City Council - Regular Meeting

two months ago like today. [snorts]

All right. Good evening. Welcome everybody to the Northfor City Council meeting January 20, 2026. I'd like to call this meeting in to order and inform the public about the opens meeting act posted in the council chambers and accessible to members of the public. At this time, we're going to start the pledge of allegiance followed by a moment of silence. 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.

Roll call, please. Granquist, here. Arns, here. Webb, here. McCarthy. Beckman here. Jensen Langy here. Hilderbrand here. Mayor I'm here. All right. Uh at this time there will be no public comment because that is at the first meeting of the month. So no action will be taken at this time. Moving on that we'll move on to the uh approval of the consent agenda. I'll make a motion to approve the consent agenda. Second. Motion second. No discussion. Please vote. All council members present voting in the affirmative. Motion carries.

With that, I would like approval of the full agenda, please. So move your honor. Second. Have a motion a second. No discussion. Please vote. All council members present voting in the affirmative. Motion carries.

That moves us to the special presentation this evening. We have a special presentation by the Northwork Public Power District, NPPPD, regarding a potential professional retail operations agreement or pro between the city of Norfor and NPPD. And as a just a side note, this is a special presentation only. Uh we will have be allowed public input. Public input is allowed, but no action will be taken on this item tonight. We've got a whole Okay, I'll let you guys go ahead get started.

Okay. Thank you, Mayor, mayor and councel. I'm [clears throat] pleased to be here this evening uh with our our partners at NPPD to present this agreement in a very brief history. Uh we started conversations almost well probably seven years ago. Um those halted over the the the COVID period of time. um those uh we kind of re-energized those conversations here earlier this spring. Um based on those conversations over those years uh with a heavier effort here the last oh seven or so months. I'm pleased to have again NPPD here to present uh the the agreement as we have negotiated it. Um after their presentation, I've got a couple slides to summarize some of the components of the agreement. Uh tonight with us to to present, I believe Courtney Dentlinger Dentlinger uh is going to do the presentation. She is the vice president for customer services and external affairs with NPPD. Uh Brittany Koig is here at the podium with her. Britney is our account manager with NPPD. And then uh they were also joined by Pat Hammerhan uh who up until very recently was the general manager for resale sales and I understand is uh taking on another position. So congratulations Pat. With that I will turn it over to Courtney here and I'll I'll jump back up here towards the end of her presentation. Thanks Courtney.

All right. Thank you Stephen. Look to uh your right. She'll flip the slides for you.

Oh wonderful. Thank you Val. Okay. Um, so Courtney Dentinger, vice president of customer service and external affairs at Nebraska Public Power District. Very happy to be here with you tonight and happy to answer any questions that you all might have. We've um had, as Stephen mentioned, a very long time uh working through this contract and talking about uh all the benefits for the city of Norfor, but excited to be here with you this evening uh to talk about the contract, answer any questions uh that you might have, but we're here to present the highlights. So we can go ahead to the next slide. So this um this relationship has been in place since 1966. We've um provided retail electric service here in Northfor. Um you all I'm sure are familiar with the Northfor operations center that we have where we operate out of. Um we've also got our centralized customer call center uh here in Northfor. Altogether we've got more than a hundred employees in Northfor. uh with a significant payroll. We're one of the larger employers in the community, so $10 million of payroll. I I live here, so this is near and dear to my heart. Um so very pleased again to be here with you this evening. Um also just wanted to highlight Northark's also got the largest community solar facility in the state of Nebraska and this is working through us and opportunities that we have in the contract. Um we've also got a battery storage system uh in conjunction with that and there are opportunities as we'll talk about uh where as your load growth grows those opportunities can also grow. Um and the lease payment is very significant. You all continue to own the distribution system. We operate it on your behalf. We make all of the repairs and improvements on your behalf. Um but not at your cost.

Uh those costs are spread across all of uh our retail uh customers uh across 81 communities. Uh but then a lease payment comes back to you each year uh significant revenue stream uh for the city and very consistent. So we'll go to the next slide. Okay. So we've shared uh Stephen has shared with you uh what we call the retail pro agreement, professional retail operations agreement. Again, this is a great situation where it allows you to retain ownership of your electric distribution system um and get a steady income from that in the form of the lease payment. Uh which as you'll see is variable under this enhanced pro agreement uh where you could increase that lease payment over time. Um but we provide everything soup to nuts. Um we're taking care of the system. We're reinvesting in the system. Uh we're helping uh with quality assurance, quality control. We're handling all of the customer service and doing the billing for you. Uh and we also provide a number of other programs from [clears throat] economic development to strategic and master planning. I know that you all uh just went through that recently and uh Britney and Nicole Sabbachk were there uh to help you with that. And then multiple sustainable energy programs and energy efficiency programs as well. Um, a key thing that I wanted to note on that, we assume all of the operational and financial risk on your behalf. You enter into this agreement, but if a tornado tears through Northfor and your system needs to be rebuilt, we do that. That's not a cost that's then assessed to you individually as a community. it's absorbed across our retail system which helps provide additional insurance if you will for the community when it comes

to that investment. So next slide. Thank you. Um, so we're just going to walk through some of the main changes, uh, referencing the articles here, but term and the effective date, the lease of the distribution system, payments, maintenance and construction of facilities, renewable generation again, and then miscellaneous. So, thank you. Uh, initial term 20 years uh, with a 5-year extension. So, that means upon year 15, the city would actually have the opportunity, if you so chose, to give notice, and then after uh that 20-year period, you could decide to do something different, whether that's with NPD or with a different power provider or doing it yourself. Um, if no notice is provided uh within that period of time, the agreement would just roll an additional 5 years. And that way you don't have to find yourself renegotiating uh an agreement continually. So you always have that opportunity um with five years notice uh to end the agreement. Um, the other thing that I wanted to mention, uh, early termination by the city, uh, would require that, uh, the either the lease payment be reduced to cover some outstanding capital costs or that you would choose no reduction of the lease payment, but you'd have a lump sum for undepreciated capital additions. Um, so as we're continuing to reinvest in your system, um, that way it protects all of our other rateayers. Okay, next slide. Okay. Lease of the distribution system. Uh again, we maintain the system according to prudent utility practice. Uh MPPPD is one of the largest public power utilities in the United States. Uh we operate in 84 out of 93 counties.

We've got 81 communities. Uh and we take the upkeep of our system very seriously. Um, [snorts] so not only do we do this according to prudent utility practice, but we go above and beyond and you'll see that repeatedly NPPD and the state of Nebraska are ranked very highly nationally when it comes to uh reliability. Um you can under the contract engage with an independent consultant uh engineering firm uh every three years to perform a condition assessment. Uh that would be paid for by the city. Um however, we're continually also doing monitoring, reporting. Uh we've got various programs where we're looking at all of these assets and we can make all of that information available to you at any time. undergrounding of the distribution system. This is something that a lot of communities are interested in typically from the perspective of aesthetics um liking [snorts] to bury lines in certain areas. We can absolutely do that um and scope it, design it. The cost of that, however, if it's purely for aesthetic purposes, would be borne by the city um instead of socializing that cost across all of our communities. Otherwise, as you might imagine, all 81 communities would suddenly have lots of undergrounding projects and that would negatively impact rates. However, when we have street projects, as you guys have seen with Benjamin Avenue, if we need to have undergrounding there um for distribution, that's at our cost. Okay. So, next slide. I touched on this earlier. Um, but one of the benefits of this enhanced program agreement is the variable lease payment. [cough and clears throat] It the city

can adjust this payment by up to half a percent a year. Uh, you can start the agreement at 12.5% instead of the 12% that you're at currently. Uh, and you could go up to a maximum of 14%. Um, [clears throat] so again, increments of 5% or 0.5%, excuse me. and that would need to be approved uh through an action of the city council. Um tax supported entities uh receive a municipal discount of 33 and a3%. Um there is an ability however to implement the lease payment on uh those taxported agencies but they would continue to receive the municipal discount. Okay. Article five maintenance and construction of facilities. Uh again, the distribution system uh through this agreement remains the possession of the city. We're taking care of it uh for you, reinvesting in it for you. I think we've invested $5 million over the last handful of years, uh in the system. Um and we continue to do that and continue to make upgrades. We do regular poll inspections, uh etc. And then we monitor the system and how it functions to determine what additional upgrades we need to make. Um, prudent utility practice is defined uh in the agreement. Um, and we'll manage the system in accordance but generally in in addition above and beyond prudent utility practice. Next. Okay. Uh, renewable generation. Um so we can facilitate the integration of renewable generation resources whether you have a new project that's looking to come to the community and [snorts] they want to have additional uh clean energy resources renewable energy resources we can help facilitate that um through

various agreements and as I mentioned earlier Norfolk has already taken advantage of what we call qualified local generation um where you can put in for the city's benefit renewable resources and you worked with us to put in the state's largest community solar program uh just outside of town. And with that uh we've got the 1 megawatt 2 megawatt hour battery energy storage system. As [clears throat] your load grows, so grows the opportunity to put in additional renewables if you so choose. Okay. And then we've got the last article is just miscellaneous provisions from the city. And I'll leave it to Stephen to talk about any of that if he would like. And I think Britney, if unless you have anything else to add, we can answer any questions. But I know Stephen has some things he would like to add from the city's perspective.

