School Board - Regular Meeting

Billy number. everybody. Hey Heat. Heat. Billy Bill.

Bill down.

Heat. Heat. Let's see it.

I'd like to call this meeting of the Xolo City Council to order. Show that all council members are present with the exception of Councilman Clark who has to be excused tonight. Um, tonight I've asked Councilman Whipple to lead us in the invocation followed by the pledge by Councilman Judge. If you guys like to stand and join us, you may do so. Oh,

our dear heavenly father, as we come before thee this evening, we are grateful for the opportunity that we have to meet as a city council and we are grateful for the city staff that has put this meeting together. Uh we're also grateful for the holiday season that we have upon us and at this time ask thee to help us to recognize the needs of others. Uh we ask you to help us to have a good productive meeting and these things we pray for in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen. Amen. Amen.

Please join us in the pledge of allegiance. To the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands one nation indivisible and all. Thank you, Councilman Whipple, Councilman Jud. That was amazing. By the way, man, I didn't say a word. It was all behind me. But thank you guys. Thank you all for being here. We got We got a long meeting tonight. We're going to celebrate some great athletes. Some singers are going to sing to us. We're going to pin our new police chief. So, there's a lot going on tonight. Um after each event that we do, you guys all take a couple minutes. So, you can leave unless you want to stick with us tonight. We'll be here about two and a half, three hours. So, you're well. I didn't think that was funny. We have to be here. You trust us to run your city. Okay, we'll do it. All righty. Next item on the agenda is call to the public. City attorney.

Thank you, Mayor. Any citizen desiring to speak on a matter that is within the jurisdiction of the city council may do so at this time. Comment shall be limited to three minutes per person and shall be addressed to the city council as a whole and not to any individual member. Issues raised shall be limited to those within the jurisdiction of the city council. Pursuant to the Arizona open meeting law, the city council cannot discuss or act on items presented at this time. At the conclusion of the call of the public, individual city council members may respond to criticism made by those who have spoken, ask staff to review a matter, or ask that matter be put on a future agenda.

Thank you. I appreciate that. But I do have one uh Chief Shioalier aka Chevy. Mr. Mayor, vice mayor, members of the council. Uh goodness gracious. Yes. Uh I didn't see the the marking over here either. So what a what a what an amazing turnout. Yes. The exits are to my right. And yeah, we're good.

The mass drops down. Go ahead and put it on the baby first. Yeah, we know that. Okay. I I just wanted to come and and uh I I've been meaning to do this for some time. I actually want to make my rounds to several different town, the county, obviously the city of Shello, the school district. Um but with the recent fatalities that Timber Mesa suffered uh through September and October, I I could not say enough about this community and and about the city of Xolo, the support that the this this entity provided us through the tragic losses was was second to none and and amazing. Uh, I love this place with with just all my heart and and uh everything that we went through was was just a just trying not to get a little bit emotional. I apologize. And and that was part of my hesitancy of even wanting to come and and kind of speak on it just because it's kind of a tough topic. But um everything that you guys provided was amazing from from your your new police chief, your outgoing police chief. Uh both those individuals are definitely mentors of mine and took good care of me. uh Grace Payne and all of her staff with all the videography that they took place was was phenomenal. And so from the bottom of my heart, uh our chairman, Jenny Adams, is here with me. On behalf of Timber Mesa, we just want to say thank you all so much for your love, compassion, and support. And uh you guys make this place a great place to live, a great place to be part of. And uh I'll be forever grateful for everything you provided me, my staff, and everything you provide on a regular basis. So, thank you all so so much. I truly appreciate you all. Thank you, Chevy, our chief. I Let's just hope um and pray that we don't have to go through that in our community again. It was uh I couldn't even address I my crew went over and served lunch to the fire guys one day and I I asked to address them. I retired from the fire department so they mean a lot to me and I couldn't do it. Every time I see Chevy or Randy Chief, we'd get emotional. You know, I I got a long history with the chief here. I was on the hiring board as the first

firefighter in Xolo. I was on the board to fire or hire him. Not fire him. All your fault. Hire him. And now he's our chief. He's done a great job. And Chevy, I hope we none of us have to go what you've gone through. But you're you were the right person in that place to keep your department together 100%. So great job on your part, too. I appreciate that. Thank you all so much. Appreciate it. Thank you.

Thank you. All righty. Next item on the agenda is uh under special events. We don't have any more call the public. Correct. I don't have any. Is uh Mrs. Whipple. You guys are going to give us a little number. This is going to be awesome. You got to lead them up here because they're like cattle. They don't know where to go.

They're like, "Where do we face? Where do we go?"

All right. We're close.

All right. So, we came tonight. We missed you at the um end of November and to announce piece of carols, which we just finished last week. and we want to thank the community for their support of that. We had three amazing shows. This was the best feast of carols we have ever had. So, um, a tribute to these kids that are behind me that put in hours of work for that show. It was year 41 and it really was the best one. So, we are here tonight to do a little bit of Christmas caroling to spread some Christmas cheer to the city and for those who miss carols to just give them a little bit of a number. So, we're going to sing a little bit of a way in a manger and then we're going to sing we wish you a merry Christmas. So, thanks for letting us be here. Away. Away. Away in a manger, no crib for a bed. The little Lord Jesus laid down his sweets and the stars looked down where he looked down where he lives. is the Lord Jesus asleep on the head. Away.

away from the sky and sing my pray till my is away. Lord Jesus, I ask thee to close by forever and I pray all the dear children us for heaven to with me.

Away. Oh, the way.

We wish you a merry Christmas. We wish you a merry Christmas. We wish you a merry Christmas and a happy new year. Good tidings to you wherever you are. Good tidings for Christmas and a happy new year. We wish you a merry Christmas. We wish you a merry Christmas. We wish you a merry Christmas and a happy new year. Wow.

That was beautiful. Get out of here. Beautiful. Thank you so much. And merry Christmas. Thank you. I don't know how you do it every single year. These kids are amazing. And I have great kids. That's how we do it. That's incredible. It was beautiful. Beautiful. Thank you. Anybody want to sing after that? Probably not. Huh. Next item on the agenda is recognition of the Xolo Junior High School softball team. Mr. McNeel. Right. You were.

So, I just want to thank you for this opportunity. Um, you guys always do a good job of recognizing the young athletes of our town and uh, these girls worked really, really hard to achieve a goal. We weren't quite sure about midway through if we'd make it, but when they came together and played their best, there was no chance. They really just kind of walked through the end of the tournament and took it home. So, it was pretty cool. Proud of them. What was our record? I don't know. You don't know? Three losses. Two losses. One. Oh, seemed like three losses. lost one, tied one, and won seven. I think seven one and one or eight one and one.

Well, congratulations. I think I told you earlier we have some great athletes up here. We do this I' I've been sitting up here since 2010 and we do this every year, which is awesome. Um, but we have a little little t-shirt for you. So, you're going to have to now that you're all here, we'll kind of yell your name out and hand you a shirt. Yeah, I wasn't expecting that. Sorry about the bombardment. That's all right. So, the first one that we have is for Evelyn. Evelyn, I'd throw it to you, but I'm afraid you'd drop it. The next one is Maddie. Maddie. I gave her the wrong B.

Well, I'm gonna give it to her now. I thought I gave that to Go ahead, Sherry. I could probably throw it to you if I can catch Muel Dallas. Okay, we'll just give it to Danny. Um, okay. Lanna, she is Are you late? I don't like people showing up to my meetings late, but no. Congratulations. She's teasing. Don't scare her. Ask anybody out there. Sophie, here we are. I could probably

Piper. That was this one. Evelyn or Eveine? Evelyn. Evelyn. We gave her gave her. Eveine. Lily. Lily. Shanlin. Hansley dinner. It sounds like Marty Izzy. Well, it's a purple hand. Obby, Emilyn,

Simone, then we have something for the coach's room. Yeah, I'll give it to him when he comes back by. We got your stuff here. You guys want to turn around? We'll gather up. Anybody want to take pictures? Run up now, please. Crowd in. Crowd in. They're trying to get in the middle. Hey, we need a new flag. It's not a professional a professional photo. You guys want to slide this way?

You want to say 67?

You're supposed to go number one. Number one. Number one. Ladies, congratulations.

You almost forgot already. Thank you. Congratulations again. Great job. Happy New Year to you. Congratulations. Good job.

I love you. I'll call you when we get done. Taking a nap. All righty. Next item on the agenda is uh recogni recognition of our citizen academy graduates. Mrs. Payne,

good evening, mayor and council. Holy moly, we're clear in the room. Um well, thank you very much for your time this evening. I won't take up much of it, but uh tonight we are going to graduate our citizens from our citizens academy for the second year in a row. Uh I have been privileged to lead citizens from the city of Xolo and in this case from the White Mountain area through our citizens academy. This year we led 12 citizens for five Tuesdays through the month of October through our academy. And what we do is with the help of our directors and our managers, we take our citizens through an in-depth look at what local government looks like and how it tends to be so much more than what public perception might lead it to be. And we get to have a wonderful open dialogue with our citizens. They get to ask us questions and we spend 90 minutes with them and go over what our day-to-day looks like and all of the projects that we work on, roads projects, aquatic center projects, parks and recreation. Truly the indepth nuts and bolts that we do. And trust me, 90 minutes is not nearly enough time with the questions that our citizens ask us. And they were begging for more after five weeks. So, I'll pause now if you have any questions before I ask our citizens to come up here and we graduate them. But I'd like to just recognize them and recognize our directors for the time that they carved out in their evenings to move through this program and we are truly looking forward to 2026.

