. Through creative programming, strategic partnerships, volunteer engagement, and consistent promotion, the event has strengthened Aberdeen's identity as a welcoming and vibrant destination during the holiday season. As co-chair of the Promotion Committee, Bobby and I have been proud to help lead and grow Winterfest while advancing the goals of the Main Street program. By creating memorable experiences, encouraging downtown commerce, and fostering community pride, we believe our efforts have successfully fulfilled the mission of the Main Street promotion and contributed to the ongoing revitalization of downtown Everett.

Hard to cover everything we do and a little presentation.

So I do invite you guys to those round tables. So, real quick to some of these festivals that we've done just so, you know, I was there at summer fest when we had some people visiting and stop on the way to the ocean and they said, you know. I'd like to learn more about this town. So they did in buying a house here and then we had another 1 of our barbecues side. He wanted to go into business. So he went into this. And so I think there's, there's more to just having fun. Although we want to have fun. Right here, this is the 1st, 2, or as you want to pass, we've offered a lot of historical tours, especially with the help of other people, like, they'll slap and a history 9852 over. So we did this in combination with the history 952 group. So we could look at the murals that they put up and talk about our city. And we ended up going ahead and getting back inside the Becker and did a tour of that and got on the roof. And that was a lot of fun for people in our town. And, you know, I think those are the things that build community, right? You build community, people come downtown, it benefits everyone. So, yeah, we did another one, which you can't see on here. We just got done with it. It was about our critters. And that went over very well. In both of these tours, we had people from out of town that came here. I can tell you that afterward, I asked people what they think, and I have heard it both times. They had no idea the amount of history and the little things in Aberdeen that suddenly bring out the charm. And if you don't know what those are, you should go on one of these tours because I can show you some stuff or anyone who's been on these tours. The other thing too is we give away gift certificates from who? Our businesses, you should know that we hardly ever. I don't think we are principles. We don't ask our businesses for money. They don't support the AA. What we do is we support them. And so we launch them a business and then we have a drawing of the business, especially if there's a new one out there like humans. All right. Next slide. All right. So I want to say I'm probably they're going to want to talk to you, but I'm the only staff. Now, you know, at some point, there's only so much you guys can do in 8 to 10 hours a day. So I'm sure all of you are in that world. The rest of it is dependent on volunteers. So we have a lot of good ideas come in and when they do come down, we got to say, well, what do we do this? Do we want to do that? And so what do we let go? No, it's not, it's just not a big funnel of ideas and a big funnel going out and let's just do all these things. So, um. I think it's very important. The other part I want to say is this, you know, as a board that's been around for quite a while, we want new board members. We want fresh ideas. We want people that are committed. How you can get there is to show up and do some volunteering so we can see where your heart is and get to know you. It's kind of like, you know, it's an important position to our city and to who we are and who we're going to be in the future. We've had board members that say, hey, I'll just join your board and then never saw them again. So again, they might take up a project, especially one that I might have posted that we're going to do. And then guess what? It can't happen because they didn't want to see it through. That's tough. That's a really tough thing. So I've learned my lesson. I don't want to talk about the things we're going to do. I want to talk about things we have done. If you want to know what we're going to do, come to one of the 952 meetings and we'll talk there. Do you guys want to continue this? We do have these appreciation parties like that. And sometimes we select the volunteer of the year. And, you know, I got to say one last