City Council - Regular Meeting

Or a picture picture for clients.

It helps too with

staying here tight. I haven't performed.

Okay. We're gonna go ahead and get started. K. You now call the complaints that accounts meeting to order March 2 at 7PM. Please rise for the pledge allegiance.

I pledge allegiance to of States Of America, and to the republic of which it stands, one nation, under valid, indivisible, liberty, and justice for all. One one thing before we approve it or we move on consent agenda, we did receive news recently of the passing of former city councilor Michelle McCall Wallace. We hope to be able to communicate more soon with the public when we learn more, but for now, we just ask that you all honor her memory and her service to our city. She was a a member of the council and somebody who was respected. So just please, if you would care for family your thoughts and prayers.

Okay. At this time, we will entertain a motion on the approval of the con or sorry, the consent agenda and the council amendments through the seventeenth.

Right of order. Yeah.

Right. This

is why you're here too. Laurie, can

you please call? I'm so sorry. So sorry.

Mayor Dunbrough? Present. Councilor Forge? Present. Councilor Papen? Present. Councilor Redding? Present. And councilor River? Present. Thank you.

Thank you, council president.

I didn't think it pushed the.

Okay. So now I entertain a motion for the approval of the February 2 and February 17 minutes, and we can send to check that.

Leader Dunbar, I'm gonna make a small minute. Certainly. Mhmm. For revision. Then and I apologize.

This is a

paragraph. I I just wanna get the TGM notes kind of dialed in because I think they'll be referenced later. So under unfinished business, I prefer if it would say councilor before to recap previously identified valuation categories between impact and fiscal impact, infrastructure affordability and long term fiscal sustainability, proposed adding zoning alignment as an additional consideration, discussed sequencing zoning code updates prior to potential expansion to reduce unintended land use outcomes. Council expressed general agreement that early modernization is important consideration of future growth plans. Council also discussed the importance of the pack representative gathering and relaying information consistent with council direction without committing the council to specific outcome and affirm that final right use decisions remaining with the council.

Which minute? This is under unfinished.

For 02/02 or 02/17? No. '17. Right.

K. So if you can send that to Laurie for updates. Yep.

I sent it earlier. It's fine.

Okay. So is there anybody object to that change? Right? No. No. So I need to do I need to remove. We need to wait on that one then. Right? No. No. The second.

Did you have some other things? No. I was just saying that I found the motion.

No. There is no motion. Oh, your oh, your motion was to revive you. I'm sorry. Okay. Sorry. I misunderstood you. Is there a second to to prove as amended?

Councilor Redding, I will approve as amended. Second?

K. Councilor Forge moves. Councilor Redding seconds. All in favor of approving the minutes as amended, aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carries.

Aye. Okay.

Alright. At this time, I'd like to welcome Russ Sheldon and to to the public comment. And we're council, we're not gonna time this one. He's this is something special special situation. He requested extra time, so we're just gonna let him He's he's pushed the button.

Okay.

Thank you.

Thank you. Russ Sheldon. I'm a resident in the city of Northglades, and I'm here to essentially honor the service of her nurse and his contributions to the city of our country tonight by reading his obituary. Herbert Hearst was born in Albany, New York to Helen Hearst, Helen Howe, and Harry Hurst. He spent his formative years in Albany, Mount Vernon, and Schenectady, New York, and graduated from Fryburn Academy in Maine.

In 1956, he joined the US Army Reserve and served as a private at Fort Drum, New York. He attended officer candidate school in 1960, graduating as a second lieutenant and was stationed at Fort Lewis, Washington in 1964. In 1965, Herb began helicopter pilot training at Fort Walters, Texas, graduating in 1966. He was then deployed to Vietnam for a year as a helicopter gunship pilot in Battery a second battalion twentieth artillery first cavalry division. During his service in Vietnam, he earned the distinguished flying cross, bronze star, and the air medal with 15 oak leaf clusters.

After returning to Texas from Vietnam in 1967, Herb served as a helicopter instructor and left active duty in 1969. After his military service, Herb moved to Oregon and worked for the state of Oregon emergency services division and later with the department of human resources. In 1979, he relocated to Portland to join the state health division. Throughout his tenure, he managed purchasing services, served as acting assistant manager at the Oregon Public Health Laboratory, manager for the Oregon Medical Examiner's Office, administered the office of health status monitoring, and was assistant administrator for administrative services. In 1995, he became business administrator for the Department of the Oregon State Police and retired in 1998 completing twenty one years of service to the state of Oregon.

Herb continued his military career in the US Army Reserve serving in the hundred and fourth division in Vancouver, Washington and later in 1972 with the three hundred and sixty fourth civil affairs brigade in court. He retired as a US army colonel in 1991. Herb married Cindy Duras in 1979, and together they moved to North Plains in 1980. Despite a busy work life, Herb dedicated time to volunteering in his community. He served two years on the North Plains Planning Commission and was a member of the city council from 1983 to 2008 except for four years when his wife was mayor.

He also enjoyed announcing the North Plains elephant garlic festival parade for many years. Following his retirement from the state of Oregon, Herb was appointed by the governor to the environmental health registration board, the sanitarians registration board, and the board of cosmetology. He continued to volunteer for the Washington County Fair Board and the Washington County Planning Commission. Herb participated in the Department of Defense and the support of Guard and Reserve and spent twelve years working in security and logistics for the Hillsborough International Air Show. He became a ham radio operator and served on the board for Oregon Valley amateur radio club for many years.

Herb was a member of the Forsboro American Legion Post two, Martin j Ryan, VFW Post twenty six sixty six in Hillsboro, the Vietnam Helicopter Pilots Association, Military Officers Association of America, Distinguished Flying Cross Association, aerial rocket artillery association, and reserve officers association. He cherished his time in the military and enjoyed participating in living history day events in the Portland area where he engaged with high school students. Herb is survived by his wife, Cindy, his daughter, Kelly Hunter, his brother, Ronald of Clay, New York, and three sisters and brothers in law, Carol and Steve Nolan of Hillsboro, Colleen and Steve Palmer of Saint Helens, Corinne and Blake Landon of Hillsboro, sister-in-law Kathy Robb of Tampa, Florida, and former brother-in-law Burdette Robb of Harrison, Michigan. Burbin Cindy also share over 38 nieces, nephews, great nieces, and nephews, and great great nieces and nephews. He was preceded in death by his parents, his brother Donald, and his infant son Joshua.

And tonight, I just wanna recognize her for his service, twenty three years of service to the city, twenty one of those on the council, and his devoted and selfless consecration to the service of of our country and the armed forces of the United States. Thank you. Thank you, Russ. I appreciate that. And while I

did not personally know Herb, it's always amazing to hear people's military backgrounds and and other backgrounds, but military to me is is personal.

Yeah. Well, I appreciate that. We laid him to rest in a beautiful military tribute down at the old Scottish church after the services, and it was pretty fitting for a guy who really put it out there.

Thank you. Thank you so much for sharing. You too. K. Let's try to pull that one out. So next item on the agenda will be resolutions. So resolution twenty three thirty four pointing Anna Warrington to city council for the remaining remainder of a term ending in 12/31/2026. At this time, I'll let I'll entertain a motion.

Make a motion, councilor Weber, for the approval of resolution number twenty three thirty four.

Aye. Councilor Weber moves to for approval of twenty three thirty four. Do I have a second?

Second. Oh.

Councilor Higgins seconds. All those in favor, say aye.

Aye. Any

opposed, say nay. Motion carries. And if you sorry. Councilor Harrington, if you'd like to come up, we'll swear you with well, not we. The royal. The only person that's really in charge here.

Nice. It turned off, so I'm sure it's it's here in front of the mayor, please. Raise your right hand and repeat after me. I, state your name. I, Ann Warrington.

Swear that I will faithfully support the constitution and laws Swear that I will faithfully support the constitution and laws Of The United States Of America and of the state of Oregon. Of The United States Of America and the state of Oregon and the charter and ordinances of the City Of North Plains and the charter and ordinances of the City Of North Plains. And I will perform the duties of city councilor for the City Of North Plains. And I will perform the duties of city councilor for the City Of North Plains. To the best of my ability so long as I may continue in that capacity, so help me God. To the best of my ability so long as I may continue in that capacity,

so help me God. Congratulations.

Thank you. Thank you.

Working with some for the council or, like, to say before I move up?

I have no words of wisdom right now, but I do want to express my gratitude. I'm looking forward to working with all of you over the next few months. So thank you, and thank you your patience. I'm sure you're going to extend today. Thank you. Thank you all. Thank you. Thank you, everyone.

Well, please. Okay. Next item is the resolution twenty two nine six, North Plains Parks and Rec Board bylaws. All the now retain a motion. Council?

Councilor Reddy. Did we have the city attorney look over the bylaws at all?

I did not, but I don't know if anyone in my office did. I

didn't. We don't have the past. We could be.