Well, we have plenty of time tonight. We can finish their questions if they wanted to ask. That's a very dangerous offer because like I said, they were so enthusiastic. Um, some of them even asked me if they could take the course again. Every year. Every year. Every year. Good. I Anybody have any questions? No. Let's Let's bring them up here. Wonderful. So, citizens, when I call your name, if you would uh stay with us because what we'd like to do is graduate you and then we'd like to have a photo op with council.

Marissa Graves. join us. Ashley Schmidt, we have a few who may have had prior engagements. Brett Palmer, more priorities than us.

I don't dare answer that question. Ruth Edmark, Jennifer Butterbroot. I need those names when we're done. Tim Flanigan. Tony Reed,

Christopher Reed, two of my most engaged citizens. Claire Thomas, who I have to share the footnote, was not only a citizen, but she was also a presenter. Sarah Simpson,

Melody Diaz, and Diane Anderson. citizens were not normally this tardy. That's pretty good if you got them to show up for class. I know, but graduation.

Miles, will you come take a photo of them? I think it's perfect. Gota geta get the mirror. Okay, there we go. It's got a wide angle on it. All right. Three, two, one. Congratulations. Thank you guys very much. Thank you, citizens. Thank you, mayor.

Thank you. Yeah, thank you guys for doing that academy. I know when we first kicked this off this year, I don't think we had one or two people signed up and so we extended a couple more weeks and you had a dozen. So, thank you Grace and everybody at the city for for doing that. Okay, we're going to skip the next item. I don't think anybody's here for the presentation of the new police chief. So, we'll go to next item on the agenda. I'll turn it over to city manager. Thank you, mayor and council. I'll ask Chief Westover if he'll come up here with me. Since I got to be up here, he can stand by my side.

Good idea. So, I just wanted to give you a little background on Chief Westover. We're glad to have him with us. After a competitive process, he was been selected as our new police chief and started about a week ago. But a little bit about a background about Chief West story. He has 24 years of law enforcement experience. He did 20 years with the Phoenix Police Department before coming to Xolo where he has served the last four years. Greg's connection to our community and region runs deep. He was raised in Joseph City and his wife uh grew up in Round Valley. They have been married for almost 24 years and they have two children. Most recently, Greg served as the operational support commander, overseeing critical operations which include criminal investigations, records, animal control, school resource officers in the regional communications center, which supports multiple police and fire agencies across the White Mountains. During his time with the Solo Police Department, he has been instrumental in helping create the strong momentum the department is experiencing today. He spearheaded the creation of a regional major incident team, the adoption of data-driven strategies that significantly reduce calls for service and crime and community outreach programs that are receiving outstanding public feedback. He holds a master's degree in criminal justice from Arizona State University, which I'm proud of that too. Go Sunundevils. A bachelor's degree from the Northern Arizona University and a graduate certificate in criminal justice education from the University of Virginia. He is also a graduate of the FBI National Academy along with numerous other command and leadership courses. Before joining Xolo, Greg served in a wide range of command and investigative roles with the Phoenix Police Department. His experience included commanding the airport bureau at Sky Harbor International Airport. If anybody's been to the airport, that's a big undertaking. You know that. and heading the leading the intelligence operations at the Arizona Counterterrorism Information Center, overseeing major crime units in the Family Investigations Bureau, and

supervising high-profile investigations in internal affairs and various detective units. He has worked closely with federal agencies, managed major incidents, and built strong multi- agency partnerships throughout the state. In addition to his law enforcement duties, Greg serves as an adjunct professor teaching intelligence and homeland security at Northern Arizona University and has spent more than a decade working with nonprofit organizations supporting youth and families. He's a strong advocate of strategic leadership, employee wellness, and has a passion for community policing. He's committed to making the department 1% better every day and brings that mindset along with his passion for excellence to this new leadership role. It is my pleasure to introduce Xolo 16th Police Chief Greg Westover as the next leader of the Xolo Police Department. So, I may let him say a few words and then I think we we're going to do a pinning ceremony of a badge and and some stars. He's going to have his wife and his mother do that. So, Chief Westover will give you the mic and then we'll we'll do your pinning ceremony. Thank you, Mr. Brown. I'm Mayor, vice mayor, council, staff. Thank you for having me tonight. U to say I'm humbled and and grateful and honored to be your 16th chief is an understatement. I I know the role that the chief plays in this community. Um old-fashioned police philosophy might be something similar to policing the community. Here in Xolo, I police with

the community and our police department is committed to policing with this amazing community. I pinch myself almost every day when I come to work and um I'm going to recognize a few community members even, but to have such an amazing council and city staff um that support the police department and defend the police department and are eager to help and serve with us is just an honor to to be your chief and work with this amazing team here in Shalo to to provide public safety and and service. So, thank you very much, Morgan. Thank you for your trust in selecting me. I I won't let you down. I commit to you, mayor. I know you were on that board. Thank you for for your trust in selecting me. I know there were some very very worthy candidates that were competing for this and I don't take this this opportunity for granted. Um if I can start by thanking our former police chief, Brad Provost. He's here. Um he's got almost four decades of sworn service with the Xolo Police Department. Um, when I found out this opportunity was here and I met with him, he told me that there were some unbelievable candidates testing for that commander spot. And I thought it was incredible that he had the organizational courage to conduct an outside process for commander. And to my knowledge, that was the first time Sholopi had done that under his leadership. He committed it would be a fair process and and he selected me. And I can't be more grateful that that he selected me to serve in that capacity cuz now serving with former candidates in that role. Um I recognize how incredible they were. They're they're regional leaders. They're well respected and they're mentors of mine. So Brad, thank you for for giving me that opportunity to serve Xolo and you continue to mentor me and

and you've committed to continuing mentor me. Barb, you're the the former chief's chief. Thank you for always being there for me and and and being patient with me as I was learning this new role with Brad and and taking time away from you and your family. I'd like to recognize our community members. I sat down with a lot of them as I prepared for this cheap process. I I see Kathy and and Denise. I see our rangers. Um I I look around the room and and the room is packed with our community leaders. John Jarrett um quarter sent me a a good luck thing and was going to come. I just couldn't be more grateful for the community guidance and advice and and commitment to serve with me. Um so thank you to our community that I feel your love and and I I won't let you down in serving. Please feel free to come to me with anything I can do to to help protect and serve this this community. Um I've got close family friends here. Um, I've got my my as many family members as can come. I've got my amazing mother of eight children. Um, I'm kind of in the middle. I've got my twin brother um here. He's serving in a government capacity with Winslow. Um, I've got my sister Railen uh here and her husband's a retired DPS sergeant and he pinned my officer badge on me and he's here. I've got close family friends I call family. Um, and I'd like to do a special shout out if I may because I'm so humbled right now to see such an overwhelming uh turnout in my law enforcement brotherhood and sisterhood. Um, Dennis Orander is the executive assistant chief with Phoenix PD. The former interim chief while while they were selecting a new police chief is here. Um, assistant chief Benza. Um, I don't want to go all the way down, but you know, I've got uh

DPS's Major, Phil Pot, and and Captain Sharp's uh they're they're mentors, but if I guess I will. I've got my amazing Xolo staff here who stand behind me. Huh? You have two and a half. Yeah, thank you. No, I

I just I don't want to take this for granted. They're doing a turn and burn today and they to see them in class A's gave me goosebumps cuz it it just shows their love and respect for me. Um I'm I'm just going around my my solo team. I couldn't be more humbled to serve with them. They're a professional agency and I'd put their talents and performance against any of our our former Phoenix uh guys. I've got Cottonwood Command here in in G. Thank you. tie with the FBI. Assistant Chief Moren was Surprise PD. Uh, Assistant Chief Benza, thank you. He's he was a mentor of mine for a long time in my capacities. Uh, I introduced Chief Orander, uh, Commander Ward. I've got my amazing dispatch supervisor team who make us look good and they're our first first responders. Um, I've got fire chiefs in the group, our regional fire chiefs with Chief Payne, Chief Nelson, Chief Shioalier. Um, I Chief Barnes, Chief Martin. Um, I'm like scanning the room. There's so many chiefs present. I I'm just so overwhelmed. Um, Chief Martin, thank you for being here. Um, a special shout out, mayor. Um, I know there's a lot of brass and chiefs in the room, but the guys who were by my side as a brand new lieutenant doing shift commander responsibilities. We call each other the five team. There were major crazy barricades, incidents, shootings. These guys were there for me through thick and thin, and I leaned on them for safety and guidance. Um Jesse Abernath is a a tactical mentor of mine. Casey Torberg. Um I've got Warren Brewer, their their commanders. Um Commander Wickers was a mentor when I went to the counterterrorism center. He's the godfather of counterterrorism in Arizona. Don't let your head get too big, Commander Wickers.