Courtney, you go to the next slide for me. Um, so Courtney mentioned that we've been working with NPPD since 1966 under uh a variety of agreements and 1990 was the last major uh rewrite of our agreement. Since then, there's been three amendments to the agreements. And I thought this was important so that you can understand that yes, this is a a 20-year agreement. Um we worked hard to get it to negotiate uh that um there was a strong desire to have 25 years by MPPPD. Um we did end up structuring it to 20 years with that plus five. Um but during the term during that term that 20-year term most likely you're going to see amendments. And when those amendments occur, those amendments also tend to push out that that term date. Um it's not always extending it to 20 years, but usually there is an extension in there. So, just to kind of present that um yes, yes, today or on February 2nd when we bring it in, we'd be we'd be um talking about a 20-year term, but the reality is uh during that term, there will most likely be amendments uh that do develop. In general, they are driven by NPPD. I think all three of those amendments you see up there were NPPD driven amendments. um not so much on the on the client side, but they were not uh they didn't work against us in any way. They were all around billing practices or um other changes in the in the agreement that didn't have a a negative impact. Um next slide. I think this is the only other slide I

really kind of wanted to go through. Uh the effective date. So this this assumes that this agreement is approved on February 2nd. uh as an action item. Uh the pro there is a process that occurs after that. There's uh uh there's three weeks of advertising that occur and then there is a 30-day period that that sits basically a remmonstrance period. Um and then that uh so assuming we this gets approved at the February 2nd meeting, we're anticipating this would have an effective date of April 1st of 2026. As Courtney mentioned, the agreement has the ability uh to increase the lease fee uh at a half a percent per year. Um is not indicating that you have to. It's just an option that's built into the agreement and that trigger could be pulled at any time in there. As and back up a little bit here. Earlier this spring, as we started to re-engage NPPD, there was a committee formed uh to help get us to this point. a committee was myself, uh, Scott, David Levy, um, RBW Engineering out of Columbus, um, and then obviously we had NPPD at the table as well, and Corey Hildebrand. So, we did have one councilman on that committee as well. Uh the committee held to my recollection four meetings uh between April and uh early October. Uh two of those meetings were just the committee um and two of those meetings were the committee members and NP NPPD. Uh during those conversations uh one of the things we looked at was what are our sister community or communities doing and within the NPPD

uh community our our our sister community would be um Carney and Carney entered this agreement basically the same agreement back in 2019 they did increase uh from 12% to 12 a.5% in their agreement they've been sitting at that ever since um they did pull the trigger on the lease payment for tax supported agencies. So, as we look at being competitive as a community uh and we always look at our other our sister communities as as we're making decisions on on rates and [clears throat] how to structure ourselves. Um it is built into the attached agreement that's attached to the council agenda item at 12 a.5% uh lease payment and it is in the agreement uh that we would have the municipal writer which would capture the lease payment from tax supported agencies. So those two components are built into the agreement that is attached to the agenda tonight. The other thing uh as we work through the agreement, there was a lot of conversation on the distribution system uh and how that's defined. The current agreement defines it as that portion under 34 uh it might be 34 and a half but 34 kilovolts. Um a lot of conversation around that. We were able to keep it at that level. Uh there were members of the committee that just felt over time uh MPPPD was looking at 15 kilovolts and we just felt that over time there was a potential uh that there could be things develop as we grow as a community and as we age as a country uh where we might see some activity in that 15 to 34 kilovolt area. Um, after a lot of conversation, we were able to keep that in the agreement uh that that again is

attached tonight. Um, I talked about the 20-year term, the 5-year extension clause in there if we if we do not issue a ter notice of termination uh before that year 15. Um, and again, I I do believe uh just based on our history that there's probably going to be amendments in there that do push that down the road. Um, at the very bottom of this slide, there's some there's a couple notes down there relative to the lease payment. So, I'm going to jump back to that. One of the things that we recognize, so when when Carney pulled this trigger back in 2019, um that lease payment went into effect for their tax supported agencies at 100%. As we considered doing this, uh we felt it meaningful to allow those taxup supported entity to have some a couple budget cycles to to anticipate this and build that into their budgets. And so that's u that's why you see that July 1st, 2028. So that tax payment on those lease supported the lease payment on the taxup supported agencies would not start until July 1st of 2028. Once that happens, we collect 100% of the lease payment. But again, we felt it was important uh on a couple of those because of the size of the payment to allow them um anou an opportunity to engage the city in anou and provide up to a 20-year step down in that reimbursement. Um so the two larger ones in there are the community college and the public school system. Uh there are 18 entities in that that make up those tax supported entities in Northfor. Those two entities are a large majority um of what that tax

uh that lease payment would be. And so what this does is um uh it allows them up to 20 years they pay that and then we would pay that back in year one. We would pay back 95% in year two. we'd pay back 90% and then that just steps down over 20 years until a year 20 then they're paying 100% of that or there's no reimbursement that really I think that summarized I don't think there's another slide there I think that's my last slide so with that we would open it up for questions either for NPPD or or myself

I do have a question for you Steve um could you clarify just a little bit when you talk about amendments being made and how that may push that term out a little bit.

It would Yeah. And it would depend on on the amendment itself. I know that those three amendments uh are are included in your packet. Um they wouldn't have to um but there's always a potential that depending on the significance of the amendment that that that that end date of that term could be pushed. It wouldn't have to be. just depends on um you know exactly what the amendment language is doing to the agreement. But the potential would exist for for an you know for that to push that term. You know let's say that let's say [clears throat] 2026 let's say in 2031 uh either we or NPPD approaches the other with with an amendment and we agree that that amendment makes sense. Um if it's a significant thing, uh maybe it's a um some sort of a major project, a major investment, uh it might require, you know, some term for them to get paid back on that investment. Maybe that makes sense to extend the contract five years. So the contract would then be extended as a function of that amendment. I one more question I guess. So, and I don't care who wants to answer it, but on those tax supported agencies, there's already a municipal discount in there of 33 and a3%. Can you just kind of explain that to the public as to what that actually means?

Yeah. Um so that's something that MPPPD offers and it is to the tax supported entities that are in the community. I think the history is um initially that was put into place um for community uh buildings but then ended up being extended to all tax supported entities and the thought was you know these are rateayers are the same as your citizens and um having that uh discount helps with the tax um burden for everybody. And maybe when we say tax supported entities, maybe there's a good clarification to be made there. That means 50% or more of their funding comes directly from state or local taxes. We're not talking federal, just state and local. So just wanted [clears throat] to clarify that maybe in case

of those 18 entities that I mentioned in the community, we I have had conversation um with all entities that would pay more than $750 a year in lease payment. Um [clears throat] that would be 13 of those 18 agencies. Um the two larger ones again did express an interest in thatou. Um Northeast Community College, their board did did uh approve theou so their their president could enter that agreement with us. Um the public school system uh they've been very gracious. They understand u what we're doing. They appreciate, you know, our extension of anou and and granting that that reimbursement over that 20-year period. uh the other entities that I talked to uh didn't have any any concern with that but I did I did express that thatou would be available to to all of them

any other any other question Steve uh just for the community they understand before we were at 12% correct and now we're going to correct we're going to 12 and a half which pays that extra half percent will they will the citizens see that on their bill or is that a they would see that. So that would go out to um all all accounts across the system. Um the average I did ask NPPD to run a number for me on the residential customer side for the average customer that's about 54 cents a month. [clears throat]

Any else? Okay. Well, thank you again. and you'll see this as an action item on February 2nd. Thank you guys. Well, thank you.

There's opportunity for public input also. So, if there's anybody from the public to come forward, please do that. Now, turn the mic off. No signup sheet, so you know who I am. There was one.

All right. Whenever Jim McKenzie, um I'm supportive of the new agreement with the exception of the add-on the increase on the the lease rate. Um this new agreement will increase that lease add-on fee on everyone's electric bill to 12 and a half% from 12%. Um as it was stated, that's a separate add-on fee on everybody's electric bill called a lease payment. I will just simply call it the city electricity tax. It's a percentage of the revenue just like sales tax or an occupation tax. The city has no cost to maintain the electrical system. It all falls on NPPD as was mentioned. So the city electricity tax is a pure income to the city. It's essentially a tax. This new lease agreement allows the city to increase it up to 14% as was mentioned if if the council chooses to. I really have no doubt that that will happen if we put it in the agreement that will happen. It used to be 10%. 12% with a rebate of 2%. So effectively a 10% electricity tax to the customer. Then somewhere around 2005 under an amended agreement it went to 12%. And now we have a path to 14%. How much is enough? Some will say it's only a half percent, so only 54 cents. But the reality is all of these small increases compound to a huge burden on the citizens. In addition to the 12% city electricity tax, the city gets 2% sales tax on everyone's electric bill. So the city actually adds 14.5% to the cost of electricity on everyone's bill under this proposed increase. Then the state adds another 5.5% state sales tax. Plus there's another 5% gross revenue tax imposed by the state that is

paid out to the city, school, and county in form of in lie of tax. And that amounts to another $210,000 a year the city gets on citizens electric bills based on the last budget. All told, these fees add up to almost 30% in additional electrical cost to our citizens for electricity in Norolk. This new lease will now require all tax supported agencies, schools, college, NRD, or whoever else is within those limits of 50% tax supported to start paying the city electricity tax in 2028. They've never had to previously had to pay that tax to the city. Why now? Why do we now have to have them start paying that tax? What's what's the reason? Because we need more money. And how will these tax supported agencies pay the additional tax? Raise taxes, I suppose. So, we're just moving the tax from one hand to another. The city already receives an increase in their city electricity tax every time NPPD raises electricity rates because the city tax is based on NPPD rates. This year, the city will take in an extra $225,000 over what it was two years ago based on NPPD rate increases of 2% and 3% in the last two years. And now we want even more. Why would government ever have any interest in becoming more efficient if they can just keep increasing taxes and fees on their citizens? There's no incentive. This additional tax money will be swirled away in that black hole of spending that knows no bounds. A year from now, you will be looking at more ways to increase taxes and fees if you don't stop now and start looking for efficiencies. Here's what happened with the city of Northol property taxes in the past 10 years. And I bring this up because it's

it's part of the whole picture of the citizen burden. In fiscal year 2015-16, the total general fund property tax increase, excuse me, the total general fund property tax budget was $1,981,000. In fiscal year 2526, it is $6,57,000. It's tripled in 10 years. And yet, the rate of inflation was only 36% over the same period of time, according to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics. Nebraska ranks fourth highest in the nation in property taxes. There are currently multiple petition drives to put property tax limits and other tax limits on the ballot. The citizens are pushing back. They've had enough. I support the renewal of this lease with NPD without the increase in city electricity tax aka lease rates and without additional taxes aimed at tax supporting agencies. We need to take a step back, understand that this cannot continue. We simply cannot perpetuate the increase on our citizens. Thanks. Anyone else?

Anything else? Anybody here? All right, we're moving on to the public hearing and related action. At this time, I'd like to open a public hearing in the request of Maple Maple Court LLC to consider a zoning change from R3 Multiple Family Residential District to RT Tiny House District on property address 309 North First Street. So, we will open with discussion and value will lead us on that.

