Municipal Council - Regular Meeting

Go ahead. I'll make a motion to approve the minutes on the agenda. Second. Thank you. It's been moved and seconded. All in favor say I. I. I. Our 2026 regular meeting schedule are the first and third Tuesdays of every month at 5:30 p.m. and our next meeting will be February 3rd, 2026. We'll now open it up to public comment from the community. So, if anybody in the room would like to make public comment on anything that is pertinent and pertains to the council or the mayor, this would be your time. We ask that you state your name and place of residence and keep your comments to 3 minutes or less. and we will open the microphone to the public and Josh will be our first one.

Yeah. One by one. Um I just want to say yeah pit count I did it last year. It was actually pretty fun being out in the cold, you know, past midnight. No, it's actually it it helps it it actually makes it so that you get to see what a lot of people experience. I've been homeless in the middle of January and so I know what it's like and just being able to see it is an experience also. So eyeoping. What's that? Eyeoping is what I would call it. It's a eye opening experience.

Yeah, it is. It is very eye opening. Anyway, I just want to say want to say thanks to Dr. K for what he did um last week. 12 grueling hours of political science and you know it was actually it was actually very very informative. Um I've been nice to see the uh more of the public there participating. Well not participating but observing um guess what I found in my vest pocket this morning. Two Twixes and um and a recent peanut butter cup. So thank you Teresa.

Thanks Teresa. Oh, um um my three, you know, you guys kind of beat me to the point with what I was what I'm trying to do with the my little 3minut segments on political therapy. That was, you know, that meeting. So, I've got to comprise a lot more data, another 12 hours of data into this before I can get started with it. But um yeah, I I'm compiling that to help with this administration and this representative body. Still more to come. So just letting you know. Right. Thank you. Thank you, Josh.

Hi, Patrick Balma and Lyn Logan. Um, I'd like to just start by asking for a moment of silence for the atrocities that are happening in Iran right now. It's really devastating to see. It's a complicated situation how this has all evolved. But I think it's important for our own sense of humanity to not let things like that happen without explicit acknowledgement. So, if you could just take a moment of silence. Appreciate it. Thank you. Um, I also appreciated uh the public meeting you guys hosted. I think there was a lot of good discussion there. I was able to sit in on a good part of the SWAT analysis that you guys did. Um, and and a lot of good things came out there. you know, you guys are showing um that you're willing to revisit some things, that you're you're thinking deeply about a lot of these issues that are facing us. I I appreciate the pressure that's on your shoulders, the challenges that we face. Um I wanted to just make a couple of of notes, though. I I think now is a really important time to be thinking about the assumptions that we're making about how things proceed from here. Not just at the city level. I mean, we're we're not an island at the state level, at the national level, at the global level. All these things affect things that we do here. And so, I I guess I just ask you to take some time and reflect yourself on what what assumptions you might be making. Maybe be explicit about those. Write some of those down. Um, you know, I I think if you're assuming things are going to proceed just kind of how they have been over the last couple of decades, I don't think it's a good set of assumptions to be starting with. And I'm happy to talk through at least my perspective on that. Um, and if you don't think any of it's predictable at

all, that's probably also not a great set of assumptions to be starting from. So, I just ask you to to reflect on that a bit. what assumptions are we starting with here with this new city council and and what is that the implications for us moving forward and then the other thing would be to to please keep reaching out to a broader group of people there there are a lot of great people working for this city and a lot of great ideas that came up in that we've got a lot of other great minds in here as well um I I want to especially call out Tyson Godfrey he's he's brilliant he's done a tremendous amount of work he's volunteered a lot of time for this But he is just one person as well, right? You guys were talking quite a bit about geothermal. Logan Mitchell would be the person probably to talk with about this. Utah clean energy. He's probably got the best pulse on what's going on um in near-term geothermal in the state. Um there would be others who would have more perspective on some of the other um climate and energy risks that we face. And so acknowledging and and appreciating everything that Tyson does, I just encourage you to keep broadening your conversation. So

thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Seeing no one else, we will close our public comment and we'll move on to our mayor and staff reports. Mayor Anderson.

Very good. Unfortunately, um, Mike Desimone has decided to retire after 15 years at Logan City. 15 years at Logan City. Mike, thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much for your time and effort. It's been a pleasure to work with you for six years and uh enjoyed every minute of it despite your attitude. So, which is always very laid-back. So, by very laidback. So, um, thank you. But we have selected a new community development director and we would like, uh, council to please ratify Russ Holly as our new community development director.

And he's hiding over there. I know. It's his usual. Please come front and center. Yes, he knows how to sit so that half of us can't even see it. So, we had two amazing candidates for this position and both their presentations were very different and both outstanding, both internal and both internal and it was a hard decision, but we felt like you were the right person for this position at this time, Russ, and we are excited to have you. Chair, do we need an official vote here? Ratification. Ratification. Perfect. I move we ratify Russ Holly as the new community development director. I'll second that motion.

It has been moved and seconded. All in favor, please say I. I. I. Thank you, Russ. That was all you had to do. That was it. It's easy from here on out. I'd like to thank Mike. I would too. Yeah, ABSOLUTELY.

He has put up with me for 15 years. For a long time. Yes. for a very long time. So, you know, that's how it goes. It's how it is. He is great at what he does and an expert in his field. We will We will miss you. We will miss you. Yeah, for sure. But enjoy the nice weather and the pool. And the pool and I don't envy the drive to Arizona because I've experienced it recently. So, yeah, do not envy your drive. He's going to live within a mile where my gr my son lived.

It's not It's not fair. It's not fair. So, we do have a reappoint and a new appointment to the planning commission though. So, uh Sarah Dutrey has agreed to serve again on the planning commission. So, we need to thank goodness reappoint her. Yes. Sarah, are you here tonight? I don't see Sarah. But we are going to appoint Craig Mann to the planning commission. Craig, please stand up. Yeah, please stand up. Thank you for coming. Yeah, thank you for coming. So, uh also, Chair Johnson, uh we need an approval. Do we need approval? A ratification, yes, of our appointments. Thank you. I'm open to a motion.

I have a motion to approve Sarah Dree and Craig M um as plotting commission. I'll second my motion. We have a motion and a second. All in favor, please say I. I. I. They are approved. Mayor, wonderful. Thank youelcome. Good luck. You have Thank you so much. Thanks for being here tonight, Craig. We will try and get you some information and onboarding and get you ready for planning commission. It's a considerable investment of time and energy. So excited to have you on board. Give him a draft general plan. Yeah, we'll give you the draft general plan to like fall asleep at, you know, with stop. It's a dynamic document that's going to guide us for the next 40 years.

It's enthralling. It's enthralling. So, all right. Um, next we have a staff uh appointment. Tyler, you are up. Good evening, council. Good evening, Tyler.

So, this is just a formality. Now, in 2017, prior to the construction of the wastewater treatment plant, Bowen City uh entered into an interlocal agreement with the six other cities we serve. And each city has a representative on that board or committee to set the rates for the wastewater treatment. The mayor of Logan has served in that role previously. Mayor Dave was approved by the previous council to serve in that role. And now we're asking you to approve Mark Anderson in that same role. Any questions for Taylor? I move we approve Mark in that role. I'll second that motion.

We have a motion and a second. All in favor, please say I. I. You have fun, Mark. Thank you for your vote of confidence. Okay. All right. That's it. Thank you, mayor. We'll move now to PL to council business and we'll let Jeanie update us on planning commission.

Uh planning commission last meeting uh looked at two projects. One called Copperwood Town houses. It is a an expansion of an um interblock development that has already begun to occur but can now um expand because we changed some of the inner block the infill regulations. So, that was approved and Little Lambs is building a new facility to better handle their uh clientele that will be at 472 West 800 or 472 North 800 West and they will meet again on Thursday. Does Craig start on Thursday?

The next one? The next one? The next one? Yeah, probably not till February 1st. Yeah, you can come listen. I mean, yeah. Good plan. Exciting for little lambs though. Yeah. Well, it's going to be in the building. It's going to be very nice because they will not have to have people line up in their cars. They'll have a much more efficient um dispersement system. I've participated in that process and it is a little tricky. Yeah. Yeah. And so it's they're very hopeful. They're very happy about being able to do it. So that's great.

