City Council - Regular Meeting

all right the time's 5 30 and i'm going to call the order the tamwa city council meeting uh i will be filling in for mayor foot tonight in his absence uh for invocation mr dalby was unable to make it tonight unfortunately due to uh work so we are going to pause for a moment of silence All right, if everybody will rise for the Pledge of Allegiance. All right, thank you, everybody. Okay, first thing, we'll do consent agenda part one. Consent agenda part. I'm going to take roll. Oh, Chris, take roll.

Council Member Dupre? Here. Council Member Kavanagh? Here. Council Member Reid? Here. Council Member Galloway? Here. Council Member Hoffman?

Here.

And as Mr. Hoffman mentioned, he is filling in as Mayor Pro Tem for Mayor Foote today.

All right, we're going to do consent agenda part one. Do I have a motion?

So moved.

Second.

Second.

Chris, take the roll.

Council Member Duprey. Yes. Council Member Kavanagh. Yes. Council Member Reid.

Yes.

Council Member Galloway. Yes. Council Member Hoffman.

Yes. All right. Consent agenda part two. Do I have a motion?

So moved.

Second.

Chris, take the roll.

Council Member Duprey. Yes. Council Member Kavanagh.

Yes.

Council Member Reid.

No.

Council Member Galloway. Yes. Council Member Hoffman.

Yes. All right, can I have a motion for approval of agenda? So moved.

Second.

Chris, take the roll.

Council Member Dupre? Yes. Council Member Kavanagh? Yes. Council Member Reid? Yes. Council Member Galloway? Yes. Council Member Hoffman?

Yes. And with that, I will turn it over to City Administrator Rath, and I believe he has a speaker for us tonight as well.

Okay, I have my monthly administrative report, and then I'm going to call up... Main Street coordinator, Chris Patrick. Before I do that, though, I just want to go over a few citywide highlights. Employment staffing, I'd like to welcome Mike Lee to staff. new finance director. He has, well, I guess maybe technically after the meeting, completed day three with the city. I'd also like to acknowledge the promotion, higher promotion of Doyle Moore for water pollution control facility superintendent. He's been with the city, I think it's 33 years, and is promoted into that superintendent position. City also welcomes Missy Connor to the accounting specialist accounts receivable position. And currently we have open positions would be police officer. Any interested individuals can apply online. Those qualified and selected would receive training to be able to work in that in that role. The University of Iowa Initiative for Sustainable Communities program kicked off last Friday. The program is a partnership between the University of Iowa and the City of Ottumwa, including our various community partners, assisting as project liaisons. As a reminder, the program provides interdisciplinary planning, design, and technical assistance through faculty-led student teams. We are anticipating receiving 10 or more projects aligned with previously identified priorities over the next several months so we could see an influx of dozens of students and faculty into the area. Vogel Heights infrastructure, it's progressing along, a targeted completion for the end of the month for the infrastructure portion. Streets are progressing, including some paving, and it is anticipated that utilities will begin with installation later this month. Comprehensive plan 2040 with the focus on guiding principle number four, which is celebrating diversity. The overall summary of the comprehensive plan 2040 identifies approximately 46% complete. That includes about 63% of the objectives either completed or on track toward completion. The focus of the plan this month is guiding principle number four, as I mentioned. Of the 24 action items in that area, seven were identified as completed. That's about 29%. An additional seven as having some level of disruption or slightly behind schedule and remaining 10 or 42% as being on track toward their scheduled completion date. Next reporting period is gonna look at researching and establishing potential incentives for minority owned businesses, developing public art policies and reviewing special event applications. Additional priorities involve researching alternative communication methods and website translation tools and ongoing collaboration with community partners and advisory councils. and as far as some upcoming upcoming council policy decisions or things that may be before the body to consider regulations related to e-bikes elected officials and staff continue to receive calls and messages related to the use of electric bicycles there's been discussion to hold a work session and i've been informed that the public safety advisory commission is considering a topic at an upcoming agenda to gather more information related to current laws and regulations for e-bikes and determine what, if any, revisions to city code should be recommended. As with any potential legislation changes, the ability and or cost to enforce regulations should be part of that deliberative process. Sewer rate structure, stormwater ordinance. City staff is awaiting confirmation of the completed model, including a revised rate structure of various fee structures, identifying the lower base fee or higher usage rate while maintaining zero stormwater fees. Once the model has been delivered by the financial advisor, it will be shared with city council for discussion and consideration at a meeting or work session, ideally later this month. And in the last review of the compensation handbook, the topic of compensation has been identified during previous meetings of the city council with the most recent version adopted at the May 19, 2026 meeting. Since that meeting, there's a combination of either minor revisions pending or an interest by members of city council to review policy procedures identified in the handbook. Mayor Foote has informed me he has received some comments and would like to meet with the Director of Human Resources, Kojo, and me to share those comments. Following that meeting, Kojo and I would be able to present some suggestions and potential revisions for City Council to consider at a future work session or meeting. And I submit this report to City Council. And with that, then, I'd like to invite up Main Street Tumwa Executive Director, Chris Patrick. She's got her quarterly presentation. And it looks like you have a guest with you as well.

