Town Council - Regular Meeting

Yeah, we can have cuz it's going to start now. I think you like Oh, that's okay. Good evening. I'd like to call this meeting of Pinetop Lakeside Council to order. Uh we do have a quorum. I just like to remind everybody to please silence your cell phone. Um I'd ask you to stand and join me in the pledge of allegiance and please remain standing for the invocation.

To the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Vice Mayor,

our father in heaven, as we gather together for this uh council meeting this evening, we're thankful for all the many blessings which thou has bestowed upon us, we're grateful for this beautiful community in which we live, grateful for this country and the freedoms that we enjoy here. We ask you at this time to to bless those who serve in our armed forces, especially bless those men and women who are in conflict areas at this time. Bless them. We ask thee also to bless our law enforcement, our firefighters, and all of our first responders. Protect them from harm and bless them and in all that they do. We're grateful to for the dedicated employees that we have here at the town of Pinetop Lakeside and pray that thou would watch over and protect them and bless their families. We're grateful for the moisture thou sent to our lands and pray that thou would send more if it would be thy will to reinvigorate our forests and keep us safe from from fires. And we pray now that thy spirit will be with us in this meeting as we contemplate things that come before us here as a council that we will make decisions that are in the best interests of the citizens here in the town of Pineup Lakesside. And these blessings we ask in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

Amen.

Thank you, Vice Mayor. Item B on our agenda tonight is called to the public. This is a business meeting of the town council. The town values and welcomes public input. Please address the council as a whole and not individual council members. Do not address staff or members of the audience. Council action on items brought up and call to the public is limited by the open meeting law. Council may direct staff to study the matter and reschedule for further consideration at a later date. Um items on the agenda will not be heard and individuals are limited to three minutes. Uh, we have a request from Kenny Kale to speak. I got got to get readers on here. Mayor Irwin and town council, when I came to work at Blige High School, I was not given three years of experience for my previous time teaching in Miami. My yearly salary was 5,000 less than someone who also taught as a state employee working the same job, the same experience in metropolitan Phoenix. Working on the reservation as a principal, I continued to be paid less than the average state principal. No explanation other than you chose to live here. They were right. It was my decision. And I'm not alone. We choose to live in nature. We choose to pay more for our groceries and rent. We know there's a cost and we work to improve these financial disparities. Speaking of finances, this town was broke. I was told you could not pay a community center donation of $8,000. You stopped funding to all nonprofits. You couldn't afford to have the town committee for a dog park. Most of the town money went to land purchases, higher than state average salaries, and possibly poor accounting for expenses. Tonight you are starting over. Will you

be repeating history? I'm not saying that the individuals you are considering tonight don't deserve better salaries. But we have many town employees, construction workers, educators, hospital workers, and many employees who choose to live here and on a routinely uh and on a routine basis receive $10 less an hour to live here. As I always appreciate the opportunity to address the council as many times as I have and look forward to the time my words will turn into actions, I would like to submit some information on a clean energy project that you'll receive for our area and that could improve salaries, also promote natural tourism. It's called geothermal energy. Thank you.

Thank you, Kenny. Once again, thanks for your passion for our community. Any anybody else need to speak and call to the public? Okay. Thank you. Um item C is the consent agenda. All items listed are considered routine matters and will be acted by one motion of the council. There will be no separate discussion of these items unless a member of town council requests uh that an item be removed for discussion. Council members may ask questions without removal of the item from the consent agenda and items removed are considered in their normal sequence. Are there any questions on the items of our on our consent agenda tonight? Okay, vice mayor. I move to approve the consent agenda. I second that.

Thank you. All those in favor, please signify by raising your hand. Thank you. That carries unanimously. Item D is business before the council. Public comment will be taken at the beginning of each agenda item after the subject has been announced by the mayor and explained by staff. Any citizen who wishes may speak. one time for five minutes on each agenda item either before or after council discussion. Questions from council members may be directed to staff or a member of the public through the mayor at any time. Item D1 is a presentation of the Nexus Coalition update. Vicky Solomon, come on up.

Do you want to So, you're just going to use the tap buttons and then when you're done, if you mind just exit. Excellent. Thank you. And uh I appreciate the time and being here. For those of you who don't know me, my name is Vicky Solomon and I am the executive director of Nexus Coalition and I've been in prevention for about 16 years now. And I've actually been running Nexus Coalition for the last 10. And I just want to do a a little kudos to um the the uh town of Pinetop Lakeside. um we use their building to be able to um hold meetings and then community and I'll talk a little bit about what we do in that one as well. But thank you very much for that. I'd like to come and present and just show a little bit about what's going on in uh your guys's town and then just a little background. Um our mission is pretty much we just want to get people together and we want to collaborate, partner with them and work when and we're working on youth um substance use. We want to lower those rates. We want to help build resiliency and in doing so we're going to work with 12 different sectors in the community. So when I think about that I have to giggle because one of them on there is other. So anybody that's breathing we want to work with you and and so we we try to partner with lots of different organizations. Um what have we actually done? Um we run off of a grant year that goes from October to October. So this is this last past grant year. Um there's six of us. I say five and a half because Cheyenne is part-time. She'll be leaving us in May as she's due to have a baby. But um we had about 9,600 youth that participated in our program. We had 3,400 adults, 661 activities, um 824 lock zone. And with the Nlloxxone, we always do that education piece that's tied to that because we want to make sure that people

know what to do with that as as we leave them behind. And then also we have 42,25 education materials that we distribute out to the community. So I feel like when I look at the things that we do, um that's why we're so busy and exhausted all the time because there's about five and a half of us that's working on that. Um right now we have um a youth contest that that is we are promoting going into the schools and trying to encourage people to um utilize their artistic um side. And uh we've had lots of fun um youth participate in this and it's amazing what they come up with. So that's going on right now. And then I want to also do uh kudos to Blue Ridge Junior High. The Arizona Youth Survey um comes out every other year and it's a survey that's been around for a very long time past 2010 and um it is very helpful to be able to get funds funneled through Navajo County with 8th, 10th, and 12th graders that are participating in this Arizona Youth Survey. And we're working with the high school right now and I think we about got them talked into it. It's only one class period for the 12th graders and the 10th graders and so I I think we're going to get that summed up as well, but it'll be it it's helpful for bringing money into Navajo County. So the kudos to Blueridge for doing that. Uh we have a phenomenal diversion program. I absolutely love this program. Um Britney runs this for me over here in the Pinetop Sholo Lakeside area. Uh we team up with uh right now currently Sholot Teen Court has a great program and youth are um I guess mandated to come do some education pieces with us. And then we we also have Blue Ridge kiddos that participate in that and then also into White River. There was a um a challenge where the White River kiddos, I think we had about

five of them that were not able to get here to take care of what they needed to. So Britney packed up her bags and she's going there once a week and she's taking care of those youth and we told them we will come to you but you have to show up and they have they it's been phenomenal. So that's a program that's very dear to my heart. Um and then we have um a phenomenal program when we go out to the community we're looking for gaps that are not covered things that are that maybe the community is needing that we don't have. And one of them that we found was there we have recovery programs but and and the people in recovery are getting better and moving forward but then the family stays behind and they're stuck with a lot of hurt and and a lot of trauma and different things. And so Destiny Hall is a phenomenal leader. She said I'm going to get this together and we're going to provide a service for the families of addicted loved ones. And so every Thursday, which is going on right now, from 5 to 6:30, she offers it by Zoom so people can get on to that. And um it's just a phenomenal program. So it's we found that little gap in our community and we're providing that service. Um and this I say this is I I'm a lot of favorites. I guess my nexus work is my favorite because I love the BTAPS program and this is a five skills of resiliency. Belief, trust, adaptability, persistence, and strength. When you think about those words, we have this for adults and we have this for youth. And I absolutely love it because if we can help individuals learn how to better themselves in each of these things, it's going to help build this community as well. So again, that's another one of my favorites. Um, now I want to talk about our office space. So it's really cool that that little cabin that we have, we utilize it for many different things. We have um the bikers against child abuse. They use that that office to do some of