All right. Thank you. I I put the property up here on red just to kind of show where it is. It is North First Street just north of downtown across from Johnson Park. Um since this request is the first zoning for a tiny house district, the RT district, uh it's been a while since our last discussion. I'll just give a basic review of the RT tiny house district. It was adopted in the fall of 22. A tiny house by definition is between 70 and 649 square ft as a 650 ft house may be built in any residential district on any lot. Uh during discussion of tiny houses in the RT district, the city wanted the tiny houses to be a permanent structure to provide opportunity for affordable housing, not something that people sometimes see on TV where the house is mobile and you know, right, able to be placed on a residential lot like here during the summer and then pulled off and moved in the wintertime. Uh the city also requires the tiny house district to be a minimum of one acre which corresponds with other districts that have special and particular reliefs provided to them. So it doesn't pop up in any residential area. Um by having a minimum size of 1 acre for a tiny house district. This provides the opportunity for the tiny houses in a planned subdivision along with the supporting services necessary to create a quality residential neighborhood. The tiny house district doesn't have any parking requirements as the intent for the RT district was to be located in an area that was a few blocks easy walking distance to like a grocery store, restaurants, work, amenities. Uh the RT district also has a maximum of 25 dwelling units per acre. Because the RT district is meant as a higher density and potential for multiple rentals, there was a maximum of 10% of the RT

neighborhood to be short-term rentals so that we wouldn't have almost like a campground going on at that point in time. So, this was the intention to be affordable permanent housing for the residents of the community. Uh this type of housing cannot be turned like I said into an almost campground like for people to turn over in a weekend or a week to come and stay. Uh this specific uh property is in the riverfront overlay district. However, the single family detached dwellings, duplexes, and single family attached up to two units are exempt from that overlay. uh for appearances of the houses. The RT district did specify that the building materials can be of any material including metal if that metal is non-exposed fastener seamless metal, but they also have to have the finished appearance of a residence. So, you can't just, you know, plop a garden shed looking thing in and call it a residence. And if this zone change request is approved, there is another step involved being of a plat for the planning commission and city council to review and approve like any other plat making new lot lines. Um, if there's any questions for me before the applicant provides a more specific information regarding the quest, I'll be happy to try and answer them for you. Just a question maybe Val, you said they have to have one acre. The tiny house

for the RT district has to be one acre. It has. Okay. The land. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Thank Thank you. The other thing, Val, uh, how many units did you say per district? I think you can have a maximum of 25 per acre. Oh, per acre. Right. So, we put a maximum density. So you couldn't just cram as many in there as you wanted. Val, is there a minimum lot size with that then? 1,200 square feet. 1,200 square feet. Okay. With All right. Thanks. I'm assuming this is more than an acre here.

Yeah, I think they're around three acres there for some reason. Okay. This is open discussion. Any other discussion? Val, off of uh their drawing here on the enclosure, is there setbacks from the lot lines? Um looks like some of them are just right touching the lot line if this is touching the lot line. Let me go to that just with the graph they're showing here. pieces. So, let me

I don't understand off the graph where our property is versus theirs. So they are let me So the outside line is the current property line and then I believe their graphic is showing like where their right of way of the roads would come up and around and then these would be the new lot lines for the the individual houses. Correct me if I'm wrong there. You want to come up and question?

We're looking at the the drawing here. Yeah. These would be your new lot lines generally speaking for the the individual houses. Correct. Yeah. Those would be like the how the for each those are your um square feet per whole house or tiny house. Not the house itself, but plus the yard and driveway. But we weren't going to lot them all off separately. So that would be what? A 15t set back kind of up tiny house from a front yard, 5 foot setback, sideyard, five sideyard, five yards, 10 in the back, 10 back, 10 in the front, 10 front. Right. Okay. But ours are bigger than that.

A little bit bigger. Yeah. Yeah. So what do you what do you with the what do you got there between roads there about 130 ft um two separate lots? Yeah like if I'm looking at lot 13 and 22 they're like 70 ft lots. So 70 70 foot lots. So 100 you got 140 foot 140 and then you got a what did we say the road was road was 32 wide or 42 or 40 and then I don't know each tile is 10 ft on there okay 20 22 foot wide looks like I'm just looking at what you guys got presented here um for the street for width of lots

oh yeah um well them half tiles so that's two half tiles so it's 30 so it be three foot wide That's okay. Yeah. Sorry, I'm not best at art. And then 70 foot deep. Yeah.

Could you both just state your name for the record for me, please? I'm Mike Miller. Jacob Miller. Thank you. So, basically be what? A 50 by 20 build area. 14 by 40 something. No, if you've got 70 foot, right? You're 70. The lots are 70 foot deep. I'm trying to figure out how big of a what we're looking at for a footprint for the house. Oh, the house would be 14 by 14 by 40. 14 by 40. So, you're a little bit smaller than what your lot you could fit on the lot is what I'm getting. Yeah. The two both sides are 5 ft and max 10. But if you're 30 foot wide, 5 - 5 on each side, that's 20. So you're you could go up to 20 foot wide. Oh yeah.

I'm trying to find your max size there. But we can only be so many square feet. So yeah, you got to stand or wider. You got to stand that 630. Yep. Right. And then I believe we got a we have a trail along that one lot line there. 12 foot trail going through there. Yeah. On that back side. Back side. That angled part. Yeah. Does that Yeah, there too. Does that show that on there? Doesn't really show that. No, that's on the other side. The lot. It's on the other side of the Cuz we actually own past that trail.

Yeah, I knew I knew that you guys zone past the trail. You kind of let the city We're okay with the city putting the trail there, but we're not that that line isn't a trail. Yeah, I think we'd have to probably come into an agreement what the distance from the trail to the back of your prop houses could be. You know, we were wondering too. Yeah.

Have you guys had any of that discussion? Have does has staff had any discussion about those sort of things that we could show council? The only the only the only thing I can think of is that there has been some conversation just about in terms of public uh public safety access and what the fire department may may require. Um I do not I can't speak for Tim in terms of whether that is too deep and he would need some sort of turnaround turnaround or or a U u to be able to just drive in and drive through. Um those would be conversations that we would certainly engage them with. Steve, I got a question about that. We hear that a lot where you you you can't get out of a

How come they can't back up? Is there a problem with backing out? I mean, it's just my own [clears throat] there's a certain depth that they'll why you have to have a you a turn in development. I I don't know whether it's 150 ft, 200 feet, but there there's a depth a maximum depth uh that they prefer. And I don't know if that's driven by code or statute. Um, but that would certainly be a conversation we would engage with when they came in with some sort of a final final version of this. Um, you know, we would need to make sure it meets those requirements because that would require another 100 foot 140 foot of road which I mean I guess I what I'm getting at is you guys are trying to keep an affordable lot so you could do the tiny house sub.

There is a circle round. I remember that. I remember that two way two roads connected. Yeah. On that back side. Yeah. Okay. So, are there two means of egress onto first street or one? Yes. Plus, plus there's another one on the closer to the trail that's a separate one all together. That corner is so useless corner. How many, Steve? How many of those would we approve uh ingress egress into this? I mean, we're not going to put three. We don't use we already they're already driveways. there already. Yeah, there's Yeah, there's two there's two approaches there. There's actually three. I thought

there's actually the one we wouldn't really need cuz it's in that corner where we can't Yeah, it's not very deep. So, we just keep two. Yeah, I wouldn't see adding another approach uh to the existing system. I don't know. I think that dash line is probably that showing that front street, but there is a that dash line is a setback from the road. We thought we just turn that into parking. Um there is a val if you want to go back to the main image.

Um and I haven't I haven't looked [snorts] at this from a dimensional perspective. Uh as you come in on the north side so you can see those two streets. They come out there's a frontage road in there that I that I believe accesses that runs pretty much the full north south frontage of their site. Um so that's how they would access that. And I believe there's essentially an approach on the north side and approach on the south side. I think there is in theory a third approach that's up towards that corner there. You can see it right there. Yeah.

Other thing there on the dimensions again without looking at it in depth uh the trail when the trail went in there there was a an easement negotiated with them. Um actually we went ended up going to condemnation on that and settled that. Um so I don't know the dimensions that they're showing. I don't know if they go all the way to the red line or whether they go to the easement line on the trail. Um, we go up to the trail. To the trail. [clears throat] Okay. Not to the red line. We're so we're five or so feet off that trail.

Okay. So, that's pretty close to where that ement would be then. So, and you can see on the back where those roads on the back side there, the west side of their of their site, uh, where the pavement ends, you can see there's sort of a I don't Is that an asphalt trail? That might be actually asphalt back there. But you can see how that kind of cement with the it that's not as wide. It's only like a Yeah. one car width. And you're not you're not proposing to go into that area, correct? That's outside of of what you're planning. So, in theory, I think you're I don't understand what you're saying there.

Are you saying that I think what I think when you presented it to us, you said there might be an option to get public safety like a a fire truck or something that there's a road that comes around there, right?

So, it's like 15 or 20 feet wide right there. So there's some I mean as they would engage in you know in the with a a [clears throat] land surveyor or something to do the platting on this those are conversations that we would have to just work with public safety and make sure we got you know if we actually needed a turnaround in there that there's something defined for turnaround or just for drive-thru. Um, is the So each tiny house would be on a leased parcel. I mean, you're going to lease out each piece. Is that how you're planning on doing?

Yeah, because I don't know how you could subdivide that into small lots like that. Right. So, similar to like what a trailer park would be, like what it used to be, but for tiny house, permanent foundations. Right. Right. Okay. And so with the before I believe the the whole area was maintained by the owners, would these streets now be part of city streets? And how are they maintained? I don't think so because it's not city streets. Okay. So it' stay as part of that leased property the same way

on the owners of the property. Just [clears throat] following up on that question, are you planning like an HOA system in here?

We're just going to have [clears throat] we're just going to maintain it because we're going to put sprinklers in and they don't have they don't have enough yard to have a mower. So, we're just going to do the mowing for them so that they don't have to have that. And then they you can get those little Costco sheds that for storing bicycles. So, we thought we can put that in the back of their thing so they can store their bicycles. So, they wouldn't have to be inside, but that way they don't have to have a mower. There's no reason to have a mower. There's not big enough lots. Will these lots uh afford to have uh off- streetet parking?

There is for each one has enough for one vehicle. And then [clears throat] along that first street there's like 20 ft wide. There's a long 25 25 foot wide thing there that we can use for turn that in the parking too all along First Street. [clears throat] Is there a way to make it for two cars to park? I mean, you look at this many lots and you're talking probably around 65 cars. No, we're only doing um I'm saying you say they're on average probably two cars per owner. Um you're talking a lot.

They're 25 ft wide. You know, car is about 25 ft. So you or they're 30 ft wide. That's really one vehicle in front of there. Unless we're going to have a space in front where they can pull in and park, but fit two cars or do that just leaves more of a mess. That's why we just thought just one car in each one. Keeps them off. Joe was driving through the trailer park here the other day by the mall and you can barely all the cars parked on the road. They're up on the sidewalk. They're everywhere. It's just looks like chaos. Yeah.

