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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2020-04-21 Work Session Meridian City Council Work Session April 21, 2020. A Meeting of the Meridian City Council was called to order at 4:30 p.m., Tuesday, April 21, 2020, by Mayor Robert Simison. Members Present: Robert Simison, Joe Borton, Luke Cavener, Treg Bernt, Jessica Perreault, Brad Hoaglun and Liz Strader. Also present: Chris Johnson, Adrienne Weatherly, Bill Nary, Caleb Hood, and Joe Bongiorno. Item 1: Roll-call Attendance: Liz Strader _X_ Joe Borton _X_ Brad Hoaglun _X_Treg Bernt X Jessica Perreault _X Luke Cavener _X_ Mayor Robert E. Simison Simison: We will call this meeting to order. For the record is Tuesday, April 21 st, 2020, at 4:31 p.m. We will begin this meeting with roll call attendance. Item 2: Adoption of Agenda Simison: All right. Item No. 2, adoption of the agenda. Bernt: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Bernt. Bernt: I move we adopt the agenda as published. Oh, excuse me. One thing. We need to add -- looking at my notes we need to add a letter to our Executive Session. So, letter D. When we get there we can clarify. Hoaglun: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Hoaglun. Hoaglun: I second the adoption of the agenda as amended. Simison: We have a motion and a second. Is there any discussion on the motion? If not, all those in favor signify by saying aye. Opposed nay. The ayes have it. MOTION CARRIED: ALLAYES. Item 3: Consent Agenda [ Action Item] Meridian City Council Meeting Agenda April 28,2020— Page 90 of 272 Meridian City Council Work Session April 21,2020 Page 2 of 26 A. Entrata Farms Subdivision No. 2 Sanitary Sewer & Water Main Easement No. 1 B. Razzberry Villas Sewer Easement Release C. Final Plat for Inglewood Place Subdivision No. 1 (H-2020-0028) By The Pointe at Meridian, LLC, Located at 3250 E. Victory Rd. D. Modified Final Plat for Shelburne East No. 1 (H-2020-0031) by Shelburne Properties, Located at 4115 E. Bott Ln. E. Findings of Fact, Conclusions of Law for Bannock Ridge (H- 2019-0143) by Ryan Recla, Located at 2940 S. Mesa Way F. Acceptance Agreement for Display of Artwork in Initial Point Gallery by Alison Brush G. Resolution No. 20-2204: A Resolution (H-2020-0023) Blue Valley Elementary School) Modifying Note # 17 on the Southridge Subdivision No. 1 Plat that Prohibits Direct Lot or Parcel Access to S. Spanish Fork Way to Allow an Exception for Lot 2, Block 2, Located at 1830 W. American Fork Drive in the City of Meridian, Ada County, State of Idaho; and Providing an Effective Date H. AP Invoices for Payment - 04/15/20 - $3,597,288.26 Simison: Item No. 3 is the Consent Agenda. Bernt: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Bernt. Bernt: I move that we approve the Consent Agenda. For the Mayor to sign and the Clerk to attest. Hoaglun: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Hoaglun. Hoaglun: I second Consent Agenda approval. Simison: I have a motion and a second to approve the Consent Agenda. Is there any discussion on the motion? If not, all those in favor signify by saying aye. Opposed nay. The ayes have it. MOTION CARRIED: ALLAYES. Meridian City Council Meeting Agenda April 28,2020— Page 91 of 272 Meridian City Council Work Session April 21,2020 Page 3 of 26 Item 4: Items Moved From the Consent Agenda [Action Item] Simison: There were no items removed from the Consent Agenda. Item 5: Department /Commission Reports [Action Item] A. Information Technology: Annual Report Simison: So, we will move into Item 5-A, Our Department Reports, and we will hear from Dave Tiede, for Information Technology annual report. Tiede: Thank you, Mayor, Members of the Council. I'm here tonight before you with the Information Technology Department's annual report to Council. See if I have control to change the slides here. It looks like I do. So, our agenda tonight -- I will try to be brief, but we will give you a brief introduction to our IT team, what we do for the city and our community. Our recent successes, including how we have reacted to the COVID-19 situation and remote work needs and, then, also some upcoming budget needs. So, with that I will just give you a little brief snippet of our mission and vision statements. We -- we pride ourselves on being customer focused, friendly, and innovative with technology. One thing you also probably know or notice throughout our slides is we also like to have fun and we like to infuse that in what we do. So, I hope this is represented well here for you guys. I'm going to start off with our service desk team, which you can see here on the slide part of our service desk team. Our service desk team is represented by all the different services we have here on the slide, but I will talk about a couple specifically. We handle technology purchasing for the city as a whole. So, all technology purchases, hardware and software, come through the IT Department and that's so that we can vet them, we can make sure they are compatible with current systems, we can ensure that we are not purchasing software or hardware that we may have elsewhere that we could repurpose or reuse. Anyway. So, that's part of what our service desk team does. And, then, another item that I wanted to mention on this slide specifically is account management. So, this encapsulate -- encapsulates providing user accounts to our employees, to City Council, and also includes administering permissions, access to systems, things like that. So, it's very important to our overall information security program. So, another item going on in this slide deck here is next line, if you will switch for me. Provide all types of technical support and that's hardware and software support across the city and you will see here we have a number of items listed, including audio visual support, which means in the chambers we support the technology in there. Conference rooms. We do hardware and software support to any application that you can think of. We have over 300 applications in the city that we support and we touch them all and, then, we also handle in the field support. So, our fire and police vehicles that have computer equipment in them, we service those, we provide technical support for them, make sure they are functioning up to date, as well as our inspection in Public Works teams. So, our next team that I will cover briefly is our -- if you can switch for me -- our software engineering team. So, this is a list of some of our services we provide in software engineering. It's a very long list and you will see even further some of the applications we support on the software engineering side on the next few slides. It's even Meridian City Council Meeting Agenda April 28,2020— Page 92 of 272 Meridian City Council Work Session April 21,2020 Page 4 of 26 longer. I will cover a couple here, though,just to give you some idea. We do new software development. So, if a department has a need for a new piece of software when they request that from us we consider should this be something we do internally versus something we buy commercial off the shelf software for. So, we do that because, A, it's a cost savings to the city many times, but, B, we can also provide software that's going to meet all their business needs, instead of 60 or 80 percent of their business needs. So, again, very beneficial to the city and a really good service that we provide. Another service that I think is very unique to the city or that we do exceptionally is integration. So, that's listed on the second -- or on the first column there towards the bottom. This is really making two different systems talk to each other and work together. So, I will give you an example. We have our land management system,Accella, where we do all the permitting and whatnot throughout the city; right? Our Community Development Department handles that. But we built in integration, so that that information, as far as the financial side, can get dumped into our financial system as well. So, that way it's not a manual process for somebody to go and pull that out, put it in the other system, and run reporting and whatnot off of that. So, we do a lot of integrations like that and we do it well to the point where we actually get requested from -- or requests from other entities throughout the valley to help them or give them tips on it, because we do it pretty well. So, this next slide is just a snippet of some of the applications that a couple of our software engineers support. Get it switched over here. Sorry. This remote control is a little slow to respond sometimes. So, this gives you a little snippet of some of the applications we support and, then, the next slide, another snippet of some of the applications we support, including Accella, which is something that we have two software engineers supporting right now. We are looking to make some changes there. So, that will be something that changes here this fall. And, then, the next thing I wanted to cover is we also handle web development. So, we handle the content of the website. We -- we rely on the city departments to provide the content to us, but we are the ones that put it up there, make it look pretty, make it search engine optimization compliant, so that the Googles and everything else can find the content and index it, so that people can get it at their fingertips easily. We also do ADA compliance and build