City Council - Regular Meeting

I'd like to call the meeting of the February 4th, 2026 Kenai City Council to order. If you're able, please rise and join me in the pledge of allegiance. I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Clerk, please call the role. Council member Cassenna, here. Council member Sonart, here. Mayor Naxstead here. Council member Daniel

present. Council member Grimmie present. Council member Asen here. Council member Petty here. Student Representative Bowling here. You have a quorum.

Thank you. Council, before we get to the agenda and consent agenda approval, please direct your attention to the layown materials. There's a um memorandum from um our city manager regarding ordinance 3501-2026. Pleasure of councel. Council member Sonart. I move to accept the consent agenda.

Second. A second. Are there any additional revisions to the agenda or consent agenda from councel? Clerk, would you please read the consent agenda into the record? Thank you, Vice Mayor Asen. Approval of the regular meeting minutes of January 21st, 2026. New business action approval bills to be ratified brought to you by the administration and introduction of ordinance number 3504-2026 accepting and appropriating an increase in the title 3 grant from the state of Alaska Department of Health Division of Senior and Disability Services for Nutrition Transportation and Support Services brought to you by the Administration. Public hearing scheduled for February 18th, 2026. And that is your consent agenda.

Thank you. Are there any public comments on any of the consent ag consent agenda items just read by the clerk? Was unanimous consent requested?

Yes, unanimous consent was requested. Are there any objections? Hearing none, the agenda and consent agenda are approved. Next, we have scheduled administrative reports. Um, Bill Lurman and Brandy Nikolai will give us the annual review of the city permanent and custody funds. and running a microphone is not my I guess best expertise, but um as I mentioned, I'm the chief investment officer of multiasset strategies. I'm going to go over the city's permanent fund. We'll we'll talk a little bit about history and where you've been and what recent returns have been over the past year since we visited. and then I'll shift gears a little bit and we'll talk about our forward-looking projections for the funds. So, if you go ahead and advance to this first page, what we like to do here is just give you an idea. Um, I don't know if I did that or if you did that.

I think I just

Okay, so here's a overall summary page. We keep this running um information since inception of the fund. So the fund started with APCM in September 2008. There's been total contributions of 22.9 million withdrawals of 18.6 million and the market value at the end of December 2025 was 39.9 million. And if we look at the an average annual return since inception, it has been about 7.79%. This chart here is interesting in the background. That gray area chart is just the market value of the permanent fund over time since inception. But at the top there, what we're doing is taking into account the current market value and any contributions and withdrawals that have happened since inception. And that gives us a net earnings number of 35.6 million. So if someone was to ask you how much has the permanent fund earned in dollars since inception, it's been 35.6 million. So very successful. You can see down below the bar charts are the calendar year returns you've actually experienced through time. So you can note on the last U mark there the return for calendar year 2025 was 13.4%. So we've had another strong year for the permanent fund. We have had backtoback um several strong kind of above average years um in the markets. If we were to just think about 2025 and recap it more broadly, uh what we have here is a chart of just different asset classes that the permanent fund uh has owned throughout 2025. And you can see all of them are positive. And so when we have a backdrop of positive economic growth uh coupled with a big increase in productivity which ke kept corporate profits quite healthy and then on top of that we get a federal reserve who starts cutting

interest rates. It creates this backdrop where we can have positive returns across all different types of asset classes which you can see here occurred. This is the first time that's happened um postcoid. So again, here just a very strong 2025 which led to the double-digit returns that the permanent fund had. Here we're looking at returns just through a couple different lenses. And so at the top here you can see a solid blue line. And so that solid blue line is the actual 12month rolling period returns that the permanent fund has experienced. And then the dash lines that you see across the chart, those are APCM's forward-looking projections. So recall our firm thinks about kind of a long-term horizon um and what is reasonable to expect for risk and return given the permanent funds allocation and we track actual portfolio results within those projections so that we can have some conviction that we're on path to meeting our long-term return objectives. So clearly you could see that solid blue line is within those projections. So it it indicates that the permanent fund is well on track to earn your long-term projected return. Down below you see blue bars and orange bars. The blue bar is your actual investment portfolio and these are different um return periods ending December 31st, 2025. So you can see on a one-year basis that would represent calendar year 25. The portfolio is up 13.5% and your benchmark the orange bar was up 13%. So you have to think of that benchmark kind of as our goal portfolio. It's the overall allocation we think that will meet your long-term goals and objectives. The outperformance there that the permanent fund experience was really had to do with some of the shorter term um positions that we built in the portfolio which kind of successfully helped us navigate the

early volatility we experienced during the tariff announcements early in 25. And then as we went throughout the year, we did increase our exposure in the portfolio to companies that could be beneficiaries of the artificial intelligence buildout. And so by doing those small trades uh that really help the portfolio earn back its management fees and then some. This is a look at where the portfolio is at at the end of December. So you can see the strategic weight right there. That's what's currently, you know, in your investment policy statement. That's the overall mix of all these different asset classes that we think will get you to your long-term goals to support distributions and inflation protect the portfolio. It's also your benchmark. So, that orange bar we were just looking at is representative of that strategic weight across all those asset classes. I do want to remind everybody that we're looking at the portfolio at a very high level at in different asset classes. In each of these asset classes, APCM hires one or more managers to get you exposure to the asset class and the overlying portfolio owns thousands of different securities. It's very well diversified, very liquid. Um, so with that, you can see the current allocation column there. That is where the portfolio is at at the end of December. You can note that we are pretty close to our strategic weights um across the board. We just had a little bit more cash. That really has to do with the fact that uh the portfolio receives a lot of dividends and interest at year end, but we've since redeployed that and we're pretty much close to our strategic weight right now. When we think about 2026, um I just want to cover a few highlevel themes regarding our more near-term market outlook. We've had a couple of years of very strong equity returns. And

when we look at the equity markets, they're not particularly cheap. And so when you think about what equity returns are comprised of, it's the overall, you know, valuations, right? Sometimes the stock market's price get ahead of underlying value, right? And it's also um corporate earnings can contribute to positive stock returns. And so right now we think in 2026 the market is really going to be dependent on the ability of corporations to deliver on the solid earnings expectations that the market expects. And so the good news about that that you can see in the top left hand uh slide or graph there is that real economic growth across all of the key economies is expected to be positive. That's good because that leads to potential for positive corporate earnings that I mentioned is important to the outlook. So on the right hand side you see the graph there of different countries um that represent consensus outlook for overall corporate earnings and again it's positive. So despite coming off strong, a strong year and a strong couple of years, we still do think that in the near term, there is some opportunity here for the stock market to continue to generate positive returns. If you look down at the bottom left hand graphic is this is a picture of semiconductor margins relative to like the broader um markets. And since that orange line is above the blue line, it's just telling you that semiconductor companies are producing very strong profits. And that really has to do with the fact that a lot of these companies are supplying chips that are important to the AI buildout. We know that AI the AI buildout is a national priority. There's a lot of capital that's being deployed into that buildout and these companies are benefiting from that. We've increased exposure a little bit in