So that's why we're keeping that corner to the north. If they have an extra vehicle vehicle, they have to go over there or along that first street parking. Are you planning on putting in new streets? No. They're They're really just overgrown. They're not that bad. And we're going to clean out all the trees. Yeah. All except for probably the two sycamores. But otherwise, we're going to clear them all out. So, are are these these are not going to be owner occupied? These are going to be

they're going to be owner occupied. Owner occupied for the house, but not owner occupied for the ground that the house sits on. Correct. Okay. There's no other way you can have cheap housing in Northport. This is about the cheapest way you can go unless you throw tents or tin sheds. Yeah. No, I I agree. This is this is this is a feasible thing. I guess I was hoping that the ground that they the house if they bought the house, they'd own the ground underneath of it. I guess that's what I was hoping for and then and when I when I saw this come through. No, I don't think we can do that.

Otherwise, you could build apartments there, but it just seems more nice to give people a chance to own a home and to start for younger people instead of just rent apartments like everywhere else around here. Apartments, look what they're getting for apartments. 1,500 bucks. That's ridiculous. But you could have your own house and at least pay it for and then, you know, after they get their stuff paid for, they can move on and sell it to somebody else. You know, there's no way a young kid could start anymore. It's terrible. Well, I got to say, I think it would be great for the for the area and uh definitely an improvement on what's there currently. Right.

And the park is all done. The river looks great. It's just gonna be a great deal. Do you have any renderings of what the houses would look like? Because I know Val indicated that any material could be used. I do. I put together um slides of a lot of them are these top ones are ones off the internet. The next ones are from the executive tiny home park across from the Yankton Dam. And I I thought those looked really nice. They look really really modern here. So, here's the first one. These ones are kind of like what we were hoping and thinking. I like how they have the little outdoor front porch areas awnings. And see if you do that then you're you don't have room for that parking.

Yeah. Or you can do it on some of them do it on the side. Little 5 foot yard. Have you any of you seen that Yanke thing? Yeah. It's you can I we could pull it up. One of these guys could pull up the It's called executive. [clears throat] You can look down. It's got they do have quite a bit. They have a lot of parking in there. So you're not parking within the driveway area. Um but they're charging 120,000 for that. It's a little different. You're right on the It's for cabin stay and on the river or on the lake and stuff. So they can only live there three time three months or something. But it but they also own the ground. I believe that the it's sitting on I think they still do pay a rent. You might be right. You might be right on that. I'm pretty sure I'm right. I can't remember. We went there a while ago. They pay a fee for the HOA, but it's taken off on the ground.

You guys, can you pull up uh South Dakota GIS and zoom into that? So, these are these are images that you've taken off the internet, but do you actually have anything drawn up that you're going to put there? We um called, but until we get further along, there's just not much you can get people to draw you. We didn't want to waste somebody's time. But, you know, we're looking at the ones by York. That Champion Place has some. But like he says, he'll just start over and draw whatever we're looking at. Yeah. He can build us whatever we want. We just have to have an idea of what direction to go.

And we were wondering too, does it I know they say they need to be mobile and on wheels to move them in. I thought, but do they we really need to have them moved in or can we just build them from the spot? Could be either way. Would it matter? Who? We're not requiring mobile on wheels. Okay. No, it says we can't. We can't do that. But then them move them in and lay val. Is that is that correct? Is that we cannot have wheels underneath tiny homes in our ordinance? Correct. [clears throat] Continuous foundation. Yes. Thank you. Yep. Yeah. I think they're just talking about to move like a pre-fabricated one there and set it on a foundation. Yeah.

But Right. You're not planning on leaving wheels. So you could have a modular without wheels and things like that. West right here. Right there. It looks like single family. Can you tell us what the planning commission had for a I don't know if you want to go over the report already, but what their vote was the report? Yeah, it's fine. Okay, go ahead. Um, read the report, please.

So, the Northfor Planning Commission held a public hearing on January 6th, 2026 to consider a zoning change from R3, multiple family residential district to RT, tiny house district on property addressed as 309 North for first street. The planning commission recommends approval of the request with a 6 to1 vote. Uh, one thing too, if you notice, I think they're I could be wrong, but in their covenants, they only allow one car per One car per household. Is that right? I believe at this particular that would be kind of a Well, and then they have parking for guest parking I think somewhere. They have guest parking on the Yeah, it's not very many. It was just a few spots. Oh, sure.

And they have a gated entrance where they you got to have a code to get in. My thing is Mike is the community has made a significant significant investment in that area like around $16 million and so how do how do we work together to ensure that what we're doing here adds to the park and how do we work with you to make sure that we're all on the same page? That's that's my biggest question. I don't want to devalue the park in any way. Um we're not going to have tin roofs. We're gonna have asphalt and I don't know how you

That's why I think we were kind of thinking of we'll do the mowing to make sure it's kept up and the underground sprinklers make sure yards and the flowers and whatever. We're going to eliminate a lot of trees cuz that's a hassle when trees want to fall and leaves. I mean can't go only get better from what it's at now, you know. I'd say we're we're really here for the zoning part. We still have platting after all this. So, um we're kind of getting in the weeds a little bit, huh? We're on zoning right now.

H No, I agree. But but we have to start making steps forward somewhere. And this all has to be platted. It still comes in front of us. I would suggest that you probably look at some sort of covenences on your own of what you want these to look like and what would be allowed. We figured that we're going to have them moved in and then sell them on the spot so that it's not going to be somebody else moving whatever in. It's gonna be us putting them there and then they're gonna sell them or Champions are going to sell them or we'll own them and sell them too.

So, Val, I have a I have a question for you. He he mentioned the word champion. So, on the tiny homes, can you put a mobile home in a tiny home park? It has wheels. You can't. Yeah. This has [clears throat] to be able to be put on a permanent continuous foundation. So you wouldn't

if the wheels are taken off and everything, but they have to stay under that 649 and smaller square feet too. And I don't know what mobile homes are made out of for the exterior like sighting. were very specific with the metal sighting and and that sort of thing too. Val, if this is approved, what what's the next step? like what assurities do can we have that this is going to complement the the investment we have in that park versus what I kind of feel like we should have had meetings with them before to get on the same page before we

so we have a better understanding because right now we're looking at graph paper and but see we didn't want to go through the if you're not going to approve it we didn't want to go through the well I think we I think we want to work with you to to make sure they're affordable it's adds value to the area. So, I don't think there's an, you know, I I think there's good reason to invest in those things and do those things because I think you bring a plan forward that, you know, we could work with, but it's just hard to with the graph paper and and stuff like that just off the investment we have in that area. It just makes me nervous. And this is public hearing, too. So, if there's any other comments out there, right,

I was just trying to get the rest of council's comments done, then we'll ask for public comment. Well, and I can kind of I think what we're hearing from Justin is a little more information. Yeah. Is what but uh but all in all the good idea for the property I think is what you're saying, right? I think that's kind of what the general consensus is and just a little more information long as what setbacks look like, what parking looks like, and what. So, but um I think you guys got a good idea here. Um so, so with some more conversation, the value of a subcommittee is is probably warranted here. Is that what you're asking, Justin? I just want to make sure that I mean to have all the questions or some of the questions with the developer.

Is it is it subcommittee or just pre-planning with city staff? whatever kind I just feel like we need to all be on the same page um to help them work with them and make sure that that it complements our investment in the area. I think there would have been some discussion ahead of time the developer would have been a little bit more prepared and had some value and and had some answers maybe better answers to some questions that were asked. Yeah. So the value of a subcommittee is there. Yeah. [snorts] Um well this is aren't we here just to uh approve this so then we can start other planning. Am I wrong?

I think that's where we're not getting clarification here.

Yeah. So this is the zone change only and they came and spoke to me and said can we do the zone change without the the plat? and I said yes because they didn't want to go through the thousands of dollars expense of a plant with the surveyor until they knew that they they had the zone change because you wouldn't have been able to do one without the other. Um so that's why we're here tonight and I did ask them to at least put something together for commission and council to show the general layout. Um but that is kind of giving getting ahead a bit. Yes. So, question for do we do you need a general layout or do we just need to know that tiny houses are something that could would be desirable in that location?

That's essentially what zoning is. So, tonight we're really asking that is a that is a that property would fit tiny houses. It'd be a good development of tiny houses. We're not we're not concerned about the layout at this point in time. What anything that's going to come down at a later time? Yes. And I think the concern tonight is and with I'm guessing with some people sitting here tonight is what's going in there. Mhm.

The fact that you just put took 16 million and put it across the street. What are you putting? You know, I think that's a legitimate concern of the council and maybe some. So, when will that discussion happen? So, the millers know that they can go out and look at a design for this property and present it without wasting money. And so, I'm guess we've got I think that's the general question in a nutshell is what we're looking for tonight. So,

yeah. So, tonight is the zone change. So you're essentially asking the question, is it appropriate for tiny houses to be in that location for the zone change? Then there's the secondary step of the plat at that point in time. It is a plat though, and that's why I brought up that the riverfront overlay does not apply to this, but we have basic requirements of what the houses should look like as a tiny house. Um, generally plat come to council if there's not a zone change involved with it as a consent item. But that's why when I heard afterward after planning commission that you all were getting some calls and some concerns and had some questions about this um it would be nice and helpful I think for them and for staff during a pre-planning to help them understand what your questions are, what your concerns are so we can help them through the process. And then if if it's not something that's necessarily on a plat, but like you suggested, maybe having their own covenants, would you bring, you know, your proposed covenants with you during the plat explain what what you're proposing for those covenants to be? That might help. Um, but also we as a city don't enforce covenants. So it would be them enforcing their own covenants. We would be able to enforce basic code compliance of maintenance of weeds and grass and tree trimming and and that sort of thing, but we don't necessarily have anything to say you have to have one tree or you have to have shrubs or anything like that just because the overlay doesn't apply to single family. Does that help explain where we are?

So essentially, if we approve this tonight, there's nothing they could go in there and drop whatever the setbacks are. As long as they're following setbacks, they would still bring the plat forward to planning commission and city council, kind of what they drew up by hand, but only professionally done with true dimensions by a surveyor. But the only thing we're looking at that plat though, if I understand this right, is just the setbacks. Essentially the setbacks, how many lots you're doing and where they're going to be put. Yes.

I guess you're just agreeing to the terms of the RT tiny house covenants or not covenants, but the what we have in our building code today, right? Any other zoning category, right? Yeah. So, you're moving away from an R3 label to an RT label tonight and the plat and the zoning or not the plat but the drawings and plat would have to come forward again in front of us for approval.

