Council - Regular Meeting

Under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Join me for a moment of silent prayer. Amen. All right. Agenda item three is approval of tonight's agenda. Is there a motion to approve it? So moved. All those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carries. My voice holds out. Allergies are abounding. Agenda item four is the time we allow at each council meeting for citizen comments. And I'm not sure if anybody's here to speak. I don't think so, so we'll just go ahead and move on from there. Agenda item five is approval of minutes. Exhibit one in your packet, and it's minutes from July 6, 2026. Council, if you had a chance to review those. Exhibit 2 of the monthly financial report. We'll call Kent up to go over that with us. Thanks, Kent.

Thank you, Mayor. All right. June is a little more active month in regards to some debt service payment. That was a little over $2.5 million. You can see that under the debt service for dispersed in regards to our principal payments are due June 1 once a year. We also do, if you remember in the budget session, our kilowatt-hour transfer, we do six months, usually in December and then in June. So that was $146,000 and change. It's basically three and a half cents per kilowatt-hour that's sold each month for six months. We closed out Bun 306, the Delaware and Second Street project. That came from no-use tax to close out. And then we also transferred 50% of what we budgeted from road use to the general fund. Every year we budget 600,000 to go from road use tax to the general fund to help. So we transferred 300,000 here in June for that. And then I talked to you last month too, but part of that dispersed of 1.4 in the general. is that 805 in that escrow account, that came out in general and went into the debt service to pay the debt service. So the other comment is, you'll see it in the summary of warrants here on the next action, but the 3.88 is the other thing that's going to be in the summary of warrants is the final payment for the aerial ladder, and that's 696. 3.1 in the general. That's all I got, unless you guys have a question on the treasurer. Any questions?

Are those in favor say yes. Yes. Closed. Item 7 is Kent again, exhibit three monthly bills.

All right. Just hit some of the high ones here. With the first fiscal year, there's a lot of budget payments for that. So the first one I have is on page three. Dutch American Museum, $15,000. Their payout for the full year. A little bit below that, Eric Ribbons for tree, ash tree treatment around the community cemetery. All our trees start for $16,000. $452,000. Kind of an annual deal?

Or how long is that program run for? Every other.

So this is the second. We did it two years ago, basically. Is it healthy? I believe it is. It's helping the one. Yes. Yep. And then page five. No, no, no. I apologize. Please interject any time. Page five, Iowa League of Cities membership news for the year. for fiscal year is 3,807. Page six is we did some patchwork with Coopman's Concrete for 18,000. They're on Iowa Avenue in the department of Minecraft. Page eight, Hornsley Arts Council, 25,000. This is one-third of their budget. And then page 9, Rosenbauer Firefighting. That was the aerial ladder payment that I'm talking about for $696,453. A few more down from that, Sioux County Regional Airport. Is there a fiscal year ask? $156. And that's been screwed up, and that will be the payment for every year going forward for a few years. Page 10, Styber. and the front office and the 35-5 was that or maintenance agreement for the maintenance is 52-86. Did it work? Yeah. Did they fix it? Made a difference? Okay, great. Yes. And the last one I've got is, yeah, Williams and Company on the very last page, page 12 is for, Williams and Company was here early getting done with their audit for the calendar year 2025. And then I'd like to add two more that I've got since the consulate went out. RODA, R-O-O-R-D-A, RODA Equipment out of Cherokee. We're buying a 2015 Kenworth tractor for the street department. It's a budgeted item for $60,000. Second one, Vision Builders. Canal, second addition for the canals to Vision Builders, $1,115,026.15. So $1,115,026.15. That's for that housing development out there that we're... And utilities, both. So that's part of our housing project. We had an agreement with them on that. It's a $1.241,240,000 payout, and this is a partial payment. So we've got about $133,000 left, I guess is my point. And that's for that subdivision just north of 14th there. Okay.

That's all I got. We had more people use that program?

Yeah. We had one payout before this, and now we had two this month. Yeah, that's correct. So that's great. It's being promoted and being used, so that's awesome.

Agenda number eight, we have to set a date for public hearing to amend the code of ordinances. It's exhibit four in your packet.

