City Council - Regular Meeting

Good evening, everybody. Welcome to the Visalia City Council meeting. We're gonna go ahead and get our our meeting started. We've asked council member Puchigian to lead us in our pledge of allegiance, and then we'd ask that you stay standard standing so that we can have an invocation offered by Eric Menchaca of the World Mission Society Church of God. Please stand and join.

Let us pray in reverence to our Elohim God, our holy and spiritual father who is in heaven, and our heavenly mother, the new Jerusalem who is here with us. First and foremost, I would like to give thanks to you for your holy love that you have for each and every single one of us. I especially give thanks to you for your coming two thousand years ago as Jesus Christ and sacrificing yourself to save our souls. Now we're here in the Vicilli City Council meeting and we will discuss several matters and many decisions will be made. Please be with us from the beginning until the end of this meeting and let your Holy Spirit guide us to do what is righteous and just.

Please bless all the council members that are present here with your wisdom from heaven and also please bless all their families with good health and heavenly blessings. Since they are working as civil servants, please provide them with your daily bread and their necessities so that they may serve this beautiful city of Visalia under your guidance. Please bless the entire city of Visalia, its citizens, first responders to live in peace and grace under the new covenant. I pray for all this in the holy name of our second coming Christ, Ahn Sang Hong. Amen.

Thank you very much. So this week, we are gonna be recognizing City Clerks Week. And we have an amazing city clerk, so I wanted to recognize Rena. She's amazing. We've been lucky to have her for is it two years now? A little over two years? One year. One year. Alright. We're we've been lucky to have her. She's amazing to work with. She takes really good care of us and we just wanna recognize her for the the great things that she does. So, if guys wouldn't mind giving her a round of applause. We really appreciate you. So we just want you to know that and this week we'll be celebrating you.

Thank you. We're gonna go in now to public comments. This is the time for the general public to comment on issues within the jurisdiction of the Visalia City Council. Each speaker tonight may speak for up to three minutes during the general comment period on a matter that is not on the agenda. The public may also make one comment for up to three minutes prior to the consideration of the consent calendar and immediately before any regular agenda item is heard. The council ask that you keep your comments concise and positive. Creative criticism presented with appropriate courtesy is welcome. Each speaker will be allowed three minutes and a timer will notify you when your time has expired. Please begin your comments by stating and spelling your name and providing your city of residence. Anyone wishing to speak at this time, please come to the podium over here to my left, your right.

Good evening, honorable members of city council. My name is Esther Perez, and that's e s t h e r, Perez, p e r e z. My name is Esther Perez, and I am a resident of Visalia, have been for the past nineteen years, and I currently live in District 5. May 7 is a national day of prayer established in 1952 by President Harry Truman. And as a person of faith, I was searching the the online to see if there were any events held by the city of Visalia in observation to this national day.

I did not find anything, which I was surprised given the religious landscape that we have in this city. Visalia features a strong Christian community with diverse congregations. For example, we have a mega church, Visalia First Assembly, which on weekends holds services for up to 5,000 people. Again, that's just on weekends. We also have the largest Catholic parish in North America in the city of Visalia.

Again, we have the largest Catholic parish in North America in the city of Visalia. So again, the large religious landscape in our town, I find it odd that we as a city do not observe and honor such an important day to our nation. My request to you is that as a council, you would consider in the future observing this day and offering an event at city level for those of us who would like to participate in this day. The National Day of Prayer is part of the fabric, it's part of the foundation and the structure of this nation. So again, I would ask respectfully that you would consider honoring this day.

Thank you very much.

Jim Reeves of Icylia. Very well deserved for Reina. Every time I've had an issue with a city or something that I needed, Reina has been right there and handled it with with grace and humility and humor. And I'm just very happy to have somebody like that in a position of that importance. The second thing I wanted to mention was that on May 6, it will be the tenth anniversary of the opening of the Source LGBT plus center in Visalia.

In 2016, we opened the Source in the basement, a small office in Montgomery Square Building. The first fundraising drive we had was for $5,000 to do our budget for that year, dollars 5,000 budget for the entire year. The Source since then has grown to be the largest LGBT plus center between Sacramento and Los Angeles. It now has a multimillion dollar budget. And we have a two building campus that we're in now that's still too small for our needs.

The county and the city have been very generous in their cooperation with The Source, And the growth indicates the need that this area has had for a facility like The Source. So I just wanted to mark the tenth anniversary and looking forward for the next ten years. Thank you.

Okay. Seeing nobody else regarding closed public comments and we will go on to items of interest. Vice Mayor Nguyen did have a report from the air board that she wanted to share with us today, so we'll go ahead and turn the time over to her.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Yes, I just wanted to report some good news. I saw a report from the American Lung Association which conflicts greatly with the Valley Air District who monitors the air standards in our eight counties in our valley. But if you look at the graph on the bottom there, see that the number of days exceeding the federal health standards year round has dropped from forty 7% in 2002 to just five percent in 2025.

