City Council - Regular Meeting

Good. All right. Welcome everybody. Uh I'm going to call the Moab City Council meeting to order on Tuesday, March 10th, 2026 at 5:30. We're starting early today because we are going to have a workshop on our strategic plan to review what we talked about in January and also to talk about what we um accomplished last year, what we're going to roll over and what we talked about in January and kind of come up with some priorities and then we're going to go right into the workshop. Today we're going to be looking at the water budget, the sewer budget, and the public safety budget. So, we'll just get started. And Alexi, you're up. Okay.

Again, I was going to say, is there a pledge? Oh, the pledge of allegiance. Sorry. Um, it's your turn. It is my turn to I I don't want you to hurt yourself. I aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thanks for the reminder. I guess I got a little thrown off because we we're doing a got a lot of work to do. So maybe next time we'll do the workshop and then the footage.

It seems like

All right. Oh, you're good. Okay. Get started. Um to my thought for this is essentially to look a little bit at what we have from last year so we can look at what we want to do next year. Uh so quick update on the current strategic plan. This is where we stand with things that are in waiting that are in progress and that are already complete. And then I have a short list below these of things that fit in the categories of our top five goals that came up after last year's strategic plan that are either in the works or complete as well, such as um the ballpark or working um on the street lights. some of those things. I to be clear, this isn't everything that's happened this year. These are the things that are related to the strategic plan in particular. Okay, so we're not done with this fiscal year. We still have some things coming up, uh, including some things that are on the agenda tonight. Also, some more work on Walnut Lane, the mat. Uh, there's some things that have been started that are just going to be continuing like the contract has been signed for the sidewalk. started. Some of the locations have already been fixed and then that will continue. So that's where we are with this year's strategic plan. And then the goal tonight is to look at the priorities that we have from the January sessions. Michael and I combined our notes. We tried to collect what we heard you say. It's possible some things didn't make it in here. We want to make sure we have the priorities right and then from there to distill it to the things that are at the top of the list for the coming year. Uh one of the things we did working on last year's

strategic plan was to try to narrow down the goals to the top five uh and then try to be very effective at those things. And I think we've done a pretty good job of trying to deliver on those top five goals. And hopefully uh through the process tonight looking at budget priorities, available resources, we can come up with the things that we really want to deliver on this year and uh I'll work on putting those in a strategic plan and bring that back to you. Okay. So this is the framework we've been working in. Um from the tomorrow together vision, we have the pillars. Last year we added preparedness um which includes our goal on mitigating natural hazards. There are five goals within these uh based on conversations there is a possibility of moving some things around. We heard a lot of things that were in the pillar for leadership and decision-making or achieving practical accountable and responsive governance. So that'll come at the end of this to discuss a little bit about how that belongs in the strategic plan. Okay, we're starting with downtown. Uh I'm including last year's goals. Um some of these have more continuation than others. Uh we can discuss that as we go. Um last year there were some things, a lot of them related to transportation. I put those on a kind of long transportation list on the active transportation goal. And then there were a few other things in here too um and related to like our lighting, things like that. and continuing our work with UD do. Uh this year what we have in this category is uh some discussions about enhancing the downtown experience, considering whether we want a gateway on the north end, uh continuing waste receptacle replacements. I'd be interested to hear if there were other things that you thought belonged in this category or how high of a priority the

things that we've identified are for this year. you want to know? Yeah. Yeah. Let's go ahead and just go right through. I I want to get your thoughts on this. So, I feel like maybe we can just discuss them one goal at a time. Um I would like to see the continuation of sidewalk improvements.

And I do have that also kind of in the transportation section. There's there's a lot of things that affect transportation and downtown and a little bit outside downtown but noted. So also so are the fiscal year 26 are those moving over to just with crossbacks being

uh yes and no. Um, so there's some things on here that are going to be really hard to ever check off as totally complete, like implementing the road safety audit. It is possible at some point. We will have implemented every last recommendation at this point. We're pursuing them, like improving lighting for safety. Um, a lot of the transportation goals fall into that category. Uh, so that one, the next one, we're not going to stop working with UD do at some point. So, some things definitely are rolling over. I think sidewalk, crosswalks, there's some things that I anticipate that you probably do want to continue and that we did some chunk of this year, but it isn't like useful to us to know um if if at some point we achieved that goal or good enough and there's something else that's moved to the top of the list.

Okay. Um well, I guess that's it. I just pulled up my strategic planning notes. I I think one thing that sticks out that we talked about was kind of like a doing more business engagement downtown. Um probably would be best in here. I'm not sure. Um and then yeah, you said sidewalks, right? Cross sidewalks. And it's said in there continuously meet. Yeah. But um yeah, I agree. Business engagement. Okay. And then probably even continued enforcement. Yeah. Safety.

That will also make an appearance uh when we get to active transportation, but I I'm taking notes. Okay. Okay. Any other comments on downtown? I think this all looks really good. I'm still I maybe I'll I'm a little slow, but uh I'm still a little unclear uh what the ask is. This this does look like it's very representative of of what we talked about in there.

Yeah, there's some I think something in here that would be helpful to discuss um is how high of a priority is, for example, having the north entry and and what exactly would that look like if we put that as a goal? Right. And I think that that's something that I brought up at at strategic planning. And so what I was considering is just that I think that we've uh sort of uh been talking about downtown as as just, you know, a two or three block area. And I would like to see that expanded. And so we're talking about, you know, more of a system that, you know, as people are coming into town that they're, you know, understanding where they're coming into and, you know, they see that that the care that we're they're going to experience when we get downtown, you know, initially when they cross the bridge. And so, you know, I would think that that's to me just simply uh beautifification and traffic calming and some other measures that are uh, you know, a lot of which are are pretty achievable. Um, I think this is all really wonderful and I uh you know what what comes to mind for me with all of this is we're talking about um some engagement with with business owners

and I see this this wonderful like uh you know sort of a a you know a branding of of our efforts downtown right here that we can take to people and say hey this is what we're working on how you know this is this is our goals and so I think that this this guides that process really Yeah, I think I'm I'm thinking about this too in terms of um we're looking at from the current fiscal year uh working on kind of merging all of our things that we have downtown to have kind of this a more updated downtown plan because we had the previous one and the RSA and some of those things. So at this point that looks like it's probably a dust study. Um and it could happen in this fiscal year but that could inform this as a goal in the strategic plan is like once we have more of a compilation of our previous planning efforts uh then it might be helpful towards implementing this sort of welcome on the north side.

I just ask you a question about clarif or just a clarification. So, it sounded like what you were talking about is just consider the the highway north of town and it's and it's cleanliness, beautifification, it's, you know, getting the, you know, mud cleaned up when the when the rains come down, all those types of things. Just continuing to do all those things. Then also considering what we can do as well to beautify. We're not necessarily talking about a monument or a sign or anything like that. So, I'm talking about when people and you're absolutely right. Yeah. I'm talking about when people drive in that they they know as soon as they cross the bridge into to the city that uh we we care about our downtown. We care about our community. We uh you know, we we're we're giving them all the the uh signals to to slow down and and appreciate what they're seeing. And then, you know, hopefully that that carries. You know, I think that for me, one an an issue that we're experiencing downtown is that uh you know, that the uh transition into our downtown area is very abrupt.

And so we have this sort of thoroughfare, you know, with with this this fourlane um you know uh you know that we've tried to limit with speeds and then all of a sudden it sort of dumps them into this very pedestrian centric downtown. I think that we could do a better job of just, you know, showing our pride in our our downtown and and really showcasing that makes sense. Okay.

Yeah. I feel like for me even these two I think as a theme probably focusing on beautifification because I think there's maybe even more also thinking about like who knows what opportunities with corporate sponsorship or like other things along those lines. But yeah, I'm I'm excited to keep in that direction. Great. Okay. And and so would you like, Alexi, would you like us to talk to you all about um I guess what these two already did about the priorities for all of us? Do you want to hear that or is that helpful information? What else can we help you with?

Yeah. Um what I'm thinking right now is that this probably will be grouped into something that's beautifification goals or something to that effect. Uh and then information that we get or like you said sponsorships or anything else that comes in the future will kind of fit into that that grouping of things. Yeah. Kind of thinking that I needs to be rewarded. Consider the north entry and plans to welcome people as they enter. I was thinking the same thing. Yeah. And I think now you have a better idea what Yeah. the welcome, you know, we've got that. So I think that would be helpful. Yeah.

Yeah. And in terms of your idea that we talked about in engaging our downtown businesses, it seems like when we finalize that downtown plan or get it closer, that would be the time, you know, when we have something to share. Yeah. You know, with our businesses that we would engage them, bring them in. Yeah. At like a town hall or um Yeah. And we have lines. We've definitely talked about some some concepts about doing that. Um, and we can we'll continue to do that and I think we do have it coming up in outreach and stuff like that.

It kind of carries over to that. But as far as prioritization goes, I think um the fact that it's in the top five or did we do six now? Is that uh we have five from last time and then there's a potential one that we could add that could be six or that we'll get to. It's flexible. Yeah, right after five. Right. So, so um the fact that it is showing up under number one downtown is means it's a priority. Okay. Let's move on to the next one. Yep. Okay. Thanks, Lexi.

Okay. Walnut lane and housing. This one um I think is going to be redirected a little bit to be broader about housing and not just Walnut Lane. uh some of the things for Walnut Lane are going to roll over because uh working on that site and asbestous debatement and other things have delayed timeline on some of last year's goals. So some of the walnut lane things will roll over and then we also heard a discussion about housing workshops or a workshop that includes some of the following topics. On this one, I'm interested in if this encompasses what you were thinking, but also how specific did you want to be about the workshop topics? Is that something that needs to be in the strategic plan or is it something that should be uh developed when they're scheduled like by current interest?

That's a great question. Um, I'm gonna pull up. So, we have kind of a a housing subcommittee that we've met a few times and and so I think some of those came from that. Um, so I think this encompasses several of those, but I would love for that to be in a little more alignment. And and I know that Johanna and Corey have talked to you guys about task force coming and kind of having that discussion. Yeah. And I I kind of grouped all these together when I did my draft of what came out of the meeting. I I these were in different places, but I I I was like, well, if if it is a workshop that you want to do, why not try and knock out a lot of these discussions at the same time?

And I think it could it could work too. Um because you have all the people here taking the time to do it, might as well talk about his and talk about it in as much depth as possible. Yeah. Yeah. Um, looking quickly at that list that we came up with is 8 gauge destruction administration walnut lane disposition um supporting chapter 17 updates doing a pipeline analysis kind of other stuff. So, but um yeah, I know that Cory's working on a housing toolbox.

Okay.

I guess one question I have now that I'm looking at this is it um are we by sponsor a housing workshop? The way I was looking at it was the council would hold a workshop as the council. That's what I was right. Is that that's the I think that's the plan with the okay task members.

Okay. And and I guess you know for me maybe rather than I you know I love the first one just housing priorities because I think that that you know first we sort of establish what this year's council priorities are based on the the greater um housing environment and uh and then maybe we that would inform what the future um you know workshops are are you know as we sort of zero in on different things. Okay, you know, one thing we want to do is have like a, you know, uh the what whatever the project where whatever one of our priorities would be and then that would inform maybe the next Is that helpful? I thought you were asking. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Right. Would it should I move this to something a little bit more like to discuss current housing priorities? something like specifying that it's the council doing it and that it's in collaboration with the task force. Would that cover? Yeah. Okay. Yeah, absolutely. And then beyond that, uh, Caitlyn, do you want things does the housing toolbox and do some of those things belong in this category? I think so. Um, yeah, which I guess we would discuss at a housing workshop to set kind of those action priorities.