And uh Brian Canupal is is just like a brother from another mother. Um I'm sorry I see Kathy. I see so many people. I feel so loved right now. So thank you for being here. And uh without further ado, I know I I miss a ton of people. I'm I'm scanning the the room. There's just so many. Uh thank you for being here. Good problem to have.

Yeah. I I feel loved and respected. Um, I'm I've asked my mom to pin my badge. Um, I'm I'm or I'm sorry, I asked my wife to pin my badge. I asked my mother to pin my stars. Um, so Dustin, if you would come up here while she's coming up here, um, she's my anchor. She's my rock. She's my everything. We've been married and have a beautiful family. as I was preparing for all these specialy details. She was there when I was doing my education and my master's degree. She'd bring the kids to the library and and get get me lunch and and she knows my trials and tribulations and my stresses and and she's just my everything. So to have her pen this cheap badge means the world to me. So thank you for allowing her to do that. She promised not to poke me, too. I thought this would be a kind of a re revenge thing before,

huh? Heard that before. Yeah. I'm still not confident she's completely committed.

I think she's done it before, too. My dad's already passed away. So, it means the world that my mom's still here to do the stars. Um, my father-in-law's here, Tom. He's my um father replacement. I'm proud to have him fill in that role for me with my my dad passed. But my mom's our our family's matriarch and our our anchor. So, thank you, Mom, for being willing to do this if you'll come up and and do this. I was kind of wanting to poke you.

Whoops. Yeah. Right in the neck. Yeah. You won't do that. Oops. That's why I brought my wife up here to help. The other side was easier. They have all night. How about four hours?

Where you going?

It's still my meeting. You know, you're right on your speech. It was a tough process. It was tough for me um as mayor. I've never gone through something like that. We had some fantastic candidates. We really did. I I look at it as we're blessed that you are our chief. We really are. And I'm I'm proud that you put in for it. I really am. We did have some great candidates and and the the best ones always prevail. you know, the process when you hire without of your your community, you know, you don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing, but the best prevailed and thank you for for taking the job and you got some big shoes to fill. Brad's done some amazing things in in the time he was in there, but thank you very much for accepting the position as chief.

Thank you, sir. Anybody else? Thank you. I look forward to to talking to you more and getting to know you more and I've enjoyed getting to know you at this point. So, I'm excited for the future. Thank you, sir. Congratulations, Chief. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Mayor said, you have big shoes to fill. Um, Brad has how many years? 40 something years. So, I guess we'll see you in about 40 years.

We won't we won't be here, Connie. Maybe they'll see you, but congratulations and thank you for the work that you've done for the city of Sholo thus far and we look forward to see what you can do in the future. Thank you. You've got a great crew backing you up and um we're really proud of them also and yeah, so you'll do great things with them. Uh thank you, Chief. um you love cello and cello loves you and we're we're grateful to have you. It's going to be a lot easier to say chief than commander. So looking forward to it.

I just want to comment as well. Thank you for for being willing to do it and congratulations. So thanks.

Thank you. And if if I can echo what you said. Um I I'm talking with my Phoenix guys, the the my former mentors and buddies and right-hand men, and they're like, "How is Xolo?" It's such an honor to be able to say this is not some little redneck podunk little town with just winging things like this. Xolo is a professional well-run organization. Our council and our city staff blesses us with this state of the art equipment and a budget that allows us to be safe and to be trained. And I've got uh Commander McNeel and Butra who have almost three decades each serving this amazing community on on each side of me. And and I've got amazing lieutenants and Justin Hart who's right up there with them. And now Lieutenant Rogers, my comm manager is a a OG in the dispatch world and and her dispatch supervisors are amazing. And you see their dispatchers and officers here. You you know them personally and they're just topnotch. I couldn't be more humbled to serve with them in this capacity.

Thank you. And we agree with you. Now you can be excused. Thank you.

We're going to take about a two-minute break.

Scatter. Oh, I knew 90%. Oh, is that

meetings? Is there drilling not heat in here? Is there It was good that there was a lot of people there. Yeah. Yeah. We're kind of experimenting wireless trans.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. He tells me I can take photo at the same time. What's going on? You do not

dude the chiropractor. This is This is where you really appreciate you coming.

Oh, he's he's the public works. Yeah. That's why it looks Christmas. Yeah. Big group today. had to wrestle. Oh, really?

You ready for the holidays?

Yes, I am. Where are we? Wring on the wall. temperature.

I didn't know. I'm actually comfortable. I'm so sick. Give me call. I will do it. For that get my bride on 10% instead of lumping along the way. But uh I got a good went to this school where I went as well and he went on into the sixth higher went higher too. I got married to get

Councilman Adams. Hello.

Was that the glass or your 17?

All right, we'll get started. Next item on the agenda is uh presentation of annual report by the Xolo Historical Society. Miss Claire,

good evening, Mayor John Connie, Council, City Staff. Well, thank you for having me this evening. Wow, what a remarkable evening. And our city, can you believe how beautiful it is? Oh, so many hands have worked diligently to make us just so beautiful. So, this evening, um, I'm going to share a little bit about the 30th year of the Xolo Historical Society Museum. We've been at that location at 561 East of Clubs for 30 years. It's a little hard to believe. Um, to give you some of our stats, our visitor count was 4,669, which of those thousands, there were several hundred children. And we're very proud of the fact that we host um area schools in the spring and in the fall and uh give them tours of the museum and they can learn about the history of Xolo and the ancestry that's so uh rich and deep here. We have uh 15 volunteers on a regular basis. Those volunteer hours uh equaled 1,121 hours of volunteer work. This year this we had uh let's see 48 assessioned donations to the museum and we have 68 active membership. So just to highlight a few things and I won't take too long because I know you're pressed for time, right?

We have all the time in the world. Uh we uh at the museum we have hosted uh two particular groups over many many years. The creative crafters and they're a group of ladies that meet on Wednesday and this year we've had um a record number of at least 30 ladies every Wednesday. They come at 10 o'clock. They bring their craft projects. They share with each other and they also teach our museum visitors when they come through if th if the visitors choose to stop and visit with them. And they are farreaching in this community and provide um all kinds of important necessities to the police department um to the homeless through and a lot of this work is done at the museum. On Thursday, we have the Regal Wood Carvers, and they're a group of people that enjoy carving wood. And Janet, who is the president of the club this year, she has taught several children's classes this past summer, and she teaches the children to do wood carving by using bars of soap. And it's remarkable the creativity that that comes out of that. And of course, we still have our Silver Creek Railroaders Club um in the old Navajo County Justice Courtroom, and they were awarded a $1,000 uh grant from Arizona Historical Society to continue their work on the last train to Maverick exhibit. Um I never know who or what request is going to come through the doors at the museum. Uh this past year I got a call from this gentleman and he was interested in the apple trees in our

area and he's with the Monizuma Orchard Restoration Project from Cortez, Colorado. And so we talked at length um on the phone. He made a trip here from Cortez. His interest was in uh in particular was about the apple trees at the Ellsworth ranch. And so with in-house research, um I determined that most likely the Ellsworth family had planted those trees in the 18 late 1800s and he was granted permission to take uh cutings of those apple trees and they will be uh put into the heritage pro uh project and preserved for generations to come. and this it it's such as a a seed bankank but it's for trees and so we were really happy to accommodate him um in that endeavor you know our museum you know most people will think oh a museum is for retired people but not museum we have like I mentioned hundreds of children that come through and the museum and staff. We have been honored over the the years to mentor young people. One in particular um Garrett Hicks. He did an internship with us one summer a couple summers back and he was um he graduated and now he's a history teacher in Tucson. He stops by every year when he comes up and it's always wonderful to to catch up with with Garrett and he's so appreciative of the hands-on training that he got in our museum. And another young man, Noah Harp. Noah lives lived in Lakeside. His

grandparents started bringing him to the museum when he was three. By the time he was eight, he determined that he was going to be working at the museum. And so every Saturday morning, he his grandparents brought him in and he was there to do his job on the railroad and he did a fine job. Uh we mentored him through grade school, high school. He graduated from Blue Ridge High and at age 18 he moved to Albuquerque and was immediately hired on the Railrunner Express in Albuquerque as a conductor. And so, you know, we had a hand in in providing that education and I'm, you know, just very proud of those two young men. Uh we had a team from perfect image digitizings. Um they came in and did uh some digitizing of the materials that we have in the museum and they were pleasantly overwhelmed at the the volume of information that we have in our museum and believe me there is a lot. um it will be online specifically through Family Search free of charge to anyone to do researching. And so we're grateful for the opportunity to be able to to share our information in in the technical world. Last but not least, we receive many, many wonderful compliments about our museum on a daily basis. This past summer, we had a couple come through and they spent all day with us. I kept checking on them. They were great. They just were absorbing everything that we had in the museum. And for those of you that don't know, our museum is large. It's 6,000 square