I brought a friend. Now, actually, I brought our new president, Colby Mercer, and she's going to talk about our new banner program that we're getting ready to implement. So let's start off. I'm Chris Patrick, executive director of Main Street of Tumwa, and I just want to thank the city for their great collaboration and partnership with Main Street. We have such a wonderful working relationship with the staff that it makes our job so much easier, and we are growing, and we're seeing so much progress in the downtown. As always, Main Street wants to thank the Council and Interim Mayor Hoffman for this time here. I wanted to call you by your first name, sorry. So, Perfect. So we are part of Main Street America. We are an accredited Main Street program, and we have benchmarks and quarterly reports that we send to the state, Main Street, Iowa, and they pass those up to Main Street America. And all of those reports are about Main Street and what is in the downtown. That includes property use, how many employees, how many residents, how many businesses. And then they put it in something called Booms Tracker, and I did put some of that information in your written report. And so you can look at that at your convenience. But we also have to have three transformational strategies, and they're mandatory. And these are our three. I am not going to read them. But I will talk about the outcomes from those strategies. Now, these were three-year transformational strategies, so we're on year three right now. And we're actually, our goal, we've succeeded and surpassed some of these goals already. Increasing our residents in the downtown. We've had 58 new residents since 2023. We have created several different social activities for residents, including our Main Street Lunch Club. That happens on the fourth Thursday at noon in rotating restaurants and eateries in the downtown if they're open. So how that works is like a cash mob. So we throw it out on Facebook, and we just wait to see who walks in the door to join us. So we see different faces every time. The median amount of money that our participants spend is about $16 for lunch, and we have between 10 and 18 people. So it's definitely successful. The restaurants are always saying, yes, we want to do it again. When can we get back on the schedule? And then we do five... free annual family events. So the business support and growth, you can read that portion. I think the one I really want to talk about on that, and we have a slide later, would be the new map. And then we have consulted with seven property owners for grant opportunities this year. Our vacancy rate is still higher than what we want it to be, but in the current climate, those vacancies being long-term vacancies of 20 years or more, some of those buildings are three stories. Without some intervention and code changes, I don't know if we can move that to that 10% within a year. So that might have to extend a little bit longer. And then also our social media following. When I was here in front of you last spring, we were at just under 10,000 followers and now we're at 11,300. And I think the most important stat on this is really the direct impact with people in the district. That is people that have come to our events, that's business owners we've helped, that's people that have called for advice. We have actually directly impacted the lives of 6,142 people. So let's jump into funding. I know this is something that was brought up at the last council meeting. So this is our sources slide, and you can see where our money is coming from in the different buckets. Community committee activities is 29%. We have our city support from TIF, our city support from DMP, grant funding, donation income. We were really focused on economic development this year and not so much on donations, but we did have 4% in in-kind donations, which is the highest we've ever had. And then responding to comments from our last presentation, you can see how we are spending our money. 40% goes to wages, which was a question at the last time. 15 to DMP operating expenses are 21%. Activity and submit expenses are about the same level. Wow, there we go. So I'm jumping into the Self-Supported Municipal Improvement District. Every single time I'm in front of you, I show you the district map. Our 16 block district is the River to 4th Street, Jefferson Street to Marion. And that also encompasses the SMID District, Self-Supported Municipal Improvement District. That means our constituents and property owners in those areas have chosen to have one, two or $3 per thousand added to their taxes, which stay in the downtown for special projects. And our SMID committee helps allocate that depending on what the people have said they want. And you will see our allocations for this last year. We spent $37,942 out of the 50,000 that we had allocated to spend for the fiscal year. And we have 28,292 in reserves. And if you do have questions on the slides about any of the numbers, please stop me. And then our downtown green and clean team, we are privileged really to help with all of the downtown, but especially the all abilities play space. We are partnering with the city and legacy with one of our people to actually go there at 630 every morning and make sure that the grass is mowed, that the weeds are picked, and it is ready for the thousands of people, seriously, thousands of people that are coming downtown. that parking lot is full all day long. So anyway, so out of the $39,900 we received last year, we spent $36,965, and most of that was on wages. One of my favorite slides, because I want to talk about the incredible volunteers that drive our Main Street program. So currently there's one staff member, myself. We are in the process of hiring a communication coordinator, which will work part time. But all of those impact, all of that impact is from our volunteers and the people in the community wanting to join in and see their downtown as strong as it possibly can be. So you can read the two rows there. We do have about 1184 downtown employees. Currently we are reaching out to all of the landlords to see how many apartments and how many residents because I know it fluctuates quite a bit. We do that twice a year. And then on the lower level, we have now accumulated over 54, almost 55,000 volunteer hours. And that $1.8 million impact is what we really use when we're going out and trying to get grants and to really a testimony to engagement in the community with our program and with the downtown. So property values in the Main Street District since 2006, They were right under 15 million, sorry, 15 million. And in 10 years, it jumped. So they were just over 21 million. So between fiscal year 2016 and today, we have added over another $10 million. So we are at... just a second, it went right out of my head, at $37 million of tax valuation in the district. And so that really goes back into the city and being able to really build that capacity and fill those buildings. So all of those buildings downtown are good neighbors and they're income producing, not just property tax, but sales tax, living wages for people in the community. So here are the new businesses that came into the district since January of 2026. The top two were already in the last slide that I presented to you in the spring. But the other ones, Ohana Grill is taking a little sabbatical as they build their brand in another community right now, but they will be back. And we have Curtis Graham, who just put in his Farm Bureau of Financial Services at 236 East Main. We have a Wildflower Skin Studio. So if anybody in your life would love to have a facial, she's the woman to go to. And Northcourt Brewing will be opening in the old Pallister's building, hopefully later this month. And then we have a new health clinic at 228 East 2nd Street. So here are just a few of the buildings that were in that tab where I said we had seven property owners that approached us. Now, we do have one property owner on the slide that owns multiple buildings, and we were really grateful to his vision for the downtown and his commitment to these buildings that have been longstanding vacant and also rescuing the Hotel Atomwa. So we did reach out to Main Street Iowa, and they did come in and are helping that owner with some designs for part of the vacancy in his building. That's a really great use of a multi-use building, especially with the addition of apartments and additional apartments that were not there before. Then we're also looking at the old Cerro Grande building, 311 and 313 East Main. And so we are assisting that owner. We have just written and submitted a challenge grant. So I did want to thank the council for their support. And I do believe you have a letter of intent that does need to be signed and sent off to the state saying that you support this project. No money, no money is changing hands, right? I'm not asking for money. I'm just asking for support so we can help that property only get $100,000 to build a new restaurant in three apartments in 311. And then next door, where the grocery store was, will be the butcher shop and the grocery store. So really excited, really excited to see this project come to fruition. Wrote the Catalyst Grant for 131. East Main, which you're all aware of. And then the last slide is of 105, 107, and 109 East Main that has mostly been pipe boxed. So looking to some projects that we've been working on behind the scenes for about a year, and now we're ready to kind of roll them out, and we will need council approval in the future. We've been working with Philip Bergmeier trying to figure out how to light safety lighting in the 3rd Street parking lot. We've had several comments of people, whether it's business owners or employees, saying we don't want to park back there because it's dark, very, very dark at night. So this is what it looks like during the day. This is the alley on the picture to the right, and you'll see that overview on the left. And this is that lovely spot at night. I don't know if I'd want to walk through there. Look at that top picture. It's just black. However, when you're closer to Market Street, you'll see the light from across the street shines for the first, like, four or five parking spots, and that's it. So our solution, this is a SMID project, by the way, is... to purchase 14 bollard lights. They are solar panel bollard lights. They stand just about three feet high. And we're gonna put them, 14 units are going to span 165 feet. And they each have a radius of 10 feet of light. So we think that would be a good way to try this and see if it works. If we need to add more in the future, we can always do that and increase the spacing. And we will be spending about $8,000 for these modeling lights. The other thing that we have been working on with the city behind the scenes is the ordinance for dumpster enclosures. So we want to thank Chris Reinhart and all of the city staff that have been working really diligently on this. So they have requested that SMID... purchase or lay out the money for two more dumpster enclosures. We do not own them. We're just purchasing the materials so they can be built for the block behind the 300 block of Main Street. So this is the Green Street parking lot behind Career Campus where Colby works. We have the Karen Tai restaurant. We have the pizza pub. We have the Mexican grocery and steakhouse that are going in. So we're really gonna need to control the refuse that happens in these businesses. So we are, or we will be asking council approval for us to build two of those enclosures on council property in the right of way. And these are just two examples of what those enclosures look like in different places. The ones in Third Street have more of a cement block type side, and also in the parking lot behind us, which is the Jefferson Street parking lot. So I'm turning it over to Colby to talk about her newest project.

Thank you. As being part of the design committee, we have come up with a new fundraiser for this year. We've done the hometown hero banners for our veterans for several years now, and we wanted to expand our hometown hero recognition. So in the next few weeks, you will be seeing applications go out for these. We are doing hometown hero banners for teachers, first responders, and also healthcare. We're still looking for a model for our healthcare banner. Again, these will be open to purchase soon and they will be hung from January to May once those are made. Big thank you to Aaron McConnell for letting us use him as an example. A portion of the proceeds of these will go to the Iowa Food Bank.

So the fee structure is going to be like it is for the veteran banners. For two years, they are up. And then after the two years, they go to the families. The price right now is $185 a banner. We're very lucky that we are sourcing these locally in Eldon. Ace Graphics does this work for us, so we're not having to use a national brand. So we got to love local. That's part of our bylaws and our policy.

Yes. Is that dollar fee for two years?

Yes.

Or a year?

No, no, no. Two years. So they pay $185, which comes to us and then we pay Ace Graphics. And then we take about 15% of those proceeds and we give them to either the Veterans Affairs for Disabled Veterans or we'll give them to the food bank. depending on which program you're talking about.

Okay, thank you.

You're welcome. So here are a list of events, and no, I'm not reading these. There are some new ones. There are a few that we do every month, like Lunch Club. There are a few like Business Brew coming up on September 15th, so I hope to see you all there. And then some of them are just once a year. But you can see that our volunteers stay busy, they stay invested, and yes, they're bringing back Bike Night. So October 8th, mark your calendars. So behind that again are all of these incredible people like Colby and my board of directors, 3,836 volunteer hours this last year for a value of $118,609.12. I don't know why we put 12 cents on the flyer, but we did. So you can just see some really cool events that happened. We had our Which Way to Maine, Trunk or Tree. Down on the left corner, we have our volunteers having a blast at the first Frank Salat, where we gave a Sir Frank Salat trophy to Fred Jenkins for lifelong service in Main Street. And then our board, and then Ladies Night Out is represented in the slide too, because it's still the, it is our premier event that rings cash registers. We have about, I don't know, 400 women come down, and they each spend just about $80 to $100 apiece. And even in some of the stores that you wouldn't think they would go in. So it's just pretty amazing. So look into the future. One of our new things promoting the downtown is our new somewhat interactive map on our website. You'll see this post that we put on social media. So when you click on it, you can actually open it up. And you can actually see the use of each building. You can see the address. We're still trying to figure out how to get the business name on there without getting too much back information on the website. A couple other things that we've been doing for businesses this year is the Future Ready Main Street. We had seven businesses enroll. Five completed all of the classes. So they are eligible to have a $500 stipend to either purchased hardware or software. for AI to make sure they're doing it appropriately, safely, and really pushing their business forward. This was geared toward businesses that were in business for three years or more. And then this was the business brew from July. MCG is our sponsor. So we will actually be at their headquarters on Church Street this month. And we're almost done. A couple other things that we've done that we've really seen some really great success is we're doing Main Street in Action, where we're really giving out information, hard facts on social media. We're also doing something called Unlocked, Main Street Unlocked, where we follow business owners who wanted to participate through how they would start their day and why they're in the district. And we ended up with like 30 and 40,000 views on those. And then I did give you the latest version of our RAC cards. These are at hotels. They're at, hopefully they'll be at the Sportsplex too, but it's special places that we know that visitors come, that residents go a lot. So if you're having a family member come in town and you don't know what to do, grab one of these, whether it's just your bucket list, you want a girl's night out, or if you're starving and you have to eat, come downtown and do it, right? So that is what... what those cards are about. And we've already gone through 1,500. That was last September. So we just printed another group. So questions?

