City Council - Special Meeting

Thanks for having me here. So starting with Gayatri mantra, which is the most considered the most sacred mantra of Hinduism, I shall be reading from ancient Hindu scriptures, some as old as 1,500 BCE, and then interpret in English. May all rise, please. We meditate on the transcendental glory of of the deity supreme who's inside the heart of the earth, inside the life of the sky, and inside the soul of the heaven. May he stimulate and illuminate our minds.

Lead us from the unreal to the real. Lead us from darkness to light. Lead us from death to immortality. Strive constantly to serve the welfare of the world. By devotion to selfless, one attain the supreme goal of life.

Do your work with the welfare of others always in mind. May we be protected together. May we be nourished together. May we work together with great vigor. May our study be enlightening.

May no obstacle arise between us. Samnivakutti, Samna Hiryaniva, Samna Mastuva Mano, Yatha Vasu Sahasti. United your resolve, united your hearts, may your spirits be at one that you may long together dwell in unity and conquer. Om shanti shanti shanti. Peace peace peace be unto all.

Thank you. Please be seated.

Thank you so much, Rajan.

Thanks, Rajan.

We'll now have the pledge of allegiance by councilor Bogdan.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of The United States Of America and to the republic for which it stands, a nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Next, we're going to a ceremony recognizing the spring twenty twenty six Probology graduates. And Probology is one of the greatest things that Provo does. And I'll present it by Scott Henderson, our chief administrative officer.

Thank you, chair McKay, counsel, and mayor Judkins. Tonight, I will be presenting and congratulating the Provology spring twenty twenty six graduates. This group of citizens has an unparalleled passion for Provo and and have been a joy for me to spend the last eleven weeks with. I'd like to give a quick shout out to our great department presenters whose passion for their work was on full display during this semester. I want to take thank Chantel in the mayor's office for her next level of provology communications and her organization.

This year, we changed things up a little bit to create more experience based learning in provology. This group stood on the tarmac watching planes take off and land, experienced the raw power of electricity, received all access tours at the wastewater treatment plant, library, city hall, recreation center, and the Covey Center. The photos are scrolling as we speak of some of these experience. I told them weekly they are the most intelligent and best looking profology class ever. If I could ask at this point for the mayor and council chair to join me for the reading of the names.

And to graduates, if you'll come forward when your name is read, we ask that graduates stay at the front for a class photo with the mayor and the council, and then there'll be a post ceremony meal which will follow in the community room right across the hall. So, Kevin, hit it.

I will hand it over to you over to William. You want to see what you think about it? All right. Ben

Rhodes.

Denia Olerton?

Stay up here for a picture.

Yeah. We're still

Have to shake up. Nice try, though.

Roger Olerton. Charity Kotem. Aaron Alt. Sydney West. Kelly Oller?

Jose Bermudez and his wife, Cassandra Bermudez. Joshua Jensen?

Caitlin Felstead.

Ethan Unclesby? Randy Burrell. Dalen Lo. Blake Snow. Lindsay Snow.

Ginny Maile Pence. Ethan? Alright. Ethan ibilsby.

Thanks for the help.

I now present to you the spring twenty twenty six provology class. Let's get pictures with council and mayor now, so stay where you're at. Yeah. Squeeze in as close as you can.

Everyone's inside.

That's why we still like each other.

And for those of you that don't know, there is a police academy, which is also awesome. So if you're getting the bug in a cup you know, if you get bored, go do the police academy with Provo, please. Alright. Next, we will have a ceremony recognizing the Provo City employee of the month, Parks and Rec, and this will be presented by our Brad Rainey, our director of Parks and Rec. And this is our first time having our new Parks and Rec director present to us.

So welcome.

Good

evening, mayor and council. I'm Brad Rainey, parks recreation director, and I have, Bobby Randall here with me. And before I read this, I just wanna recognize Bobby's family is here to support her and want to thank them for, sharing Bobby with us and allowing her to spend her time with us, and also like to invite them up for a picture afterwards with the council. So it's an honor to recognize Bobby Randall, senior accounting technician, as Provo City's employee of the month for April 2026. A proud Provo native, Bobby joined our parks and recreation department in 2015.