feet, 17 separate themed rooms. So, there's a great deal to uh enjoy. So, they completed their tour. And um as they were leaving, I asked them if you know what they enjoyed. And they said, "Oh, they enjoyed everything." And the gentleman said, "This is our second favorite museum. We travel all over the the world and visit every museum that we uh can during our travels." And you could tell that they were world travelers. And I said, "Oh, okay." I said, "Well, that's wonderful." So I said, "Well, what is your first favorite museum?" And his answer was the Art Institute of Chicago. So you know, my head just swelled after that. Um, so that was really quite a wonderful compliment for Xolo Arizona. The museum continues to be in good standing with the Arizona Corporation Commission, Arizona Historical Society as a certified historical institution. the gold standard of history, communication, preservation, and education. And we work hard to maintain that that level. Um, we look forward to working with the city TV crew, uh, continuing our time capsule videos. I and Grace and her team, they they do a marvelous job and I so appreciate being able to share uh, our history. So, in closing, I want to thank each and every one of you here at the city for your financial uh support to the museum. Um, it's a big building to run and Rick and his his crew uh you know, they they come at a moment's notice to help us with that aging building and we're always so very appreciative appreciative.

Um, the museum will close to the general public on December 20th and reopen on March 4th, although I'm available for group tours and can be reached um at my local number 928-242-3905 or if I'm there, you know, knock on the door and come in. So, can I answer any questions for you? I don't know. But thank you for everything you do down there and I love your videos. I I think they do a great job and and hopefully it helps people realize what we have in our town. So 6,000 square foot. So you don't need any more room then. 6,000's good. Uh no.

Okay. If we gave you 20,000, you would fill it. I know how passionate you are about our community, our museum, but but it's not me. It's it's the town's folks, you know. It's it's y'all's treasures that are in in that building. And um you know there's not a member here that can't say oh that's my family or that's my friend or you know it's it's in there. So I everything else John your

I just want to thank you um all your years of hard work and building this museum and continuing it. It's a lot of work and you do a lot. I want to thank you. Um it is fabulous. I hope everyone goes and spends some time there. The tour is is very educational and exciting and you learn a lot of good things and um I just want to thank you though um for everything you do and the support you are for our community through that museum. So thank you Claire. You're welcome. Everything. My pleasure.

Claire, I agree with both of these gentlemen. um you do a wonderful job and you're so educated and knowledgeable about our our museum and I appreciate that so much. It's hard to believe that it's been 30 years that you all have been in there. Yes, I worked in that building when I first started with the city of Xolo in 1980. It was your home, too. So, it's just amazing to me that it's already been 30 years that you've been there. Okay. Give everybody your age. Anybody else? Thank you, Claire, very much. Appreciate everything you do. Wish you all a very merry Christmas. Thank you. As well, thank you.

Next item on the agenda is presentation regarding the Xolo Turner of the Cart Community Center and and Mills on Wheels. Mr. Gerard. Yes. How are you, sir?

Mean, nasty, and honored as you as always. While everybody's moving up here, I'll kind of make some introductions. I'm the board president. Jim Gerard. Bryce Jud is a board member. This is our executive secretary and also our interim director. Uh we've got Stephen Harrington over there as our VP and our kitchen manager uh the main Jessica Turney. So I'm going to turn the uh presentation over to him and then I'll close it up. I have to say, you know, just as an unrelated comment, I have two kids. We got them uh through school, high school, and then university. And uh they were both involved in music. And uh every time I would hear about, okay, we're going to go to another high school. Uh and I would say, okay, well, we have to. We're parents. And I was always shocked at how great the high school performers were. Uh even the bands and then tonight to listen to these folks, they were just unbelievable to follow.

Absolutely. Just uh great. Uh they are more than ready for America's Got Talent. All right. Um uh so your uh your highlight of the evening. I understand. I have two hours. Yes. No, we're down to five minutes. I thought I heard him say we had all the time in the world. That's what I heard.

All right. So, we're going to talk just a little bit about statistics for the year. I want to tell you which what we've done with your money, our activity highlights, fin uh talk a little bit about our financial budget. Um uh we've got our year-end budget for 25 in there and our budget for 26. Some of our strategic issues that we have for fund development as well as continued organizational development and activities planned. So meals on wheels are home delivered uh meals trended. uh we've gone up uh 1.3% over the previous year and we continue to have a demand for services. We have a number of folks that are on the waiting list both at Nikki. So uh um we keep them uh on that list hoping that a a position will come available. When we do the financial analysis of our uh uh of our meals, whether it's congregate or uh home delivery, we do have a lot of folks that don't pay. And so uh we are actually um uh covered about 52% of the meals that we serve. And that's um uh quite an interesting statistic and that's why as a board uh our uh responsibility is to continue to raise funds to fill that gap uh from the dollars that we received. Our congregate meals uh those have uh gone up month over month for the most part over the past year and uh uh we are down a little bit over last year and uh uh but we expect that to tick up. Our Head Start statistics those uh the

volume stays the same fortunately. There are 40 kids over there and uh one thing that we were successful in doing is uh asking them for an increase in the meal rate. We did uh cost analysis and we were successful in getting an 8.6% increase in payment for the uh meals that we provide to them. Uh I'm not going to go through each of these uh tables unless you would like me to, but just a little bit. Uh uh most of the folks obviously are from uh Xolo. Uh but we do have uh 23% that uh we service up in Pinetop Lakeside. You may be aware aware or maybe not that we have um uh the senior center services uh uh in Pintop does not do home delivery. So we fill that gap. They do do congregate uh but we uh we do the rest. Not surprisingly, um about um uh 60 some odd percent are over the age of uh 70 and gender makeup for our home delivery. Uh not surprisingly, most are female uh with some males in there. The uh on our congregate clients, uh it doesn't change that much, but our uh draw is a little bit broader. Uh we do get folks down in from um uh White Mountain Lake, White River. We got a couple of folks there, but most uh 80% uh come from uh Xolo. Our veteran status uh for home delivery, we've got uh uh 14% of the population uh of uh the Meals on Wheels population are uh veterans. and the household

composition. These are things that I look at as well both from a uh quality of life and a clinical perspective. Uh 47% of them uh live alone and uh uh that's something that we minister to as well in our welfare checks and uh for our congregate our veteran status um uh we have 28% who are veterans that we service. household competition there. 62% of our folks uh uh that come in for congregate meals are um uh live alone. I I also like to look because of my background in uh healthc care uh uh other issues that the population that we serve and you support uh have. Uh we do have a high number of folks that have an illness or condition um uh uh that um changes the type of food that they can have. They uh we do also have 36% where they eat fewer than two meals a day. And uh for many this is the only meal that they do have a day. We do have folks come in for congregate uh meals that will also uh take a portion of that meal home with them to have that evening and those are the types of folks that we are uh seeing there. Um uh nutritional risk this is a key issue that uh we concern ourselves with. 85% of our home delivery are at nutritional risk level three which is the highest risk level and those are um uh concern for us that we keep them uh fed and try and improve the quality of

um diet that they have and uh keep them from uh decelerating and requiring um uh either hospitalization or post hospitalization care. our congregate uh uh clients, 50% of those folks are at nutrition risk level three. We do an assessment for every applicant and then we do an annual update for each of the uh folks that we service to see and we have had some improvement. I don't have that here with you, but we do. Objective client status for home delivery. Uh uh require mobility aid. Uh 90% have a handicap or disability. And uh most need a uh walker or a cane. And so uh uh they are all fall risks as well which is another uh underscoring the need for us to do uh welfare checks. Uh we're a community center. So uh uh we're not just a senior center. So I've provided the uh statistics for you for uh 24 25 of the number of visi uh visitors that we have. Now, we count everybody that walks through the door. And so, we've gone up to 14,000 uh 14,000 visitors. So, uh uh and as I was leaving tonight, we had a group of about 35 still meeting there. Uh tonight, they appreciate the opportunity to have a place where they can meet. I've given you a list of uh various activities that are going on at the uh community center. And one of the things that I wanted to point out uh that we were uh able to put in place through a grant, we now have uh a couple of computer kiosks there uh attached to a

printer for folks to be able to come in and uh use the computers who may not have a computer at home and want to come in and do some work. Uh a big shout out to our kitchen manager. She is the queen of grant writing and finding us money. Uh because thanks to her, we've been able to get uh funds in for equipment, financial budget. Uh I've given you a table of uh sources of income and for uh we ended the year um uh uh last year uh we um I'm sorry for this year we've budgeted a loss of $15,000 and that's our goal to uh close that gap through our fund development. I've given you a a picture of our sources of income and uh city of Xolo provides uh us with 17% of the funding that this organization consumes. Um uh which by the way I want to point out that you guys also support us for a number of our programs, our Thanksgiving and uh also with the square footage. We're hired to manage the community center, but there's also value to the square uh to the square footage that we occupy uh in there, and we're not blind to that. We're very appreciative of that. Uh budget notes, uh we did have a successful increase in reimbursement for our Head Start. Uh we did get an increase in our NICOG cap for our uh home delivery and congregate. Uh however, there was no increase in payment for the meals and we'll um I'm working with them now to see what we can