the permanent fund. um in order to participate in that near-term market environment. And additionally, the bottom um right-hand chart indicates the fact that emerging market stocks, they're just a little bit more attractively priced than certainly US large company stocks. So, they also have exposure to key countries that are beneficiaries of the AI buildout. So, we've also increased our exposure a little bit to emerging market stocks as well. I'm going to switch gears a little bit here and now talk about forward-looking um expectations for the permanent fund. And if we start here and we look at the overall portfolio, these numbers here represents APCM's forward-looking return projections. So, it's our team's um estimates based upon the current market conditions today, the price of these different asset classes and long-term economic growth. What do we think is reasonable in terms of return expectations for the next 10 years on average, right? So, if you look at that long-term return line there in the chart, it says 6.7%. That's our long-term 10year average return. So 10 years from now, if we were looking at the average return, we'd say it should be close to 6.7%. We know that's an estimate. So right next to it, you see 6.4 to 7. That's the range of possible outcomes, we think. So we think the long-term return is somewhere between 64 and 7%. If you take out our inflation assumption, which is currently 2 and a.5%, that leaves 4.2% 2% of real earnings growth in the portfolio and that's right in line with your highest distribution amount you can take. So because the current portfolio strategy

owns virtually all the different asset classes that you can get exposure to outside of private markets, you're well suited with your current allocation to meet your long-term objectives. Before I leave this slide, I want to point out something important because we've reported a lot of good news recently, but we do have a range of expectations of calendar year returns we think we could report on the permanent fund. And if you look at the annual return line and you see that range -14.1 to 28.5, that's the range of returns that we think um we could experience 95% of the time. So, I could be here next year, the markets could be off according to current um expectations, and we wouldn't be surprised if the portfolio is down 14.1%. Um, as long as we maintain our current strategy during those more difficult market conditions, um, we do anticipate that the negative returns and positive returns will converge towards that 6.7% if that makes sense. So, we're going to look at kind of the two primary funds within the permanent funds. And we're going to start here with the a airport land sale permanent fund. And so, we have these goals associated with uh this portion of the assets. We want to preserve uh capital. We want to inflation protect the portfolio. And we want to be able to sustain a withdrawal rate somewhere between 3.8 and 4.2%. And so since I just went over the fact that the portfolio as a whole um has a real expected growth rate of 4.2, that's why we're not making any changes um our recommendations for changes in strategy. So when you look at the graphic below, we're looking at the blue line which is the market value of the portfolio during different time periods and the green

line which is inflationadjusted principle. And so if you recall postcoid we had this big inflationary spike that really was a challenge for maintaining real purchasing power in the portfolio. But you can see that blue line market values really converge towards your inflation adjusted principle. And that's important because once that blue line exceeds the uh inflationadjusted principle you can distribute at the higher rate of 4.2%. So I do think it's pretty um remarkable too that the overall deficit that you had between market value and inflation adjusted principle um has been reduced by 85% over just one year. Here in this graphic we're showing for the airport fund um what our projections are for withdrawals. And so that black line that you see in the middle, that's our base case estimate of what we think your withdrawal will be over the next 10 years. But of course, there's a range around that. And you can see that we have kind of best case and worst case scenarios. But um over this next 10-year time horizon, we think there's a 43% chance that you'll move from distributing at a 3.8% 8% rate to a 4.2% rate. So here is where we uh look at the current market value of the airport fund at 32.9 million and we project forward you know if you take out our base case estimate distributions which down below are displayed at the 3.8% 8% rate. Uh where will the portfolio be at the end of 10 years from now? And if you look at that black line in the candlestick chart, it says 42.9 million. And that will be just above your inflation

adjusted principle. And so that's our base case estimate of where the permanent fund can grow given those projected distribution levels. And then the general uh fund, land sale permanent fund, it has a little bit different um rules as it relates to spending, but you still have the goals of preserving capital and inflation protection. And you want to be able to sustain a 4% draw. Again, here our real return is 4.2%. So within your withdrawal rate and inflation protection. So again supporting our recommendation for no changes in asset allocation. uh the again we're looking at the blue line which is the market value of the portfolio and then the inflation adjusted principle. this portfolio is exceeding inflationadjusted principle primarily because if the market value is below inflation adjusted principle, you can't take a draw. And so just by not taking a draw, it really helped the portfolio market value exceed inflation adjusted principle. Again here um we have a spending rule where you can take the lesser of the cumulative earnings in the portfolio or 4%. And so down below you can see that the distribution projections that APCM has calculated that's at the 4% level because we think that through the next um several years the portfolio will have a positive earnings reserve above that amount. I did um add the cumulative earnings here this year because I think that's interesting in terms of trying to calculate what do we think your reserve total will be and you can see it's increasing steadily over the years. We think this portfolio given those projected distributions would end uh

begins at 4.3 million today and would end 10 years from now at about 5.7. You can note here that this portfolio is expected to um exceed inflation adjusted principle at the end of 10 years. Here this is just cumulative earnings projection. So, I showed you the black line on the previous page, but I just wanted to show the array of potential outcomes for those that cumulative earnings bucket. I'm going to finish my comments just on these last two slides because we talk a lot about um the permanent fund specifically, but your team at APCM does do a lot of work um in the background. And part of that work really has to do with um evaluating the different managers we use to get exposure to the different asset classes that you own. Um, one of the things that APCM does is when we're working with mutual funds in particular that have different share classes. Mutual funds um, generally have an institutional share class or where if you're investing a certain amount of money, then you can qualify for the lowest expense ratio. even if the uh permanent fund portfolio doesn't meet that APCM since we're managing um about $5 billion in assets, we're able to negotiate with those managers to get the permanent fund the lower fee rate. So, I just wanted to make make sure you knew that was happening. This alpha beta spectrum that you see here is just a technical way of saying the permanent fund owns a little bit of everything. you own a lot of index funds where, for example, if we want exposure to large company stocks in the US, we're owning the S&P 500 index. It's a strong performer. It's a way for us to control expenses. And then we do own some other funds that are more in the middle where managers have created a quantitative way

to capture a risk and return profile of an asset class. and APCM's job is to evaluate how they created it and whether or not it's capturing the asset class exposure like we wanted to. The last point I want to make here is that um in the first quarter of each year, we do go through and we evaluate um the different managers we have inside the permanent fund. we make changes if we think that we can get better exposure to an asset class or if we're able to reduce expenses. Um, one of the interesting things I think here is that black and or yellow graph that you see there. There are no now more exchange traded funds available to in the marketplace than there are individual companies listed in the stock market. So, there's a lot of funds out there for us to choose from. The good news is we can get exposure to different parts of the market very easily in a cost-effective manner. So um importantly APCM we don't have any financial um connections to any of the managers we use. We're completely uh open platform. We have no conflicts of interest to disclose and we have no financial relationships with any other financial intermediaries. So I think that's also helpful to know. So, with that, I'm going to turn it over to Bill. Oh, I can take questions on the permanent fund. Uh, Bill was going to cover the custody account on the fixed income side here briefly, but if there's any questions, I can take them.

Okay, perfect. Thank you.

