City Council - Regular Meeting

not part of the meeting, but something I thought worth sharing. Had anybody else heard of him before? You have? It's not one I was familiar with, but he's written a lot on leadership apparently.

He's on audible read if you want a lesson to five levels of leadership. All right. So, we are six o'clock, so I'm going to call this meeting to order. Um, thank you all for being timely. It was great to uh share a thought with you before the meeting. Uh, we will open with public comment. Is there anyone here who would like to share public comment?

Seeing none, I will move us on beyond public comment. And our first item is a planning item. Item C, recommendation by planning commission. Uh this is an application for a zone change for a property located at approximately 2600 West Quailbluff Drive from residential R1 to professional office. Has everybody had a chance to look at this? This uh is seen from Analopee. So I think it's a personal or professional office makes some sense. it's not uh as easily accessible that we would want something like retail commercial or something, but it does make sense to me. Does anybody else have any thoughts?

I think it's a good location for professional office. Yeah. And just to the west of this, there's professional office has been approved. So, it's kind of in the same same line. Yeah. It looks like it looks like it's going to all be eventually professional offices from there to the corner.

Yeah. If nobody has any objections, should we put this on the consent agenda for our next business meeting? Okay. Uh we'll move that to consent agenda. Next item, discussion and review of proposed lease agreement with Antelopee BMX. In your packet, you'll see examples of what other people have done with these BMX tracks. We're in a position where we've allowed it to be built. We're now in a position where the city has to do something legally for who has responsibility where and you've got a couple of different options in the packet. I'm not going to try to lead you one way or another. What are your thoughts council on where we should go with this? I can't remember with anal with who who did all the infrastructure to get that set up to

so we did a little bit of the land work but the site itself was done by the by the organization they put a lot of sweat equity into the lot we we did the electrical okay we did the water the drainage okay so that kind of infrastructure but as far as like all the stuff to get the tracks in they did all they did that themselves so they have put some equity into the property propert that that they don't own.

I mean, as long as these are comparable to what we're seeing in the market and it's a similar situation where I mean, as seems like we didn't do a whole bunch to set them up for it. They put in a lot themselves. It seems to be in line with what others are paying or charging. In reading through, I understand that none of this is permanent. Yeah. So, it's all temporary structures can be easily removed because it's a 10-year term, but 180 cancellation, 180day cancellation. Yeah. And of course, you know, the idea is we want them to be successful so that they stay and

draw crowds. And I think that they're off to a good start. Yeah, I support that. Okay. So, we thinking the Yeah, I I I don't see a reason to oppose it, I guess, is the way I feel. Yeah, I would be fine with this.

Okay. All right. Uh, it's a money issue, so it's not going to go on consent, but I will put it for approval on the next uh agenda. Uh, item E is discussion regarding proposed amendments to title two of the Syracuse Municipal Code pertaining to appointments to local districts. Uh primarily I just we over time have moved a little bit back and forth as to what um we've already handled your issue. That was fast. Yeah. And it's moving to the next agenda for approval. So you're welcome to stay, but don't want you to wait for it.

No, but I appreciate you telling me. Thank you.

Okay. Um All right. So, uh, mostly over time we've, uh, altered one one district appointment or another, and they've kind of they don't quite mesh. My goal is to get these to mesh so that they're all uniform. I think that the one that makes the most sense is what is been the most consistent amongst all uh, of the county, and that is the mayor makes a nomination and the council has the right for consent. If they don't consent, the mayor makes a new a a nomination and that goes through until they find a a an agreement between the mayor and council. I think that makes the most sense.

So, we're really essentially just removing it from a work session. Yeah. Well, I think that that's a discussion. So, that's only in one of the boards anyway. So, I think the others the sewer district doesn't even have that in it. So my point is let's just make it the same for all the appointed districts. I'm good with that. Okay. All right. We will move that forward to the consent agenda. Uh discussion regarding proposed amendment to title two pertaining to govern government records and retention. Um Mara, are you going to cover this one?

Panic. Well, I I didn't see Cassie here, so I thought maybe she left you some instructions. So, it looks like she did leave it with Colin. Apparently, it's me. Colin was just gonna let Sydney let you sit there and sweat for about however many months ago, several months ago, Brody uh created an innovation committee. That's not the official name, but it's close enough. Yep.

And each department has a representative on there. Any task each department's representative with coming up with ideas to make government more efficient, make it more transparent. Uh use artificial intelligence or other available technologies that are coming on board. Uh just make things easier, faster, quicker, and cost savings wise. Fair summary.

