City Council - Regular Meeting

Good evening and welcome to the City of Pasco Council meeting. The Council thanks you for being a part of your city government. At meetings, the City Council takes formal action on items, holds public hearings, and conducts other business of the city. Agenda packets are available on the City of Pasco's website at www.pasco-wa.gov slash agenda. This meeting is also being televised live on PSC TV channel 191 on Spectrum Cable in Pasco and Richland and is streamed on the city's Facebook page, website, YouTube channel, and Microsoft Teams webinar. This and previous council meeting video is available on the city's website. Lastly, the public may submit their comments and or questions by contacting the city manager, city clerk, or by using the Ask Pasco app. Ms. Sanchez, would you call the roll, please?

Campos?

Here.

Carter?

Here.

Figueroa?

Present.

Hernandez?

Present.

Perales?

Here.

Milne?

Present.

Graham.

Here. Thank you. We are all present and accounted for. If everyone would now rise for the flag salute. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic All right, happy birthday again, America. The consent agenda. All items listed under the consent agenda are considered to be routine by the city council and will be enacted by a roll call vote as one motion in the form listed below. There will be no separate discussion of these items. If further discussion is desired by council members, the item may be removed from the consent agenda to the regular agenda and considered separately. Letter A, approval of meeting minutes for June 8th, 15th, and 22nd and the 23rd Letter B, bills and communications approving claims in the total amount of $6,863,260.41 and a write-off totaling $311,650.37. Letter C, crash prevention zone letter for the US 12 corridor between A Street and Tank Farm Road. D, resolution number 4758, interagency agreement with the Washington State Criminal Justice Training Commission E, resolution number 4762, setting a date to consider a notice of intent to commence annexation proceedings of Goodwin Annexation Annex 2026-002. Is there any council members who would like to remove any of these items from the consent agenda? Not seeing any. Mr. Mayor Pro Tem. Thank you, Mayor. I move to approve the consent agenda as read. Second that. Motion on the floor to accept the consent agenda as read by the Mayor Pro Tem, seconded by Council Member Perales. Ms. Sanchez, if you'd take a roll call vote, please.

Campos?

Yes.

Cotta?

Yes.

Figueroa?

Yes.

Hernandez?

Yes.

Perales?

Yes.

Milne?

Yes.

And Grimm?

Yes. Thank you. Number six, we're moving on to public comments. The public may address council on any items unless it relates to a scheduled public hearing. This item is provided to allow the opportunity to bring items to the attention of the city council or to express an opinion on an issue. Its purpose is not to provide a venue for debate or for the posing of questions with the expectation of immediate response. Some questions require consideration by council over time and after a deliberative process with input from a number of different sources. Some questions are best directed to staff members who have access to specific information. Citizen comments will normally be limited to three minutes each. Those with lengthy messages are invited to summarize their comments and or submit written information for consideration by the council outside of formal meetings. Lastly, when called upon, please state your name, city or county of residency into the microphone before providing your comments. So with that, let's open up the floor to public comments. Would anybody like to address council?

Good evening. My name is Ken Poletsky. I'm a local real estate broker, investor, property owner. I also own several short-term rentals in Kennewick and West Richland. And so I'm glad to be here tonight because I do speak firsthand on how to operate these businesses and be responsible for these types of properties. First, I'd like to thank the council on bringing this ordinance on short-term rentals forward. It's been something I've been striving to have in Pasco for quite some time as I own rental properties here already. I appreciate the work that's gone in recognizing short-term rentals are an important part of property rights and also protecting neighborhoods. I support having a reasonable framework that promotes safety and accountability. First, I have a few things that I would like to ask the council and maybe get some direction on. And my comments are going to be hopefully improving some of the areas that I believe the ordinance has already addressed, but maybe making it more clear and more equitable. First, the question I would have is on the business license requirement and the short-term rentals aspect. is the city's intent to require a separate license for each individual rental property that's out there operating under a short-term rental? Because I believe it's kind of unfair if it's the requirement that's going to be that. Maybe that should be directed to staff later on when you have your discussion to find that out. Because already under the long-term rental short, rental properties, that is not required. It is required to have a business license where I can operate my multiple rentals in the city right now. I understand that each individual short-term rental will be required to have a permit, and I comply with that. The Ordinance 51-2030 requires the city business license for a short-term rental, and I would ask the council to clarify that one item if it's gonna require for multiple pieces. Second is a good neighbor policy, and I think it's a good policy. Short-term rental properties owners already have this policy. We keep it in our rental properties so that we can comply with the neighborhood and make sure our tenants and guests that are sitting there comply with what is already existing. Having another override of the city's jurisdiction from a neighbor that might complain about it and having to respond within one hour is going to be very difficult and challenging for short-term rental owners in the sense when you already have city police and code enforcements that can address any of the issues that come up. Lastly is the inspection requirement. In the Section 7, it requires the maintaining certificate of inspection for safety and wellness through the IBC code. And I'm just curious on if that is an annual event And is it required for each individual other types of properties that are out there that are being used for homeowners or other property rentals types? And I think that if it's short-term rentals are already listed and we comply with the Certificate of safety that we have submit to the city on an annual basis on working components and things in the property I see it running out. I'm sure you're out.

Yep.

I'm out So I just want to thank you for bringing it forward because I am very much in support of it And thank you for the staff's hard work at doing it and bringing it to you guys Just there's these items. I would like to see maybe some discussion around and some clarity on perfect Thank you for your comments.

Appreciate it Thank you. Before you come up, I had one in the back here, and then we'll get right to you. Thank you.

Bob Mancione, Franklin County. Good evening, Mayor Grimm and members of the council. Thank you for the opportunity to speak before you again this evening regarding tonight's vote on short-term rentals. We want to extend our gratitude to the many who have joined us here tonight, including the executive leadership teams of the Automotive Service Association, Berkshire Hathaway Home Services, Clean Sweep Tri-Cities, Community Real Estate Group, the executive director of Emmaus Counseling, Equipment Share, the Pasco Chamber, and Thorne Electric, as well as members of the faith community, our neighbors, friends, and supporters throughout the Columbia Basin. Thank you. Just two days ago, we celebrated our nation's 250th anniversary. Then the right people for the right reason at the right time came together and great things happened. That principle is woven into our nation's founding. Ordinary people stood together and together they accomplished the extraordinary. That same spirit for the good of the community inspired us to form the Columbia Basin STR Alliance. Built on advocacy, education and service excellence, our hope is to help responsible operators exemplify stewardship in their homes, neighborhoods and communities. With 24 years of combined hospitality, business and marketing experience, we're glad to serve as a resource to help strengthen short-term rental operations. As I shared in April, cancer dramatically changed our family's future. It's by God's grace that I'm even able to stand here tonight. One of the tumors permanently damaged my spine, which prevents me from continuing to work full time in the general contracting business our family has faithfully operated since 2009. While our faith remains strong, recognizing how blessed we still are, this reality has significantly changed my ability to provide for my family. That is why this ordinance means so much to us. While this decision deeply affects our family, we believe the framework before you will benefit many other responsible STR operators and the small businesses that serve them. Short-term rentals strengthen families, support local businesses, and shape a responsible future in Pasco. You've heard already from a real estate expert and others who will benefit eventually here. We'll talk about STRs this evening, including a wonderful special resident in Pasco who needs to rely on rental income. We'll speak after I'm done. Just as our nation was forged by ordinary people who came together in extraordinary ways, we believe this is one of those moments. Tonight you'll have the opportunity to do something meaningful for families, small businesses, and the future of Pasco. Thank you for your thoughtful consideration of this important topic for your service to our community, and God bless you.

Thank you, Mr. Mangione. Brad, did you want to get up now? One second, ma'am. He was just ahead of you. You can be next, though, ma'am. Oh, he yields. Just name and city or county residents for the record, please.

Thank you for letting us contend this evening and support Bob and his family. This factor that you're voting on this evening, this short-term rental, is a big help to him and his family because of an illness. Myself may be affected, and I wanted to add an aspect to this. My husband passed away in October. We own our home. He was a veteran. He was a Vietnam veteran, near 20-year retirement from the Air Force. However, when he passed, my finances took a big hit. Well, we have a home that we have for 47 years in Pasco. We've raised our family here. We love Pasco. alternative that I am looking at is maybe a possibility of renting out my six bedroom home. The reason I would have to do that is because I have to have some sort of an income to sustain myself. Social Security isn't going to last that long. I am unable to work, I am disabled, I have a disability coming in. But if I can rent my home out on a short-term disability, on a short-term lease, excuse me, it would provide me with a steady income and I would not have to sell my home and then have to worry about whether or not I can live the rest of my life on that set amount of money. So the factors that you're voting on this evening, for rentals, short-term rentals, for Bob and his family, there's other aspects to it if you look at people who are in a place where they can't afford to live. They have their homes and that's all they have. So I thank you for hearing me out. And I hope you find favor with us. And God bless you all and have a wonderful evening.

Ma'am, would you be so kind before you walk away, would you state your name and city of residence for the record? And I'd also be honored to hear your husband's name and his dedication of his service and honor to his work for this country.

My husband was Ted McKee. Thank you. He was a 20-year veteran in the Air Force. He was a veteran of Vietnam. Vietnam veteran. He left Pasco. He left the area. We retired in 1974. Retired from the Air Force. And when we moved here, I said, we're not moving anymore. That's it. We're going to stay right where we are. And we've been in the same house on 19th Drive for 47 years. Thank you. And what was your name, ma'am? I'm sorry? Your name? My name is Lynn. I apologize. We want to know who you are, too. Thank you so much. Actually, it's Mama Lynn. They call me that through Clean Sweep. Thank you so much for sharing tonight. Thank you.

Yes, sir. Yes, please. Good evening, staff, city council. My name is Brad Goldberg, and I am one of the equity partners that are the developers of Wisconsin companies who are buying 90 acres of the Broadmoor project. And I think tonight in front of you, you've got discussions for the infrastructure agreement that I negotiated with the city. And the first thing before I wanted to ask through any questions, this is more of – I think some time ago I said once we submitted or made our submit or come and present and we introduced myself to council members. I've met some of you various times. We're looking forward, number one, to developing a project in Pasco. It's been a long time in the making and 90 acres of the 600 plus acres, it's no small feat. So we're committed to, and by looking at history, to putting together a quality project in Pasco. Harold and his staff will make sure of it. I'm sure that the project is quality and The staff has been great. I know that when we started working in Pasco initially a while ago that there were some comments made, Pasco's a tough city, tough city to get development done, but so far it's been great. We respect quality city management because it leads to a quality project. And the investment we're making in the community We want our neighboring projects to be held to the standards that we hold ourselves to. And it appears to us that Pasco is a city that holds itself to quality standard development. And like I said, the city's been great. The infrastructure agreement's done, we hope. And with that, are there any questions that I can answer for you guys in advance of you guys having any discussions?

But I know we've got to discuss that a little bit later on tonight. I'm not sure if staff or council is ready to at this point. And I know you've got to leave early, but maybe Ms. Sigdell or somebody can leave your contact information or whatever.

We actually have a planning meeting in the morning, too. Yeah, that would be great.

Thank you for your time. Appreciate it. Awesome. Thank you, sir. Please step right up, sir. Just name and city or county of residence for the record.

Rich Sexton, I live across the river in Kennewick, and I come in support of the Mangione family, but I wanted to speak briefly about short-term rentals. I've rented quite a few vacation homes, either for church groups or family groups, several different states, three different countries, and I've talked to owners about what kind of problems do they have, and really what they tell me pretty consistently is that people that rent vacation homes are not there to create trouble, make noise, disrupt the neighborhood. And so there's a shared interest between the owners, the renters, and the platforms through which you rent in things going well, being good neighbors, not damaging the property, or disrupting the neighborhood. And so I just, I view the short-term rental ordinance as a good thing, and I would urge your support of it. Awesome. Thank you, sir.

Appreciate you coming across the creek to make some comments tonight. Anybody else in the chamber? Are you coming up, young lady?

Good evening, mayor and council members. My name is Kaitlyn Razo. I'm from Pasco and I'm a community organizer who works alongside families, youth, and community members throughout Pasco. I appreciate the opportunity to speak with you today. Having spent most of my life in this community, I have seen firsthand what makes Pasco strong. Hardworking families, locally owned businesses, neighborhoods who support one another, and people who believe in creating opportunities for the next generation. Those are the values that have shaped our city and they are the values I hope we continue to support. While the proposed casino is being presented as an economic opportunity, I am concerned about the long-term cost our community may face. Across the country, communities have experienced increases in gambling addiction, financial hardships, and stress on families when gambling becomes more accessible. These impacts extend beyond the individual and can affect children, relationships, workplaces, and the overall well-being of the community. As someone who works directly with residents, I meet families every day who are already working hard to overcome financial challenges. They need investments that create long-lasting opportunities, not projects that have the potential to deepen economic instability for those who are most vulnerable. I encourage the City Council to consider development that reflects the values of PASCO. Investments that strengthen local businesses, create quality jobs, expand educational opportunities, support affordable housing, and provide safe spaces where children and families can thrive. I assume to carefully consider the long-term impact this decision will have on our community. Growth should improve the quality for life for everyone and leave a legacy we can be proud to pass on for future generations. Thank you for your time and for your commitment for serving the people of this Pasco.

Thank you for your comments. Appreciate it.

