Board of Aldermen - Regular Meeting

for 20262 downtown stretch of the We also have a representative from CFS here. Do you have any questions? Anybody want to ask have any discussion? Want to ask the represent? We didn't second it. No. So, we have a motion on the table now. A second. I'll second it. Okay. A motion and a second, but we're not going to take the vote yet. Discussion. All right. Okay. Anybody have anything you want to ask this gentleman? Does he have anything wants to tell us? Go ahead. He said, "Do you have anything you'd like to tell us?"

Sure. If you could please state your name. I number. Yeah. Hold it down for a second. Perfect.

Yes. My name is Sabanz. I'm a senior vice president and principal with Cook Flat and Stro Engineers and uh we're pleased and really appreciative of the opportunity to serve the city of Odessa on this project. Um as we looked at the project and working with your staff um certainly know this has been one that's been probably an accomplishment for quite a while. Um a little bit about our firm. Our funding has been around since 1961. Uh we do a lot of public infrastructure work everything from planning all the way through construction inspection services material testing services which are the services we'll provide this project you will see frequently uh one or two of our inspectors on site as this project is rolling as the city administrator mentioned um once the uh the bid award is taken care of and contracted we will be engaged directly with a contractor on behalf. Um, a little bit of background about me and and our firm from the standpoint of why this project was important. We I was 20 years with MODOT prior to the last 20 years as a partner in the firm.

Well, I'll hold that again. Yeah, I I was hoping that some of them might avoid that topic. I got I got you. Um, I'm 20 years gone though, so it's all good. But, um, I'm very familiar with the process. we understand the paperwork, the the the separation of projects, and so our our lead construction manager also is a retiree and been with us for about nine or 10 years. So, we feel like we're we're in good shape to take care of you and uh we look forward to working for you. Any questions? Where are you out of?

Uh we have multiple offices. I'm out of the Kansas City, Missouri office and my responsibility we have we have two offices in the metro area. One of them is kind of our field services which is this inspection and materials testing and then we have a planning and design office which is in South Kansas City. We headquartered uh the company was founded in Tika Kansas. Oh and we have an office in Springfield Missouri City uh Lawrence and uh Holton Kansas the small town of Kansas. Thank you very very much. Appreciate it. With that, we had a motion and a second. All in favor?

Thank you. All right. Resolution has been approved. All right. City audit presentation for fiscal year 2024. Clay. This must be Mark. Come on up. Hello. Hello.

I'm Mark St. I'm a senior man I'm a manager in creative planning business services. Uh the audit firm is Murdan KDV. Uh so uh that is the firm that we do our audit work through. Uh I am an employee of creative planning business services but we lease me to the audit. Would not do any work. So that's why the papers you have in front of you all say burn KD. Uh, I'm here to cover the 2024 2025 audit and

we're getting a mic stand. I'll process if you want.

Uh so we're going to talk about the independent auditors report. Uh it's basically the reason to pay us to get that opinion. Uh the opinion that we are issuing this year is an unmodified opinion. Uh which is the best opinion available uh in under audit standards. It's also known as a clean opinion. Uh we do have a couple of things to talk about this year with emphasis of matters. Uh we had some restatements from the prior period. Uh we have to emphasize those in our audit report. So there'll be a paragraph in the audit report that talks about that and by the audit report it's contained in the big packet you guys have. Um so those restatements were basically uh the ARPA funds were treated as revenue in a prior period and the funds were then put into the fund balance of that fund and because that grant is uh not a guaranteed grant until you have met all the conditions including spending the money that really should have been an unearned revenue um which is a liability account. So that's basically the the biggest change that you'll see from the prior period. We also had in the proprietary funds uh some inter fund receivable and payable stuff that uh with working with the city we determined those were not valid receivables and payables between the two funds. So we are removing those from the funds that they were located in in the prior period. Uh the next thing that we have an emphasis of matter for is the implementation of a new uh audit principle this year which is Gatsby statement number 101 compensated absences. Uh this statement basically requires the city to record a liability for all