Yeah. Well, where some of the questions are is was RT and when it was created and what's in the RT, not necessarily what they're what they're going to do has to follow RT or tiny homes, right? I see. Yeah. RT. So, we created as a city staff and approved as city council what's in RT already. One thing we did do, our RT requirements are a little more stringent than most, I would think, a lot of townhouse subdivisions in the nation are because we require foundation. A lot of them don't require that, but that was something that got brought up and that was something that was agreed upon was the foundation part of it, which is a permanent structure and that was one thing that was discussed. I remember back then, I think the acre size subdivision was another thing that was brought up. The reason that was brought up was was so that your neighbor couldn't just tear down his house on their lot and then put three tiny houses on a 150 by 200 foot lot or a 70 foot by 150. So that was part of the concern there. That's why you had to have the amount of property in order to come in and ask for an RT subdivision. So um those were the two primary concerns. One thing I don't remember talking about really with a tiny house subdivision is what does off- streetet parking look like? you know, and I think that's probably a little bit of a concern within uh when you're when you're talking about 20 25 tiny houses per acre. I don't know if we addressed that at the time

we did. Okay. So, we said that there were no parking requirements because they many people that were going to live there might have one car and it's a wide enough minimum lot size that you could get that one car parked on the street if necessary. And a lot of them may not even have a car or care to have a car. So, they were going to be a lot of walking and biking, which is why the intent was them to be closer to amenities and work and grocery stores and such.

I I just wanted to say I totally agree with Justin, right? We want to have that focus. I think we're all on that same page. We all want to have that focus. This is going to look very nice across from uh the riverfront area in Johnson's Park. There's no doubt about it. But if we really have concerns of what's in RT, then we need to look at that, not as much of whether they're going to follow RT or not, because they have to if this is approved. This is strictly just zoning. That's what I was trying to say before. And then is it strictly zoning? All right. Is any other discussion from the council here?

Uh, see there's is there anybody uh here tonight that would like to come up and address this? Has any concerns? Feel free to step forward. Uh, mayor and council, thanks for having me tonight. My name is Scott Williams. I live at 11-11 West Nebraska Avenue. [clears throat] I am testifying tonight uh in opposition to this zoning change. I think if you change the zoning tonight, you're going to be going down the wrong road. Um, but I am a firm believer in a robust housing development for homes of all price levels that it is needed in Northfor, including tiny homes. What I'm opposed to is the placement of this project. Now, I've sat here and listened tonight and I get I guess I understand that you want the tiny homes placed near shopping and entertainment and I I I understand that now. But prior to this request, this property was a rundown mobile home court that had and it's been vacant for many years. Um, as I reviewed the documents that the planning commission reviewed, uh, it looks like, uh, there's going to be 33 tiny homes on this property on lots 30 ft wide and now I know 70 ft long. U, it looks similar to a trailer park and it looks like a trailer park disguises a housing development. In my feeling, according to Google, a tiny home is one

that is between 100 and 500 square feet. Um, Norark code um now allows it between 70 square ft and 649 ft. Uh, the must home must be fixed and hooked up to city services. Additionally, the Nebraska Tiny House Registration Regulation is published by the Nebraska Public Service Commission allows for manufactured homes, modular homes, recreational vehicles, and including motor homes and travel trailers. Now, I learned tonight you can't have you have to have can't have wheels under it. So, it has to be on a firm foundation. And um I saw the September 6th article where um uh Val outlined the uh quoting here, the land options can be made out so the plat is made so that people can own the land under the tiny house along with the house. Two, the layout is similar to a mobile home park like Andy's Lake where the lots are leased from the property owner, but another person owns the house, which it sounds like that was was proposed. or three, the property owner can do a layout option but maintain the ownership of the land and rent the houses. In my opinion, of these three options, I feel like the first option is the only one that should be considered where the developer sells the lot to the owner of the house. Um, I think there should be some uh deed restrictions placed on this to ensure that the houses are owner occupied for a period of at least 3 to 5 years. Um, I had the concern of uh emergency veh vehicle access. Um, I walked by the the property and I walked around the trail on it and the access streets appear to be about 30 ft wide. I didn't look at it

on the on the map here, but um if you if you got a car parked on both sides of the street and a fire truck needs to get in there or an ambulance needs to get in there, I question how they can get in and out of that. Um, so parking was addressed. Um, you know, there's going to be one parking spot and additional parking to the north. Uh, I think it's comical to think that people living there are only going to have one car. I mean, uh, where you live, there's six or seven house cars next door to you on on your street. So, parking, in my opinion, is is a big issue there. um who's going to clear the snow? Um how are we going to get merchant vehicles in and out of there? So, at a minimum, I guess I'm asking you folks to uh table this decision until you can get some answers to questions that that you've already asked. Uh or the extreme, I'd like you to, you know, define it or not define it, but deny the zoning change altogether. We have put $16 million in the park right across the street. And I don't think we want um initially I think this this be a nicel looking development, but in 20 10 15 20 years it might end up looking like a mobile home park again. Thank you. Any questions?

Scott, he did address the snow removal and the grass and I mean I guess I understand that. I know people who live at Andy's Lake, so I know what they're they do that way, too. But if [clears throat] you have somebody that I mean the city would oversee and make sure if if there's a complaint if they don't do the snow or if they don't do the the grass that the city would be able to enforce that to where they would have to. Sure. But in order to the the houses that they're showing or the the specs for something. Um would you rather have the trees and as the property sits now? Um no. I think it should be cleaned up. Uh, personally, I think the park would be or that property would be a great addition to Johnson's Park. I don't think the city's interested in buying that right now.

Well, I I understand that, but um my thoughts are it'd be a great place for a zipline course, rock wall courses, uh other other recreational uses, but it' take an eminent domain action to get that. So, and I don't think the city's up for that right now. So, unless you want to put up some money and and do some planning for for us. I've spent all mine lately.

Uh [laughter] so yeah, thank thanks. I Yeah, it it's anything else. Okay, thanks. Any further comments? Come on forward, please. Well, my name is Gerald Vachek and uh I've been a businessman here for 35 years and past six years I've been retired. Thank you everybody for allowing me to speak tonight, but I am on the and I didn't write that down. I should have, but I was appointed by the previous mayor to be on the uh riverfront overlay district committee. And that committee was designed to protect this area, I guess, from uh have appropriate housing, whatever, down here. [clears throat] As we said before, we spent $16 million on Johnson's Park. The thing is absolutely gorgeous. I think that thing is is our signature uh area right now for Northfor, Nebraska. I don't think there's anybody else that has one. I want to make sure we preserve that and don't let something happen. I'm concerned. Uh Valerie, did you say you could put a trailer house on there if you took off the wheels? Did you say that? Did I misunderstand? You can put a a modular house that comes

in in parts and the wheels [cough and clears throat] are off and everything like that. So, okay. When you say modular, is that the same as a trailer house with no wheels? No. So, it's just built someplace else and brought in and yeah, a manufactured mobile home are built under like the HUD standards and a modular [clears throat] is built under the IRC.

Okay. Well, part of the uh [clears throat] uh contract that we have or the deal we have here for the overlay district, it says that as you mentioned, Val, single family detached dwellings, duplexes, and single family attached dwellings shall be exempt from the nonconforming uses. Uh except for non-conforming uses. First of all, what is non-conforming uses? What would that be? A non-conforming use is like a a residential house and I1 zoning. So, it it's a use that isn't the in the correct zoning. Okay. Yeah.

Well, this verbiage was put in there not to uh allow something like this, but it was put in there in the event of a house in this district down here gets hit by uh burns to the ground. whatever fire, uh, whatever it may be, tornado, that we're not putting an extra burden on those people to have to. The insurance gives them $200,000. We're not going to make them spend another $50,000 for brick and exterior of the house that they wouldn't have had to spend. So, that's reason. Correct me if I'm wrong, Val, but isn't that the reason that was put in there? That was the main reason that we thought of. Um I don't know if council members remember any other reason. I mean that was the main

That's 100% correct. We didn't want to put an overburden on people that lived in the area and just happened to live there and all of a sudden we created an overlay district and plopped it on top of them and Exactly.

That was the whole reason behind it. Yes. So anyway, like I said, I don't feel that uh we should change the standards on this because it's that's the reason that thing was put in there. And yes, it's in writing and whatever. Um it also says here preserving in this contract that we have here, it says preser preserving existing properties while encouraging harmonious design. Is this harmonious design, I guess, compared to the rest of the of the area down here? I mean, I I I guess I don't see that as happening. Um, and then it says in there that they have to provide open space. Okay. Is there any allowance for open space with this zoning? I mean, with this plot, we don't know, I guess. So I mean that's in this in in this agreement here. Um [cough and clears throat] the other thing here is as I as I told you Val uh you know the city does have the right to come in and if if the grass gets too tall 12 in I think is what you said. Okay. Well, I mean, if we're going to let some property get 12 in tall over there before we make it have somebody mow it or whatever, I don't think that that meets the criteria of this area down here. Uh it concerns me when they said that uh they're not going to do anything with the streets down there. They look pretty good. They look pretty good. What does that mean? I mean, whatever. So, I have terrible concerns about, like I said, allowing this to happen. I'm not opposed to what does that mean? Five minutes.

One minute. I'm not opposed to tiny homes, whatever, but and the location, but I just hope that it's done right and [clears throat] and we don't have a mess down the road. What happens? a guy from California who sells his house out there for 3 million bucks. Comes back here. It's cheap. You know, the property's cheap back here, buys one of the things, decides he doesn't like it. So, he takes off and goes someplace and here this house is sitting there and he's gone. And the money that he has to spend probably isn't a big deal to him. What happens in that situation? Well, the the property owners did say they're maintaining the mowing and the snow

and they they're maintaining the roads. They're their roads, not city roads. Okay. One one thing do do add though that this property right now is zoned R3. Okay. Which is highdensity apartments. Okay. So, just just keep that in mind as we're making these arguments because, you know, the RT what we call this tiny houses would be less density, you know. So that's one thing to think about while you're talking about, you know, high density, low density. It's just Mhm. It just seems like it's almost a trailer court to me. And so anyway, thank you very much.

