Public Works Committee - Regular Meeting

Alright. Welcome to Stomach County Council Public Infrastructure and Conservation Committee for Tuesday, August 19 at 10AM. We're meeting in the Jackson Boardroom and remotely this morning. Before we do roll call, I'd like to read our public comment script. Take public comment beginning with in person and then remotely. In Zoom, click on the hand icon to raise your hand. If calling by phone, press 9 to raise your hand. When called upon, press 6 to unmute. Each speaker will have up to three minutes to speak, and please start your comment with your name and city of residence. With that, we'll go ahead and do roll call.

Committee Chair Lo?

Present.

Vice Chair Dunn? Here. Committee Member Nearing? Here. Committee committee member, Mead?

Here.

Committee member, Peterson?

Here.

Chair, there are five members present.

Great. Next on the agenda is public comment. Anyone in person wishing to get public comment today? Alright. I don't see anybody in person who'd like to do public comment. Anybody online with their hand raised?

I see no hands raised.

Okay. We'll go ahead and close public comment and move on into our agenda today. We have, 13 action items and one discussion item. And so with that, we'll go ahead and go to action item one, motion 25 dash three four five.

Good morning, committee chair, low and council members. For the record, Deb Eveson Bell Council staff. Proposed motion 25 dash three four five would approve and authorize the county executive to execute amendment number nine to the master contract for comprehensive appraisal assessment and treasury system and sign any necessary option to extend under Snohomish County code three point zero four point one four zero, paragraph 11. Snohomish County has used this software since 1998. The proposed amendment extends the term for maintenance and support, including user fees for the most recent Marshall and Swift rate tables for assessment values.

The term is from 09/01/2025 through 08/31/2026 for a cost of $299,822. The requested action is for counsel to move the motion to GLS on August 20 for consideration. The request is to expedite as that the start date for this amendment is on September 1, and the vendor is requesting lead time for processing. This concludes my staff report. I'm available for any questions.

Alright. Any comments or questions from council members? Hearing none, we'll go ahead and move this to consent on August 20 unless there's objection. Hearing none, we'll move that to consent and go to motion twenty five dash three six zero.

Thank you. Proposed motion twenty five dash three six zero would approve and authorize the county executive to execute amendment number four to the software as a service agreement with Legal Adams Corporation LLC under Snohomish County code three point zero four point one four zero paragraph 11. The proposed amendment would add an online payment collection services for users of the county's electronic filing solutions for citizens utilizing the e file service for court documents. There is no cost to the county to add this feature to the current software portal. The requested action today is for counsel to move the motion to GLS on August 27 for consideration. This concludes my staff report. I'm available for any questions.

Right. Any comments or questions from council members? Hearing none, we'll go ahead and move this to consent on August 27 unless there's objection. Hearing none, we'll move that to consent and go to motion 20 five-three 69.

Thank you. Proposed motion 20 five-three 69 would approve and authorize the county executive to execute an interlocal agreement for information technology services and associated work orders and amendments between Snohomish County and the Snohomish County Fire District four under Snohomish County code three point zero four point two one zero and three point zero one point one four zero, paragraph 11. The current agreement expires on 12/10/2025, and the term of the new agreement is from 12/11/2025 through 12/10/2030 for not to exceed amount of $20,000 over the term. Requested action today is for council to move the motion to GLS on August 27 for consideration, and this concludes my staff report. I'm available for any questions.

Any comments or questions from council members? Hearing none, we'll go ahead and move this to consent on August 27 unless there's objection. Hearing none, we'll move that to consent and go to motion 20 five-three 70.

Thank you. Proposed motion 20 five-three 70 would approve and authorize the county executive to execute amendment six to the software's service agreement with RAVE Wireless under Snohomish County code three point zero four point one four zero paragraph 11. Amendment six allows for the city of Marysville to use the county's existing agreement for RAVE alert services. The county and the city of Marysville currently have an approved interlocal agreement that includes access and support for alert services as part of the annual fee to the county. Requested action is for council to move the motion to GLS on August 27 for consideration. This concludes my staff report, and I'm available for any questions.

Right. Any comments or questions from council members? Hearing none, we'll move this to consent on August 27 unless there's objection. Hearing none, we'll move that to consent and go to motion 20 five-three 71.