Not how not how you would have said it. Sit there. And and so my department um we have several network drives. We have one for the city attorney. We have one for former city attorney Paul Roberts. We have one for former city attorney Brie Brass. And we have one for me. And so one of the things I wanted to do is combine all of those network drives over time and get all of the documents to where we don't have to search through places to find a draft of a BMX agreement or something like that. We're working on that. But in that process, I noticed that we have a lot of really old criminal files for traffic tickets, mostly infractions. And the state has a retention schedule for felonies, and they and it's years and years and years. And they have a general retention schedule for uh nonfelonies, which would be everything from infractions through class A misdemeanors, and that is 10 years. And I really can't see keeping traffic files for 10 years. We rarely look at anything more than a year old. And so I recommended to the state records committee, the archives group, uh that we come up with a specific retention in Syracuse city for infraction cases two years after the case is closed. The state also does not have a retention schedule for cases that are declined by the prosecutor at any level. And so again, I said for cases that are defined or that are declined for prosecution, again, two years is about right to keep those records. And beyond that, the police still have them. We could access them there if we needed to. And for the cases, the traffic cases, the courts still have those and we could access them there. Um, the way it works is you go to the archives committee and you present your idea and they sort of buy off on it and say thumbs up, thumbs down. They've given us their approval to proceed. So now the next step is for us in our ordinance to adopt those if we wish to do that. And then once adopted, we take the adopted ordinance back to the archives group and

they give us the final approval. So this would eliminate a large number and I don't know how many hundreds of cases but hundreds and hundreds of files from our database and from our storage um that simply we just don't ever use anymore.

Uh in that process, Cassie said we have this issue on how long we retain uh the recordings of our meetings here. Apparently we were We had already stepped away from the state's recommendation, but her recommendation is that we repeal that portion of our ordinance and simply follow the state recommendation. I wish I could tell you what that is. I think it's three years. Yeah, it looks like it's three years. Uh, and so she's proposed that we just do away with the exception we already have and go back and follow the state. That wish I could tell you more about that, but I thought Marica was gonna cover it. Anyway, those are my proposals.

So, for the city council meetings, that would just be digital recordings or audio recordings. Yes. But I think what she saves I think what you have now is the stuff that's both audio and video, right? The stuff whatever it is that we put on YouTube. Yeah. And then I have the we have a separate system um for Docu and I store all the minutes. So, I've gone through and I've already scanned all the old minutes like back to the 70s. So, we have those. And then every time I get new minutes, I put them in there. So, we have those. I need to pull up. So, we're we're talking about getting rid of all the old minutes for the city. No, no, no. Minutes are forever.

Okay. This is simply getting rid of audio recordings that are more than three years old because that stuff is already included in the minutes. and it's scanned and it's searchable and it's so much easier to find it in the written document than going back and reviewing hours and hours of audio.

I'm just trying to think if there's a situation where we could have used an audio or video recording of a city council meeting, but we're not sure if it's three years or not that we would retain. It would under her recommendation it would be three years which is what the state recommends. Oh the state recommends three years. What are we what are we retaining now? I think I think we're retaining them forever now. Definitely. Okay. Yeah. The big thing is is is I got to imagine that the cost of data storage is quite a bit and that would be a physically responsible thing to do to alleviate that cost if we have a cost associated. It's on YouTube anyway, right?

And it's and YouTube is gonna be there forever until we feel probably forever, right? And and as long as we have the the minutes, I think that's the most important thing is that's what documents the actual actions taken by the the council is the minutes. Yeah. There have been one or two times that we've had to go back and we tried to figure out why a council 10 years ago did something. Unfortunately, I don't think of I can't think of an incident where we actually found that. We did go looking for it or that it helped, but we did go looking once or twice.

Anyway, that's the you know, it's harder to search uh an audio or video file because you don't know where things are, right? um with with the traffic offenses, all that stuff's backed up the MBD if it is found responsible to the defendant. The cases that get filed with the courts are all backed up by the courts and they keep them for a long, long time. I don't know how long that is. Currently, the police department is required to keep those traffic tickets and citations for two years, which is the reason I selected two years as well. And just based on experience, we just don't go back and look at them,

right? A DUI is a class B misdemeanor. That one's going to stay longer. This is simply illegal left-hand turn, failure to stop at a stop sign, speeding, those kind of minor offenses that we just don't need to store forever. Yeah. Yeah. I don't have any issue with this. This could go on consent agenda unless anybody objects. Okay. Consent agenda for item F. Item G, discussion regarding proposed amendment to the Syracuse city personnel policies and procedures. Imagine that's you.

