City Council - Regular Meeting

It's 6 p.m. on Monday, June 8, 2026, and I call this study session to order. I want to thank everyone for joining us this evening. Would you please join me in the flag salute? Councilmember Poore, would you lead? I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, And I have been notified that Councilmember Cedar may be late this evening, but other than that, the Council is here. And staff present today, Public Works Director Madden, Finance Director Robach, and Police Chief Hernandez. For any of you that may not have gotten the updated agenda, we have removed item number 3A, the presentation for the employee of the month, and that will be moved till next week. All right, the first item on the agenda this evening is on page three, the development standard update presentation. Public Works Director Madden will be presenting this item.

Thank you, Mayor, Council. The item before you tonight is an insight into what something Milton has been working on for the last decade plus. We had our public work standards. Those were last refreshed in June of 2010. And so in the last 16 years, multiple public works directors attempted, and it is a big lift, to revise these and update these standards that we have. So with me tonight to talk about what process we went through is Ryan Graves. He works with Gray and Osborne, and he's our primary engineer that we connect with. And Ryan and I, oh, I don't know exactly when you started with Gray and Osborne, but we've worked together for the four and a half years that I've been here. And so Ryan is a fantastic asset, and he led this project for the city of Milton to help us cross the finish line.

Yes, so these were last updated a while ago. We started out with 171 standard details, and we went through them, figured out which ones were required, which ones needed to be updated, which ones could be removed. We ended up with 87 details. So the main goal of this was to bring Milton standards up to current engineering practices, current technologies, and rely a lot on WSDOT standards. WSDOT keeps theirs up to date very good. They do it every year. They reduce some liability from the city because we're saying we're doing what WSDOT does. So all the ADA ramps, things like that, we just started to refer to WSDOT because they are keeping up the most relevant information. In addition, AutoCAD, where we draw all these details, a lot has changed there, so we brought up all of them to CAD standards so that as we go forward, we can continue to make smaller edits as opposed to doing all 177, 87 every 16 years. Now, if we see a change that needs to be made, it's a lot easier to keep them up as we go. On top of that, worked closely with Patrick, the new Utility Director, on some changes that would be nice in the water details. So we are just trying to make sure that the Milton Standards are in current day's time.

Thank you, Ryan. So I have a set of these standards here. A lot of the time when we revise documents, we bring you a redline version. That is near impossible on something like this because we consolidated standards, we deleted standards, and so what I have in front of me is our updated standards. This was our old book, and We have been able to get down to the 87 fundamental standards for us that are searchable. That's the one thing where I didn't say, which is a big thing for us as we're trying to fly through standards quickly and tell contractors what's relevant, what's not. It also helps contractors working in the city have a simplified way to find the information that they're looking for. No longer are they looking through standards that may conflict and contradict one another. But they're looking through updated standards that are searchable. So that is what this effort is, was meant to accomplish. We have one more step in this, and I'll be working with my internal team to work through all of the verbiage that's attached to the Public Works standards. What we've gone through is all graphical standards to date when we slim that down from 171 to 87. This is a, it's not a decision point today, I just, are there any questions from Council?

Yes, Councillor Osanic.

Thank you for all the hard work. You cut it almost in half, it's amazing.

Yes.

I had, when I was reading this I didn't know what G&O stood for, is that Gray's and Osborne?

Gray and Osborne, yes. Gray and Osborne, OK. We just happen to have Ryan Graves with us tonight.

Thank you.

Yes. Any additional discussion or questions? Yes.

Could I see them?

Absolutely. Michelle, we can pass those down. And it is a thicker document when it's done, but I'll bring back the full document. We'll probably need about three months to work through the verbiage.

Anyone else? Yes, Mr.

Member Hall.

Through all of this, who's doing this?

So it started with a pipe dream of me wanting to finish this. This actually has Nick Azali's card in it. And I had notes going back in our public work standards through directors well before his time. And so I started talking with Ryan and Angeli and I worked through it with him quite a bit in the beginning. We went through all the environmental standards also, and then I brought in my specialists in storm and water and electric. So electric is quite a bit lighter of a lift because we use City of Tacoma public standards, and they also do all of our inspections for us.

Well, thank you. That is a tremendous amount of work.

It was more than we anticipated, in all honesty. It was a big lift. And I'll work with my team and Ken Foshay to finish the verbiage.