Not my recollection, no. We've never had any with the bylaws.

Mean Other comments or resolutions?

Councilor, how you get on here? I do have one comment for it the bylaws does cover aspects that would also be touched

upon within the umbrella policy. Is that an issue with the bank? Or

Councilor Vagadorn, the the policy?

Oh, the the umbrella policy, the committee The subcommittee. Subcommittee. Sorry.

I guess, broadly speaking, I don't know

because I don't know what the

Yeah. I mean, I've never seen like, we're gonna have a work session. We'll talk about the plan is to have a work session to go to kind of get an update on all that. I mean, potentially. But until city council adopts new ordinance that changes the code for the parks board, they need they these are just their bylaws until any changes are done on you all. So I don't know the answer because I we haven't had that work session yet.

Okay.

I I think to add to that, the bylaws, you know, in the future can be changed, but they do have bylaws. Correct?

Yeah. That's kind of the the odd thing about all this is, they're breaking the law by not having bylaws.

It's in the code. That's so

weird. I mean, that's, you know Yeah. That's a way to put it. But, yeah, they

They're they're not in place. Bylaws. Well, they

they need laws to conduct themselves. Right. The thing to remember about the bylaws is that is that 80 to 90% of that document is actually the code itself

Okay.

About the park's board and what it does and who it is and how they get there. And, really, the only original information in the bylaws that they came up with based on what the EDC's bylaws are have to do with things like how naughty do you have to be before you get a recommendation to counsel to be, you know, be to be booted. They're allowed to do subcommittees, and there's rules for that. No more than three, a non court group. You know, things like that, just sort of how they conduct themselves, but the code doesn't tell them how to do it.

And it's pretty difficult for most boards that I've been on that have adopted bylaws, and I've written a lot of them. So with that, any other discussion or motions?

Councilor Redding here. I I don't wanna belabor the process, and I fully support accountability for attendance and conduct. However, the phrase allowing removal if a member acts in a manner, quote, deemed contrary to board goals is subjective and does not define a clear threshold of pro or process that could unintentionally blur the line between misconduct and policy disagreement.

Yeah. I believe if I read the hold on. What page is that on the bylaws? It's

Forty seven?

Forty six?

Yeah.

Sorry. One seventy.

Yeah. So Can I just conduct in meeting section four? Article six section four that we're talking about.

I don't have it in front of me.

You can let me see.

No. That's I don't think. They can do these.

Yeah. Article four.

It's and basically, it says That should they can recommend the council, but for well, it doesn't give them any break, is fine because they can like, just like any subordinate board, they can recommend, and then cancel us to make a decision. I mean, I I could recommend the lowest up to cover. I don't think she's gonna pay attention. Mean, that that's just my 2¢. I mean, I'm I'm being a little bit funny, but at the same time, I think they can recommend. It's up to us to make the decision as what the council's function would be. If does that answer your question? Like, you're concerned, or is it still a concern?

I I mean, I just it sounds like you wanna clear an objective language, and so that's what I've been focusing on. And it's just I feel like tightening the language to include objective standard, a defined attendance special, written notice, and an opportunity to respond while keeping final removal authority with counsel. It strengthens accountability and protects the city from claims of arbitrary or politically motivated removal.

Because we're going to do an overlay or an an over action Mhmm. Policy, can we would it be okay if that was part of the overarching policy and is amended in the future so they can have bylaws?

Mhmm. K.

So does anybody wanna make a motion?

I'm new to adopt resolution twenty two ninety six to approve bylaws for North Plains Parks Board with the provisions outlined by councilor.

Exactly are the provisions? The

I have them written down.

But it but that didn't come. Oh my god. I

withdraw the motion.

Or you have to be very specific. So the they you either need to approve it or send it back. Because if we what I'm referring to is when we when the subcommittee presents there within the work session, we will send it to all of the boards to say, make sure that your bylaws are aligned to this, and then that will be the time we're going to change it. That was my suggestion. But, I mean, it's up to you all. I'm just I'm just telling you that's the process. So we either need to approve it or send it back to March board. But because yeah. I'll stop it. So thoughts? Motions?

I

move to adopt resolution twenty two ninety six to approve bylaws for the Northland's board.

Alright. I have a motion for councilor Baker Orange to approve twenty two ninety six. Do I have a second? I'll second. Okay, councilor. Four seconds. All in favor of approving resolution twenty two ninety six, say aye.

Aye. Aye.

Opposed? Motion carries. K. So just on that note, I will suggest to the subcommittee when we do the work session, let's make sure that comes up, that we ensure it's clear objectives so that we can if there's anything that we would like different, then it's noted. Right now, we have five of us And we're out of the hot water. Next is an ITA intergovernmental agreement. Sorry. We're Resolution twenty three thirty six, broadband user group intergovernmental agreement. And I am going to give this to Bill. Do you have the staff report? Okay. Bill has the staff reports.

Thank you, mayor. So resolution twenty three thirty six, basically, if approved by council, we join the other nearly 18, jurisdictions in Washington County that have, for a while now, coordinated basically on Internet connection. As you can imagine, if if the city were to call up Comcast and say, we need Internet service, they would say great. But then we say, but we need one secure line. We need wireless.

We need assurances that police and the county also needs a separate line that we need to hear, like like, complications on and on, that make being a public agency getting an Internet service kind of special. So Bug, which has been around for a while, is basically just most of the cities and many of the emergency service operators that coordinate on negotiating Internet service needs, from whoever the the primary vendor is. And it it's been Comcast successfully by bid for a little while. But either way, over the years, that's also meant, the addition to the system of a GIS platform that also kind of enables infrastructure and emergency services information between agencies. So this IGA is basically a cleaned up version of the one that was, originally done years ago.

This the group is so called broadband users group, but broadband is an antiquated term, and there were some antiquated terms and things in the old agreement that this just brushes up. As the staff report says, the city is charged about $4,600 a year for this service as part of the bug. And most of that, I believe all of it, actually, is reimbursed to us by MAC and enrollee. So at the end of the day, we pay. So council, you know, we have to approve those expenditures, but they get reimbursed to us. So but it's still technically up front end expenditures, so why we're also here. So that's the nature of the resolution. And if you approve it, then it authorized me to sign that IGA and continue service, moving forward. And just

to clarify, this is effectively a collective bargaining with Comcast, which is in our favor because Comcast otherwise, we're running a month. So any questions, comments, thoughts, motions?

I make a motion that we approve. There is a question.

Councilor Warren councilor Warren.

Question. Thank you.

Yes.

Councilor Warren. I don't know much about the broadband user group or bug as it's known for. I did a little bit of research on it. And if you Google the broadband user group impact data centers and it comes up, yes. It impacts it by driving demand, ship shop or I'm sorry, shaping regulations and infrastructure development.

So, of course, our city is, not database pro. Yep. It's not not a good thing for most of the people who live here, if you look at our voting record. I'm not opposed to this bug, resolution two three three six. However, I would like to make a notion that we add a clause into the agreement or this proposal, that says, comma, or create a pathway for any data center activity in North Plains just to make it clear for our people who live here that, this isn't about data centers at all.

I just wanted to make that clear for people here, that this isn't a way, shape, or form associated with that, so we're all on the same page.

K. I think modifying an IgA is that would require a significant amount of process. Correct?

The IgA as it's presented in the packet is re

agreed.

You know, the language is kind of put together and reviewed by all the different representative attorneys. So it would be us petitioning the broader all the other agencies to add that provision specific to North Plains. So I guess what I would say is, you all should deliberate whether or not you want us to do that, but that's what that would mean.

So this motion that this resolution isn't just for North Plains, all of the cities, 18 cities sign the exact same resolution?

That's correct. Correct. But, yeah, it's it's just an agreement between all the government and the government entities to negotiate for broadband pricing for this specific one. Any other comments or motions?

I'll move. I move to adopt resolution twenty three thirty six to approve the broadband users group intergovernmental agreement.

Moved by councilor to approve resolution twenty three thirty six. Do I have a second?

Councilor Weber, I would second.

Then moved by councilor, seconded by councilor Weber. All in favor, say aye.

Aye. Any

opposed? Motion carries. And I I understand your concerns, councilor. I just wanna make sure that we don't end up in a bad situation with broadband because that also feeds our emergency operations center.

Understood.

And now I'm going to turn it over to Emily who gets part two.

Yep.

I am going to give a training on some topics. And those of you who were here a year ago, Ashley Driscoll from my office gave her some more training. There are some difference. I've added some things, but, generally, it's Bear

with me. Point thumbs up. So

okay.

Let's see. Yeah.

Okay.

So my goals in giving this presentation are not to make you an expert. My goal is to try to give you the tools to recognize issues as you proceed in your role on the council. And then once you recognize those issues, come to me or staff for assistance. The topics for tonight are council's authority, public meetings, public records, decision making, and government ethics laws. And I have a little asterisk on public meetings because the the GDC now requires that you take a approximately two hour public meetings training once per term.

