City Council - Regular Meeting

that loud enough it is now 6 30 and the meeting will come to order good evening and welcome to the september 15 2026 kennewick city council meeting council meetings are streamed live on our website go to kennewick.com viewers can enable closed captioning by accessing this feature this setting feature in their preferred web browser either during the live broadcast or when watching the recording will the city clerk please state who is present and whether a quorum is established

Thank you. Will Council Member Anderson please lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance? No one is registered this evening to provide tonight's invocation. Persons interested in giving the invocation can find information on our website or through the city clerk's office. We'll now do some proclamations and a recognition, and I would ask if Deputy Fire Marshal Ethan Bishop will join me at the podium. All right. Whereas the City of Kennewick is dedicated to the safety of its residents and visitors, and whereas fire poses a significant safety risk, heightened by lithium ion batteries in household devi

Next, we'll have a recognition, and I would request Council Member Milbauer to please join City Manager Aaron Erdman at the podium.

Yeah, I was just going to ask if Council Member Wilbel ever had anything you wanted to say.

I'll just say thank you to everyone. I think AWC does a wonderful job in the 281 towns and cities in our state with everything they do in representing us, so I appreciate that. Thank you. Thank you, and congratulations, Jim. Well done.

Next on the agenda is visitors. This is the only opportunity for visitors to comment at tonight's meeting. Visitors are welcome to state their opinion on any topic except for election matters, quasi-judicial matters, and items under a pending or previous public hearing. The city clerk has informed me there are no online visitors signed up to speak. All right. Are there anyone that would like to make public comment this evening?

The public comment period is not an opportunity for mutual conversation with council members or for posing questions with the expectation of an immediate answer. Council members will listen closely to your comments but will not directly respond to you. The city clerk's business card is by the door. If you need to follow up after the meeting, please reach out to her and she will connect you with someone who can help you. When it's your turn, please come to the podium and state your name and city of residence before beginning your remarks. Each person is permitted to speak once for a maximum of

Thank you. Yes, please, in the back. If you'd like to speak, you're welcome to speak next. We have one on their way.

Or helping. Thank you, Terry. Additional comments this evening? All right. This comment period is closed. Oh, did I miss one? All right. There we go.

Thank you. All right, any more comments, final comments this evening? All right, so this comment period is closed. Thank you all. This next item is approval of the agenda. If the council member wants an item removed from consent agenda, please be recognized by the mayor and state the item number you want to remove. For further discussion, this item will be considered separately. I will entertain a motion.

I move to approve the agenda as presented.

It has been moved by Mayor Pro Tem Torelli and seconded by Council Member Anderson to approve the agenda as presented. The floor is open for discussion. There being no further discussion, it has been properly moved and seconded. To approve the agenda as presented, will the clerk please start the vote?

Next item is the approval of the consent agenda. All matters listed within the consent agenda have been distributed to each member of the Kennewick City Council for reading and study and are considered to be routine and will be enacted by one motion of the council with no separate discussion. I'll entertain a motion. Mayor McShane? Mayor Pro Temporelli.

I move to approve the consent agenda as presented.

Is there a second? Mayor, I second that. It has been moved by Mayor Pro Temporelli and seconded by Council Member Anderson to approve the consent agenda as presented. Will the clerk please start the vote?

Mr. Mayor? Yes. You know what, I just started looking at that. I do have a question. On the consent agenda on H, as I went through that, I did not see that. I am one of the owners of Desert Sands on that plat. So I probably should refrain from that vote. even though it's a consent agenda item.

Okay, so I think you could abstain. I think you can abstain from this vote. That would be the appropriate action. Thank you for bringing that to our attention.

I am unable to review anything on my screen.

May I have a couple of moments, please? Yes, you may.

