City Council - Regular Meeting

Good evening and welcome to the Monday, October 5th, 2026 city council meeting. Our invocation will be provided by Steven Ballantine assistant pastor with the mountain Zion restoration branch. Please stand for the invocation and remain standing for the pledge of allegiance.

Here. This brings us to presentations and resolutions 26-762. I would like to get a motion and a second to approve.

Madam City Clerk, please call the vote, please. Thank you.

Please make a note that she is present from the first roll call. Thank you. All right. Tonight, we are pleased to recognize Candy Laster, Promotions and Marketing Supervisor with the City of Independence Parks and Recreation as the October 2026 I-Star Award recipient. Since joining the Parks and Recreation Department in the fall of 2024, Candy has demonstrated an extraordinary level of dedication, creativity, and enthusiasm in promoting the programs, activities, facilities, and services available to the City of Independence community. Candy was originally tasked with increasing awareness and i

Whereas the Service Recognition Program recognizes outstanding performance and exemplary acts of service by employees of the City of Independence, and whereas an employee committee selects the I-Star Independent's service and teamwork above responsibilities, award recipient for exhibiting the qualities and ideals that best represent public service. And whereas the Service Recognition Committee has selected Candy Laster, Promotions and Marketing Supervisor in the Parks and Recreation Department, as an I-Star award recipient for October 2026. Now, therefore, be it resolved by the Council of the

Do you have enough costumes for the whole city council?

I will be there. I will commit myself, and I challenge the rest of the council to commit at least to one night to dress up and have a little bit of fun.

Our next speaker is Jason White. Please state your name, and you have five minutes. Thank you.

Thank you. Our next speaker is Daniel Moorhead. Please state your name. You have 10 minutes because you're representing an organization. Thank you.

Thank you. Our next speaker is Terrance Kelly.

All right. We'll wait to the public hearings. Thank you. This brings us to Old Business 26-072.

Any discussion? Mr. Mayor. Yes. I'm going to make three amendments to this UDL ordinance. I'm going to do them separately, so please bear with me. Number one is in relation to the BESS separation. I move to amend section 14-432-02-C to increase the separation requirement from 100 feet to 500 feet. but also at a separation that can be reduced upon recommendation from the Planning Commission and approved by the City Council. So we currently read no best facility shall be located within 500 feet of land used for residential use or public activity purposes such as schools, parks, recreation, playg

Okay. Do you want to read the rest of your amendments?

Okay. We have a motion to amend... 14-431-02-C. I second. Any discussion? You want to vote on each one of them separate or you want to put them all together because I've got three amendments to go along with it.

Let's vote on this one and then I'll do the data centers individually.

Okay. Madam City Clerk, can you please call the vote?

Yes. 14, amendment to 14-431-02-C passes with six yeses, zero noes.

Okay. Mr. Mayor, my second amendment, and I'll do these together because they're both related to the data center. In section 14-430-02-C. I would like to increase the footage, the setback from 500 feet to 1,000 feet. And then, let's see. So basic letter read, no data processing and hosting facilities shall be located within 1,000 feet of the land use for residential or for public activity purposes, such as schools, parks, recreations, or playgrounds, daycares, nursing homes, hospitals, and religious assemblies. Okay, and then the second amendment I would like to do is in section 14-432-12-A in

Thank you. I have three amendments that I want to make as well. The amendments that I propose would be to 14-430-12-A on major data centers. To add the link, I'll read the whole thing, but to add language. No Impact Assessment and Mitigation Plan, Noise Impact Assessment and Mitigation Plan, a report prepared by qualified acoustical engineer that evaluates all existing and proposed noise sources associated with the major data processing and hosting facility and demonstrates compliance with all applicable provisions of the city code. To include this language, the report shall analyze noise leve

And a second. Any further discussion? All right. Madam City Clerk, please call the roll on the amendments to the ordinance.

Yes. Amendments to the ordinance pass with six yeses and zero noes. Now we get back to approve 26-072 with the amendments that have been passed. So any discussion on that? Madam City Clerk, please call the vote.

Yes. 26-072 passes with six yeses and zero noes. This brings us to our consent agenda. I would entertain a motion.

Mr. Mayor. Yes. I will make a motion to approve the reports and recommendations of the city manager. Can I get a second?