Or Steve. All right, Steve. Do quick edits on this one. Um, first one is adding some language for advancements for personnel and putting in a clause saying that if they're on active uh suspension within the last 6 months, they would not be eligible for advancement until that time has lapsed. The second one is URS has added a Roth 401k plan. So, we're just adding that into our quality as an option since they add every time. That's it. Any issue with these?

All right, I'll put those on the consent agenda as well. The next is to discuss and review the city mission and vision statements. I realize we did this already, but I want to make sure that everybody has a chance because as we're talking through what should and shouldn't be in a budget, we base it on these statements. What are we what are the services we cover? Now, there are details that we'll get into at a whole another time, but if you feel like the mission is not well defined, we need to amend that. And there were a couple of suggestions that came out and that's I don't have any issue with those. But are there any others that are to amend these statements of what we do and why we do it? And and I want to make sure I accurately reflected uh your comments, council member.

Okay. Felt like a turd for intervening on something that was kind of already set. But well, and the thing is is it should be a living document. We should be able to modify those. Okay. I I mean I remember when we said them but it was 10 years ago and so well and we went through them last year and I had interjections and things too. So a lot of feedback there's a lot of us that had comments last year but yeah and and it is important but it's it is the generalized statements. It's not specific projects that we're talking about.

Yeah. Yeah, these are guiding statements. I'm your north star. Any other changes to them? Are you good with the changes that were suggested? Yeah, I don't need because because it takes three of you to say yes. No problem with the changes suggested. It's okay. Yeah, I think those are good. Okay. All right. I like that. Just in in the packet, I had sent in an email that had some items that I was hoping to discuss. I realize that may not fall into what you were intending with your uh email that went out.

And we can talk about those, but I don't think they fit in the mission statement. Okay. I before we're done today, I would like to talk about those.

Okay. Then let's divert to that first. Let's say that the mission statements are okay to go ahead as outlined and then I will just allow for interjection. You're welcome to add specific project discussion if you'd like, but uh yeah, I felt like we were getting into the into a specific uh project, not a vision statement. And that's where I felt different. But you go ahead and explain what you'd like to see us adopt. Well, I'm I'm not necessarily seeking an adoption of anything. I think that there are issues that are budget related that did fall into the scope of what you suggested in your email. But I would like to uh have an idea of what we're going to discuss and when going into the budget uh meeting that is upcoming. So, I listed some ideas of what I thought would be appropriate for discussion and I would like to have those on an agenda beforehand and I would like to hear from the council any other issues that they members believe are important for this upcoming budget session uh so I can be adequately prepared.

Okay, we can add those for the next meeting. Um, does anybody feel like there that the part of the budget I I know that there's a a feeling that you'd like to know where the budget is going right now? We don't even have all of the department heads having submitted what changes are. That's due at the end of this week. And so, I mean, we don't even have that as a collective knowledge yet. So, I I would love to have that, but where we had a council change in January, we give them that first month. Um, and then February is the month that they are due to do all of the changes. They get a month to meet the new people and figure out if there's anything that's pending that you're asking them about. And then, so this is

I I mean, we just don't even have it yet. I I don't have your list up in front of me, Brett, but I I feel like it during the budgeting, at least that initial budget process. I always feel like there's certainly my list of concerns and things that I have, but I always feel like the budgeting process and even some of the things that I'm kind of vaguely recalling from your list, it seems like we go through that process pretty thoroughly. And a lot of that stuff we do that we do cover. It's on page 30 of the packet, my list. Oh, it is.

It is. And I'm just wondering, are there any items on there that the council thinks is not an appropriate agenda item to discuss so we can be adequately prepared for the budget session this coming? Oh, other proposed changes. I didn't see that. I don't think there's I don't think there's anything if there's a if there's something that one of us want to discuss, I don't think it's ever inappropriate to I agree to bring those up. And so, I wouldn't have any objection to going over any of this. I I would ask that it be put on an upcoming agenda for discussion and if I need to flesh out what my concerns are, I'm happy to provide that. Okay. Beforehand. Okay. I will seek clarification from everybody. if you have something that you think needs to be a consideration for a budget line item or a budget task. But I think that in general the purpose of tonight was to make sure the vision statement was on point that we're headed the right direction

and and I appreciate that. So and the willingness to take a role. So thank you. Okay.