Okay. Because I guess also reading this, I see two different like I think we should have housing workshops for our priorities, but I think also I'd love to advocate for the city supporting or sponsoring communitywide housing conversations with task force or like in partnership with um I guess another one that we've talked about a bit with the impact fee program is how to keep funding the housing fund. Oh yeah. And review the policy. That's something that you guys to do is to review that policy. Yeah. Okay.

So, we'll keep the housing workshops in there. Um add housing toolbox and other community engagement uh activities and uh reviewing the impact fee policy. Anything else? Okay. Active transportation. This one is a long list of things. Um, so we've discussed a few of them like keep going with crosswalks, sidewalk fixes, uh, traffic calming. So what we have in this category includes some things that are are underway like the SS4A grant which is a complete streets policy and then looking at different kinds of options on Mil Creek uh Spanish Valley and Spanish Trail. Then uh it was also brought up to discuss downtown street parking. Uh okay, I'm seeing nods. Uh blood repair damage to continue to work with that on our trails. uh bullouts. A lot of these are discontinuing things that we're doing. Then beyond that, we have working to secure funding for Matt and then traffic enforcement, which was also previously brought up. Is this missing anything that would be a high priority?

Does does the downtown street parking belong in in the downtown one? Is that I mean, it could be. And we want we want to be discussing with business owners down there and having a conversation. Yeah. So, we can move that one to downtown. A lot of things fit in two boxes, but I think having input from the business owners downtown is crucial to that one. Yeah. And that one does not extend beyond our downtown area. I'm wondering about cleanup and flood repair damage also could be in our hazard. We have another We do have a natural hazard mitigation.

Is that part of it though? It is. It is. I think this one was just specific to how it affected the um the the path. That's I believe that's exactly what it and so maybe we should add paths on that. Okay. Yeah. And I think if we're going to talk about like Mil Creek and Path, you know, we've done a lot downtown to kind of make that path more inviting, adding lighted ballards, stuff like that. There are definitely some very dark kind of uninviting sections of path throughout town. And I think Yeah. else towards that. Okay. Yeah. Enhancing pathway safe safety.

Pathway safety. Like if we're going to make a crosswalk safer and we're going to encourage the path, we might as well lean into that, too. Absolutely. Caution. We're looking at a pilot. Okay. Anything else?

Everything else. all the transportation we've Okay, implementing plans. This is a kind of a continuation. Uh we always have plans that need to be implemented. These are some of the ones that could be potentially coming up in the next fiscal year, including continuing the ballpark planning. uh the Emrach facility uh I think that structure evaluation is coming to completion now um but then there's kind of this next step of the Swany Park master plan uh which is also related to the skate park which has come up in discussions beyond that uh we've talked about pesticide use and uh the way we maintain our ground so that could be related to an integrated pest management plan and Then uh we also heard discussion about lowwater landscapes and and again that kind of gets to the way we maintain our facilities.

Anything else or does that include what you were thinking or does something not belong on that list? It doesn't include what I'm thinking. Um other than I I don't know if I would I guess I would put maybe the general plan. I know general plan could fit into update old and create new master plans, but I just think that that's going to be such an important uh piece of all this. So, I would almost give it its own a general plan update. Okay,

I can add that. Any other thoughts?

Okay, natural hazard mitigation. Uh a lot of this is some things that are rolling over, some things were already completed in the last year. Uh the storm water master plan uh is going to start this fiscal year, but the planning will continue into the next fiscal year and then from there we will have more information about things that we need to plan for. Uh we don't know what those are yet, but they will probably be coming up in the next fiscal year. A lot of flood mitigation projects will also be continuing. Are there any other specific projects or thoughts that people had for this section? I know to some degree there's been a lot of discussion about fire preparedness and about you know we made some decisions in regards to WOOI and all that kind of stuff but said we would then define corridors within our own city that may you know uh

require a city code built around or policy built around fire wildfire mitigation. So I feel like that should end up in hazard mitigation. That makes sense. Y

okay we'll add fire preparedness in here. Anything else? Okay. So, this one uh is a possibility. There's uh some discussion I think around how this belongs in the plan, but there were a lot of things that came up in strategic planning related to making sure our city policies were clear and accessible. uh that we were doing public outreach and the way the council was envisioning it to make sure that we're getting information out there. Uh the budget workshops were part of that discussion and then also opportunities for staff and council to connect with residents which is probably related to updating the public outreach plan. This could be more of a methods thing like the way we are implementing the strategic plan or it could be a separate goal. It does fall under one of our pillars. I'm interested in your thoughts on this.

I like it.

Do you want it in here as a separate goal or should this be more of a how we implement the other five? you think it's how we implement

okay so one place I could put this is uh the way the strategic plan is structured right now right there's some kind of introduction about how we got to this year's strategic plan it could become kind of part of that introductory information and specifically describe like how to implement the following five goals a lot of that would be similar year to year and this could be something that we could add. Last year we were talking about how we restructured the plan. This year we could talk more about the communication and the responsive governance aspects of it. Does that work? Yeah. I'm kind of wondering if this fits into the implement plans whether it's not just implement but implement and communicate

because a lot of this is you know it's touching on a lot of the same things. It's just like that final step of like communicating out. But either way, I can put it in both places and like we could make it a little more concrete and adding it to the implementing plan section and then we can also kind of included in the beginning as uh things that are different about this plan. Okay. Are there any other thoughts about things that belong in the next version of the strategic plan? I any final discussion points?

Okay, we're good. We'll see what you come up with and then we'll change everything. Well, you'll see a formatted final version to review for the next city council meeting. And I believe on our schedule that would be the first opportunity to adopt it. Of course, if it's not showing exactly what you want, don't you know, you don't have to adopt it, but that'll be when you see the full formatted plan. Thank you. Good job, Alexi. Thanks, Alexi. That was great. That was really good. Now, remember, purpose of this review is to help guide the budget process. So, when you're looking at numbers and the budget, think about what we've just done. Okay.

Okay. Thanks for that. Next up, we have the actual budget workshop. So, um this is the first budget workshop that we've done in a public setting. So, I'm excited about that. I think this is great. Um like I mentioned, we have sewer, water, and public safety. Danny is here with each um department head to kind of explain the benefit and HR component, personnel component. And then, you know, Obie's here to talk more about water and sewer, the specifics of this budget, and Michael's here for Well, I've got a presentation, too. So, I'll start things off. Okay.

And, um, we're going to talk about just some overview of things, where we are at this point in the year, uh, because I think it's a good it's good to have a context as we go into talking about budgets, what things look like as an overview as well. won't get into too much detail, but at least you can kind of see where where we think we are. Talk about personnel overall really quick and then we'll get into the um the budget presentations. So, the first thing I want to talk about is the end of year. Um revenues are are trending higher. I think I've I've pretty much told everybody that. I'll show you some graphs in just a minute where you can see kind of where we were when when we had our uh workshop for the strategic plan kind of we had a little bit of a dip and I kind of gave you a grim outlook and then what things what if what's happened since then. Expenditures are down. Uh we have a practice of doing an end end of year estimate each year. Um I've asked all the department heads to do an endofear estimate uh to show where they're going to end. This is mainly to see what things are going to roll over to next year. So, this is kind of the carry forward of um things that weren't finished last year, projects, plans, things like that. Um non-specific items like like uh office supplies and things like that. Those things just roll into the general fund and then roll over to the next year, not specifically back to their office fund or something like that. But it's looking pretty good. But I don't want to give numbers right this second, but I do think uh this everyone's done a really good job of saving and not spending where they don't have to. And then also with the increase in revenues based on increased visitation over the winter, I think we're doing pretty well. So we still have a few months to go

though. So fund balances are are doing well. Just giving you a snapshot of what they look like at the end of the last fiscal year. Some of these have grown since then. Some of these will be drawn down just a little bit. Uh like you when you look at the enterprise funds, it looks like a lot of money. Well, the enterprise funds still owe some money to the general fund for CIP and things like that that have come out of uh the P our PTIF account in the general fund that now need to be paid back by by these enterprise funds. So, those transfers are going to happen. It's not going to decimate these things by any means. U but we should should see the general fund go up a little bit and water, sewer, and storm water go down just a little bit. mainly water and sewer, but still looking really healthy. I thought you'd be interested to see what wrap tax looks like. Uh we transferred $1.2 million at the end of or the beginning of this fiscal year and we brought in another $248,000 since then and we're so we're looking pretty good on the collections for uh the RAP tax. This is the graph I was telling you about. The orange line is this fiscal year that we're in right now. So if you look at September, we had a dip. The blue line is last year. So as we compare monthtomonth, uh you can see some months are up, some months are down, but since uh November, everything's been up. We've been trending high. And we've seen some, and this is sales, resort, and TRT, the main the main taxes that are influenced by visitation, but we've seen some some months where we're 30% higher than we were the the month before or the year before across the board. going forward. It's hard to it's hard to estimate what's going to happen, but um

if we put a conservative increase on that, I do think we end up I did ran this a bunch of different ways, but if we do a conservative increase, not a 30% increase, but a conservative increase, um things are looking pretty good at going forward in spring. We've got some big events coming up. We've got 60 years of Easter Jeep Safari or Jeep sponsoring Easter Jeep Safari or being part of it. They're planning a lot of different things I think will bring a lot of people to town specifically for this this year's event. A lot of different things going on. We're going to end the year if those all those things happen, we're going to end the year um a bit higher, which you add up all of those those uh increases and it's a significant amount of money. Again, I don't want to I don't want to jinx us by saying anything, but um but we are looking pretty good there, and that only helps us going into next year. So, that was that was I have a couple other things to talk about. I want to talk about personnel overall. So, overall in city, the entire city, when you look at everything in the city, Danny and I have have looked at this and we've we've gone through gone through everything and the overall increase of this salary for everyone in the city is 5.42%. We think that's pretty conservative. We've we've done some things to to try and get it down. We're going to talk about the salary freeze for the highly compensated employees and things like that. But with uh salary increases that are planned for merit increases at 3.75% and a cola which is proposed at 2.8% which is consistent with with what's going on with the federal government and everything. um we're we're less than

what that would add up to be if you just added those two numbers together. And has a lot to do with the freeze. Benefits, that's actually wrong. Uh benefits increase is about 10% but overall increase for benefits and salaries is 7.1%. Um benefits did go up this year. benefits. When we talk about benefits in that line item, we're talking about health insurance. We're talking about URS, Utah Retirement System contributions and things like that. Danny will talk about this when we get to each of the departments and give you kind of an overview of what it looks like for each department. But overall, it went up about 10%. Um, and the overall increase for these two line items throughout the entire city is 7.1%. So, let's um talk about the uh savings from the freeze on salaries for the next two years for highly compensated employees. And I have to say that because this is not for everybody. Look at the graphic. It's only the people on the top um that are circled because that's what this freeze is for. Right now, it's it's about it's eight people. It could be as many as 13, but it does net some pretty big savings over the first two years. Um, we will save somewhere around $300,000 by doing this. And as as you know, one of the reasons to do this is stop to slow down the compounding effect. But what we're also doing is we're we're allowing for these savings to compound year over year over year. And they will continue to compound even after we stop the freeze. And after five years, as compared to what we would have spent without the freeze, we will save a million dollars just by doing this freeze for two years. And that will that will continue and reverberate and go

throughout time. Um, but I just wanted to bring this up to show you that there definitely are things in place trying to slow down the the growth of salaries, but also give the opportunities for people who are just starting out to continue to grow and move into higher positions without having to worry about being frozen out or freezing um, hiring or anything like that. So, that's pretty much what I wanted to go over. Not a lot to discuss in this section. Just some overview. Um, we'll go ahead and get into the department budgets. I want to just say really quick the department budgets. These are not final. In fact, uh, Obie's going to talk about it in just a minute, but we did make some changes today to his budget. Uh, he'll talk about those things, but mainly it was for the overhead. the overhead was not added in in the budget that we we put out. So, we added that in. Things still looked really good, but we're not looking for recommend. We're not looking for approval tonight. We're not even making a recommendation. We're here to talk to you about the numbers that we have at this point. And we've got a few more meetings to go before we get to the point where we're making recommendations. So, turn it over to Obie and to Danny. Michael, can I ask one question about that? Is is the freeze the two times AMI is that for wages or wages and benefits?