custom applications for web based needs. So, a lot of fun stuff. Our next team that I wanted to cover is our GIS team. We worked with many other departments throughout the city that have subject matter experts in the world of geographic information systems, including Community Development, Public Works, Police and Fire and this is the smattering of services that we provide throughout those different areas. A couple that I would like to highlight quickly is automated data exchange for GIS. So, you can see here kind of towards the middle of the slide there is a part called automated data GIS data exchange. We work with other agencies throughout the valley, including Ada county, ACHD, COMPASS, to get their data and to incorporate that into our GIS system for analysis and visualization through maps, but we also provide information to them as well. So, we have -- we have taken it a step further here in the last few years where we are actually able to automate most of that data exchange, instead of manual back and forth labor every time that there is an update. So, pretty significant. Another item or service I would like to highlight on here is AVL, just because it's one that we are pretty proud of and we think it's pretty cool. So, we have outfitted most of the city vehicles in the city, including police, fire, Community Development's inspection team and most of water and some of wastewater with GPS Meridian City Council Meeting Agenda April 28,2020— Page 93 of 272 Meridian City Council Work Session April 21,2020 Page 5 of 26 tracking capabilities. These GPS tracking capabilities are through CradlePoint Devices. They are a local partner of ours. They provide just -- not just GPS, but they also provide the data connectivity back to the city. So, through a carrier and a VPN connection. But through this technology we are able to track vehicle location information in near realtime. We pick up points right now about every three seconds. We were doing one second at one point, but it was -- it was a lot of data. So, with that type of data we can do heat mapping things for law enforcement, so they can see, hey, look in the last 24 hours where did a lot of our vehicles spend their time, where those crime -- you know, higher crime areas or where our Community Development inspection vehicle is at at this point in time. Where are the most inspections happening this day type thing. So, some really cool information that we can glean from AVL. The next slide. Again, you will see a little bit different taste on it. Again, we are a -- we are a team that likes to have fun, so you will see here we went with a little bit different theme for our infrastructure team. So, infrastructure really covers this wide variety of services that we have here, but a couple I would like to highlight specifically are our data protection services, which means everything from backups to, oops, somebody deleted a file and they need it back, to, hey, look, we are in a situation where there is some major disaster or disruption that we have to go and get systems up at another location so that the city can continue to operate. So, that's -- that's all encompassed within the data protection services that we have and I would say they are pretty robust as we can bring things up in a matter of hours if we were in the event to lose our data center at City Hall. So, pretty cool. And, then, we also provide network and internet connectivity to all city facilities. So, this covers all the main city facilities, including the police station and fire stations, water, wastewater, but we also have connectivity out to many different SCADA sites for the Public Works team, as well as managing connectivity for, again, a wide variety of fleet vehicles. So, anyway, that's just a couple items on our infrastructure side. See if I can switch slides here. The next one that I wanted to cover here is also under infrastructure. So, we handle project management for IT projects and I will talk about a couple projects here in a few minutes that we manage, but that means that we are the ones overseeing the project working with the vendor to make sure that everything comes and meets the time requirements that we have resources, et cetera. And, then, we also handle information security across the board for the city. So, that's cybersecurity, that's security awareness training for employees, that is in some spaces meaning that we also are aware of and help with the physical security of certain aspects, especially when it comes to information that we house. So, again, information security, very high priority important for us and it's something we do -- I think we do reasonably well. I would say exceptionally well, but, you know, don't want to pat myself on the back too much. Next I would like to cover a few of our successes that we have had over the last year here. This is just a few highlights. In conjunction with our Community Development Department we partnered to work together towards electronic submittals and plan review phase two for Community Development. So, we have gone fully electronic online for all electronic submittals for Community Development for that side of things. We are working on the planning side of things and land development. So, those will be coming up in the next six to nine months. But for the most part everything else in Community Development is being done electronically. I'm sure you have probably heard Cameron talking about that a number of times in the past. We also worked to complete the number of server migrations. We actually migrated Meridian City Council Meeting Agenda April 28,2020— Page 94 of 272 Meridian City Council Work Session April 21,2020 Page 6 of 26 over a hundred servers to a new operating system this last year and that was a big undertaking. It was important for us from an information security standpoint, but also to make sure that we are compatible and up to date with applications as they continue to evolve and require newer hardware or software. So, that was completed this last year. We also did a number many Windows 10 upgrades with the exception of MDPs, which will be -- many will be replaced this fall. That was, again, for security requirements, but also to make sure that we are up to date with requirements from a software standpoint as the various vendors that we work with were phasing out support for older operating systems, such as Windows 7. Another project you will hear me talk about a little bit more in a minute is our independent content management system. We worked on phase one of this and this is a -- this is going to be an ongoing budget request that I will talk about here more in a minute. So, you will hear more in a minute for that one and, then, the other one that we did was our ITS RMS data migration. So, we completed ITS RMS project here last year, which was to bring all law enforcement records into this new records management system that we built in house and, then, this year we worked to migrate over 18 years of information from the old records management system into this new system. So, a significant undertaking that our -- our software engineering team worked with the Police Department's crime analysis unit and records staff on. Pretty cool accomplishment. So, the next thing I would like to cover on successes is our reaction to how we have handled some of the different COVID-19 needs due to this unique situation that we are in. Sorry. Getting calls. We have done near continual updates to the city website in conjunction with the Mayor's Office, Public Works, Community Development, and in many other departments to make sure that citizens have the information that they need at their fingertips as to how to deal with the COVID-19 situation and what they need to have available to them. We have also been working a lot with people with our employees to make sure that they can work remotely. In fact, we -- we set up nearly 200 employees to be able to work remotely in about two weeks. So, that was a pretty significant undertaking and I think for the most part most employees are up and working successfully from home, which is pretty cool that we could --that we could turn that around that quickly, so -- and, then, the one that you are all aware of -- obviously, we are using this technology right now. We were able to get Council and Commission meetings working in a remote fashion. Big huge kudos to the Clerk's Department for managing all this. It's -- it's probably a bigger lift on their end long term than it is on ours on the technology side, just because how they handle the workflow and process behind the scenes to make this all happen. So, I will give kudos to them, but also say that we are pretty proud that we were able to get this up and working in such a seamless fashion, even though there were some bumps along the road. Next I will talk about our -- oops. Jumping ahead here. Our Enterprise content management system. This is one of our upcoming budget needs that we have slated for this coming year. Enterprise content management really came around for us as we discussed needs on the document management needs of the city. So, many different departments were running into challenges with, hey, we want to store these electronically, we want to do this electronically, we want to move more electronically so we are not storing all these paper records or worrying about managing all these paper records. So, a