Council - Special Meeting

Somerton, yes. Can you hold for a moment? Louie needs to say something to you. Is it okay to give him 1 minute, please? Okay. I'm I'm still going to call it to order. Okay. [snorts] Yeah. Yeah. It's Thursday, April 30th, 2026. It's 12:00 p.m. City of Somerton special council meeting. We're going to forego all formalities and can we go straight to to roll call? There's no quorum, mayor, but Okay. Are we expecting another member?

Okay. Yes, Council member Roldan will be logging in right now. Okay.

Okay, mayor. We're ready for roll call. Okay, roll call. Mayor Hattabaugh-Anaya. Present. Vice Mayor Juan Castillo. Council Member Miguel Villalpando. Council Member Luis Galindo. Council Member Jesus Roldan. Council Member Martha Gonzalez. Present. Council Member Lorena Delgadillo. Present. Mayor, you have a quorum. Thank you. We We have one item. Um it's item 3.1, discussion of possible action to approve a request for reduction of the required subdivision one-year warranty assurance monies as requested by Somerton Subdivision Ordinance for the subdivision known as Las Estrellas Unit Number Seven. The property owner is Development Somerton LLC. Good afternoon, mayor and council. Saul Albor, Community Development Director. And yes, the item on on the agenda before you is a request for a reduction of the required one-year um subdivision warranty assurance. The request is by uh Las Estrellas Development Somerton LLC, and the subdivision is for Las Estrellas Unit Number Seven. Mayor and council, the construction of public improvements at Las Estrellas 7 is just about done. It is 95% complete. The only substantial item remaining at the subdivision is the installation of lighting on the pathway along the County 17 Street US Bureau of Reclamation main drain and the lighting in the in the retention basin pathway that was required as part of the conditions of approval for this project. So, we're looking at pedestrian lighting. That's the biggest item remaining. The developer, you may have noticed, has quite a few homes already under

construction. Some of them are very close to a a final approval and they wish to record the plat. They wish to record the plat so that they may proceed with their Department of Real Estate Public Report and subsequently begin sales of homes. In order to record the plat, the developer must complete all the improvements or post assurance for their completion in an amount equal to 100% of the cost. Uh in this case the remaining items that would um that have not been completed equal to $162,812 based on the engineer's cost estimate and the developer has indicated that they wish to record the plat now and post this as an assurance money instead of completing the improvements and then recording the plat. Um Section 10.4 of the subdivision ordinance also requires a one-year warranty for assurance. Sorry, one-year warranty assurance for the repair and maintenance of public improvements to be retained by the city. This warranty the zoning ordinance prescribes to be 10% of the total improvement cost, which in this case for Las Estrellas 7 is 2.7 uh actually 200 Sorry, 2,738,203 dollars. So, the of that would be be $273,820.30. The developer is requesting that um the council accept a reduced 1-year warranty. Instead of 10% they're proposing that they're requesting that it be $162,812, which is the same as the required um assurance for completion of improvements. The developer states that this 1-year warranty is something unique to Somerton and that they would like to match the practice of the city of Yuma.

Uh that does not require this 1-year warranty. So, what this 1-year war- warranty is is the city retains this money and in case that there's a repair that needs to get done on the street, on the sidewalk, on the lighting, um if the developer fails to take care of that within 1 year, the city uses this money to to to address it. Um staff has confirmed that the city of Yuma indeed does not request this 1-year warranty. And um this that is the request by the developer that we accept the money that they're going to give us for the completion of improvements and hold on to that money for 1 year and use it as the warranty. Staff has reviewed this request with the city manager and the city attorney and finds that this request must be approved by council action. If approved, the developer will record the plat immediately and proceed with the completion of the subdivision and the construction of new homes. Any questions from council? Any questions or comments? I have a question, Mayor. Uh uh Councilwoman Gonzalez, go ahead. What is the What is your recommendation, attorney's recommendation, um as far as that amount. The amount the 162 Councilwoman is enough to complete the improvements. Um if you wish to is if the council wishes to offer the same degree of flexibility as the city of Yuma, then this would be acceptable. Any other questions or comments? This is Michelle Sanson from the city attorney's office. From from a legal perspective, Council, I mean, this is the reason that we are bringing this to Council is because it

is it is a policy decision. It is a is is a um different standard uh than our code requires in terms of the the actual risk. So, the the risk of of um approving a lower standard is is essentially that if there are remaining remaining amount that we have just as Saul was explaining, if that that does not cover the work um that would need to be completed if something does happen, uh then the city just might not have sufficient funds to finish the improvements or or cover um any warranty repairs or something of the like. Any other questions or comments? Mayor, I have a question. Yes, go ahead. So, so can we get something in writing that guarantees I don't I don't know about this. Councilwoman, if I may, uh Mayor, Um

