City Government - Regular Meeting

Uh, not as lively as the last one. Hi. So, how do we want to go about? Honorable mayor, if you wouldn't mind, I'd like to give you guys just a real quick presentation of what I call the SPT by the members of the Hi, Amy. Um, Oh, I think they said if I move out there, I might get on a camera, right? No, that's all right.

I do my best thinking on my feet. I'm going to try it from my seat.

I'll just hold the owl up. Um, I just kind of pulled this little presentation together quickly to give you guys an idea of what I I figures the specific purpose excise tax by the numbers. You go to the next slide, please. You know, the total ballot is $95 million. Um the estimated annual collection in Albony County that's uh that our administrative service director and the county treasurer have decided that they're comfortable with is about $9.1 million. You know, when you think about a $95 million ballot, that takes 10 to 12 years to collect. And that's the exact same amount of time that we estimated in 2018 when we projected that ballot. Also, now remember the tax the tax increase and what we accumulate, what's collected is based on the economy and how the economy is going. Um, this last few years we've been extremely aided in sales tax by wind energy development through the utility sector has really picked up and sped up our process. If you think about it, in 2018, 10 to 12 years would have been 2028 or 2030, right? Well, we're in 2026. So we are two years to four years ahead of schedule on that collection just simply because the success that sales tax has had. Next slide please.

The ballot breakdown. Yeah. Do you think part of that was uh oh do you think that uh part of that increase in sales tax was uh the taxation of online purchasing? That right? Um, can you guys make sure you

absolutely may that has a lot to do with it. Um, and I want to say the number is in the budget book. So, just excuse me if I misped that normal general fund has grown by about one and a half to$2 million per year in its collections from those online sales and use taxes. That number doesn't translate one to one to the sixth penny, but it is significant. Thank you for for answering that. Yeah.

So then when you think about the ballot breakdown and the $95 million, 48% of that ballot is estimated to be collected by the city of Larmy. Uh 46% of that ballot is to Albony County, and I don't talk much or sell their projects, but their two projects include the fairgrounds and a county services building. The 4% by the Larmy Regional Airport. We have uh Amy Terrell here who will give you a little presentation on what they're doing. And that equates to about $4 million for the airport. And she can tell you what that project's intended to do. And then there's another 2% or a little over a little under $2 million for the town of Rock River.

When Yeah, go for it. Um, councelor Freed. Thank you, Mayor. Can I can I just confirm uh city manager that that's that's not where we expect the revenue to be generated from. That's what we're asking for on the ballot, right? That's the percentage the breakdown of the $95 million of the ballot. Thank you that it's coming from

one of the numbers that I really find appealing. If you go to the next slide about the the tax itself is if you think about the tax and if it generates $9.1 million annually, 20% of that tax is estimated to be generated by tourism. And so you take out and you think that 80% of that Albany of that tax is provided by Alb County residents or $7.28 million annually, which is a good return on the investment. We're getting 100% of the dollar for 80% of the investment. If you break that down even further and you take the the estimated population of Albony County, which is around 38,000, the annual contribution per Albony County resident is $191.58 or $16 a month. It's $16 a month towards the $95 million investment and commitment, which is really a good value for what you're going to see. There's other things that happened out of the SPT, especially out of this last one. You know, the SPT was the match for $4 million in W grants. It was the match for $500,000 in TAP grants. It was the match for another $400,000 in land and water conservation funds. So, if you think about what the tax provides in base money and uh uh seed money or match money for grants, we can really turn this into a huge investment for our county residents, for every resident of Albony County to really see the benefit of what the SPT can provide in this community.

Um, thanks Todd. the information on like what those uh spat funds are able to leverage in the past would be super helpful to just have on a piece of paper that we can use as we're talking to people. So, if you could just whatever you just Absolutely. Yep. If you could Thank you.

Okay. Thank you, Mayor. Um Mr. Mr. Manager, I I'm trying to clarify how to do this. Mr. Manager, City Manager, Mr. Mom. Mr. Um, Mr. Todd. Um, so like you were just saying like the matches. So that doesn't affect the collection of the 95 million. So it doesn't go against you. It just is an additional fund. Just want to make sure everybody knows that. That that's just additional money that's working for us, you know. So if you got another 500 grand, it's on top of that $95 million or what have you. Absolutely.

Excellent. Excellent. One of the ways that I look like to look at that councelor Lockhart is when we provide the seed money we just extend what we can do with the the specific per specific purpose excise tax funds. So if we take the the trail allocation from 2018 which is where I think we had some of the best success. Um it was roughly a little over $2 million was allocated. And out of that $2 million, we acquired $4.5 million in grants on the projects that were specifically allocated. So then we take the remaining amount and we're putting it toward the Westside West Larmy connector project, which is going to provide a substantial amount of money to propel that project forward. If you would have asked me by the time that I got to this point in my career if I would have been able to potentially finish Spring Creek Trail to Third Street and get Westside West Laramie Connector done in 2018, I would have thought it was impossible. But through the work of the staff and everybody that worked so hard for this community, we were able to expend those dollars and turn that roughly $2 million investment into hope $6.5 million investment. Hopefully,

that's a good return, Council. Thank you, mayor. Um, city manager, could you describe how do we know that 20% comes from tourism?

The, um, honorable mayor to councelor Freed. So, that's a number that we've actually acquired from the, uh, visit Larmy and they've provided that number. At one point, I thought it might have even been 30%, but I did have Nancy Oak Potter check and visit with Sarah over there. But it's estimated that in general sales and across Wyoming, it varies. You know, take Jackson for instance. their their specific purpose taxes are greatly aided by travel and tourism, but there's there's known numbers, there's known quantity of visitors, there's data metrics that provide that and we take that information from visit Larmy. Thank you.

Next slide, please. you know, the city projects. I've got all the staff here that really have the large projects, and I wasn't sure if I was going to throw them out there, but I would like each one of the staff members that has a project to tell you a little bit about their projects if that's all right. You guys all okay with that? Chief Brown, you're first two on the list, so we're going to pass it over to you. Awesome. Mayor, council members, I'm not sure what the right way to address you. Councelor Odhorty, I was wondering if we could um get rid of formality in this setting so that we don't have to do three. Yeah. Before you get to the person's answer. So, if we could just call each other by our names.