uh paid time off that is eventually going to be used or is more likely than not to be used. Uh the previous standards required uh disclosure of a liability for uh vested things that were going to be paid in a settlement of some sort. Uh whether that's a check or other non-cash settlements. Uh this standard also recognizes time that would not necessarily be paid out by a check but could be used in a future period. Uh so that's the other re or emphasis of the matter that you'll see there. Uh other matters noted in regards to the fiscal 2024 financial statements being audited by an other auditor. Uh each report was dated July 31, 2025 and we relied upon that audit for our beginning balances. Uh so that's another required piece of the audit report that just mentioned that we're relying on that audit. uh since it was not our work uh we can't simply audited the beginning balances with that. The next piece of the audit report is that it talks about the responsibilities of management and the auditor. Uh the manager's responsible for presenting the financial statements that are prematerial in the statements. The auditor is responsible for designing and executing an audit approach that adheres to the relevant professional standards in order to express the opinion that we expressed. Finally, our uh opinion is based on reasonable assurance. It's important we highlight that it is not absolute assurance. Uh we do uh testing by selections instead of 100% testing. We can't offer absolute assurance but it is designed to provide about 95% confidence in that that there is materialistic

reporting on internal control over financial reporting is required by government standards. Uh this is the second report the back of the packet that you'll see. Uh again this is kind of a uh required reporting because of the government standards portion of this. Uh we did note in that report the material weakness uh for the adjusting journal entries and pre-statements of fund balance uh net position and the reliance on the auditors for the preparation of the financial statements including the footnotes. Most of that is not highly unusual by any means. uh but with those AJs we did feel that uh warranted a material weakness in the internal control. The other item that we have we're going to consider a significant deficiency. So a little background on what those are in case people are not familiar. Um basically have tiered systems where a deficiency is not something that we would necessarily report to you guys. We might find it and address it with the city administrators. If you have a big enough deficiency or multiple deficiencies, we would step up to the next tier, which is a significant deficiency. And then if it's uh beyond that, the next step would be the material weakness that we already covered. So this one, the second item is not as severe as a material weakness, but is uh still worthy of your note. Uh that's for a lack of segregation of duties. uh we did reduce this from a material weakness level given the compensating controls such as the finance committee meeting uh finance committee meetings involvement in the process. Um and also noting that this is a very common finding for governments of your size and even larger than yours. Um it just has to do with it not being a

practical uh thing to acquire enough staff and separate all the duties in a way that the financial standards would suggest uh is the optimal segregation. Uh it's included in the report mostly as an awareness item so that everybody involve remains vigilant of the fact that there are some opportunities that are created by having the smaller staff that's less safe. in and the needs with that I can move to financial results. So this first chart you have is just your general fund balances uh covering a period of five years. Uh it breaks it down by non-spendable, restricted uh and unassigned. you guys don't have any committed or I assigned balances in there for those five years. Uh non-spendable would be funds that are basically already spent such as prepaid items. Uh restricted would be things that you guys have officially set aside for the use of uh pay debt service. Uh those kind of things that you guys have as a council as the board of alder have decided uh that you want to only use those funds for this specific purpose. Sometimes that's by debt covenant, sometimes that's by your guys' road. Uh the biggest thing that you'll see in that chart is the 2022 to 2023 jump. And that jump was car caused mostly by the ARB money. Uh and then it fell this year as we took that ARA money back out of fund balance and put it into a liability.

I'm sorry. What did you say restricted was? So restricted is for uh things that you guys as a board of alderman have voted or things that are required through your bond covenants that you have uh to only use that money for a specific purpose. Most of the time it's debt service. And how is that different from non-spendable? So non-spendable is essentially money you've already spent. Okay. So that's your like prepaid items. uh where you can't spend that money again, but it hasn't actually left your uh your fund yet because it was prepaid, not an actual expenditure.

And then the RSI balance is your usable funds. Uh you'll notice that for the last four consecutive years, the RSI fund balance has increased. So that's a positive sign as well. The next page just shows the general fund revenues and in a visualization. Uh the biggest difference between these two visualizations uh is that taxes went up a little bit between 24 to 25 but the charges for services uh was reduced significantly. So that led to the big difference in those two categories percentage of the total The next slide that we have covers the general fund revenues uh for the last five years. It shows it by category, taxes, licenses and permits, intergovernmental charges for services, fines and for fines and forfeitures and then miscellaneous. Uh generally it's uh in increasing and and positive at all uh five of the periods. Uh you will notice kind of some big numbers under intergovernmental in 22 and 23. That's a category for grant funding. So whenever you guys spend grant funds like that, I would anticipate next year being a potential uh year that that spikes back up because of the use of the AR money. Uh so that's what that category shows. Um and then uh the miscellaneous income uh kind of the big jump there is uh significantly larger investment income the last couple of years. Uh so again I would venture I guess that that's largely caused by holding arm budget. Uh the next slide is the expenditure

side of things. Just kind of visualizing the breakdown of uh what each piece of the pie spent. Uh I don't need to cover a whole lot there. Pretty consistent spending overall. The next slide shows you the breakdown of the five years by category, including the general government, public safety, highways and streets, municipal ports, and capital outlay. uh categories. Uh the general government spending has increased in all five years as well as public safety in the highways and streets has increased for four straight years. Uh other than that, municipal court is generally increasing overall. There is an outlier at least second of the five years and capitalizing kind of all over the place, but seems to be stabilizing. Uh again, you guys have a temple outlay plan in place at this point. So that should kind of direct that and you'll see jumps by six in accordance with that. So because there are some some varying levels from that plan. Uh the next slide that we have is the water utility fund. I hope I skip one.