thing about that. Some of you don't want to volunteer. You're thinking, hey, I got it. Like, I'm not going to go to all those meetings. You know, what you can do is show up the day of. Just kind of let us know who you are. So we know that we can count on you to help us with the garbage or for setting up stuff or whatever. running rock stars down an alley. I mean, we've done a lot of crazy stuff. All right, next slide. Oh, by the way, you can learn more, if you want to volunteer, you can go to our website, which you'll see in a minute, and just a place for you to do that. Value to downtown, right? So we get $60,000, maybe a little bit more than that now, from the city every year. In return, I can't see that, so I'm gonna read off of mine. We invested this year already $24,576 right back into downtown. That's buying things here, renting from people here, being able to do those kinds of things with Aberdeen. Our priority is to shop first in Aberdeen. If we don't have it, then we go to the county. If the county don't have it, then we'll go further out. We don't just quickly order something from Portland. And then you should just know that since 2018, We've invested in real dollars, six hundred, six hundred and eight thousand dollars and eight, eight hundred and eleven dollars. So that's a lot of money. I went back into here. So do your math. Tell me what you think you're given a sixty seven thousand dollars a year. Do you have a good return? You don't think so then these projects that the city has asked us to do like these, but top spectacular other things that our volunteers do that's value to downtown. Do you want how much value that is to downtown? You have to report out on it. So, this year. We've already given in our hour 754 hours of volunteer time. That's 26,200. $13 value. Over the years, 31,842 hours. That's $993,734. Altogether, the money and the value that we put back into Aberdeen is now $1.6 million. I'm going to tell you, if that doesn't deserve a hats off to volunteers and the people that are in Aberdeen, some of you have volunteered, I know who you are, and I'm telling you what, that is, if you did have that, Yeah, I wonder if you can run Spook Chapter again, and you can run these other festivals. All right, so let's go to the next slide. We do get some awards and recognitions. I think they get them all. I'm lucky to have been part of a couple of them, but one of those you should just know is not about me. It's not about them. It's about Canton's. Why? Does anyone know? They're the oldest family-run restaurant in our state, right? Do you know people come? just to sit there right somebody to come there see where chris used to sit or other people but yeah i have their menus from when these have a three-digit phone number phone number and the same food it's a family-run business right so i have to say i love that kind of stuff go ahead to the next one please all right so on our boards these are our board members And you see Bobby Betty and you see Danny Bacon and you see Anthony elders are pressure. We also see the mayor. We've always had a city rep on every one of our board meets if they get long once they can attend one. So your mayor or your previous councilman have sat in every board meeting to give us an opinion on what we do. And if we're doing something right, if we're doing something wrong. However, they never been able to vote. Why is that? I would ask you to consider council someday. You know, I think. You guys have great ideas. You should be able to help vote for something like that. We certainly get very spooled up on what the mayor wants to do. And we love it. And he's been very supportive. But, you know, he can't vote. So if there's an ethics issue here, maybe that's what it is. But I also want to say, you know, I've heard people say, why can't they vote? So I said, well, today I will ask you guys that. So sometime, you know, next slide. All right, so there's other things that we do, and you know what? Founder's Day, I think I was the last Grand Marshal, and I do what I love to do. I gave a girl their ukulele that showed up, and I got such a fancy ride in such a fancy car. Thank you, Betty. All right, but I want to point out something, too. This is just not part of our program. This is just because of who we are. Since 2024, we have now given 359 instruments back to our community. And if you don't know what that means, then you don't have a child going to school looking for a trumpet.