Thank you. Anyone else? That's good. All right. Thank you very much. We'll now move on to Item 4B, which is on page five of your packet. The 2027 to 2032 Six-Year Transportation Improvement Program. That will be, again, presented by our Public Works Director.

Thank you, Mayor, Council. The item before you tonight is a discussion item. I bring, or the Public Works Director position brings this forward to Council every year for adoption. This then rolls up. This is our city traffic improvement program. This rolls up into the state traffic improvement program. So for our projects to be grant eligible, they first need to be captured here, and then this gets rolled up or incorporated into the larger state document. So that is kind of why this is here and why we bring this back to Council every year for an update. So also, it's part of state law. It requires that each city develop a local transportation improvement program and update it annually. These need to be recorded as accepted by Council by July 1st of each year. There will be a public hearing for the 2732 TIP, and that's scheduled for our next regular meeting on June 15th. The yearly update of the six-year Transportation Improvement Program is part of an ongoing process that is linked to the development of the city's Capital Improvement Program, which we're also working through right now. The six-year TIP is linked to various state and federal funding programs, regional, inter-jurisdictional planning, and coordination processes. The TIP is a planning document for transportation-related projects in the city of Milton. Local agencies are required to develop this six-year TIP, and there must be at least one public hearing. So, what I've done in the past is I've kind of run through each project. We can do it fairly quickly. And if there are any questions, please raise your hand and stop me, and we can address them as we go through them.

Can I stop you now?

Yes.

Go ahead.

Thank you, Mayor. I just want to know, if it's scheduled for public hearing next Monday, where is it advertised so that the public can come prepared with their comments?

Very good question. Trisha. Yep, so those are the three places that we advertise. Newspaper, front of the building, and on our website.

And what part of the website specifically? I know the agendas are not easy to find.

So if you can find your way to page 12 of our document tonight, that is where Section 1 starts. is safety improvement. I also have our previous plan next to me. So if you have any questions about how this compares to the last year, feel free to ask those. Projects that we completed have been taken off. So 1.1 this year is safety improvements in the vicinity of schools, miscellaneous locations. And this is a project that we This is a planning document, I should say that up front. So the city's goal is $20,000 of city contribution to the sidewalk and routes to school, and then we're looking at $200,000 for grants, so, you know, a 90-10 split, and that is Typical for some grant agencies, other grant agencies, you'll see that split is different in different projects. A lot of our TIB projects, that's a 12.5%. So, and then RCO grants, unrelated to this, but they're an 80-20 split, just so you can kind of have those splits in your mind. So number one is that Safe Route to School. The projects that we're scoping right now for that primarily centre around Oak Street and carrying the planned Oak Street parking and sidewalk improvements from Dave's at the bottom of the hill on 11th and Oak all the way to the school facility. So that is the current project that we're scoping for students. Number 1.2 is the Milton Way improvements, Juniper to Porter Way, and that has been on here for years and years, and that might be something that we take off in future years, but I felt that it was necessary to leave it on right now. We've had a lot of change in Council and leadership, and this project would take a sidewalk all the way down from Juniper to Porter. And so right now we have one sidewalk on the, I guess that would be the south side of Milton Way, and it goes into the park at some point, and you've got to, you know, meander through the park, and then it comes back out at the bus shelter. So this project would essentially build the walls necessary and build the curb and gutter and the sidewalk along that section so people wouldn't need to walk into the park. Is that a priority for the city and for Council at 2.5? That's the question, you know, that we need to ask ourselves. So I'll be looking for input on that as we, you know, move through this and move into approving the plan next week. Next one, 1.3. Porter Way Improvements, 7th Ave to West Milton Ball Field, just under a million dollars. That is a project that we receive TIB funds for right now and is in design. So we are looking to complete design this year and hopefully there's some storm water challenges on that site just because the road is so close to the storm facilities. But we're working through that with our engineering team. 1.4, Milton Way improvements, 28th Meridian. Uptown area improvements, that is a concrete intersection. You've probably seen those in other cities, the four-way stops. They are somewhat challenging to move traffic through, but they are very safe, and it essentially creates a four-way stop. Pedestrians have the right-of-way, all four sections.

Sorry to interrupt.

It's okay. Please do.

Have we considered roundabouts instead of four-way stops?