their meetings and and different things. Sometimes they'll bring youth in there and and do some activities with them. We have friends of the library. We have Copa Health that had a youth group and they just called and said, "We just we don't have a place for these kiddos to go and so they come and they use our office for that because we have a pretty big conference area." Um and and then also we have a community networking meeting that's been going on. Gosh, I've been in, like I said, about 16 years of prevention and I remember that meeting 16 years ago and and we are holding that in our office there um at at the at that Blue Ridge building. And so I just want to tell you guys, thank you very very much. We appreciate that and it is being utilized and I'm very careful and very responsible to make sure who comes in and out of that. But I just want to say thank you and kudos for that. And then here towards towards the closing here, we hold a coalition meeting on the second Tuesday of every month. Everybody's invited to attend. We do updates and then we go through the um people who attend and get um updates from what's going on in their organizations as well. And it's another great place to network and um help people find resources. And then this last side right here is just kind of an overall picture of things that we do. Nlloxxone training. We have a mental health portion of it where we're trying to encourage people to make sure that you take care of yourself because if you don't take care of yourself then you can't take care of anybody else. And usually people forget about themselves and they run themselves ragged. And so we do go into um different organizations and provide staff trainings on on balancing and making sure that we're taking care of our mental health as well. Um so lots of different things that Nexus does. if there's something that you see a need in um and you wonder if if there's a service out there, if we can't help you, then we will find somebody that do that does that and if there's nobody that does that, then

we'll create that for you. So, um any questions? Any questions for Vicki? Go ahead. for the last couple years you've talked about the fentanyl increase and is it use and the danger obviously of of that is is it still increasing or is it leveled off or going down or

and thank you very much for that question and I've got a very expert professional behind me that's going to come up and speak Randy Mafa is a phenomenal partner he's he's he still works a little bit with Arizona Heiden We've continued that collaboration and now he's with a Navajo County um sheriff's office and I'll bet you that he'll touch base on that. right now it we went from out there was like seven out of 10 pills on the streets had a deadly dose of fentinyl or possible deadly dose of fentanyl and that's down to about five which is great because it's a lot lower but when you think about it still if a kid goes out there and grabs 10 pills on the streets half of them I mean that that's Russian roulette and so yes it is decreasing compared to what it was but do we need to keep our foot off the brake or put our foot on the brake absolutely Not

okay. It's still out there. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Did um and I know the statistics here. Do you have uh could you provide us the statistics for Pinetop Lakeside? How many particip are participating in that? I I'd be interested to see that.

You bet. In in all of our programs or what? Okay. Um, so I can tell you, I can get some numbers for you, but your Blue Ridge um, junior high is phenomenal. They have their doors wide open. We are in there every single week and then we're working to get into the high school trying to get their doors open a little bit more. Um, at one point we were going there providing there was almost a thousand kids. There was like 950 kids in an assembly style presentation and it was phenomenal. So, um I don't have numbers right off the top of my head, but the Blue Ridge School um junior high has been phenomenal and we're in there every single week. Okay. All right. Thank you. Anything else, Ruby? I do have a question.

Go ahead. I I heard you reference like the conference room and stuff like that. Where? I don't know where that's at. It's so It's not really a conference room. I think it looks like a conference room. So, right behind the Lakeside Library. Okay. Literally right behind it. There's a little cabin and then it it's the Pinetop Lakeside building and it and it used to be used for uh they used to call it the Yellow Jacket Youth Center. Yellow Jacket Youth Center

and and the youth was there often and we still try to get youth there often but we don't use it like that as much. That's the building that we're referring to. And we've been able to upgrade it substantially in the last 10 years to where now I don't feel I'm not embarrassed about it. You can go in and it's very nice and comfortable and professional. Thank you. Yeah. Okay. Thank you for all your work, Vicki. We appreciate it. Keep it up. Keep it up. We do appreciate it. Yeah. I'll just hit escape.

We'll move on then to item D2, which is the presentation of the Save Our Park adopt an acre program. Nancy Welch. Thank you, Mayor Irwin, and members of the council. It's a pleasure to be with you again uh this evening and I'm really here to give you an update on what we've been doing since uh our September appearance with you and to answer any additional questions. As you can see um the name of our presentation today is debut 2026 for adoption. We are very close to being able to announce publicly the program to help start to fund uh quality maintenance at Woodland Lake Park as we've talked about in the past. And so that's what I'm going to focus on today is the what we expect very soon. uh continuing to work with you. Uh expect to have a public announcement of adopt an acre when when we're all ready and set with that. I'd like to uh thank Mayor Irwin for her input um as well as Annie D. Roger uh for her help in um helping us just continue to move this ahead. So, as you recall, Adopt anacre is really to help uh raise funds um to help the town maintain Woodland Lake Park. And we chose Adopting Acre, as you probably recall, because it provides an easy continuing program for everyone in the community, whether it's a business, an organization, residents, visitors, institutions to contribute. and they would be contributing via um Save Our Park, which as you know is a 501c3 nonprofit organization. And since since September, our focus has

really been on infrastructure. Save Our Park um needed to update and upgrade uh much of its infrastructure. And so we have created a new website that we will be taking a preview uh with tonight. We've um developed payment donation uh options, subscription features. We're planning for a public roll out. We've developed a new uh community newsletter to uh be a monthly communication vehicle. We've renewed Facebook and Instagram to start with um our roll out. And we've created a rollout toolbox that can be used by Save Our Park. It can be used um with the town and it can be something that we can use over time to make sure that we are communicating well and that we are really getting the word out about this very important program. So we've really um as I say have focused on infrastructure since uh September. Our next phases will be uh in 2026 will be really outreach and followth through. And that followth through is critical to being able to reach the goals the big goals that we all have for this program and for the park and a partnership with the town. So our outreach uh will be focusing on uh the public roll out when we are ready. Uh community speaking, implementing ideas from committees that uh will be led by Save Our Park uh members, committees uh for residents, visitors, tourism, businesses, all of the kinds of target audiences that we've talked about. We'll be developing committees so that people develop the tools and activities that really make sense for that target group

and that we are able to follow through with getting those target groups to um donate through adopt an acre. We'll be implementing uh ideas from those committees and certainly coordinating with the town. um expanding our contacts and networks. Outreach is a neverending job as you know and it's a never- ending personal job and organizational job. The follow through is our third um phase for 2026. Uh it focuses on consistent communications, kiosks and signage planning with the town for the remainder of 2026. more tools and activities for raising awareness and sponsorships. Um grant applications. Uh there are cert certain uh sources of funding that we would like to bring to the um organizations and towns uh attention so that we can make sure that we are getting every possible dollar that can come into um the town for Woodland Lake Park that we are uh able to do that. And then finally uh we'll be doing a first annual evaluation and report so that we have a report to the community about what has been uh raised, how it's been used, what we've done, and what is anticipated for 2027. So I wanted to give you a preview tonight of our website. We won't go through it in great detail given the agenda that you have but it there is a link here obviously that um can be shared with you if you would like to look at it in greater depth. this particular um slide you'll see um in the present in the oops pardon me

Lisa can you tell me how I might get to that to the link oh please

thank you thank you so much so this is the landing page of our um website and we appreciate the help that we've gotten on it from people throughout the community. Uh it is heavy on photographs obviously we want to emotionally engage people with the the park. Um and it focuses on visiting the park which is really moving um obviously through the town's reservation cycles. the um all of the activities that the town sponsors. We talk about support which is really about volunteering about um bringing additional resources to it and we obviously also talk about adopt an acre. Lisa, could you check click on the adopt an acre, please?

Click on sorry click on the adopt an acre in the menu or on the picture. Does that work?

That's fine. Thank you. and move that down just some. Thank you. A little bit more. Great. Thank you so much. So, the adopt an acre page uh you can get to it in two ways. One through the photograph that is on the homepage and then there is a menu at the top to be able to uh get you to the adopt an acre. As you know, it tells you how to do it, what um what it means to adopt an acre. the fact that we are helping to fund quality maintenance that is done by the town. It tells people that they cannot change that acre in any way. Uh they can have an acre in their name, they can do it for someone else. All of those details that we've talked about in the past. So then this is really where it gets to the are you ready to adopt? people click on the um color. Would you click on one of those colors, please? So, actually, it's ready to the box on the bottom. The round box. Yeah, that one. Thank you. And now move the map down. Thank you. More. Yes. More. Now move the ma map up. We you can see that we still have a little bit of detail to work out here. And the map is one of those things. The map shows the initial 107 acres in the um park. And as acres are added, we will put more and more um colored boxes there. The um brownish boxes are the $50 boxes. The

green boxes are 200 and the blue boxes are 500. The difference in cost is based on estimates of the difference in maintenance cost. And we are anticipating that um we will be able to um continue to have those um the acres that cost more that we'll be able to fill those out as we have more and more acres in the map. So here you would select an acre. You want to select one of those boxes. And then we won't go directly through all of this, but I wanted to show you that we are um really set to have people adopt an acre by sending us through Stripe, sending their donation to Save Our Park. That donation goes into a special earmarked account that is only used for adopt an acre and we are then able to send a certificate uh thanking someone. We can send other materials, put them on our communication list, all of that. This particular form is the way that we are set really setting up a long-term relationship with people who donate. So that is really Let's see. You want to go back to the Can you go back to the home page?