And so I am going to just do that very briefly because you guys are either have already or will very soon take a two hour training, so I'm not gonna focus on that one too much.

Is is the BEH training on the Emily's side of the oh, sorry.

Ashley.

Ashley, sorry. Send this last time. Does that still serve me another new one?

No. So I I my understanding was that that the it was, like, certified, approved by OGEC through, like, the summer, but I don't know for sure. So let me I'll find that out and let you know because we do have a our own training posted that OGEC approved for that.

Okay. I just wanna make sure we're all in compliance.

You are. If you watched it, it's good.

Okay. Good.

You're done for your term. Good. Yeah. So first, we'll talk briefly about your form of government. So your charter creates a council manager form of government. That means that all powers are reserved to council as a body unless they're delegated to someone else. Council sets the general policies for the city. The mayor serves as the political head of the city, and the city manager is responsible for the administrative or day to day affairs of the city. This means that individual councilors and the mayor have no power individually. Right?

Council conducts its business as a body. So individual councilors and the mayor have no independent authority to act for the city. It's also a division of authority between the council and the city manager, the council manager form of government. So council acts through ordinances for legislative decisions, resolutions for administrative decisions, and orders for quasi judicial decisions. And we're gonna talk I'm gonna, like, table that, and we'll talk about the types of decisions a little later.

This slide was left over from Ashley's. I'm not gonna read I don't like reading big lots of texts and slides, but it lays out it shows that the charter says what the council does, what the mayor does, and what the council does.

Okay.

Generally, the express approval of a majority of a quorum is necessary for a council decision. And your charter section 13 sets the quorum at a majority of council members. That is four. But there are certain decisions in your charter that require approval by a majority of the council, not just a majority of the quorum. So most decisions require three votes, but certain decisions like adoption ordinances, appointment on removal of city manager, require a majority of council or four.

Every member who is present when a question is addressed must vote for or against the question unless the council excuses them or for just legal cause without being excused by the council. And an example of a, excuse is a conflict of interest, which I would go over a little bit. Yeah.

Real quick clarification. How does abstentions work into that then if it's not for if it's not for conflict? If somebody abstains.

Somebody abstains? So the way I read this is that every mem you you can only abstain for, if counsel excuses you or for just legal cause. That's the way I read that. Uh-huh.

Okay. Thank you. Yeah.

Wait. Hold on. Okay. Counsel generally uses Robert's rules of order to conduct its business, but I always say that my advice is not to get hung up in parliamentary procedure. And what's most important is it being clear to the people in the room and on the record what council is doing and who supports what they're what council is doing.

So don't council uses Robert's rules, but if there's a question, just make sure it's clear what's going on. Either the mayor the mayor or the council president in the mayor's absence serve as the presiding officer. If both are absent, then council elects a temporary presiding officer. Unless

a

member of the council is excused from voting, their silence is recorded as an affirmative vote.

Mhmm.

So the charter requires council to adopt council rules to governance meetings. Those were recently amended. I encourage you to revisit them every so often just to remind yourself what they say. I'm not gonna read again, I'm not gonna read it, but they have requirements about revising ordinances. They have requirements on focusing on city issues and avoiding becoming involved in extraterritorial issues and also on who can speak and when.

So I have a portion of presentation on political activities, but I didn't include it here. I'm happy to come back as the political season heats up or just send it in a memo. But the main advice is don't solicit political support from staff. It's pretty straightforward for elected officials. It's a little more complicated for staff.

But for elected officials, don't ask staff for political support or ask them to, you know, support I guess, do administrative duties in support of a political cause, etcetera. And generally speaking, you should limit your requests for staff support. Routine secretarial support is provided. Mail is opened by city staff unless other arrangements are made. And with respect to correspondence, you should check with city staff before taking action to see if an official response has already been sent, and copies of correspondence should be provided to the city report.

Generally, items for the council agenda should be submitted in time to allow sufficient research by staff and also recommendations from subcommittees or advisory committees. Although that is generally the case, the council may add items not on the agenda by a majority vote and then add taken on the item. So that's all council business. So what is not council business is the duties that are delegated to the city manager in the charter. For example and this list is not exhausted.

You'll see the numbers are out of order and missing some. The city manager must administer and enforce all city ordinances, resolutions, franchises, leases, contracts, permits, and other city decisions. Must appoint, supervise, remove city employees. Must organize city departments and administrative structure, prepare and administer the annual city budget, administer city utilities and property, promote cooperation among council staff and citizens in developing city policies and building a sense of community, and delegate duties but remain responsible for acts of subordinates. And, of course, the council supervises the city manager, but council does not have authority to direct individual action related to these subjects.

That's basically what I was saying earlier. There is a charter provision about do not attempt to influence city staff on the making of appointments, awarding contracts, selection of consultants, processing of developing applications for granting of city licenses and permits. That's charter section 34 I. And it also says that violation of this prohibition is grounds for removal from office by a majority of the council after a public hearing. There has been some recent litigation, and there's I have some free speech concerns with this charter section as drafted. But and I'll raise it at the charter review process. Yep.

That's what I was gonna ask you. Yep.

But the general concept is legal and is inherent in the council manager form of government. So to the extent that matters require council involvement, staff will bring them to council as a body for discussion and action at a council meeting. So I am going to very briefly expand on the contracting aspect of, council and staff's role. So the code says that council is the local contract review board. Resolution twelve fifty from 2005 establishes the city's public contracting rules, and my office is already starting to engage in the process of updating those, and we'll be bringing in something to council soon.

The rules govern the council rule or, I mean I'm sorry. The public contracting rules govern the processes for awarding personal services personal service contracts and goods and services contracts, whereas state law covers professional services contracts. The rules lay out formal selection procedures, informal selection procedures, and then also allow single source in certain circumstances. And the city manager's contracting authority is $50,000. And one of the things that the update will do is since you adopted your public contracting rules, the limits have the state legislature sets the limits for the selection procedures, and they've been increased.

So you can sort of be more nimble in awarding contracts. So that's one of the reasons that I think it's important to update your rules to sort of be able to take advantage of that. But, like, $25,000 meant something different in 2005 than it does now. So having said all that, contract administration is within the purview of the city manager. And so neither a council as a body nor an individual councilor should interfere with contract and administration.

And if those matters require council involvement, they'll be brought to the council as a body. I also wanna note before I move on from public contracting that I our office has done webinars, not just the OGEC public meetings training, but we've done other webinars as well. And there's a public contracting one zero one webinar on our YouTube page, which if you're interested in learning more about public contracting, that is a good resource. And I'll try to remember to point out the other topics we've done. Okay.

So, in all statements relating to public issues or policies, a counselor should take care to state whether your comments are personal opinions or representations of official city positions. I think that's in your council rules also. Yeah. And then counselors must keep all materials provided to them on matters of confidentiality in complete confidence, and no mention of such matters should be made to anyone other than fellow city councilors, the necessary city staff, or the city attorney as needed, and confidential matters does include information discussed in an executive session. In general, and I think this is also in your council rules, members of the council should not respond to comments made during public comment agenda time except to ask clarifying questions.

Any public requests for city council action will be referred to staff for review before being placed on a future agenda. Okay. Here's my very brief public meetings law. It's only one slide. Oh, no. It's two Sorry. So as I mentioned, state law requires that you take the OGEC approved public meetings law training once during your term in office. So if you've already taken it in your term, you don't have to. But if you have not, can coordinate with staff. We do have this webinar that's approved for the training on our website.

I can't remember when it expires, so I will follow-up on that by email. If it's still good, then that's a great way to do it easily from your own computer. But because you'll be you either already have taken a two hour training or will be soon, I'm gonna try and keep this section brief and just hit basically on three topics, serial communications, executive sessions, and meeting minutes. So Oregon's public meetings law requires that council's deliberations and decisions must be done in public after notice of meeting minutes and then all the other things that the public meetings law requires. The this means that you can't convene or hold a meeting without being in public and giving the required notice and taking meeting minutes.

And the reason I say this is because you can accidentally convene a meeting, and that's basically what a serial communication is. So I want to warn you to beware of serial communications. And what that means is a series of communications of any kind directly or through intermediaries such as staff to discuss, deliberate, or take action between a quorum of a governing bond. So I'm not gonna spend too much time on this, but just I'm gonna warn you about a couple different scenarios where it could come up, such as an email. And my general advice is to avoid emailing each other about subjects that will come before you for a vote.

And, specifically, I'll tell you to beware of reply all. That's just a tip, especially because serial communication by email is in writing, so it's really easy to prove. So just be careful. I also will warn you about social media because that's something else that I see. There's, like, a robust Facebook conversation, and one counselor weighs in.

