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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2020-10-27 Work Session Item#1. Meridian City Council Work Session October 27, 2020. A Meeting of the Meridian City Council was called to order at 4:32 p.m., Tuesday, October 27, 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, Bill Nary, Cameron Arial, Caleb Hood, Dale Bolthouse, Laurelei McVey, Mike Barton, Brian Caldwell, Joe Bongiorno and Dean Willis. 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: I will go ahead and call this meeting to order. For the record it is Tuesday, October 27th at 4:32 p.m. We will begin today's work session with roll call attendance. ADOPTION OF AGENDA Simison: Next item -- next item is adoption of the agenda. Bernt: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Bernt. I move that we adopt the agenda as published. Hoaglun: Mr. Mayor, second the motion. Simison: I have a motion and a second to adopt the agenda as published. Is there any discussion on the motion? If not, all those in favor signify by saying aye. Opposed nay. The ayes have it and the agenda is adopted. MOTION CARRIED: FOUR AYES. TWO ABSENT. CONSENT AGENDA: [Action Item] 1. Approve Minutes of the October 13, 2020 City Council Work Session 2. Approve Minutes of the October 13, 2020 City Council Regular Meeting 3. Hill's Century Farm North No. 1 Sanitary Sewer & Water Main Easement No. 1 Page 5 Meridian City Council Work Session Item#1. October 27,2020 Page 2 of 25 4. Lost Rapids Subdivision Pedestrian Pathway Easement 5. Final Order for Baraya Subdivision No. 5 (H-2020-0088) by Matt Schultz of Schultz Development, Generally Located South of W. Franklin Rd. and East of S. Black Cat Rd. 6. Final Order for Baraya Subdivision No. 6 (H-2020-0089) by Matt Schultz of Schultz Development, Generally Located South of W. Franklin Rd. and East of S. Black Cat Rd. 7. Final Order for Lavender Heights No. 1 (H-2020-0090) by LH Development, LLC, Located East of S. Locust Grove Rd. and North of E. Lake Hazel Rd. 8. Findings of Fact, Conclusions of Law for Modern Craftsman at Black Cat (H-2020-0022) by Baron Black Cat, LLC, Located in the Northeast Corner of N. Black Cat Rd. and W. Chinden Blvd. (SH 20/26) 9. Findings of Fact, Conclusions of Law for Pearson Subdivision (H- 2020-0075) by Melanie Pearson, Located at 175 W. Paint Horse Ln. 10. Development Agreement Between the City of Meridian and Brighton Development Inc. and Quenzer Farms, LLLP (Owners) and Brighton Development Inc. (Developer) for Quartet Northeast (H-2020-0017) and Quartet Southeast (H-2020-0018) 11. License Agreement with Settler's Irrigation to Allow City of Meridian to Cross Settler's Irrigation Southside Canal in Hickory Road Between Pine Ave. and Fairview Rd. 12. Professional Services Agreement Between the City of Meridian and Trauma Intervention Program of the Treasure Valley, Inc. 14. Liquidation of Winnipeg Well Site Lot - Resolve to Declare Intent to Dispose of the Winnipeg Well Site Lot for a Minimum Bid of $70,000 and Authorize the Mayor to Sign the Resolution 15. Resolution No. 20-2234: A Resolution of the Mayor and the City Council of the City of Meridian, Amending the Pathways Master Plan; and Providing an Effective Date 16. Resolution No. 20-2238: A Resolution Declaring the Intent of the City of Meridian to Offer For Sale at Auction Approximately 0.218 Acres of City-Owned Real Property Located at 345 W. Winnipeg Street, Ada County Parcel #R5672060442, Legal Parcel #0442 of Lot 1, Block 10 Page 6 Meridian City Council Work Session Item#1. October 27,2020 Page 3 of 25 Meridian Heights Subdivision No. 02 (Parcel B, Record Of Survey #5472) Ada County Idaho; Declaring the Value or Minimum Price, if any, Meridian Intends to Receive as a Result of Such Conveyance at Auction; Instructing the City Clerk to Establish and Notice a Hearing to Review the Proposed Conveyance; and Providing an Effective Date 17. Resolution No. 20-2239: A Resolution of the Mayor and the City Council of the City of Meridian, Reappointing David Fulkerson to Seat 1, Josh Cummings to Seat 2, and Jon Wardle to Seat 3 of the Meridian Impact Fee Advisory Committee; and Providing an Effective Date 18. AP Invoices for Payment - 10-28-20 - $1,354,444.14 19. AP Invoices for Payment - 10-20-20 - $6,358.18 Simison: Next item is our Consent Agenda. Bernt: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Bernt. Bernt: I move that we move Item No. 13 from the Consent Agenda for further discussion. Other than that, I move that we approve the Consent Agenda as amended and for the Mayor to sign and the Clerk to attest. Hoaglun: Mr. Mayor, second the motion. Simison: I have a motion and a second to amend 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: FOUR AYES. TWO ABSENT. ITEMS MOVED FROM THE CONSENT AGENDA [Action Item] 13. Approval of Cost Chare Permit with Ada County Highway District (ACHD) for NonTransportation Improvements Associated with Eagle Rd., Victory Rd. to Amity Rd. Widening Project Simison: There was one item moved from the Consent Agenda, Item No. 13, which is the approval of the cost share permit with Ada County Highway District. Is there any discussion on this item? Bernt: Mr. Mayor? Page 7 Meridian City Council Work Session Item#1. October 27,2020 Page 4 of— Simison: Councilman Bernt. Bernt: I believe we -- we have further discussion later on this evening in regard to this and we -- also there is -- depending on how things go tomorrow at the Ada County Highway District meeting, we may need -- this may change going forward, so we are just going to put this on the side burner until we get more information. Cavener: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Cavener. Cavener: Sorry. I got the gist of what Council Member Bernt was just talking about, but his -- his audio is very very faint and it is very challenging to hear him. Bernt: Can you hear me better right now? Cavener: Yes. Bernt: Okay. So, to -- so, to repeat what I said, we just need further discussion regard to this later on in our 6:00 o'clock meeting and with what -- I believe ACHD has a meeting tomorrow that we will have further discussion regard to Item 13, this cost share agreement, so until we get-- I get further clarification on what this looks like going forward, we are going to hold off on this approval. Hoaglun: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Hoaglun. Hoaglun: In regard to this item, do we just want to continue it to November 4th? Bernt: Yes, sir. Simison: Do I have a motion? Bernt: Is that a motion? I second it. Simison: I have a motion and a second to continue this item to November 4th. Is there any discussion on the motion? If not, all those in favor signify by saying aye. Opposed nay. Perreault: Aye. Simison: The ayes have it and the item is continued. MOTION CARRIED: FIVE AYES. ONE NAY. Page 8 Meridian City Council Work Session Item#1. October 27,2020 Page 5 of 25 DEPARTMENT / COMMISSION REPORTS [Action Item] 20. Community Development: Budget Amendment in the Amount of $7,590.00 for the Purchase of Software to Integrate ProjectDox, Accela, and Laserfiche Simison: Next up is under department/commission reports. First item is Community Development. I will turn this over to Cameron. Arial: Good evening, everybody. Can you hear me okay? And see the slides? Okay. Great. Okay. It's a pleasure to be with you. Just a real quick update and, then, also kind of dive into this a little bit. So, as