Wages. Wages. Okay. Thank you. This was the only one that AI wouldn't change. So, it's really plain.

Um, yeah. So, right up front, uh, we added some, uh, overhead. Overheads is what uh the enterprise funds pay to the general fund for all the services that like engineering and Danny and everybody else uh provides to uh the the enterprise funds, right? Um and so we added that into both uh departments. We also took out uh some of the plans. Uh we're looking at redoing uh updating some of our uh master plan for water and sewer and those were taken out and moved to capital. Um, did you send them that spreadsheet or No,

no, we just go over it here. Um, it will be updated a couple more times, I think, but we can just go over it. And capital is where those plans belong anyways. It's just moving them to where they belong. So, in the starting with the water division, uh, so you see at the top there the two actuals for uh, 2024 and 2025. 2024 looks so low because for whatever reason in 24 we didn't pay overhead payments or at least it's not on the slides that I had. If you add in a comparable amount of overhead payment uh 24 would have come to 1,896,000.

So it would the actuals for 2024 were higher than the actuals for 2025. Um then the approved budget and then the uh requested budget or requested budget is uh about a $215,000 increase over uh last year's approved budget. Uh the majority of that is coming from salaries, benefits, and depreciation. Um if you take those three out, the increase is about uh $7,700. Um but overall it's a 11% increase but uh it's uh a point4% increase when you take out salaries, benefits, depreciation. Uh so a really slight increase over last year. Um the some of the bigger line items that we uh that went up this year, office supplies went up about 300% and that was us moving sample shipping from uh where it was in into office supplies. We got uh or I got some uh uh uh some guidance. So we're trying to align with the guidance for each line item to make sure everything's the same across the city. Uh, professional technical went up about 66%. Most of that is a new fee from the division of uh, drinking water. Um, and special departmental supplies went up about 21%. And that's primarily just the increased cost of parts. You want to speak?

Yeah. So, to touch on salary and benefits, um, one of the things that I want to point out before we get into this because you're going to see some benefit numbers that raise and some that go down. A lot of that's out of our control. So a lot of that what happens with benefits is when we budget for an open position we budget for the highest benefit load that may come in. Once we have an employee in that position, we budget what that employes status is at that time. And those statuses can't change throughout the year. So we may have budgeted for a single, got married, took on a family later, may budget for a family, got divorced, and now is a single. And we don't really have control over that. But the cost of benefits between a single and a family are significant, right? So you're going to see some of those changes. And a lot of that is what this is from. Um in moder specifically, salaries did go up about 13.37%. This increase was uh due to a correction of a salary calculation error that we had on an employee from the previous fiscal year. We did expect to be about 6 and a half 7% is kind of what your our normal increase is going to be based on cola and merit alone. Um there is no employee in this um department that is frozen. So, I'll point out which departments do have frozen employees in which also will lower what their percentage is. Um, 25.77 for benefits. This is due to a little bit to that salary correction, but then most of it was change in benefit status. So, that's kind of where we fall on that.

Um, Danny, there's a slight increase in the cost of benefits, too.

There was there we we're expecting Yes. Thanks, Michael. We're expecting about a 10% is about what our average increase should be between the dental and the health insurance increases that we received this year. So, anything above that is where you're going to see me point out that there's an increase or a decreases based on those standard numbers. All right, moving on to sewer. Uh where you have about a 10.9% increase over last year's budget. Again, 24 there was no overhead payment. If that was uh like a comparable overhead payment, it would have been in the 2,385,000 range, which is quite a bit less than 25. We we got an additional employee at the WRF, and I believe that is where that uh cost, you know, that increase is coming from. Um the difference between what we're requesting and what was approved last year is about uh 300,000. Um the vast majority of that is coming from depreciation which is 350,000 for some reason depreciation look a lot in that

it did depreciation we're basing it on the um the figures that we get from our auditors and so all we can do is take the monthly amount and multiply that out for 12 months and it it ends up being more in the coming year than it is in this year. So um and we explained the whole depreciation thing. It actually never leaves the account. It doesn't ever get paid. it just is shown as an expense.

Um, and so if you take out salaries, benefits, and depreciation, there's actually a $17,000 decrease in sewer uh fund this year. Um, which is about a 4% reduction from last year. Uh some some changes again. Office supplies went up significantly because of sample shipping being moved from other to samp uh to office supplies. Uh this uh WF sent a lot of samples off. It's a fairly sizable uh expense. Uh utilities went up about 54%. Uh that was us moving sledge halls from professional technical to utilities. I just felt like it fit better as a utility than it did as like a a professional technical service. Um, uh, building supplies and maintenance, there's about a 300% increase. Some of these are actually not that much. Building supplies and maintenance went up about 4,500, but that's 300% increase. Uh, we we have to do some HVAC upgrades at the treatment plant. I will note that uh collections, all of those were at the WRF. So, uh, sewers, the the treatment plant and collections, collections, uh, outside of salaries because benefits actually went down in collections. um there were no increases for any items.

So to break up the salaries and benefits for these two departments. So with the WRF, there was a slight increase in in salaries that was due to an offcycle um increase or promotion. There is one employee that is frozen in the WRF budget. Um as far as benefits of WRF, data go up by 10.77%. that is expected at the 10% but you know a little bit the 77 is going to be relative to the increase in the salary the do you want me to go through sewer too if you have any other slides if we could okay all right so um sewer collections itself um salaries went up by 10.3% so this is kind of a larger increase it again is due to offcycle salary increase promotion the sewer um benefits this is where it kind of gets a little weird actually went down by 1.53% and that was due to benefit status changes. So, this is where I was kind of talking about you're going to see some that are going up and then some are going down.

All right. Now, I was just going to touch briefly on capital projects. I know they're going to go through the whole capital projects at the next meeting. Um, so we won't get into bit real in depth on these, but we want to update the master plan, both water and sewer. That's pretty important. Um, we're going to do some upgrades on the existing water tanks. This is mostly painting and adding uh some safety features. The SCADA upgrades will continue. So, we should have this mostly done this year, but it'll probably drag on into next year a little bit. Uh, and then hopefully we have that new water tank designed by the end of next year. There's also some road projects that will probably have some water stuff. I didn't put those on here. You'll hear about those at next meeting. Um, and yes, uh, they Hey, I didn't like this one either. So,

uh, questions for Obie or Danny? Of course I do. Um I did have a qu I I flagged um I guess I'm wondering I think I understand but can can you describe what a sledge hall is?

Sure. So uh at the treatment plant we have two products. One is clean you know the the treated water that goes to the river. The other is uh the the pressed dried sludge which is like uh basically the uh the dead bodies of the of the bacteria that treated the water. And that has to be hauled to the dump. And that it's uh that in that number is both tipping fees at the at the landfill and uh charges for like the actual driving it there all to um monetary waste. Thanks. Waste whatever it is now. Candylands. Yes. Thank you.

Thanks. Um and then this might be one of the master plan things. So, I was wondering about the special departmental um 600 546. Um is that one that you moved stuff out of? Yeah, I was wondering if that was one of the This one is in sewer or water. Yeah. Which uh this is sewer. Um you're wondering why it went down so much. No, I'm wondering why special departmental went up from 95 to 130,000. um in the WRF. Yeah.

Um the 95 is only is only the actual of what we spent. We actually budgeted 120 for this year and we expected to get up to that or wait let me take a look here actually

that oh that is all we spent for that year. I can look at your thing if you want. So, it looks like the biggest thing is for consumable consumables, polymer, chlorine, and blockant. Uh, that's $95,000 just for those things. Okay. So, that is like special departmental supplies. I was just curious what that category.

Yeah. So, the polymer is what we use. uh you mix polymer with the sludge to so that it'll uh uh dewater correctly. Uh fauculent uh is what will settle out the treatment plant and uh the chlorine is what we treat it with when it's hecting up. Lab supplies are high one in that and special part supplies. Yeah, that's just a really high uh a very uh expensive thing, you know. So special departmental supplies is things we use specifically in that department that don't fit into any other category and uh the treatment plant uses a lot of chemicals that are very expensive and those all that stuff's going on.

Thanks. Um yeah. Well, and I guess more a comment, but um one of my other questions was about the increase for professional and technical for I'm wondering if it makes sense to call that the division of water drinking water if that should be in professional technical or if that's more of like a fee or that's underwater. Yeah, underwater. Okay. So, more so a question. I mean, yeah, I remember us I remember talking about that fee and um

yeah, I mean that's where it would come out. It's possible that we could put it another place. It's $19,000 is what the the fee is. So, it's not the entire thing. The biggest um portion of that is software programs. uh that's $29,000 and then sample testing is is over $15,000 as well. So that's the majority of what's in that budget. Okay. Yeah. I guess then yeah, my overarching question was why it went from 40,000 to 136,000. Uh primarily the the division drinking water fee. The fee that we have to pay that we have to pay. Yeah.

They raise their fees. Right. But did Michael just say it was only $19,000? I'm showing that line item underwater professional and technical at 66,500. We moved $70,000. This is what it is. We moved $70,000 out of there because it was for planning. Okay. And and it went over to uh CIP. Okay. And the 40,000 came out of uh elections professional technical for the same reason. So your your number on uh collections professional technical iss 40,000 high. Okay. Thanks. Anybody else?

All right. Remember this is just the workshop where we get to ask questions and and then we'll have a draft. So more discussion. This is not the last time we'll be talking about it. Thanks Obie. Thank you. Thanks. Thanks. Good job guys. Danny doesn't get to be. No. No. Good job. It's unusual for you to be sitting in front of us like I know. It's always good to see you. All right, Chief. So, now we will be looking at the um public safety department.

This is the low chair. from shared. Do you want to say anything? No, we'll just fight through it. Um, yeah. Um, so we're going to go through the the police department budget, but that includes all of our different um divisions and did you want to start or you want me to start? Start.

All right. Okay. Here's here's what we've got going on. And I did a lot more numbers and a lot smaller and it's not wasn't my intention to make it harder to see. Am I seeing these in my way here? But um I'll go through these quickly and then we'll kind of talk a little bit more on line items if we want to as we get through things. But one thing to point out when you look at our our asks for 2027, there's a couple things that aren't there before that kind of throw the numbers off. Police grant shifts, we never budgeted for those before. And then movie and security wages, we never budgeted for those before. Those are both pass through pass through money items. So $375,000 that isn't actually in the budget. We're anticipating potentially bringing that in in grants for overtime or shifts through security stuff. So if we remove those two numbers out of there um because that's not going to cost the department or the city any money in actuality. Uh our entire budget for police department only goes up 3.56%. So that those numbers right there skew quite a bit what you're seeing here. Make it look like we're going up a lot more than we are. Um and do you understand what those mean? What what I mean by those? So anticipated a lot of the grant shifts are our traffic safety shifts. We do about 150,000 to 180,000 worth of those shifts. So we're going to budget ahead of time for those. Those will all be reimbursed

by security shifts by the state state grant money. Um if we can work security we are for Jeep coming up etc. Uh we're anticipating that that is a high number likely and that'll change to what we actually work at the end of the year. So it may not make make it to 200,000 but so it's just an offsetting. These are just offsetting. Yep. Yeah. There. Yeah. There's an equal revenue that goes with Right. And just to just to clarify on those the money's in there that's not money to be used anywhere else and unless we receive the money in the grants that money is not spent.

That's right. or if we receive less, we're it only gets spent up to the point that we received. That's kind of even money.