number of years ago we decided that it was time for the city to have some type of system to handle this citywide, instead of a few departments having their own silos of information, and last year we were Meridian City Council Meeting Agenda April 28,2020— Page 95 of 272 Meridian City Council Work Session April 21,2020 Page 7 of 26 able to fund the first year of this project. This is -- that was phase one of three phases. So, giving some more information about what this type of system can do, it would help with the audit -- or it helps with the automation of records retention. So, right now a lot of that's manual work for many departments every year as we go through and execute the records retention schedule. This system would allow us to tag things and, then, have them handle it in a more automated fashion, that would still include City Council for the actual destruction needs and it also handles better searching abilities, revised -- or revision control notifications when documents change, things like that. So, if we have policies that change we can actually notify people based off of HALOC or the change. We don't have to worry about manually managing that process. It also allows us to do a lot of things -- we have forms and automate workflows. So, a lot of power in this tool and a lot of-- we are really excited of where this is going to go, because we -- we see a lot of efficiencies being created by this, including things like e-signatures and things like that. So, pretty cool technology. We are actually--just for the--just for informational purposes, the City Clerk's Office has had the tool that we are using for a number of years, but we upgraded this system and added some features that will be coming out to other departments here, so -- and, then, the next resource -- or request -- budget request that we have this year is for communications infrastructure extensions. This is really a continuation of a long-term strategy that we have at the city for communications infrastructure. We have been partnering with ACHD and Public Works to look for opportunities to put conduit fiber equipment in where we can when it make sense for the long term benefit of the city and the community. So, right now a couple of projects in the works where the city will actually have city-owned conduit and fiber in the future included in the Chinden corridor, which will be beneficial for the city, but also it could be something that we could lease out to other entities if there is a need at some point in the future, which we see being valuable to our community and, then, we are also -- this coming year we are looking at a couple of extensions in south Meridian along Eagle Road, I believe is one, and another one along Locust Grove. So, that is that continued effort. And that covers our budget needs for this next year. With that I think that covers my slide deck and I'm trying to switch to the next slide here. With that I will stand for any questions that you may have. Simison: Thank you. Council, do you have any questions? Cavener: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Cavener. Cavener: Not a -- not a question, but just a comment and I guess it's kind of threefold. Dave, first off, you guys -- your department does such a great job. One of the things that I'm -- I'm thoroughly impressed with is the team based DNA that you and your staff have helped to develop. That doesn't come by accident, that comes from intentional leadership, and I just wanted to thank you and your department for that. To be able to build I think such a strong team while also continuing to serve our internal customers is -- is nothing short of remarkable. And, then, to throw -- kind of giving all city employees the ability to work remotely during this crisis is really amazing. So, I just -- I just want to Meridian City Council Meeting Agenda April 28,2020— Page 96 of 272 Meridian City Council Work Session April 21,2020 Page 8 of 26 say thank you to be able to continue to lead that department, to continue to retain great people who work so hard for city employees, it's just -- it's really really remarkable and something that I hope you are proud of and I hope your staff are really proud, because I am. Tiede: Thank you, Councilman Cavener. Yes, we are proud of it. Hoaglun: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Hoaglun. Hoaglun: Yeah. Dave, to echo a little bit of what Luke said, you know, your software development where you have customized some things for our various city departments have just -- I have seen some of that stuff in action and it's really amazing. My question is how do you maintain the integrity of that product, because it is customized, when you do have turnover, you know, it's -- it's unique and, you know, someone's thought process went into it. Are you finding you are having success being able to enhance it as you go down the road without the original people there? How does that work out for you? Tiede: I will have to say that we haven't had a lot of turnover in last decade or so in our software engineering team, so we have been lucky there, but we also follow a very rigid standards practice, so a lot of the different technologies that we have leveraged are modularized enough that we can leverage them where ever and they are also very well documented. That's the base -- both in the code and outside of the code as far as -- in our software code repository. So, those are what we have done so far and we have had success. We have had a little bit of turnover here and there, for example, on our Accella system we had to hire a new software engineer from scratch about five years ago and we were able to get them up to speed fairly quickly and get them to the point to where they could understand all the different touch points and integrations and customization we had done to that system, but we have been successful through, again, lots of documentation, following a rigid set of standards, and really good communication. Hoaglun: Mr. Mayor. Just to follow up -- Simison: Councilman Hoaglun. Hoaglun: Yeah. Kudos to you and your team for the work that you do. it is amazing and there are times I just think, man, we need to box this up and get it sent out and have other -- other entities pay us for it you guys do such good work. So, we really appreciate that. Tiede: Thank you, Councilman Hoaglun. Strader: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Council Woman Strader. Meridian City Council Meeting Agenda April 28,2020— Page 97 of 272 Meridian City Council Work Session April 21,2020 Page 9 of 26 Strader: Thank you so much for the presentation and I echo the other comments about especially how nimble your department was with the COVID-19 situation. We talk a lot about our successes. Are there any ongoing challenges or things that we should have on our radar that came up, you know, during this transition to remote work or things that it would be good for Council to be aware that you guys are grappling with? Tiede: Sure. I can definitely speak to that, Council Woman Strader. The biggest challenge I think that we probably had was adjusting to remote work needs. So, as we -- as we transition people to these remote work situations many of them hadn't had that opportunity in the past, so it was really helping them wrap their heads around how they can get -- you know, get around not having a printer at home, you know, or not having a scanner at home, how they can take their process digital when they hadn't had a need to do that in the past. So, I think we have -- you know, we have covered a lot of that with the employees so far and -- and to date I don't think we have many concerns left. I will say that there may be requests for some of that technology as we continue to evolve the city's work from home program, but I think at this point in time we are in a good place. The other area that we run into challenges with was really with the need for video conferencing or calling solutions. We really had one solution at the time, which was GoToMeeting and while we had a few basically meeting hosts available, we didn't have something that would cover, you know, this large of a shift or a need that we had with this situation. So, we were able to leverage a lot of the different opportunities out there for vendors that were handling -- handing off free licensing for, you know, temporary needs due to this challenge and so I don't think that we had anything out of the ordinary come up there, but long term I think that we will definitely see that continue to evolve and there may be some future software oriented solution expenditures that will come up due to that, so -- Strader: Thank you. That was very helpful. Simison: And, Dave, if I could just also add in. You may be seeing a policy next Tuesday in front of you regarding a telework work from home policy. You know, we didn't have something in place specifically, but this is a direction that Dave and I have been talking about going since January. It just got here quicker than we were ready for it. So, we do need to get something down officially on -- on telework, but it also has to take into consideration this is not a normal telework practice that we have been under, so they will be separated slightly, but it's still important to get something down. So, you can see that as early as next week. Council, any further questions? All right. Thank you very much, Dave. Appreciate