Yep.

And when you say color, what is a little different? Uh so this just kind of covers the revenues and expenditures of the uh water fund and you'll see that in all years it was a an income or overall uh profit to the water fund with the exception of 2025 uh prior. If you don't consider the depreciation which is a non-cash expenditure uh then that had a profit as well. Uh so that depreciation uh for having replaced some assets um you'll see a significant jump in that in 23. Uh so there must have been some uh large purchases then that created kind of some higher depreciation for a period. I can't speak too much to that since we weren't doing the audit back then, but that would be my assessment of that trend. Uh the next fund that we have is the wastewater utility fund. Uh again, this has been fairly steady over the years. Uh so there's not a lot of note there, but I do show the numbers in the revenues, the expenses, the operating income, and the income without depreciation. And then finally, we have the electric fund. Um, one thing to note here is the again the increasing depreciation. So that's part of uh the decreasing net income uh is as you guys have been doing more and more projects and updating uh assets that's led to current depreciation in the past hasn't been as as significant as the assets that are being replaced cost less than the ones they're buying now. So that creates bigger

depreciation. Uh with that, I don't have anything else uh to present. So thank you guys very much for allowing us to come in and do this audit and uh thank you thank you to Kathy and her staff and uh everybody involved with the city's responses to our questions and that kind of stuff. Uh they made it uh very easy for us to work on this and we appreciate that. So they've been great to work with. Uh open it up for any questions if people have them at this time.

I have one question and it might not be a question specific. It might be a question for John and if that's the case. Okay. So looking at the general fund revenues, we see charges for services through Dublin from 2021 to 2025. So we're we're getting more revenue coming in from services, but if I look at all the utility funds and whatnot, I don't see correlating increase that much.

So the charges for services in the general fund are not produced by your proprietary fund, which is your water, electric, and waste water. Those are going to be more things like collecting at the pool uh the pool admittance, your fees and uh fines and stuff like that going to charges for services. Uh court cost, dog licenses, all that. Business licenses would be general fund. Yeah, your your biggest ones. Um yeah, where your licenses and permits and then the trash service is included in that as well because it's not a proprietary fund.

Um so charges for services or licenses and permits are two different categories here. No, you're right. I'm sorry. Oh, uh charges for services is where the trash is. Trash. That makes sense. What else would be under that to to if our utilities aren't in that utility services? What other services? I'm guessing. Well, no, it wouldn't be only trash. I We'll have to look. Yeah, it's it's things like your trash and then like any of the park stuffs like selling concessions at the parks. Uh that kind of stuff would also go into your charges for services account there.

Also, 2023 would been would have been when we started our 5-year um new contract with Republic. So, that could have had a If trash is in that. Yeah. Would general fund revenue include allocation of services or allocation of expenses to the enterprise? It does. Okay. Yes. What does that specific amount of chart if if the federal fund pays the utility clerk and then at the end of the year we allocate per cost to the utility funds split up to the utility funds to reimburse the general fund.

Okay. So could be playing paying some salaries. Other questions?

Could you explain to me a little bit on the pension? We have a $700,000 $775,000 that it showed as an asset for our proportionate share of the pension fund. Yes. And if we lower that from a 7% uh future value to a 6%, meaning that they don't make quite as much money on their investments, then we go to a $600,000 liability. Yes. Am I looking at that correctly? You are. Yes.

If they make just a little bit less than 7%, we go in the hole. in our pension funding. You can look at it that way. Yes. Uh the the liability versus the asset with the pension is a little bit odd in that you're never going to write a check for that liability, right? Uh and you're never going to get to cash that that asset out.

Uh but yeah, that's that is what that sensitivity is showing you. uh because the fund is so large uh it does not take a a big difference in earnings percentage. Uh so if they're at 7% is what they aim for in what they generally achieve. Uh it wouldn't take but a one point drop in that interest rate to uh end up at a point that under other current circumstances you would have a viability to the pension fund which is asset. So that that just means that your uh total pension liability would at that point be larger than your fiduciary uh li fiduciary net position of the fund right now, right?

