City Council - Regular Meeting

All right, we'll call the meeting to order, beginning with the invocation and the pledge. Almighty God, send down upon those who hold office in this city the spirit of wisdom, compassion, and justice. Grant that with steadfast purpose, we may faithfully serve our community, seeking the common good, protecting the vulnerable, and promoting the well-being and harmony of all who dwell here. Amen. Amen. Pledge. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Okay, all members are present and accounted for. First up is ceremonies and announcements. Today we have three proclamations beginning with um Arbor Day. Whereas in 1872, J. Sterling Morton proposed to the Nebraska Board of Agriculture that a special day be set aside for the planting of trees and a holiday called Arbor Day was first observed with the planting of more than a million trees in Nebraska. Arbor Day is now observed throughout the nation and world. Trees can reduce the erosion of our precious top soil, lower heating and cooling costs, clean the air, produce oxygen, and provide habitat for wildlife. Trees are a renewable resource, giving us paper, wood for our homes, fuel for our fires, and countless wood products. Trees in our city increase property values and beauty beautify our community. Trees wherever they are planted are a source of joy and spiritual renewal. Now therefore, I Randy Wesland, mayor of the city of Postfalls, Idaho, do hereby proclaim April 24th, 2026 as Arbor Day in Post Falls and urge all citizens to plant and care for trees to gladden the heart and promote the well-being of this and future generations. Next up is Military Child Month. Whereas April is the month of the military child, an opportunity to recognize military children for their resilient spirits, personal sacrifices, strong character, and courage. And whereas military children are part of the strength of our nation as they support and encourage their service members with a fierce patriotic spirit. And whereas these children are a source of pride for the great state of Idaho and to us all. And it is only fitting that we take time to recognize their contributions. And whereas military children continue to make significant contributions to family, community, and their nation as they endure prolonged and repeated absences of one or both parents. And whereas a month-long salute will recognize that military children serve to and citizens of Idaho will be afforded the opportunity to dawn the color purple every Friday of April in support of these children. Now therefore, I, Randy Westland, mayor of the city of Post Falls, Idaho, do hereby

proclaim April 26 to be the month of the military child. In witness whereof I have here unto set my hand and cause to be affixed to the great seal of the city of Post Falls, Idaho on this seventh day of April in the year of our Lord 2026. Take a picture with you.

Yes, let's do that in just a moment. Let me do the third proclamation and then we can do some photos. Yeah. Uh National Fallen Fighter Fighters Memorial. Whereas the United States Congress and President of the United States have designated the day of the annual National Fallen Firefighters Memorial Service as a day to honor firefighters and emergency services personnel who have sacrificed their lives to save others by lowering the American flag on all federal buildings to half staff. And whereas an average of 80 firefighters courageously make the ultimate sacrifice in the line of duty each year. And whereas firefighters and emergency services personnel play an essential role in the protection of lives and property in our local community. And whereas is it is of great importance that we increase and support the efforts to reduce deaths, injuries, and property losses from fire. And whereas on June 29th, 2025, Coupney County Fire and Rescue Battalion Chief Frank J. Harwood and Celane Fire Department Battalion Chief John G. Morrison lost their lives in the line of duty. Now therefore, I, Randy Westland, mayor of the city of Postf Falls, do hereby proclaim that Post Falls observes National Fallen Firefighters Memorial Day on May 3rd, 2026 in recognition of the patriotic service and dedicated efforts of our fire and emergency services personnel by lowering American flags in all buildings to half staff. I encourage residents and businesses to pay respect to the survivors of our fallen heroes by participating in light the night for fallen firefighters from April 26 to May 3rd by lighting glowing or shining red lights on their landmarks, businesses, firehouses, and homes. In witness whereof, I have here unto set my hand and caused to be affixed the great seal of the city of Post Falls, Idaho on this 21st day of April, the year of our Lord, 2026. All right, now we can do some some brief photos and we'll continue. I hope they're going to do it in front

of the Want me to stand up?

No problem. Oh,

hi. How are you? Good to see you, too.

You look like you're just out there. Thank you guys so much for all you do. All right, moving on. Are there any amendments to the agenda? There are none tonight, sir.

Declarations of conflict, exparte contacts, and site visits. Seeing none, move on to please present the consent calendar. Item A is minutes from the April 7th, 2026 city council meeting and item B is payables April 8th through April 22nd, 2026. This is the shortest one we've had in a long time. Any questions on that? I move to approve the shortest ever consent calendar I've had in 15 years on the council. Second. Motion in a second. Further discussion. Roll call, please. Luca, hi Malloy. Hi Mosby. Hi PL. Hi Ziggler. I Stigler I.

Motion passes. Thank you. On to public hearings. Tonight we have one. City of Post Falls 2025 transportation master plan. We'll open the public hearing.

Good evening honorable mayor, members of the council. Robert Paulace, city engineer. So tonight for this public hearing, you were pre provided in your council packet a copy of the 2025 transportation master plan. In it, it included appendices that document the travel demand modeling, the capacity analysis reports, project cost data, and openhouse signin and comments. Staff is requesting tonight that upon your consideration of the materials presented to you, public testimony received, and your deliberation that you approve the 2025 transportation master plan for adoption and implementation. Our transportation master plan is part of our comprehensive plan. Development of the transportation master plan works with adopted goals and policies from the comprehensive plan. The desired results of a transportation master plan is to provide a safe, efficient, and reliable transportation system by identifying and addressing anticipated transportation needs for our planning horizon. In this case, through 2045. Implementation of the transportation master plan allows staff to provide you, the city council, the planning and zoning commission, and the general public with guidance on determining impacts of proposed land use actions, whether that be annexations, zone changes, special use permits, subdivisions, or site plan reviews. It gives us the opportunity to take a look at a project and say, does it correspond with the land use assumptions that we have in the master plan? What are the impacts of that going to be if it gets a gets adopted, is an additional traffic study needed for that project that's being proposed, and how do we see projects being implemented in that area that may impact a project's development?

The 2025 transportation master plan is built on 2023 traffic data and it would replace our current 2017 transportation master plan. The 2025 model is built off the Coupney Metropolitan Planning Organization's regional model and it allows a more refined look at the local transportation system while coordinating with the regional model and needs. Traffic count data was collected from over 80 intersections in the city of Post Falls to allow for calibration between the local and the regional model. The 2025 model takes into consideration the best available information of long range and and ongoing planning efforts by the Idaho Transportation Department such as the Ratham Prairie area transportation study and the I90 widening whether that be the current work that's ongoing now between Postf Falls and Celane or the future anticipated work through the city of Post Falls itself. The development of the 2025 master plan included coordination with the Coupney Metropolitan Planning Organization, the Postfalls High Highway District, the Idaho Transportation Department, emergency services, the Postfall School District. We incorporated a technical advisory group. We held stakeholder interviews. There were two public open houses held. We had public outreach at postfalls days in 2025. And there were two council workshops with you. The 2023 traffic data reflects a transportation system today that is in relatively good operating conditions. There are some areas of concern in the current modeling, but those areas are currently being mitigated, whether that's through projects that are already under construction or projects that are in the planning stages for development and construction within the next two years. Amongst those would be the Pleas Pleasant View and State Highway 53 interchange which ITD is working on, the I941 interchange which is near nearing completion and then traffic signals

which we are anticipating in the next couple years at Idaho and 15th, Spokane and 15th and some lane access restrictions at Idaho and 12th amongst other plans. The master plan identifies projects needed to address anticipated growth. It's divided into three sections. short-term projects which are in the next zero to five years, midterm projects which are identified for five to 10 years out and then long-term projects which are anticipated as being needed between now in the year 2045. We also have an implementation plan where we take what the model shows is these are the projects that are needed and try to look at it a little bit more from a realistic taking in some of the political and development aspects that are out there as to how do we make these plans work with how we see growth actually occurring. Where are some of those funds going to be coming from? And allowing the flexibility too as to as the rather prairie area transportation plan comes to fruition. Does that impact some of the things that we have projected as well? In 2023, the city hired JB engineers to conduct the analysis of our city's transportation network, identify projects that were needed, and address growth between now in the year 2045. Tonight, we have with us representatives from JUB who will be giving the more in-depth presentation. We have Mr. Sean Hoisington, a professional engineer with JUB, and he has managed the development of the final product before you this evening and implementation of tools that will be utilized by staff to help get you the best information in the future. We also have Miss Riannan Zender who is also a professional engineer and she's managed and been with this project since its beginning with the development of the collection of traffic data, the coordination with the Kney Metropolitan Planning Organization, uh system modeling and development of the projects that address growth. So unless you have any questions from me, I

will then turn it over to Jub. Who who do you want to answer? I have questions, but I don't know if you want me to ask them to you or to the engineers. So, since this is a public hearing, you can ask me staff questions now. Uh you can also ask questions during the time that Jub is making their presentation. And then there's also the chance um if there's public testimony for rebuttal, which I think JUB and I will tag team. So, if you have some staff direct questions, I can answer those now. Okay. I'm not sure who they're more appropriate for, but I like asking you questions. You always give me great answers. So, okay,

I think I'll start with you. After reviewing the transportation master plan and listening to some of our upcoming projects, I am truly concerned that we don't have a reasonable north north south like thoroughfare in postfalls. um especially if we're implementing additional like lights and traffic control mechanisms on Idaho and Spokane. So I'm curious in the master plan I really didn't see a road like you can get from Prairie to what is it like maybe pole line on Cecil without like too much like you can just go straight down on Spokane. you can get from pole line to Mullen before you start hitting a lot of so I think like there's just not a part of post falls where you can truly get across town and as we become larger and spread more into the prairie. I'm curious about how that's being addressed in this master plan.

So for our transportation system where we're at, you know, where we have our traffic signals and our roundabouts, those do control and slow down traffic. Yeah, as traffic along those major corridors, and I'm going to say the major corridors for us would be Pleasant View Road, Maguire, Chase, Spokane, Idaho, Greens Ferry.

Those roads in and of themselves, we want traffic to be on those roads. And as traffic increases on them, it's going to increase the need of putting traffic control systems, whether they be roundabouts or uh traffic signals, at strategic locations. But at every block, I mean, we're talking about putting a traffic control on Spokane at Pole Line, 12th, Mullen, Seltis, the interstate on the other side on fourth, like how do you get across town north and south? So on Idaho and Spokane Street in particular. Yeah.

So we are looking at as you go further to the north that the traffic signal spacing is going to be about a half mile. So you've got a signal at Mullen Avenue on both Spokane and Idaho right now. A half mile north is 15th and then a half mile north of that is Pole Line where we switch over to a roundabout.

We're now at the stage over the past 25 years we've gone from three traffic signals to now we have 20 in our inventory. And we're now at that state where we need start to start looking at more technology implementation where the traffic signals are going to be talking to each other to create these traffic engineers are going to call them green bands so that you get traffic to move through so that you try to you're at one stop light. When it turns green, you move through and you go at the speed limit. You should hit the next light as being green. One really good um location which I'd like to point out as a recent implementation of that in that uh technology is in the city of Celane. They have taken government way and they've coordinated the traffic signals on government way from Apple Way all the ways up to uh the signal that's before Prairie. Prairie becomes the s city of Hayden. I have started going that route because I am just amazed at I will hit one red light and then I'll hit green lights almost the rest of the way through there most times of the day or the weekend when I happen to go through that

different than the optimization of Northwest and the 90 which is a nightmare that that is a nightmare that's one of those problems and we have that similar problem down here on Spokane Street between Mullen Avenue and the freeway we have a lot of traffic signals in a very tight corridor and it gets very difficult to coordinate that especially when you're trying to move around 20,000 vehicles per day through that corridor.