Thank you, Jean. We'll move now to council announcements. And as I said last time, this is a time if you've been to a meeting or have something coming up or anything from one of your boards. If you have a moment you'd like it to bring it to the council and the public, this is your time. Uh well, tomorrow actually we have local officials day at the capitol and um Melissa will be and I will be joining the youth council uh attending that and we thank for the city for the support because it it does cost money to register the students um to attend and so I think the kids are very excited to to be there. We will be fortunate enough uh if everything goes as planned to meet with um our legislators Chris Wilson and Jason Thompson.

Wonderful. Um and yeah, so we're excited. How many youth council members are you taping down? There are 12 registered. We're cross 12 show up tomorrow. 12 show up on time. 5:30 a.m. 5:30. Are they officially excused from school is the question? Okay. All right. That was a good reason to show up then. Yeah. 5:30. Yeah. Last year, everybody that was registered showed up at one time. Uh how many last year? Do you remember? Last year there were six people and they're I think they're very excited this year. Good. They seem to be You've done an amazing job of engaging and I think that you will find you'll have 12. We're hoping for the 12th to come. So,

you're planning on taking a lot of photos, too, so you can share those for the mayor's newsletter. That would be sensational. Yeah. In fact, um um Representative Thompson uh will use a personal privilege is what he calls it to introduce the group to um the floor where he's going to be talking about. Very cool. Oh, cool. Very cool. That's awesome. Wonderful. Love it. Anything else anyone else would like to bring up before we move on? Wonderful. Well, we look forward to that. It'll be I'm excited to see the photos and maybe one of these years you'll take me with you.

I won't look at Melissa while I say that. Um, can I take your spot? No, that's okay. That's okay. Maybe one year. He's the one he made up the spot. I know. I know, right? So, you don't get to say that she took your spot.

She did not take my spot. I did not say that. Um we'll move now to uh we have a board appointment for the renewable energy and sustainability advisory board. Um this person has I believe attended a couple meetings and has they've been attended a meeting and they have been approved by the board. Um if Amber Spackman Jones, are you here tonight? Amber. Wonderful. So Amber's here tonight. Um this is a council advisory board. So they are uh appointed and approved by the council. Um, so if anyone has any questions for Amber or if we'd like to open it up for a motion, I will turn it over to the council. I'd be happy to make a motion uh for Amber Spman Jones to join the res board. I can second that.

We have a motion to second. All in favor, please say I. I. I. It has been approved. So, Amber, thank you. And we look forward to having you on our renewable energy board. Congratulations. Thank you. Our last council business is we have a general plan workshop on February 3rd, 2026 from 3:00 to 5:00 p.m. That is in the city hall conference room, which is the room just west of here. And that is a public meeting. So, the public is invited to to attend that meeting as well. Uh, and we will move now to our action items, and we'll give Amy the microphone and let her run us through ordinance 26-01, the first ordinance of the year. Thank you. Chair Johnson.

It can be Mike. That's really fine. Mr. Chair Johnson, first your chair. Mon your mic. The very first action item of the year. 2016. How exciting. I know. And and it's a bookstore. How could it be any better?

All right. So, I have ordinance 2601, which is the future bookstore. We talked about it a couple weeks ago. So, it is located at 404 Park Avenue, uh, west of Fair River Headstart Daycare, the aquatic center, Cash Valley Fairgrounds. Um, this parcel is 052 acres on a triangle-shaped lot and the driveway accesses Park Avenue. Um, a little bit of history. It was originally built as a schoolhouse and then converted into a church and then in the 50s it was turned into a single cabinet component. I don't know if you've ever seen the house, but it has some

pretty interesting features inside. Yeah, has some character that be nice. Uh, it's currently in an NR6 zone. Um they're asking for neighborhood center and neighborhood center is like spot floating zone. It we currently have four on the east side which her in island market tendor oven and a bank and then one on the west which is not far um which is that bagel shop um far enough huh far enough. Yes. So you have to have at least a quarter uh a quarter mile between them and it is just over that. So

neighborhood center is our lowest intensity commercial zone. Is that correct? Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Thank you. Well, I mean you can have nine units. It's lower than community commercial. Yeah. Commercial intensity. Oh, intensity. Yes. I was thinking dwelling units. I was like, okay. Yeah. Yes. Very low intensity. Yeah. Yes. Um, so there it is.

Here's all the other ones that I mentioned. And ours is down here in this little corner. Not ours, but the applicants. So, it needs they're typically pedestrian oriented oriented. Uh, like we said, low intensity, quarter mile. If they were to demolish everything on the site and start new, they could have nine dwelling units per acre, but no standalone residential projects allowed. Um, they can have a detached s single family home permitted. Multif family would be conditional conditionally permitted. A maximum of 3,000 square ft commercial footprint. Any more than that up to 5,000 requires a conditional use permit. Uh, no drive-through lanes or windows are permitted. Parking at the side or the rear. And the max structure is 35 ft, which is the same for the residential zone. Let's see. So, the applicant is asking for this reszone to neighborhood center and they're proposing a book store and coffee shop. um they'll apply if they get this reszone, then they'll apply for that conditional use permit and possible design review permit depending on what they're planning on changing. They want to take out the garage that's in front of the house and turn it into a patio and then move the drive. The driveway would be moved up north farther where they have the parking lot. Um so planning commission approved it unanimously. The main concern anyone had was increased traffic concern. Um Darren spoke on that saying that the road is has an adequate capacity for this use and also the proponent will need to

submit or be required to submit a traffic plan, a traffic study, impact study and staff recommends approval because there were some sight line concerns with coming around the corner and the cross the intersection of the interception. Correct. So, any questions? Does the I'm going to look up Paul in the back there. Does the crosswalk that's just north of this? It does not have an RFB, does it? I don't think so. What's an RFB? The rapid flashing beacons. You push a button.

No, it doesn't. the rectangular rapid flashing RFB government acronyms. You mentioned that uh it has a maximum of 3,000 square ft. Uh yes. Is there a minimum? No, not a not a minimum. And that's the footprint. So, how many square feet is this building? Do we know? Like the footprint's not 3,000 square feet. Uh, no. It was They're going to do some remodeling. There's like a loft, but they're going to take that out. So, they they mentioned that it was not 3,000 square ft on the inside.

Not quite. I mean, my main concern has been not an increase of traffic, but just the fact that that's a blind corner. Um, and maybe that's something to consider when they do the parking lot that maybe it could be a right turn only out of that parking lot or something like that so that it's safer because when we have big events like the fair and vintage market days or basically anything big at the fairgrounds, people are parking on that street on both sides of that street. It makes it extremely narrow and extremely blind. So my concern streets would want to paint the curbs red. You can look at them.

It would be something to It's like painting the roads. Painting the or people are just going to park in their parking lot. So and they would park in the parking lot. Drinks and donuts. Yeah. Yeah. That would be

Any other questions for Amy before we open it up for public comment? Okay. Thank you, Amy. We'll uh this is a public hearing, so if you have any thoughts or comments on this, uh we will open the microphone. You you're welcome to state your name and take 3 minutes or less, and I will officially open the floor. Seeing no one, we will bring it back to the council for further discussion or an action or a motion. Did you say the garage is going away?

Yes, they they have proposed that they were going to take out the garage that's in front of the house and make it like a patio area. Do do we know if there is any more plans for increasing the visibility from that corner towards where the parking area will be? like are the trees going to be removed or

I when I drove past it looked like some of the trees had already been trimmed. No, that's just the Google Maps one, but um it seemed like the trees had already been trimmed a little. I'm not sure, but to increase visibility to the place, I would assume that they would want it seen more than lost. And they will take out that driveway that goes to the garage right now. Correct. Correct. Yeah. Uh engineering parks or not parks but streets would won't allow public works won't allow two driveways, just one. Okay. Yeah.

Would it change the speed on that road at all? Right now it's 30 miles per hour and that's been another concern because people on that curve people that live on the west side of the Park Avenue on that curve have had they have boulders out there now but they've had their mailbox taken out plenty of times. They've had people run into their boulders plenty of times. Would that be considered speed now that there's going to be a business on it? I'm not quite sure. I would cuz there's businesses up north and it hasn't changed it speed then. Yeah. So, probably not. I think 30. I say it's at 30 miles per hour. Correct.