Chris, when the city does have to do a match with a grant, what's our return of investment?

So our return of investment for every dollar spent is $27. Good question. Thank you.

Chris, could I offer a suggestion or ask a question, I guess? The flower box that's located at Court and Main Street is right in the line of traffic. And more than once, people have driven into it. And something, a design needs to be changed. Something needs to happen so that that's not quite so much in line with the traffic pattern coming from the west on Main Street. Comments? I'm not a design engineer or anything. I just know that people have complained about driving into that, knocking over the concrete. That's not good.

No, it's not good. And I reached out to Philip about the fact that that concrete gets knocked into that flower. But we think of it as a flower bed. It's actually a bioswell. It's a water retention. There is so much runoff in the downtown, especially coming from the hills to the north of us. If we didn't have those bioswells in the downtown, our sewer system would get overrun. And that's why the streets in the downtown flooded. So that was one reason that those were put in. Granted, they're deep. Right. And and sometimes people take that corner a little too fast. So I think we're looking at maybe I mean, if there's ways that we can plant things that are taller, we could potentially do that. But I'll definitely talk with Mr. Bergmeier a little bit more and see if there's something else we can do. But I'm not an engineer either.

I would suggest some type of fence, lighted or bright fence on the west side of that planter to get people's attention so that they would know they have to drive out around it, not through it.

Solar bollard lights, no.

No, no, I totally agree with you. Yeah, there's gotta be some solution. That seems to be the one that people really like to land in the most. Some of the other ones people have driven into, but yes, it's really too bad.

Thank you.

Council, any other questions? All right, thank you, Chris. Thank you, Colby.

Thank you for your time.

Great update, thank you. Oh, now we come to the part of the meeting where we want to identify citizens who want to speak on agenda items. When we come to the agenda item, I would call you up, except right now I do not have anyone that wants to speak on agenda items. I have a couple for the end. Is there any, is there any back there, any ones? Okay.

He's got one right there.

I don't know, I didn't know where to put this.

Oh, you're fine. Do you want to speak on an agenda item? Okay, go ahead and bring it up and I'll call you up on this time. Thank you. We're glad to have you. All right, with that, we're going to move into the public hearings. So I would like to declare the public hearing open.

This is the time, place, and date set for a public hearing on the proposal to convey interest in real property to JCG Rentals LLC pursuant to a proposed purchase, sale, and development agreement related to a project within the Westgate Economic Development Urban Renewal Area.

Can I get a motion and a second? Motion. Oh, he's okay. So Community Development, go ahead.

Good evening, everyone. This is about 131 East Main. This is the bank building. So a little bit about the project. This is going to be a three-party partnership between Iowa IDA and the city and the developer, in this case, GCG Rentals. This is a city-owned property in the Westgate Urban Renewal Area. And the project is going to be rehabbing the existing building and turn it into a mixed-use development that is going to include two apartments and a commercial space. The project is supported by $100,000 Catalyst grant through IDA. So proposed for you here for council action, a development agreement to convey the property to the developer in terms of agreements going to be city to convey the property for a dollar. And the developer to complete the improvements is specified, which is rehabbing the building, including doing some facade repair on the front and then completing two apartments and the commercial space. For the developer, a developer would be required to complete all the specified improvements. And minimum construction cost is going to be 921,000 and change. And I will have to meet the timeline in the development agreement, in this case tied to the grant, which is June 23rd of 28, or any date agreed upon by the city. The developer agrees to a minimum assessment of 300,000 after improvements. And in turn, the city would give the developer up to five year consecutive annual payments as a grant, light remediation grant. Those going to be out of the increment value created by the improvement will not exceed 33,000. Payments are contingent on the project being completed and the value generated. And this share would be the local share that is required for the grant. It will constitute the local match. This is about the grant because the second council action is going to be approving the agreement, the grant agreement with the state. So the city would accept the $100,000. The grant is going to be passed, the procedure will be passed to the developer. through the terms of agreement, and the city will make sure the product is in compliance with the grant requirements. And this is going to be on a reimbursement basis, basically improvements being made, progress being made, and the application for reimbursement. For your consideration, here are two resolutions. One related to the development agreement, which is approving the purchase, sale, and development agreement, and then authorizing the TEF It's going to be light remediation payments will be authorized through that agreement. And then establishing the $300,000 as a minimum assessment agreement with the developer. And the second resolution is going to be approving the grant agreement accepting the $100,000 catalyst grant and then authorizing execution of that agreement and agreeing that proceeds will be given to the developer.

Is this building protected by the Historical Society? Is that where the $100,000 is coming in from?

No, this is a catalyst grant. It's not a historic grant. It's not a historic preservation.

So this building is not protected by the Historical Society?

It is a historic building, but so far there has been no application for historic credits or grants.

Okay. So the $33,000 payments for five years, that starts after the completion of the project?

After the completion, the building is going to appreciate in value. This is the extra taxes, the new taxes generated, is going to be given back in annual payments, and the cap will be the $33,000.

Right, but that's after it's completed? Yes. Okay, so it would be after 2028?

Yes, it would be the new taxes paid. Why all of this makes sense? This is going to be a redevelopment of currently underutilized property. The project would put that Building back to productive use. I'll add housing in the district as well as commercial space. We'll remediate light. This used to be a nuisance property. City took it and has been holding title to it. and also would allow us the opportunity to leverage external funding, investment in the community, in this case state money being invested in the community, and it will encourage more private investment in the area, as well as adding new taxable value. in the long run, it should be a positive impact for the district and for the backspace. That's all I have for you here. I'll take any questions if you have any.

So I have a few questions. So first off, If let's say that the deadline is not met, then does that, the funding that the 100,000, I know it's given at, I think you said reimbursement, then is the city responsible to pay that back to the grant or to the grantee?

Yes, we will not receive the grant until we met all the requirements in the agreement. Perfect.

And then also, if the project weren't to come to fruition, would the city take possession of the building again?

No.

No? Okay. And then another question too. If when the project's completed, we've seen this some other places too. Is there a clause that the owner would have to continue to keep the building prior to selling it to make a profit? So like they complete it and then they sell it right away.

We do not. We did not put anything like this in the agreement. Obviously, you want to put it back on tax roll as soon as possible. And as long as the building is being maintained and improved, the value is created.

I would like to, and maybe this is for future, but I do think that we as a city have a responsibility that if we are selling a building for a dollar or some price like that, that we should have a clause in there that should a project not be completed, that the city has the ability to take it back for a dollar. just something to think about or a smaller price. So I understand like selling it after because it is on the tax roll and stuff too. But if a building stays vacant and no work is done, not that that's going to happen here. I'm talking in general. I want to clarify that, that I think we should start to consider that too.

I think that's a good suggestion. I think there's always room for protection on the backside. And although we don't expect this to happen, sometimes things happen you don't expect. So that's worth reviewing anyway.

yes of course along the lines of what they're talking about on page 22 there's quite a few pages with this thing here it does talk about default and it defines the default and defines what the city can do if if goals aren't met and things aren't done again i don't expect that and i really appreciate people who are willing to take on a project like this and take something old and make it nice and useful again. So I don't expect any kind of default or anything, but it is defined in here and the city is protected in this material I can see.

It is protected. And then because it was a nuisance property, if those improvements or it comes back as a nuisance property, we'll start the enforcement process on that. And then the fact that the city owns a lot of property, it makes sense to put them back on tax roll. Even if just being stabilized, it's better than having nothing. Okay. Because, yeah, over time it deteriorates.

A couple other things we talked about previously when we were talking about initially with the Catalyst Grant in this property or similar properties is when it's under city ownership, then it's also under city liability and things too. So if you have a property that's nearing a state of... less than stable, and there were to be an accident or something happened, that's going to be on city liability. If it's under a different ownership, that's going to transfer that liability and the maintenance needs. So you have less cost to the city, plus any additional that will gain in tax revenue, as was mentioned. So it's a net positive overall.

