Board of County Commissioners - workshop

Recording in progress.

All right. Good morning. Welcome to the Thurston County Board of County Commissioners. Board work session for Wednesday, August 5th, 2026 is 914 AM. My name is Ty Menser, Chair of the Board, Vice Chair, Commissioner Wayne Fournier, Commissioner Rachel Grant, Commissioner Carolina Mejia, Commissioner Emily Klaus. Participating virtually, County Manager Leonard Hernandez, Assistant County Managers Josh Cummings, Jennifer Walker, and Clerk of the Board Amy Davis. The meeting is being live streamed to the Thurston County YouTube channel and written public comment may be received up to two hours in advance of the meeting and distributed to the board. Action may be taken at this meeting. First up is a second review of this afternoon's business meeting agenda.

And there were no follow-up items today?

Okay, no follow-up items. Did board members have anything they wanted to address before we move to the next item? I HAVE NOTHING. OKAY. THEN WE'LL GO TO ADVISORY BOARDS.

WE HAVE TWO APPLICATIONS FOR THE VETERANS ADVISORY BOARD, ONE FROM JOHN MERRIBOLD AND ONE FROM AMANDA SPIEREN. BOTH ARE ELIGIBLE FOR APPOINTMENT AND HAVE BEEN REVIEWED BY THE BOARD AND RECOMMENDED FOR APPOINTMENT.

OKAY. AND THESE FILL THE LAST TWO SPOTS ON THE BUTT?

THEY DO. OKAY. FOR NOW UNTIL SOME UPCOMING INEXPIRATIONS AND

Right, but this fills the void. Commissioner Fournier.

Are there other like pending applications for these positions or is it just we've received two applicants for these two spots?

Thank you, Commissioner Fournier. I received your email inquiry on the application for Vijay Latch. We did receive an application for VJ Lodge and I'll be following up with the Veterans Advisory Board staff to see where that one landed at. But that would be the only other one that has not been reviewed by the Veterans Advisory Board.

Thank you. So that may have come in later in their process?

It may have. I'll double check with the staff and see, check where that one's at.

Okay, you folks wanna wait? I mean, review these and see what clerk.

I wouldn't wanna overlook the DJs. I know he's very involved with the community and he would be a good applicant that I would wanna consider.

Okay, I don't think there's a rush. So we just keep these.

Circle back next week. ON THESE?

CIRCLE BACK NEXT WEEK ON THESE UNLESS THERE'S OBJECTION TO THAT APPROACH. OKAY, VERY GOOD. THAT'S IT FOR ADVISORY BOARDS? OKAY. PROJECT MANAGEMENT, PROCESS IMPROVEMENTS.

THANKS SO MUCH, CHAIR. WE HAVE OUR CENTRAL SERVICES AND PROJECT TEAM HERE, AND THEY HAVE A PRESENTATION ABOUT SOME OF THE RECENT SUCCESSES AND WHAT WE'RE FORMULATING AS A BEST PRACTICE THAT WE'D LIKE TO GET BOARD CORRECTION ON. Without further ado, I'll hand over to our Central Services Director.