you guys know the Community Development Department has been working on our software integration particular to Accela and ProjectDox for over a year now and that -- that's been awesome. It was fortuitous that we did that when we did it and particularly with the building side of this prior to COVID. That enabled us to go remote and continue working --working during the pandemic, which has been incredible. We are able to maintain service levels and so on. We are now into the planning phase of this integration and during that process we discovered a pretty cool efficiency and, therefore, that's why we are before you this evening. The meat of this is really just to basically add on an additional -- well, let me step back and just give you a quick overview of kind of what happens now. So, as a planning application comes in, for example, and we will keep it there, you know, the planning team will -- will assess that. It has to be inputted into Accela in order to be tracked and also into ProjectDox, so that the various folks can review those plans and, you know, address them accordingly. It's also filed in our Y drive for internal processing and, then, also in Laserfiche for -- which is our, you know, repository for the entire city. So, customers and citizens can access those files, just like any other public record. So, as you can see there is a number of places where this occurs and not to say that it's a -- it's perfect. It works. But we, through this process, have discovered a more efficient way to do this and that is the proposal this evening. So, with this in mind, just to give you a taste, there is a lot of public records requests, so we worked with IT and, obviously, the clerk's department to -- to really understand what's going on there and really what the impact is and so a lot -- a lot of document flow, a lot of documents saved here and there and it requires a lot of folks to look at things to process those public records requests. So, our proposal really is to automate all of this, to move planning, which is a large portion of our public records requests, to integrate both ProjectDox and Accela like we are currently doing, but also to add on this records retention element, which is Laserfiche. Again, as you can see here this is already the -- the city's repository of choice going forward and so, really, the reason for this is to streamline things, make it more efficient for our team internally to process, but also for the public and, really, we see that, you know, as -- you know, we go into, you know, our strategic plan goals. It really does help us accomplish this. So, it may be that we are able to service customers without them even having to call anymore. Our public records requests as far as planning concern -- is concerned can be very much all online and folks can access the information they are requesting without that extra level of touch from -- from city and staff. With that, just to kind of break down the numbers for you, and if you can just follow my cursor, we really are just talking about the planning piece of this Page 9 Meridian City Council Work Session Item#1. October 27,2020 Page 6 of— now, because that's what -- where we are in the -- in the phasing of this project. At later points likely with the budget cycle we will come and talk about, you know, potentially other funds that are needed. Obviously, we have completed this ProjectDox integration with building that was that massive project that we are pleased to announce that that was completed on time and on budget. But we are really just focusing in on -- on building it this time. You should also see that we have funds available to carry forward -- or that are available from -- from the past project to move towards this and, then, also you will recall that the -- the Council did approve a budget amendment for some of this project for the land development portion of the project. So, really, when it boils down with all that being considered, that's where we get the net ask this evening to advance this part of the integration with the addition of Laserfiche is -- is the 7,590. And, really, we will -- you know, will, again, through the budget process and as we, you know, learn through the integration of Laserfishe with planning, we will bring other potential enhancements and future budgets. Again, really, in our view the -- the time is now to do this. We are already in the -- in the heart of this project. We are already working with the consultant and it will potentially alleviate future rework and just keep the whole project moving forward with this additional efficiency baked in. So, with that, you know, I have -- Caleb's here with us. He's been -- he and Bill and Mindi have been working on this pretty heavily. I also have Dave Tiede on the line from IT, who has -- and Christie who, you know, truly have been managing this project from the IT side. But happy to answer any questions that the Council may have and -- and -- and -- and look forward to a discussion. Simison: Thank you, Cameron. For the record, Councilman Borton has joined us. I don't know when he joined us, if he heard all that, but he is now on the call. Is there any questions for Cameron regarding this budget amendment? Cavener: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Cavener. Cavener: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Cameron, just a couple of questions. I'm certainly supportive of the enhancement as an amendment. Excuse me. But it did -- your presentation did bring up a couple of questions and one is about these public record requests that we are receiving, are they coming from any specific industry or entity? I mean who is our top requester of those? Arial: Mr. Mayor, Councilman Cavener, I really appreciate that question. You know, it's -- it's hard to pin it down as -- because, quite frankly, the requests come from all over the place. It could be, you know, a citizen just wanting to know what's going on and -- with the development next door. It could be design professionals, you know, other interested parties. The news media. Certain -- there is -- there is a lot of folks that make those requests and I think it is safe to say-- you know, maybe Chris and others can attest -- you know, those requests haven't been going down, they have been going up, and so it's from a variety of folks and -- you know. But I do appreciate that question, because it -- it does highlight just the workload that's -- that's required to service them. Page 10 Meridian City Council Work Session Item#1. October 27,2020 Page 7 of— Cavener: Mr. Mayor, follow up if I may. Simison: Councilman Cavener. Cavener: Cameron, I think the reason for my question is I think oftentimes -- especially, you know, with government when we start looking at new software tools, it's natural we look to improve the efficiencies of our employees and help relieve the heavy workload that they carry. Sometimes I worry there is unintended consequences that we are so focused on our internal customers that it becomes a cumbersome solution for external facing customers and so maybe you can just give Council a quick kind of flavor about what type of engagement we had with the public to make sure that this is the right tool for them to use, as much as this is beneficial for our internal customers. Arial: Yeah. Sure. Caleb. Hood: Mr. Mayor, Councilman Cavener, Council Members, so regarding that question, I think -- and I want to just double