It is 30. That's just my I mean I just have concerns that way. I love the idea of a bookshop. I if it stays a bookshop um it'd be awesome but in the neighborhood. But yeah. Well, we do have to remember that it might not be a bookshop. Yeah, we do. And that's also been a concern from people that I have talked to is what could it turn into being a neighborhood center? Amy, what are what are the other businesses are allowed in neighborhood center that would be allowed without a conditional use permit? So, not that many. No. Um, let's see. Permitted or conditionally? Uh, just permitted.

Just permitted. Yeah. Food service less than 3,000 square feet. General office and sales and service less than square feet. Agriculture community or urban. That's all that's all right. Grow farm. But sales and service can really be pretty broad, right? As far as what they sell or what they Yeah. Yeah. But limited to 30,000 square feet, right? Yeah. I mean, it can't be automotive sales. Say that again. Can it can it be automotive sales or something like that? No, it has too small. It has Yeah, general sales and service. So, you could have like a small office building there

or food services or offices. Yeah. Food service offices. Sales and service less than 3,000 square feet. And you said no drive-throughs allowed, right? Yep. No walk up windows, no drive-throughs. But there are other uses. conditionally permitted. Correct. And those are food service more like up to 5,000. Mhm.

With the conditional use permit. Uh office up to 5,000. Basically the same things but up to 5,000. I move we approve ordinance 26x-01. A second. It's been moved and seconded. All in favor say I. I. Any opposed?

Ordinance 26-01 passes. Thank you, Amy. Russ, our second ordinance of the year.

Mr. Chair, thank you. This is another neighborhood center request and it's just barely a quarter of a mile away. Due east is the fairgrounds north reszone project at 390 South 400 West. If you're familiar with the fairgrounds, there's the north gate. It's directly across the street from the north gate. The applicant, Tony Johnson, um, successfully reszoned the parcel across the street and is nearing completion of, I think, what they're calling fairground or fairway bagels and donuts and donuts. Um, I can't forget. I'm excited about the donuts more than the bagels. Let's be honest,

it does say Fairway Bagels and Donuts on the sign, though. That property had a historic corner market that was abandoned for decades. And then this resone um restored that historic building.

Uh this is across the street to the east and it's currently a 1920 brick bungalow home. It's a singlestory home. Uh it doesn't quite sit at the corner. It's kind of back in the property a little bit. The current uh fluff calls the area MR. And again, this is a floating neighborhood center zone. So we don't really plan these out because they could work on a lot of different corners. Um and so we leave that open and and look at them more individually and try to determine do they make sense here? Do they serve the purpose? Uh the current zone is MR12 and you can see across the street is the um neighborhood center for the bagel and donut shop. The proposal is to zone this parcel which is just over a quarter acre. Some of the questions last time were you know how big should a neighborhood center be? And the zone or the code doesn't say you know it's limited to two parcels or three or four. When you read the intent of the zone and you talk about the small scale or the intensity of the commercial, I don't think it's wise to to have four, five or six parcels clustered together. That would be a larger zone which we call community commercial or even a commercial general. But to give you an idea for scale, um the other neighborhood center, which is the Tandoori oven and the credit union on the corner of 10th North and 700 East shown here, is two parcels. Um two businesses, two parcels. The Island Market on the corner of Center Street and 400 East is actually three parcels, but there's only one business. Um, the two residential parcels to the south and east are also zoned neighborhood center

which may allow for some expansion in this area. Um, but this proposal with two parcels, so the existing one to the west and now the proposed one to the east, um, in staff's opinion doesn't, you know, supersede or or exceed the intent of these smaller scale neighborhood centers. Uh they can get up to 5,000 square feet with a conditional use permit, but typically they're a 3,000 square foot smallcale retail or neighborhood serving use. In this case, the plan is another food service. Um but they would have to come back if this is successfully reszone and go through a design review and conditional use permit depending on the size and shape um to get a design and renovation approved through the planning commission.

So Tandoori oven and the credit union are an anomaly. They were shoved into this zone. They existed long before the zone existed. and we sort of stuck them in there because that's sort of the way they fit.

But my question becomes how many parcel how many streets do you cross with your one community commercial thing? I mean, does it become have do they need to be contiguous or can they be randomly placed like do they have how do we define the quarter mile? How do we define how big they can be and how many parcels like do they go all the way across the across from the fairgrounds parcel by parcel or and it's still community commercial or neighborhood center neighborhood center

um without becoming community commercial what I don't understand that my question you know I know we use the Tandora and the credit union as yeah they can cross the street but they are definitely an anomaly because they already existed when we created neighborhood commercial.

That's a great question and the answer is up to the council. If you feel like four properties that are closely clustered meet that intent, then you could technically reszone four properties. I think being adjacent or contiguous is wise. In this case, I would say these are adjacent. They are across the street, but they're adjacent. And and again, walkability is important because if you think about these, they're intended to serve the surrounding neighborhoods. So folks can quickly walk here, get a service per performed or or pick up a quick snack or whatever. Um they're not generally auto oriented. I will agree the the tandoori oven and the credit union were assigned the zone after the fact and walking across 10th right there is not super neighborhood friendly. There there is

there is a a marked crosswalk there. It's a T intersection and T intersections are all a little always a little tricky for drivers but they technically should yield. Um, now how many folks go to the tandoori and the oven and then straight across to the credit union? I don't know. You know, um, they actually do because Tandoori says to park at the credit union if it's like at night and they don't have parking. Throw them under the bus in the public meeting.

But anyway, I realize that it's not generic to this particular request, but it is generic to the concept. And I don't, you know, I was trying to figure out, okay, yes, these are the same owner. So, but if it were the whole crossing the street with the same zone, it was like it seems like it should be a little cluster thing, you know, a little little bit here and a little bit there or then it goes to the larger community commercial zone. So you have concerns of having a street through the middle of two of these. Is that

Well, I just it conceptually conceptually, yes, community commercial doesn't have the caps on the 30,000 or the 5,000, right? Um it opens up the window for more types of businesses without a conditional use permit. Um a couple of those examples are the Dwelly and the former Cubeex and the Elks Lodge. So all three of those which those that's a much larger acreage that's probably seven or eight acres total and two of those we applied the zone to after the fact after the fact.

Um so yeah that's that's kind of a step up in intensity as you look through our zoning portfolio if you will.

Right. I guess I just I I applying them after the fact should not define the parameters for moving forward, but I don't want to belabor the the issue. I just think it's something we ought to consider as we move forward because this seems to be something people are going, "Oh, I can do this right here and oh, I can jump across the street and do it over here, too." Because it's still the same, not a quarter mile apart. And if somebody else owned the next property, would they be in the same neighborhood commercial or would they be different because it's a different owner?

If they're on a different property, then they're zoned differently,

right? But they're contiguous or adjacent to the current neighborhood commercial. And if they made an application to reszone, we would look at it and and judge it on its merits. Again, I I think you can get too many. And I don't I don't know if that's an exact number, but two, three, four, um, is probably about as as high as you want to go for these neighborhood centers. And then you start thinking about a a higher intensity. But we've had to assign zones retroactively all the time. Logan started out with two commercial zone. It was a C1 and a C2 in 1950. Now we have a half dozen commercial zones for all the different types of, you know,

businesses we have. So

I guess I I wish we had a little tighter definition on neighbor or community commercial, but that's okay. Or neighborhood center, sorry. I in my mind the neighborhood center there's they're all a bit unique maybe and that's the the reasoning. They're also more restrictive in terms of you know some of those um you know square footage etc. So seeing them on a case by case given how many we have currently seems like an appropriate way to approach it. So we're the community commercial kind of being the next level up

opens up more sort of considerations and challenges impact if we reszone those two parcels. Does it fit that in total there can only be 3,000 square feet? I interpret it as 3,000 per store or per building because if they were owned by separate owners, then you wouldn't enforce your neighbors. But what I'm saying is we've said neighborhood center is 3,000 square ft without a conditional use permit for these three things. This is neighborhood center. But they're too separate, aren't they?

The code says per parcel. Three square feet per parcel. Per parcel. Per parcel. Okay. All right. Thank you, Chris. So, are you asking Genie so that if like the lot next to this one, they turned that into a neighborhood commercial and then the next one did as well? Like where is our limit of saying you can't have another neighborhood commercial? Currently, it's the discretion of the council without without specific specific maximum. Yeah. Well, it's on the planning commission. Yeah. So,

yeah. But anyway, that's that's just sort of not pertinent to the question at hand, but pertinent to the larger question. So, planning commission recommended approval. We did not receive any written opposition, nor did we receive any verbal opposition at planning commission. Correct. I think because it's bagels and donuts. If it was only bagels, I would not have approved. No, no, not this one. I know. I know. But what what more are they going to offer as the owners? You know, something else. It has to be round. Maybe.