On that particular intersection, we don't have the right-of-way necessary for the roundabout. So, and it's fairly enclosed with different elevations. That large rock wall right below the shopping centre there, that is problematic for the roundabout. And it's not an insurmountable problem, it's just an expensive problem. Yes. So that is that project. It's still something that we feel would benefit the uptown neighbourhood and the community up there. So that's why that's on here. 1.5 is pedestrian connections. Now what's different of 1.5 and 1.1, this one actually calls out three particular projects, Porter to Vine, Vine to Yuma, and 20th from Milton City Limits. And that would be the construction of pedestrian improvements from Porter Way down to Milton Way, 20th connection to schools. So right now we have a gap on Milton Way. essentially from Porter Way, there's a couple of little sections of sidewalk, but down to 20th at the bottom of the hill. We need to bring that sidewalk all the way up. I think it's important for our high school students that would like to ride a bike or walk to school, or they need to walk home after a sporting event, we need to have a safe route for them to do that. 1.6 is 161 and 28th Ave. That is a project that is part of the inner urban trail. So that's at that very northern limits of the city. And it's that odd angle that you kind of come in right there at 28th up on Enchanted Parkway or 161. And so there has been a lot of discussion about how to make that intersection more pedestrian-friendly as it connects to unincorporated King County and Federal Way. And those conversations have been somewhat on hold until we move forward with the interurban because it's all right there. And so, one is intrinsically tied to the other. And that's why we show a $0 amount in 2026. 1.7, 23rd Avenue improvements, Emerald to Alder. That is a, oh, that's the project that we've been talking about and doing right-of-way acquisitions for, and that will be coming back to Council next week. But we are making good progress on that project. OK, 1.8 on the next page. This is one that I think will be very important to the city, and this is the Taylor Street sidewalk improvements. is to have a sidewalk and a bike lane all the way from 161 to the north through a little section of Edgewood that is controlled by Edgewood and Taylor, and then all the way down to the Porter-Milton Way light. Just bring that sidewalk and bike lane all the way down. And that's part of the backbone of our pedestrian and bicycle network. And then that would create a safe route for people to ride bikes through the city. It's also one of the less steep grades that we have here in Milton. Next one is 1.9, 23rd Ave from Taylor to Milton Way. That's another one that we've talked about, the right-of-way acquisition. We've got two small parcels that we've reached an agreement with, and we'll be coming back to Council for approval to purchase those parcels. We needed about 10 feet of their front yard to continue that bike lane and sidewalk. So 23rd then would connect that whole bicycle infrastructure and skeletal structure to Taylor. Next one, 1.10, Milton Way, Porter Way intersections. That is a subpar intersection. And this project would look at Doing something like we've done, we don't have a lot of room to widen up there, but like we did at the school district, we made small improvements to that intersection to help traffic flow through. And that is one of our choke points that we have here in the city. All right, 1.11, traffic calming. We're all pretty aware of that one. That is a project that we hope to, through our contributions, a 20% contribution, acquire additional grant funds. And that would help us build out four-way intersections, do new rapid flashing beacons at mid-block crossings, potentially some elevation, speed humps, all the things that we've been talking about when it comes to traffic control and traffic calming.

Ms. Question?

Yes. Ms.

I know we have those speed humps right now that are temporary, so those will stay in place until we can get to these updates? Is that what the...?

We just applied for a grant, an educational demonstration grant that we submitted for Juniper and Milton Way. to close one direction of Juniper. And so that's the kind of projects that we'd be going after with this. They may help fund speed humps, but a lot of those speed hump dollars, that's a pretty low cost threshold. We might be able to package them if we have eight locations around the city, then we can go after a grant. So, but right now, to answer your question, yes, those are temporary. We want to try one other temporary with a longer travel lane, just to see if it's received better by the community. And that will give us more information for our permanent speed humps that are going to be concrete. Councillor Holland, Thank you.

Yes, Congressman Moore.

Thank you, Mayor. I was just, I hope it's not a dumb question, but for the sidewalk improvements, how do you determine which side of the road we're gonna kind of go for the sidewalks on the various projects?

There's a lot of contributing factors, but I would say the two that are the most important. Where are the utilities? Because if we need to move utilities, then that's going to almost double the cost of that project. So we look at where the utilities are, and then we look at what other pedestrian facilities are in that general area, and how could we connect that logically so people don't have to cross in the middle of a road. You know, we always want people to cross at intersections.

Awesome. Okay, so kind of where available, you kind of continue on where it's already built? Correct. Okay, as a general rule.

Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. So Oak, that's one of those projects that we're working on through design right now, and that's something we're really focused on because we have a lot of utilities on one side, so we're balancing right now. Does it make sense to have sidewalk on only one side, or do we need it both in that upper section of Oak? I think where we're landing now is both. Okay.

That's awesome. And I just wanted to say I appreciate that because, I mean, kids, you know, it's going to make it so much better for the entire community. Agreed. Yep.

Yes, Member Miles.

Since we're talking about 23rd and speed bumps at the same time when you're doing the sidewalk and bike lane improvements on 23rd, is there any possibility of putting speed bumps in there? Because right now it's a thoroughfare between Taylor and Milton Way. It's just a racetrack sometimes.

Yep. That is a time. When we go to build that sidewalk, that's, if not before, to get those temporary speed bumps in there.

Yes, Council Member Roberts.

Thank you, Mayor. Just a general question. So for this period here for all these projects, are these all slated to be completed by 32 or just the projects that we're planning on doing in general?

Great question. Some of them are kind of finite and they're wrapped around a certain area. Some of them are more generalized. So you'll see ones that kind of carry through. I'm going to skip down to 1.15. which is the citywide traffic calming, that one is, you know, ongoing. So it doesn't really have an end date. If we're looking more at the Milton Way-Porter Way, you know, 1.10, that is a project with limits that, you know, would not be ongoing. So that one is slated to be completed by the end of 2027 is how the document is projecting it.

All right, thanks for the clarification.

Absolutely. Yep, so traffic calming, we've got two of those. This, the 1.11 is specific to Porter Way improvements and Emerald Street improvements. 1.12, 28th, Birch Street to Alder Road extension. Comet Street to Alder. 28th, oh, yes. That is a section of road that Right now, 28th Inns, kind of behind where Excel is, if you know where that is, kind of by Taco Bell, there's a small spur of 28th. The overall roads plan has that 28th continuing all the way down to Alder Street, which would create another kind of avenue for people to come in off of 161. So we will need to make that not a racetrack to get through Milton, but We'll have to likely put some traffic calming in there, either chicanes or speed humps. But that road is coming. We are talking with a developer right now. They will contribute a half road, and then the city will be obligated to provide and fund the other half of the road. Pack Highway, east reconstruction, that is a massive grant, and probably one of the things that's driving our total, but $9 million, that is something that we worked on with WSDOT a couple years ago, and that is something that we have now built into all of the designs with Sound Transit to achieve that. And essentially, that creates a shared use path going down 99. What Fife has, we will continue that all the way up to the Federal Way boundary.

Council Member Ternes, I saw that you had a question.

Thank you for all this planning. I know at previous council meetings we've had some people that were holding out on whether or not they wanted the sidewalk improvement to go through their yards, and it sounds like you've secured a couple. Are there still people that are holding out on those improvements going through their yard and losing some of their street?

I believe we've come to an agreement with everyone. There's one home that we haven't had the ability to connect with them yet, but we've left cards, knocked on doors, and they weren't opposed to the project. I think they're just traveling. And so, yeah. But yes, that is moving forward, and that'll be coming to Council next week for approval, yes. And the sidewalk section that Councilmember Ternes is talking about is the one that goes from Alder on 23rd down to where Diamond is, and that subpar road that is more of a one-way, that'll make that a two-way plus a sidewalk. Let's see, next one, 1.14, miscellaneous asphalt overlays. That's another example, one of those ongoing projects. Historically, the city has contributed $200,000 a year for overlay projects. And what that 800 number is below for grants, that's assuming that every other year we receive some TIB funds. And historically, that's accurate. OK. Citywide traffic calming, we've already kind of touched on that one. This is just more of a generic general. project-specific. Oak Street improvements, we've talked about that one. I've got a meeting later this week with our engineering team to go into the details and talk about phasing of that. I'll be bringing that back to Council. 11th Street improvements, that is a stormwater project down by but during heavy flows, the storm ditches out here fill up, and so we were looking to establish some additional holding capacity to allow water to move slowly down the hill, because most of our large facilities are at the bottom, and the more we can do to slow water from reaching those lower ponds, the better, because then we don't have any kind of breach at risk.

Yes, Council Member Ternes.

I was recently talking to the homeowner on Queen Street, that it had the water had flooded the street there. And was there a resolution that happened with that, or is any of this money, would that be able to address that issue that he's currently having?