Next slide. All right, I volunteer to do stuff like this.

This is a, I don't know if you knew about this, this was a showcase right here in our town to take seven of our best songwriters, I didn't pick them, and so put them in here. Those are people from the industry, Nashville, Texas, all these labels. So I have to tell you, the girl standing up right there, right now, She signed a record deal. She's moving to Texas. I have another guy that's on stage in there and he is just went to a Midwest tour with a Jelly Rolls family. And now they're going to come to a different band on the West Coast here. And so one of our people, one of your kids. And then there's one more on there right now looking at a modeling contract and also a record deal. I don't know if that's a big deal to you, but I got to say that's whole. That is something I already can get off of our view. And that's a story. Next slide. And this made it through, I don't know how many Indian nations. Our first families are important to us. So when that band in the background came to our town, they were the first Native American band to have been signed to a commercial label in since I don't even know how long. Well, when a tribe, nation, band comes to your area, guess what you do? It's a government to government, right? We understand what that is. Maybe people in the community don't know what that is, but that's respect. And so that happened to be a commissioner, your city administrator, myself, and we did the gift exchanges, and that got picked up on many, many of our Indian families across the nation. That's important. It's very important. And I think that I'm happy we recognize that step. One more slide, I think. All right, not everybody gets this picture, but Dale totally arranged it. So that's a really fun thing, right? I think the police get a lot of hard comments to them. But you know what? This is something cool. When you go on a tour at the police station, you'll probably see this, right? I love that. So I'm going to tell you, as much fun as we're having here, I'm going to say a couple quick words. One, I love this town. And I've invested a lot of my time away from my family, as you probably know. So I'm here to tell you that I can't do this forever. I've been waiting to retire for a while. I thought I was going to do it a couple years ago. I said I'll do it this year, and I didn't. And so my board, I respect my board. We wouldn't have an agency without these two ladies and other people on our board. And so I said, I would work till my birthday of 2028. so that's March 29th, 2028. That doesn't mean I need to be full time. It just means I need to start thinking out a succession plan. I don't want to get ahead of my board. But, you know, I think if this is valuable work, you know, then I think we should be figuring out how to continue it. And whoever the next director is, they need to be a cheerleader. They need to know about our town. They will refer people from Florida where the big tree is up the woods. I mean, they have to know the area. They will come. And they also have to work with celebrities. And they're not always the easiest. But I'll let it go there. That's down the road. I wanted to say right now, I don't have to be back up here again. Thank you, Aberdeen, for the opportunity in my life. Thank you. I have so many people in my life now that I consider friends. They're not all Facebook friends. They're really friends. And I've got a lot of good golfing partners. And, yeah, maybe you noticed I cut my hair because, you know, I need to, like, not be known for a while. So I let that go. All right. Do you have any questions? I know we've taken up a lot of your time. But if you can't get an answer, will you come to one of our roundtables and we'll talk?

Thank you very much for your time.

Thank you very much, Will and Betty and Bobby, for that very informative presentation on downtown Aberdeen. I think there were a lot of numbers in there that many of us were curious about. Did you have a question?

Yes. I want to say thank you for doing the blue team. Really appreciate it. I've had kind of an idea about something. Well, we like ideas.

downtown business cleanup competition. You know, you're not the only one. We had some people from out of town walking things. We were just talking about how we could do this. And I know that Betty's going to say that you can come to the Bloom team parts of it, and they do regularly put nuts. I actually have students that do, or people that need to do community time, and I'll track their hours for them, so we'll do kind of that too. Let me just say one last thing, and then you can take over. You know, those pink flowers are just no longer in Aberdeen, right? Other cities are doing the same thing. And I think WSDOT decided to just give us an entrance way for miles of pink flowers. So WSDOT, maybe Rich can send them a thank you card.

Josh, FYI, we used to have cleanup twice a year that was on the weekend. And so we would have, not necessarily competitions, but we'd have cleanups and nonprofits would come downtown, Rotary, Lions, you name it, they'd be assigned to a block. When funding became tight, they could not pay overtime to some of their employees. And so instead of doing it on the way there, it was that the cleanup was then the blue team pretty much takes care of the cleanup. And when we pay twice a month from May to September, we do the cleanup and then we do it in October as well. And that's, and it's done on Tuesdays. And the city actually, the city employees help us on the parks rent, help us on those Tuesdays, but it used to be a lot bigger. I mean, we had Comcast where we had over 300 people downtown cleaning up.

Any other questions?

Thank you again for that presentation. We'll go ahead and move on to request for council action. We'll start with finance with chairperson Fredo.

We are requesting the city council host a public hearing and receive a public testimony lift assistance penalties at licensed healthcare facilities and extending utility rate discount programs to the ambulance and emergency medical services utility. Bill number 26-11. I'd like to make a motion to reopen this public hearing. Second.

The motion has been first and seconded to open the public hearing. Is there any discussion?

All in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed?

The public hearing is now open in relation to the lift assist penalties of licensed healthcare facilities and extending the utility rate discount program.

Seeing no comment. I'll take a motion to close the public hearing.

I'd like to make a motion to have the second reading as the third reading. Or do I have to wait for you first? You've got to wait.

I'm sorry.

A little bit more in the middle.

Second. Can I close the public hearing?

Second. It's been first and seconded to close the public hearing. Is there any discussion?

All in favor?

Aye.

Opposed? Public hearing is now closed.

I'd like to make a motion to count the second reading as the third reading.

I think you have two more public hearings.