All right, that motion is passed six to zero with one abstain as noted earlier. Next on the agenda, we'll consider the adoption of ordinances and resolutions. The city clerk has published each ordinance title with the agenda and does not need to read those aloud. That's right. Thank you for that. So items 5A, 5B, and 5C are dockets containing multiple items. All items listed in the docket have been made available to each member of the Kennewick City Council for their review and consideration. All items in a docket can be approved with a single motion from the council. A staff report will be pr

um i guess it would be maybe for anthony so we're hearing kid wants to change spot 34 i don't know what to call it district 34 don't make it public facilities did kid get a chance to put input earlier and on in the process or Because this, I mean, I know at the last workshop it was discussed real quickly, but apparently it never went before the planning commission. So what was the timeline for making this last minute change, I guess?

Yes, please. Anthony, following up on that, it seems to me it's an interesting designation change going from residential. I would normally assume that the facility or whoever owns that property has requested to go to public facility because that becomes a very limited land use. I guess number one is why would that change take place without the request from the landowner?

Do we have the opportunity tonight to pull that from this?

indicated during the public comment period the visitor portion of the meeting just to ensure that we don't change kenwick school district's property as well one quick follow-up i might on that not knowing well enough with school is there something in the code that would allow for a school just a school to build on that in residential low or any other other than public facility

So it wouldn't limit them if that was to still, if this cell was to fall apart and didn't go public facility, they could come in, ask for the conditional use, move forward with their other parcel to build the school exactly where it's at?

And I'm just looking for protocol here. And so for the city clerk is the way this would go then is after we get done asking questions, we would have a main motion to approve the comp plan items docket 5A1 through 5A3. Then there would be another motion to modify that with a pulling of parcel or designation 34, and that would be voted on first, and then we'd go back to the main motion. What is the protocol? How do we handle this in the correct order of things? Because when we're dealing with the comp plan, I don't want to do Bob's Rules order on this.

Okay, just make it one main motion then. Okay.

Yeah, I just wanted to make sure that we had a path forward for this.

Yes, Council Member Mulvara. Would that be the whole Section 34, just the KID portion of that?

Just so I can be clear on this, I don't know who the question is really directed to, but with this change, so the change to public facilities was decided by the consultants, the city staff, requesting input but not necessarily receiving input from the landowners. So this one, number 34, we're looking at, is that something that was made, the decision was made with or without landowner input? but it kind of makes sense with who owns it, and so the city said, let's go ahead and make this designation. Am I understanding that correct?

But no objection was made until last week? Correct. Okay. And with that objection...

It goes back to the potential added layer of. So there might be an added layer for the landowner. Correct. But it's not going to adversely affect the city. No. Zoning or anything else or what can be done on the property. It's just, it would be a benefit to them according to what they are requesting. And so we just make this modification and everyone's happy. Is that?

Yes, Council Member Clipper. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Sorry, I'm trying to find your presentation and I can't. So could you speak just very quickly, again, on minimum parking requirements that were reduced or eliminated?

Reduce it, but does not eliminate. Because I remember the presentation last Tuesday, I think they used both words. So I just want to make sure we're not eliminating zero, so that there's no parking requirements whatsoever. You could build and not have any parking requirements. That wouldn't work.

Follow-up question, please? Yes, please. Greenhouse gas emissions, can you tell me about that portion of your presentation again? What's the plan there? What are we seeing?

Can you speak to at all what type of requirements or will we be putting on the citizens of the city of Kennewick in the future with these standards that we would be voting on tonight? I mean, are we all gonna have to drive electric cars within a certain amount of time? Are we gonna have to shut down our nuclear reactors? What are we saying with all these state requirements to the citizens of Kennewick?

And last question, critical land. management and buffer zones and stuff like that, had dealt with that a lot in the state legislature. What specificity, once again, what type of requirements were we putting on the citizens of Kennewick in the future with these type of restrictions?

No, but that's okay. I'll not press for another interesting time. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you.

