City Council - Regular Meeting

Hey, everybody. We've got a couple minutes, but I'm going to go ahead and start the meeting recording so our online participants can join.

Recording in progress.

that went away the first of the year. Janille has been, you know, she's using my community magnets, but I haven't seen any. So I sent you an email. I'd like to catch up. Some of them have changed over the years. Some of those have changed over the years. Thank you.

Thank you. Madam Chair, we're at 515.

We're ready to start whenever you're ready.

All right. Welcome, everyone. This is the Sandy City Council meeting for Tuesday, May 26, 2026. We have on tonight's agenda three information items and three public hearing items. We will be taking public comment on the public hearing items, and then we will have general citizen comment at or as close to 6 PM as we can possibly fit it into this agenda.

All right.

We start our meetings with a prayer and a pledge. Shane Pace, would you please give us the prayer tonight?

Our dear Father in heaven we're grateful for the opportunity to gather as a community. We're thankful for Sandy and for the beautiful realities that we enjoy here. Father we're grateful for these elected officials for their willingness to serve the community. We pray for them as they deliberate and as they go through the process of helping this city through this time period we pray that they will be inspired by the to do what is right for our community. We're thankful for our residents for their efforts to keep this community a wonderful community and we pray for them for their health for their vitality for their careers and we say this in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

Thank you. Will everyone please rise and we will repeat the pledge.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

All right. And introductions. Dustin will you kick us off.

Of course. Thank you Madam Chair. My name is Dustin Fratto from the city council office. There are a couple other council staff members in the back of the room. Justin Sorensen and the last time I get to say this Liz Theriault.

I'm Tracy. I'm counsel for the council.

Chris Edwards with the council office. Chris Nickel District 3. Brooke Christianson, District 1.

Cindy Sharkey, at large.

Allison Stroud, District 2. Brooke D'Souza, at large.

OK. I'll go ahead and introduce myself first. I'm Shane Pace, city administrator.

Lynn Pace, city attorney.

We do have two additional. Oh, Marcy, you are on. I was just going to introduce you. There you are. Go ahead.

Yeah, sorry. I'm driving. Marcy Hausman, District 4. Happy to be here tonight. Thank you, everyone.

Thank you for joining us by phone. And we will look for you to arrive and take your place on the dais at some point. And we know Council Member DeKaiser is having car troubles. We're expecting him to join us any minute as well. We go ahead and start into our agenda. Item number one is an information item from Metro Water. And Annalee Muncy, are we starting with you? Are you taking this one up?

I didn't get the training, but is it this controller? OK. Thank you, Sandy City Council members. My name is Anna Lee Muncy. I'm the general manager at Metropolitan Water District of Salt Lake and Sandy. I've been in this position for three years, but 19 years at Metro Water, so some of you I'm familiar with from your previous service. I wanted to introduce who's with me today. I have Tom Godfrey. He's the chair of Metro's board. He's also... President of the Provo River Water Users Association and he also serves on Salt Lake City's Public Utilities Advisory Committee Then we have our two Sandy City trustees with John Kirkham He's vice chair of Metro board he also serves on as a director for the Provo River Water Users Association and is I believe chair of the Sandy City Public Utilities Advisory Board and then we have Florence Reynolds our Not over a year ago pointed to metros board and she is a newly appointed director at the Provo River Water Users Association and also serves as a board member of Sandy City's public utility advisory board I also want to thank Tom Ward for being here Obviously, he's your public utilities director and I appreciate his support and I I want you to know we have a good relationship with Sandy City and we coordinate with both of our member cities regularly and we have monthly meetings with them. So today, I thank you for your time. I'm going to share with this council our fiscal year 2026-2027 budget. I'll provide an overview of Metro Water, as mentioned, our tentative budget to this council, and I'll summarize our sources of funds as well as our uses of funds. So the Metropolitan Water District was established in 1935, so we recently reached our 90th anniversary. The purpose of the water district is to provide long-term drinking water supplies to the Salt Lake Valley. Sandy City annexed into the district in 1990, thus changing our name to the Metropolitan Water District of Salt Lake and Sandy. And I think we're the only metro district in the state that represents two member cities. So our board members are appointed by both councils. This council appoints two of our trustees. The trustees serve four year terms that can be renewed. And I just want to comment that our trustees provide a wealth of knowledge and expertise to Metro, to myself and to our staff. And I'm incredibly grateful for their service on our board. So Metro's water supply is diverse, which supports a reliable water supply for Sandy City. The bulk of our water is supplied through the Provo River Project. This water is stored in Deer Creek Reservoir. The dam and reservoir were built as part of the Provo River Project in the 1940s. Metro's supply also includes Little Cottonwood Creek water. The 20,000 acre feet is a combination of Salt Lake City and Sandy City water rights that we treat at our plant on behalf of the cities. Our third largest source of water is through the Central Utah Project. This water is stored in Jordan Nail Reservoir. And a metro is a petitioner of 20,000 acre feet on an annual basis. Our other water sources include the Central Utah Project Utah Lake System, which is water from Jordana Reservoir. We also receive water from Ontario Drain Tunnel, which is the Sandy City Preferential Right, as well as Bell Canyon Water. So in a combined total of 108,700 acre feet, again that's in a full great snowpack year. In a poor snow year like we've experienced, our water supply is notably less. So when I think in my simple mind about water infrastructure, you have to have a place to treat the water, a way to convey the water, and a way to store the water. So Metro's first key water treatment plant is the Little Cottonwood Water Treatment Plant. I know many of you have had an opportunity to visit it. This was originally constructed and commissioned in 1960. And it is the second largest water treatment plant in the Salt Lake Valley. Metro also owns the Point of the Mountain Water Treatment Plant, which is located in Draper. It was commissioned in 2007 as part of the Metro Water Project. And this plant helps meet peak flow demands and also provides redundancy for the Little Conwood Water Treatment Plant. And there were also two sevens owners of the Jordan Valley Water Treatment Plant, which is located in Bluffdale. They are currently undergoing a capacity project to increase it from 180 to 250 million gallons a day. And we're two sevens of this facility, so we share in its capital and O&M costs. And when you think of the pipelines that convey the water, the construction of the Salt Lake Aqueduct was completed in 1951. So this aqueduct is 70 plus years old. It has a design life of 50 years. It's doing well because the ground hasn't moved, but we are monitoring that and monitoring this conditional assessment of it as well. This water delivers water from Deer Creek down in Provo Canyon and terminates at the terminal reservoir, which is located in Mill Creek. So it's a 42-mile pipeline. We have our Point of the Mountain Aqueduct. It was commissioned in 2007, as mentioned. It was part of the Metro Water Project. And there is a 12-mile finished water portion that connects the Point of the Mountain Water Treatment Plant with our little cottonwood. And then the Jordan Aqueduct system also has a pipeline called the Jordan Aqueduct. It starts midway up Provo Canyon, and it delivers water to the northwest quadrant of Salt Lake Valley for Metro. And then we have two storage reservoirs. We have terminal reservoir. It's a 48 million gallon storage reservoir. Originally it was constructed in 1951, but we did rebuild it in 2017 to address the seismic concerns. And this reservoir provides reliable water storage for municipal and fire use. And then we're also two-sevenths owners of the Jordan Aqueduct Terminal Reservoir, which is located off of Bangor Highway, about 5,500 south. It's a 100 million gallon reservoir. So for our sources of funds, we traditionally have four main sources, but this year we have a fifth, which is bonding. So in our fiscal year 27 budget, 23% of the revenue is coming from water sales from our two member cities. We have a property tax of almost 21%. Then we have assessments, and those are for capital projects that expand capacity, such as the Metro Water Project when we built a new pipeline and a new plant. Those are 10% of our revenue. We have some miscellaneous revenue in this portion of the budget. A majority of that is Salt Lake City's reimbursement to Metro for construction of a cottonwoods conduit that we built in Fort Ewing Boulevard for Salt Lake City. And then we are planning on bonding this year, and that's a little over 36% of our revenue. So for water rates, we are proposing a 6% increase to the water rate to both member cities. It's applied equally for Sandy City. That would be a net increase of over $430,000. And our goal is we project a three. three-year forward rate increases for the for our member cities they can know what to anticipate what's coming up included this slide to show the history of water rate increases I just went back 15 years of course Sandy's been with us longer than that I do want to note that in from 2015 to 2017 There were higher water increases due to the terminal reservoir replacement project. So when we have these big capital projects and we're spending more money to pay for those, that was a year that those rate increases. You can see they went down, they've held steady, and they're starting to climb again due to, again, we have some capital projects that we're funding and will be funding for several years. So the fiscal year 27 budget does not include any increase to our certified tax rate. So based on the 2025 tax year, a little more than $4.8 million from tax revenue from Sandy City and then a little over $17 million from Salt Lake City. Sandy City's current certified tax rate is 000337. So what I tried to illustrate here is a 10-year look back for property tax for Sandy City. So you'll note that in fiscal year 25 or the 2024 tax year is the year that we proposed an increase to our certified tax rate to 00035. And so that notes in the red font that increase from 2.7 million in property taxes to the 4.8. And as I mentioned, we're not increasing it. not proposing an increase to the certified tax rate in this year, but we do see a need in fiscal year 28 to increase that certified tax rate to pay for capital costs related to aging, infrastructure repair, and replacement. So we have currently in our fiscal year 26, we thought we were going to bond this year. We did not have a need for it that the projects weren't progressing as fast as expected. So we are anticipating completing bonding and fiscal year 27. That bonding will be for completion of the cottonwoods connection project, which is the pipeline that connects the two canyons. We also have the little cottonwood conduct replacement and intake modifications project. This is a project that will ensure the delivery of Little Cottonwood Creek water into our plant. And then we have design for the Little Cottonwood refilled. This is a picture of how it used to look at one time around our plant. So our total budget expenditures are $115 million. The O&M budget totals a little over $48 million. That includes our routine O&Ms, such as our salary and wages, employee benefits, all of our costs associated with the Provo River Water Users Association, any interest expenses, our essential Utah project fees, general insurance, contract services, utilities, chemicals, and non-routine O&M. It does exclude Salt Lake City's portion of the Cottonwoods Connection project. The fiscal year 27 budget, part of that includes our capital improvement project, which is nearly $46 million for routine non-capacity improvement projects. A significant portion, as I mentioned, is for completion of the Cotlitz Connection project. These projects represent replacement or repair of key infrastructure, and capital improvement projects from other agencies totals $7.6 million. to get a combined total of a little over 53 million. So Metro Water has water infrastructure that has reached its design life. A hazard mitigation study identified the Salt Lake Aqueduct, the Raw Water Little Contwood Conduit, and the Little Contwood Water Treatment Plant as facilities that need to be repaired, replaced, or rebuilt. All these projects will provide seismic resiliency, thus ensuring the reliable delivery of clean drinking water to the residents in the Salt Lake Valley. As mentioned earlier, the Solid Aqueduct was placed in service in 1950 and still continues to deliver water for us. The Raw Water Little Cottonwood Conduit is even older. It was placed in service in 1931. And then our Little Cottonwood Water Treatment Plant, which was placed in service in 1960. So Metro does have costs from other agencies. The Central Utah Conservancy District is responsible for all Central Utah project facilities. They do have escalating costs for their operations, maintenance, repair, and replacement budget. And our total annual fee for them is a little over $5.7 million. For Jordan Valley, again, Their actual, their O&Ms have decreased slightly, but they have an increase in capital related to the expansion and the repairs that they're making to their water treatment plant. So Metro's cost is $3.8 million, which is about a 32% increase in capital. And then Provo River Water Users Association, Metro is the majority shareholder in the association. So all their costs, we're paying a majority of those. This is a picture of the Deer Creek Intake Project, a key project in ensuring the liable function of the dam and delivery of water really to the whole Salt Lake Valley. Our total annual costs in fiscal year 27 are 5 million. And this year, when I did this presentation, we had an initial allotment of 50%. actually improved to 69%. And that's my last slide. I think I'm supposed to say questions. But I'm thankful for this opportunity to share our budget, and I want to thank each of you for your service to Sandy City, and I'm happy to answer any questions you have about the budget.