Okay. Next question. The city council hosted public hearing to receive public testimony regarding the amended ordinance for EMC 1380-130 and the ambulance bill cherry crack program bill number 26-05. I'd like to make a motion that we open the public hearing. Second.

Second. Seconded to open the public hearing to receive public testimony regarding the amended ordinance for AMC 138130. Is there any discussion? All in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed?

Public hearing is now open.

No comment. I'll entertain a motion to close the public hearing.

Okay, spend moved and seconded to close the public hearing. Is there any discussion? All in favor. Any of those public hearing is now close.

Hey, see, first thing that city council post a public hearing to receive public testimony regarding the amended organs to amend. AMC 13.64 low-income senior citizens rate remission to include low-income disabled citizens. Bill number 26-10, I'd like to make a motion to open. Public hearing. Second.

It's been first and seconded to open a public hearing related to the amendments to AMC 13.64 for low-income senior citizens rate remission and to include the low-income disabled citizens. Is there any discussion?

All in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed? Public hearing is now open.

David O'Leary? Because they keep on leaving when we go.

Okay, we're going to stop in and have a comment for the public hearings.

Yeah, there's two people online.

I can't. Okay, so you know, entertainment entertainment. Close the public hearing. Second, it's been moved and seconded to close the public hearing. Is there any discussion? All in favor.

Aye. Aye.

Aye. Any opposed? Public hearing is now closed. Now you have three second readings.

Oh, sorry. Okay. Second reading, requesting the City Council approve an ordinance establishing lift assistance penalties at lightness healthcare facilities and extending utility rate discount programs to the ambulance and emergency medical services utility, bill number 26-11. Second.

I've been moved and seconded to accept the second reading for bill number 26-11. Is there any discussion?

All in favor?

Aye.

Aye.

Any opposed?

Motion carries. Second reading passes.

Second reading, requesting the City Council adopt the amended ordinance for AMC 13.80.130 regarding the ambulance bill charity program, bill number 26-05. Motion to approve. I'll second.

It's been first and seconded to approve the second reading of bill number 26-05. Is there any discussion? All in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed?

Motion carries from the second reading of bill 26-05.

Second reading, requesting city council adopt an ordinance to amend AMC 13.64, low-income senior citizens rate remission to include low-income disabled citizen, bill number 26-10. The committee approves. Second.

Second person seconded to accept the second reading of bill 26-10. Is there any discussion?

All in favor?

Aye. Aye.

Any opposed?

Second reading of Bill 26-10 passes. Each one individual.

Each one individual. I'd like to make a motion to count this second reading of.

Requesting the City and Council approve an ordinance to substantially lift assistance penalties at licensed healthcare facilities and extending utility rate discount programs to the ambulance and emergency medical services utility. And take the motion to count the second reading as the third. Second.

I'll spin first and second and then take the second reading of Bill 26-11 as the third reading. Is there any discussion? All in favor?

Aye. Roll call. Aye.

Aye. Our third reading is a roll call. Thank you for that.

I can tell people. Francie? Yes. Aiken?

Yes.

Hodgkin?

Yes.

Hubbard? Yes. Nipper? Yes. Fredo? Yes. Brajic? Yes. Shaw?

Yes.

Swore? Oh, that's right. Taylor? Yes. Wilson?

Yes.

Okay, it passes.

On the second reading and question, City Council adopt the amended ordinance for AMC 13.80.130 regarding the Angela's Bill Sharing Program, bill number 26.5, I'd like to make the second reading count as the third reading. Second.

it's been first and second and two except the second reading of bill 26-05 as the third reading is there any discussion there's a little thought one on this one as well please francie yes hodgkin yeah i'm sorry i missed bacon yes hubbard yes nipper yes credo yes rajic yes shaw yes

Taylor? Yes. Wilson? Yes. This passes.

That's one more.

Second reading, requesting the City Council adopt the ordinance to amend AMC 13-64, low-income senior citizens, rate remissions to include low-income disabled citizens, bill number 26-10, I'd like to make a motion to have the second reading as the third reading. Second.

It's been first and seconded to take the second reading of Bill 26-10 as the third reading. Is there any discussion?