Yes. So, one of the things that we discussed and and a a lot of the we understand the to finish the project the 160, that's going to be covered. So, the lights will be there, all that. Um Saul, can you uh at least provide an update to American Council on these assurances, how these are kept, and how they return our history? How long have you been here? Yes, of course. Well, we thank you. Um, so we've the purpose of retaining the money is in case that something goes wrong in the public improvement set the street, the sidewalk, the curb, the drainage, if something goes wrong, the developer uh for 1 year needs to come back and fix it. That's standard practice everywhere, and that'll be in a letter that we're actually going to issue to the developer. We're accepting these improvements, but you have to provide a 1-year warranty for the for um um your public improvements that you installed. We issue this across for every subdivision. We've never once had and we require this warranty for for every development. We've never once had to use it. Every single subdivision that has gone in in in the time that I've been here has always either not had an issue with public improvements, or when there is an issue within 1 year, they come back and fix it. So, that's that's the record that we have so far. Thank you. And um Saul, think we're always looking at our neighbors and how they um do business and um well, for for this, my understanding is that well, well,

we we are one of the few here in Yuma County that that require this, or maybe the only one. Uh so, maybe we could start looking at changing that like we've done with with other instances that that that we've encountered encountered with this new um um this new uh what is it zoning ordinance or out of what or subdivision ordinance? Subdivision. Yeah, so um maybe that's something that maybe your uh person that replaces can start working replaces you can start working on that. Yes, Mayor. Um you're correct. Yes, this would be this would be acceptable in the city of Yuma that just there is no warranty requirement and actually we've had this discussion with legal. Um as part of the review uh we found some things that maybe the city could clean up in the in the zoning subdivision ordinance just to do a little bit of housekeeping. Yeah, that would be a good time to maybe revisit this requirement um as an overall review of the subdivision ordinance. So yeah, that that would be a good task perhaps for the my replacement. And uh that and and and there's other means right that that other cities would in case there's an issue with uh the developer not uh doing I um working on those warranty items and that that the city can make sure that they that they do those those warranty issues arise which most likely in a year uh you you you you probably see issues down the road but not not within a year that's Correct, Mayor. Likely would not happen within 1 year. And yes, there there are other options the city could look into

if to achieve compliance. And Mayor, I can I can provide one example that our office did discuss with um so we were we were mentioning that we're familiar with some other city codes that allow for the city to withhold certificates of occupancy or or even just the building permits until until the required improvements are completed. So so adding a little bit of flexibility and catch all language is something that we we have already had some discussion about. So it sounds like there might be some direction from Council to to continue those discussions and and possibly bring bring some revisions some suggested revisions. Yeah, that that that's that's been I guess the direction of this Council with past issues that we want to be developer friendly and we always look at our neighbors and what they're doing and we want to be competitive in the in in in that that way. Any other questions or comments? Is there a motion? Mayor, if I may just add one last thing. On the suggested action um I would like to request that the motion that Council makes if you are to approve this uh could you scroll down a little? Can we see that suggested action? Oh, yes. Um if the motion could be instead of motion to approve the reduced warranty assurance in the amount of 162,812 if the motion could be motion to approve the um completion of improvements assurance and 1-year warranty assurance in the amount of 162,812 dollars.

Is there a motion? So moved, Mayor. So motion by Councilwoman Zacarías. Second, Mayor. Seconded by Councilman Rudin. All those in favor? I. I. I. Any opposed? Motion carries. Thank you, Mayor. It's 12:16. Meeting's adjourned. Have a good day, everybody. Thank you. Thank you.