back real quick on Cameron's answer. We get these requests from all the gamut of folks. A lot of them are design professionals. The city clerk's office does send people right now currently to Laserfishe and online and that's where we are proposing to put these documents, so they are in one consolidated place where they can access them, staff can access them, the clerk can access them in one place, not having them be in three and four different places. So, I think it's going to be user friendly. We have thought that through. Again, our city retention -- records retention policy says use Laserfishe, so we are trying to push everything and everybody towards the Laserfishe. Cavener: Okay. Strader: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Council Woman Strader. Strader: Quick question, Caleb. From a -- a user perspective in terms of streamlining things, is the end goal to enter a document one time and, then, it will automate all those other workflows into other systems? Is that kind of where we are going? Hood: Mr. Mayor, Council Woman Strader, to some degree, yes. And maybe -- let me just make sure we are all on the same foundationally with these different -- what -- what the different software does. So, Accela is our enterprise permitting software. So, that's actually where the permit kind of lives and the workflow lives. So, we kind of communicate internally with where each permits at in process. ProjectDox is the software where you review those plans and you can mark it up electronically and send them out back and forth and, then, finally, again, Laserfiche is kind of where they live in perpetuity to keep those records. So, there is this integration they will still technically exist in some of -- you know, in their previous forms, if you will. They will exist in some of those other locations. So, Accela or ProjectDox you could have older versions of that document. But, really, in Page 11 Meridian City Council Work Session Item#1. October 27,2020 Page 8 of— Laserfiche where they are going to be kept will be most of the documents that most of our customers are looking for, if that makes sense. Strader: Mr. Mayor, follow up. Simison: Council Woman Strader. Strader: I guess what -- a little bit of what I was hoping to hear would be along the lines of the -- maybe IT was sitting down to kind of go through the user experience and make sure that any kind of duplication of entering information manually was being eliminated as much as possible or that what -- I just -- I'm hoping to hear is ultimately planning isn't now uploading into yet another program that -- that somehow this integration ultimately helps eliminate the duplication of work. Hood: Mr. Mayor, I'm sorry that I didn't answer that. Yes, that's exactly what we are trying to do. So, they do talk to each other-- those three softwares talk to each other, so when something is reviewed in ProjectDox, you press the button and it gets uploaded into the Laserfiche software for retention. Strader: Thank you. Simison: Thank you. Council, any additional questions? Or do I have a motion? Perreault: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Council Woman Perreault. Perreault: I move that we -- excuse me -- accept the budget amendment for the Community Development Department regarding the request for funds for Laserfishe. Strader: Second. Simison: I have a motion and a second to approve the budget amendment in the amount of 7,590 dollars. 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 carries. Thank you very much. MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES. 21. Fiscal Year 2021 Budget Amendment to Fund the Operating Account for Lakeview Golf Course for a Not-to-Exceed Amount of$700,000 Page 12 Meridian City Council Work Session Item#1. October 27,2020 Page 9 of 25 Simison: Next item on the agenda, Item 21, is a fiscal year budget amendment to fund the operation account for Lakeview Golf Course. I will turn this over to Mr. Barton. Barton: Good afternoon, Mr. Mayor, Members of Council. We are here this afternoon with a budget amendment. Last Thursday the Western Ada Recreation District approved the asset purchase agreement between the current golf course operator and, then, as you know, the City Council also approved an agreement in August, on the 11 th, that the city would, then, manage the golf course. WARD approved that agreement at their meeting last Thursday. So, it appears as if these items that we have been talking about over the last couple of months are beginning to fall into place. So, this budget amendment will allow us to transition into the operation of Lakeview Golf Course. It's also worth noting that we are -- it's our goal to offset this with revenue and with that I will stand for questions. Simison: Thank you, Mike. Council, any questions regarding this item? Strader: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Council Woman Strader. Strader: I just have a question maybe more from an administrative perspective. Now that we are going to kind of house an operating business, I'm wondering how often and what form Council might get updates regarding the performance of the golf course? Barton: Yeah. That's a -- Mr. Mayor, Council Woman, that's a great question and -- so we will review the financials with the management company on a monthly basis and I think that we would be happy to come back to council as -- as often or -- as you desire. I would say that probably at a minimum, maybe just a quick check in once a quarter would be good. We -- as -- as we are working through this process we are also going to be undertaking a master plan that kind of gives us our guiding document for one to five and, then, five to ten years and we will -- during that process we will be talking about preferred long-term management, as well as fees, and, you know, all sorts of stuff that's just the nuts and bolts of the golf course. So, we will be back to Council with -- to seek input on that master plan and I think it's appropriate to probably come back once a quarter with financial information as well. Simison: And if I could maybe suggest, I know finance is listening, they always are. This would be a very simple one to have on your dashboards on opengov to see revenue in and costs out. So, you can go in and see that as frequently as you would like. And, then, the conversations with -- with the Parks Department can be more about other things than the financial management and less a concern. So, we need to address -- would be my recommendation. So, hopefully, Todd, if you are listening you can see that's something Council would like on opengov to build review specifically. Strader: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Council Woman Strader. Page 13 Meridian City Council Work Session Item#1. October 27,2020 Page 10 of 25 Strader: I think -- I think that's a perfect idea to put it on the dashboard. I'm imagining there is some seasonality to this business and I do think for the first year at least I'm -- I would appreciate some kind of a context for the performance, at least if not quarterly, you know, twice a year as it's getting started to understand the drivers of revenue and we can check the dashboard and make sure that's all there. So, I love that solution. I just -- I think maybe as we are getting going I would appreciate a little more into the weeds. Simison: And, Council Woman, I think that that's what Mr. Barton was saying, that you can always go