Good morning. Kim Burnett, Director, Central Services. We're here to talk about the Central Services project management process improvements that we have put in place. So we've been working on project management improvements, including the creation of a new project delivery manual. The delivery manual will provide consistency for managing our projects. including templates for budget, communication, project charters, and business cases. We've also included some new and improved processes for managing our capital projects. There are three main goals for our process improvement. So the first of those would be the customer's operational needs are being met. Central Services has the responsibility to ensure that our buildings are The buildings that we purchase and renovate are functional and operational for the occupants. We ensure that offices and departments are considered valued stakeholders and the buildings they occupy will meet their needs. But sometimes there are factors such as budget and timing that may preclude us from providing our customers with all of the requests that they make. Another goal that we have is to ensure that our projects are completed on time and on budget. Central Services respects the board's approval of projects and the budgets for these projects. And we work closely with the offices and departments who will eventually occupy these buildings during the design phase to ensure the goal is met. We are also continually building trust with our customers and the community. By completing our projects on time and on budget, we're demonstrating respect for our customers and for the board. This also allows us to gain the trust of the community members, which may help build future partnerships. And being financially responsible with public funds builds confidence with our community members. So on time and on budget is the mantra in the central services capital projects group. Next. Next slide. Oh, sorry. Back one. There we go. Sorry. So there are five main principles of central services project management standards for adaptive reuse. First and foremost is the clear direction from the board of County commissioners. So the board sets the parameters on the scope project management and available funds for our capital projects. And the central services team is then empowered to lead the project forward within those parameters. Secondly, there's collaborative and achievable expectations. So the core needs and the scope of work are determined at the project outset, and we implement a hard stop on the design phase. Wherever possible, we will modify existing space without doing a complete do-over. We'll use existing offices, workstations, materials, et cetera, wherever we can. And we ensure that all parties are adhering to the strict timelines. Thirdly, we have transparent and continuous communication. So we ask that our occupants provide a single point of contact for the project, this person should have the authority to make decisions and speak for the department or office. And then the project management manager is the one that communicates with that single occupant representative and passes off those updates to the contractor. and leadership and stakeholders will receive regular progress updates to ensure they are fully aware of all the milestones being met or major issues that have arisen. As mentioned earlier, the fourth one is that we'll utilize existing materials, workspaces, and functionality within those buildings whenever possible, and that we continue to maintain a focus on being financially responsible and timely with our projects. So I wanted to provide a case study of where these process improvements have been implemented and have been very successful. So with the Israel Road project, we had three options. One was to renovate the existing buildings. This was problematic because one, there was no room for expansion. We had aging systems, HVAC, electrical, plumbing. Staff were housed in several different locations. And evidence storage was in several different buildings. Option two was to build a new building. But this was cost prohibitive. Land was expensive and new construction was expensive. And there was a lack of availability of land available. The third option was to purchase a new building and renovate. This was the best option, one, because they had specialized needs. They had security, technology, community engagement, and the cost of renovations was less than the other options. So the construction, the budget here was $20 million for this project. 14.25 to purchase the facility. And then we had 2.6 million in renovation costs. And that included things like IT cabling, card access control. We also have soft costs, which ran about 650,000. That would be all of the due diligence and feasibility studies we did up front. It also includes some design, construction administration, and our staff time. And that left... funding available for us to be able to purchase the new market building to house the evidence for the sheriff. The timeline was very tight. The lease was due to expire at the end of May, 2026. So that was our goal to get the sheriff moved into that building. But by adhering to the standards we had set, we were able to bring this project in on time. So if you think about it, we purchased the building in February of 2025. Design began in March and continued through August. Construction started in September, and the sheriff was able to move into the building, I believe it was the second week in May. That's unheard of. Yeah, which was incredible. It's phenomenal. Yeah. Kudos to our project manager. And I also want to say this was a collaborative partnership. So we worked really closely, Central Services did, with IT, the Sheriff's Office, the contractor, the architect. Everyone was on the same page during this process. So this really initiated our adaptive reuse concept. The project manager and the occupant representative developed the scope of work up front. The design specifications were front loaded and a hard stop was implemented on the design phase and everyone stuck to that hard stop. During the design phase, we had a single point of contact from the occupant's office who was able to quickly make decisions and keep the project moving. A pre-construction meeting was organized and attended by key stakeholders. During this meeting, We discussed the timeline, the budget, the design specs, and everyone's roles and responsibilities. All parties involved in this project adhered to those strict guidelines. And again, occupant representative was empowered to make decisions when they occurred on the fly. In the case of the Israel Road project, we were also able to utilize workstations that were left behind by previous occupants. THEY WERE IN GREAT SHAPE, AND THIS SAVED US CLOSE TO A MILLION DOLLARS IN NOT HAVING TO PURCHASE. OTHER EXAMPLES WERE INCLUDING THE CARPET WAS NOT REPLACED. THE FRONT COUNTER PRETTY MUCH REMAINED THE SAME. OFFICES AND CONFERENCE ROOMS WERE KEPT INTACT ALSO WHEREVER POSSIBLE. WHAT WAS THE RESULT? THE RESULT? OH, YES. SO THE RESULT, THE PROJECT WAS ON TIME AND UNDER BUDGET.

SORRY.

Thank you, Josh. Yeah, thank you. So that was my next line. All of this allowed this project to be on time and on or slightly under budget. We are very proud of the collaboration between our team and the Sheriff's Office on this project. They were great to work with and understood the goals of the project. Central Services is now looking to adopt these standards and principles set by this project on all future projects. And here's just a look at the before and after pictures of the new building.