Yeah, so basically we've updated our official zoning map, which has included a highlighted the changes that we've made over the last number of years. I think it's 2022 that it was last updated. So we annexed one piece west and then west of the community, and then we also changed the zoning on several areas. So that is basically sending a public hearing to look at that. Planning and zoning has approved of this. Yeah.

Thank you, Janet. Addendum 9, a resolution proposing to dispose of city-owned property. This is out by Puddle Jumper, correct?

That's right, yes. This is the Madison Place, so Puddle Jumper, 12th edition. So we officially dispose of the property, and then we also, at that point, we're sending the public hearing for the disposal of the property. Also, at that meeting, we will propose the covenants and lot pricing to go with that. So that will be presented at the next meeting.

Okay. So we need a resolution for that one, right, Janet? Okay. And that will be August 3. Mm-hmm. So somebody make a motion first? Yes. Thank you. All right. Agenda item 10, electric lineman position. Jason's going to come up and present that. Thanks, Jason.

So yeah, over the last few weeks we've been doing interviews for electric lineman positions. We'd recommend hiring Ethan Osler for that position. He currently resides in Milford. recently graduated from NCC Powerline program. He's been working at an HVAC company since landing the job. So, yeah, we're excited to have Ethan and his fiancée, Jenna, move into our community. Okay. Awesome.

Okay.

Great. Great. We just need a motion to approve his hiring. Right.

Okay.

I move. All those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? I'm curious. Thank you, Jason. Good. Agenda item 11, a special event permit. Jeff.

Yeah, we had a request from Diamond Vogel to, as part of their 100th anniversary, they'd like to close down a section of Arizona Avenue next to the park, Mill Park. So with that, we present that to council. and the request they had to have an event in the park.

They did paperwork and everything. Awesome. Good. Okay. Support. All those in favor signify by saying yes.

Yes. Opposed? Motion carries.

Ryan is going to give us an update on some housing development.