Additional questions? I have a follow-on question, Anthony, regarding these maps in critical areas. How defined are these maps that the state used, and are they really looking at actual areas where – you know, there's some critical use for habitat, or are they really just, you know, using some type of, and I hate to say, AI to determine where these may or may not have been, or some analysis of aerial imagery to try to determine where this is, rather than actually boots on the ground, recognizing whether habitat is actually there or not.

I might contest whether fairly good is the accurate depiction or not, but we'll leave that for a second. Depends on what you're looking at. What I appreciate is that this is not something that we've designated. This is something that's come to us from the state. We're applying the principles in the narrowest way we can and ensuring that boots on the ground actually determine the actual condition of the property and what needs to happen. I think that's about as narrow as we can get. Correct. Okay. Any additional questions of staff?

Does council wish to pull any item from the docket for individual consideration? Not hearing any, I'll entertain a motion.

I move to approve the comprehensive plan I move to adopt docket items 5A1 through 5A3 with a modification to exclude Benton County tax parcel ID 10789-300-0001-002 from the public facilities designation in the future land use map.

Yes, Council Member, or Mayor Pro Tempore. It has been moved by Council Member Anderson and seconded by Mayor Pro Tem Torelli to adopt docket items 5A1 through 5A3 with a modification to exclude Benton County Tax Parcel ID 10789-300-0001-002 from the public facilities designation in the future land use map. The floor is open for discussion.

So I had a call from a constituent and they were concerned about this because the appearance was at the last second a change is being made on behest of an organization. The same thing happened at the workshop. It was only on the behest of the community. The comp plan is cast in yellow until this point. Anybody can ask for a change. Now, the preference for orderly process is to do it in a timely fashion. That doesn't always happen. We all know that. So, I want to emphasize, if this was a comp plan amendment and it was already casting concrete and was trying to be changed, this process would not

Additional comments? Additional discussion? All right. It has been properly moved and seconded to adopt docket items 5A1 through 5A3 with the modification to exclude Benton County tax parcel ID 10789-300-0001002 from the public facilities designation in the future land use map. Will the clerk please start the vote?

Questions? We're just voting on this one motion, correct? This is not on the comprehensive plan.

So this is the docket, which includes... Well, I'll defer over.

All right, that motion is passed six to one. All right. Next is a docket with 18 development, and thank you for the presentation. Thank you. Don't go too far. All right, next is a docket with 18 development code amendment ordinances pertaining to the 2026 comprehensive plan periodic update. And we don't need to read those because they have been previously done as part of the agenda.

So are there any questions of staff regarding these ordinances that we're considering under this docket? Does any council member wish to pull any item from the docket for individual consideration? I'll entertain a motion.

I move to approve the development code amendment docket supporting the comprehensive plan periodic update as presented, adopting docket items 5B1 through 5B18.

It has been moved by Mayor Pro Temporelli and seconded by Council Member Milbauer to approve the development code amendment docket supporting the comprehensive plan periodic update as presented. adopting docket items 5B1 through 5B18. The floor is open for discussion. There being no discussion, it has been properly moved and seconded to approve the development code amendment docket supporting the comprehensive plan periodic update as presented, adopting docket items 5B1 through 5B18. Will the clerk please start the vote? That motion is passed six to one. Our final docket with 32 ordinances per

Does council have any questions of staff on these items? Does any of council wish to pull an item from the docket for individual consideration? I'll entertain a motion.

I move to approve the development code amendment docket supporting the comprehensive plan periodic update as presented adopting docket items 5B1 through 5B18. I'm sorry.

So a motion to approve the 2026 critical areas ordinance docket supporting the comprehensive plan periodic update as presented in adoption docket items 5C1 through 5C32.

Yes. That is that presentation of this is how little errors are made and it happens.

Is there a second? Mayor? Yes, Council Member Milbauer. I'll second that motion.

It has been moved by Mayor Pro Temporelli and seconded by Council Member Milbauer to approve the 2026 Critical Areas Ordinance Docket. Supporting the comprehensive plan, periodic update is presented. Adopting docket items 5C1 through 5C32. The floor is open for discussion.

