City Council - Regular Meeting

Okay, we'll call this meeting to order. This is the City of Buckeye regular council meeting for September 15, 2026. We will begin with the invocation led by Pastor Stephen Hood from West Valley Community Church, followed by the Pledge of Allegiance led by Councilmember Jermaine Berry. Would you please stand?

Okay, thank you both. We will move on to roll call, please.

Present. Thank you very much. Item number two is comments from the public. Members of the audience may comment on any non-agenda item of interest. We will start with Sean Fogarty.

Thank you for your comments. Mr., or city attorney, can somebody just provide an update on that?

Okay, great. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker request is Joe Van Sutphen.

Thank you, Joe. OK, those are all the speaker request cards I have for the public comment on item number two. We'll move on to item number three, awards, presentations, proclamations. We do not have any of those tonight. Item number four is consent agenda items and new business approval of items on the consent agenda. All items with an asterisk are considered to be routine matters being acted by one motion and vote of the city council. There will be no separate discussion of these items unless a council member requests. This section may include the approval of minutes from previous meetings. A

Thank you, Ms. Dillon. Council, any comments or questions on the consent agenda items? I'm seeing none. If not, council, what's your pleasure on the consent agenda?

Mr. Mayor, I'd like to make a motion that we approve consent agenda items 4A as an item through 4I as an item.

Second. I have a motion for approval of consent agenda items in a second. All in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed? Consent agenda passes unanimous. Thank you. On to item 5A, council take action on funding the economic development catalyst program application for Barbone-Osadero on the amount of $22,722 plus certain city fees eligible for reimbursement. And you're not Ashley. Susie, you're presenting.

OK. Council, questions on agenda item 5A?

No questions, but I would like to make a comment. This is something we need downtown, that look right there. I mean, they already have ignited our area with their food and their culture and how the building looks. But to bring this downtown, it'll just change everything. It's a game changer. I do like the look. It's a good idea. And I'd like to thank the Martinez's for what you guys done during the, just when we had that long power outage to open their building up to the community to cool off. They were hot just late July. So thank you guys for that. I never told you guys thank you. But they m

Okay, any other comments? Just echoing what Council Member Berry said, and it is really neat to see the picture of the trailer, the Tacos Barbón trailer, and where you have been and where you are now. When we leave here tonight, and now everybody's gonna do this, drive out, look, and you can see in the restaurant, and I guarantee it's gonna be half full of people on a Tuesday night. Probably people YouTubing the council meetings, I would assume, in there. but is just a treasure in the downtown area. And so thrilled to be able to support that with the Catalyst Grant and want you guys to continu

Mr. Mayor, I'd like to make a motion that we approve, excuse me, we approve item 5A as an item.

Second. I have a motion for approval on agenda item 5A and a second. All in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. And opposed? 5A passes unanimous. Thank you. Thank you, Susie. All right. You're sticking around. Item 5B, council take action on resolution number 83-26, adopting the notice of intent to enter into an economic development tax incentive agreement with Festival Marketplace LLC, an Arizona limited liability company, and findings of fact. And Susie Boyles, you're presenting again.

and that is my presentation i am happy to answer any questions council may have thank you susie council let's see let's uh... let's do this let's go to council questions questions from council on this item

Okay, appreciate that, thank you. Just a quick question. Yeah, go ahead. Do you know the distance between Festival and the closest grocery store, which would be on what, on Watson? Well, now Miller. Any idea what that distance is?

So building this Safeway would put the money back into our city?

Thank you for the question. Susie, can you, this has been talked about for a long, long time, I think, Patrick had a full head of hair when we were initially talking about grocery stores back in the day. And can you maybe explain a little bit why it hasn't happened until now? It's starting all the way back when Pulte was beginning the development out there?

And I think I understand that the goalposts or those thresholds have kind of moved over time. It seems like before the crash in 2008, 2009 timeframe, it was a certain number of people that you needed living in a radius, and then that's moved a little bit. Maybe speak to that.

Okay, thank you. And then the last one I have is the two reimbursements. This is pretty typical for retail that's coming in or development that's coming in that has revenue associated with it. And there's a great opportunity for us as a city to ask the developer to build regional improvements that are not necessarily part of The project itself. I mean there isn't I don't There may be one other more shovel ready site than this location, but everything is Utilities tied in everything else the the drive entrances That's all there. They could come in and plant this there, but we're leveraging that

I said that was my last one but I fibbed on it. The last one I have is the site plan shows and they're required to build a full service grocery store. There are other uses that are gonna come along with that in that plaza that's pretty typical. I know we probably don't have any leases sign or names but can you talk a little bit to the type of services, retail services that are coming?

Okay. Awesome. Thank you So we typically don't do this because this is not a public hearing but I do have a speaker request card from Michael nooses Not in support of the item. Did you want to come up and speak to that? Yep, three minutes

Susie, just clarifying, the incentives or the reimbursement is for public infrastructure, regional public infrastructure that the developer would not otherwise be required to build.

Okay. And the benefit to the taxpayers is... payoff within a couple years, probably to be conservative, let's say within five years, and then over a 10-year time frame, $22 million worth of tax revenues, sales tax revenues into the city. Okay. All right. Council, any other questions? Yeah, go ahead.

I have a motion for approval on 5B and a second. All in favor say aye.

5B passes unanimous. Thank you, Mr. Peterson. Thank you. Go fast. We have two more sites for you that we can start immediately after this. Okay. Great. All right. Item number six, comments from the mayor and council. Any?

Councilman Eustace. I just wanted to comment about Friday. being 9-11, that we had one event start at 5.30 in the morning on the stairs up in Verrado. I didn't walk them, and I don't think too many people my age would be able to walk them. But what was it, six and a half times, Mr. Mayor? Yeah. To equal the steps that were taken at 9-11. And there was quite a showing, quite a number of people show up up there. Firemen do it, a lot of them do it in their full gear. They'll go up and down those steps six and a half times. If you haven't seen those steps, you ought to take a drive up or out of th

That they've done that up at their fire station, where they put on the event, the mayor spoke up there, they had, matter of fact, he spoke up the stairs too, didn't you? Yeah. And we had the event then up there at, Festival ranch at the fire station. They've been doing this every year If you're not doing anything in your 9-11, you ought to come to one of these two events Thank you. Mr. Mayor.

Thank you Any other comments? I'll just add in one thing. The Buckeye Chamber of Commerce and the Buckeye or Buckeye Valley Chamber of Commerce and the Buckeye Hispanic Chamber of Commerce hosted the Mexican Ambassador NOT AMBASSADOR, COUNCIL GENERAL, WHO CELEBRATED EL GRITO, WHICH WAS A FANTASTIC CELEBRATION. IT WAS ON 6th STREET PLAZA. HOPE I'M NOT STEALING YOUR THUNDER HERE, MR. CITY MANAGER. Friday night was a great Sixth Street Plaza night market, and then they followed it up the very next night with this celebration that was fantastic. Had a massive amount of neighbors out there that wer

Okay. Thank you, Mr. City Manager. Item number eight's proposal for future attend items. Do we have any from council? Not seeing any. Item number nine, with nothing else on the agenda, we are adjourned.