Good evening, Marcy Torres and I'm from Franklin County. I was here earlier in June to talk to you guys about Mr. Perales and his behavior along with Mr. David Cortinas. The behavior hasn't stopped. In fact, there was an article that has been smearing my name that he himself has been sharing. Okay. which I am not okay with.

I understand. Please just address the council as a whole, yes, instead of...

Which I'm not okay with. Thank you. And something needs to be done about it because you're allowing a council member to... be smearing my name with the city of pascal information all over his account and commenting on things that are not true about me this situation is still under appeal and there was no reason for lavos and mr leo paralysis to come after me especially after i came and shared my concerns with them I have been being followed, attacked. In fact, during the parade this weekend, there were some men that were attacking me from the crowd, and I did defend myself. So, I would appreciate it if you guys would hold them accountable, because the behavior that is being, just how women and children are being targeted, there's no reason for my 15-year-old's problems to be blasted all over a newspaper.

And if we're going to say that we care about the community and about children, you should be behaving yourself better than this. There's thousands of cases in the Tri-Cities, and they chose my case. And my child, who doesn't even understand why he can't come home, but he has to read it on a newspaper because people can't be grown-ups. This is still under appeal and it's disgusting that grown adults who have children would behave in this manner. I also told you guys that there's a bunch of businesses in downtown Pasco that have told me that David Cortinas and Leo Perales during COVID, they were applying for all these grant money and charging a large amount of money for them to help them apply. A lot of these people don't speak English. Why aren't we investigating that? During the parade, we gave Galbraith, who's currently under investigation, the first spot in the parade. So we're in support of the kind of behavior that's happening right now? Where women and children are being harassed and stalked and we're okay with that behavior? Men are supposed to serve and protect, and this is not okay.

Thank you, Ms. Torres.

Thank you, City Council. LaWanda Hatch, I am from Franklin County. I appreciated the young lady's comments on the casino. I too am very concerned. I've always seen Pasco as a family place to be, from East Pasco all the way to West Pasco. That is our commonality. It is the thing that binds us together. We are somewhat of a bedroom community, actually, for Hanford. So many homes. We don't have a lot of businesses here. We don't have a mall. We have Walmart, Lowe's, and a few grocery stores. But the thing that is so great about, I love downtown Pasco because I love the businesses. I frequent those, bought dresses for my girls when they were younger and I'm so much older now. But that was a wonderful, they're just wonderful. The community is wonderful because of the small businesses and I feel like casinos does not fit what Pasco is. It does not fit the character of who we are. I know it's money, but there's some things that are more important than money, and that is families. And that is a community that love each other and are bound in our commonality of family. I'm also concerned of... Recent events that are happening with our police department a young man as You know was arrested for sitting in his car for five hours Across the street from someone who is running for office to follow the Secretary of State's direction on how to figure out if someone is actually living at that resident and And they recorded his one phone call without his permission. And then they took his phone without his permission, and they leaked the conversations as well as the phone call to the media. The only people that had that phone were the police department and maybe Sean Sant, who's our prosecuting officer, our prosecuting attorney for the county. So that's going to take investigation, because this young man's Fourth Amendment rights were offended. And that's something that should be concerning to all of us, because one today, us tomorrow. And we can't decide guilt just because we don't agree with someone on something. Guilt is discovered in a courtroom with order and rules. so process matters and our amendment rights matter and I hope that we can have some investigation on that because I I do know this family is being ramrodded for and it is political prosecute prosecution and that could end up coming back to harm the city and I would hate to see that as well as harm our County we can't afford lawsuits we need to take this seriously because it is serious and we need to address that and I thank you for your time Thank You miss hatch mr. Olson good evening

Good evening. My name is Robert Olson. Most of you know me as BJ. I'm a resident of Pasco. Good evening, Mayor, council members. I am speaking this evening on the behalf of Bob Mangione in support of short-term rentals. I've known Bob for many years, and one of the things I respect the most about Bob is his commitment to our community, his thoughtful and practical and constantly looks for solutions for the needs of our community. And so my support tonight isn't simply because Bob asked me to speak, but it's also because I believe that the proposal, especially the proposed I'm drawing a blank. Anyway, the proposed approach is balanced and short-term rentals provide valuable lodging options for visitors into our community and temporary workers and business travelers, families, loved ones. And, you know, as the Tri-City continues to grow, there's a need for a variety of accommodation options to accommodate those needs. The proposed ordinance recognizes this reality and establishes clear standards for accountability and safety. Some might worry that short-term rentals would edge in on other businesses, and while there may be some overlap with other businesses such as hotels, short-term rentals are often a different market. Families needing multiple bedrooms, people staying for extended periods, visitors seeking a more residential experience frequently those short-term renters do not choose a hotel because it doesn't meet their needs in fact visitors if that option is not available in Pasco will probably just go to another community to get short-term rental or they'll rent a short-term rental that is unlicensed unregulated so either way allowing short-term rentals keeps those visitors and their spending in our community I also believe that this proposal is responsible for property rights, homeowners who have invested many, many dollars into their properties should have a reasonable flexibility to operate and use their property in a way that they see fit, as long as they're doing it in a way that's responsible and is not creating problems for their neighbors. What I appreciate about the proposed amendment is that it includes strong safeguards. Operators have to obtain a city business license and a permit to maintain insurance and all the various things that are required for that. The proposed ordinance, I think, addresses the concerns that most people raise when they're thinking about short-term rentals. And so I believe that the proposed ordinance strikes the right balance between neighborhood protection, economic opportunity, and private property rights. And I respectfully encourage the council to approve it.

Thank you, Mr. Olson. Anyone else in the chamber? Step right on up.

Good evening, council members. I'm Marie Redout. The last time I tried to get here, I had to come in by phone, and it was really a complicated thing, and you guys were very gracious to let my friend here bring me in by phone, so I appreciate that. I did want to talk about a couple different things. Specifically, the things that I had brought up before were regarding the family court issues and preserving some of the records. I'd sent out emails to you, Mayor Grimm, and just wanted to say that When we're talking about these cases, there's hundreds of them. And they're not going away. In fact, they're getting bigger. In the next coming month, I will be speaking on behalf of two other families that have asked me to. One is going to be for a 15-year-old who has been trying to speak on her own behalf and has been shut down. And it's important that a lot of people and these judges that have been hearing these cases and making these decisions, putting gag orders and protection orders without any foundation, no evidence, nothing, just hearsay. There's an area where you have to go for safety, but it has to be substantiated in a way that's not just this wild accusation, which most of them have been, where the kids are taken away. I'm not talking specifically about domestic violence, just wild accusations. But I have these stories to tell, and they'll come up. I'm going to use their own words, and we'll start naming names. But I want these judges to know they remember your faces. These kids that you've taken away from their families, please understand, they grow up. They grow up and they understand what you did and they are coming to say their story and they're going to make sure that everybody across this state understands that this is a harm. This is irreparable damage to their family life and their childhood which is completely devastated. You have people that are raising their kids for 14 years and then all of a sudden somebody makes an accusation that has no evidence. whatsoever it's even documented by the law enforcement officer there's no evidence but we're going to go ahead and make sure somebody has to be listed here and then you use that information to separate a family so you have a 14 year old young man 13 and 14 taken away from a family member and then all of a sudden he doesn't know why and you're supposed to be quiet about it and then you're blaming the victim we're not going to do that So just on notice, stories are coming up. I want you guys to understand it's not going away. The information I sent you, we're not asking you to change a judge's decision. We're asking you to preserve records. We're asking you to reach out to the law enforcement officers and say, hey, these cases need to be presented. Prosecute an attorney. Send it to the court. It's relevant. This stuff matters. And publishing the letter that belongs sealed is not okay. Thank you.

Thank you for your comments. Appreciate it. You can bend the microphone down a little bit, too, if it'll bless you. Thank you.

Good evening, mayors and council members. My name is . I'm from here, from Pasco. I'm not a politician or a business owner. I'm just someone who grew up right here in Trace City and saw firsthand how gambling can fracture a family long before it can even enrich a community. I grew up watching my father disappear into the local cards room scattered around Pasco. For him, it wasn't entertainment. Gambling was an addiction and drained our bank's accounts and shattered our trust. I could still hear the screaming fights echoing throughout the walls for our home. Back then, there wasn't any mental health services available, and even if there were, his pride would have kept him from seeking help. I lived through the fall of a gambling addiction. I've watched it follow our home from the inside. If expanding Casino Express is impossible risk, putting even one more local family throughout that pain, we owe it to the neighborhood to pause and demand better. Let's make sure that before anyone breaks ground, we fully understand the long-term consequences for PASCO. Not just the glossy short-term promises. Behind the bright lights is the darkness my family had to endure. And I'm speaking up now to make sure our community future doesn't include more than of the same. Thank you for your time.

Thank you for your comments. Appreciate it.

Good evening. Good evening. Amy Snow, Pasco. On more than one occasion, we reported incidents to Pasco Police Department seeking help and protection. Instead of feeling supported, we often felt dismissed. When our home was broken into, we were told, we don't fingerprint anymore. We asked that the home be cleared to make sure no one was inside because we were genuinely concerned for our safety. When we were told that, they cited Officer Safety and refused to go inside the house. I asked the officers. What if someone shoots us? Just call us again. We'll be back in 30 seconds. We were told I Continue to ask myself. This is how every citizen in Pasco is treated when they ask for help Or is this only how Mitch snow has been treated? I genuinely need to understand what is happening.

I

because our experiences have left us questioning whether we can rely on the very people who are sworn to protect and serve our community. No family should be made to feel that reporting a crime is pointless or that their safety concerns are an inconvenience. When people call the police, they are often frightened, vulnerable, and looking for reassurance that someone will take their concerns seriously. We did not feel that happen in our case. These experiences, combined with what we have endured in the court system, have shaken our faith in the justice system as a whole. I have watched a loving father be separated from his son while feeling that our reports to law enforcement have been minimized or dismissed. It is heartbreaking to feel as though every door we turn to for help closes in our faces. We are being retaliated against when we ask the police for help to do their jobs. And all we're asking is for help. Thank you.

Thank you for your comments.

Thank you.

Hello, my name is Tim Sanchez. I'm pastor at Faith Bible Church in Milton-Freewater. I'm here on behalf of the Bachman and Joni family and the short-term rentals. And I have a confession. I'm an addict. I'm addicted to short-term rentals. My wife and I love short-term rentals. They allow pets and we've met many people, scores and scores, all over the country. We've rented their homes for a time to get away and those folks are so, they're like family. They've become family. We don't generally have any interaction with them but the little notes that we pass back and forth They're always clean and that's why we choose them. They're always affordable. It's another reason why we go. I have many friends in the pastorate community that in Milton-Freewater have had to resort to Airbnbs. Their congregations are small and that extra income helps them to get by without a salary from their congregations. Bob's not asking for a handout. I admire his work ethic. Matter of fact, I had truck problems when Bob called last week. And I said, Bob, I don't even know how I'm gonna be able to get the part. He says, you know, I think we have enough money in our auto fund to be able to help you get that part. And they sent a Venmo to be able to buy a thermostat for my shabby truck. That's the kind of people that we've met all over the country, from the Finger Lakes of New York to the coast of California. My wife and I have stayed in short-term rentals and have grown fond of them. We'd rather be there than in a hotel. There's a need for Bob and his family. I know what it's like to have the injuries. I, too, was a contractor for 34 years. I fell three times in three years over two stories the third time, two and a half stories, and I herniated the discs in my lower back. So being able to do something different, I guess contractors, when they retire, they become pastors, but there's a need, and I pray that this motion will be passed so that not just the Mangione family, that others who, like this dear lady that came up, could be taken care of. Because they care. They care about this community. They care about you. Thank you for your time. Thank you for your comments. Appreciate it.

My name is Doug Graydon. I'm a Burbank resident in Walla Walla County. I'm looking for an advocate on this crash prevention zone. Highway 12 and Tank Farm Road is dear to my heart. I was a motorcycle victim May 26th. And you're looking at a miracle that I'm here. Something needs to be done. I'm looking for an advocate, Mayor. City Council members, please push this through. This intersection should not be open. There's trucks that come from Walmart out of the Port of Pasco, and they try taking a right. There's not even enough room to get to the bridge for an acceleration lane. They just pull out. There's people turning on the Tank Farm Road, and they just race across there. Hopefully they make it. We have one way home, and that's the intersection. that has taken lives of Burbank residents. A year ago, my buddy lost his sister there. Car cut across in front of me and hit her at 45, 50 miles an hour, blew 70 feet in the air, several fractures in my back, bruised spleen, broken shoulder, broken hand, internal bleed, collapsed lung, Because God spared me for a reason. And if that's the reason, I'll take it. But something needs to be done. I don't want it slow walked. It's easy to slow walk things. I don't want it slow walked. I want something done before the next person isn't as blessed as I am to walk away. I thank you for your time. Thank you.

And sir, if I can just make a comment or two. I know that's near and dear to my Mayor Pro Tem's heart next to me, who was also hit on a motorcycle on Lewis Street, but it was actually part of our consent agenda. We actually already passed this evening to go ahead and make that letter to the state to have that included in that. So, yeah, thank you. Yeah, it's us as a community. Those intersections and those north of town on the 395, I think Commissioner Didier rightly described them as death traps that are, you know, last century's technology and we're kind of all grown up now in the third largest metropolitan area with these ancient intersections. So yeah, that's going to be something we continue to work towards. Thank you. Anybody else in the chamber for public comment?