That's fine. Yeah. So, we've really tried to structure this so that it answers the questions that people will have about Save Our Park, about the town's um work and ownership of Woodland Lake Park, and what they can do to continue to donate and support the park. So, we really hope that um this will go very quickly. I don't have a a sense of how fast these acres will be adopted, but we will be working to make it as quickly done as quickly as we can so that there is that uh funding for the maintenance. So, I'll be happy to answer any questions that you might have. I did want to mention too that this is on a staging site. So, um that if you do have questions or concerns or comments tonight, it is not live on the internet. So, we can do what is necessary and then we'll make it live when everyone is ready.

Any questions? Any questions or comments? Go ahead. Go ahead, Jerry. Um well, I'd like to um thank Save Our Park. you guys have have been excellent uh benefactors to the town of Ponttop Lakeside over the years in the hundreds of thousands of dollars. Um so we appreciate all that you do for us. You're welcome. Thanks. Yes, vice mayor. Yes. Thank you. Also, the question I had on on an earlier slide, it said the roll out was happening March 24th. Is that

you know that is a tentative date. It was what uh I had in mind, but there is it can be done when we are ready and when the town is ready. That's that's next week. So I that's not not going to happen at this point. Is that right? You're right. Okay. All right. I just wanted to double check with you. Thank you. Thank you. They'll still take your money. Yeah. Yes. If anyone would like to adopt an acre tonight, um I would be delighted to make that happen. Okay. Well, thank you. We look forward to seeing the success of this program because we really really need your help and councelor Smith is right. We value the partnership we've had over the years and hope that it continues. Great. So, thank you and thank you to the team that you brought with you too. Okay.

Thank you. All right. Thanks, Nancy. Excuse me. We'll move on then to item D3, which is a Navajo County Sheriff's Office 2025 overview and update. Um Randy Moffett's going to be here. You don't look like Sheriff Claus. That's okay.

Thank you. And thank you to the board for allowing me to be here to present just a little bit. Sheriff Klaus is on the other side of the county doing another presentation. So, he couldn't make it tonight. Um, but he's kind of sneaky, I will tell you that, cuz he's like, "Hey, do a PowerPoint for us." And so, I did the PowerPoint. I was like, "Perfect." I submitted it to him. Then he's like, "Go present it." So, so be careful what you ask for. So, we wanted to talk about kind of what we're doing this year with sheriff's office. Want to give you some updates of how things are happening and make sure that that if you have any questions, we'll go from there. So, our dispatch center, we have to knock on wood every single time we talk about that dispatch center. We are fully staffed. Um, they have all the employees, both men and women in there. They answer your phone calls within uh 3 to 5 seconds and they say, "What do you need and how can we help you?" So, it's incredible. Just a few numbers, 15,83 dispatch calls, 34,559 total calls, and then 18,000 911 calls, 8,710 traffic stops. That's 800 8,711 cuz Chief Pucker did a traffic stop last night on the way over here. And then currently we have nine dispatchers, two supervisors and one dispatch manager. So it's really working well. And I will tell you when something's working well, the best thing you could do is let them work. And so that's what I've been doing. So, our criminal investigations unit, um, last year we had six homicides that we investigated. Um, obviously we have the most recent homicide just right up here in Pinetop. We've been working on that diligently. Um, that individual is still in custody. We have one lieutenant, one sergeant, three detectives, and we have three openings for detectives, but those men and women are working night and day to make sure

our communities are safe. Um the White Mountain Regional Response Team currently um Navajo County Sheriff's Office and Xolo Police Department have a large vested interest in this. We have 14 individuals on the team. We have openings for two people. We have two negotiators from Xolo PD. Tomorrow we'll be presenting to the sheriff about getting some tactical medics on the team as well. So we're excited to have that. um that's going to make things just far far safer for our White Mountain Regional Response Team. Uh Lieutenant Williams, this is his program. We have our aviation unit up and running. A lot of people are completely unaware that we have a helicopter and uh we have our fixed wing. We use our fixed wing all the time for prisoner transports. Uh saves us a tremendous amount of money as opposed to driving over there, picking them up and driving them back. Our helicopter is pretty phenomenal. we can have it up in the air in about 45 minutes from the time we get the call and uh it's truly a life-saving tool. You don't need it until you need it and stuff. We currently have one helicopter pilot and we have seven fixed wing pilots and it's a just call them. They would like to get their flying time and they set it all up. They do everything for you and you just jump in the plane and off you go. Um MCAT Major Crimes Apprehension Team. This is near and dear to my heart. Um, most of you in this room know that I retired out of MCAT, uh, went to chief deputy and it's it's just an incredible task force. I know Jerry, you had a question about the fentanyl. So, let's talk about it. So, currently we have one lieutenant, we have two K9 handlers, um, one detective and then one detention detective. Um, we're down staff because everybody got promoted. That's always a good thing when people get promoted. I would love to have more detectives in

MCAT, but I will tell you the work is out there. It's available. Um, we see people in crisis all the time. That's why we use Vicki all the time. I will tell you when I first came up here, um, I met an individual. He was in crisis using a ton of illicit drugs. I met him because he was using illicit drugs. A nicest guy I ever met. And I mean that sincerely. And he just said, "I'd like to have some resources and stuff." And I was like, h, I don't have that at my fingertips. I called Vicki and said, I need a resource card. Within a week, she developed a resource card for the entire Navajo County. Uh, we hand those to people right and left. We say, "Hey, we're not here to always be the bad person. We're here to make sure you get the resources you need." Thank you, Vicki. So, so drug seizures, this is always a a crazy topic. Methamphetamine 347 lbs. Heroin 5 lbs. Uh cocaine 27 pounds. Cocaine is back on the rise. It's coming back up. Um marijuana wax uh 73 lbs. And then as fentanyl pills, as you can see, 533,000. So Jerry Smith, to answer your question, it's kind of leveling off,

right? The terrible part is if I were a drug smuggler and I were to drive to Phoenix or Tucson, I could buy buy a fentanyl pill for about 24 cents a pill. I could bring it up to the White Mountains and I'm going to sell it anywhere from $8 to $10 a pill. So that's what we see. It's just a really really damaging cycle. And you know, I could probably do that trip and if I if I drive legally seven hours, if I drive like I normally drive, probably six hours. So, it's it's really leveling off. But the thing is, Vicki said it perfectly. We need to make sure that we're never letting up on trying to get people resources, trying to be get people the help they need. Fentanyl powder is a new big thing um that's coming up. And then we have zero asset forfeitures based on the forfeite laws. So, we're not really seizing the money like we were in the past. We were taking ill gotten gains from drug dealers. it's just not out there anymore. Everything's crypto or or they're doing Venmo or whatever. They're getting their money a different way. Um proactive enforcement successes, physical arrests. Um that's always, you know, it can flex any time. We have 213 for last year. This is the drug task force agency assist 259. That's us running out to DPS on the interstate when they're asking for a canine saying, "Hey, we need a dog out here." Drug trafficking organizations. Those are five or more with a person with leadership status. So, that's how we break that down. It's a big fancy definition for a group of people who work together to smuggle drugs. So, two of them are closed, one of them is actively open, and we're we're still working that. Search warrants 49. uh vehicles 13 and then residential 10 search warrants. Our arrests, this can

change uh given given any daily investigation. 228 for last year, the year before, 213. And then this is kind of where we've been all over the map. We help everybody. Uh we never say no. We we go and go and go. Um so our DPS assists are at 43. I might need those readers if we still have those. But so, um, you know, NCSO, CI assist, and then NCSO patrol, and then probation. We assist probation with a lot of searches, too, just to make their world safe. And so, we're always out there doing something. We put this one in there. I know it's a lot of data to read, and I don't like a lot of data to read. I'll tell you the long and short of it. Um we have a very very aggressive um smart, intelligent young detective. His name's Jordan Smith. Um he did a traffic stop um on I40. Kept saying thinking something's not right here. Something's not right. Um as he continued his investigation, he was able to uh ultimately search that vehicle and he found a 13-year-old smuggled in the back seat of that vehicle. um the individual was extradited back to Alabama. You know that I40, that little corridor, it's a it's a criminal network if you're looking for the right people and we want to make sure they're not committing crimes. So, outstanding activity. I will tell you, we had four or five different slides in there, but I wanted to shorten it up just a little bit. Obviously, we always show pictures of the drugs that we seize on the on the road. Uh this is 34 lbs and it's $618,700. If you were to buy street value, back in the day when I was a drug cop, it was $100 a gram and that was $100 a gram all day long. Um, now it's broken down to about $20 a gram. So that's why we're seeing such a rise in methamphetamine in our communities. And then this is something I'm really