No, that comes out of stormwater, so it's a different pot of funding. We have a scoping meeting tomorrow on that in the morning for my internal team. some opposition from some of the homeowners about allowing us to ditch through their yards some of the first houses across from the school. And so we will be talking tomorrow internally of how we can work from the other direction, more down by Queens and work back towards the school through that storm channel. But we have a couple of ideas on ways that we can reduce the flooding risk that we saw last year.

Great, thank you. I'll let him know.

And then the last one that we've got for this, Section 1, the other sections go pretty quick. 28th sidewalk extension to Alder Street, and what that is, basically from the retirement community there down the hill, we wanna have a sidewalk that will take residents from Alder Street down 28th to the inner urban trail. And we've worked with a couple of developments happening in that area, so you'll see sporadic pockets of sidewalk on 28th. This project would connect all of those.

Yes, Council Member Roberts.

I just had a question about the sidewalk down the hill. Would that be on the left side or right side? Just curious, because I'm looking nearby. Because I go up and down there all the time, and having a sidewalk would be great. Thank you. Not getting hit by a car.

Yep.

So going down the hill where we have sections of sidewalk built out are on the right, or the east side. So just from a cost standpoint, that's probably the gaps we would try to close first, sidewalk on the east side. Mm-hmm. The next section is Section 2, which is traffic signals, street lights. So we've got Milton Way signal intersections, and that is to interconnect the signals as you kind of go through Milton from a timing standpoint. Right now, a lot of them are on loop only, so they're activated by traffic, active traffic. This project is more of a study project to look at would it benefit people travelling through the city to connect those lights. So the same, I guess, group of people would move through the intersections. So all the way down Milton Way, things would be timed. I haven't seen that as a huge priority. I also see it as a way to, you know, allow people to move faster through the city. So I think we will need some engineering assistance on that one to see if it's beneficial for the residents or not. Yes.

Councillor Kiley.

So we're not talking about giving pedestrians and bikes priority over the cars like they do in Seattle, right? It's not tripping the lights for the pedestrians. It's just to synchronize the lights for the flow of traffic.

Correct.

And we don't want them to go too fast, and we want them to get out of town. Right. Got it.

Next one is Citywide Traffic Lighting Improvements. That's one of those ongoing projects. As new technology comes on board or we need new lights, this project allows us to fund those. And then Pack Highway East Lighting Improvements. That is a project that, let's see, east within the city of Milton. So that was a project that was initially identified when we were doing the Porter Way, 99 improvements. We cut that out of the project, the additional street lights, on 99 in that section just because of funding. But this project would incorporate and bring more lighting on PACAF. All right, Section 3, Transportation Planning. Pavement Management System, that's going to be that ongoing. Every other year, it's advised to have a pavement management management system van drive through, or truck, drive through the city and scan all of our streets. The scans pick up what distress cracks, what potential subgrade areas are failing, and they give us a PCI, a pavement condition index, for each segment of road. The city did that two years ago, and that was the first time that I'm aware that we had done that. And so the reason you want to do it every two years, you could probably stretch it to every three, is because you don't want just a picture in time, but it needs to be a living picture of what the condition of your roads are. And then the development guideline modifications, that is one of the things that we just went over right before this. So those standards now have all been updated and we're looking at, you know, $5,000 that we need for this year to complete that. All right. West Milton Commercial District Streetscape, $30,000, planning level cross-sections and streetscapes. That is for the West Milton connection, which is what SR99 is. Director or Planning Manager Stahlnecker has secured those commerce funds to help the city look at that. So we're going to do a mini study of that SR99 section to help inform the city of exactly what we want that section to be. What do we want the road sections to be? Do we want it to be business-focused, pedestrian-focused? And so that study for 3.2, that West Milton Commercial Streetscapes, That's what that is, that $30,000. So that's all going to come from grant funding, which Planning Manager Stalnaker has already acquired. And then second to last is actually it's the last section that we've got the totals. 4.1 for beautification, that's our inner urban trail. We are working with that and our grant consultant to allow Commerce to release our engineering funds. It's been a little problematic, but we now have a consultant and a lobbyist in the bicycle network system down in Olympia lobbying on our behalf. Unsignalized pedestrian crossing. Yes, sorry, Council Member Roberts. Yes.

Thanks, Mayor. Just had a question about 3.2. So when Sound Transit came earlier, they were talking about adding sidewalks and whatnot. Is that being considered in some of these projects here, the amount of funding that they would contribute? Yes.