So can I restate then an answer to my question based on what you've said which would be there isn't really an intention to have like a stretch of north south roadway um that that you're able to travel without having lights. The idea is to put the interchanges in there and then optimize the lights so that if you're going the speed limit, you can drive through. That is correct. I don't like that. I'm going to be really honest with you. Okay.

Um but that's okay. It's an answer to my question and and that that's what I appreciate. So that makes me nervous then about this plan. I I I appreciate the stretches and postfalls where some people like to insinuate last week that that's because I speed and that is not the reason. I just like to be able to drive down the street and not stop every half mile. Um, so okay. So there's no real intention of having other than Pleasant View and then the 50 or the 41 which are on opposite sides of the city a way to just get from the north side to the south. We started to look at trying to put in what you're talking about is what we would consider a principal arterial roadway.

Okay. Uh, Celty Sway is a principal arterial roadway, but we have traffic signals on it. I I'm aware. And that causes it that slows down your ability to move through town at a higher rate of speed. The higher the rate of speed you go and trying to handle more traffic. It's not about the speed, it's about the stops.

It's about the stops. But if you want to prevent the stops, you then have to widen the roadway and reduce the access onto those corridors. So you'd be shutting off all the side streets so that you would then get to a point where you can only access at half mile or mile spacings and then you would then see that you would need to put traffic signals or roundabouts at those access points. Is not our philosophy for um roads off of like the 41. Isn't our philosophy there to have them at a quarter mile and a half mile? Traffic signals at half mile spacing and 3/4 turn restriction at

package roads. Thank you. I'm talking about baggage roads. Yeah. Or surface roads. Okay. All right. So, I would love to have this conversation with you in a time that doesn't make everyone stay here till 11, but it sounds like there's not a plan in the way that I am imagining it in the traffic master plan. Um, could you tell me a couple of things that were actually changed in this master plan um from maybe what was originally proposed by the consultant based on public input from these different outreaches that we had? Uh, one of the areas would be Mullen Avenue where we were looking at Mullen Avenue in the original layout to be a larger and wider roadway.

Okay. Uh the problem with that that we saw both from some public input as well as um staff input as well was that trying to push the width of um Cecil Road would end up getting into the point where we would need to do multiple access or multiple rightway acquisitions possibly buying out entire row of homes along one side or both sides in order to fit a larger roadway on Okay. Um, trying to think off the top of my head where there were other changes that were drafted. I know that there were, but I can't think of any right off the top of my head.

Okay. Okay. Um, I think maybe that's mostly what I have for you. Okay. Yeah. So, anyway, thank you so much.

You're welcome. Anyone else? Okay. I'll turn it over to Mr. Sean Hoisens. Thank you very much. Good evening. I wanted to thank you guys for the opportunity tonight to present these highlights from your 2025 transportation master plan. And of course, as um Rob mentioned, uh Rian and Zinder, the one in charge of the traffic analysis for the entire project, is with me tonight, and she's going to share this presentation. Um uh this effort represents a a comprehensive regional uh regionally coordinated evaluation of your transportation system and and it reflects input from city staff and partnering agencies and and the community of course throughout the entire planning process. And tonight culminates in a custom implementable plan that helps guide growth, improve connectivity and support the community for years to come. and and and this transportation plan depicts a pre-planned future where Post Falls um continues to grow with intention but at the same time um maintains your character as a community and continues your record of excellence in transportation service. I want to talk just a little bit about the highlights of what we'll discuss tonight. First of all, I wanted to talk about uh just some acknowledgement of the planning partners that were engaged in the in the process. Also overview the transportation planning goals that were used as guidance. We also wanted to highlight the process for developing your plan and that's going to be the bulk of what we talk about. And then also Rian's going to take us into more detail about the results uh and recommended improvements from the plan. One of the catalysts for success that in

this planning effort was a truly engaged technical advisory group and starting with your staff and council participation. The tag also included ITD, KMPO, Postf Falls Highway District and the city of Celane. But also profoundly helpful were the many community collaborators that I'm showing you on the screen here. A few of them, you know, of course, were Kney County Sheriff's Office, Postfalls Police Department, uh, KCFR, Postf Falls Chamber, and the and the Postfalls School District. A really rich participatory group giving feedback and input to this planning process. Next, I want to just take a few seconds to talk about um, our guiding process as we moved from phase to phase along the uh, the pathway of developing the plan. We used nine specific transportation planning goals and the goals were well aligned with your comprehensive plan. In fact, in the plan document that you folks have in your packets, you can see connections between these transportation goals from the plan and also from your comprehensive plan. But they're well aligned and and and they cover subjects like access management and and safety and circulation and freight mobility and planning for multiple modes and coordination with the community uh the development community and corridor preservation and and and as we've already discussed quality coordination with adjacent planning partners. the plan development process. Uh as as you look at it kind of in a bird's eye view, public involvement was a overarching theme throughout the entire process. Um the community was engaged as Rob summarized basically from beginning to

end on the project and then the um planning was broken throughout that process. The planning process was broken into phases beginning with existing conditions assessment. Uh we're going to go through these for you. Multimmodal analysis, alternatives analysis and capital improvement planning, implementation planning as Rob has already mentioned, and also some very effective GIS tools for your staff. Just real closely or quickly looking at the public involvement process. Um just just for a minute zooming into that uh as we engaged in the planning process, we prioritized transport or excuse me transparency and meaningful engagement to help shape a plan that was guided by community input. And so the public involvement goals pursued during the process ensured for us that information was accessible to the community, that public interaction was meaningful, and that feedback was genuinely valued and reflected in the outcomes of the plan. And then thank you for the questions that you've already asked about that.

I'd love for you to tell me more ways that public input um actually shaped this like specifically as you go through if you could. That would be it would be really nice to be able to to bring along the actual to actually pull out the actual public comments and then show you because because it wasn't that necessarily that the planning process had one direction and that the public came along and changed that direction. It was all it was all developed at the same time. And so when we understood the public's concerns, those concerns were in our back pocket, so to speak, as we were developing solutions.

Maybe if you can think of an of an example when we get to that, this is one of those areas where the public gave us input and that's how we arrived at this decision. If you see any of those as you go through. Thank you.

Thanks. So, um, we supported these, uh, public involvement goals, uh, by using a wide range of outreach methods, um, to meet people where they were. And, and so this included in-person and online opportunities to participate. Uh, and the intent was to reach as many voices as possible using innovative methods of connection. And, and that helped us ensure that the feedback received was well-rounded and representative of the community. We also used many venues. Uh first of all, we had an interactive website. We used social media tidbits for a little bit of educational materials. We used open houses as venues for public interaction, personal interviews, technical advisory group interaction like we've mentioned. Also an interactive comment map that was g online and GISbased so that each person could actually just zoom in and share their concern at a certain spot. We had a booth at postfalls days and we also use uh manyformational flyers to help uh engage with the community. This the public involves the involvement process represented. It was genuine public involvement, public engagement, real opportunities for meaningful input and feedback. And the online system provided easy access to anybody wanting to participate. And the feedback was rich and it had experienced local knowledge and everyday user concerns ranging from vehicular to pedestrian to bicycle safety, transit, freeway access, congestion concerns, and even comments about beautifification of the city. Nearly 900 community members were engaged in that process.

moving forward in our planning process. Uh our existing conditions assessment um took a look closely at um existing and future land use the the transportation network as it exists today, existing transit, bicycle and pedestrian networks, gaps and sidewalks and other infrastructure and freight routes. and and in this stage stage we drilled into each one of these uh categories at the same time while we took traffic counts at 80 major intersections across the city. So this in a nutshell this assessment helped us really established a clearer picture of how the system functions today and it def it identified key components and patterns and gaps across the network and it also provided the foundation for all the planning recommendations that we're presenting to you in the plan. multimodal analysis uh was was the next part of our process and it really was truly multimmodal. Not only did we look very closely at the vehicular systems performance, but we evaluated pedestrian and bicycle potential and at the same time looking outwardly at local and regional multimmoal connectivity as you can see in the proposed multimodal projects. And then next um as we've evaluated your system, we looked from from a vehicular perspective, we looked at uh traffic volumes in the PM uh peak uh for current conditions and also projected that traffic into the future in 5, 10, and and 20 year horizons and looked at the at the results of growing that traffic and seeing the impacts of that traffic on our transportation system without making any improvements so we understand what the future looks like uh if we did

nothing and at the same time we looked at multimodal potential which I'm going to share with you in just a second we looked at uh the travel demand model that KMPO uses refining that and I'll talk about that a little bit more closely and we also evaluated in our existing system and multimodal analysis um crashes and So um one thing I wanted to mention here is to to estimate the the felt experience of transportation system users. We used our analysis tools to evaluate total hours and you can see on this slide as an example and in your plan total hours of system delay across the network in this in these PM peak hours. Uh estimated amounts of gas burned while you're waiting during that delay. and also the total number of stops during the analysis periods. And so these um these uh analyses and these measures help us uh you know appreciate the understanding that congestion is an experienced thing not just a calculated thing. And so we wanted to make sure that we could show you uh in our results that the improvements that we're suggesting do change the experience of each of your um uh transportation users.

And are these metrics annual?

No, these metrics were shown at um those peak times like 2030, 2035 and 2045, those horizon years. And so when we we measured for instance when we looked at 2030 and we measured the existing system we measured those metrics um in terms of uh again total hours of system delay felt at that period of time that PM peak hour of at 2030 as well as gas burn during that same time and the number of stops. And then when we created mitigation for that um for those uh for that system uh that that that increased system congestion, we were able to compare that and show that we've reduced the number of hours of delay and that we've reduced the number of gallons of gas sitting there waiting in a in a queue waiting for the light to turn green. Those types of things,

if I can say it another way. So there's 319 hours of delay that's on the sidebar. That's in what period of time? That's in the 5 to 6 PM peak hour of one of the days. Just a single day. One single day. Yes. So there's 319 hours of delay and 1,600 gallons of gas wasted in one hour in any given day. In the in in this case, we're reporting that in the PM peak hour, which is typically on your system and a lot of systems between 5 and 6 PM.

Thank you. So that's the number of hours of delay experienced during that peak hour, the number of gallons of gas. And so then that's that's something that we would compare to in the future and then in the future with mitigation. So yes, so mitigation wouldn't assume that we would get to say zero hours of delay. We would just this is the baseline by which we can gauge how effective those mitigation measures would be because we've taken it from 319 to 219 and we've saved a 100 hours of delay every day. Yeah.

Okay. And so and and of course we're all going to experience some delay especially in the PMP hour because everybody's getting off work and going to the grocery store and running home and picking up the kids. And so there's going to be delay at intersections but can we mitigate that delay so that it's minimized and and so the system continues to flow smoothly. Maybe you could look at like number of marriages saved or something like that too through that is a great idea. I want to write that one down. Homicides avoided.

Um, I want to focus just for a moment on multimodal evaluations. This was kind of a neat uh process that we used using our GIS tools. Um this uh this graphic uh was used to develop and then evaluate bicycle and pedestrianoriented needs and improvement scenarios. And so we used a GISbased what this is called as a heat map to help us discern where multimodal investments might have the highest potential to be beneficial. And so the heat map was developed by combining all kinds of aspects of common non-vehicular attributes. And some of those were population and job density. And so if there's a lot of, you know, dense population and and dense employment, walkable block sizes was another one. Public interest in multimodal enhancements, experience of excuse me, existence of sidewalks and bike routes, uh low vehicle ownership, mixture of land uses. And so all of those were kind of combined and created the different densities or shapes, excuse me, the different densities of that color blue, for instance. The deeper the blue, the more likely uh these things were all true. And and the more and the more the most beneficial or the most likely to be uh used would be uh a multimodal investment. And so you'll notice that our recommended multimmodal improvements kind of follow this general pattern. But uh in addition to that, they the multimodal improvements that we've suggested uh also realize that there's regional connectivity with other people's networks that would be nice to have connected together with Post Falls on the outskirts of town.