No, I'm just kidding. I do have I do think Tony's planning on a small scale restaurant. Cake pops. No, he won't. He'll release it to somebody else now. round. Are there any other questions or comments before we open up streak two? Any other comments or questions for Russ? Russ, there's no T on the end of that. Sorry,

not yet. Anyway, uh this is a public hearing. Uh for anyone who would like to comment on ordinance 26-02, please come to the microphone and state your name and take three minutes or less. I always want to leave awkwardly long pauses in hopes that he'll answer because that's what I do to my son. I just sit here and stare at him. He answers eventually. Seeing no one, I will bring it back to the council for either further discussion or a motion. I do think that given all the commercial activity that happens at the fairgrounds

and how busy it gets, this to me does not seem too out of place to have those two parcels be become neighborhood centers. So I with that said, I would move approval of ordinance 6 262. I'll second ordinance 2602. It's been moved and seconded. All in favor say I. I. Any opposed? I'm going to say nay. Ordinance 26-02 passes. Do I have to officially state that for the record? She's got it. She's got it. Okay.

Thank you for the discussion on that one. We will move now to ordinance 26-03, the very exciting rightway vacation. And we'll let Paul give us a brief overview of what we talked about last time. You bet. You're asking for two vacations. Yeah. Two. Correct. Very different from from Never do just one. Mike Desimon's vacation, unfortunately. Yes.

Thank you. Um, as a brief overview, um, the first one's 900 North, right? We're discussing a public right ofway vacation at 900 North and approximately 1,000 West um in Logan. This is the larger subdivision called the CVE subdivision that was created many years ago and at which time 900 North was dedicated as a public street. It has been um petitioned that 900 North be vacated as a public rightway. Um, we discussed that the property owners to the south and the north have entered into a private agreement for maintenance and also to record a future um access easement for those three properties to maintain access to their properties. Um there was a question about changes um potential changes to that easement since it is a private agreement or how could that happen? Um I and the concern for if they were to narrow it in the future beyond fire lane requirements, those kinds of things. I discussed it with Craig Humphre, the fire marshal, also Darren as far as Darren Far, city engineer. processes they could, and this would apply to any private easement um throughout Logan City, which there's probably thousands of them, whether it be a road or a utility or something like that. Anybody that has interest in that easement could agree to change it. There would not be a trigger for a review with the city process um necessarily if that's all they were doing. But if it involved a building permit, a subdivision, a boundary line adjustment, anything like that with a city process, it would trigger that review to where that um could be

commented on and changed or not approved if necessary. Um I asked Craig, I said, "Well, given that, do you have any concerns or conditions you'd like to see?" And he said, "No." He said it's how things have been done and it's never been a problem before. And so he was fine with it. tried to look into it to answer your question. um Ernesto. So the assumption then is that they wouldn't do it because during the building permit if if that was their intent that would reveal to us correct

they are agreeing to reduce the the easement enough that would become problematic for public safety or is that

so for example on the drawing we're looking at up here um the applicant of the south is proposing to build a new warehouse back here and has recently submitted plans for that for uh design review and building permit process. Whenever that happens on any of these three properties, there's a review and the city, the fire department could require saying, "Hey, at some point you shrunk that or maybe with their subdivision or their building permit, they're proposing to do that." And they could say, "You cannot go below fire lane restrictions due to this fire code. you have to put it back to where it was or you can't make the changes you're proposing is how that would happen.

Well, and that possible building is further than where the easement goes, right? So, we wouldn't even Correct. But because it's on that piece of land, it could be part of that review for fire access to that future building even though it's not adjacent to that easement. So does that mean that they will have to increase the easement further to to the west? To the west if there was a fire access concern with their proposal. Yes. But given today, no, they wouldn't have to now. Yeah. Because there's no building.

Correct. But if they were to put a building clear in the back corner and the fire department said, "We need access to that, you need to provide that as part of your plan like they do with any development." Okay.

Thank you. You bet. Um, as an update, making sure that's my last slide on this easement, I received, um, one email from a representative of the property right here, um, owned by GZner Foods inquiring about the schedule and the process of this, uh, when they could make public comment, those sort of things. We gave them that information. They said, "Great, thank you." And so that was that correspondence. Um, and for the first time in doing these vacations, we always have a petition that is posted at city hall for those that received the notice to come and it says the following signatures represent those property owners who consent to the requested vacations. They support it or consent to it. And for the first time, I've had someone come in and sign it. And we've had three um folks come and sign that petition.

Wow. So we do these for a reason apparently. Once every 20 years. Yes. So So there was support for that then. Correct. The three um represent the property to the south, the property across 10th west to the east and I don't know who the third one represents because it didn't have the business name on it. So I I don't know exactly which one it was. Uh, we haven't received any other verbal or written comments or inquiries on this one. Are there any other questions? So, as far as you know, the property to the north, they are in support or they just haven't said anything.

The property to the north um did submit a prior to coming, we did talk to the applicants, hey, we'd like to at least go talk to these property owners. and they did and they supplied a letter of support for it, but it wasn't part of the petition process. I guess just I wanted that before I ever brought it to came. And just to clarify, the diagram that we have in our packet shows the easement extending all the way to the edge of that this one like that. So that is showing the right of way that will be vacated. That's the vacation. Okay. This is the easement that will be dedicated.

So we're going from this to that essentially. Correct. So you're being reduced already. Yes. The entire right it's two separate Yeah. things. The entire rightway is being vacated. Yeah. And then as part of that they are dedicating a pee and cross access easement to that point. Okay. And just of note, the currently built or improved goes that far. It ends right there and everything else is just I don't know what to call it. Native ground. That might be undeveloped. That might be a stretched

and we and we did notice that that one building does go into the rideway already that's already built there. So correct. I did note whether I don't know if this applies or not when this subdivision was done on the dedication plat for the subdivision. Uh this building was noted as being it it would be in the public rightway and there was a note saying that if this parcel were to ever excuse me at the time that this road was ever built out the rest of the way this property was required to remove the building out of the rightway. So I guess that requirement Wow. Would go away because there wouldn't be a road built there.

Yeah. So, it was noted, I guess, is the point. It wasn't an accident.

Any other questions for Paul? Who are the parties requesting this? Uh, it was to the south. Cash Electric was who started the petition or the application. If there's no other questions, this is a public hearing, so we will open up for public comment. The public's welcome to come to the microphone, state your name, and take three minutes or less. And everyone shouts to their feet of right away vacations. So exciting.

I'll narrate for the YouTube. There's a mad rush for the microphone. Seeing no one, I will close the public hearing and bring it back to the council for further discussion and or an action. A motion. I move we approve ordinance 26-03. We have a motion. Any second or further discussion? I'll second. It's been seconded by Melissa. Any further discussion? All those in favor of approving ordinance 26-03 03, please say I. I.

I. Any opposed? Ordinance 26-03 passes. Thank you, Paul. And you get the next one. 2604. Electrical easement vacations. If you want to give us another another rundown. You bet. is located within the Cash Valley Marketplace um subdivision between 1400 North and 1250 North and Main Street and 200 East um otherwise known as Target and commonly known as commonly known as

um the application of petition is to vacate certain public utility and electrical easements um mostly for the two items. The development of the property where they would be in the way of buildings, the redevelopment and secondly with some boundary line and property line adjustments that happened when there's a public utility easement adjacent to a property line and that park line moves. We like to move that easement with it if it obviously can be done. Uh my understand is all of the utility companies that were existing mostly electrical loan light and power have already done the work to move. These are the electrical easements that would be vacated within this subdivision with this ordinance and the public utility easements that would be moved to now be adjacent. They would be vacated so the new ones could be adjacent to those new proxy lines showing. Um, if you want to see the legal ease, there's the

the legal side of it that will actually be recorded. Um, with regards to response, you saw in the packet there was a long list of property owners that this petition was sent to, uh, three pages and we had no one come and sign or giving their consent. And we had one inquiry from an adjacent property. I believe it was that one car wash quick inquired in just about how it affected him or if it did he was given the information he wanted and that resolved his question. I wouldn't even say concern but the question. Are there any questions I can answer? So in this in this case all of the if there was any electrical infrastructure there or the easements used to be uh that has already been

my understanding is it's it's either already been done or is going to be done as the development continues. Correct. If we don't vacate these easements, can they build their buildings over the easements? Um, this is more my curiosity than not. We shouldn't be able to. Okay. Are new I don't have any. Are new easements created when they put install the new electrical? Yes, as part of their um subdivision or dedication plan. Yes, it would be. Okay. And when do those when are those brought forth? They typically would happen with the subdivision as part of that.