Okay. Done. Done. Mr. Manager. Thank you. And Mr. Manager. Mr. Manager. Mr. chief. Mr. Chief,

so the Laram Police Department was not built to be a police department. Originally, it was built to be, I believe, an engineering firm um and or to house an engineering firm. And it, as most of you guys have seen, it is just not adequate for a a police department in today's day and age. So, we leverage technology very heavily as a force multiplier. And what that does for the taxpayers in Larmy is it really gives us the ability to not have a salary embburdened officer with re or incurring inflation year-over-year. So we're really trying to leverage technology. The problem is we're in a facility that doesn't that wasn't made um to leverage the type of technology that that we currently have. And we're talking about dispatch functions, software, uh drones, anything related to advanced technology that requires even radios to work. So even our Microsoft radios do not work in most of the building at the Larry Police Department. So this gives us this proposal gives us the opportunity to potentially either redevelop our current police department or redevelop a new police department or develop a new police department in a new area. And I'll tell you um we're one of the biggest departments in the city. We have approximately 47 police officers, another about 25 um civilian staff that work in dispatch and um at the animal shelter. So right now we're spread out to three different locations. Fourth Street, which eventually will be repurposed and redeveloped, and then here in Lark. And for the community that hasn't been to our dispatch center, I will invite you to come and reach out to me directly and I'll take you into our dispatch center. And part of the problem with being in the basement or the lower level of a jail is all of the cells are above. officer. Every time that there's a plumbing issue, which is pretty common in a jail, a lot of times, um, for whatever reason, whether it's a mental health issue or it's to get attention or there's another reason for it, those pipes tend to clog, um, or purposely get clogged and a lot of that sewage comes into our dispatch center.

The same thing with pepper spray or OC spray when that's deployed in the jail, a lot of times that will come down into our dispatch center. Um, so it's an opportunity for us to really get all of our employees kind of in the same house under the same leadership. And I think our dispatchers deserve to be in a facility where they have full windows. Uh, they spend about 12 and 1/2 hours behind a computer screen. And um, there's very little opportunity for them to get out. And right now it's very dark in there, which is the first thing that you notice. And a lot of our employees are there for 12 hours. They come in when it's dark and they leave when it's dark. So it really is about having a better work environment for our team, too. while also upgrading our facility. And I will tell you that $12 million is not enough based on the feasibility study to build a new police department. And our team has diligently been looking for other grant opportunities. And some of that matching grant will SPT will be used for some of those matches. We're currently applying for a $3 million grant. Um I don't know if we'll get it or not, but the SPT potentially could meet the requirement of the 20% match for that grant. We're also working with the county right now to look at another $1.5 million grant to upgrade some of our radio systems which would also go into the new facility. So, we are looking for every grant opportunity that's out there that's possible and I'm confident that we'll be able to find the matches that we need to support this project. Um, and I'll stand for any questions. So, um, when we do the new station, it will incorporate dispatch, get them out of that basement over there. It will incorporate, uh, animal control. Everything will be in one campus.

Yes, mayor. So, the feasibility study recommended bringing everybody to the same campus, and you'll see that on the second project, too, is the Larie Animal Shelter. Um, and I would encourage the public to look at the videos that we have now posted on YouTube and Facebook for the animal shelter and the police department and several other projects from our partners behind us, the fire department. Um, and it really gives additional information that our staff from what our our staff's perspective, which is different from mine, which is very much a fiscal perspective and a leadership perspective. Theirs is a day-to-day working perspective. We're going in formal. I thought you still have a call,

Aaron. Um would you clarify because dispatch is for the fire department and the police department and the sheriff, right? Like so would the county be working out of there too? All our dispatch people would be there instead of in a basement.

Yes. So our dispatch is a shared function. Uh, our dispatch currently serves Albany County Volunteer Fire Department, Albany or City of Laramie Fire Department, Albany Sheriff's Department, and the Laramie Police Department. And then also at time Tyler Patrol, depending what other law enforcement agencies are operating in our area. And as it sits today, um, our dispatch and records function are in, uh, the lower level of the sher of the detention facility, not the sheriff's department, the detention facility. So that whole working function would come out with the police department. And I can tell you it's a challenge for us because we handle also our records component handles all of the records for the county. So a lot of times we'll have people coming to the Larmy Police Department to get a lar police record. Um and we have to send them to the jail to get that record, which isn't common. Um if I'm being honest, I don't know that I've ever seen it that spread out before. And the majority of the people coming to get police reports are city residents. Um, but we have a great partnership with our our friends on the county side and I would also encourage the public to take a look at what they have with their um new administrative services building with the county clerk, the treasurer, the assessor. I believe there's a couple other components going in there, but those are all all partners that we as a police department partner with on a daily basis for various um reports and functions.

Thanks, mayor. Yeah, of course. Um, more of a comment. Um, and thank you, Chief. Um, I would just say that um, for anyone I know I know most of us have spent time at LPD um, but also for any member of the public listening, the more time I spend on the police advisory board, the more time I spend in the police headquarters. And though they are in great spirits, it is rough. Um, and so I, you know, this feels like a just the way that a municipality should operate and treat its employees. And also I think that the animal shelter is a particularly um important thing and I think also is a good thing to be able to talk to constituents about because um that kind of hits at the heart. I also know, you know, that LPD is considering um the need for some um uh for some uh canines and um that will uh allow um those um animal assets to kind of, you know, be in that centralized location along with uh the rest of the animal services provided. So, thank you. Um, yeah, Chief Brown, I I just want to say I've spent mo most of my adult life in Larmy, and it wasn't until like maybe 3 years ago that I realized that like it wasn't a one-stop shop, and that y'all existed in like multiple different spaces. And so, um, I I think this is a really important project. And uh yeah, just to echo counselor bowling, um I've been to your space and we love your optimism. Um and it it's it's rough out there to be honest. Um and I I I think our town deserves better. Yeah.