All right. So let me make that All right. The next is uh we're asking for some key legislation updates. Every year in February, while we're in the middle of the f of the legislative session, we try to flag bills that may have an impact on us as a city that are getting any traction. Now, keep in mind there are a lot of bills that don't get very far. And if it doesn't get out of committee, we usually don't worry too much because until it does, but uh that's that's where that stands. So, I've asked staff to prepare that. I'm assuming that was you, Colin? No. Brody.

Uh the Are we talking about the um bills? Yes. I didn't know which. No, that was something that you put on the agenda. I did. I wasn't sure which ones. I didn't know about it. I I put out a task for somebody to look up which ones are okay. So, there are a couple of bills that I'm aware of.

Um there are a couple of bills that I'm aware of. Most of the ones that would negatively impact us have failed. They're they're done for the session. The ones that I think are still in process, we have our amendment, which is Senate Bill 203. It's struggling. Um it's struggling because the push back seems to be that they think that it's more than we need and it's uh there is a push back from southern Utah that this was never meant to be shared with the rest of the state which I find a very bizarre argument because um if it was good for one person in the state that's why we tried to use the exact same thing because it had already passed. we weren't trying to alter it in any way. Um, but the the financial office came back and said that they believe that if we impose the exact same task that southern or tax southern Utah did that we would raise $1.4 million and we only need $1 million. Well, I think that's an interesting thing because we're willing to say we're only put it's very highly restricted. It can only go to certain things which is first responders salaries in in our case. It could also go to equipment. But um considering our expenses in this area in the last few years, I've been arguing adamantly almost daily with different senators to try and make the case that we have paid for f for first responder services out of our citizens tax dollars for 20 years to analopee. At this point, we're just asking for them to pay for a second firefighter shift. Not even the second paramedic shift. We've paid for the second

paramedic shift. But really, I have to have a backup because 70% of the calls that we served out to the island this year uh included leaving us unprotected in Syracuse. And that's where I'm trying to get a backup crew paid for out of a tax that is shared by everyone who spends money in Syracuse. And it is a third of a percent. It is tiny up to a third

up to a third of a percent. And I have suggested that we would not charge more than we need. We might only need a quarter of a percent. But that's so tiny when we look at the grand scheme of things. Um, but what it does is all of the visitors who buy gas, groceries, and uh prepared foods and not groceries, but pre prepared because it doesn't go on food, but it goes on restaurant prepared restaurant food or goods. Yeah, it would be on it would be on like at a grocery store if you buy like shampoo, it would be taxed, but if you buy bananas,

it would not because it's an unprepared food. So, so again, it doesn't really impact our citizens much, but well, it does in that it takes the burden off of them entirely. It's they're now sharing it with everyone who visits. Yeah.

And with the new retail, I think it makes all the sense in the world because that's all these where all these people that go to the island are going to stop. So, anyway, we're not getting very far with that one at the moment. Uh, I thought it was going to save our budget, but we'll see. Um, anybody has any thoughts on that? I I mean, we've been down several times. We've been c making phone calls. Uh, we we got to get support. So, it's only being used in southern Utah. Yes. Washington County. In Washington County, it's only being used in Washington County to support uh Zion National Park.

What a horrible way to write a bill. And let me explain. I can explain exactly how it came about. What what happened is Zion National Park has Springdale who does not have their own fire department. So that means that Hurricane has to drive all the way to Zion because they're the closest district to serve them. And so they're saying, "Well, why are Hurricane citizens paying for Zion National Park?" Well, the distance is within just a couple of miles of what the distance we spend to get to calls on Analopee Island. So, this parallels it exactly except for it's a state park, not a national park. And so, we tried to get them to expand that. And our research indicates that if they expanded it to allow for Analopee Island, which would just mean the state park additive, nobody else in the state would even qualify anyway. So, we would be the only other ones that qualify. But the Washington County representatives have said, "Well, this was only meant for us and we shouldn't be allowing anybody else to charge a similar tax." Which does not make a lot of sense to me. But I have been fighting uh this battle uh almost every day for two weeks trying to get this into committee. So, that's my report on that bill. The other bills that I think uh we need to be concerned about is House Bill 501. That bill is uh horrible. Uh Andrea posted on that one, but that would essentially take all of our citizens and require them to double their taxes for special infrastructure districts. And I'm not talking about their city taxes. I'm talking about your entire tax bill. So for our city, they ran the numbers and if that tax were imposed, they would generate $26 million out of our citizens pockets. Your

average user, I think I wrote down, was like $3,400 in money that would go to special districts. Absolutely horrible. And I understand we have a water problem, but you can't double people's taxes. This this bill needs to die. And unfortunately, it's being looked at very seriously. Did you look at the modifications they did after the hearing?