it. Tiede: Thank you. B. Human Resources: COVID- 19 Employee Policy Discussion Simison: And now we will go right into our next phase of the COVID, piggybacking off of that with Item 5-B, which will be a Human Resources COVID-19 employee policy discussion. I will turn this over to Crystal. Meridian City Council Meeting Agenda April 28,2020— Page 98 of 272 Meridian City Council Work Session April 21,2020 Page 10 of 26 Ritchie: Thank you, Mayor, Members of Council. I appreciate your time this afternoon. So, on March 18th, 2020, President Trump did sign a law, the Family First Corona Response Act, and this act does require that the city provide two temporary benefits from the time period of April 2020 to December 31 st, 2020, to our employees. You have a copy of those two policies in your packet. They are the emergency paid sick leave and family medical leave expansion. The emergency paid sick leave allows employees, regardless of how long they have worked for the city, to be eligible for additional paid sick leave, with the exception that as an employer of emergency responders we may elect to exclude such employees. The FMLA expansion allows employees to take a paid FMLA leave if he or she cannot work remotely because of a minor child's school or childcare service has closed due to COVID-19. These temporary policies will be placed on the Human Resources intranet page for employee reference, as well as the support forms and request forms, et cetera, for processing. You have a resolution that has also been attached and so on behalf of the HR Department I respectfully request here adoption of these federally mandated policies. Nary: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Mr. Nary. Nary: Mr. Mayor, Members of the Council, I would add one more comment. As Crystal mentioned, because of the unique character of both public safety and Public Works personnel and the unique character of both their scheduling, backfilling, overtime and those types of things, that they -- they will have to be evaluated on a case-by-case basis, rather than a blanket policy, and that's now been inserted into the policy that is now on the website. So, the original one that we sent to you on Friday has this new language inserted into it to separate that out just to make it clear, because the original policy as proposed didn't call that out specifically and so I just wanted to make sure you were aware of that. Simison: Thank you, Mr. Nary. C. Resolution 20-2205: A Resolution Of The City Council Of The City Of Meridian Adopting Expansion of the FMLA Employee Policy Simison: Council, any questions regarding this information? Okay. If not, I will -- we will move on to Item 5-C, a Resolution 20-2205 regarding the City Council -- for the City of Meridian adopting expansive of FMLA employee policy. Any conversation or motion on this item? Borton: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Borton. Strader: If there is no discussion, I move that we approve Resolution 20-2205. Meridian City Council Meeting Agenda April 28,2020— Page 99 of 272 Meridian City Council Work Session April 21,2020 Page 11 of 26 Cavener Second. Simison: I have a motion and a second to approve Resolution 20-2205. Is there any discussion on the motion? If not, Clerk will call the roll. Roll call: Bernt, yea; Borton, yea; Cavener, yea; Hoaglun, yea; Strader, yea; Perreault, yea. Simison: All ayes. Motion passes. MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES. D. Resolution 20-2206: A Resolution Of The City Council Of The City Of Meridian Adopting Expansion of Sick Leave Policy for COVID-19 Related Leave Simison: Item 5-D is a Resolution 20-2206 regarding the City of Meridian adopting expansion of sick leave policy for COVID-19 related leave. Is there any discussion on this item or do I have a motion? Borton: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Borton. Borton: If there is no discussion, I move we approve Resolution 20-2206. Cavener: Second. Simison: I have a motion and a second to approve Resolution 20-2206. Is there any discussion on the motion? If not I will ask the clerk to call the roll. Roll call: Bernt, yea; Borton, yea; Cavener, yea; Hoaglun, yea; Strader, yea; Perreault, yea. Simison: All ayes. Resolution is agreed to. Thank you. MOTION CARRIED: ALLAYES. E. Community Development: Budget Amendment in the Not-To- Exceed Amount of $49,900 for Fields Area Professional Services Consulting Simison: Item 5-E is from our Community Development Department. I will turn this over to Mr. Hood. All right. Meridian City Council Meeting Agenda April 28,2020— Page 100 of 272 Meridian City Council Work Session April 21,2020 Page 12 of 26 Hood: Thank you. Mayor, Members of Council, the requested budget amendment before you this afternoon is the next step in the Comprehensive Plan implementation. So, as you know we adopted a new Comprehensive Plan December of last year and there were seven implementation -- high priority implementation projects that we had discussed and got direction to move forward with in -- in various forms and fashions. A couple of those you will actually see later this year, enhancement requests for fiscal year '21. We saw an opportunity to build on what Logan Simpson, who was our main consulting partner on the Comprehensive Plan, to piggyback on work they did and develop -- helping us develop the Comprehensive Plan, to dig a little deeper into The Fields area. I have been using that term for several years now. It's the northwest four square miles of our area of city impact. So, south of Chinden, north of McDermott -- or, excuse me, McMillan to the county line and State Highway 16 would be the eastern boundary of that. So, the community saw some real opportunity in this area. It's going to be kind of out on an island -- again, it's going to be -- it's going to be bisected from the rest of our community by a future state highway and an existing state highway. This may not be the best analogy, but it's sort of a -- more of a Hyde Park on steroids, if you will, with a mixed use center kind of grounding it right in the middle of those four square miles where you could have neighborhood shops and services, some higher density kind of around it and, then, feathering to some more traditional residential and commercial uses. What this -- what this project actually does is, again, puts a finer point on those and not only -- the consultant wouldn't only just tell us what we need to get out of developers or property owners as they develop -- annex and develop in the city, but what should we as the city be doing to prepare for that? How should we till the ground, partner potentially with -- with developers to get this area to be something special? You know, we would probably -- I will be -- I will be honest, we would probably be okay if we didn't do this and get more of the same. You know, we would get some residential subdivisions around a high school and it would just be more of Meridian and that's fine, you know, most of Meridian is pretty nice. This -- again, we heard from the community there is a real opportunity out here. There is a lot of vacant ground with real potential into the future and so we want to do it right, kind of similar to the Ten Mile specific area plan in 2007 that we adopted. It's real similar to that, with real specific standards on expectations from, again, both the development community, as well as the city on -- on how we can bring something to life out in this area. So, you have some more information in the -- attached in your packet. It is a 49,900 dollar, not to exceed, budget amendment, largely to help us facilitate those discussions and, then, draft up white papers and a plan for implementation. So, with that I will stand for any questions you have. Simison: Thank you, Caleb. And -- and I -- I just want to make sure I didn't miss this. This was something that was originally contemplated when we did the Comprehensive Plan. That was pulled out from the original budget due to the cost initially, if I recall. At least maybe not this specific area, but the idea of doing these specific area type plans. Is that correct? Am I remembering that? Hood: Yes. Mr. Mayor, actually, back when we were negotiating the original comp plan contract there was three or four different kind of add-on tasks that Logan Simpson had identified as potential. So, this is one that we didn't originally fund. It doesn't mean we Meridian City Council Meeting Agenda April 28,2020— Page 101 of 272 Meridian City Council Work Session April 21,2020 Page 13 of 26 are committed to having to do it now, but we do see again some benefit in this. And so, yeah, this was something that was -- was talked about. Actually, I will even -- I will take it a step further. There was a push -- and I'm not going to say it was a huge push, but there were -- there was -- were some on the steering committee from the Comprehensive Plan that wanted to delay the adoption of our Comprehensive Plan to do this work. They were concerned --there was such an opportunity out here they were concerned about adopting the plan without having this level of detail in the plan and we -- we told them let us get the plan adopted. There is 500 policies we really want to adopt and we think there is some good things, but we will come back and do this work and really put, again, a finer -- finer point on some of the things in what we envision in this