And I think that's commendable for our businesses and for our people who are doing their best to clear the air. As you know, we live in the little bowl that captures all of particulate matters from our friends over in the Bay Area. It blows right through us. And then we have no control over what are called mobile sources, which would be all the trucks that go up and down the I-five, but they're so important to our economy. So I just wanted to bring that to your attention that as a mother of a daughter who's asthmatic and a granddaughter who's asthmatic, these numbers are really, really impactful.

They don't have the trouble that they did. My daughter, especially when she was growing up and here in the Valley because the air, there are so many days the air is so much better than it has been in the past. I encourage all of you residents and businesses, you can go to valleyair.org. There are still a lot of incentive incentive programs to get rid of wood burning fireplaces, electric vehicles, electric lawn equipment, battery operated lawn equipment. There are small incentives there. And also there's funding available to put charging station at your home if you have a EV vehicle. Thank you.

Thank you for that update. Okay next we're going to the consent calendar. Council Member Nelson any items you'd like to pull? I have no items to pull. Thank you. Council member Puchigian? Nothing to pull. Council member So to? No items to pull, thank you. And vice mayor Wynn?

No items to pull, thank you Mr.

And I have nothing, so I'll entertain a motion.

I'll make a motion to accept the consent calendar as I'll second.

The first and second, all those in favor please vote. Item passes five-zero, Thank you very much. Next we're going to regular items and public hearing items. Comments related to regular items and public hearing items are limited to three minutes per speaker for a maximum of thirty minutes per item. The mayor may reasonably limit or extend the public comment period to preserve the council's interest in conducting efficient orderly meeting. Item number one that we're gonna start off with is inclusive park project. Staff report, please.

Good evening, mayor and members of the council. Jason Huckleberry, director of engineering building. I'll be joined tonight by Cody McLaughlin, associate engineer. Cody will be giving you the full presentation as well as Chris Crawford, our city engineer. We're excited to bring this project forward as we're looking to move it forward as quickly as possible and get this new inclusive park built. It's an exciting project that we'd like to see kids playing on it soon. So with that, I'll turn it

over to Cody. Good evening, council. As Jason Uglberry stated, I'm here to present on the city's fully inclusive park project tonight. This project was awarded 7,800,000 in grant funding through a very competitive application process through the California State Parks Department. This year, we have a map showing the project site being recommended.

The recommended site for the project would be the undeveloped parcel located at the corner of McAuliffe Street and Mill Creek Parkway right there in the photo on the right outlined in red. Here we have some existing some photos of the site's current existing conditions. As you can see, it's just an undeveloped parcel at this time. Other sites were considered and examined for this project, although each alternative site faced reasons that led to each not being an ideal site for this project, for reasons such as very unaligned timelines, limited infrastructure, and limited space and footprint at some of these various locations. To preface, what is inclusive park?

An inclusive park is a play area that provides an accessible space where users and attendees of all varying physical, mental, social, and learning abilities and interests can play and gain enrichment through their play environment. It's space that is designed to benefit all users and provide many modes of sensory enrichment. The following slides are images and illustrations to show the types of amenities and play equipment and uses that would be considered for this inclusive park project, starting with playground equipment as shown. These are other illustrations and renderings of playground equipment and play areas. As you can see, it's sequoia themed to correlate to our area.

These are examples of fully inclusive restrooms and picnic seating areas that would be as part of this project scope. This here depicts the interactive water play amenities and music auditory amenities that both operate through user interaction and are not actually powered by electricity, but rather through user engagement. And then here we show inclusive ball courts and fitness equipment that would allow for interaction from users of all types of abilities. Very unique type of equipment here. So an overview of what park operations could be for this project.

This would include an on-site parking lot with fully accessible parking stalls. The park project would be fully fenced to ensure user safety, and the park would be under the monitoring of city park rangers and staff. An outreach meeting was held on 04/15/2026 at the Valley Oak Middle School. 900 mailers were sent out to the nearby neighborhood, and we had a total of 14 attendees at this outreach meeting. The presentation focused on the new project site for consideration, the type of function and use for the future inclusive park.

This outreach opportunity generated a variety of public opinions and comments ranging from some attendees expressing interest and excitement for the new inclusive park and other attendees expressing concerns about the park's possible impact to the area. I have listed a summary of these comments on this slide here. I will go through those to address how city views these as ways to mitigate and address those concerns and keep those in mind while going through this project. Concerns with transients utilizing the park and the bathrooms. So this park is gonna be an enclosed park with six foot tall fencing and will only be open during specified hours.

City staff would be opening and closing the gates in the morning and in the evening, so there will be a regular city presence that can report any issues to the appropriate departments and personnel. In addition, city staff intends to explore design options for the bathroom equipment that would prioritize heavy dirty heavy duty commercial quality as an effort to prevent vandalization. Park operating hour concerns. Attendees expressed concerns of unacceptable behavior and use of the space after dark and made requested that the park would only be open during daylight hours. Staff will do more investigation in the appropriate park hours with this comment in mind to mitigate this concern.