Understand your concern. uh in in good evening. My name is [clears throat] Joe Ferguson. I uh have been working on this riverfront project for the last 20ome years. Uh this this piece of property sits next to the riverfront project and uh uh I walk through here every week on on my route around the riverfront and the property has never been maintained. I mean, it's not maintained today. If you go down there, the weeds are growing. There's there's dead branches laying all over. The property has never been maintained since it was originally a trailer park and uh now we're talking about taking it back to a trailer park. Um the community just spent the last 10 years and over $20 million building the riverfront, uh redoing Johnson Park, uh putting trails in. Um this pro piece of property is an embarrassment uh to the community. It has been for years. Uh you know uh if it was done right, this could be a showplace. The problem is the current owners are the same owners that are proposing to do the new project. And so their history tells us that this is not going to come out looking very good. Um,

you know, I there's a number of people that have worked for the last 20 years trying to develop the riverfront, the river. Now we have another project going on where the old alcoh showplace on this piece of property. This is not a what we're proposing here is not a showplace. It's another trailer park, glorified trailer park. You just took the wheels you just took the wheels off the trailers. Uh that's the only difference. And the other concern is the parking and the traffic. Uh we just spent a fortune building a new bridge and a roundabout and Brash Avenue has been completely redone. It's really beautiful down there, but we're talking about sticking another uh another project in the middle of all that work we've just completed and uh taking us right back to being another trailer park. If there's renters in here, you know, nothing against renters, but they don't take the same pride in their property as property owners. And so if it's going to be rental units, I would be 100% against it. Uh I'm concerned about parking. Uh most people have at least two cars. I don't know where you're going to get 40ome cars parked in there plus all those uh trailer parks or or all those miniature homes, whatever you want to call them. But anyway, I'm opposed to this project. there's a better use for this piece of property. Hopefully, the right project will come along. And, you know, I would like to

see a tiny home village in this in this town, but this is not the place for it. I originally worked on the uh uh project earlier on years ago to uh develop housing projects in this community. and uh uh we've done some some great projects over the years in this community, but we don't need to go backwards with a a project like this. So anyway, I hope you take all this into consideration and do the right thing. Thank you.

Thank you. Anybody else here this evening? My name is Ryan Hoffford. I am a member of the planning commission. Um, my votes on record, but by me being up here, I assume you know it already. Um, we do need some affordable housing in this area. Uh, and I do think this property needs reszone. I'm not against the tiny homes by any means. I don't think RT or R3 fits here, though. Um I haven't seen a map of the overlay of the surrounding zoning yet. There's not very much on that side of First Street for residential besides this one. Um I'll keep this short and sweet. This will be the first RT zone, I think, at all. Correct. I think this one needs to be airtight before we pull the trigger on the first one, especially next to a multi-million dollar park. [clears throat]

Thank you.

Hello, my friends. I am Ty Waznik. Um, one of the things I like to say in the counseling room is God does not give us grace for hypothetical situations. Um, I do think there needs to be more thinking on this. So, tableabling this and coming up with something um a little bit more um comprehensive would be prudent. Uh on the flip side of this, as a father uh with two boys, one in high school, one in college, conversations are often with the cost of rentals alone in apartments being almost or more than even our mortgage payment currently that we're having, how on earth do they get their feet on the ground? Um so I think in terms of discussing this, I think h having a subcommittee to figure this out would be prudent. uh the location would be um actually a nice location for that for some of the reasons given, but we don't have an idea of what that looks like and without that picture, it's very hard to make a decision. So, we're all arguing on hypotheticals. Um but considering it to be a trailer park, I would just remind you that one of the reasons why the tiny home movement um has come about is younger people trying to figure out how to get ahead, start off on life, and do so in a way that is economically prudent. Um so I would encourage all of us to be very gracious with our words um that we use in speaking um of this uh part of that being I agree with some that was mentioned that the ability to own the land that the house is put on particularly if it's on a permanent foundation is also a wise thing because again it helps uh those who are trying to get on their feet build equity and start off life in a way that is both wise and prudent uh would be beneficial to uh to everybody. So, from what I'm hearing from all of you, I think we need to hit the pause button, uh, figure this out, understand what the tiny house is in the first place, uh, because I think there's a lot

of misunderstanding. U, but this is an opportunity to solve that housing cost crisis. So, my kids who are getting to the point of needing to start off have that opportunity and they can stay in Northfor, not have to move elsewhere where housing is affordable. Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else? Okay, seeing no more discussion, anybody else want to come up? Nothing. Okay, with that being said, you've already read the planning commission report, correct? So, we will close the hearing. And with that, I would ask for a motion to consider uh item number 20, consideration of ordinance number 5967, approving a zoning change from R3 Multiple Family Residential District to RT Tiny House District on property address to 309 North First Street.

I would move for approval of ordinance number 5967 from uh R3 to RT on 309 North First Street. Second motion second. Further discussion.

Yeah, I'd like to just make a couple comments. I would like to thank the developers for coming in. This is a a great idea. I think the tiny homes is a an affordable option. Um and I think it's going to happen sooner than later. Um whether this is the location for it or not, I guess we'll we'll find out. But with all the information I think we received tonight, um I think it it certainly would behoove us to take a look at maybe a site plan and some renderings uh before we jump into a decision. That's my thought. And with that, um I'll allow for more discussion, but I I would actually recommend we we table this for another meeting. Well, what I'm looking at here is just the zone change. They still have to go through all the other planning and zoning and platting and everything else still has to come. So, it's not to say that that will come forward unless they comply with what we already have in in uh our code. And if there's something that we don't like, there's a time to pull the plug. But now, it's just the time to reszone. Give them a chance to prove what they're saying. So, I'm just I I'm for this for the fact that I'd rather see something like this try and go in. I mean, if you look at the ones that they have here in Yankton, look at something like that as opposed to what is there now. For God's sake, how long do we have to look at that? I'd rather look at something decent and give it a chance.

Sue, I don't disagree with you. Um, but would you also think that it'd be prudent just to get a little bit more information on this or do you think that we have enough in front of us? I think we have enough for what we're supposed to be doing right now. I think it has to go backward and then can come forward. But for right now, I think this is what we need to do. Look at the what we have in front of us. Okay. The zoning changes is pretty permanent. I mean uh so forward after that I yeah personally I I guess I'll let for other people give their opinions.

I'm going to ask for a vote to table it. So I like to call for a vote to table it. That's a second. Yeah, I'll second. Did you make that motion? I contemplated but I didn't actually. I'll make the motion we table and I'll second that motion. We have a motion to table. Now we can have notice. Okay. There will be no discussion on a table. So we have to vote.

Voting in the affirmative. Granquist Arns Langy Web Hildebrand. Voting in opposition. Beckman. Motion carries.

All right. We bring us to our regular agenda. Item number 21, consideration approval of change order number 2F with Elorn Paving Construction Company Incorporated for a concrete repair project 2024 resulting in a net decrease of 219,796.

All for consideration of through the approval of change order number two without court paving. Second.

All right. discussion would be led by Steve and councel. Uh the agenda item number 21 before you. I put I put both 21 and and item 22 uh on the agenda. Um just so that as we talk about the negative, we can talk about the the increase on 22 at the same time sort of. Um but what's before you here on on change order 2F with Elorn Paving is for the 2024 repair concrete repair project. Uh that project um as as discussed kind of in the in the agenda item um or background information included some substantial repairs on 18th Street between Center Drive and Pazwalk. As we as we um contemplated those improvements and started marking those out, uh additional conversation amongst the engineering staff recognized that 18th Street uh in that section from Center Drive up to Pazwalk is a substandard street. U it's got a series of of reverse curves on it. And so to to truly recognizing the multifamily housing, the location of the of a couple malls, uh more multifamily housing going up uh on Pazwalk um as well in that area. it was very desirable to uh look at that section of 18th Street um and uh take take steps to improve that to uh to make that a a standardized design. So with that with that consideration, um we backed off on those repairs. Uh and the the net uh the net of that project then is a decrease of $292,7796.

Any questions for Steve? Pardon? Any qu I thought you were done. No, you can you can go ahead with any questions for Steve on this um deduction. I see no questions. Any public questions? All right. Please vote.

All council members voting in the affirmative. Motion carries. All right. Consideration approval change order number one with Elurn Pavement Construction Inc. for the construction improvements 2025-1 project result in net increase of $296,240 45.74. I'll offer for consideration the approval of change order number one paving blackjack. We call that a push for a motion to second. [laughter]

Steve, I guess you're leading us in discussion here. Mayor and council, this is the 2025 uh concrete improvement project that was awarded to Elcorn Paving. um in light of the deduct occurring on uh on their 2024 contract and is a desire um as we hear over and over to get more and more street work done. Um we worked with Elorn Paving and extended some work uh throughout this contract uh to get more work done under under those um bid quantities. Uh we tried to manage that as close we could to make these a net zero. Um this is change order one. the the project is essentially essentially done. There's a concrete crushing component to it. Uh we've left about 40,000 in the contract for that crushing. Um I don't necessarily think we're going to spend it all. Um but there is only uh the final change order probably be coming forth here in the next two or three weeks, but again it was just, you know, kind of listening to the public, listening to council, a desire to get more work done. Uh, a lot of the work that we did extend here was on side streets. So, where we were working on a a section of street, uh, if there was work that needed to be done at the intersection of a side street, uh, we pushed that uh, anywhere from 50 to 100 ft down the side street to capture any repair. Um, so that when we got back into that area, we wouldn't have to disturb that intersection area anymore. um kind of falls under the once in once out, you know, kind of get it done if we can. So again, answer any questions you have around this change order.

Any questions for Steve? No, but I have one for Kylie. Go ahead. I'm just curious. I don't know, but project concrete improvements. Should that be 2026-1? No. No. Okay. No. Good question. Anybody else have any questions? Any member of the public have anything? All right, Steve, explain what's going on here. We have a motion, a second. No other discussion. Please vote. Item all council members present voting in the affirmative. Motion carries.

All right. On to number 23. Consideration approval engineering design services contract with JEO Consulting Group, Inc. for the Northfor Avenue Bridge UI75521025 red deck and widening project for the amount not to exceed 342,5 or $55. I'll make a motion for consideration of approval. Second. I have a motion to second. Steve, again, please leave some discussion here. Mayor, council, I'll go ahead and correct the spelling error here. Uh, this is a bridge deck uh and widening project. Uh, I apologize for that. Red deck. Um,

I was wondering what that was. [laughter] I was just hoping I was pronouncing it right.