Um, and then we'll go we'll go through and kind of look a little bit closer to a couple things. I did a lot of reshuffleling and we'll talk about that. Um, and that's going to answer a lot of questions, I think. So, anyway, take those away. We were about a 3.56% increase as all in the police department. Victim advocates pretty honestly going to go down a little bit. Pretty stable there. Uh beer tax we throw in there. This is what we anticipate receiving from beer tax. I don't know if the new big beautiful liquor store is going to bring us more revenue in this regard, but most of the time we use this to purchase messaging signs. um and and speed trailers and things of that nature. Code enforcement, which we are transitioning to be community service officers, um that budget is going to go down just a little bit.

A lot of salaries and benefits, and I'll touch on that. Animal shelter up a little. That's a salary benefit thing as well. And if we if we take that out and look at just um a couple other small items, it's it's really the cost of utilities that has gone up and it's pretty flat and that's a small budget anyway. Um all right, for the salary stuff, this is

Yeah, I'll jump in on salaries and benefits. So, we'll start with the police department for salaries and benefits. Um their salaries went up by 4.01%. So, that's less than what our anticipated amount was. Um there's a couple reasons for that. There are two employees that are frozen in that department in that budget. And also, we moved an FTE out of the police department and moved them into CDD. So, next meeting when we meet on CD, you'll see there'll be like there's going to be a pretty big bump there, but that's because of the FTEs moving around. So, we have a couple of those coming up. Um, benefits are up in police by 15.61%. Um, part of that is our line of duty pay, which is a salary item, but benefits historically have not been calculated on that. We wanted to correct that this year to make sure we are calculating the correct amount of benefits on everything. Um, so that's kind of where police lie. Victim's advocate salaries are just slightly up. They're 7.48%. It's it's basically what we anticipated. There was a slight increase um last year in one of the salaries. Um, but benefits were down by 9.29%. This again is due to benefit status that was changed during the year. Um code enforcement salaries are up or sorry salaries are down by 13.75% which is great. Um that is because historically we have budgeted for a part-time position that has not been filled and then also an intern that we did remove this year. And then benefits went down by 4.68% which is relative to the salaries that went down. um animal shelter um 8.77% increase in salaries. That is be is mostly due to the fact that we have a part-time employee up there that we have been budgeting for 20 hours a week. They've actually been utilizing that position for 29 hours a week. So while it doesn't seem like much, it does increase because such a small department and um same thing with the benefits. Any questions on salaries, benefits? Okay.

You guys didn't even need me here. No. Yes, we did. You have questions. It's coming. Yeah, coming. Believe me.

So, the u the biggest thing that if you notice looking if you look at last year's um budgeted to this year's uh requests are going to be the line items that look very different. The reason for that is I went through and with the direction of Danny and Michael, it was an effort to more accurately track expenses to proper line items going forward. The biggest moves was um moving things into professional and technical where they belonged out of subscriptions. Um another was uh specialty department supplies and some of the others that that we'll look at. professional and technical are things that should you know are our technical services and not they were they'd been under for years and and it's just oversight I'm sure under subscriptions because it it's a it's a contract or a subscription with Motorola or so forth is is kind of why I think it was there but what we did is is move things to where they should properly be and on the next slide I'll go through and kind of make sure that all makes sense but some of the big ones to point out professional and technical and why it's high and why subscriptions went down is a lot of these moved from that to this. But Motorola, they're big money item about 75,000 annually. They obviously they go up about 68% every year. That's our Spillman which is our record system, our report writing system, body cameras, handheld radios. Uh UCA has been doing a lot of upgrades and changing in towers. And with that, um, we have several older 7000 radios that are going to be no longer supported by Motorola. They already aren't, uh, supported by Motorola, so we'll have to start transitioning those to a newer model. Uh, but we'll do that over several years. Um, but those are things we just we have to have. um obviously our body cameras that's building and the fees that go with those power DMS that's um 28,68%

annual increase that's where we track use of force mental health field training our accreditation uh internal affairs complaints uh compliments we actually get those um I get more dick yeah um but those are those are required by statute and some of those are you know obviously uh very very beneficial to us in in making sure our people are taken care of and that we're for tracking use of force. We're tracking the types of calls that they go on. One of those is it tracks if you've gone on several deaths in a short period of time. It'll flag us to say hey admin maybe let's let this individual go talk to somebody or give them a quick timeout and make sure they're okay. So it's really beneficial. Axon, taser, um those are expensive and storage that's about 21,000 and required. Lexipole is our policy operation manuals. They all have them and police want training. No significant increases in any other departments under public safety. Uh the animal shelter just has a small increase for utility costs and couple small projects that $3,500. So this is what I was talking about. Subscriptions went from 200k down to 40,000 due to moving expenses or proper categories. Professional and technical increase from 164 to 250 for the same reason. Most came from subscriptions. Um if we move remove that 375 of pass through money for the grant shifts, then our budget goes up to only 3.59% which is actually less than COLA and increased benefit costs. So overall our budget decrease for fiscal fiscal year 27 outside of salary and benefit lines. I did some of the math if you're curious, but I know there's several line items that are different. So I'll open that up to questions and

we'll work through those questions, comments. I got some, but I always go first.

Go ahead, Kaitlin. Okay. Um, so I I appreciate kind of this the explanation of a lot of these. I think seeing the massive shifts between subscriptions, professional, technical, I think we'll see that because I know that you guys are cleaning a lot of that up, which I appreciate. Um, I think it while it is a a 3.5% increase, it's been almost a 30% increase over the last couple years. So that's that's kind of something. So, I'm I'm appreciating that we're kind of balancing out now that staff has come in, you guys have the equipment that you need to serve, but um so I guess kind of thinking about that and line of duty. Some of my questions are about the hard stuff, you know, the the hiring bonuses. Um now that we are fully staffed um got Michael gave me numbers about 11 um officers over the last three years which great um and amazing that we were able to add those on staff. I guess one of my questions is moving forward um what what would it be like to hire officers like in the future without that or with a decreased amount? The last couple that we've hired, we've hired new, which means they don't get that hiring bonus. Um, and I I like that because we're giving people opportunities from the community and they've been members of the community. One that's in the academy right now, member of the community, last one saying um so they don't get the bonus hiring. That was something that um really was helping us to recover from an untenable position when I got here and we had six police officers for this city. Couple were sergeants and it was was not good and we've worked really hard. We needed to bring in talent and people with

experience and I don't see us needing to do that as often going forward if at all. Um we anticipate a couple personnel changes every year of course which which happens. Um, I know there's discussion on how we might, if we did bring in somebody with great deal of experience, say we have a supervisor position open and we don't have somebody internally that can do that that we would spread out the bonus or the hiring bonus over three years. And that way they don't get that much upfront. It's at the end of, you know, a year they would get that and spread that out over three years to make that a little bit better. And also if they leave within that first three years, which has happened, they they pay it back, but it would limit, you know, what we're out. So they've only got 5,000, they pay back 5,000. We have, you know, individual gets hired now and gets a $15,000 bonus and leave, they pay that whole 15,000 back. So that's one thing. I don't anticipate us needing to hire at the rate that we did in the past of of highly experienced officers. I I love that we're in a position to build them.

Yeah, I think that's awesome. Especially, yeah, last time you shared that they were local hires, which is great. Um

my other question is about line of duty, which was rebranded. We learned that at strategic planning. um was previously a housing stipen um specific to officers and um so kind of similar question um given that it's it's I I I'm really struggling with with this and I and I think that I see it as opportunity to um talk about a housing stipend that is equitable across the city. Um, you know, I'm I'm I'll talk about this specifically for sure. I'm in a very unique position where I I was on staff when there were six officers. I was on staff when Gabby Patito happened and BLM and all of that stuff. And um, so, you know, I remember that and I know how valuable it was to invest in that. Um, and so I think that that shows that investing in employees as you hire them and giving them good benefits and good support works to rebuild a department. And so one of my questions now is how do we now that we've accomplished this with MPD? How do we make that equitable across other departments that are continuously struggling with that, especially with employees that are typically on the lowest ends of the pay scale? Um, and so, so yeah, I guess one of my questions as I'm evaluating that in the budget is like, you know, what's your what's your take on that? How do you think officers would respond? How how is the housing siphon versus line of duty cross? Well, I I think there's a few things to consider, but the biggest one I It's expensive to live here. We know that, but it's expensive for everyone to live here. So, I absolutely understand that. And just real quick, Chief, I can answer

the question about like the the equitability e whatever e equity for the whole city. If you just Yeah, if you just want to answer what what it would look like for your department, you know, now we are staffed and everything. What is it? Is is this uh still necessary? How many people get it and that kind of stuff?

Yeah, all the sworn officers get it. Um and it adds up to what is it 100,000 a year. Uh one of the things with it because we don't have retention is that in some ways works as that the cost to train a new officer hire do the background put them through all the you know steps and rigors to get them hired trained through field training and on the road is about 150,000 per officer. So, in us retaining who we have, we're saving money every year, frankly, and keeping what we have right now with the with that um line of duty. I think we would we would potentially lose some officers is my is my thought process. Um not all, but we would lose some. Uh right now, we we keep them because they pay more on the Wasatch front. This gives us makes us a little bit closer to even and they get to live in a beautiful place and work in a place that they love um and don't have to go work at a big agency in those areas which for me is huge because we we've got a great group of people right now that we've worked really hard to develop and and train and get to where they are and um things are working great the way they are with with who we have. So that's my thought on it. Um, one of the things I've tried to do every year, um, with budget and was able to do it this year, I mean, I mean, I can jump into this right now. If we if you look at all those line items and do do the math um of course take out out that 375 but outside of outside of not looking at salaries and benefits but the total decrease in what I've requested for professional technical everything that's

down below the overtime and unemployment line of duty everything below that we're actually coming in at 152,00 600 less than last year, which pays for line of duty. And that's kind of how I've trying to also help out in that regard. We did really well and been super supported in equipment and getting things that we need to be a professional police department and we're in a good spot now and we don't need as much of that so we can save on that end, I think, and and invest in personnel.

So, and I I'll just jump in here. So, you know, I my recommendation is that we continue to provide the benefits that um that have been provided in the past and and chief and I have talked about this and you know that's I think it's really important that to realize you know we were in a crisis at at a point and we're not in a crisis now but we don't want to end up in a crisis again. So his points about retention and everything are really important, but there's always room and there's always opportunity to have discussions and to talk about these things and um and to look at the situation that we're in at this point and see, you know, what what can potentially be done. Um is there any wiggle room? I know one of the one of the um desires is to be equitable across the board and uh and I think I think that's something that we should talk about as as we look at the entire budget. Um but uh but just on this in this situation, I think going forward if um we we want to recommend that we continue this benefit that has been in place for a while and that um and if if this is something that you do want to have discussions about, I'm more than happy to talk with the council about policies and things like that and to work with the chief and come back to you with options and and those types of things. I just need direction from the council.

And I' I'd like to say before we move away from this item, um I I personally kind of want to add my voice to this in a way. Um I am made somewhat uncomfortable by the rebrand of a housing stipen just being called line of duty and continued to be handed out. Like what I would really like to see is, you know, I want to make sure that our officer salaries reflect that retention, you know, and I would be more comfortable with it instead of being a stipen if we made sure their salaries reflected what we need for retention. and that if we were going to have something like a housing stipen that as Caitlin kind of brought up that it would theoretically be available to any department that was struggling to staff itself versus just kind of rebranding this one. Um, and like you know if salaries need to be adjusted to keep people in town I completely understand the idea that we put a lot of time and effort into training and investing in our officers and that losing them is hard for us. Um, and I certainly don't want to make anybody feel like we want to rip a rug out from underneath them or otherwise. But I think in the way that we structure things and in the way that we pay people, like I'm more comfortable with this being like payroll than it being an additional item that uh is treated differently.