Thank you. So, I'm going to do a a kind of U-turn and go back. You know, Alaska permanent uh management um manages the perm fund, but we also have another bucket of assets that we've been uh managing um for a little bit since November 2024. And these are your what we call your uh custody assets. These are uh it's a bucket of money that's kind of outside your your cash pool. Um, so it's kind of your reserve fund outside your uh normal cash which is held at uh Wells Fargo and uh the Alaska Municipal League investment pool. Um these are all securities that are anywhere from 0 to 5 years. They're it's made up of treasuries, FDIC, uh CDs, um and agency securities. Agency securities meaning Fanny May Fanny May, Freddy Mack, Federal Home Loan Bank, those types. So all government um a little bit later um in and you guys's you guys will be asked um to look um for a work session um a date for me to come back down. I last year when I was in front of you guys and a couple new faces here but was to look and and do a work session with you guys and look at opportunities that we can use for this portfolio uh to do two things. one to add additional assets uh classes um investment grade uh credit um and then second is to allow greater maturities within this portfolio. One of the things um historically as we manage this uh portfolio and working with staff and having discussions there isn't a much need for liquidity as much liquidity need in this portfolio that is in this. And so I'm going to look to come back down uh uh to you guys and walk through some examples what other cities are doing. Um other government entities are doing some with some of these reserve funds. So that's uh to be taken in a little bit later. But um here

it you know the portfolio is $ 35.1 million uh dollars. The the annual yield on that portfolio is uh 371. The benchmark is 350. What's that benchmark? If we think about the benchmark that's all securities, government securities that are uh maturing between one and three years. So if we take that all that that would be the index and that GVIXX is the allspring money market and that's just think about that as your c a cash fund uh like a Wells Fargo something like that that's holding cash. So in theory we shouldn't outy yield that over a long period of time. our performance should outy yield cash um over a cycle of the interest rates. And when we look at the bottom right hand corner, we look at the performance of the fund uh gross uh quarter to date 110 versus a benchmark 114. But again, that cash number of 97 basis points. So we uh were able to produce uh 13 basis points more than cash. If we look at our last 12 12 uh uh months, the portfolio return just north of 5% versus that cash number of 4.17. So about 85 basis points more than that cash. And one of the reasons why there's that performance number is in interest rates are coming down. And as interest rates come down, price of bonds move up and the reinvestment in your cash is going to be coming down too. So, one of the areas we we're think uh that APCM has been working is we believe that interest rates will continue to come down over the 6 to 12 months period as the Federal Reserve decreases interest rates. And so, we kind of want to get in front of that, invest out and lock in some yields for you guys. So, that that's part of the discussion that we'll have uh kind of moving forward. Um if we you know, looking at the annual coupon income over the next 12 months, this portfolio will generate about a million dollars um in in coupon income. that's outside price increases or decreases, but just coupon income off this

portfolio. And then the last thing I just kind of want to hit on and and this is the bottom lefthand corner. Um, just kind of the makeup of and I I mentioned this earlier. Um, the one thing I I think I want to point out from the the difference from us managing the account since uh, you know, November of 2024 is uh, that kind of that yellow group there. And that's the agencies. Uh we've been able to add some agencies into this portfolio at at yields greater than treasuries. So that's one um u thing that we did to increase the yield in the portfolio. But I kind of we're cut up on time and I'll just pause there and take any questions and look forward to being back in front of you guys here shortly.

Council member Petty. Yes. Thank you for this insight. uh on those agencies that you added to this portfolio, what sort of increase in risk was taken? Are were those uh FDIC insured or were they governmentbacked agencies? They are governmentbacked uh agencies there. Uh one was a Fanny May federal uh u and one was a federal home loan bank. Uh they were callable agencies. Um but so but from a risk credit risk they are backed by the government. And are they all investment grade? Yes. Correct. Mhm. Thank you, Council Member Daniel. Uh,

thank you. Um, my question is this. So, your ask of us, it looks like my understanding of this um portfolio is that everything is very shortterm like you know a year, one to two, two to three, but nothing over five. And as you're asked as part of the work session is to look at longer term stuff, can you walk me through what you're thinking just so I have an idea um uh kind of when we look at the constraints of the portfolio um that's in charter that uh or or code I'm sorry code uh securities have to be less than 5 years at least 20% of the portfolio shall be held in maturities no less than one year plus the cash. So that's a constraint. So we're holding a lot of cash or really short-term securities. So one of my uh recommendations will be to use some of that and allow that constraint to be more flexible to invest out. Um and then the second piece is uh there's no more than 30% of the portfolio that can be two years and greater. So basically 70% of the portfolio has to be two years and in and with the amount of liquidity needs out of this um working with staff there's very little liquidity needs because you have that in your in the other cash buckets that if we lengthen the portfolio or allow uh the us uh the flexibility to buy longerdated securities will do two things. Um when you inherently when you buy longer securities you should get a greater risk and greater return and within the confines today that's what we have an upward sloping yield curve. So as we work out the yield curve you get more yield and then the second is to lock in those yields for a longer period of time

because as interest rates move down you you'll have that uh higher yield for a longer period of time. Thank you for that. This is kind of a followup and maybe for city manager. Um, was the intention always like a slush fund? Is that our goal if we had ever had a need? Um, was that what this was originally concept concepted for?

City manager.

Uh, thank you, uh, Vice Mayor. Um, Council Member Daniel. Um, I wouldn't call it a slush fund, but what these funds represent are are reserve balances. So when you see you know our fund balance numbers in the general fund, our fund balance numbers in various other funds um these are those reserve balances. So these you know these balances represent um you know the cash that we have on hand for working capital along with a lot lot of other uses. So this is just our normal cash balances. Um, these have grown over time obviously as as our fund balances and things have grown over time or you know the the balance in our equipment replacement fund, our fleet replacement fund. So these various funds that we have that we carry balances in this represents that cash. I think what APCM is is looking at and recommending at this point is that you know some of these as those reserves have grown um we don't have to require the same amount of percentage of liquidity in those seems a bit excessive and they believe that we can you know earn more funds by taking on a little bit more risk or increasing the duration by stepping out um with a little bit longer investments because I don't think we need as much liquid liquidities based on these percentages as we used to. I think the other thing Bill may touch on too is um they're they likely going to recommend that we explore adding a different asset class. Right now we're confined to um governmentbacked things or governmentinssured things where um we may want to take in high quality um credit um from corporate side to buy when we start looking at bonds as well which again is incremental increase in risk but it's probably the chance for return is great enough to justify it and I think that's what they want to come down and have talk with us about. Thank you for that followup and that

explanation there. I really appreciate it. I would be interested in discussing this further and a work session to see what makes sense and what fits our use case. I really appreciate it. Thank you. Does anybody else have any questions?

Thank you, Vice Mayor and Council. Next we have scheduled public comments. Samantha Springer with Kenai Chamber of Commerce and Visitors Center will present her annual report. Hello everybody. Okay, so we're just going to do a little year and review. Um, pretty basic stuff. Obviously, I put some of our achievements on here like getting chamber of the year. Um, some of our historical and cultural programs that we did, um, changing how we did silver salmon derby. I'm not going to go over everything because I know you guys have a print out of the exact same thing. But, um, I want to say it was a very successful year. I think that having a a full staff that has stayed, you know, for the entirety has helped a lot and we're on a very stable path right now. And I'm seeing that with our funding and I'm seeing that with um the sponsors are feeling comfortable in committing early this year for 26, which is a great thing. Uh makes my job a lot easier. Um and just consistency in in what we're doing and bringing to the community. So, all things good. Um, there was a decrease in visitors, but we noticed that pretty early on uh in the beginning of 25. We definitely caught up toward the end. So, after July numbers were very similar to the previous year, but I would say that January, February, March of 25 was much slower than I had seen in the past. But still, we were only about a thousand visitors off from previous years. So, it wasn't anything crazy. We

still had a lot of mainstay programs and events. Um, lots of facility rentals and then we added things. We had uh multiple book signings. The Angel Tree was a huge success. We will continue to do that. Um, it was a massive undertaking, but it was totally worth it to help all those families. We're continuing with family movie night and first Fridays even though they're changing to bimonthly instead of monthly. And that was a request of the artists because it's such a large space to turn over every month and this way they'll have a chance to display their art for a longer period of time. Other than that, I think all of our mainstay events are pretty much staying the same. Staffing, the biggest change was we did end up not keeping an administrative assistant. um there wasn't enough I mean there's enough work but there wasn't enough work to pass down to administrative level um that made sense so we kind of relocated that money the cultural center coordinator position when we got that approved last year with city council was for 20 hours a week that was definitely too too little like she could work probably 60 hours a week if I let her but she we did move her to salary so um we are covering the difference of that and just kind moved money around to make that work, which has been great. Same with the the cultural or the visitor center representatives. We kind of changed the way we did that as well. Before we used to just bring on two people and one would be the full-time year round and then we'd have one seasonal. We found that it actually worked out better to have um high school students work that and have multiple along with working with the um the cabins as well. So we had rotating staff moving from the cabin park and the cultural center uh and that worked out amazing. So and I swear we