Well, I I do have a question particularly about this area um regarding bike paths and whatnot and you know, forgive me for not having as much familiarity. I wasn't involved in the workshops at the time uh while this was going through uh city council workshops. But does this plan and for understanding my concern is mostly about what the goal is for bicycle uh supporting infrastructure and my concern is mostly centered around you know we see around here particularly in Celane u during Iron Man preparation seasons cyclists are all over the place. Mh.

So, is this plan more designed in building a bicycle network that's more of a share your road model, share the road model, or more of a stay in your lane model, like we're trying to move cyclists out of the way of uh of cars?

Yeah, that's a good question. Um, I would say yes, a little bit of everything. Um, one of the things that we kept in mind during the the the development identification of multimodal improvements was uh what's called the industry calls level of stress. And so for instance um it was attractive to look for parallel opportunities just off the hightra uh arterial that we could use to to put uh bicycle traffic for instance. And so those just off that corridor, maybe one block off, they could be multimmodal pathways, they could be sheross or share the lane or they could be striped lanes. And so it kind of depended on the situation which one of the projects we you're looking at. But what we were trying to do is um provide a full um breadth of solutions depending on where you were at. And one of the big themes I think that I see through what we recommended were were an pretty decent expansion in multimotal pathways so that you could have bicycles and pedestrians on that same multi-use pathway. Um in areas that we did recommend uh share the road type lanes, it's very low traffic roads uh so that it would almost be natural that a person would be using a road like that uh trying to escape the stress of a higher a higher like like a higher traffic route like Seltis Way. So, uh, that's and then areas that we were I remember areas that we were looking at um in improving pedestrian or bicycle travel on busy corridors. We did suggest a couple places where we were going to where we suggested cycle tracks uh so that there was a little bit more of a barrier

between the traveling public between vehicular traffic and and bicycle traffic. So, does that answer it? Does. Thank you.

Thank you. any more on that? And then also um finally I wanted to just mention uh travel travel modeling. Um I wanted to mention that uh this analysis wasn't in a vacuum. Um instead we partnered with iteras inc to coordinate uh use of the KMO regional travel demand model. And this is a computer model used by KMPO for estimating vehicular trips produced and attracted by different land uses in the in town and and also evaluating the origins and destinations of those trips and then how to those trips are loaded onto the network. And so it was kind of a nice tool to be able to use for that. Um the regional model was refined by zooming in uh to Post Falls and breaking the larger areas into smaller zones. As you can see kind of in yellow, the the red were the larger and then the smaller zones were the the refined zones were in the yellow. Um, and really this helps us approximate a local versus regional travel and and model how people are going to move around within postfalls, not the more uh zoomed out look at the whole county or the MO boundaries. Um, and so it was uh it was a refined look at local operations while not uh neglecting regional impacts. So the regional impacts kind of fed into and in and at the the planning that was taking place in postfalls at the boundaries of the refinement that uh we worked with it to create and so we really appreciate that quality coordination with KMPO and are thankful for their participation in the planning process. Uh if there's not any more questions for me yet and again we can come back up and we can have us any discussion that you guys would like. Um, I'm gonna have Rianna come up and take

us forward. So, before you go, just back on the um bike commuting stuff. I used to be a bike commuter and that was a very daunting uh prospect. Um, yeah, sometimes. And what was really important is um and I'm just wondering if there's a mechanism a practical mechanism for this was I would use you know one of the mapping providers like Google or Apple or Strava to find

the route I was going to take and they would like update and improve that route map from time to time and I'm just wondering if there's a mechanism that you would share this with those services or how do they know like this is the preferred bike route for if you're getting going from here to here in the Yeah, I I haven't personally done that. Um I know that there is a mechanism. I'm I mean we all I don't know how many of you I I use a app called Trail Forks. Uh you can do that easily through there. Um but um one of the things that you'll notice in your multimodal improvements for instance um and I've ridden the route quite a few times as as many of you have is the Centennial Trail kind of in the Greens Ferry Road area. Um and so if you're riding along Greens Ferry kind of headed towards in the Celane direction all of a sudden uh at Greens Ferry the trail takes a gigantic detour. And that was one of the things that we wanted to make sure that we provided for. And so what we the the way we provided for that was was making the assumption and I think it's a realistic assumption and that's why it's in your plan that that rail corridor would eventually be a a railto trail or a or a bike a multi-use pathway. And so that that is a key connection. those those Centennial Trail connections are the Centennial Trail serves as a pretty decent um core for um for multimodal travel in in Post Falls actually for the whole region but in Post Falls. And you'll notice that we had uh we were serious about making connections in the north south to be able to draw that um that opportunity for multimotal travel north into town. But uh we did look for those opportunities to make those strategic connections so that the Centennial Trail connects right where it should instead

of having to jump over on your bike over to Saltis and ride down to the 41 interchange and you know and see if you can survive getting through it uh as you try to figure out how to get across onto the onto the multi. You go down to Ponderosa but yeah you do but yeah so anyway that's that's kind of the the approach we took. Okay. And yes uh uh we would we would be happy to look into that as well. Um updating those important if you want if you want adoption like if I look at Google maps and it it looks absolutely kamicazi to to ride my bike to this place then I'm not going to do it

right. If Google knows like hey we've got a good route for you the city set up this route adoption rates would be much higher.

Yeah good point. When it comes to inter modal, there's a lot of bias I think or pressure from international groups and um and federal groups as well to push people into more and more uh sustainable development goals and these types of things. Get out of your cars, 15minute cities. As you know, a lot has been made over agenda 2030 with the UN and all of that. How much of that, if any, has made its way I think the public's going to ask this, so I'm asking you now. How much of that has made its way into this transportation plan where we're looking at interotal and trying to encourage people to get out of their cars rather than just making it easier for those that wish to do so. There was not a in the planning process there wasn't there was a goal to to promote multi multiple modes of transportation and you can see that in the goals but there was not a goal for achieving a certain percentage of mode shift for instance there wasn't like a a goal of saying we want to get 10% of the people out of their cars and walking and so these are why these these changes are suggested But what there was was um a a more opportunistic approach to to making investments where they would be successful and most utilized. And so when we looked at the during the planning process, we looked to make sure that we weren't creating some sort of a multimodal improvement that was out someplace in some, you know, some uh area of town that just wouldn't really get used. Um it also corresponded with many times with vehicular corridors. And then also in the heat map that's on the screen. Uh

those are places where it's really likely that those types of improvements would really help. But there was not a a 15minute city agenda or anything like that that was used to um establish any of the proposed solutions in this plan. So the inner modal uh is more opportunity and um considered secondary to automobile traffic then I would say that it was considered um I don't know if it was I guess maybe in a as far as volume of effort in in terms of analysis uh just because of the nature of traffic analysis it was secondary but it was taken seriously and it was thought through with regard to regional connectivity and the Centennial Trail and also lowering stress of multimodal users. That's the way it was approached.

Thank you.

Anybody else? Thank you. All right. Um, moving along here in our plan development process, uh, talk a little bit about our alternatives analysis and capital improvement planning. Um so taking the traffic analysis results um from the the performance um analysis Sean previously discussed we went through an alternatives analysis process uh to determine what projects or improvements were needed to mitigate the congestion that we're anticipating um coming from the the new growth. Uh and then secondly um how much those improvements would cost. Uh so an example of an alternatives analysis that we went through many times was uh in the future seeing some potential degradation of operations of an intersection. Uh what is the improvement that would make that intersection function uh the way that we want it to? You know, was that a signal? Was that a roundabout? Um we take into consideration the context of the surrounding network. um the functional classification of the road uh the cost of the project um and refine that into a recommended improvement. Um want to touch on uh uh as as Rob did earlier on just the the change that is continuing to occur in our in our uh region and in our city. Um, and then, uh, how we addressed those influx transportation studies, the the Rather Prairie transportation study and then the I90 widening. Um, we we took the best information that we had and

incorporated that into our analysis. Um, knowing that in the future, uh, things will change. Um, but, uh, it's important that the city doesn't stop planning and looking and budgeting for the future. um and and just highlights the importance of continuing to update these plans on a periodic basis. So, uh from that traffic analysis, uh we uh determined that about 91 projects would be needed to make the system operate uh really well into 2045. So, those 91 projects included recommendations for 17 new signals, uh, I'm sorry, 13 new signals, 17 signal upgrades, five new roundabouts, five existing roundabouts that need some sort of expansion, um, some turn lane restrictions at six intersections across the city. Uh, five projects based, uh, purely on on safety needs. uh 27 corridor projects including 30 miles of roadway expansion and then uh 13 intersections where we identified the improvement needed as either a signal or a roundabout. Uh which provides the city with the flexibility um of looking at either one in the future and basing uh you know the the decision on the current uh safety needs, current capacity needs and budget available. Are these projects um prioritized?

Yeah. So, so they are prioritized um in three different buckets, not necessarily um in order. Uh so the way that the project will happen is going to be uh dependent upon uh the way that development occurs. Uh you know, we we may anticipate that a development is going to happen over here, but it gets delayed and something happens over here. So, a project may, you know, it may move from from midterm to shortterm. Uh, it may, you know, be shuffled around uh within those those those different buckets as well. So, it's it's a really flexible um plan that allows the city to uh move projects into different time frames as as they become needed.

Okay. there aren't like mission critical projects that need to be done regardless of growth that you identified. Um so there were a couple that we identified as needed currently. Um Rob touched on a couple of those. So the the uh Pleasant View Interchange. Yeah. Yep. So those those are um in the works. Okay. All right. Another question about this the short-term slide. Um obviously that's very immediate u projects that need to take place. Is there a total I for that row of costs? There is I'll get to that in just a moment.

And then once we have that total I want to know obviously funding is coming from impact fees, developer agreements or something to that effect and grants. And um is does any need to come from the general fund is is my first question and my second question is how much are we able to account for from the impact fees and developer agreements and grants? Um I think that's probably a question that Rob is going to need to to answer to to get to drill down to it, but I've got some general information I'll share with you that hopefully clarifies some of it. Okay. Just right now.

Can you come speak on the microphone? I was just saying Rian and you might spend just a minute explaining the difference between the analysis recommended short, medium, and long-term and implementation that's based on realistic situations. So they I can see ahead to that.

Sounds good. Yes. So, so these these lists are based purely on those the traffic modeling, the traffic analysis that we did and then the next step in the process was was taking these lists um you know in in workshop form uh what is realistically going on? What development does the city know is is upcoming? Um, and what maybe did the traffic model not show that that we know with our, you know, uh, local knowledge engineering judgment needs to to happen sooner or or maybe later and and this short-term list was, I'm assuming, created because the level of service was slipping in that Exactly. Yes.

Yep. Yes. Exactly. So, this this list you see here is based purely on on traffic analysis. Okay, these cost estimates, are these exclusively just the cost to do the improvement in already existing city rights of way or is this estimating the need to acquire land through eminent domain?

If the if the project uh needed right-of-way acquisition, that cost was accounted for in this process. also included is uh engineering design fees um construction administration costs uh and then the actual construction costs in addition to right away. Thank you.