Added bonus is I learned that this was the first LEED Gold building in the state of Washington built by a Thurston County local developer. So the fact that we were able to purchase it, that developer and his wife attended the ribbon-cutting and they're just so excited. They never thought in a while this IMAGINATION WHEN THEY WERE BUILDING THIS PROJECT THAT IT WOULD BE SOMETHING AS SIGNIFICANT AS THE SHERIFF'S HEADQUARTERS FOR THURSTON COUNTY. SO THEY WERE JUST SUPER EXCITED THAT SOMETHING LIKE THAT COULD TAKE PLACE. JUST WONDERFUL ADDED COMPONENT WHEN WE'RE WORKING TOGETHER WITH OUR LOCAL COMMUNITY.

AND THAT'S HUGE TO BE GOLD CERTIFIED. WOW. THAT'S GREAT.

SO IN CLOSING, NEXT STEPS. WE ARE ASKING THAT to direct the county manager to use these project management standards for adaptive reuse as outlined in the presentation for all future projects and to work with central services to formalize this approach. And as a side note, staff will provide regular updates to the board on the downtown campus project. And I'd be happy to answer any questions.

Any questions for Kent?

There's a proposed motion.

Okay. Commissioner Fournier.

I don't have any questions, but I think this all sounds great. IT SEEMS LIKE THIS IS LESSONS LEARNED THAT WE'RE ADOPTING. SO I DIRECT THE COUNTY MANAGER TO USE THE PROJECT MANAGEMENT STANDARDS FOR ADAPTIVE REUSE AS OUTLINED IN THIS PRESENTATION, ALL OF YOUR PROJECTS, AND TO WORK WITH CENTRAL SERVICES TO FORMALIZE THIS APPROACH.

SECOND. MOTION AND SECOND REGARDING PROJECT MANAGEMENT STANDARDS. DISCUSSION ON THE MOTION.

Thank you. Yeah, I was actually going to ask for if we could do this motion next week. I appreciate the information that came forward today and I don't have any objections. I just need to sink in with it a little bit more. But if not, if the board's ready to move forward, I'm happy to stay.

Cushman class.

Yeah, I would be okay with Commissioner Mejia's proposal to move this motion to next week, but I think this was an excellent presentation and I appreciate all of the information staff has brought forward and really good job keeping things on time and on budget.

Commissioner Fournier. I forgot to take my hand down.

Okay. I'm okay with moving it to next week, but I think it's a great proposal.

Okay. There's a motion on the table in a second. So if we wanted to follow that approach, I think Commissioner Forney, you would withdraw the motion. I'll withdraw the motion and we just, we move it to the next agenda. Commissioner Grant, is that acceptable? You were the second.

Yeah, I can withdraw the second.

Okay, perfect. And we will have this on for next week. Okay. If there's any questions. Thank you. Manager and or Kim. ALL RIGHT, THANK YOU.

THANK YOU.

THANK YOU, KEN. GOOD JOB, TEAM. GOOD JOB. OKAY. NEXT UP IS SOUTH BAY ROAD,

over to the Public Works Director.

All right. Good morning. Thank you for having us. Karen Reese, Public Works Director. And I'm presenting today with Matt Unselman, County Engineer, and Todd Mason, our Development Review Manager. So as Leonard stated, this is simply an informational brief to provide the Board of County Commissioners awareness of a unique project for an upcoming private construction of a private pedestrian tunnel under the South Bay Road Northeast. So here is a quick overview of our presentation today and the project location. It's noted there. So as background, Gospel Outreach Church, which is located on South Bay Road Northeast, is proposing to construct a private concrete pedestrian tunnel underneath South Bay Road from the church to private property on the opposite side of the road. The private property is owned by a church member. The road is a minor arterial and within the city of Olympia UGA. It has a posted 40 mile per hour speed limit and an average daily traffic volume of 11,400 or 300, excuse me, vehicles a day. Previously, the church worked with the county to construct an enhanced pedestrian crossing across South Bay Road for church staff and children who live to the east and attend the church school. And for increased safety, the church is now proposing construction of a tunnel underneath South Bay Road. So with that, I'm going to pass it to Matt, and he's going to give you the project particulars.

Before you do that, maybe you mentioned it and I might have missed it, but you sent an e-brief, I believe. Correct. Thank you for that clarification.

Yes, we have provided the board an e-brief. I am remiss in not knowing the date that I sent that specifically, but we did give some additional information there.