There being no discussion, it's been properly moved and seconded to approve the 2026 Critical Areas Ordinance Docket. Supporting the comprehensive plan, periodic update is presented. Adopting docket items 5C1 through 5C32. Will the clerk please start the vote? That has passed 6-1. Next on the agenda is a resolution regarding the 2046 transportation system plan. Mr. Malott, may we have a staff report, please?

Do we have any questions of staff? When will the next update of this most likely occur? In around eight years. So around eight years.

Okay. So if there are things that were not quite what we expect and things change, what happens?

Any other questions of staff? Yes, please. Yeah, please. Council Member Clipper.

So I'm looking at 1.8 environmental impact policy. This is intended to minimize the transportation impacts on the natural environment, air quality, noise quality and fuel consumption. Having served in the legislature for 14 years, a lot of these policies are written by people who live in the I-5 corridor, Seattle, Tacoma, Bellingham, Vancouver, and have no idea what it's like to live in eastern Washington in our agrarian community. So when we are adopting these environmental impact policies, the reason why I voted no on the last section was for the same reason. Are we going to be constraining

we put in there it's more like what the state is trying to encourage for the um the city okay thank you very much appreciate it thank you mr mayor thank you uh mr marriage yeah quick comment on this uh he says with the fires we saw up in spokane one of the biggest problems they had were emergency evacuation routes and people got really really lucky And I know our transportation plan doesn't include emergency evacuation routes at this point, but for our upcoming plans, if there is a way to start looking at that and start planning for that, because that is going to become a bigger and bigger rea

Okay. If there's no additional questions of the staff, I'll entertain a motion.

I will do it right this time. Motion to approve the Development Code Amendment docket supporting I'm in the wrong place again. Dang it. Too many screens.

I move to ban Chuck Turelli. I'm just kidding. You have not been recognized by the chair.

I'm turning over my motion-making machine. I move to adopt the resolution as presented.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem Turelli. Is there a second? Mayor? Council Member Anderson. I second that. It has been moved by Premier Pro Temporelli and seconded by Council Member Anderson to adopt the resolution as presented. The floor is open for discussion. I'd just like to comment on what Mayor Pro Temporelli talked about with his emergency evacuation. I do think it's something that's important. We don't see a lot of this in our community, but the fire that happened on Inspiration Point, we happened to be out as a family and observed some of the evacuations that happened off of that. I thought

Any questions, staff? Mayor McShane? Mayor Pro Temporelli.

I guess it would be for Chief Carrero. What type of law enforcement traffic is there around Neon Park?

Council Member Klipper. Thank you, Mr. Mayor, and thank you, Mayor Prokofian. I have the exact same question, so thank you for getting that answered for me. And then for our city manager, have we, you know, When a piece of property is gifted, have we spoken at all to that church that gifted the property to us, their feelings on this matter?

Thank you, Mayor. You know, it's not on the high priority, but I understand what you're saying. I hate to see, once we have a green space go away, we lose it forever. But I don't have a problem with proceeding, and especially having a public hearing on it to find out what the public believes. But still, at that point, if I understand it, we can still say no, we're not doing it. Is that correct? That is correct. Thank you.

The adjacent neighbor, do we have any idea what they're looking to do with that property? Would they be looking for a zone change on it, or do we know?

And with that in the process, as we go through that, does that automatically, if we decide to move forward, enter into an agreement with them, or does that just go on the market for an open bid, or do we negotiate openly with them? with anybody to receive a bid on that property, or how does that process work?

Thank you, Mayor McShane. Just a quick question. I don't think, can you tell me how long this park has been in the city's possession?

Related to that, is the donor church still in existence in the neighborhood?

So as a follow-up to that, the church building is there. Is it the same church as was at the time it was donated? I guess we don't know when it was donated, so it'd be hard to answer that.

In line with my question, I would be firm about calling for a public hearing.

So the amount that we've invested in the park, are those in today's dollars or just total dollars invested since 1956 or whenever we started putting the play around?