Second. Got a motion and a second. At this time, I'm going to ask if anybody would like to pull anything off the consent agenda. Mr. Mayor? Yes.

I would like to pull item number five. Okay.

All right. Anyone else? I would like to pull item number four. Anyone else? Madam City Clerk, please call the vote.

Yes. Consent agenda passes with six yeses and zero noes. At this, I'm going to go down in order. So I'm going to go over number four. I have a couple questions to the city manager on this one. This one is for $537,000 for Reed Environmental. I have a couple of questions because we have a procurement policy in place that says that anything above $300,000, there are certain requirements to come into play. One of them be an approved apprenticeship program. also through ERISA's health and welfare plan and a pension or retirement equivalent to ERISA. And my question is, because my understanding is

Was this advertised in the point that everybody that was when the announcement or when the publication went out? Because with a public funded project, there has to be a public notification goes out that this bid is up or coming out for bid. And when the time frame is for that, when they're supposed to be turned in. If there are qualifications and policies in place like this, they're supposed to be advertised or have a conversation if you have a pre-bid before the bid goes out, that these things are relayed to the contractors or to the entity that is there to possibly bid on these projects. So

So real quick, I want to make sure. Local preference is one thing, but you have requirements in there that says you will have this, this, and this. That's not a preference. That's what it says in the procurement policy. So it's not a preference, okay? To me, as a construction guy, if you don't follow the qualifications that you're supposed to have in a bid, that's a non-responsive bid. So for that reason... I'm going to vote no on this. And for the simple fact, this company, I believe, and correct me if I'm wrong, they're out of Sheldon, Missouri, right? Is that correct?

Yeah, and I'm not either. And, you know... I want to see this go out for rebid. We've done that before. And I'm a no on this. So I will not make a recommendation to approve at this point in time.

Actually, would you consider just sending it back to city staff, make a motion to send it back to city staff? I mean, to have it rebid?

Okay, then I'm going to make a motion we send number four back to city staff to have it re-bid.

And I will second that motion. Any further discussion?

Mr. Mayor? Yes. Yeah, I'd like clarification. So it seems like we're getting caught up between a requirement and a preference. Is it a requirement that they have an apprenticeship program, or is it a preference that would improve their score to be selected?

I think it might help to explain what this is, what this process is, that this is something we do. This is sort of the season for this. Can we get more information on what this project is?

Mr. Mayor. Yes. If we re-bid about how long could that potentially

Any further discussion? I will make one comment so everybody's clear. I'm the one that helped get this language in, the procurement policy, and so I know what it reads. And so I know local preference is one thing, but it does say in there about, an apprenticeship program. It does say about a health and welfare program and pension through an ERISA qualified plan. And I'll just leave it at that and any further discussion. All right. Madam City Clerk, please call the vote.

So just for clarification, there's a motion on the floor for rebidding. Is that right? Yes. Okay. Thank you.

Yes. Vote is tied 3-3. So now we take the actual any discussion on the motion because now we have to go back. That was to amend it to send it back out.

No. Motion passes with four yeses and two noes. All right. Now, Council Member Vaught.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. So item number five, can I ask if there's a representative here for the applicant tonight?

Sure. Can you clarify if Complete Square Capital LLC is connected in any way to the prior or current owners, managers, or operators of Sports Stadium?

OK. All right. Thank you. So will the prior owners have any day-to-day operations to deal with this?

He's not doing any of the operations Okay, neither is their mother Okay So and do you know if and any Our safeguards have been put in place or changes For the new application to address the problems that led to the prior revocation of this the license at this location

That's all I have for Quick question you said Complete square capital zone by Mike Patel. Is that correct today? Okay, so I just have one quick quick question because We had another owner prior to and now we're looking at a business and new business so to speak right so what makes this different than the original people that owned the building before because of the issues that we had there what's going to be the difference between the way it was ran and what went on there and what's going to happen moving forward and how it's going to be ran where's the difference

Okay, thank you. I want to ask city manager a couple things if you don't mind. One of the issues that we had before was the amount of activity that was going on in that area as far as complaints and police. Can you kind of give us some numbers on... how it was before and then numbers now as far as activity between police and fire, if you don't mind. Do we have that available?

Thank you. I just have one more question, if you don't mind. Council Member Vaught. I do not mind. Okay. So this has been vacant since when?