All right, I'll dive into a little bit deeper what Karen was getting into as far as what's in place now. During school hours, there are a lot of children who cross South Bay Road at this location. Because of this, there's a 20 mile per hour school zone on South Bay Road through this area. No different than, I should notice off the top of my head, but however many school zones we have throughout Thurston County. In 2006, school zone signs with flashers that blink while children are coming or leaving school were installed at both ends of the school zone. In 2019, the church worked with Public Works to install the crosswalk and the rapid rectangular flashing beacons, RRFB, if you ever hear that in the future, directly in front of the church. And then most recently, Public Works worked with the church to install the speed feedback signs, which are located on the school dance signs on each side of the school zone. Since then, however, the church has continued to have safety concerns regarding the children crossing South Bay Road, and they approached the county about installing a grade-separated crossing, which is the proven countermeasure to eliminate crossing safety concerns at crosswalks. Next slide, which is me. The church ended up deciding to pursue the tunnel alternative The extents of the tunnel would extend from right away to right away on both sides of South Bay Road. The tunnel would not be open to the public. The public crossing above would remain in place. The tunnel would be approximately 12 foot wide, 8 foot high, and installed 15 to 20 feet below ground. So the proposed project will need to accommodate both public and private utilities, including Olympia Water and Sewer, Puget Sound Energy, and communications such as Comcast and Lumen. The geotechnical report prepared for the project confirmed that groundwater will not be encountered during construction, which was something that definitely needed to be investigated given the depth of the tunnel. The project will be conditioned that South Bay Road will need to remain open at all times during construction. To do this, a bypass road will need to be installed on the church property to accommodate traffic while the excavation is completed to install the tunnel. The applicant will be responsible for the maintenance and repairs of the tunnel, and they will be responsible for providing an annual inspection report to the county for review. If for some reason the tunnel needed to be abandoned, the identification agreement, which I'll be talking about in a minute, will address that. So a SEPA determination of non-significance has been determined for this project. The church's design team has addressed all county and Olympia comments. Their attorney has drafted an identification agreement, which has been reviewed by our prosecuting attorney's office. So the next step would be Public Works will be submitting an AIS for September 15th for the BOCC to consider approving the identification agreement. In the meantime, staff will be working with the church's team on the construction agreement, which will include all the conditions that must be met during construction. So again, the intent of this presentation today is to bring some familiarity of this project to the Board of County Commissioners so that when we bring the indemnification agreement forward on September 15th, you're prepared to make a decision.

And we also expect that because of the unique character of this project, that there will be some interest at the public level. And so we wanted to bring that for awareness. And we were talking and working with the church on a communication plan, having information available about the project available. to the public as this progresses. I'm not sure how to get all the presentation.

I think the uniqueness is we don't often tunnel under roads. In this unique situation, working with the applicant, the church, something staff are mapping a good process forward and taking into consideration all the necessary steps. So as actions come to the board for SOMETIMES JUST SEEING THE PICTURES AND SEEING THE MAP IS ALSO PART OF IT.

YOU SAID IT'S NOT GOING TO BE OPEN TO THE PUBLIC. SO HOW DOES THAT WORK?

SO THE TUNNEL ITSELF EXTENDS FROM BEYOND THE RIDER. BECAUSE YOU HAVE TO ACCESS IT FROM PRIVATE. CORRECT.

AND MATT, MAYBE TALK A LITTLE BIT ABOUT SOME OF THE the expectations about that will actually have a physical barrier when not being used so that there's not access just at any point in time during that.

So in discussions with the applicant, while the tunnel is not being used, they will have some sort of a gate as well as security cameras to confirm that there's no usage that's not approved for the tunnel.

But school children are expected to use it? Correct. The church has a school. Oh, it's a church school.

The children are passing from the private area on one side of the road underneath to the church's school. On the church campus? On the church campus. And many of the properties on the other side of the road are owned by church members.

And they'll have access. And then... You got, I mean, obviously we're not paying for it, but like. I should add that there is, this is at no cost to the county. You know what the budget is for this? Like if a community member, I mean, people are going to see this and go, oh, I want a tunnel under my row. Is this like a million dollar project or?

It's probably close to a million dollar project, but that's something I could definitely reach out to the applicant and follow up with.

At least. I think the important part is it's not just the cost of the project. But it's also in perpetuity, the steps that they're taking for the indemnification. It's not a infrastructure piece that the county is going to be responsible for. That's something that the county would not necessarily be willing or even recommend to take on. But because of the steps that the applicant is taking, this is a very thoughtful and comprehensive approach that the applicant is taking to look at all these components of how it works. The genesis of the need for this is, if we go back to the presentation, Amy, the last slide for questions, I think it's important just to show that road. So that road right now is where children are having to cross, and it poses a significant risk for them. Now, it can be done, but that's what I understand from talking with staff was the origin for the desire to get this done. So here we have a situation where private citizens have come together. They've raised the funds. They've looked at all these different components. I've not seen anything like this before. It's quite substantial, their investment to do that. all the steps they've taken to make sure that the county isn't going to be responsible in 10, 15, or 20 years is also part of, I think, the thought process, what we wanted to come and communicate, have staff communicate to the board.