proud about because uh just coming back to the sheriff's office, we didn't have the jail medical staffing that we needed. um today we do and that's because of all of the work for the citizens. Um Vicki over there helping us out all the time. We have um 18 nurses on staff and that's to provide resources for individuals to get the help that they need. Um we started anou program which is a for individuals that are addicted to opioids. We can get them on the recovery medication that they need and that's unheard of for a jail. So, we're trying to help people. We currently have 16 individuals in there. We have capacity for 72 people. So, if they want resources, um it's 100% available to them. And then this is a new piece of equipment that we just got. I will tell you, I was nervous about the photo on the right. So, that is a an internet photo because I was like, I'm not going to put a real photo up there. But, we have a body scanning device. So when somebody walks into our jail um to make sure they're not bringing contraband in, they have to walk right through there just much like they do at the airport and we do body scans to make sure they're not bringing contraband into our jail. That sounds really cool in a law enforcement aspect. But the other thing I will tell you is our nurses have picked up people who are very very ill on that body scan and they said, "Hey, we need to get you some help. We need to make sure that you're doing that." So, it works out a whole different way that we didn't expect it to work. And with that being said, I am not Sheriff David M. Claus. I'm Randy Moffet, but I'd be happy to answer any questions. So,

thank you, Randy. Any questions for Randy or comments? Appreciate all the work you're doing. Good job. Thank you so much. So, yeah, thank you for being here. We'll move on then to item D4, which is presentation of the February 2026 financial report. We have Sarah here. Is Gabe on the phone or you're doing it? I am doing this. Okay, very good. Please proceed. Let me get her this. Hold on. Thank you.

Um while Lisa's bringing that up, um I did want to say that the um monthly financial report for February is in your packet. Um, and so I will touch on the expenses, but I did want to touch base on, you'll notice that there is a missing piece of information um, in the financial report for February um, related to our revenue. Um and so what's transpired um over the last week and a half is we re realized as we were going through our revenue um that there was a discrepancy in what we um had been submitting to the um council as far as how much sales tax revenue by buckets um we we have received. So what's happened is there was not a reconciliation that was done from that report from the sales tax from the state to what we were actually receiving in the bank account. Um and so we um with the help of Annie today we were able to go through and reconcile all of February. Um so I'm happy to report that February is reconciled and it's not been an issue of what we've received and reporting in our financial statement. It's more of what we're showing in the slide from that five-year sales tax information. Um, and so we've identified a process um, based off of our February reconciliation that we did today. Um, and so now the next step is to go back and start with July and move July through uh, January. Um, and then we'll have a year-to-ate March financials for you in the next um, presentation. Um, that will be tied out to what we've actually received in the bank. Um, I don't anticipate huge changes. What it seems like what we found is that there was about a week of reporting that the state that we're not we were not pulling into those reports. So, it seems like every month we are missing about a week of um sales tax revenue that we were not reporting on. So, we'll provide more information on

once we fully have that reconciled um out for everyone. Um but that is what we why the financials are missing your uh revenue numbers for this month. So just for clar excuse me clarification is that a cumulative a week every month it's missing. That's what we're seeing right now until I can go all the way back to July and start over. Um I can't tell for sure but that's what we noticed when we were looking at the January report. It seems like there's about a week that we were missing.

Okay. Thank you. Um with that, so unfortunately we will not talk about revenue numbers here. Um but I do have um the report on our expenditures and cash. So um looking at where we're at from an expenditures perspective on the general fund. Um you can see here our managerial costs are about 20% of our expenditures with personnel at 73% and then training at five and operations at 5.9. Um, one thing looking at our year-to- date actuals, um, in the general fund, we've spent about just under $5 million on a budget of about 9.6 million. Um, our we're about 67% of the way through the year with our eight months um, completed and we've spent a total of about 51% of that budget. So, we're doing really really well and I that's kudos to the organization here to continue to manage the expenditures. There are a couple of areas or um departments that are showing red or yellow. The yellows I they're not concerning whatsoever. Neither is the red, frankly. But the yellows are right there. Um it's just timing um on our annual contracted fees and things like that. And same thing with the man magistrate um department as well. That's really been read all year long because of that annual contract that we pay in J in July time frame for Navajo County. So great um things that the team is doing um and continuing to manage their expenditures. Looking at our next slide, which is our other expenditures by our other funds. Um same story here that we've reported out all year um long. So far, we've spent about $2.9 million on $33 million budget. that's a little inflated because of the capital and the grants in there. Um because we do need a budget with based off of what we think we're going to spend um regardless of whether we see that revenue um come in for grants. Um

the only item that's really there and it's yellow and again it's at 67.79 and we're 67% of the way through the year. So not a huge issue um is our streets and that's really related to our street maintenance and drainage re rehabilitation. And then finally on our fund balance, um this chart here just kind of shows what we have historically seen and where we're projecting for the follow for the rest of the year. Um February for general fund, we ended with just over $2 million worth of cash in the bank. Um which is up from January's numbers by about 137,000. Um we are down year-over-year um about 1.1. The good thing that I want to mention and make sure that the council is aware of is our projected year-end balance. Um, if you can kind of remember where we were earlier in the year, we were projecting more in that 1.4 range, 1.5. I'm happy to report that based off of our spend history that we've got so far, we're looking more at the 1.7 1.8 million worth of cash in the bank for the general fund at the end of this fiscal year. Um, and that really represents about 19% of our annual our annual cost or about two and a quarter months, which is what we want to see for this year. So, and with that, that completes my report, but I'm happy to answer any questions the council may have.

Thank you, Sarah. Any questions or comments? Okay, seeing none, we'll go ahead and move on to item D5, discussion and consider legal action of resolution number 26-1805, approving amendments to the town's cash handling and purchasing policy 2018 edition. Um Christie,

good evening, mayor and council. Um this is an update to our purchase current purchasing and cash handling um procedures. We made some targeted improvements to keep us current, compliant, and efficient. Um the core structure and intent of our purchasing policy is unchanged. Um I just want to share just two um items that we changed in here. We clarified our emergency procurement procedures for repairs and then we modernized our perdm and mill reimbursement. Um the James Benson group looked at this and they felt that we had a really well structured purchasing policy already. Um, Gabe worked on changing the PDMS to match the um, general services administration federal rates rather than we had specific numbers in there. We would have to bring those back and change them all the time. So, we just changed it to match what the federal rates are going to be. And then, um, I did some work on the emergency procurement repairs and services and then the James Vincent Group and so did our town attorney. Um there I did notice on my printout that I gave you guys there was one sentence in here on page eight um where number seven emergency procurement starts. It says the town manager shall be empowered to authorize emergency purchases on or for town or on emergency um incidences. The sentence right after that is taken out from Bill Sims. Okay. So that will be changed and I know that this was just a draft. What I'm wanting you guys to approve are these amendments in red and I have to redo this entire document. I think it's been edited so much that it messed with the spacing if you'll notice in there. But there's also things that are misnumbered. So what I'm wanting you guys to approve tonight is the wording. So um a few more things on there. Um a good example is what we just had happen at Woodland Lake Park with the plumbing issue over there considered an emergency. Um, this will help us to be able to do those without getting bids

with as long as the vendor is on our qualified vendor list. Um, what constitutes an emergency is anything that threatens the public health, safety or welfare of our citizens, endangers public property, causes or threatens immediate interruption of essential town services, or creates a situation where delays are resulting from compliance with standard purchasing procedures. Examples that may not be included in that are um uh wait go here uh poor planning, end ofear spending, routine maintenance, avoidance of competitive procurement, or budget shortfalls. If a if an emergency repair is over $50,000, it gives the town manager permission to move forward with that. if it falls within these guidelines. However, a written report will be um brought before town council within two days and it will be ratified at the next town council meeting. So, we felt that these were some important changes. Other than that, I just want to um remind all of council and and the public that um we will be doing some training for all of uh our staff and directors to make sure that procurement policies are followed um tightly and that we're we're being efficient with those.

