Town Council - Regular Meeting

Thank you.

It's now 3 o'clock. I'm going to call the work-study session for June 4th of 2026 to order. Can we get a roll call, please?

Council Member Lopez? Present. Council Member Keough? Present. Council Member Freund? Council Member Greer? Here. Council Member Schumacher? Present. Vice Mayor Sercher?

Here.

And Mayor Pelaguda? You don't see him? We have a quorum.

Thank you. Going on to item number two, discussion items. The first item is item 2A, CAFMA response times presentation. I'm going to welcome down Chief John Penma of the Central Arizona Fire Medical Authority. Welcome, sir.

Sounds like it on. Well, thank you. Vice Chair Zurcher, used to Chairman Zurcher for a long time on the fire board and council members. We appreciate the opportunity to come today and just share a little bit of update on where we're at with the ambulance transports. I know the original discussion that I had with Gilbert was just Kind of an update of where we're at. And so today is really kind of a little history on how we got here, how we as CAFMA got into the ambulance response time or response business, and then share a little bit where we're at now, and then hopefully where we'll continue to go into the future. So again, appreciate the opportunity just to present to you. the group today and then at the end, if there's any questions, I brought our EMS chief who will probably be more helpful with the questions. So with that, I'll turn your attention to just the PowerPoint. So why obviously this matters, obviously is part of the response to this community on the medical side. If you look up there, 68% of what we respond to is medical. We call ourselves the fire department, but a lot of what we respond to is medical. and EMS calls within the jurisdiction. And now that gets broken up into a few other calls for service, just good intent calls and other things that happen. But again, 68% of the total incidents in 2025, which I'll have a slide later on that will kind of show how call volume has increased. Of that, there was about 10,600 transports Now, that was not CAFMA, right, all CAFMA. We have three response or transport agencies. CAFMA is simply one of those. And, again, I'll give a little more detail. I think actually Doug provided it to me today. But of that 10,600 transports within the jurisdiction that we track, 1,350, 221 call for service required to transport by campus ambulances so we're out there, we only have two in the Community in our overall Community one is in chino and one is in prescott valley so station 58 is where we house, one of our ambulances we call them rescues and we do a better job of that. But so Station 58 is on Robert Road and kind of just down the middle is the nice, one of our nicer ones these days, two-story, but it houses the ambulance. And so that's where we respond from. And obviously, again, we're kind of a support mechanism. You know, we look at community expectations and obviously the goal is reliable and timely because it's very important, right? Not just the on-scene treatment, but also getting to higher level treatment and getting them to the hospitals. And... I've lived in the community for a long time and I've been the recipient of, you know, my family has been the recipient of that medical service. And obviously not only is important for me from the position I'm in, but also my family lives here. So this is, again, an important topic. With that. A LITTLE HISTORY AND BACKGROUND. SO BACK IN 2015, THE FORMER CHIEF, THERE STARTED TO BE DISCUSSIONS WITH DHS ON JUST OVERALL AMBULANCE SERVICE IN THE AREA THAT CAFMA PROVIDES. AND JUST TO BE ALSO TRANSPARENT, CAFMA IS COMING UP ON 10 YEARS. AND SO AT 2015, THERE WAS STILL THE CHINO VALLEY FIRE DISTRICT AND THE CENTRAL YABAPI FIRE DISTRICT. AND TODAY, CAFMA ON JULY 1 WILL CELEBRATE 10 YEARS AS CAFMA, WHICH IS We're excited for that and we're excited to what the future looks like. But some of the discussions started in 2015 and then in 2020, I don't know if you guys know what happened during 2020. There was a lot of challenges to the system at that point across the board. And so the board authorized us to kind of consult with a CEO and consultant. And 21, we utilized some rescues that were part of the station, but they were supporting the system. But that was just something that I would say the taxpayers were taking the burden on. We couldn't bill for those ambulances or those rescues. And so that was just something that we tried to put in place to help when there was no other units available in the system. So that started, you know, ramping up in 2021 and, you know, There's a kind of a gap there, but we began officially utilizing our certificate of necessity from DHS and utilizing those rescues and able to bill for those services on October 1st of 2024. And so from that time, we've been operating those in the system and supporting that system with those two ambulances. Again, one in the Chino Valley area and then one in the middle of Prescott Valley.

Mayor Mrakas, Vice Chief, could you just maybe go into for the Council and the those that are watching a little bit more on just the the certificate of necessity, and that is a state regulatory process. Mayor Mrakas, If a community is underserved with something they can't just go out and. have an ambulance company just show up, there's a long state review process. So if you could maybe talk a little bit about that. Absolutely. Oh, you do. You do. Right there.

I didn't want to interrupt, sir.

You were going and you were doing a fine job answering it for me. I wanted to make sure because that's a really important piece to it. Absolutely.