area. So, again, no promises there, but that's -- that was -- that -- that's kind of how this has played out over the last several months. Simison: Thank you, Caleb. Council, the only thing I'm going to add is that as a member of the steering committee that was going through this is to what Caleb pointed out, this is an area that's bordered by the county -- or by a different county on two sides and by state highways on two sides. It -- it is going to need to -- it's not going to develop the same way. We don't have control over how it adjusted to those other areas. So, Caleb is correct, we spent a lot of time as a steering committee on this specific area, but leave it for your consideration from here. I saw Council Woman Strader is unmuting her mic. Did you have a question? Strader: Yeah. I guess a question and kind of a comment. I mean I -- I understand it's such a unique area of the city and it makes sense to me that we want to look at it very carefully and it sounds like we used the same process with the Ten Mile area, so I get that. I -- I would be curious and just sort of thinking big picture for the department, each area of Meridian seems to be asking for these types of specific area plans and sort of tailored plans and I'm just wondering do you envision a way to you -- is it ever possible in the future to move away from consulting work on these types of plans and bring, you know, either augmented talent or just something different in-house or do you think it's important to have a consultant, you know, for this type of process? Caleb: So, Mr. Mayor, Council Woman Strader, so certainly into the future -- I mean as our -- our city continues to grow and evolve I could see adding staff to do this type of work. To your point we do have other parts of town that want similar work, although a lot of that is in existing -- are within an existing city limits are surrounded by city limits. This is really in the county. I guess we -- right now we don't have the subject matter experts on staff to do this type of a work. Again, we are looking for them. They do work all across the country. Internationally. And, again, what -- what are those communities that bring those visions to reality doing as a government agency, even to facilitate the development on the -- in the -- with the private sector. So, that's really what we don't have that experience on and, really, what this is -- kind of the heart of what this is getting at, they are going to interview developers -- local developers and -- and other stakeholders, so property owners, and kind of understand where that market is and what we can do -- and, then, again, what we can do. I'm kind of getting off track from your question there. I will give another example, though, because down in the southern rim area we feel we do Meridian City Council Meeting Agenda April 28,2020— Page 102 of 272 Meridian City Council Work Session April 21,2020 Page 14 of 26 have the staff to do some of that type of design work. So, in-house we don't need to consult that out. Brian McClure in my office has a lot of that background as a landscape architect and -- and some of those things that we can really work with that neighborhood or that community to develop some of their specific area plan requests. So, a little bit of both. It's kind of project specific. Again for this project we don't have the in-house staff to perform the duties necessary, but for some of the other requests we do. Strader: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Council Woman Strader. Strader: That's helpful I think for context. I -- I think we do a really great job as a city of innovating and in sourcing when -- when we can and I -- I just would urge us to try to, you know, evaluate when it makes sense and how to kind of get to where are can use that same type of a process in the different parts of the city that we need to. It sounds like you're looking at it on a case-by-case basis, but, you know, the consulting bills do add up, so it's important to use them judiciously. Hood: Duly noted. Thank you. Perreault: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Council Woman Perreault. Perreault: I would also like to share that the original bid was about 20,000 higher than this and in our conversations about it the Mayor and I had talked with -- with Planning Department and had asked that they remove their bids for travel expenses, since we -- we and everybody else has been learning how to do this remotely and so I'm proud to say that -- that this is 20,000 less than what the original bid was, because we were able to go back to them and -- and make some adjustments to it. Is there anything that Caleb could add on that or did I get that right? Do I understand that correctly? Hood: That's absolutely correct. I guess the only thing that concerned me a little bit at first when we talked to them about that was what's the implications, then, for the local boots on the ground for staff and in those conversations they made us real comfortable that they could do most all of the work even remotely and, really, we wouldn't be shouldering a lot of that burden to make those meetings go. They will just do it remotely. So, yeah, it's 20,000 dollars less than -- you know. So, we are saving them taking three or four trips out, I can't remember now, face to face. I think we will lose a little bit in value of that, but I think we can --you know, like I think the Mayor said, you know, we are getting comfortable with these Zoom meetings now and things, so I think most of our -- our community will really still engage, even if we do it with our consultant being video conferenced in. Simison: Council, any further questions or comments? Meridian City Council Meeting Agenda April 28,2020— Page 103 of 272 Meridian City Council Work Session April 21,2020 Page 15 of 26 Borton: Mr. Mayor? Borton: Councilman Borton. Borton: One of the elephants in the room in this area, which I'm sure they are going to address, I just didn't see it in the task is the compatibility with Highway 16 and if it will be utilizing an assumption that that current location is for sure the location and elevated or not elevated, that will be one of the principles that they will probably address more specifically. Simison: I will say, yes, I know that they have been buying up right of way out in that area, so a lot of those questions are being addressed more fully than they have been able to do up to this point in time. Caleb, I don't know if you have anything else to add, but -- Hood: Yeah. We just actually this last -- Mr. Mayor, Councilman Borton, just this last week got the GIS line work from ITD and their consultant on -- on the design for these first four miles that are impacted here and so, yeah, to the Mayor's point, right of way design is almost done here, so that certainly can be part of what we give to the consultants to be accounted for as we get, again, into some of the specifics and -- and the property owners in there are -- are at the table. I will just let you know. We have probably over half of the lands kind of alone in that corridor, we have talked to two-thirds of them and so, yeah, we -- more of that's been known all the time. Borton: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Borton. Borton: Last question to that point, and it -- I don't know if there is any potential development applications contemplated in that area, but is there direction similar to how we did it back in Ten Mile of providing notice that this -- this area's under study and it's best to hold for now and let this project be completed? Hood: So, Mr. Mayor, Councilman Borton, we haven't anticipated that, but that is one of the reasons, again, that we are looking at a budget amendment and not an enhancement. Time is of the essence to some degree here, so we do want to get moving on this, because, again, we have, you know, parcels all the way from Ustick up to Chinden that we have talked to about development out here. So, we haven't taken it to that extent, but once we really kick this off I think we will -- we can relay that to property owners and developers that, hey, we have got a six month project here and we would like to work with you on your plans to make sure that it's integrated into that. I don't -- I don't-- I don't know that it warrants saying, you know, pause on everything. I think we can still move simultaneously. But there are -- again, there are some applications that are moving forward. Some site plans anyways that are moving forward in this area. So, if we are going to -- if we are going to jump now is the time. Borton: Okay. Meridian City Council Meeting Agenda April 28,2020— Page 104 of 272 Meridian City Council Work Session April 21,2020 Page 16 of 26 Cavener: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Cavener. Cavener: Caleb, has there -- has there been any conversation at the staff level about how our current economic climate is going to have impact on development in Meridian? I guess I go back to 2008 and if -- if we anticipate that things are going to go back to like that, even if we plateau, I just-- I guess I have got some concerns now maybe more about the timing and I'm just curious if that's something that you have discussed as staff. Taking away -- I have got some real challenges with the scope of work as well, but the timing to me seems to be also an issue. I guess I'm looking at it from the other side. Hood: Yeah. So, Mr. Mayor, Councilman Cavener, yeah, we -- we haven't talked about it as it relates to Fields, but I am in regular communications with Bill Parsons, who -- who sees the development applications that -- you know, he's -- he's the -- kind of the frontline of defense, if you will, for -- we have not slowed down. We are -- we are -- and I don't -- I don't know; right? A trend what -- you know, what is a trend, you know, those -- so, I don't have that crystal ball, but there is a lot in our industry that is seeing this more as a blip and not a recession. Again, I don't know that, but there are some folks -- and I think Cameron's on the call. We are having those conversations, obviously, because we want to know that, too. I hear what you are saying. I want to be sensitive, too. Fifty thousand isn't just something we take lightly and throw around. I will be honest, though, I think -- I would bet that we are going to see at least three or four projects right there along McDermott slash State Highway 16 in the next -- this -- this calendar year, irregardless of if we do this. But, again, there is an opportunity to partner with them to make sure that it's the right project for our community and fits in with the larger vision for this area. Again, I don't know that, but I am -- I'm -- all -- all signs I'm seeing are here locally. There is not a whole lot of -- at least new development and it's still -- we are still moving forward, so -- Simison: And, Caleb, if I could just add. If it does slow down, what better way than to have the project on the shelf ready to go, as compared to waiting to a later date and time to, then, try to brush it off. Cavener: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Cavener. Cavener: Mr. Mayor, didn't we even make revisions to the Ten Mile plan coming off of the great recession, because so much had changed and so I guess if -- sorry. Mr. Mayor, I will leave it at that. Simison: Yeah. I think every plan is subject to change no matter how well you do it, you know, and I think this is the exact conversation Council had last week where if you look at --just because you have a plan you got to be willing to follow, otherwise, the plan is no good anyways. Meridian City Council Meeting Agenda April 28,2020— Page 105 of 272 Meridian City Council Work Session April 21,2020 Page 17 of 26 Hoaglun: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Hoaglun. Hoaglun: And -- and to that point, you know, when you look at that -- the new highway project and the cost still yet to be -- even though they have started acquisition of property and whatnot, that's 450 million dollars and the state does not have a funding mechanism for that. We can't even keep up with our current highways. So, I really think we need to plan -- we need to move forward with this, but we definitely have to have some flexibility, because that -- that could be a long time coming for that highway. Simison: Council, do I have any further questions or comments? Strader: Take one more bite at it. Simison: Council Woman Strader. Strader: I think my feedback is -- because of the timing and that you are seeing applications likely to come in the near term and given the importance, it sounds like in criticality of this location I'm supportive of this one, but I would really love for the Planning Department to just quickly follow, as you do, through the process, but to figure out when it comes to the next specific area plan, can we try to do it all in house? Is there more support, you know, that we can provide to you and what's the cost benefit of that, just -- I get that it's helpful to have a consultant for some of these, but I think we should really take a hard look at -- at trying to in-source that, too. Perreault: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Council Woman Perreault. Perreault: If there isn't any further discussion, I would like to make a motion. I move that we approve the budget amendment in the not to exceed amount of 49,900 dollars for The Fields area professional services consulting work. Strader: Second. Simison: I have a motion and a second to approve the budget amendment for 49,900. Is there discussion on the motion? Cavener: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Cavener. Cavener: Probably no surprise to anybody, I'm not going to support the motion, but I want to share a few reasons why. Off the bat I think we just got some communication from -- from Mr. Lavoie, shows that the city spent -- I think we spent 140,000 dollars already on Meridian City Council Meeting Agenda April 28,2020— Page 106 of 272 Meridian City Council Work Session April 21,2020 Page 18 of 26 a Fields study plan. I know that this will be somewhat different, but I worry, again, about spending dollars on a plan that may not be enacted because of -- of what I believe is a pending financial crisis. Two, I'm really just concerned overall about the timing. There are some elements within that scope of work that I'm concerned about. Again, how are we going to engage people virtually. I don't know if it is the right thing. Lastly, though, because of the concern about a financial impact, that -- now is the time for -- for government to not be as heavy handed, to allow the free market to really thrive in that area and if development slows down, the last thing we want is for something to not be able to occur simply because it doesn't conform to a plan that was created before we knew the real world impacts of this -- what I believe is going to be a financial crisis. So, for me it's -- it's maybe not a no, but it's just not a no right now. If Council wants to move forward I'm on board, but I just think that this is something that's worth pressing pause on. Simison: Council, any further comments? If not, I will ask the clerk to call the roll. Roll call: Bernt, yea; Borton, yea; Cavener, nay; Hoaglun, yea; Strader, yea; Perreault, yea. Simison: The ayes have it. The budget amendment is agreed to. Thank you very much. MOTION CARRIED: FIVE AYES. ONE NAY. F. Community Development Department: Planning Process Improvement Discussion Simison: So, we were going to leave it with you, I assume, for this next item? Council, know we have an Executive Session. We have got a 6:00 o'clock. I want to make sure people have time for a break before we get into our next meeting. So, can we give Caleb 15 minutes until about 5:40. Does that work? Or do people want to stop earlier than that? All right. Caleb, you have 15 minutes to get through this item. Hood: Thank you, Mr. Mayor, Members of the Council. So, yeah, we -- this is continued from last week, although the things we are going to talk about today are -- are new topics, but it's all under the heading of planning process improvements. I think I'm just going to dive right in, since we have got a couple of big items and even some smaller ones to cover. The first one has to do with scheduling hearings. So, I'm going to -- I'm still going to be working from the same Excel spreadsheet that was sent in your packet and the Word document and for this one I'm primarily going to rely on the Excel spreadsheet, because this does not relate to city code. This is more just a process -- potential process change. So, I'm looking at line seven on -- it's item four, but line seven on that Excel spreadsheet and it really, again, has to do with the amount of time it takes to schedule a project for hearing, generate a staff report, and, then, obtain and consider agency comments. So, as you are aware -- typically by the time a project gets to the City Council we have ACHD and school district comments, but not all the time and the Planning and Zoning Commission even less. Sometimes it gets to a hearing at Planning and Zoning Meridian City Council Meeting Agenda April 28,2020— Page 107 of 272 Meridian City Council Work Session April 21,2020 Page 19 of 26 and they don't have a staff report yet from the Ada County Highway District and we get a lot of neighbors that are there that want to talk about traffic, yet we don't have those comments from our-- our transportation partner. So, one of the things we --we had talked about was waiting to schedule a project for -- for public hearing until we have in hand the -- the action letter from ACHD and/or the school district and that's where some of the discussion is. I will also just say-- one of the things we have talked about with my Council liaison and the Mayor as we have kind of gotten it to this point is we do have an open position that we hope to fill here in the next couple of months. A coordination planner. So, we would give ACHD -- let's just say 30 days or 45 days and if -- if we don't hear anything from them we could use our -- our planner to basically be an in between ACHD and our staff and basically do some analysis, try to -- try to get that information out, but a proxy, basically, for -- for ACHD and their staff report. So, we wouldn't hold a project up indefinitely. There would be a backstop or a time at which we say, okay, we have given you enough time, we aren't going to hold this project up forever. But, again, traffic is a big thing and schools is a big thing and so our -- the big point here is we want to have elected and appointed officials have all the information, all the data available to them to make an informed decision. So, again, the question kind of at hand is do we wait to schedule public hearings until we get those -- those comments or the -- we are typically at about eight weeks anyway, so when the application is deemed complete we are scheduling projects out for roughly eight weeks to a Planning and Zoning Commission. This could elongate that another couple three weeks even. So, that's -- that's kind of the first issue or feedback that I would like some direction on, please. Perreault: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Council Woman Perreault. Perreault: I am -- I am in favor of waiting until we get a report or document from ACHD. However, I would like to comment that I have already heard feedback from the development community that they are not excited about -- this probably might be the -- the element of -- of all of these process changes that they are the least excited about, because they don't want to create additional time delays beyond what -- you know, the process already takes quite a few months and they -- they feel like since our code says that the -- that the reports need to be in before Council and Council is generally the one that's making the final decision on most of the applications, that that should be sufficient for us. So, I am not advocating their -- their thoughts, I'm just sharing with you what I have heard and what's kind of the other side of it is and -- and certainly with the Mayor's permission would welcome Caleb to -- to share his thoughts on that comment as well. Does Mr. Hood or any of the Council Members have any comments they would like to weigh in on? Hood: I would rather not touch that one. I think Jessica's accurate. That's -- this is not going to be popular with our--with the development community. Absolutely. This is more, again, at the request kind of out of neighborhoods, the public, and to a lesser extent, but even our Planning and Zoning Commission, because they are the ones that have to deal Meridian City Council Meeting Agenda April 28,2020— Page 108 of 272 Meridian City Council Work Session April 21,2020 Page 20 of 26 with not having ACHD staff report a lot of times that you have a room with neighbors that want to talk about traffic. Bernt: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Bernt. Bernt: My -- my only concern about this as we are making a policy change to a process for, you know, reports that we -- that ACHD or West Ada School District aren't required to give us. So, if -- now, with that said they have done a great job in the past or -- with -- with needed improvement. However, are we willing to make a process change based upon other organizations' willingness to abide by our new policy when they don't really have to? So, that's -- that's something to think about as well. Perreault: Mr. Mayor? Simison: And I will weigh in just --just from a general standpoint. I'm not going to -- but from a practical standpoint one of the things we have talked about doing is on the back end shortening the time frame in which we push them through our process. So, it's not a complete slowdown, it's just a modification, but I think the end result for Council would need to be under any scenario are you okay with pushing -- or doing a project without a -- that information from the school district or ACHD? Would you hold it up at your level if you never received that information one way or the other? To me I think that's as much the policy question for you all, regardless of the time frame, because we can -- we can say we will hold it for a month and wait for them. If they don't do it we add in a staff report and, then, we push it through P&Z and City Council in a shorter time than we currently do and there is not necessarily an elongated time frame. But, then, you're still doing it without the information from those two organizations and is that okay or not. Council Woman Perreault, I know you were wanting to speak. So, I'm going to go to Council Woman Perreault first. Perreault: Thank you. I agree it is -- it has been difficult for us to get consistent information. In the time that I was on P&Z from then until now they have made significant improvements in getting that information to us and while I realized President Bernt's statement, ACHD is going to issue something. It's my understanding from the Planning Department that we will get something from them. It's not always necessarily that they are going to have a hearing and issue a full report, but at some point we are getting something from ACHD in writing and so I'm not as much concerned about them. So, I think to say that there is --just because they don't have to send it to us that we shouldn't make a policy based on -- you know, on that. We are going to get something from ACHD every time. I just don't know how that time -- how we can sort of guarantee the timing on that. West Ada -- we all -- we all know the challenges that we had with -- with the history of that and -- but they have been very consistent recently and I really hope they continue to do so. Strader: Mr. Mayor? Meridian City Council Meeting Agenda April 28,2020— Page 109 of 272 Meridian City Council Work Session April 21,2020 Page 21 of 26 Simison: Council Woman Strader. Strader: Thank you. I -- I do -- for your first question I do think it's important to have information from ACHD and from West Ada to make land use decisions. They are subject matter experts. Those are the two biggest issues that I think we face on these and so I think we need to have that. I would be curious if -- you know, does this require a -- a policy change in code or do we have the ability to pilot the new process and see if we can kind of shorten it on the back end and if we can come up with a process that's workable. Hood: Mr. Mayor, I can -- I can answer that. So, again, this --this is not a code. We have some sections of code to talk about the number of days between Planning and Zoning to City Council. That is in our code. We need to be timely in this, but kind of to your point we could pilot this. Bill Parsons does track the amount of time from when an application is submitted, deemed complete, when we get an ACHD report, when a staff report is written, when the Planning and Zoning -- so we have that information and we can report back and look at averages, how much does it, if any, extend the timeline of projects. So, again, this -- this wouldn't necessarily require a code change, it would just be direction to staff, don't schedule a project for Planning and Zoning until you have in hand, you know, a staff report from one, if not both of those agencies. Hoaglun: Mr. Mayor, question for Caleb. Simison: Councilman Hoaglun. Hoaglun: Caleb, how -- how long was that time frame again from when -- we know the project is coming that they have to get it to -- I heard eight weeks, but I don't think that was an accurate -- accurate time frame. Hood: Our average right now -- Mr. Mayor, Councilman Hoaglun, so our -- our general average -- we used to be more in the six to seven weeks. We are pushing more eight and nine weeks now, even without this policy. So, quite honestly, that typically gives ACHD enough time to get us things anyway. So, there really may not be -- but I hope this isn't the new norm. We had to kind of delay some scheduling of projects because of COVID and all that, so we are a little bit backed up right now in our queue. Typically, again, we are -- we are -- it's at least 30 days. We are usually kind of in the six week time frame. We are pushing more eight weeks now. Eight, nine weeks to get a project on for hearing. So, essentially, we are kind of testing it almost now, because it is a little bit of an elongated time frame now, which gives our partner agencies a little bit more time to get us comments. Hoaglun: Well, Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Hoaglun. Hoaglun: To follow up on that, in the 30 days, six weeks, eight weeks I mean, yes, I want that information from our highway district and school district to make an informed Meridian City Council Meeting Agenda April 28,2020— Page 110 of 272 Meridian City Council Work Session April 21,2020 Page 22 of 26 decision. It does help. How are -- we are -- are going to have to make a decision and they are responsible for that information and to me no answer is an answer and we move forward on the project based on the information we have in hand. They have elected officials who are responsible to their constituents and for whatever reason, if that information is not getting to us, I certainly want to find out why and if there is ways to improve the process I'm interested in doing that, but we can't extend a time frame out so far that it's -- it's -- it's really on us to make the determination right away or as -- as timely as possible. So, I don't want to extend that definitely beyond eight weeks. If-- and if they can't get us that information in that -- in that time frame, I -- I'm sorry, no answer is an answer to me. Strader: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Council Woman Strader. Strader: I tend to agree with you. I --what I would --what I'm kind of hoping is, you know, is there a way to pilot the new process and the new time line -- and I agree with you, though, if we have requested it, if we have given them adequate time to provide the information, maybe there is a drop dead date where if we haven't received it we will, unfortunately, have to move on without it. But I like the idea of trying a new process, because I mean it sounds to me like it might