Mitch Snow, Pasco, Washington. It's my third time being here, I think. You all know I've been having some troubles getting the law to protect me equally. It's very rare that I ever speak up about my veteran status. So tonight I'm going to let you know I Spent seven years, ten months, four days in the United States Army, military intelligence and special forces. I didn't leave because I wanted to. I was discharged honorably, medically. I sustained fractures to my skull, my face, my jaw, my neck, my lower back, my hip, my knee, my ankles. left shoulder, shrapnel through my eye, which entered my brain. It took a long while for them to finally remove it. I left service under a special condition with special skill sets, which back then, they made us sign an agreement that I would not use my skills or any of my training against my fellow citizens to try and exact any kind of justice that I thought I needed. It means that I depend upon the law to do its job, to the letter of the law, to protect me equally. I've never asked for any special conditions. Religious treat me equally. The last 10 years, that hasn't happened. Sadly, it comes down to integrity. about every level that I've seen in government around here where integrity is no longer something that people hold on to. I could go on about my personal problems and I'll talk with the chief later about it, but recently I am going to speak up for Marcy here. On the 17th, she was in need. She had a car. She had to get it repaired. She had to be picked up. So she called us. We did. And we went and met her. We took her home. On that same day, a city councilman who was giving me respect, so I thought, was going to meet with me that day, as he said several other days. And he ended up telling me that he couldn't make it that day because he was at his child's birthday party at Chuck E. Cheese. It's rather amazing, though, I was at the Chuck E. Cheese when he sent that. The only car was David Corrales's. which has been following Marcy around at the behest of a judge.

Mr. Snow, thank you. You're over time. I have a full room. I have to give equal time to everybody. I'm happy to have a cup of coffee with you later, and I would hear you out for an hour, but for the sake of decorum and time, I have to... For decorum and time. Fine. We'll talk. Okay. Thank you, Mr. Snow. Appreciate it.

Hello, council. My name is Celeste Francis Carlson Stanley. I work and reside in Pasco, Franklin County. I'm here to talk about fireworks and some ethics issues. My father, here's proof, Hanford firefighter, volunteer firefighter for Pasco and Franklin County. He always told me fireworks are emergencies. You've got council members, Leo Perales, selling fireworks. When today I posted proof of it, he said, as usual, Sluss leaves out the facts. He doesn't allow any screenshots. I copied and pasted it word for word. Here's the proof. He sells fireworks. When you're selling fireworks, Everybody thinks, oh, they're safe and sound because that's what you say. No, they're all problematic. Then I've got some ethics violations going on, and I put counsel on notice. So we got counsel on notice, we got ethics. The next thing is Superior Court, and I have no problem going there. Here we've got a quote. Lance Brahas, while she was sitting on council, is the most anti-community council member I've seen. It's time for her to step down. Leo stated that. Leo is actively, legally retaliating against Marcy. Myself, because his buddy posted in a Tri-Cities group that I'm a troll. And a simpleton lawbreaker posted my address. I'm an ACP participant. Address confidentiality. Shouldn't be broadcasted. Yes, you can look it up publicly. Shouldn't be broadcasted by anybody on council or related to council, in relation to council. Non-stop harassment for the last couple of years from Leo Perales towards me. I have lawyers because I'm ready to stop it. I want cease and desist. I want to be left alone. These are a couple. I got a binder full of it, and I don't mind coming in every time and providing the facts. So I don't know what your little slap on the hand with Leo's going on, but obviously it needs to go up to the superior level. He, and I think anybody who has sold fireworks on council or in the past or now, should recuse themselves from conversations about fireworks because it's biased and conflict of interest. Because I fear retaliation, my lawyers are prepared to protect me and my businesses against council and Leo Perales.

Please wrap up, your time is also complete and over.

17 seconds 18 seconds.

It's counting. It's over three minutes ma'am. Yes.

Yeah 20 so I will be back with more proof.

Yes, ma'am. Thank you Anyone else in the chamber for public comment I Just want to make sure everybody has a right to speak who wants to or an opportunity. Yes, ma'am, we'll get you to you first, sir. You're up here.

Hello, Council. Matthew Ducat, Benton County, owner of Steve's Higher and Auto in Kennewick. I'm also the president of the Northwest All-Care Alliance Tri-Cities and a board member of Big Road Job Foundation. I'm here to support the Mangione's as an automotive business owner and president of our chapter for the Auto Care Alliance. We feel like there's definitely a need for what the Mangione's are trying to do. I sit on that board because I feel like Joe's work is important and I have been invited once they get their nonprofit status to be on the board for their automotive outreach program that they would like to start. So I just feel like this could be something that will really help them. It will help the community. There are many families and elderly people who this will help and many people that are not here. or people that don't want to speak.

So I hope you vote yes. Thank you. Appreciate your comments. And then for the sake of those who may not want to speak, if I can just get a show of hands in the chamber, who was invited by Mr. Mangione and is in support of this? Perfect. Thank you so much. Anyone else in the chamber or actually a young lady back there wanted to come up and speak?

Laurie Thompson, Pasco. So many issues, so little time. First, I'd like to give my kudos and support for the folks speaking about their personal experience with gambling addictions and all the other problems that come with gambling. I, too, feel that Pasco doesn't need casino within the city and that would be my vote no. I also would like to ask the council and the staff support in any means necessary to start addressing the many issues at the TCAS which for those that don't know is the Tri-City Animal Services used to be called the Tri-City Animal Shelter, I believe. There are still serious issues with that program. And we need to work with the citizens that are concerned who volunteer down there, who work there. We need to give them our support. And let's get some of those issues taken care of, because little lives suffer and die because of it. when we have issues that aren't resolved. And they've been ongoing for quite some time. I'd like to know when we're going to announce our new chief of police. And then certainly last but not least on my personal agenda here is the good news is the July 4 is over. It's a shame that after 70 years of life I look to dread that living in Pasco because of the illegal fireworks and the melee that is a serious risk to our property, our lives, and our quality of life. And it's my proposal that if the city cannot come up with any better I would say now the bad news is that the fourth being over, the bad news is a lot of players in Pasco did not get that memo, nor did they get all the memos that we put out on shiny posters and whatnot. I don't know how much money the city of Pasco spent on that, but the majority didn't get the memo. The illegal fireworks are completely out of control. Now it's been said that the law enforcement just has to throw their hands up. They can't do a darn thing about it. So I suggest then, if that is truly the case, if we can do absolutely nothing about that on our own, that we then start contacting other powers that be, like the state of Washington, to step in and give us a hand to get control of that. It's absolutely miserable. It's out of control. It's uncalled for. And the cons of those illegal fireworks far outweigh the pros that anyone else might see in their freedoms and whatnot in using them.

Thank you, Mrs. Thompson, for your comments. Appreciate it.

Thank you.

Anybody else in the chamber for public comment? Going once. Going twice. Moving on. Thank you, Mr. Mayor Pro Tem. I'm just having a little technology issue here. We are going to move on to number seven, reports from committees and or officers.

Mr. Cotta. And we met with the Tri-City Chamber. You know, we missed a week here, so it was kind of a couple weeks back. But they made some great recommendations and really dealing with the homeless issues that we can consider, and so that was really good. And then, you know, the July 4th parade was awesome. It was wonderful participating in that and celebrating our country's 250th birthday. I got to share a float with Cal, and that was fun. And we've got some boards and commissions interviews coming up on Wednesday. Thank you, Council Member Hernandez.

Yeah, I attended the Fourth of July parade, and that was a lot of fun. Also got to judge, oh, we were there for Mayor's Choice for the car show, along with Councilman Campos. We picked a truck. We picked a truck. Very original, but anyway. It was a lot of fun, though, doing both of those things on the fourth.

Thank you. Councilmember Peralta? Thank you, Mayor. Yeah, no, I just want to say thank you to the Pasco Chamber. That was a very enlightening meeting. I saw Colin walk in, really appreciate his board and their thoughts on development to homelessness. That was really great. I had a Tri-City Animal Services community meeting last week. About 40 individuals showed up. That was a REALLY GREAT COMMUNITY MEETING. DID A LOT OF LISTENING, TALKED ABOUT A LOT OF THINGS, AND I'M LOOKING FORWARD TO HAVING ANOTHER ONE HERE IN THE NEXT COUPLE WEEKS. ALSO ATTENDED THE GRAND OLD FOURTH OF JULY PARADE WITH MY FAMILY. IT WAS GREAT, YOU KNOW. one of the longest parades that we've had in a long time. It was great to talk with residents. I want to give a shout out to Captain Paramore. We had a resident who had some homeless individuals living right next to their house. I told him about it and he addressed it right then and there. So they were really happy about that. And honestly, they didn't know who to call. It's foreign to some individuals to call the authorities and they didn't want to call. And so I don't know. I mean, I'll track the officer down right now and he handled it, so I just want to say thank you. If I could have liberty, I'm going to make it very brief, Mayor, but I think as elected officials, and I'm going to go ahead and speak for every elected official in the Tri-Cities, I respect public comment. I call this First Amendment Mondays. You won't ever hear me criticize individuals for coming here and using that mic. That is your guys' mic. But I think, however, I think sometimes I think we should be able to please speak to things that are being thrown at individuals, whether it's at Franklin County, Benning County. I think if you're gonna come here and talk about a council member of the city, please bring facts. I think everything that people say sometimes is not true. I don't think people in the audience should take everything as true. Even myself, I think you should be skeptical. But when people keep on attacking, even my fellow elected, it does come to a point where why do we do this job? I'm not dissuading from doing this job. I will continue to do this job. I will run again in four years. You know, I'm not looking to cause problems for anyone. And merely elected official responding to someone, whether in person or online, should not be harassment, whether it's a criticism of a policy, whether their stance, like, if you're... Mayor, can I call a point of order? I was going to be very brief, Mr. I'm going to finish up. And so, and that's that. I mean, collective officials, we should be talking with our representatives or excuse me, with our people that we represent. And, you know, I'm not, I'll just say it out loud. I wasn't going to dignify a lot of the accusations because they're just not true. If they are true, then bring the facts. You know, me in 20 to 2021, I'm a private citizen. No, I'm gonna I'm gonna speak. No, I know I'm gonna finish this is I know I do Please but the individuals are in the room. So I'm gonna I'm gonna address this Being you know, they're point of order again.

I believe that this is not business.

I'm gonna wrap it up with mr. Prowess This is the time frame. I do are out of order. I know but I'm just gonna finish with this So it's just being told and I wasn't somewhere if that is untrue. I I'm going to show everyone. This is my daughter. She turned five. Point of order, Mayor. Thank you. We'll move on. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you, Mayor. I just also wanted to say thank you to the staff for facilitating the meeting with the Chamber. I thought it was well attended. Again, we had a lot of hard questions and some good answers. So I do appreciate you putting that together. Hopefully we'll be able to meet with the other entities that we think can build Pasco into a better place to live. And then, again, I also enjoyed everybody showing up for the 4th of July parade. Again, it was a pleasure to be with the council and lead the parade. And, again, I was glad you were able to do some community work or spend some time with your family. I know you're always active in our community. And, again, it was just one of the most well-attended parades, I thought. Again, I just appreciate all the kids and everybody out there. And so, again, I had a good time. And I know my... A fellow councilman, Campos, he was quite the hit. Everybody was yelling Campos, so I assume he was giving out good candy, but it was good to see that people acknowledge you. all the work and hard work that we tried to make the Pasco Council the best place it can be. So thank you.

Thank you, yes, and I appreciate everybody filling in for me while I was sick one week at, yes, for the meeting with the Chamber and others, and then, yes, getting away a few days on holiday for our Independence Day. So thank you, everybody. Mr. Figueroa.

Yeah, just to reiterate some sentiments from my colleagues. Had a phenomenal Fourth of July parade. Just seeing the city come out, I think that's what we're about. bringing people together versus being divisive. We also had the opportunity to share some city remarks. We have the city at the Giza Stadium fireworks show and just another opportunity, family-friendly event for folks to come out here and enjoy. But I also do know that there was other opportunities for folks that Parks and Recs provided. I know that the Fairchild Cinema was rented out so that folks could go in there either catch a movie or just get away from all that big noise and so I think that's really good opportunity and I'm sure that we're gonna have some some data points of how many people took advantage of that but I'm glad that as a city staff is doing kind of their job and their diligence of making sure that we take all the concerns of the residents and provide spaces for them because I know that some folks love the fire fireworks and some don't I think that we can always kind of come together it shouldn't be in this or that but we can make things work for all of our residents here in Pasco so thank you thank you

Council Member Campos.

Yeah, I just want to give a shout out. I know people already said it with the Chamber, meeting with them, Pasco Chamber. That was just a great opportunity for all the stakeholders. These are Chamber business owners as well. And so it was a great conversation to come together. I think one of the desires of our Council is just basically making sure that we are starting that first step forward of engaging with everybody. So I want to appreciate the Chamber for agreeing to meet with us, that was a great time. And then also, yeah, the parade was amazing. Great to see so many people just celebrating out there in their outfits with their families, and really just highlighting not only our country, but also just our community as well. So it was great. I'm a past going, hearted through. So all the different generations, what I call the legends, showed up. It was a great opportunity for that. So it was good. I really liked it.