Uh when they review the plats and those sort of things, they'll make sure they're on there. They don't have to come to us though, correct? Yeah, they do. It's only when we give it away that we have done it.

When we get it, we're just happy. And these, it's funny, these vacations are almost always associated with something else, a subdivision, a boundary adjustment. And we try to do them as concurrently as possible, but like for example, tonight I will hold any resolutions that are signed and not record them until the easements and we record them at the same time, the new easements. So the vacations and the newsrooms typically get recorded at the same time, but they're probably different processes that created them, if that makes sense. Does

any other questions for Paul? This is also a public hearing. Anyone who would like to speak on or 26-04 is welcome to come to the microphone, state their name, and take three minutes or less. Another mad dash. Seeing no one, I'll bring it back to the council for discussion or a motion. Does keeping them like denying or is this put us in a liable position of some sort? Just keeping them. Yeah. If we said no, we're not going to approve this vacation. That means that we keep the current easements. Right. So, does that make us liable for

I'm not an attorney, but I would say I don't think so. I heard it potentially. Potentially. I think we have development agreements with them and we grant them building permits and told you can build here. We say you can't build here because of these. I have a question, Craig. Have you ever said yes or no instead of potentially or possibly? BUT NO, he didn't say yes over that. I was hoping for a yes or a no. Response. You got me there. I was hoping yes or no. I don't think you like the context of your question. It depends. I will move approval of ordinance 26-04.

We have a motion. I'll second the motion and a second. All those in favor of approving ordinance 26-04, please say I. I. Any opposed? Ordinance 26-04 passes potentially. Official. Yes. It is a solid yes. I got a yes out of it. All right. We have one last public hearing for the evening. I guess the crowd was here for the easement vacation. Uh resolution 26-01 for the vacations. Yeah, a day for the vacation. The free vacation. Rich, you want to take us through this one?

Three items to consider for uh approval, two donations, and one grant. 2500 donated to the police department for the replacement of glass and police rescue vehicle. 2500 uh donated to the fire department for a storage container training facility. And lastly, a grant from the from UD do for 225,000 for improvements on 200 North. And this is a little unusual because that's a state road. That's the reason we're doing it because we've been given a grant to do it. So, how does someone go about doing a donation to the city for a windshield replacement?

Check. Yeah. I wasn't sure if there was a special process that everyone should know about. Do you have to specifically say it's for this these these purpose but this is the request of the departments to use it for that purpose. We do receive grants that are for that purpose but this was a donation but this was this was a donation I think was mortgage did that they do every year and so we told them this is for Okay. So, is it a donation specifically to the police department? Yes. Or Okay. And then and fire department. And fire department. That's okay. To give you equal Yes. It goes to the city of Logan, but they have But the people can specify like it to go.

Yeah. Okay. That's very So if you want to donate to the golf course, that's what I'm wondering. I just think it's awesome. So it's like, well, if anybody else wants to do that, what's the mechanism to do that? Yeah, you have donations period as long as it's a tax deductible donation as long as there's no value given in kind. So it happens fairly frequently. It happened for some of our large capital projects that have a library and some of the others. Okay. So it's a good thing. Thank you. We love donations. Any other questions for Rich? Can I ask? Yes. If we council like clarification when we receive it for a very specific purpose versus when it's somewhat generic. Yes.

When I bring these forward, I'll I'll try to remember to do that. I'm just curious just cuz I'm curious like do people donate just to Logan City? I mean most often I would say very it' be very specific. They'll either donate to a department for kind of a general purpose and then allow us to decide or they'll donate to a very specific item or thing is how it usually happens. We do we do have others though that's how they usually are. But we usually don't discuss them until they're being allocated. Right. So we wouldn't get a report of what was donated. It's just when they're allocated in just when we bring it to council to spend,

right? Is one of the exceptions that a conservation easement was donated?

Yeah. I in that case, so if we if we are donated a capital or a item a lot of times that will not come to council because there's no monetary transaction. It's either we accept it or we do not. Now there are maybe concerns about accepting something that has liability associated with it and we would try to come to council but there's no requirement to come to council if it's an item or a thing. So the the easement in that case is do we accept it or do we not? But we would definitely want to talk to council if there was some sort of dollar amount associated with it because we'd be asking later to appropriate some sort of funds in order to complete or take care of or maintain something like that. Any other questions for Rich? This is a public hearing. Anyone from the public who would like to comment on resolution 26-01 is welcome to come to the microphone, state their name, and take three minutes or less. Seeing no one, I will bring it back to the council for further discussion and or a motion.

A motion to approve of resolution 26-01. I need to put my glasses. Is that your first motion? I don't know. Is it? I think it is. I think it is. No, you did it before. She seconded, but is she No, she's moved motions before. Would you like to second her? Sure. We have a motion and a second. All those in favor, please say I. I. I. Any opposed tonight? As a matter of fact, my memory is that short. Teresa's going to look it up for us. It might have been just the minutes in the agenda. It probably was the minutes. I do. to approve.

Okay, that closes our public hearings for the day. We'll move on to our workshop items and we'll take it back to Mr. Anderson for our resolution 26-03.

So, we receive these fairly well periodically at least. Uh so, we do overtime shifts for various entities when it's in the interest of the city. those entities pay us for those police shifts and then we we come to council after the event typically and request reimbursement. So it's it's an understanding that we would come afterwards. Typically we with most budget resolutions we come before the thing has happened but in this case many times we don't know what the costs even are right

and it's in the public interest that we uh maintain public safety of some of these things. Typically, we like to do it quarterly. We've had a string of three or four of these in a row, and it's just because our budgets are fairly tight right now, and this is a fairly large item. So, the requesters appropriate 7,142 for police overtime shifts for which we have been reimbursed. Any questions for Rich? Thanks, Rich. We'll see you in two weeks. Our last workshop item tonight is resolution 26-02. We have our wonderful library director, Michael,

who will run us through a proposed resolution to approve new library fees. And this is the one that covers our non-resident non-resident. Yes. Good evening. Thank you for waiting for the end. That was neither intentional nor anything else. It's now 7:30, so

All right. So, brief PowerPoint. So, back in um when I was hired, one of the first things I heard about was our non-resident fee and the general public uh reaction when we tell them that it's u $163 a year. And when I asked why, every single person I ever talked to from uh board members to city council to mayor to anyone is that it was based on the average residential property tax paid by uh Logan residents. Uh however, um that is not accurate. uh I started doing some research uh with some help from some of my staff and in Jan June of 2000 uh this was the formula that was used to come up with it. It's basically trying to figure out what cost per circulation is whether or not I actually agree with this formula. Um, but in June of 2000 it was established at $157 and I knew that well okay it's now 163. So at some point it was changed. And so I started uh looking through our archives and found an article from um uh April of 2009 explaining that the 163 came from this formula. It was just updated to the numbers from 2009. There was a brief time where uh when there was discussion of a county system attempting to be formed that uh we actually lowered it to $75 with a uh kickback from the county of $30 in that uh so well it was 7030 so it was $100 it was reduced and then when the ballot measure came along and failed it was put back to the 163. So, since January of 2011, after that

little hiccup, uh we uh have been charging $163 a year. And uh in 2013, the library board approved a uh a quarterly option. So, you could buy three months of access. So, basically one one quarter of that. So, um I brought this to our board if nothing else to be say that we should we we at least need to accurately report. And this is no no fault of anybody's. Uh I've got recordings from board meetings of board members saying I was at that meeting where we decided it was based on property taxes. It wasn't based on property taxes. So it's this this kind of myth that we have there. So um

I said well okay what if we actually uh took that same formula and adjusted for inflation to 2025 and that would actually increase to $278 uh a year. uh which 14 years sounds about right.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. If if we were to stick to this for this point the library board went we're not doing that. Um because nobody would buy a library card at that point. Um I did speak with Rich and uh Rich did agree uh with us that uh the right now the average residential property tax is approximately $125. Uh Rich suggests and you will hear from him shortly that uh we actually double it and put it at 250. I will let him him explain uh his reasoning for that. This was also rejected by the library board. This is what is in your packet. There's a lot of wording here. I will shorten it significantly. Uh the current is the 163 or 42. What the library board has approved and is proposing for council approval is that we actually reduce that to $125 a year. Uh we allow for prr rating. So if somebody wants to buy six months, we divide that by two. We offer these cards on a fiscal year for better and easier tracking of statistics because right now it starts whenever you buy it. So things cross fiscal years. Um but then every time a library card is purchased by a non-resident, we would add a $10 service fee to cover some additional costs and acknowledge that we are providing a service outside of the city. Um, so that logic $125 a year does reflect what we have been telling people. I will acknowledge that uh people who purchase cards do tend to circulate more items than people who don't. Um, but there are still just 10% of our annual circulation. So, not a large amount. $10 service fee takes into account providing service to non-residents and the fiscal year allows for bettering as I've mentioned. So that is my presentation.