Over the last decade, she has become the backbone of our administration team, ensuring the department's diverse financial operations from budget monitoring and expenditure tracking to preparation of our capital improvement plan, run with absolute precision and responsibility. In an apartment as complex as Parks and Recreation, we rely on professionals who serve as trusted stewards of public funds. Bobby's integrity and meticulous attention to detail help prevent errors and support the informed, effective decision making that benefits all Provo residents. Her character is such that when her office was relocated to the recreation center years ago, her former colleagues made it clear she was missed, a sentiment of respect that continues across all department management today. Bobby's technical expertise has been vital during critical transition.

When the city moved to a complex new financial software system, Bobby Bobby did not just adapt adapt, she mastered the platform and became a key trainer for staff across the entire city. Furthermore, during our recent national accreditation review, Bobby's preparation and presentation of our financial standards helped department earn a nearly perfect score, a testament to her high professional standards. Outside of the office, Bobby pursues her lifelong passion for bowling with the same focus she brings to work. She has distinguished herself as an elite competitor and leader, having achieved the rare feat of bowling a perfect game not just once, but twice. Beyond her personal success, she has organized leagues and tournaments across Utah and the surrounding states, even leading teams to national championship competitions.

On behalf of the Parks and Recreation Department, it is a privilege to present this award to Bobby Randall. We are deeply grateful for her professionalism, her commitment to excellence, and her unwavering dedication to serving the needs residents of Provo. Congratulations, Bobby, on this well deserved recognition as the April 2026 Employee of the Month. Come up front.

Alright. One two three, Bobby. Okay. Then I'm gonna get her one closer. We'd also like to recognize that counselor Jeff Whitlock is online with us today.

As indicated on the screen, a required public hearing will be held for certain agenda items prior to council action. After each such item has been presented, time to comment will be provided for all those who wish to speak. For items that do not require a public hearing, public comment will still be taken following presentation of the item but will be limited to ten minutes. Please note that item six on the agenda will be continued to a future council meeting and will not receive public comment in today's meeting. At this time, up to fifteen minutes have been set aside for an open public comment period, which is intended to allow comment on matters that do not appear on the agenda, but are limited to topics regarding municipal business or within municipal council purview.

Persons who speak during this time to an item that is on the agenda will not normally be afforded a second opportunity to speak during the comment period specific to that item. During any public comment period, each speaker will generally be limited to two minutes. Due to noticing requirements, no formal action will be taken in this meeting on matters that do not appear on the agenda. Those with comments are invited to approach the podium. Those participating on Zoom will need to raise hand feature to indicate they wish to comment. The chair may choose to alternate between in person and online commenters. Please begin your comments by stating your name and your city of residence. You will have two minutes to speak. Is there anyone who wants to do public comment today? Seeing no public comment, we'll move on to our council business.

First, a public hearing to solicit input on the twenty twenty six twenty seven annual action plan. This will be presented by Melissa McNally, our community grants administrator.

Thank you. Good evening. So this is just a public hearing asking for input from our residents and anybody within the Utah Valley Home Consortium to add their thoughts or any changes they'd like to see in our annual action plan, which is the plan that we put together each year for our HUD programs. So this is for CDBG and HOME funding and the ways in which we anticipate using that funding within the within the 2627 program year. Do we have the yeah.

Perfect. Thanks, Kevin. Kevin. So there is a draft available online on the Provo City website, and here is the QR code to access that. There is a place to comment on the website, and comments are also welcome through email and phone or through mail, and all of that information, the contact information to do those are in the annual action plan.

Thanks, Melissa. A lot of us did sit through a lot of the public meetings and discussion that went on with this over the last few months. Are there any questions for Melissa? Alright. This item is open up for public comment. Is there any public comment on this item? Seeing no public comment, we'll move to council discussion. Alright. And we do not need to vote on this, so we're good. Thanks. This is just for we had to do another announcement in public input. Alright. Next, an implied motion on a resolution of many of the council audit committee charter and internal audit charter. And this was presented by Tanner Takuchi, and he is our council policy analyst.