Um thanks, Chief. One of the things you said earlier made me think I don't know how it's possible but um for city manager if we I don't know if we have a special purpose tax like spot on the website but you know I feel like the medium of of some of those YouTube videos and things where people can visualize if they haven't been out there for the animal shelter for the police department in fact for any of this if there's a way that we can tie that into this work session somehow so people could get that stuff as easy as possible and as we're talking about in the community over the next few weeks really trying to get people out that there's a one-stop shop for spet stuff and this it could be this work session and LinkedIn there could be a couple really cool compelling videos. So just thought but

councelor Newman uh Mr. Chief guy I don't know what what rules we're supposed to use. Oh, is there time right after this meeting to do a quick walk through over there? Cuz I've never seen I've I've been out to the station and that was a nightmare. Kind of like council bowling was just saying um just the Yeah. Uh just the how your staff is doing such a great job working in that but they need something else but I haven't seen over there. So could we do something quickly after this meeting?

I would be happy to take you through that. I will say it's National Telecommunications Week. So, our dispatchers are being recognized uh this week for their excellent service. Yeah. So, so there's been a lot of food, a lot of decorations. So, when you speak to my optimism, that's that we do the best that we can to try to um to to dress it up. So, yeah, but we would be happy to take you over there. I just uh want to say that I think that the videos were really well done. uh both of them, the one about the animal shelter and then the one that you did with Ted and Bob. Just really well done.

Thank you. I would love to take credit for that, but Owen from the city manager's office did a phenomenal job. He did a great job. Um and Bob Cell and D Kramer really helped us out and they've been phenomenal partners on our police advisory board. They really have been. Yeah, they're great.

Next is fire station. Honorable mayor, members of council, uh we had a feasibility study done on station one about our location. We looked at all the functions that come out of it and the people that are working out of there. Uh the the company looked at possibilities of remodeling, adding to the building or relocating uh uh the functions of the uh um station outside to a different location. Uh they strongly recommended that we've uh need to relocate uh uh I don't know how many people have been over at the station, but if you take a walk through, you can see it's been um uh apparat the apparatus. It was built in 1938. Apparatus has changed a lot. They keep getting bigger. Our functionality, our expanded services. Uh so we're operating out of very limited space with very little chance to expand where we're at. Um we uh if we pull the truck out, we're blocking sidewalks and traffic just to check the truck. Uh it's uh uh there's really no way to to build out uh there. Um, another thing that's pretty bad is we've learned uh quite a bit over uh the last few decades about cancer and firefighters and what we call decontamination zones. So when you come back and and your apparatus floor basically is a hot zone. You bring them back carcinogens on your clothes and everything and and our living quarters are right above our our uh uh apparatus and that's that's something we need to get away from. We just need a a better, healthier, safer place for our firefighters to work out of. More spacious, more modernized for and that's why uh we uh uh put that on the u um

ballot for um consideration. Um there's no ADA in the uh station and uh that's been an issue lately with uh doing our own ambulance billing, the people uh coming and going uh to talk to us about billing. Uh there's uh there's no we have the stairs and stuff there. That's it. Um the goal would be just to move the firefighters to a different station and keep our administration in the current building on the upper floor of that building and we could repurpose the lower floor for something else. So I stand for questions.

Dan, do you mind telling them a little bit about the future location? Uh the future location we're looking at is uh on 9inth Street between Carney and Kuster. It's the old Whiting School location. The school admins there right now and they're going to be vacating that property and moving their administrative functions over to the vital school area. So, it's one of the properties that they would like to sell. We looked at uh trying to possibly build uh in this downtown location like right off of Grand at the parking lot just out like the back door of the annex in that area there. But boy, we would be really scrunched in there and it's a busy street coming off Grand. Uh this Ninth Street location, I really like the uh the demographic of the station, the response times to the community. It it'll serve South Laram much better than we can serve today. We still have good access to downtown, good access to the university. Uh we have nice street. You got Sheridan going one way and Grant's not too far away. So it's it's a really good location. Councelor Adhorty,

is this where the the trucks that are too big to fit or the engine, whatever you call them, the big the big trucks that don't fit in the garage right now or something, is that where they would live?

Well, they fit, but there's hardly any clearance. So, our ladder truck uh would go in that station. We would have a a a triple combination pumper or class A uh pumping engine and probably our reserve engine would be in that uh for uh and then we would have a couple ambulances at the station plus a command vehicle. Our commander is at the station and our incident commander responds out of that. So, and our ladder right now is a 2003. I think it'll be scheduled probably sometime in the next 10 years to be replaced. At some point, it'll need to be replaced. Uh uh we're really limited on what we can get in the current building. Uh I would highly recommend that if if the spec passes and we build a new station, but we would definitely wait uh to replace that truck when that new station and build that station where we could uh it has a 90 foot 5 foot aerial. I think we should probably go to about 135 ft aerial on that piece of apparatus uh when we when we replace it. So they make them up to about 160. So

we'll have the city manager climb it when we get it and chief. So and city manager, how are the negotiations or are they even going right now on the purchase of that building? and follow it up. Would you repurpose the building or demo it and start from scratch?

Um, I believe, uh, councelor Lockheart, I believe we would need to demo the building. I've looked at it. There's I'd want to get an assessment of it. Uh, um, but it appears to me, and I'm no architect, it appears to me we would just start prep the site for a new, and I'll let uh, city manager talk about the offer. Um, currently we we've completed the environmental assessment phase one. It came back relatively clean for what you would expect from a building of that nature. You know, there may be asbestous, there may be lead paint. No concerns about any underground stuff, no VOCC's, nothing to have concern with there. So, as far as negotiations, the offer has been accepted. Um, we've given the school district a certain date to let us know when they're ready to make this uh to do the closing. And so that's all kind of moved forward. We just um right now the school district's using it fully. There's no reason. We know that there's an agreed upon term. So I feel comfortable and confident that we've already got that acquired.

Any other questions? I think we'll turn it over to Director Bourke with Parks and Rec to talk about the recreation center. Thank you, Mr. manager. You can call me Mr. Recreation.