Thank you. It's a really cool I'm not sure who took that picture. Yeah. Thank you, Joe, for taking that picture. So, one of the I'm gonna talk to Mike here for a minute because Mike's big on using electronic services from library and was very upset when they were limited because of cost. Sorry. So, how does I do remember him being quite uptight about it. So, how does I hate real books. What do you want me to say? I'm just kidding. I'm kidding. I I just prefer my Kindle and my audio books. Sorry, keep You're reading. But what I'm I'm not here to criticize Mike for that. But it's okay.

But I what I want to know is we're providing we pay for that out of our budget. We provide that to our residents. But now if we are providing it as well to outside of Logan City, how does that affect the use of those types of services?

It it is significantly hard to predict to be completely honest um because we don't know how many people will buy carts. Uh last year because we offer the annual and the quarterly. I did the math to like how many cards we sold equivalent to a year when it's about 163. So we're not we're not talking thousands of people who are purchasing but we might be talking about more people.

Sure. Yes. Yeah. It we we would anticipate external purchasing or non-resident purchasing cards would go up. Yes. I've spoken with staff. Nobody. Digital is a little hard harder to predict than physical, but we don't anticipate, you know, we suddenly need twice as many staff because so many more people have bought books for Well, no, no. What I'm But what I'm saying is that we've limited Hoopla the Hoopla. We've limited Hoopla to X number of dollars. Yes. But and still on that first come, first serve every day, X number of dollars. Yes. Yes. Because of how Hoopla works. Mhm. And and so that's my concern.

Okay. That's my only concern is that we want to advantage our residents in that sort of a system because we are paying the balance that we are paying the bulk of the bills. Sure. But I don't want it to to shift the ability of our residents to use those services. That's a fair that is a fair possible prediction. Um, no, no, I'm just I just want to Fair. Yeah. No, throw throw it out there. I don't have a solution. Sure. It's one of my biggest concerns, too, but obviously I was the one that threw a fit about Hoopla, so it was a fit. I love it. I Yeah. So, I just the first two. Yeah.

Are there other capacity concerns? It sounds like there aren't in terms of, you know, if there are increased um library cards, you know, um

Sure. We right now about 53 or 54% of Logan residents have a library card. Uh and that's not even use it, but have one. Theoretically, be a little hyperbolic. We could have 300,000 residents sign up for a card next week. Yes, that would be a significant impact to to services and to to staff time to to run the building. Um, but in in asking people to pay, we would assume lowering the cost would increase the number, but not significantly to make any sort of impact. So, if it increased to just 500, that wouldn't

then nobody would buy. No, not the price. But like if you had 500 people buy it, you don't feel like that would change your fact. We want to be busier anyways. So I mean we like you you ask a librarian, there's going to be like we want we want people to come into the building. We want people to use our services because otherwise we're just a building full of books for no reason, which does sound kind of amazing sometimes. Well, come see my house. But I agree with you. We won't be using the library. Yeah. So, I know this had a lot of discussion in at the library board. Um

um and I understand that when there was an initiative on the ballot to see if there was a county, it was a narrowly uh what do you call it? Vote for the no. Uh it was voted yes in Logan. It was voted no in the county, but it was pretty narrow. Do you any idea like close to 50 like 5050 or are we talking 6040? I don't recall. Oh god. I thought it was close countywide. So um countywide

we have our finance director kind of advocating that we increase the fee. Your own math says that it should go up based on budgets if well based on the formula that was picked in. Yeah, exactly. Based on which I I don't necessarily agree with as a metric. Yeah. So if this were to to gain brother broad support in the council, how do we advocate for this to our Logan? uh population, our constituents. How do we say

how do we say, "Hey, we're we're wanting to lower this fee in the hope that more people who need or want the service will will but how how do they see this?"

That is a very good question. I I would argue that Logan has this jewel of a new library and we want people to use it and those who need access to it to get kind of basically what you said. Um I mean I'm sure there will be people who are like it's ours, it's for us and we support it. But there are there are many different ways that libraries preside provide services to non-residents whether uh we do have other ways to get cards say if you work for the city or whatnot that where we don't charge any because you you are participating in this community and I would like to get an increase of people participating in this community

currently anyone can use the library they can't take stuff out correct yeah they can't take stuff out they don't have the digital access this is the only thing really. This is the only extra thing that they're getting for this amount. They can come to our programs. They can come in and read a book in the building. They can can do anything take it home or the digital access. It's the digital access and the the on the ability to take it take a physical item out of the building. So, all I'll say is Mike is going to tell you if he gets cut off anymore from there's going to be trouble. You know, you and I I would love to have a conversation actually. Yeah.

So, I actually quit using Hoopla and went to Audible a few months ago. And in November, my accountant wife, she's listening. She's I'm back to Hoopla, but I have I have three more Audible. You ran out of I'm out. So, she called it audible. So, I I have a couple probably four weeks left before I'm out of an audio book. Well, my wife then I'm back hoopless. So then I'll be who knows what. My wife uses auto and she's listening so she balances you out. It's so expensive though. I Yes. How much is Hoopla?

Hoopla is expensive but it's in my taxes. I already pay for it. It's cost by book. But Audible, their base subscription's 18 bucks a month, but you get one credit and you get one book a month, which is about five days at Freedom Speed. No, I just I just listen while I'm driving and running and then I'm done in a week. Yeah. And then I'm like, well, another 20 books and that adds up over a year. I used to have a two-hour daily commute. I got through. Yeah, you get it. You understand? Can I ask a dumb question? Because doesn't the county use Libby for their online? We do too. We do too. We have Libby and so what makes someone buy a pass with us just because they can check out books from our library

bigger because they already have Libby with the county library? More often than not it's the it's the physical items that we have. We have a much larger physical collection and having Lubby on two cards does give you access and there's a state there's a state level discussion since especially Overdrive is mostly funded by actually state money um about what we call double dipping and that is a national problem. So like that's I mean more often than not in my experience in talking to people who have bought cards and talking to staff it's because they want the physical collection. They're like, "Well, you name other town. You have that library." It's like, "Yes, but it's this big. I want to come to the Logan Library." So,

well, and I think we have an incredible children's collection that is heavily used and we have wonderful children's programs and I think they attract people from all over the county. The programs are outstanding. Mhm. Yeah. 100% due to the staff. Um, yeah. Yeah. North Logan's Library. Do you know what their non-resident fee is? $100. It's 125. It's 125. Uh I was told by the director they changed it to 110. They lower I got the ordinance from their council this week and it said 12. Okay. All right. So that's comparable. Yeah. Comparable. Yeah. Okay. Um they're also currently closed.