But if it's payroll then it compounds. It compounds. Yeah. Benefit you know to be raised. So that X amount whatever is going to turn into higher number. Danny, is there a policy in the employee manual on this or is this something that you were going to update for us when we look at the employee manual later? We currently have a a policy on there. We had talked about if anything was to change, we could add or change there, but right now we do have a policy on it. Okay. Any other comments? Questions?

You were talking likeund, you said like $120,000 or $110,000. It's 120 for all of right, you know. So, who knows what we're saving as far as get three officers leave, right? $300,000 at least. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It definitely, in my opinion, it's a worthwhile investment in that regard. Just just because is probably the one department where the onboarding is so expensive compared to

it's it's expensive anywhere to onboard officers it really is and we'd rather not have to do that over and over again in this you know this last year we were fully staffed almost the entire year and for a police department to be fully staffed ever is pretty amazing and we've we've been at or near fully staffed the last couple of years So, you know, we're spending more of that salary and and um um line of duty and going forward. Right now, we're fully staffed. Um you know, not to I can't predict the future that I I anticipate, but there's always one or two that will retire or or take another opportunity. So, but if we if it's small like that, it's a lot lot more manageable than start from scratch. Any other questions?

No, I just want to say that I think that speaks to your leadership, Lex. You know, I a bad boss can make the best job in the world crap. Well, thank you. So, I think that speaks a lot to your leadership and your team. I appreciate that. But we got great people. All right. Um, more conversation to be had. Just so you know, this is just the beginning. Thank you guys. And this is anything else, Michael, you want to add?

Yeah, I'll just add um appreciate the conversation. I am open for questions at any time. I'd be happy to talk about philosophy and and why do it this way versus another way and happy to be open to suggestions any as well. I think uh we obviously don't know everything. So, we uh we do try to do our best and that's what we're trying to do. And I know that tonight we had two great department heads present who have worked really hard on their budget and are very very involved in the budget preparation and which makes u very involved department heads in budget management which ends up saving us money um at the end of the year every year. So we really appreciate everything everyone's done and obviously Danny needs to be thanked as well. So since she's the she's what hold us all together around here. So thank you.

Thank you guys. All righty. Thanks. Um, we will have uh our second budget workshop at our next meeting on the 24th of March. And who all will be performing that? Everyone. Um, yes.

So, we I I got to bring this up really quick. If I can take a second, mayor. Um, we may have to put some do a workshop before the April meeting where when we approve the tenative budget and the salaries and the fee schedule. um just because uh it just is working out that way. But the next meeting will be full again. Um we'll have a lot of smaller departments and then a couple of big ones uh public works and uh community development and then a lot of smaller stuff from there. So looking forward to it. All right. Thanks.

Um so next we have Randy Day that's probably here to speak to the Do you Are you here to speak to the public? That's public comment tonight. I knew you were. So, um, next up we have public comments. And Randy, if you'd like to come up three minutes.

Not sure how to approach this. Um, I know I'm late to the wagon on losing 25% of my ball fields overnight because the redesign for this city ballpark is going to take 25% of my ball venoms away and I don't know how we're going to replace them because I looked at the design. It looks like we're getting three ballparks. Is that correct? No. And a parking lot? No, it hasn't hasn't been designed yet. What's in there are some concepts that somebody put together. Yeah, it's a concept at this point. The design will be heavily influenced by public comment, right?

Um but but somebody just threw some stuff together and said, "Hey, these are some options." None of those have been adopted.

Thank you. I'm relieved. I I need baseball diamond right now. I'm coaching a a team because of my grandson. And so I'm putting together what I did last year, the same thing, a uh travel team. is 13 and under. We wear the Devil's uniform. We copy the colors of the high school because I want them to want to play for the high school. I want them to want to win a state championship like my kids did. I want them to do that. I can't do that in city wreck. It doesn't work. The rules are changed so the game's easier for everybody. I understand that. Baseball's like light. You get three strikes, you're out. You get lots of different opportunities though. Where else can you be successful? Only three out of 10 times and you're good. That's baseball. I need some help. I've left messages for staff staff and when they work with me, it's unbelievable how they help me. I promise. I'm not knocking them. But lately, I haven't been able to get a field organized. I got a tournament I want to bring here 13 and under. I got teams lining up that want in, but I got to make sure that I have the support from the city to make sure that these fields will work for me. The county fields, I've been out there very difficult to adapt to baseball at under 13 years. Fields are a different size. That makes that a little tough. The infields out there are a little gritty. You get a lot of bad hops. I can't afford bad hops for little guys. I don't mind it for adults. Fine. get your teeth knocked out, you can afford to fix them, but not for a 13-year-old or 12 year old. I am so relieved to hear that these designs aren't accepted because I put a lot of time in that baseball diamond

over the years. I welded fence, I put up screen, and I will do it again to help save the money to build that. I will do it again. Okay? When Glenn Richardson ran that program and we changed that, I would love to have that field named after him as a Hall of Famer coach. He brought that to us. I'm wearing his uniform that I wore when I was in high school. And I'm not telling you how long ago that was. You'll laugh. And yeah, we had wooden bats. We did not have metal. Wonderful times. Sorry. I just really appreciate your opportunity. Please let me know how I can help because but I need a field and if somebody can call staff and ask them to get with me to let's work this out. I need to practice and I need to play and we got tournaments and we want to bring that to Moab. This is a baseball town. Always has been. And now I understand the high school's struggling for players. That breaks my heart. We can't have that. We got to fix that. And it takes a it takes a town to do it. Mayor, thank you.

You bet for recognizing me and we'll have somebody get in touch. We appre appreciate all the work you do. I know you and this is budget time, but I felt like 25% of my bald diamond just went away and I'm so glad to know and you'll be, you know, please pay attention because we'll like to include you in I would love to be part of that discussion and and I was serious about naming that field after Glenn Richardson. Promise. That's cool. Thank you. Thanks. Thanks. Thanks, Randy. Anybody else? public com. Yes, Sophia. Hi. Hey, buddy.

Um, my name Wow, I've not heard of this microphone in a while. Um, my name is Sophia Fischer. I'm an employee for RDM restoration. Um, it's great to see all you here and thank you as always for the time and dedication you give to the community as public servants. Um, I'm just here to give a quick shout out to another group that's given a lot of time to our community. Uh, and that is Team Rubicon. Team Rubicon is a veteranled humanitarian organization that helps communities before, during, and after natural disaster. Um, and they're actually going to be in town next week for their eighth operation in Moab. They'll be removing hazardous fire fuels out on a city-owned property in Spanish in collaboration with the fire break campaign, which the city's also a partner on. Um, so I'm just here to extend an invitation to city councilors, the mayor and staff leadership as well. If they'd like to come out uh for a site visit, meet with some volunteers, um, meet with the leadership of Team Rubicon and the Firebreak campaign, we'd really appreciate it. Um, the visits are meant to be fun and informal, and it's a great way to show our community's gratitude for these volunteers. Uh, many of them have come to Moab three to four times in the past, over the past decade. Um and they've provided really invaluable support helping us prepare for and respond to natural disasters including wildfires and floods. Uh we also have opportunities for engagement before and after the workday in case a workday time site visit doesn't work for anybody. Uh so I just want to add that you should have received an email last week with more details in a scheduling poll, but I'm happy to resend that in case anybody wants that back in their inbox. Show of hands, does anybody want that email again?

Send it back to us. Perfect. We'll do gets lost in our emails. I understand that happens to me too. Um, and I brought this cool hat which you might get also if you come out to a site visit. Just promoting the swag. Cool. That's all I have. Thank you so much and I hope you guys have a good night. Thanks for having me. Any other public comments this evening? All right. Um, the chief is up again next for a department head update about the Citizens Police Academy. taking a taller chair this time.

Um yeah, this this is a something that I've wanted to do since I um came here and this year the stars are aligning. So what we're going to what we anticipate doing we are doing um is a citizens police academy which is at its definition a familiarization program for citizens to come starting we're going to start April 22nd Wednesday nights from 6:00 to 9:00 p.m. for six Wednesdays in a row. So, for six weeks, we'll do a basic police academy with with a lot of hands-on experience for anybody in the community who like who would like to participate. Um, I anticipate one or two council members. I would love that. I know we got one that's interested, one broke his leg to get out of it.

When I heard about the push-ups and sit-ups, I was

Yeah, there's no PT test. No, no PT test. But um really what it is is to is to give people an idea of what the training is like that we go through, what our day-to-day life is like. Um give you an idea of what it's like to do a traffic stop, to walk into a family fight. Some of these scenarios that just really help people understand the the stress and then the lack of any time to make decisions sometimes and and what we deal with and then and experience some of that. We'll also talk about what we do for training. Um again, we we anticipate six weeks. Um there will be a range day. There will be a day doing some emergency vehicle driving. And the other days will be different types of scenarios. We will feed everybody who comes every week. You're coming after work on a Wednesday from 6:00 to 9:00. If we're not going to feed you dinner, I don't think anybody wants to come. So, we'll feed you. The only caveat to it is 18 and older and you have to pass a basic background check because we will we will do a day at the range and we need we need to make sure people can be around firearms and around those sorts of things. Um there's not a physical requirement or anything of that nature. So I was was joking, but um we're going to put that notification up on Facebook and uh we'll have the city post that as well. You can get applications by emailing me to come to the police department itself. We'll have application period open for the rest of this month which will give us time to do a quick background check on those that are interested. I'd love to have 20 members of our community and this can be anybody in the whole community um media included can attend if they'd like. I think it's it's pretty fun for everybody. Um I'm really excited. We've been looking forward to doing this and we're we're designing some really fun stuff and really educational things. Um, but we'll get that information out and the

applications are available here and I can email them out. Any questions on I just gave you the basics, but what's that? I No, I already told him he's Yeah, I already said he broke it to get out of it, but he could do it. He would just miss out on the fun. I think a lot of the might be a good actor though. Might be able to use it. Just play the victim in all the scenarios. Yeah, I mean we might actually be really good. All right. Any questions? Any comments? Sorry.

Great, Lex. But yeah, I think it's going to be a lot. I mean, there's a lot more detail is going into it than what I'm saying, but I just wanted to make the announcement that we're doing it. We'll get it posted on on social media and um yeah, spread the word. I can I can send any of that information to each of you, too, so that you can hand it out if you run into people that want to do it, but I'll send it out to everybody. That's a great idea. Okay. And if you're interested, let us know. Yeah. Two people from the council. If there's room for more, you'll let us know. Yeah. I want to give people opportunities, but you know, if there's extra room, the more the marrier. Thanks, Lick. Okay. Thank you.

All right. Our first item of business is our consent agenda this evening. Items 5.1 5.2. to approval of the minutes from February 24th, 2026 regular city council meeting and the approval of the bills against the city of Moab in the amount of 1 million78396,022. Could I have a motion to approve the consent agenda? I'll move to approve the consent agenda. Motion by Tonnie. Second. I'll second. Second by M. Uh second by Miles. Any discussion? No. All those in favor say I. I. I.