Is it projected for the apartments to be on the main floor as well as second floor, or are they all to be on second floor and some other purpose for the main floor?

It would be on the second floor. First floor would be commercial.

I couldn't hear what you said, I'm sorry.

It would be on the second floor. Both apartments? Both of them.

Okay, thank you.

Council, any other questions? All right, since this is a public hearing, does anybody from the audience want some input or want to say anything? Okay, with that, I'd take a motion to close. So moved. Second. Chris, take the roll.

Council Member Duprey? Yes. Council Member Cavanagh? Yes. Council Member Reed? Yes. Council Member Galloway? Yes. Council Member Hoffman?

Yes.

Resolution number 179-2026, approving and authorizing the conveyance of certain real property to JCG Rentals LLC and approving and authorizing execution of a related purchase, sale, and development agreement within the Westgate Economic Development Urban Renewal Area. Recommendation passed and adopted. Resolution number 179-2026. I get a motion.

Move the resolution.

Second. Second.

All right, any other further questions from council? All right, Chris, take the roll. Council Member Duprey. Yes. Council Member Kavanagh. Yes. Council Member Reed.

Yes.

Council Member Galloway. Yes. Council Member Hoffman.

Yes.

Resolution number 180-2026, approving and authorizing the execution of a community catalyst and remediation grant agreement between the city and the Iowa Economic Development Authority. Recommendation pass and adopt resolution number 180-2026.

Can I get a motion and a second? Move the recommendation.

Second.

Chris, take the roll.

Council Member Dupre?

Yes.

Council Member Cabaniss? Yes. Council Member Reed?

Yes.

Council Member Galloway? Yes. Council Member Hoffman?

Yes.

This is the time, place, and date set for a public hearing approving the plan, specifications, form of contract, and estimated cost for the CDBG Sanitary Sewer Rehabilitation Project and awarding the contract.

Okay. I'm going to declare the public hearing open and turn it over to City Engineer Phil Bergmeier.

Thank you, Mayor. Mayor Pro Tem. So this is a sewer lining project. CDBG is a community development block grant. What we're doing for this project is installing cured in place pipe to rehabilitate existing sewer mains. I got to... example of what a cured in place pipe is it goes in as a cloth that's impregnated with resin and then it uh is steam cured and hardened in place um so it's a new structural pipe that has a lifespan of a 50 plus years is what its uh intended lifespan is Some of the types of pipe that we're rehabilitating here, there's cracked sewer mains, which most of the project is. We have other areas that have open joints, and the issue with open joints is you get water coming in the open joints, and that turns into a little sinkhole where you see a little hole in the street on your left, and then it turns into what you see on the right, which is on James Street, which is one of the streets we're lining up. um locations kind of hard to see um this section right here is that area around james street it's mary street is coming across here and you have silk avenue down here and all those stewards in here are all old clay sewers put into the 50s similar construction they have similar problems with i and i and sandy soils and the high water table some of these other areas here are just small sections of pipe between main hole to main hole that we have a number of defects in, and we can rehabilitate the pipe now and not wait for it to collapse later. These areas here are more accessibility issues. This is Quincy Avenue, so we're going to line a sewer along Quincy Avenue. That'd be really disruptive, but we have to dig that one up to repair it. This one over here on Mallory, it's in people's front yards. It's right next to their houses. We had to repair a storm line in that area once, and the sewer line is even closer to the houses. So we want to get that line just to kind of prevent a maintenance, not to go back there for a while. And then we have one here that's in backyards. And again, it's disruptive. It's not very accessible having to track an excavator through people's backyards. So it's a little bit... less disruptive to rehabilitate that pipe with a sewer liner. This video is from a past project, luckily, because Chad's not here to make a new one for us, but you'll see this is from a phase eight division five, but it just describes the process of lining a sewer.

I'm not sure how to make this start, so if I hit the wrong button.

If I just hit over, oh, there it goes. I didn't know there was music. I had my volume turned down. So this is the contractor cleaning the sewer. They have a camera on the upstream side, and then that's the cleaning head pulling back. So they go to the forward and they pull it backwards to pull all the dirt and debris out of the manhole. And this is, I'm trying to narrating if people can't read that. This is a clean sewer.

Is that liner that you showed? Are they all that diameter or are they?

Uh, they, they have them specially made for each diameter of pipe that we have.

So there's a variety of sizes.

Yeah. Yeah. Okay. This is a cutting head cutting off a protruding, protruding tap, which is a protruding lateral. This is them pushing the liner into the manhole. So it's kind of inside out and these air pressure to blow it through. You'll see it really starting to move here pretty soon. Then you'll see it come out the other manhole here.

Oh, wow.

So there, it's still soft. It's got resin on it, but the resin's not solidified yet. And this is the curing process. They use steam to heat it up. This is a different contractor now, so they'll have a slightly different setup than this, but it's the same basic process. And this is the operator now going back into the lime sewer. And when they clean it out, they take a televisor through there and they mark out where every sewer lateral is. And then they drill out where the sewer laterals are so that it flows again. Then that's after it's been lined. That's one of the laterals they ground out to reconnect it to the sewer. You can see now it's a seamless pipe, nowhere for INI or roots or anything to get in there.

So where they cut a lateral, do they seal that in some ways?

There is a product that they can... put up each lateral and seal the lateral off, but it's really expensive to do. And unless you have a big eye and eye problem, it's not, I don't believe cost effective to do. It would double the price of the contract to line each lateral. And then you only can line it like a few feet up anyway. So this is more to keep the, mostly the clay pipe joints, the structural of the main to rehabilitate that, not necessarily the laterals.

That's supposed to last 50 years?

Yeah, yeah.

We should get 70 out of it then.

Hopefully. You'll see later it got invented in 1971, so it's been in place 50 years in some spots. Anyway, so for the bidding, seven contractors, I said took out, but seven contractors took out plans. Four bidders ranged in price from $1,076,934 to $731,4103. The low bidder was In-Situ Form Technologies USA of Chesterfield, Missouri, in the amount of $731,481.03. And kind of a fun fact, In-Situ Form's founder actually invented CI Custom Place Pipe back in 1971. So I think there's a reason they were so much cheaper than everybody else. I think they have their own manufacturing plant. And luckily, I guess they were close enough to us that they would bid this project and save quite a bit of money from what we were expecting. Funding, the CDBG grant award amount was $491,000. That's a fixed amount based off what the estimated cost was. Area 15 is our grant administrator for it. They have a $40,000 not to exceed contract. So the minimum amount we'll have remaining for construction is $451,000. And with the as-bid contract price of $731,041.03, we'll have... required local funding of 280,000 for $81.3. And we have $500,000 budgeted for sewer improvement this year. So it was coming out of that 500,000. That's the end of the presentation. I will take any questions.

When do you expect the project to start?

I expect it to start this fall.

Will it be completed before winter then?

Well, let me back up. We told the contractors we would prefer it start this fall, but we told them we wouldn't give them a notice of receipt till this spring because several of them said that their calendar is full right now. So we didn't want to lower the number of bidders that we had bid this in order to get it started a few months sooner. So hopefully they can start it this fall. If not, we're not going to require construction when it's frozen out because it just creates a lot of problems with steam coming out. You can imagine how icy the roads would get if they did that in the middle of winter. So we won't have a late start date until this spring.

So if this project is going to require an additional $281,000 and we have $500,000 in the bank, are you expecting other projects to consume some of that money?

We have a whole list of sewer projects on the table that we could use that money for. What was left over, we have small repairs that we can do. We have like little small sewer separation projects that aren't big enough to really bid out as a large contract. And we'll try to design those in-house and bid them out as like RFPs. So we have plenty of work we can spend the rest of that on.

Okay, thank you. But you expect it to be done this fiscal year?

Yes, this fiscal year, yeah.

Council, any other questions? That being said, this is a public hearing. Does anybody in the audience have any questions or comments? Okay, with that, I would take a motion to close the public hearing.

So moved.

Second. Chris, take the roll.

Council Member Duprey? Yes. Council Member Cavanagh?

Yes.

Council Member Reid? Yes. Council Member Galloway? Yes. Council Member Hoffman?

Yes.