I have a couple questions for you. First off looks like you've got some well quite a few capital projects teed up. A couple of them you've got a rebuild a project design rebuild cost for the little cottonwood water treatment plant. You've got some administrative campus improvements. Have we got a deal for you? We just bought a building over here, and we've got space for you. If you guys want to join us, come down and join us. It'll be so much fun. We've got space. Bring your administrative staff down. We'll make you a heck of a deal. Instead of building, you can lease from us. Think about it. Think about it. So you're proposing a water rate increase of 6%. which will yield $1.5 million in new revenue. So I'm looking on slide 12. But it looks like you've done a really good job in your budget this year, because you've got a decrease over last year's expenses of $2.6 million. So you decreased more on your budget than the value of your increase. Did you really need to impose a 6% increase this year?

so the two first the decrease was mainly attributed that we did not issue the bonds that we were expecting to issue in this current year and so a lot of that is related to issuance of bonds and those interest payments so it it looks we didn't spend it but we are going to be spending we're since we are issuing bonds in fiscal year 27. so that's kind of the difference is we had it budgeted but we didn't issue the bonds and the associated costs

So if you moved it from last year to this year, would that have increased the costs this year instead of decrease?

The bond payments don't happen until January of the following year. So they don't show up in the fiscal year 27 budget.

OK. No more questions? And I don't see hands up from council members who have joined us online. So thank you. Appreciate that. Thank you, council. All right, item number two on our agenda is Utah Retirement System Tier 2 Public Safety Rate Pickup. And that, I think, is Katrina.

KATRINA WALSH- Hi, good evening. Are we able to pull up the resolution? Thank you.

Give us just a minute Katrina.

No problem. I'll go ahead and start. So I'm here to talk to you about one of the resolutions that's being included in the budget for 27, and that is the Tier 2 pickup. I touched very briefly on this in my last presentation, so if you don't remember it, that's okay. But basically, each time URS increases the employee contribution, the city gets an opportunity to decide if we want to pick that up for police and fire employees. Am I talking into the mic? OK, sorry. It felt like it went out. And so if we choose to do that, the Utah Retirement System requests a resolution documenting that we have done that. So what we're proposing as part of the budget is that we do pick up that increase for police and fire. Currently, the rate that the employees are required to pay for police and fire that we have picked up already is 4.73%. That rate is going up to 5.98%. Now, that's one and a quarter. However, it's not really that much because we already put more than 4.73% into retirement for these employees. So right now we put 5% into retirement for FHIR employees, and that 4.73 comes out of that 5% for those employees in the hybrid plan, and they get the difference. So for FHIR, what we're basically requesting is to increase their contribution from the 5% to the 5.98%. For police, we already put 5.58% into retirement. So that 4.73% comes out of that 5.58% for those employees in the hybrid plan. So really, we're only going up 0.4% for them. So from 5.58% to 5.98%. Overall, our URS rates, we are going down. So we're actually saving money because tier one rates are decreasing, but tier two rates are going up. And so that's what this resolution is proposing is that we pick up that difference. So any questions? Ms. Nichol.

Thanks, Katrina. I don't remember this. So if you answered this question already, do you know the dollar amount this reflects in the budget?

Yes. So between police and fire, it's about $70,000. But overall, the savings was $135,000. So that's why we're saving money.

OK. And that's just one-time savings? But ongoing, it will be about $135,000?

So every year they change the rates, but that's what the rates would be for fiscal year 27. So the change between fiscal year 26 and 27 is where the savings is coming from.

They change it every year? Is this substantial?

No. And when I say every year, they put out a new rate sheet every year. Some rates don't change. So far, police and fire tier two, this is the fourth time they've changed. And that is tied, of course, to salaries going up faster than memberships going up. But tier one rates have been going down the last few years. So it just depends on how well each system is funded.

Thank you.

Ms. Housman, go ahead.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you for this, Katrina. I just want to make sure I'm understanding correctly. This is additive. So we've, in addition to the compensation plan we've been discussing and that additional market increase for our sworn officers, this is an additive compensation element for those who are at the tier two level, right?

Yep, you are correct.

OK, so on top of. And then you mentioned the amount. But because this would be ongoing, well, I don't want to make that assumption. Is this going to be ongoing or a decision we would make every year?

So once we adopt a particular rate, we are committed to that. So we adopted the 4.73 two years ago. So we are committed, at least on an ongoing basis, to the 4.73. If we adopt the 5.98% this year, we are committed to that on an ongoing basis.

Okay. So the amount you indicated that would impact the budget this year, that will be a year-over-year fiscal impact. Is there anything else we need to be prepared for in terms of an annual fiscal impact of this?

No, not that I'm aware of. I mean, the number of Tier 2 employees is increasing while the number of Tier 1 employees is decreasing. That's why the Tier 1 rates are able to go down and the Tier 2 rates are going up. Tier 2 should stabilize at some point, but you are right. It is an ongoing cost.

Okay. I think those are the two questions I had. Thank you. Ms. Stroud?

Thank you, Madam Chair. What percentage right now do we have Tier 1 versus Tier 2?

Good question. 63% of our employees are Tier 2. And what have we seen? I mean, 2011? July 2011, yeah.

Thank you.

63% of all employees or public safety employees? 63% of benefited employees are tier two. Do you want the public safety? Do you know the public safety one? Yes. So actually, I didn't break it out that way. I will get that to you. That's fine.

Any more questions, council? All right. This is an information item tonight, and we'll have it up for a vote on another night. Thank you very much. Thank you. All right. Third item is Ms. Stroud.

Thank you, Madam Chair. So this is the first reading. And I've reached out to you guys. Hopefully you've had a chance to review the memo. This is primarily something that I wanted to look at to get into the budget. We just weren't able to get it this year. And just more for informational purposes, for me, I always find it beneficial to see what the impact of our dollar and what is happening every year. Six of the seven of us, I think, have all gone through a property tax, truth in taxation, and something that has always come up is, and I hear this every year, Um, you know, well, where's the city able to, to tighten their belt? Um, where are you able to, um, you know, find areas that, you know, maybe, you know, are redundant, um, you know, looking at the way that we are spending our money. And this I think is something that can help for residents to understand that even we have an inflationary cost is that each year the city does look and says, okay, even though, um, The price of tires didn't go down. The price of fuel didn't go down. Employee compensation is not going down. But what are we doing? Because inflationary rate is this, whatever that number might be, yet we are able to do our best to try to compensate for that and look out for the resident dollar. So I'd like to have this proposal here as just trying to include this in an annual budget so that when we have that, you can have the current council and then councils future councils to be able to look back and see a snapshot in time what the inflationary rate was five years ago, 10 years ago, 25 years ago, and just have a better understanding of how the city was able to adjust. So it's just something that would be included in the budget as it's presented so that councils have that information, so that residents have that information, and they'll have it for years to come.

Any questions? Council member questions? Ms. D'Souza?

Thank you. Okay, so I guess my question is, is this just informational and people are using it how they want to, or is this also for the council to use in decision making? And if so, I don't know that I'm personally making a connection with how that might be helpful outside of all of the other information. So I'm wondering if you can maybe give me an example of how you see this beneficial to your decision making.

I think the more information that I have, the better decisions I can make and the more informed decisions. And I think understanding what the inflationary rate and how our buying power is decreasing year over year, it helps me to understand. It helps me understand the need when we hear that we are cutting back in certain areas, why that is necessary because, you know, $10 this year isn't buying as much as it did last year, isn't buying as much as it did the year before. And so to have that and to really understand where we're spending our money and how it is decreasing year over year is helpful for me. in making future decisions and in understanding the budget overall. Mr. Kelly does an outstanding job with presenting the budget. And it's something that I've just looked at and thought, I'm surprised that this actually isn't in here so that we can better understand. Once it's just adding a piece of information, you know, what does that look like? I'd be curious, you know in you know, 25 years ago You know, what was the inflationary rate 25 years ago? And how did a council adjust? You know, was it was it a property tax increase? We did see property tax decreases You know, how did they adjust if they didn't do an increase or decrease? How did they adjust in in the expenses? I?

Is this something that's easy to come up with and create, or the entirety of what you're asking? And I ask that because I'm curious. I understand that it's another piece of information, but another piece of information, I'm having a myself a disconnect with understanding how that might be helpful to me in making a decision or to inform the public as to why we made a decision. And so I'm wondering if it's possible to even get like a three-year look back on, hey, if this were in place over the last three years, this is what it would have looked like, just to give me some more context, because I'm I get what you're asking for, I think, but it just seems like I'm having a disconnect with it not being just a number, but how it's going to be used. What would it tell you in terms of your decision making with a budget?

And I think a lot of it is providing information. And I think it's providing information to residents as well. But for what purpose? To let residents know that the city is cognizant of and aware of of their tax dollars and how we're spending it, and telling residents of saying, hey, we know that times can be tough, that times are hard. You've asked us to tighten the belt, and we have, because this is the amount of money that we have. it's things are still costing more money yet we are tightening in these other areas to make sure that we keep that tax rate where we have had it okay is it so it are you able to like maybe provide just like a three-year look back just so that I can see what I can look for that for you okay

I'm assuming that it's not overly cumbersome to create or to get because it sounds like it's mostly just a standard index number, right?

Yes, we had asked finance to kind of look at something into you know, decide, you know, is there a certain, would it be a, you know, where would you come up with this number? And they've provided that input to us, you know, of this would be kind of the best area. You know, there's a lot of different, you know, inflationary rates that you could look at. But that's, you know, you know, You know, I can definitely get the three-year. You know, it could be that every year we see departments noting inflationary increases. You know, the line items when presenting their budgets. This would help you to understand whether those increases actually align with inflation.

Okay. And then I guess understanding the consumer price index for all urban consumers, just to why – Why is that one the best index to consider? That would be helpful to know. That was a suggestion that came from finance. Do you know why that was the suggested?

Of the one that they felt that it was most applicable to Sandy of where we were. OK. It was just it was most applicable to us and the most steady to it.

OK. All right. That's all I had. Thanks. Ms. Hausman.

Yes. Thank you, Madam Chair. Are you able to hear me? Yes. OK, just checking. Sometimes self-service is spotty. So I think I'm going to just dovetail a bit with the question that Councilwoman D'Souza just asked. It was a question I had for later, but I want to go ahead and ask it now. I hear what you said about the CPI, why that index was recommended, but it I guess I need to more fully understand that. I was thinking that we would consider municipal costs, not household costs. And I thought there was a municipal cost index that would... Again, my limited understanding, but it seems like that would be a more appropriate index, but it sounds like finance department recommended something different. And I'm just, I know that was just asked and answered when I had the same question and I wanted to specifically understand why we're not using the municipal cost index.

And once that was financed, there were a few of them that we had suggested. And that was the one that they came up with. They felt that it was the most applicable for Sandy. Mr. Kelly, is there anything that? I deferred a lot of which one that he felt would be the best. Is that Madam Chair? Yeah, that's fine.

Yeah, we don't have a strong preference. We just felt like the CPI is the most widely quoted and used and seems like understood by most people and just the general public. The Fed uses the PCE when they look at inflation. And it's a broader range. It includes not only households, but organizations and businesses. And it's a broader range. Usually when you hear people quoting, they always quote the CPI, so we just felt like that would be more understandable to everybody. But I'm fine with either one, really.