How did the neighbor come to discuss with the city the potential of this? Had they heard it at council meeting and had come to find us, or had they come unsolicited and said, hey, you should consider giving this?

Do we think it's a reality that we could relocate the backstop to another park, or is that a...

But would it need that capital investment if it was to be relocated? That's why I asked. Okay. All right. So as we're talking through this council, the question, you know, Are we going to continue to proceed with the surplus evaluation first, and then should we hold a public hearing? And I've heard a couple people say yes to a public hearing. Mayor Pro Temporelli?

I would say yes to both. Proceed on, and we should hold a public hearing. Okay.

Do I have any – I'm going to suggest that based on what I'm hearing that There's a desire to proceed with the surplus evaluation and to hold a public hearing related to this potential surplus. If any member of council has a disagreement with that, please be recognized and stated.

Okay. Yes, Council Member Beecher. I don't disagree with that. I just want to make sure. Those can run concurrent at the same meeting. You can have the public hearing the night that we'd be voting on it, correct? Is it a planning thing? I'm just trying to get staff involvement on something like that. It'd just be one public hearing at our city council meeting.

Is there additional questions or comments? Sure. I think, not having surplus to park before, I would suggest that I recognize what Council Member Beach was saying about the expedition, being expedient about going through it. I also think it's important we make sure that the public has an opportunity to comment and we have a chance to listen to that and think about that before we necessarily take action. So although I want to be expedient, I think I would prefer to not have a public hearing and take action in the same meeting. just so that there's time to consider what has been said. Again, I'm

October 6th, okay. Okay. All right. City Manager Erdmann, you're still up. Next will be a staff report regarding the Tri-City Animal Control Facility.

Does any of this include debt service on the facility, or is this just operating costs?

Mayor, what's the difference between the municipal code and the behavioral? Behavioral.

Aaron, on that chart. So is this a, does it continue on? So like, is the 301 inclusive of the 154? Right, so they were in there, and now they're moving here, and now it's getting smaller and smaller. Yes, that's correct. Thank you.

Aaron, these eight dogs, are they the ones represented with the 180-day stay in the table above? But a lot of the cost associated with their care is the length of time they're staying? There is a lot of it, yes. Okay, thank you.

Erin, on slide 10, the ACA funding issue, so it shows our 26 as $1.1 million. Of that $1.1 million, how much of that is the base cost and how much of that is that 39%? Do you have those numbers?

That does, thank you. Council Member Anderson.

I think this is a no-win situation regardless of how we look at it because you've got the sort of an opposing viewpoints. A good friend has animals and he's very basic in the animal hiccups and they're eight years old, let's put them down. And his wife is the exact opposite, mortgage the house, sell everything, spend unlimited dollars on the animals. And I think people are the same way. I mean, I think you're going to have one extreme and the other extreme. I think we as a council have to steward the city resources and say, how much are we spending and how is that relative to the rest of our b

Thank you. Other comments? Council Member Cooper?

My question is similar to what was just spoken. Is there a cost difference breakdown of the three models at this time, or no? I wouldn't think there is, but if there was, I'd love to see it.

Thank you. Yes. Council Member Millar. Thank you, Mayor. We're running this. You're looking for a consensus or a vote on one of those three. I would assume the other two jurisdictions, cities, are doing the same thing.

So... if we say we're going to go with the animal control facility here the other two jurisdictions pick one picks the animal shelter one picks the hybrid are we looking for consensus from all three cities too because if that's the case i think we ought to go with a different format to do this because we're not going to get through it the other thing would be uh as councilman anderson said this is probably an emotional subject financially speaking we got to deal with it because budget-wise i don't know how we will What are we doing by whether we pick one of these three options or not? I mean,