The reason that I've got the very first sheet there, the new website adjustments, and I want to say special thanks to Dan and Jason for just the work to put GIS correctly, and then our website has been an ongoing process, but the reason I want to throw this first is you can see an overview of essentially everywhere where we've got lots. It's all in red. And then if you look at the next page, it actually details out, for instance, this is Puddle Jumper 11. It's got every city of Orange City lot on it. So it hasn't hit the website yet but it's it's uh ready and soon we're we're assuming jason uh you've worked on this one i think we're talking about a soon rollout but i want to just say this will be a significant improvement from current process where we've had to take pdfs and continue to color them and adjust them, and Curt really spent a lot of time on that. This will be more, it'll still be work, but it's more automatic, and it is also more easily accessible for anyone interested, including realtors or homeowners wanting to purchase. So you see, I just took a screenshot, and taking this screenshot then, it'll really tie into the next which is the spreadsheet to give you some ideas as to where we're going with the housing update. The top is just all Orange City lots. The next section is all the private. The next section is apartments. And then the last section is future. Okay, so just break it down so you can see where we're going here. Orange City Lots, this is available Orange City Lots presently. So we have one in Puddle Jumper 5 that's still $20,000. It's been available for a while. It's not moving currently. Puddle Jumper 9, we're down to three. Puddle Jumper 9, as you can see, it's right across from the apartments. Yes, directly to the east of the apartments, the current Hillcrest. Thank you. name was escaping me hillcrest apartments there's three that are available there the one is way up on the in the corner that's on 14th street southeast three in puddle jumper nine puddle jumper ten we have seven lots down to seven this last year we sold five i mean we're just continuing to to to empty our inventory um and then there's also four additional fam multi-family lots that you can see the stats on that, Puddle Jumper 11. We see we've got 12. We do have interest in several, but nothing moving presently. And then you get down to Gelderlin, and you can see all of the Gelderlin in red. Three of those Gelderlin have sold in the past year, and the rest of those 15 remain open. Now, not on the new website adjustments page is North Weiland. And that's where we get more into the private. Currently, we don't have any city lots in the North Island because we haven't extended Frankfurt. We haven't plotted, put a plot map together and finalized that and gone through. So in the next couple of months, we will be doing that. And so I'll be updating my spreadsheet and various pictures. as well as the website that will be over in time in the next couple of months. But currently, Orange City does not own any lots. We own land, but not lots. Understood? So we get into private, North Weiland, and you can just walk through North Weiland out west, canals with vision. I've got highlighted as to what's single-family. I've got highlighted as to what's multi-family. And then I've got highlighted for affordable single family, twin homes, condo units. They're for sale condo units. And then condo units for the 55 plus. That's obviously Canal Heist. But the private, that's a realm of which I've got to tie in fairly closely. You've got to see what inventory is out there and where we need to continue to push. But this goes back to... Well, since I started in the very first workforce housing meeting was all of the various industries and major employers of Orange City sitting down in a room and saying, we've got to have housing as a focus and we've got to have child care as a focus. And a few of you might have been in that room. Darren, I know you were. So those are the things that are driving additional housing. But in addition to that is the apartment side of it and the affordable side of it. So that's where we get down to the last section there. The apartments between R. Perry and their Salem development, 72 apartments, the first set of 12 available in August, I believe, August, September, October. So we're going to have 72 apartments in time. The first 36 will be available in this 2026. So we'll have 36 of those apartments ready. RTI, which is the old Nederlanders, we have 12 apartments. Those are rented. When I talk about apartments, it's the rented apartments, or we're talking about condos that are sold type of a deal. But we're talking about 84 apartments, and the RTI ones, they are 10 rented and two that are still available. They are going quickly. In fact, and that was July 1st. I don't know if it's been rented, any additional rented. Does anybody know? Okay. In addition to those 84, Vision will have 36 I might just pencil this. It's up higher when you look at the canals. Let's see, where do I have that? Oh, it's the blue. The canals, porches, and the private one, seven multifamily lots. Well, those seven multifamily lots that are right on 14th Street, Puddle Jumper 11th Edition, they're actually turning into 12 three-plex apartments to be rented. So that's still yet future. I just added it to the one above with the private, but you're going to add 36 additional apartments. So we're going to have 120 apartments over the course of the next couple of years to be added to our book for Orange City. Then the future, North Weiland extension. We've obviously been talking about extending Frankfurt, so seven Orange City lots will be almost immediately available. Volink will have two additional single family. Those are going to be the more custom homes. The veranda slash porches, they're going to have 23 affordable single family. That's part of their workforce housing tax credits that they receive. So they'll add 23 core homes. to our book of availability. Vision also has 10 single family in the Porches area. So you have the Canal Heist, you have the Canal Twin Homes, then you'll have a row of single family homes that will be 10 lots, but they'll still be for the plus 55, those single family. And then you've got the, what we call the Porches, core homes, 23 of those, and then they've got the apartments along 14th. So you can kind of see the grand big picture of the canals area. And I've been talking a lot. Any questions on what we've covered? Go ahead. So the website, when you go to it, what does it look like? It is. Well, it's GIS. If you've been to the GIS, but yes, that is actually a screenshot of it. It'll be highlighted in red. It'll have the details on it. It's really handy for anyone to access. Is it, like, interactive, like the GIS website? It is. In fact, it is the GIS website. It's just this is overlaid right onto it.

Okay.