Resolution number 183-2026 approving the plan specifications form of contract and estimated cost for the CDBG Sanitary Sewer Rehabilitation Project and awarding the contract to In-Situ Forum Technologies USA LLC of Chesterfield, Missouri and the amount of $731,481.03. Recommendation pass and adopt resolution number 183-2026. Do we have a motion and a second? Move the recommendation. Second.

Council got any further questions? Chris, take the roll.

Council Member Duprey? Yes. Council Member Cavanagh? Yes. Council Member Reid? Yes. Council Member Galloway? Yes. Council Member Hoffman?

Yes. All right, with that, we'll move into ordinances.

Ordinance number 3259-2026, an ordinance vacating part of the right-of-way of Iowa Avenue in the city of Ottumwa, Wapello County, Iowa. Recommendation passed the second consideration of ordinance number 3259-2026. I'll get a motion and a second.

Move the recommendation. Second.

Chris, take the roll. Oh, no, we talked. Go ahead. Sorry, Elmo.

All right. Second consideration, this is to vacate 12.5 square foot part of South Iowa Avenue to allow for building addition. This is going to be a little over 12,000 square foot. Okay. adding to the JBS facility. Currently, there is no need for public use for that piece of the right-of-way, or we don't anticipate needing that in the future.

And just for clarification, it's the little red part that we're talking about, not the green part.

Correct, the red part.

Twelve and a half square feet.

Twelve and a half.

Council, got any further questions? Okay, Chris, take the roll.

Council Member Dupre? Yes. Council Member Kavanagh? Yes. Council Member Reid?

Yes.

Council Member Galloway? Yes. Council Member Hoffman?

Yes. Is there anyone else? There's another one.

We got all of them.

but that's okay, nobody said anything, so I'll just go on. All right.

Ordinance number 3260-2026, an ordinance amending the municipal code of the city of Ottumwa, Iowa by amending various sections of chapter 23, motor vehicles and traffic for the purpose of adding stop signs on Ferry Street at Finley Avenue. Recommendation passed the second consideration of ordinance number 3260-2026. Mr. Bergmeier?

Thank you. Oh, I need to motion.

Second. Second.

now mr bergman all right thank you uh i don't think there's a whole lot that's changed since the last time this was up here the stop signs were installed before school started they seem to be working okay i haven't personally received any comments positive or negative on them um I know we had to put a stop ahead sign in front of it because the first day it was up, people were just running it left and right. So we put a stop ahead sign halfway up there that seemed to do the trick and haven't heard anything about it since. So let's, police chief, is there anything?

No, we had an SR up over the first day, so there was a lot.

Chief, that's $75 a piece.

So, Phil, is there going to be some painting then, Phillip, painting there at those intersections to make them more clear or not?

We didn't plan on putting crosswalks or anything at that stop sign. It's not in the city code to put them there, and most stop signs don't have that. Okay. Okay.

I do like the stop ahead signs. I don't know why. I feel like we should have thought of that last meeting, but that's a good idea. That's... Council, any other questions?

I still like that idea, painting in crosswalks for the children and adults that don't know where the cross is. I don't know if we can do that or not, but probably not rocket science.

Well... I guess it should be something that's part of like a safe routes to school plan. There already is a crosswalk a block away and usually you don't put, it's not normal to put two crosswalks that close together. Usually you try to concentrate all the student traffic into one crosswalk. That way you're only having to have a crossing guard at one and you're not spreading the...

But if they're coming from the south down the street, they still have to get across... the Chester intersection, right?

Yeah, but that's, yeah.

And from my recollection, the school was working to update their safe, whatever you called like safe way to school plan to because they want to consolidate where the children are crossing to ensure to kind of mitigate some of the questions and concerns that we had. But they wanted to just I guess, for my recollection, correct me if I'm wrong to to consolidate where children cross just to increase safety and observations.

No, that's what I recall, too, because they wanted to kind of train people to use that. So they only had one to control.

Well, and if they're crossing Findlay from the south, too, I don't have it memorized, but they should be crossing that one spot, too, whether that's Findlay and Ferry or if it's Findlay and some other street they want them to cross at. But usually they try to funnel them across major streets like that. They'll try to funnel them over in a couple spots, and then they can filter out from the residential areas from there.

Council, any other questions? Okay, Chris, take your roll.

Council Member Dupre? Yes. Council Member Kavanagh? Yes. Council Member Reid? Yes. Council Member Galloway? Yes. Council Member Hoffman?

Yes. All right, we're going to move into Department's Board's Recommendations and Resolutions.

Resolution number 178-2026, declaring a public purpose and waiving certain permit fees for improvements at 714 West Mary Street. Recommendation pass and adopt resolution number 178-2026. We'll get a motion and a second.

Move the recommendation.

Second.

You guys take the role? Oh, Amal, I'm sorry.

This is the Wapello County Rural Fire Department. This is a volunteer fire department providing, or the primary agency providing services for townships and providing mutual aid to the city of Ottumwa. They're requesting waiving building permit fees associated with a building they're putting together to house equipment. So resolution is declaring public purpose and authorizing the department to waive permitting fees. We're estimating permit fees to be around $1,800.

Just tell my fellow council people how I feel. $1,800, you said, that's really extremely cheap for what they do for the community. They're a very good partner in the community. I would support waiving the fees, not only fire services, their big training and role models in the community. So I personally think we should waive the fees.

So, you know, when I first read this, that was really my thought too at the beginning, and I'm not saying that's wrong, but there's a lot of people, nonprofits and worthy projects and things in the city. And so I'm a little concerned about, you know, if you give this, then who else do you need to give that to? That was a concern that came up. They're also a voting site. That's something else that is there at that location. So there's no doubt that they are extremely valuable and profitable place, you know, for our community and for our county. But that is the thought that came to me later as well. Okay. If we give this, then who else do we need to give this to? And what's that going to do to us? You know, right.

I'd say if other people want a waiver, they need to step up and ask for it. If the council thinks it's reasonable, we'll award it. If not, we won't.

I like that, Councilman Capps. That's right. We would look at any idea that or any nonprofit. And I think, you know, he's right. It would be on a kind of a case by case. I don't want to say we wouldn't be consistent because we want to be fair, but that is kind of we would have to look at the different organizations.

It would definitely need to be a case by case thing. I agree with that.

How do we define public purpose? It's a benefit for the community. In this case, safety, the agency is providing mutual aid when we need them. And also they're allowing the city to use their facility as a polling place.

but in general we have a definition of what public purpose is so if other applications did come forward we would be able to use the definition of public purpose to be able to for you all to decide hey we're going to bring this forward because it meets this definition of public purpose correct yes

So maybe we can get a point of clarification. Attorney Stone is on the line. I know when we talk about donations or other things using tax dollars, we have to establish that public purpose clause, and it has to be in a written document. Christine, would this have to be similar of having a document to identify that?

Iowa courts are detrimental to the city council and what its determination is for a public purpose. So as long as the council has established its reasons for including something in the purpose, is a public purpose um that's generally going to be you know there's going to be deference given to that determination so it's it's really up to the council to decide what is of a public benefit to the local community and that would be on a case-by-case basis correct it can be yes you can either sort of create an upfront policy where you know what it is or you can assess requests as they come in

So for clarification, you can decide upon this if you want to establish as a public purpose and approve waiving the fees as recommended or requested here. And if there's something that you want to have as a body going forward to further define what a public purpose would be, we can definitely do that. But this one could be decided on its merits in front of you tonight.

So correct, I agree.

So as far as the permit fees being waived, there still would be inspections. We still have our city inspectors that would need to be going and doing certain inspections during the process, correct?

Correct. Councilor, any other questions?

The only thing I would also mention is I know and I kind of like to the point of opening up, we have had other projects like from school district or other public entities that have put forward and have paid the fees and inspections and all of those things. And so if we open up the door for one, it could be opening it up for others. And there have been a lot more than $1,800 received from some of those other inspections.

Well, and yeah, and I agree in consistency and fairness is the key. But if you look at project versus costs, I mean, $1,800, that's a lot of money. I agree. But I always look at the with the bang for the buck. I mean, they do. They can help county city. I mean, they're a valuable I mean, every organization is valuable to the community. So I don't want to make it sound like it's not but I think $1,800

So what I'm hearing is that we can decide that this is a public purpose tonight, but maybe going forward to mitigate some of these conversations and concerns, we could develop what qualifies for a public purpose for a fee reduction or a waiver.

Is that what I'm? We can maybe even put a limit on how much we would, we would have a cap on how much we would waive. depending on the size of the project.

Council, any other questions? Chris, take the roll.