They are interesting. I uh spoke for quite a while on the phone this week with um the chair of the Cash County Library Board, which I'll pull up Melissa here and throw somebody under the bus. Um I don't do it that often. No, you're okay. I'm doing it right now, so it's fine. Um who I've known him for quite some time. He called me up this week and and said, "Hey, um we're probably closing. I don't know how much you know about this." And I, you know, we talked about that. They got a six-month reprieve basically. Yeah. Um and we and we talked about their usage and you know what their outlook was like and he lives in Providence and what Providence might do with the building and

it's all hypothetical at this point right 6 months out. Um and I brought up our fees uh and he was not aware that they were that we were considering changing them. Uh and his biggest concern immediately was that was Libby um and and that that's their biggest usage. And he he immediately said to me, I don't know what impact that will have on your library. He said, "But I I have concerns with that." Um, and I need to talk with him more. I hope to sit down with him in the next week or so, but I know that Yeah, because they see a lot of digital use because of the geographic use of it. Um, and also they have a very small collection, right? So, um, I do know those concerns coming from that side.

I I've talked to slightly more than 10. I don't think I've hit 15 of friends of mine that live in North Logan believe in Providence who I know have Logan library cards. And I said, "Hey, if we dropped it to 125, would that change anything?" And me being me, I said, "If we raised it at 250, would that change anything?" And every single one of them said that it's a bargain at 160 and they don't see it as a problem at 160. Well, the people who had paid it

and I understand I understand that I'm talking to and I also understand I'm talking to 10 people out ofund whatever thousand and they're already paying for it. Um but also every single one of them said if you raise it they would make me buy burger next time we went out but they would but they would be fine with it. You know that that they feel like it's providing value with where it's at with and I understand that I'm talking to people who Sure. Yeah. Yeah. currently pay for it. With regards to the money that comes in, as we understand it right now, it goes to to the reserve fund for the library.

The board would be completely okay with dedicating a portion or all of it or something to collection development, to overdrive, to hoopla, to whatever. So, we could offset any potential raises. All of the money that comes in from cars, from non-resident cars, all just goes into reserves. What what revenue account is it? Is it 369 or is it 35? I do not have the account numbers memorized at this point. No, I'm sorry. But it it doesn't get magically added to our like collection budget is my understanding.

I'm not 100% sure. We just have it's not we just set the budget. Some most of those fees are negligible anyway, right? the fee accounts and so I'm not 100% on it but it's it's it's not something we balance nor sure do anything with the budget well and you and I talked about this which I know you know that I'm vaguely opposed to this not not strongly I'm I'm not going to go nuclear on it not what not militantly that's a good term um potentially potentially possibly opposed but if but sorry if I can finish I thought I know you and I talked about this briefly. We're looking at what 200 cards a year averaged over the last 3 years.

Yeah. And if you change the card fee by 40 bucks, you're changing library revenues by $10,000 a year on a $2.9 million budget. Like it's not I don't know. It's not a life-changing amount of money to library. Like it is something, but it's not right. It's not like we're going to bankrupt the library either way. Genie, so how much what portion of our budget are the electronic resources that would be 180 what like Libby if the county closes their library and what how much would the Libby cost for us to have it for the whole county?

For the whole county? That is not a number I have off the top of my head. No, but I mean Is Libya by by user like up to a threshold? We pay into a state the state runs a statewide account for Libby Overdrive. We pay into that based on our I think it's population size. So everybody in the state who every library in the state who participate pays a rate. Um, and then we've dedicated specifically for Overdrive approximately $10,000 extra, which we can use to buy down our holds. So, if our holds are high,

you said 10,000 extra. Yeah. Yeah, it's 10,000. Um, and then we we can put in more if we need to out of our general collection budget. Um, but that way if um a lot of Logan library users want a particular title, we can buy copies in the Overdrive system that are specifically for Logan library users. Do we spend more on physical collection or digital collection? Physical. Okay. Yeah, that's right now about uh we're 50,000 150 between $100,000. Although the most significant increase in last year's budget was for digital

is that the 162 that was the mayor's line the mayor's electronic there was there that was the 162

this was under the previous director so I don't want to speak too much to it but my understanding is is is a budget line was not paid attention to and so money had to be moved to cover because what happens with hoopla is you basically just say if everything is completely available there is no adding to a collection, everybody can get what they want and then we can set a a max spend so we can keep to a budget per day and that max spend was either non-existent or wasn't being paid attention to. So it hopefully was over spent which is why those those changes were implemented. And we do we will be re-evaluating them this year once we see our usage and have a another full year's worth of stats under these new and see what the budgetary impact would be if we were to change those numbers.

Okay. But that's what that 162 Yeah. last year was that So that's not typical. No, absolutely not. That will not happen again. And remember, but that's what people want to spend on hoopla. Oh yeah. Exactly. Right. If we didn't cap it, it would they would blow the physical out of the water. Yeah. So, did you already say how much it would be if we stayed to the current caps uh for Hoopla, for example? I mean, it stays the same as what it is. Don't know the Hoopla number off the top of my head, but if you don't increase the cap, the price is the same. People each person just has less access as the group gets bigger. But the potential largest I think you said largest usage for those non-residents are the digital resources in particular that that's what I got from their board chair. Oh, you said oh.

So I guess well they're saying Providence is use is is more digital library but they also have a much smaller physical collection than we do. So they kind of have to be more digital more digital on that. Yes. And then in terms of Libby Overdrive, you said the um the the payin to that on the state level is based on population. Um is that what is that correct? I I I am fairly confident. So we base that based on the population of of Logan Logan residents. So it's not based on non-resident correct users. So that impact is not well at the moment there's about 162 non-resident users.

But if we had a thousand our payin would stay what residents are not what resident and I get the idea is like of the whole usage only a portion general. So you're okay. Yeah. as and half of our city uses a library card, give or take, or has one? Has one. Yes. Was I mistaken, Rich? Was there anything else you were going to add to this? I'm going to subtract from the discussion, but Okay.

So, yeah.

So, I'll say this now and then I'll refrain from comment during the uh action item. You can vote any way you'd like. Obviously, this is a council action and council is welcome to adopt a fee wherever they feel it is appropriate. However, I do want to make sure we're all very aware of the difference between something that is supported by a tax versus something that is supported by a fee because I think there's a big difference. So a tax what you do to to figure out what the tax should be is you figure out the total cost of providing that service to a certain constituency. In this case the the Logan taxpayers and then you figure out the rate that will give you that amount of revenue. Now during that calculation

per taxpayer

per taxpayer knowing full well that not all of them are going to participate. In fact since it's a government service we think everybody should participate because everybody benefits to a certain level even though only maybe some decide to participate and some decide to participate a lot and that's just fine. That's how you do it with a tax. With a user fee it's different. With a user fee, you try to divine the full co typically the full cost of providing that service to that user. So if a business calculates a fee and it's $300 user fee that they decide we don't want to charge 300 because not enough people are going to come, we're going to charge $200. at some point down the line they'll go bankrupt because they're not supported by taxes. So I think it's super important that we maintain or we remember that it's because we have this tax base that we're able to determine the fee. However, you know, Ronald Jenkins many years ago was the one that kind of came up with that way of calculating it. What he did is he tried to figure out the cost per circulation, applied that to a household as best he could, and that's how he came up with that figure. When you update that figure, you he came up with 278. I've always approached it a little differently. So for Ronald, when he'd asked me, I'd give him the property tax calculation and trying to turn that property tax into a user fee by taking into account the participation. And we'd get fairly close. So we say, you know, there's some there's some validity to how we're calculating this. Well, in this case, the updated user fee using the circulation is 278. The way I would calculate or the way I would convert a tax into the full cost of providing that service would be able to take would

be to take that 125 that is the average charge to Logan taxpayers. They have no choice in the matter. They have to pay that. Then I would divide that by the participation rate which is somewhere between 55%ish 56 I think you said something like that. Yeah. And 35%ish depending on how you consider inactive cards. I just split the baby in half and said half of them are going to participate. So you need a new phrase. Sure.

So using a participation rate of 44% divide that into 125 you get $280. That's the estimated full cost of providing that service to each user. Um so the concern that I have with this very shortly we're going to start the budget process. We're going to try start figuring out how do we get by this next year? How do we provide general fund services to all of our residents and then separately we're going to have a discussion and have a proposal of how do we provide library services to our residents and taxpayers? And at some point, we're going to have to raise those property tax rates. And how do we as a city look our taxpayers in the face and say it's okay to raise their taxes to provide this service when we're unwilling or unable to charge the full cost for providing that service to non-residents. For me, that's a really, really big deal. For me, that bites at the equity principle that we talked about and included in our tentative mission statement. To me, that's very inequitable and I have a very, very hard time with it as a finance guy. Furthermore, I think there should be a benefit to living in Logan. And one of those benefits should be access to that library because all the Logan residents are paying for it. Again, this is the spiel. I'm a finance guy. I know there are other perspectives that need to be taken into account. They're all wrong.

