Remarks by Bryan Stucky
40 remarks on the record, newest first · Page 1 of 2
I'd like to add a budget discussion to the agenda. Okay. I would say probably obviously before executive session, but we could do it later in the meeting so as not hold up other people who are online. Sure.
Yeah, I think the, the whole unhappy pairing with that, I agree. It was a, a huge success. I know some people from out of the area who stayed and hung out at the booths and stuff. I told you I'd work on those Hills. I haven't gotten to it. Um, I do, I do see what you mean after doing it this last year that those Hills are no joke. So other than that, it's a wonderful event.
Yeah, it was his request. Nothing formal is needed. I bring it up for a couple of reasons. One, not to put anyone on the spot to give Mayor Pro Tem a chance to comment. So she was not at the meeting if she has anything. And two, we had a workshop. And that workshop was smooth. And I want to make sure that we're getting ahead of things before we get to final votes. November 4, we're voting on a utility increase. We're voting on a TBD. We're voting on a master fee schedule. And we also have the mayor's final budget coming around that time, too. And so I want to make sure that we're giving clear…
moving beyond the marina and i appreciate everyone indulging me and that's it's kind of as mayor wright was alluding to that's i'm just trying to get ahead of this having civil conversations now because there have been times where it's quiet it's quiet it's quiet we get to the vote and it's like well where did this come from so that's and there's no gotcha i'm just trying to david in in general we don't get in the nitty-gritty because i know we're meeting tomorrow and I'm looking at the City Tighten Its Belt page where it's talking about the $7.7 million. I guess my concern is I'm looking at…
I've mentioned this before this like We raise the utility tax so that we could acquire five new officers. We have not acquired those five new officers and So that money also helped with public defense, but you're right. You're right to be fair. I So that money, I understand, is most likely going to do some overtime. But it's just accumulating. What's happening with that money that we increased utility tax up for, which a good portion of that was the five officers. We don't have the officers. And maybe we'll get the five officers. I would love for us to get those five officers. But right now,…
But if we don't add, let's say, three years from now, you look at the amount of officers, and our amount of officers increased by three.
And I'm totally sensitive to the fact that you spend months and months and months looking at this, and here we spend days and weeks, and here I feel like I'm – poking some holes, which is partly our job. But yeah, I think it's going to be a combination of, for me personally, I would like to see some other place that we can trim. I understand that we're also going to have to increase some taxes. That's unavoidable. Things are going up. So I'm not necessarily opposed to all of the increases. I just think if we can try to find a little bit more to maybe offset some of those increases a little…
I didn't hear you saying you tried the bananas, just that you saw BioFest. There's a thing for everything. Good on them. No, I just wanted to also say the Hispanic Heritage Festival, they did a wonderful job to all the volunteers. I talked to a lovely couple who came from Port Townsend, and they said they've gone through Oak Harbor many times and never turned left on a pioneer. So those little things are small wins, but they can make a difference. So good job, and thank you to all the volunteers and everyone who helped put it on. Thank you. Thank you for that.
So correct me if I'm wrong, but part of the reason you wanted to do this and type the master fee schedule was to take some of the ambiguity out of it. Like you had mentioned $50 to $250.
And I agree. Looking at the current code that's not being enforced as far as... I do think, unless you're using a lot of discretion, I understand you have some, some, it still seems a little restrictive to me. I mean, I'm thinking, I got no problem necessarily with the dollar amounts, even though I know that's a master fee schedule and that's not, it's the idea of one false alarm in 180 day period. I mean, I try to think of the scenarios My alarm goes off. Oh, I'm sorry. I think everything's OK. I said it again. It goes off a second time. How much discretion are you using with this?
And I think you mentioned that the intent is definitely those repeat offenders who just aren't fixing their alarms. I mean, I'm just worried about things like, you know, I have a restaurant and maybe I have new hires coming and going and occasionally you don't turn the alarm off quick enough and things like that. That's the part that I'm concerned about, not the people that are legitimately just not fixing their alarm. That's why I say the discretion piece I think comes in and this is trying to take a step towards removing the discretion for the dollar amount, I'm just worried a little bit…
I think we can agree that could have been handled a little bit better. I think it was a little confusing for the public as we negotiated those treacherous waters. I'd also like to apologize to staff. We did ask some hard questions and there's a place for those hard questions. And we can always do better, and we should always strive for transparency. And if there's issues, we need to fix them. But I think we should always assume a positive intent, not necessarily nefarious actions. And I think some of our tone may have came off a little more accusatory towards staff than it should have. So I…
love the change but they were comfortable with it so that was their recommendation councilmember Stuckey all right there's got to be some questions but first i want to turn to our city attorney partly because she's in the house it's one of those questions i know the answer but i always got to ask it my wife as of like a week ago is now on their board am i allowed to vote on this Can I say that definitely she's not on the board yet because I haven't given her her contract and she hasn't signed it. It shows how much I know. She's probably watching right now.
of the RCWs. Applicants applying for use of revenues in this chapter must provide the municipality to which they are applying estimates of how money is received will result in increases in the number of people traveling for business or pleasure away from their place of residence or business, staying overnight and paying accommodations to a place 50 miles or more from their place of residence or business. And I want to zero in on that. So first of all, for Wendy, Because we don't have an updated application with those updated numbers, are we still able to approve this? Because the RCW is…
OK. Now, I struggle with that 50 miles. And sometimes I bend when it comes to LTAC. Main Street is wonderful. And having been to that Christmas event, I think I've only missed one year of the last six. It's wonderful. But I think to myself, if this event was held in Arlington, would I go? Probably not. I don't know how often any of us have gone that far for a small town Christmas event. Maybe I'm wrong. To the executive director, if you could explain a little bit, I mean, we have this, but there's also the public watching. So if you could explain a little bit why this would be different, the…
So the money, I heard it's for the tree, which we did have a sad tree a few years, so. But it was for what else specifically that this is being used for this year? That would be used specifically for the tree. That's how much tree.
Show us how much I know about trees. Yeah. So. It's a commercial grade tree.
Fair enough. And then to Mayor Pro Tem, who's our LTAC chair. I mean, I hear what you're saying about the precedent. How do we navigate that in the future? Because I really don't want people applying. I mean, a lot of times you have applicants that apply and they never use it, which kind of stinks because they take the money out of the pool. Yeah. but what can you do? But how do we stop people from, I don't think anyone's doing an intentional bait and switch, certainly not with this project, but it could happen in the future. And that's kind of my worry is, we're applying for this, you know,…
OK, and then circling back to our city attorney. I'm good?
Could you, if I abstain, I really don't think it's a big deal considering she's not even on the board, but if I abstain from this round, can you let me know for sure? Are you sure enough?
All right, thank you, that's all I have.
piggyback on your comments there a little bit. What a busy weekend with Church for the City, Rotary Challenge Series, the picnic. So also very heartfelt thank you to our staff who works on weekends over time after hours to make all those things happen. A special thanks to all the volunteers. I mean, it's really cool to see community members coming out, donating their time. It's much appreciated. One request unrelated. Can we bring back the meetings on social media? Not necessarily the comments, but it's been a couple weeks since they've been on. I didn't know if that was... We haven't had a…
No, no, no, no, no. It was said that the meetings would be available on Facebook and YouTube, and they haven't been on Facebook since the fourth.
Well, I mean, I'm looking at, like, our last two council meetings and our last workshop. And that's a change. I just was confused with the statements.
So you can't have the video embedded right on, okay.