had like the best 16-year-olds on the planet and hopefully they come back because they were invited to. they were that great and even some of them worked over the winter at like the haunted chamber for the weekends and stuff like that. So, been really lucky with the way that all that has worked out and kind of changing how we were doing it to make way more sense. So, um I think I did forget to change the bottom part where I was saying we were going to try and get her to 40 hours. Clearly, we have got her to 40 hours. Um, and we are still looking at grant funding though to kind of make up the difference, but I don't know if it's necessary at this point. Um, board of directors, mostly the same, but we did get three new board members. Um, Tanya from Senator Mowsky's office, Jesse from Chissa, and June Harris joined our our board. So, we are full and happy and it's everything's going well. Um, this is all just normal. We're not changing anything as far as hours of operation uh or the days that we're open or closed. Uh the fee schedule has not changed. We haven't in fact I think we've actually taken some things off just because it was an excessive amount of paperwork to try and track every single thing that people wanted. Um we are going to take off coffee and tea though. We will not be continuing to do that. Most people have caterers, so it was very unnecessary. And we were trying to make like four pots of coffee for an event, and it's not good when we make it. So, we just we're gonna stop that. Um I did not normally I do the entire calendar for the year for you guys. Uh it is not ready. So, there's things coming up like um the gubanatorial debate forum that we're setting up for evenings, the Senate debate forum for um the state. And so there's a lot of local and then local debates. So we're not ready to put out the full calendar cuz it's just going to get changed. So I did

put the major events and their dates on here. Um and obviously we've been putting out in the newsletter what's coming up each month, but until I'm ready to actually I last year I changed that calendar so many times that it became such a headache. I have it. But if you guys have any questions about what's coming up, let me know. I'm just not going to publish it in something that is probably going to change about 800 times. So, this made more sense, but those dates will be coming for the debate forms because those are going to be pretty big ones. Um, the gubernatorial one, we are waiting until after um the uh first thing that brings them down to four candidates.

Thank you. The primary, we're waiting for that because we don't have room for 28 candidates in the chamber for a debate. So, we'll do that. And then the Senate debate forum. We're looking at a shoulder season um either before summer or after. We're not sure where that's going to fall, but I'm working with um Senator Sullivan's campaign and I've reached out to Pala as well to get that down here. And those will be evening forums. So, we're going to work with KSRM on that as well. And we are, like I said, we're still doing first Fridays, but they'll be by monthly. Um this Friday is going to be Kai Central High School students art. And I know that the welding department and pottery and I'm not sure who else they're going to be setting up hopefully tomorrow. I haven't seen anything yet. So, but we're planned for Friday. So, we'll see. Make sure that happens. Uh, one update that I didn't include on here that is really exciting. Um, we have all the funding now to do the roof for the Moose John cabin. So, between a grant, um, a donation directly from Moose Me John's nephew and, uh, a private donation, we will be able to get the roof fixed this summer. So, we're like, yay, finally. That's exciting. Um, and then, oh, another thing coming up that I'm sure you guys have heard of, the small business symposium is going to be on the 18th, and that's going to be from 10:00 to 3. That's also when we're going to be having our chamber awards. We brought them back this year. Um I we haven't done them since I've been the executive director. I I wasn't completely in favor of them, but we are trying them out again to see how it goes. But hopefully we get some more submissions cuz that's the biggest thing is if people don't actually nominate then it's just like we have to choose people to award and that's where it gets a little difficult. We have had quite a few nominations but I'm hoping we see more of the like volunteer awards and um individual awards. We see a lot of businesses come through, but not necessarily the the people who make

those impacts like the volunteers and the that's what what I want to see represented more. So, like I said, that'll be February 18th. That is a free event minus if you want lunch, lunch will be there as well. I believe Hearthy is doing that. Um, so please RCP if you'd like to be there. Lots of people are going to be presenting. Um, and other than that, I think that is my full report. Nice and easy. So, have any questions? Does anyone have questions for Samantha? Council member Daniel?

Uh, thank you, Vice Mayor. Uh, first of all, thank you, uh, Sam for coming and giving us an update. We appreciate what you and your crew does and your board of directors. Uh, it's very, you definitely have an impact in this community. We appreciate it. My only question really is, um, anything you need from us to help you continue this mission?

Yeah. Um, the biggest thing is I would love to see more participation in our events from the city. Um, I think that we put on all these things and it would be really cool to see everybody there. I think we I mean we have bi-weekly lunchons. We have lots of opportunities for you to interact with the public that doesn't take very much time. Um, just and volunteering love to have anybody volunteer at any time. I know you guys are all busy, but who isn't busy? Let's be honest. So, I think participation would be would make me super happy. I I feel like we see the same like two people the majority of the time. So, I think we know one of them. Thank you for that.

Of course. Anything else?

Thank you, Samantha. Thank you. Seeing none, we will go on to public hearings. The the first public hearing before us tonight is ordinance number 3500-2026, sunsetting the harbor commission, amending Kenai Municipal Code 1.9.010. 010 General Standards for Standing Advisory Commissions repealing Kenai Municipal Code 1.95.040 Harbor Commission repealing Kenai Municipal Code 11.20 leasing of tidelands amending Kenai Municipal Code 14.05.0100 duties and powers enacting Kenai Municipal Code 22.05.016 016 Tidelands available for leasing enacting Kenai Municipal Code Chapter 22.10 Tidland leases for shore facility fisheries and amending council policy 20.02 to reflect the sunsetting of the harbor commission. Pleasure of councel. Council member Son, I move to enact ordinance number 3500 2026. Is there a second?

I'll second. Thank you. Is there anyone from the general public that would like to speak to ordinance 3500 2026? Seeing none, we'll bring it back to council. Discussion from council. Council member Daniel.

Thank you. Um, vice mayor, uh, just want to thank all the council or all the commissioners on the harbor commission over the years for all their work. Um, and my question is, and I think it's in here, all the powers have been transferred over um, to the PNZ, but if we were to reenact the commission in the future, be city manager or the clerk, um, would how hard would it be just to be a new ordinance or what would we need to do to do that? Thank you, Vice Mayor, Council Member Daniel. Um, yeah, I think the process would be the the exact same that we're going through right now, which would be to identify um those those tasks that council would like the commission to undertake and then codifying uh the different sections of code to to make those changes. So, I think it would be just the exact opposite of what what's being accomplished here.

Any other discussion? If not, clerk, please call the role. Council member Sonart, yes. Mayor Nstead, yes. Council member Daniel, yes. Council member Grimmie, yes. Vice Mayor Asin, yes. Council member Petty, yes. Council member Cassenna, yes. Student Representative Bowling, yes. You have seven yes votes. Ordinance number 35000-2026 is enacted.

Thank you. We're now on to item E2, ordinance number 3501-2026, determining four city-owned properties in the Beaver Loop area not needed for a public p purpose and authorizing sale by public sealed bid auction. Pleasure of councel. I move to enact ordinance number 3501 2026.

