City Council - Special Meeting

All right, ready to go. Thanks everybody for being here. I'm going to uh call this special meeting to order. It's a public hearing on the community development block grant CDBG and it's our first public hearing. Um, I just said that this is for the 2026 community development block grant CDBG grant. It is December 9th at 5:30 p.m. The purpose of this meeting, this public hearing is to provide citizens with information about the CDBG program and allow for discussion on possible applications for the 2026 funding cycle. We seek citizens views and suggestions regarding the possible projects utilizing these funds. The amount of CGB funds expected to be available for projects for the new year comes from the SERTA, Southeastern Utah Association of Governments. It's not called that anymore. Um the amount of money that they have available is $778,284. The type of activities that may be undertaken with CDBG funds include a lot of things and can be summarized as such. Construction of public works and facilities. Example is water, sewer lines, fire stations, park rehabilitation or the provisions of public services among other eligible activities. We would like to identify and discuss the community development needs of the Moab community and welcome views and suggestions regarding possible projects. I ask anybody with questions or comments or suggestions during the hearing to please identify yourself by name before you speak. Recorder will include your name in the minutes and we will like to

specifically respond to your questions suggested during the hearing. I invite anybody to come and speak and I think we'll start with you Savannah. I think we can start with uh the you folks. That's okay. The free help. Okay. So, you don't So, is there anything else you need to say? Oh, no. Sorry. Thank you for that. Um I have a handout of the full Could you come up here?

I have a handout of the full list of eligible activities. So, if anybody wants a copy of this, it's everything that the mayor said, but this is the in detail list if that's helpful. So, I'll leave that here. Um but no, people are okay to start. All right. So, I believe the Moab free clinic is here with a couple of project ideas. So, if you want to go ahead and come up and I'm gonna be projecting for them. Okay, great. Thank you. Hello, I'm Kate Jagla. I'm the director of the Moab Free Health Clinic and I'm here with David Olson

David Olsson project. Yeah, you're available. Man,

the last time we presented, you asked at the end what you could do for the Moab Free Health Clinic. Well, here is exactly that. Um, so every day, just as a reminder, hundreds of Grand County residents, City of Moab residents face barriers to addressing essential health care services. Um, we serve more than 12% of Grandounty's population. We're on track to do um 3,400 appointments this year. You can see on this um illustration here our community impact over the last decade. Um you scroll down a little um you can see from 2015 to what's projected for the end of this year. We've significantly increased our services and are seeing a lot more individuals from the community and also providing them a lot more appointments and services. Um I'm going to let David take over in terms of introducing our project.

Okay. Um one thing I wanted to mention when I started working for the city in 1990, one of the first thing I was given was a binder this thick with CDBG rules and said apply for a CDBG grant. And so I didn't realize I'd be handing back a binder that thick after the project's over with. So it's kind of interesting. And I've done over 20 of them for the city when I worked for the city just almost yearly block grant. And at first I thought they're really hard but I started getting used to it. So just want to let you know that I've been involved with that. Um there's a slide on a floor plan and um what uh we wrote a letter about providers and providers do a lot of work at the city for free and they have to stay at hotels and motel and things and it gets really hard to coordinate those things. Um um Kate wrote down um like just the uh vision clinic could take up to

192 nights of accommodations for one three-day vision clinic. And at these vision clinics, we're seeing hundreds of patients at them. Um next year we're projected to see 575 um have 575 appointments alone from our vision program. And that equates to for just one 3-day vision clinic anywhere between 28 and $38,000 in hotel rooms. So that's just a little bit um to show you the perspective of what we're looking at. And that's probably on the low end. I was projecting hotel rooms at $1500 to $200 a night. Um, our primary request is a $350,000 to place a three-unit modular unit on our property in order to house these volunteers. They include physicians, dermatologists, dentists, vision specialists, mental health professionals, medical residents and students, um, America vistas. Um, so this investment would provide on-site lodging um for years to come and limiting thousands upon thousands of dollars in annual hotel costs while also enabling us to continue offering more services to the community. Um, especially um specialty services, accessible lodging is really the limiting factor in terms of our growth. uh the UN for example, University of Utah has expressed that they want to bring medical residents down here to have extended stays which also connects into workforce development also bringing these people in to see what it's like in rural health care and eventually hopefully getting them to stay here and practice and maybe we'll get some more specialists in the long run. Um, we are requesting modular units because of Davis Bacon wages and federal rules and stuff that would make it a