Council Member Vito. So this isn't new. Obviously, we've been talking about this for six and a half years since I've sat here for different reasons, I think, throughout. And I don't even fully say that I can remember all the different reasonings and how it's all changed. And there's been a lot of different organizations. And I don't have them all clear in my head. I think I understand how we operate this currently. With that being said, if we said, hey, the city's responsibility is to do an animal control facility. I think in the past, on this hybrid model, the problem was the nonprofit, right

My opinion is we probably have a duty for the animal control facility as a city. and we're obviously just looking at this very quick slideshow. We're not very good at taking the other side of this, um, city staff stepped up and I think it's doing the best we can, but there's probably people out there. This is what they do and they have a passion for it and get them involved much more than what we are able to do. Um, I'd much prefer to see that. Let us do, this will sound bad. I have multiple dogs. I've had dogs forever and ever. So, um, The city should do the minimum amount to get it over to t

So hopefully there's an organization to step up, but that would be mine. The animal control side, do what we have to, and then let them take over and do it. that would be the first one for you well i guess it's the third one yeah the hybrids well i'm saying the only part that we i don't want to have any part of the the hybrid side i'm saying for me i'm just saying we do we just offer the animal control facility i don't know in the hybrid side are we still involved with the non-profit side i mean i'm trying to cut ties saying we're going to participate in this and they can

I would love that. I mean, we just spent a lot of money building a big facility that I don't know is underutilized at that point. Now you're telling a nonprofit to step up and, you know, we've got this big, beautiful building and now go operate out of the kind of building we just tore down. That's tough for me. I would prefer to do it. Yes, just what number one says, operate ours as an animal control, but I can see there's some huge problems. But that would be my first one, yes. We just have an intake and then we do our hold and they're gone to somewhere else. not not utilizing that facility f

That would be option three. To the right.

By the prioritization, okay, I got you. Council Member Trumbo, did you have anything you wanted to add?

I don't think it would be very helpful, but let me just say that I think that the problem that exists here is the same problem that existed the last time I had to be face-to-face with this. which is, it's not animals, it's the owners. It's the owners who have created the crisis. And that's a tough one, but I would like the owners to be smothered with guilt. That's what I would like. Understand that they are the problem. And having expressed my frustration, finding a solution for that is difficult. You're asking for peace in the Middle East. Yeah, right. The best probable, I don't know, but the

I presume that's not an estimate, that's where we are. So the two years prior, 25 and then 24, it's odd. is a larger number than 24, and I'm just wondering why that is. That's not what I'm thinking. 24 is a higher number. Let me see if I can find my way back there so that I don't make things stupid. If I'm wrong, I'm wrong. Slide 10.

Well, I don't have slide 10. It's right behind you. It's also on the big screen behind you there, Jonathan.

Okay. Yeah, 24. I misspoke. I'm sorry. 24 is 859 and 25 is 844. Is there a reason why I can?

Originated in Kennewick. So the usage, right?

Going back a little farther, just roughing them out, we got 100,000. getting from 20 to 21. We've got 180, whatever it is, to 2022. We've got about the same to 23. And then we have less than 100 to get to 2024. And then we have a drop. And then we see this huge leap, and I don't understand why.

Well, I heard some things tonight that talked about the value of volunteers and why volunteers bring love, compassion, and all the good things that animals need. And I don't know if the volunteers understand this, but they just got themselves a lifetime job. And, of course, they know that already. I think the best way for us to go is to try to balance all the pieces by saying, if at all possible, go with the animal shelter model and build into it as many volunteers as you possibly can. I don't know what else to do because the dollar signs are significant enough in light of the other dollar sig

So essentially under the hybrid method, if we don't find a contractor, we are defaulting to an animal control facility just by definition, right? So I would favor the hybrid method because that at least is for doing the outreach. And I understand what Council Member Beecham was saying, but I think at this point, because it's so new in the process, nobody's had time to reach out to us. So there can be entities out there that truly would be interested in this. And as far as coordinating three city councils, I understand what Council Member Milbauer is saying, but I'm thinking if we get at least