Okay. Thank you for that, Christie. Any questions or comments from the council? I have one more thing on that. I'm so sorry. Council member Ferno told me um had called me and said that he had noticed somewhere in the packet that the town manager was listed as him and it is all over this purchasing policy. I did not catch that, but in um it's not in red because I didn't have time to edit it, but anywhere where it says the town manager or his designate is going to change to his or her designate. Okay. Thank you. Anything else? I do have a question. Yes. If if you could just help clarify on page three, you've redlined the splitting a purchase amount to keep the purchase under $2,500 is forbidden. Yes. Just I'm just curious on the thoughts on that specific change.

That's not changed. That was already in there. We moved it. Okay. So, if you notice up above it, it's crossed out. It was moved down to a more appropriate place. That's always been in our purchasing policy. Anything else? I'd entertain a motion then. Council Heiser, I move to approve resolution number 261805 adopting amendments to the town of Pinetop Lakeside purchasing and cash handling policies and procedures 2018 edition with wording as presented and legal changes.

Yeah. and maybe add the I'm going to change the wording to the town manager or his or her designate because I didn't have that in red with genderneutral changes. I'll second that. Well said. Thank you. We have a motion to second. Is there further discussion? All those in favor, please signify by raising your right hand. Thank you. That carries unanimously. Thank you, Christie, for working on that. Can you tell me who seconded that, Mayor? I'm so sorry.

Vice Mayor, thank you. Item D6 is discussion and consider legal action of resolution 26-1806 adjusting the town clerk salary range on the council approved salary scale. Chrissy. Uh thank you mayor and councel. So tonight I wanted to just talk to you guys about aligning the town clerk position um with the level of responsibility that um the town clerk carries. The town clerk is um statutoily required position under Arizona state law. Town clerks are responsible for elections, public records, open meeting law compliance, um maintaining public records, and it protects the town from legal um risk and ensures transparency to the public. The town clerk um is a full full support to the town council, the town manager, the staff, and the public. The town man or the town clerk does a whole lot more than what I just listed, but I just wanted to give you some of the some of the more legal um uh job description. So, and what the legal risk is if we don't have a town clerk who knows their business. Um, unlike other positions, um, the town clerk requires special certifications. Um, this is a highly specialized municipal profession and is and this is just going to be adjusting to be in line with other directors and market standards across Arizona. The town clerk position in the town of Pinetop Lakeside is a as a director level position. um are I have put on each of your desk are and I know the entire pay scale needs to be worked on but I did put it there just for you guys to see um how the percentages and stuff are all over the board. Um the current salary range starting for a town clerk is $64,739. I'm asking it to be adjusted to the base level of 71735 to be in align with our other directors. um our community services director that we just hired started at that rate and that's where I'm why I'm bringing this back just for

equitable equitable reasons um for town council. Um if you guys have any questions I'm I'm happy to answer that. I I do realize that it it would be peacemealing our uh salary scale together a little bit. The whole thing is being looked at right now in its entirety. So, if the town council wishes to not move the entire salary range for the town clerk, I would like to in the next Well, I actually because Lisa Mirs is going to be hopefully appointed town clerk in the next item. Um, I want the town council to allow me to start her at step four. She's 14 years town clerk in the city of uh in a city in Texas and has her Texas municipal clerk, which it transfers over to Arizona as well. and I I honestly just don't feel it's appropriate to start her at $64,000 with her with her skills that she brings to the town.

Thank you, Christie. Any questions or comments on this issue? Councilor Heisler,

I did I did want to just make a a a comment briefly and um Kenny Kale came up. You you mentioned some things and I I think it's just important that we recognize that. I mean, if you go out and look at the average range of a town clerk in the state of Arizona, you're talking $94,000 a year. And so, if you if you talk about that, that is the $10 an hour difference that you were talking about for living in the White Mountains if we move the scale to starting at 71. Um, I understand I guess from my perspective, I understand why we would adjust this position because it's a position we're currently hiring and I would anticipate you'll probably do that as other positions get hired, but I I I mean I do see the pay scale and I do think that it it needs to have some adjustments made to it as well. Um, and so I just wanted to say not to leave you hanging over there after you made your comments at the beginning of the meeting, but I think it is about a $10 an hour reduction over the state average that you would see uh across the state for town clerks.

Thank you, Councelor Heisler. Anything else? Just this discussion. I mean, I I think it might be well to, like you say, not peacemail it. And I'm I mean I' I'd certainly go with raising her up to the step four, but uh I think it maybe it's just better to do the whole thing together, come back with that rather rather than whatever you guys decide. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I'll make a motion if no one else has any questions or anything, but go ahead. I move to authorize the town manager to place town clerk Lisa Mirs at step four of the current town clerk salary range to align with her experience and qualifications. We have a second.

Okay, that motion fails for lack of a second. Pardon me. I said, are we on that agenda item? I thought we were on just on the town. We are. Oh, I'll second it.

Okay. Um, is there further discussion? All those in favor of the motion made by Vice Mayor, please raise your right hand. Thank you. That carries unanimously. Thank you, Christie. Okay, we'll move on then to item D7 which is discussion and consider legal action of resolution number 261807 appointing Lisa Mir's town clerk for the town of Pinetop Lakeside.

Thank you mayor and council. Um earlier this month we held um a pretty selective um process. We had two applicants for the position of town clerk. They uh provided a written assessment. They did an oral interview and a professional presentation. Um I think we had a really strong um hiring committee assembled for that and Lisa and uh McKenzie who both applied for the job both got really good marks. They Lisa was recommended unanimously to be appointed to this position. Um, Lisa's been over training with me for about a week now and she's doing a great job and I would with her experience I would like to recommend that council appoint her as town clerk for the town of Pinetop Lakeside.

Okay. I would like to have one clarification. Um, CDR references a different salary than the resolution references. The res resolution references. Um, we left it blank because we didn't know 69 368. Oh yeah, I need to change that. Okay. Okay. So, I can change that resolution if you guys approve it with the amendment um vice mayor made to So, the step four of the salary scale is 71675. Okay. So, the resolution will be I'll fix it. Okay. Thank you. Just don't sign that one tonight, mayor. Okay. Okay. Um I would like to invite Lisa up to to tell us about herself and introduce your other half if you would like to. You want to go up to the podium?

You want to come up here? No. Really? Good evening, mayor, vice mayor, and council. I'm honored to have been chosen for this position. Um, I look forward to serving the council and continuing to serve the community alongside our amazing staff and the executive team. I have my Jeff in the audience. And then, um, I have seven there are seven girls in my family and they're having a girls weekend this weekend. So, I think they're watching online. Oh, wow. That'll be fun. Well, well, welcome. I guess assuming this passes, but um I have enjoyed getting to know you at public works and I look forward to great things. So, are there any other questions or comments?

What what community did you serve in Texas? It was the town of Trophy Club right at Dallas Fort Worth right in the middle. Yeah. Okay. Well, I move to approve resolution number 261807 appointing Lisa Mirs to the town clerk for the town of Pinetop Lakeside with a retroactive effective date of March 9th, 2026. I second that. Thank you. We have a motion to second. Is there further discussion? All those in favor, please signify by raising your right hand.

Thank you. That carries unanimously. Welcome, Lisa, to town hall now. Okay. Item D8, which is discussion and consider legal action of resolution number 26808, approving a member of understanding with Blue Ridge Youth Football. Melina, good evening, mayor and councel. Congratulations, Lisa. Thanks, Melina. You're welcome. you will be miss.

Um I'm I'm pleased to we we discussed this a little bit in the work session a couple weeks ago regarding uh um cons continued support of some of our youth activities and recreation programs in the area. Uh this is for the Blige youth football program and they've been operating for a number of years. They have held practices and will continue to hold practices at Woodland Lake Park. Uh they usually typically begin in July, mid to late July, and their season games begin in August and go through to October. They don't play their games at Woodland. They play at uh local our local school districts between Round Valley, Snowflake, Xolo, Blue Ridge, and I believe Hullbrook. Uh so this is just approving um by council approval what we've been doing. Uh last year we started with youth football but previously we've been um partnering with the Blige basketball booster club and they've been running our um youth basketball program. So this is just formalizing this with council. uh we will be accepting all of their registration fees through our civic wreck program and then they um get 100% of those proceeds as well as a $3,000 sponsorship and it is in our current fiscal budget fiscal year budget and will be in pending approval will be in our next year fiscal year budget as well.