check. This allows you to check whenever you want, if -- when you have the question. But, yes, there will be this ongoing dialogue as we find long-term solutions for the golf course. Borton: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Borton. Borton: Mike, are we still going to be able to utilize a citizens committee to provide feedback to KSM and ourselves as far as operations and how they are doing and to continue to gather that and utilize that to provide direction and suggestions to the new operator? Barton: Yeah. Mr. Mayor and Councilman Borton, absolutely. Yeah. It's our goal to maintain the golf course focus group and maybe it becomes more of an advisory board or whatever we want to call it going forward. But they will absolutely be involved in the master planning process, as well as quarterly meetings and we, yeah, fully intend to keep them engaged and going forward. Borton: Thank you. I think that's great, continuing to do that. Simison: And I think that the other thing that we will have to be focused on, too, though, that will be under our parks and rec is how this can be more integrated into the Parks and Rec Commission and its role as well. So, there will be some -- some of those efforts that we will have to figure out what makes the most sense. Cavener: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Cavener. Cavener: I appreciate that distinction and I just -- my two cents would be is that we continue to support the mission of the golf course focus group, whether -- whatever we title it, in that as long as we can as that continues to be a separate operating entity outside of the Parks Commission. I think it's incredibly appropriate to continue to update the Parks Commission, but I think we have seen great value for that task force and I would hope that they would be able to retain -- or remain. Excuse me. Mr. Mayor, one more just -- Mike, I wanted to thank you and your team and the Parks Department. This has been a heavy lift for you and your team and appreciate all your hard work and excited Page 14 Meridian City Council Work Session Item#1. October 27,2020 Page 11 of 25 that we are -- we are kind of getting to this end point in this new chapter. So, thank you very much. Barton: Thank you. Hoaglun: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Hoaglun. Hoaglun: Just one -- one comment to Council Woman Strader's question about, you know, revenue and keeping an eye on things, just -- my sage advice is we just watch the weather report. If it's good weather there is going to be lots of golfers. Bad weather is not so many, so -- but with that, Mr. Mayor, I would move approval of the fiscal year '21 budget amendment to fund the operating account for Lakeview Golf Course in a not to exceed amount of 700,000 dollars. Borton: Second. Simison: I have a motion and a second. 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. The motion amendment is agreed to. MOTION CARRIED: ALLAYES. 22. Lakeview Golf Course Management Agreement Between the City of Meridian and Kemper Sports Management, Inc. Simison: Next up is the Lakeview Golf Course Management Agreement. I will, again, turn this over to Mr. Barton. Barton: Thank you, Mr. Mayor and Council. As previously discussed with the Council, our preferred short-term method of operating Lakeview Golf Course is to hire a golf course management company. The agreement that you have before you this evening is that agreement that will allow us to bring Kemper Sport Management on board as soon as the asset purchase agreement closes and with that I will stand for questions. Simison: Council, any questions? Borton: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Borton. Page 15 Meridian City Council Work Session Item#1. October 27,2020 Page 12 of 25 Borton: You might already have this planned out, but if there is a -- maybe a brief summary on the rollout, there is a -- there is a lot of chatter and incomplete information, just the nature of the beast with this -- as it's been a moving target to make this process happen. So, opposing continue -- or if it gets completed as scheduled is there a plan of attack for the city with KSM to kind of launch this in sort of a celebratory way that there is a lot of positives that is coming from this transaction and answering questions and we are encouraging in particular all those regular folk that --that really enjoy the golf course, that this is something to celebrate and we are all excited about it. So, is there a plan to have an open house or something before Thanksgiving that -- that kind of launches this endeavor with the public? Barton: Mr. Mayor, Councilman Borton, that's -- that's a great -- great question and appreciate the idea. That's a little different than what I think we have been thinking of like. I talked to -- and it's great. We love it. I was talking to Erik Oaas today about some operational transition stuff and one of the things that we talked about was putting out a message to the -- the members and they have an e-mail list that they notify people of upcoming tournaments or, you know, whatever the case may be and it's a pretty pretty extensive list -- to come up with -- with an FAQ or a -- you know, a summary of what's taking place and just so everybody is on the same page as far as whatever -- not rumors, but, you know, we want to make sure -- we want to make sure that -- that -- that the information that's out there is accurate and -- and that's -- so, that's something that we do -- need to do right away. But I, honestly, love the idea of an open house and meet the staff and maybe meet the folks from Kemper Sports Management and even city staff and -- I love that. That's a great idea. Borton: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Borton. Borton: Mike, I think that will help a lot. I think KSM is -- there is a good chunk of folks who just -- they don't know what that is and there may be a total misperception that it's like an east coast venture fund that -- that runs a golf course. That is totally -- is not the case, so seeing the face-to-face interaction and the ability to know that these are boots on the ground folks who care about the course and kind of side by side with the city to make it successful, if the pro is staying, whatever personnel are sticking around, all of that it's going to be really important to have that neighborhood kind of reengage and be excited about this, because they should. Barton: Love it. Thank you. Good idea. Simison: And, Councilman Borton, maybe this could be -- I know that the Council has not been able or -- to do their town hall gatherings, maybe this would be a great way to re- kick these off and to -- that one in this area with the council member from that area. Borton: Could be. Page 16 Meridian City Council Work Session Item#1. October 27,2020 Page 13 of 25 Simison: So -- Borton: Not a bad idea. Hoaglun: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Hoaglun. Hoaglun: I'm full of good advice tonight and I just wanted to inform Councilman Borton we cannot have that party until Kemper has their liquor license first, so just -- just, you know, something to -- something to consider. Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Hoaglun. Hoaglun: I move that we approve the Lakeview Golf Course Management Agreement between the City of Meridian and Kemper Sports Management. Perreault: Second. Simison: I have a motion and a second to approve Item No. 22. Is there any discussion on the motion? If not, all in favor signify by saying aye. Opposed nay. The ayes have it. The agreement is agreed to. Thank you very much. MOTION CARRIED: ALLAYES. 