Concerns about the parking lot being utilized for non park activities. Staff can consider placing vehicular gates across the drive approach entrance that can be closed to coincide with park hours and park operating hours. This will need further discussion and investigation with the Parks Department during the design process to ensure proper function and feasibility to integrate into this project. Concerns of noise nuisance from park and park amenities. This may have been a misunderstanding about the park equipment.

Various park equipment does have the ability to make noise and function as a learning type tool for some of the park attendees and users, but staff does not believe that these noise will be loud enough to significantly impact the nearby neighborhood given the location and the type of equipment that would be used for the end users. Increased traffic activity within the neighborhood. The drive approach for this project will most likely be located on Manzanita Street. Staff will keep resident concerns in mind when placing this drive approach. Heavy traffic to the inclusive park is not anticipated, but will be considered when designing the entry and exit points to minimize impacts to the nearby neighborhood and area.

There were requests that the parking lot not be placed on Manzanita and further away from the nearby neighborhood and homes. This comment seemed to be geared towards residents not wanting a park a parking lot right next to their homes and wanting whatever would to be built and installed adjacent to their homes to be look nice, be well maintained within their neighborhood. Staff will keep this in mind when placing the parking lot on the project site through the design process and explore design measures to mitigate that. Lastly, safety concerns about the uncontrolled intersection at McAuliffe Street and Mill Creek Parkway. Staff did inform residents and attendees to the meeting that the design is currently underway for a traffic signal at this location and at this intersection to mitigate those those concerns and safety concerns.

Thank you council for this time. At this time, I'd like to take any questions and comments regarding the project and the presentation.

Thank you very much. Councilor Marso, any questions?

I'll I'll wait till after public comment to make any comments. Thank you. Wonderful. Vice Mayor Wynn?

Yes. This is a relatively small park, correct? Three three and a half acres

or so? Four and a

half acres?

Four and

a half acres? Okay.

Okay. Thank you.

Councilwoman Pachigian? No comments at this time. Councilwoman Nelson?

I'll wait until after public

comments. I I had two quick questions. Yes. The first one is parking lot size. I mean, obviously, it's four, four and a half acres. It's not that big of a park. How big is a parking lot going to be?

That hasn't been determined. Obviously, we'd need to go through the design. But as a part of that design, we'd obviously do traffic study and kind of designate appropriate parking stalls. It being a fully inclusive park, obviously need to accommodate accessible parking stalls So as definitely that would be the emphasis with that. I don't have a number at this time though.

Okay. Let's say like guess would probably 20 to 40 is what a good guess would be.

I'm sorry, I couldn't hear that one.

20 to 40 parking stalls is what they're anticipating. So how much of that 4.5 acres would 20 to 40 parking stalls take up? Three quarters maybe.

An acre with landscaping and everything. Half acre maybe, three quarters, half

to three. So you

don't incorporate landscaping and so

on Obviously this is a unique pie shaped parcel and part of it becomes kind of unusable essentially unless I mean, you guys can get pretty creative with the playground equipment, I just want to make sure that we're utilizing it and protecting the neighborhood and still giving people access. I'll be interested to see what that plan like. And then my last question was timeline. When's the anticipated start date for construction and when are

we anticipating the project being done? Of course, yes. So given approval on the site and the updated design proposal, we would be prepared to start right away. In speaking with the consultant, our target would be to have a bid package ready before the end of the year, go out to bid, and start construction anticipate by late spring

of this upcoming year. So, '27 and then probably a year for construction?

Yeah. Targeted is an eight month, eight to ten month construction time. Eight month if we push aggressively on contractors is what's our target goal. So, twenty twenty eight ish? 2028 would be opening.

Okay. Very good. Alright. Let's go ahead and open this up to the public. Anybody from the public wishing to speak on this item? If you guys wanna speak, you guys can come up one at a time and speak right there at the podium. You have three minutes. Go ahead and state your name and city of residence.

Good evening.

Teresa Glessner, Visalia. I live three doors down from the proposed congestion, Manzanita is a very narrow, small street. And it's a dead end also. I'd like to know if there was any consideration for it being given to Douglas Street as an entrance. Douglas has a small area there that might possibly make it an entrance or possibly even an exit.

Perhaps if we have to use Manzanita, perhaps we can do the entrance at Manzanita and an exit on another street. Some proposals that I have for possibility. The entry gate to the park itself possibly being on the McAuliffe side of the park rather than anywhere near Manzanita. That would mean having if the entrance was on Manzanita, it would mean having to route cars through to the parking lot on the other side of the park. I think that would give us some excellent invisibility to anyone at the park.