I'll second that. Is there anyone from the general public that would like to speak to ordinance 3501-2026? Seeing none, I'll bring it back to council for discussion. I move to amend ordinance number 3501 2026 by filling in the blank in the 11th whereas clause with the word enactment, the whereas clause to read Whereas at their regularly scheduled meeting on January 28th, 2026, the city of Kai Planning and Zoning Commission reviewed the proposed sale of the properties and recommended enactment to the city council.

Is there a second? I'll second that amendment. Thank you. Thank you. Discussion on the amendment was unanimous consent requested. Uh request unanimous consent. Thank you. Um are there any objections to approving the motion to amend? Hearing none, the amendment is approved. Council member Sonart. Okay. Is there a second motion?

Yes, there is. I move to amend ordinance number 3501206 to add a new whereas clause to read whereas the city's intent in offering these parcels for sale is to facilitate gravel extraction and the properties are being made available for that purpose exclusively subject to all applicable zoning permitting and regulatory requirements. I like to second that. Thank you. I request unanimous consent. Thank you. Is there any discussion on this amendment?

Hearing none. Um there unanimous consent was requested. Are there any objections? The motion to amend is approved which takes us back to the main motion. Is there any additional discussion? Clerk, please call the role as amended. Mayor Nagstead.

Thank you, Vice Mayor Asen. I wasn't sure if I should speak up or I know how difficult it is, you know, to see there, but I just wanted to say that I I absolutely support this this ordinance. I don't remember how many years ago, maybe six or seven years ago, I encouraged the administration to excavate some test holes in that area. Um, and it's near some other existing gravel pits and and uh we we found a substantial amount of gravel in on our property there. And uh those test holes, of course, as long as nothing has changed at the ground are good pretty much for forever. But um Beaver Loop gravel is in the center part of uh this Beaverloop area is in the center of our city. It's some of the best gravel uh that I've ever worked with for a road building. It's not too big, not too small. Um, it it compacts very well. And, uh, as as time goes on, um, gravel sources are getting to be more and more difficult to find. And, uh, uh, this is this is, uh, this will help, uh, our city grow. Gravel is needed for all development. And, uh, um, and it's in a location where it's not in a neighborhood and whatnot. It's sort of it's a win-win uh for everybody, I believe. So, um with that, I'm I'm in full support of this this ordinance. Thank you.

Thank you, Mayor Nstead. Is there any other discussion? Council member Sonar. Thank you, Vice Mayor Asen. So, I'm looking on page 57 at the map, and I'm I'm just curious, what is the access to these four lots? Because obviously the gravel pits in front of them have access to Beaver Loop. Am I missing something on the map? I'm just wondering, is there going to be an issue if somebody bids and and buys a parcel? Are all four of these parcels going to have access?

City Manager Eubank.

Thank you, Vice Mayor. Um, Council Member Sonar. Uh, yes. I mean, one of the burrow's requirements, you know, and our own requirements to complete a subdivision is to make sure that legal access is provided to all these lots. Um, at the southern border of the three lots you're looking at there, there is a section line that runs um east to west that will provide adequate access. Uh there is also some accesses that run um north to south um through or you know on the property lines of those adjoining pits. Um so yes I think all of these do have legal access. I will tell you some of the accesses is access is probably easier than others but they all do have legal access.

Thank you. Any other discussion? Hearing none, clerk, please call the role. Mayor Naxstead, yes. Council member Daniel, yes. Council member Grimmie, yes. Vice Mayor Askin, yes. Council member Petty, yes. Council member Cassenna, yes. Council member Sonart, yes. Student Representative Bowling, yes. You have seven yes votes. Ordinance number 3501-2026 as amended is enacted.

Thank you. We now have item E3, ordinance number 3502-2026 authorizing the city manager to reimburse annual leave used by firefighter Garrick Martin for attending a paramedic internship program brought to brought to us by administration. Pleasure of councel. Council member Sonart. I move to enact ordinance number 3502 2026. Second that. Thank you. Is there anyone from the general public who would like to speak to ordinance 3502-2026? Seeing none, we'll bring it back to council. Discussion for council.

Council member Daniel.

Thank you, Vice Mayor Askin. Um, this question is for the city manager. Uh, first of all, I fully um and support this and I'm excited that um firefighter Martin was able to get the get through this program and get his paramedic um training done. My question really is more of a for future. Should we I'd like to see if we can look at ways to handle this administratively. Um, and seem like an ordinance is a lot for it. I'm glad we're doing it, but I'm just curious if there's another mechanism maybe in the future to make this easier for staff to move these forward. Thank you, Vice Mayor, Council Member Daniel. Um, I think that's a reasonable question. This is the third time the city has gone through this process. There's nothing within code that gives the authority um to do what we're being asked to do or what we're proposing to do, I guess, is probably a better way to to do this. Um, it's certainly something we could look at proposing an amendment to code that would give us administratively the the ability to do this. Um, like I said, this is, to my knowledge, this is the third time that we've done this in eight my 18 years here at the city. Um, so, uh, that's definitely something we can look at. Um, but yeah, it's it definitely the reason it's coming forward like this is there's nothing in code that allows us to do this at this point in time. So, As a followup, I would just take a note. Let's look let's take a look at it and see what it would take. Appreciate that.

Thank you. Is there any other discussion? Hearing none. Clerk, please call the role. Council member Daniel, yes. Council member Grimmie, yes. Vice Mayor Askin, yes. Council member Petty, yes. Council member Cassenna, yes. Council member Soner, yes. Mayor Naxstead, yes. Student Representative Bowling, yes. You have seven yes votes. Ordinance number 3502-2026 is enacted.

Thank you, Clerk Sainer. This brings us to item E4, which is ordinance number 3503-2026, increasing estimated revenues and appropriations in the water and sewer capital project fund and accepting a loan from the state revolving fund program for the water treatment pump house project brought to us by administration. Pleasure of councel. Council member Sonart. I move to enact ordinance number 3503 2026. I'll second.

Thank you. Is there anyone from the general public who'd like to speak to ordinance 3503-2026? Seeing none, we'll bring it back to council. Discussion from council.

Council member Sonar. Thank you, Vice Mayor Haskin. I was just wondering for um the public that might be listening out there if we could get um Mr. Fry to give us just an overview of what this is about. Mr. Fry.

Thank you. Sure. Uh so this is the loan. Um we we we originally applied and received a $1.2 million um loan from the state of Alaska. Um we went through design on the project that we were forward funding with $1.2 $.2 million. Um, and we've since through the design process, um, realized that the the cost estimate was, uh, coming in significantly higher than we expected. Um, we went back and applied for additional funding through the state. Um, and we're lucky to receive the additional $1.5 million that we received um that we're planning on using with that previous 1.2, the million that we appropriated to, uh, complete the project. Um plan for when this is going out to bid is to design a new pump house um that will be constructed or sorry the plans are building's already designed um plans are already designed for everything. We're planning on releasing it tomorrow for bidding. Um so it will be construction of a new pump house with a backup generator. Um and there's also an existing 16-in water man that was um installed as part of the um spur project several years ago. So we're now going to connect that main, put it into service. um will reduce a major bottleneck in our water system that we have out there. Um in addition to that, we're doing some controls upgrades with how those pumps are are going to work. They're bigger, stronger pumps than we had before. So, it's going to help with fire flows um and pressures throughout town. Um we're doing some access controls um with the gate out there. That's one of the additive alternates is to put in um some electronic controls for the access gate. Um and the second additive alternate is doing um pressure tanks um at our wellhouse that's just up the street. Um so that'll help with power outages. Um currently when we have a power outage in our system, it takes uh about 10 seconds for a generator to spin up, power up those pumps and make sure we're keeping pressure on our system. Uh these pressure tanks because our system is so flat will help keep system pressure while we're waiting for that generator

and the pumps to spin up and keep everything going. Council member Gy and I just want to clarify this is a forgivable state loan. That is correct. Council member Petty. Uh yes. My question is the same lines. Um it says it's forgivable. Is there any provisions in there that would cause it not to be forgivable or is it absolute? uh through anybody who wants to answer that question. City manager, you may.