Um so currently you guys have a fiduciary net position that shows that you have uh more than the actual liability. Uh and that that would change with those six with the one person changing pension. That's not unusual. Naturally, you guys are in a great position right now because uh most most governments of your size and again even larger carry a liability for the most part. It's somewhat rare to have a pension asset like that. So, you guys are in a pretty strong place with that. Thank you. All right. Anything else?

Hear nothing. I'll thank you guys. Thank you very much. Another presentation budget CIP. Okay. All right.

Okay. So, you guys never gave me a microphone. Thank you. Thank you.

We're gonna sing. We're going to dance. Um, I put a very detailed slideshow in your packets. We are not going through 57. There's eight people tonight. You're welcome. So, what I'm done, you've got all the details. As I was putting that together, it occurred to me that I probably need to provide that to you on a quarterly basis and I'll start doing that um moving forward instead of just um as we start doing the budget. So any rate, we're just going to hit the highlights. Uh general fund, just keep in mind our largest tax distribution is our real estate and personal property taxes that come from Lafayette County. Those will come in January. the largest part of that distribution. So, all the revenues look like they're a little bit behind, but they really are by and large fitting in with where they should be. Um, we are up over budget in interest, grants, and donation income. Um, police department has done a phenomenal job this year getting different grants to support their services. ly they've also gotten some donations towards specific projects like the uh drone that we're trying to get. So, and then interest, the interest rates have been up. If you've borrowed money, you've been paying more, but you're also getting more on your return. So, we've been able to get some more interest income. We've also done some reallocation of some of our funding so we're not leaving a large amount um in non-interestbearing accounts. We've shifted a lot of those funds over to where they're they're earning more interest for us. So that is positive. None of the inter fund transfers are happening yet. They're not going to happen till the end of the

year. Um but revenue is general fund overall looking pretty good from the expense side. We've talked about it. We are doing things about it. Um, you're going to see a common theme in all of the funds from the credit card processing fees. They're all over budget. We know that fixing it. We're moving forward. So, that will be better next year. We've had conversations as well about our attorney fees across the board tracking higher than what we had anticipated. Um the finance committee at the meeting last week said that they want us to do an RFQ for legal services and it's it's on the whiteboard so it's going to happen. It's just uh in the process to do that. Um we also have the other professional services is what we've been paying to navigate for their portion of the downtown sidewalk project. I can tell you from the short time I've been here, that has been money well spent. We do not have an engineer on staff, they are amazing and have done really, really great work to keep the sidewalk project flowing as it should. So, did you have a question?

Yeah, I want to interrupt your flow just a little bit. Okay. I talked about you talked about interest being higher than it was budgeted. Um, most people don't know this, but about a month after Kathy came on board, she pretty much tripled our interest earnings from what it was in the past. So, Kathy has done a lot for the city that a lot of people don't know about. So, I just want to make sure everyone knows that. Thank you.

Okay, so we're having ice cream for supper again tomorrow night. um other expenses. I really appreciate you saying that, Bruce. And and we did. I I came in with my banker brain and went, "Why in the earth aren't we getting more money out of this?" So, um that's one of the things that we've really worked towards happening. So, um the police has got a nonoperating line for around 50 grand. They got a Blue Shield grant that we um were able to buy a new car with. it was in our CIP for next year. We were able to accelerate that to this year. So, just another example of them doing a really good job getting us grant funds. Um, fuel is trending higher. You're going to see that specifically. I'm I'm pointed out here in the streets that you do see that in all of our budget categories. It's just been a little bit higher this year. It's not horrible. It's not like it's jumped and doubled or anything crazy, but it is going to, you know, be a little bit more than the budget had anticipated. Um, from the street department, their operating and maintenance right now is behind budget. If we have an awful winter, that could change. It just is going to depend on what snow removal looks like for us. Community development that is boy I have done a deep deep dive into community development the last few months and it's a lot. It's a lot but we're going to fix that. We are bringing you guys plans and we're going to make this so much better. But our engineering fees, professional services fees, those are higher than what we budgeted for. And that's a good thing. That's a good thing because we're having more development in our community. We're seeing more commercial development. We're seeing more residential development. And every time we have those developments come, we have to have them professionally evaluated. We do not have an engineer on