Thank you, council. During this item, this was heard in a work meeting, two weeks ago, and it pertains to amendments, text changes that will be made to the council audit charter council audit committee charter and internal audit charter. Those were created by resolution, and there's no code effect that this decision will have today. But just to explain a little bit of what the changes are being made to these charters, this is a summary of what is being changed in the council audit committee charter. If And I can just go through and explain a little bit of why this is important.

Our current structure right now is set up more in terms of how a auditing function would work in a business, in a company. We use the terms external to refer to things that are primarily financial in nature and internal to refer to things as more of a internal quality assurance and advice for procedures and processes. Our government, the way it's set up, is structured more like the state in the sense that there are external audits that can be either financial or performance based or process based, and then there can be internal ones of both financial and, process based, audits as well. And so we're just changing that vernacular from referring to external and internal to financial and performance in the audit charter. So it's a little bit easier to understand for the layperson.

There was some comments brought up by councilor Hobin last time about the term performance auditing and that it might limit our ability to audit certain things. I included a definition in the council audit committee charter of what performance auditing means. This comes from a very established source, Salinas Knighton, who is one of the original performance auditors about what is contained in that. I think that this is pretty broad in its, ability to audit different functions of the city, and we will have no limitations in what we can request of the administration.

K.

What it also does is it makes the composition of the committee more flexible, allowing for fewer or more members of the public or the council as needed. If there are fewer qualified applicants that come from the public, there can be fewer. As it is right now, there has to be two. There's only one currently serving. But if there were to be another interested and qualified person, we could add another as well as another council member as well.

This also designates the council executive director as the chief audit executive who kind of functions as the liaison between the committee and the legislative side of the audit process and then the audit function on the ground itself. I think that the executive director is well suited to this because of their familiarity with government operations and the consistency through, multiple iterations of the council or the committee. Change to the charter also adds a requirement that members of the committee have to receive audit training provided by the office of legislative auditor general. This is probably the I mean, in my experience, the best auditing agency this side of the Mississippi, if not the world. And, they provide valuable insights into what we can do to, properly audit and make sure that we're making impactful recommendations that increase the effectiveness of city functions.

At the request of council members in the last meeting, we added some language that explicitly includes members of the committee in our city's code of ethics and disclosing any conflicts of interest or any family members who may be on the auditee side of our audit function. In terms of the changes to the internal audit charter, just clarifying the process. This graphic here, hopefully, is a simple explanation of how this will work. The director will work with the members of the audit committee to form an audit plan. That is essentially our priorities for what we will audit during a given year.

That will go to the council on a work meeting for approval. And then depending on the contents of that plan, we can either go out to RFP for an outside contractor, outside consulting auditor to come in and do a a sweeping structural audit, or council staff can go in and do a limited review of certain executive functions as well and report on them. And, also, a minor change is it adds explicit steps to, the council committee's response to fraud hotline complaints that are filed through the online portal. That's on the Provo City website. So the only action is to approve the audit charter amendments as they're presented to you. I'm free for any questions.

Thanks, Tanner. Any questions for Tanner? Councilor Gary Garrett.

Tanner, the training you mentioned to so there's that video segment that council members are supposed to review. Is this something beyond that just for the audit committee members on the council?

That's great. Are you referring to the state auditors training? Yes. This would be separate from that. This would be more get more aimed at the audit function itself and not, like, a personal standard of ethics or common.

Okay. So you'll tell us when that's available? Or

Correct. We would we would just, as the council staff, coordinate with the office over there, and we would set up a time zone.

Okay. Thank you.

Alright. Do we have any public comment on this item? K. Seeing no public comment. Council discussion. Any discussion? Alright. We'll take a vote on the motion. Councilor Garrett?

Yes.

Councilor McKay? Yes. Councilor Christensen? Yes. Councilor Whitlock? He's on the line.

Yes.

Councilor Bogdan? Yes. Councilor Holpen is excused. Councilor Whipple? Yes. So that passes six o. Next, resolution appointing public members to the council standing committee. And this will be also presented by Tanner Ticucci.