Possibly wrong. I thought you said we were right. None of us were right. We're all right. I know there are other perspectives you have to take those into account. But this is a difficult issue for me and I think how do we possibly raise taxes on our residents if we're not willing to pay to make the others pay the full cost to provide that service? Don't we have a tenative truth and taxation for August with a tenative library raise tentatively August 11th? Yeah, but it's tenative for for 3% on it's inevitable at some point we'll have to raise last year two years ago. Last year the last two years we raised the library that last three years maybe just two

last two years once was just the library and the last year was across the board. That's right. Yeah. So last two years we've late raised the library. I anticipate it's going to be necessary in the general fund and very likely in the library as well. Just one thing, just one thing in response, I I'll kind of assume what the board would say at this point. I mean, uh, the 125 is based on the number we have now. I would not anticipate the board having a problem with adjusting that if if the tax rate goes up, adjusting the fee to match. I would hope not. Yeah. No, we it wasn't discussed, but I haven't I mean, some of them are here and they're shaking their head. Yes. So, um

but according to Rich's argument, it's still on a downward train. I I I don't have an alternative number. I I've I've talked to other libraries about how they do it. Some of them they just divide population by the collection budget because it's impact on the collection. There's no I So, you know, Rich has his formula of how much it costs to provide this service. I can find other libraries that would agree with that. I could find other libraries that are like, "No, we use a completely different formula." So, I you know, here's now word of a non- finance guy, a librarian. Um, you know, I I I get his point. I don't agree with it, but I I don't have a exact number. It's

This is what I say to my wife all the time. You finance people, I say, I get your spreadsheet. I don't agree with it. So, I empathize. Yeah. We can disagree about what we think the fee should be. I don't think we can disagree on what the full user cost is because I mean and this is the operational cost only. This is not the capital cost. We spent $18 million on that library as a city. 3 million of that came from the general fund of local city not from the restricted reserves of library. We can we can disagree on what we think it should be. We can't disagree on what the total cost is. We can disagree on how you

and there are soft benefits to letting more people into our library that benefit Logan and our community in general in large. What's that? There are soft benefits that are not that I think are we can look at the hard numbers and say yes, this is where we are. But there are benefits to saying we want all to come to our library. They benefit in many ways to them and us. Absolutely. But what's the is it fair to give it I I mean I agree. We want all to come to our library, but is it fair to give everybody the same cost? I mean, it seems like you go to Brigham City Pool, they charge more for non-residents. Why can't we charge just a little bit more for non-residents? So, you have 125 for 300. No. Well, that was that was the I just think like why not 150? Why not? No, I mean

Yeah. Well, again, just just remember the full user cost cuz I think 270ish. It's I it's not even debatable. It's somewhere around 280 give or take 15 bucks. That's where we're really at for the full user cost. There is no question. My whole thing is is I I feel like our goal is to protect our taxpayers. Yeah. Right. And so that's why I have a hard time just charging the same amount that our taxpayers pay. I think for me we don't we we don't pay. We do in our taxes. We pay $270 technically. I thought it was 125.

125 in our taxes. We pay 125 on average the average. And that's what I'm saying is that which means you pay more than some people and some people pay less less. And I I I think the board's intention with this I'm sorry I missed that was to kind of add that 10 bucks on top of it just to make it a little more and each time you buy a card that's only time they buy a card. So that's I know, but some people will buy a short-term card and then buy another short-term card later in the year. So, they would pay that and it would pay you would pay the $10 on renewal. Yes. Yeah. So, it's an extra 10 bucks a year every time they buy one. Exactly. So, an extra $2,000 a year in the budget. They're charging an extra $10 right now.

No, that's what you're proposing. And that's rich. You say that 125 is the amount that a a household pays to support the library. But not all households use it. Every household, but then in order to figure out the cost of providing that to everybody, the cost of providing that to a user, you have to because not everybody has a card or the number based on

Yeah. And I think for me for like since this is workshop and no action correct tonight is to see that that I I hear it and I think I understand it but I also I think for me it'll be helpful for me to see it you know just what you just articulated you know and to make sure I am understanding it correctly which I think I do. Um because really the cost per user to Logan residents the cost is 280 plus what what they pay is 125. The reason they pay 125 is because everybody has to has to pay. It's like a gym

even though I don't go there. Oh, I see what you mean. Okay. M you're converting it into he's trying to cover the cost of providing service but from the people who pay the tax but don't use the service. And and to me this really comes down to truthfully because every time I've thought about this is are we running on the hard numbers here because the hard numbers say don't lower it possibly raise it probably. Sure. Or are we running on the principle of we like libraries or the principle of we're protecting our residents? like they like the numbers say don't lower it and so it's really a principle of libraries are good give them to everyone which is true or protect our residents and do the best by them which is true

yes and so that's why I've struggled with this and that's why why I've struggled with this though because the numbers say one thing but we can do whatever we want here and it's really two competing good principles decisions all the with within the current. We'll need to go get donuts after this. Human resources of the library. Yes.

Um have any and if you don't have an answer right now, you could bring it in two weeks. um a handle of how much more um demand of the actual services that they provide could the current makeup of the human resources library take? The the only services that would theoretically increase under an increased non-resident participation would be the digital services which has basically approaching zero staff input or you know staff time into it and then it's purely it might be a little busier at the desk and we might have to shell more books. That being said though, increased circulation of physical materials at the library actually gives us more shelf space to buy more and fit more new materials into it because you technically if every single book came back today, we wouldn't have the shelf space for it. We we plan to have books checked out.

That's interesting. So, is the 125 per person or per family?

It is still a family. So, the 163 is a family. So that means in um uh a household pays the fee and then can have as many cards as family members living in the household. And that number is an average of 3.7 per household. But when I say we've had 163 purchased cards, that's 163 worth of or 163 fees that have been paid. you would actually number of cards would actually be approximately 3.7 times that. But not all those cards are then actually used. So mom buys the card gets one for her husband and three kids. That doesn't mean all five of those cards are necessarily used with any regular.

And this would be the same way be 125 bucks. you get as many cards as we were we were we investigated trying to convert it to a individual card significantly lower number than 125 and that that that went nowhere we decided to stick with the family card and I have had one phone call from a from a non-resident who said that's discriminatory because she doesn't have a family she lives by herself and so she should 63 which is the same for the person who lives in Logan in Logan going to pay their property. Yeah. Yeah. No, I know. I'm just It was funny that I like Rich who lives alone. Sad. My family lonely and rich counting his spreadsheets. Yeah.

My friends in some cases even these numbers are kind of because of how our systems work. I can get to approximate numbers but I can't get you know hard and fast 100% accurate. Sure. Other questions for Michael or Rich or Craig? And he will give you a vague answer. Craig's Craig doesn't want any part. You've been labeled Craig. You've been labeled. I'm happy to. So, does this turn into a public hearing?

It will be a public hearing and action every two weeks. So, we'll take public comment probably from our library board members who are sitting here and others and uh then you get a vote on it. Any other questions, comments, thoughts, concerns, arguments, please. And from just I think I know the answer because I was I think there for one of them at least one of the meetings. Was this uh recommendation um what was the split or the unan was it unanimous or uh unanimous from the board for and you stayed Yeah, if you

will you be if you need more data on this, please let me know and I will instruct staff to assist with that. And for the new council members, feel free to schedule a time with Michael or Rich or Craig and they will all talk with you. Um, you have a a library board meeting next week, Monday. Yeah. Are you planning on discussing this at all, do you think, in your I I mean, we'll report back to the people who uh weren't here. But they voted. Yeah, they've already they voted on it. Needs your approval. Okay. Anything else? Okay. Thank you, Michael. We'll see you in two weeks. All right.

Very last time on the agenda, I'm sure. No, you you'll be the you'll be one of the first. You'll be the next. Yeah. There you go. All right. So, thank you for staying and for putting up with us and thank you to the wonderful library board members who hung out and you guys are all welcome to reach out and support talk to us as well. Please do. Please reach out and thank you for all the work you guys put into the library board. It's very appreciated. Yes. Thank you. Any other considerations before we close from any of our council members or our mayor? Okay. With that, we will adjourn our meeting. 7:18