Yes. No, I appreciate that input. And obviously, you can see from the time that we started that process in 2020, And it took a while to get there to Gilbert's kind of point. So with that, what is that certificate of necessity? So again, it's state authorization. So we had to go through DHS. We had to go through a process to get there. And we utilized a consultant to help through that process because it is extensive. And so with that, obviously there's a response times, expectations. And so Chief Nominski did a lot of work on looking at our area. What are those response times? What does that look like? So in that certificate, what it does is it also gives us authority because we can't, even when we put up those rescues, when we didn't have this, we didn't have the authority to bill. And so there was, there was some challenges during that time related to those rescues. And so this kind of gave us the state authorization to continue that process and identify the need. Because what you've got to be careful of is we don't want just anybody and everybody just starting an ambulance service without it being somewhat regulated. So this is that process. And so DHS works that process and provides also the expectations. So we have to report to that what we have said we're going to respond to. And I'll kind of go through that reporting here shortly as well. So with that back to Gilbert's point, right? It is definitely, I mean, it's a certificate. So when we talk about certificate of necessity, sometimes you wonder like, no, they really issued a certificate. We actually got one just recently, which also changed with some of the updates that they have made. And I'll kind of go through those here in a second as well. Chief, if I can pause you for a moment. Councilman, you have a question?

Oh, I'm sorry to interrupt. I was going to wait, but anyway, thank you. A couple short questions. One is, well, I've never taken an ambulance ride locally, so you have the private operators and then you have the CAFMA operated. Now, I believe the private operated ambulances charge a fee to the patient, is that correct? And the CAFMA ones don't?

No, sir.

It's like the luck of the draw as a patient, whether you get the pay or not, right?

No, I'm sorry. Let me correct that. We charge as well. You do? So according, even when we went through the DHS process, we have to charge as well. And so it doesn't matter private or a calf from the rescue. you are being billed for that service, yes.

Oh, okay, thank you. And then a related question to that, you have some people, for example, in the unincorporated areas that don't subscribe to CAP and that don't have coverage for fire for their property. What happens is, does the same thing occur with an ambulance if they need an ambulance? Do they also get turned down?

No, the benefit, so when we went for the certificate of necessity, we put it to CAFMA's jurisdiction. So we covered the jurisdiction by itself, and there's multiple reasons for that, because there are, at that time, when we finally got it, there are two other providers in the area. One of them is AMR, you have representatives here today even, and the other one is Priority Ambulance, I think now Copper State Ambulance, But they came in at around June of 24 or 22 maybe. June of 22 is what my note says. So there are multiple providers. Their CON covers a much broader area than ours. We looked to keep it within our jurisdiction. One of the things we did as well is we didn't try to take on the – the inter-pacific transports. We did it specifically for the emergency medical, trying to prop up the EMS system and emergency response. So we know we're competing, but we're trying to be good partners in that as well, because what we feel is Yes, we're helping support the system, but the system is made better with multiple partners at that point. So we're, again, it's always a working relationship and we'll continue down that working relationship. But to your point, AMR and Priority's CON covers a much larger area than ours does.

Okay, and then my last question. What percentage of the CAFMA ambulances have a paramedic on board when they leave the station? And what is the ratio of EMTs to paramedics?

So each unit that we have is staffed with one medic and one EMT. So we only have two. We have one in Chino and one in Prescott Valley. And so the nice thing about it, they also qualify for firefighters. so they can respond to a structure of fire and participate in that as well. But there is one EMT and one medic staffed 100% of the time.

Thank you for your answers.

Yeah. OK. We're gonna continue forward. Just to that same certificate, here's an example of what the standards that are in that certificate, what the expectation is. And so you can see, this is specific for Prescott Valley. Our certificate includes Chino Valley and the unincorporated areas of Yavapai County that we do cover. But for Prescott Valley, the goal is 10 minutes or less, 90% of the time, 15 minutes or less, 95% of the time, and 25 minutes or less, 98% of the time. And so that is something that DHS, we have to report those times. And so we have times, obviously, when they're short, but we also are challenged by times when they're longer. And some of that depends on utilization in the system, how many calls are going on, multiple calls, how large those calls are. And so, again, this is looked at from the percentile, not just an average, but we have to report back to these. And so that's where the certificate is not just... Now we decide to do what we want. We have to respond back to those. And I'll give you just one of the last ones we reported to. What is our... What is that response back? So you can see our performance from March to February of 26, 10 minutes or less, 90.74, right? We're riding that cusp. 15 minutes less, we're 99, so there's some leeway there, and obviously 25 minutes or less 100% of the time. So of that, that was only 637 calls. Again, there's a lot of other calls in the Prescott Valley area, but some of those calls are being picked up by the other providers as well. So this is what we reported. I will tell you that 10 minutes or less, we've had some challenges with that. So DHS continues to monitor and we continue to work on that, even in the Prescott Valley area. And if we determined, you know, some of this, that we have to make adjustments, we'll make adjustments. And we've looked at some of our areas as well. Some of the unincorporated areas are a challenge to cover. And so whether it's through the partner agencies or ourselves making those, you know, that response, we have the ability to, if we can't make that, that means maybe we add more ambulances and we add more personnel. So it's a way for us to track what we need to do as well. A couple other items as we move on. So just so you can kind of see, there's a lot of numbers there. Please don't worry too much about that. But I do want to highlight something, changes that we're trying to make in the system. So if you look at 2018, these are not just EMS calls. These are all CAFMA calls at this point. And so that includes fires, calls for just good intent calls, calls for assistance. 2025, obviously we had 17,600. So about a 26% increase. Something that we have tried to work with our partners, including the ambulance providers, is put in a tiered response system. The question used to be, and still it comes to us sometimes, why do fire engines go on every call? And so they don't. We, and that started, and I'd ask, you know, look at that, the notes on there from 2025, December of 25, we began that tiered response system. And what that means is that there are times when it's an ambulance only call. There's times it's an engine only call. And then obviously there's plenty of times when it's an engine and an ambulance that responds. And so we're trying to look at the system and make the efficiency of that system as well, because I know we've gotten challenged even, you know, from the, The ambulance side, when we have a larger accident, do we need multiple units going code three down the roadway? And the answer is no. We should be trying to maximize that efficiency so that we're reducing that risk to the responders and the community. And so some of that tiered response is designed to do that. Is it perfect? No. And we're still working through some of the hiccups. And some of those challenges is through the PRCC, the dispatch center. trying to work with them on those protocols. So that is a work in progress. But what you can see from the 2026, we've actually been able to reduce the average call volume right now through that system. The calls are still coming in, but we're trying to divide up that workload. And so you don't have a fire truck going to every call. when it may be an ambulance-only call. And so those calls are being picked up by our rescues, but they're also being picked up by the partner agencies as well. So that, I think, has been a good improvement to the system, and we'll continue to try to refine it as we move forward.