So nobody's been in there, hasn't been occupied, so to speak. How do we know if it's still structurally sound?

conditional approval process so at this point in time we don't have that information available to us because those inspections have not been conducted thank you any further discussion Mr mayor yes so this seems like a pretty extraordinary step that we wound up taking to revoke a business license and I think that would indicate at least to me that some pretty extreme things were happening there that were not being fixed, causing pretty extreme harm to that community. So I appreciate the research you did to give us those numbers and to show us how drastically things changed upon revocation. Than

I mean, there has definitely been improvement since the closing of that property. The numbers don't lie about that. But did you say he did? So is there a plan for keeping the property secure and preventing the homeless encampment or trespassing?

Okay. I move to approve item number five.

I've got a motion to approve item number five.

I've got a motion and a second. Any further discussion on item number five? Madam City Clerk, please call the vote.

No. Item number five fails with one yes and five no's. This brings us to our regular agenda and public hearings.

Is there a conflict of interest here for me, Jeremy? I think you're good. Okay.

Any further discussion? Madam City Clerk, please call the vote.

Yes. 26-094 passes with six yeses and zero noes. Guys, that's your warning, okay? Please, no clapping. Please, thank you.

Can you go over a little bit? This isn't quite, it's not just a grocery store. There's a lot of amenities that they're adding on to the property.

We have a representative from Dillon's here tonight. Can we have that individual step up?

Yes. I've received some concerns about some residents in the back. You and I have discussed this with the grocery pickup in that area. There are some concerns about light and noise. I just didn't know if there were any plans to try to plant something, put a screen up, anything to kind of reduce that?

That's all I have Any other questions Councilmember Dorman well, we got to read it again, right? I'm sorry. Sorry.

Any discussion? Madam City Clerk, please call the vote.

Yes. 26-095 passes with six yeses and zero noes.

This is a full public hearing. Go ahead. I'll get to the rest of it here in just a second.

Thank you. This is a full... public hearing so I will ask if anybody wants to speak in favor of or against this and if you come up please state your name and your city of residence if you would like to speak I'll ask again anybody that would like to come up and speak in favor of or against and one more time anybody in would like to speak in favor of or against This public hearing is closed.

I would like some clarification because it seems like by eliminating the public hearing, it might... Limit with the council's hearing as far as or with the public's hearing so what drove?

Yes. 26-096 passes with six yeses and zero noes.

This is a full public hearing. Again, I'm going to please state your name and your city of residence if you want to speak in favor of or against.

Just your city, just your city of revenants.

Thank you. Anyone else that would like to speak in favor of or against... Please state your name and your city of residence. Thank you.

Thank you. Anyone else wish to speak in favor or against? Anyone else wish to speak in favor or against? Full public hearing is closed.

Yes. 26-091 passes with six yeses and zero nos.

Mr. Mayor? Yes. I'd like to ask the city manager to kind of run down why this is a recommendation.

Just for clarification, we're still going to have teams of folks that are experts in power, experts in water. Can you talk about that a little bit?

Mr. City Manager, you mentioned a lot about in compliance with the charter, and you mentioned the charter several times. So, Mr. Cover, can you give an overview of what the charter actually says, and if you believe this is in compliance with it?

Mr. City Manager, you mentioned this had been done before and then it was reverted. This is while I was on council. Do you have anybody on staff that can explain why it was done before and why it kind of failed before?

Thank you. So I think we just need, I don't really like the idea of combining them and put them under the Department of Utilities. I'll be voting no on it, but that's just my personal preference on that. So, okay, that's all I have. Thank you.

Thank you. Any further discussion? Madam City Clerk, please call the vote.

No. We have a 3-3 split, three yeses and three noes. 26-092 does not pass.

Mr. Mayor? Yes. I'd like to postpone this 30 days and reevaluate after we get some more information from Kansas City. Okay.

And can you run through just a timeline of why now, why we are able to do this now?

So in the past, before the Geobond, we couldn't ask them to annex this because we didn't have a way to fix the bridge. Is that right?

And in the past, what were we asking of Kansas City? We were asking them to split the cost, is that right?

Any further discussion? All right, the vote will be to postpone this for 30 days.

Any further discussion? Madam City Clerk, please call the vote.