I'm going to get that as a name tag. Uh so we have a $2 million uh portion in this uh existing SPE for uh the Laramie Community Rec Center. Uh we don't have a specific project. We have an idea of several projects that that could be done. Uh my goal is to try and uh do at least one repair project and one improvement project. um something that the community uh can an enhancement for the community. Uh but we also have some repairs. And so uh right now the one that is kind of top of list is uh some of the degradation on our on our pool decks. Uh we've got just age and uh chemicals and and stuff. We've got some spalling and peeling of the concrete. Um that's not an easy repair. Um and it's not an inexpensive repair. Um, but the other improvement that we're looking is also uh on the deck of the lap pool. Um, we have space where the old bleachers used to be. And there's uh been a kind of an ongoing plan for uh or or some drawings for the last several years idea of uh creating additional uh dance uh and and fitness uh instruction space uh in there and potentially some additional um office space for some of our fitness instructors and and uh other instructors. So, those are kind of two of of the ideas that we're looking at. But realistically, you know, uh we we really won't know until we actually start really kind of vetting what the top needs are when when we have the money that's been collected for for that amount. Um so, I'll stand for any questions or or any suggestions you all may have.

Free. Thanks, Mayor. Um thank you, Mr. Recreation. Um, is the is the area where the old bleachers were is that the west side of the pool? Is that what that is? Todd's nodding his head. Yes. So, yes. Uh, I am terrible on my west south, but yes, it's on when you walk in, it's at the far side of the of the lap pool. That makes sense. And my only suggestion would be let's freeze it and make another ice rink. So, there you go.

Thank you, mayor. Um, now that we're being formal, thank you, Bruh. Um, I I appreciate it. No, so, uh, I just wanted to say, um, you know, when we first started on council, all of us freshmen got a tour of the rec center, and I think that was one of the most impactful tours I've ever been on. Um, because you can always walk into the rec center and just like, oh, it's so nice and like, yay, fun. But you don't really realize like the maintenance that it requires, especially the pool area. Um and and it's a lot of money and so um yeah, I I just wanted to say thank you and we're here for it. Thanks. Thank you.

Thank you, Mayor. Um but in all seriousness, um Director Bourke, I think, you know, being on the park trees and rec board with you and some of the comments that we get from the public, I mean the rec center is one of the the gyms of our community. So, I think this is a really big selling point, I think, for a lot of folks who are interested in the SPE tax because that's an improvement that everyone gets to benefit from. Um, you know, you might not be benefiting from some of these other things, but most of the community does, but I know that rec center is just people are in there every day as you know. Absolutely.

Council Dhy fun. Um, as I recall when when the rec center was built, the idea of that lap pool. I mean, I'm not clear why we took out the bleachers. Um, that, you know, it would be nice to have an option for swim meets, but then they, um, I guess it's because the high school built theirs, but um, if we could seek out people that want to practice before they're meet, do we do that? And and might there be an opportunity? This might be something that Todd would know better about, you know, like the bleachers having bleachers and why it's not interesting anymore.

Yeah. Once the once the high school uh pool went in their their technology for for running swim meets and uh everything is is much higher than than what we've got at at the rec center. and and when that all happened and and everything switched over and now with the university building their uh competitive aquatic uh center um our lap pool, we're we're actively in fact Todd and I were just talking yesterday about ways that we're looking to kind of rethink uh programming uh in the lap pool because our lap swimmers are are a core key component um as are some of our standup paddle board classes and the and the kaying lessons. Uh but there's a lot of other opportunities out there to try and maximize the use of what right now is probably well not probably is the most underutilized portion of our of our at least our aquatics uh center. Um just because again originally it was much more heavily used for swim meets and swim teams and and things like that. And I just think quite honestly other facilities have now surpassed us in their ability to to have uh those quality meats and and that's not a bad thing. We just need to look at how we're going to repurpose our uses. And so the bleachers were great when when there were the need for meats, but now that has gone. And so we've got a big open space there on on that end of the pool deck that I think um is is a it's a it's a good opportunity for us to to look at how we can reuse that whole space. Any other questions, comments?

Um, Director Parks, um, uh, uh, water temperature in the locker room showers. Should add that to your list. Yes, we have water temperature in the locker room showers. that

for for will we do have a uh chance. We've been efforting about some controllable features and stuff that we can get to that is going to really rectify that situation that I think will be fine. Um with uh Director Brooks, Director Webb not being here, I'll hit on the remaining projects a little bit lightly for him. I feel pretty confident I could answer most of the questions. Uh there's $4 million on there for surface water drainage projects. You know, we've heard a lot that this community wants to lay a vote on surface water drainage projects, which this really meets that need. But those projects are detailed. What we will do is we will fund projects in the the surface water drainage plan of the specific projects that are going to be improvements to our storm water drainage program to make sure that we're secure and we're protecting life and property with that those funds.

Councelor Newman. Um, just to clarify because I've read some stuff online. Um, that's not going to be for staff. That's just going to be for storm water capital projects. Right. The $4 million.

Correct. The the specific purpose tax can't be used for general general government operations. It has to be used for specific projects. These are surface water drainage capital projects that will have to be funded by the specific purpose tax bout. We have a very well done study that indicates projects that need to be done and we'll have to work on uh maybe state revolving loan funds or slip grants or whatever is available to try to support that through the state, the feds, anywhere we can to bolster that up and do some of those capital projects as we move forward. The next one, the roughly 1,55,000 is for ADA sidewalk crossing improvements. You know, we've actually been tackling a lot of those with this project that's going around. A lot of ADA. Um the Labani Park project that we've talked a little bit about here recently. Um that one is actually addressing some ADA concerns around that area. Spring Creek Trail phase 2 is addressing ADA across the street from it so that we can make sure that we're properly addressing um accessibility issues. But this is intended to provide mostly corners and crossings to make sure that we continue to maintain compliance, which will be evaluated through the sidewalk study that we have recently completed. And we'll take the worst ones first and we'll just cut those off the list and start getting them replaced, getting them fixed as we move forward. The the other three projects that are on there, uh, Bill Nye Avenue, that's considered uh phase four of Bill Nye, which is listed on the ballot from 3rd to 15th Street. So, it will come up, you know, past the Maverick. It'll cross Spring Creek, go past Chonos, uh make the swoop around by the uh storage units, and then start to head a little bit to the east right past that new uh toolbox or toy box storage unit, and then it'll make the connection there. And the that's a fantastic project because it opens up both