Another comments later on. You know, a third, you're you're really playing with a potential serial communication in that situation when you're all communicating on the same social media post. And then I added social gatherings. It's social gatherings are okay, but you just have to be really careful to avoid discussion of official business. And sometimes that's really hard because the way you know each other often is through your time on council, so it's really easy to sort of drift in the conversations about, you know, the meeting or the the packet or whatever.

So just be careful when you are gathering socially. And I do wanna also note that there is a bill. Oh. There is a bill? Yes. There is.

There is a bill. Do you mind if I ask about an example? That's a kind of a a big an example of a situation to get an answer from you so that they don't have to worry or better under kind of better understand about social meetings. Let's suppose there's a neighborhood meeting and it's meant and staff are giving a presentation about a topic just to inform the neighborhood or the community. And let's say that that meeting location is the most convenient for a number of city councilors.

And on one particular meeting, let's say three city council let let's say three city councilors show up and sit with their families at different tables, aren't near each other, aren't talking to each other, or just listening to the presentation because it's a a deep dive on something. But there also happens to be a city councilor helping staff talk about things. Is that a problematic situation from a serial meeting standpoint, or is it because counselors in the audience by themselves just listening, it's okay.

So I would say that this is a tough one because whereas a previous Oregon Government Ethics Commission makeup probably wouldn't have found that to be a serial communication. I think currently, the Oregon Government Ethics Commission might. And I came and talked to counsel previously about some of these issues in an executive session. And I that's basically where I was going, which is there is a bill in the session right now to kind of address this confusion, and it's moving. All indications are that it'll pass.

I don't know if that's true. It's hard to predict, especially because the session is ending so soon. So I I don't really know how to answer that question right now. It's not how I understood serial communications to operate because the communication is going in one direction. Right? But, again, if it's not a quorum, I would say then it's not a problem. But if it is, then I can't it's we're in a tough spot right now.

Oh, hold on. Because we're running at the

Oh, you put me on the spot.

I'm sorry. You wanna come back to you?

Oh my goodness. Yes.

Yeah. Go ahead,

Actually, counselor Weber, what confuses me in this is if I'm just attending a meeting gathering information, it's not even an agenda item that's gonna be on the council for. So I I don't really understand why there would be that much fear if a bunch of us just attended a meeting and we're gathering information. It's not a a discussion in the future. Right. I can address it.

It's okay. Yep. So we've had this conversation with the, the county commissioners and mayors. Our understanding from all of our city attorneys is we're pretty sure that, both so this is why the bill is before the the legislature. But our understanding is it is open for interpretation, and that's why, mayor Rosen championed the bill to get that clarification because it was the language was unclear to us, and we all felt that it was going it was causing a lot of problems that were unnecessary.

It's causing a lot of churn for attorneys to try to figure out what was gonna happen, and we're also trying to predict what a government commission is going to determine without knowing, you know, basically, just based on how they see it. So, yes, I I think what what Emily said earlier is doesn't seem like from her perspective, but also it seems like it might you know, it's we don't know what the ads commission is gonna say. This is the all the way are saying the same thing. So, yes, we understand what you're saying. We don't know how that is commissionable. That's just the feedback from all the mayors that I've been doing.

I mean, I'm just saying councilor Weber I mean, to me, there's some element of common sense, I think, that would prevail. Like, if the four counselors went to the funeral today, somebody has to leave. I don't think we have to be that worried. Now, obviously, if we're attending something that's discussing what a decision will be on the urban growth boundary, that's a different thing. But just that's my only thing is making people so fearful they count to room every time they go somewhere.

Yeah. I mean, it's like, I guess the two things that I will say about this is it's a matter of risk tolerance for you to decide for yourself how you feel about being in that situation. But secondly, it it is only something that may come before you for a decision. So if it's really nothing you'll ever that will ever come before counsel for a decision, then you're safe. But if it doesn't have to be scheduled, it doesn't have to be there's no time limit on that language. So if it will come before you or it may it sometime in the future come before counsel for a decision, then it could be a problem.

Yeah. It's written. Got it back.

Got it. That. So come on. Get out of that. The bill number that should we be watching for it, or will you be able to Alright. I will update you. Yeah. And that is canceled already.

Yes. Trust me. When when the is done, I plan to add that to my cancel reports because I haven't followed a bunch of those. Okay. Anybody else?

Bills. Okay. So the second public meetings law topic I wanna talk about very briefly is executive sessions, which are public meetings that are closed to the public, and they can only be used to discuss certain matters which are defined in statutes. And counsel cannot make a final decision in an executive session. There's specific procedures to enter into executive sessions, and the media may attend in most situations.

So they can be present for most executive sessions. And while they may not report on what they hear in the executive session, they may use information they learn in the executive session to follow other leads. So that's just something to keep in mind. And then lastly, regarding minutes, the public meetings law requires a recording or keeping minutes, and you record meetings. But your council rules also require the keeping of minutes, which is actually very common among cities in Oregon in part because it's just a lot easier for the public to review, you know, a four page minute document than watch a three hour video, for example.

The council rules say that minutes should contain certain information such as council members and staff present, motions, proposals, resolutions, orders, ordinances, and measures proposed, and their disposition, the results of all votes, including who voted yes and no, the substance of the discussion on a matter, and references to all documents discussed. The minutes are not required to be verbatim and especially that is especially true for you since we also keep the audio recording as the official record of the meeting. Okay. I'm gonna very I said there's two slides, but this is sort of a different topic, which is control of public meetings. Your I can't remember if it's your charter or your council rules.

The presiding officer has inherent authority to keep order and impose reasonable restrictions necessary for the efficient and orderly conduct of a meeting, and council should not eject an individual from a meeting unless that individual has actually disrupted the meeting. And that's a pretty high bar. It means that the person has to prevent counsel from doing its business. So for instance, holding a sign in protest, that's not an actual disruption even if it's a really icky, upsetting sign. Someone yelling or singing or playing an instrument, that is an actual disruption because it actually prevents you from hearing each other and being able to vote on an issue.

Our advice, my advice, even when there is an actual disruption, first of all, you have to warn them, the person who's doing the disrupting. But second of all, my advice, because this is such a touchy subject, free speech rights are involved, my advice is to recess the meeting rather than ejecting a single person, come back later that night or the next day and reconvene just to be safe. K. We're gonna talk also briefly about public records. So a public record is a writing that contains information about conduct of the public's business.

It doesn't matter what format it's on. Writing includes a photograph, a map. Think a video recording is a writing. It's any tie any type of medium, and it's on it's anywhere the writing is located, which means if it's on your personal phone, if it contains information about the conduct of the public's business, it's still a public record that you must retain. If it's on your home computer, it's and and it contains information about the conduct of the public's business, it's a public record that must be retained.

Having said that, you only are required to keep one official copy of each record, and that's the city. The city is only required to keep one official copy of each record for the applicable retention period. So if you have it saved on your home computer, but you also have it in the agenda packet, the agenda packet's the official record. So you don't have to worry about that. And this, Judy, I'm I'm it's obvious because of how I'm describing it.

It extends to council members, not just employees. So your notes, your social media posts, your emails to personal accounts, and your documents on home computers might need to be retained if they contain information about the conduct of the public's business. Of course, exemptions may apply. So just because it's a public record doesn't mean that it'll automatically be sent out in response to a public records request. There may be an exemption that affects the information in the record.

And, also, destruction of public records is a crime. It's a misdemeanor. Destruction or tampering with public records. And then I will also just note, I did a webinar on public records. So if you are really dying to learn more about that topic, you can watch it also.

And just one point of that. We do retain all emails. So if you do have something that you think might be a public record, you email it to yourself or you told me that that's your cover.

That's a great method. It's and,

so you like, my advice is not to text about, you know, public issues, but you can't control what people text you. So if someone texts you something that is related to the conduct of the public's business, you can either move the conversation to your email or just forward the text message to your email, and that's a great method for retaining it. Okay. So we're gonna talk a little bit about decision making. And at the earlier in the presentation, I talked about quasi judicial decisions, administrative decisions, and legislative decisions, and there's a reason I did that.

So quasi judicial decisions are made by order, and an example is a land use application. Administrative decisions are made by resolution. Sometimes they can also be made by motion. And one example is rates, setting rates for the city. And then legislative decisions are made by ordinance, and an example is the nuisance code.

But, you know, any code amendment is a legislative decision. So a quasi judicial decision typically applies preexisting criteria to an individual person or piece of land. And determining whether a proceeding is quasi judicial turns on these three characteristics. So the first is that it's bound to result in a decision. And that's a weird I feel like that's a weird phrase.

It's from a case. But what that means is that, for example, you have an application before you. You can only approve or deny it. Ordinance or otherwise, you can table it. You don't have to deal with it. You can vote yes. You can vote no. You can amend and decide later. A quasi judicial decision is approved or denied. There it's bound to result in a decision.