do to get a little bit of a bump there and they're open to that despite the challenges that we have at the federal level. Uh we've received a $98,000 grant thanks to um uh Mrs. Turney um uh from Delhi Web that we use to upgrade uh equipment and add equipment to the uh facility. We've uh done increases uh we've gotten uh increases in donations. Uh one thing in particular when TJ Maxx comes came to town, please support TJ Maxx. the first thing they wanted to do was call us over and give us a check for $10,000. So, um uh we are uh very grateful for that. We had our second annual golf tournament. Uh thank you for participating in that and we netted $7,700 uh uh in that. And uh uh we have applied for funding to Pine uh to Pinetop Lakeside uh this past year. Unfortunately, they weren't able to um uh approve that and we're going to meet with them again uh as well. And then I'll be meeting with our folks at uh Navajo County um for the donations that they typically provide for us. Our fund development uh will continue. I uh uh told you on behalf of our board last year that we were going to have a larger presence in the community and we did. Uh we had a great Fourth of July in the Freedom Fest. Uh as I mentioned, our second annual golf tournament, Head Start increase in funding and nourishing neighbors. We had lines out the door. Um uh we uh

this uh last year we had uh were given $500 uh 500 cards at $50 each that had a value of $25,000 from Nourishing Neighbors. And this year we got 425. And so, um, somebody had put it posted it on, uh, uh, out in the, uh, on the internet and all of a sudden we had people literally from all over Navajo County, I'm not kidding, with a line out the door. And it took uh, two, sometimes three of us just to keep up with that line to give those cards out. And then uh we'll be working on our sponsorship program for mailing uh solicitation. So we've done right pricing and costing on our heads uh head start. We've done that. Meals on wheels. We've done our costing our updated costing on that. And I submitted our average cost per plate to Nikk uh for their records. And the same thing for congregate meals. And then uh for activities, we cast a budget for each and then measure our return on investment for those activities. Grant applications, uh I've listed them for you there for um uh applications that we'll continue to apply for additional funding from. And then I've given you a list of our uh activities planned. And um then I'm we are open to any questions.

Um I got a of course I have a comment. Thank you guys for everything you do. When you if you need any uh work on meeting with Pinetop Lakeside. I think Councilman Jud can maybe go up there with you and strongarm them a little bit. Where where are you getting a grant? You say a grant from Pinetop Lakeside. What does that mean? uh last year uh I'm sorry, the year before we got I think $2,000 from them. And so I did a um uh costing of of of that and then we met with them this past summer and I showed them that we are at a negative of $27,000. And so I asked them for $10,000, but I understand uh what I understood is that they had some significant fiscal issues this year. So I I imagine that's why we weren't able to get any funding from them.

Well, like I said, I I I really appreciate what you're doing. These reports, you know, I was on the board for for a few years myself because I wanted to know all of the all the stuff that we're doing. But is this still working? There it goes. It's me. But anyway, thank you for what you're doing because you're going in the right direction. But but um for what you do for our community. I think the part that really grabs me every time I hear this report is the seniors that are live alone. And sometimes you delivering that meal is the only human contact they get. And it just breaks my heart to think about that. they they're excited for the meal, of course, or twice a day or once a day that you bring it to them, but they're also excited for that human contact that they get because of this program. So, um you know, when like I said, when I was on it, just to learn the ins and outs of what goes on, because I really didn't know, I know a lot more now. But, um what you guys do is fantastic. And I know we do everything we can to help support that program. I know I I I lean on Nikk quite a bit because I a past chairman for many years with Niko and I I know there's some some struggles with NACOG as well from the federal government. So I just appreciate I that report was fantastic by the way. I I liked how you broke everything down and you the nuts and bolts and and I can tell that Dave's got his his heart into it as well. But I I just can't thank you guys enough and thank you the kitchen crew cuz I'm sure there was some cost cuts there that you guys have made and not as wasteful as we were. Not saying it was a bad thing, but you know, if you have so much food, let's see if we could put it on the special. So, I know you guys thought about that when you're ordering food, and I appreciate that.

I wanted to add something real quick. Sure. The Thanksgiving uh meal, 455 meals were served. Wow. 50 of them went to the uh uh fire department. That's okay. Um and the other thing I want to add is everybody on this board supports us in one way or the other.

Um all we have to do is ask and we get what we can get. you know, whether it's maintenance or it's contributions from uh or a little bit of advice on some things, you know, it all adds up. So, we want to thank you guys for the great support you do. And I'm going to tell you, it shows in the community. We just got uh almost $3,000 from the realtor uh group because they see this organ, this committee M this council is supporting us. So, thank you.

Thank you guys. And and and Dave, I I thank you again for stepping up. I I didn't know you were in term until today when I stopped by with a with a donation from the community fast, but thank you for stepping up. I appreciate I remember a few years back when you first got on the board, I thought, wait, I thought you were retiring and now now I appreciate you coming semi out of retirement, but we could sure tell where your passion is at. Gerard, thank you for for staying with it. You guys do a fantastic job and and it's a need in our community and thanks to people like you. You're filling that need. So, thank you guys. Councilman J.

I'd just like to say thank you to James and everyone. Uh everything you guys do. Most of you guys are volunteers and you put in a lot of time and effort and those that uh get paid don't get paid very much. So, we realize that uh you guys do a lot of good for the community. I'd be happy to go with you to to Pinetop to meet with those guys and see if we can and you're all welcome to come to lunch. Y we'll put it on the mayor's bill. Thank you.

Good. Move that decimal one more time in which direction. Thank you guys. Great report. Appreciate it. Okay, next item on the agenda is consent calendar where we entertain a motion to consideration of approval of propos of proposed fiscal year 2027 budget calendar. Consideration of acceptance of playground equipment for city park new pavilion. Oh boy, I need somebody to read this. It's a lot. Consideration of resolution number R 2025-47 consideration of applications for Federal Aviation Administration grant funding consideration non-commercial ground lease for Mohawk Partners LLC consideration of resolution number R202546 rescending resolution number R 201922 consideration of award of well 13 repairs consideration of award of well 6D upgrade consideration award of well 3A upgrade consideration of the minutes of the Xolo City Council regular meeting on November 4th, 2025. Do I have any Do I have a motion or correction or removal or

make a motion to approve the consent or to approve the consent calendar is read? Thank you.

It's been a while since you done that. And a motion got a second by Councilman Jud. All those in favor? All those opposed? Motion passed unanimously. Next item on the agenda under new business is a public hearing and consideration wait of ordinance number 202507 amending chapter 5.05 05 section 505-070 dog at large exceptions and adopting resolution number R 202544 declaring as public record that the the documents title chapter 5.05 section 5.05070 05070 restraint dog at large of the Xolo city code. City attorney. Thank you, Mayor Council. At the city council retreat held on October 1st, staff presented information on issues related to dogs at large and dogs restraint and the and the current dog at large ordinance. Dogs running at large can risk to people, other animals, and property, including the potential for injury and spread of disease. Improperly restrained or controlled dogs are also potential hazards to res residents, visitors, and their pets from nuisance behavior or harm caused by dogs not properly restrained or controlled. Currently, the city's ordinance requires that dogs off the owner's premises be on a leash. However, the leash length is not specified. Generally, retractable leashes range from 10 to 26 feet with an average of 16 feet. The average width of the path at the city park is about 10 feet and sidewalks and walking paths are are obviously narrow narrower. The longer leashers and the owner's ability to physically control their dogs creates issues with unwanted contact between people and other animals. Most Arizona uh municipalities have adopted a six-foot leash. Um that is also consistent with our city park. We

already have an ordinance um for a 6-ft leash length for animals inside the city park. The pro proposed amendment includes reasonable regulations uh designed to protect the public peace and safety along the um along with the rights of the responsible dog owners to maintain enjoy their pets. Um, as indicated, the ordinance specifies a six-foot leash length and that all dogs need to be under the physical control of the owner sufficient to prevent unwanted contact um by passerbys.

Thank you. Appreciate that. At this time, I'll open it up to a public hearing. Seeing nobody sprint up here, I'll close the public hearing and turn it back to council for any questions or comments. Seeing none, I'm not going to forget Rachel. Have the city clerk read ordinance number 20257 by title only since all council members have a copy.

Thank you mayor and councel. City of Xolo ordinance number 2025-07 an ordinance of the mayor and council of the city of Xolo Arizona amending the code of the city of Xolo chapter 5.05 definitions and general regulations section 5.05.070 070 dog atlarge exceptions. Thank you. Thank you. Turn it back to the council for motions or questions. Vice Mayor,

I'll make a motion. I move to adopt ordinance number 2025-07 amending chapter 5.05 section 5.05.070 070 dog at large exceptions of the city of Xolo code and adopting resolution R2025-44 declaring as a public record that document titled chapter 5.05 section 5.05.070 restraint dog at large of the city of Xolo city code.