That would stop people from parking in front of the homes, wandering around the neighborhood, and so forth. I'm a little concerned about the fence only being six feet high. Seven feet, I think, would be optimal. I'd like to see a natural vision and sound barrier inside the park, perhaps cypress trees or something like that, that would allow us to not have to be seen by in park. This is a security concern for me.

We have many people who are single homeowners here who live alone, me being one of them. I think that's pretty much it. I think it's a great idea for a park. I would like to see us maximize the safety and security to the residents here. And I'm concerned about the impact on our little neighborhood being overrun by too many cars.

And I suppose that remains to be seen. I thank you very much for your time. And I really appreciate all of you for the work that you do for our city. Thank you.

Thank you. Anybody else wishing to speak? Come on up.

My name's John Peterson. I live in Visalia. I live in the house that's on the corner of Manzanita and Reis. So I am directly across the street from this proposed park. And usually people hear me pretty well.

So when we had the outreach meeting, it became obvious that there really isn't a plan or a site plan or a design yet. And a lot of the factors that if you approve something without knowing some of those factors, you're just kind of buying a pig and a poke from the standpoint of, will the parking lot be inside the fence? If not, it will likely be subject to loitering, sleeping in cars overnight. We have that problem already. Litter such as condoms, needles, food containers.

Containers. We already have problems with camper vehicles being parked on the street. We've had to have the police come and tow them away and the animal control people. Is there going to be any regular security patrol? We're just going to count on PD to sweep by every once in a while. Where will the entrance to the park be located? Will people be able to drive into the park? Or is it going to be walk through gates? Where will the bathrooms be located? We believe that the bathrooms are a major issue because the homeless people in the area are always looking for a place to clean up and hide and do their things that they do?

Will they be gender specific or gender neutral? Where will the noise making play equipment be located? You've got McAuliffe. So anything that makes noise ought to be over close to McAuliffe rather than on Manz Anita because we won't hear it. I I hear everything right across I'm right across the street. I would like to see this lot developed because I have a lot of dust blows into my yard. And I think this will stop a lot of that. Will there be landscaping such as turf and trees? What kind of lighting? Will it be on all night?

Will there be lower level security lighting at night and higher level during the play times? How many trash receptacles will be on the site? Will there be any in the parking lot? We've had covered bus stops removed in the area. One in front of RN Market had to be removed because the homeless were using it as a hangout. So if you're going to have picnic areas like that, that's one of those things. It's a public place. You're not going be able to stop people from going in there. If they just want to hang out and sleep on their benches, how do you stop that? And I just like to see the high use areas away from Manzanita because it's a residential area. And there's no other residential area around this place. All right. Thank you very much. I appreciate your time. The staff did a really good job.

But yet we still haven't seen any concrete idea of what it's going to look like. Thank you.

Thank you. Anybody else wishing to speak?

Jim Reyes of Isiah. I like the idea of a park there. The only concern I have is the traffic on McAuliffe is pretty high speed. And they make that curve at Douglas and then continue on south. I like to hope there would be some sort of intrusion barrier to keep vehicles from getting into the park and keep the play areas away from McAuliffe just for that very reason if a vehicle comes through there.

I'd rather have it have to traverse a good portion of the park before it actually got to the playground area itself. But otherwise, I think it's a good idea. And I look forward to seeing it. Thank you.

Good evening. My name is Maria Guilen. That's G U I L L E N, accent over the E. I live in Visalia. And nothing seems to sadden me more than whenever we're talking about parks.

And I know how important open space and recreational access is good for a community, right? And all the positive aspects that it brings forward and the opportunities for people to, you know, get out into nature, socialize. Many people don't have a backyard to play in. This is a way they can go out and stretch. And yet, it saddens me when the first thing it seems like is everybody is trying to figure out how to fence it in, how to keep people out, certain people out, people with needs, people that we should be helping and addressing so that they don't have that particular need to occupy these spaces, right?

That we are taking care of our community so that we can then say we can have parks that are supposed to be open, not fenced in, not regulated, not policed. But that we have these spaces that are meant to remit our community. So something's wrong when we're trying to plan something good for the community. But all we're focused on is about the bad behavior or the people that really don't have other options. I'm talking about people that don't have backyards.

There's people that don't have roofs over their heads, that don't have homes. And that seems to be everybody's concern. But yet, our only way to deal with it is to keep them out, to lock them out, to and that really bothers me. And I don't have the answers, but I didn't want to sit there and let everyone think that that's not of concern, right? And I know that in a little bit we'll be talking about how to use some extra money that we have in the city to help with this problem. And so that gives me a little hope. Thank you.

Anybody else wishing to speak? Okay, seeing none, we'll go ahead and close public comments and I'll turn it back over counsel with any further questions or comments. I will start on my left with council member Nelson.

I appreciate the aspect that this has come back. Mean, for people that don't know, this has been a six year project. The original site was located at a different location and then we found out that it didn't work out. It's a shame because it's an inclusive park. It's a park for everybody.