K? The second characteristic of a quasi judicial decision is that you are bound to apply preexisting criteria to concrete facts. So you have the criteria. Does this meet does do these facts meet the criteria, and how are you gonna decide based on that? And then lastly, it's directed at a closely circumscribed factual situation or a relatively small number of persons.

Again, it applies to me generally to an individual person or piece of land or a small group. And there is a reason that I am doing that because a quasi judicial decision must comply within process. And that includes providing the person an opportunity to be heard, an opportunity to present and rebut evidence, an impartial decision maker, a record, and written findings adequate to permit judicial review. And I'll talk a little bit more about your role in due process. First, we're gonna talk very briefly about legislative decisions.

They typically just mostly to provide a contrast because they involve the adoption of more generally applicable policies, so not to a small group of people, but to a general broad group and apply to a variety of factual situations and, like I said, broad class of people. Because a legislative decision is the expression of government policy, you're not required to reach a decision. What I was saying earlier, not bound to result in a decision. You may table the issue or decline to review it altogether for legislative decision. So to contrast that with the lameness application, for example, which is approve and deny.

So the reason this is important is because for quasi judicial decisions, you have to consider ex parte bias and conflicts of interest. So that's why you should be thinking of those for the quasi judicial decisions. For legislative decisions, you have to consider only conflicts of interest. So you don't have to consider ex parte or bias for those. And the reason for that is that they implicate due process. Yes.

Can you give us some example of the time when we might face the quality nutrition?

The land use application is the exact

What's the actual planning commission? But then it comes to you. Oh, final. Okay. Sorry. Okay. Yeah. I was trying to follow the process. No. Really?

Okay. So an ex parte contact is loosely defined as any communication or information about the matter before you that is obtained from any source outside the hearing. And it's commonly understood as a conversation with, for example, the applicant. A meeting, an email, text, a phone call with an interested party that is outside the hearing process. But if you look at the loose definition above, it is much broader than that and includes any evidence relating to a pending application that is relied on by a hearing body member making a final decision if that evidence is not disclosed.

So it means it that a ex parte contact can include a newspaper article you read about the developments, for example, or a blog post or a report you heard on the radio. All of those are ex parte contacts. But the good news is that they don't render a decision unlawful as long as there is full disclosure. And there are two components of full disclosure. You must place the substance of the ex parte contact on the record, and you must publicly announce it as well.

And by placing it on the record, that means the written record of the quasi judicial decision and then also announcing it verbally. Disclosure must occur at the earliest possible time in the decision making process, and the reason for the disclosure requirement is to allow the public an opportunity to rebut the substance of the ex parte content. Communications with staff are not considered ex parte contacts. However, staff can't serve as a conduit for obtaining information outside of the public process unless it is disclosed. Okay.

The other issue you have to consider for quasi judicial decisions are is bias. Biased decision makers substantially impairs a party's ability to receive a full and fair hearing. Bias can be in favor of or against the party or the application, and generalized expressions of opinion are not biased. Now I wanna tell you what actual bias the definition of actual bias. It means prejudice or prejudgment of the parties or the case to such a degree that the decision maker is incapable of being persuaded by the facts to vote another way.

It's pretty extreme. It can include personal bias, personal prejudice, or an interest in the outcome. Now I wanna note that when you're acting as a quasi judicial decision maker, you're not expected to be free of opinions or even bias. Likely, you were selected or elected here because you have opinions about issues in the community. Right?

You generally favor or oppose certain issues. But you are expected to set your bias aside when deciding individual applications so that you can engage in the necessary fact finding and attempt to interpret and apply the law to the facts as you find them despite those feelings that you have. So actual bias is a very high bar that you can't even see the facts to vote another way, basically. Okay. Now we're gonna talk about conflicts of interest, which are you should be considering in all the decisions, legislative as well.

An actual conflict of interest is defined this the ethics laws are at OS two forty four as any decision or act by a public official that would result in a, quote, private pecuniary benefit or death. And pecuniary means financial. So an actual conflict is a decision or act that would result in a private financial benefit or detriment. And it extends not just to the financial gain or loss of you as the public official, but also to any of your relatives or any business with which you are associated. And we're gonna talk about what those mean next.

The law defines what a relative is, and it includes the spouse, parents, step parent, child, siblings, stepsiblings, son-in-law, and daughter-in-law of a public official. It also includes the public official's spouses, parents, step parent, child, siblings, son-in-law, and daughter-in-law. It includes any individual that the public official has a legal obligation to support and any individual to whom or from whom the official provides or receives benefits from employment. So someone's, like, on your insurance, then they qualify as a relative regardless of your actual relation to that. Businesses with which a public official is associated.

So for private businesses, it's if you are a director, officer, owner, employee, or agent of the business, or if you own or have owned more than $1,000 worth of stock, equity interest, stock options, or debt interest in the preceding calendar year. For a publicly held corporation, you're associated with the business if you are an officer or director of a publicly traded company or if you own or have owned more than $100,000 worth of stock in the preceding calendar year. And you're you're also associated with a business as a public official. If you're required well, you are required to file a statement of economic interest. But if that business is a source of income on your SEI, which we'll talk about later, that produces 10% or more of your total annual household income.

So if the other two aren't captured, then if you if it's 10% or more of your annual household income on your SEI, then you're also associated with that business. Now a common question that we get is you sit on the board of a five zero one nonprofit organization, which is up, for example, for a grant before the council. The the non five zero one c nonprofits are explicitly exempt from conflict of interest laws, so you can vote on that grant, for example, if you're on the board of the nonprofit. But what if you do have an actual conflict of interest? What do you do?

You must both announce the actual conflict of interest in the meeting and then refrain from taking official action or even participating in any discussion or deliberation on the topic. And my advice, if you have an actual conflict of interest, is to step down from the dice, potentially even leave the room. The ethics commission has found that nodding or even other gestures, which you it's hard to keep yourself from doing. Right? Those count as participating in a discussion.

So like I said, my advice, if you have an actual conflict, is to step down from the dais or leave the room while the discussion is happening. So by contrast, the potential conflict of interest is a decision or act by a public official that could result in a private financial benefit or detriment to you, your relative, or a business or a. So the difference is potential is could, while actual is would. So in the case and I'll give you some examples in a minute. But in the case of a potential conflict, you must announce the conflict, but then you can participate in the discussion and and even the vote on the issue.

So I have some hypotheticals. I'm starting to lose my voice, but I think I'll go through them anyway because they're they're really illustrative. So the first typo is a school district has decided to construct a new elementary school, and the school board is at the stage of developing criteria for the construction bid process. A recently elected school board member's son owns a construction company in town. Will this school board be met with a conflict of interest if they participated in official actions to develop the bid criteria, and is it actual or potential?

Talk about it, or you just leave me at it?

I mean, it seems like it would be until this child or until the yeah. Until her child.

I agree. It's a potential conflict because the official actions she takes could financially impact her son's construction company and business with Grisper relative and associate. And the reason I led this example is because it shows that there's it's more than just voting. Right? A lot of people think, obviously, yes, no, vote.

That is something where you have to consider it. But even developing bid criteria, you have to still be thinking thinking of conflict of interest issues. So then in that case, the school board member should publicly announce the conflict every time the issue arises, but may participate in the discussion and the vote on the bid criteria once it's publicly placed. Okay. So I'm tweaking the facts a little.

A school district is soliciting bids for the construction of the new elementary school. The bid deadline was last week, and the district superintendent has notified the school board that there are four qualified bids, and the school board will be awarding a contract to one of the four bidders at their upcoming meeting. One of the qualified bids was submitted by the construction company owned by the school board member's son. Will the school board member be met with a conflict of interest when awarded misbid? And if so, is it actual or potential?

Yes.

Yes. This is an actual conflict because the effect of her decision would have a financial impact, positive or negative, on her son's construction company, a business with which her relative is associated. And I say positive or negative because a conflict of interest is a decision that could that would result in a private financial benefit or detriment. So if she votes no, that doesn't resolve the conflict because that's a detriment to her son's business. Right?

So then what should she do? She should announce call me. She should announce the conflict and refrain from participating in any official action on the issue and refrain from participating even in the discussion. And like I said, my advice would be to step down from the for that conversation. So I have a last hypothetical, which is a school district is soliciting bids for the construction of the new elementary school.

One of the qualified bids was submitted by a construction company owned by a board member's best friend, but neither the board member nor any of the board member's relatives are associated with the construction code. So would the school board member be met with a conflict of interest when awarding this bid? And if so, is it actual or potential? Yes. Oh, this one's tricky. There is not a legal conflict of interest because the effect of her official decision would not and could not have a financial benefit a financial impact on herself, on a relative, on a business with which she or her relative is associated. So what should the school board member do in this situation?

I'll be clear.