Thank you so much, Council Member Campos. And thank you to staff and everybody who showed up, our city, our community, for our grand old Fourth of July. Mr. Mayor Pro Tem, I would welcome a motion to amend the agenda at this point.

Yeah, I'd like to make a motion to amend the agenda. So since we have so many people in the audience, And we got a lot on our plate tonight. I'd like to push item 9B as the next. And then we can come back to the hearings and council actions. So if we could move that along and just so people could enjoy the rest of their evening.

Thank you. Mr. Mayor Pro Tem has made a motion to move letter B of number 9 to our next item of business. I'll second that. Seconded by Council Member Perales. Discussion? Not seeing any, all in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed, nay. Motion carries. We will move into that now if staff is ready. This is letter B of number nine, ordinance number 4847, regulations for short-term rentals. And for this, we are moving to our deputy city manager, Ms. Sigdell. Good evening, ma'am.

Thank you, Mayor and Council. Tonight we bring forward ordinance number 4847, which would be creating... Chapter 5.120 of Pasco Municipal Code to establish a regulatory framework for short-term rentals, which is what Council has directed staff to do. We discussed this item on June 8th workshop and there were a few points that Council wanted to make sure that we were adding a limited framework focused on mostly life safety and operator accountability. So that is what the ordinance in front of you today is. It requires operators to obtain a city business license and a short-term rental permit. There was a question earlier of whether the permit would be for each address, which that is how it is written at this time, which is that it would be for each address where the short-term rental is, not for the business that runs several short-term permits. There's also a designated local representative that would need to be available 24-7 to respond to complaints within one hour. So that is how the ordinance is written. That is in front of you. Maintain a liability insurance, which is a state law, and complete an annual life safety self-certification. So essentially it would be the self-certification that would be present in the property at all times. and this is instead of the annual city inspections, which would reduce the workload for city staff, but also reduce fees for the applicants as well. Event type uses, such as weddings or large gatherings, are prohibited, and these requirements apply consistently to all operators, including those outside of established platforms. We discussed about the fact that Larger platforms like Airbnb, VRBOs, they might have their own requirements, but we also have many short-term rental operators who might be operating on their own. The fiscal impact is going to be minimal. However, what you will notice is that staff has not brought forth what an application fee is going to be, or essentially the permit fee for this type of application. We are planning to do that between now and November of this year. And you'll also see a lot of attachments to the staff report, which includes draft forms of what staff is recommending in terms of what the self-certification forms looks like, the application, the good neighbor handbook policy, those kinds of items so that you have a clear idea of what staff is thinking and can provide feedback as we go for exactly what the final forms of those documents will look like. And what I also want to clarify is that at this time, A city's code is mostly silent on short-term rentals, which essentially means that it doesn't say it's not allowed and it does not say it is allowed. However, there are certain areas, and it is a confusing thing, and what we appreciate is so many people who want to follow the rules, and if they feel like it is not explicitly allowed, that it might not be allowed. definitely a great place for the city to be and its residents who want to follow the rules. There are certain specific areas like Osprey Point. These are some of the new codes where the codes were written with explicit allowing or disallowing of short-term rentals. So Osprey Point is where it is specifically coded as allowed. And then the ADUs, which are accessory dwelling units, where they're expressly not allowed. So as we're going through our land use work, which is our ComPlan amendment, a process that happens every 10 years and is a substantial effort, what we are recommending at this time is making sure that we're cleaning up that language, making it very clear on where all of the short-term rentals are allowed. I also want to clarify with Council that at this time staff's understanding is that short-term rentals would be allowed at all residentially zoned properties, which would mean that they would be allowed for condos, duplexes, fourplexes, single family apartments, all of those different types of residential uses. And if council approves today's ordinance, what it will allow for staff is to communicate this out, let the community know what to expect. The ordinance would be effective as of January 1st of 2027. And also at the same time, we would be changing our land use for clarity. Some changes like the ADU and Osprey point will make sure it's consistent across the board and it is allowed. And also that will make it a lot more effective use of staff's time because any land use changes requires comments from Department of Commerce, SEPA notices, and we'll also allow for a larger outreach because ComPlan amendment is, sorry, ComPlan update is a significant effort and we do a lot of outreach so more people will have an opportunity to understand what the council is trying to do here. And with that, I'm open to any questions that you might have.

Thank you, Deputy City Manager Signel. Mr. Perales.

Yeah, three other questions that were mentioned during the public comment period that were on my list, but you did answer one of them in regards to the zoning. So in regards to business license, I envision that if someone had multiple properties, they would just be one business license, and then you could attach it to all the short-term rentals they had.

So there is business license and then there's a permit, a short-term rental permit. So you would get a business license with the state and get a city endorsement, essentially, that you are running a rental business. And then the permit would be what they would apply for. That's what you see. the application attached, the draft of the application attached.

So there would be a permit per home, not a business license then?

As it is written, that is how you have it, per home.

Business license per home or permit per home?

Permit per home.

Okay, permit per home is fine with me. Okay, that's what I thought I had written, but I was kind of confused. The one-hour requirement I thought was pretty, you know, pretty... I don't know. I mean, sometimes the cops don't get back to anyone in one hour, at least the phone call. So I think there should be some grace with that. I hope that we don't issue, hey, they didn't meet the one-hour requirement three times and then revoke their permit. So that would be my two cents on that. So I don't know who's going to be the one really responding to that. Would that be the director, CD director, or would that be code enforcement?

That would, essentially, if there's violation, if there's a violation, we would expect that we can call someone and solve the issue within that one hour. So it would be our court enforcement or whoever is on call at that time. And police department as well.

Can you clarify the good neighbor policy? I mean, the way I took it is that that's just having that book on file so that they can review and that they're essentially abiding by those good neighbor policies.

That is correct. And you'll find the larger platforms like the Airbnbs who do have their own good neighbor handbooks. This is just covering for the short-term rental operators who might not be going through those larger platforms.

And then lastly, it was the same thing, the self-inspection, the international building code. He asked the question of, is this being applied to other rentals? We don't oversee other rentals. This is that first thing since ending the rental inspection program. So obviously the answer is no. And so this would be an annual thing and they could self-certify that, correct?

That is correct. So they would essentially do that as they renew their permits every year.

Okay, let me look at my notes one last time.

But I think I got all my questions answered. Except platform coordination. How are we gonna be working, are we gonna be working directly with Airbnb and Vrbo so that we can report violators? Have we reached out? I know we've had communications with Airbnb, but I mean, I've had no luck with Vrbo. So how are we gonna do that?

We have not envisioned a direct collaboration with any violators with Vrbo or Airbnb or any of the other platforms. I anticipate that we will be fully aware of the operators who are not following our codes. But then there might be operators who are not following Airbnb's policies as well. And so we have to be careful about punishing someone for what is not within our code. So I would say that city's obligation is to ensure that we are working with what's within our code and making sure that people are complying with it.

Okay. Well, because individuals have made comments that essentially some of these short-term rentals are being rented by individuals and they're not neighborhood friendly. And so I mean, there could be a way where we can stop the short-term rentals that are problems by working in coordination and in tandem with the VRBOs and the ARBBs. So I don't think that should be in the ordinance, but I mean, I think we should have some type of policy, some supplement where we could actually work with them. Because the last thing we want is, you know, I would assume we're going to pass this tonight, and then we have people coming in and criticizing us, and we could easily just work with those so that we could get those short-term rentals off of those platforms. Obviously, they can do it on their own. And so that would be my two cents. I don't know how we work that out, but I think we should be working in close coordination with these platforms. So I'll leave it at that. But I appreciate it. I think everything looked good based on what we talked about a couple weeks ago. So I'm in favor of this.

Mr. Stewart. Yes, Mr. Member of the Council. Just to address Council Member Perales' last concern, I think we'll cross that bridge when we get there. Let's see if there's any complaints. And at that point, we can try to form communications with those companies, if that's appropriate. I do just want to take a minute to talk about one issue that hasn't been discussed, just so there's some clarity, both publicly. So as I came in and looked, my family was looking at relocating to Pasco. We were looking at making offers on some houses, which meant that some of those homes were in HOAs. and I read through a lot of HOA regulations. So I do want to remind those that are potentially participating in this that the city ordinance does not override HOA regulations. So if there's restrictions in your HOA, you need to pay attention to that. Because our ordinance allowing it does not override those HOA requirements. Secondarily, if you're an HOA, and that is violated, that's a violation of your HOA regulations, that's not a violation of city ordinance, So the city is not going to help the HOA enforce their regulations. That's a civil matter between the HOA and the property owner. So I just want to make sure that that's clear on both sides and the city is not in the middle of HOAs and short-term rental issues.

Thank you, Mr. Stewart. That's a good point of clarification. And Council Member Campos.

Thank you so much for the presentation. I'm all in favor for the SDR. I think both its users and its owners are a great community. They do their best to make it function in a good possible way. My only question is, Is there anything part of this to where if there's neighbors, other community members that want to call in and have some concerns, are we going to have anything in part of this ordinance that they can do that? Or is it just more of they could just self-check their listening or say everything's good and then the neighbors don't really have any say at all?

There are noise policies and overall any ordinance that we have around noise and and let's say there is an ordinance around parking, those are things that still, they need to be abided by, by any resident within that home. So if there is a loud party after 10 or 11 o'clock, whenever our noise timeline starts, and then regardless of whether it's a short-term rental, our police department, our court enforcement would be going there to ensure that They're abiding by the city codes.

Yep.

Thank you Thank you any other questions or comments, mr. Figueroa on the topic of parking I noticed it on one side there is Brief, you know one line about parking but then when you look at the slides The parking component has been just struck out. Is there a reason for it and is that a conversation worthy? it's not gonna be a lot for the property owners to decide what parking allotments are gonna sign for these STRs or Is that something that we can kind of begin to think about as well?

There are ordinances throughout the country that are very specific about parking because that tends to be an issue with short-term rentals at times. However, what is in our code is just a standard parking for any any residential residents. So if it's an apartment, whatever is required for an apartment, regardless of whether it's a short term rental or just a regular residence. So that is what we have it. Uh, there's many different ways of doing it. There's, uh, there's, uh, ordinances that require a submittal of exactly where the parking spaces are going to be that to be included within the handbook. Um, so you can go really far out with it, but what we have is a really simple, be a good neighbor. And there are specified single family or any other resident parking within that short-term rental.

Mr. Stewart, just to help in response to that, our last conversation, it was the direction of council to staff to keep this as unregulatory as possible. And so that's why the deputy city manager's given the response that she is. We don't want to incur any other additional regulations with regard to parking. We don't want to keep it as simple as possible.

Thank you. Any other comments before we go back to Mr. Perales?

Yeah, no, I was just going to jump on that. I mean, that's the reason why some of us didn't bring up parking, because, I mean, there's already some parking issues in a lot of neighborhoods. And so I think there's no reason to burden short-term rentals. Again, they're short-term rentals. They may be there for a couple weeks, and then they leave. So I don't think parking is really going to be an issue. But if it is an issue, it's more of a broader issue that we already see in our community. So there's no need to talk about it, really.

Perfect. Not seeing anything else. Yeah, I'll just say thank you, staff, for bringing this back. I think this is a win for what we're seeing, you know, just in response for the community. I don't think we've heard anybody really against it either in the chamber or, um, through email or anything. So I think this is a positive win. I think what's been put together so far strikes a good balance between, um, property owners being able to do what they do with their property, having that right to do yet at the same time. I mean, we require all other business operators in the city to have a license. So I think that is a, um, good basic thing. I like the, um, self-inspection program and keeping it simple and as least regulatory as possible. So I'm not seeing any other comments. Mr. Mayor Pro Tem.

Thank you, Mayor. I move to adopt ordinance number 4847, creating chapter 5.120, short-term rentals of the Pasco Municipal Code, establishing a clear regulatory framework for short-term rentals within the City of Pasco with an effective date of January 1, 2027.

I'll second that. Motion on the floor by Mayor Pro Tem Milne, seconded by Council Member Perales to adopt ordinance number 4847. All in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed nay. Motion carries. With that, we will... We'll recess for two minutes and allow those that would like to go. I know some travel quite a ways in. And we will be back in two minutes.

All right.

We are going to bring this meeting back to order. Thank you for everybody. Again, we're going to bring this meeting back to order. Thank you everybody in the chamber. We are moving on to number eight, hearings and council action on ordinances and resolutions relating thereto. Letter A, essential public facilities, secure community transition facilities and less restrictive alternative housing code update.

Mr. Stewart. Yes, Mr. Mayor, I'd like to turn some time over to our city attorney. So in response to council's last direction, there's some additional processes that we need to do, and the city attorney will walk you through what those are.

Thank you. Great. Oh, Mr. Kinney, did you have a comment? No, did I hear?