And it's got the price then just like that. Cool. Price, size of lot, what that equates to in acres, et cetera. And then the last Puddle Jumper 12, which is Madison Street, when Madison, is it Madison Place, goes in, adding an additional 24 single family. Obviously, there's huge differences between the Puddle Jumper realm and, say, North Weiland. or go over to Gelderland. Those are the higher end customs. Puddle jumper realm is some restrictions on the size of house. And then last but not least, for still future, the Prairie View Estates, 10 acreages to the west of Unity Christian High School. Now that gets into the last page that I've got. And just the last two days, Friday and Monday, got more information to fully color this. You'll see there's only two of our communities that are in the general area that are seven-year full tax abatements for multifamily. Again, this is multifamily tax abatements. Only two are now... That's a major change from two years ago when almost all of them were seven year and we were one of the only 10 year. But something happened with legislation over the last couple of years where the TIF no longer is able to, or I should say, they removed out of TIF payback the school side of that payback. So now with that, these other communities are saying, well, since that's been removed, then we're going to add a few years to try and equate it, because it's about 30% reduction when you remove the public schools out of the TIF equation. So just today, I updated this, adding three of the people who were on seven years to 10 when we finally got some good information. There are, of these nine communities, only two that have seven-year tax abatements all of the rest of them have jumped up to where we currently are at my recommendation would be to continue granted we are seeing some tremendous growth in multifamily you can see what we've got there's a hundred single-family currently inventory and seventeen multifamily as well as some future things. But my opinion is we let the private sector decide whether or not Orange City has had enough multifamily or not. All I know from workforce housing and the industries, they're begging for more apartments and more affordable housing. So that's where we're at.

these other communities do the tax abatement on on top of the tax credit or do they go with the more thousand dollars a door I think they end up going with that thousand dollars a door

But they also, well, no, I would say this. I would say they do not remove out of the equation the tax abatement. In addition to that, they're also trying to hit that $1,000 door. It'd be interesting to have a conversation with one of our communities, actually both Lamar's and Sioux Center, because both have been awarded some workforce housing. My understanding, though, is that workforce housing, they do not remove one or the other. We have our abatement, which is part of the law of the city, as well as any additional help to bring in any workforce housing tax credits. So it's an and situation. The rebate does not ever get removed because it's law, and then in addition to that, they're saying, hey, we want to incentivize this developer, and we're going to throw an additional whatever. So I would almost guarantee that, but I can double-check, Mark. It's a good question. I don't want to say 100% that that's the case, but I'm pretty positive it is. The money's covered. well um yeah workforce housing tax credits come from the state and the city has the yep but i think what mark is asking is is the cities are the ones providing the tax abatement in addition sometimes like for us when someone comes and requests hey, we're going to apply for a workforce housing tax credit. We are also, in addition to that, saying, okay, we have our abatement, but in addition to that, we're going to work with you on a reduced price of lot or something because we need multi-unit. But they're not guaranteed the workforce. They are not. You know, it's the apply for it and it's granted. That's correct. That's correct. Yeah. In fact, more times than not, they are not receiving it. It's a difficult incentive.

All right, that brings us, oh, library board appointments. We are very, we have two seats, and Mark can correct me, a representative of the library board that can be reappointed, and John Buntzman and Benjamin Langton. have um agreed and uh would like to serve another term and um so that would be part of the motion and then we did have a vacancy and we actually had four applicants that were very very good and um but i'm going to recommend uh the council approved joellen harvey uh to the new um to the board And I did talk to her today, and she's incredibly excited. So that's a good addition. And I think we can do it as one motion, right, Janet? So unless you have any questions or Mark has any input, he serves on the board as our representative. And I think they were excited about – I was excited to have four people.

Yeah, we've never had that. Thank you. didn't come to a consensus on any one of the four because they thought they were all good candidates.

So we're hoping to keep them on file because every year it kind of, we can lose somebody or somebody moves or whatever their situation is. So we're going to grab them sometime. So if there's any other questions or comments, I'll also entertain a motion to approve those three appointments to the library board. All those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carries. Any other reports?

Matt? Yeah, a couple things. Just a reminder, on Wednesday is the appreciation supper, so we've ordered 20 degrees cooler for that night, so hopefully that works out. It should be better, but invite the community for that. Second, Jackson Miller has informed us he is basically finding a job closer to back home, and so we are advertising for a new parks supervisor. So that job advertisement is out there now. So looking forward to hopefully finding that soon. the staff we've talked about anticipating reports that that we typically give as staff and other organizations and as part of the budgeting process and learning process for council we are looking at doing a tour of some city facilities maybe if we have a shorter council meeting in the next month or two that we can go look at things like the pool some of the perhaps some of the shops the treatment plants just get an idea of what we have, our assets, and our employees can provide some information that way as well and get to see what's happening with that.

That's a good idea.