Any opposed? Motion passes 5-0. All right, Andrea, thank you for coming. Our first item of business is a consideration of a letter of support for Grant County's application. Um, it's a planning grant application to approve Sand Plans Road and develop a separated multi-use pathway. Appreciate you coming. Normally, this is something I would put on a consent agenda, but I felt like it'd be good for you to get us give us an update on where we're at and um and vote on your letter. Sure. Happy to answer questions. I um am looking for a letter of support. I've already gotten a letter of support from uh the commission and uh the BLM, of course, uh the governor's office of economic development, um emergency uh management director and Grand County EMS and uh motorized trail committee and then Sand Flats recreation committee. And um so this project is uh we call it SECA sandflats economic and community access project. It's a comprehensive planning and design project focused on improving safety, mobility, emergency access and multimodal connectivity along the Slatz Road corridor and into the Slats recreation area. The proposed planning effort will evaluate transportation conditions along approximately nine miles of the Sandflats Road extending from the Sand Flats Road Mil Creek Road junction to the Porcupine Rim trail head. And so this is part of the uh 2022 Grand County and Mob City Unified Transportation Master Plan. And that uh plan identified the Samplat Road as one of the 10 prioritized roadway projects. And the purpose of the pro of the plan was to identify, plan for, and prioritize near, mid, and long-term transportation projects, which include street connections, roadway improvements, new pathways that will enhance connectivity, multimodal transportation and safety. In addition,

it identified the need for constructed pedestrian and bicycle facilities to connect Sandflats to downtown Moab, and a shared use path from the Samplat's entrance to access Porcupine Rim. And uh when the roadway was originally constructed, it was set up for approximately a 100 vehicle trips per day. Uh we are now seeing an average of 400 vehicle trips today. And in peak season, we are seeing 800 to,200 vehicle uh trips per day. And so this is three to five times what the federal highway uh commission recommends for a gravel road capacity. And so um I'm coming to you today for for your support. Uh this was supported before as part of the unified master plan between the city and the county. So I'm hoping I can get a letter from you folks as well.

Questions, comments for Andrea?

I' I'd comment on this. Um I'm very much in support of this and this is something as Andrea knows that we've we've uh has come across the the trail mix uh committee many times in the past and I you know in addition to just uh you know a desperate need for for safety improvements for uh bicycle access into sand flats um to me the the the most uh sort of powerful argument is uh the impact that that we've all learned that that dust has on our snowpack and and the Sand Plats road is if you've been up there during the season and when it's really heavy in traffic uh you know it's it it it reminds me a little bit of a Mad Max movie. I mean that the the dust impact is is just so significant and uh you know how adjacent it is to our lasals and to our our dwindling snowpack is just uh for me such a compelling reason to support this. So I'm really glad that we're we're talking about this today. I I agree and I'm glad that it seems like this has been an ongoing thing for a few years, you know, and stuff. And I'm hoping that if it is paid, you know, that you guys will be able to pave the washboards in, you know, so

I'm actually I'm glad opportunity have paid. So, thank you for spearheading this for so many years.

Yeah. And and just for background for people that maybe aren't aware, uh we tried in 2023, we almost got a you know a capital grant to do the project. 2024 we we didn't rate as well. They had changed things and then they changed it again this time. So what we put in for is a planning and design grant because we're like okay this will be much less money and if we can get this then we can be ready for a build grant in the future or a flap grant in the future which is actually a better match. So, we're just stepping back and trying it this way instead of going for the capital project. We think that this is a better option. Uh the commission and the planning and zoning and and the engineer at the county and and the road department as well.

You've been working on this for a long time. Yeah. Um I'd like to make a motion to approve the letter of support for Grant Countyy's application to improve Slass Road and develop a separated multi-use pathway. Motion by Jason. Second. Second by Colin. Any further discussion? Jason, no. Colin. Anybody else? All those in favor say I. I. I. Any opposed? Motion passes. 50. Thank you. Thanks, Andrea, for coming. Really appreciate the update. And here is your All right. Through the magic of television, you knew it would pass.

All righty. Um, next up, we have item 6.2, to consideration of a contract award to Civil Science in the amount of $144,600 for the Center Street Ballpark Redesign Project. Please don't pay attention to what was in your packet. Those are just ideas. We'll have a full um community engagement. That's what this whole process really is about. So, um I think Patrick's on Zoom. You guys, we've talked about this. It's in our capital plan. I don't know if you have any questions. I don't know if you want to add anything.

Um, I'll just say really quick, Patrick is here to answer questions, but I'll say it's under what was budgeted. Uh, the contract amounts 144,000. We're working with a firm that we're we're familiar with. The plans that Randy Day was talking about. We're we're just concepts that were put to them. Nothing's been adopted or anything like that. We definitely have planned a a robust uh public involvement process for this. And uh there are a few things in the contract that are fill in the blank that we need to fill in and we're asking for approval and uh authorization to move forward with the contract.

Yeah. Really have anything on it because I think we've been working through this for so many years. It's a great use of the wrap tax. Yeah. Yeah. Have a motion. I'll make a motion again. Um, I move to award the contract for the redesign of the Center Street Ballpark to civil science in the amount of $144,600 and authorize the mayor to sign the agreement. Second. I'll second. Second by Tony. Discussion. Jason. No. Tony. No. Anybody else? I just have one question for record for the public. The last time we considered this, it was for perimeter. Um, I'm wondering if you can explain this the shift to civil science.

Sure. uh never actually got to council with Perimeter, but yes, we did uh work with Perimeter for a little while until it was discovered that uh they they actually weren't uh responsive in the RFP. The response required a few things that uh that they did not provide. So, um it was we couldn't move forward with them legally. It was it needed to go to the second bidder and they were responsive and that's that's what we're doing now. Thanks. Any other questions, comments? All those in favor say I. I. I.

Any opposed? Motion passes 5. All right. Next up, 6.3. Consideration of a request from Amasa apartment phase one for impact fee waiverss under the afford affordable housing partnership policy and impact fee assistance program. Michael. Yes, ma'am. This one myself.

Okay. Um, so yeah, I'll just take this. This this is uh based on the policy that we worked together to create and it was just adopted. Um, the uh policy outlines a process for an application to be uh submitted and then presented to the city council after the city manager reviews and makes a recommendation. My recommendation is that we approve uh this application for the fee waiver for the amount that is in the document which I will I will say is $43,750 um and award that to AMASA. They do meet all of the criteria that was established. Um they're providing low-income housing for the community which is the reason why this was uh prepared. and uh we look forward to working with them going forward. This uh is just for the fee waiver. Has nothing to do with development agreements or anything else like that. This is just the fee waiver and I'm recommending approval.

This is for phase one. Phase one. Yes. They they could potentially if the program continues apply for future phases as well if they qualify.

Comments, questions? So, I do and the well, I'm going to say the same thing for the next item. Um, I have watched the city and the county. I I think that the way code is written is always at the end of the day the most important thing, not what the intention was. Um, and the way that I read this policy is that, um, the impact fee waiver is applied on a per unit basis. Um, and it's not clear to me how averaging is determined or when it's applied. Um, there's no specificity in there. So I would like to well and so I'm going to propose for both uh an alternative calculation which is on a per unit basis which is how I read the ordinance um without um applicability of averaging. Um and so I would when we're ready I would make a a motion for a different amount. um it's the difference is $625, but the way that I calculate this um rather than applying an average AMI across the board um and applying proper weight to units below 30% AMI and then units in the 30 to 59% AMI category, um my calculation comes out to $44,375. Um and I believe the applicant I'm assuming once again that they're on Zoom. Um hard to know but um that I believe that is how they calculated it as well. Um so that would be my proposal. I believe that um the first time we implement this

is going to set precedent for how we implement it for every project moving forward. And so that is my recommendation for how this should be applied and how I'm interpreting it. So what was the amount?

Uh $44,375. And the way that comes out is for the five units that are below 30% AMI, um they receive a maximum waiver of $5,000. And for the 45 units um that are in the 30 to 59% AMI category, they'd be the next tier down. So rather than getting the full at 45,000, it would be 39,375. So adding those two together. So, just a comment. Um, the uh the intent and I I think that's why you brought up the intent was that it would be based on averaging. That's the way it was presented to the council. I think it's up to you to decide whether or not the the language supports the way that I've presented it or or the way that uh Caitlyn has has presented it. It's it's something I think that could be resolved going forward with a with an amendment. I have some ideas about how to further incentivize people who are closer because 30 to 60 range. Both applicants are in that range, but you got one applicant that's down the lower end, one applicant that's up on the higher end. And I think, you know, if we had all the time in the world, we might have thought of this. But that's something that we could look at in the future as as um providing a little more incentive on the lower end, whether it's per unit or or by uh average. But I do think that that would be more beneficial uh going forward doing it that way. I know that it's only $625 for this applicant, but it changes other applicants drastically in the other direction. And I think um you know, my intent in writing this and presenting it to you was was always

averaging. Um again, it's up to you to to interpret the code on how it's written. And I think the section that is being referred to is six uh 6C number one. Go ahead, Jason. I cut you off. It's the leg, isn't it? It is.

Uh I Michael, I appreciate that explanation. I and I I do have a different interpretation than than Caitlyn. I you know, there are I think two references to the average in in the the wording. Um and I think that uh you know I think this is a uh this this policy is a work in progress and I do look forward to amending it and I I think that you know even as as now in the current state of things we're seeing a sort of an evolution of of the needs of the community in terms of housing and so I you know I do hope to uh you know to keep this sort of malleable so that we can uh keep addressing the the newer needs or the the evolution of the community's needs. Um, I also want to say that that to me and looking back at the uh, you know, the the workforce assured housing ordinance, um, that that really is is the impetus for this. Um, I you know, I think that these are very consistent with with the intent, you know, whereas, you know, most of the money in that in our in our Wahoo fund in our housing fund did come from the fi of construction of of large hotel projects. And I think both of these projects really uh sort of embody that that that demographic that uh you know didn't get that that that workforce that that hospitality workforce that didn't get housing you know uh with these new big constructions of of hotels and rather we got a fee in lie of that housing. Um, and so I think both of these these projects do a great job of of, you know, sort of casting that that safety net that that is, you know, something that was was the true intent of the the uh workforce assured housing ordinance. So, I I look forward to uh you know, I think I'll be voting uh to approve both of these. And I uh I think that these these both these projects are are one money well spent and and just the scale of these projects are going to have a massively positive impact on our community.

Jason, um said it very well. Yeah.

Any comments from you? Um, yeah, I I tend to agree with Colin and with Chase, but um I I think it's money well invested. It's I I like your term keeping it malleable, keeping it um keeping it living and adjusting it as we need to. Nothing nothing is a silver. Nothing is perfect. So motion I uh I can make a motion. I move to approve the impact fee waiver request submitted by Amasa Apartments with the condition that the applicant shall provide proof of recording of the required declaration of restrictive covenants prior to the issuance of any fee waivers or credits and authorize the city manager to execute the required waiver contract.

Motion by Colin. We have a second. A second. Second by Tony. any further discussion?

I do um I'll I'll explain myself on this. That said, I I do stand by everything I said. I will be supporting this because I support the intent. I still strongly disagree with the interpretation and do think that language needs to be revisited. Um because I think it's important for us to be prioritizing the most subsidy to the units that need it most. Um need that most most of that gap. Um and so I I will um ultimately be supporting this. However, I will emphasize my disagreement with the final amount um but I'm willing to accept it. We will be reviewing this policy, I'm sure, in short order. And at those times, Kaitlin, I think it'd be great if we could make those clarifications. All right. Motion by Colin, second by Tonnie. Any other discussion? All those in favor say I.

I. Any opposed? Motion passes 4. Right. Next up, item 6.4. same thing, different uh developer. And this is a request from the collaborative 1581 phase 1 LLC for impact fee waiverss under the affordable housing partnership policy and impact fee assistance program. And Caitlyn, I think, you know, we know where you stand on this. If you feel like you need to say the same thing for this one and what the differences in the calculations would be, I think that would be appropriate.