Oh, I was just going to jump in. Oh, please. Great. I appreciate it. And you can hear me. That was going to be my first question. Good evening. Thank you, sir. I appreciate that. So, a few things to talk about here on the public hearing that's noted on the agenda. So, given Council's direction at a prior work session, staff and legal have been working to identify ways to update the draft code to meet those proposals and those ideas. and that is going to include additional work that will be necessary and so that'll move forward along with what we've heard about earlier tonight and that we'll hear about obviously in the coming months with the comp plan process and the idea that was proposed by council was to look into the potential of an overlay to try to confine these locations into the industrial areas and that overlay is going to take time to analyze both the capacity analysis to make sure that that can actually be placed there but then also because the comp plan is being updated and the zoning table is being updated all that work is happening kind of simultaneously and so staff can roll this in and make that work happen this is an ongoing project it is still ongoing it will be rolled into that and so in order to accomplish that the public hearing that was uh scheduled for tonight isn't needed we will have a new ordinance that will incorporate this new information it's obviously very very important that the public has an opportunity to provide comments on that there will be a public hearing on whatever ordinance is pulled together and so we are not bypassing that we are simply we'll be holding another public hearing when that ordinance is ready and prepared and so the uh hearing that was scheduled for tonight council has the option to continue to open that hearing and hear feedback that's perfectly fine although the the ordinance will change but getting public input is always a positive thing i know council always looks for that And so you can do that, you can close the public hearing, and then we'll move forward. And then another public hearing will be noted when the ordinance is updated with the input both that Council already gave and that's being worked on and then the input that you'll give further on that when it's prepared. At the same time, as we know, there is a moratorium in place on accepting applications on these uses. That moratorium is coming closer to the expiration in August 17th. And so that will need to be extended. And so that will keep the moratorium in place. That will be brought to you for a public hearing on the moratorium distinct from what I was just talking about. a public hearing and then extension of the moratorium for an additional six months, nearly an additional window to allow this continued work to happen while maintaining the status quo, which right now is the moratorium on acceptance of these applications. And so there's two things that will happen. Number one, extension of the moratorium to give the window to work in and then working within that window with additional public input and a draft ordinance that council will continue to work with. and so we want to make sure we get this right and legal and staff are gaming it out to address those that input that you've already given to give you that ordinance that incorporates that in there and so at this time i guess i'd open questions and then if you would like you can open that public hearing receive feedback and then and then close it and then move on with your agenda So are there any questions about what I just explained?

Yeah, Mr. Kinney, just one point of clarification for me. Thank you for clarifying all that. One of the comments you made was that if we open the public hearing tonight, it would change the ordinance. And I guess what do you mean by that? Just the feedback we get? Or I just want to know exactly what you meant by that. Because, yeah, I'm always open for more public comment. But what would that do specifically if we did open it up again?

I apologize. I probably was just speaking too quickly. I intended to say that you will be changing the ordinance. And so what they're giving public comment on tonight is not the ordinance that will be moving forward and likely because it will be continued to be worked on. But any feedback on the topic and what was noticed for tonight is fine and it will not change anything. You'll continue to work on it as a council.

Okay, perfect. So we do it tonight, we do it again in two weeks, we extend the moratorium for another six months to give you guys time to work on it as staff and legal, and hopefully we seal this up and keep sexually violent predators out of our neighborhood, correct?

Sequentially, yes, correct.

Perfect. Questions, comments for Mr. Kinney? guess I just before we do open it up and I do want to open up a let anybody that's in council that maybe had planned to the opportunity to speak just to I guess catch everybody up a little bit this is the Department of Corrections and through the Growth Management Act also in the Department of Health placing these LRAs that that's kind of the big umbrella less restrictive alternative housing and they come in all these different or these essential public facilities that come in these different forms of SCTFs and the one that's probably caught the most attention, these less restrictive alternative housing, and it's basically them putting what they describe as acronymed as SVPs, sexual violent predators, basically predatory human beings who look for the least or the most vulnerable people to have a past of sexual violence. And so where we left this last time was to task staff and Mr. Kinney to put it east of the 395 and north of the 182 basically into that industrial almost becoming where it borders on the agriculture where we just don't really have any residents. We're trying to protect community from these sexual violent predators that the state insists on putting in our communities and it is super frustrating so with that we will let's go ahead and open up this public hearing we'll give anybody that wants to speak on this issue three minutes this public hearing is officially open please come to the podium state your name and address for the record and you have three minutes to speak on this topic No, just your name, city and county of residence. Fine. Turn on the little button there that'll make the red. There you go. Thank you.

All right, LaWanda Hatch. I live in Pasco, actually out where the casino may end up being, and also the sexual predatory house, which is great. We live out in the farm grounds and a great family community and a beautiful area. I am completely concerned about this. I don't know what safety measures are. I know people that have these proclivities sometimes can be very smooth operators and I don't know, I don't know how much safety that they, how secure they are. And it does concern me, because I'm out in the county. By the time the sheriff gets there, either this person's going to be dead, or I am. Depending on who has again, so that's that's my concern is that there are a lot of elderly farmers out there there's a lot of people that You know, we're just used to the piece of being out there without all the commotion. I and concern. So I'm really not happy about that. The greatest concern about all of this is the traffic that it brings out. And so I would like to learn more about that and what safety you've got there. Is it going to be like a prison? Are they going to be able to leave? What is the perimeters of this home? So thank you.

Thank you. Yes, Ms. Hatch, we have some of those very same concerns. And these, again, is the State Department of Corrections and Department of Health placing these within the municipalities and perhaps, I mean, the counties too. We are just working on what's within our, you know, jurisdictional authority and everything like that. And so just trying to keep them away from the most vulnerable people we have in the community as much as possible. States put us in a bad spot here. Anybody else in the chamber want to speak on this issue? yes so if you're wanting to put this stuff out in Franklin County then Franklin County Commissioners have any say so if I can just clarify no we we are our jurisdiction is only within the city of Pasco so basically the state came and this in I apologize this is we should stop her time there's a good point of clarification is the state is imposing these within our municipality potentially like they did in Kennewick And so it is us trying to basically make it as difficult as possible for them to come, but we can't make it impossible or the state will basically force them probably within our most vulnerable areas. So we are just trying to find the spot furthest away from the schools, furthest away from bus stops, furthest away from just our most vulnerable in the community to protect our residents from the sexual violent predators the state wants to put in our communities. And it's just so frustrating that I even have to explain that because it's all completely ridiculous in my mind.

Okay, so are you aware of Mirror Ministries? Of course. Okay, and that they wanted to buy Sagemoor Kennels and then they were blocked from that. So if they were blocked from being able to offer housing off Sagemore Kennels, can any of what went down there be used to be able to block, move, or influence the state at all to further the housing for these individuals?

Yeah, this isn't really a time for back and forth. This is really just for a comment, but I can tell you we're just having a legal look at every option that's available to make this as difficult as possible. Okay, thank you. Yep, of course. Anybody else in the chamber? Mr. Bowen.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor and Council. I'm Franklin County Commissioner Stephen Bauman and I wanted to say thank you to you and your staff for the hard work that you're doing on this. I also have great concerns like you expressed with this less restrictive housing in our community. And I wanted to share kind of what that means, less restrictive housing. The house that was going in Kennewick was proposed to have five occupants. the recidivism rate of those sexually violent predators is 78%. Statistically, that says four of the five of those predators will reoffend. And so thank you for what you're doing. Thank you for paying close attention to this. We are also having this discussion at the county level and wanted to just express appreciation for what you're doing and look forward to having the conversation as a wider community also. Thank you. Thank you. Appreciate it.

Anybody else in the chamber want to speak during this public hearing on this issue and this issue only? Going once. Going twice. We're gonna close this public hearing. Mr. Mayor Pro Tem. Thank you, Mayor.

I move to continue the public hearing until July 20th.

That's actually not needed because we will be coming back with all new information and we will be bringing you anything you need following this.

Perfect. So no motion necessary whatsoever, right? Correct.

And I apologize for interrupting so much.

Thank you. Perfect. We're moving on to number nine, ordinances and resolutions not relating to hearings. Resolution numbers 4759, 4760, and 4761. Surplus of city properties number 112042336, 112042245, 112034263, and 112041282. And we're going back to Ms. Sigdell.

Mayor and council member, we have Samantha McCance, who is our management analyst, who has been working on this issue, and she'll be presenting to council on this matter. Thank you.

Good evening, Mayor and Council. Tonight I'll be presenting three city-owned properties that staff is recommending to be declared surplus. I'll provide a brief overview of each property, explain why the city acquired them, summarize the request for proposal process that is currently underway, and discuss next steps. Tonight's request involve three downtown properties, 321 West Lewis Street, 122 and 124 South 4th Avenue, 414 West Columbia Street. Although each property was acquired for a different purpose, staff has determined they're no longer needed for municipal use. By declaring the property surplus and marketing them through the RFP process, the city has the opportunity to return these assets to productive private use while advancing the council's goals for economic vitality and downtown redevelopment. The first property, 122 and 124 South 4th Avenue, this property consists of approximately 15,000 square feet and is located adjacent to the Pasco Specialty Kitchen, directly across from the Farmer's Market and Peanuts Park. The city acquired the property in September 2024 with the potential of future expansion for the specialty kitchen. Since then, staff has determined that expansion is no longer anticipated, making the property available for redevelopment. Given its size and location, the site offers significant opportunity for investment and complements surrounding downtown activity. The next property is 321 West Lewis Street. This property is approximately... 4,400 square feet and was required in February of 2025. It previously served as Pasco School District's AmeriCorps program and is currently housing the graffiti abatement team on one side of the building. The city purchased the property below market value, providing an economical Solution for city operations at that time as the operational needs have changed staff believes the property is better suited for redevelopment into a commercial retail restaurant or other community-oriented use The final property is 414 West Columbia Street. This property is a former Thunderbird site consisting of approximately 0.64 acres. The property was acquired in 2022 to address longstanding public safety and nuisance concerns associated with the motel, which also created an opportunity for future redevelopment. Following demolition, the site is now ready for redevelopment and is well positioned adjacent to Peanuts Park in the farmers market to support continued investment in the downtown core. This slide provides some additional context regarding each property's original acquisition. As you can see, the purchase price does not always align with today's broker's opinion of value because each property was acquired to meet different city objectives and under different market conditions. For example, 414 West Columbia Street was acquired not solely as a real estate investment, but as a part of a broader effort to address longstanding public safety concerns while positioning a key downtown site for future redevelopment. The broker's opinion represents the current estimate market value of the properties today, whereas the acquisition price reflects their circumstances and public purpose at the time of purchase. The requests for proposals were released on May 18, and proposals are due July 17. Interested parties can find the details on the City's website under Bids and RFPs. Staff has advertised the opportunity through Tri-City Herald, the City's website, social media, and scheduled property walkthroughs. The goal has been to provide broad public awareness and encourage competitive proposals. Unlike a traditional real estate sale, proposals are not evaluated solely on purchase price. The evaluation committee will consider how each proposal aligns with city objectives, including the quality of proposed use, contribution to downtown activity, The proposal's experience and financial capacity and the overall value of the proposal brings to the community. This approach helps ensure redevelopment aligns with council's vision of downtown. The overall objectives are to activate downtown, increase pedestrian activity, support economic growth, strengthen existing businesses, create safer and more attractive spaces, and support community identity. Following tonight's considerations of the surplus declaration, staff will continue accepting proposals through July 17th. After the submission deadline, proposals will be evaluated, negotiations will begin with the highest-ranked proposers, and staff will return to Council recommended purchase and sales agreement for consideration. I'm happy to answer any questions.

Thank you for your presentation. Any questions, comments from Council? Mr. Perales? No, only...

Comment I'll make is that I would like to have at least a person or two from the council be on that evaluation committee. Not asking for myself, but I think having council perspective, I would say downtown is Kyle Hernandez's district, so I think he should probably be on that committee. That's all that I'll ask.

Thank you. Any other questions, comments? Mr. Mayor Pro Temp.

Thank you for the presentation. The 414 West Columbia Street, I know it had been talked about at the time as part of that decision to buy the old Thunderbird Hotel and turn it into a parking lot. Was there a reason why? I know we've always talked about having more parking in the downtown area. Was it just an economic aspect of why it didn't get turned into a parking lot or we didn't have the funds? Do you know anything about why that was that way?

I'm going to have to turn this over to Rita. She'll be able to.

Mr. Mayor, members of council, that's a great question. We did discuss this with council previously. The goal here was before we move forward with turning it into a parking lot, whether we see whether there's any actual commercial use or need for it. The council could potentially go back to that concept if there is no interest or it doesn't, you don't receive a proposal that generates the type of activity that you would like downtown. I'd also like to remind the council that since the time that you purchased and demolished the building with the plan of putting in a parking lot, some of the state laws have changed, which now requires to put in electric charging stations for vehicles, which significantly increased the price. And so before we move forward with continuing with that plan and coming back with a budget amendment to spend more money on putting it in the parking lot, it was council's direction to do this and see if there was any interest in revitalizing and giving it back to private use before we move forward with putting a parking lot on it.

Okay, thanks for the clarification. Yeah, I forgot about the EVs. Charging station, yeah.

Thank you. Thank you. Any other questions or comments? And Mr. Peralta, just your, to evaluate, just to clarify your comment, just to evaluate the offers that come in, or flesh that out a little more.

Well, yeah, I mean, the RFPs are asking to, you know, hey, we want to buy this property for this reason. I think the council should have some perspective on what, you know, especially customer analysis is district, and I'm sure he talks with lots of individuals and business down there, and kind of he has a pulse, and so I think it would be valuable to for a council member or two to be on there, because we all have a vision for the city and the downtown, and so that was my reasoning behind it.

Okay, I appreciate it. And I guess my question for Mr. Stewart, too. We would be evaluating as a group, though, right, and making that same evaluation, though, at the time of the purchase and sale agreement, correct?