Yes, sir? Yeah? Sorry to be the guy, but anyway, like... planning for let's say the worst case scenario we have a very large wildland fire that's threatening a lot of houses and stuff and then you have over at the airport you have an airliner come in and have a crash landing where most of the people need medical aid they're not all killed there a lot of victims and and you see you have something like that what is our mutual aid or do we have agreements with all the adjoining areas for mutual aid

For that fire response, you're saying? Or something like that. Yes. Yes. So we have automatic aid with the city of Prescott. And what that means is that, let's say we burn down one of the largest structures in the middle of Prescott Valley. they're coming because we call them. So with the city of Prescott, we have an agreement that when we call, they will come. And then they respond, backfill their own agency as they need. And so that's a very important distinction when we talk with them about mutual aid. Because mutual aid then at that point is a request for that assistance. So we do have mutual aid with all the other partner agencies around the community, including Williamson Valley, Mayor, Any other actually, you know community, but also statewide. So there's statewide mutual aid system. So when you think about like the legato fire that we had, we had units from Camp Verde, Clarkdale, Copper Canyon, which is that the Verde Valley area. We had even, I think, a Phoenix crew that had come up during that time. So yes, for something like that, we don't have the resources to handle that. And even on the ambulance side, there are agreements that even they can utilize to help bring up additional ambulances in the system as well, including those ambulances, you know, from Phoenix, Mesa, some of those same groups that operate their own ambulances, they are part of that same statewide mutual aid system. So that becomes, like you say, a much bigger call, more than we can handle, and then we have to start utilizing the resources outside of our area.

Thank you very much.

Just in terms of regional collaboration, we continue, we try to put up like a regional EMS collaboration group or coordination group. And again, let's just try to continue to act as good partners because I will be remiss to say that this was just a streamlined process with a CLN ambulance. There was challenges throughout it. And so obviously. We want to be a good partner. We want to be an agency that supports the best service we can provide. And so some of that is making sure that we're collaborating. And so we have an EMS coordination group that gets together with those partner agencies to try to address those items that need to be addressed. And so that we, again, provide the best service we can provide. And it's the same kind of avenue that we have even with the city of Prescott. So we work with the city of Prescott and we have regional meetings because we don't always get along with the city of Prescott, but we want to respond well. And so how do we handle those differences? And it's collaborating in those meetings and figuring out how do we take positive steps forward in the best interest of the community. So again, kind of to your point, some of this is also about disasters because we look at this time of year And obviously, we're very expectant of fires right now. And if we have a significant fire, we don't have the resources to just handle ourselves. It's no different than on the EMS side, the ambulance side. We definitely rely on our partner agencies to support that. With that, yeah, I don't have any more specific items. I would just turn it over to, obviously we had some questions. If there's any further questions, you're welcome to answer those.

Chief, I have a few questions. I appreciate the presentation. One of the reasons why I put this on the agenda was because we had some concerns from some residents they reached out in regards to just response times and how that process works. So I thought it'd be a good opportunity for you to let council know, so then we can report back to the residents. I know in a car crash, if a vehicle needs to be towed, we have a rotation of tow truck drivers, considering there's multiple tow truck companies. How does that relate to being multiple ambulance companies? How is that set in regards to who responds to which call? Absolutely.

So it's a good question. And again, some of that is trying to figure out how do we utilize the three providers in the area, obviously us being one of them. And so the way it works right now within the there's there's kind of two separate areas. The city of Prescott has an agreement with AMR. And so AMR is the priority provider within the city of Prescott. And so is responding to those calls. If there is, you know, I think it's larger than 10 minutes. Then it's the closest unit available at that point, and that's similar in the Prescott Valley, Chino Valley. The areas were large kafma. Same concept, however, with priority ambulance and obviously our own CAFMA ambulance. So that is done through the PRCC. And we continue to kind of identify some challenges related to that. So we'll continue to work with PRCC. But again, some of that is trying to use that coordination group. The goal is closest unit, but how do we utilize that closest unit? And so there's been, you know, looking at for emergent calls. So that on those emergent calls, it is closest unit regardless of that banner. And obviously, I think that's the goal we're working towards. But it's, again, how do we accomplish that in that process?