Okay, any questions or comments? I think this is wonderful wonderful thing for us to continue. I'd entertain a motion. I'll give you one. Thank you. I I move to approve resolution 261808 authorizing the memorandum of understanding between the town of Pinetown Lakeside and the Blue Ridge youth football and authorize the town manager to execute any and all documents related to this agreement. Second. Thank you. We have a motion second. Further discussion? All those in um favors, please signify by raising your right hand. Thank you. That carries unanimously. Thank you, Molina.

Item D9 is discussion and consider legal action of resolution 26-1809 approving an amendment to the town fee schedule.

So, we are bringing this one to you tonight after much discussion. Uh we have decided to continue our green waste program. Last year we started that program and I believe we did it for about a month and a half. We ended up extending that program. At the time, it was prior to council's decision to begin charging different fees for residents and non-residents. At that time, we had offered the program free for anyone that brought green waste in efforts to continue improving and firewising our community to help protect against wildfire and fire danger. We have brought this. This is something that the council has shown and specifically Mayor Irwin has shown a a desire to continue this program and we've decided that we will do it from April 1st to May 31st. It'll be free for residents and 50% discount for non-residents. So that is why we are proposing that fee change for this evening is just to be able to offer that discount to non-residents.

Elena, any questions or comments? Council Phillips. Will the uh free to residents include businesses that are located within the town? Within the town and it does require a business to bring in a current town of Pinetop Lakeside business license along with their ID um with the address in in physical location in the town limits. Thank you. And that I I'm sorry just to expand on that too. That's in efforts we Annie and I believe Priscilla as well have been working with the Chamber of Commerce to partner more with the business community in efforts to clean up specifically Highway 260 and to make it a little bit more beautiful as you drive through. So we want to continue that.

Councelor Ferno. Yeah. I I just had a question on on the financial analysis portion. I mean there's no cost there. So is it I mean what what is the cost to the town to do this service? Great question. I have no idea. Can't tell you what it is. And the only reason I can I say that is because it depends on how much we get.

Unfortunately last year we had um a lot of illegal dumping if you will because not everybody was coming through the collection center. So we've worked um very hard. We've had some pretty substantial meetings with our supervisors at public works to come up with a plan on how we can really track that as well as um track each load that we're taking to Novo Biomass and how many miles we're putting on the track, how many loads are coming from that so that we can really come back next year and and give you an accurate number on what that would be. Last year we did have obviously operational costs with the normal operations of the collection center and then we paid I believe it was $5,000 to Canyon Creek Logging in Tommy Hall and they came over to Mountain Meadow and ground up all of it and then hauled it. Um this year we are not doing that. We are going to be hauling the loads as they come.

If it gets to a point that we um need we we just can't keep up with it. We do have a contingency plan. We actually have a couple contingency plans in place. Thank you. Councelor Smith, go ahead.

Yeah. I have a concern that uh the a resident a non-resident can just be across the street, okay, on Woodland Road, for example, just across the street. And I if the intent of this is to prevent wildfires and um I I'm not sure we should limit it uh really and and charge more for someone out of out of town. Although, you know, I I don't want everybody from Xolo to to come also. But I'm just wondering if there's another way to do that somehow. Um maybe if they have a lakeside or a Pinetop mailing address, they would qualify for the free um uh green waste.

Um I I would like to encourage everybody to do that because that can can help prevent a big problem. Absolutely. That that's completely understandable. And that was actually brought up this week. Um Christy actually came over to public works and we had quite a bit of discussion and one of our employees did bring up that concern is you know there's some of us that live in Lakeside or in Pinetop we just don't live in town limits. That's right.

But however they're not in town limits and that was something that council had wanted to try to use this as an educational purpose but after discussion and thinking about it and Christy and I spoke about this as well. One thing that we do have to keep in mind is we don't charge a property tax. So we don't collect specifically just from Pinetop Lakeside residents. We do collect from anyone who shops in town. With that said, it could be from re we we collect our sales tax revenue from people that may not live here. However, we do only get state shared revenues from the people that live in Pinetop Lakeside. They're using our roads if they even if they don't live here. So that's something to consider. We certainly could re-evaluate and um we would have to shift our program and it would require some more work uh for our staff to verify and education to tell people that they have to bring in that utility bill. And um we not saying that we couldn't do it. We would just have to pivot a little bit and I'm certain I'm I'm positive we could make that happen if we wanted to open it up to everybody in the 85935 or 85929 zip codes. Um, it just might be a little bit more of a process.

Mr. Mayor, I I don't I don't think we should do that. I I think it's this is a good deal for those that live outside the town. And again, this is education and also an incentive for them to look towards uh annexation in the future. A little one more comment to your question. Yeah. So, you know, like if I drive up with a big load of pine needles and it's and I'm an out of town resident, it's 50% off. Like, how have we priced ourselves compared to the the neighbors that that do that? Oh, so as far as like if if somebody um I can't think I was going to green waste or Yes. Um you know, I don't know. We have not looked into that as far as how much they charge at 50% off. Would we presumably be cheaper than that though? So, we're still a benefit, right? Yeah. Yes.

Okay. Yes. Yeah. I I can answer that. A neighbor of mine told me two weeks ago he went to the town site instead of green waste and it was significantly less. I mean even paying for it. Yeah. The full price. Of course, he's a town resident,

but yes, I would say it would be significantly less. Great. Um, and something that we have talked about numerous times is the the benefit of having it here in town versus you're certainly welcome to drive to to Waste Management in the Lone Pi Dam transfer station or out to Blue Hills, but then you have that time and the the wear and tear and all that when it's conveniently located. However, I will um Eric, our um collection center supervisor, is back in the office, so he's on light duty. He will um I will ask him to look into that and just to make sure that we are being competitive. Great. Councelor Heisler,

I I was just going to say I um I too don't think that we should um give it away. Um we have expense that we're paying to do it. It's our trucks and and our people and our maintenance that's going into it. Um I know that the city of Xolo, if you want to dump, they offer it for free, but you got to bring a utility bill from the city of Xolo in order to be able to do it. And so it it is an expense for for us to handle that. I I would like to see though if it's feasible after you guys evaluate the dates that we continue this through the summer because um I know from just personal experience, people come up in the country club, they don't come up till later in the year. They're trying to get their properties cleaned up. And I just think that if it's feasible for us to to offer this benefit longer, that we should consider doing that. So if it is, I'd love to see it come back to council maybe for an extension. Okay, that's something we can certainly look into. Um, however, we do offer the green waste program for a fee um all year round. So, that does help um the collection center. Uh, but it does also help the community. Um, I would like to see how it goes, especially because we are doing it for a full two months this year and then re-evaluate how much of a burden is it is on our our staff. Um, we are still at the moment one truck down. Um, we're hoping to get that um, repaired here in the next couple of weeks. And I'm I'm going to say month just to give us an extra little time uh, to get that back on the road so that we can haul more efficiently.

I'm not putting any pressure on you. I just if it works, I'd love to see it extend. I I don't disagree. We have a a huge, as you know, with as being a firefighter, we have a huge fire risk this year. Um, and it's continued from last year. So, I think this is a great program to help our residents not only clean up their their properties and our businesses, but to help mitigate that fire risk. And I think once we've evaluated it, we'll have more of an idea of it. Can we afford this? Absolutely. Really, as a community? Yes. And I know Eric and the collection center staff are going to do a really great job of keeping track of that this year so that we can really come and we know exactly how much that's going to cost us. Okay. Thank you, Melina. You're welcome.

Um, any other questions? I entertain a motion. Councelor Heisler, I move to adopt resolution number 261809 amending the town of Pinetop Lakeside consolidated fee schedule to establish a 50% discount for non-resident green waste disposal during the green waste disposal event held April 1st, 2026 through May 31st, 2026 and authorize the town clerk to update the fee schedule accordingly. I'll second that. Thank you. We have a motion second. Is there further discussion? All those in favor, please signify by raising your right hand. Thank you. That carries unanimously. Thank you very much, Molina. Thank you.

Item D10, discussion and consider legal action to approve a revised job description and salary range for administrative assistant to the town clerk. Christie.