That's helpful. I think the reason I was intrigued by that is because of what you just shared, Councilwoman Stroud, in terms of as department heads are putting together their budget proposals and sharing information relative to inflationary costs, it could be helpful if it was apples to apples, so to speak, wherein the inflationary costs there, I guess you could say citing, would be compared to the municipal cost index, because that reflects traditional municipal costs, you know, such as employee healthcare, you know, fleet, et cetera, et cetera. So asphalt, the cost of what we are actually doing. And I understand part of your why is communicating with residents. So I guess I just, I wonder if, the index would be more valuable if, I mean, Mr. Kelly indicated he was fine with either one. It's just a thought. It's something, I know this is a first reading, so something to consider. Like if the goal, Councilwoman D'Souza just asked, you know, several questions about kind of your why, the framing for it and how it would be used. And I can definitely see the value of department heads being able to speak to the inflationary costs of, of their expenses. And so perhaps the index around municipal costs would be appropriate since it would be a more natural element of their budget presentation. So just something to think about. Another question I had has to do kind of also with the framing of how could we use this? Is there intent for why beyond just, like you've already asked and answered, kind of providing information is always good. But kind of my understanding now The information we would be providing is, here's the rate that we would need in order to maintain our current purchasing power. And so the calculation of that could potentially, and I don't know if this was your intent or not, but it could potentially be a form of advocacy for property tax increases, for example. Is that the intent to build in this annual communication form of, I guess, form of communication that says in order for our purchasing power to continue, this is the rate it would need to be at. And that lays the groundwork for advocacy for a property tax increase.

I think in the very first part of your question got a little bit cut off, but I think I got the gist of it. And the entire budget could be used if somebody was going to identify a property tax increase or the desire to try to pursue one. This really is informational, and it's something to look at historically over time. So if there was somebody that was looking to do a property tax increase, then this could be used, just as anything in the budget could. But primarily, this is really to let residents know kind of where we stand, where our buying power is located. is at, if it is eroded, and if so, how much, where these increases actually align with inflation when we get department heads that come up and present their budget. It is 100% providing information for us, for residents, and it's just something else for us to be aware of and to look at.

Thank you for that. Do you anticipate, and you're anticipating this being an annual analysis?

That would be my goal. And once again, I mean, for me, I would love to look back and say, you know, five years ago, you know, or seven years ago, just pre-COVID, what were things like? You know, what were they like 27 years ago? What were they like 47 years ago? just out of curiosity and to see kind of how the city has been able to adapt and adjust over time. So it is, once again, it's just something that, yes, I would like to see each year in the budget, and I think it would be helpful as part of a historical reference point.

And do you anticipate expanding that analysis in any form? Or is it truly this one single, you know, and I guess the reason I'm asking is the title, and I'm driving, so I don't have your memo in front of me, but it's something I'm recalling, executive standards or executive something and transparency. Anyway, the word executive somewhere. And so is that... is that because it's titled that, are you anticipating additions, expansions? That's a pretty broad reaching title. And I'm assuming you mean the executive branch, but maybe I misinterpreted that as well.

Yes, ma'am. It's executive branch disclosure and transparency standards. Thank you. I thought I'd give it to you so you didn't have to find it when you were driving. But yes. Not a good idea, yeah. And when we receive the tentative budget, it is called the mayor's tentative budget, which comes from our executive, our administrative branch. So this would be something that, yes, I'd like to see it year over year. If there was something at this point, I think that we've pretty well covered in here what I'd like to see in there. If next year or in 10 years, if there was a council that wanted to expand upon it, then they could look at it at that point. But right now, I'd just like to have it included as a reference.

And is there, and this might be like getting way ahead of, this is a first reading, and this will be my last question, I promise. So is there a plan for, there being like, for example, as the budget authority, if we were to have, if we were to receive the analysis in the way that you just presented it, and we, for example, question the methodology, or what would you say is the plan for navigating that? Or is that something you're like, that's way down the road, I'm not ready to unpack that yet?

I would say if just as anything in the budget, if the council or a council member has a question, then it's fair game. Once it's presented and once it becomes ours, if there's questions or concerns with methodology or applicability or how it was implemented at all or used, then it's up to the council or council members to be able to question that and to find clarity with it.

Gotcha. OK, very helpful. Thank you for providing that. And I guess the one piece of actual feedback would be to consider the index. I'd be interested in perhaps reconsidering that before the second reading. I think it's always good to think through the process of both receiving information, but also being careful to understand the why we are receiving it. So thank you for the effort you've put into this. You bet. Ms. Nichols? That's all I had. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you.

This may be a question for Brian, or do you know how often the CPI is calculated? Is there a better month to use?

They come out with an update every month. We recommended we look at the most recent 12 months is what we recommended in this. Because if you go by calendar year or fiscal year you're going to be missing the usually when we present the tentative we were preparing it in April so it would miss the first three months the most recent so we just recommended the most recent 12.

And some of this data you guys actually use in your budget formulation, right?

Yes, yeah.

So the more information and the more I can know how those calculations are factored, I welcome the information. So I kind of see it as a little added to the budget that we have some background on it.

We've done similar analysis in past years. We haven't done it every – we haven't put it in the tentative budget, of course, but we have done a similar analysis, so it's not new to us.

I know there was once a council member who spoke at the CPI. Quite often it may have been in those years.

Yeah, and Katrina had it in her presentation, the CPI, for this year. So we look at it every year.

Thank you. Mr. DeKaiser.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I just wanted to comment that I will be supportive of this. I think it really does bring clarity and honesty to our budget discussions. If you recall from the presentation we had where I asked the question about an annual CPI policy, I don't think this is quite that, but it provides the background information that we would need to keep residents informed. And I appreciate that this doesn't require a tax increase. One question that I had, I hear my colleagues' concerns about how municipal costs like employee benefits and fleet aren't necessarily or would be a different metric than the CPI. But I just want to clarify, is there actually a municipal index that we could use? Or would it be like a calculation of a bunch of other indexes? And maybe that's a Brian question.

Madam Chair, I could answer that as well. Or Brian, either way.

Go ahead Dustin.

There is a municipal cost index. I believe it's put out by American city and county. We could definitely look at using that. The only thought that I have is just whatever you decide to use we should use the same thing year after year after year after year so that there's a good comparison point. The reason we initially selected CPI was just because it's recognizable. Everybody knows what the CPI is. The information is put out regularly. You can count on it coming, becoming available. And that was the main reason that we used it. But I think you could go with any of those indexes. And they're all going to be different from one another. My experience in looking at the MCI is it usually is quite a bit higher than CPI.

That's great. Thank you so much.

So for me, I'm not afraid of information. Is this important information in my decision making?

No.

As you well know, I did, when reading it, text you and say, is this justification for a tax increase? I mean, that really does sound like what it is. And even the descriptions where it says, when costs rise and revenues stall, the city is forced to stretch existing dollars, eventually impacting service delivery. So on your issue of looking back to what other councils did, Sandy's 130 years old. We don't know, going back 100 years, what they did back then. We do know in modern history, Sandy's only had a few property tax increases, only a few. We've actually had a couple property tax reductions. And it's because of growth. So when we have growth, my thinking is not that when costs rise, so do taxes have to also. That is not the way. And throughout history, apparently, that is not how Sandy has thought. So if we had revenue growth to cover even inflation, then we can do that. So I'll go back to my statement. We could include this. I don't want to alarm. You know our residents that were collecting and presenting this information as justification for a tax increase. So that bothers me a little bit. So I'll just say that for me it doesn't hurt but it's not important for my decision making. So anyway do you have what you need for a second reading.

think I do and in just a you know kind of a quick response you write sandy has not had a you know a significant amount of tax increases over the hundred thirty years and I think that this actually goes and it it supports and it illustrates that to residents it says in times where we do have a inflationary rates that are high, the city works very, very hard to evaluate our current expenses and to try to establish the best practice moving forward in order to keep taxpayer dollars at the forefront of what we're spending and how we're spending it. So residents can see that, and it can be illustrated year over year. in the same section of the documents of our budget.

So you good? I am. OK.

Thank you.

All righty. It is just after 6 o'clock now. So we will use this time for general citizen comment, remembering that if anyone wants to comment on the public hearing items, the next three items that are coming up, you'll wait for those to be introduced. So I do have two cards. Shane, come on down to the podium down here, and you will have three minutes when you begin speaking. Please introduce yourself.

Shane Manwearing. So it's like man wearing a coat. That's how you say that last name. And this is just my opportunity to introduce myself. I'm running for sheriff of Salt Lake County. And so this is a quick introduction to me. I live in Bluffdale. I'm married. I have five children. I spent 30-plus years in the best leadership school in the world, and that's the United States Army. And that's including ROTC. I came out at the rank of colonel. I retired out of the Utah National Guard last July. And I'm happy to observe that was a privilege of my life. I work for a local police department. I'm a lieutenant for that police department. Right now, I'm assigned as the watch commander. So I work at night. Kind of the best job. I get to go out there and chase around, go around the city, all the fun calls, and work with your officers here in Sandy. The largest budget I was ever in charge of was $300 million, and the largest unit I was ever in charge of was 2,995 people. That's a real number. I was in Afghanistan in 2019, 2020. And then just a brief, to respect the not trying to campaign here, but my goal as a sheriff would be everybody has to use a Salt Lake County jail. And my goal is to be the best partner Sandy City has ever had and to help make it so that your officers stay in your city, aren't sitting there at the Salt Lake County Jail waiting with a prisoner. And I know there's some simple things that we can do to fix that. The next thing that I'd like to accomplish is I'd like to work on adding some infrastructure to the jail where we can deal with this drug epidemic that we are all facing. And that is, I'd like to add a detox facility to the jail. so that we can help people that are suffering with drug addiction get help. But that's my quick introduction. I'd love to spend some time with you in the future. If you'd love to contact me, I'm not too hard to find. If you just Google Shane Manwaring, I'm on the internet, and you can get a hold of me. I'd love to spend some time with you and expound on some of the stuff I'm talking about. With that, if there's no questions, I'll say thank you and sit down.

Thank you. Appreciate it. All right, we also have Kent. Kent, feel free to come on down. Please introduce yourself.

Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, council members. My name is Kent Davis. I live in Cottonwood Heights with my wife and my two children. My children actually go to school here in Sandy. I'm the Republican nominee for Salt Lake County District Attorney. A short word about why I'm qualified to do that job. I spent the last two decades of my life leading teams in hard environments. I did two deployments to Iraq. I was an infantry officer. I earned a Ranger tab, my Bronze Star, my Combat Infantryman's badge. I came home to continue my public service. I clerked for a federal judge. I worked for the United States Department of Justice. And then I came here to Salt Lake County, worked as a deputy district attorney from 2017 to 2021, where I tried felonies and built the office's first cyber crime prosecution unit from the ground up. Today, I work at Woodbury Corporation. I'm the director of cybersecurity and corporate counsel. I am the outgoing chair of the Utah State Bar Cyber Law Section. I serve on two Utah Supreme Court committees, advisory committees, including the Committee on the Rules of Professional Conduct. I share all this not as a resume, but to make a point. Over the last few weeks, I've been visiting city councils across Salt Lake County, Bluffdale, Harriman, Taylorsville, and tonight, Sandy, because the DA is a countywide race, and its work touches on every one of those rooms. Leadership, as everybody here well knows, is showing up where the work is and listening to the people who are actually doing it. And that's what I'm doing here tonight. It's what I want to keep doing, regardless of whether or not I win in November. And here's my commitment to Sandy, the same commitment I've made to every other municipality I've been able to visit so far. As I said, the DA's office is a countywide race, but its work lives in your city. When your officers refer a case, the outcome lands here in your city in Sandy. When a domestic violence victim calls in your community 911, what happens next is partly on the district attorney's office. Sandy should not have to wait until a press conference to know what the DA's office is going to do about that case, about repeat property crime, about the Wasatch Corridor trafficking of fentanyl and stolen vehicles, or violent offenders cycling back through your neighborhoods. So I'm here to listen. I'm here to open a direct line. It was a pleasure to meet your chief earlier today. Sit down with any council member who would like to ask me questions. I would happily attend a town hall if you'll have me and answer any question that anybody has to ask. Tell me what Sandy needs from the next district attorney. I'm taking it very seriously. I'm an easy guy to find. I welcome you to do so, mayor, councilwoman, council members. I'm sorry, council madam. I got all discombobulated. Thank you, and I look forward to earning all your trust.