Because I think the biggest challenge, I mean, that 25 minutes probably seems like an eternity to someone that fell down and broke their leg or something. So that's certainly concerning. I just want to make sure that at the end of the day, I don't think I think someone that falls and say hurts themselves, they don't care what name is on the side of that ambulance. They just want the first one to come to them as quickly as possible. And I just I want to make sure that our residents know that that is what our goal is, that this is what happens, whether if there's a person right across the street, if there's one ambulance across the street and can get there within 20 seconds. I would rather that happen than, well, this other ambulance, if they can get there in nine minutes, technically that's who we use. So is that where we're at? Is that? No, not where we're at.

You know, for emergent calls.

Can you describe an emergent call? Like what is, to me, if I fell and broke my leg, that's an emergent call, but that might not be what you think is.

Absolutely. No, I agree with you. And so some of that is through the dispatch pro QA and the protocol within there and what gets determined as that emergent or non-emergent. And from me to you, that's exactly where I'd like to be. However, right now, the response is gonna be greater than 10 minutes, then it's the closest unit. That's the protocol within PRCC, within the Prescott Valley area. And I do wanna make an important distinction that that is the same agreement that is in with the city of Prescott as well. AGAIN, TRYING TO FIGURE OUT HOW DO WE UTILIZE THE AGENCIES THAT WE HAVE TO THE BEST OF OUR ABILITY. WHAT I WOULD LOVE TO SEE IS THAT ALL AGENCIES ARE DISPATCHED AT A PRCC AND IT'S VERY CLEARLY IN THERE. AND I THINK, YOU KNOW, I THINK THAT'S A GOOD GOAL THAT WE'LL CONTINUE TO WORK TOWARDS BECAUSE I THINK THAT HELPS THE MOST ON HOW DO WE UTILIZE THOSE RESOURCES THE BEST. BECAUSE WITH ANYTHING ELSE, SOMETIMES THERE'S A CHALLENGE OF WHERE DO YOU PLACE THOSE UNITS. WE'VE DEALT WITH THAT IN THE CHINO VALLEY AREA WITH THE OTHER PROVIDER THAT'S OUT THERE PRIORITIZING NOW COPPER STATES. We put it at a station. They moved those ambers right next to the station. And so then that challenge, that kind of the response area a little bit. So trying to work with them, you know, again, the groups to try to, what is the, how can we provide the best service? And I'll tell you, that's the goal. Again, to your point, we're still working that direction and hopefully we can get there.

Gotcha. Is there a way to make, because what happens in Prescott happens in Prescott. Is there a way to make our protocol here in Prescott Valley that no matter what time, it's the closest ambulance? Is that a possibility? Is that something that you guys could all work together in the sandbox, get with the dispatch and be like, hey, new rule in Prescott Valley, no matter what, we can see where each ambulance is on the screen. We just send whoever it is.

Yeah, I think it's absolutely something that's possible. And again, I think to your point is that collaboration so that we are working well and we understand what are those parameters to get there.

And I'm just one voice on this dais, but that would be something that we would want to see, Councilman.

Yeah, I think that's a great idea. I also have a little bit of an unconventional idea that I've seen work very well. And that is that they have in areas where there's traffic congestion, like, for example, you have a road and it blocks up because of the crash and now the ambulance can't get through. So what I've seen is that they have paramedic motorcycles. They have like a BMW with the boxes and they have an automatic defibrillator. They have oxygen. They have, you know, cervical collars, trauma kits, you know, ability to stop bleeding and splint so that they can stabilize a patient while they're waiting for the ambulance. And those turned out to about half cut the response time in half. Sure.

Yeah. If you tell some of our firefighters, they get to ride a motorcycle and, uh, Certainly love that. But I appreciate the point. Right. Yeah. How do we provide how to provide the service during not to interrupt? Please keep going. Sorry.

Yeah. Well, you know, I was a first responder myself. I was a wilderness EMT and for a large sheriff's department. And, you know, we used to respond sometimes to incidents that. If we were close, we would respond individually with the kit that we had in our vehicle to stabilize the patient, establish an airway, get them, you know, do CPR or whatever before the ambulance arrived. And that's just something that, you know, I think that maybe trying out one paramedic motorcycle wouldn't be a bad idea. Thank you. Yeah, no, I appreciate the information.

Chief, we have three ambulances providers here. I think one is, do we have two providers, other providers out in the audience? Anyone else here? Sir, you want to come down for a moment. I'd love to just hear, just if you would interject a little bit, if logistically what we talked about with the closest ambulance in Prescott Valley, is that, maybe that's not even possible. You can pick whatever, you can go this side next to the chief. I just want to make sure it's logistically possible. I didn't know if our ambulance company or if our dispatch works that way or if it doesn't work, or do you have the technology in all the ambulances? Can we see them all? Is that something that you can weigh in on if you can just state your name and who you're with and I just didn't know if it was a dispatch issue. At the end of the day, folks, I just want to make sure that we are making sure that the quickest ambulance can get to a patient as fast as possible. That's all I'm trying to say. I just want to know if that's possible.