It's a park for people that can't really park. I've been an advocate for this since the inception and now I'm looking at two years from this date, if at all possible, that's an eight year project to come to an inclusive park. I agree with the it's kind of hard to come here and say, hey, we have a new location and then you canvass the neighborhood and you put out flyers and informational and then they have legitimate questions when you really haven't designed the DIRTT, what you're saying is let's, allocate and say we're gonna do the DIRTT, then you're gonna have to come back and say this is how the DIRTT is gonna be laid This is where the entrance point is. So I think you you put the the horse out of the barn before you really had enough information for the neighborhood. I'll assure you in the neighborhood that the park will be designed correctly, that it'll be designed to be the least impactful as possible.

Let's be honest, when you put something new in a neighborhood, it's going to be impactful. If additional you housing, it increased additional traffic flow. Putting a park in and say, hey, we're adding additional housing, there's going to be extra people. Are you looking at a humongous outpouring of people utilizing the park? It's not going to be like a sports park, but you're going to have that traffic flow.

But any time you come with something new in a neighborhood, it's impactful. I think that to be fair to the neighborhood, there should have been more due diligence done on, hey, this is how we're looking at maybe designing the entrance point. This is how we're gonna lay out the, playground. You saw a lot of amenities in, pictures and presentation. I guarantee you, not all of those amenities will be in that park.

So, again, it was kind of misleading in the aspect of now we need a sound barrier. We may not have sound amenities because the park hasn't been designed. There has been no discussion on what's going to go in the park. So again, we are kind of out ahead of the game, so to speak. Now we can look at there was a design done on the original site that was the first site that came out. Again, we're trying to change things around. There was an amphitheater in it. We decided we don't need an amphitheater. It's a moving target. I can alert the neighborhood that you'll be in every step of the way on what's happening.

I think you need to understand tonight, we're saying, hey, we've got a piece of dirt. I agree it creates a lot of dust. It's not really doing much for the neighborhood right now. It's like putting in a neighborhood park. Is an amenity for the neighborhood. It creates an opportunity to go out and be outside. This gives people that normally don't have that opportunity an opportunity to be outside. It amazes me, again, had a discussion on fencing. I understand you want open space. I understand you want restrooms.

Restrooms. Sadly, to say, today's day and age, we have people that don't understand how to take care of our facilities. We've had the sports park damaged because people have gone in cars out on the soccer fields. We've had damages to restrooms out at the sports park. We've had them utilized when they were not in the correct way. These are things we have to take into consideration. It hasn't been decided there's going to be restrooms there. Hasn't been decided. I guarantee you, I will advocate for a fence. To protect the amenities and the cost of putting that park in, yeah, there should be a fence around it.

Will there be access? Sure there's going to be access. The idea is to allow people to come in. The sad part is you do things because a certain segment of society doesn't take care of things. But I think on this one, the amenities are going to be in there, reason the park is going to be developed, yeah, it should be fenced. Question I have, you talk about opening the playground in the morning and closing it at night. Is there a staff member at the site all day long? Has that been decided? Because in the presentation, it sounds like there's going to be

a staff member at that park all day. I would need to consult with the parks director,

but I do not believe that's the case. They have park rangers

at Wolves' Is it open? Right.

Because they're normally our park. They open the park up. They patrol. They hit the road. Blah blah blah. Again, I want the neighborhood to understand what reality is.

Jason Gulick, Parks and Recreation Director. The idea is that the the the facility will be secured. A park maintenance worker would open at the morning, and in the evening, a park ranger will close the facility. In between that, we do not have we don't plan on having staff there. Thank you.

Thank you. And that's what I knew. And I just wanted to share.

Jason, probably wanna stay up there. Think we have a few more questions for

you. I

do or you do? Okay. None of our parks do we have a resident park person at the park when it's open. It's catch as catch can by most standards. Open the park up and then it's locked down at night by the park ranger in between that. If I say PD could patrol it or the park ranger could be patrolling it. But we have a lot of parks in the city. Are all the parks being touched? No. Are all the trails being touched? No. So I just want the neighborhood to know that. Neighborhood parks normally aren't staffed. This is a needed park in the city of ISAIA. And I have advocated since day one.

Are kids that can't go to our parks and play. Are adults are mentally disabled that can't go to our parks and play. This gives them an opportunity to have that amenity. I will fight tooth and nail to make sure this gets done because on the first site we got sideways. But I'll also commit to the neighborhood to make sure that it's done right and keep eyes on the ball. And again, let me end it with this. Any time you put something new, it's going to be impactful. I know you're concerned with traffic. If traffic becomes unbearable, we'll do a traffic study. We'll do calming measures.

There's different things we can do. All we're doing tonight is saying hey, this is a good location. Let's do the dirt, get the design and it's two years out and we'll have a ribbon cutting ceremony and everybody's invited. Thank you, that's all I have. Thank you, Councilman Pachigian.