So just a couple of things. You know, Aaron, you'd asked a few other questions about service level. And I think it has a question for me on the usage rate. The number one complaint I have about animal control is they never show up. And I'm not trying to exaggerate, but I have not had a single person that I've talked to that has said that they've ever had animal control actually come and deal with an issue in Kennewick. all of the calls that I receive are complaints that they haven't. Now I recognize that that might mean that the people that are getting help are not calling, right? But I would

Okay, so this is not based on telephone calls that come in. I recognize the differences there, but I would say from a service level perspective, though, I think there is a problem where we're not getting animals resolved. And like I said, I've heard that consistently. I've heard concerns that animal control says their hands are tied, they can't help with certain things, and so on. And so your second question about consistency between the jurisdictions I think is critical, and I think your recommendation that we get to a point where all the jurisdictions have similar rules. And I don't know how

And so what would happen in the event of an animal control? I'm going to call it option one because it's on the left because it's priority. Okay. option one that's on the left what what's the result of this i mean i i'm not i'm just trying to wrap my head around if we say okay we're going to do the 72 hour hold but then we choose not to do the other things what happens to these animals at the end of that 72 hours so that's where we're looking to have a non-profit or a shelter facility step up and take these animals or we have to start looking at euthanasia of these that would be the alternativ

No, I think it makes sense to me. So we would not have any... city staff right pasco would be in the administrative city at this point but we would not have any city staff operating in that facility would all be a contractor and we would be overseeing supervising i mean i heard some of the things that were brought to concerns obviously providing oversight and ensuring that the contractor is fulfilling all the obligations that they need to

Could we not, though, require minimum activities? If you're going to use the facility, you have to provide these things.

Okay. Mr. Mayor? Yes, Mayor Pro Temporelli.

Just for clarity, for my own sake, the animal goes through intake, put it in a kennel, and after 48 hours, in the case of a dog, he doesn't necessarily move out of the kennel. He's just designated you're now a shelter animal instead of an animal control animal.

It's just shifting designations. So somebody else is going to look after you tomorrow because they work for the volunteer and I'm out kind of thing.

It's the way I understand it. Thank you.

So we're looking for some level of consensus as a council for you. Erin, do you feel like you've received enough information from council this evening, or do you want kind of an up and down priority? What would you like to have tonight?

Obviously, I'm not specific enough for you, but what I'm really counting as valuable is heavy reliance on volunteers. It would probably be best if it was hybrid.

The other thing that I failed to mention is, and I don't know, could be asking for more trouble, because people can sometimes be as much trouble or more than animals. But having this, expanding the committee is, I've had plenty of contact in the community about that's necessary. It's like holding the system accountable. Apparently, there have been issues that have come up that have made people very unhappy, and it would be better if there would be a representative from the council of each city sitting on this panel. I'm not sure I agree with that. but oversight apparently has not been good eno

Okay. I was just making sure I was included with that. I will say that as part of the ACA Management Committee, and I would just ask you to think about this, if the city manager's focus is not, because you have so many other things, if it makes more sense to have that be focused through a parks director or someone else, I wouldn't mind seeing that not be a city manager required activity. I think that could be delegated to somebody that, perhaps has additional focus on those things. So that's just my opinion of that. And if we wanted to have additional council type or other appointed additional

Mr. Mayor, I think Lisa was blinking at me that she wanted to be that in charge, but I couldn't tell what her blinks meant just throwing that out there. I wasn't going to make it easy. Did you see it too? Okay, I'm sorry.

I think it is an important thing that we provide in our community. As we're parting from this conversation, I think something that was said somewhere along the way is really important, and that is that if we don't prioritize this, this problem will get worse. As we looked at some of the numbers of animals, I mean, there was a mention here this evening of 50,000. I didn't know if I got it right, is it 50,000 stray cats in Tri-Cities? And we have touched just a small fraction of those. And so that number I'm sure multiplies very rapidly as I remember from my youth and childhood having cats with

All right. Next for consideration is the 2027-2029 IAFF Collective Bargaining Agreement. And Chad, will you give us a staff report, please?