In the third reading, I'll roll call vote, please.

Francie? Yes. Aiken?

Yes.

Hodgkin?

Yes.

Hubbard?

Yes.

Nipper?

Yes.

Credo? Yes. Radek?

Yes.

Shaw?

Yes.

Taylor?

Yes.

Wilson?

Yes.

Okay, this passes. Thank you.

Is that all from finance? That's what this was for, isn't it?

I'm going to also move on to public safety with Councilperson Humbert. Although, with you being online, I assume Councilmember Nipper will be doing our report this evening.

Yeah.

That is correct. Thank you.

All right, just a few updates from the fire department before I get the agenda items. The summer fire program only has five students this year. So it allows them to be able to get a little more one-on-one. And they still currently have no vacancies. And just kind of a little change to some of the laws since June 11th that any bikes that exceed 750 watts are now considered e-bikes. Our report for tonight, request recommending the City Council approve the 2026 to 2028 EMS agreement between the City of Aberdeen and the City of Cosmopolis. I move that we accept this report. Second.

And it's been first and seconded to approve the request for City Council to approve the 2026 through 2028 EMS agreement between the City of Aberdeen and the City of Cosmopolis. Is there any discussion?

Yes.

Councilperson Schatz.

Since we've batted this around, I just want to make sure and thank Chief Golding for making sure that he did the work to bring this in alignment with Aberdeen's other EMS rates so that we understand that POSI is paying the same as the citizens of Aberdeen. I appreciate the work that went into that.

Thank you. Any other discussion?

And then just a couple of side points on this agreement for you guys, just so you know, we're at the process and it's a little different than our previous agreements. Usually our agreements are one year. We do have one two year one out there. We're running this one out to run in conjunction with our current rate structure that expires at the end of 28. so that's kind of locks us in to then be in block step with the City of Aberdeen as far as rates go through this rate cycle. although you know there's also the ability to amend that down the road if you know that opportunity arises or if we see fit um and then also just we are kind of i don't want to say jumping the gun on this that's not the right term but uh we're approving this first on our site uh while cosmopolis still ties up some boost ends on their end so it's ready to go for them in july for their july meeting for it to be acting retro retroactive to july so

Thank you.

Thank you. Did you add the amendment in? There was a typo in the actual agreement that said the invoices was going to be on the 50th of each month instead of recently.

It's never the 50th. A amendment to change that one word, which

would make it more billable.

It was moved to second it. Thank you. It was moved and seconded to strike over 50th from the contract agreement and change it to 15th. Is there any discussion on the amendment? All in favor?

Aye.

Aye. Any opposed? The amendment passes.

Thank you, Chief.

Since we've made an amendment, we do need a motion to approve as amended.

I move that we approve the request recommending the City Council approve the 2026 to 2028 EMS agreement between the City of Aberdeen and the City of Cosmopolis as amended. Second.

Spend person seconded to approve the 2026-2028 EMS agreement between the City of Everton and City of Cosmopolis as amended. Is there any discussion?

All in favor? Aye. Any opposed?

That motion passes. And then we have one ordinance. This will be the first reading requesting the City Council approve an ordinance amending AMC Chapter 12.04 to establish new sections relating to a temporary alley closure program for protection of public health, safety, and welfare. Bill number 26-09. I move that we accept this ordinance.

Thank you.

It's been first and seconded to accept the first reading of Bill number 26-09 related to temporary alley closure programs. Is there any discussion? All in favor?

Aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? First reading of Bill 26.09 is passed. Moving on to Public Works. Councilperson Francie.

All right. Public Works moved by Shirley Erickson-David. I think that's a very good discussion we can meet. We've got a lot of agenda items here to put up to date, so I'll just get into it. The report is a request recommending the City Council authorize the Aberdeen Railroad Corridor Crossing Elimination and Safety Improvement Study Award Authorization. Second. Second.

Spin first and seconded for the City Council to authorize the Aberdeen Railroad Corridor Crossing Elimination and Safety Improvement Study Award Authorization. Is there any discussion?

All in favor?

Aye. Aye.

Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes.