All right, so moving along here um in addition to the vehicular projects um we also developed a list of 30 multimodal uh recommendations. Um, so those include new sidewalks, cycle tracks, uh, trail connections. Um, and again, as as uh Sean said, we we really focused on the locations that showed the most potential for demand. Um, and then um what would provide connectivity across the city. And then just to touch on some of the conversation earlier, I think, you know, we all we all recognize that um in the middle of winter using, you know, your bicycle to commute is is uh there's only a small fraction of people that might do that, right? So, um, we these multimodal improvements are not, uh, recommended to, you know, uh, be they're recommended to provide an alternative for the community should they want it, not um, force people to use it.

So, we're going to put the snow in the bike lane on some roads is what you're saying. Uh, yes, probably. So, got it. Okay.

All right. Um so additionally we reviewed many of the city standards used for um development. Uh so we looked at street standards so which is you the width of the roadway, how many lanes they have um features such as u bike lanes or or uh pathways and all of those are you know dependent upon the context of the road and and its use um and its functional classification. Uh we looked at the operational standards of roadways and intersections. Basically, you know, how easy it is or isn't to get around and what the city's tolerances are um for when a a development comes in and and puts that extra stress on the roadway. What is the city's, you know, what are they okay with? Um and then we also looked at uh access management standards, which is the spacing between roadways and driveways. Uh wanted to note here that there's a regional policy that um affects this a little bit. Uh the KMO critical arterial corridor policy um uh identifies a little bit different intersection um and access spacing um and Pleasant View Prairie, Hayden, and Greens are all considered um regional critical arterial corridors. Um and then we also reviewed the traffic impact study uh standards. Um and all of these are included uh in the new TMP. Um so next is the implementation planning. Um so when do these projects really need to happen? How do we make them happen? Kind of what we've been talking about. you know, we're taking we're taking the raw data, the raw output, you know, this is what's needed and then um kind of bring it in into um what we know um locally.

Uh so it's it's it's all based on timing um based on uh anticipated uh growth patterns and our regional modeling. Um the timing of this is based on on the best information that we have now and again uh things will change. Um uh but it does provide the city with flexibility to move things around um according to development potential funding availability and and and what's actually going on. So this is a list of our refined um short-term projects. This is what we're calling our implementation table. Um uh so in the in the plan there's a a detailed project description um expected cost including cost sharing um and expected impact fees, direct developer costs and then other sources such as grants from um state or uh the federal government. So uh the grand total for our show shortterm is a little bit over uh $10 million in 2025. Um, and uh, digging into into the the table a bit, I know it's kind of small. It's very small for you to read, but um, there's uh, it's it's defined there what we're expecting to be impact fees versus developer um, versus other.

Okay. Thank you.

You bet. So, and then this is uh, the midterm implementation list. um same information, detailed project description and impact or or cost sharing uh developer costs, etc. Uh grand total uh for this group of projects is just over $53 million in 2025. And then finally, our long-term implementation list. Um the needs really start showing up here. It's it's a longer period term. This is a 10-year window where the other two were five-year terms. Um, do want to mention here that a significant number of these projects may or may not be needed depending on the outcome of the Rathrum Prairie Transportation Study and um the ultimate uh buildout of of I90 and what happens with the interchanges along uh I90 through Post Falls. So bottom line on this one is um almost six uh 262 million

and that's all just capital improvement projects. That's not any that doesn't include anything having to do with maintaining current infrastructure.

That's correct. And this is assuming that the the growth that we have experienced in our region over the past you know 10 15 20 years continues to occur. So you know should there be a slowdown uh this would change significantly. Okay. So finally in our process was the development of a GIS story map. Um two two kind of uh sections of that. So uh the first part is a community tool. Um, so instead of that, you know, 5 800page PDF that is super inaccessible for the public, um, we developed a public-f facing interactive map that summarizes the entire planning process and will be available to, um, the city and public with the adoption of the document. Um, with this web map, uh, community members can scroll through and see what projects are planned in their neighborhood or on their commute. Um, some benefits is obviously keeping the public informed of of what the city's planning and what they've got going on. Um, additionally, there's some potential time savings to city staff. Um, you know, say somebody, you know, sees an issue somewhere, they can go to the map and they can say, you know, they can see that the city recognizes that there's an issue and that there is a project planned for this intersection or this roadway and and the general timeline of when that might occur. Um, and I'll just click on this real quick, just give you guys a quick overview. just

so we've got the whole planning process. You can click across the top or you can just kind of scroll down through and it takes you through the the different sections. So nice handy tool. Um clickable GIS map, stuff like that. All right. And then finally, um, a web application that is, um, internally facing and and for staff use. Uh, so really, uh, has the the nuts and the bolts of the plan, has all of the traffic analysis results, more detailed project information, detailed cost estimates. um we can go into a cost estimate and and see, you know, if there was anticipated rideaway acquisition. Um and then traffic count data uh and projection data. So, in in summary, it's a a tool for staff that relieves the need of of a big thick document. Although I I've seen Rob and his well-loved um transportation plan all tabbed up. Um we we think this will be a much easier tool for him to use. That's comes to the end of our presentation. We'd love to take any more questions if you guys have any. I'm still concerned about the north south corridor and I guess my question with regard to the decision that we're making tonight is is there an ability to review the master plan and look at the necessity or implementing something that is able to bring commuters north and south like Prairie Saltis and the 90 take residents east and west. Yeah. So um there are um so based on the

the functional classification of the roadway um you go all the from local to collector to arterial and then principal arterial freeways um along that that um you know step of of going up the classification you're expecting less delay less um you know all the way from there's a driveway every 20 ft on a local roadway that you are, you know, you've got to go 20 m hour and all the way up to um an, you know, access controlled freeway type of a situation.

So, um the from my understanding the city uh network generally is more of that lower classification of roadway where it's really providing access to homes, access to businesses. There are some arterial roadways that are meant more for that long range travel, right? And that's uh why we have the And how would one do that from north to south if you needed to go from pole line to Seltis?

Um or prairie to I guess prairie to Seltis. Greens fairy roadway is is a north south that goes all the way. Um and then and then yeah there's on Chase uh Pleasant View,

but Greens Ferry turns into like local roadway at some point. Doesn't it go through a county island or like at least right next to a county island? Um we're looking at traffic controlling more on Spokane and Idaho. Cecil doesn't go all the way through. It goes past the high school and then the church. So, so your options are really Pleasant View on the far west side and the 41 on the for the far east side. And so I I guess not to like belabor exactly which road. I'm just curious as we continue to expand north, it is quite difficult to get effectively from the north end of town to the southern end of town. And as we continue to expand north, I'm curious as to if at this point in the in the master planning, there's an ability for us to like truly evaluate having a road that's more closely aligned to Seltis or to Prairie that can move residents quickly in the city north and south.

One of one of the projects is a widening of Greens Fairy Road. So that would be widened to five lanes. So that would really help um provide some capacity for that north south um travel. Um I uh Pleasant View is another one of those um that's uh proposed to be widened to five lanes. So So just with those additional lanes that inherently gives you some more capacity. So Greens Ferry would be the answer for the north north to south that will be a principal arterial and that's what it's classified as. Um I uh I can't minor arterial actually.

We need a principal arterial to go north and south, right? We we don't have any or we're not going to have any. Yeah, absolutely. So the difference between a minor arterial and a principal arterial comes down to how much traffic do you anticipate being on it. We do set our roadway classifications based upon what is the estimated traffic volume and what is the correct roadway to handle that traffic volume.

Okay. If you if you want to start seeing roadways that allow for in more of the developed area of Post Falls, north south throughput with a traffic signal spaced every mile, then we would need to go in and take a look and say, "Okay, we have to start closing every local access roadway into that." And then when you get to locations like 16th Avenue, which is a major collector intersecting Greens Fairy Road, which is a minor arterial, what is the correct methodology to address that traffic? If your priority is to move traffic north south and we're going to let east west get stuck, then you either say I'm putting in a traffic signal and I'm going to penalize the east west movement to the greatest extent possible to move more traffic north south

or you go up to the next step which is I want to get that north south movement through a developed area. I don't want traffic signals. So what do you do with those side streets? You close them off, you force people onto other roads, but they are going to have to get onto that road using Greens Fair as example at some point. So, where are the access points going to be? Mullen Avenue and if the next one's at Pole Line, so what do you do with Horse Haven? What do you do with 16th? What do you do with 12th? Closed or do they become bridges? Surely you ask those same questions when we're developing Prairie and Saltis, right? Well, if you look at Prairie and Saltis, I'll jump in a bit because I've been here for a minute. Mhm. If you if you go way back in time,

east west here seems it's a bit anomalous because we've got a freeway that goes right through the middle of Sure. So freeways are extremely expensive to build. You got underpasses, overpasses, on-ramps, off-ramps, all that kind of stuff. Uh so almost what you're asking for is is a north south freeway. Some way to get north and south is if if you look at Seltis, how many lights are on Saltis right now in the city of Post Falls? 15. I mean, there's a ton of them. Yeah. So, back in the day, if you wanted to go east and west, north of town and not get stuck in stop signs at Seltis, you took 12th. There was nobody out there. So, 12th was the east west. Well, then the city grew. It became 16th. There was nobody out there. Yeah.

Well, city grew. Now there's stop signs. It became pole line. There was nobody out there. Now it's Prairie. In 10 years from now, Prairie is going to have stop lights every quarter mile. That's just the way it goes with growth. Unless we want to invest tens of millions of dollars into a freeway that allows people to go under it. So, it's going to be Hayden Avenue is gonna be the next east west. It's just the nature of growth and the amount of money. The other downside of of city development, too, is nobody has a crystal ball of how fast it's going to grow. So, you set blocks and street widths and everything else uh when they were set back in 1890 or whatever, nobody's anticipating post falls to be 55,000 people or 100,000 people or whatever. There's just not. We either have to start buying houses on both sides of a street, creating off-ramps, underpasses, all that sort of thing, so you can get north south, or it's just the cost of growth is you got to go farther out to get up and down.

Yeah. If you're on Idaho Road, for example, and and you live on one block in on 16th, you might get your friend's house on the other side of Idaho Street, one block in on 16th, then the alternative is to close that off, have them go all the way down to the freeway, get off the next exit, come back over to go two blocks away from their house. That's not very efficient. So, it's it's just one of those we either need to be to convince the taxpayers to spend hundreds of millions of dollars on some kind of north south freeway so we can get up and down Idaho Street faster or Greens Fair or whatever or we just need to accept that this isn't a small town anymore. I can't imagine that I would reasonably be confused to have requested a north south freeway. We tried to build one at 41 and there's a stoplight every 5 seconds. It feels like 95 is the same problem.

Yeah, I totally agree. What I'm asking for is some consideration north south in the same regard that we have consideration to throughput going east west where we do make the decisions to close off certain intersections and we do prioritize certain um so what's the road on Saltis that is like by Gross Donuts and Taco Bell that takes you you like turn down it and you can go that's how you like get to Denny's and the cute Tim's butcher. here to furniture.

Yeah, you have to make a left, right? Well, if you're going it it is technically a road, but when we talk about that, we don't talk about it in the way of like, so what? You're going to stop all of the traffic from that road because you don't put a light there? Well, of course not, because you have to prioritize some traffic over other traffic.