Thank you. All right, Pat. Pat Jones. Come on down, Pat. And as you know, you have three minutes.

Hi.

Good evening.

So I want to give a little bit of a comment, my comment about Council Member Stroud's proposal. It's interesting that the chair make this comment exactly what I was thinking when I was reading going through your proposal. And I'm thinking that I'm not exceptional person, so if I think along that line, that this is a justification for a tax increase so that we, as residents, we will, oh, yeah, right, OK. We cannot have much to comment anymore. There will be others, too. There will be. And also, from another perspective, I recently made a comment about maybe we can help the residents to understand a bit more about property tax increase. I was also reacting in that way, too. Oh, this is a proposal, yeah, in some way, you know, you look at both perspectives, right, from two perspectives. So I hope that if this goes through and is voted in, that it will be used prudently and honestly and really to help the city to keep a good budget and also as well as the residents as well because I do know I have many friends who are not in good situation as time goes on because people are aging, yeah, thank you.

Thank you. That's all the blue cards I have. Dustin, would you like to invite anyone online to participate if they'd like to?

Of course. Thank you, Madam Chair. If you're joining us virtually this evening, you'd like to comment on any city business, now's the time. Go ahead and click the Raise Hand button on your screen. Call your name in the order in which you raised your hand, and you'll have three minutes. Not seeing any hands raised, Madam Chair.

All right. We'll close general citizen comment and move along in the agenda. So we're up to item number four, which is a public hearing on compensation for executive municipal officers. Is that Katrina again? Okay.

Hi. Thank you. So state code does require that cities hold separate public hearings during the budget process to allow for public comment on compensation increases for executive municipal officers. As a reminder, an executive municipal officer is the chief administrative officer, an assistant chief administrative officer, a city attorney, department and division heads, and assistant or deputy department or division heads. And then a compensation increase is defined as salary or deferred salary, incentive pay, and a vehicle allowance increase. So it's pretty straightforward for us with our budget. Executive officers have the same compensation increase proposal for their positions as for our general employees. And this was presented on May 5. So as a reminder, we're proposing a 2 and 1 half cost of living increase. And then executive officers would be eligible for performance pay, which could be given as part of a salary increase or as part of an incentive. And then, as always, the budget book has a section on staffing and compensation policies in the back, as well as the staffing schedule, which lists each of the positions and their proposed ranges. So any questions?

Ms. Nichol.

So at the top of the state code, it was implemented 5-1-2024? Effective 24, yes. OK. And did we do that in 24? Listed out like this?

This is our third time doing it, yes. OK.

So also when I look at the state code, it says the elective and statutory officers of a municipality. First line.

So I will let the attorney go ahead. Go ahead.

Madam Chair, may I? Yes. Yeah, it's an interesting statute. The first subparagraph one says that the elective and statutory officers of municipalities shall receive their compensation as per the budget. Paragraph 2b says that before the governing body may adopt the final budget or final amended budget that includes compensation for executive municipal officers, the governing body shall hold a public hearing on that compensation increase. So it references elected and executive in the first paragraph, but the hearing was only required for executive. So.

Does that create a gray area?

Well, you can, of course, hold a hearing more broadly than what the state requires.

So this is like the floor. We can create a ceiling.

Well, the budget has everything. What the state required was a separate hearing to highlight the compensation that was being paid to executive officers. You can, as a council.

Yeah, reporting.

Right. This is the floor. Correct.

So we could... have a policy that stated we needed to do this for other?

You could.

OK.

Thank you. Eligible for performance pay. So what, remind me, or let's go back to performance pay. And in your previous presentation, what is being proposed in the tentative budget for the rate of performance pay?

So we're proposing an average 3% increase. However, each department will have discretion to allocate that as they would like.

So average 3%. So what is the top end that an employee can receive in performance pay in terms of a percentage?

We do not set that by policy. They just can't go above their range, the top of their range.

You know, and then, OK, so that's great. So then the last bullet is refer to the tentative budget sections for the consolidated staffing schedule and staffing and compensation plan. So when you look at the consolidated staffing schedule, almost every single position is expressed in a range of pay. I don't know if this is a poorly written law or whether We are, if we are complying with the law, if that's our point of view, there's no transparency here. No one could know. No interested party, or am I wrong here, could an interested party who wants to verify what we just said, actually look in here and figure out that what we said is true, because there's information in the tentative budget that verifies that what we said is true. Maybe it's a poorly written law, but there's just, for me, there's no way to verify that what's on this slide is true. Even when you look at the back, and when we're looking at the back, do the ranges include, are they without COLA and without performance pay? Is that what they are? The ranges that are shown in the back of the budget book?

So the ranges would take the COLA into account, but an employee is paid within their range when they're given performance pay.

So we don't know what an employee's pay is until next year's budget book?

None of the budget books show actual pay, so they show ranges. So if you were looking for actual pay, you would have to request that information. But that's not what the code requires. It just requires that we state what we are proposing for their compensation increase. Yeah.

Yeah.

Thank you. Just want to make one clarification. So each department they receive the department head receives a pool of money based on an average of 3 percent for the employees in his or her department. So any raise given to somebody that's over the 3 percent it has to come out of that same pot. They have a budget amount. They can't go over that budget amount. And so when I was a department head, I had some employees that were underperforming. And I would hold back on a full 3% or whatever it was for that year. And if I had high performers, that money would go to those high performers. And that's how it's balanced out. No department head can spend more than that average of 3% for their employees.

express it that way in the budget I that we're do we call it an average 3% merit or do we call it 3% because this thing of average and that you could you could take the entire pot of money and give it to one person and they get a 20% pay increase or whatever it whatever it comes to right and I don't know. It just makes me... It would be bad management.

You wouldn't keep very many employees around if you did that.

I don't know. It just makes me... I don't even know that I... This is my seventh budget. I don't know. I don't know what individual employees make.

I can't verify this unless I go to...

administration and say, can I have the pay of all the people that qualify under this description of what this law includes? Is there any reason? So when we talked about we could ask for more information, the city council could decide that this isn't adequate, this isn't informative enough, it's not transparent enough. Is there anything that precludes us from listing, from asking for a list which would be presented in a council meeting either by title or by name of what these individuals are actually earning today and what they would, will earn if this budget is adopted? Is there anything that prevents us from doing that?

No, but that would require that the raises have been predetermined before the budget's approved. And we typically wait till mid-June to start asking departments to identify those raises. So again, the law is not saying we have to identify what people are paid. We have to identify what the compensation increase budget includes.

And it defines compensation as salary, a budgeted bonus, or budgeted incentive pay. So you're saying it's not budgeted until it's been given to someone?

I'm saying that's where the average 3% comes in, is that's what we budget. But we don't actually allocate actuals.

To a specific individual until the event has happened. Correct. Also listed are vehicle allowance, and so is that in here?

There's no increase to vehicle allowances in the proposed budget.

And deferred salary?

We don't do deferred salary.

Okay. You know, Ms. Hausman, I'm sorry. I noticed your hand up. I should have gone to you before now, but I will. Go ahead, Marcie.

MARCIE HOUSMAN- No, please, if you have more, I can wait. Because I don't want you to stop your thought.

Go ahead. I can think while you're talking.

OK. All right. Well, thank you, Madam Chair. I know we've had this conversation before, but I think it's become a more urgent conversation than perhaps it's been in the past. And I don't know if my colleagues receive the same kind of outreach as I do. I don't want to assume they do, and I don't want to assume they don't. But next to speeding. in our neighborhoods and loud, loud vehicles in our neighborhoods, all of which we've heard about. And then of course, you know, potholes and those kinds of things. I will say that the number of residents who have started inquiring about kind of, for lack of a better word, executive level pay, has definitely increased. And I think it's because households are just being so significantly impacted by inflation and other costs increases that they're just sort of starting to scrutinize at a new level. And I think this is one of those areas that is receiving some additional scrutiny is the level of pay for executive officers. And I think the question that Councilwoman Sharkey asked is a valid one in terms of what is available publicly is in the budget book. And that's where I always point people when they ask. And they are very confused by what's in the budget book when they do go there. And I'll walk them to the pages, et cetera. And I'll explain. Essentially, it's the pay ranges. So then they'll do some of their own calculations and they'll often pick the midpoint and sort of say, so it looks like this role is paid, the midpoint would be this. And anyway, the next thing that they tend to express is some alarm over how how high executive officers, how high that pay is. And so then they're asking for kind of justification for that and what is that? And I often, I hope, do a fairly adequate job of explaining the different roles and responsibilities, et cetera. But it's caused me to kind of wonder if there's an opportunity to think a little differently about how we handle COLA. Right now, I know our norm, and maybe perhaps it is what's required, and I'm just now learning this. But our norm is basically when we adopt a COLA, it is across the board. And unless someone turns it down, it is given to everyone. That 2.5% that we are considering just is for everyone. And I wonder, I guess I wonder a couple of things. Is there an opportunity to think about what 2.5% of a significantly high salary is compared to 2.5% of someone in a tier seven or tier six would be? Because as we think about I understand the idea of like equity, everyone should get the 2.5%. But then as we parse out what a 2.5% increase actually looks like for someone who's making quite a bit more than the average resident in Sandy, would we want to ever consider sort of disaggregating COLA a bit and thinking, and thinking a little bit differently about how that 2.5% gets. Should we automatically be doing 2.5%? And I know I'm potentially opening a can of worms here. And we may not even be allowed. I don't even know if we would be allowed to sort of think a little differently by pay bans, for example. I don't know. I'm just sort of voicing what has been shared with me. And it seems to be emerging as a repeated concern. I'm hearing it more and more frequently over the last couple of years. And so I thought I would just share it during this course of the conversation and just ask the question, is it possible to think about the 2.5% a little differently when it comes to executive officers. So that's kind of my first question.

Yeah, go ahead. So I think that's possible to do different COLAs for different groups. But if you're looking at inflation, inflation hits everybody. So if the inflationary rate is, it was 2.7, I believe, in last year. That affects everybody's salary, so whatever your actual spending is, whatever your salary is, that's why we do that COLA is to accommodate for that inflation. I would also like to remind that we do have department heads and the CAO on the salary survey, so we do compare to other cities for those jobs. And we are, for the department head average, we're about 6% below the group average. And for the CAO at the top, we're over 17% below. So I think Sandy's very conservative to begin with. And I think if you don't have good leadership, you're not going to have good service for your residents.

Let's compare not the top, but the averages. That's a better comparison, right?

Actual pay? Okay. Is that what you're saying?

Actual pay? Yeah. And you said comparing at the top. But I like to compare averages instead, right? So if we're always chasing the city who is paying the person the highest wage, I'm not sure that that's what we need to do.

And remember, we try to match to the average. So everything what I just said is based on the average. So there's... that many below as there are that many above us.