residential and commercial growth in our community. Um the next one, the $7 million for street maintenance construction. We listed much less streets than we did last time. If you remember the ballot last time, we listed virtually every street except for we found out like two, right? There was two streets that we didn't list. And actually, one of those is ones that we had to do some work on, so we couldn't use the SPT in there. But, uh, we listed uh fewer streets, so we didn't give the impression that we were going to do more than we could potentially do. But, uh, I can't remember all the streets. There's seven or eight, but one of them that's listed in there is Bill Nice phase three, which would get us from 19th to Corthell, which will connect to the Bill Nice phase 2 that we talked about the other night at council. So, we have a chance if the SPT is successful to actually see potentially Bill Nye get finished, which has been talked about for 20 plus years in this community. So, what a fantastic improvement if this is supported. Uh the final one, the $2 million for Harrison Street is at our unpaved to paved initiative in West Larmy. And I've talked about this a little bit. Um, you know, often times I believe when you get into upper management positions and big projects come on, the dollar value sometimes gets you to stop and not think about it. Um, you know, one of my philosophies that I carry is I always like to make one step forward and get better. I believe that if we as the city concentrate and we try to get the one next project in West Laramie that potentially in 10 to 15 years we might see West Larmy get done and get finished. You know, we've got a potential to pick up uh a block of Jefferson Street with a development here if we can invest a little bit of funding with it. So, every time we have an opportunity that we can pick up, we need to try to do that. And at a certain point there will be a more cohesive more belief that West Larmy and Larmy are all one. We're not divided by what your road by me made of. So, but I'll be happy to

answer any questions. I do want to hand it over to Amy before we get off of this slide so she can tell you about the plans at the airport, but I'll be happy to answer any questions about the service water street and road projects. Councelor Frerieded.

Thanks, Mayor, and thank you, Mr. Manager. Um, I guess I know looking at the sample ballot, it's great that I know that the county has we link to that sample ballot. Um, I've I've gotten questions about what types of projects and so for that storm water surface specifically and so, you know, within that $4 million is the best way to cite that is that we have all the information of what needs to happen and that's what the storm surface water drainage fee would have supported, right? And so is there like a phasing or a more detailed list or should we just say can we point people to that study? Is that the best way to say you know projects that are high priorities out of this that could be funded with the 4 million would most likely be considered first?

I think it's important to point them towards that and understand that there's priority projects. There's list of projects and we will as staff bring them to council for you guys to choose which projects are supported by the SPT. So that study is the best thing to look at for sure. Thank you. That'll be after him. Okay,

great. Thanks. Um, yeah, and I just wanted to comment on the Harrison Street project. Um, city manager, I really appreciate what you said about that. Uh, my my property butts up right against uh Wyoming Avenue and so to be able to see like that whole thing paved is is really wild. Um, and all of my neighbors are taking very great advantage of driving their mo motorcycles at very high speeds. Found that. But it's okay. It's we're we're all having fun. Um, yeah. And so, you know, I think it's kind of invigorated um some of the excitement just around having a paved road, you know. Um, and so that's that's really exciting and I'm I'm really um, you know, proud that this this project made it into into this. So,

I am too. If you look on the packet that you were provided tonight that's on all the seats, it's got a list of projects of past projects that Wyoming Avenue was a 2018 specific purpose excise tax project, you know, and it is beautiful. I every time, in fact, Mike and I were just driving around looking at stuff with the west side and I'm like, "Hey, go down here and then go here." And he's like, "Where are we going?" I said, "We're driving on Wyoming." Because I love driving on Wyoming. And so, uh, we just, uh, they're just projects that are coming along that are so great that really bolster the importance of the SPT that we could have never managed without it. And so, it's important for our community to know what it provides, what it can provide, and what it could continue to provide. All right, I'm going to turn it over to Amy Terrell, director at Larmy Regional Airport.

Thank you. I really appreciate you letting us come and talk about this and sharing kind of what we're what we plan to do with the 4 million. Um, years ago when the airport was developed and built, we were very fortunate to get crosswind runways. What that means is we have two two large runways that intersect. Many airports our size do not have that. They just have one long runway. We have two. With that bea come be comes the taxi ways. They we call it's kind of like your on andoff ramps. different sectors where you can get on and off the the runways, get onto the taxiways, and we have a lot of pavement out there to to support that. The great thing about having the infrastructure we have currently is on game days, let's say in or for the University of football when they come in, we're able to bring in, we could bring up to four 737s, we could bring in a 737 and all the private aircraft. Um BYU brought in a 757. We can fill that ramp. So, there was nowhere left to park on that ramp because we have so much pavement. We're a diversion station for Denver. Um, we have lots of opportunities out there, but some of that brings some challenges with all that pavement. We have to maintain it. Um, we have not done a great job maintaining that over the years. So, um, this summer, for example, we're doing a $15.3 million project next summer. Um, and of that, we have to come up with match money. So, we have all the match money set aside for this coming project. It's 2.5%. the state comes up with 2.5% and then the federal government or the FAA has discretionary funds. Um, and so moving forward as we start to look at we take a we what we call it as a WIP. We look 10 years out at the airport and we start projecting all the projects we need to compete for that discretionary funding with the FAA for the next 10 years. So we have our 10 years of projects that we've we've projected that we need and then we put it in front of the FAA and the state and we have to get approval for those projects. So, and I say approval very roughly. If another airport has a priority and they decide to divert the funds, that is their ability to do that. Um, but right now we