Mr. Mayor, typically the process would be is that there would be a proposal review committee, which I think is what Council Member Perales is asking, that there be a council member that sits on that. Ultimately... The final decision will come to the council. The council can review all proposals, but the community that prepares the recommendations for council consideration would go over that, and I don't have a problem with a council member being on that review committee.

Okay.

Thank you. Any other... Council Member Hernandez put you on the spot. Would you be open to do that? Yes, of course. Okay, perfect. Thank you. Sounds good. Any other questions, comments from council? Mr. Mayor Pro Tem.

Thank you, Mayor. I move to approve resolution number 4759, approving the surplus of certain city-owned real estate property located along Lewis Street, parcel number 11203-4263.

Second. Motion on the floor by Mayor Pro Tem Milne, seconded by Council Member Perales to approve resolution number 4759. All in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed, nay. Motion carries. Mr. Mayor Pro Tem.

All right, Mayor. I move to approve resolution number 4760, approving the surplus of certain city-owned real property located along 4th Avenue, parcels number 11204, 2236, and 11204, 2245. Second. Second.

Motion on the floor by Mayor Pro Tem Milne, seconded also by Council Member Perales to approve resolution number 4760. All in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed nay.

Motion carries. All right, let's finish it up. I move to approve resolution number 4761, approving the surplus of certain city-owned real property located along Columbia Street, parcel number 112041282. Second.

Motion on the floor by Mayor Pro Tem Milne, seconded by Councilmember Cotta this time to approve resolution number 4761. All in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed nay. Motion carries. All right, moving on. Letter, we already did letter B, so moving on to letter C, resolution number 4763, regarding state and local personal income taxes. Mr. Stewart, good evening.

Officially, Mr. Mayor, members of the council, this was an item that council directed staff previously to bring this forward. So there's two items here. Only one is for actual action this evening. First is a resolution. stating the city council's position with regards to income tax on the state that you requested. So we'd ask that you review that, and if that reflects your thoughts and opinions and statements that you would like to make on the issue, that would need a motion for approval. It was also asked that we bring back a previous ordinance that was prepared and discussed, and that is in the packet as well.

Thank you. Questions, comments for staff?

Mr. Perales. Yeah, I'll go ahead and speak to this since I brought it up for discussion. You know, I really appreciate the resolution. Just to make it clear, I'm totally in favor of this resolution. I just really do think that we need to provide a procedural barrier, hurdle, if you will, if, for instance, the city in the future wants to implement a local income tax. We've seen the state of Washington take a... kind of left turn in regards to income tax policy from the capital gains tax to the millionaire's tax. Some of these things are being, you know, they're being, I guess, stayed in the courts, but I think my position on this, the reason why I brought it up, is I think we should have the ability for the people to have a say. And so by putting in an ordinance, it provides that legal hurdle, procedural hurdle, and it allows the council to discuss along with the community if the city actually wants to do that. I totally understand some of the legal arguments in the presentation or in the staff report talked about the state law supersedes local law, but at the same time, I think we should be able to speak for ourselves and have our own policy. And so, to me, I just believe it's a safeguard for the community. The benefits of not having an income tax speak for itself, I don't need to speak for that. And I know there's a lot of individuals in our city who would be in favor of that. I would be in favor of this resolution tonight and also bringing back that ordinance. And if legal wants to speak to that ordinance and what maybe his thoughts were on that, you know, but like I said, I'd be in favor of bringing that back at a later date.

Mr. Kennedy, do you have any comments on the ordinance?

Oh, thank you for the opportunity. Pretty limited comments. Mainly that if anything were to happen in the future, it would take council action to do that. And adopting this into code would not confine a future council. You can't bind a future council by some action like this. In many ways, it's merely symbolic, which is what the resolution does and is really intended to do. Putting something of symbolic nature into the code is a bit unusual and does not bind a future council. I'm not saying you're precluded from doing that. I think if you choose to, you can do that, but it will be symbolic in nature.

My question to you, Mr. Kinney, would be, but if we pass the ordinance, that would have to be repealed if the city council wanted to implement a local income tax. Is that correct?

Yeah, correct. And implementing that tax would take an action, and so it would be just kind of folded into that so it wouldn't actually be a barrier. But, yes, you are correct. It would be in place. It would need to get out of the way if that were to happen.

Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Any other? Oh, sorry, Councilman Kotter, please go ahead.

Yeah, I'm in favor as well of both the resolution and the ordinance. Anytime we can send a letter to the government, Governor Ferguson's desk and say we're not in favor of a tax, I think it's our voice. We might as well use it and do what we can to prevent and instill some pressure if we have any influence to minimize the impact of these taxes and these ordinances. Thank you.

Thank you. Any other questions, comments from staff, or I mean from council? Mr. Figueroa.

I do want to share some words on this. So I was doing my research and everything else on this behalf. I'll go in favor of this, but I want to make sure that I express some of my sentiments for the record. So what I wrote down is that I appreciate the intent behind this resolution and understand the desire to provide certainty for businesses and maintain a competitive economic climate. I also believe it's important that we acknowledge another reality. Washington has one of the most regressive tax systems in the country. When I think about taxes, I think about the families in Pasco who are working two or more jobs just to pay the rent, the college students who are working full time and still pursuing a degree, single parents trying to make ends meet, seniors living on fixed incomes, and people living paycheck to paycheck. Those are the people who often feel the greatest impact of our current tax structure in the state. I believe we have a collective responsibility to continually examine whether our tax system is fair. As the saying goes, to whom much is given, much is expected. That doesn't necessarily dictate a specific policy solution, but I hope we can all agree that the conversation about tax fairness shouldn't end with this resolution. And just to give you some stats from the Institute of Taxation and Economic Policy, here at Washington State, the lowest to middle income household owners, which is 60%, pay up to 13.8 of their annual income in state and local taxes. Meanwhile, the wealthiest 1% pay about 4%. That's not because lower to middle income families pay more in dollars. That's not true. That's not what I'm saying. But they do pay a much larger share of what they earn. And I think that that's unfair. And so as we continue to have these conversations about the tax system that we have, we should definitely look at that angle as well. Because I believe that we should have a fair tax structure. And again, whatever that looks like, we can have conversations I'm sure we all have different ways of reaching solutions. But at the end of the day, I don't believe that this resolution is going to fix all of that, but I appreciate the intent. So I just wanted to share those words.

Thank you. And I guess before we vote, I'm going to take a point of privilege and read this resolution. A resolution of the City of Pasco, Washington, expressing opposition to state and local personal income taxes in Washington State. Whereas the City of Pasco is committed to fostering a strong local economy through a stable, predictable, competitive tax environment that encourages investment, entrepreneurship, family wage employment, long-term economic growth, And whereas Washington State has historically relied upon a tax system consisting primarily of sales, property, business, and occupation, and excise taxes rather than broad-based personal income tax. And whereas the Pasco City Council previously adopted Resolution No. 4150 in 2022, expressing its opposition to the authorization, and imposition of a local income tax, reaffirming the city's longstanding commitment to maintaining a favorable business climate. Whereas during the 2026 legislative session, the Washington State Legislature enacted legislation establishing a personal income tax certain high-income individuals representing a significant change in the state's historic tax structure and whereas legislation has also been introduced in prior legislative sessions proposing to authorize counties cities and towns to levy local personal income taxes under certain circumstances and whereas the City Council believes that expanding reliance on personal income taxes whether imposed by the state or authorized by local governments may discourage private investment business expansion workforce attraction and and long-term economic development within communities such as Pasco, whereas the City of Pasco remains committed to policies that promote economic opportunities encourage business retention and expansion, support workforce development, and maintain a tax environment that provides certainty for residents and employers and local governments. Now, therefore, be it resolved by the City Council of the City of Pasco, Washington, that the City of Pasco hereby reaffirms its longstanding opposition to state and local personal income taxes in Washington State and affirms its support for a stable, predictable tax environment that encourages economic opportunity, business investment, and long-term community prosperity. Be it further resolved that the City Council encourages the Washington State Legislature to pursue tax policies that promote economic growth, preserve a competitive business climate, and provide certainty and stability for residents, employers, and local governments. Be it further resolved that the City Manager is authorized and directed to forward executed copies of this resolution to the Governor of the State of Washington, members of the Washington State Legislature representing the City of Pasco, the Association of Washington Cities, the Washington State Association of Counties, and such other governmental organizations as deemed appropriate. Be it further resolved that this resolution shall take effect immediately. I would take a motion, please.

All right. I move to approve resolution number 4763, expressed in the City of Pasco's opposition to state and local personal income taxes in Washington State.

Second. Motion on the floor by Mayor Pro Tem Milne to approve resolution number 4763. Seconded by Council Member Perales. All in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed, nay. Motion carries. Moving on. Number 10, unfinished business. Not seeing any. Oh, yeah.

When would that ordinance come back for a future?

Oh, I guess that's a good point of clarification to the, are we going to have the ordinance come back? I mean, was that the idea, I guess, amongst us to bring that back? Yes. Mr. Stewart, Mr. Kinney?

I would say that. Council will need a direct staff. If you want it to come back, when do you want it to come back?

Is that a future date, whatever you guys deem appropriate? Thanks. Do we have to have a workshop on it? I don't think so. Okay. Then just at the next regular meeting?

Would that be enough time? It's an ordinance. So, yeah, we can do that. Okay. Just want to make sure. Thank you. Appreciate it. Okay. That's a good point of clarification. Number 10, unfinished business, not seeing any. Number 11, new business. Presentation, Confederated Tribes of the Collierville Reservation, Pasco Economic Development Project Update. And this is Mr. Stewart.

Mr. Mayor, we have representatives from the tribe that are here that have requested a presentation of the council to the public. So I will turn it over to them.

Thank you, sir.