Thank you, Vice Mayor. Um Council Member Petty, uh I think in order for the the amount to not be forgiven, we would have to um not comply with the terms and conditions of the program. Um and and be mindful that, you know, throughout the process, we're consulting with with DEEC on this. They've approved our plans. they're approving, you know, our bid documents. I mean, we're we're in lock step with them. So, we're not anticipating any um um situations like that. And they actually grant forgiveness at the time. So, when we at the time of issuing payment to us, so as we take progress draws as we're completing the project, each of those payments that we receive are being forgiven at that time. So, the city truly is not um incurring any debt along the way.

Thank you so very much for that clarity. I appreciate it. City Attorney, thank you, Vice Mayor. I just also wanted to point out that we did reach out to outside bond council and have an opinion that the city is not incurring debt, which would trigger the necessity to go to a vote, but we we've reviewed this with bond counsel and got a favorable outside opinion. Thank you, Council Member Graie.

I just want to say again that I I appreciate the work that I know city staff are doing to find alternative funding sources to meet the city's needs. I think this is another really great example of of finding an alternative source that isn't going to to use city funds. So, I'm I'm appreciative of that. Thank you. Thank you. Is there anything else? Not. Clerk, please call the role. Council member Grimmie, yes. Vice Mayor Askin, yes. Council member Petty, yes. Council member Cassenna, yes. Council member Sonart, yes. Mayor Nstead, yes. Council member Daniel,

yes. Student Representative Bowling, yes. You have seven yes votes. Ordinance number 3503-2026 is enacted. Thank you, Clerk Zer. We're now on to resolutions. Resolution number 2026-10 authorizing the use of the equipment replacement fund for the purchase of a new trackless MT7 with snowblower attachment brought to us by administration. Pleasure of councel. I move to adopt resolution number 2026-10.

I'll second that and request unanimous consent. Thank you. Is from the general public who'd like to speak to resolution 2026-10. Seeing no one, we'll bring it back to council. Discussion. No discussion here. Mayor Nagstead.

Thank you. I'll I'll wave when I I don't count on that little yellow hand to work every time. But I have a question for the city manager on the delivery expectation on that piece of equipment if that would be something we might see this year or is it for next year? City manager Eubank. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Um Mayor Knack said I'm going to defer to Lee. He's been working with the vendor. Uh thank thank you. The expected lead time is about 6 months from once we get the contract approved. Just in time for summer.

Any further discussion? Unanimous consent was requested. Are there any objections? Resolution 2026-10 is enacted. Next, we have item E6, resolution number 2026-11, designating the investment and allocation plan for the city's permanent funds and establishing appropriate benchmarks to measure performance for calendar year 2026 brought to us by administration. Pleasure of councel, council member Sonart.

I move to adopt resolution number 2026-11. Second unanimous. Thank you. Is there anyone from the general public who'd like to speak to resolution 2026-11?

Seeing no one, we'll bring it back to council. Discussion. Seeing none, unanimous with consent was requested. Are there any objections? Not resolution 2026-11 is adopted. We have we have no unfinished business. Uh we're now at um action approval item H3, confirmation of mayoral nomination for a partial term appointment of Scott Bremer to the airport commission. Pleasure of councel. I move to approve this action, this confirmation by mayor.

I'll second that.

Thank you. Is there any um public members that need want to speak to this? Um discussion from council. Seeing no discussion, unanimous consent was requested. Are there any objections? Hearing none, the appointment of Scott Bremer to the airport commission is confirmed. Item H4, scheduling a work session with Alaska Permanent Capital Management to discuss potential amendments to Kenai Municipal Code investment options. City Manager Eubank, do you have a date in mind or a time frame?

Thank you, Vice Mayor. We've identified three potential dates. Um these are all preceding um scheduled council meetings. Um either March 18th or I don't have April's calendar in front of me. either meeting in April, first or second meeting, 1 or 15th. Thank you, Madam Clerk. Uh oh, wait, that's Sorry. Yep. 1st or 15th. Thank you, Madam Clerk. Um we're recommending March 18th. Um starting at 4:00. Um gives us that gives us a little bit of time before the scheduled council meeting, but it's the pleasure of council. Council member Petty.

Yes. Um I may have to check my calendar because I am scheduled to be out of town one of those weeks and I 18th of March would not be um April would work better for me.

Anyone else that isn't able to make the March? Council member Sonar, I will not be able to make March 18th. Usually when I'm out of town, I zoom in. Um, but at that exact time I will literally be driving through the pass on the way to the Anchorage airport. So there's never any connection to even call in at that point. So I am out on March 18th. How does April 1st look for everybody? You kidding? At 4. No, I'm not kidding. Are you fooling? At 4:00. Yes.

Well, it's either April Fool's Day or tax day. So yeah, April fools or tax, your choice. Does April Fools look good? I'm good with it. Okay, so April one at 4:00. Thank you. We now have commission reports. Um, Council on Aging did not meet. Our next meeting is February the 12th. Um, airport commission council member Sonart. There hasn't been a meeting since the last report. The next meeting for airport commission is Thursday, February 12th.

Thank you. Um, parks and recck commission council member Gy. We have not had another meeting. We are scheduled for tomorrow.

Thank you. Planning and zoning commission council member Cassenna. Well, uh, the planning and zoning commission, uh, unanimously approved the Beaver Loop Properties is not needed for public purposes. Uh, and then they also unanimously approved a transfer of a conditional use permit for a boarding house um, from the current owner to a an LLC that the current owner had formed. So, same people essentially. And the meeting on February 11th has been cancelled due to a lack of agenda items. So their next meeting is scheduled for February 28th, 7:00 p.m.

Thank you, Council Member Cassenna. We That brings us to beautifification. Council member Petty. Yes, there was not a meeting since our last time together and our next meeting will be on April the 14th. Thank you. Great. Thank you. Um, council or Mayor Negstead. Next is report of the mayor.

Uh, thank you, Vice Mayor, uh, Asen. First off, I want to thank Vice Mayor Askin for doing a very good job on the meeting tonight while I'm not there. Um, much appreciated. Um, uh, I wanted to revisit an idea uh, from the joint work session we had with the Kitesh tribe on January 28th. And uh one of their requests was u in that they have nine nine units, nine forplexes that they're planning on building for elder housing in our city and they were looking for some relief on on permit cost. They said the total permit for the all nine buildings uh was $75,000. My understanding is all nine units are are identical. I believe that to be true and uh but uh there's different parts of the the plan review and uh that uh it might make sense to to reduce and what I would like for council to consider is a reduction perhaps in the plan review if all the buildings are exactly the same. If they're the same, it would be one plan review to my understanding for for all all nine of them. Um there uh there's also building permits and whatnot which involves uh going out and inspecting and all of that and um that might be something else we want to discuss as well, but um it would seem like the the plan review um might be something we might want to consider and I think administration's looking for some direction from us on that. I just didn't want to let that go by the wayside and uh and perhaps that's something council members might want to discuss amongst themselves if they want to go forward and I would certainly check with the with the building official and whatnot to make sure that that makes sense. Um, the next item I