slick project a lot easier um when you're bringing in um three unit triplex and dropping it on a foundation. So the foundation and some of the other costs that are connected to it, those are Davis Bacon, but the the unit itself would be without all those rules. It would be slick. Any questions for Kate or David? Okay. Thank you. And do you have anything else you want to add? The second part was the parking lotion. I I didn't know you had more

six $60,000. Now, this is an if you uh could have um I don't know you we are in competition with four other counties or three other counties besides ourselves and sometimes if you can if people are not applying we could do two projects and one is to overlay the the parking lot.

Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Savannah and Patrick set up here. One moment here. I'm going to get my screen shared for the presentation. Okay, that did it. Okay, okay, thanks for your patience there. Yeah. Um, so I'm Patrick Trim. I'm the parks wreck and trails director. I'm joined by Barry Ellison, city building official. Um and our and our proposed project uh would would fall under that parks rehabilitation track as the mayor outlined in her introduction um through the CDBG. Um and that is a Swany park accessibility improvements. So the purpose of this project is to support essential accessibility at Swany. Um, you know, since we constructed the playground, usage has only gone up at Swany Park. Um, you know, we sort of view that as our flagship park internally. And I think that's sort of u, you know, public the public and citywide. It's viewed that way as well. Um we've got some other upgrades uh that along with the playground that we view as necessary to sort of um one to to provide ADA accessibility but also um comfortability and convenience for for all visitors. So

the funding would support a restroom remodel um restroom access via via um a continuation of that sidewalk connectivity effort that began with the playground. Um, in addition to to lighting, bike parking, and some other improvements there, I touched a little bit on um, Swany Park being sort of one of our most utilized um, facilities. U, and again with the building of the playground that's only increased. Um, there we are not currently in compliance. Um we would like to provide access uh to just in in increase that enjoyability um provide some modernization to the facility and you know another consideration is looking at extending lifetime MRACH facilities and what that means is currently what we're seeing with some of the restrooms and disrepair and our you know our crew is doing their best to keep those relevant um is that people are using the MRE restrooms and water fountains and things um and that increases, you know, that kind of taxes the infrastructure there and so that would alleviate some of that. Um so some of the um specifics on the restroom upgrades looking at ADA compliant stalls, fixtures, doors, clearances and then just um you know providing for a more welcoming environment as those facilities age. You know our users are not um excited to use those type of facilities. um it's not accessible for them. Um mentioned some of these other components that we would be looking at um with ADA, you know, potential water fountains, bottle filling, um and then some of bike parking um repairs to existing sidewalk structures. Um and then ADA access. So Swany Park,

we've got the pavilion, we've got the skate park. These are sort of operating as islands right now for as far as ADA accessibility. Um we have tied the park into the um egress parking on the west end, but we would like to continue that effort in connecting the pavilion, restrooms, bike park and other features of that park as well as some possible um perimeter access from the um on the south end pavilions as well for the parking. So lots of considerations there. Um Barry was going to touch a little bit on um some of the the budgeting numbers that we put together initially and then you know maybe answer any more technical ADA questions. So

sounds good. Thank you.

Um so we're we're asking for $200 to $250,000. This will cover repairs and upgrades to the restrooms. Uh some of the plumbing fixtures um are missing. some of them that were replaced but they're not ADA compliant. Uh pavement like Patrick mentioned would be to conduct an accessible route from the different locations and get from the handicap parking to the playground but now you can't get to the bathrooms or or the bike park. So we're going to conduct some sidewalks that way so people can get around. Um, some of the pavilions on the south end that people rent out, they're not accessible. Um, and and same with the the water fountain. You have the water fountain on site, but if you're in a walker, you can't get to it. Um, so those are the kinds of things we're looking at. Uh, the biggest expense will probably be the concrete to fix the areas, the access at the pavilions, plus the sidewalks internal. Any any questions on any of that?