Thank you. We got a motion by Councilman Adams. All those in favor of the motion. All those opposed? Motion passed unanimously. Thank you.

Um, next item on the agenda is a public hearing that we're going to pull item B and save that for a future meeting. We weren't quite ready to bring that to council. So, we'll move on to item C on the agenda. Consideration to adopt agreement with AMK Solutions LLC to replace access control system. Mr. Towalt. See, I'm getting that name down, ain't I? I promise I'll never call you DeWalt again. I promise. Well, that's all right. Thank you, sir. I appreciate that. Good evening, mayor, council members. Um, the city of Xolo currently utilizes an outdated access control system that is in requirement of being replaced. The proposed new system will significantly in significantly enhance the city's security infrastructure by restricting access to sensitive areas and maintaining a detailed log of the date, time, and employee identity for each access event. The project was publicly bid according to statutory requirements, and only one bid was received. After thorough research, the staff recommends that Brevo access control system, which is well suited to meet the city's needs, both now and in the future. Staff recommends approving an agreement with AMK Solutions LLC for an amount not to exceed 156,428.75 for the replacement of our access control systems throughout the city of Xolo. The city will use a standard form contract for this agreement.

Thank you, sir. Any questions or comments? Councilman Adams. I move to approve the agreement with AMK Solutions LLC in the amount not to exceed $156,428.75 to replace the access control systems throughout city. Got a motion. Got a second by Councilman Whipple. All those in favor. All those opposed. Motion passed unanimously. Thank you very much. 75 cents. Why? That always catches me. Why can't it be even? I don't get it. But maybe you can talk to them. Say, "Hey, can you wave 75 cents?" Uh, yes. Sounds good. Thank you.

Thank you, Chris. Appreciate it. Next item on the agenda is consideration award of construction contract for headworks automatic screen rake and wash press city of Xolo project number 7552206 and authorize of associated budget transfers. Mr. Hemsoff.

Good evening, mayor and council. Uh the city's 2026 capital improvement budget includes $250,000 for the installation of an automatic screen rake and wash press at the Headworks building at the city's wastewater plant. Current operations include manual raking of the bar screen. On the new uh screen rake will remove larger debris before they enter the wastewater plant, dispose of them in a nearby dumpster at all times during the day. The scope of the project is to provide and install the automatic screen rake with wash press, including all required electrical, plumbing, and infrastructure provided to provide a turnkey operational unit at the headworks. City engineering staff designed the project with a construction estimate of 400,000. The project was publicly bid in accordance with statutory requirements with the following results. Mountaintop Development LLC $525,000 and Fan Environmental LLC at $547,612. Staff recommends awarding the construction contract for the Headworks automatic screen rake and wash press city of Xolo project 7552206 to Mountaintop Development LLC in that amount not to exceed that $525,000 and authorize the associated budget transfers. City will use a standard for contract for the contract for the construction contract. I'm here for any questions.

I I I got one. Does nobody Does anybody have any questions? They know what that is. I think so. Okay. I had I had to ask because it's a manual process right now. Yeah. You I don't think we want to know exactly what it does. We'll just keep that. But maybe get with staff and ask what that is. Um where was I going with that? Dang it. The guys at the plant will be pretty happy. Yeah, I'm sure. Anyway, do I entertain a motion or or comments? Vice Mayor,

I move to award the construction contract for the Headworks automatic screen rake and wash Press City of Xolo project number 7552206 to Mountaintop Development Development LLC in an amount not to exceed 525,000 and authorize associated budget transfers. Got a motion. I got a second by Councilman Adams. I do have a question now. Where are we transferring? Where are we getting the rest of the money? We had uh money in the wastewater improvements account that's for overruns or small projects that we see. Um we just awarded our manhole replacement project last month. So this is the last sewer project for the year possibly. So we're comfortable using those funds to do the project.

Nice. Thank you. Okay. I got a motion. Got a second. All those in favor? All those opposed? Motion passed unanimously. Next item on the agenda is consideration of approval of 5-year capital improvement plan for fiscal year 2027 to 2031. Mr. Hemaw,

you bet. The city of Xolo is required by city code to have an approved 5-year capital improvement plan. The CIP is a planning tool looks 5 years ahead to plan and prioritize the city's needs. The program is administered by an advisory committee that consists of city staff and representatives from the city council. Uh prior to the advisory committee meeting, a public notice was issued seeking recommendations for capital project requests. Every requester that provided contact information received a written response from staff. The first year of the CIP 2027 includes any projects that were not funded in the fiscal year 2026 budget. The 2027 projects are the committee's top priorities. However, it is understood that not all projects will be funded. Uh the the budget process will be the final determinant of which projects receive funding. Only projects $50,000 or over are included in the CIP. Smaller projects will be accounted for in each department's operations budget. Each project listed in the CIP has a detailed capital outlay project sheet which includes the project, its cost, potential funding sources, and a timeline. Detailed cost estimates and maps are also included with the with the worksheets when appropriate. Staff held a meeting with the advisory committee on November 13, 2025, at which time the CIP was recommended for approval by the committee. Staff recommends the council approved the 5-year capital improvement plan fiscal years 2027 to 2031. And I'm here for any questions.

Thank you. Any questions or comments? I I got some comments, too. Just

just to remind council, I I was kind of um I think about this capital improvement plan. And I think it's a more of a wish list because we do move that around. And just remember that, you know, there could be some projects that that we might think is real important. And this is this is it's good to have this committee because it gives us a wish list and maybe we follow it, but just a reminder that that sometimes we might go off key and need to put it somewhere else. So, so it's just something to remember in the future in the next 5-year plan because it's on there, it might not get funded or we might decide we want it somewhere else and that's that's part of the budget process. So, that was all I just that quick comment. So, now I entertain a motion. Do you have a comment, Vice Mayor? That was my comment.

Oh, that was your comment. Oh, I'm sorry. You want to say it, too? We have time. Yeah, we don't. Okay, go ahead. I moved to a 5-year capital improvement plan for fiscal year 202 2027 to 2031. Oh my gosh. For the city of Shello. He acts like he's just tired. Got a motion second by the vice mayor. All those in favor of the motion. All those opposed. Motion pass unanimously. Did you miss us, Shane? You're up again.

I'm here all night. Next item on the agenda, consideration of acceptance of programming for Xolo Sports and Event Center and consideration of entering into a schematic design phase of the design bill contract city of Xolo project number FM 4625. Mr. Hempsaw.

Thank you, Mayor. At its regular meeting on July 15th, 2025, the city council awarded a pre-construction contract to Hayden Companies LLC for the Scholola Sports and Event Center. The scope of the work for this contract is the first phase of the design build contract for the facility. The pre pre-construction design is divided into four phases of development to achieve the final design for the building. The four phases are programming and conceptual design phase, schematic design phase, the design development phase, and the construction document phase. Over the past few months, the design team has been working to identify possible programming elements of the facility. A public comment open house was held on September 16th followed by a city council meeting to discuss possible additional items that may be included in the final building programming. Cost to add additional possible items was also presented and discussed. Based on that direction, the design team has finalized the initial programming for the facility. The Hayden architect on fourline studio team Chris Ford is here and present to to discuss an overview of the final programming document. And at that time, I'll go ahead and invite Chris Ford to come on up and share the presentation with you.

You didn't have to stretch or anything. You just flew out of that. He's ready. Welcome, Chris. Thanks.

Well, thank you. Thank you, council, and mayor, uh, for letting us be here today tonight to, uh, kind of provide a update on where we're at in the process. Um, hopefully get you all excited for the next steps, um, so we can keep moving on. Oops. Um, so a quick update on kind of where we've been. As Shane Shane mentioned, um, we were here midepptember to kind of kick off the project, meet with the members of the community, um, and make some kind of really important decisions in terms of number court, site, stuff like that. Over the next two months, as Shane mentioned, we worked on producing that final programming document, um, which includes, among other things, room data sheets, which identify the various spaces that are going to be proposed for the facility and all the various things that are going to go into those spaces. It includes narratives and in design intent for the various systems of the building, such as the mechanical, structural, and electrical systems. and it includes an updated conceptual design package which we're going to review here today which includes floor plan, site plan and renderings. Um from here we are hopeful that we get feedback from council and staff um in order to move on to that 30% schematic design phase. In the meantime, Hayden Construction is currently pricing that programming document so that we can in basically right before the holiday review that uh initial budget internally and then be back here early January in a special session to go through that programming budget um before we get too far down the line on the schematic design phase. Um so jumping into the fun stuff here, just a reminder of where the site is. Um, I'm sure everyone is aware. It is located north of Wolfford, the Wolfford Road expansion, um, between Penrod and Highway 260 on the western edge of the commercial development located on Xolo Bluff. So, as we jump into the design, what you have here is the site plan. Um, the