All right. Our second item is a request recommending city council authorize the public works director to sign payment agreement 4906-DR-WA for obtaining federal and state emergency and disaster assistance funds. Would you please accept this? Second.

been first and seconded to author as a public work searcher to sign the FEMA agreement 4906-ER-WA. Is there any discussion? All in favor?

Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes.

all right now we're down to public hearing the first one is the requesting city council host a public hearing to receive public testimony regarding the franchise agreement with forged fibers 37 from the llc means bill 26-20 second and first and second to open a public hearing regarding the franchise agreement with forged fiber 37 bill 26-12

Is there any discussion?

Yes. In reading this, I brought up some questions that went to yourself and- Council Member Shaw?

Yes. This is related to the public hearing.

We'll still have comments for the second reading if you'd like to save those for- But do we host a hearing when we have an anticipatory change to the material expected? That would still come up at the second reading. All right, thank you.

Any other discussion? All in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed?

Public hearing is now open for any comments related to the Forge Fiber Contract. Not seeing any comments, I'll entertain a motion to close.

So moved.

Second. Spend first and seconded to close the public hearing. Is there any discussion? All in favor?

Aye. Any opposed? Public hearing is now closed.

All right, next public hearing is requesting City Council to host a public hearing to receive public testimony regarding the Title 17 zoning code amendments. I move that we open this public hearing.

Second. In first and seconded to open a public hearing regarding the Title 17 zoning code amendments, Bill 26-07. Is there any discussion?

This is in regard to updates to the financing.

That was great. Seeing no other discussion, all in favor of opening the public hearing?

Aye.

Aye. Any opposed?

Public hearing for Bill 26-07 is now open.

Not seeing any comments, I will entertain a motion to oppose. So moved. second it's been first and second to close the hearing related to bill 26-07 any discussion all in favor aye aye any opposed public hearing is now closed all right we're down to ordinance the resolution

First one is a second reading requesting the City Council approval of the franchise agreement of 4-5-3-7 on the LLC of Bill 26-03. I would like to accept this request.

Second. Second person seconded to accept the second reading of Bill 26-08. Is there any discussion?

Yes. Is it time now? Yes, it is. I'm jumping the gun here. But there was questions that came out in review in reading this that went to Director Sanger and yourself and received feedback from our city's attorney. My reading of that feedback reflects the fact that that agreement probably will need to be changed, updated. And so I'd like to, I personally, this is a very interesting agreement. I did some research on it and I can't support going forward with it at this time it's granting unclassified, undocumented franchise rights. And we either need to have those documented or we need to have the fact that there are not existing rights documented either way. And I believe that was agreed to as an idea by the attorney. So I can't vote for it. I think it's not a problematic activity for us to do, but Going forward, we need to be really clear. This is a new agency, a new company that's taking on a position that was held by several other telecom companies. And at the end of the day, they weren't required to have a franchise agreement under state law because they operate across the state. This is just for Aberdeen, so they're required to have a franchise agreement. So we're starting from whole cloth. And I think we really have to understand what we're granting or not granting.

Any other discussion?

All in favor of accepting the second reading of Bill 26-08 to say aye? Aye. Any opposed?

No. Francie?

Yes. Gaiken?

Yes.

Hodgkin?

No.

Hubbard? No. Nipper? No.

Prado?

Yes.

Radjic?

No.

Shaw? No.

Taylor?

Wilson?

No.

Okay, we have three yeses and seven nos, so this motion does not pass.

Thank you.

Okay, the next item is the second reading for African City Council pre-board, Title 17, Zoning Code Amendment. Bill 26-07, will we accept this reading? Second.

It's been first and seconded to accept the second reading of Bill 26-07. Is there any discussion?

All in favor, say aye.

Aye. Any opposed? Second reading passes.

I'm going to move on to C. I have a request recommending city council approval of the resolution designating authorized representatives for the purposes of obtaining federal and or state emergency or disaster assistance funds. And it's resolution 2026-25. I move that we accept this request.

And first and seconded to extend the request for city council to approve The resolution designating authorized representatives for purposes of obtaining federal and or state emergency or disaster assistance funds. Is there any discussions?

All in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed? Resolution 2026-24 passes. Okay.