I know that there are cities that do adjustments because you know a two and a half or a two and a half plus a three a five and a half percent pay increase for someone earning forty thousand dollars a year is a lot different than someone earning $200,000 a year. So I do know that there are cities that do make adjustments there. They'll put a red line in there. Everybody above this level is only getting 1.5% this year instead of 2.5%. So I know that that is possible. But here's the thing. As I look at even fixing this, And Marcy, your hand is still up, and I'll come back to you if that's intentional. Yes, it is. Okay. As I look at fixing this... for increased transparency. Because my feeling is, as I look at this, we've told the public nothing. Nothing definitive here. So if I were to want to increase transparency and increase information, the part that I won't be able to address is the performance pay part. Not at this point in time. Not unless we bring it back to another point in time And then it's outside of this public hearing noticing requirement for the tentative budget. So we're kind of stuck. Let's go back to Ms. Hausman first. Go ahead, Marcy.

Thank you. I appreciate that additional insight from both of you, actually. So thank you. I was not aware that other cities are doing that. So my second question really has to do with that performance. And Mr. Pace, I appreciate your explanation of the pool of funding, so to speak, that is given to the department head. That was my understanding as well. that essentially there is a bucket. I appreciate the explanation that that bucket is determined by across the group of employees, what 3% on average is. So that was an additional layer of understanding I'm gaining from tonight. So thank you for that. But again, my understanding was department head receives a bucket of money and can determine how to allocate that bucket but has to stay within what's been given and can determine employee by employee who receives a greater portion or not, or maybe whatever. I get that. But my question really is, is the department head eligible for a portion of that bucket? And if so, Who decides that? Is it the department head who decides what their own merit pay would look like from the bucket they are allocated?

No, the department head's raise would be decided by the mayor and CAO.

And then who decides the mayor and CAO's?

portion of the buckets they're given. So the mayor would decide the CAO's increase and then per year policy, the mayor is eligible for the COLA.

Mayor is eligible for the COLA, but not eligible for merit because of what we recently, because of the elected official status of the policy that we just passed. OK. Let me just think through. Sorry, I'm trying to focus and drive well and not put myself. I think that's everything I had. I know that there's probably questions in a different line than what you were potentially. I know we're just trying to have the mandated public hearing on this, but I felt it was an appropriate time to kind of surface some things that I have been hearing from the community more frequently and felt it was worth bringing up for council colleague consideration. That's all I have to say. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you. Ms. Nicole.

I was reviewing some compensation studies that you had given me at the first of the year, and noted on that is that Provo did break up their COLA to different pay levels. So if anybody wanted to look at Provo's, you could find that information there. So going back to the... Other compensation. I know we put that policy in place at the First of this year. How was it given the years prior?

So elected officials got the average increase of employees so I would look at every single employee what their pay rate was and the current fiscal year, what it changed to in the new fiscal year. That would give me the percent increase for that employee. I would average all of the employees, and that's what elected officials would receive.

Okay. This may be a Brian question. I don't know if I should ask it later or not, but what is in the tentative budget for performance pay from all funds?

Three percent. Oh, sorry, dollar amount. Yeah. Give me just a moment to go to that presentation. So performance pay, just a reminder, is tracked separately from the step and grade pay increase for police and fire. So the 3% performance pay for the general and governmental funds is $585,000. And then for all funds, it's $820,000.

And that's the number in the tentative?

Yes.

So general fund and other government, and then

ALL THE OTHER FUNDS. WHICH INCLUDES THE GENERAL AND GOVERNMENT. SO THAT TOTAL.

YEAH.

YOU DON'T ADD THEM TOGETHER.

THE 820 IS INCLUDED. THE 80 IS INCLUDED IN THE 8.

YES. OKAY. AWESOME.

THANK YOU.

MS. TROE.

NOW I'M IN LIKE 15 DIFFERENT DIRECTIONS. I JUST HAVE WRITTEN DOWN THAT 6% THAT WERE BELOW Is that below the average or the top?

That was the top of the range for department heads. That was just the question I had.

Thank you. And Ms. Nichols' comment, I just want to clarify, too, that council members are asked every year if we want to accept the increase or not. So that's in our policy. So it's not automatic for us. We're asked. I'm not talking about – even the cost of living. Yeah.

Madam Chair. Yeah. That's not on the council policy. It's just a practice that the council has had. But you should automatically just receive the COLA increases now based on the new policy that was passed.

Oh, we will automatically receive those?

Yes.

Oh. I missed that. I missed that part. Okay. All right. Thank you. Thank you.

Council Chair Sharkey, can we direct our staff to bring back a more detailed presentation on the specific possibly with a legal brief? Just verifying that who needs to do this and

So here's the thing. I was thinking pertinent to this year as an example. So we could get a list of every employee that's covered under this law and the application of the 2.5% cost of living. But we're missing the bigger piece, which is the 3%, or it could be much higher or it could be lower. We won't have that part. And it could be bigger than the 2.5%.

It could. I'm not specifically to not applying it to this budget year, just to the interpretation of this state code. I know Lynn's opinion is that it excludes elective. I can read it both ways. I'd like to know. for sure how that should read. And if we need to be showing these numbers, we do. And so what exactly we need to show and how we would need to show it could come in that presentation.

Yeah. So are you talking about tabling this item and bringing it back this year for more information?

If possible. I know everybody's super busy with the budget thing, so if it doesn't happen, I'm not too heartbroken about it, but I would like to right after the budget, and we can amend the budget as necessary as well.

And do you want to add elected officials as well as the executive?

I would like to, yeah, add elected officials. Since that's the floor, I would like to set a higher bar and standard ceiling. That could be one of the considerations when we're getting more information about it as well.

And are you proposing to just show the COLA and not even an estimate of performance pay? Or do you want to include performance pay at the average of 3%?

Or how would you like to do that? That's going down something in sequence that would happen after we get more information on it. And then we could formulate a policy around it once we know the legality of this. how we're supposed to report it, and who is actually supposed to be reporting it, or who is subject to this particular state code.

I think what you're saying is for this year, you want to include more people and more information, but you also want to work on a policy for future years about how it's presented every year?

No, I don't want to have this presentation apply to anything in the budget right now. I want a full legal review on this bill or this state code telling us what we actually really have to do and who we have to show it for. Sorry, there's a match. That's our floor. But eventually, I would like to add elective officials into it, yes.

So I think we got our city attorney's opinion on this. Are you saying you want to?

I want some outside as well.

Meaning our council attorney as well?

That would, yeah, start with that. Yeah.

I'll be happy to write you a memo on that, Madam Chair, if you'd like me to.

OK. Clear as mud.

Yeah. Any more comments on this, council members, or even this discussion that we're having outside of what we've received tonight? Ms. D'Souza.

So just quickly kind of wrapping up my comments based off of everything that I've heard and the presentation that was provided to satisfy state code on this. I do think that there is room for improvement. You know, kind of going back to the line of questioning that I had with, you know, the Councilmember Stroud's amendment to our budget presentations in terms of you know How is this information even useful in any way and to be honest? I don't know that I find this one slide Useful and I know that the information that's being presented for state code isn't necessarily for the elected officials but if I can't even like tell in any way how with any certainty that this is true outside of we just trust, which I'm not saying that there isn't a reason to, but that's not what the code is about, right? I think that we could ultimately do better in how we present this information so that it is more transparent because I think that's kind of the goal of this state ordinance that we're complying with for the public. So, I mean, I guess maybe it is what it is for this year, but I would like to consider I would like to consider policy on a couple of different things that have come up over the last few years since I've been on the council relating to pay. And one of them would be maybe a policy on how this is shared annually. I do think that performance pay should have some sort of policy at a minimum. It doesn't seem, it just seems like there should be some sort of policy that we could use for that.

Council Member D'Souza, there is some explanation for performance pay in the employee handbook. I don't know if you've seen that.

Well, there is some here, too.

But not in the budget. Yeah, not in detail in the budget.

So I mean that I think that it needs to be reviewed.

When we adopt this, we adopt. And there's language in there that we adopt the employee handbook at the time we adopt the budget.

Yeah, there's a lot of convolution, if that's a word. OK, I'm going to end my comments there. But I think we could do better in being more transparent.

So what I'm getting is this is something that we need our staff to look at, maybe for Tracy to come back to with an opinion on compliance with state law. It may be identical to what Lynn has just said, but we're wanting another opinion on that. And in terms of how or if we change this, it would be nice to have some staff involvement, maybe some suggestions on that. what we should do now this is a public hearing item and so i'll open the public hearing on it um it's not something that gets voting it's just a noticing kind of thing right so dustin is that what you're thinking we should go ahead and open the public hearing and ask for public comment on this and just whatever we're going to do following is a separate issue madam chair the requirement is that we hold the public hearing it's been noticed

And so we should hold the public hearing. I mean, you're welcome to continue it if you'd like to, or you're welcome to close the public hearing. We just have to hold one.

We're not adopting anything, right? The purpose of the public hearing is simply for notification purposes. Correct.

There's no resolution or anything specifically associated with this. But you have to hold the hearing before you can adopt a final budget where increases for those named employees are included.

Ms. Hausman, did you have some more comments?

I just, as we are, and it could probably wait until after we take comments, but I just, I don't want my question to get lost as we are summarizing potential next steps for staff. I know Provo was just given as an example of a city that does look differently at housing COLA, the 2.5%, for example, that we're looking at, and maybe having that be disaggregated based on pay levels. Anyway, if we're asking staff to look into some things and come back with more information, I would like to add that to the list. I would be interested in exploring how other cities are doing that. So that's all. Thank you.

OK. If we're going to make that change, I see that as a budget amendment item, not something connected directly. Obviously, we've had a very robust conversation. Yeah. But someone could come forward with a budget amendment on that now or at any time before the budget's adopted.

Yeah. Yeah. Madam Chair, may I?

Yeah.

I would say that changing how we do COLA is a pretty big change. And so if that's something that somebody wants to do this year, that's going to require some pretty robust research. A legal opinion that you just asked for, that's not a big deal. That's easy. But completely revamping the pay system, HR spends months working on that. It's not an overnight change.

At the beginning, though, at the minimum, we could at least understand what other cities are doing.

For sure. We're happy to do that. But my question is, is that a right now before we adopt the budget need? Or is that something that can wait until after the budget is adopted in interest of things that are going to directly impact the budget? I'm asking the question to get everyone's perspective on that.

My perspective is that it could be this it could be a budget amendment for this year's budget adoption. It depends upon how much study and analysis a council member who is moving forward with that amendment wants to put into it. But once again, this all started with compliance with this state law that started in 2024 and our questioning as to whether the information we've got really tells us or our constituents much of anything at all. And therefore, should we modify in order to get more information now or in the future?

The way I see it, with the information I want, it's strictly informational with the way that Marcy's talking about it. That would be a budget amendment, but I could be wrong. That's just my thoughts on it. And we could absolutely do that and look at that before the adoption.

Okay. Mr. DeKaiser.

Thank you, Madam Chair. As this conversation has progressed, I just want to say that I understand the desire maybe to prioritize lower paid employees, but I think we should tread very cautiously about politicizing COLA adjustments for certain groups of employees, because it's not like a reward or a bonus. As far as I understand the COLA, the point is to keep pace with inflation. And I genuinely believe that our leadership and executive staff are still employees serving the community often I see them at council meetings late, they work long hours, they put lots of time into the community and they have significant responsibilities and significant institutional knowledge. And so I just wanted to say, I think there's value in treating our employees consistently as an organization and just being very careful not to create an adversarial culture.

Ms. D'Souza.

Thank you. Council Member DeKaiser's comments, I agree. We want to make sure that we are compensating our employees in a way that retains them and makes sure that they can live their lives and support themselves and their families. But I also just want to draw a distinction, and I feel like I bring this up every year, and so I'm going to go on my soapbox once more. And while this is a public institution, The taxpayers largely are in the private sector. And not everybody gets COLA no matter what to keep up with inflation. And so while there is an inflationary consideration that we need to consider, that is being paid for largely by people who may not be receiving that same inflationary increase. And so I just want to bring that to everybody's attention because I feel like that gets missed because we're this public institution and we're separate from the private. But the funding sources for these increases are generally private sector individuals who don't receive the same nice cush across the board COLA and merit increases that municipal employees do. Thank you.