So nothing is legally required, but she could announce the appearance of a conflict, say it's not a legal conflict, and then because it's not a legal conflict, you will participate in it. Okay. There is a an exception to the conflict of interest laws where a public official is part of a class that consists of a larger group of people affected by a decision. And in that case, no conflict exists. So a good example of this is, like, a decision to pave an unimproved street in your neighborhood.

Right? That may affect your value of your home. But because it's a you're part of a class that consists of a larger group, that neighborhood, it's not a conflict. Now this one's tricky. There's no hard and fast rule on the size or type of class to which the conflict exemption applies. So and it's very fact dependent. So my advice is to seek legal advice before relying on it if you're you believe that you're part of it.

And just to clarify, I mean, aside from just calling you, they I believe we can also call CIS and OEGC if we have questions correct.

Correct. I'm gonna address that a little later. It's okay. So this is a weird one. The ethics laws are personal to the public official. They're personal to you. Would I represent the city? So you don't call me if you have an ethics question. I can answer general questions like the five zero one c three question, but otherwise, OGEC is a good resource for a personal attorney. Okay.

I'm really close to that. So there's a gift law which prohibits public officials, relatives of public officials, and here's a new one, members of the public officials' household from soliciting or receiving any gifts over $50 in a calendar year from any source that has or could reasonably be expected to have a legislative or administrative interest in the public officials' decisions or votes. That's kind of a hard one to wrap your brain around, but my advice is to look to the source of the gift, and that's for both whether it is a whether the person has a legislative or administrative interest and also the amount. A gift is anything of economic value, but I think the last time I counted, there were 19 exceptions to the gift law. It's, like, longer than the gift law itself.

So if you believe you are faced with gift decision, I encourage you to look at the exceptions. Conference like, conference meals are included in the exceptions. Gifts from relatives are members of a household, tokens, plaques, trophies, or mementos that are valued at less than $25. There's a lot of exceptions. Okay.

Abuse. There's also prohibited use of office or abuse of office, which is in ORS two twenty four as well. So public officials may not use or attempt to use their position to obtain financial gain or avoid financial detriment that would not otherwise be available but for the holding of the official position. And I have a really good example for this one. So there was a this is a real true thing that happened.

So a fleet employee was buying a bunch of new cars for their city, and they were getting a really good deal because they were buying essentially in bulk. And so they decided to use their own money to buy themselves a car, like add one extra car. Didn't use Citi funds for that extra car. Nevertheless, it was prohibited use of office because they used their position at the fleet obtain a financial gain. The discount was a financial gain that would not otherwise have been available but for their holding of that position, and that was decided to be a prohibited use of office.

Confidential information. Public officials may not further or attempt to further personal gain through the use of confidential information that is gained in the course of or by reason of their official position or activities in any way. And my example here is if you find out confidentially that, like, a landfill is moving in next to your house. Right? Your property value is gonna tank. You can't do anything about that. You cannot use that information to further or attempt to further your personal gain. Can't sell your house if the landfill's moving in. If you find out confidentially that the landfill's moving in next door. Nepotism.

This is pretty straightforward. You can participate in the appointment, employment, motion discharge, firing, or demotion of a relative or member of your household and cannot directly supervise a relative or member of your household. I mentioned the SEI filings a little bit before. It's a statement of economic interest that must be filed by April 15 of each year. It covers assets from the previous calendar year just like your taxes.

It's basically a declaration of income holdings and business associations, and OJEC provides a form that you have to use for that. Lastly, as I mentioned earlier, ethics laws are personal for the public official. They are enforced by OGEC. OGEC does provide a lot of really excellent resources, including the guide for public officials and also opinions. I And wanna note for opinions, if you get an OGEC commission decision excuse me, commission opinion based on something, then it's a safe harbor.

You cannot be then found to have violated the ethics laws if you follow the advice in that commission opinion. Staff opinions don't count, but commission opinions provide that safe harbor. And they also have good trainings, and their staff is really helpful. And my advice here is to only use OGDC if you are faced with a prospective ethics conundrum. If you worry that you've already done something, my advice is to go to a personal attorney because, obviously, the ethics laws are enforced by OGEC as well.

So if you go to OGEC for something you already did, then you're essentially confessing. So but, otherwise, I really do. They have really helpful staff and resources, so go to them. Use it. And that's all. Do have any questions? Thank you. If you think of something, feel free to do that.

Yep. Yes.

Thank you. It's always a good refresher. Yeah. Any questions?

Thank you. Avoid. Avoid.

Okay. With that, for me, when I'm finished business, I'll take a quick five minute recess, and we'll be back to the. And we are back session. K. So next time on the agenda is on finished business. We have the was it? Either it's UGB pack meeting update and council representation update, councilor. No

updates for me.

No updates from councilor DeForge. Does anybody have any questions for councilor DeForge on any updates? Just wanna give everybody a chance. Yeah.

Okay. I appreciate it.

I appreciate the succinctness. Alright. I'm gonna update Bill.

Thank you, mayor. Nothing really no no major update from audit process. Marina and us and that's programmer. And UVF, Quad Valley Financial auditors have just been working on back and forth, getting asking for information and and getting things sent to them or elaborating on different things. So that's been going on for a couple weeks, fairly standard procedure.

The big thing I wanted to report was that, I'm working with Marina to, make a presentation at your next meeting on the need team and just kind of walk through, the questions and answers and kinda walk through, you know, their process and kinda what they do for the city and how that is part you know, what what they're producing. The financial statements ultimately are what get, you know, ultimately get audited. And so what the what the process is, like, from the series side of things. And then just very pointedly, we're by the by excuse me. By Monday the sixteenth, we should be able to, come to you with some clarifications about the presentation that you heard on the second.

Excuse me. At the last meeting. So Okay. The February 17. Thank you. Thank you, Laurie. The presentation that was given to you all was we were expecting to have the CPA in charge of our audit presented. Instead, it was Savannah Halter who kind of manages the information flow between the auditor the audit team and the city and Maria. And she, you know, she

kind

of went into some details that were more speculation than actual findings yet or actual conclusions of anything because we're so rooting the process. So on the one hand, she mentioned final financials were delivered, you know, two weeks prior. But at the same time, she was answering questions along the lines of there are this many findings or this many deficiencies, and that's contradictory. And until you go through the full process and the CPA in charge kind of reviews and wraps up and and and finishes it, it's early and speculative to say actually what's going to ultimately be in the audit report that you get from, and then you get a presentation from UVF about. So we're gonna work with UVF.

Marina is and we as well to kind of clarify there. Some water was muddy, and we'll be back and talk about all that on the sixteenth, Monday the sixteenth. So that's the big update for you is just, you'll you'll, you'll get to meet Matt Abkin, and he'll kinda walk through some things for you there on that side. And, Matt, you, I think I communicated it. But Matt is Matt's a CPA, public CPA.

He's been a finance director for other cities, larger cities in North Plains, so he's in his fair share of weird stuff. And, also, Marina used to be municipal auditors, and he was, a lead part of that team. So, he's come at it from the audit side as well as being at the public agency side of things. So he'll be ready to answer questions for you too. So that's the big audit update, I would say, right now. So stand for any questions on that if you have them. Questions? Mhmm.

Councilor Weber.

Councilor Weber, on that Berena issue, we had said, I think, they're contract right now. So is that something that's gonna also come back to us at some point? New contract for Berena?

Yes. That's part great question, councilor. But that is part of what they'll discuss is we need to the contract we had with them that expired was, a little more narrow than, we kind of really need now given that we've given that we, you know, are we're not able to really get any applications for the finance manager position that had the base met the basic requirements. So they've taken on some of those some of those functions and but we need to kind of formalize fully what that is in a with contract. So that'll be discussed too.

The contract will come to us at the next meeting? Yeah.

It it will definitely a contract with them will definitely exceed the $50,000, so it will absolutely come back to you all when when we have a contract.

So that's coming at the next meeting?

No. He'll he'll be here to discuss the scope of that. And then then we'll have to go through our a process to contract on that, and then we'll bring that back to you at a later time.

K. Any other questions? Councilor Pavin, I just don't wanna leave you out. I'm sorry.

I appreciate it. No. I'm okay. Thank you.

Okay. Perfect. Thank you all. Good questions, and thank you both for the report. And we look forward to hearing from you. Next is new business with Rehabo. So we're gonna

go right back to Bill for city manager report. Thank you, mayor. I don't have a a ton to update on, the most kind of already in the packet or Friday vibes. So what I'll just kind of stick to is my normal ask of you all, and that is that, we're planning out work sessions and a lot of topics. So I just kinda wanted to go over where we were and then, moving forward.

So March 16, I still have down the boards and commissions subcommittee to give an update to council about where they are and talk about all that. April 6, I continue to have URA grant program ideas. The EDC at their last meeting heard Rowan go over, research that's been done and then kind of some recommended new directions for URA grant programs that extend or get out of just doing assistance for restaurants that might wanna open open up a town. So we'll we'll that would be April 6. April 20, we didn't have anything really formalized and down yet.