23. Public Works Annual Report Simison: Yes. And now when all the fun hard work begins. Next item is Item No. 23, our Public Works annual report. So, without further ado I will turn this over to Mr. Bolthouse for the next 28 minutes of riveting information about where the magic happens in the city, our Public Works Department. Bolthouse: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I will take that as a victory, because I think we were talking 13 minutes just a little bit ago. So, we are -- we are headed in the right direction and I appreciate the opportunity. I will say that the pebble in the shoe, though, is a good move, because, you know, that -- I'm going to be fidgety and I won't be able to settle down, so I will continue to move. So, anyway, thank you, Council and Mr. Mayor, for the opportunity to give you a quick update on Public Works and what we have been busy with the last -- the last year or so. I'm pleased to be in front of you not asking for any money. That's reserved for November through September. So, we will -- we will see how that plays out over the next -- the next several months and so I think -- I just -- I love this picture. Susie found this one. It kind of demonstrates I think exactly what Public Works is in some respects. We got boots on the ground. Critical employees doing -- doing good work for the citizens of the city and serving the community and so I think it's a -- it's apropos for -- for a lot of the work that we do in Public Works. And right up front I just wanted to say thanks to Susie and other staff for helping assemble some of this material. Page 17 Meridian City Council Work Session Item#1. October 27,2020 Page 14 of 25 So, without further ado, this is kind of what I hoped to kind of walk you through tonight. Just a quick look at the water, utility, wastewater, streetlights, a little bit about the financial aspects, enterprise fund, something on staffing and, then, touch on some accomplishments and things we have going on in a lot of our -- kind of foundational support organizations. So, with that we will step through. There is a little bit of organization to our thoughts and that is as we address the utilities we will talk about regulations, we will talk about some capacity, we will talk about some future issues and how things are going along. The water utility -- this happens to be the test well for Well No. 9. It's in reconstruction right now. What you are looking at in this picture is seven different zones. It was an existing well, so we had a better idea of exactly where we had to go to get good water and so those larger tubes that you see are really specifically isolating to what we think are those better aquifers to be tapping into. So, kind of an interesting picture as we look at what -- what a -- what a test well kind of is and look -- looks like there. So, I got a slide by the numbers. One slide for each of those areas that I talked about. And so I just want you to kind of digest this for a minute if you would, 621 miles -- these are kind of how we -- we measure and puff out our chest and kind of our badge of honor is just, you know, how big we are getting as a -- as a water utility. We have added 21 miles, just peeking over 40,000 accounts as the city for the water department. We are averaging almost ten million gallons a day of supply. You can see the number of service orders that our -- our department is processing in the water utility and in addition to that 22,000 number, processed over 15,000 dig line tickets as we locate utilities for other folks in the -- in the community who are -- have a need to -- to do that. One of the other items I wanted to mention here is that we are now -- with five of our facilities having water treatment, we are supplying about 6.7 million gallons a day of that 9.9 with treated water facilities and we will talk a little bit more about that here in a minute. Two other accomplishments. One, absolutely zero regulatory violations in the last year. And, then, words of wisdom from our assistant city engineer Kyle, who very nicely quotes that without water we get really thirsty. So, thank you, Kyle, for that contribution. A little bit more about water quality. As I mentioned we have five treatment facilities online. We have two that are in progress and will be completed by the end of this fiscal year and, then, four others that are planned by FY -- by the end of FY-25. That allows us to move from our current 66 percent of average day demand being treated up to 90 percent of our -- of our demand. And as the chart in the upper right would show, if you look at water quality calls associated in the years for brown water and those items as, you know, are associated with manganese, you can see that the treatment facilities have made a substantial improvement in the quality of that particular concern and we are down very low. Adding to that is a great effort by the water department in modifying and improving their flushing program, so that we now prevent that precipitation from occurring in our water system and we are flushing it and getting it cleaned out. It should stay clean. But we do have some future challenges and -- and those items are that manganese, which used to be an aesthetic challenge for us, is now gaining in regulation attention across the nation as a concern. We felt that most recently as our UCMR IV efforts and the health advisory concerns that came of that, that specifically precipitated moving up and treating Well 17 specifically there. Other wells that we have in our system -- some of them have higher than desired uranium levels and so that's another opportunity for us to look at as we look forward in treatment efforts. Arsenic is prevalent in our area and we have a -- we Page 18 Meridian City Council Work Session Item#1. October 27,2020 Page 15 of 25 have a particular well that we are working on mitigation efforts today. And, then, we are in the midst of our corrosion control study, which is a regulated requirement that we understand the corrosivity of our water on a variety of materials, most of those being metal based type materials. So, those are going to be the issues that we have continued to focus on as we -- as we look down the road here in the water department. In terms of supply, I wanted to just reconfirm that we do have 25 supply wells in the system, that we have a maximum capacity of 54 million gallons per day. That's a peak capacity, which, by the way, our peak capacity demand today is 20 million gallons in the last year. So, we do have what appears to be more capacity than what's needed. However, when you look at the regulatory requirements and being able to supply the community and pulling off your top performing wells in each of the zones and everything else, that suggests about 15 to 20 million more gallons than what we need and on top of that fire flow and you quickly get up to about 50 million gallons per day plus is what we need to have satisfying our needs today and -- and we have that. In addition we have got two ground reservoirs that are supporting us with four million gallons of storage capacity that help take and shave off that peak as needed. In the future, looking out at about the next 15 years, we do have five additional wells and a lot of that well