have is the city manager and I uh met um on the 29th of January with the burough mayor and peninsula city managers and uh and mayors and some vice mayors as well. And there was a a number of of topics which included school funding, taxes, housing, LNG and those sorts of things. The item that uh we spent most of the time discussing had to do with the was with with the closing of the school pools. That's a school board function what they're doing and not necessarily with the uh under the purview of the the the burough mayor. However, u what I what we kind of found out was most of the cities would like to keep their pools, but that we just don't have the the dollars, the information uh necessary to make those decisions. It hasn't been forthcoming. It may not be available exactly, but uh Mir Pekki is going to be uh trying to get some more of those uh ideas of what the costs are ongoing and whatnot and uh and provide that back to the cities. So, that might be something we could be looking forward to. Um, and then the last thing I had was on January 30th, uh, Vice Mayor Asin and I, we attended the senior center volunteer appreciation, uh, dinner at the senior center and, uh, it was well attended and we, we passed out, uh, appreciation, um, certificates and whatnot and had a very good time and and like to thank Kayla and Kathy for all the work they do down there and get everybody else at the senior center that that makes that work so well. So that is all I have. Thank you.

Thank you, Mayor Nagstead. Um we'll move on to administrative reports. Uh city manager Eubank. Thank you, Vice Mayor, members of council. Um I have a little video I wanted to show tonight. I don't know if council recalls, but we uh council redirected funding um for the purchase of some power loaders for the fire department for ambulances. And I thought you really would appreciate seeing um how those work and what the benefits are for for the um not only um our crews over there, but patients as well. So, thank you, Madam Clerk.

Yeah, I thought I thought that was really appropriate to see. And um you know, I'm super excited because I think it allows, you know, firefighters of different stature to be able to do this. I can't imagine being part of even a group of two or three trying to load a patient or load 400 lb uh in a situation like that on icy or uneven surfaces. So, um I I think they're long overdue and really appreciate them taking the time to put that together for us. Uh on the staffing and recruitment front, um excited to welcome Seth uh Balentine and Bradley Deacon. These are two utility operators. both have accepted positions with the city. Um, tenatively they're probably going to be starting around March. Both of them are moving up from the lower 48 and dealing with the logistics right now of a move. Um, remind council our city of city's new building officials starts tomorrow. We're looking forward to her coming on board and uh getting her oriented and um working here. Um, we're also happy to welcome Sarah Heron um back as a police officer with the city and um she's returning to work likely next week. Um we currently have active recruitments ongoing for the airport manager and fire and a firefighter position. Uh wanted to give a little update on the bridge access pedestrian pathway. Um and also that is going to be the state's trying to coordinate that with the bridge access asphalt preservation project. Um the pedestrian pathway project fully designed. It's actually ready to go to bid. Um the state's holding back. They'd like to bid the two projects together. Uh they they have concerns about the potential of having two contractors working in the same area at the same time and the conflicts that

could could exist. So, they want to bid them as a single project. Um, they're trying to put the finishing touches on the the bridge access asphalt preservation, hoping to bid that project, those projects together in May of this year. Um, in all likelihood, uh, majority of work, and you could see surveying and things like that take place summer 26, but likely, uh, spring of 27 is when you're going to see construction out there. Um and uh we had um public works director and myself had a meeting with um the design team on that to talk about um you know uh as they develop the construction plan the impacts of the traffic on we wanted to make them fully aware they were talking about potentially a complete closure of Warames bridge. Uh we really spoke strongly in discouraging that. Um, you know, obviously we highlighted during the summer, especially during PU fishery, um, you know, construction during that 3-week period would be very problematic. So, um, you know, it I appreciate them reaching out and having those conversations with us and, um, hopefully they they heed them. You know, we we wanted to most importantly, I think, impart upon them that, you know, what they consider a detour is like 15 to 20 miles. It's this isn't go down the road, two roads and take a right. This is drive all the way through Satana, you know, all the way to the Y, come back through the other side of Satana, all the way down Spur Highway just to get around the single detour here. So, um, pretty significant impact for travelers around here. So, hopefully, like I said, they're going to take that and heed that. And, um, but that that's the current schedule that they have. Um, we got word this week, um, Kai Peninsula Housing Initiative had a grant

application in, um, to construct 20, uh, new units of senior and low-income housing on lot seven of their development. Um, that grant was not approved during this funding cycle. Evidently, the the total grant awards amount, they didn't have sufficient fundings to approve that um, that amount. They do plan to reapply. They were awarded um funds to construct one additional forplex uh of low-income housing on lot three of of their development over there. And uh we're still waiting on um notification of award hopefully for the uh community development block grant that we partnered with KPHI on to extend water and sewer and um construct a portion of Sixth Street, the newly platted Sixth Street. Um we're thinking that awards will come out sometime here in February. So we'll keep you posted on that. Um the mayor mentioned um when we're talking about pools, give you a little bit of update on work we've been doing on um KPBSD pool closure. Um uh the district did provide information to the school board. I believe I don't know if it was our LA I don't think it was our last meeting cuz I think that was down south. But um at a recent meeting here within the last month um that talked about you know their recommendations and path forwards and they outlined some of the costs involved. Um though they sent us city administrators a copy of that. Um I asked if they plan to schedule any additional meetings with city managers to discuss it. They said they had nothing planned. Um and then as the mayor said, uh the mayor and I met with um Mayor Machiki, some of his staff and other city managers and mayors from

around the burrow. And um you know, uh Mayor Machiki is is going to be um trying to gather some more information and see if there's a way the the bureau could participate in the process as well. So, um uh I guess there's more to come on that. It's taken quite a while to get information and um but um we'll keep working on that. Uh some public safety recognitions. In January, fire, police, and dispatch staff responded to multiple serious structure fires under extremely challenging conditions, including severe winter weather and and active um safety threats. Their coordination, rapid response and life-saving efforts, limited property damage and prevented loss, future loss of life. Their professionalism, teamwork, and dedication to the public safety are greatly appreciated and dur deserving recognition. There were numerous lifesaver awards issued by the department during that period of time. So, um think pretty challenging month. I just want to uh recognize our efforts. Um, we talked council uh appropriate funds this evening here for the uh water and sewer um utility pump house project. Uh, I did want to just call a little bit of attention. Um, the city is transitioning its bid um RFP and bid process to um an online solution called bid express. Um this is the same um platform that's used by the burough city of Saladan I believe also uses it and um I think it's going to increase our exposure and access to potential vendors. Um I know we've already got some bids out there and we've seen um you know more activity and picking up sets of plans than we have um been seeing lately. So I think that's a positive step. So um then I did get a

letter from Cape just here um in the last day or so um requesting uh the city to become a strategic asset part partner um and which could involve the city's fire training andor challenger learning center um uh this is about bringing workforce development potentially to the western side of the peninsula here um and a collaborative effort um that Cape Head's been kind of spearheading I do expect Cassidy to be at the 218 meeting and we'll probably have something before council either um a resolution of support or an action approval. U I'm not sure the exact form yet. We have to talk about that internally. But um uh I think that uh is an exciting thing. Uh last thing I have for you is tomorrow um I'm hosting a lunch with the chamber board to go over the results of the community survey and in particular to highlight um the community's interest in uh economic uh development and job growth as well as um the the uh support in there for um the city supporting local businesses. and just look to those to to the business leaders on ways they think the city could engage and suggestions they might have how we could accomplish those um those goals of of the community. So looking forward to that and having a healthy discussion there. And with that I'm happy to answer any questions.