Yeah, thanks for the presentation. I understand the neighborhood's concerns. Personally, I think with something being built there, you'll have eyes on that area and that will kind of keep people, unwanted factions out of that region because people are out there, people are bringing their kids there, they see something they're calling the police. I am in favor of a fence around that because it protects the kids that are in that park and the individuals that are in that park. I have young kids.

I remember going to parks and sometimes be kind of nervous of what was going on in those parks. I understand the concerns of the neighborhood. I can't wait to see what the design of this is. I remember when we first got pitched design, like they said, this six years ago, and it was going to be downtown. Everyone was super excited about it and couldn't wait for it to happen. And now it's been six years and we're still here. So I'm looking forward to get this going. But like I said, I think we should listen to the neighborhood's concerns and figure out a way we could address those, but I'll be fully supportive of this tonight.

Thank you, Councilwoman Roseto. Thank you

for the report and comments tonight. So, I I'm in favor of this park of course. I can't wait for this to be done. It's it's something that we've been waiting for for a long time. I I would like like staff to take a lot of what was said tonight into consideration when designing this. The only thing I'm not in favor of is a fence around the park. And so one of the questions Jason I had is how many park rangers do we have staffed in the city of Isaia?

Currently, we have one full time, one part time.

Okay.

Thank you. In favor instead of a fence, I would rather see us hire another park ranger, someone that neighborhood can call when they see these concerns. I don't mind putting a fence around the restrooms maybe. You know, some of the stuff that gets vandalized but besides that, I'd be fully supportive of this project. Thank you.

If if I may, councilman, I believe that the the fencing was actually included within the grant application when it was done specifically for actually not keeping people out but keeping in. In this case with some of the kids with different disabilities having a protective fencing from roadways and that was So very that's actually where it started. It seems to be satisfying the other issue that's been coming up as well.

If I recall, I remember it was more of like a five foot aesthetically pleasing fence still, right? You bet. If it was something like that, I would support it. I don't like the spiked fences at parks. We have a park that has a similar fence. Not a fan of. I'd rather have more park rangers so that people can call and and and you know, address whatever concern the neighborhood has. So, that's what I'd rather see but but of course, yeah.

Thank you. You. Vice Mayor Wynn?

Yeah. I was just going to bring up the same. I have a disabled relative who would take to the park and would run. And those are busy streets, so yes, helping that. In addition, I think the neighbor's concern about traffic. If there's fencing around, it's going to really force people to park in the parking lots, not on the street, because then they'll have to they would you know, everybody's going to park to closest entrance. But I'm fully supportive of this project, and I'm sorry that we couldn't give you all the answers tonight. But I think it's prudent that the staff says, first, let's find the piece of land, then design it. Because then if we designed it and the piece of land didn't work out, then you've spent all that money. So it makes sense why we're heading in this direction.

And I just wanted to, could you just give us for the public what's the next steps as far as the design? Does that come back to council? Does it go to planning What happens next so that everyone's kind of clear on the process?

Yes, perfect. So upon, and we have written the staff report as well, upon approval of this and the updated design proposal, we would move forward with the conceptual, obviously, utility research, all that kind of stuff to develop that and develop a concept layout kind of like you'd previously seen on the previous site. That we would intend to bring back before council for comments, adjustments, obviously, any of that before we get into actual construction documents. Obviously, it's hard to do that when we, like you said, putting the cart before the horse. We need approval on the dirt, approval on design proposal to expand some efforts to develop that concept and obviously bring it forward hear those comments and concerns again.

And then my only other concern, does that have to go back to the state for approval, the design?

The design, not necessary. So we've been in coordination with the state agency and let them know of the obstacles that was faced with the previous site. They were completely understanding, and us letting them know how proactive we were with trying to find a new site and keep this moving forward. They're very motivated, very happy with that. So there is a small paperwork process to site change. Obviously, we have design component changes of removal of significant things. We'd have to go through amendments with them as well, but it's not impossible. It's just a process.

They are just They

are aware of that.

Okay. But they are aware of it, they are very excited to keep this moving forward given the obstacles we faced and given that we're still to proactively get this thing done as fast as we can.

And I will tell you, have been very good to work with, very accepting and accommodating. We're going try

to keep

that moving. Stay

with that staff member. Hope they don't quit.

We received no notice of

have other to say that.

Sir, we can't allow any comments from the audience.

Thank Can we make sure to alert the neighborhood when this comes back for design? That way, it gives them a chance to give us more public comment? We we can. Okay. Thank you.

Yeah. Thank you very much for your report. I appreciate you guys going through the process of of notifying the community and kind of explaining how it works. You know, this is something that we have been looking forward to a long time. It's a unique piece of property that, you know, I was kind of wondering for years what could it be developed into and so I'm kind of excited to be able to see a park there.