staff. We cannot afford, we're not the size to have an engineer on staff. Same with an inspector. We don't have those things on staff because we're just not there yet. Will we be there someday? Most likely. Are we there today? We are not. So, those costs have gone up. One of the things that we're finding as we look at the fee schedule is we're not recouping what we should be in a lot of those areas. So, we really are going to do we've done a deep dive on the fee schedule so that when we move into the next budget year, we're not in this business to make money, but we are in this business to be good stewards of taxpayer dollars. So, we want to break and so we those are things that we're looking at to get us where we can go. Moving on. What's next? Arc funds. Mark talked about ARA funds just a little bit for us. The Ninth Street project is substantially complete. So, we should get all of that paid out. Um depending upon the railroad if we can get that right away with the railroad and finish that we will have the arc of funds completely expended this budget year and that entire fund will just kind of ride off into the sunset because we are not at another co um electric department um solar services are trending a little up I think you're going to see that in all of our services um we're having more development our funds are going up That's just how it's working. They are also seeing the interest position moving forward as well. Um overall electric department revenue is right where it should be. Contractual services are within budget. Other than credit card, we're going to have that conversation. I'm not being the dead horse, but it is there. Um developer expenses, we've mitigated risk on that. So, we've changed our policies

to where if someone comes in and they need to have a transformer that doesn't, you know, I'm going to start this new business, I have to have the specific transformer that's being paid before we place the order for the transformer. The fees schedule adjustments will help with that as well. So, overall, we've been pretty good in that department. Water, I believe, is next. No big surprises there. Um, service revenue is a little I 100% put those in the wrong spot, but that's okay. Your your other slide shows had it. Um, service revenue is up a little bit on um water. We're still losing money every time we make a tap. We're fixing that with the fee schedule. What you see here is the service revenue for the wastewater. Same thing. There have been more taps connection fees than what we've had in the past. So that is up. And then um we were able to get some proceeds dispersement on wastewater for the 2004 two yes 2004 series bond. Those funds have come back to us now. We paid off the 2005 this week. So whatever's remaining in that rebate will come back to us as well. So we'll see that soon. Um I think you know water department wastewater I mean their expenditures are what they are. There's been some um breakdowns that they've had. There's been some equipment failure that we've had some expenses in water and wastewater both. Some of those were budgeted this year. Some of them weren't. But we're trying to find a way to make that work. Um, park park is just kind of its own thing. It's just they they do they're just

different. We fund park a lot through other sources other than the park taxes. Park is not a self- sustainable fund. So we are putting they have a sales tax, they have program revenue, they also get money from the general revenue to make it work. Um all of their um revenues for the year have been at or just below what they had budgeted. I think it may have been over anticipated a little bit last year and we'll try to make some adjustments to this year's budget and that their um expense side of their budget is really in line with whatever had been budgeted for years. So parks, no giant surprises. Um there the park board we we provide what we anticipate the revenues will be. The park board does the expense side of their budget and then the programming side of it. So it's there's a lot of hands in the park's budget, but we'll get through that. All right, I think that's going to move us into our CIP. Um, you go to the next slide, Sha.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Forgot about that one. So, when somebody comes in and they're going to do a subdivision, they have the option to contribute financially to a park system or to donate green space to the park system. So, when Pine Creek came in and they did their development, they decided, we're going to do a financial contribution. So, we've been able to get $24,000 this past year in park development fees. Those fees can be used for any park other than Dyer Park. They have to be used either to develop a new park or to expand on any of our outstanding parks other than our main Dire Park. So, that um they've gotten some decent revenue there this year. Haven't had that in the past. They've put very minimal expenses. They painted um one of the ball courts over in one of the parks. I don't remember which one it was, but just and it was around the seat. It's all I could get for it. Um so any rate, they do have some funds moving into the next year, but they'll be able to expand their parks outside of the D park.

And they are I can't remember what the one that's off of uh Mason Phillips

Phillips Park Phillips Park. They've been in discussions that parks board has about replacing the equipment there with some of these funds and potentially grant dollars too. Okay. CIP um sales tax right in line with where it should be. Interest income again has been up and we haven't done any end of year transfers. So the revenues I really think are going to be right at or a little above what we had anticipated for the capital improvement sales tax. Um the expenditure side of that we're making really good progress on our CIP. Um the police department and I cannot see that. That's way too far away for me. So the police department has finished their CIP. They have all of the expenditures completed and ended up with some excess. So they came in under budget on that. The street department things are moving along really nicely with that with the exception of the street shed. We put it out for bid is really expensive. It was more than we wanted. Um we've asked them to revise the scope a little bit. that we anticipate getting cost on that back this week. I got an email this morning. We should be getting those soon. So, we're still optimistic that we can do something to move that forward, but we'll be bringing those revised costs to you guys whenever we get that. Um, parks has not completed all of their CIP because they had a bump at the swimming pool go down and so they kind of held on to some of their CIP funds to get that fixed. So, it will be fixed this fiscal year and before the pool opens. Um, have a club go down last year.