Council member Petty. Yes. Um city manager. um the process that's going over on bridge access, is that just from Beaver Loop up to the highway or is that from uh the Spur Highway all the way over to K Beach? I didn't quite understand the location because I know that we've already allocated assets from Beaver Loop up to the Spur. If you could help me understand, please.

City Manager, Eubank. Thank you, Vice Mayor, Council Member Petty. Yeah, that's a great question. Sorry to make that clear. So, the the bridge access pedestrian pathway project constructs uh a pedestrian pathway from Kenai Spur Highway to Beaver Loop and it joins it with the bike path on Beaver Loop. Um the um bridge access asphalt preservation project is to uh basically repave um bridge access road from Kenisburg Highway to um K beach. It also does um some major work on Warames bridge and um so but it's to do redo the entire paving of the roadway itself. There is at this point there's no um there's no project to put the bike path across u the rest of the way unfortunately.

Any other questions for city manager? We'll go on to our city attorney, Mr. Bloom. Thank you, Vice Mayor Askin. I don't have any um comments, but I'm happy to answer any questions tonight. Any questions? Okay, that takes us to the city clerk.

Thank you, Vice Mayor Asen. Just rolling forward with our special election on April 14th. We are have ballot layouts done. We're recruiting election officials and we also when people apply for an absentee ballot, they have a box they can check to receive a application every year. We mailed those out right after the last meeting when the election was scheduled and surprisingly we're getting a lot of applications back already. So, we have um calls coming in about how to vote if they're going to be traveling so people know it's on the books and I'm hoping that we have a pretty good voter turnout for this and I'm available for questions.

That's great. Thanks. Any questions for our city clerk? Okay, we'll move on to additional public comments. Are there any members from the public who'd like to address the council at this time?

Okay, then we'll go to council comments. Um, student representative Bowling, you're up. Good evening, Vice Mayor Askin and council members. Um, we'd like to thank Vice Mayor Asin for visiting our leadership class. They asked me to let you know that they all love you. Um, at KCHS, winter activities are in full swing. We have strong participation and community turnout at our athletic events. We look forward to seeing our basketball teams attending state in March. KPBS students look forward to our upcoming job shadow event, and we'd like to thank you for your collaboration on that as well. Thank you, and have a good night. Thank you. Um, Council Member Cassenna.

Well, I don't have too much. Uh, I just wanted to congratulate the chamber again for all their accomplishments in 2025. Uh, to Scott Bremer on his appointment to the airport commission. Uh, an obvious big special shout out to our fire and life safety folks for their efforts um in the last month. Um and then uh congratulations to the three new employees uh on their new pos positions, but also appreciate them taking the leap of faith from all of them moving up here uh at this time. So that's great. And uh yeah, just a general appreciation for the city's efforts and your efforts, Terry, to work with local businesses on uh how to make this city more supportive for them. So, uh, yeah, appreciate that.

Thank you, Council Member Cassenna. Council member Petty.

Yes. Thank you, Vice Vice Mayor Asen. Um, I would like to say thank you to City Mayor uh, Eubank for bringing that very informative video for our new stretcher opportunity. Um, not only is it greatly enhance our safety of our fire department, but it'll be uh greatly enhancing the safety of our public that will be utilizing that. So, I think it is a wise um use of resources that uh not only will the fire department um be benefited from it, but every potential individual who might be on that device, it will give them greater safety. So, I want to say thank you for sharing that with the decision that we made to move forward. So, I have no other comments. Thank you and good night.

Thank you, Council Member Daniel. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Uh, a couple quick comments here. First off, uh, thank you to the chamber and all their efforts. I heard your challenge, Sam, and I hope this body will rise to the occasion to get a few volunteers uh, out of it. Also, I really appreciate um team manager Eubank sharing that video with us. It's really great to see um some what happened with some of those resources. Like we know, okay, we approved it. It's moving on, but it's really neat to see that in action, see how much of a posit that's had for everybody. So, thank you for taking the time for sharing that with us. We I really appreciate it at least. Um and now I'll keep it at that.

Thank you, Council Member Daniel. Council member Sonart. Well, pretty much I want to say ditto to council member Sabala here and ditto to coun council member Daniel and ditto to council member Petty. And the only thing I have to add is thank you to the our public's works department um Lee Fry who's here tonight. Uh when we had all that snow come down um you guys were awesome clearing it and then as the snow settled and we got rain and the temperatures warmed up and we had to deal with ice. To me, that's even worse than having to deal with the snow. But you guys got out there and you scraped the ice and our roads are good and I appreciate it. So, thank you.

Um, Council Member Greeny. Um I attended the Kite Council annual joint work session um a couple weeks ago and it was very it was a valuable opportunity to foster some cooperative relationships and identify some new opportunities for us to work together um to the benefit of our shared community. So I was grateful for that opportunity. Um I really appreciate the creative thank you from KFD. Um I I appreciate their the effort that went into making sure they they let us know. Um and I I actually would encourage them to share that with the community on social media if that's something that they can do. I think that would be um one I think it's going to bridge that gap for between our community and our first responders. And I think it's it's a real tangible visible example of the things that that our city is continuing to to do and to do better for our residents. Um, and I am consistently grateful for the number of city staff that attend meetings and work sessions. I know you guys have already been at work all day and then you're you're here either in person or in Zoom. Um, and you're here to answer all of our questions and help us continue to move through these processes expeditiously and the insight and information you guys always just know off the tops of your heads. Um, so I'm I'm grateful for your subject matter expertise and your willingness to be here after you've already been at work all day. So, thank you for that.

Thank you, Council Member Grammy. Um, I am not going to repeat everything everybody said, but I wholeheartedly agree. Um, I attended the senior center appreciation and I think they said there was like 4600 volunteer hours just at the senior center. It's pretty amazing what they do there. Um I enjoyed the leadership class immensely. They got to hear from the the um baby boomer this time. So they that was different. Um and I too enjoyed the um work session with the kites and again congratulations to the fire and police department. We're already number one and it's so nice to see us continue to excel. Um we are going to now go into executive session. Would anyone like a 5m minute break before we do?

Yes. Okay. Excuse yourself. Okay. Is there a mo I'm going to go into executive session first? Need to make a motion to go into

Okay. Is there a motion to enter into executive session? I move to enter into executive session to discuss a new gas storage facility within the city of Kenai pursuant to AS 4462310 C1, a matter which immediate knowledge would clearly have an adverse effect upon the finances of the city and AS 4462310C3, a matter which by law, municipal charter or ordinance is required to be confidential. The executive session will include Mayor Knackstead, city council members, manager Eubank, and attorney Bloom.

I'll second. Council or sorry, Mr. Eubank. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I would with the pleasure council, I'd ask, could we amend the motion to include our planner, Kevin Bner, as well? He's He's online. Is Is he still Is he going to be able to participate, Shelly? He might. He just He may. We just had an attempted Zoom bombing that they got through several of our walls that he shut down from that. So, it's going to take some extra steps to secure our I can call him on my cell phone, too. And we'll have to call both him and the mayor if we're going to disable the Zoom. Okay.

If the pleasure council, if you could amend that, I'd appreciate it. Of course. Um I so moved. Can I say that or do I have to be more specific? Okay. To include planning director Kevin to include the planning director. Is there a second? I'll second that one too. Thank you. There are there are there Yes. Okay. Okay. I um I have to declare a conflict because I'm an employee of one of the parties that you'll be discussing.

As chair prom, I rule that a conflict does exist and vice mayor Asen will abstain from participation in the executive session. We will now have a 5m minute break. Don't let him out of it.