OK. So Sound Transit essentially is they would be responsible to fund a half street improvement. So from the turn lane to typically it would be the east side. So that section, they would from the center line, everything east, They'd repave those two lines. They'd change all the widths. They'd put in the pedestrian mixed-use facility, so the 10-foot-wide trail, and then they would build their skyway on the other side of that for their tram. The other side of the road is on Milton. So, you know, we do need to start planning for that. It's likely, you know, four years away, but we would want to have enough money or enough grants saved to finish our half of the road. That was on 3.2. 4.1 is that interurban trail. 4.2 is unsignalized pedestrian crossing. That's the rapid flashing beacons that you'll see down by the roundabout and other places throughout the city. And then miscellaneous sidewalks and ADA access. When those are identified in the city, this project would allow us to request grant funding to assist with those. And then the back page is our totals. And as we discussed earlier, the $10 million or slightly under pack highway pedestrian improvements take a third of that for the city.

Councillor Kiley.

I know you said some are going to have bike lanes. How do you determine which roadways will get the bike lanes?

That is a very good question. What I've found is that a lot of our roads are too steep, and so what we would like to do is we'd like to make that skeletal structure of what roads bikes can go freely up and down. Taylor is one of the primary ones. Milton Way, where we have sidewalks, those sidewalks are wider in general, and so people can use those kind of as mixed facilities. But Emerald would be the street on the north side that we would look to have bike lanes. And that is a very steep road. But we kind of need one on the south side, central, and on the north side. And then those are the three roads that people would ride bikes up and down. And then all of the roads that kind of cut across on flat grade, we would be eyeing 15th or 19th. for those pedestrian improvements where it's logical, it connects to parks or it connects to schools or retail facilities.

Thank you.

Of course.

Yes, Council Member Roberts.

Thanks, Mayor. So when you say too steep, is that a regulation of some sort or are you just saying too steep for people?

It's not too steep for everyone. I'm sure one of our Council members rides up there with ease. But in general, you know, it's not comfortable to ride up those grades. And one of our saving graces is we do have the interurban trail where people can kind of go from the lower section to the upper section, and it's more gradual. But even that is a burner. It's not a regulation. You know, we do have regulations on driveways, you know, don't exceed 12, 14%. I'm sure, yeah, Emerald is in that percentage of 12%. And so that's where it's no longer comfortable to ride a bike. Yeah, preference. All right, and that is our six-year Transportation Improvement Plan. Councillor Holland. One more question. Councillor Holland.

Yeah, of course. Would the motorized bikes be considered street or would that be considered the bike lane? Because we got, we have more and more people using the motor assist bikes.

So I think that is ever-changing from a legislation standpoint. And I'm seeing a lot more aggressive enforcement both here in Milton and then in the surrounding community. And I believe it's June 11th that there is a law changing that essentially allows enforcement to impound some of these. And it also tries to clarify which vehicles are allowed, which ones you need a driver's license for. Because as we all know, some of these are nothing more than motorcycles.

Thank you.

Yep. So anything that is, to answer your question, anything that is allowed at the time, right now what that would be is e-bikes that have pedals on them. That's what we would allow or expect in our bike lanes.

E-bikes?

E-bikes.

So you'd have e-bikes and regular bikes?

Yes.

All existing?

Yep.

OK.

But they must have pedals.

Have what?

They must have pedals. They can't be the straight motorcycles.

I've seen bikes now that have pedals that don't do anything.

Right, they'll get around it.

Through how we can legislate that. Yeah.

So that's our six-year TIP. If you have any questions this week or you want more clarification on anything, it will be coming back on the 15th for approval.

Any additional questions or discussion before we move on? Councillor Osanic.

This is a newbie question, right? If we have the public hearing on the 15th and the public brings up something that we think needs a deeper look or we need more information on or we don't, how can we approve it the same time, the same day as the public hearing? Is that normal that you have a public hearing and then you vote on it right after the public hearing without having a chance to research issues that the public brings up?

For this document, because a lot of our capital planning documents, we'll give it more time because that's every six years that those are looked at. This is a document that comes back every year. But I acknowledge the benefit of, you know, what you're saying. And if we did have residents that come forward and Council would like to adjust this, we can adjust it in real time. We could also hold a special meeting that last week if needed. But understand, understood.