Yeah. Yeah. It's a 18 19 year old pool. It's There we go. showing its wearable, but do they go out every year? No, but there's more than one pump. There's about four pumps on. Question. Yes, sir. On the last slide, just point of clarification for me. So, the Blue Shields bought the new vehicle. Did we get a second vehicle like schedule or because you mentioned we're not getting the vehicle for next year? Okay. We had one in the CIP. Correct. We have two in the CIP for next year, but we went ahead and bought one of those shelter. You just pulled that one ahead.

Yeah, pulled it up here. Um, admin, we're making progress. You guys have nice new shiny furniture and you can hear us. It's kind of cool. So, um, we're finishing up that project. We're still in the middle of our job analysis and compensation study. Um, but everything is looking good for all the general fund CIS. Um, what is this? Electric department is running a little behind on schedule on their CIP. We did get a an electric engineer under contract and so that was um some of the projects that they have on this year's CIP. We needed the engineer in place first. So, we are moving forward with some of those. Um the plant rehab they've um are going to get the roof replaced and or repaired or replaced alone. Um and some brick work done there. The tree tuners are doing their piece right now. So um some things are moving along really well there. Some things have really kind of stalled out and will probably be in next year's CIP. Um water department things are moving along really well there. The only thing that is missing in the water department CIP is the GIS project is not yet complete. It's very close to being complete. Um but everything else has come in out of the low budget. And I wanted to point out um the the lime lagoon cleaning that sludge out of there came in $45,000 under budget. So good job on getting that bit out and and taken care of. uh wastewater. They have everything. The GIS mapping found out this morning that the GIS

portion is now complete as far as what the mapping of that is. So, um haven't paid all the bills yet that their project, their CIP is complete. So, I think they get the gold star for winning the race. I don't know. Josh got it, but he always gets a gold star. So, we'll give it to Ky. Okay,

transportation tax. I think we're right in line with where we expect things to be with that. Um, sales and use tax are all on budget. The transportation tax is going to be used for a couple of things. We use that for our street projects. We use that for our downtown sidewalk. Um, we are so incredibly excited. of the downtown sidewalk project is moving forward and at our next meeting we'll have um a little more detail for you on that. Um but as far as transportation tax, everything is falling right in line with what we had anticipated. So I think that is there maybe one more. Okay, that's it. any questions you guys have about where we're at right now and what our next steps are.

Can you provide the slide as well? I absolutely will. Thank you. Okay. Very good. Thank you. Well done, Jackie. Thank you.

All right. We have a discussion. Uh strategic plan street. Okay. So, we're continuing our strategic plan series. So, we have um honestly we took such a long break from it that I've we have um I don't know what we have. I'll be on it.

Well, I know we have water next. So, street today and water at the next meeting. So, um this kind of just shows you our problem statement that came out as a result of the strategic plan. Um that problem statement being that deteriorating road conditions and insufficient long-term funding have led to public dissatisfaction with residents demanding more visible and lasting improvements beyond temporary fixes. So, we really tried to lean into that last bit of the of the statement um and trying to see how we can we know that we're making improvements, but we also know that there's in every circumstance there's an opportunity to do more. So, we want to focus on the more visible and lasting improvements and that's what you'll see when you look at the action items that we have on the left side. So number one, implement a routine road condition assessment. We can hire someone to do this, but it will be costly in order to do that. So what this is going to consist of is basically an in-house road condition assessment. This is something that Jean and Darren do on an annual basis probably more than once a year to be honest because you look at it uh during budget and then you look at it after the winter has um kind of changed things around. So this is just really kind of formalizing and documenting the road condition assessment that they currently do. um and then utilize asset management systems with GIS and software to prioritize maintenance needs. So, we've already started our relationship and have had a relationship with SAMGIS, but there's other ways once our crews are completely trained on GIS. There is a multitude of ways that we can utilize that mapping system to track where we