have lots of pavement coming up in the next 10 years. That requires match money which we are we have no more match money left. So, this spet tax will ensure that the city of Larmy and or Alb County essentially city of Laramie is able to maintain that infrastructure out there. So, the $4 million we're using that to rehabilitate the runways. We're rehabbing some of the stuff. We actually have a $23 million project in 2035 um to redo one of our runways entirely. So take it back down to the native ground and build the runway back up. Um our goal is to prevent that as long as possible. That has to happen no matter what. As when you talk about streets, same sort of scenario. Um we have some millan overlay projects coming up. Um but really what that is is if we get that spent money, we will be able to do all those projects. If the spent money is if we don't get that spent money, we're going to have to pick and choose what's most important. and we run the risk of closing down one of our crop our our shorter runway. Um that would be that would be devastating to the airport because I think we're right on the verge of growing. We don't want to lose any of the infrastruct structure that is out there. When I talk to some of the public, we get a lot of questions about, well, I never use the airport. I don't fly. I'm not a private pilot and I don't take commercial aircraft. Things that I don't think people think about is we have some cargo come and go from there. Um with UPS pulling out, we don't have them coming in, Amazon coming in every night. We have Flight for Life, a lot of Flight for Life that comes in. I don't think we always think about that. Um, we can have a helicopter out on I 80 servicing somebody and run out of fuel. I mean, they're real low on fuel and they can't get into Colorado. They stop at our airport and get fuel. Um, so there are a lot of things that happen. They come in all night throughout the night. We have staff going in. Um, so people actually are using that airport. We just don't necessarily identify with it. Um, we move all of the univers so for the last three years, the University of Wyoming, we've moved all their charters in and out. Um, we've moved all the visiting teams in and out. It doesn't matter about weather. We're able to open those runways. We have an incredible staff out there. So, people are really using the airport. It's just sometimes it's harder to identify, but

if you turn on the University of Wyoming, a basketball game, most likely they flew in. Um, so we are you people are using that airport. Um, so we spend a lot of time talking about that when we talk about the airport. Some other things we have on the for spent money. We talked a little bit about an S sur building. What that would provide us is right now we have our we have two fire trucks and all of our snow equipment. Um our grant asurances. We're all parked in one building. We need to spread those out and make them a little make them drive-through buildings. We have a huge semi that I worry that we back that in during the winter. It'd be great to have a drive-thru. So we have some of that on the infrastructure. We have deicing pads which would also be fueling pads. So during fire season, we could fuel helicopters, make some money, um, and we could fuel diversions. Those are kind of on our wish list. But I can tell you the first and foremost thing we're going to do with the $4 million is set that aside and line it out with all the discretionary money and have our pavement taken care of. If there's leftover money on that, that's where we would look at those fueling pads in the S building. Again, we can't use it for operational expense. So it will actually be the infrastructure and what will stay with this airport for the next 10 to 20 years. So, any questions?

Amy, questions for Director Terrell. Thank you. Um, director airport. Um, uh, I just want to say, um, thank you for the 5:30 a.m. flight. I just booked my first one. Total game changer. Perfect. I was running a little late tonight. We had some problems with the weather. So, I called Todd. said I may not be coming. 220 people are about to be affected if we don't get this system back up, but it's up and running. So, we'll have all our flights today and tomorrow morning. So, any further questions or comments?

Thank you. Yeah, I've uh we've started flying out of the airport now and I've done it uh uh three times uh this year and it is so convenient and the money I save on if you go on a two or three week trip on parking and on going back and forth to Denver and you get in after a 30-hour flight and you have to drive home. It was only like a 7 minute drive home. It was great. They're also having some challenges at DIA right now with car theft and um Chief Brown definitely supports the airport. They drive by at night, they document it. So, we have a great partnership with the police department. It is the safest parking lot, I would say. Yeah.

I don't want to say the safest, but one of the safest parking lots and it's a for your cars. A lovely area to wait into. Thank you everybody. To everybody that contributed, thank you for being here. That's super important. Uh next slide, please. election date and information. You know, it's just important. I think we all know May 5th, 2026 is the election date. Um there's no early voting. There is there's abs no you can get an absentee ballot and turn in your absentee ballot, but there is no early voting like you've seen in the past where you go in actually record your ballot.

So, but you can get your absentee ballot and turn it in exactly right there on the spot. Yeah. So, that's the difference. I was going to explain that to you. And then that this year there's going to be five polling locations. Those five polling locations include the municipal operations center, the ice center, the library, the fairgrounds, and then if you want to go out to Rock River and vote, you can vote at any one five of the polling locations. Um, that is new this year because we used to vote in districts, right? We used to vote in our specific area. So, that's new. Now, keep in mind when the primary in general come around, there's going to be 10 polling locations that people can choose to vote at. But it's it's incredibly important that people understand that like I used to go to Indian Paintbrush School. Well, now I've got five options of places to go and none of those are Indian Paintbrush school. So, I will I will vote at uh probably the MOC. So, but next slide and then we're to questions uh whether community or council driven, however you guys would like to drive these. Well, I think right now uh since we've all been talking and we do have uh some visitors uh I'm wondering do you all have any questions or comments?

No ma'am. All right. No. No. Bernice. No. Okay. Well, thank you very much for joining us. Uh I really appreciate that. Uh counselors uh councelor Freed. Yep.

I always have questions. I feel like uh my I guess city manager or maybe director Wade if you guys would just be willing for the folks who are going to watch this kind of explain. You've already hit on that you know special purpose tax and how it's collected and that it can't go to salaries. it it has to go to projects that are specifically identified on the ground, but could you say like if this were to not pass? I know you can only speak for the city's perspective, but you know, how could these projects get funded if we didn't pass what's on the SPE ballot or maybe some of the the things that could happen to the community? I just want to if it doesn't pass be able to provide that to the community and and say, you know, what we would see. Um yeah, honorable mayor through you that so if the tax doesn't pass, there is an option for it to be uh re what I forgot what the term is, but you can bring it back to the voters after 11 months. Uh probably under different projects, different circumstances, however you decide to do it. Um, as far as projects, if this tax doesn't pass, it's going to be very difficult to continue to maintain some of the improvements that we're looking at. Um, you know, we will certainly try to look to alternative funding sources or other ways. You know, there is a municipal option special purpose tax. there is some other opportunities for you to go after, but there's not a lot of opportunity to go back to fund a fire station or a police department or projects of those nature because they're just uh very large uh ticket items that need this general funding to make sure that they're able to go. Anything you'd like to add? Well, I think what I'd add to that, too, is just I mean, remember h just think about how behind we've gotten over the years, right? And we're so lucky that we have all of these sales and use tax collections right now from wind energy development. And think about how how

fortunate we are to be able to put those to good use, right? And so right now at this point in time in our history, if you were to look at our financial statements or look at our budget, you know, as a member of the council or as a member of the public, you might think, "Oh, well, times have changed in Albany County." And maybe we only need 5 cents of sales and use tax. And that's just not true. Even this year, when we look, we do have some one-time collections. We have about a million, but a million, it's a lot of money, right? to you and I as people that's a ton of money it doesn't buy much road I mean if you want to convert it into the types of services that we do and so that's one of the things that I really worry about you know because we have had some good years we we've tried to talk about that a lot like why things look the way that they do but I hope when the public looks at how we're reinvesting that money into the community and the value of the projects um on the upcoming spet tax that they feel that they can make a good decision for the community so that we can keep investing and keep improving where we live.