demand starts with fire flow requirements in areas as we build out these pressure zones. Those wells will be coming online. One projection suggests is as we approach build out of the city we are going to need 75 to 80 million gallons per day of future capacity and that will include two additional reservoirs and those are -- those are ten million dollar investments each. We are continuing to drive forward on source water protection. That's extremely important for us. Not only is -- is the City of Meridian, but the entire valley, we have made progress with IDWR and -- and enforcing good well construction efforts and that's -- that's almost been an area that we have had to continue to put focus on and make sure that those -- those administrative rules are being enforced and we are continuing to always look at drought mitigation. So, cities, municipalities, we are not exempt from a call if we ever ended up with a shortage and, surprisingly, we don't have the most senior of water rights in the city. So, we are always looking for opportunistic efforts, possibly purchasing senior water rights, making -- making sure that we are in the conversation as new water sources become available. A couple of those we have listed here as the -- you know, Anderson Creek dam raise that we are -- we have submitted an MOU of interest in that project, as well as Cat Creek, which is similar in nature, that could -- could offer future drought mitigation. So, we will see where those --those play out. On the regulatory front, certainly mentioned that we had zero -- non -- noncompliance issues this year. However, we do have a few more things that we accomplished this year. We completed in November the UCMR IV efforts without issue. We completed risk and resiliency assessments, which is required by DEQ. That led to an update on our emergency planning response plan. That was also a requirement that had to be completed and we finished all of our well security upgrades, which has been a multiple year project that was largely driven by Homeland Security recommendations. We have some future challenges that certainly we got to keep a constant eye on. Current items that are regulated, contaminants and things. There is constant science improvement and changes and regulations and that has a tendency to drive -- drive those limits and requirements down. The whole area of health advisories, which appears to be a way that regulatory enforcement can occur without new regulation. So, that's -- that's something that we are watching. Lead and copper rule, Page 19 Meridian City Council Work Session Item#1. October 27,2020 Page 16 of 25 there is a lot of activity on where that's actually going to sort out and where the responsibilities lie with water purveyors in terms of that potential issue. And, then, constituents of emerging concern. I just picked one here PFAS. Those are kind of almost ubiquitous chemical compounds associated with plastic and in a variety of product manufacturing. We did have a success story as a relates to that and that was working with our fire department. The foam that they use in firefighting had that constituent in it and it can be a pretty serious contaminant and working together they identified an alternative product and actually had that removed from -- you know, from their trucks and use. So, we really appreciate their support on that. In terms of infrastructure, we did have a number of things that were completed. They are listed here. You are aware of some well abandonment projects that we had going on and this map just kind of highlights some of those infrastructure efforts throughout the town. Red are projects that got done. Green are in progress. Yellow are those that are coming in the near -- in the near term future. So, you can see there is a lot of effort there. We also have a number of challenges that's -- as it relates to infrastructure and that is the development of the southwest pressure zone. As we see contiguous nature of the geography down in that area becoming more challenging, the engineering team is doing an awesome job of looking at proactive opportunities to make investment that will prevent the need to be as disruptive as we look to expand our systems down the road. An example of that is actually in some of these roundabout intersections that are going in, putting in sleeving and infrastructure in advance of its actual needs, so that when -- when that time comes we are not --we are not tearing up those kinds of assets to support it. This is the year that we progress in our AMI efforts. That's the automatic meter infrastructure, which allows us to have online realtime monitoring of our water meter systems and that will be progressing this year and, then, one of our future challenges that here a few years ago that we didn't even really recognize and that is the boring industry, as they lay new fiber around the town and do other things, has really become a bit of a thorn in our side and we are -- we are regularly having some of our services and assets hit, most recently up on Hickory, by a boring -- by a boring outfit. So, anyway, something for us to keep an eye on as we look down the road. Shifting gears now over to the wastewater plant. A particularly nice picture that -- of some of the new infrastructure that we have got there from our recent capacities project. Just wastewater by the numbers. Fewer miles than water, but we just broke over 500 miles of sewer and over 2,000 new accounts added in the past year. Fifty-eight miles of our sewer system got cameraed and logged in terms of their condition and 40 additional miles got cleaned and I direct your attention to the pretreat. This is a two person team in our group that is there to put in preventative measures from any businesses in supplying any kind of contaminant or concern that comes down to -- to the waste treatment plant responsible for making sure that restaurants and those things have adequate systems that prevent grease and oils and those things from coming down and you will see that they had, you know, over 550 inspections and reviewed over 500 plans as they come through the system. Our maintenance and service orders here are internal and -- and largely completed by our maintenance and operations group and recognizing the -- the great work that our lab staff does. They completed over 13,000 compliance tests out of our-- out of our laboratory facility. Also very proud that they had zero permit violations at our wastewater facility. They are actually having to -- under the jurisdiction of three different permits, the -- the IPDES discharge permit, the reclaimed water permit, and -- Page 20 Meridian City Council Work Session Item#1. October 27,2020 Page 17 of 25 and an air permit as well. So, great-- great effort. And they were also recently recognized by Idaho DEQ as a pollution prevention champion with a lot of the great work that's happening down there at the plant. In terms of the regulatory landscape for wastewater, you know, that permit that started in 2017 just had a substantial reduction in nutrient discharge. As the challenge for the city it increased the laboratory testing significantly and in order to accomplish that we -- we negotiated a ten year compliance schedule that included both interim limits, which were at the five year period and final limits, which we are required to comply with in ten years. The day that we got our new permit in 2017 is the day that we started planning