All right, well, I'm going to go ahead and take the advice of opening the public hearing on this because it has been noticed and so we're going to do it. I don't have any blue cards on this. If anyone would like to speak to this issue, go ahead and come on down and we'll probably be able to figure out who you are.

You know, I am becoming either very popular or very unpopular, one way or the other. But I want to thank the council members for having such a robust discussion. This is taking care of the city and the residents, really. It's interesting, you know, earlier my comment was, oh, I was having the same thinking, you know, when I read through Council Member Stroud's proposal that this is a justification for a tax increase, you know, so. And then now I hear from Council Member D'Souza having the same thought that I have, which is senior people are on fixed income. Now I know, obviously you can look at me and I'm a senior, but it would be interesting to find out what is the percentage of the population of Sandy that's senior, and how close the population is getting to be the seniors. We don't get COLA. When the budget, when the property tax comes on, we have to tighten our belts. You give somebody something, it's taken away from another part of the city. So this has to be taken very carefully. And your discussion is not popular here in this room. It's not popular. I know it, I feel it, I understand it. So I want to commend you and I want to thank you for holding this discussion. Where it goes, maybe it ends up with just, you know, nothing happens. at least it is open up for a discussion. And public comments, I'm so grateful for general comments and public comments, because this is the only time where I can address personally to all of you, and to even for my comments to be heard by department heads and other city staff. It's rare, so I'm sorry I'm coming up here so constantly, I apologize for that, but when it's an opportunity, open up for me, I should use it. I should use it, you know. So thank you very much, and I want to thank all the department heads and all the, every time I email Justin, you know, and he says, just like that, he would respond right away. I want to thank you so much for all the department heads. They do such a good job for the firefighters, for the policemen, everything. But This is kind of a sensitive subject and I appreciate that. Thank you so much.

Thank you. Let's see if we have any online participants. It looks like we do.

Thank you, Madam Chair. If you're joining us virtually and you'd like to comment on the public hearing tonight for item number four, just go ahead and click the raise hand button on your screen now. Madam Chair, Steve Van Maren has his hand raised. Steve, I'm going to allow you to begin speaking. Please remember to unmute yourself and you'll have three minutes.

Thank you, Dustin. Good evening, council. My internet is very poor tonight. If I don't get to finish this well, I will send you an email. I don't think what Katrina has produced represents the intent of the disclosure. I think it should be something more like a tabulation of at least the current year salary or the proposed salary, one or the other. And I couldn't hear clearly what she said about car allowance and such, but there are also other benefits besides the hourly wage, retirement and medical coverage. So the mayor's current salary in the budget book is proposed to be 184,000. But on transparent.utah.gov, in 2025 fiscal year, she made $177,950 in wages and another $43,236 in benefits for a total compensation of $221,186,099. That is a disclosure. And I think having year-to-year disclosures would be very beneficial to the public. Thank you for your time.

Don't see any other hands raised, Madam Chair.

All right. So in terms of what to do with this item, Dustin, is it your impression that if we want to have the information come back with more information, do we need to decide that by a council majority?

I would say if you would like more information, making a motion and passing that motion is the best way to ensure it. I don't know that you need to continue the public hearing in order to do that. If you'd like to continue to hear comments from the public on this you could do that. But again it just has to happen. The hearing has to be held and I would assume that means the hearing has to be closed before you can adopt a final budget.

So would it motion to continue?

I think that's what our, I'm guessing that that's what our actions will be on the rest of the public hearing items. So leaving all of them open for conversation until the final budget is adopted wouldn't be out of alignment. And wouldn't be, I mean, it's acceptable to me. Yeah, we don't have to close it tonight. We can leave it open, right?

Yes, you can do that. My concern isn't necessarily about a motion on whether to close the hearing or continue it. I think as the chair, you could just continue the hearing if you'd like to, as long as there's no concern from the council with that. My question would be, what information, what is the reason you're continuing the hearing? What information are you hoping to come back? The one I understand. You want to make a motion on that. is council member Nichols request for a legal review. Do you want that provided to you outside of a meeting or do you want that brought back to him to a meeting. And is there other information that you'd like brought back. That's that's what I would say if you'd like that. Now's the time to tell us that the emotion.

So yes, I'm thinking more of a motion based on wanting more information on the specific state code itself. Do we want to include a possible code amendment with that, or do you want to do them separately?

Well, I don't know if we need to go. I think we can just ask for it to be presented next week.

But that would have to be by a majority. So if we asked for a possible couple code amendment language with regards to that, I don't know. I know what I want, but I don't know what anybody else wants.

Madam Chair, so may I? Yeah. I understand the request for a legal review. That's easy. When you're talking about a code amendment, I don't know what the code amendment is you're asking for. And so I don't know how to bring that back for you. Furthermore, it's Tuesday night. I don't know that we'll have a full code amendment on something that gets worked on for months ready for the agenda packet Friday morning. That's my big concern.

It's not a city code anyway, right? It's a state code. We don't have a city code.

Yes, you can't amend the state, right. But I'm assuming there's some discussion about, again, I don't know what, I don't exactly know what it is you're asking for in terms of a code amendment.

It would be the percentages that people get based on their, of the performance pay based on where they're at.

If that's what you guys are thinking but I cannot produce a full code amendment on that by Friday to get in the next week's packet. I don't think.

Once again if it's the percentage of the merit increase the performance increase they're getting we don't know that.

Madam Chair, if you're wanting to understand what the actual increases were, again, we don't know the merit increases as you've just stated. As a council, you could request that information after July 1. Is that what you're looking for? I just don't know exactly what information you're looking for, so I'm trying to understand that.

Miss D'Souza, go ahead.

OK, I don't know if I followed this in the way that everybody's kind of thinking, but I'm going to kind of give you my gist of it. So it sounds like there were some agreement that maybe what we received isn't as helpful as it could be. And so what does that look like? And it doesn't sound like we need to do that necessarily in a code amendment at this moment, like by creating code to provide this information in this way, but maybe we can just ask, you know, table this and ask for more information and have it be returned for us to consider at another meeting, right? And is that accurate?

I believe so, if you can tell us exactly what information. I think that's going to be the most important thing. Right.

And so here on the fly, that might be a little bit hard. But I'm thinking that it would be helpful to have at least a starting point of, this is the position. Not the person, but the position. The last year's salary. what this year's salary is calculated to be. That would be an easy math calculation for anybody looking at it to say that it's 2.5%. I don't know that it necessarily makes sense in the context of this disclosure, and all of the other benefits. A car allowance, this is last year's car allowance. This is this year's car allowance for this position. I don't know how anybody would be able to verify the information that was provided on that slide without actually providing some set of numbers. The range doesn't work. So that's what I'd be asking for. That position, last year's, this year's, I can quickly calculate if it's not more than 2.5%, then we're compliant with what we've said, and then outline all of the other benefits for compensation that are included in the state code. That's what I think.

For clarification, that's not what I want, Dustin.

Fair. But I'm just trying to solve this conversation. Do we want more information or do we not?

And it's still not complete. See, that's the whole thing. And it's still not complete. So I'm kind of throwing my hands up going.

I don't know what you want.

So let's take it off. Let's take all of this offline. Because I don't think, I'm not sure. Do you understand what I want?

Yeah. OK. You want to? Yeah.

Madam chair I understand what council member Nichols asking for. You're asking for an analysis of the state code section which is I think 10 318 to make sure that. Right. Right. Yes.

That's the only thing that you want.

OK. OK. Well I would like that other information. Does anybody else have an opinion on that. I went through the trouble of stating it.

I would like that information as well. I'd be supportive of including that.

So would I.

And Madam Chair on that second piece of information that Council Member D'Souza is requesting I don't personally have all of that data and so if you would like to request that information from the administration to be presented next week that's what I would suggest you do by motion. So maybe a motion to bring back additional information on this that shows the salary for the executive municipal officers for the current fiscal year. and what that salary would be including car allowance, benefits and the proposed COLA increase.

So moved.

Would you like to include an average, the average 3%?

That's the question.

Knowing that some of those positions may not receive that, or they may receive more than that. No.

No, I personally think that that might be not helpful in what we're trying to determine. I think it would be helpful to, like I said, review policy, create policy that is maybe, I don't know. That's not what I'm asking for now.

You only want last year's. Would a historical view say the last four years, so you see the trend lines of the number you're going to get? Yeah, but I don't need that for this item.

Okay, cool. I'm trying to get at the heart of what this item is, and I think that we could be more transparent. And without the merit pay and knowing, I mean, we can't solve for that right now. And so let's figure out what we can solve for and get that. That's kind of what I'm thinking. trying to accomplish.

I would think if we're not going to include even an estimate of the merit pay, because we don't know what it is, or a 3% saying it could be this, but maybe it won't be this, at least a footnote indicating that there's also another component that can't be computed, which is the merit. That seems reasonable.

Madam Chair may I? Yes. It sounded like council member D'Souza made a motion that was based upon what I expressed. Is that accurate?

Yes, I would look to motion that we ask the administration to provide a list of last year's compensation for each of the employee... Municipal executive officers. Municipal executive officers that are listed in state code for last year and then what it will be this year, including and broken out separately by all of the other compensation that is included in state code, like the car allowance and anything else that would be applicable.

Friendly amendment. Executive official in statute or what we consider? Because there are only four positions in statute. Would you like department heads?

Well, it's like department heads. And so it needs to be broken out by, you know, this department's department head, this department's department head. It can't be aggregated because I'm asking for specific salaries.

Madam Chair, municipal executive officer under that 103818. It includes more than just three or four individuals.

So that's my motion. Do I have a second?

Yes. Second. Second.

so i have a question are we including we started this off by saying that there's some confusion here because the law refers to both elective and statutory advisors however the public hearing is only required for executive municipal officers so do we since we're adding more information Do we want to add elected officials, or do we want to leave it with just the executive municipal officers, which are defined?

Do we want the information, is that what you're saying, included in it?

Do we want that included in this same analysis?

I don't understand.

Do you want elected officials included, or just staff? Because that's the motion that was just... That's the question.

Is that a friendly amendment? Am I being asked for a friendly amendment?

Okay. I'll ask for a friendly amendment to include elected officials. Sure.

I can include that.

And I'm seconding again.

All right.

So, Madam Chair, can I just double clarify before we go to a vote? Sure. So my understanding is that you've made a motion asking administrative staff to bring back additional information next week. Brian or Katrina is next week feasible for this information to come back is it.

Then it should be easy to replicate right for the sake of this public conversation and public hearing. Thank you.

Okay. So to bring back the current year salaries for the executive municipal officers and elected officials as defined in 103818, including the total compensation, broken down by compensation type, right, salary, benefits, car allowance, et cetera, and then to show what that would change to in the upcoming budget, including the – with the 2.5 percent COLA increase and any other increases other than the merit increases because we don't know what those are.

Yes. Okay. And Council Member Stroud reminded me that there are nine elected officials, including the judge. So OK, thank you.

JANET NAPOLITANO- Judges are kind of a weird offset of an elected. Do you want a roll call vote?

What do you want? Either way is fine.

JANET NAPOLITANO- Might as well. If it's not unanimous, we have to have a roll call vote, since we have council members online.

Ms. D'Souza?

Yes.

Ms. Nichol?

Yes.

Ms. Hausman? Yes. Ms. Sharkey? Yes. Mr. DeKaiser?

No.

Ms. Stroud? Yes. And Ms. Christensen was excused. So that motion carried five to one.