are with uh maintenance needs when it comes to our road system. So, we plan to try to utilize what we have a little and um allow that to grow a little too. And then create a 10-year capital improvement plan. So this is included in um all of our utility infrastructure categories or priority areas, but we want to strive towards um doing a little bit more when it comes to our capital planning and not just focus on the five years because just like the how the road conditions change, the five-year um tends to change too. And we feel if we have a longer capital improvement plan, we can um do a much better job at forecasting and and planning out for um the years as they come. So this that'll be a huge improvement. And it also includes not just a 10-year CIP for streets, but also kind of digging into the sidewalk projects as as well. So um at the bottom, I'll just jump ahead. The last one, implement the sidewalk and storm water cost share program. There's a lot of other cities that utilize programs like this where it's a 50% cost share um for storm water and for sidewalks. Um Richmond being one of those comparator cities that utilizes programs like that. So, if we can set dollars aside for both of those purposes and split the cost, we can uh make improvements. And then I'd like to see us make improvements, especially if we receive an additional funding source for dedicated transportation. I'd like to see us utilize some of those dollars to make more significant sidewalk improvements beyond what we're doing in the downtown port and then collaborate with private sector for road maintenance and road maintenance and investment. So um this kind of fits along with our economic development kind of fits along with community development as well. But um we

are starting to see some significant growth in our community and we want to make sure that those areas are growing efficient or sufficiently for um the type of growth that comes with us. So, if that consists of um collaborating with our partners, our development partners, then we'll we'll see what we can do to make that happen and make sure our roads are are going to be suited for the type of growth that we're we're seeing in different areas. Um research and train staff on alternative methods for durable repair materials and modern maintenance procedures. So Darren and I have had quite a few conversations about this um in particular, but I think what we're what we're wanting to get to in this is the ability for us to look at other options when it comes to our road maintenance and street maintenance. Our program we have today is a street maintenance program. We do trip and seal. We do overlay. We will continue to do overlay. But how can we look at um different different types of materials used, different types of strategies used to see what makes the most sense for our community. And so this this doesn't necessarily mean we're going to do everything completely different, but we are going to put some research into what what our options are. So, um, Darren has a really strong relationship with Vans Brothers who helps them on an annual basis to determine, you know, where where improvements need to be made, conditions. They vet the conditions that we determine and and make sure that they align and agree with the conditions that we set for each street. So, they have um offered their services to the board of alderman to come in and talk to you all about what our options are and what they look like and what the pros and cons are as well as the prices of each of those different options.

Anything that helps us with all

Vans brothers will be helping us overall execute some of these. So, um and then develop and implement a storm water improvement plan. We talked, Darren and I talked today that this might be one of the most critical action items on this priority area. Um, our storm water our storm water program right now has has not been hardly even existent quite frankly. Um, storm water has kind of fell to the wayside unfortunately, but it plays such a critical ro role in our street infrastructure. So, um, when something breaks, we're fixing it, but we also don't have a revenue source for storm water, uh, at the time. So, we do want to look at different ways we can we can seek a revenue source for storm water, but at the very minimum, we want to make sure we have a game plan. And there's a lot of ways that we can do that, but we need a complete system analysis of our storm water and the conditions that they're currently in. So we can when we do have the funds available, if that's every year or not every year, when we have the funds available, we need to know exactly where we need to be investing those funds into our systems. Go ahead.

Would that be the one with the guy that works with you for his yard? Would that be where he would fit in? Roger over on uh First Street. Yeah. Or Russell, sorry. Yeah. I mean I mean his whole yard floods whenever it rains. Yeah, he was talking to me about it.

Yeah, I mean this is going to have to take some engineering uh this will take some engineering to to get done uh throughout the next five years to see where we need to start and um we're going to have to start in town. Uh it's going to be downtown area with the with the storm water and work our stuff out. Um, but we also got to look at the outside to see what we need to change, you know, as we go through this because we can't start inside, make all the pipes bigger, the pipes going out of town or smaller. So, it it's going to take a while to get through all this. But, uh, I think it's very important to our streets to make sure we get the water off and away from our streets so we can do better streets. Well, since all of the downtown water runs into his area, I

mean, would that be Yeah, that will be I mean that that'll probably be one of the first ways we get

Yes. But yeah, his his uh yard is I'm running on Thursday is the downtown area that you know runs out of Davis Creek. So uh it goes all the way across to Dryen um Mason and Dryen there. So all that will be looked at. Yeah. Well, he he asked me that and so yeah, that's been a problem for a lot of so and we've got a couple of them in town like that. So thank you.