That road's also only one block long. My point is only that like there with we get in these like circular conversations I feel like with the traffic master plan where it is in this moment where we approve the traffic master plan and then we say oh well the street has this classification based on the master plan that we agreed on right now. Um, and so because of that, this is how we're going to operate for every development for the next 15 years, however many years it is, 20 some odd years. Um, and I just want to be sure at this stage, that we don't become a town similar to some of the aspects of Celane, often in the valley as well, where you the your only option to get anywhere without hitting a million traffic lights, is to take the freeway. And as soon as you get off the freeway, you're going to be stopping every other block. And the residents don't like that. That's what makes it feel not like a small livable town. I am not saying that we should go 45 on every single main road that goes north and south. I'm just saying that I would like at least one road between Pleasant View and the 41 considered to be something that you can get downtown like across town. And I don't see that consideration here or I'm asking for you to point it out very clearly to me. I do think that Greens Fairy Road is going to be our major north south roadway. It provides regional connectivity up to Rathrum. It will be the only connecting point between Pleasant View and State Highway 41 that would allow you to get to State Highway 53 once they close Meguire Road. Our plan is for that to be a fivelane roadway from Seltis Way pos from uh Third Avenue all the ways up to Hope Avenue. That's what our master plan is showing.

Okay.

Within the master plan or within our roadway design standards for minor arterial roadways, whether they're a threelane or a five lane, we reserve 110 ft of rideway. That gives the city the ability long term, hopefully beyond my experience here with the city of Post Falls, that if we need to come back beyond the horizon of of this plan, that we can still widen those roadways and there's enough room to go from three lanes to five lanes. We've seen that on Mullen Avenue back in 2004. The master plan was showing that Mullen Avenue only needed to be a five-lane road from State Highway 41 to Greens Ferry Road. Um, prior to the 2004 master plan back in 1996, um, the city had started doing some of the expansion of Mullen Avenue west of Greens Fairy to Five Lane. We didn't change our course and that was actually a good thing because now we're seeing in this master plan we've now identified that Mullen Avenue needs to be a fivelane road from Highway 41 to Spokane Street

Library. Yeah.

So that will happen and we have the ability that we can do it. We've got the same thing on Greens Fairy Road that we can do that. Uh Pole Line Avenue, if you go back to the 2017 plan, had a three-lane road in front of the high school. Well, that's not going to work anymore. But we do have and we have been building a five-lane facility in there. And so I see that in Greensferry. Uh right now the master plan is not identifying that we need more than a three-lane road on Spokane Street or on Idaho Street north of where we already have five lanes. Part of the master plan is we have identified levels of service. So based upon the traffic volume, based upon the delay, it says, "Is there a problem or not?" If there isn't a problem,

just in the interest of council not absolutely slaughtering me on our text messages, sorry. I'm sure what you're going to say is fantastic. Greens Fairy is identified as a north south main corridor. We're not going to put lights every other intersection. That's the That's the road that that's But I think it's a reasonable consideration like No. Is it because I drive my children around all day long? Is that cuz I'm the one that does you're going to say something to me and I want to hear it? No, I just I think I think the principle here that we need to keep in mind is there are no 100% solutions to any of this. It's just a matter of tradeoffs. Yeah.

And making the most improvements that will serve the most people. So when you're talking about a north south, you know, corridor that goes through the center of town, first of all, I think the areas that you're talking about specifically Chase Spokane and Idaho Street, the major difficulty there is they're already built out. Yeah. And so we have a lot of neighboring uh, you know, neighborhood access that really needs to happen. I live there, you know, in the central part of town. And so the idea of not say for your example of Idaho Street and 15th, putting a light there, it's a beautiful idea. Okay. Um because I experience it. Sure,

I understand that those people living, you know, north of there in Fieldstone and and farther north probably think, you know, this is really disruptive to me, but I think it does the most good for the most people. Okay. One of the things about having a higher speed corridor as like you mentioned on Idaho Street is it's not just a free pass to move a bunch of traffic because what is happening now is that there's volumes of traffic that is trying to get onto Idaho Street that can't

um which necessitates some type of mitigation. The light is the alternative that we have. If we don't do that, all it does is overburden Spokane Street which will then present the same problem. you have a high volume of traffic of those people from, you know, anywhere from Idaho Street West that are trying to go north and south that can't get on to Idaho are going to find the next best route, which is going to be Spokane Street and we're going to run into the same thing. So, the idea of kind of exclusively designating a north south actually concentrates traffic on those other streets that don't because Idaho wouldn't provide the access. I think the key to what you're saying is that it's all built out because if you look at Cecil over in field it's a pole line

pole it's you don't have community access to Cecil between pole line and prairie right because we didn't build it that way so it's just like the backsides of houses that are on the street so you don't have anyone trying to get there except for the designated accesses that we built and you can move freely and I'm not advocating for a highway. I'm just I'm just and I'm not even asking for every single north and south street to be there. I'm happy with Greens Fairy that we don't put a light at every single intersection. That's really all that I wanted to hear. So, I just want to elaborate one little piece on that. So, Spokane Street, Idaho Street, and Greens Fairy are being given priority north south movement.

Okay. We do see the need for traffic signals at the halfmile point between pole line and Mullen Avenue in between and this is in particular for Greens Ferry, Spokane and Idaho. 12th Avenue which is the minor collector roadway is identified in the plan to restrict access and that traffic will not be able to go east west across those intersections.

Um and that traffic will be able to make left turns from Greens Fairy, Spokane, and Idaho onto those side streets. But those side streets can't make left turns onto those roadways. So that will I think start going in the direction what you're talking about. That's the first step. If we need we start looking in future transportation master plans. Do we need to restrict more access points maybe even prior be prior to another uh transportation master's plan. If you start having a a safety issue where you have a lot of collisions, then you look and say, "Do I need to close more of those intersections to provide better access, maintain the the continuity through the system and what you want to do with north south movement versus east west.

I just wanted one north south corridor you guys. That's all I was asking for in the beginning of this. I think a lot. It's very reasonable. I like Greens Fair. It doesn't help me out. Spokane would help me out, but Greens Fairy seems reasonable. Five lanes in this master plan. That's what it's set for, correct? Yes.

Okay, great. Thank you. The but the challenge is is when you get down through from Greens Ferry to Interstate 90, which is where most of that traffic is heading when it's going north south, you get to what I'm not sure exactly what ITD's plan was when they put our exits and and uh entrances into sort of sort through a dart and put an entrance where it landed and an exit where the next dart landed because it makes no sense in the central part of the city. But Greens Ferry doesn't go to a highway. So now you're going to be on Collector and Arterial Streets trying to get to the freeway, hitting the light at Spokane Street or wherever you're going. It's confusing, but Greensbury does seem like it's the best option we have because there's so much county land in the middle where it might be cheaper than rather than taking out rows of houses, we can take out a few feet of of uh of ground. Um, for me, since most of the the housing developments that people want to develop and annex are on the north side, we have to in the comprehensive plan have a way to say no until these roads are ready because the more people we add on the north side, the more pressure we're putting on the north south. Exactly as as councelor Stiglet is saying, we don't have a good north south way to get traffic through there and it's already starting to bottleneck. So, I would love to see a north south plan incorporated into this somehow either through amendment in the future or before we approve this. Um, just to see some what what is the plan for getting all of that traffic for future growth if we're going to if we're going to sit on this and hatch it for the next 10 years. Um, or we need to start saying no to more of the annexations that are proposed on the the north side of the city. Part of the issue is some of those north south roads go through county pockets.

We do not have the ability based upon my understanding to go into the county pockets and do eminent domain. You need to get those areas annexed in so that we could then either do eminent domain or through the development of those properties we get some of the improvements we need as well as the rights of way and easements. So with our philosophy of as growth occurs, growth pays for growth. So the developers put in the pieces and along their frontage, we end up with a little bit of a jigsaw puzzle. We know long term we're going to get there. The difficult part is moving in that direction and getting to that point. Uh there's a couple of those county pockets where it's like the only way you're going to get the road through on them is you're going to have to buy the entire house out. So, and growing from where we're at now at within spitting distance of 50,000 population to if our projections are correct to be around a 100,000 by 2045. We've got some work in front of us

and we just simply don't have the infrastructure or the ability to create that infrastructure without some sort of major investment in a north south arterial road. And so I hope that all of us when we're presented with these, you know, 100 thousand is not inevitable. So I hope that when we we're presented with these plans to annex more land on the north side that keep this in mind because we're at a point where it seems like the traffic doesn't leave at the end of the summer uh like it used to and getting around is very difficult sometimes. And so a lot of the the work that's been put into this I can see it's going to have a great effect like widening Hayden and things like that that would have a great effect. But our weakness is exactly as councelor Stigler said it is the north south travel through the city without having to stop constantly and have that backed up. There's schools letting out in on some of those roads at certain times and um and then AM PM bottlenecks. So it is it is definitely an issue.

Any other questions for me? Can the tagline of the master plan be all roads lead to Rob? Will you be here in 2045? Uh I don't anticipate that. No. And uh you know that comment came up at the last city council meeting and I've had a number of people refer that to me. Oh, good. It's kind of fun. So, I appreciate the humor on that. Okay, public comments. Okay, we're done with the presentations, right? Or was there more that you didn't get to yet? Okay, any public testimony? We have none.

All right, so there's nothing to rebut. We can move on. All right. Council discussion or motion. Clo. Do you need to close the move to approve the city of Post Falls 2025 transportation master plan? Second. Motion in a second. Further discussion.

I'm a little concerned. You know, again, I like I mentioned, I wasn't present at the time when those workshops were being done and frankly having this 700 plus page uh transportation master plan put on the agenda and made available to me on Friday, I haven't had the opportunity to fully read it. So, um I'm not comfortable with uh voting to approve it yet. I I have liked a lot of the answers I've heard today, but uh in the interest of wanting to fully and fairly review the document before um I I vote to approve it. Um I would actually like to see it tabled for another meeting and I think there were a lot of concerns and questions, a lot of them from councelor Stig Leader that I would like the answer to as well. Um, so I I would ask that we uh consider a motion to to table this for uh to be brought back at another date.

Second. I'll withdraw my motion. If we bring it back again, does it have to be a full public hearing or can it be unfinished business? So, um I think we need to gavel and close the public hearing. Um public hearing is closed. Um, and at that point, I think we can just return it as as unfinished business to for additional deliberations. I move to table the city of Postf Falls 2025 transportation master plan to a future meeting for continued deliberation. Second motion in a second. Further discussion. Roll call, please. Malloy. Hi, Mosby. I Ziggler.

Hi, Stigleer. Hi, Luca. I

motion passes. Thank you. That is tabled. Before we move on to the next thing, I I neglected the announcements that I was supposed to read at the beginning of the meeting. So, community recycle day will be held this Saturday, April 25th, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at city hall. Residents can recycle electronics, shred important documents, safely dispose of unused prescriptions, and more, all in one convenient location. The city is hosting presentations in a drop-in workshop on April 29 through 30 as part of the comprehensive plan update. Three identical presentations will be offered on Wednesday, April 29th, followed by a drop-in open house on Thursday, April 30th, where residents can learn more and share feedback on future land use and development. Arbor Day will be celebrated on Saturday, May 2nd from 8:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. at Camillean Park. Urban forestry staff will provide educational demonstrations and free trees will be available for the first 100 participants. More details on all events are available at the city's website at postfalls.gov. Okay, with that taken care of, we will move on to the next agenda item for unfinished business returning ordinances. First item up is the Corey Sports Complex phase 1 construction agreement. Good evening, mayor, members of council. Robbie Quinn, parks planner, here this evening seeking council's approval for the mayor to sign uh two agreements related to the Corey Sports Complex. The first one being the construction agreement and the second one being the uh construction administration agreement. Um so just quickly going through some of the the background on what we've done to date. um starting back in 2019 with the master plan and then followed up with by the mass grading plan which then we did the mass grading constru um construction throughout the entire site and then we

moved on to the Cecil road frontage design completed that road frontage construction designed the irrigation well specs installed the irrigation well and then most recently completed the uh 100% phase 1 CD package and that is the uh project here this evening for construction. Few of the recent council touch points. Um back in 2024, we requested approval to apply for the land and water conservation fund grant. Um few months after that, we did a lot line adjustment. If you recall, there was a lot line that was going to run right through the middle of our building here. So, we moved that lot line just this way here. Um and then November 2025, we received approval from the state for the land and water uh grant and which was accepted by council. And then a month later, we did a um approved council approved an easement for Ross Point Water District for their existing sewer service that runs on the north side of our property here. Was there any discussion in the lot line adjustment conversation about acquiring some of that southern portion of the Ross Point Water District property?