Anything else? All right, now moving on to Item 4C on page 21. It's the 2026 Budget Amendment, first reading, and it'll be presented by our Finance Director.

Thank you, Mayor and Council. The proposed ordinance provides adjustments to the 2026 budget as adopted by Council in December of 2025. This is the first ordinance amending the 2026 budget and reflects changes that have occurred since adoption of the original budget. These adjustments are detailed in the accompanying exhibits and include changes to the wage scale only. In 2024, the public works project manager position was added to the wage scale as a three year limited term position to assist the public works department with various projects throughout the city. This role has proven to be a benefit to the city and staff is requesting approval to convert it to a permanent position. The project manager performs many functions previously performed by the city engineer, so staff is also requesting to defund the city engineer position, which has been vacant for several years. These changes are intended to better align staffing resources with the operational needs of the city. And there is additional information in the company exhibits along with some numbers comparing the wages and benefits of the two positions. If you have any questions or need any additional information.

Yes, Council Member Miles.

It might be premature, so you can tell me stop, because you're going to answer it on the next page. But I went through exhibit A. And I see where we've crossed out the city engineer. I don't see where we added the project manager. And I wasn't sure it was referred to as a budget neutral, but it looked like it's going to be a budget savings. So if you could address just those two things for me.

When you get there, sorry. No, thank you. The project manager position is actually directly above the red line city engineer. It is existing in the 2026 budget. So I guess the only change to the 2026 budget really is defunding the city engineer. or that we're proposing is to defund the city engineer. And we're bringing this forward at this time in preparation for the 2027 budget to make that project manager a permanent full-time position. I'm sorry, let me see, oh, and the budget neutral. By doing this, we would actually, at least based on just wages and benefits, you're right, it would be a little bit of a savings compared, the engineer position compared to the public works project manager position, and those numbers are on page 25 of your packet.

and 29 also in the exhibit. Then is it 83,118? So that's a substantial savings.

And the amounts that are in the budget, we have actually budgeted both of those positions at the top level. Thank you.

Any additional questions or discussions? Public Works Director Madden, it also has you on the agenda for this agenda item for presentation. Did you want to say something about it?

Yeah, I would love to. When I joined the City of Milton, we were without a Public Works Director and an engineer. And so my previous position, I had overseen all of our construction, our engineers and architects. And so I was very comfortable with kind of working with a consortium of engineers through consultants. And we always wanted two or three consultants. But when I was at State Parks, I found a lot of value in approaching my engineering staff that way. with maybe a few in-house if we could afford them and find them. They were very sought after. But then also working with all of the consultants because they really give you the specialty. Most engineers, you know, they are focused on one aspect. And because we work with street design, stormwater design, water, electrical, we really need a handful of different specialists through engineering firms. And so that's when we started increasing how much we consulted out. We worked for about two to three more years really advertising and hunting for that engineer position without luck. I interviewed a few engineers that gave me a lot of insight saying, you know, Dustin, if you hire an engineer, we are essentially going to manage your projects for you. And you've got a licensed professional engineer managing those projects, which is very appealing. But they're still going to need consultants. So we're not really going to save a lot on the subject matter expert side of things. It just gives you that official title. without having that engineer or that person to help me deliver these capital projects, it was very challenging the first couple of years. And so we decided to develop this three-year contract for a project manager. We were very fortunate to get a gentleman named Val Buzinoff to join our team. Not only did he help us, he speaks both Russian and Ukrainian fluently, but he has a background working with Patelco on the electrical side. plus he was a project manager for apartment complexes, building, hooking up storms, sewer, water. And so he had a variety of background. And that's what I found with the project manager position is that position is tailored to help you deliver these projects, not necessarily engineer them, but we weren't doing that in-house anyway. And so what I've found is a lot of value in having this position full-time to help us deliver projects in the city.

Any additional questions? Yes, Council Member Roberts.

So I was looking at the annual salary for the last step versus For the city engineer on page 25, it shows $202,782. And then for the last step, E, it shows $143,000. So I was just wondering what the discrepancy was. insurance, et cetera?

Ms. That's correct. Mr. OK. Ms. It's the benefits. Mr. OK, sure. Ms. It's health insurance, pension contributions, withholding, Social Security, Medicare, kind of all those things.

Mr. OK, that explains it then. Thank you.

Anyone else? All right. Looks like we're done with our agenda, and seeing that all agenda items have been concluded, I adjourn this meeting at 6.50 p.m.