I did, but I don't know if it's enough. I mean, first of all, it's a huge tax increase if they pass this. And while it doesn't affect us as a city, as individuals, because none of that money would come to us, it would affect us because we would be required to collect that through the sewer and water bills that are not ours to collect, but we collect them because we have a utility bill and they don't have it. And really, this comes down to I can explain a more in-depth version of this. It really comes down to the EPA ruling that I told everybody about two years ago, which um required all of the state to reduce the level of potassium and nitrogen that is let out back into the reclamation areas of water by 1 1,000th of a percent. This extra little percent has caused several of the uh sewer plants throughout the state to have to be rebuilt. Now, we as a sewer plant were able to come up with a real innovation and we started, this is why we did the pipeline over the last couple of years and we pipe our stuff across the levy so that it goes into Gilbert Bay instead of Farmington Bay because Gilbert Bay has a thriving population of brine shrimp which eat that nitrogen and potassium and it they actually thrive on it and it doesn't produce algaooms which is the issue. They're saying the nitro or the potassium creates these alga blooms, which I don't know if that's actually true, but um that's the purpose of this. What it cost Salt Lake County was over a billion dollars in red or redefining their plant. what it cost us was plenty, but it was a $55 million

instead of an over a billion dollar solution if we had to redesign this plant to take out that 1,000th of a percent. Um, it sounds crazy and believe me, it is. I don't think that that tiny little article really changes anything in the Great Salt Lake. We've been discharging there for 60 years. And we don't have the algae problem that they are saying is created in Utah Lake in Utah County by this same process. Yeah. That bill is currently it's been through the third reading of the House but then was circled. Is that like held? Yeah.

So it's kind of stalled in the House right now. Um yeah. Again, this is just money to redesign what we already have and I don't know that it really changes uh at least us in this county. Um but it would sure change our people's pocketbooks and I I really object to that. Made it through the committee with favorable recommend. I know that drives me insane. I can't believe that it got that far. So, who's behind it? Who's pushing it? Who's benefiting from it? Who is the sponsor on that one? I forget. Who's um the bill the bill sponsor? I don't know who's like it's not him

behind it, but yeah, it's uh Representative uh Bolander. Okay. He's on his way out. So

anyway, those are the two that concern me the most. Uh the league has had a few that they were concerned with that have been killed. Uh there was a bill that was set to take away all zoning rights. Uh Representative Ward out of Bountiful was running a bill, but he got that bill was killed yesterday and um he was quite violent on the floor about how we are going to destroy the housing because we're letting cities have some say in zoning. But um that should concern you that he's still fighting that fight that they want all housing authorities stripped of all cities. And the theory behind that is if developers could build whatever they wanted, there would be affordable housing, which I do not agree with at all.

Um because and I will I will report this as well because this is really important. At our last uh meeting amongst mayors um COG meeting, we had uh Mayor Sheepard from Clearfield who is in the real estate business has said that all of the reports are that we have been building the wrong things. That multif family isn't what's going to solve this problem. that it is small single family homes which is the lack in the market and things that that need to be uh the gap in the market that would allow people to actually afford homes because the rents that are coming out on multif family over the last 5 years have well exceeded house payments for the average Uton. So if that's the case and that's data that they're bringing to the table as realators is that we're forcing people into rents that are higher than mortgage payments, then we've we have done the wrong thing. But um that's that's what some of these uh legislators are pushing is we need more of the multifamily. And I we've seen it in our city. It's not It's not helped the affordability.

It has housed people for sure, but it has not made it more affordable. None of the new apartments have been more affordable than a mortgage payment. So, those are the ones that I'm aware of. There might be others, but I'm not aware of any that are progressing. The most concerning is that House Bill 501 was moving forward. And of course, our number one priority as a city is that Senate Bill 203, our bill, is not moving fast enough. Are there any assignments for 203 that we can do to help? You know, I'm trying to figure that out because every time I meet somebody who's in the Senate, I tell them I need their support and they tell me to my face that they will, but that doesn't hasn't translated into support. So, um, we have thought about and and I'm open to your suggestion here. We've thought about starting a calling campaign to try and call the senators who are on the committee at least, which you're seven of them. I've already emailed all of them with a fact sheet that helps, you know, paraphrase what we get out of this and what's why it's important to our city. Um, I can share that with all of you. Did Did I share it with all of you? I might have copied the council.