Thank you. Proposed motion 20 five-three 71 would approve and authorize the county executive to execute an interlocal agreement for information technology services and associated work orders and amendments between Snohomish County and Snohomish County Fire District number five under Snohomish County code three point zero four point two one zero and three point zero one point one four, paragraph 11. The proposed agreement would allow for technology and network services to be provided to the count by the county to the Fire District five using the county's work order system for not to exceed amount of $40,000 for the next five years. This agreement was negotiated and the projected revenue was included in the approved 2025 through 2026 by any budget. The requested actions for council to move the motion to GLS on August 27 for consideration.

This concludes my staff report. I'm available for any questions.

Alright. Any comments or questions from council members? Hearing none, we'll move this to consent on August 27 unless there's objection. Hearing none, we'll move this to consent and go to ordinance 25 dash zero four nine.

Thank you. The proposed ordinance 25 dash zero four nine would vacate the deeded unopened right away for 90th Avenue Northwest from Bow Road South to the end of the avenue located in Section 6 Of Township 31 North, Range 4 East. The county engineer has prepared the required engineer's report and recommends conditional approval. The proposed road vacation is in conjunction with, and I apologize if I butcher this, the Ziz Abba phase two estuary restoration project, 248 acres of tidal wetland restoration on Stillaguamish tribal property. Requested action today is for council to move the ordinance to GLS on August 27 set time and date for public hearing to consider the county engineer's report and to hear public testimony according to RCW thirty six point eight seven point zero six zero and Snohomish County code thirteen point one hundred point zero six zero.

This concludes my staff report, and I'm available for any questions.

Alright. Any comments or questions from council members? Alright. Hearing none, we'll go ahead and move this to August 27 to set time and date for a public hearing and go to ordinance 25 dash zero five zero.

Thank you. Proposed ordinance 25 dash zero five zero would authorize the county executive to execute the interlocal agreement substantially in the form of attachment a to the ordinance with the Tulalip tribes for the transfer of Totem Beach historically called Road 8 or Road from Mission to Tulalip. The ordinance authorizes, excuse me, the county executive to execute the quick claim deed substantially in the form of attachment b to the ordinance and and a transfer the road and the county bridge number five zero nine over a creek known as Battle Creek or Mission Creek. The proposed ILA has been negotiated and is mutually agreed upon by both parties that the road and the bridge are to be transferred to the Tulalip tribe's tribal transportation program and is to be operated and maintained by the tribe for continued public use of both members and nonmembers of the tribe. The requested action today is for council to move the ordinance to GLS on August 27 to set time and date for public hearing.

This concludes my staff report. I'm available for any questions.

Or any comments or questions from council members? Alright. We'll go ahead and move this to August 27 to set time and date for a public hearing. Go to motion 25 dash three three nine.

Thank you. Proposed motion 20 five-three 39 would approve and authorize the county executive to sign supplement number seven to the professional services agreement CCF zero one-twenty two with Confluence Environmental Company Inc. For the amount of $20,000 $820,817, excuse me, for a total amount not to exceed $324,027 under Snohomish County Code three point zero four point one four zero, paragraph 11. Proposed supplement would amend the existing agreement with an updated construction schedule, including related construction activities below the ordinary high watermark, which includes conservation measures for fish protection outside of the approved in water work window. The requested actions for council to move the motion to GLS on August 27 for consideration.

And this concludes my staff report. I'm available for any questions.

Alright. Any comments or questions from council members? Alright. We'll go ahead and move this to consent on August 27 unless there's objection. Hearing none, we'll move that to consent and go to motion 25 dash three five one.

Thank you. Proposed motion twenty five dash three five one would authorize the critical area protection on county property as shown on the critical area site plan for Swamp Creek Bridge number four, excuse me, number five zero four replacement project. This is RC1633 under permit number NWS2015Dash379WRD. As attached and incorporated by reference to the motion and authorizes the county executive to execute the same under Snowmish County Charter 2.2. Improvement project required a designated protection site that would be left excuse me, permanently undisturbed in a substantially natural state for compensatory mitigation of the project's impact to critical areas.