I personally have four children and in the last twenty years we've lived in two homes and we specifically have purchased those homes because they were near parks. Close enough that our family could walk to or the kids can just go play without you know me having to helicopter parent over and let's go to the park and play. So, I personally love it. My kids love living near a park and so we feel this will be a great amenity for our community and especially for our special needs community who don't really have a place to kind of really enjoy to the level that this park is gonna bring. I've seen parks like this in similar cities and they're absolutely amazing just to see how they function.

I mean, seen something like the Audible Parks where water flows and makes different sounds and sand that will make different sounds and it was just really neat and it was fun to watch the children playing with it. So, I'm excited. I appreciate you, the staff being willing to listen to the community to hear their concerns. Obviously once this gets designed, community will again have an opportunity to be able to speak because there's some current concerns from the community that we wanna make sure that we're listening to and that we're intuitive to those concerns from our community. So I just wanna say thank you but I think this is a great location. I think this is much needed for our entire community. So I'm looking forward to supporting this project. If there's any other questions or comment, I will entertain a motion at this time.

I move to approve the new site location for the Inclusive Park Park project and approve contract amendment number two in the amount of 405563¢ Westward Professional Service for the change and update in design scope.

I'll second. Fantastic, first and second. All those in favor please vote.

While you're gone, a lot of

things would be like a staff recommended motion. And

the item passes five zero. Thank you very much. Appreciate that. Alright, next we're on to item number two which is a measure in public hearing.

Good evening, counsel. My name is Renee Nagel, I'm the finance and technology director for the City of Iselia. Tonight, we're here for the Measure N ten year plan, the new ten year plan, and budget fiscal year twenty six-twenty seven and twenty seven-twenty eight, so that we're asking for a public hearing and then a motion at the end. So for those of you in the audience, what is Measure N? Measure N is a half cent sales tax for essential city services such as police, fire, recreation, as well as maintenance for parks, roads, and city facilities.

Measure n was approved, by the voters in November 2016 and became effective in 04/01/2017. The measure uses a detailed ten year plan. Measure N does have an expenditure process that has to be followed, so tonight's public hearing is to receive comments on the next proposed ten year plan, which is years 11 through 20, and for the two year budget, that we've been working on, which is for fiscal year twenty six, twenty seven, and twenty seven, twenty eight. Measure in funds requiring, requires, three actions, to be taken place before an adoption could happen. With the first one was, to provide a recommendation to city council and to receive, comments and feedback, which was brought to city council on March 16.

Then it's taken to receive comments recommendation from the sales tax oversight board, which was completed on March 26. And then we're we're to conduct two public hearings at council's regular meetings to consider the expenditure plan. The first public hearing was on April 20, and tonight, we're here for the second one. The new plan components so the plan starts in the second year of the proposed budget, which is fiscal year twenty seven-twenty eight. The proposed ten year plan continues with the original intent of the plan providing essential city services and maintenance of parks, trails, and roads.

The plan continues to fund everything that is in the current tenure, plus adds additional full time employees, capital, and increases maintenance funding. Down below is the revenue assumptions for the Measure N over the next ten years, which on year eleven, the measure in sales tax is projected to bring in about $20,000,000 a year and then to continue to grow over the next ten years, which will bring in approximately $230,000,000 This assumes no recession in the next ten years, so it's a best case scenario. But it's a lot of money, which then tells you what we can do with Measure N as well. For additional plan elements that have been added to the plan, again, going with that, we're going to continue with the first ten years we've done, and we're going to continue that. And then we're going to add additional plan elements, which is hiring additional staff and police, which would include seven police officers, two community service officers, and two professional staff.

For fire, it would design and construct a new fire station, which would be also known as Station 57. It would purchase the engine and then staff a portion of the staff. The remaining staff, if there's not enough funds, would be funded out of other funds such as fire measure T or the general fund. For streets, we would continue with the annual street maintenance of 4,000,000, increasing it by 0.05% annually. For parks and recreation, we would continue with funding the trailway, tree, building, and park maintenance, increasing it to 2% annually.

For the maintenance and emerging needs category, which is 8% of the sales tax, building maintenance increasing building maintenance from 1,100,000 to 1,500,000 annually, and the remainder of the 8% of the budgeted revenues to fund the emerging needs, which would come back with a policy at a later date. The 2% category, which is your youth, to fund a total of 2% of budgeted revenues for police and recreation youth programs. And then for the uncertainty fund balance, maintain the uncertainty fund balance at 30% of operating expenditures per the policy. So this table tries to put the proposed ten year plan into a slide. It's a lot of numbers.

We broke it out into five year increments, and it shows what the revenues would be plus the total expenditures by the categories as outlined in the current plan. It shows as continued expenses, which would be from the first ten year plan. It shows us growing those with the costs that would be associated with the personnel and equipment for each category. And then, of course, the blue is either adding new or increasing it by the cost that I mentioned a minute ago. And the same goes for the next two categories.

That was the essential service side. So the next two categories is the 2% youth and the 8% maintenance emerging needs. Again, it's continuing with the plan that we have in the first ten years, expanding it into the next ten years, and then adding or growing it by any additional cost, which is the blue. So that was the ten year new plan that we're recommending. And next is the two year budget.