Good afternoon, Mayor, Vice Mayor, and Council. My name is John Valentine. I'm with White Pine Ambulance, and I'm here to answer questions.

I just want to know, are the ambulances that you have, are they capable of being seen by Prescott Dispatch, or how does that work?

They are. PRCC sees all of our ambulances that sit in theater. We went to great extents with CAFMA and with Prescott to make sure that the PRCC has visibility. We are dispatched out of the Phoenix area, but we put an extensive system in called a CAD to CAD link that allows them very rapidly to transfer calls to us almost within seconds, and they can see our units. They can see their status, they can see where they sit.

So all ambulances are seen by the dispatch at the same time. And then they can say, well, this one's right down the street. We can just send them. That's possible.

It's possible, yes. Yeah. They should even actually get a CAD recommendation. Depending on the protocol that's been put in place, either by the fire chief or by the PRCC, should give them a protocol. That would dictate that a unit would be assigned based on a protocol or its closest resource.

So is that a dispatch policy or is that a... Fire Department, what policy is that?

So this was something that was implemented a while back. It is, right now, it's a protocol within PRCC for that, what we currently have with priority. And again, some of that is to try to support the system. Again, it requires exactly what you've said is good collaboration. And, you know, I think certainly we can get there. We want to do that across the board. But some of it is trying to make sure how do we are placing those units? How are they again? How are they responding? Obviously, we strategically place stations. We strategically place resources. And I think that same consideration should be in there. We even move resources with that same consideration. And where do we move those resources based on the current call volume? And so I think if we can certainly get, you know, that part of the system in play, then, yeah, I think this is definitely the direction we would like to go. But again, it comes down to how are we playing in that sandbox and making sure that we're all understanding, like, here's the goal.

Gotcha. Because everyone, I'm sure we're all on agreement. It's just customer service is what we're trying to provide them. Yeah. As quickly and as safely as possible. And if you guys can do that, if you can get together and solidify some sort of Policy for Prescott Valley, at least so I can say to the residents. Yes, I guarantee if something goes wrong. If that ambulance is across the street, they went on lunch break or whatever, and they hear a call. They're going to go. They're not. You're not going to wait 10 minutes. For another ambulance. That's something we can all agree on. Sure. That's that would be terrific.

So we, we get the same questions. We have 2 stations located here. We're staff of paramedics. We get the same questions from the constituents and even our employees. Why ambulances are coming from farther away. We spent. THREE YEARS IN BITTER LITIGATION BACK AND FORTH ON CLOSEST AMBULANCE. WE WANT A CON SO WE CAN PROVIDE THIS SERVICE. WE'VE ATTEMPTED FOR MONTHS AND MONTHS AND YEARS TO TRY TO GET CLOSEST AMBULANCE POST CON. AND I DON'T SEE WHAT THE COMPLICATION IS. IT'S A FLIP OF A SWITCH. IT'S A CHANGE OF A PROTOCOL. AND WE HAVE CLOSEST AMBULANCE HERE. I don't understand the issues.

I appreciate just the willingness of everyone to get in the same room and just say, hey, this is what we got to do just to make it happen. Because like I said, no one cares what's on the side of the ambulance. The AAA taxi could show up. As long as that person can get to the hospital, that's what we're trying to do.

No, I agree. And again, I think it's important to remember how we got here. Which, if you go back into the challenges we faced, we had resources waiting on scene much greater than 25 minutes for resources because of the challenges during that time. And everybody was facing that same challenge, staffing, all there. And so trying to look at how do we bring resources into the area. And I'll tell you the response in this area. is much better than it ever has been. And obviously we can continue to improve it, to your point, but we didn't just get here overnight. And so I was trying to make sure, from my perspective, that we have something sustainable well into the future. And again, we're not just supporting today's needs, but how do we continue to support the future growth and the needs there?

No, and I appreciate CACMA recognizing the need, and they were trying to fix it, again, to provide good customer service. And I think we can just kind of tweak it a little bit more than... All the residents will benefit from it. So if you guys, I'll leave it up to the experts. You guys work it out with dispatch and representative from the other ambulance company. That'd be great. And if we can get an update back in a couple months, that would be amazing because it does come up probably once or twice a month. I hear from a resident in reference response times, and they just don't understand. Like you said, they just don't get it. They're just a little worried about it.