The licensing and identification agreement runs for 70 years, a 70-year period with renewals. Which is the theoretical life of a concrete title. And that just means at the end of it, we would reassess and potentially renew the license.

And should the area be annexed into the city of Lacey, you've also, excuse me, Olympia, you've also coordinated and had them sign off on it.

So the city of Olympia has reviewed the application the entire way through the process.

Yeah, just kudos to staff for working all those angles. There are a lot of things to consider with this. But obviously, when an item comes forward for indemnification, we didn't want the board to have no context to that. So this is a helpful presentation to go through it, allow you to review the information and to ask staff any questions. Questions for Public Works staff?

Given the unique circumstances here, I'm curious to know, because there will be a traffic delay, will we need to have any sort of a public hearing process?

Or is this just, I mean, yeah. I believe there is a public hearing that was part of the SEPA process. There was not a public hearing that was part of the SEPA process. So no, there is not a public hearing.

Well, have I...

I might add on that. So part of the construction is doing a full bypass road just adjacent to the tunnel that go through basically the front yard of the church. Because it shows. Yeah, it does show on that. Yeah, there's the bypass. So it's a great partnership for. or them coming forth and going, yes, recognizing there's a lot of traffic on South Bay, it could potentially have a public impact. So instead of doing just one lane of travel with stopping, there shouldn't be any impact other than people doing the zig and the zag, so.

We'll have a very comprehensive communication plan about the traffic impacts in advance, so. Thank you, Commissioner.

Aware. Commissioner Klaus, I mentioned that we're going to be next working on a construction agreement. So that very issue that you just brought up, the conditions that, hey, you cannot hold up traffic, that'll be included in that construction agreement.

Awesome.

Thank you.

Other questions for... Next is an executive session pursuant to RCW 42-31-10-1I.

We had a scheduling issue on that one, so we're going to push that hopefully until next week or just the week after. We're going to try to get it as soon as we can.

The director is out for a few weeks, so if we don't have a director there, it'll have to be pushed out. Okay.

Okay.

With public works related, we're pushing it out. It'll be rescheduled. So that takes us to Commissioner Items and the external committee reports, if any, from the board. I guess one thing I would ask, because I wasn't here, is how did the voting center go yesterday?

Oh, the use of the facility? Yes. It looked like it went smooth. There were no reported issues. OK.

Okay, that was just something I wanted to ask since we're all here. Any external committee reports since last week? Nope. I've got, yeah, I'm in building code council almost every day right now. Today we have public hearings all day and Friday and we've had work sessions every Tuesday. That's just taking the board which is something that we're probably gonna have as an appendix, which I guess what that means is that jurisdictions can choose to adopt it. So it gives a framework for doing that, but it's not gonna be required, but it's trying to get the reporting and the conversation and the analysis and the data started for embodied carbon in buildings to try to reduce climate impacts, et cetera. That's about it for me and external committees. There was an Office of Public Defense 30th anniversary. They have an annual event and this was a 30th anniversary and I was really bummed to miss it because I was stuck in Building Code Council, but it happened at the same time yesterday. Anybody else with an external committee report they'd like to share anything? Commissioner Forney?

I have none since last week. I appreciate your service on the Building Code Council. Sounds like you're busy.

Yeah, it's been, it's, THE CODES ARE IN THREE-YEAR CYCLES, SO IT'S LIKE WHEN I GOT ON THE BUILDING CODE COUNCIL ABOUT THREE YEARS AGO, THIS WORK HAD ALREADY SORT OF BEEN DONE BECAUSE THAT WAS THE REALLY CONTROVERSIAL ENERGY CODE ONE, AND SO IT WAS WE WERE SORT OF IN THIS EXTENDED, LIKE, PIECE. SO THIS PARTICULAR TYPE OF WORK, I DIDN'T ACTUALLY, THIS IS LIKE ACTUALLY MY FIRST TIME GOING THROUGH IT. YEAH, SO IT'S BEEN INTERESTING Anyone else? Okay. Very good. Then other commissioner items. Otherwise we are adjourned. Thanks.