Hello. Thank you. This this is a related item. As I mentioned, there is currently one member of the public who is agreed to participate again for another term as the citizen member of the audit committee, Rick Anderson. The council has been presented with his credentials, his experience. He was on the audit committee before we made the shift to the council office. He has served, one term on the audit committee, in the council office, and he has an extensive career in banking and finance. So, nothing has changed since my presentation in the work meeting, so please feel free to consider his appointment.

Thanks, Tanner. Any questions for Tanner? Alright. Do you have any council discussion on this item? Alright. We'll move to a vote. Councilor McKay, yes. Councilor Christensen?

Yes.

Councilor Whitlock?

Am I permitted to abstain because I did not, get the information or presentation?

Yep. No problem at all. Councilor Bogdan? Yes. Councilor Holbrens, excuse. Councilor Whipple? Councilor Garrett?

Yes.

So that passes five o. Yeah. With one abstention. Thank you. Alright. Next implied motion on a resolution tentatively adopting a proposed budget for the publicity for the fiscal year beginning 07/01/2026 and ending 06/30/2027. And just for the public's sake, adopting doesn't mean it's not gonna change or it doesn't mean that it's a done deal. It's a long process. It's about the second week in June or or so that we have to have everything finalized and perfect. But this will be presented by Kelsey Zarbach.

Good evening. I'm Kelsey Zarbach, the budget officer for Provo City. Last week, I presented the tentative budget to the council, and tonight's item is simply an acknowledgment that the mayor's proposed budget was given to the council last week. Any questions?

Any questions for Kelsey? Thanks, Kelsey. Do you have any public comment? Any public comment on this item? Alright. Council discussion. Any council discussion? We we've all received our nice printed copies, so thank you. And we will be working through them. We will take a vote on the implied motion. Councilor Christensen?

Yes.

Councilor Whitlock?

Yes.

Councilor Bogdan? Yes. Councilor Holman is excused. Councilor Whipple? Yes. Councilor Garrett?

Yes.

And councilor McKay? Yes. So that passes six o. Next, have adjournment of the municipal council. So if there's no objection, we will now adjourn the municipal council and convene as the storm water service district governing board by unanimous consent. So next, have an applied motion on a resolution tentatively adopting a proposed budget for the Provo City Stormwater Service District for the fiscal year beginning 07/01/2026 and ending 06/30/2027. And again, this will be presented by Kelsey Zarbach.

Thank you. Similar to the Provo City budget item that you just voted on or that the council voted on, the redevelopment agency board can now acknowledge that they received the RDA budget, last Stormwater. Oh, sorry. Is this Stormwater?

Yep.

Yep. Sorry. Stormwater. Got my order mixed up. So, yes, this is for stormwater board to vote and acknowledge that they received that budget last week.

Thanks, Kelsey. Any public comments on this item? Is there any council discussion on this item? Alright. We'll vote on the implied motion. Councilor Whitlock?

Yes.

Councilor Bogdan? Yes. Councilor Holben is excused. Councilor Whipple? Yes. Councilor Garrett?

Yes.

Board member.

Everybody's been a board member. Now board member McKay, yes. Board member Christensen?

Yes.

And that passes six o. If there's no objection, we will now adjourn the storm water service district governing board and convene as the RDA governing board by unanimous consent, and we are all board members.

Right. Implied motion on resolution 10 will be adopting. Kelsey, you're up again. Kelsey Zaierbach, the budget officer.

Thank you. This is the RDA item. So just an acknowledgment that the RDA board received the RDA budget last week. Thank you.

Alright. Any questions for Kelsey? Alright. Any board discussion? In public input. In public comment. K. And any, public comment? Alright. Seeing no public comment, no board discussion, then we'll call for a vote. Gary Garrett? Yes. Catrice McKay?

Yes.

Craig Christensen? Yes. Jeff Whitlock? Yes. Becky Bogdan?

Yes.

Travis Hoban is excused. And Rachel Whipple?

Yes.

Alright. So that is six zero. And we'll now have the adjournment of the RDA Governing Board. If there's no objection, we'll now adjourn the RDA governing board by unanimous consent. Here we go. Thank you for attending.