Council Member Dupre? Yes. Council Member Kavanagh? Yes. Council Member Reid?

Yes.

Council Member Galloway? Yes. Council Member Hoffman?

Yes.

Resolution number 181, 2026, approving changes to the hearing protection policy. Recommendation pass and adopt resolution number 181, 2026.

I have a motion and a second. Move the recommendation. Second. HR Director Kojo.

Thank you, sir. So this is two minor changes to the policy. One is adding a position that we had inadvertently left off during the first creation of the policy. And then the other change is to change the name to match what our current name of a position is.

I'm right here, right? Council have any questions? Could you take the roll?

Council Member Dupre? Yes. Council Member Cavanaugh? Yes. Council Member Reed? Yes. Council Member Galloway? Yes. Council Member Hoffman?

Yes.

Thank you. Resolution number 184-2026, approving the Professional Services Agreement for Engineering Services between the City of Ottumwa and Chi Padere Incorporated for the North Court Street Reconstruction Project and authorizing the Mayor to sign the agreement. Recommendation passed and adopted. Resolution number 184-2026. Move the recommendation.

Second.

Mr. Burgmeier. All right, thank you. So Shife Hattery will assist the city with evaluation and design for the reconstruction of North Court Street from Park Avenue to Golf Avenue. The pavement will be resurfaced or reconstructed as needed. Sanitary sewers will be repaired and separated. Sidewalk improvements will include an eight foot multi-use trail on one side as outlined in the Entomba Bicycle and Pedestrian Plan. Shive in the city will hold a public house early in the design process to gather information on priorities and concerns of adjacent property owners, the school, and other affected parties. So the SCBG application was approved on June of 2023, and that'll fund the construction of the project. Funding for the consultant contract itself will come out of local funds. But just a little background on the project too. The surface transportation block grant will cover all cost for construction except for the sewer work. And these funds are from the federal government and they come to the state and then from the state to area 15 and then from area 15, they allocate them to the city of Ottumwa. The funds are earmarked for the improvement of federal aid routes. which includes any streets classified as arterial or collector streets. So they're for our main roads. And using these funds requires the city, the consultant and the contractors to perform extra work that's not required for locally funded projects. The projects must attain NEPA clearance, which is the National Environmental Policy Act. This requires historical, archaeological, and environmental evaluations. The construction plans are submitted to the DOT for multiple reviews. The contractor has to follow federal prevailing wage laws. They have to follow disadvantaged business rules and also Buy America laws. The DOT also audits the project upon completion. So there's a lot of hoops to jump through for these STBG funds. That's why we hire consultants to help us with this. I have Mike Janicek from Shive here. If you guys have any questions for them.

I guess I have a question maybe for you though, is what is the ballpark idea of the total project?

So the construction part of it is around $3 million. It'll depend a lot on where the sewers can get separated to. It depends a lot on how much of the road we can save. I think based on what we found north of the project, that a lot of the concrete was in really good shape. So we think we can keep a lot of what's there and not have to completely reconstruct the street. So aside from where we have to pull sewers off and separate those out, I think we can save a lot and that'll bring the price down.

Okay.

But we're looking at about the $3 million range, what the total project will be.

And the reason I ask that is just because, you know, that consultant amount there, those professional services, you know, that's a lot. $400,000, that's a big chunk. Yeah. But it's a big project.

Yeah, it's a pretty big project. And it's more complicated than most of our, or the last one we've been on anyway, have been just pretty much straight repaving. So Mary Street. There was some sewer work there, but not a lot of separation work. It's just replacing what was already there. Same with Milner Street was replacing what's already there. So there's an added layer of complication when you're trying to find new places for stormwater to go. So it's a little bit more difficult to design that than if you're just replacing what's already existing.

And that saves your department time and effort in engineering.

Honestly, right now, we don't have a number of people needed to do a project like this. I think eventually we will. I think our assistant engineer is really, really talented. And when she gets her license, that she'd be able to maybe tackle something this big, but not at the moment.

Go ahead. So with this evaluation and design,

just this is probably an ignorant question on my part they give you the ideas of what you what to do down the road are they involved during the whole project or is this just used as a road map for you yeah so they they do all the background surveying they do a lot of the they're going to do course for us on the street to find out what exactly the structure is of the street here we'll we'll look at old plans ourselves and give those to them see if that can help them out They'll do any sort of studies needed and they'll do all the design work up through letting. And then we have a placeholder amount in here for them during construction to like review shop drawings and also to answer questions on the project or if there is something.

They continue to assist during the project.

Yeah. They're not going to hold like they don't. We oversee the project directly.

They're not here all the time, but they're there.

But they're available to answer questions. Yes, for sure.

Thank you.

Yep.

So that $3 million project, how far? What's the distance of that? Let's put this into perspective.

I don't have that number. I want to say it's probably close to a half a mile.

So I just wanted to again, I like to bring that forward. So when we have people saying, oh, we need to fix the roads, where's the that kind of stuff that we bring into perspective that we're going to be spending $3 million to fix about a half mile of road, including sewer separation and all that stuff, too. But that's our reality right now.

yeah um and you'll see on future like street work yeah i'm trying to put more and more money to rehabbing existing streets because you can get a lot more street fixed than complete reconstruction complete reconstruction is expensive you can't really use that as a reference because it depends a lot on what you're going to be doing to the street and the sewers

That's not a good candlestick to hold up and say, well, we can repair half a mile of street for $3 million. Maybe we can, maybe we can't.

And that would be, this would be on the high side. Cause like I said, you're doing sewer separation for it too. So like, that's not just like you said, yeah, it's not, it's not straight reconstruction. Correct. It would be cheaper if it wasn't for that work.

Yes. But I still think it's important to have a conversation about how much we're repairing for that amount. Because right now we live in a, a world where we have to repair our sewers and separate our sewers. And so, you know, it's not that that's where our budget has to go.

Council, any other questions? If not, Chris, take the roll.

Council Member Dupre? Yes. Council Member Kavanagh? Yes. Council Member Reid? Yes. Council Member Galloway? Yes. Council Member Hoffman?

Yes.

Resolution number 185-2026, a resolution of support for the state of Iowa historic tax credit application for the developer of the Agassiz Lofts apartment project and historic preservation of the Agassiz School by Agassiz Historic Lofts, LLC. Recommendation pass and adopt resolution number 185-2026. Can I get a motion and a second?

I move the recommendation and I apologize for jumping ahead of you on the previous situation.

Second. Second.

Mr. Rath, City Administrator Rath. Well, I mean, I can read, but I see Community Development Director Elthier is there, so I'm going to turn over to her. And we also have Ed Molloy.

All right. This is for the Agassiz School project. It's an adaptive reuse type of project. Council has seen this project presented numerous times for different council actions. This time it's to support an application, a state application for a historic tax credit. This is going to be a huge benefit if this project gets it because it gets the project up to 25% of the project cost in tax credits and project is a huge investment as well. It's a senior housing project adding 32 units to the community. Our project has already been awarded LIHTC, which is the 9% tax credit, and it's about 1.2 million. which is awesome, having a lot of investment in the community. The application would require the community to show support for the project. That's why we need the resolution of support to confirm that the community is indeed in support of this project. And I have Ed Malone here.

Counseling questions for anyone?

And this is, I think the last time you came and talked with us for the historic credits, we were just a couple points under getting rewarded or awarded this. And this last tax credit, the low-income housing tax credit, should help us get those few points, right? Or help you get those few points.

Actually, yes. The last time I was here, we were applying for the low-income housing tax credits. Yeah. We were awarded those. So we did increase the number of points. So that application is already through. Part of our funding package includes the state historic tax credit, something that they deal with very separately. The building is registered on the National Historic Registry of Historic Buildings. So we have been in this process of acquiring tax credits just for the historic purpose and that this application, yes, the fact that we were awarded the LIHTC will definitely help this application, their knowledge and confidence that the project will be completed.

I like the fact that it's a senior housing project. Is there an age then? How do you determine? Go ahead.

It's 55 plus.

55 plus.

Do you know when you'll be starting the project?

Yes, so what we're doing now, this application for tax credits will go in on September 15th. It'll be 60 days before we get word on that. We're in the process now of getting an equity partner with the original tax credits that we get through the LIHTC. We have a bank that will sponsor the construction loans. We're putting all of those pieces in place over the next four months. We hope to begin construction just after the first of the year. and then opening would be the spring of 2028.

My father will be very happy to hear that.