And so what what we were proposing to you all is between updating the URA, the URA strategic plan and all of that. And then just some questions that have come up about future improvements on Commercial Street and diff and a a particular use that is having issues with some of that. What I wanted to propose is on the twentieth, we we kind of do a work session about the the North Plains downtown improvement plan and talk about right of you know, adopted plans for right of way improvements and then kind of different identified projects that when the URA plan gets updated, you kind of have plug

and

play projects from the downtown plan, but we go over all that in a work session. So that's

I think was good. I got it. So now this I mean Good.

Okay. So let's make that happen. And I assume you guys rolling. You and Rowan?

Rowan and Will and Dustin as well. Oh, and Dustin. Yeah. It'll be it'll be a team effort. There's a few different things few different angles on that one, from property redevelopment, concepts, the street furniture to put a lot of public right away stuff. So it gets there's a lot in there. There's a

lot of street furniture, but go on.

So what's the topic of that again you're saying it's for?

The downtown improvement plan. We could just be kind of digging into that, as of you know, to kind of better help tee up kind of URA planning updating, better tee that up for you.

Do you think that's on 04/20?

April 20. Yeah. Second meeting of April. Yes.

Counselor Weber, my only question would be if we it would be helpful to have a URA expert to kind of give us more feedback on what we could and couldn't do because sometimes that's a complicated issue.

Yeah. Good question. So, when the URA meeting starts and we talk about the strategic plan, prioritizing projects, new prioritizing new projects as part of that scope of work. And so the intent of the downtown plan work session is just to kind of give you all familiar with the full menu of projects that adopted plan has so that you kind of have a menu to choose from as you prioritize with the URA consultant.

K. Perfect. Then what about, you wanna get in the May, or you wanna wait and do it later? Say that again. Did you wanna get into the May

work sessions? Well, I I wanna put it out there for you all. If you wanted to have anything for May 4 or May 18 yet on paper, the only asterisk to all of that is that in late April or early May, we do need to reconvene the budget committee for mid biennium. It's one meeting, and it can be an hour or an hour and a half if folks wanna really talk. But that would be just an additional meeting to think about if your schedule gets busy that time would be.

Do we have final grades for sorry.

Councilor Hagedorn here. Do we have final grades? Or have we zeroed in on a debate for our, strategic game session on a weekend that I think is slipping into potentially April now?

Well, councilor, correct. It's going to have to be April, and I have a couple of facilitators that I just haven't that's the weekend. So but I would say that it's gonna fall somewhere in that time frame too. So I think, I think my intent, if you all are okay with it, is one of the April weekends gets nailed down as the strategic planning strategic goals, strategic planning exercise. And then, I think I think probably, early May could easily be the budget or even mid May.

I mean, there's there are no decisions being made by the budget community. It's just, you know, we it's traditional, to meet, report on where we are compared to budget, and then just kind of update on the different efforts that were authorized in the budget and, and all that stuff.

So that can be made easily. That sounds good between. K. Anything else?

That's it. Thank you, mayor.

Alright. So let's move on to councilor Ports. So councilor Peyton.

Good evening. My ex officio duties are coming up. I will share I I attended, a partial WACA budget committee meeting on behalf of councilor Hagedorn a couple weeks ago. Had a great interaction meeting the executive director, Mark, there. They at that meeting, they approved the, budget committee meeting minutes from February 2025.

This was my first time attending, but some of the notes I had captured, was just really, the investment in $1,000,000 into their CAD system. Their budget is built on roughly a 106 employees, and right now, they currently have 91, and they are, really feeling a constraint with staffing, particularly. Some of the feedback from other neighboring cities that is that they, are are seeing a little bit of a frustration with continuing rising costs. Again, I think we're that's kind of the sentiment from a lot of local jurisdictions. And then at the end, I was able to get a quick tour of the center and, just learn about some of the redundancies they have in place to make sure that they're remaining operational, in the event of any kind of catastrophic earthquake or anything along those lines.

And, I really encourage you, if you have any questions to reach out, but I learned I learned a ton on at that session. With that, I will pass it back over.

Thank you, counselor. Counselor. Are you I don't

have anything to report.

Didn't I didn't wanna I didn't wanna leave you out.

Thank you.

But if it's also if this is a time of change we wanna have with the agenda, to a future attendance, it's the time we bring it up. So just so you're aware. Alright. I just I try to remind everybody that we don't participate.

Thank you.

Yes. Councilor DePorch. You.

Mayor, start off with, I understood that we had an action item last council meeting to discuss monthly accounting reports. And so I think the feedback is that you should have that as an agenda item. Let me turn it in.

What I'm sorry. You got it. Just a second. Accounting reports to this and what you wanna see from city manager or from the Yeah. City finance. The thirty

second recap is, Bill brought up

last session that he was willing to consider new ideas on the monthly financials that are produced. And so I just wanted to I I took that took that up, and, I think the the direction because that we've added to an agenda item future meeting. And is everyone okay with Yes.

Okay. Headaches.

Okay. What's that? And so just to be clear, we're gonna work independently and then discuss it as opposed to a subcommittee type preparation.

I think to paraphrase, please do your homework and come back with your suggestions. Is that what you're getting at?

Yes. I

like that idea. K.

Sounds good. Next is I attended library board meeting, and was actually really impressed by the team there, which I was a staff member, Emily, and a voluntary main part of a early literacy support program. So it really goes beyond, you know, just just talking about what was there really supporting our kids. I I appreciate that. I got inspired, so I made a donation to the Friends of Library.

That mister Hatcher's doing it? Because he he, gave me the talk and commutes for the time.

You know, I'll give credit to Emily in a link, but I was at the data.

You know? It was a it

was a nice

A good sales guy. Yeah. Good thing to support. It is.

I also attended Metropolitan Advisory Board. This agenda is was focused on transportation and industrial land use, so we just thought it was kind of interesting, the overlap. Of course, we're not in Metro, but it was interesting to see how they're considering how population growth housing needs and, how it's, overlapping with what we're doing on TGM. There is some back and forth about support for the Washington County and a little bit of division, but, it appears that there are some pretty determined supporters there. And let's see here.

I think that's going to conclude my council report.

K. Councilor Reddy? I

don't have any council Redding here. I don't have any ex officio duties that I attended, and I sadly actually need to ask if anyone is available to cover my parks and rec ex officio duties on Monday, the ninth, as well as April 1. Some things came up for my children. So I apologize for taking What

was the date again? Sorry.

Monday, the ninth.

Of March? Yes. Next Monday. Okay. And then April 1. It's a Wednesday for EDC.

EDC is the 04/01/2001?

Yes. Parks and rec.

I can

amend the EDC. Can anybody cover for Monday the night for parks? I will be on airplane.

I'll be

in Vancouver. Can it be by phone?

Lori?

It's probably the

best. Zoom? Okay. You okay? Visit visit.

Zoom has a phone number.

Okay.

You can go in. I just wasn't sure if we're oh, if I was allowed. I was just verifying. Okay. I surely won't check. Okay. So you got that?

Coming in.

Thank you.

And if there's anything you guys would like to swap with me, please.

You have to take it on a wallets.

Yeah. And I'm gonna pride myself a little bit. So thank you both, council Weberly, council Hagedorn. And then I'm gonna bug Bill about the Jesse May's audio visual update.

Yeah. I'm actually scheduled a meeting with Mac, about that, the agency themselves, not the vendor. So we have a, an existing grant we're doing some accounting on, and it may work its way into something better than the rents we've been getting on money besides what we're spending of our own. So that's kind of

Okay. Great.

Thank you.

And last time, I just wanna confirm, you said you thought it would be over the 60,000 that we had, which is blowing the mind.

Well correct. So $60,000 won't buy a lot these days. I'm afraid to say I mean, we we have projector issues. We have camera issues. We have microphone and audio.

I mean, it's it's kind of an overhaul. And and the last quotes we got on kind of a substantial overhaul were in the 100 to 120,000 range. So the $60,000 that we that you own your debt with the budget, part of that money in the Jesse Mays fund, that's being clear for us to spend on whatever whatever we can get for $60,000. They didn't get the additional amount back then into their budget. I don't have a great story for why that is, but that'll be part of the conversation with them is kind of get get money back in spending on the project. So

Alright. Thank you. And then this is kind of to Bill and Mayor. The Waterville QR or resident survey, I had kind of brought up and was ready to present on. You guys are like, hold on. We got an idea. I'm just kinda wondering, is there some movements there, or could I get a Go on. Go ahead. Sorry.

Yeah. No problem. So we are it kind of got delayed because of people being gone, but we're gonna move to we're we're looking at and likely going to be better from mailing out in a slightly nicer print version of the newsletter separate from water bills. And so we'll have kind of dedicated space for people to kind of get used to QR code polls, getting their and then sort of thing. So we're gonna move it.