I think Jen brought up something that's rather important that I you talk about sales tax in Wyoming and potentially having 6%. And I will openly admit that I was down in Fort Collins with my family and I bought some stuff at Harbor Freight. My tax bill at Harbor Freight was 8.3%. right, which is 30% more than it is locally. And so there that that five and six cent when you think about the tax rate is really a small imposition for what it can provide in our community. Uh councelor Balding.

Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, B. Um uh I I think we all understand the importance of why this is so critical. Um but I think it there's value in gaming out the hypotheticals, right? So, I'm just curious if we were to have this not pass, would we then, if considering the 11month um window, would we go back into negotiation with the county and with Rock River um or would the um the agreement stand as is? No, the my understanding that the the resolution is passed and done, then we have to go back and start over again. Yeah. It doesn't doesn't roll from that point forward. You start the process over at the beginning.

Uh, councelor Luckart,

I just I just want to say I'm, you know, a thousand% in support of this um as a community and and if with anything, if you're not moving forward, you're moving backwards. And we got to stay ahead of it. We're trying to grow the community, trying to get housing, trying to bring in industry, and it's curb appeal also. So, if we make a nice community, people are more likely to choose us over maybe someone else in Wyoming. And so, um, we we we do need this. And there's always misinformation online. And that's why I don't get on the rants and raves anymore because it's almost disgusting. So, if you want true answers, go to the website, talk to the directors, talk to us. we'll get you the answers instead of listening to that because it is a it is so important for the survival and the growth of our city in the next 101 15 years if not more.

Councelor Dhorty

uh back to the airport. Um I think you know I know some people have been critical like yeah I don't use the airport. Um you know I hope you never need flight for life. Um but the other thing that the fire season I am I'm so glad we have the airport and a place for refueling. Um not you know just we don't know what's out there this year and uh you know particularly I mean this isn't going to pay for it this year but uh I mean we all we all use services from the airport. It brings in business. It helps bring that 20% um of the sales tax comes from visitors. So um I hope people understand the importance of the airport to the economy of our city.

Councelor Freed. Thank you, Mayor. I'll stop talking one of these council meetings maybe in two and a quarter years when

I hope not. Um, well, I just want to say I'm forever an optimist and I think our community has shown that we really support, you know, the the SPET tax. I mean, we have a history of it and I think we've done a really good job, the city staff has and presenting, you know, things that that benefit growth, but also tackle some of these issues that affect us, you know, roads, um, ADA accessibility, the airport. I mean, you could go down the fire station, police station, uh, all these things that benefit the health and well-being of our community truly. So, I think it's a great thing. Um, one comment then one question. Another comment is, um, you know, in the trail work sector, we spent, u million dollars on two miles of trail down in outside of steamboat on the national forest. Um, so that was from nothing. So, you know, trails cost a lot of money and then that's just trail, not a road that has to be up to spec and, you know, has all the other things. So, it's expensive. To your point, Director Wade, I appreciate that. That made me think of that. So my question to this maybe city manager director Wade is um optimistically I think this is going to pass. We're going to have some awesome capital projects. At what point um from us starting to collect that money would we make decisions about bonding for some of these bigger projects or how just how does that look? And I've got some questions from the community saying you know that is an increased tax right or that's you know we have to eat some money to do that. And so if you could just describe kind of that process what the public would see and the benefit of it. Thank you for that question, Council Member Frerieded. And so, um, voters when they're considering the ballot are also going to be voting on our ability to issue bonds, and those are general obligation bonds because, as you know, anytime you pledge, uh, the full faith and credit, the taxing authority in a general way, the voters have to actually approve that debt. And so, that is actually going to be part of the ballot question. Um what you'll see on the ballot are our bonding assumptions assuming um that we bond around the maximum amount and that is based on our assessed value as it's a certain

percentage of assessed value and as we have things like property taxes going down of course that eats into our assessed value. So interestingly enough we're able to bond a little less um because of some of these changes around property tax that is factored into the forecast. the interest rate you see um and the bonding rate you see is the most we're going to pay. And then what we do is we get together as a leadership team and we say, "Okay, when the rubber like meets the road, who goes first, how much does that cost? What are we going to get ahead of? And what's the order of events going to be to be able to really maximize the return um on how we're using those funds?" And so, generally speaking, that's how we'll go about that. But we don't have those answers right now because first first is we have to see if the tax is going to be passed. Then we need to look at what project really goes first and how are we going to fund it. I can tell you we have bonding projected for both the police and the fire um projects. But we may need to move that around and we have the right to do so in the ballot.

Councelor O Dhy. So more about bonding. Um can you explain like the economics the reason that you would do a bond which yes we have to pay interest on a bond but the rising cost of so so how that balances out like why it's an advantage to not just sit on the money until you've collected the whole amount and then go on a spending spree.

That's a great question and I think it's one that a lot of people have. And so, um, we we have a really good credit rating. And so, we tend to, as a city, and I don't know, it's not this way for all cities, right? It's based on the strength of your balance sheet. Um, we have a really, um, we get competitive rates. And so, when you look at the rates we get, um, bonding is going to be at a little bit lower cost than that lease lease back, but I'm going to use that as an example, right? Because we talked about that as a lot as a group. um based on the amount of return we're getting just to hold funds versus the amount we spent to finance it, we actually are right about even. And so you're not losing a whole lot of money because you're staying ahead of the cost increases um that would happen with inflation. And even if you were to say, well, I'm going to hold these funds and I'm going to make a little money and I'm going to have that interest. The fact of the matter is that most of the time the rates that we get on the bonding are not that much higher than the interest we would make. They're they're a little higher. Um and so the money math, if you want to call it that, tends to work out pretty well. And then we have the added benefit of course of getting those projects out the door because I also think there's some intangible value in that, right? If you just wait and you wait and you wait for five years and no one sees anything going on, what how does the public feel about that? So, right, low cost, you get it out the door, you show that progress and all of that really does add up to be a good value.