One parcel was chosen for compliance with conditions of the Army Corps of Engineers permit in connection with the Swamp Creek Bridge 504 replacement project. Permanent protection of the site requires approval by the Snohomish County Council and the recording of the critical area site plan with the county auditor. The requested action is for council to move the motion to GLS on August 27 for consideration. This concludes my staff report, and I'm available for any questions.

All right. Any comments or questions from council members? I will go ahead and move this to consent on August 27 and move to motion 20 five-three 79.

Thank you. Proposed motion 25 dash three seven nine would approve and authorize the county executive to sign amendment number one to the interlocal agreement between Snohomish County and the Alderwood Water and Wastewater District concerning utility construction associated with the Swamp Creek Bridge Number 503 replacement project under RCW 39.34. This is a proof tip project in ACP item f dot five four, and the proposed amendment provides a more accurate scope of working cost. The new description includes the installation of up to 490 feet of eight inch ductile iron restraint joint water main, including fittings, routing through the new bridge wing walls, and supporting the pipe with hangers under the bridge deck, insulating the exposed portions under the bridge, and installing a fire hydrant and water meter for an additional $99,457.72 with a new not to exceed amount, $607,474.89. All costs associated with utility shall be reimbursed by the Alderwood Water and Wastewater District to the county road fund.

The requested action today is for council to move the motion to GLS on August 27 for consideration. This concludes my staff report. I'm available for any questions.

Alright. Any comments or questions from council members? Go ahead and move this to consent on August 27 unless there's objection. Hearing none, we'll move that to consent and go to motion 25 dash three eight one.

Thank you. Proposed motion 25 dash three eight one would approve and authorize the county executive to sign supplement number 13 to professional services agreement CCF zero two dash one eight with Jacobs Engineering Group for the amount of $628,107 for a total not to exceed amount of $3,981,846 under Snohomish County code three point zero four point one four zero, paragraph 11. This is for tip and ACP item e dot five two dot zero one for improvements to Ashway from 164th Street Southwest to Gibson Road. This is west of Mill Creek City limits in unincorporated Snohomish County. This would include Swamp Creek Culverts design specifications, including an opinion of cost for construction and assistance in identifying right of way needs in support preparation of the right of way plans of Ash Way.

And that's from a construction from 18th Avenue West to the intersection of Admiralty Way and Gibson Road. Within my staff report, there is a typo under authority granted with a misplaced comma. I apologize. The requested action today is for council to move the motion to GLS on August 27 for consideration. This concludes my staff report. I'm available for any questions.

Alright. Any comments or questions from council members? Hearing none, we'll move this to consent on August 27 unless there's objection. Hearing none, we'll move this to consent and go to motion 20 five-three 40.

Thank you. Proposed motion 20 five-three 40 would approve of the findings that is in the public's interest to acquire permanent easement for a right to cross and the installation of tieback anchors for support and stabilization of a retaining wall and authorizes the property officer of the Department of Facilities and Fleet to sign all necessary documents to complete the acquisition. All parties and departments involved have conferred and agreed to the proposed action under Snohomish County code four point four six point one one five paragraph 14. A retaining wall is needed as part of the redevelopment of the Arlington operations center along the Southern Common Pop excuse me, along the Southern Common property line. Due to the constraints of the property and the necessary setback, the county needs to purchase from the adjacent property owner a permanent easement for below ground tieback anchors that will support and stabilize the retaining wall.

Additionally, a right to cross the easement area is also sought. Proposed agreement would encumber tax excuse me, would encumber assessor's tax parcel number 31051 z excuse me, 1500401400 in perpetuity for the agreed amount of $28,238. Requested actions for council to move the motion to GLS on August 27 for consideration. This concludes my staff report. I'm available for any questions.

Or any comments or questions from council members? Hearing none, we'll move this to consent on August 27 unless there's objection. Hearing none, we'll move this to consent and go to motion 25 dash three seven eight.

Excuse me. Thank you. Proposed motion 25 dash three seven eight would find that it is in the public's interest to approve the donation of seven parcels of real land. These are assessor's tax parcel numbers. And I apologize.

It's gonna be long. 29052600101100. 29052600101200. 29052600101300. 2 905, 2600, 101400, 2905, 2600, 101500, 2905, 2600, 1016029052600104200 to the city of Lake Stevens and would authorize the property officer of the Department of Facilities and Fleet Property Management Division to sign the statutory warranty deed, escrow closing documents, and any all of the documents necessary to effectuate the transfer of the parcels to the city of Lake Stevens in accordance with the terms and conditions of the donation agreement.