Our last item is a discussion regarding the taken building code revision. I open the board and Lisa's talk.

Thank you.

So we brought this forward as a discussion item after the last council meeting where we brought up the needle exchange. So we figured it was beneficial to have this as a discussion item before bringing the first reading forward of the ordinance change. This has been a passionate item for many of you on council as well as the community. Um, and I'm going to turn this over to Josh pageant, our building official who's done a wonderful job. This is kind of his baby in his program and he can go into a little bit more detail. But what we're looking from you is conversation tonight. If you've read this, hopefully you have, you have some suggestions that you'd like to add. You'd like it the way it is. 1 of the things that will accompany the 1st reading will also be a fee resolution. All of our fees are set by resolution. if we do want to establish fees for this program. But again, Josh will be happy to answer any questions that you may have and maybe walk you through a little bit of the program.

Yeah, so pretty much I know the last three years we've had the vacant commercial building program, and it's aided in creating communication with some of these property owners to get some movement. but not fast enough from what I've heard. But we're changing it to vacant property registration, which encompasses all of Aberdeen. And we're moving it back into the property maintenance code, which is a lot stricter. And then I've actually revised the penalties where it kind of allows code enforcement to issue fines if compliance isn't met. It's kind of what we've done with this new ordinance.

Okay, any questions?

Could you elaborate a little bit on how that will change regarding the findings that they could have been not maintaining their property?

So right now it was just registration. And then if they didn't register, I would go into the unfit buildings and structures code, which takes years. With code enforcement under 1808, which is the nuisance code, the penalty for that goes to 1.12, which allows a daily fine. So it's a lot stricter. and working with code enforcement every day generally when they send you a letter saying that they're going to find you daily they get a lot faster compliance than i do so that's kind of what we're what we're hoping for is to get some some quicker compliance um best results is that you know the bills building owners whether it's residential home an undeveloped plot or a commercial building um with the new ordinance and registrations

get some some more compliance and get stuff done faster because I've asked about this a number of times you know and I was told a number of times that you can't find someone who has a vacant building from the built building being vacant but of course what we're concerned about as a council is that things are maintained you know so obviously there is something that we can do to you know try and get these building owners to maintain their buildings

Which, yeah, the fines won't be because they're vacant. The fines will be because of the...

They're not maintained. Yeah.

Okay, good. Great. I'm all for that.

Okay. I can say I like these changes.

I appreciate it.

I'm just going to echo the same. I think you did a great job on that, Josh.

Thank you. Yeah, thank you.

Excellent. As far as the compliance and upkeep goes, do you think this is going to require more of your time or additional staff time? Or how are people going to check in and say, hey, I'm in compliance? Or how does that process work? We already have cases started on these, so we'll do site inspections. If they don't comply, we'll create a little bit more paperwork for code enforcement if it gets to that point where they send their letters. Regarding fines, because they'll have to send 3 letters prior to them being able to certify. Okay, so it's a little bit more paperwork, but it ends up both important.

So.

Awesome, thank you.

We will go ahead and stick with council president for our special committee items.

We've got two reports, a request recommending City Council allow the department heads to enter a contract with Teamsters upon acceptance. Will anybody accept this report?

Second. It's been first and seconded to approve the request recommending City Council allow the department heads to enter a contract with Teamsters upon acceptance. Is there any discussion?

All in favor?

Aye. Aye.

Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes.

Okay, our second item is the request recommending City Council adopt the reclassification of the parks director's salary. Anyone accept this request?

Second. Spin person seconded to accept the request recommending City Council adopt the reclassification of the parks director's salary. Is there any discussion?

I was under the impression that we were going to do without the arts director.

HR director Dana Smith is not with us this evening, but that was the other person that attended that meeting. I think this then the effort behind doing this is to better align the salary with things further away from the I-5 corridor should we ever look to rehire that position.

Any other discussion?

All in favor?

Aye. Opposed?

Motion passes.

Not sure about this part.

We have a number of appointments.

Just do the first group and then the second group.