Uh, no, not at that time. Thanks. So, to recap, phase one, um, we'll be installing two multi-use fields, a restroom and a shelter building, a large parking lot, an entry plaza, and then the maintenance yard. And I'll touch a little bit on the alternates in a moment. Those blue things aren't pools, are they? Those are courts. Great. No, they're not.

Um, so we put this out to bid March 11th and had our bid opening on April 1st. We received one bid from Larivier um for just under $4.9 million, which came in about $138,000 under the engineers's estimate. So, pretty close to the estimate, which means we weren't able to um move forward with any of the two alternates, which one was for the playground and one was for the sports courts. Any guess on why nobody else wanted to bid?

So, great question. Um, we had a pretty good turnout on at our pre-bid meeting, um, which was mandatory, and I would say we had about 40 people there. Not all of them were primes. A lot of them were subs, but I think there were about five prime contractors that could have bid it. And we were a little surprised as well. So, our consultant did some phone calls to the contractors and I I contacted a few um just to see if there was anything glaring that we may have missed. Um and a lot of it came down to timing. Uh, one of the contractors said they ended up being awarded like four projects during that window, so their season was basically full. Um, the other one again was just timing part of the year that they couldn't do it. We actually had a nationwide sports complex builder that was there and he had actually been contacting me every year for the past four years. Um, so he reached out to me saying, "How did we come in on our bid?" And I told him, "You didn't bid it." Um, so I think because of the size of their company, he wasn't really involved on the final, um, bidding portion of that, more just the estimating. But, um, so in general, I think it was mostly just a timing issue, which was, you know, kind of good to hear that it wasn't anything that had to do with the site or the project or the plans. So, um, so following review by city staff and our consultant, uh, Livier was deemed a responsive bidder and we are recommending the award to them this evening and also seeking a 5% contingency for a total ask of the construction portion of 5,12,88818. And this will be paid out of the um land

and water conservation fund grant as well as impact fees. And then the the second portion uh another contract would be with MTLA our consultant for the construction observation throughout the project um which includes submitt reviews um pay app requests, inspections, daily logs, material reviews and um quantity tracking. So that contract came out to $157,046.50 and that would be paid out of impact fees. So the total ask this evening for both contracts plus a construction contingency is 5,259,93468 and again 1.25 25 million of that being paid out of our grant and the remaining out of park impact fees. If approved this evening, uh we would not issue a notice to proceed for May of 2026, anticipating an 8-month construction window with substantial completion around November and final into December and then most likely contract close out in January, February timeline. With that, I'll stand for any questions.

Go back one slide. What's that parcel to the left that's darkly shaded that has a line to it, but no? That is the maintenance yard right here. And so that's part of phase one, correct? Yes. Um, so that's where our well is currently drilled. And so we'll be obviously hooking up the pumps for that situation. And that's where the main power is coming into the site and it will be where a future building maintenance building is which you can see right here. Okay. So it will be fully fenced at this point and a gravel maintenance yard.

You know, are there ballards uh to keep vehicles from Yes. vandals from traveling on the fields there? Well, there's a curb. Um, and we do have ballards uh kind of in this area here where um there's the ADA access. They also have curb stops for those, but the ADA is flush. Um, but the ballards are there actually more for a maintenance standpoint. So, we can access them, remove the some are removable and we can access the fields.

Thanks. And we do also have ballards in this area here as well to prevent vehicles from traveling into the plaza. But the plaza is set up to be used for food trucks and etc. So we do still need vehicle access to there as well. Further questions uh quickly you're with love law I can never pronounce that La Rivier's bid and your contingency are aboutundred and 4,000 over your engineers estimate. Is that of concern to you at all?

No, I don't think so. The um the we have it budgeted either way. So um and I think the estimate didn't even include a um contingency or I guess it was kind of built in. Um but the short answer is no. We we have it planned for future. Everything is still laid out on track for all the other projects we have committed to as well. I would move to approve the Corey Sports Complex phase one construction agreement. Second. Motion in a second. Further discussion. Roll call, please. Mosby. I. Pl. I. Ziggler. I. Stigleer. I.

Luca. I. Malloy. I.

Motion passes. Thank you. Next up is Seltis Way Rehabilitation and Pipeline Project recommendation to award. Good evening, Mr. Mayor, members of the council. Andrew Abini, projects division manager. Uh so this is a very significant project for both the utilities and streets division. Um it will accomplish both current and future needs. As such we've taken a team approach and presenting all the information tonight. So uh together Jackson and I will uh cover the project material. Uh just to clarify this presentation includes both items B and C on the unfinished business. So they are separate action items but related as they're connected to the Southeast project. We did put together an outline of the presentation. I'll cover the first half um talking project background and the history and then Jackson will cover the um the construction phase and the request of council this evening. Project limits are Southeast Way generally from Chase Road to Maguire Road. So I'll start with what we're building with this project. So this will install the future uh utility needs in Salt East way. This is all the wastewater pipelines that have been identified in the master planning documents. As a result, we're constructing reconstructing the roadway. So this is a complete rebuild um removing all the submaterial subsurface material including the original uh concrete highway underneath the roadway. So it starts from the subgrade and will rebuild back up. Uh this is based that

level of of work is based on a 20-year design. Uh so envisioning that this road will last at least 20 years. Uh we will also be addressing some storm water deficiencies within the corridor and making some minor improvements to the pedestrian facilities and the trail uh that runs through the project area. Andrew, did it have to get taken down to the base because of neglect over time or I mean it's unusual, isn't it, to go that far down?

So, there's a combination. Um, yes, this is the first project that I've been involved with at the city where we've done a full rebuild of the roadway. Um, historically, this was the US 10 um highway that ran through that corridor. It was approximately 20 ft wide. um just the over time Seltis has built on top of that roadway. So there's been improvements done but nothing that's addressed the subsurface area. Um so I'll talk a little bit about how we started at uh rehabbing the road and as we got into that design it became clear that there was an opportunity to also include the underground infrastructure that's needed in the future. So that also drove some of the decision-m in removing that concrete and subsurface material. Um, but there was a a large amount that would need to have been removed without putting the utilities in the ground. That probably covers a little bit of the talking points I was going to go through one by one. Um, the Yeah. So the uh existing pavement's in poor condition and uh to the best efforts of the streets division, we've been able to maintain that and patch it, but the the ultimate solution is to replace the roadway. Uh so a pavement condition study was done in around 2020 uh citywide and that confirmed that Seltis does need some attention. We supplemented that with a geotech uh report working with a geo tech firm and um they were able to map out the subsurface area as well as the extents of the concrete highway underneath. Because of the magnitude of the project and the direction we were heading, uh we had some interest from utilities and that was the recognizing that we have future needs in Seltis for wastewater infrastructure and combining the project. So including all of the

wastewater needs into this roadway project. We also reached out to um outside entities. So city of Rather and East Greenacres in particular. Uh both of those entities have and operate infrastructure in the project limits in Seltis. So during the design um we brought two separate to city council. Those were approved. One was with city of ratherum and the other with East Greenacres Irrigation District. Um I'll run through each one just as a background of uh what's entailed here. So for those that may not know the city of Rather pumps their waste water to the city of Post Falls and is treated at the Post Falls water reclamation facility. They have a need for another force main pipe to accommodate future flows. So similar to city of post falls future wastewater needs they they also have similar needs. Uh they were very interested in participating in the project and combining their work with ours thatou outlines reimbursement from city of wrath room to postfalls for their portion of the work and uh similar method we initiated anou with east green acres irrigation district. So, um, EGID for short, they service part of they're a water purveyor that serves a portion of the city of Post Falls. So, they have in infrastructure, uh, in the Seltis Way, uh, project limits. There's a agreement in place between City Post Falls and EGID that predates this project and that essentially outlines that the entity performing construction work impacting the other entities infrastructure shall be responsible to protect the other's work. So in short, city of Post Falls is responsible to protect East Green Acres work as it um

as we impacted in this area. East Greenacres will perform that work. uh they'll protect their lines and then they will be reimbursed by the city of post falls um for that protection that allows them to remain in control and ensure that their uh work is getting done per their requirements. So summarizing the benefits of having both of um theseus and these entities really it got all of us talking early on in the project and we were able to coordinate and identify those opportunities and then through theus we're able to uh establish the roles and responsibilities of each of the parties. So I'll call this the Crayola version of the utilities and what we're putting in the ground. Um it's six different pipelines that we're installing. That's including City of Rather's line. So a significant amount of infrastructure that will go in um ahead of rebuilding of the road. And these are a couple photos uh both looking east. The photo on the left is uh near the park there on the corner. I believe that's Karen Streeter Burke. Uh looking east up the hill, you can see some of the patching that's been done. uh the discoloration in the asphalt that's that's the patching in some cases patches within patches uh be other photo on the right is near the utilities driveway. So with that uh this is our transition point. I will hand it over to Jackson to talk about the construction phase and uh the bids.

Good evening council. We uh had to keep it interesting for you. So fresh face. So, we opened bids for the project on March 24th. Uh, MDM Construction Group was our low bidder at just under $5 million. Engineers estimate was 9.3, slightly under that, 9.3. The bid that came in from MDM uh has been determined to be the lowest responsive bidder. Um, their bid amount came in with the requested contingency that we're asking for of 10%. The total requests we have for you tonight is $5,429,000 or eight sorry 5,429,87830. Um we did get seven biders on the project. Um and there was a handful of biders that were fairly close. So we feel that it was a competitive bid environment. Construction management services on this project are more significant than they have been on previous projects. large reason large reasoning for that is that we cannot shut down this entire corridor to the city uh to be able to complete our project. We had to go about this in phased approaches um to allow for traffic to go back and forth during construction. Um we will have some limited closures of the Meguire and Chase intersections. So, there can be some anticipated night work as well as some work outside of Monday and Friday to try and efficiently get those intersections done for the public. We also anticipate two construction seasons. Um, and we will have full-time observation on site. So, that's kind of some of the some of the explanation for why services are um more for this project than others. So during construction, that phased approach, you're going to have observation on both sides versus closing down the entire road to watch observation once.

Um, and we have some pretty comprehensive public outreach planned to help mitigate traffic impacts to the public during construction. Uh, the award itself, so the contract amendment for construction management services is the 1.2 million number. Um, we are requesting a 10% contingency on top of that. retiring all unused contingency from the design contract. So the total ask for CMS tonight is 1,353,770. The total request for both the construction award and the CMS service amendment is $6,783,648.30.

How much unused contingency did we have from the design phase? I would have to get you an exact number, but it is absolutely above 80,000 close to all of it of uh the management reserve contingency. Yes. And then it was retired to where uh back into the budget line item that it would have came from. Great.

Yeah. Okay. Perfect. Um during all of this and per ouru and and conversations with rather uh rather would be uh invoiced their proportionate share is an important point to note. So do we know roughly how much that is? Yes. 16.