Absolutely. um excuse me uh yeah so because this one is a much more uh significant change um especially given the number of units so the way that I have calculated this rather than the agenda summary recommendation of 126,000 um I would recommend and I have calculated $109,625 the way that breaks out for 140 units units 144 units is 30 to 59% AMI 15 units um rather than a max waiver 15,000 calculated waiver is $13,125. Um next tier down 60 to 79% that's 127 units in that range. Um and this is the biggest change um the biggest change in calculation but um instead of 127,000 I've calculated n 95,250 uh given the scale and then finally 80 to 120% there to 80% AMI units rather than 2 calculated waiver would be 1,250. Um, and again, we'll just emphasize, you know, same points. Um, but that that would be um and the difference between those two is $16,375. And I think it's important I feel it's important for me to raise these concerns between these two. Um, because $16,000 is down payment assistance. That's as we're talking about single family or ADUs. that's the kind of level of investment that we need to be considering for

people who need that. I think those are going to be very different tools. Um, and we've had conversations about how this program is not going to be as applicable for single family and for ADUs. Um, but I I see that number as like that's that's a real difference in calculation. And so extrapolating out um over time that that will result in different amounts over time. And so the way that we're moving forward on this um I think is important because over time, especially with bigger projects, it makes a difference. So I'll leave it at that. Any other councils, members, comments, miles? So yeah, I so I wasn't able to speak or vote on the last one as I was recusing myself because of my company's involvement with AMASA. Um I also wasn't here for the decision to implement this program um and this policy and I do feel that while many other council members have have voiced this as money well spent, I don't see it that way. Um, frankly, I I see the Wahoo fund as something that we could really build a program that is more beneficial to our locals. Like right now, essentially, we're spending this money to adjust a developers bottom line so that we can theoretically be more uh enticing to develop in. And like this money will not make or break these projects. We don't want a project that was made or broken by $40,000 or $100,000. Um, but I know that, you know, in our recent uh housing task force meeting, one of the discussion points was how helpful a down payment assistance program could be. And to me, something

like that is exactly what Wahoo is for. And we are, you know, honestly, our infrastructure needs a lot of work. And so, we kind of need all of our pennies to work on it. And I am not in support of uh forgiving impact fees right now when we have a lot of work to do with exactly what those impact fees are meant to do which is work on our infrastructure. Any other comments, questions? One more thing. Sure.

Um I just I also want to thank Jake for coming down and your partner. Um yeah um thank you for coming. Thank you for listening and responding with an updated letter. I think that um this project is a really big deal. 4% there's a world of difference between 4% 9% litech projects. Um we never thought it could be done and so this is a major milestone for housing. Um so I want for you to know my comments are about policy implementation. Um I appreciate you guys showing up and for everything that you're doing to build in Moab. Um and so I just I want to be clear about that too. So thanks Michael.

Yeah, I just wanted to give a recommendation. This is a sec a different application. There's 144 units for the last one was 50. They have met all the criteria. Um they have also already recorded the deed that is required that uh restricts these for 50 years. And I'm recommending approval of the $126,000 based on the interpretation that you used in the last uh approval.

I agree. I don't think it makes sense to change the policy on this. You know, at this time when we created this policy and these guys have met the stipulations that we asked them to do and stuff. Um yeah, I was, you know, you had some great comments and um you know, and stuff that, um, you know, when we when we created this policy, it was, you know, we we created the guidelines that we that we thought would work, you know, stuff like that. So, I I appreciate your comments there. They're good comments and stuff. Um um yeah, anyone I'd like to go ahead and make a motion to to approve the impact v waiver request submitted by the cooperative 1581 phase 1 LLC based on staff's findings of compliance with the affordable housing partnership policy and authorize the city manager to execute required waiver contract.

Motion by Jason. I'll second. Second by Todd. Any further discussion, Jason? Tonnie,

um just to say that, um I'll say this again that this isn't this isn't going to be perfect. Nothing is going to be perfect. Um it does it it makes us put our money where our mouth has been for over 10 years. And um if we move the goalposts on this development, we're not trustworthy. Um, and I don't think the Wahoo was ever intended to be a down payment assistance program. It was meant to benefit the larger community. It wasn't just for, you know, certain people. So that's that's why I'm going to continue to support this and I hope that we can um recraft or rewrite this policy so it's more palatable to other people. Anybody else? All those in favor say I.

I. All those opposed? Nay. Going to do a roll call. Miles nay. Caitlyn. Hi, Colin. Hi, Connie. Hi, Jason. Hi. Motion passes 4 to one with Miles in the opposition. Thank you guys. Good comments. Um, we'll get the policy start working on that coming up with the rest of them. So, we have a lot of policies. But anyway, thank you guys for coming um from the cooperative

and thanks for the uh you know you guys were kind of instrumental in us moving this forward. So thanks appreciate you guys come up with policy. Great. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. All right, that's it for our general business and we move on to city manager updates.

So, I'm going to do a quick update today. Um, I did go to the uh Glen Canyon National Recreation Area update today on water levels. Um, it's grim, you know, it doesn't look gray, but they do have several projects that they are working on. I think some of these are required because of the lower lake levels, but I did uh snap a picture on the presentation really quick. Um the and the way that they put it, these these are the priorities and and how they're listed. Um first one being first priority height north river ramp access $27 million. Um Analopee Point public lake access ramp $81 million. Bullfrog Stanton Creek Lake access ramp $74 million. Rainbow Bridge north um access national monument access $10 million and Midlake fueling $14 million. I don't think they have the money for all of those, but those are the projects that they they had mentioned. I do think there are some projects that they they just have to implement as part of maintenance because of the lower lake levels. They have to change some of the ramps, things like that. Um, they're not at a point right now where they're they're going to stop making electricity, but it's not

looking good. It's not looking good. The uh the people who ran the meeting today basically said, "We always knew this could happen. We never knew it would happen so quickly." So, they're uh they're getting dangerously close to a dangerous situation. So, um, so Lake, what is that? 53 35 to 35 35 43 I think is like 32 or it is. You're right. Is down in the It's low. Yeah, it's like 40 feet. I think I was going to say the bottom power bowl. It's within like 90 feet of where it is right now or less.

Yeah. So, what if I get a copy of the presentation, I'll forward it to everybody with the graphs and everything. I don't have those here with me, but um yeah. So, 3530 and I think it's 3490 where they can't use the third one. So, they're on 40 away.

There's Yeah, and there's a couple of thresholds. So, anyways, they're they're not things are not looking good, but I just want to let you know I did attend that as well as a couple other staff members. We've been working a lot on budget. There's a lot going on. Um, we've got uh se couple departments that have several departments that have been reviewed already uh with our team, four departments, and we've got several departments left to go. So, we're looking forward to uh going through the rest of those. As you know, and you're going to hear a lot, we are trying to clean things up as well, trying to get uniformity. We're trying to get establish some processes and policies internally that will help uh these uh pro these budget processes go smoother and provide that really important uniformity going forward. Um because we want to be able to look at a line item and understand what possibly could come out of there and um and not have to make changes moving things around a lot. So if you look at professional and technical, we want to make sure that it's professional and technical that's coming out of there, not not other things. So, uh, everybody's been really great with that. They've been very receptive and and everyone's working really well together. I don't have anything else to update you on at this point except to say that, uh, if you have any questions on budget, I'm always available. Love to chat. I know you're going to be talking with the mayor soon. Um, if you have any questions and you'd like me to to uh to address anything during those meetings, let me know and I'll be happy to.

Thank you. All right, council reports. We'll start with you, Colin. It's a short one. Uh,

that's why we're starting with you. I attended a trail mix meeting today and uh we talked a lot about uh you know uh the city among other organizations sponsored uh Spring Bruce that's coming up in about a month and so there are a lot of I think there about 12 pretty amazing projects. Um expecting about 125 volunteers. Uh there's this year is a a special one because they're uh Friday night we're going to be showing a film called the uh best day ever which will be about um adaptive access to to a lot of outdoor recreation particularly mountain biking and uh you know the the folks from the uh Kelly Brush Foundation which is a a very very active um and successful foundation in uh promoting access for for people needing adaptive uh access um will be down uh with for the showing and you know it's just a great weekend. So I'll I'll send out to all the rest of the council and other staff a little more information about that. But be great to see all of you there.

Thanks. Is that it? That's it for me.

Tony, mine's pretty short, too. And I didn't break my leg. I attended a meeting with some of the board members of Canyon Mass Healthcare Special Service District. It was to discuss some HR issues and um hopefully get that program in place and I attended the audit committee um meeting and we were told that we had a good clean audit. We had a few um I'm not even going to say they were problems. we just had to rectify a few little issues and um it's it's um I think it's it's testament to Michael's dedication and the and other staff's dedication that um our our budgets are getting cleaner and cleaner and and we're learning and we're not, you know, we're not reverting to old habits. So, thank you.

Thank you. And haven't you now been taken over the responsibility for the bills? Oh, I I meant it. Thank you. It's Yeah, that's going to carry forward because right is Look at this. I can't Yeah. It's actually kind of fun. You're I question that, Tony, but uh I'll I'll fill in again for you if you need me to. I'll be back. I'm back next time. But Tony, thank you so so much. Yeah,

okay. Um, let's see. So, um, on 2:25, just after our last council meeting, I had two different meetings. So, I attended uh the Hassu. Um, it's good to know those cottages are full. They finally rented all those out successfully. Um, which they're stoked on. Um there were a couple odds and ends brought up. They uh basically bought those cottages or restructured their loan. Um Mike uh McCertie was there and he brought up that they have done an impact fee um increase at the county level. Um and so that's something that if you're building out there, you'd keep an eye out for. Um there's six more self-help uh homes approved through um through hassu that are going to get going forward and there's been some odds and ends going on at Cinema Court uh Skyline in the Virginia. um they have had a couple vacancies and it is tricky to fill vacancies in these AMI restricted housings because uh a lot of times people are able to apply but at like after a certain period of tenency their income changes and then they have to move out or change their uh situation. Um and then they had some uh updates that they were doing at the Virginia that was a fairly old development so they had to do some pest control and some other updates to some of the units. um city housing task force. I'm sure Caitlyn uh will talk about it as well, but we are planning a presentation for the rest of you guys um which we're really excited about talking about housing priorities in the community and really trying to develop that housing toolbox with Corey. Um, uh, one of the main things that I pulled away from that in a big way is, uh, the city figuring out how we're going to do deed deed restriction management because theoretically we have ADUs which are all AE and they're online. We have people living in them, but we are now starting to see these AE apartment buildings and

otherwise start to come online and we need a way of monitoring and managing those deed restrictions and ensuring that they are doing what they need to fill them. Um, I've heard of some issues where these units aren't being fold filled and they're being asked to be removed from the AEH restriction. Um, but there is some question in regards to how they are trying to fill the units and whether or not that is effective. So, I think all of that just needs policy built around it and then it needs people to manage it. Um, and then of course, Red Rock Flats is coming right up on like being ready to move people in. That's pretty exciting. Um, and then, uh, my final meeting on March 2nd was the Utah Renewable Communities. Uh, so that made it through, uh, the public service commission, which is really exciting. Um, there will be some training that I'm assuming some of city staff will be at, um, in regards to how to talk to people about what's going on, but essentially, we are working our way towards having a more renewable power grid. Um the way they quoted it, it will likely be a $2 to4 increase on anyone who is part of the plan uh on your monthly power bill. Two to four bucks. Um but there will also be two opt out notices going out from Rocky Mountain Power. So if you do want to opt out of this program, you will have the opportunity to do so. Otherwise, that $2 to4 dollars a month is going towards inc including uh more renewables in our power grid and making us a little bit more sustainable, which is exciting.

That's it. And my understanding is there's going to be an ordinance coming before the council here in May. Yeah. So, more on this to come as well. Thank you, Miles. Who else? You, Jason. Oh, just go ahead and say it. long talker.