I may not have I don't have it. Okay, I will copy you all. We did this just a few days ago, so I I forgive me for not doing it immediately, but I want you all to have that faction.

Um, so I will put that out there. What about a what about a campaign as far as like reaching out to media and doing posts on social media to the community, letting community members who are active in our community um to cause them to call and even listing the numbers of the representatives for them to call to say, "Hey, we want you to support this. This is vital to us. This is important because this this doesn't just take care of that fire district." My understanding is this can also potentially help our gap in our public safety and our law enforcement. It helps to cover training for all of our public safety officials and fire, paramedics, and police. Uh it's it's a huge thing. It's a huge

it is huge to our budget. What they're pushing back is that is that truly a need and 100%. We say it is. I mean, I can absolutely document that without these nine firefighters that would be the twoird or more of the bill that we have a a impact that I can't fill service. Correct. They're not going to they're going to argue that if I did have an extra couple hundred thousand, which could supply additional police, which we need, um they might argue that that's not a necessity and it's an over reach. If we had a search and rescue incident on the island, would not our police respond to help with that?

I'm not arguing that we're wrong. You are correct. Okay. The question is is how do I in their mind not make it look like we're reaching too far? All we were reaching the reason we used the number we did is because it was already written in the bill, right? That that made it seemed like it was easier to ask for the same thing than to ask for something new that wasn't already approved. And it's it's actually less than what's allowed in the current law because that's right. Uh with a with a public hear or with a vote of the of the citizens, they can go up to 1%. The the amendment would just cap park issue at 33.

But even that even that 1% is so minute when you think about how much that's going to cost the end user buying prepared food. It's it's nominal to to the end user making the purchase like it doesn't feel like anything but to the citizens of Syracuse this is significantly yeah 033 033 you know the third of a percent I mean we're talking about 30 cents on $100 I just don't see the that's nothing

I just don't see the rationale in simply because we border a state park we have we have the financial burden of supporting that state park without any assistance from the state. And we're not asking for them to assist us directly. We're asking for a mechanism tool tool to do so.

So the push back that I got this morning um at 7:30 was why don't you just set up a system where you build a state every time you go out there? And um while that could be an option, the challenge is is that when you bill for services that were rendered only in an emergency, you don't cover the cost of being prepared for that. That's correct. In the training, you know, because we have to have those people paid all the days they didn't go as well.

I will give you this one background because I've been looking up the history of why we've done this over 20 years and and where the funding has gone for this. um over 20 years ago, just barely over 20 years ago, when we were first getting our full first full-time firefighters because before that we were a volunteer station. At that point, when our population was under 10,000 people, so that's a long time ago. But back then it made more sense for us to volunteer to be the service because it justified having a service that was marginal on whether we could justify a full-time department. You know, fast forward, you know, back from the 80s to the 2020s. Now it is a real burden because our city uses up the whole correct

on call department. Yeah. So, it's where it changed from we were trying to justify actually having a full-time fires department where we volunteered to do a little more to where now it's become it takes away from our citizens. No good deed goes unpunished.

So, I mean that's the that's the background and I've I've really dug deep into some of this so that I can discuss it properly with people who are resisting. The main objection that I get right now from the senator that is is representing us is there isn't an appetite for any tax to be approved this year and this is technically a tax says Stevenson. Yeah. Well, he's just giving feedback from the other senator. Yeah, he's given the feedback that in general every tax Yeah. He has not said he's opposed to this. He's running.

He's running it. He's leading the the charge for us. But he's saying the push back that he's had in getting it on the agenda is that there's not an appetite to run anything that would include attacks. I think where I was asking that is if we employed people to send maybe a template or a form letter to him to show, yes, I have all of these people who are supporting me or do we have people testifying at the hearing? Well, there's not a hearing yet. Steve and I went down there. It looks like they've had them, but they're not on the agenda. No, they they've not been on We haven't made it to the agenda. Oh, they're just in committee here on We're still in committee.

Steve and I went down to meet with him. We I've called him regularly. I've met with his intern that's does all his scheduling more than once. Um we're we're doing as many things as I can that you need to think about. I I get the campaign of trying to show support. Let's get a lot of names behind it. But when you think about it in the grand scheme of things, um, think about when we get a a petition and 25 people said you,

you know, we we got that a couple of years ago. Somebody said, "I should be allowed to have 10 dogs." And they said, "6 people at the Walmart have signed my petitions, right? So, I should be able to have 10 dogs." And you know what did we do with that information? We're like, "Okay, there's at least 25 people who don't want you to have 10 dogs because that's a burden on a neighbor, right?"