All parties and departments involved in the matter have been conferred with and agree with a proposed donation agreement. So the county acquired the 26 acres known as Cavalero Park in 2001 with the assistance of Snohomish County's neighborhood improvement program and conservation futures. This land was then annexed into the city of Lake Stevens around 2011 and now resides within the city limits. Snohomish County Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, as the custodial owner of the property, would like to donate the land to the city of Lake Stevens, including transferring all associated costs and management of the park with a projected cost savings to the department of approximately $65,000 per year in maintenance and management costs. There is an error in the as the wrong version of the final agreement was included in the And the corrected version was sent over from executive staff, and I had forwarded a copy to that to council this morning.

There is also an error within the motion. The fifth whereas needs to be stricken as it mentions, the transfer of a different park that is not connected with the proposed donation. So the requested action for this ECAP is threefold. One, for counsel to direct the clerks to edit the motion by removing the fifth whereas, to direct the clerks to swap the correct final version of the agreement within the ECAP, And three, for counsel to move the corrected documents to GLS on August 27 for consideration. This concludes my staff report. I'm available for any questions.

Deb, I just want to say thank you for all your work on this. I know that it's a lot of effort to get to this point on your behalf, so great work. And so I'll just go ahead and restate that for the record. Counsel will direct the clerks to edit the motion by removing the fifth whereas. Also direct the clerks to insert and correct or as you said swap the final version of the agreement and for counsel to move the corrected eCaF and documents to GLS on August 27 for consideration.

So we'll go ahead and do all that unless there's objection. Hearing none, we'll go ahead and do that, put it on consent, unless there's objection. And that'll be on consent for August 27. And with that, we'll go ahead and put that on consent and move to our discussion item. So welcome, Kelly and team, and let's hear your presentation and update on the budget.

I'm gonna pull up the presentation, so just wait a minute. Well, good morning, counsel. Thank you so much for the opportunity. I'm Kelly Snye, the public works director at Snohomish County. And today, we're going to talk, just to provide a little update on our roads budget.

So even though we do solid waste, this is a focus on roads today. So I have a few slides for you. And then perhaps if you have any questions, happy to answer those as best I can today. And note that I'm solo at the desk today. Mister McCormick just picked up our next national award for the Index Galena project and is flying back right now. Very exciting.

And that was in Chicago? It was. And the mayor was, Blake Stevens was there. Council member, Peter Schagen was there, and Thanks. Mayor Wito was there also.

Fantastic. That's so great. Love it when we can all support each other. Alright. Let's go to the next slide, please. Thank you. So this is not new for you. We've been talking about our concerns with the road levy and our overall budget for couple of years, so not a shock. I think what is most, I think, concerning for us is the increase of the cost and expenditures inflation inflation on the budgets that we, have available to us. We are I like to refer to our team as very MacGyver like.

So whether you like the old MacGyver or the new MacGyver, we are the MacGyver. We try to do the best that we can with every single dollar that we get in our revenue and try to make sure that we can leverage it the best that we can. And I'll talk a little bit more about that in our future slides. What have we done to date so far? So you can see in the blue box that there are several, things, but I'm additional ones.

We've sold properties that we have, been able to surplus the last couple of years. The last very significant one will close, crossing my fingers when I say this, knocking on wood, next month. That'll be about, $11,000,000, and we've incorporated that in our overall, financial outlook. We're looking at reductions across many areas for ourselves, including fleet, computers, phones, conferences, training and travel. We have been working with OPEX for many years, and OPEX has provided some really excellent advice and guidance in looking at various processes that we have in Public Works.

Given our size and scale, you might imagine what those kinds of hours look like. That's over ten thousand hours in process improvement time that we've been able to save. We are currently at a 15% vacancy rate. That is 60 people, 60 different FTEs across our departments for a vacancy rate. And we're looking at potentially even a greater number for next year, up to maybe 25%, which will be 100 people.