Yep. Uh so overall project cost share. Um so these are approximate numbers because during design versus construction versus construction management some of those numbers fluctuate slightly. Um but overall project cost is estimated to be approximately 7.9 million. Utilities should share about 56% of that. Our streets division shares about 28% of that and Ram shares about 16% of the the overall thing overall project. because of the total amount of waste water that we process only 16% of that is from Ram.

No. No. So we uh it was much more detailed. Um so the prior to bidding we went through the um itemized like what the contractor bids every single item. Okay. And had an an assigned amount towards Rather and us agreed to prior to bidding. So once bidding came out, those numbers are the same for them as they are for us. Hopefully that made sense. I mean, sure. It that was uh and those actions we took were per our Okay.

Um also included in that 7.9 million number is the E eg protection work that we will be reimbursing. Um the estimated cost of that is sub $200,000. They are still getting some finalized bid pricing. So that's why that isn't official yet. We're going to give EIG we're giving E3 acres money. Yep. So per our our agreement with them. Uh and this is what Andrew was mentioning. Yeah. The protection.

Yeah. So the the agreement that we had with EG prior to theou for this project. Um and again my understanding it it dictates that the the entity that's coming into the road to do work if they are disturbing the other entities work the entity coming into the road is responsible for the cost of that work. So we would be responsible for protecting EGID's work because we are coming into the road disturbing it. Yep. Nope. I totally understand that. Which is to say that we're not going to take a pickaxe and put a hole in their pipe. Right. Correct. So why do we have to pay them $200,000? We're just not going to disturb their work. That seems like a reasonable agreement.

We it it will be impossible for us to not disturb their work as we go through construction through the alignment. They they are already within the road. And so where our estimated damages to their work is $200,000. No. No. Um I don't want to butcher this. Come on up. I'm so sorry. No. Uh, so yeah, I probably could have explained that a little further. So on the protection side of things, typically um when we are doing a construction project, the city of Post Falls, if we're doing um a water lane somewhere, we are responsible to protect other entities work. Most often that's just included in the construction contract. Seems reasonable that part.

Yeah. So there would be probably a similar type of cost associated with that that just gets folded in with the construction contract. So the contractor bidding the work also knows they are responsible to do the protection work. In this case what we are doing is we're separating that out and we're um per that agreement with East Green Acres. The city of Post Falls is responsible financially to protect their work. It's just the mechanism we're using. Instead of having the city's contractor, MDM Construction, do the protection, East Green Acres, will hire a contractor. Can you describe what protection? Yeah. Thank you. Physically are we doing standing there? Yeah. Um, yeah.

No, sorry. They're all right. Okay. So the protection work uh there are instances where we need to go over or under uh East Greenacres water line. There are also instances where we are too close to their water man and we need to maintain separation. So um for drinking water and wastewater there are uh guidance uh requirements. You have to have at least 10 feet of horizontal separation. So the protection work encompasses all of those requirements. Um, so the benefit to this is East Greenacres will do this work ahead of our project.

I still need you to des to elucidate what the work is. So like in your example, the pipes have to be 10 ft apart. So there's actual physical work of moving the pipes those 10 feet apart because they are not presently. Correct. So that's the work that East Greenacres is going to pay and then we're going to reimburse them.

It is. So, um, there there are locations where we where East Green Acres is moving their line completely out of a wastewater alignment and there's a physical relocation that occurs. Um, there are other instances where they're replacing the material of pipe. Um, certain older material standards of doing pipe installation have changed. Um so some of that still is is in the project limits. So um concrete pipe for instance protection but it's like physical work not correct not preventive not preventive. Yeah.

And that also it was at a level that required design and uh engineering design. So that 200,000 is uh what we anticipate being the most. Okay. Uh likely we will see that cost be less than 200,000 and that includes the engineering design, construction management support and then the physical cost of um moving water lines and protecting water lines. Thanks for the additional

I would assume though, correct me if I'm wrong, that by granting them I we're paying them to do it, but it also is a bit of a protection from future liability. If they if if we were to have our contractor come in and even if it was done to spec and had any kind of future deficiency, they could potentially say, "Hey, you didn't do this right." Whereas, when it's them, it's like, "Well, this is your deal. Like, we paid you. It's over." So, in that way, it is a bit of pro protection to the city. it keeps them in the driver's seat for their infrastructure and they're making those decisions. Um, since I'm here, if I could maybe just follow up on your comment earlier, you asked a question about the proportionate share and force main. Yeah. From city of Rather just to clarify that

Force Main, City of Rather owns the Force Main. So, they are responsible to get their wastewater through their piping up to the reclamation facility. And then the proportionate share as Jackson mentioned is based on the actual length of pipe and all the valving and everything else that is associated with their line. So that 16% represents the construction contract plus the portion of oversight and design. Okay. I can guess where you were at.

I Yeah, I think I think I'm about wrapped up. Thank you for your question. Uh yeah, thank you Andrew for for taking that and explaining a bit further. Yeah, so that does include the the full amount for each. Um and we're about wrapped up here, but I thought it'd be good to touch base on what construction will look like because it is such a large project in such a major area of town. Um so this has been broken out into four phases. Phases three and four we see as being the intersection intersections work. Um and they will require full closures of the intersection. Um we have it in the in the agreement only one intersection can be closed at a time. Uh detour routes routes will be posted for that. Um and we anticipate that the contractor will construct phases three and four this year. Uh phases one and two are the north and south half of Seltis. Um again we're doing those in phased pairs. So one can happen be finished up and then we flip over to main one lane of traffic uh one lane of travel in each direction. and we anticipate that to occur in 27. Uh as for next steps, uh we anticipate construction this summer through summer to fall of next year. Um we'll have public outreach occurring throughout all phases of the project. Uh road closures and tutorial routes will be published in advance and all of these updates will be posted to the city's social media page and website.

There be any disruption during the winter shutdown? like is anything going to be closed and coned or is it all going to be there's some flexibility that the contractor has depending on how they approach these phases to where there may actually be a world where they can work through the winter. Um weather is so fickle here in North Idaho. uh during that shutdown, if and when it it occurs, all of that will be will be properly coned off, blocked off, marked off,

but no lane closures or anything over the maybe just like trench plates and cones or something. Depends on the phase that they're in. Um during the winter shutdown, there shouldn't be. No. Well, three and four are just intersections, right? Correct. Yes, that's absolutely correct. So there next year it's all going to happen during the summer season or during the construction season.

Yes. I I'd love to give you a perfect example of how I can see it happening. Um I could see phases three and four occurring throughout summer normal construction season and then January there's a wild hair February wild hair contractor wants to get going. And so during those months where they can get ahead on some work getting ready for paving the second batch plants open up. I can see them doing some quote unquote winter work then. Um I don't see them working through the winter um with big open pins or anything like that. During construction though um whether winter or not we will have proper safety in place.

If I could just add so we currently the contract is structured that there would be shut down all work removed. Um so there's vinyl stones for each of those phases. So, it's intended that um with the season that we have coming up on us this year, they would be able to um do half of the project work and then shut down completely and be off of the the road as much as possible and then um next year come back and do the remaining two phases. So, um I guess to what Jackson was, um getting at is if the weather is conducive to work continuing through the wintertime, that may be something that um if there's an opportunity to get work completed with a weather window, that may be of a consideration.

Yeah, that's fine. My my question is more about we're not going to abandon this in in a hot mess where people are I know that a lot of us especially those of us who live very close to 41 in Mullen are tired of the orange cones for the last four years and being rerouted and all of that and so now we're going to inflict that on another neighborhood. Um, I just wanted to make sure that if they're not working, we're not going to leave it up there where there's a lane closed or detour or something like that. Right. Yeah. And that that's a great point and our intent is that if they are out there and the road is disturbed, they are working. Absolutely. Okay. Thank you. Questions? No,

I think we already had those. I would move to approve the Seltis Way rehabilitation of pipeline project recommendation to award. Second. Second. Motion to second. Further discussion. Roll call please. PL I. Ziggler I. Stigler leader I. Luca I. Malloy. I. Mosby. I. Motion passes. Thank you. Thank you. I move to approve the Seltis Way rehabilitation and pipeline project construction management services amendment. Second. Motion in a second. Further discussion. Roll call, please. Ziggler. I. Stigler. I. Luca. I. Malloy. Hi. Mosby. I blue

I motion passes. Thank you. Does anybody need a recess before we continue? Just going to make that motion. We'll recess for five minutes.

All right, we'll call the meeting back to order and move on to new business. First up is solid waste temporary projects ordinance update. Uh thank you, council. Chris Gabbert, deputy city attorney. Uh what's before you tonight is kind of a first uh quick look for ordinances. We bring them back to you twice. We kind of outline what we're going to do before we bring the actual ordinance back for adoption. Uh just a quick background on this one. This is a cleanup ordinance to our garbage services ordinance uh chapter. Uh the background is the legislature back in uh last year passed a provision that um eliminated temporary garbage services from being required to go through a franchise ordinance for the city. So it allows people to individually contract for a service provider for temporary services. So, you're doing like a home remodel or something else, you can hire somebody with that is not our franchisee uh to do that. And so, they codified that in the code um at 5344 um but allowed the local entity, the city to define what temporary and project specific uh limitations are. So, they gave us that ability. Uh so, what's before you for consideration is recommended by uh Republic Services, our provider. Um two, it's two quick fixes. I'm just we've just identified what temporary service entails and said that there is therefore exempt from uh our our franchise ordinance requirement. Uh that's the bare minimum we need to do um and is will achieve that and then uh if it needs to be revised in a few years as to us regulating temporary garbage service or anything else or be becoming more um more regulatory in that manner. If there's an issue we can always address it then. So that is the quick uh

version of it. Um I was I was hoping finance would be here tonight because this is kind of Jason's deal, but here I am. So there is no financial impact to this, correct? No, it's just they manage the billing for the for that. So there is no financial impact. What did we set as being temporary? Sorry. 90 days. And you can only do that once in a calendar year for those of council that have remodled homes. Does that seem reasonable to you? The only thing that caught me in what you were just saying is that Republic helped write this ordinance and they do a fantastic job for the rest of the city, but it seems like they would be inherently um So, Republic brought it to our attention. Sorry. Go. You want to finish?

Yeah. Just that like I mean they wouldn't want people to not be using their services too much during the year. So, does one 90day instance seem reasonable to like redo a house if you were going to do that? and and before you uh get into the deliberation, let me just address how it came to us. Um they they provided us with a couple ordinances across the state that have already adopted it. Um I took a look at those like the city of Meridian was uh the one that took a comprehensive approach, basically regulating all sorts of temporary services and put in a new permitting structure and everything else that we thought was probably unnecessary and a little bit of overkill.

So the 90 days is just a our our wag at it. um for the one service. I think their concern was you're going to have re you're going to have certain people that are either repeat offenders and are going to continue to use it as a way of avoiding using the the the city's provider and or it gets more difficult to uh enforce if you uh have anything but kind of a bright line rule because this is by property, right? Not by like person. Correct. Right. I I believe so if I could look at the ordinance again and I can only answer anecdotally. done a couple of projects and the dumpsters really only needed for the destruction the demolition phase. Okay. And I haven't haven't needed one for more than a week yet. That seems it it was just like a I I don't have an answer. Good question. So yeah,

90 days would be there might be a commercial application that would run into that, but I can't imagine a residential one that would just the one time would be enough. Yeah. Okay. And for our enforcement mechanism, our contemplation is just to have it on the permitting stage to have them check a box identifying if they're going to use it as a temporary service and then that at least allows us to track it a little bit. So uh okay to see where it goes. So if I understand it summarized is used to be that they had to use the franchise provider and now with the state law passage they they will not have to or they cannot be forced to use the franchise provider for temp temporary services.