We've also started discussions for a development agreement for this project as well. So there'll be something else in the future coming before city council to consider for the project.

Council, any other questions? Chris, take the roll.

Council Member Dupre? Yes. Council Member Kavanagh? Yes. Council Member Reid? Yes. Council Member Galloway? Yes. Council Member Hoffman?

Yes. Okay, we are at the point of the agenda. We have the public forum. I don't see any other white papers back there. So I do have one that wants to speak tonight. Mr. Brad Payne, would you please? Oh, he had to leave. I didn't know. I'm sorry. So we don't have anyone. I do have two that want to speak on something here, but first let's do a mayor and council report and communications. I personally don't have anything. Does council have anything?

This weekend, oh my goodness, I don't have my notes, but there is a fundraiser for the airport museum. There's a pancake breakfast starting at seven, and then there's a car show, a fly-in, and a band. Is there a band again? And a band from one to four. And I'm pretty sure JD's cooking pancakes and they're pretty. What? Well, we should encourage him to come back next year because his pancakes are pretty fantastic. But go out, support it. It's been the last two years. It's been a great time. And it's great to show your support for the airport museum. Again, that's Saturday starting at seven band one to four. Lots to do with the family.

i have something as well it's not quite as fun as that one um i vote no on the second part of the consent agenda about the alcohol i just don't feel that alcohol should get a 100 vote as much damage and troubles it causes a community anywhere not just here anywhere I know that many times people like to, you know, they sell alcohol. It evidently makes money, brings in a good profit for the business. But I was thinking about what it costs our city to have that alcohol. That money that's made in profit by a business obviously is coming out of the pockets of our people. But besides the financial part of it, you know that there's a cost in the health of our citizens with alcohol. Alcohol is a toxic substance. It does cause trouble. It's toxic, toxic to every cell of the body. And so it's something to be thought about with the health concerns that are created from alcohol. Another area is in the finance area. There's a loss of discretionary spending by our families. The money that was spent on alcohol can't be spent on taking care of properties, can't be used to take care of children and buy maybe sports equipment or clothing or school supplies. And so it takes some of the discretionary money out of our community in that regard. Also, the alcohol... tends towards an increase in some family troubles. Just by children being left alone, not receiving as much attention perhaps from parents, as much guidance as they would need, not being cared for as much. And so there can be a tendency to have some extra family problems, perhaps even between husband and wife because of the alcohol, but the children are paying a price for that as well. So there's a cost to alcohol. It's not just a profit-making thing. There's a cost. The last one I have is a cost of initiative. Um, know the plans and goals that people have you know it's hard enough you get plans you have goals you want to accomplish something you want to do something there's always things to get in your way i believe alcohol gets in the way of many plans and goals being followed through with things that would have been thought of things that would have been done things that might even been invented a business that might have been started something that could have been done positive for the for the community is lost sometimes due to alcohol and so i just wanted to mention the cost that comes along with alcohol use.

I have another. I was thinking we had another meeting before, but we do not. There is going to be on September 11th. There's going to be a remembrance ceremony out here in front beginning at 9 o'clock. So September 11th in front of the building at 9 o'clock.

On the 4th Street side. You may be pointing. It's just listening.

It's for 9-11. I have a little bit on the parks. The beach closed this last weekend with their finale with the dog day, and they had an excellent season this year. We want to thank everybody who participated and came to the beach. Also, it's Labor Day weekend is coming up, so the campgrounds are going to be busy this weekend. And finally, Octoberfest is September 30th through October 2nd at Jimmy Jones.

Thank you.

I would like to comment on my friend Councilman Dam's comments. And I can't disagree with everything that he said, but I will tell you that people who are applying for these licenses are complying with the state law. They are complying timely, they're paying a fee, and they are a business that depends on their revenue to stay in business. So I think Dan is 100% right, and I gotta tell you that there's another side of the story.

Council, anything else? Okay, we actually are gonna, this wasn't tabled, was it? This was, I'm pulling up reconsideration of the, do you have to read that?

Mayor, I would like to ask that this be reconsidered at this time.

You actually can't make the motion because you voted no against it.

It has to be someone that voted in the affirmative.

I'll motion for the reconsideration.

Do we have a second? I will make a second.

Okay. So I do have two that want to speak on this. I think before I let them speak, since I made the reconsideration, I want to explain my point and then we'll let them speak and then council can speak. Is that good? Okay. I want everybody to know that this is not that I don't want a department to have things they need. This is about process. When we did that, I mean, I asked, you know, are we following process? And I was told yes. But to be fair, I think I was being told yes by others who didn't quite understand the process. And there's no policy actually in place. So what we had to depend on was policy. consistency and and precedence and when you look at all the steps we followed we we we didn't actually follow that either and and we do have a fleet committee that i i don't think we made use of like we should have so i want everybody to know this is a process thing this is not a um i want to be fair to every department who needs equipment or or vehicle so um i was pulling this back to to review it because we actually have no policy in place to be fair and consistent with with all departments and all vehicles i'm not centering somebody out so um now i would like to call up the two that uh have i would like to speak and then counsel we will um mr rick bick

uh please approach the podium and give your name and address sounds like i'm in trouble when you say please approach the podium yeah um rick vick 1204 north wapolo um first of all i'd like to

Chris Patrick, thank you for being so excited about what you do in your presentation.

I just wanted to compliment her because she's all excited about what she does and it rubs off and that was great. So I want to compliment her, thank you. I wanted to comment about the purchase of the trucks because I was a little confused. I think we were misled. One, there's a couple of questions. First of all, the fleet committee said that the trucks that we have now are good till 2029 and 2030. So why are we replacing them now? Secondly, the question was asked by one of the councilmen, how far are they driven? Well, the one is driven 12,000 miles away because that person lives off of the north side of town. I'm just gonna use Rochester as a point of reference. And when we asked where the other one, how much it's driven, the answer was a little bit further. And everybody knew a little bit further is Albion. We need to redefine where a little bit further is. And then we were given a big dissertation on we have to have these trucks to tow these boats. How many times do we have to tow the boats? I've lived here since 2009. I've been the police chaplain for 11 and a half years. I'm thinking maybe one time we've had an emergency where we had to tow the boat other than train. I mean, so, okay, let's not make everything like everybody's gonna die tomorrow if we don't have these trucks. The way it's presented is a little scary. The thing is, don't we have other trucks that we can use in case of emergency? Do we have, like I've mentioned to some, we have the public works department, they have trucks. If in an emergency, could we borrow one of those? Do we have to buy these? Something else was said too. Mr. Kavanagh made this statement. He says, just because we have the money doesn't mean we have to spend it. That was a great statement. Except for one thing is I'm not even sure that we have the money. Do we know that we have the money? We welcome Mr. Lee to the city, and I think we need to give him some time to find out, do we really have the money and where it is? Because I know the people I know, they're a little concerned about where it is and do we really have it, right? He keeps staring at me, so I didn't do it, but I can. So anyway, that's my point. I think that we don't need, and the other thing is, I don't think we need to buy anything until we find out where the money is and do we really have it. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. B. Mitch Niner, will you please approach the podium and state your name and your address, please?

Mitch Niner, 420 Hackworth Street here in Telmois. I guess I don't even want to begin. I do agree with Rick that, you know, I don't think we need two extra trucks at the fire department. You know, I think there's only one boat, the other one doesn't float. And there's probably plenty of vehicles within the city that would pull a boat if we had to. I think it's just a terrible waste of money. And really when it comes right down to it, we're like hundreds and hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars behind on a budget. There really isn't any money. And the biggest part to me is you guys as a council was lied to by top city staff that should be great concern honestly because he was completely misled and i know i told mr hoppin tuesday before the meeting man they're telling you wrong you know you're around the system round the system this guy doesn't know how to do anything follow any kind of policy from the ems to the to the vehicles you just go around and around the policies or the procedures i guess it's not a policy yet but you know we developed a fleet committee i believe when i first got on council and brought it back trying to get our vehicles back in shape and where are we at and what needs replaced and maintenance records and and all that stuff and i i think they've done a pretty good job over the years of of making stern recommendations uh Yeah, we need to replace this or maybe we can get another year out of it or, you know, what what have you. So I think we need to trust what the fleet committee says. You know, then all of a sudden, no, no, I don't want to turn those vehicles in. I'll just go around that and go to the CIP and buy them out of CIP. But I don't think that's what the CIP should be for. They're just regular vehicles. They're not. You know, the mini rigs or any of that type of stuff. I just think it's wrong. But like I said, I'm sorry, but it should be a great concern, folks. When you've got top staff up here in front of the public lying to your face about what happened, send them down the road, man. Pay the money and let's move forward. Thank you.