It's like almost sounds like redneck. Um, but yeah, this is the the bridge deck and uh sidewalk widening project uh for the North Fork Avenue and uh uh and what I call the North Fork Avenue flood control bridge. I think everybody's aware that we've installed steel plates on the west side approaches on on that bridge deck. Um we have that in our CIP. I don't remember exactly. I I believe it's uh 28 29 uh 30 for design and construction. Um we've seen some deteriorated uh um some deteriorated um um how about deterioration? We've seen some deterioration of the abutment seat um on those bridge on that west approach of that bridge deck. Um, we knew that at some point here we were going to need a a bridge deck replacement on that. Uh, we've just been pushing that to get as much out of that as we could. Uh, here about three years ago, I think we put a 2-in overlay on that. Um, hoping to get that down to the the currently scheduled um, redecking for that. What I intend to do here with this project is move the design forward. Uh we've got about a 9-month design to get uh a nine-month period here to get the design done. Uh because we are in the flood control system, this will have to go to the core of engineers for review. Um anticipating that could take a minimum of six months upwards of nine months for final review and approval on that deck. Uh and then again following that we would um rep prioritize our one and sixyear program as we go through the budget cycle this year. and then antic in anticipation of bidding this and getting this reconstructed um

um as soon as uh the core of engineers approved approved our permit. Um, again, currently because we're going to do a whole new bridge deck, I believe it was about 15 years ago, I don't remember exactly, um, we extended the abupment seats on the south side when we put the sidewalk on the south side. Uh, so we're um, this design would do the same thing on the north side. It would extend the abutments uh, and then put a sidewalk on the north side. It would not be a wide trail like the south side. it would just be a narrower probably a five or six foot sidewalk on that north side. The other thing that is in here um there's third a little over $33,000 of this $342,000 is for designing a trail extension from Chestnut over to Cottonwood. You may recall here about two years ago. We worked at JO uh JO um uh had a college student as I recall, a UNL student that did the design for the trail from the top of the levey uh down to Chestnut there on the south side of Northfor Avenue. Um, but from from Chestnut West to Cottonwood, essentially the H High gas station, the sidewalk is a series of 4ft sidewalks, uh, driveways, uh, parking lots, uh, a little bit of sidewalk thrown in here and there. So, it's really from a from a conflict perspective for the pedestrians and bicyclists that are are using that to connect from our trail system along the river up to the levy. um there's a substantial amount of of uh potential for conflict on that stretch. So I think it's wise that we uh use this opportunity to go ahead and get that designed. Uh we wouldn't necessarily have to move that forward as a function

of construction. U but at least it would be designed. I think there's opportunities. We could look for trails grants uh as we would uh you know in a couple years maybe we get a trail grant and can complete that stretch on a trail grant. But just want you to be aware that that that is included. There is $33,000 in fee here that's for that uh design of that trail extension there on the south side of North Fork. So this is something proposed the deck is replaced 28 29 maybe 30. The bridge deck is currently proposed I think for 2029 and again as we would go through this year's budget and one and sixyear program I would look to move that up. Um

I guess my question is why are we moving it up? I mean is it is that the whole is just it's above it's detering faster than what we anticipated. The deck is essentially done. Okay. Um yeah Steve maybe hit on why that I don't know if it's a metal plate or what repair. I don't know if I'd even call it a repair as much as a jump almost, but right. So, what was done there is not

based on based on the time of year it was, there wasn't much else we could do at that time. So, we put a ste we put steel plates over it and then we did a very short asphalt approach. Um, you know, to get us to the reconstruction, those steel plates would stay there. Uh, we have a a 1.7 million asphalt mill and overlay project this summer. And so we would we would work with them to extend those approaches probably another 25 to 30 feet um to take that bump out of there. But that was my next question. So in the meantime, we're going to smooth that out here come spring.

Come spring. Yeah. I think that asphalt project uh my recollection is they're they're thinking they're going to show up mobilize late June. So about a 3 to four week project. But yeah, we would work with them to come in and do some milling over there uh to improve both the the approach going onto the deck and then the approach as you go over that steel plate the the approach you need about 30 ft on either side of that to feather that in. And we'd probably look to drill and bolt that in a little bit better than it is now so that it gets down the road for us about two and a half years. Any other questions?

Ly, can you uh look up exactly where that was at in our CIP so we know for sure? Yeah. If if when it comes time to do the bridge deck, what's the anticipated length of contract? It would be we anticipate constructing that under traffic. So, we would move uh we would move westbound eastbound traffic to one side of the bridge, rebuild the rebuild. So, we'd move everything to the south side, keep one lane open in each direction, build the north side, and then switch traffic and build the rebuild the south side. So, you'd have to take out a center median to do that. Yes. Yeah. That whole center median across there would come out. There would be a as a function of the crossover, there'd be a little bit of a crossover

that goes all the way to the roundabout. Yeah. Steve, I would say uh we talked about that. I'd say that is imperative for those businesses. They've been hit by the bridge replacements and taxed pretty heavily over the past few years with construction. So, we would have to make sure that stays open for them.

Yeah. And it's possible um we could look at rebuilding leaving traffic on the outsides. Um that's, you know, we would I would say we would not just cross that off without looking at it more thoroughly, but it's possible. um we could take out the center median on the bridge, the two inside lanes, keep traffic on the outside and then um so then we wouldn't really have to do any kind of a crossover and then flip the traffic to the inside and redo the outside lanes. Um so well, you know, that that would just be part of the alternatives analysis process in the in the design. [clears throat] Well, I think the important thing to remember what we're discussing here, we're discussing a design contract being issued. We're not talking about when it's going to be built or anything like that, but there are some elements in this design that, you know, we've got uh possibility of the feds looking at it and slowing us on up. I think it's imperative that we get this passed this evening regardless of any I concepts of when the when the CIP may fall into place. We need to have this design in place so that if an element came in from the federal government or they said well no you can't do that and your your permit's going to be much longer then we've got that time frame but we don't have that if we don't get going on this design. So I think we need to stay on point and discuss the design. Yeah.

And the design alone, design contract alone. So right right now we have design scheduled for 2032, fiscal year 2032 and construction in fiscal year 2035. So we're moving we'd be moving design up to fiscal year 2026. And I would anticipate we would be um probably awarding a contract in uh late fiscal year 2027, early fiscal year 2028 with the majority of construction probably occurring in 2029. Well, again, that's that's pending design.

That's pending design. And like I say, as we go through the one and sixyear program and as we go through this year's budgeting cycle, we would we would look at our at our high at our chaff budget and just re reshift those things. What I do believe is going to happen here and I have started looking at how this would get funded and and again as we would go through that budget but what I anticipate is um about this is going to be about 3.8 million. I would anticipate about two to 2.3 million coming out of city highway allocation funds and probably about 1.5 million coming from the uh sales tax. So we're anticipating around 6 and a half 7 million coming from the sales tax. Um the current fiscal the current budget anticipates 5 million of the sales tax going into street repair. So that leaves that leaves a million and a half or so for for something like this. and doing this design services was in the budget also.

It's I have the cash I have the cash flow in the budget to do that. It's currently scheduled for 2032. So, we're we're upping that um to now fiscal year 2026. Like I say, there's I have the reserves in the budget to manage manage that. Right. Any further discussion? Anybody from the public? Any discussion from public? Please come forward now. Jim McKenzie, just one question. Well, maybe two. Um, so the 3.8 million, is that including the trail or is that just the bridge redeck? Currently, the 3.8 a million would be the bridge redeck, the addition of the sidewalk on the north side and the sidewalk connection on the north side more more east. Uh currently there is sidewalk trail for say in that northwest corner by the auto dealer. Uh that's part of our trail system, but as you go east to the roundabout on the north side, there's no sidewalk. So, as we would put that sidewalk across the levy, we would need to extend that east to the roundabout.

So, that's part of that 3.8 million or not? That's part of that 3.8 million. Yeah. Okay. Okay. But the the sidewalk, the trail extension on the south side of Northfor, again, other than just using this as an opportunity for the design, no, that's not part of that. Okay. Estimate. Okay. Um, and then the other thing I'm going to bring up again is we didn't bid this. So, no bid. No, we don't bid engineering services.

Okay. Again, I think we need to do that. How do we know that we're getting the best deal on engineering services? I mean, fully just ding the governor himself on giving away contracts to people without bidding. So, I understand there's an exception for it. I think we need to change that. Thank you. discussion. Please vote. All council members present voting in the affirmative. Motion carries.

Right. Me bring this item 24. Consideration approval award contract of to award a contract to IMP Construction LLC in the amount of $412,4453 cents for Liberty Bell mini pitch project. I'll offer for consideration the [clears throat] approval of award contract to IMP construction. Second. You have a motion to second. Nate will lead us in discussion. Honor, I'd like to note at this time that I will be abstaining from voting on this item. Okay. As is apparent in the document.

Mayor and Council, thank you. Um this is a um a project that's been uh in the works for for some time. Um this is a a mini pitch project for Li Liberty Bell Park. It is a soccer arena um type facility. has walls on the side, similar to an ice rink, but it would have goals on both ends and then two sets of goals in the middle as well. So, there's there's basically um there' be six goals um available for use for our soccer community um within that within that um area. um great for little kids and great for soccer players that um want to learn the skills um for um I guess they call it pitching, you know, for um soccer pitching. Um, so, um, this came about, um, with with a with a donor, um, um, I want to go ahead and I'll go ahead and name all the the donors involved here, but this did start with, um, Ryan and Brooke Anderson who, um, wanted to donate $125,000 towards this project. Um, they went ahead and, uh, kind of got the ball rolling, had the vision, and it's something that they've wanted to see in our community for some time. um they also were able to secure a grant for $50,000 in addition to that um because of their donation. And then um we uh sent this out for bid as well um as we wanted to see what other um donors might be available um to actually um see this project through. We didn't know where it would where it would fall. Um we certainly didn't believe it would be 412,000 but um once you look at all the the prep work that needed and the groundwork that needed to be done um um it went a quite a bit higher. Um so we were um talking with the contractor and um IMP construction um they're um donating another $56,000

of services. Big Rock Readymix is going to come up with almost 19,000. um BVJ construction, another 24,000. We also have some remaining funds in our Colar donation which we've stretched quite far. We've got the team lockers done, the the back stops um at at Taha, the um fishing dock, and also the boat ramp is all been part of those funds. Um this is the remaining uh funds. And then urban soccer came back and discounted us another 13,000. That's a total of $328,000 in donations, grants, and partnerships. And um that would bring the estimated city cost to $84,000. Um we have 55,000 remaining in the Liberty Bell improvement funds. And we also have um the other the other 30,000 would need to come from a a project that we have or or council priority dollars. Um but the plan would be to to forego the fourth street fence a tennis court fence um replacement this year put that on to next year and that's another 30,000 that would get us to our 85,000 that we need to um see this project through. Um we will be asking for other donations as we go but um we're we're um we've come a long way to this point. We think we're ready to go. Any other questions on this? Good work, Nate, getting all those.

Yeah, right. That's a lot of people involved in one project. Yeah. Thanks, Nate. Thank you. Any other comments from the council? Any comments from the public?