Um,

a couple of questions. One, these are couple of amazing projects. Um, you know, this is very much needed at Swany Park and I imagine the uh next year or the following year, the demand of the free health clinic is going to grow exponentially with things happening nationally. Um my questions are you know do we do do we have experience when when they're looking at these these projects are they looking at um you know the them geographically? Um have have multiple uh awards come to the same community? You know it looks like the with these projects we're tied up most of the you know 700 plus thousand dollars that's available in these grants. What do we have experience with that? We do, but I think tonight what we're actually talking about are the projects themselves, not the process. And I think Savannah can kind of update us on where we go from here.

Okay, that makes sense. So then my next question is just, you know, we've had multiple discussions about um a skate park and other amenities at Swanie and and what we've been told is that you know what what's really needed and and I agree with this is a comprehensive plan for that park for you know directing the the future development of the park. How does that that play into this if we're looking at, you know, re putting money into redesigning bathrooms and and concrete sidewalks, different places?

I think the discussion we've had around especially the restrooms, which was the key component of this, is that, you know, with the the plumbing being where it is, you know, any sort of um plan or comprehensive study of the park would likely leave the bathrooms where they're at. Um, and so I think that was a key component is the restrooms. And then um most of what we're looking at um wouldn't necessarily change the potential future projects over there. Um it would be pretty minimal infrastructure. It would be primarily improvements to existing infrastructure. Um but you know as we look at paths and and different potential walkways, we would consider any any sort of future growth of that park that process. Yeah. So Colin, we did I don't know if you were on the council when we approved I think you were when we approved the parks master plan

and one of the things that the council at that time wanted to um emphasize was ADA accessibility. Absolutely. As kind of our priority you know to you know where there's funding available that was something that I believe we all agreed needed to come first. Absolutely. Okay. if I might with just regards to the bathroom. We have the bathroom, but if you're handicapped, you can't get to it.

Yeah, that's kind of what this is just trying to solve is that problem. Thank you. So from my understanding is like CDBG grants are like I think like a certain percentage like the majority percentage of funds need to be used towards services or things that target like low to moderate income like populations. Is that correct? Yeah, they they do. I mean, that's what they're set up for is to address um facilities and structures that that do affect moderate to low-income households. ADA improvements are automatic qualifiers.

Okay. Okay. Yeah. I was just wondering like how you would be able to kind of like project what percentage of people benefiting from these things would and I and I think um what it is is the community has to qualify under certain criteria to in order to even qualify to apply and so I think that's you know if we and we do we fit into that um definition. So I think that's how you calculate the underserved is based on our qualification not how many people are going to be served by the project. It's not project based, it's community. Yes, there is a a project aspect, but yeah, we do qualify. That's why we're we're told we can apply. So,

any other questions? The only question I have is the pet bowl when dogs aren't allowed in the park. I mean, it comes with the fountain. So, it's actually for little kids. Or if we wanted to get down and we could crawl totally hygiene hygienic. Yeah, it's it's it's the lowcost splash pad that we're all about. That's right.

But there are people that go to the park with their dogs and their dogs aren't I mean this summer I saw a lot of people with their dogs and rather than having them play in the park, they play in the street so they still get thirsty. There certain animals. We won't deny any dog a drink of water any anything else. All right. Thank you guys. Thank you. Appreciate it. Anybody else in the audience with the project they'd like to put forward? Okay. Savannah, do you just want to kind of let us know where we go from here because this is the first public hearing. I believe then it goes to SERTA.

I'm not quite sure exactly how the process. Yeah. So from here we'll we'll be looking to make a decision on how many and which proposal we put forward. Once we do that we'll get it together. It requires a bunch of different estimates that we can show what the cost is of everything. There's a whole you're familiar with it I'm sure too. Um there's a whole set of documentation that's required. If we're accepted into that first round of grants then we'll host a second public hearing. Okay. Thank you. um to have another conversation like this about a specific project. This one was just as the mayor said to get your thoughts, ideas, any questions from the public to put everything out there. Then we'll move towards a decision-making process on how we want to proceed and we'll work through the CDBG requirements and and that's me for the city side reading that

and I my understanding is they sort of like starts looking at this like in March. Yes. Yes. So going to move quickly. I think first applications do end of January. So yeah. Yep. Yep. Yeah. So that's why we're having to do it now. Yes. Okay. Very good. Any other questions? Anything else for Savannah? All righty. Thanks. Thank you. So, um, do I close the public hearing now? All right. I will close the public hearing at 5:51 p.m. And now we have to wait 10 minutes. Arthur should be here. Oh, okay. So I'll address