All right. Thank you. I'm going to leave that public hearing open. And we'll move on to item number five, which is the public hearing to consider the adoption of the 26-27 fiscal year budget. Ryan.

Good evening, Council. We have a few slides to pull up and some resolutions to review with you as part of this public hearing. So thank you, Liz, for helping with that. So what I'd like to do is go over a couple of slides that kind of summarize some of the Items, amendments or adjustments to the public hearing, or to the tentative budget, excuse me, and then actually look at the resolutions to provide some more detail. But, you know, on first Tuesday of May we presented the tentative budget, so I'm not going to review that whole presentation. We've had all these departments come in the last three weeks, so I'm not reviewing everything. items that you have helped us identify. And my clicker's not advancing the slides. I'm not sure what's up. I'm missing the, do I need the?

Give us just a minute, Brian.

Okay, there we go.

Okay the first one I want to identify as it's on page 42 of the budget public works the streets this is the snow removal contingency reserve. So in that document we failed to reduce the overtime the variable benefits and the snow removable removal amounts by those adding up to eighty one thousand one twenty nine. So we want to reduce those and put into reserves $81,129. So we're recommending that amendment to the tentative budget. The second one is we failed to reduce the grant acquisition item in water. So we want to reduce that by $50,000. In Parks and Recreation, I talked to you about this the very first night, is in our financial structure, we currently have the recreation center, which is out the Canyon Recreation Center. and the recreation fund which operates all of the normal recreation programs. One of them is an enterprise fund. The center is an enterprise fund currently. The recreation fund is a special revenue fund. We want to combine those together because the governmental accounting standards have changed for enterprise funds over time. And the current standards do not require us to have an enterprise fund for the sports center and the recreation center. And our new accounting system allows us to have one fund. We can still have separate accounting for the center and the rest of the programs. We call those cost centers. We have one fund, two cost centers. You can still track the expenses of the center separately. But it will help us, I think, the staff in some ways are keen on this idea of having it all in one fund and We just have two cost centers track them, but that's what this is doing So we would move all the sources uses and balances From fund 54,000 which is currently the Alta Canyon Rec Center Into fund 2400 which is the current recreation fund Any questions on that one?

Mr. Sousa. So I'm just trying to make sure that I understand that it's clear is that the rec center would be a separate cost center under Parks and Rec? under the recreation department? What department is it in?

It's all under Parks and Recreation. That's where it has been, and it will stay that way.

But instead of being an enterprise fund, it's going to be a special revenue fund. And so is the budgeted amounts restricted once it's in there? Like it can only be used for the rec center?

Yeah, they're still restricted just as they are now. OK.

So nothing changes in practicality? It's just a paper change?

Yeah, it's just an accounting change. But we'll still have all the revenues going to the center will still be restricted and contained within that cost center, just like they are now. It's just now they're two separate funds. We're going to make them into one fund, but two cost centers. It's just an accounting thing.

OK, thank you.

That's all. Brian, I can't imagine that I'd even notice the difference, right?

I mean, it sounds like- Yeah, you won't notice it, because right now, and if you look in the Parks and Recreation Department section, you'll see administration, cemetery, senior center, golf out the canyon, which is now the recreation center. They're all separate cost centers. Some of them now are different funds. But in this case, we're just combining those two. They'll be separate just like you see them now. You probably won't even notice the difference other than the heading numbers will change. So instead of it being $54,000 fund, it'll be $24,000 fund. Okay and then community events one thing that was pointed out we didn't move the healing fields from non-departmental so we're recommending we do that move it to community events and have that broken out as a separate line item. Also a non-departmental we had some kind of technical errors where we had we didn't have the health center cultural series shown. We had some lines that were merged together so the total expenditures don't change but we are breaking out. We have the reduced utility box art line item by 9000. The general government by 25000. and when we add in the line for the cultural series at $34,000. So that just breaks those out so you can see those clearly. We just had an error on that. And then in other governmental funds, it's on page 131. This is a little bit confusing, but this is largely due to our new accounting system that we have that allows us to be a little more sophisticated. And we can track things by grants now. So we've set up a fund called Operating Grants. And in the past, we had separate funds for all these different special purposes, like, for example, some of the donations that came to the police and fire departments. The alcohol grants, a lot of our grants we had completely separate funds for them. Now we can have one fund called operating grants and we have separate grants and we can track them by grant. So it's just another accounting change that we have that's available with our new accounting software.

Brian, I'm thinking that could be helpful. Will it include all grants of all types?

Not capital capital projects, but that's what we have a fund. That's why we call operating grants, but the male one exception currently is we the MVP grant that we receive we do have those revenues coming into the general fund because they're paying for police and fire officers and they're paid out of there, but all the others will be in this These are grants we receive and give and These are the ones we receive and expend.

So grants we give to are included in that, right?

No, these are just the ones we receive and we have expenditures for.

Okay. Thanks.

Yeah. Like, for example, The orchestra and the ballet those are not in here. We give we grant money or to the Boys and Girls Club. That's not in this grant fund. OK so Liz if you could pull up the resolution please on the general fund option. And then if you could maybe zoom in a little and scroll down to the attachment. So this is kind of the line item detail of what I just reviewed with you. So number one here, this is the transfer to reserves for snow removal. So you can see over on the far right the variance from what was in the tentative to what we're suggesting we revise. The difference is we're reducing those three line items, which equate to $81,129, wanting to put that in reserves for a contingent snow removal. Number two is the grant acquisition cost for the water fund. We're reducing that by $50,000. Number three, that's the combination of the two funds for this recreation center and the recreation fund. Number four is the cleaning up of the non-departmental. So we reduce general government and the utility box art and include the cultural series. And then on to the next page. Number five, we have the healing field, moving that from non-departmental, 10,000. Number six is this operational grants. And I think that's everything. So those are the suggested amendments we're making now. We have this resolution, which you would need to, if you want to amend it or have other amendments, needs to be done by before June 30th. Also we have resolution 2663C which sets the property tax rate. That one needs to be done prior to June 22nd because that lets the county know if there's an intent to change it. The way it's drafted right now is to not not the rate won't exceed the certified rate. So no property tax increase and then out the canyons service district is still on the tax rolls and Labeled that even though you've changed the name of the center So that's we have two resolutions regarding out the canyon service district one is for the adoption of that budget the other one is to set the tax rate and it's drafted is not to exceed the certified rate and And then later tonight we have an RDA meeting where we have resolutions for the RDA budget as well. One thing I just want to remind you too is there was some new state legislation that was passed this year that requires the council by June 13th, if you want to, have a property tax increase, there has to be a hearing by then. So if there's any intention of that, please let us know as soon as possible. There's also a provision in that law that says we need to notify the tax commission by June 1st. So that's next week of our intent to have that hearing before the 13th. So there is some calendar logistics there that we have to try to balance to meet that. So if there is any intent from the council to do that, please let us know as soon as you can so we can comply with that. Any questions?

Madam Chair, can I ask a question?

Sure.

Just related to the hearing, Brian, so if we were going to consider a property tax increase, we'd have to hold the hearing on by the 9th? That's our last meeting date before the 13th?

Before the 13th, yes. That's my understanding. Gotcha. And there will be.

Council members any questions for Brian. OK. This is a public hearing so we'll open this to public comment. I have no blue cards for this. But if anyone would like to speak to it make your way up to the podium. And Dustin if you want to invite people online.

Of course thank you Madam Chair. If you're joining us this evening virtually via Zoom and you'd like to comment on the public hearing item number five on tonight's agenda just go ahead and click the raise hand button on your screen now and I'll call your name in the order in which you raised your hand and you'll have three minutes. Not seeing any hands raised. All right.

So we will close the public hearing. No, we will not.

Yeah, you're not closing the public hearing.

Relating to the motion, do you want a motion just to next week and then another motion next week to extend again or what do you want?

You can do it via motion. I don't know that you necessarily need to just to continue the hearing. The only motion you'd want to make is if you were going to make a motion to adopt any of the budget resolutions or to adopt any of the resolutions setting the tax rates.

Okay. All right. I'm good to just leave it open-ended.

So we don't need a motion if – So the 2663C is the resolution setting the tax rate as is, right? With no increase?

Yep. We could do that.

Okay. I'll make a motion that we approve Resolution 2663C.

Second I was considering whether or not if we're not considering it then we can maybe just cross that off the list All right, we have a motion and a second do we have discussion on the motion I

Seeing nothing. We're taking a roll call vote on a motion to adopt 20, what was it, 363. 26. 26, 63C. Which is, yeah. Leaving the tax rate as is. Leaving the tax rate as is.

Right. Ms. Nickel. Yes. Ms. D'Souza.

Yes.

Mr. DeKaiser. Yes.

Yes.

Ms. Stroud?

Yes.

Ms. Hausman? Yes. Ms. Sharkey? Yes. Madam Chair, that motion carried 6-0.

All right. Do we want to talk about the other, Alta Canyon? Can we kick some of those off, or? Um.

You know, we know some budget amendments are coming. I don't know what's coming.

Thank you.

Madam Chair, can I ask a question to Brian about the tax rate for Alta Canyon? Brian, did you say we have to notify the, was it the state? By the first?

The state tax commission, we need to let them know, yeah, by the first, of our intent to hold a hearing to consider an increase.

Gotcha. So, Madam Chair, I would say if there's If you're considering that, you'd want to decide that tonight so that we could let the State Tax Commission know if there's an intent to hold the hearing. Is that correct, Brian?

Yeah.

Okay, so let's go back to what that resolution is. Which resolution number?

26-64C.

And the way it's drafted right now is to set the rate not to exceed the certified rate, same as the one you just passed, but for the Altus Kenyans Service District.

I move that we approve resolution 26-64C.

Second.

Any discussion to the motion?

All right. Roll call vote, actually. And so just really quick, because we didn't really go into detail on these resolutions, that means that we are setting it at the same rate that it currently is. We're not exceeding that, right?

It's at the certified rate, whatever. They'll tell us that by hopefully June 8th. OK. Thank you.

Okay. Ms. D'Souza?

Yes.

Ms. Nickel?

Yes. Ms. Houseman?

Yes. Ms. Sharkey? Yes. Mr. DeKaiser?

Yes.

Ms. Stroud? Yes. Madam Chair, that motion carried 6-0. Okay.

All right. Moving on to item number six, which is an RDA meeting.

And so... Can we make a motion to recess into... recess the city council meeting and go into RDA?

I'll second your motion. Okay. Do we need a roll call?

No madam chair no all in favor aye any opposed all right thank you madam chair good evening board members tonight is just a public hearing for the RDA budget and if I don't have anything to present if you have any questions I'm here to answer any questions and that's that's the main item tonight

You have a second item, too, tonight. OK. So let's start with the public hearing for the RDA budget. Any questions for Casey? I don't see anything. I will call for a public comment, then, and open this public hearing for the RDA budget. I have no blue cards. Dustin, do you want to go ahead and invite online participants?

Of course, Madam Chair. If you're joining us virtually via Zoom this evening and you'd like to comment on the RDA public hearing this evening for the RDA budget adoption, go ahead and click the raise hand button on your screen now and I'll call your name in the order in which you raised your hand. You'll have three minutes. I'm not seeing any hands raised, Madam Chair.

MS. All right. Casey, what other business do you have for us?

MR. The other item on the agenda is just approval, looking for approval of minutes from the RDA meeting on April 14 to 2026. MS.

Does someone want to make a motion on that?

MS.

I'll make a motion to approve those minutes.

MS. Second.

MS. All right, Casey, we have a motion and a second.

Go ahead. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Aye. Any opposed?

That's all I have.

All right.

Madam Chair, I just missed this. Did you close the RDA public hearing?

No.

You did not?

No.

Did you continue it?