Um, so I had a last two weeks been very busy. Um, last week I had the opportunity to go out to Washington DC um with the with I was out there with actually another organization, the Guides and Outfitters um of America were out there working on a bunch of issues that they have coming up. Um, one of those issues was things like the Northwash boat ramp, which is has an economic impact upon our area and trying to get some things moved along with that. Um, as well as some other things that are doing. While I was there, um, the mayor was there and then I was and we were able to I was able to do kind of do double um, appointments, you know, and stuff. And, um, and you know, it was funny. They're like, "Weren't you just here like a half hour ago?" I was like, "Yeah, I put my city hat on, you stuff. Um, but we were able to meet with like all of our um all of our Utah de delegation which was um which was great and we um I think it's you know we were talking a lot about the flood mitigation and um and the bridge that we need on 300 South and I think it's it takes a little bit of time to kind of get the wheels moving on that and stuff and I I really felt like this time um with like um like Congressman Kennedy um and um who will not be our congressman um after next year. Um um but we're able to speak with him, you know, about, you know, why we need this bridge and um that we're trying to control flood waters coming off federal lands, you know, and how this this bridge is actually probably quite a bit cheaper than um than taking care of these flood waters up higher, you know, stuff that this is actually, you know, a cheaper version. And I think they a lot of those guys really caught on to it this time, you know. I think a lot of them were like, "Oh, yeah, yeah, I get that and I see that and stuff. And so I think with um like Senator Lee's office um and Senator Curtis's office and then like we're able to meet

with um Congresswoman Malloy and um and Owen Owens Owen's office, you know, we just had some great meetings and Blake Moore, you know, um great meetings with with all these guys and I think they all kind of got it and they were very supportive of us what we're trying to do and trying to to get this pushed through with appropriations and stuff. So, we'll see what's going on. Um, you know, we also did talk to him about um, you know, we were there, you know, a week after Arch's time to entry had been had been taken off and so that was fresh on everybody's mind. They they asked us about it and, you know, and I think we um really kind of brought the point that, you know, time entry is gone. It is it is what it is. and that we needed um we needed congressional and federal support for to help us deal with what is next. you know, whatever the plan is to deal with with that park entry, we needed them to be able to pivot to work quickly and to come up with substantial um remedies, you know, to deal with um traffic backed up in the park and and to help, you know, with businesses who have it, you know, because we could have the opposite thing happening in with our economy, you know, and and they were very receptive of that. And it it almost seemed like that they all knew, yeah, we know that we need to implement other things and we need to do it very quickly. So I I I felt fairly positive about that, you know, and I felt like that that they understood the urgency um that, you know, and how critical Arches is to um to our economy here and what happens there. Um we also talked to them about um Amtra. Um the mayor was very good. stole your thunder on that, but very good about um you know, just pushing that we needed to keep that budget, you know, going and we were getting close and it was amazing how many of them said, "Thank you for keeping to push this going. It's good to

see you guys want this to end," you know, which um was was great. Um other than that, um the EAS contracts for the essential air service for coming in are in. So, we we had um four there was four airlines that bid on the contract. They've all put in proposals and now in the process of going through those proposals and um and trying to figure out which one will best support the community and is best for the community. Um the airport board will be going through over those next week um and putting a recommendation to um to the county commission know who who they think is best and the county commission will be doing that as well. Um, I think, you know, we talked about before like this, um, it's it's a big deal. You know, we got some great contracts and some great things coming up and I I can hopefully share those contracts with you guys in the next couple days and you guys can look over them. It's good it's a good read. Um, the travel council met today. Um, part of that meeting was to um approve some some grant funding for advertising for some events coming to town. Um the Grand County Commission allocated $250,000 towards helping with marketing grants for events that were coming. Um they're going to be doing it in two different stages. Today we um I think we went over about about 14 um events that were coming and um and helped give them some grant funding for that which which came up to about um I think it came up to about $65,000 in this in this um in this cycle. And there'll be another cycle in June, you know, for for events and stuff. So, there's a lot of great events that are coming. That's um Oh, yeah.

Thanks, Jason. Um, don't need to repeat a lot of what Jason said. That's me. Didn't I do you already this year? Oh, sorry. I meant to do him with I don't know what it is, Kaitlyn. I'm sorry. It's okay. I guess Miles, you know, Miles did all the housing stuff, so I think I kind of got confused. I'm sorry, Kate. Two of us now. No, it's okay. I I'll go quick. Um,

yeah, we'll reiterate um city housing subcommittee and vocalized earlier, uh, recommendations um for priorities for the city. Excited to talk about that moving forward. Um so the 25th on March 2nd I attended LPC final LPC session ended on Friday. Um we're going to have I was going to mention this at our next meeting we'll get we have a recap on Thursday and then at the next meeting we'll do a recap on everything that's going to impact Moab.

Great. Yeah, because I was following some stuff, but you know there's Anyway, so session is over. We'll talk about that next time. Um I'll be at that session recap. Yeah. Um and then on the third I attended the courthouse open house um which was hosted by the Utah Judiciary um and the sheriff's department. It was super interesting. They had all four um of our judges for district um

yeah seventh district court um justice court justice court uh juvenile court and district district or the drug truck drug program. No, maybe I don't. You were there. Clearly I

um No, but I I I think it's our third branch of government that I've you know, it's intimidating for and a lot of people don't ever have a real reason to learn how the courts work. But, um yeah, really impressed with um the way all of the judges responded to questions, particularly some political. I think that um they make it very easy now to participate in court online and to be able to review judges and so I think even just looking up the reviews of our judges here I think we've got a great team um in our court system. So, they want to continue to do more open houses and events trying to get people more educated on how that system works, which I think is amazing because obviously my PE brain only retained a little bit of it even from that. Um, and then on the 5th I attended a housing task force meeting. Um the big thing that we talked about is this upcoming presentation to city and county about accomplishments and kind of goals moving forward, how the task force can better work with city and county to implement their respective housing goals. So that will come uh soon. Um, there's also a committee between the task force and local homeless council that is doing a pretty big revamp of mobousing.com to make that a little more accessible, update a bunch of information. Um, CR is having their next open house in San Juan County on Lydia Court on March 26 for four homes. Um, and I think those are those are my highlights.

Thank you. Yeah. Next time you can go first. That's okay.

Okay. So, um, Jason talked a lot about DC. I I will have to say uh we both were a little uncomfortable going to Washington since there was a war in the that occurred the Friday before we left. Um but it wasn't at first uh you know there's a lot more security up on the hill and that was a little intimidating but um it was good to get back there meet with our delegation and others. We did talk about the flooding and just so to be clear the project for the bridge is approximately 10 to 12 million. We're probably not going to get that from the federal government, but we potentially could get, you know, half or, you know, five million or something like that, but it's good to get in there. It's, you know, it's our second year ask, so we're feeling pretty confident. We probably won't know anything until after the election. You know, right now is like the ramp up. Everybody's going in and saying we need this, we need that. Then it kind of mellows out. They work on the on the the budget and appropriations. So, we probably really won't hear anything until the end of the year. Uh, we did talk about um the umptra site. I'll get into that in a minute. But we also are going in for some transit funding um for a a planning grant for our transit service so we can hopefully identify ways that we can make our transit service more sustainable and looking at a regional transit service from San Juan County up to the Wasatch which is something we're working on with AOG also. So we did put in that fund. we that request you and Alexi are going to move forward on the language to get that request in. I think by Wednesday we need to they moved up all the deadlines

and that was the other thing. So everything's getting really rushed. So it was good that we went back there when we did. Um and you know it was interesting that the arches I mean most of our delegation brought up arches to us. They know our position. They know where we stand. And so even though you know our our statement was hopefully you've got something planned um um but all of that's going to cost money. We know that and um for you know we'll see where that all goes. We did also emphasize reinstating the timed entry was an option that they could consider because that's lowhanging fruit. It can be done really easily. It's not going to happen this year but I think we should push for it to happen next year. We'll see how it goes. I don't anticipate that everything's going to be smoothly run in the park this year during our busy season. Um was great. I mean I everybody is so excited about that project. It's um so close to being finished. Everybody's really glad that you know we we got it over the finish line. I had an opportunity to meet with the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California. Some of you guys may not know, but they were very instrumental in advocating for this project. And when we went to meet with them, they were they were just so excited to see us and that we're getting so close. And they've been behind the scenes pushing for this project. Also, they talk about it every meeting they have. They It's in their annual uh report. We've got this event coming up where the final million tons of tailings have been moved. They're already gone. you know, we had to postpone the event, but the um the water district is planning to come out on their private Gulf Stream jet to celebrate with us along with Congresswoman Grace Npalitaniano. Hopefully, she's going to be there. She was the Democrat from Southern California who also really was behind this project and she actually called me up and said, you know, what's going on with Moab, you know, and so she really wants to come. So, hopefully she'll be a

she retired from Congress last year, so we're hoping that she can be here because this is one of the few non bipartisan projects that we've seen which is truly bipartisan on both sides. We've never had any kind of controversy from the Republicans or the Democrats on the importance of getting this project um completed. So that doesn't happen anymore. You know, like uh Tim told us right now bipartisan and Congress is considered one Democrat and the rest Republicans. You know, to me that's not bipartisanship, but this project was. So, put the 9th on your calendar. It's going to be a big event. I believe our uh Tim Stewart and Ryan Levit are also going to be here the day before. I'm planning to have um have us all get together and then perhaps have a dinner um a big dinner. So, I'll keep you posted on that when they get here and the timing, but would love for you guys to to meet with them personally so you can get a sense of what they're doing for us. And lastly, so I've been to every museum and every thing that you could possibly do except the spy move museum because it's too expensive. It's not free.

Um but uh but this time Jason and I had a couple hours to spare in between meetings and we were having lunch and we look across the street and there was the post office, this big post office building and there's a museum in the post office. So, I'm like, "Hey, let's go to the post office museum." What, you know, I've never been there before. It was fascinating. I mean, there's, you know, you could get any kind of stamp. I wanted to get the ladies the Ruth Boehner stamp, but it was kind of expensive. Um, so I got you all the little magnet. I was going to get you something else. And Jason's like, "No, give them the magnet. They can put it on the refrigerator. Otherwise, they're going to throw that in a drawer and they'll never see it again." But it was a very interesting uh museum. If you're ever in Washington, I would I mean, it's fascinating to see how the postal service has evolved over the years and where we're going now, which is probably not even having a postal service anymore, but it was it was really interesting. We saw the old um trucks that they used to use and the dog on the stuffed dog. There was a dog that used to travel around the country with the post office guys. I mean, sorry you guys are looking at me like like, "Okay, Joe, I can be insured this meeting." But

keep going. It It was good. It was a great way to spend an hour and a half of time. Um, glad we did it. Um, anyway, enjoy your gift. I always bring you something when I come back from Washington. Thanks. And you guys look so excited. I'm excited. I can't wait to get home. But look on there. Okay. The one thing you will see amp on the far left. It's the inverted Jenny. You want to tell the story about the inverted? Did you watch that one? I did watch it. Yeah. So, the that airplane is supposed to be the other way. And the first upside down the first plate they did, they printed it upside down.

And then one guy in BC like went he was like the first person at the post office to buy a sheet of stamps. We bought them and it came out and it was upside down. And the postal service was like, "You got to give this that back." He's like, "Nope, I'm not giving this back to you." He like, "You have to." I guess they harassed him for like months. You gotta get this back. And then he said, "No." And then he ended up selling it. He ended up selling it and like moving out to the country, getting a farm. He ended up for $15,000, right? He bought his house. He lived on his retirement. Yeah. This one worth anything? That's the one. That's the inverted on here. Yeah, that one. Yeah, you could. Sure. They trade that in. Yeah. Yeah.

Anyway, it's kind of cool. It was kind of cool. So, um anyway, interesting stuff in Washington. A lot of interesting stuff. And that's it for me. So, with that, um ask for a motion to do we don't have a close. Oh, damn it. Do we have a close? We do. It'll be quick. All right. Sorry. Gosh. I guess I'm reminded you. All right. We have two discussions in close session. Um uh 9.1 strategy session to discuss the purchase exchange and lease of real property and 9.2 strategy session to discuss reasonably imminent or pending litigation. I have a motion go into close session to discuss

discuss purchase exchange or lease of real property and or reasonably imminent or pending litigation. Motion by Tonnie second by second.