That's very significant, and we have to be very careful about, what that looks like and making sure that we can still maintain the services and safety within our community and our road systems. We have used our reserves. We have had reserves for a number of years. And right now, we're sort of at the end of the ability to have any of those reserves. We have been delaying projects.

We'll talk about that a bit more, whether those are growth projects, projects to prepare for, safety improvements, sidewalks, roundabouts, whatever those are. And we have ongoing increased regulatory compliance. So I think about our road maintenance crews who are in all of our NPDS work, and that's in collaboration with, Service Water Management. The number of assets that are think about the amount of development going on in this county. And the number of stormwater facilities that we are able to, maintain are increasing exponentially.

So that is a regulatory requirement when I think about how to articulate the amount of work and volume that keeps being added to our plate. And if you think about whether that's urban and rural, of our 1,600 miles of roads, about 800 of those are urban. As a county, we're more established to take care of rural or suburban types of infrastructure. And when I think about the amount of urban, that is increasing exponentially all the time. So we'll see that, hopefully, reduce over time as we see annexations take place.

But for now, that's over half of our service area is in the urban area. So we've talked about this starting in 2000 when we started seeing numbers of inflationary 2023. We've identified that the 1% road levy is not keeping up with those inflationary measures or our ability to decrease costs. And we are seeing this again in twenty twenty twenty four and 2025 with no slowdown in our case right now. Let's go ahead and move to the next slide.

What does that mean in real numbers? Here, you see the adopted tip. So when we see the ACP tip, that's something that, regardless of a biennial budget, you approve every single year that's required under state law. You can see that those numbers continue to go down. And if you look at the I know spreadsheets are super fun things that we like to look at all the time, but you can see in the bottom of this particular slide that there are reductions in certain areas.

You can see that the percentage of reduction with engineering, with the design, with and we keep pushing those studies out. For example, we need to always be prepared to apply for federal dollars regardless of what the environment is right now. We get a lot of federal funding for bridge replacement and maintenance. And oftentimes, those are very little match for us, so we would need road fund to match those dollars. So on the Mountain Loop Highway in east parts of the county, we were at, Swamp Creek Bridge with congressman Larson this week.

About 90% of that project, and that bridge replacement is, federal funding. So we need to have the studies ready so that we're able to apply for those federal dollars. And if those aren't available, then we actually can't apply for them either. And if we don't have the match, we can't then actualize those federal dollars, which then that bridge doesn't get replaced. And possibly, of the two ten bridges that we have, about 17 of them are currently under some sort of restriction, whether it's a load restriction, a lane restriction, and we could see those numbers escalate over time.

There's also this happens with culverts as well. There's a culvert out in the Steely Valley, closer to Savannah, and, that culvert has, was destroyed, about two years ago. We have not had the ability to go replace that until this year. So we could see more of that over time. We have about $40,000,000 worth of culverts that need to be replaced in some sort of fashion.

And given the current regulatory environment, those are likely to increase in size so that they are now not just culverts, but they will become bridges, which then costs more to replace and maintain over time. Let's go to the next slide. So you can see that in 2028, there's a bit of a bubble there. If you took that part out, and that is the Bridge 102 out in Granite Falls. So we will see that ex large amount of expenditure in that particular year given the very sizable, grants that we received, from the federal government, which is is exciting.

We took seven attempts to try to get those dollars. There's no way we want to give those back. When you see the proposed budgets this fall, adjusted budgets this fall, we have kept every single dollar that we possibly can of someone else's money. So we've taken every bit of road dollar to make sure we maintain all those. We would not want to return grants grant dollars, and particularly on the Granite Falls Bridge, given the size and magnitude funding that we see there.

But you then see a very precipitous drop in the ACP TIP. In order to reserve the road fund for road maintenance, to make sure that we're staying regulatory compliant, make sure that we're keeping the roads paved and maintained as best we can, that means that the ACP tip will reduce significantly. And what does that look like? Let's look at the next slide. Here's what that means in a more graphical way.

It means that, as I've mentioned, we may have bridges that are unable to be maintained or replaced. It means we'll probably have a lot more restrictions on bridges. We are likely, reducing the ACP tip by 41%. It means no new construction. The maintenance operations will be reduced.