Uh correct. Yeah, the legislative code changes just says something to the effect of despite any city contractor franchise, any person may contract with a waste collection provider of their choosing for solid waste collection containers that are temporary and project specific as defined by city ordinance. So, but it used to be that they could be could have been forced to use the franchise provider prior to that law. And that's why the amendment to our code is necessary just to carve out that exception and and make sure that it's clear.

My only concern is that if there is a legitimate need for two temporary projects in a year or a legitimate need that's going to go 120 days instead of 90 that this is a little bit restrictive. It would it would be maybe nice to write in something that said or by its nature is, you know, or or a permitting process or something where a variance where somebody could say, "Hey, this is this project's going to take me all summer, but we're cleaning up this giant farm that was full of tires and trash and stuff."

So then they would just have to pay Republic and pay their other service provider, right? Like that's what they would be forced to do with this ordinance. Like they'd have to pay the they'd have to pay Republic like 16. How much do I pay Republic? $16 a month. 14 I don't know. Um well I envision this primarily being for dumpsters, right? Somebody's got Yes. Yeah. So

I think that's the the intent of it, but you're always going to have people that are abusing it or trying to get around the process. Right now our code requires or it's unlawful for somebody to engage in the business of collecting garbage unless they are franchised by the city. So, and that's and that's a standard uh feature in Idaho. It's not unusual to have a municipal franchise for that. So, this accepts out the temporary use. We just have to define what that looks like. But I think to answer to your question, so the the regular garbage collection, you know, the green cans for residential or whatever would still be handled by Republic on a weekly basis even during while the temporary thing is going on. Is that correct?

Yes, I I would assume so. Unless it's not intended for for normal household waste, but because the legisl legislation is kind of broad, we're just trying to carve out that exception so we don't get sideways with it. Oh, I thought this meant that you could forego Republic for 90 days and have your own one. I don't know. I think you probably could if you wanted wanted to push it. And again, they're bringing it to our attention to just get ahead of it. Well, I'm just saying then if if you buy a house to flip or something like that, you don't need residential garbage service when you have a dumpster sitting out there. Yeah, but you can only have it for 90 days one time a year, but then if you needed the dumpster for more time during the year, you would just have to pay Republic and pay the dumpster

or get a different dumpster or contract with Republic directly. Yeah. You'd have to go through dumpster system. Yeah. And again, this trash talk from this council. In the interest of time, would it there be any objection to having some sort of a to empowering staff to write something in there for either a permitting process or a way that they could get a variance if their project's going to be longer um or they need to do multiple projects? I think as long as it's as long as it's simple. I don't I don't want to create a whole new permitting process that somebody's going to have to follow and develop and everything else, but if it's something really vague that, you know, on the permission of the city administrator or something, something simple that doesn't require an extra process,

something very simple, but it's just not just it's 90 days or else, and it's once per year or else.

I don't I think we're to address your your point. Um, Republic had originally suggested we uh follow Meridian and and institute a new permitting process and everything else. And then I kind of took a look at the collection costs and whether or not that would really be useful or not to create a whole another permit scheme, adopt fees, uh create this whole structure just to deal with what may be a small issue. Um so they had suggested we we do something more adept, but this was after we had already got this on the agenda. So that's where I'm seeking direction from you folks. if you want to go through a more complicated process, we can always bring it back at another future date as well just to uh address it at that point. Um but

or alternatively too, we could pass it as is and if because right now it might be a solution in search of a problem. Um so if something does arise where somebody needs something longer, then we can always amend it then. That would be my preference. if we have any sort of process, it has to be fair and evenly applicable and then we've got to create standards for it and there's a lot of work in that. So, if we can just get this up and then see if anybody has an issue with it and always revisit it and if it's the council's direction, maybe we can extend it to 120 days and you know, four months and if you can't get it done in four months with a temporary project, it starts to not look like a temporary project in my opinion. Um, have you my house? So,

a theme you may be noticing about me with these policies is I like flexibility. Like, I don't like to pigeon hole people. I want them to be able to do their project without our stupid laws getting in their way. Right? So, if you're trying to flip a house, you you get to the 90th day and you're like, I need four more days on this stupid dumpster. No, now I have to go contract with with Republic. I can't just call the city and say, hey, I need four more days. Is that all right? you know, if we could just put that flexibility in and we don't have have to revisit it ever again, like I don't think any of us care, right?

But but with the standards, it makes it a clear indication as to how to enforce it as well because if it starts to get too arbitrary or anything else, then it's like, well, does this really apply? How do we enforce these standards? the the city may extend this if by the very nature of the project it is clear that whatever like there's there's there's language I think that would allow us the flexibility without having to revisit this later or get a complaint from a citizen that said I had to get rent another $700 dumpster because I needed four more days on this project

who determine who determines the reasonable amount of time for a particular project because on the flip side you could also have neighbors that say I have a neighbor that's had a you know movable dumpster in this front yard and he keeps getting reperided and it's been two years to some people two years is a temporary project if he's doing it himself. So I do think it opens up kind of a Pandora's box of how we define all of these different things. I and generally speaking I'm in agreement with you but with any type of liberty there's also potential for abuse. So I think having the the kind of criteria is necessary as well. Ultimately too, I think this is no matter what is better than the current state because the current state is you got to contract with the public no matter what. And dumpsters are typically rented by the day or by the week. So, you know, if you get to to 90 days and you're still not quite done and we got to be super hardcore about it, which I don't think we probably do. That's an enforcement thing, then it's pretty simple. You just rent a dumpster from Republic for a week and finish out your project if you need four more days because you you'd have to renew the other dumpster for a week anyway. And they don't usually charge you to drop them off and pick them up. It's just a daily or weekly.

Yeah. I I just I moved into a house that I had to have a dumpster three times in order to get rid of all the junk out of this residential lot. That would be that if if that was here, that would be mean that I would have to contract with Republic. That would create a monopoly for them. That's a good question though. So, is this 90 days total for the year? No, you can only do it once consecutive. Yes, that was that was the recommendation. So whether you whether you need so if you contract a dumpster with somebody besides your public for a week

and then six months later you want to contract a dumpster for another week, you can't do that. Not the way it's currently written. I see your point on that, Mark. It says 90 days or less in duration. Well, it's the it's the one time only thing that would run into Mark's Oh, I see. example. Yeah,

there's also I think there's going to be people that that might want to create a business and purchase the infrastructure to have rolloff dumpsters and all of that based on the fact that now they can compete well this is limiting their business. So I I think there just needs to be a standard about what is a temporary project and is there flexibility for the city to say yes that's temporary and no that's not if it's outside. I mean, I understand that Republic recommended, but they stand to gain from the recommendation to the exclusion of other businesses. How about we table this and work on some drafts that meet more of what we're looking to get.

And and again, we're not passing anything tonight, uh, council. This is just a, like I said, a first wag at this. Um, just to take direction, let you know that this is coming back at some in some form or other. And if it is to work more flexibility in this or not have a bright line 90-day rule or 90 days total in a year, you get 90 days. I don't care if you contract 90 times or maybe 180 times a day some suggestions about what they'd like to see in it. And then we just,

you know, alternatively you could flip it, right, and say a temporary project is 30 days uh or less and the uh provision is limited to three times per year, right? Because then you're getting to the 90 days and a three three limit. So we can we can make adjustments, we can make edits. Um, we just need direction. Yeah. Or maybe even not more than 90 days total and not more than Yeah. Or could could we just do the reasonable man uh language in there? Or like with with land use, we say you can you can get a a you know spe a special use permit or whatever.

Something that allows somebody to review it and go clearly this is temporary. You did the roof in January. I get are in June and now you want to take the old tires out in August. And I think that works in the land use context. Uh um I'm sorry, Councilman. Um and if we were to create the regulatory scheme, that would be the perfect place for that reasonleness or a continuation of your permit or anything else. Um so if we're going to go down that route, then we can certainly build something into that if we're going to have them get a permit for a temporary thing, uh temporary use. Uh that would be the broader structure. Again, I was bringing it to you guys as a nar narrow issue, but it can be broader.

My concern with that again is now you have to create a whole new process for permitting or or whatever else like a special use permit. There's a whole lot of words in city code about that. Yeah. And hopefully we don't have to go that route. I just, you know, if you can wave the legal magic wand over this and make it the least hassle for the most amount of people and bring it to us next. Well, that's what the legislature did. Now we have to deal with it. Yeah. I think to Chris's point, anytime you build in discretion, you build in uninforcability. Some Yeah. uninforcability and some process to process those that discretion.

Who's it going to be? What department's going to how is it going to be processed? And and so anytime you have those sort of discretionary calls, you are you're effectively adding process. Yeah. I move to direct staff to bring back the solid waste temporary projects ordinance and that it include some additional flexibility that does not require a new permitting mechanism. Second motion in a second. Further discussion. Roll call, please. Stig leader. I. Luca, I. Malloy, I. Mosby, I. Pl. I. Ziggler, I. Motion passes. Thank you. Next up is Community Gardenou with Post Falls Food Bank.

Oh boy, I almost just made the motion. Yeah, it's totally fine.

Good evening, Mayor and Council. Chris Emerman, parks and recreation director. I'm here tonight seeking approval to enter into anou with the Post Falls food bank to utilize our community garden to provide food for those in our community that are are food burdened. Um pretty straightforward. Historically, a member of our community did that. His name was Mark Jones. He has passed. So he worked with youth from the high school to to do the same thing. Uh now we're just looking for an a replacement and uh comms uh food bank has some willing and able volunteers to to fill this void and I think it's a great thing for the community and I'd love to just continue that with them. So any questions? Pretty straightforward I believe.

I like it. I would move to approve the community garden with Postf Falls Food Bank. Second. Motion in a second. Further discussion. I have one question, Jack. What sort of oversight or supervision or involvement or any kind of connection is the parks department going to have once we approve this?

I mean, so in theou it talks about, you know, m maintaining the area, keeping it weed-free, doing the the needed maintenance. So, we'll just have a partnership with them and and our oversight is, hey, you're if they're not fulfilling that, um we I mean, we could, you know, um I think it says in there, we could uh abandon theou or whatever, give them 60 days notice or something. So um so that's an option is just if they're not meet fulfilling their end of their requirement we could discontinue theou

I mean is the idea to actually observe or is it just uh here's the memorandum of understanding do whatever you're going to do are we are we actually going to pay attention to it or Oh yeah absolutely just like the other plots that are rented um so we'll we'll have oversight okay thanks that was it yeah it's a great idea do love to see if we have other fellow land that could be used for that purpose if we could increase that program. Further discussion. Roll call, please. Luca, I Mallaloy. I Mosby. I Stigler. I Oh, wait. Was that me or you? Sorry, that was that was me. Yeah. Okay.

Ziggler, I Okay. I heard Stigler. I heard Keep guys on your toes. Motion passes. Thank you. Next up is citizens issues. This section of the agenda is reserved for citizens wishing to address the council regarding city related issues that are not on the agenda. Is there anyone who would like to speak? Seeing none. Scared them all away.

Mayor and council comments. Nothing from me tonight. Anyone here want to prolong the meeting? All right. On to executive session. We do need one tonight. I move to enter an executive uh session pursuant to Idaho codes 74-206A, 74-206B and 74-206D. Uh further no action will be taken during the session and the session will last approximately 45 minutes. Second motion in a second further discussion. Roll call, please. Malloy. Hi. Mosby. I blue. I Stigleer. I

Luca. I Ziggler. I motion passes. Thank you. We're enter executive.

All right, we'll return from executive session and absent any objection, we will adjourn. Thank you. I object.