Hey, good evening, mayor and council. Um, as part of our ongoing um, organizational review and restructuring efforts, I wanted to bring back this proposed job description and salary range um, to council. This is a job description that has been in our job descriptions and salary ranges in the past. When I was hired on with the town, I was hired as an assistant to the town clerk and then when I started attending courses and started working towards my CMC, I was made a deputy town clerk. So, what right at right now what I'd like to do is we want to wait just a little bit of time. Lisa's asked to kind of get her feet underneath her so that when she does when we do hire somebody for that, she can go on and train an assistant. Um, we would evaluate that person for a year and see if it's something that's going to work, if they're interested, if they like it before we start putting in for them to go to school. There is a cost to the town for that. So, right now, I want to bring administrative assistant to the town clerk back into our job description titles. And with the salary range of 37851 to 57253, um I do want to keep deputy town clerk in the salary range so it moves along when we if we do end up moving this person on to that eventually. That's what this item is for tonight.

Thank you, Christie. Any questions, comments for Christie? Councelor Heisler, just just wanted to make a comment again. I as we talk about where um money's going within the town and kind of restructuring positions um this is another step towards I think to um Kenny Kale's point earlier right this is this is steps of restructuring the town not just um doing some of the things that you were mentioning before so I I think it's all positive stuff and I I appreciate it thank you thank you any other questions comments motion councelor

I move to approve the job descript description and classification for the position of administrative assistant to the town clerk is presented and authorized the town manager to adjust the council approved pay scale accordingly. All second. Thank you. We have a motion to second. Is there further discussion? All those in favor, please signify by raising your right hand. Thank you. That carries unanimously. Thank you again, Christie. One more couple more for you.

Yeah, I have a few tonight. D11 is discussion and consider legal action to approve the creation, job description and classification for the position of finance and administrative clerk. Thank you, mayor and council. This um again is a new position for the town. Um this is just ensuring continuity in our financial operations following the resignation of our accountant. Um our accountant left and um gave us a two-e notice, but that's not enough time to post a job and hire someone and train somebody. So, I have to tell you like our staff has stepped up big time. Annie has learned payroll and processed payroll this week um with the help of Sarah and Kristen from the James Vincent Group. Lisa has learned the benefits part of payroll which we worked sat down and worked with um the James Vincent Group today. And actually, even though I used to do it, I think they knew more than us because they I'm glad to say that they work with a lot of the companies that we do our benefits payroll through. So, they kind of showed us stuff we didn't know. Um but um we have I I got another contract with James Benson Group for just accounts payable and payroll. Um and that uh total for the year is I want to say $27,000. And I want to bring in a position for a finance and administrative clerk at a low end of a clerk position which is um in line with a library clerk of starting at 36,000 um 49 to 54 527. Um, with that, we don't need an accountant on staff, but I will leave an accountant job I will leave the accountant job place in the salary range in case this doesn't work out and we decide to bring it back in house. Um, but for now, this is a this is just kind of a maintenance position to help with the there was a lot of things Stacy did that I don't think everybody realized. And uh so we need some help with getting you know all of the bills we get paper from all the different um departments within town

scanning them all over making sure everything's filed being able to help with the audit. So we have someone in house and it's going to take a lot off of the staff that has all stepped up right now and is wearing many hats. So this is a new job description. I uh don't have it in front of me tonight, but do any of you have any questions on the job description? the James Vincson group worked on that um job description for us for what they kind of need in that position. Any questions? I think this is a great move forward. Thank you. Motion. Go ahead. I move to approve the job description and classification for the finance and administrative clerk position and authorize the town manager to amend the pay scale accordingly. I second that.

Thank you. We have a motion second. There any further discussion? All those in favor, please signify by raising your hand. Thank you. That carries unanimously. Christy again. Um D12 information, discussion, and legal action regarding the town's fiscal year 2627 employee health renewal. Thank you, Mayor Council. I just back on D1 real quick. I'm going to get that one job posted for to fill up that finance. Um great.

Yeah. Just so you guys know, so we'll have that assistance um for our staff. Um this item is regarding the town's fiscal year 2627 health insurance. Um in our budget discussions for fiscal year 2526 council had um asked us to reach out to more carriers to um do some comparisons for our health insurance and I did get some letters from a couple of the companies. We reached out to three and they had two that um wrote us a letter and they're on your guys' desk just so you know we did do our due diligence and worked with them. Um, and they both declined to quote for and it wasn't them declining to quote, the insurance has declined to quote. They said it's too early in the season. The way our contract is with Kyros, we have to be give them our letter of intent by tomorrow. So, I had to bring this to council. Um, we could not renew with Kyros and take a risk that our rates are going to be higher. One of those did get two quotes for us from other companies and they came in quite a bit higher than what Kyros's rates are. I asked them if they knew why our rates were so high because Kyros rates actually um didn't have as big of an increase this year as we have historically and they said it's really because of where we live being in a rural community and the cost of our healthcare up here is just really high. Um I am happy to report that our increase with Kyros came in at 3.4% this year. We've seen as high as 12 and 14% in the last couple years um for an overall um increase in our rates approximately 9.6% in 9 years which is actually within the national average. I'm sorry my mouth is dry. So national average is anywhere between 9 and 12%. So we're actually sitting pretty good with Kyros. So my recommendation for you guys tonight are the the premiums go from 1,68648 to 1,ion105 381 which is a difference of 36,733.

That is not the town's cost. Um the town pays for employees 100%. But if you have a spouse or family, the the staff picks up a portion of that. So that's not the town's cost. Um, I did talk to Kyros and if we want to keep the cost down a little bit more, we could offer four um, different um, policies with them or well plans. And so right now we're on the 1,700 high deductible health plan. They also have a $2,500 one. And then so I don't have to have the numbers to them yet. I just have to give them a letter of intent to stay with them. So, that's those numbers are something I will be working um closely with James Vincent Group and with the council to see what the council wants to I would really love not to have to pass on this 3.4% to our staff, but um we'll see where we're at when we put together our revenues with what the the staff has worked on on our budget for this year so far.

Thanks for all your work on this, Chrissy. I know it was a lot. Um from my personal experience, 3.4% is really pretty reasonable. Um, and you know, as far as increasing the deductible, if we can't afford to give raises, I would hate to put that burden on our staff, but that's a conversation we probably need to have. So, are there any other questions or comments? Yes. Question. So, if we do nothing April second, it goes into effect. It's an automatic renewal at the same rate. Mhm. So I guess my next question is are there any insurance companies that might come back to us within the next two weeks before April 2nd with anything?

They didn't think so. They they because we got the rates on the 3 and they are like they want you to make a decision in 17 days. I actually sent our contract to our attorney. He wrote the contract for Guy Ross and it's it's pretty uh stoneclad. Yeah. Ironclad. So, it's going to um it's it would be taking a risk of nobody coming back with a better rate. They did say they did tell me though to get an accurate full look at your insurance, it takes about a year for a company to look at that and on board you. So, going forward, the companies that I reached out to said they're still excited to try to work with us for the next year and then we'll have to work on our contract a little bit with Ky Ross on not having to push it through so fast.

Okay. Thanks. Thank you. Anything else? Councelor Heiser, go ahead. Qu motion. Sure. Go ahead. I move to authorize the town manager to finalize and execute the employee health insurance renewal agreement with Chyros subject to legal review. I'll second that. Uh we have a motion to second. Is there further discussion? All those in favor, please signify by raising your hand. Thank you. That carries unanimously. Again, Christie, thank you. I know that was a lot of work. Um, we'll move on then to item D13, which is the town manager monthly report.

I'll try to keep this a little bit short. Um, there's a lot of really good stuff to report, so I'm going to go through this pretty quick if anybody gets the talk of the town. There was a lot of good information in that, but I have a few new things from today even I want to share. So, um, we'll go ahead and start. Um, so I want to walk through a a few key um items that I'm going to talk about tonight and it's just our budget preparation, our election updates, staffing and operations, departmental highlights, and the community initiatives. Um, as you know, um, the staff is taking a little bit of a different approach to our budget this year. And on March 10th and 12th, um, all department directors met. They had the James Vincent group had provided us all with guidelines that they wanted us to fill out for each of our budgets. We went through it. We honestly thought it would take a few hours and we were there all day. So, we went through it line by line. every department director was able to ask other department directors questions and there was some things that um we actually graded them one, two or three um and we made some adjustments and then came back on the 12th and those department directors had made their changes on the 12th. I sat down and went over those today with Sarah and then we'll be working uh closely with Gabe to bring that back at our next budget meeting to council and then they'll have um the benefits and the salary portion of it. We didn't do that. We worked on just our independent budgets. Um, let's see. We're just working the collaborative internal processes with the James Vincent group to provide a balanced budget for the to the town council. Oh. Oh,

it was quick. I went I said it was going to be quick. Well done. Not what I meant. Um, the consolidated fee schedule is underway. Um, department directors were asked to send any changes they have to the fee schedule to the town clerk. I believe all those changes um proposed changes have been sent over to Lisa. We'll be posting that um 60 days prior to our June 14th meeting 18th.