I'm Joe Myers. I'm the boys head soccer coach at Northfor High School. I'm speaking on behalf of myself, uh not on behalf of the school district, uh per se. Um [clears throat] yeah, this project has been talked about for a long time. has kind of been a dream of uh pretty much the soccer community in our town to provide um better access for our um young people to um just be able to go and play pickup soccer kind of like uh what people are able to do with lots of other sports like basketball where the courts are open, lots of tennis courts where tennis, you know, you they're accessible. Um you don't have to pay to play at those um places. I think that's really key to get um people playing. a lot of the athletes that I coach at the high school level um you know are relying on basically um our community to provide some opportunities for them to play the game that they that they really love. Um so yeah, I think this project I like the fact that it's in a it's proposed to be built in a very accessible location. Super important to me. I know that um lots of people have said to us in the past um that there's, you know, fields down south of town out by the airport. I think those are all fantastic. Like that was uh super big step forward for our community to have those kind of fields. Um those are privately owned by the Express Soccer Club. This is an opportunity just like the fields that are found over at um off the off of Benjamin at the fire training station fields um often called in in my circle of soccer the the La Liga fields because a lot of our Hispanics use that um to access fields for playing on Sundays and for training and stuff like that. It's just open. Kids can ride their bicycles over there and play the game of soccer. They can walk over there from the apartments around there from the middle school, from the high school and so on. So, I think that um um you

know, this is money well spent. I think um and and I would never want us to build facilities that aren't being used. To me, I think this is a I think this is an example of a place where you're going to see it being used a lot. Um I think it will be used by um you know, uh people from all different ages um just because of the way that it's kind of set up there. And honestly, um, I hope that this gets approved because as you can see, there's been a lot of, uh, community input into this project, um, and and for the game of soccer as a whole. And I think that, um, this is building momentum to continue, um, you know, the comm community coming together to build facilities, to cooperate together. Um, you can see the success of, uh, soccer growing in our community with what's happening at Northeast Community College. Um, and I think that they're going to get excited about collaborating with uh with the city and the Norfol public schools and all the other entities that are are using sport as a way to like help our um our young people do positive things, stay connected uh to the schools. From my perspective, we're helping kids be successful um in the classroom by giving them giving them these kinds of opportunities. So, I hope you do consider this uh you know project. Um, as you can see, a lot of money has been privately u funded. I think um if we move forward um with these kind of projects, you're going to see kind of a snowball effect for the next project. Like when people see that this project is happening and they see the result of it, then they're going to be excited about the next project because I think there really is a need. We only have one uh turf field in town. Yes, there's lot some grass fields and so on, but we really the city has one turf field. We all rely on it. I think there's a need for another couple of fields to be um covered with turf that can be used not just for soccer but for multisports. Um and I think this is a step in the right

direction. When we support projects like this then the next projects are going to find uh more support as we go forward. So as you can see there's a there's people are putting their money where uh where their mouth is and they're saying hey this is something that we really want to support going forward. So thank you for your time. Thank you.

[snorts]

Mayor and Council, my name is Dale Koy and I appreciate the opportunity to speak tonight. Um, first I wanted to start off by commending uh Nate Powell on his ability to find creative ways to sponsor new projects in town. I guess I had one question about um with that green space is getting to be very dense with the addition of the pickle ball courts and now with this uh they took away some parking for the uh uh softball field for the uh handicap accessibility. So I'm wondering uh there's no no consideration for parking. I went down there just before the meeting and counted. There's 15 spots on the east side, 15 spots on the west side. So that's 30 spots. So, and also with egress in and out, if you had double rows of parking there to get cars in and out of there. I mean, I worked for the parks department for almost 10 years when Liberty Bell was open, that parking lot was almost inaccessible with cars getting in and out of there. So, it's great to have these new amenities, but we have to look at the whole picture. we can't just focus on the tree. We got to look at the forest. So, that would be my one concern. And it's probably a little late in the game to to address that. Um even even the dynamics of the church when the church was there, I think that a lot of overflow parking for the softball went into the church, but now it's a mortuary, so they could have funerals there every day. So, that that opportunity has dissipated. Um, and then just knowing from sitting up there where you guys are and working in the parks department for 10 years, every time you add something to the park system, there's a legacy cost that nobody sees. Um, that's great that we got the money to pay for this court, but going forward, you're going to be paying

that for the end of time. When you buy a house, you got to paint it. You got to put new windows in it. You got to maintain it. Same with your vehicle. any any feature that the city has is going to take costs going forward. Costs that no one sees. It's the bottom part of the iceberg. So, I guess moving forward, I just hope you guys realize those costs are there, too. Um I just, you know, it's kind of off topic, but I can't imagine what we were spending to maintain Johnson's Park before and what we're what's costing us now to maintain Johnson's Park. It's got to be exponentially greater. But just keep that in consideration. But thank you for your time.

Thanks for bringing that up, Dale. That brings up a good point, Nate. Is can we start putting a cost of what maintenance looked like? Obviously, we're cutting the grass before it was there. So,

yeah, we also we're running a pool and so a lot of things come to their useful life and we we move on from that project. Um, and we do new things. I mean, that's that's, you know, we're also um with all the things that we've added. I I have a full list here. Um things that we've added, but we have not increased our our full-time staffing budget. We did a little bit of part-time staffing budget increase for the ice rink just to get through the winter, but we've become more efficient. You've you've allowed us the council's allowed us to buy equipment that's that's be better suited for our needs and um that helps us um work smarter, not harder. And uh we continue to do that. I still don't have a request for for additional staff coming this year at all. So, I think we're doing well. Um, you know, we can always, you know, we always we have a lot we have more, you know, more to do than we can handle sometimes, but we, um, bring in the summer staff to to to work through those peak seasons in the summertime. So, um, but we've been doing that, um, you know, for for many years and we just continue to do that. So,

I just make a comment. I think the parks um did an excellent job working with the private donors in this case. So, um job well done. Thank you. Any additional comments? Thank you to the donors. Wouldn't be possible without them. I do think though, Nate, just not that [clears throat] a lot hinges on it, but just have an understanding like with the equipment, the the value of the equipment going into it. What's the 10-year projection? Just so we have an understanding and it just more informs the citizens, informs the council of what what the cost is to own it. Yep. Yep. So, thank you.

Right. Any additional questions from Nate? Right. Anyone else? Anyone going once, twice? Okay, no additional comments. Please vote.

Voting in the affirmative. Granquist, Arns, Web, Hildebrand, Beckman abstaining. Langy motion carries. Right. On to item number 25, consideration ordinance number 5968 amending section 2-5 of the city code to update miscellaneous parks and recreational fees. I'll make a motion for consideration ordinance number 5968. Second motion, a second. Um Nate's going to lead us in discussion here.

Okay, so yep, we just have a few um fees. We try to address fees annually. um small increases um are generally better. Um um the few fees that we have here tonight are the youth athletic fees from 11 to $12. Most of our contracts are in for the year. So this is really looking at beyond uh this summer. Um the RV parking RV um park site fee is 27 to $28 another dollar increase. Private swim lessons from 15 to 20 and that would be to cover our u minimum wage um requirements. um that we are we have um and those are the the three that that we have before you today. Are there any questions?

You had mentioned that the minimum wage adjustment did kind of do a number to you guys a little bit and is making you adjust some of these fees. Yeah, that that's correct. Yep. So that was um um about a $70,000. That's right. $7,000 increase. I think somebody had asked that question. I don't remember it was but asked what that minimum wage had done to park B and it was a 70 million or $70,000 increase. So, and this is just the result of that. Yep. Nate, I just have a question. I'm just looking through the packet. Uh, and when I was going through it, I I mean, I see like a dollar increase on most of these things,

but I mean, generally, I'm just asking as a question. Generally, when you do like youth versus adult, there's a price difference. And here we've got kind of the same prices. Um, I guess I'm just kind of wondering why. If you go to the movies and you're a child, you get a lower price than you do if when you're an adult. And I just they're the same price. I was just kind of wondering. Um the adult fee um the adult athlete fee should be 15. Um I was kind of looking at like youth practice um per athlete $12 and the same as adult practice per athlete. I'm on page 161.

Okay. The same goes with page 163. I was just kind of wondering why they were the same. Okay. Yep. For memorial, we have it at 15. So, you're right. We do not have an adult fee for um Taha. It's something we could we could bring forward. Um but we have not we have not done that yet. Yep. But we do have it at at Memorial. An adult fee for Memorial is 15, not 12. Okay. Okay. Yeah, I was just wondering. We don't have it at Taha. So, it's something we can we can adjust next time. Okay. Yep.

Just thought. Thank you. Question, Sue. Um, anything else? Members of the public have any questions for Nate on the fee structure? Okay. Seeing uh more discussion, please vote. short title or I'm sorry, we need a short title, please. An ordinance of the city of Norfor, Nebraska to amend section 2-5 of the official city code to update parks and recreation fees by increasing the private swim lesson fee, increasing the regular campsite fee, and increasing the per athlete rates for use of city's baseball, softball, football, soccer, tennis, and cross country facilities. and to provide when this ordinance shall be in full force in effect and to provide for the publication of this ordinance in pamphlet form.

Now you can vote. All council members present voting in the affirmative. Ordinance number 5968 carries on first reading. I'll make a motion to suspend the rules and wave the second and third readings. Second. All right. A motion and second. Any discussion? Seeing none, please vote. All council members voting in the affirmative. Ordinance number 5968 carries on second and third.

All right. That moves to item number 26. Consideration approval to purchase a replacement excavator in the amount of $116,434.33 for a Bobcat of Norfor off of Norfor off of the state of Nebraska contract. Oh, sorry. Motion for consideration of approval. Oh, it's from sorry from Bobcat of North. Second. We have a motion to second. Chad's going to lead us in discussion.

Yeah. Thank you, Mayor Councel. Uh before you hear is the approval to purchase a excavator for the water and sewer divisions. This is a shared purchase. So with that uh 50% of it will be paid by water, the other 50% by sewer, and then the s the water will pick up the tax also for that that purchase. Uh we do have that currently in our CIP right now. Uh we had $212,732 uh allocated for this purchase. Um going through the state contract, uh we got a 33% discount on the unit, which brought it down to the $116,434.33. Our current unit that we right now we have right now is a 20-y year old model. We bought it in two 2006. Um over the last four or five years, we've had extensive use with it with a street division. Um starting to see some wear and tear on it a little bit. Nothing major, but it's starting to see some age on it. So, uh looking at getting approval to purchase this new unit

and the old what is what's anticipation with the older? So, right now we're looking at possibly moving that one over to the transfer station for the use of when their boom goes down. which the boom the boom goes down. Okay. Yep. Yeah. They actually had it last week for a couple of days and All right. Fortunately, I got it back on Friday afternoon when we had our event Friday night. So, 212,000 budgeted. Got that down quite a bit. Yeah. 212 was uh budgeted for it. We got it for 116 is our So, any other questions? All right. Thank you.

All right. Thanks, Nate or Chad. I'm sorry. Anybody else? Additional questions for Chad. Audience discussion. All right. Seeing none, um please vote. All council members present voting in the affirmative. Motion carries. We're adjourned.