So the two year budget is putting into play what the plan says to do. So for fiscal year 'twenty six-'twenty seven, it's off of the current plan. It's the last year of it, which would be year 10 of the current plan. And then fiscal year 'twenty seven, 'twenty eight would be the year one or year eleven of the second year, ten year plan. And so budget is just putting into play what this plan is.

And so the sales tax projection, as I just mentioned earlier, would include a 2.5% per year in the two years. That's our revenue projection. For expenditures, fiscal year six-'twenty seven is based on the current year current plan, and fiscal year 'twenty seven-'twenty eight is on the proposed plan. And then it uses updated cost estimates and includes any amendments that may occur throughout plan or the years. So for the two year budget, the new positions per the plan would be for fiscal year 'twenty six-'twenty seven, which would be the current plan, we're going to be adding two police officers and one professional staff to police.

For fiscal year twenty seven-twenty eight, for the new plan that I just mentioned, we'll be adding one police officer and one professional staff. For fiscal year twenty six, twenty seven plan amendments, we're, asking to replace a wrecked police vehicle. We're, requesting additional appropriation Station 50 one's construction and then we're going to increase the building maintenance from the one. One to the one. Five million.

Quick question. If we wanted to make an amendment, so Vice Mayor Wynn last time mentioned how we could potentially pull a couple thousand dollars from the youth to add to the youth grants total. Would should we do that now or have do that after we've finished this these amendments that we've already discussed once?

We could do it with this or what staff would like to do is bring back a proposal and then we go through the process where we bring it to you and then go back to the committee and kind of outline what does that look like with the youth grants and how much and just kind of outline how we would fold that in maybe to the current nonprofits on what that would look like.

Awesome. Okay. Thank you. So

this slide shows the proposed budget for fiscal year 'twenty six-'twenty seven, which again is year current plan. And so the highlighted yellow is the totals that I'm just going to mention because everything else is the continued plan and it's this real total cost. So for essential services, we're proposing the budget to be 37,600,000. That number is large. As mentioned earlier, we're requesting to add an additional appropriation for the construction of Station 51.

We've been talking about it for years. It's in the plan, and we've been saving for it, so that money is there. And so hopefully when the bids come back, when we go out to bid, the cost would be less, so then that could go back to fund balance. For the 2% youth programs, the budget would be $393,600 And for the 8% maintenance and emerging needs, it would be the 1.5%, with the emerging needs still needing to come back with a policy and ask to propose funds at that time. So this takes the total for fiscal year 'twenty six, 'twenty seven to be $39,600,000 For the next year, it carries those same positions and the same functions over, just growing them and then adding the positions that I talked about on my previous slides.

And so you'll notice the essential services total is much less. This is more in line of what it is annually when you're not adding to build a fire station, which is 17,200,000, and the youth programs for 103,500. The 8% maintenance and emerging needs would be again the 1.5 for building maintenance with the emerging needs coming back, and then for a grand total of 19,200,000. So this next slide is just a projected fund balance. It basically builds upon the beginning cash of what we're estimating it to be from this fiscal year and carrying it through with the projected revenues that I've shown in my previous slides and the expenditures that I just went over.

The transfers is to transfer what we would estimate to be in the economic uncertainty fund. That number is based on actuals when you get to that, so those are just estimates at this time. It is important to note that there is cash balances, and some may think, well, those are large, but you have to save cash in order to move with your ten year plan, and that's because your plan is requesting in there to do a station 57 in that next ten years. And as you just saw, we needed 21,000,000 for 51. Now, the next station isn't going to be as large, so it would be less.

But it's going to be several millions. Right? So you need to have that money in there when you get there so you can move forward with that project. Tonight's recommendation is to conduct the second public hearing and to approve the new proposed ten year plan and the fiscal year twenty six-twenty seven and twenty seven-twenty eight budget.

Thank you, Renee, for your report. I appreciate it. Any questions for staff at this time? Okay, seeing none, let's go ahead and open this up to the public. Anyone from the public wishing to speak on this item, please come forward.

And seeing no one running up there, we're gonna go ahead and close public comments and I'll entertain any further questions or a motion.

I move to approve the next measure in ten year plan twenty twenty seven to two thousand and thirty seven and the proposed fiscal year 2026, 2027 and twenty seventwenty eight measure in budgets.

I'll second it.

We have first and a second. All those in favor please vote. Tie. It sound like councilor Merso to beat them out. It

should be rock paper scissor battle.

Thank you, item passes five zero. All right, and there's no closed session reports?

Nothing to report this evening.

Wonderful, then we're gonna go ahead and adjourn and we welcome everyone to come back at our next meeting, which will be a special meeting on Wednesday, May 13. And then our next regularly scheduled meeting will be Monday, May 18. Meeting adjourned.