Thank so many dates in my head today. Um the same date that we adopt the the tenative budget will be when the the fee schedule will come to council. There's only just a few minor changes on that. Um staffing updates. As you all know, um, Lisa Mirs was appointed as town clerk, and I'm excited to work with Lisa. Um, deputy clerk resignation of Mackenzie Valichik. I am very sad to see Mackenzie go and appreciative of the four years that she gave the town, but I think she's going to do great in her next chapter and I wish her well. Um, accountant um, Stacy MacArthur has resigned and we have our support. It's not interim support from James Vincent Group anymore, but they have in the interim did help us, but they are processing our accounts payable and our payroll um at this time. And then um you guys just approved the job description, so I will be getting that job posted. I want to recognize several staff members that have really really stepped up. I I can't even tell you guys how much work they've done and I want to just publicly recognize them. So Annie D. Roger has been assisting with payroll and purchasing card administration among many other things. Susie Anders Anderson has assisted with supply ordering. That was something Stacy also did. Lisa Mirs is training um with both the town manager and Mackenzie during the transition to the town clerk role. And Lisa also um learned to do the benefits payroll. So we're doing quite a bit of cross trainining here. Um, Eric Dea Garza returned early to light duty and is working full-time at public works right now at the front desk to help um in the transition since we did take Lisa from them. And I did go over to and meet with Public Works last week. And um I know they're all really sad to see Lisa go, but I think they're all also very happy for her. Alana Jackson is assisting with business licenses and vendor permits since McKenzie is leaving us and she is working four hours on Thursday and four

hours on Friday and will also be assisting Lisa with doing some minutes until we get an assistant to the town clerk. Frank Nurano and public works um supervisor has been assisting uh interimm director Melena Spilman during staffing shortages and uh with a lot of stuff that they have going on at the public works. So we appreciate that. Buddy Miller um continues to assist Frank Young with building inspections. And Marie Kernney from the library is helping to cover the front desk over at the public works department as well. Bessie Bambulis that is already a part-time employee at the library has stepped up to cover and Marie's hours at the library. So, we are all over the place, but everybody is stepping up to help and I appreciate that. The police department is continuing to operate efficiently while it's staffed. They're answering a lot of animal control calls. That's another job I need to get posted, too. Um, employee of the month this month is Frank Nurano. I'm very excited to announce that. Um, we are proud to recognize Frank Nurano. Many know Frank Nanho as Frankie Ray, also known as the grass whisperer. Um, Frank has dedicated 18 years of service to the town and his work ethic speaks for itself. One thing everyone in our community should know is thanks to Frank, we truly have the best grass and fields on the mountain. His pride for his work is evident in every detail. Frank is dependable and hardworking, a team member who consistently steps up whenever help is needed. Beyond his work, he is a devoted family man who genuinely loves the town of Pinetop Lakeside and that commit that commitment shows every single day. Thank you, Frank, for your years of dedication and your pride. Um, the pride you bring to work. And that's Frank right back there in the corner, everybody. I'm going to do just a real quick uh overview of just all the departments right now. Um, our police department

continues to prioritize training and regional coordination. Um we are also seeing a very strong community feedback with high satisfaction ratings for prof professionalism and overall service. Um while total incidents have decreased in February, calls for service and arrest increased which reflects both continued demand and a proactive enforcement by our officers. Um the library continues to be a strong hub for the community. They saw over 1,600 visitors in the month of February. Um along with the strong participation in programs and continued volunteer support, community development has had seven building permits and six new business licenses in the month of February. And they are making some operational improvements and they installed some monitoring cameras in some areas that we have some code enforcement issues and they're doing sign cleanup on our town code. Uh public works has been very active across multiple platforms. Crews have completed park safety improvements including tree removal and restroom upgrades and have been preparing irrigation systems for the s for the season. Roadway maintenance and safety improvements have also been completed along with ongoing facility repairs. Additionally, the collection center continues to serve a high volume of residents processing over 65 tons of material during the period of February. This morning, our mayor's youth advisory committee had a field trip over to public works and they were able to even see how some of the equipment works sitting there and they actually love this. This is their favorite meeting of the year. I believe that and going to the police department. And I want to say thank you to Melena, Frank Nuranho, and David Halverson for showing these kids what it's all about. The community services department continues to strengthen partnerships

across the town. This includes engagement with the Chamber of Commerce, Rotary, and the People's Voice Committee, as well as coordination for upcoming events like Easter. I want to let everyone know that the Easter event will be held at the Lakeside Gym, which is where the pickle ball courts are, on Saturday, March 28th. There will be pictures with the Easter Bunny, lots of eggs for all, and a free lunch provided by the Rotary of the White Mountains while supplies last. Marketing and communication. Um, this department continues to support both community engagement and tourism efforts. Work is underway on event planning, design support for local partners, and community awareness campaigns such as Firewise and Bear Aaware. We are also seeing strong engagement across social platforms helping extend to reach the reach of both town messaging and tourism promotion. Our visit Pinetop Lakeside socials had 529,000 views on 129 pieces published content. Town of Pinetop Lakeside socials had 59 over 59,000 views with 44 pieces of published content and our live and they have broadcasted uh three live meetings in the last month. the clerk department um is in transition with Lisa. Um I wanted to share that there are there is going to be a vacancy for a town council seat. We are planning on a special meeting for April 21st for interviews and appointing of a town council member to fill that two-year seat. Um we did have a third applicant candidate, not applicant, um turn in a packet today to run for a council seat. So, we now have three people running for three vacant seats on the town council and still two candidates running for mayor in the primary election. Um, we'll be publishing the vacancy of the two-year seat in the White Mountain

Pendant um for two weeks in March, the first week in April, and then we have a deadline to turn in applications, which is April 13th by the end of day. And then we'll take that to council on the 21st. So, if anyone's interested in running for council, you just need to be a qualified elector for the town of Pinetop Lakeside and live within city limits. Um, it continues to support operational efficiency across departments. This includes equipment management, system updates, and security awareness training as well as assisting staff through transitions. With all of the changes in staff, Ryan has had to set up a lot of new computer systems for us. Um, I'm not going to talk too much about the green waste disposal, but we do have a flyer that we will put out. It will be in talk of the town. We'll have copies of it here at town. And this is um just for the green waste disposal, but the collection center also has managed to stay busy. And um we're hoping that people, the residents will uh take advantage of this and make our town look nice and firewise. it. Um, it's also really important to notice we get that the public message out there that um, last year the reason I think why Tommy is not wanting to grind our stuff up this year is we had a lot of illegal dumping and a lot of things that were not green waste, trash and stumps and that's not okay and we don't have a really strong way to police that. So, if we can, we we put our heads together and tried to come up with some ways yesterday. Every way we came up with kind of cost us money, more money than we probably need to spend. So, um if anybody has any good ideas on that, let us know. Um moving forward, I just wanted to let uh recognize that the town has been through a period of transition and challenge, but some days require extra patience and flexibility, but I have a strong staff here and I'm really proud of the work that everyone here is doing. So, that is my report for the month of February. If you have any questions, I

have one more thing. Mayor handed this to me today. Um, the Pony Express ride starts April 22nd through the 24th. I will remind you um everybody again next month, council. I'll send you a calendar invite. Um, it's a really cool event and um this will be posted at town hall and we'll have flyers here if anyone else is interested in that. I'm done. Did I? Thank you, Christie. Yes. Go ahead. Did I remind everybody about the town hall meeting? Of course. Just go ahead and uh just for the public, there's a town hall meeting tomorrow night, 700 p.m. If you want to know what it's about, read Talk of the Town. You're welcome. We hope you show up.

And I just want to give a shout out. Um, I've heard from a couple of citizens recently about some extremely positive reactions with the PD and um, a situation they had as well as with u public works and the cemetery and a recent burial. So, thank you guys. Um, people are seeing all that. So, it's much appreciated when I hear about it. I know everybody hears about those things, but I just wanted to point it out tonight. So, anyway, there being no further business and it is allergy season, I have to apologize for my voice. Um, thank you and meeting is adjourned. I got to run, guys.