Paving will be reduced. We may have about eight roads over the next ten years go in arrears. So what does that mean? It means that if there's a piece of property that might convert from a single family unit to, let's say, a multifamily or eight houses or 10 houses, that that property would contribute towards impact fees. It makes the cost of that housing go up exponentially, which we all are very concerned about the affordability of housing in this county.

So it means that we can't do the construction that helps build the capacity in the system. I've talked about those culverts that would have to be delayed in their repair. Safety improvements, we have about nine projects. Think about some of the roundabouts that we will not be able to install. It could be that shoulder widening. It could be a whole host of things. ADA compliance, we have a long, long list of ADA access that we need to put in this county. We try to do two to four of those projects every single years. Every single year, those would have to be delayed. We do reduce our overlay program.

This is the one that causes me a great deal of cringe because if we reduce the pavement conditions index, we have a measurement for that out of 100. If we get below 70, which ours toggles between seventy and eighty most of the time, it costs us far more financially to repair roads and eventually have to be replaced. And there are counties in this state who have converted some of their roads into gravel because they are unable to maintain them. And we don't want to ever be in that space. Yes. Councilmember Low, Chair.

So with about 50 projects put on hold and about $150,000,000 not being spent. Is there a potential for reduction in staff?

So we're currently at 15%, which is 60 staff. We may have to go to 25. And I think the difference between fifteen and twenty five is a conversation that will need to be had, during the budget process.

Thank you.

And then you see overall maintenance. So we're still going to put signs up in the middle of the night if they fall down and get hit. We still need to do investigations when there's accidents. We still have to reinstall the guardrails. There are a whole set of things that we will still have to do. It's all the other things that we will have to reduce. Let's go to the next slide. So here's you did the quick calculation. You were probably peeking at my slide. But you may recall that last year, we pushed at $100,000,000 We're looking at somewhere between 35,000,000 and $40,000,000 in this upcoming budget.

And all the things that you just mentioned, Councilmember, are on the deck, plus all the things that I've mentioned in the previous slides. These are concerning times. These are hard times for us. We have been talking with staff for quite a while as we prepare for these kinds of conversations. You know, we have been doing hard things for a while. It's just not always transparent to the public. It's maybe not always transparent to everyone who is in this business. We are not the only public works department and roads department that are struggling with this. Across the state, are struggling. We're trying to come up with answers.

I think our team has done some really hard work. We continue to do hard work. We're trying to leverage every single thing we possibly can. With $144,000,000 of federal funding currently in place under contract, another $56 that are in the works right now and applied for, and hopefully we can be awarded and potentially even sign those contracts, we need to make sure that we are able to deliver these things. But I think without these cuts are going to absolutely cause us to think about how we do our delivery of services differently and potentially consideration of additional revenue. Let's go ahead to

the You mentioned preservation and maintenance. I met with secretary Meredith this morning from Wastod, and I wanna talk to her about Highway 2 bridges. So we have 17 bridges. One I saw was 93 years old. You see rebar on some of the sides of these bridges on Highway 2 between Monroe all the way out to Skykomish.

And, what was great is before I could even start talking about preservation and maintenance on those bridges, she brought that up to me first as as a priority for her. So I really think that's gonna start being a drum at the state level on preservation and maintenance. And, hopefully, that's something that we can also, push really hard at the local level for preservation and maintenance, especially around our bridges and taking care of our bridges. And so, hopefully, that will help bring more revenue potentially to, help with that, but just wanna share that.

That's outstanding. It reinforces our belief as well that preservation and maintenance is a very crucial part of our work. We were able to take a tour with the new secretary of WashDOT, Julie Meredith, and show her some of the projects that we have around the county. We are very much in sync with the kind of prioritization and work that need to do and preservation maintenance is at the top. I will stop there and see if I've provoked any questions from you.

Any other questions from council members? I'm trying to push them. They don't they're not pushing on you. So great presentation. Appreciate it. Thanks for the update, and, definitely keep us updated going forward.

Thank you so much for all your support. We know that Roads is not just a place to drive on, but also drives economic development and supports housing in this community. So we know that it's a crucial role, and we're happy to be part of that solution.

Great. Thank you so much for your time.

Thank you.

Alright. With that, we'll be, that will conclude our meeting today, and I don't believe we have any more meetings today. So we're off the hook for the rest of the day. See you tomorrow.