So, I mean, let's say that we got 2,000 people from the city, which would be a good number to all say we want this. It's vital to our success. Even 10,000, they're going to look at the population of Utah and it's going to mean nothing to the grand scheme of things because we're one city. Even if it were 25%, 10,000 names would be 25% of our citizens. That would be overwhelming that this is a good thing for us. Every other senator doesn't represent any one of those people. And that's where I'm I'm not against the idea. I'm just trying to put the perspective of what moves the needle. What moves the needle is uh you know, a bigger issue is what do we do to serve Adelaope Island? I actually have said to him, I said, you know, my worry is I don't know if I can afford to keep going out to Analopee Island. Now, our sworn, you know, vested firefighters are going to say, I I'm not going to leave anybody unattended. And I get that and I support that and I'm not telling them not to.

But from a financial standpoint, if that's if I have to have no service while they're out there fighting something because they won't help, that's a problem. And that's kind of where we're at right now. Well, that's why I think like maybe like and I don't know. I'm going to default to whatever our city employees think and our PIO thinks, but like I I think u I I can't imagine that KSL wouldn't want to do a news story on it. I mean, they're so happy to talk about all kinds of crazy stuff if it's negative. And and this this is negative, though. You have elected officials that aren't

willing to serve a population. And uh I mean that's fine until it's you out there on Analopee Island with a broken leg on the top of the beach. You need to be helped or your kid goes lost because you're camping out there. The more likely scenario, and this is where I I worry a lot, the more likely scenario is our department is out there carrying somebody off of Frer Peak because they're injured and somebody back here has a heart attack and I don't have anybody to cover it. and we would be covered by mutual aid who may be too far away right at the time. That's where I'm I'm deathly worried and that's the story I know.

And with the new Davis corridor, too, like there could be a horrible accident. We could have our fire team ki up out there and then what? Yeah. Anyway, this is it's bad over bad. it. That's what That's why I'm willing to do what needs to be done. If I need to go down there and

tick people off and kick the beehive, I will. I'll do it. So, what do we think? I mean, I I mean, I'm really open to suggestions. Uh, I've consulted with staff on what we think would actually move the needle, what would get us there. I have taken a lot of phone calls and and instigated a lot of phone calls. Um, we physically went down there. I put on the monkey suit and walked from the parking lot in Egypt all the way through the Capitol into a building that nobody no guard knew where it was. Steve and I were asking directions. I don't know where that is. I mean I nothing's beyond us at this point, but I'm trying to it.

We have to believe it would actually be you effective is what I'm suggesting. Do you have any thoughts, Brody? I mean, you've chased these longer than any of us have. Yeah. I mean, you're I I think at a minimum it would you would get a lot of good information by engaging the members of the committee on it and the chairman. Why Why is it not on the their agenda? It's their it's their bill. It's in their it's in their committee. They're the ones that decide if it goes on the agenda. Maybe that's the thing we need to do is get a each one of you to write and say this bill is essential to our city. How come we can't get it on the agenda? Oh,

I'd be willing to do that if we have contacts and Okay. Yeah. Yeah. We've got a sheet we can send out. There's seven. There's seven. That's easy. Yeah. So, it's not like you got to take contact all members of the the because I'm way overloaded with things right now. Can I ask Cara, can you send that sheet that was prepared to all of our council members and a list of the people on the committee? You had that. I don't or was it in one of our chat? Yeah,

it's in our chat. If you'd send that to the council, you'll get it. And let's see if we can't move this. It's really important to us. So, I like that idea. I think that's a good next step at this point. Have we have we asked uh the fire department chief and our police department chief as well to do that? We have a letter from not only from the fire department but from the what do they call it the council of fire chiefs. The joint council of fire chiefs statewide have given a supporting letter and Analopee Island has given a supporting letter. I would love those too if I could get those and just attach them as attachments.

Yeah, they're in the bill file down there. So they have a physical reattach them though be like you need to read this crap. Okay. Yeah, we have a digital copy of both of those. That'd be great. I I guess I guess I'm I'm just trying to be very cognizant and careful because when we got onboarded, we were told to be very careful that the way we represent the city and that we have a mechanism that does that. And so I'm pretty careful about what I post on social media and all of that because I don't want to misrepresent anything. We have to careful we don't offend the people. We need to vote for it. Yeah.