Okay. For the Museum Transition Committee, it'll be Council Member John Shaw, Council Member John Ferenczi, Luke Tavenolpen, from History 95.0, Les Bolbin, also from History 95.0, George Donaghy, Oracle Historian, and John Higgins, former Secretary of State.

Do you have a motion to approve the finance?

Okay, I move that we approve. to approve these appointments.

Second. It's been first and seconded to approve the appointments to the Museum Transition Committee. Is there any discussion?

All in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed? That motion passes.

So our second one is the Utility Rate Advisory Committee. It comes from Casey Ann Morrison, Jimmy Simmons, and Daddy Thomas.

Any other motion?

Motion to approve? Yes. Second.

I believe that a motion came from Council Member Hodgkin. Is there a second? Second. And person seconded to approve the appointments to the Utility Rate Advisory Committee. Is there any discussion? All in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed?

No.

Director Williamson.

Francie? No. Aiken? Yes. Hodgkin? Yes. Hubbard?

Yes.

Nipper?

Yes.

Prado? No. Radjic?

Yes.

Shaw?

Yes.

Taylor?

Yes.

Wilson? No. We have seven yeses, so the motion passes.

Okay, and we have two resolutions. We've got a request recommending City Council approve the creation of appointments to Museum Transition Committee by Resolution. That's Resolution 2026-25. I'm going to bid you accept this.

Second. Second. To approve the Resolution establishing the Museum Transition Committee. This will be Resolution 2026-25. I'm going to bid you accept this.

All in favor?

Aye.

Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes.

All right. We've got a request. Recommend City Council approve the creation of the BAMC with B3. So as we should 2026-26. Do we accept this? Second.

It's been first and seconded to a present request recommending the City Council approve the creation of the AMC Review Committee during Volition 2026-26. Is there any discussion? Would it be okay with all of you if I made a comment here? Yeah. This is a project that I've been working on for quite a few weeks now. I'm excited to see it take off. The initial appointments were listed in the full packet of the agenda. It will include myself, Council Member Shaw, Council Member Hubbard, and Council Member Raddick. And the full breakdown also has it spanning over five years, so we'll take it kind of chapter by chapter. I've also worked pretty closely with the department heads to make sure that everything is going to follow a structure that will work best for them and we're not interfering with things that we don't know enough about to be interfering with. Thank you for your name up.

Any other discussion? All in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed? Resolution 2026-26 passes.

We got the girls this hefty agenda much faster than I thought it would. I'll go ahead and open the floor back up for public comments. Please be sure to limit them to three minutes. State your name and the ward or city in which you reside.

I'm Ruth Hamilton from Hoquiam, Washington, and I'm president of History 98520. Just want to thank the city council for your enthusiastic support of helping us move forward to one day having a museum and navigating it. It means a lot to us, not just to our organization, but to all of our volunteers who worked tirelessly to preserve and interpret history because it's so important. So just want to say thank you again.

Thank you. Any other public comments for this evening? Okay. Anything for the good of the order?

Council Member Wilson.

I saw a thing about chalk art, and I just wanted to mention that I want to take that to the arts community.

We thought that hanging out big pieces of chalk and having kids do some chalk art downtown, that that might be related to gathering some kids and having some fun, just an idea.

Anything else for the board?

I have some. Terry's also.

Go ahead, Councilmember Gagan.

I would just like to point out that in all of my time of following anything political, in the city. I've never seen a no vote on a committee vote before ever. And I just want to remind that we're supposed to remain nonpartisan. And I believe that those no votes were politically motivated and unnecessary. And I just wanted to go on the record that I thought that was disgusting.

Okay. Council Member Hubbard.

I just wanted to say I wanted to thank all of you for letting me attend this conference this week. I am having an amazing time. There have been some amazing sessions. I'm learning so many things I cannot wait to bring back. I had a session today specifically on youth topics, and I cannot wait to bring all of that back. And I look forward to seeing you all at the next meeting.

We're looking forward to hearing reports from you and Council Member Moynihan and Mayor Orr when he returns.

Anything else for the good of the Order?

Okay, I'll entertain a motion to adjourn.

So moved.

Second. And moved and seconded to return. Is there any discussion? All in favor?

Aye.

Aye.

Thank you.