Okay. And then the last action item we have is develop a maintenance tracking system to monitor all completed repairs. Again, this is something that all of the utility and infrastructure uh departments as a whole could benefit from, but we don't have a formal um maintenance tracking anything for our system as a whole. So definitely something that will help us one better understand the impact that we're making and then uh maintain that from a documentation perspective and efficiency perspective. So um and then we have a few measures of success. So these are going to be our performance measures and we're working now to kind of turn these into performance measures. But the first one there, percentage of roads rated poor or below that received treatment. So this helps us just make sure that we're staying on to we're you know we're making sure that we're improving the streets that need it the most and this helps us track that to make sure that's what we're doing on an annual basis. The ratio of dollars spent to life cycle extension received for street projects. So this is also a good measure because it helps us better understand one just as a whole the impact of not just we've invested x amount of dollars this year in our street plan but also we've extended our our systems life by x amount of years. So it takes those two factors and creates a ratio out of that. Um next ratio of cost for preventative maintenance to reactive maintenance. So, we kind of dove into this a little bit today, Darren and I. Um, in reality, a lot of the work that we do today is preventative maintenance because we have a street maintenance program, not a street reconstruction program. So, um, this will be an interesting um, measure to see how it kind of unfolds. I think we'll see very minimal changes um, in it

from year to year, but it'll still be interesting to track. We also have linear street of sidewalks replaced and added annually. This is a pretty straightforward measure, but we want to improve the amount of sidewalk impact that we're having on an annual basis. And this is um a very clean way to track that. And then miles of roads resurfaced each year. And this will probably adjust us ever so slightly to lane miles of roads resurface each year just so we can be consistent across the board. So this is also again just a straightforward um right now our best our best mechanism we obviously have you know we'll make our list of the streets that we are doing each year and the dollar amount and that's what we look at when it comes to performance. This year we invested x amount of dollars. Last year we invested x amount of dollars. These performance measures are going to allow us to be better put um a a better picture to what our reach is when it comes to our street infrastructure and the improvements that we're making. Any questions? Any comments? Damon not right now. Yeah, that that um res the resurfacing part. Um it's we're going to have years that that that goes down to nothing because we've got to do maintenance on the road that we've already resurfaced. So like next year is one of them then that we're going to go back and try to seal everything that we have resurfaced and and so we make sure it doesn't go downhill while we're resurfacing roads the year after. So uh every once in a while look like a hiccup in that where we don't get as many resurfaced. Um it'll be more of a a maintenance thing with either chip seal or flirty seal with a few balls in them. So u just to keep that in mind and uh right now we did the kind of did the math on the

present preventive maintenance and uh reactive and and we're running about 82% preventive maintenance 17% reactive. So reactive is more of street cuts uh and cloud holes and uh get them fixed when they call and stuff and uh control over that that uh what being built in town and sewers put in tree cuts. So um that a lot of that's that. So but we we're we're keeping up on the on the preventive maintenance to try to have some data. Another thing we discussed um is that in order to create the a sidewalk program of any type that would require some um ordinance revision on the board of alderman's behalf. So there's a lot of um kind of question or gray area when it comes to can a resident rip out a sidewalk, can they install a sidewalk, whose responsibility is that? Things like that. So, um, we've talked a little bit about sidewalk ordinances and policies, but that was really in regards to the downtown area. In reality, we need to look at it on a more global perspective and a city-wide perspective. So, we'll do that before we can really get any type of program off the ground.

I just have a comment. Um, Darren mentioned reactive maintenance and there's always going to be that. It's just going to exist. But in general uh this entire strategic plan shows a commitment to proactive being very proactive with with finding out problems seeking out solutions ahead of time before they happen. So I think as we go forward we find we're pro proactive on everything in the strategic plan including streets including water we're going to see those reactive needs go down. That's going to save the city money over time. So, uh, kudos on the strategic plan and what's going on. So, uh, I'm I'm a proactive person, so I like to see proactive things and proactive. It means the city needs to be more proactive in discovering the solutions going forward. Just wanted to mention that. So, thank you for that.

Thank you. All right. Can we go back to me for a minute? I'm sorry. Nice to have you. Um, I was supposed to print this and email it and send it to you today and I just remembered it. So, this is our budget timeline. We should have talked about that when I was speaking. We do have workshops at 4:30 our next three meetings. Just a heads up. and I will send this out to you with that other slide down at 4:30. She said,

"All right. Uh, next scheduled meeting is Monday, January 26, 6 o' 4:30 workshops at 4:30, meeting at 6. Uh right now is the time where alderman can request items be put on the agenda. Are there any such requests? Workshops are open in the community. Right. Absolutely. Absolutely. Okay. Nothing further. I would take a motion to adjurnn. I'll make motion to second a motion and second. All in favor by zero. We are a joint.