So there are some pretty significant. Very high level calls that have been bypassed. In recent times that are not that are not good and the chief and I've talked about this and it doesn't pass the stiff enough sniff test with. With the constituents out there that we delay ambulance responses on very critical cardiac arrest calls and other calls that are out there. So we definitely want to work with to remedy this. I, I don't see that being that big about a lift and I think it could be.

um done very easy so more than willing to work from our side awesome so if you guys can just keep us all posted that'd be awesome yeah absolutely thank you guys thank you all right moving on to item 2b central arizona fire medical iga

Mayor, Vice Mayor, and Council Members, John Jacobson, Principal Planner. I'd just like to simply recognize Chief Fetterman's efforts on this IGA and his staff. I know it's very rigorous. I'd also like to recognize town staff that have been intimately involved, management, legal, and to let you know if there are any questions outside of legal and management issues. We have a representative here from Building Safety, Russ Harsh. Say that three times fast. He's here to answer any questions if you have on the IGA. With that, I'll turn it over to Chief.

All right, and I'm back. Different topic. So the IGA was something that has come up for a while. We do have a number of agreements with the town of Prescott Valley for a number of different services. And I'll give you a couple examples. We have an agreement for SWAT medics. And so with the Prescott Valley Police Department, we have a SWAT medic, and so there's an agreement on how that works. We also have an agreement with the IT department for CAFMA and the Prescott Valley PD for radios and infrastructure related to their system so when we went through our accreditation process recently one of the things that came out of that process was they recommended that we do a better job streamlining our agreements and rather than having a lot of different you know agreements with the same agency we have one standardized IGA with multiple addendums. And when I spoke with Gilbert about this concept, obviously he was very supportive and wanted to make that the next step related to streamlining these agreements so that way we can make sure they're tracked. When we looked at some of these agreements, we have an agreement from the 1980s related to just CYFD and their response in the community. And so some of these obviously have expired and are of no value. And so it's just trying to streamline this process. And Stacey and Development Services have done a great job because we're also looking at updating the agreement, just the process that we utilize within the town for plans, plans reviews on our side, And so, again, it's just trying to streamline those, bring those into one IGA with multiple addendums. And we're going to take this concept and try to move to Yavapai County because we have numerous agreements with Yavapai County, Chino Valley, Dewey Humboldt. Because we cover a larger area than just Prescott Valley, we have the same challenge that we have exists for multiple other agencies. so we're trying to utilize uh prescott valley as that starting point on putting this together some of this relates to fire code as well as we just recently did the fire code adoption how does that impact the town of prescott valley and our working relationship with the town and the town staff so with that i'll answer any questions or if there's more you need any questions for the chief

Mr. Mayor, members of the Council, we'll be, so we've got more work to do on this IGA, but we'll be bringing that back to Council probably after the summer recess and we'll be before you for consideration. But I think it's going to be a monumental thing in terms of just kind of that cleanup from past years, have one comprehensive document. And what I really appreciate is on the the Review side of it, just, you know, kind of the relationship that we have as projects come through development services and then need to be passed on to CAFMA for review. And what is that exchange and how we can work together to again, make sure they have good customer service. So we're not as one government saying. Oh, that's not us. You need to go down the street and talk to them. They make a change and then it comes back to us. And then we say. Oh, now you they change this. So now we're going to make you change something else. We want to be very well coordinated and how we're managing and helping to support businesses and people that are going through a development process. Thank you, sir. Thanks chief.

Yep. Next up item to see. Welcome, sir.