If they get offended, they're in the wrong business. Okay. Well, that's that's where we need some help. So, I'm going to move us on from the kind of a hot issue for me. So, it fires me up. This is kind of one of my maiden campaign points. It's important to us. So, it really is and I've been trying.

Okay. So, I'm gonna do this. So the next item I went down to Texas to look at to this destinations conference which was absolutely fabulous. One of the best most packed with info that I've ever been to. Um and I've been to a lot of conferences not just for city but for work. And um they were really loaded with lots of good information. And I want to share all that with everybody. I mean I walked away with 17 pages of notes. So, there's a lot to cover, but as I got I was so excited that on Wednesday night um after just the first day, I sent a message to Cassie. I said, "Put me on the agenda. I have to share all this with counsel." And then uh when I flew back in Friday night, instead of going home, I came here and made Brody listen to me for half an hour or an hour and to talk about how enthused and excited I was.

And Steve and Steve. Yeah. So, um

he's a good listener. So anyway, I want to say that it's really exciting, but as I spent the weekend preparing a presentation to go over all the details, it occurred to me that we have been burned a couple of times where we have talked about great ideas that somebody else beat us to because they listened or looked up our meetings. So here's what I'm going to do. I'm going to give you a general overview of what the nature of this is and then I'm going to ask that you come in two at a time and we share it just with council because I'm not ready to give away the secrets that are going to make us successful to the neighboring city. Before we do anything, it will have to be a public vote. But I would rather plan first and get things in place so that somebody doesn't beat us to the punch on some of these key details. And I'll tell you what some of these details are. We spent half a day just on creative financing and all different things that have worked across many different states. Um, as I told Steve on Friday, one of the things that's important about that is we have to decide which ones are legal in Utah and how we could execute them in Utah because state laws are different. For example, they they said, I you know, the guys from Texas were saying, "Man, you've got great laws." Because they're very restricted. Uh whereas the guys from New Mexico are like, "Man, you're way restricted." Because they're wide open in New Mexico. So, we have to do a little homework to see which ones of these we can do. But the general principle of the whole thing is that they were this is a couple of examples started this and then a group kind of formed that have been doing this and the principle is how can we monetize things that we do so that it pays for the services that we need and um these are

through private uh public private partnerships. In other words, there would be a element that is a private party that would be a money-making party and they partner with the city and the city can do things through funding that they can't or can do things with uh property and positioning that they can't. And in exchange they pay either a rent or a lease or they a share in the profits. And what I found was they actually had full civic centers that were paid for by the neighboring private business. And uh both were on city-owned land. And I thought that was an interesting way to look at things where they were allowing somebody to be to run a business, but in return that business was paying for a civic service. And um there's some great stories. I'm I'm not going to go into those until I can get you individually. Um but again, they're just some brilliant ways that they looked at this. And um there are several projects in the works that I reviewed that were uh cities who have already broken ground from discussions of this conference last year. This is the second year of the conference and uh there are several examples of where it's can be been well underway more than 10 years down the road and um these funding mechanisms seem to be working really well. So, so that I don't get too bold and tell anybody the secret sauce, um, I'm willing to stay tonight and meet with two of you. Uh, I'm willing to stay long enough to meet with all of you if you want to wait

around. Legally, we can't have a public meeting with more than two of you at a time. But, I mean, this is so exciting. I actually felt blessed that and this may be a strange way to put it but I felt like I was suddenly blessed with getting information that I've been looking for for a long time. We have been doing some of these things but not on the scale that they've been doing them and uh seeing real examples and and learning from professionals how to get this done is exciting. So, we've got to find ways to turn some of our needs into funds for the other needs that we haven't been able to fund. Um, so is there two of you that want to go first tonight?

Okay. Do when this week would the others of you be willing to come in? Um, I have Friday at 4 if that works for anybody. I have and I have Thursday at 45 or 6. I I could do Thursday. Thursday at 54. 54 or six would be fine. Any of those times. Is there somebody else that Thursday works? Thursday as well. Which which time do you guys prefer?

I I have no preference. I can do any of those. Let's do four o'clock. Do four. Yep. Actually, let's do five because my boss will like that better. Yeah, let's do five o'clock. Brett, when can I meet with you?

What other times do you have? I have no time. I have Friday at 4. I'm open after 4. If that works, if that day doesn't work, um, I could do six o'clock next Monday. I could do Friday, but it would have to be at five or after. Okay. I can do five if that works for you.

All right. Let's plan for that. Okay. Um Okay. Other than that, I think we are done for the evening. I hope you had a