No.

Okay. Would you like to close the RDA public hearing or would you like to continue the RDA public hearing?

I'd like to continue.

So we briefly talked about, remind me again about, so we can close it but continue to take public comment on it until we've adopted the overall budget?

It's only a matter of order on the agenda, if I'm being honest. Because sure, you could have the council meeting and have the continued budget public hearing. And you could also have the RDA meeting with a continued hearing. And then each week, we'd have to open it. Casey would have to produce an RDA agenda. And we'd have to hold that separate hearing. And people could come comment on the RDA item. But really, you could just have the budget item. And people are going to comment on the budget one way or the other. So you would be saving staff work if we closed the RDA hearing.

But it doesn't mean that public comment can't still be made on the RDA budget.

I mean, people can make comment on the city budget. I don't think you guys are going to prevent them from providing you with comment on the RDA budget.

But what we're doing is we don't have to convene an RDA meeting every single week.

We will have to do so once we, on the evening that you're going to adopt the RDA budget.

I'm good with that. Everybody comfortable with that?

To close the public comment on the RDA budget. Right?

On the public hearing.

Yeah, there's no motion necessary. I think you can just either... The chair can close it.

I'll close the public hearing on the RDA budget.

Thank you Madam Chair. That's all I have.

Thank you. Okay. We're at the bottom of our agenda. Oh yeah. Please go ahead.

Motion to convene the regular city council meeting.

Second. All in favor. Any opposed. All right. Going to the regular agenda, we're on standing reports.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Give me just one moment here. So believe it or not, next week we're in June. So next week's agenda, we do have a presentation related to RDA-owned property that has the potential for some future housing projects. This kind of came out of our housing workshop series. And so Casey will be presenting that. We have the voting item for the tier two public safety rate pickup that Katrina presented this evening. Council Member Stroud tentatively has her second reading on her item she presented tonight scheduled. Council Member Houseman has her second reading scheduled for the communications division amendments that she presented last week or two weeks ago. I can't remember. And we tentatively have an item for council member budget proposals scheduled. There are some of those in progress. And then we have the continued public hearing for the budget. And then we will add on the continued public hearing for the increases in salary for municipal officers. So that's next week's agenda at this point. One other note, I'm sure nobody's going to be surprised that I bring this up, but tonight is Liz's last meeting, last council meeting after five years with us. We're going to have a farewell event for her on Monday, kind of at the end of the day, like 3.30 to, I think, 3 to 4.30, Liz, is that right? 3 to 4.30. So please stop by and say goodbye to Liz and curse the state of Maine with me, because that's what I'm doing. But yes, so please stop by on Monday. And thanks to Liz for all of her amazing work. Just really appreciated working with her over the last five years, as I know we all have. So she gets free Tuesday nights from here on out, which is great for her, but not so much for us.

You can watch the meeting online.

The other thing that I would like to mention kind of on the flip side of that is most of you did express that you're interested in reviewing the kind of initial crop of the communications director applications that we received. A couple of you didn't say that you were interested, but I just sent it out to everybody. I'd love you all to review them if you can. I think that would be great. At this point, we had 25 applicants. They look pretty well qualified. We may get some more. I'll send those out if we do. But I emailed you today, and what I'm hoping is that you'll take a look at that group, you'll take a look at the job specifications, And you'll respond to me by next Monday with who you would say initially your kind of top five candidates are. And we'll use that when we meet next week to figure out who we're going to interview. My goal is to kind of interview everybody who is well qualified. And I'll kind of keep you updated on the process as we go from there. But that's the first step. Please review those. Please send me your top five by Monday. If you don't want to do it, you don't want to participate, that's fine. I won't chide you for it, but I'd love you all to participate if you could. I think that's it, Madam Chair. Thank you.

Ms. Nichol. Lins, will you come up here, please? There's an empty seat next to me. Will you come up here? Yes. It may not be your last day, but it's your last council meeting. So we just have a couple of gifts for you. We have to mark this.

It is your last city council meeting.

Do you want to talk into the microphone? Everybody wants to do that.

All I said was she made me come up here so that everyone could see me cry. Thank you guys so much. I can't tell you how lucky I feel to have this. This is my first job out of college. I feel like I kind of struck gold with it. I've learned so much and have enjoyed so much here. All the people, all the relationships, all the projects and everything, it's just been so great. Maine is home, so it is happy to go back, but really, really sad to leave. And Monday's going to be really difficult. So everyone come and bring happy vibes because I'm going to be trying not to cry all day. So thank you guys so much.

If you miss us, you can always tune in on Tuesdays. You know, I probably will.

What else am I going to do with Tuesday nights? Oh, my goodness. I can't imagine it.

Well, obviously, it's not your last day. We'll say all the right things on your last day, but we're going to miss you. Thank you. All these years with us at council meetings, we're going to miss you, Liz.

Do you want me to open this? Should I just take it?

Yeah, you can just take it. Thank you, guys.

All right, council member business, guys.

Last Wednesday, so we met with CDBG and had a wonderful tour over at the MVP. Part of CDBG is to distribute federal dollars out to businesses that serve Sandy residents in areas of need. And the MVP is one of them that applies. and that the CDBG has awarded several years, the past couple of years at least. And so the committee wanted to go over and take a tour of it. And looking at it from two years ago when we were first over there, I mean, just how much they have done and hearing about the amount of lives that they have impacted. It was great for the committee to be able to hear that, to ask those questions, to have them answered, and for them to see firsthand where the money that they are allocating, where it's going. So it was a very, very positive tour. And I think the committee was very fortunate to have that. to have that time. So thank you, Community Development. Please pass that along to Mr. Warner, as well as to MVP.

Thank you. Thank you. I attended the Senior Center Advisory Board meeting last week, and they had their, I was going to say 4th of July, Memorial Day barbecue this last Friday. They are preparing for their annual car show, which I believe, let me just check, is September 10th. It's a big event for them because they use it a lot for fundraising. Outside of that, the thrift store that they run is their other major revenue source for different things. For example, the senior center's advisory board budget just replaced blinds with roller shades to be more energy efficient. I think that was kind of the goal because the others were not and everything was getting really hot. And the county did provide them with a really nice little letter saying, you know, thank you. That is so nice. You know, it is a facility kind of thing. They are looking to raise money for, I believe, some new dumbbells, barbells, I guess more dumbbells, because they are worn out. And it sounds like that may need to come from their Uh, advisory budget as well. And so the car show is going to be a big deal for them. Um, they were asking for, um, help with. Advertising that from the city. And so maybe that's an opportunity for our city communications to reach out to Cindy, um, to allow there to get some information and maybe share on some of our socials. I know they're trying to reach out to, I believe Merle regarding the amphitheater sign. to be able to advertise for that during a specific window to try to drive some traffic there. So if the administration might consider reaching out, can you have communications reach out? OK. That would be great. Thank you. Other than that, they were able to get some planting done. The senior center was not on the beautification day list, but they were really appreciative that the parks department was able to go back and clear out some of the dandelions that were growing in the grass and get some of the annuals planted. So they wanted me to express appreciation to the parks department for getting that done. And that is all I have right now. Thank you.

All right.

Ms. Hausman.

Yes, thank you, Madam Chair. First, Liz, I know I'm not there in person, and I'm hoping you see me trying to make eye contact with you. I do not blame you for going to Maine. A few years ago, I was able to experience Maine for the first time with my mom, and I have some beautiful memories of Maine, and it is gorgeous. So I understand, but we're going to really miss you. The only other thing I had was just I want to take a bit of my report time to kind of acknowledge Memorial Day. We all shared in that opportunity to pause and remember yesterday on Memorial Day. Over the weekend while I was traveling, I had a really interesting opportunity to connect with a veteran Marine. I won't hold that against him. I'm go Army, but we love our Marines as well. He and I joked about that rivalry between the different branches. And hearing him talk about his service, the fact that his son also became a Marine, once a Marine, always a Marine, he said, And then he very tenderly spoke about some of his battle buddies that he has lost. And so we had an opportunity to kind of connect literally on Memorial Day. And I was able to learn a little bit about what his service has meant to him, thank him for his service. And we both discussed the fact that it really is, of course, about the soldier who dons the uniform, but it is also about the family. who serves alongside the soldier. And so Memorial Day is absolutely an opportunity to remember those who've donned the uniform and lost their lives in service to our country. And it's also an opportunity to remember the families because they have served and sacrificed and lost as well. So I wanted to just say once again how grateful I am for our collective effort as a city to bring the Gold Star Family Memorial Monument to our city hall campus to have that very dedicated space to remember the fallen, remember the families. who are left behind and offer a space where people can gather, can remember, can honor. And we, as a community, signal to those families that we are indeed wrapping our arms around them, that we will never forget, that we honor the fallen, but we honor them as well. And so I'm grateful for Memorial Day. It's a very... tender time. And for many, it is a very, very difficult day. And I just wanted to pause and honor the fallen and honor the families of the fallen. We will not forget either their loved ones or the sacrifices that they, as family members, have made. That's all I had. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you.

I never want to let the opportunity to get away from me this time of year to thank the Public Works Department and especially the Streets Division for the bulk waste program. It is a thing to behold every single year watching those guys work the streets and pick that up and the expertise that they show. And even if you're driving down the street and you can see them ahead of you working on something, just slow down a little bit because they'll be done in a second. They're so fast. I just Ryan please tell them how much we appreciate the program and how well they do it and that we do hear from our constituents every single year with appreciation for that program. It is so popular in Sandy. So we appreciate them this year as we do every year. All right. Mayor's report.

I just want to welcome the Elterview Hospital Behavioral Health Center that opened last week. It's one of only seven centers in the nation that offer this type of mental health crisis care. It's walk-in, immediate mental health care support services available right here in Sandy. There's a special wing that's dedicated to new mothers, maternal mental health care, and very specialized top tier Facility we're very very proud to welcome them to sandy the Altaview Hospital is one of our healthy sandy partners and this This new center is a huge investment by Intermountain Health in the well-being of our community very honored to have to be their host city So pleased to attend Memorial Day events, the Falcon Park Neighborhood Breakfast. Thank you to Lynn Olson and all the organizers. For 30 years, the neighborhood has been hosting the Memorial Day Pancake Breakfast. And it's great to see everybody who turned out for that. Honoring veterans with an honor guard flag ceremony. Thank you to Chief Niber for attending with me. Thanks to all the neighborhoods around Falcon Park and the Silver Mesa Elementary, so proud to live in that community. They express so much appreciation to the city for all the great services we provide. The city provides the neighborhood. Also attended the Sandy Senior Center Barbecue last Friday for Memorial Day and Thanks to all the organizers, the cooks, the servers, and those in attendance. If you are in senior status and not taking advantage of the services, the conversation groups, the socialization, the meals at the senior center, you're really missing out. Exercise classes, art classes, want to put in a big pitch for our Sandy Senior Center and thank our county partners. That's it.

CAO report.

I don't have anything. Thank you.

All right and the recreation center.

Thanks to the council. The construction project at the Sandy Recreation Center continues to go strong on budget and on time. This past week, the air handlers have been delivered. The HVAC crews continue the overhead duct work at the Fieldhouse and Gym. Still crews finished decking the pool equipment area. Concrete crews poured some of the hallways, the group fitness room, and the exterior stair walls. Framing was complete on the east elevation. And in this coming week, the job site was closed yesterday for the holiday. Roofing crews have begun installing the roofing insulation and membrane. Overhead mechanical plumbing, fire sprinklers, and the electrical will continue over the gym and field house. And finally, the still crews will finish decking the main entrance and the office areas.

Thank you, Ben. Appreciate it. All right, that's it. Would anyone like to make a motion to adjourn? Move to adjourn. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? No. Thank you, everyone. Have a good evening.