Again, for the record, mayor, vice mayor, council members, John Jacobson, principal planner here at the town. I'd like to share with you, you might remember the Urban Land Institute ESTAP program, the status of that and a lot of the primary outcomes. If you remember the final report, summary report from ULI is in your packet. And I invite you along the way here, don't hesitate to interrupt, ask questions. What I'd like to do is step through these three areas. One is just a reminder of the program and of the organization, ULI. Then we'll talk a little bit about the summary report, the final report, and rather than go through the details again, I'm going to focus on the recommendations. If there's anything else that you'd like to talk about within the report, feel free. And lastly, looking at next steps, I want to share with you that the staff already, upon receipt of this final report, has put together a draft strategic plan that you might have seen in the packet. So we'll step through that as well. So first, ULI ASTAP program. Again, just as a quick reminder who ULI is, they're a 501c nonprofit, and they focus on research, education, organizational support, which we're on the receiving end of of this program. 95 countries worldwide, very influential. Happens to be that the ULI Arizona District Council is one of the largest and most influential. So we are benefiting from that and having worked down the valley for decades and been involved, not only influential, but very knowledgeable and can guide development, smart development. So we appreciate that. And we sought out ULI for this program for some of those reasons. The program's specifically comprehensive, pragmatic approach to complex land use and development. Panels is comprised of distinguished experts, which includes, as you'd expect, land use planning, infill and adaptive reuse, creative placemaking, economic development, real estate development, and transportation. The area, study area you see here, and it was interesting as we worked through the scope and this process, and I'll explain that as we move along, the yellow line that you see was a previously established opportunity zone. I won't get into the definition of that, but that was one thing we identified not only to be consistent with that definition in that area as a focus. But in addition to that, as we work through this, I would call it the nucleus or the primary area would be the blue outline, what we call the downtown core. And with that, we still recognize the impact beyond these limits. And as you'd imagine, that was all considered as part of this process. So the process, we started out, we formed this partnership, we worked through a scope, We really worked with them closely to clearly understand what the benefits, what their services offered. Things change over time. Though we had worked with them in the past, we worked through that, formed an agreement. Once we did that, to really nail down the scope specifically for the town of Prescott Valley, what they had is a boilerplate list of questions, very rigorous. We worked cross-departmental. This was not contained to... specifically development services. We work with different departments, economic development, Parks and Rec and other departments. So that was part of the question and answer. And that was all to get to, as I mentioned, specific scope for Prescott Valley. And we were clear about that. We did not want to get into a situation where they had boilerplate, and I knew they didn't, but we still had to go through that rigor to get to our scope and what was important to us as a town. Once we got through that to find the scope, then they endeavored to identify stakeholders, which you see in the report. In addition to that, we gave them more information historically, I think, than they anticipated. But we spent a lot of time digging on past plans, past research. We wanted the best outcome. We wanted them to have all the information that we could find. We were in Les Affiches. I mean, we were in paper plans down in the basement, pulling things up, and all that was to give them that data again to make sure this was specific to our area. The panel discussion October 6th, and I'll get into more of the details of that, but what they do is they come for the day and we do some activities, and that leads us to this year, February, where the final report was delivered. The panel day specifically, after stakeholder interviews, after going through all of the data that we had given them, and part of that, they had questions after the data to get clarification. But the real focus of this panel day, it's interesting, it's a full day. And it starts out, we meet here outside. Thank Tracy Lira, recognize her. She really logistically recognized put together, getting folks here and arranging transportation. We all get in a van, did a tour of the town. Tracy laid all that out. We talked about it cross-departmental before the panel arrived. And what was interesting about that, so we toured town, had great dialogue. They had questions, some of it born out of the previous research. But what I had learned in that was that many of the panel members had taken it upon themselves to come up here and in person, walk around, talk to citizens. So it was encouraging that they had done their homework and come here in preparation for this panel day. So the tour happens and we come back, have some discussion, question and answer. And what they do is we go away as staff and they close door with all the information they have. You can see the flip charts here with their experience. And they talk about everything that they have in front of them. They make recommendations within themselves. Then they call us back at the end of the day and staff goes in. They give us a quick brief. Hey, this is what we did and very high level, but gives us an indication of where they're headed and they're looking for quick feedback. So if they touch on something and for whatever reason, we as a group say, you know, that's not as important as we thought it was. Now that we talk about it, they give us that opportunity before they launch into preparing this So now we'll move on to the recommendations. And again, I'll cherry pick a couple of things out, but certainly jump in if you have identified something through the packet or as we talk through this. But you can see in the report, these are the headings under the recommendations section. The triangular area that you see, they identified that within this downtown core, that there are three anchors that really define a space that we should consider as a low hanging fruit and then dig into, okay, within this area, what priorities should we be thinking about? And that triangle you see is anchored to the southwest with the downtown core. to the north of what they're calling the municipal complex, and then to the east is the dignity health. This is a continuation of the recommendations list. And like I said, to give you an example of how We get into the details on each of these items. One example is what you see here on the right. It's a very simplistic graphic that's in the report that you may have seen. And what I'd like to do is call out the yellow, I'm sorry, the green line. Well, to get you oriented, or folks that are listening, if you see that arch, that's Skoug Boulevard that you may be familiar with. And then to the radius point that goes north-south, that's Valley Road, so to get you oriented. The Green Line is interesting. They got into enough detail that they recommended a pedestrian connectivity. And what that accomplishes is, just by definition, connecting, in this case, Dignity Health, the Municipal Complex, the Liberty School, and you see it circles around. Now, one of the things that was talked about was, you know, what's the value of that? We have trails, we have sidewalks, but we talk about this connectivity, and if you think about, and I'm sure you've observed, people get in this climate, people get out here on campus, Lunchtime, before work, after work, walk, get exercise. If you've ever walked down Valley Road, you probably didn't do it a second time without a sidewalk and the way people drive down there. So what this would do is take it out of that right-of-way, be closer to Dignity Health. And then through the municipal complex, we called it and completely loops around. One of the things I've been involved in design projects in the past where, you know, to add value to that specific alignment and use, we could look at. INTERPRETIVE SIGNAGE, FOR EXAMPLE. WE COULD DO A TIMELINE. PEOPLE COULD BE EDUCATED ON THE HISTORY OF PRESCOTT VALLEY. WE COULD METER IT SO PEOPLE THAT WALK AND ARE CONCERNED OR WANT TO TRACK HOW FAR THEY WALK, YOU METER IT AND PUT DISTANCES ON THERE. THEY KNOW WHERE THEY START. SO ADD A LEVEL OF INTEREST. AND THERE COULD BE STATIONS WHERE WE POINT OUT WHAT'S THE WILDLIFE IN PRESCOTT VALLEY AND START TO EDUCATE PEOPLE IN INTERPRETIVE. AND WHAT WE'VE SEEN IS THAT ADDS VALUE. not only residents, but visitors alike. So that's one example of the level of detail that we were able to get to in a very short period of time. And again, next steps. We've already had multiple meetings with town management, town staff, and we took that information that you saw in the report and on those flip charts and really digested it and started to think about, okay, we're going to use this as a stepping off point. And what are our priorities? How do our Previously imagined priorities align with recommended priorities. So we've gone ahead and now this is a draft. This kind of gives you a peek behind the curtain on a working document. So keep that in mind. We're looking at a two year plan. And we divided into tiers to start to give duration of some of these efforts. We have assigned dates to them. Again, this is a draft. We built in flexibility depending on funding, budget, workload, capacity, all the things that you'd expect to help make our decisions on how to prioritize and when we can pull the trigger on some of these efforts. The reason I mentioned the tiers What I'm showing you here, there are 11 items that we identified initially in this draft. Here are the first five. I won't get into the details, but what you can see is it's not completely a copy and paste from their recommendations. Like I said, we've had multiple meetings internally and said, okay, within this priority that they've identified, how does that dovetail with our desires? And a little more detail. So that's what you'll see on these items on the left. And these are the first five. And for example, the walking path that I described is actually contained within one of these items. It's not a separate item. Can we pull that out if we identify that, as I said, as low hanging fruit? You know, we'll have a methodology of how we define that. It's not just cost. What's the value? What's the return on our investment? And to be clear, the return on investment is not contained to dollars and cents. It's the quality of life, the value, some of the things I described briefly on that walking path. We've also, as part of that, have talked at length about community engagement plans. So we are not going to do this in a vacuum. If we identify this path as the same example, we are not going to just forge ahead with it without a very rigorous community engagement. PLAN THAT WE'RE WORKING ON IN GENERAL. WE HAVE SEVERAL PLANS THAT WE'VE KIND OF IDENTIFIED CONCEPTUALLY DEPENDING ON THE APPLICATION. SO FOR EXAMPLE, ON COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT, I DON'T WANT TO GET OFF ON TOO MUCH OF A TANGENT, BUT TO LET YOU KNOW, WE'RE ENDEAVORING TO DO THAT AS WELL. IF WE HAVE A PLANNING PROJECT COME IN, THAT'S A DIFFERENT COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT PLAN THAT WE WOULD APPLY THAN A wildlife corridor. That's a different community engagement plan for something like this. There's a third community engagement plan. They're all a little bit different depending on the application. That's something we're working through as well. Be happy to answer any questions. Questions, comments for John.