That's great. And then in the next, also working on some strategic planning updates, and all the tasks we've done, just provided an update at a council meeting, so working through that to provide where we're at on on that plan it's been hard to believe it's been a few months then two things just seek a little council input now mayor and i both received an email from the dutch heritage boosters they are considering a statue a dutch themed statue would be a likely a woman in dutch costume and being somewhat active, doing some Dutch activity. It wouldn't be just a statue.

They're looking at a bronze statue. Yeah, that's right. Let's go with that. We want to bring people in.

So they've considered a few different locations, perhaps in Windmill Park. That might be a little bit crowded there, so they've asked about the area in front of Stadcentrum. looking at that and so we are I think they're in the process of fundraising and before they go any further they want some indication that we'll work with them on that and you know I think it'd be nice to see what the statue looks like if they have a couple sculptors in mind and as they work through their concept yeah

And hopefully we'd have input as to where on that, you know, and we'd talk to the steering committee and the chamber as to when they, you know, we want it to be visible, but we don't want it like we're the Dutch organ or anything like that. So they just want to know if we kind of support their endeavor and so they can move forward.

It's actually, I think, of you.

Of me?

Yeah.

You might have to move it. I'd be in support of it. I mean, I don't know. Yeah, exactly. But I think, yeah, we talked about our heritage and attracted people downtown and all this stuff. It'd be cool to have another thing for people to come see. Yeah.

They're on the fundraising effort right now, some private funds.

We kind of wanted you guys' approval before they took every step, or at least.

As long as we can look at it. Yes. What it's going to look like. Right. Yes.

And maybe where the location and snow removal and stuff.

Sounds like the sculptors are pretty excited about the location and working with the group there. They're still working on their concept yet, but that's a good point.

Yep. Quick question, Matt. Maybe, I'm sure they have a reason, but is it just more visible in front of Stoudt Centrum? I'm just thinking like between the museum and the, what do they call it, the annex, like that area, you know, if they're going to have somebody more on staff in the future and people touring, or is it to get people to come downtown from there? Is that maybe their reasoning?

I think they were initially thinking the park, and so this would be just a little bit still in view of the park. Gotcha. Do some of the windmill, but that is a... Yeah.

Yeah. Because Lori's been at the museum, I think, some regular hours, so that's a good suggestion.

Sounds like everybody's supportive. We'll continue. Yeah. And then finally, we've talked to staff over the last couple of months, and Jim has brought it to our attention a little bit more, regarding golf carts and just right now golf carts are not allowed, but they're becoming more and more prevalent. And so our thought is to do a little research to see what other communities are doing. I think several have adopted. new ordinances allowing that on the streets. Certain streets, you know, UTVs are allowed, but not on the highway, I believe, Jim, or on the county black tops with the speed limitations there. So, you know, with more and more of them being around, I thought we'd evaluate that at least, at least consider what's going on. But put the feelers out with that, too, and just... If we want to stop it, we probably should do that, but we're going to consider allowing that on streets.

I'd like to know what other cities are doing, where they're allowed and whatever.

There's not too many cities that don't allow it. Alton's had it for years. over there. Sioux Center has it. Rock Valley has it. Remsen just adopted it.

You still got to have a license, I'm assuming.

Yeah, different towns do it differently. Some mandate that you got to be 16 years old, have a valid driver's license. Some say 18. Some say sunrise to sunset. Some say as long as you got lights, you can drive home in the dark. that we can put the ordinance if we wanted to do it. But for the most part, all they ask is that you have working brakes, headlights, and taillights. My only worry is crossing Highway 10. And then a lot of cities restrict where they can drive. I think Rock Valley, you can't drive down the main street. And then Orange City, I would think that you'd want to definitely keep them off Highway 10. You probably wouldn't be able to ever cross Highway 10 on a golf cart. They let you cross it. They let you cross it, okay. They let you cross the busy roads, but they just want to keep you off them. Yeah. That's the same rule with UTVs. Yep, same rule as UTVs. You can cross it, but they just don't want you on Highway 10. And then some cities don't ask for a registration fee, but like Alton does, two years is $25. for a registration fee, and you get a sticker here at City Hall. So whatever you guys.