for our future permit. We have two of them coming, one in 2022 and another one in 2027. They are on a five year cycle. And we do have some emerging regulatory concerns that we are watching very carefully. We are one of the only municipalities in the area that does not have a temperature limit on our-- on our discharge and arsenic as a constituent, which is naturally occurring in this area, is also possibly on the horizon. So, we -- we spend a lot of effort as we prepare and now move towards our upcoming permit renewal. In terms of investments to meet those compliance milestones, what -- I would say that we are probably reaching halftime. We have just completed the capacity expansion on the liquid side. The new headworks project. We have -- we have built over the last six or eight years the facilities to support the needs of the -- of our permit and requirement going forward. As identified here that's been slightly over 80 million dollars that have been invested in projects and completed and now we have another 72 million dollars planned as we look to really drive down to those final limit levels that are required. Projects that you have approved for us in terms of digester six, which helps us expand the solid side of our operation, the sidestream phosphorus, which is -- which is, obviously, tied very specifically to our final limits tertiary filters, which are on the horizon and have to be in place and operational by 2025. We also appreciate support in terms of getting property around the wastewater facility and we have completed part of that effort with our recent land acquisition. If you are -- if you are really interested, one of the -- one of the things that we are having to do is completely modify and change the biology of our facility to a much more complex process and that will enable us to remove and get down to some of those final limit areas and I know that Laurelei and Travis would be more than happy to -- to school you on -- on the difference in these processes. In terms of infrastructure, like on the water side you can see that red is complete, green is in progress, yellow we got a number of sewer efforts on the infrastructure side. We have done some commissioning of chemical feed systems, our electrical power system buyout has proven to be a great contributor to our efforts out at the waste treatment plant. Just recently completed the automatic transfer switch effort and in a number of these projects we have upgraded our switch gear and transformers and where ever we have been able to do it we have undergrounded our power distribution system to date. We have also just recently last week received the draft odor study that we have been waiting for and Friday we actually have a first effort to have the consultant give us a breakdown on what that shows. So, we will be -- we will be back to share that with you. In addition, we have had a lift station abandoned and a number of road projects as you can see here. I wanted to take just a minute to talk about some of those really big efforts that are on the planning horizon as it relates to the sewer servicing of -- of some of the areas of town. So, in order -- I will just kind of walk down through this list and if you look at the pink session -- section here, in order to serve that area, because that's downgradient -- everything in our city basically Page 21 Meridian City Council Work Session Item#1. October 27,2020 Page 18 of 25 falls from the southeast to the northwest -- that requires the addition of a lift station. That lift station has been added into our CFP. That's an eight and a half million dollar effort that if desired will -- could move forward as early as FY-22 with the design and that would allow us to serve that -- that area in pink and that ultimately gets brought back to The Oaks or North McDermott lift station and ultimately gets pumped back to the plant. The yellow section is -- is the McDermott trunk extension. We also have that starting in FY- 27, an investment of approximately a mile of that, and moving south and that's required to serve really anything to the south along there. The blue is the South McDermott lift station and that's what will ultimately enable the city to open up the Victory sewer shed that is highlighted in blue there. And, then, all of those projects, depending upon how they come in and in what combination, will require us to take The Oaks lift station, which is a temporary lift station and, ultimately, build a large regional lift station and that -- that's a nine million dollar investment there that would allow us to handle any and all of the capacity coming. So, those are -- those are some of those future planning items that allow us to, you know, open up other areas of the City with -- with sewer service. Just a little bit about streetlights is that we are -- we are over 8,000 streetlights that the city's responsible for. We added 591 new lights to that portfolio this year. Now, the bulk of those come from developer driven projects that have contributed capital back to the city, but, in addition to that, the money that we have available to us in serving under -- underserved areas, CDBG grant type efforts and things all contribute to that number. We completed 131 LED conversions and if you recall you -- you supported us in bringing in the line locate effort for streetlight power runs and we completed over 1 ,200 of those efforts, you know, in house. You may not be familiar with the fact that we have three different rate schedules for our street lights. The 41 A schedule is an Idaho Power owned and maintained light that we pay just the power bill on, but it's very expensive, because it includes those other costs built in. The 41-B is very limited maintenance by Idaho Power, but bulb changes and things. It has a -- it has a more favorable power rate and, then, finally, the ones that we own and maintain ourselves has the lowest power rate. A lot of -- a lot of irons in the fire there that are certainly coming down the road, continuation of the LED conversion. The PUC recently approved the recommendation that the 41-B lights and their system have to be ultimately converted to 41-C. That is not required to happen until the fall of 2023 and we are looking at that, but opportunistically, as long as they continue to maintain and replace the necessary things, we may be looking at converting some of those a little bit sooner and probably one of the biggest challenges we have got I think as a city is we need to find a sustainable funding mechanism, so that we can make the appropriate investments. We probably have -- between underserved areas that we could serve and LED conversions that we could do, you know, we are probably staring at somewhere around six to eight million dollars of effort that could be -- that could be needed and that -- that's a lot of pressure and competition when you consider that that's -- that has to fight with all of the rest of the general fund areas. Enterprise. Jumping into the Enterprise Fund financial, if you take a look here you can see that the rate model that we run and track shows that we are in pretty good shape in terms of solvency for the department for revenue and expenses and that includes both operating and capital requirements. However, you will notice the trend the last few years starts to kind of taper off and when we extend that out we actually go insolvent over the -- over that 2032, 2033 time frame. So, a lot