I'd like to thank you for the time tonight. I wanted to give an update. It's been a while since we updated the city council, and unfortunately with changes in the administration and a lot of dependence at this point in the process on the federal government, there hasn't been much movement since the last time we gave an update. So since many of the council members are new, we thought we should give a more broad overview, kind of the project's implementation, what the intent is, and then a quick update on where we are as far as that fee-to-trust process. So first, for those of you that I haven't met before, just some background on the Colville tribe. So the Colville tribe is a confederacy of 12 tribes that come from northeastern Oregon all the way up into British Columbia. The tribes that historically used the Pasco or Tri-Cities area were the Palouse and Chief Joseph Band of Nez Perce, and to some extent, depending on the seasonal rounds, the Moses Columbia tribe as well. So our current day tribal government is represented by 14 council members. and they're responsible for handling the affairs and representing each of these 12 respective tribes. So to move on to the project, back in 2019, we purchased several properties on the northeast side of Pasco along Highway 395 with the intention of developing businesses that would help supplement the revenue that we used to provide governmental services for our tribal membership. So when we look at funding that we receive. There's some revenues that we generate, primarily from taxation, from sale of power that we get from some settlements that we've got with either the PUDs or the federal government, and also timber revenues and some gaming revenues. Although we have three casinos now, Harcompac allows for six, those three casinos only generate between 8 and 12 million a year that support our tribal government. All in very small markets, none of them really generate a lot of money. And our travel budget for last year was $83 million, and that doesn't meet our need as well. So we looked at other economic opportunities. We looked at a gaming study that the state of Washington had done back in, I think, the mid-2000-ish, like 15, that looked at what markets had either... gaming that was providing the service and those that were not. And we noticed that Tri-Cities was the area that had not. And again, we've made a very concerted effort over the last, in particular, 10 years to try to expand those areas that our tribes come from so that we can provide not just economic opportunities, but also provide properties where those tribes can practice their cultures and their traditions. So we've got several that are in the current application process. Looking at the map, the one that is further south is 6.58 acres. We have a positive determination from the regional director of the Bureau of Indian Affairs. That property has been appealed to the Interior Board of Indian Appeals, so we're waiting for a final determination on that. And the gaming parcel for the casino, is the 160 acre parcel that looks like a pivot, which it still is today, which is 160 acres. So that one is continuing to move through the process, but albeit a bit slow. For the other parcels that we've purchased, I'm not sure if my scroller does, okay. So this parcel is another one we purchased, it's about 17 acres, and this one across the way is approximately 10 acres. all of which we hope to develop with some type of economic development. And we've tried to work with the local community over the last, God, it's been four or five years now, to try to look at what the PASCO's needs are from a business perspective, from a services perspective. So moving on to... Agreements we've got with local entities. Again, unfortunately, we've been in this process for a long time and haven't gotten quite as far as we'd like to, but we have an agreement in principle with the City of Pasco, a letter of intent with Franklin County PUD for a potential lease. We understand that they have some need for power services there. So they, we looked at a substation up there that could potentially be located on the travel property, uh, cooperation agreement with Franklin County sheriffs on law enforcement and public safety. Um, obviously until that properties and trust, we can't use the BI funding that we received to help police that property, but also recognize that if there's significant increase in activity, we're going to need to partner with local jurisdictions to ensure that we have coverage for that. Uh, also got a cooperation agreement with the port of Pasco, to address any unnecessary impact mitigation for future projects. Again, when we look at the partnerships that we try to develop in the communities that we work in, recognize the sharing and the benefits and mitigating some of the costs are important. So, again, working with the Port of Pasco, we understand that's part of this process and have entered into a cooperation agreement with them. And then a municipal services agreement with the city of Pasco, understanding that would be a particularly large investment and would take a fair bit of infrastructure improvement, making sure that we have a mechanism to have those conversations and identify what those needs are. So when the day comes that that decision gets made, and if it's a favorable decision, we have a path forward on that. Moving forward just kind of an outline so we've done some preliminary designs That will help feed into the environmental impact statement that we're working on So this is just generally a schematic design shows generally what the footprint of the hotel would look like and casino. So casino roughly here in the darker yellow. Hotel, if that's the alternative that gets selected to the north here. Parking lot and how it would lay along that 160-acre parcel. Kind of an aerial view over here to the right. Again, these are all preliminary. All of these are being studied through an environmental impact statement now, which is the most stringent, the most thorough of the environmental review processes that the federal government has under the National Environmental Policy Act. Just more schematics about what we think it might look like at build out. Again, casino in the foreground, hotel in the background. When we looked at alternative development, we had as the preferred alternative, we would do both right from the start. The environmental impact statement will look at both the economic, the environmental, and the social impacts that will help determine what that final selected alternative will be, and that will be documented in the final environmental impact statement and record of decision, again, all of which is currently being handled by the federal government. And I'll go into a little more detail about that as well. So now moving into the complicated part of this. The feed-a-trust process is complicated. Even if it's not a gaming project, it's a 16-step process. It typically takes many years, requires at a minimum environmental site assessments even for projects that are on reservation. It takes a number of steps of review from federal agencies. Currently, we're working on a draft environmental impact statement. Typically, These processes are supposed to be done in two years by federal statute from the notice of intent, which was filed in, I think, April 3rd of 2024. So technically, the federal government should have this process done by April 3rd of 2026. And they just got the scoping report. We should have taken them just a few months, released like a month ago. So something that should have taken three months took them two years. So now we're working on the environmental impact statement based on the feedback that we got as part of that scoping hearing. We're currently at about step seven for the environmental compliance review. Again, this is all of that National Environmental Policy Act requirements. And Once that draft is done, we can complete what they call the 292 application or the application for a gaming designation. So there will be further review looking at what those environmental impacts are, both to Colville and to the local communities and to the surrounding tribes that may all have gaming facilities that we may compete with. Again, Notice of Intent was published on April 3, 2024. Scoping hearing was held shortly thereafter on April 24th. But unfortunately, again, with the change in administration, we've taken a long time to get to a public scoping report, which, again, just happened a month or so ago, that's helping inform that draft EIS. So we've been working with the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the Office of Indian Gaming. Ultimately, it looks like under this administration, the Assistant Secretary of Indian Affairs will be the individual that will approve these getting moved forward to the Federal Register. which will be the next step for the draft EIS. So we're hoping that will happen relatively quickly, but again, unknown at this point because it's largely up to their discretion as to how fast these things move or don't move. And I don't relate in the agenda, so I'll try to be relatively quick with this. It won't go into any more detail, and I'm sure you'll ask me questions about the fee-to-trust process if you have them. And kind of just closing thoughts, and again, this is similar to a presentation we gave several years ago because, again, we know many of the city council members are new, that the intent of this was to provide economic growth in south central Washington for the local community, for Collville. And we think with the increased revenue, it helps bridge funding gaps that Collville has for governmental services. So if you look at several different reports that the federal government has done, looking at its own funding levels for the programs that it provides to Indian country, they're all drastically low. So if you look at the Indian Forest Management Assessment Team report, it says that forest and fire management is funded about one third of what it should be. If you look at law enforcement, it's funded at about 13%. If you look at healthcare, it's funded at about 11%. So clearly, although the federal government has obligations to tribes, they don't do a very good job meeting those. And if we look at the appropriations for this year, it doesn't look particularly well either. So we've looked at other funding streams or revenue sources to help supplement what those funding shortfalls are to make sure we're providing the things that we need for our communities and understand that all particularly rural communities in Washington have similar challenges. So when we look at these type of business ventures, we look at them as partnerships. How do we not just benefit Colville but those that we're in partnership with and those are the communities that we work and partner with? We think that based on the preliminary work that this should provide about 2,000 jobs. This should be pretty good jobs. We did hear some comments earlier about problem gambling and kind of some of the what have been perceived as social issues that come with gambling. I think there's been several reports that have come out about places where casinos have gone in around the country. That's not necessarily what they've seen. But our compact with the state of Washington does require that we contribute a certain amount of money to problem gambling help. It does require that we provide a certain amount of the revenue that we generate back to local communities to help build those communities out and meet some of those unmet needs those communities have as well. And again, those are all mandatory within compact, but that doesn't limit us to providing additional funding for projects that we think are great fits for our partners, or when we look at building out of the remaining acreage there, what are the needs for Pasco, and how does Colville work with, whether that's the Port of Pasco or the City of Pasco, to define what the best fill of that additional acreage might be. And again, we want to make sure that recognizing that The history of federal Indian policy isn't particularly good, that many of the people that we have at Colville weren't from there historically, that our people came from around eastern Washington, northeast Oregon, and British Columbia. We're continuing these efforts in British Columbia with some challenges as well, but want to make sure that our membership have access to those places that are important to them because tribal history, tribal culture is so tied to place that unless they have the ability to come back to those places and practice those cultures, it's very difficult to maintain the things that we deem important from a cultural and social perspective. And we have many of the similar issues, I would say, from a social perspective, drug and alcohol abuse that many local communities have. And we're seeing the best success with that, even though we've built the treatment center on reservation to help deal with those things. It's those people that reconnect with their history and their culture and find something else that provides really some direction in their life. So that's one of the real motivating factors in this. And frankly, we've seen a shift from populations living on reservation to off. So we're really looking at how we provide services somewhere other than the college reservation. So we have as many Cabo tribal members living in and around Spokane as we do on reservation. We have quite a few of them that actually live down here. I don't remember how many our Enrollment Department identified, but it was several hundred. So as we build out these kind of satellite offices, we can also provide services to our members that live here and not just make them drive clear back into SPLM to get any kind of services as the federal government provides them, for example, at the Indian Health Service. So with that, I will wrap it up and answer any questions you might have.

All right. Thank you. Questions, comments? Start with the Mayor Pro Tem.

Thank you, Mayor. Yeah, I don't know how many of the other council members, but I actually have been up to the Colville Indian Reservation. Saw your chamber, everything, very well done. I was very impressed with the tour I received. I will say that over the years, I thought you guys have had an outstanding partnership with the City of Pasco. attended some events in Mexico and have been helpful in local stuff. And again, you can answer the question or not, but I know I was kind of surprised when I went into the Pasco Airport. I saw a thing talking about the Yakima's. And up until you guys had mentioned you wanted a partnership with the Pasco, It seemed like there was no word. I mean, you never heard nothing about them. And so my question kind of to you is, what is, like, the relationship? When you guys have, like, disagreements, I think we saw, like, a negative letter about you guys. Do you guys, like, get together and try to hash things out? Or is it just, like, we're supposed to be the entity that's in the middle? And, again, it's very dis… It's very frustrating as a council member to see how much you guys care about making this project a success and then hearing somebody else say, oh, they're not legit. We're the ones that were there first. I don't know what they're talking about. I mean, do you guys get together? That's my biggest question. How is this going to be ever resolved between you guys, or does it have to go to federal courts and stuff?

So the process is a federal decision. The only part that comes back to anybody outside of the federal government is concurrence from the governor in the two-part determination process. We have sent letters to the Yakima Council asking for a meeting. Those have not been responded to. We recognize they're opposed to this and have concerns about what the economic impacts might be to them. We've heard a number of concerns of theirs during the public scoping hearing. I don't know that when we will have a meeting or if we will have a meeting, but again, we have reached out. So I'm not sure what else we can do at this point. But again, the way this fee to trust process is designed is it's a federal decision. So the BIA will have to make that decision through the Assistant Secretary of Indian Affairs. If they don't like that decision, they'll have the opportunity to appeal it through the federal courts. And again, it will take concurrence from the governor of Washington state if the assistant secretary approves this as well. So by and large, outside of those two entities, the other parties don't really have to weigh in. So we recognize it's not a lot of fun to be in the middle of intertribal fights, and we try to keep people out of those as best we can. And we'll continue to do that.

Okay. I appreciate that. And again, I really... applaud you for how active you've been in our community and how you've tried to work with the City of Pasco. So I do want to say thank you. I know I've met him six or seven years ago. So again, I just want to say thank you.

Thank you, Council Member Perales. Thank you, Mayor. Yeah, I also wanted to say that as well. For as long as I remember, six, seven, eight, ten years, Coalville tribes have made a very good impact in our community, and so I've been in favor of this casino since you guys presented it, really, as an idea, and then, yeah, I remember seeing an article not too long ago which prompted me to reach out to Mr. Gunn and ask him, you know, what's kind of going on, and I think, because I really didn't, I wasn't, I didn't like the article because it made it seem like everyone was against this idea, and the city of Pasco has been silent, and so I really wanted to kind of hear what's going on and see if the city, the council could provide a letter of support for this endeavor, but I mean, there has been concerns, especially in regards to the gambling, which is a question I was going to ask you, and I think I would like to see a little bit more what that looks like, because we had two individuals come today and talk about it, and so a lot of individuals in the community are very concerned with that, and so I would hate to be in support of something that eventually, with more facts, that could be detrimental to the community, but if you guys are providing funding for services and things like that, then at least we can assist people with that. One question I had was, I've done some research. Are you aware of being like a 2% committee with tribes and how, I'm not sure if the city of Pasco has, have we talked about that with you since we had you here? I wanted to ask you about that and how we could create something like that where we could get some funds for public safety and impacts and things like that.

Yes, and that's language in our compact. It requires that 2% of those gaming revenues come back to the local community. And again, we want to have those conversations about what that looks like. Again, that's the floor, though. That's not the ceiling. So there can be more. And again, as we work on this partnership, that's where I think the city council work with our tribal elected officials to talk about what those investments are, how we improve services to the local community, services to the tribal membership in the area, and generally benefit the Tri-Cities area.

Right, because, yeah, I'm looking at once you do develop here, the traffic impacts in the area. I know one area that's also a really bad area is that Foster Wells Road. You guys are kind of adjacent over there. So those are things that are going on the run line, especially in regards to the impacts. But I love the construction jobs, like you said earlier, tourism. I think this is definitely needed in our area. It will bring people to the city of Pasco. So I would love to have more information here going forward and just keep more in contact and let us know how we can support you. Obviously, it's a council decision, but just kind of keep those lines of communication. Sometimes it goes quiet for a long time. We don't know what's going on, or maybe it's not developing, but I see that trail out there, and I'm just waiting to see some equipment out there moving dirt and things like that. So I appreciate your time.

If I could respond to that. Since we've got the new assistant secretary in place now, he was confirmed, I think, last September or October, and then he immediately went into a month-and-a-half government shutdown, so things were a little slow to get started. Based on what we've heard from the Office of Indian Gaming, they have a process that these fee-to-trust applications will be considered through now. So we expect to see some movement. We just don't know how fast because we also know that the federal government has reduced its size considerably over the last year or so. So there's less folks in there. But we will stay in touch. We continue to push at the D.C. level to get movement on this project. And as we hear progress, we'll definitely come back to share that with the City Council.

All right, thank you. Any other questions, comments?

Mr. Figueroa? I just want to add, thank you for the presentation. And as one of those newly elected council members, I appreciate the presentation. Just asking more questions about the awareness, recognition of the history, because I believe that indigenous history is rich in this land and we need to honor that legacy. So how do you kind of view with this casino, stuff like that, honoring some of that rich history, and also including a lot of the residents in the Tri-Cities, because I think it's important, right, of honoring that legacy of this place and space. How do you foresee that happening?

So we'll continue to develop what that looks like. We've got a ton of history for the Calvo constituent bands we've got here, and obviously we leave representation of those other tribes that were in this area to them, like the Acomas and Umatills we've heard from most frequently. And obviously when you look at a landscape feature that's as prominent as the mouth of the Snake River on the Columbia, I mean, historic fishing site, probably not quite as good as Celilo and Kettle Falls, but still a place where tons of tribal people gathered annually to gather salmon. So we recognize that that history is not unique to any one individual tribe. It was one of those features on the landscape that had a lot of tribal use. So I think that's something that, again, we can represent the Cabo component of that. But we will do that in the casino, but I'll also recognize the other tribes as sovereign nations have their ability to represent their own history as well.

Thank you, and I'll take a slightly different take on it. I mean, I appreciate it. I've seen, like you've shared a lot of what the Colvilles have done around the communities and others. I do have some kind of concerns about the impact, though, and what would be really a massive financial impact. I saw that you had an agreement set up with the Franklin County Sheriffs, but I think about... the impact that that would have on the people of Pasco, you know, for fire services. And, you know, if you do outgrow Franklin County Sheriff and, you know, Pasco Police and some others and Councilman Perales brought up, you know, the need for that interchange and others. I mean, this would be a massive impact and really the the city wouldn't gain any tax revenue per se. I mean, there's maybe some other ways to do that to offset what is really just a massive impact. And I'll be honest with you, when you shared some of those stats and details about the federal government not fulfilling their obligations They've been kind of atrocious, whether in their treaties or in current financial obligations that you brought up. I have concerns about the people of the city of Pasco making up some of that difference. And I have no problem if people want to go out to a Friday night and have themselves a nice time, but I do worry about those people 10.30 in the morning that are there on a Thursday and what kind of impact that's going to have on them. So I appreciate the presentation today. I still have a lot more questions. I do have some concerns too. And as maybe we continue to talk, we can work through some of those. But that's kind of where I'm at on it. Anybody have anything else before we let the gentleman off the hook?