I mean, if you haven't had an issue patrolling them in Alton. No, they've been around for 40 years, so. A lot of it, I think, for us to keep in mind is the Landsman Retirement Home using golf carts, right? If we would stick to a hard no,

Likely that needs to end, right? Yeah, we either need to start enforcing it or we change it. That seems they can interfere on the vote quite a bit, aren't they? Recently, yeah.

And they'd have to probably own it so it wouldn't be thousands of golf carts, you know, so I think it's Good. Thanks, Jim. That's all I had. Ryan, anything else? Jim, anything else from you? Kent?

No. Jason? I got a few updates on projects. Madison Place, all the water is installed, passed all the tests. The last section of storm is being put in probably tomorrow. The one out there today, they're making good progress. They had a couple boxes to set. And then they'll go into preparing the final grade and putting the sub-base down on that street. So it's going to go on really good. And then Seventh Street, so we'll be paving Thursday, and then they will start tearing out from where that one ends through the Florida intersection, and then that will get paved next week through the intersection. By Thursday of this week, every rent

And they park them on the west side of the cemetery, don't they? I was out there the other day.

We rented like six golf carts. That's nice. Kind of back and forth, but everyone's very easy.

Without our ordinance, right? That road's closed in. Yeah. Yeah. City's ranting, but...

They're not actually driving on the road, Jim. But all the residents have been great. They've been really good.

So will that affect, like, along those side streets, like Arizona and so on?

No, that won't be as bad. Okay. So mid-August, we'll start the asphalt part of the project. The asphalt, okay. We'll mill it down two inches. So the only time they won't have access as well, the machines are going to die. There'll be a little two-inch drop-off that they have to drive over, but we won't limit any access to anybody once we get that done. Okay. We purchased a new snowplow truck last week, I think. We went and picked that up to add to our fleet to take care of the streets we're adding. And then we also now purchased the dump truck chassis. So we're actually going to make a side dump on the dump truck so that we'll go to Smithco and get a side dump. Hopefully we don't pick up a bunch of trees again, but it'll hold up a lot better if we have to. So we're going to try that out.

Any questions?

Dan, anything? I got two hats tonight. The one hat is from the Legion. Thank you very much. We received the tablet at the memorial today that was installed, as well as the bench. I'd pay for them to do it. And kudos for the utilities. I think Mike helped with that. Lipped that in. So from the Wheaton, thank you very much. And from the fire department, go past station and there's a missing bay. We have one of our trucks that's being repaired right now. Brought that up to Lyon, South Dakota yesterday, and hopefully that'll be back tomorrow night. They're doing some repairs on that. And then the Tower 61 is delivering on Wednesday. So we're looking forward to that. So you'll probably see it out. We were scheduled early August to do training on that. And then the current Ladder 61 will be going to Salix, and we will probably do a full-day training down there for their fire department to deliver that truck. So we would probably have an open house, but if you want to come Wednesday night, I would say after 7 o'clock or so, come see the new truck, fire station. Everybody's more than welcome.

Good. Good. Thanks. And also, Andrew, do you have anything? Mark?

I had to ask Ryan, what's the update on the North Weyland land purchase there? Do we have anything there?

North Weyland is purchased. it's closed and now it's a matter of getting a final plat and then pricing lot pricing is also so in the next couple months we need to have a final plat and then have council provide the pricing and then there's more steps thanks to all the city workers it's been hot out lately so a lot of people whether they're inside or outside

Working hard, thanks to them. And then just had one question the other night at the pool. Somebody asked me, and I said, I'm guessing it's a state DOT thing, but they said, out of our three stoplights, why is there one of them that doesn't have the stoplight on the side? Like it's just the top? Two of them have top and side, and they said it's hard to see in the morning. And I said, I'll ask the question. I don't know if that's something we put in with the state for, or... if it makes sense, or if it's something we can change.

We can probably change it, I would think. I think it's, we own the lights, so.

I don't know. Well, whatever. on wednesday and so you need a motion to adjourn