Yes. 26-093 passes with six yeses and zero noes. Or postpones it till November 2nd. Thank you.

Any discussion? Madam City Clerk, please call the vote.

Yes. 26-097 passes with six yeses and zero noes.

I think we need to clarify. There are sort of two fire stations. Fire stations one that we're talking about. Can you clarify which fire station this is?

City Manager, could you clarify, originally we thought this was only going to be a partial replacement and now it has become a full replacement. So what transpired that we weren't able to know that originally?

Just to be clear, I am going to abstain from this vote because of my past history. I think it's only fair here, so I will be abstaining when the vote is called. Madam City Clerk, please call the vote.

Abstain. 26-098 passes with five yeses and one abstention.

Actually, a question for the city clerk. When would packets be available for pickup? Do you know?

I seen some discussion online earlier this week on when they would be available.

Any other discussion? Madam city clerk, please call the vote.

Yes. 26-099 passes with six yeses and zero noes. This brings us to first readings.

This brings us to council member comments. Council member Dorman.

Okay. First thing I'd like to talk about is our guidelines Good Neighbor Week, which is love where you live. I think we had an amazing week and thanks to everyone who participated, the staff, the website, the videos, the deputy city manager Reynolds for coordinating all the people and the master gardeners. So it's a start and it was a lot of fun to be out with people having them come and pull weeds with us and have the master gardeners tell us about different invasive plants that actually smell really good and they have pretty little berries on them, but they're terrible. Oh, and we did have t

Yeah, I want to double up on Councilwoman Dorman's thanks to all of city staff and volunteers and participants. That was a lot of work in a short period of time. You all have a very loaded up plate already. So it was a tremendous event. I also want to give a special thank you to G.K. Callahan and the Master Gardeners for all of their work. That was just them volunteering. And to have so many dedicated volunteers participate in the city and showing that they do indeed love where they live is pretty cool. I hope that we... can build on that. I plan on continuing to do monthly cleanups just so we

I hate them so much. So I really appreciate that. And Dillon's Grocery, I'm so excited about that. I'm excited to see a vacant building get ticked off that list. I know it's something that everybody up here just really can't stand to see so many vacant buildings in this wonderful city. So looking forward to making some purchases there. Thanks.

Thank you, Mayor. Just a couple of things. At the Planning Commission meeting last week, we honored Virginia Ferguson. Virginia has been on the Planning Commission for 12 years. I served with her for six of mine, and she ended her time on the Commission, and we honored her with pizza and a plant, and she has been a loyal volunteer for the City of Independence for many years, so I wish her well and will miss seeing her. And I also, the cleanup the last week was a great event. We had a lot of fun. And I want to thank everybody who came out. And I also want to give a big shout out to Independence

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I am just going to forth what they said about love where you live, Indy cleanup, because I think it's that important. And what I like most about this campaign was that it gives people a reason to come together and take pride in their own neighborhoods. Sometimes it only takes a few people deciding that they care to get others involved. So I hope this keeps growing because clean neighborhoods matter, but so does knowing your neighbors. and looking out for one another and feeling proud of the place that we call home. So I wanted to thank everyone who was involved and help m

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. So earlier tonight, the Unified Development Ordinance passed regarding buses and data centers. I was so excited about that I almost applauded, but I didn't want to get gaveled, so I refrained. I just want to say thank you to my colleagues here on the city council for going through this process with me. Mayor, thank you for holding the town hall. Mr. City Manager, thank you to your staff, Charlie and Tom, for diligently working on the rights and the rewrites and everything else. And to the citizens of Independence, thank you for coming up with some great ideas that we ende

That's all I have. Thank you. Would you please put your hand down? Thank you. I'm going to echo everybody else here on the volunteers and everybody being out there. This was a great week. I thought we were going to get into a meatball throwing contest out at George Owens, but it didn't happen. But we had our hands full of manure out there, I will just say that. But I want to thank the sponsors, too, because we could not have done this without some of the sponsors that we had. Donating money, but also donating dumpsters, donating people. Those things are important, and we can't do this without

Great. Thank you. I am just going to say I am looking forward to see what costumes the rest of the city council will be in at Enchanted Forest. So with that, we will see everybody next Monday, and thank you for coming out today. I'm sorry, Troy, I missed you.