large or the thick dash line on the edge is the property line, roughly two uh, 12 and a half acres that has been identified. Uh, Wolfford Road bounds the site to the south. uh the what we're calling road X bounds the site to the east that is a connecting road within the commercial development that has not been named and then on the north end edge of the site is the Lewis Street extension that is shown for reference here but is not currently planned as part of this project scope as you can see this uh building is located in the southeast corner of the site um and it's located there mainly to minimize disturbance to the neighborhoods to the west as well as provide as much frontage to Wolford Road and the planned commercial development to the east as possible. You'll notice that the roundabout that is planned along Wilford Road as part of that project's um scope is really kind of really forming that southeast corner of the site. The main entrance into the site is located off of Road X here where the cursor is. Um that is the primary vehicular entrance into the facility with secondary access off of Road X here to the north and off of Wolfford Road here to the south. The main entry into the building highlighted by keynote one is located here. Again focusing the front of the building towards the east of the site. A large drop off is located on the north end of the meeting rooms which we'll show in a second. um with the intent that that becomes a real ex exterior extension of those community spaces and helps promote safety in that drop off zone when you have a bunch of schools dropping off or school buses dropping off a lot of kids. So, it's really designed to help promote the safety of that drop off experience. Uh keynote two here, which is on the northwest corner of the building, is a secured patio, um which will be shown in a second. that is there mainly for when there is a ticketed or private event in the facility that there is still an

exterior patio access that can be secured. So whether it's concerts or weddings or whatever that event may be providing that opportunity for that secured exterior space was really important. That would also be where food trucks could potentially be rolled in for concerts and those types of events. Oops. um on the western edge which is the back of house space with the loading dock and mechanical areas. And this area has been designed with both the actual architecture and the site and landscape design to screen this completely from the neighbors to the west. Um which I know is a big point of contention on the project. Um so careful attention has been paid to how that is laid out and it's again screened with walls as well as landscape. The parking lot is primarily focused here on the northern end of the site as you can see. Um but we are still as mentioned last time we are still going to be deficient on parking spaces within our 12 1/2 acre site. So the um additional off-site parking is kind of identified here off to the east. Again, the layout of that is not uh part of this scope right here. Um, so that is still to be determined, but basically the additional off-site overflow parking will be to the east, which is really what drove the location of the building entry on that northeast corner so that when you do have a large event that does need that overflow that it feels welcoming and very clear pathway to the front entry. So, as we jump into the floor plan of the facility, um, so obviously it was rotated slightly on the site, so now everything's kind of been rotated 90°. So at the northeast corner here is a large covered entry uh entry uh plaza space. Again that's that at northeast corner that uh butts the the drop off. You have a large lobby that's accessed from a primary vestibial here. Within that lobby and pre-function space is going to be a welcome reception check-in desk located here as well as a focal

feature uh fireplace moment that is really designed to kind of create that hearth kind of community focus in the lobby uh space itself. The primary entry into the court space is off of that lobby space here with a secondary entrance um towards the west at the back of the kind of main hallway. And the intent of that is if you can see this dash line here um that is just to the right side of the blue line that is basically where a um divider will be placed so that during community wreck mode the facility can be kind of cortened off so that only access to the lobby, the gyms, the upstairs walking track and then one bank of restrooms will be available to help kind of just keep people out of the spaces that they don't need to be in when it's in recreation mode. Um the meeting room volume here is on the north and again the idea is that that has the ability to open up to that plaza space on the north side of the facility. This is the 500 um seat banquet hall for weddings um conferences that type of element. The majority of the bathrooms and storage spaces are located here on the north side of the courts. And then in the rear of the BU building is the uh large commercial kitchen and fac um building support spaces. The concession stands are split so that this item here number four is the concession that's direct that's attached directly to the commercial kitchen. And then a satellite concession is located here just off the meeting rooms to help split that up and kind of create as much separation in those two pieces as possible when there is large events. As you go into this to the uh gym space, as you can see the various configurations of the six basketball courts, 12 volleyball, performance um mode, and then obviously what you see here is championship court mode with the seats rolled out. Off to the west side is the storage space here for all of the equipment that's going to need to be stored for

the facility and for its multiple uses. And then there's additional storage space scattered on the north or sorry on the east and southern ends of the gym for various uses. Then jumping up to the second floor. Obviously this is primarily dominated by the three lane walking track that goes around the perimeter. You do have your four stair cores. Your elevator is located in the northeast corner again close to that front entrance. And then we do have these two little bumpouts here off the track. fact that it's kind of an opportunity um for people to jump off the track and have a place to be rather than on the track itself for stretching or those types of um those types of scenarios. So all of this the way the plan is laid out the way that the square footage is kind of all lined out is all in line with what we have presented to date. Um and it has been received a lot of vetting from the city's uh SFC uh adviser, our internal design and engineering team and obviously the construction team. Um so jumping into the conceptual design of the facility um bringing back the idea that we had um from day one about making sure this building really relates to its context to the region and to the city. Um the use of materials is really trying to be brought from the natural environment. Um, obviously with the large spans that we talked about before, with the large spans of the structure, we have to use a pre- engineer metal building, which does require the use of metal panels, but being creative with that with texture and color to really help drive home that natural feel is is the goal of this is of the structure. Bringing in CMU as well for some of the pieces that you actually are going to be at ground level with and be able to touch. So, it has a little bit different feeling. and then bringing in a large format stone on that fireplace element.

Um, so these are just the 2D elevations of the design as is. We're going to show 3D stuff in here in a second. But the two things I want to point out on the elevations is the gym itself, the six courts and the um associated storage is a single mono pitch slope here that you can see whereas the meeting rooms are much lower than that to minimize the uh impact of the building on the site. Essentially, the the gym itself is where what is used is what is treated with the metal panels that we're going to see, whereas the meeting rooms have that kind of more block and stone material to really help drive home that kind of that feel that you're touching those elements cuz it's at ground level. So, we're going to kind of walk through kind of around the perimeter of the building with these renderings. Um, and I will just very much reiterate that we are still very much in conceptual design. There is still a lot of stuff to figure out. So I think you know from we feel that we're in a really good spot especially with the fact that we haven't even started schematic design yet. Um but there is still a lot of refinement and kind of fine-tuning that's going to take place over the next 6 months. So this is starting at that northeast corner. Basically this would be your approach from that overflow parking area. You can see the large entry plaza that's covered here. You have that road X here and then this element here is the gym in the back. And here you can start to see how that metal panel starts to be sculpted and start to really mimic those rock faces that we talked about earlier. And as we zoom in to entry plaza in more of an um evening uh mode, you can see the vestibule here in the back with that um with the raised drop off plaza here to the right as we start to rotate towards the south. Now we're basically at the roundabout. Um, so one of the things we really wanted to focus on is opening up the

southeast and southwest corners with as much visibility and glass as possible so that those corners really feel welcoming from both directions as that's obviously going to be the primary access is off off of Wolfford. So here you can see this is Wolford here to the left and then Roadex to the right and really opening up that corner. the use of the metal panel here on the main masses of the building in contrast to kind of spling up it breaking up the panels kind of recessed with glass here to maximize views from the track um as you're kind of upstairs and having kind of views out to all directions. And then here's that same view kind of in a more evening um perspective. Obviously, there's a lot of fine-tuning here on the lighting, but just to kind of give an idea of how this building is going to sit within the landscape. And then as we rotate now to the southwest corner, kind of sitting at Wolford Road at the intersection of that secondary access, you can see how that the building is really designed to really fit within the landscape as much as possible on that corner. Um, one of the things that we'll do, and it'll be clear in a second, is the mechanical units that are going to be serving the gym space are actually hidden by the building itself rather than on the ground. And so, making use of architectural elements and that change of material on that west side is how we're bringing that architectural interest cuz ultimately, again, this is a four-sided building that has to have visual interest and functionality on all four sides because of how it sits on the site and how it needs to function. So, making sure every single side of the building has that interest is really important. And here, and it'll be a little bit clear in a second, but again, we're opening up that southwest corner with additional glazing so that as you're driving from the 260 up Wolford that it really becomes that inviting presence and experience all the way around. And then here's a view kind of from the north parking lot. This is a little bit

raised up, but you can start to see how the massing of the building and the materiality starts to really be reminiscent of those natural features that we had talked about. And now we're going to kind of get up in the air just for clarity and rotate around the building. So here again, this is road X. This is that front entry lo entry plaza. Here is that raised drop off area. Um, again using the paving and the change of grade to really help maximize safety for drop offs. And then again with those meeting rooms being able to expand out at certain times for and utilize that plaza space. So rotating around now, we're at the southeast corner with the intersection of Wolford and Road X at the roundabout. Again, this area here is really is going to be heavily developed with the landscape to really hammer home that idea of the building rising out of the site. And as you can see, that corner really opened up with as much blazing as possible in the southeast corner. And then same thing on the southwest corner as we rotate around to really help help bring in people. And then as you can see, you can kind of see the opening in the roof here, which is where those mechanical units will live to help again minimize how much sight disturbance the kind of back house elements are going to have. And then last rotation here. Here you can see that secured patio area. Um, we do have a cut in the roof there for part of it so that there's at least some natural light, but again that will be secured with operable gates and walls so that it can be open and closed as needed for security. Um, so going through just a few more slides here. This is these are just three quick sections through the facility. Um, this one is cutting through the gym. As you can see that mono mono slope of the gym itself trying to minimize height at the low end with with as minimal slope of roof as possible and then the banquet hall

meeting rooms opening up to the north. Rotating the other way um here and then running the section long ways through the building again just showing the the courts and the racetrack. And then lastly, you know, we don't want to throw too much at at the at everyone, but um we have put a lot of thought into the interior of the facility as well. Um but instead of showing renderings, we just wanted to show some of the inspiration of what we're we're looking at in terms of materiality and and and theme. Um making use of the woods and warm materials on the inside and exposing the structure as much as possible is kind of our approach. Here you can see just a few examples of this at other facilities. Obviously, it will be very specific to the to our building once we get on the inside, but just to get a get an idea of where we're headed on the interior. So, appreciate again everyone's time here and look forward to comments and discussion.