Does Council have any questions of staff? If there are no questions, I'll entertain a motion. Mayor? Council Member Anderson.

I move to authorize the execution of the 2027 to 2029 collective bargaining agreement with the International Association of Firefighters, Local 1296, as presented.

Okay. Mayor Pro Temporelli. I was going to say, he's fast. All right. It has been moved by Council Member Anderson and seconded by Mayor Pro Temporelli to authorize the execution of of the 2027 to 2029 collective bargaining agreement with the International Association of Firefighters, local number 1296, as presented. The floor is open for discussion.

I think there's been good progress with this contract agreement. I'm aware that it was... done through a new strategy of negotiations. It was kind of a change up to a new way of doing things. I believe I'm right in saying that. And I think that that has shown itself to be beneficial. I'm appreciative of it. I am going to vote against this. because with this changeup and with these apparent positive dialogues that occurred, I see absolutely no reason why this could not continue with open, observable negotiations involving members of the fire department through this labor union group and the pub

Additional discussion? All right, if there's no additional discussion, it has been properly moved and seconded to authorize execution of the 2027 through 2029 collective bargaining agreement with the International Association of Firefighters, local number 1296 as presented. Will the clerk please start the vote? That motion is passed six to one. I just want to express appreciation as we depart from this for all the work that's been done both by staff and as was recognized by the local as well who work collaboratively to do this. This is a lot of work to do these collective bargaining agreements

I do not have anything I wish to share. I have, as the council knows, had a difficult several weeks in which I have missed some meetings, and I'm just trying to catch up. Thank you. Council Member Klipper.

Just having attended the flag-raising ceremony on the morning of 9-11-2026, I just want to thank all the first responders, everybody who made the events that took place that day in Kennewick, recognizing what happened 25 years ago. Just thank you, and thanks to all the first responders, the veterans. Appreciate you all.

for the sake of brevity nothing yes thank you mayor I just want to thank everyone that came in as visitors and spoke to us about your concerns appreciate hearing from you I want to thank city manager urban for kind words at the podium for my certificate thank you very much I disagree with Council Member Trumbo's rendition of the negotiations and open public. I think it just was proven today and that what they did between the two parties was collaborative, worked well together, no harm, no foul. So I appreciate everyone's involvement from the union to the staff and working together to get that

I did have something. I was trying to be fast like Chuck. On Friday, just as a reminder, there is the focus group, the police officers. It's a tailgate party at the high school, but it's the collaboration between the SROs and the Kennewick Police Department and the Kennewick School District. And there's the football game. It is Kennewick-Camaican? I cannot remember. Who knows? Anyway, there's a tailgate party at Lampson.

And the Tri-Tech students put on the meal, and it's fantastic, and it's a fundraiser for the police department that they use to help fund the kids' year-end parties and some other things. So I can't remember the price. We were debating what the price is. That's for next year. But anyway, it's $4 for students and $10 for a family or $15 for a family or something like that. And so go there, take your family, take your kids. It's always fun. The band will be playing. There'll be music and things like that. Thanks.

Thank you. I just wanted to say thanks to the planning staff. and we don't have to hear about the comp plan for a while more, so I'm super excited. So they're more excited than I am, so don't get – no, I know that's a tremendous amount of work. It goes unsaid, but, you know, that is a lot of stuff we've heard for a long time. So I appreciate everybody that's in the playing department doing that and getting through it. So that's it. All right. Mr. Erdogan.

Thank you. Yeah, it was a great activity on Friday. If you didn't get a chance to come up and see the Field of Remembrance, it was really quite something to see. It was really quite something to see. Again, got a lot of compliments from others about the way that we'd run that program and what a wonderful opportunity it was to hear the stories and to share our experiences with folks, both from our community and not from our community. With that, I think that the only other thing I was gonna add is that I do have a speaking engagement at the WFOA, that's the Washington Finance Officers Associati