We're we're gonna but that's where we would be putting it as in kind of in the newsletter in a in a glossier version. But that's where we're moving forward with that idea. It's just not we're gonna we're gonna we're printing cheap water bills by themselves and then do a slightly nicer version of the of the newsletter separate from it, with things like polls by QR code. Because people are people are we have

a we have a we have a ton

of people who autopay and just toss the newsletter. And so we wanna we think this will be better getting their attention and get their participation.

My only concern is if we tie it to the water bill for if we decide to do the lottery, people won't necessarily know their number if it's separate. So that's just something to think about.

Excellent one. So we'll have to figure out how to link it. But, yes, that's a

very good point.

But just know that the the the effort here is to try to get more people to see

and interact with the newsletter, and

I think that'll help. Yes.

Thank you. I'm glad you hear some Mhmm. On it.

I

know. Okay. Thank you. So first and foremost, the week before last, I wanna acknowledge counselor for painfully and very last minute stepping in to attend the WACA WACA budget session. It was very unexpected, and I really appreciate her just she was there in minutes,

and it was really amazing.

It was just a great example of partnership and the kind of team spirit I think we we value. So thank you, counselor. I did on the twenty seventh have a one on one with the director, Mark Bulk Buckolds. I don't think I pronounced his last right name correctly. Buckolds. Buckolds. He usually has one on ones with all of his board members. I spent a lot of time talking about AI. He's really excited about this. He's inserting three, modules into kind of his call center, standard work.

So the last time I reported that they're, doing skill, like, training training and skill development for people in the call centers. But and then they recently rolled out a module for nonemergent call handling. And then in about five weeks, they're going to be rolling out a module on, policy and procedure, application and consistency, which I thought was kinda neat. Because right now, they only sample, like, one to 2% of all their calls. And so this would enable them to broaden that and deliver consistent kinda service and and whatnot and training and, kind of a QA really to think about it.

So, I asked him if he had any, messages to add on here, and he wanted me to emphasize that they're doing a lot of training and or hire me. They need people in their call centers, and it's really hard for them to get people. So in a funnel of, like, 80 applicants, there's just kind of that natural, attrition, and he maybe hires and keeps, like, three people. So he needs to hire people. And so I thought I just read the word, and a really great benefit of working there is you can take your dog with you. So, I wanted to mention that. It's a really great career by maybe retirees fresh out

of college, so please think about that. Thank you.

Great. Thank you. Yeah. Or would I have one?

Go ahead.

Yeah. Yeah. Whatever is good. Good. Alright. Sorry. I see. It's good. Alright. Let's see. So the remote handwriting. Oh, question for Bill on did we book state of the city for the whatever date was it? So we did literally.

We we should sit down

and talk about it. I mean, yeah, we

have I have the date. It's just kind of what you

Okay. Plan. Yeah. Yeah. I'll I'll spend some time with you. It's whatever date I sent you, and I can't remember. It's probably the wrong one too.

I thought

it was early the week after next. This was kind of the seventeenth would be. It's the nineteenth.

It's a Thursday, the nineteenth. No.

We're not. We might under the Saint Patrick's Day. Might be a better reception.

Could be very perception.

No. Alright. So, yeah, I'll I'll schedule some time. So with that Yep. I started writing the outline, so I I have most of my notes. I was gonna bring it in and make probably subject you and Lori to make sure I don't say anything, though. Good luck with that. Okay. So, let's see. I was I'm scheduled for TDFNR, Academy so I can finally be cool like councilor Papen, And that will be I didn't realize it'll be the Friday, Saturday before Easter.

So if you get a chance, I strongly suggest doing it. I I never actually gotten into it, but we used make fun of environment when I was a cop, so it'll be a lot of fun. Probably get through that for summer, so then my sleeping bag. It was brought to my attention, and this is my fault for not realizing this. We don't have a backup for WCCC, or at least not officially. So it's usually the council president, but I'll leave it up to council. I told them I would give it to you guys, and we can figure out. But it meets monthly, I wanna say, if I remember.

Second Monday of each month. And I have no backup duties, so I'm happy to

Okay.

Step in there as backup.

It's mostly just listening to everybody complain about transportation problems. So should air trafficking over if it gets more money. Early. Okay. So councilor ready. So I will Is

that in person or not?

It's on you can be I don't know. I'm always on Zoom. So

Perfect. Thank you.

It's actually a good one. It's there's a lot of arguing. Today in the mayor and the chair meeting, chair of the county commissioners, chair Harrington brought up there's a first responder drone program that's funded through a grant. So if you see a drone coming at you that says sheriffs on the side, it's probably not gonna attack you. There's actually that's first responder program. Very excited to see how this goes. And if you have questions, sure the chief would love to talk about this. I think it's cool. But she just wanna let us all know that, hey, this is coming. We don't know how wide it's gonna go yet, but they're just kinda trying to figure this out to get better, faster, better first response.

And it's not designed to be the first responder. It's supposed to be one of the first responders, but as she pointed out, it may get there before the car. So just be aware of that in case somebody starts freaking out. Please don't shoot it. The other thing is I don't know exactly how widely the block cameras are used, but there was a lot of questions about that concerns with integration things. Chair Massey spoke with chair and let her know that they're retaining I think it was license plates or something like that. That's all they're retaining. It's a very small amount of data. If you have questions, please reach out to bill or chief, and they can direct your questions to the sheriff. Well, let's not panic about things.

I mean, if if you have questions, just ask Bill or or the chief. I can figure it out for you. It's pretty limited data. I know a lot of people thought because my site or my day job, and I it's pretty limited what they have access to. And I had a a meeting with county commissioner on the proposal to raise taxes, another tax and more, you know, the registration fees in the county. I was supposed to, you know, that probably went about as you would expect. She's asked to come to speak with counsel, so I direct her to Laurie, which is appropriate process. And Laurie will figure out when that will be.

It's her.

Oh, Laurie's already taken care Sorry. I should know.

There are a lot of presentations coming.

I know this.

I've kinda had to Yikes. Yeah.

Well, that one doesn't.

Because TV up in Oregon's the one holding it up. Let's see.

What other kind of stuff?

You didn't ask questions. So I'll just say, I I did inform her that she's not gonna get a warm reception in North Plains, but that we will be respectful and polite and courteous. But please bring your questions and your constituents' concerns. I gave her some of what I thought was gonna be concerns with doubling the the registration fees in accounting. So but please remember, be respectful. This is an elected official at the county level. It's Trevor. We're all trying to do the right thing, and she's trying to solve one problem and just give us another problem. So let's see. I think that was all of them.

All of them with Bill on State of the City, I think we're mostly there. If you can make it Thursday, I think, noon or 02:00 or something at banks. I can't remember what time it is.

I can tell you.

It's in my calendar. I know that. Too. Because I've got so many One hand. One bank hand. So you can come out and support banks. That'd be great. I have not made it to any the others, unfortunately, because of work travel, but that one, think I'm gonna be at. And finally, election season's coming up for some of you or some of your seats at least. So just be aware of that. And just in general to the public, if you're interested in running, always reach out to one of us, and I'm sure that we're all happy to help explain, not campaign for you. Sorry. Explain to you what the process is best we can.

Yeah. I'll be putting it on Oh, perfect. Not not real soon because

It's still always.

It's dates backwards from this date and dates backwards from this date. So

Very confusing. Intentionally.

Yeah. Especially when you only get every two years, but it would be online probably the May. Okay. I'm I'm estimating because you can't apply to run until after July. July. Summer. Yeah.

It's like July or August.

Was weird. I have deadline. So Yeah. It's So but just be aware that that's coming up. So there'll be a lot of yard signs, and make sure you follow the rules on yard signs, please. Because we don't wanna have somebody driving around putting in yard signs. And with that, we move on to council calendar. I think we're good. Does anybody have any questions or we can switch anything else on council calendar? Ex officio meetings? What do need for doing this? Councilor Warren, we will get you plugged in.

Have her

plugged in on Wait. Already

already have homework.

Yeah. She has it in her in her packet. And

signing. She

doesn't start her first ex officio duties until June. Well, usually, I like to give them a couple of months to get a deal for

Duties are fun. Alright. So it looks like I have Wyoming Commission on Wednesday. Oh, that's week for Wednesday.

Let's let's do.

The only thing we have is Council Pagan with Economic Development. What?

Katie's parks and rec is not is on the eleventh or ninth?

Okay. And that's six. Okay.

Oh, yeah. It's just.

It's the calendars are so exact for. Got it. Thank you, silly.

Okay. So yes. And then I will have commission on the eleventh, and then cancel right here on the March 30.

And Just so you

know for

upcoming presentations, April 6 is Clean Water Services. April 20 is Commissioner Trice. And then I think the following, the first one in May is too beautiful. So 'tis the season for these.

Yes. Remember to come from them you play, but also bring your light foods. And with that, I believe that we are adjourned at State Of Victory.