Just be careful when you make a comment. Money goes up. So, no, I think it looks great. I I'm obviously on I've been part of this this process up to date till now. So, I I don't have any questions or comments. Anybody down there? Vice Mayor, I just have a question as to the meeting rooms. Is there an outside access to them individually?

Yes. Um, so there will be access off that north side. Um, again, those are required for egress for emergency exit. Uh, regardless, so there will be exterior access. um how that actually functions, whether or not it's I mean it will be locked most likely most times of the year, but during certain events um there will be that kind of indooroutdoor access there. Anybody else? Got any beautiful building and looks good. Yeah, I like the design. Down there. Councilman Whipl, are you still with us now?

I'm still with you. Just want to make sure past probably everybody's bedtime. I think it looks great. I'm I'm excited to move forward. So appreciate all your hard work. Very professional run meeting. Almost like one of my meetings. Very professional run meetings. So um appreciate your guys' hard work. That's for sure. Okay. May I do have one question? Okay. Sorry.

So what are the steps from here? You know I'm sorry I meant to ask that earlier. What steps from here? So basically as Shane mentioned there's four steps of the process. Programming, schematic design, design development and construction documents. This is essentially the end of programming. Um so assuming we get approval tonight, we'll move on to the schematic design phase. Um which is where we basically get to what is basically 30% complete drawings. Um as I mentioned, we will be back roughly in a month to review pricing of this design as we showed so that we can get an idea of where we're at and what needs to change if anything. Um but basically from here on out we're basically developing the drawings at a 30% level 60 90 and then 100. We are splitting the site and building packages into separate things come June July but that's that's kind of later down the road but that those are the next steps.

So in in I'm sorry you're fine. So you second we go forward. When's it go to bid? when if if we go forward with this, when to go to bid, when when do we break ground, what what are we looking at for those? Yeah. So, I don't quote me because I don't have the schedule in front of me, but I believe that the site package goes out to bid in July with a with a start in the fall of some sort. And then the building package follows a month or so behind that. And I believe that piece starts in October or November of next year. Again, don't quote me on that, but I I have the schedule. That's pretty close.

Vice Mayor, I have another question on the building. Yep. Where the heating and cooling elements are that are recessed in the roof, how how is that handled for snow removal and um that type of thing. So, it will it'll be sloped. It'll be just like they're sitting outside. We'll just you'll basically treat the roof just like the ground that it's sitting on. And there will be openings for like what those fins were basically openings that we have to provide for outside air anyways. So it'll be basically like they're sitting on the ground outside from that perspective. So okay.

And you know just a quick comment. I know this doesn't have a lot well it does moving forward but I talked to Shane earlier about some of the areas or I don't know if I talked to Shane. I don't remember who I talked to about some of the areas even that open area in the roof. Maybe we would have put some kind of a heat treatment. So the snow melts and then maybe on the north side of the building. So we'll get to that part, but I think that's something that we need to look to in the future, too, to make sure if water does get in that open area that's fenced in, is it going to melt? I mean, so we might think about putting something in there. I don't know nothing about how to melt snow and concrete, but I'm sure somebody can figure it out.

And to to your point, that's basically that third like that percentage is about developing the detail and figuring those types of things out. So that's that's the type of information that will happen over the next six six seven months is developing those details and how things function like that. So anybody else? Okay, I'll look for a motion to move forward. Somebody so move. So what I need you to read the motion you can so move it, but let's let's go do it official. Councilman Adams, you got it. I got it down here.

Okay. I move to approve programming conceptual design for the Cholo Sports and Event Center and direct the design team to begin schematic design phase of the pre-construction contract city of Xolo project number FM-4625. Got a motion. Got a second by Councilman Whipple. All those in favor? All those opposed? Motion passed unanimously. Thank you again. Appreciate coming up, Chris.

Thanks, Shane. Great job. Okay, next item on the agenda, summary of current events. I'd just like to thank uh staff and and Rick and Mikey and and all those who have put the lights up around town. I've gotten a lot of comments how amazing it looks and I just want to thank them. Um if you see them, thank them. They put a lot of work into making Chill look really good right now and they're and all the staff does. So, I'm just really proud of how how Phil looks right now and I want to thank him for what they've done. Absolutely. Vice

I agree with that. And um quick story, my mother-in-law, we just moved her up into Sultterara and a bunch of the members of the Sultterra community went on a tour and um they went up to Pinetop and they weren't finding any lights that they didn't have to get out of the bus and walk in the cold. So they came to Xolo and man was she proud and I am certainly proud of our staff and police department, public works, Mikey, everybody for all the great job you do, all of you, the pride that you take in your jobs. Um, I was really thrilled to to see the crews out there putting up the lights and they were all dressed in elf suits and a Santa outfit. It was the coolest thing ever. Merry Christmas everybody.

I'll ditto that. I've gotten a lot of compliments of how well it looks and I appreciate the effort that's gone into that. So, thank you.

Yeah, I I ditto every everything that was said. I I actually called Rick this morning because I was so proud when Saturday night, you know, the the parade and walking around town and people just saying great things about Xolo and about the decoration. So, I I I called Rick and just said, "By the way, are you hearing what everybody's saying?" And and he does. He He hears it and, you know, he follows social media and he's absolutely our staff is amazing because they're probably more proud than we are. They can't wait for next year. You know, I I talked to him this today and he said, "Wait till next year." It's like, "Okay, I'll let everybody know." So, Christmas destination in Arizona, Xolo, we're going to make it happen. All right, city manager.

Thank you, Mayor and Council. Yes, we are very proud of our staff and they've done a lot of hard work and there's a lot of good events coming up during the holidays here. Just want to mention a few that the Xolo Family Aquatic Center is hosting a Holly Jolly Christmas pool party on December 12th. Cost is $5 per person. You can get more information at 5324130. The library has a Polar Express night on December 13th at 3. You have to get tickets for that. Um they're available at the library on a first come, first- serve basis. You can call 5324070 for more information. There's also a flashlight candy cane hunt at the Senior Field at City Park on Thursdays, December 18th. That's for kids ages 12 and under. The Christmas Tree Trail is going on right now through December 27th at the Sholo Meadow. And our final event of the year is the Deuce of Clubs drop on New Year's Eve in front of the public library that begins at about 11 p.m. where they drop the giant card and have the fireworks at midnight. I just wanted to mention our community fast that's officially ended, but there will still accept donations to help any of our fellow citizens in need at this holiday season. You can contribute through uh December at the city hall or at the local banks, National Bank, Chase, and Arizona Central Credit Union. After the holidays, once you want to recycle your Christmas tree from December 26 through Sunday, January 11th, you can drop it off. Have to remove all the decorations and lights. Uh they're at the Frontier Airfield parking lot. That's north of the Duca Clubs on 9inth Place. We take the trees from there to Novo Power in Snowflake to use as biomass fuel. And then just as everybody's mentioned, this is our last regular council meeting for 2025. We want to wish everyone a merry Christmas and a safe and happy holidays. We'll see you back in the new year.

Thank you, city manager. You're going to have to tell my wife she can't go to the candy cane hunt. 12 and under. I'm not doing it. She had plans to go, but if she can't go, I'm going to be You're going to have to tell her. Um, ditto. Merry Christmas everybody. Be safe. God bless. Pray for a white Christmas. We need the moisture. Um schedule our meetings. We're again as mentioned, we're going to try to do a meeting on January 6th um just to receive the report from the um on the sports and event center for the cost model there. We might have one or two other things on the agenda that night as well. Okay. You'll let us know what time we're starting. Yeah, it'll be regular meeting. So, okay. On January 6th.

Okay. Sounds good. At this time, I'll entertain a motion go into executive session. We'll discuss discuss or consider for legal advice or city attorney to go into executive session.

I got a motion by a motion by the vice mayor, second by Councilman Hatch. All those in favor? All those opposed? Thank you guys very much. We appreciate your attendance and be safe. Heat. Heat.