All right. Thank you for coming tonight. Appreciate the presentation. Thank you. Appreciate the time. Yep.

All right, let's move on. Let me put my glasses back on. Number 12, miscellaneous discussion. Looks like we usually begin with our city manager, but we're going to start with the Harris Road realignment. Mr. Stewart.

Yes, Mr. Mayor, members of council. This is not on the agenda for action tonight. This will be on the next regular council meeting for action. But I wanted to provide this as a... a major component of developing the Broadmoor area. The staff has been negotiating with the Visconti Development Group for the last several months to get to this point. But we wanted you to have an opportunity to look at and review the agreement and ask any questions. And you have the next couple weeks to ask any additional questions as well. Anyway, so in a nutshell, What the city is committing to do here is to relocate the old Harris Road so it no longer connects into Broadmoor. It would be diverted to connect into Santa Fe, which is part of the overall transportation design for the whole area. We're trying to not repeat the traffic issues at Road 68. Previously, the council had approved a traffic impact fee or a TIF for this area. This is a project that is an eligible project within that TIF. In essence, the city would be agreeing to a specific timeline for relocating the Harris Road. This is an important component as the developer tries to secure commitments and leases with different businesses that will locate as part of this development. This is a question that comes up often as they're trying to negotiate that, is how will it be accessible and what will that look like? So negotiated in the agreement is the timeline for that as well as the costs. There is no There is no financial incentives or kickbacks as part of this agreement. So this is truly development paying for development. So Visconti is agreeing to pay their fair shares calculated through the TIF fees for the relocation of this road. And also we added a component in there that if the project comes in over engineer's estimate, there's a cost share mechanism that would trigger through that so that the city doesn't eat all of that overage going forward. So I think that is in a nutshell kind of the agreement that we're looking at and I'd be happy to answer any questions if you have any at this time or I'm available over the next couple weeks to answer any questions as we lead up to the next regular council meeting.

All right. Thank you. Any questions or comments from council for Mr. Stewart regarding this? Not seeing any. Yeah, I think we, well, I don't want to speak for everybody, but I know I definitely want to see it developed and have spent a fair amount of my bandwidth. And these are the kind of projects that will return revenue to the city that will allow us to pay for for these impacts and I think hopefully bring the kind of businesses that people keep filling out surveys to bring here. So yes, I am definitely all for it. So not seeing any, let's move on to letter B. Mr. Stewart, your city manager report.

Members of council, appreciate your patience this evening. I do have a few updates here. Just just a note before the councilman to provide the council report with some fireworks statistics over the weekend I want to express publicly appreciation for our police and fire department that worked very hard this weekend and We're doing their best to enforce ordinances and educate and those kinds of things I also appreciate the work of our public information office who's coordinated regionally with Richland and Kennewick, and did some outside-the-box thinking, including renting out a couple of movie theaters and some movies. That was well attended. There's some statistics with regards to that. I personally, with my wife, attended the Friday night showing of Young Washington, and that was fun. For some reason, my kids are old enough, they didn't want to go see Toy Story 5, but there was a lot of participation in that. So I appreciate... a lot of the public celebration this weekend. Even for me who enjoys fireworks, there was a lot of fireworks going on. And I'm not quite used to the M-80 fireworks either. But it was a great event all the way around and I thought the Giza Stadium show was fantastic. And we had positive comments about the flags down Burden as well, which I think added a nice touch. So I appreciate the council's support and direction on that previously. The parade, as was talked about earlier, went off really well. Just a couple of things here real quick. We are seeking additional middle school and high school teams for a 4x4 co-ed grass volleyball Aloha Friday Night Lights. There's some information on our website and our social media for that. If any of our high school teams or middle school teams want to get in some volleyball practice over the summer and stay in shape for the upcoming school year. The Aquatics Center continues to see high attendance daily. Just on Saturday and Sunday alone, we had over 1,500 attendees at the aquatics facility. We have a few hiccups that we're working on. We're trying to reevaluate the phone system to better handle call volume. and we're also working to improve the entry process, especially for past members. There's also a few mechanical issues and other things behind the scenes that we're working on with the contractor that built the facility to make sure those get resolved, including some mechanical and safety issues. Our last fan zone was held this evening. I guess, unfortunately, we won't be celebrating the United States continuing to play in the FIFA tournament after this evening. But I appreciate the work of our staff that organized and put that together. That was a multi-departmental collaboration, but particularly the Parks Department leading out with that. I think those were very successful events. Movies on the Lawn at Pasco Aquatic Center will start this Friday, July 10th at 7 p.m. There'll be lawn games and other activities. The movie Bad Guys 2 will be shown at dusk. The movie is free, but does not include entrance into the Aquatic Center. So it'll be out on the property, but you're not getting free entrance into the Aquatic Center, but you can watch the movie for free. And then just a few other things real quick. Our police department also continues to be busy. Just a reminder that National Night Out will be celebrated August 4th from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. And the police department will be partnering with the Dust Devils and local Pasco businesses for that event. There's another District 1 Business Watch meeting that will be taking place tomorrow, July 7th at 1 p.m. That will take place at the Franklin County Historical Society Museum. Topics to be covered will include automated license plate readers, or LPRs, crime trends, and training requests for the fall. And then also next week we have Coffee with a Cop, On July 16th, that will take place at Rooster Crow Coffee over on Marie Street, and that will be from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m., so please come and interact with our fine officers and leadership in a couple of those different capacities and express your appreciation to them for the work that they do every day, especially this last Fourth of July. So those are my updates for this evening. I'll open it up for any questions if the council has any with regards to the City Manager Report. That's included in the packet. Something else or a question? No, a question.

We kind of want to see a more expansive report on the fireworks. It looks like it seemed like we had an increase from last year with calls for service from the fire department. Is that a correct assessment?

Chief Crowley, you want to address that? Yeah, we're still getting.

Right, okay. Yeah, no, I think we'd be remiss not to talk about fireworks. So instead of doing a ride along, I actually went out on my own on Fourth of July. I was off about three and a half hours. I'll speak for District 3, they love fireworks, I will say that. I'm not trying to criticize the police, but I think we've been told that we have to see them light, and I had no problem finding people lighting fireworks whatsoever. I took video, it's on my Facebook page, and people were saying, stop, I'm gonna light this firework real quick. And yeah, I saw some very interesting things, so a lot of individuals making comments online and sending us emails. asking, when are we going to start enforcing You know, if aerials are not allowed, mortars are not allowed, M180s, when are we gonna start enforcing this a little bit? I think education has been great this past year, but I saw on that PowerPoint that you sent to us, one citation, I mean, we could have cited multiple people. I think, if I had to put a number on it, it was about seven individuals that I saw lighting illegal fireworks, and I just think we need to start educating and citing people. At the end of the day, I'm not sure if the police can BEING ON UNMARKED CARS. LIKE I SAID, I JUST HAD MY META GLASSES ON AND WAS JUST DRIVING DOWN STREETS. AND IT WAS, I'M OVER HERE MISSING MORTAR, LITTLE PROPS AND STUFF. AND I JUST THINK WE'RE JUST ALLOWING THIS STUFF TO HAPPEN A LITTLE BIT. AND I ENDED UP, I WAS ON MY WAY HOME, AND WHEN I LOOKED OFF TO MY RIGHT UP ROAD 44, I SAW THAT ORANGE KIND OF COLOR. I'M LIKE, MAN, THAT SEEMS REALLY, IS THAT A HOUSE? AND IT ENDED UP BEING OFF ROAD 36 OVER AT THE AIRPORT. And I shared that video and that thing's, I think it's been viewed almost 500,000 times on my Facebook page. So a lot of people are commenting on there and just wondering when are we, a lot of people actually thought aerials were allowed in Pasco. So I started seeing comments like that. Oh, I thought that was allowed. And so again, I think we really need to step up and start citing individuals, educating them. I actually had a conversation with my neighbor who was behind me last night. I went over there and they were concerned about the fireworks usage and we were standing right there and the guy lights an M180 right there in front of his yard, just right there. And I did call the police. We did call the police and stuff like that. I haven't gotten a phone call back. According to him, no one came out. So I think some of these stats are a little bit low because individuals do call and no one comes. So I understand priorities. I guess my biggest thing is that I would like going forward, especially in regards to this, that our Our priorities are aligned with our community's expectations, because it just seems like we're not meeting them in that regard, especially talking with my residents in my district. I have a lot of senior citizens. They want to sleep. First thing that Jim said, he goes, when is this going to stop? I want to go to bed. It's 10 o'clock at night. I'm like, I agree with you, Jim. I'm not sure why we can't call the police to come over here and at least talk to people and cite people. But I just think we need to change things up going forward. But I do appreciate the fire department, police officers and stuff like that. They're really, really busy. I mean, again, there was fires everywhere. So I really appreciate them. But, you know, I want to give them a break a little bit. I really do. So with that, I'll get off my soapbox. Thank you.

All right, anybody else want to speak to that or any other issue? Mr. Campos.

Yeah, just piggyback off that. I'm kind of curious too on the data. I know that it happened in my neighborhood. Somebody called in, thought it was a fire, and it wasn't. And so it's a waste of time and resources that our city had to go through to show up, and then it was absolutely nothing. So I'm just kind of curious if that's happened throughout the state. I'm sure it does, but how many of that, and maybe we could do something with that as well. I mean, obviously, I think everybody... Just had to look up and see all the fireworks. We do have a problem with that. But I think it's going to be a shared opportunity. It's not just enforcement, but it's continued education. Like Parada said, I agree. I think there's still people that don't understand what is allowed and what is. But I think it's going to be both sides of it. It's enforcement, but also continued education with that. And I do want to appreciate both fire and police for doing a fantastic job.

Thank you. Yes. And I know, I guess I'll just speak to it too, you know, coming from the wet side of the state where it seems like it rains 300 days a year. And most 4th of Julys are spent raining till about three o'clock in the afternoon. We still get fires over there, but it's a little sporadic. But moving over here, it was like, whoa, you know, and that was 20 years ago. But things are really dry over here. And so, you know, I think we do need to take this, um, you know, more seriously and be more careful in many ways. I mean, we have a lot of residents who, um, you know, are very concerned, whether it be their parents or their parents, maybe their parents too, but their, their pets, we, we have to give our dog trazodone every single year in a couple doses to for him to mellow out so I understand our residents who do have those concerns and can sympathize and empathize with it but yet we have a whole bunch of other residents also who you know it's their god-given right and their liberty you know to do so and so I guess my goal is what where I try to always land is that we could strike a balance somewhere and maybe do a better job than we're doing with education, like Mr. Campos said, with enforcement, like Mr. Perales said, and see what we can do to maintain people's liberty while at the same time protecting our community, persons, and property. With that, does anybody want to speak to any other issue before we move to our executive session time? With that, I want to leave us on one note. Maybe some of you other residents, before we go in there real quick, somebody posted an Ian Saddington from Australia posted on the Pasco Washington Residence Info. He said, thank you, Pasco. The people, the local government, The 4th of July event organizers and participants of the Battle of the Bands. My wife and I have been visiting and touring the USA and Canada for the past six weeks. We head back to Australia on Wednesday and we just randomly chose Tri-Cities, nominally Pasco, to hang out for your 250th 4th of July. I'm so glad we chose your wonderful city. We have had a truly great memorable time here and have been offered every courtesy and welcome from so many folk here. We head off to Seattle tomorrow to start our long series of flights back home and it's just so good to be taking with us so many memories of your city and your fine people. We have traveled over 9,000 miles since we arrived in the United States in May and have thoroughly enjoyed our touring from San Francisco to Memphis and New Mexico to Winnipeg and Calgary. It is Pasco to which I'd like to give my friendliest and funnest town award. Four days here, a rest stop before heading south, and it has been a real treat. Thank you with a heart. I just want to tell everybody who's ever listening within the sound of my voice, our citizens and stakeholders, thank you. Thank you for making, I think, all of us proud, not only the council but the staff, but your fellow citizens that here we had this stranger in our community and was treated with such warm hospitality and had such a glowing review of our community. I mean, I think that's the reason we all choose to live here and are proud of this city. I mean, that's the Pasco pride. we talk about and everything so Ian I hope you and your family and loved ones made at home and you know maybe one of us will make it down down yonder maybe some of us already have but yeah thank you Ian for your nice comments and again thank you to everybody in Pasco whether it be police fire or citizens who not only give not only gave Ian this special time but just who we are day in and day out, so thank you. So with that, let's move on to the next item on our agenda, which is our executive session, number 13, discussion with legal counsel about current or potential litigation per RCW, 42.30.110, number one, section I, and this is for 30 minutes. I'm gonna call for a five-minute recess. We still good with 30 minutes?

We'll start with that and see if it's long enough.

Oh boy, okay. Well, the time is nearly 9.42. We will begin our executive session at 9.47 for 30 minutes. All right, the time is 10.17, and we are still in executive session, and we'll need another 15 minutes. So the time is now turning to 10.18. Call it, I've got to do math in my head. It's getting late. 10.33, we will return. Thank you. We are back from executive session. No decisions were made. The time is 1044. Last item on the agenda is adjournment. This meeting is adjourned. Thank you for participating.