be more efficient and it might -- I think give us all the information at the same time and it sounds like on the back end it might be more efficient for staff as well. Caleb, do you want to maybe -- are you leaning toward the process change? Does it help your department in terms of processing applications? Hood: Not -- so, I will just advocate -- it certainly does -- Mr. Mayor, Council Woman Strader. It certainly does help staff to make an informed recommendation as well. So, it certainly is helpful for staff. If you want a solid staff report we should be having that information. That's the other side of this is, yeah, it's great for the decision makers to have that information, but it's tough for us to give you an educated recommendation if we don't have that information. So, that's part of the story as well. Again, I'm not necessarily advocating for it. We communicate with ACHD honestly and Council Woman Perreault asked for this and I don't have a hard number, but you can count them basically on one hand this last year the amount of times where the --the Planning and Zoning Commission didn't have a staff report from ACHD in time. So, we do -- Bill Parsons does a good job of talking with ACHD. Hey, we have got this staff report, when do you think you can have a staff report written? Okay. Here is when I'm going to schedule it for hearing then and that gives us a week or two kind of leeway in there for them to do their thing and so we do have that information. So, to answer your question, yeah, I do think it will help us, but is that -- is that benefit worth the cost to the overall process? Most of the time I would say no, we can -- we -- we kind of know what the staff reports are going to say anyways, so don't -- I don't think we do this just because it helps staff and -- and our process. We kind of already -- again, I'm pretty proud of how Bill does it and talking with ACHD to make sure most of the time that we can get ACHD to promise us a staff report in time prior to hearing. It just doesn't always workout that way. Meridian City Council Meeting Agenda April 28,2020— Page 111 of 272 Meridian City Council Work Session April 21,2020 Page 23 of 26 Simison: So, Council, we are -- we are right at the 5:40 mark. I know we have got at least one person who hasn't spoken yet. Councilman Borton, were you -- was that you that was asking for -- to be recognized? Parsons: No. This is Bill. Bill Parsons. Borton: Bill can go. Parsons: I just wanted to kind of piggyback on the comments that Caleb was making and just share with you the -- kind of the process improvements that -- that we have done over the last several years to get stakeholders, our partnering agencies involved in the process. So, the school district is invited to all of our pre-application meetings. They are invited to all of our project review meetings. They are on our transmittals list. So, they are -- they are privy to the information way before the time that we even transmit the application to them from the clerk's office. So, certainly going back to Hoaglun's comments, you know, sometimes -- we can't force them to provide comments if they don't want to, but they have that information at their fingertips early on in the process. That's -- that's been a goal of ours two or three years ago and we continually to try to make strides to improve on that. So, I think that is -- is no word is the -- as Caleb mentioned, if there is a controversial project or I know it's going to take an extended lead time forACHD, I do reach out to them and ask for their expectation as to when we can expect a staff report from them and that's built into our review time for the planning team. What I can't control is if a neighbor or one -- if some person complains about the project and all of a sudden we thought it was going to be ACHD's staff level approval on the staff report and someone complains and all of a sudden we are scheduled two to three months out for a public hearing, because they want to be in front of the commission and have their say in front of that body. We can't control that. That's -- that's ACHD's process. So, I just at least want to share that information with you. Yes, is it good to have all of that information up front? It is. As Caleb mentioned most of the time with the -- Sonya's level of experience, my level of experience, even Caleb's level of experience, we do anticipate what ACHD is going to say in their recommendation for the staff report and if we don't have that information certainly the -- the assigned planner will reach out -- reaches out to those agencies and asked for at least an e-mail or some kind of response so that you have something on record saying, yes, we generally support it or we don't. But we try to get that information ahead of time so that you can make that informed decision. So, again, I can't control what--when a neighbor complains about a project and it goes before ACHD's commission, but we have revamped our staff report and we let you know that we -- if one's been received or not and that's included for both Planning and Zoning Commission and you for review. So, I think we have done -- as staff we have done everything that we could do possibly in order to get that information in front of you. So, again, I will just conclude my remarks and let you guys deliberate on that request. Thank you for your time. Simison: Councilman Borton, did you have some comments you were wanting to make? Borton: No. That's all right. Meridian City Council Meeting Agenda April 28,2020— Page 112 of 272 Meridian City Council Work Session April 21,2020 Page 24 of 26 Simison: Okay. Well, Council, what I'm going to suggest is that we stop there. You can mull on this a little bit more and we can come back next week with any further final comments on this topic from that standpoint, so -- Perreault: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Council Woman Perreault. Perreault: Could -- I just wanted to ask Caleb very quickly -- Caleb, do you feel like you received clear direction from us on the first three items last week or is there anything else that you just were unclear about and you wanted us to circle around again so that we make sure we do that? Hood: Thank you, Council Woman Perreault. Yeah, I think we are in pretty good shape. I will just double check my notes and next week, since we have to continue this one more time, I will just double back. But I think last week was very productive. Even this week was, even though it didn't really get any direction on that one. We have one more thing and, then, a couple of small ones. So, I think next week another 15 minutes we should be able to knock this out. So, thank you. Simison: All right. With that, Council, do I have any motions or -- Item 6: Executive Session per Idaho Code 74-206(f): To communicate with legal counsel for the public agency to discuss the legal ramifications of and legal options for pending litigation, or controversies not yet being litigated but imminently likely to be litigated, and amended to add (d) To consider records that are exempt from disclosure as provided in Chapter 1, Title 74, Idaho Code. Bernt: Mr. Mayor, are we -- are we going into Executive Session or are we going to adjourn the meeting and do this Executive Session after the regular meeting? Do we have time? What would you -- what are your thoughts? Simison: Mr. Nary, can you weigh in if we have -- will have our Executive Session people available afterwards or if we should do that during. I don't see Mr. -- Johnson: Mr. Mayor, this is Chris. I predict he may be on the Executive Session call. Simison: Let's go into Executive Session. If-- and that --from that standpoint. So, yeah. Bernt: Okay. Simison: So, Item 6. Bernt: Mr. Mayor, I move that we move in -- go into Executive Session per Idaho Code 74-206(f) and (d). Meridian City Council Meeting Agenda April 28,2020— Page 113 of 272 Meridian City Council Work Session April 21,2020 Page 25 of 26 Hoaglun: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Hoaglun. Hoaglun: Second. Simison: I have a motion and a second. Is there any discussion on the motion? If not, the Clerk call the roll. Roll call: Bernt, yea; Borton, yea; Cavener, yea; Hoaglun, yea; Strader, yea; Perreault, yea. Simison: All ayes. Thank you. MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES. EXECUTIVE SESSION: (5:44 p.m. to 6:01 p.m.) Simison: All right. Looks like we have people. Council, do I have a motion? Bernt: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Bernt. Bernt: I move that we come out of Executive Session per Idaho Code -- I guess we don't need the code. Simison: Do I have a second? Hoaglun: Mr. Mayor, second. Simison: Councilman Hoaglun with a second. All those in favor signify by saying aye. Opposed nay. The ayes have it. MOTION CARRIED: ALLAYES. Simison: Do I have a motion? Bernt: I move that we adjourn the meeting. Hoaglun: Second. Simison: I have a motion and a second to adjourn the meeting. Is there discussion on the motion? If not, all those in favor signify by saying aye. Those opposed nay. And we are adjourned. Meridian City Council Meeting Agenda April 28,2020— Page 114 of 272 Meridian City Council Work Session April 21,2020 Page 26 of 26 MOTION CARRIED: ALLAYES. MEETING ADJOURNED AT 6:01 P.M. (AUDIO RECORDING ON FILE OF THESE PROCEEDINGS) 4 / 28 / 2020 MAYOR ROBERT E. SIMISON DATE APPROVED ATTEST: CHRIS JOHNSON - CITY CLERK