I have some comments.

Well, I wanted to give Chief Canto, I think he should have respond. Do you want to respond?

I have some comments. First and foremost, I'm going to respectfully disagree with Mr. Bick and Mr. Niner about being lied to up here. And you all can have your opinion, and that's fine. I appreciate you all coming up here. But to say that we've been lied to about a policy that does not exist. We have in the CIP a policy for... like replacing. I went through with Mr. Rath and I said, I want to see this policy because I am not finding it. And if we have people accusing people of lying or misleading, then I want to see the policy. What am I missing? Because I'm not finding it. So to say that we are being lied to with a policy that because over a policy, it does not exist. Do we need a policy for that? 100%. Should we walk away tonight and say that there's nothing we need to do regarding that? No. I've talked to Mr. Rath and said, hey, this needs to be established because we need to have a policy around that. But to come up here and say that we have people lying is not okay. I think there was also a comment about EMS, and I know that's not right here, but I'm going to comment on it right now. This council instructed and asked Chief Canto to do that report.

I wouldn't like to stop that there. That's not what this is about. I apologize. I'm not trying to cut you off, but I don't want to get off on something that this isn't about.

It was commented on, I was just responding. But anyways, that's what I have to say.

Anybody else? So I do feel like I was not aware of the common practice. I just understood, well, we don't have a policy. And so I wasn't aware that for new vehicles, and the process, I wanna support our fleet committee folks. And I feel like if they will look it over and make a recommendation, I wanna follow the recommendation. And I feel like we need that to be put in place. We need to hear from them.

yeah but that would be for consistency for everyone we're not trying to just take something away from it because of yep city administrator yeah if i may i think some of those comments are directed towards me in the last meeting um when this came up to councilman galloway's comments there isn't a specific policy in place yes there is a fleet committee and they have looked at when vehicles are up for replacement and recommending if those should be replaced or not And I believe I was distinctive in a replacement process versus new vehicle process at that meeting. And I did find something in, looking back through Cole's notes, this looks to appear to be a memo from 9-16 of 25 to the fleet committee. And it was stating that the two vehicles in question, number 303 and number 312, were to be evaluated per the process and for replacement. And I believe that was done and it was recommended for future years that they'd be replaced. But there's also a note that says two Yukon are budgeted for next fiscal year. If council approves, they will be added to fleet and not replacements. And I believe that was done through the capital process and later in the budget process. And that was what was stated at the meeting last time. I did not lie. I did not intend to mislead. I was going off the information that was available. And those are vehicles that were presented previously and that were up last meeting for purchase. The Yukons were not, I think, and there were specs that were submitted to Fleet Committee for the Yukons that were not approved. However, the vehicles that were up for purchase were from specs that were approved by Fleet Committee for other departments. And Chief Canto had spoken to that and the modifications to those because they didn't need pursuit packages and those things. So it was lessened at that time. So the dollars were budgeted. The dollars are in the budget. I guess I just wanted to clear the air on that.

Thank you. I'm good.

Do you have anything?

Chief Canto?

When I first brought the vehicles up, I was very clear that these would not be replacements. I brought this up to the fleet committee members and I was told since they were new additions, they had to be approved by council since the other vehicles were still going to be within the fire department's fleet. At that point in time, I spoke with Mr. O'Donnell who told me how to go through that process and I believe I followed that process.

Just one other point of clarification. The capital improvement process, which was just open for the next five-year cycle, it would be for any replacement vehicles as well as new vehicles, because those that are replacements that we're looking to purchase and maybe sell or move into other departments, they still go through that same capital process because they are pieces of capital equipment within our fleet and so forth. That part is consistent within the capital process. The differentiation is replacement vehicles or equipment versus new. And so I think those processes were followed with the vehicles in question. Now whether the council wants to approve the purchase of those or not at this time is a separate question. and i'm more than happy to uh to work with uh finance director lee and putting together a policy for ongoing future usage of fleet in replacement vehicles and capital improvement process i would like to see that anybody else have anything um

Again, I want to reiterate, I respect what the other council people have said. I respect Mr. Niner, Mr. Bick, but remember, I brought this up as policy and process. I just think that, you know, we weren't just all on the same page. And I think that's what happened. And that's what concerns me, especially, I mean, $86,000 is a lot of money. It's not that I don't want any of our departments to have what they need, but with that amount of money and consistency and other departments who would come and say, we need this, we need this, there needs to be something. That's why I'm calling for reconsideration.

Is everybody ready to vote?

Does anybody else need to? Does anybody else want to speak? Okay. So If I motion for the reconsideration, does it go on next agenda? We've already done that. Yeah, but how does it, that's what I'm asking, is will it go on?

So we would vote for this, whether or not you want to reconsider this item. If it passes, then it's...

So the first vote is we're saying... Reconsidering. We're reconsidering it.

Yes. And then if council decides they would like to make another motion to approve the purchase, someone would make that motion and second it and vote. Or if somebody wants to do another, like if they want to table it, if they want to vote it up, vote it down, it's council's appetite, which you would like to do. And there's city attorneys on the line too, if she has any other further recommendations or clarifying items for your council.

Well, let's do step-by-step. I have the motion to reconsider. I motion to read the reconsideration. So now we'll go for a second.

Reed seconded it, so now we can vote on it.

Okay, Chris, take the roll.

And everybody knows what they're voting on, correct?

And for clarification, a vote yes would mean that the item would be put back for reconsideration. A vote against would hold the prior vote to purchase the vehicles.

Okay, is everybody ready? Council Member Dupre? Yes. Council Member Kavanagh?

Yes.

Council Member Reed?

Yes.

Council Member Galloway? No. Council Member Hoffman?

Yes.

Okay, so it carries 4-1.

Okay, now this is.

So if there's any other action council wants to make on this item, now is the time to do that.

And we're open to discuss right now, right? I mean, okay, so. our thoughts about that, you know, getting the everything together with the fleet committee policies and everything put in place is what you said, Councilman Reed, correct? That's what you wanted to.

Yes, we just need to make sure we're following our common practice and that we have confidence that that's been followed and know that fully.

Which again, the common practice has been followed in both replacement vehicle, which these are not and the capital improvement process, which was done.

Okay, I would like to make the motion that we reconsider the vote on this item.

We've done that.

That's just what we did. Now we're talking about the next steps.

So do you want the motion read exactly how it was at the last meeting? Or do you want to approve it? Or to table or to vote it up, vote it down?

reread it like it was at the last meeting.

I don't have that. I mean, I'll just read the fire department vehicle purchase totaling $86,326 for a 2026 Ford Explorer and 42,780 from Dewey Ford and a 2026 Chevy Chevrolet Silverado for 43,546 from McGrath Chevrolet. So that's approving the vehicle purchase.

Now what do you want?

If we want to discuss that, we got a motion and second. So do I got a motion to discuss it?

Move the recommendation.

Because this is an actionable item, right?

Correct.

So I need a second.

I'll second that.

Okay, Chris, take the roll.

Do you guys want to have any more discussion?

One of the things that I have a question about on the specifications, I know the specifications from other vehicles were used, but did the fleet committee consider specifications for this use for our fire department? Was specification specific to them or is it just, well, here's a vehicle and we've talked about it before. That's the specifications. It seems like it ought to be not specifications for the police or for somebody else, but specifications for fire.

From my understanding, previous pickup trucks that were purses were purses the same as other city pickup trucks were utilized.

Everybody, Councilor, I think, I mean, I've stated mine. Mine's just process policy getting something concrete.

I haven't changed my mind.

What'd you say, Chris?

So right now, the motion on the table is to approve the purchase, and it has been seconded.

So we take a vote. Thank you.

Okay, if there is no further... comments on this. Chris, take the roll.

Council Member Duprey? No. Council Member Kavanagh?

No.

Council Member Reed?

No.

Council Member Galloway? Yes. Council Member Hoffman?

No.

The motion fails.

All right. I think everything is. I would now ask for a motion to adjourn. Motion to adjourn.

Second.

Chris, take the roll.

Council Member Duprey? Yes. Council Member Kavanagh? Yes. Council Member Reed?

Yes.

Council Member Galloway? Yes. Council Member Hoffman?

Yes.