Thank you, John, for a good presentation. You know, whether we plan for the future or not, it's going to get here. And it's commendable to start getting serious about planning for the future. I want to give an example. Visualize the planners in Las Vegas 100 years ago. I'll bet they didn't envision what it became. And so it's very hard. It's like we don't have, unfortunately, we don't have the best crystal balls to anticipate where everything's going to go. And I think but I think there's a common thread, and that is, of course, Las Vegas is running out of water and our water is threatened as well. I think we need to always keep that in the back of our mind when we're planning things. And I think we actually should try to plan further out, even like 25, 50 years out at 100. Historically, almost every time planners try to hit 100 years, it almost always doesn't turn out that way. Right. So I'm not sure about planning 100, but it helps to dream and envision things. And to have and to set goals because if you don't you're just wandering around like being in a lifeboat without a rudder Eventually, you know, it's just not not the way to do it. So I commend these things I would like to drill down further eventually and finding the some of the specifics of these mentions here these asks But I think it's it's an overall. It's a good thing. Thank you.

Thank you if I could add to that I'm in agreement with you and some of us you know, in our travels may have heard from people, whether it's citizens or peers or coworkers, you know, why make a plan because it never works out? And, you know, I'm just not conditioned that way professionally that a plan is something to deviate from. Agreed. I will agree to that every day. But it's a plan. It's a roadmap to head somewhere. It's not written in stone, but it gives us information, that data we all collected on this particular project. So I would just say that I'm in agreement with the thought of planning. I HAVE TO BE, I'M A PRINCIPAL PLANNER.

I LIKE PLANNING AS WELL, AND I DO APPRECIATE THAT THIS AREA WAS LOOKED AT AS FAR AS ECONOMIC RETURN ON INVESTMENT, COMMUNITY HEALTH, THAT IS A GOOD PLACE TO BE FOCUSING ALL OF THIS PROJECT ON BETWEEN DIGNITY AND THE LIBRARY. THANK YOU.

AND THE AREAS, COUNCILMAN Keel, I didn't, again, in the interest of time, you'll see in the report that the concept of creating districts, you know, with their own identity makes this connectivity even more valuable and more important, you know, with different kind of visual identity in addition to the function. So that's another part of kind of the planning.

John, like you said, it's a blueprint. I call it a blueprint. You call it a roadmap. Same thing. You got to start somewhere. And this is a great opportunity for us to just envision the future, get people involved and excited for what the future holds.

And I can tell you, in addition to that, we talk an awful lot about grants, you know, budgets tight. This was a recovery fee, very minimal. If you look at the professionals that were involved, that's one reason we identified it. But currently, as of this week, we're chasing a grant to help supplement the wildlife corridor efforts. So that's all a part of this as well. We recognize how important that is to get these things moved forward. We can't just rely on the town budget. So we recognize that.

Great. Glad to hear it. One more short question. The green line on the map, was that intended to be like a multi-use path or something else? A multi-use path, correct. Thank you. That's all.

Seeing nothing else, meeting adjourned.

Thank you.