I think if we add to that, if you think about what happened in 2018, one of the projects that was bonded was the fire training facility. In 2020, the pandemic hit and we saw 25 35 45% cost increase in the cost of construction. Well, because of that bonding, we were able to be ahead of the curve in that increase and get that project done with Dan Johnson, Chief Johnson, and his leadership to provide that services at the value to this community that they needed. And so, when I think about bonding, I think you're protecting the cost of projects ahead of what you might pay for a little bit of fee. Um,

mayor, if it's okay with you, I have one more thing to add. So, what I'm also finding out is a lot of the grants that we're applying for have time limits. So, if we get awarded a grant that's, I don't know, say a million, two or $3 million, then we have to get the project going and spend those funds within a loted amount of time. That's usually dictated by the federal government. So, a lot of times even though we're financing a portion of that through the bond, um we're recouping that through and then some usually through grants.

And I think a a comment I wanted to make is uh about the long-term impact that some of this has. And I'm looking at uh 2010. And in 2010 uh Laramie was experiencing significant issues related to uh water and wastewater infrastructure. And when you have a crumbling water and wastewater infrastructure, then you cannot develop on top of crumbling infrastructure. And so in 2010, we appropriated uh about $17 million toward uh the improvement in our water and wastewater infrastructure. Prior to these improvements being done, we were having close to 150 water breaks a year. Since these improvements have been done, we're having less than 40. So, they had a situation going on where they would go in to patch uh a leak and as they would cut through uh the pipe, it would begin crumbling and something that should have been a two foot repair turned out to be 15 ft. And it was ju we were just wasting money. When we got this taken care of, then we were you cannot start paving your roads until your water infrastructure is taken care of cuz roads, as we've talked about, are really expensive. So you don't want to

pave the road and then have crumbling infrastructure underneath. So after we got this done, we were able to move more aggressively toward road development to take care of Grand Avenue. I mean, it's been uh 16 years of work and impact on development uh in our town. And that's just one example of what one issue coming forward, the impact it can have on our community, on our well-being, on waste of money, and on uh providing the infrastructure necessary for progress and quality of life. So that's just a comment. Uh, Council O'Dhy,

and that makes me think about um when those repairs are happening. When do they happen? It's going to be after hours. It's always like after hours and on the weekends. So then we have to pay people more because of emergency. Yeah. Really terrible weather. So if we can use the capital projects, that'll reduce our maintenance cost.

Thank you, Mayor. Last two thoughts. Um

I well and I appreciate all the bonding information and and the help because construction prices never go down and so I really do appreciate your your comments um Director Wade and city manager because I mean that's or we're in a depression and they're going down. So uh assuming that's not happening, they always go up. And so I I do appreciate utilizing our resources the best way. And the only other thing I wanted to say is that uh I think for voting the last day to register to vote is on the 20th on Monday, but you can register the same day up or from the 20th up to the 5th and just vote absentee. But if you wanted to register to vote at the courthouse, the last day is the 20th next this coming Monday. Um but then after that you can get an absentee ballot and and still register to vote for for this you

any other and does anyone here have uh any comments or questions? Uh yes, Eric.

There you go. Thank you. Hit that button on there.

All the technicalities. Great. Hi, my name is Eric. Um, I am trying to get young people to register to vote. So, thanks for that date, Mark. Um, I don't see what it says it's doing uh at the airport, but I see the airport as maybe a factor that can inspire young people to get to the polls. Hey, maybe I can fly into Laramie instead of having to uh and maybe I don't have to fly on the vomit comet. Maybe I can fly in on a on a normal plane. Um, is there some stuff in here that particularly appeals to the young vote that I can really focus on and hammer?

Thank you for the question. Um, uh, personally, I would, um, I would maybe focus on animal shelter as one that I think is really going to, um, be attractive. Um, I think you could also uh consider um trail improvements. Um um and uh director Terrell of the airport is sitting right behind you. Um and gave presentation before you entered the room. So um she can answer any questions that you have for that. Might point out we don't have a anymore. It's a jet aircraft. So it's a CRJ. It's 55 seats and it is a jet aircraft. I won't spread misinformation.

It's not propeller, so it's a much smoother flight.

Honorable mayor, if I could add for Eric is that um if you think about what the protection, the surface water drainage projects are about prot protection of property and life. And so that's something. But if you think about the street projects, the street projects are hopefully going to unlock more developable neighborhoods for residential homes. and Eric and I just met the other day and discussed about uh housing and those different things. And all of these lend themselves towards leading towards the availability for more developer property. And the Bill Nye projects themselves specifically open up acres and acres of land with both road, water, and sewer projects that will provide for development in this community and hopefully help ease that burden of housing burden. Any further comments or questions? Director Wade, Owen and I are meeting on Friday to confer about the last video for the SPET. Um, I have the honor and so if you have ideas, um, everyone's like creative juices are flowing tonight, right? Which is I love it. Um, but if you have ideas for what we should hit in that last video, like I certainly am mulling over lots of things in my mind after listening to you all, but if you would take the time to just come up and visit with me briefly, um, that would help me and Owen and Todd inform what gets on that last video.

Councelor Vill, thank you. I think you should give Owen free creative reign. just let him go feral a little bit. I I really do believe that. I think yeah, like he he is good people and he'll get a lot of views. Um and yeah, he's right up there with Fort Collins and their content and so thank you Newman. I think Mr. Manager and Mr. Fun should be part of that.

Yeah. Well, thank you very much. Uh, I think this has been really helpful uh for us in getting our to me it's so important to get the narrative down and I've got some public appearances coming up where I will be talking about this bet and this helps me. So I appreciate the time that you all have spent and I appreciate our visitors coming tonight from the human rights. Yes. From the Yeah. All of them.

They have Bernie and Yeah. Very good. Well, thank you. And then we're journed.