of assumptions we get out there. How fast are we growing? What Page 22 Meridian City Council Work Session Item#1. October 27,2020 Page 19 of 25 are -- you know, what are our costs actually going to be. But with what we know today it suggests that, hey, that's now on the horizon, we need to start thinking about doing something about that and to that -- to that end we are going to talk about a cost of service study here shortly. But as a refresher this is where we fall in terms of average cost per customer, if you will, in our rates and fees. We put in the bar graph for those that both have sewer and water. You can see that we are -- we are down near the bottom of that. So, we have been able to manage that very effectively and just as -- as a point of reference our annual revenues that we budgeted for this coming year is a little over 44 million and our actual expenses are a little over 45. So, we are going to be tapping into a little bit of that fund balance as that -- as that graphic shows. Strader: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Council Woman Strader. Strader: I will hold my questions for the end, Dale, but I think maybe one thing that would clarify or help provide context for that chart regarding the insolvency, does that assume that we hold the rates that we charge constant and is that where the -- the challenge comes from in that -- moving that curve? Bolthouse: Mr. Mayor, Council Woman Strader, yes, there are -- there are no programmatic increases built into our rate modeling at this point. So, that would assume the same rate structure going forward and -- and if the city desires to continue to save and, then, fund, it suggests that we now need to take a closer look at that and understand what kind of adjustments would be necessary to prevent that line from going below zero. Strader: Thank you. Bolthouse: And to that end the way that we are attacking that is that we are going to do a full cost of service study. We just signed the notice to proceed and assigned with FCS the opportunity to do that for us. We are in contract negotiations on -- on rates, but that effort will be starting here in earnest and will be complete by the time we get into the budget process. The intent of that is to go through everything associated with our rates and fees, our base prices and usage prices, and make sure those allocations are correct, so that we understand it. Review our assessment fee methodology, make sure that that's in proper order, and also take a look at a fund splitting methodology for us moving forward. So, from that we will come back to you with recommendations on, hey, here is what we do, here is the -- here is the tweaks and corrections we need to make in our -- in our rates and fees today and, then, here is -- here is what we recommend as we look long term on adjustments that should be made to -- to those to make sure that we -- we stay solvent. Mentioned the fund splitting. This is something that's been kind of on the back burner I think for a number of years at the city and this is a -- this is a suggestion that's supported by both Finance and Legal, that we really should be managing and -- and truly split the water utility from the wastewater utility. Today we have a commingled checkbook, if you will, and even though we budget very specifically our operating expenses and capital and everything by utility, in the end it all goes into one Enterprise Fund and it's been Page 23 Meridian City Council Work Session Item#1. October 27,2020 Page 20 of 25 recommended that we evaluate that and consider possibly, you know, splitting them into two complete separate funds and so we are tasking our consultant to help us look at that as well and -- and be able to make good recommendations to the -- to the Mayor and Council on that as we look forward. Just a few comments about staffing. You know, this is really the engine that makes it -- makes it run. This is, obviously, a picture not from this year. This is last year's picnic and they really -- these employees really make it happen and so we wanted to -- we wanted to get that in there. Just kind of by the numbers here is some things that are happening on the staffing side. So, we have 118 FTEs. You can see how they are divided amongst the -- the basic areas of administration, water, wastewater. It is a -- it is a complex operation. We have 169 licenses that we are obligated to maintain in the organization. We had -- we had the opportunity we spent over 1,200 hours in training and we just -- out of the necessity in the COVID era we -- we kind of jump started and moved all of our safety training now to nearly all of it to online and that's been a great accomplishment by that group. I wanted to highlight the fact that we have had six internal promotions and that's always something that we strive for is making sure that our folks are prepared when the opportunity comes and we can -- we can move them up. Last -- last couple items here is that you will -- you will see that we did have 19 new employees join our organization. We had some retirements, but we also had a number of folks that departed and as the note here indicates that about 75 percent of those, you know, moved on for better opportunities, which we -- we appreciate for people, but from an organization standpoint, you know, it puts a lot of stress on us as we -- as we try to take on that challenge. So, with that there is a couple things that -- that kind of come out of -- of that effort and that is we are -- we are having difficulty in this market the last several months in finding qualified candidates, those who can come in and -- and really hit the ground running and, then, a number of candidates that do come in qualified there has been a -- there has been a number of them that don't even get to the first day where they have accepted other opportunities in the community and things and so we got our work cut out to try to figure -- crack that nut and -- and be able to get ourselves fully staffed and be able to stay there. To that end something that we have been working on and we hope we will get some traction this year and that is really a revamping of the Public Works. You know, some departments in the Public Works as it relates to the job, family structure, we just -- in this graphic you will see kind of that current structure. That's kind of how we have historically been set up. You have got job grades, you got levels, you have got work and there might have been a time where it was assigned that way, but really today that's just not -- that's just not how we -- how we do our work and get our work done. We really need to have, you know, all employees moving up and gaining experience and -- and -- and adding value to our organization. We believe that that's a lot more effective and efficient operation, it's not dissimilar to the police STEP plan in terms of their drive to try to get everybody to a senior patrol officer type status in time and so I know that the compensation committee is open to and is looking at this kind of an effort, but we think it's extremely important for us as we -- we look to give career path and flexibility and opportunity for -- for both us and our employees. As we kind of wrap things up here, we have got -- we have got a few areas that we just thought we better -- we better touch on, because we are not just water and wastewater, we have some other responsibilities here in the city in our Public Works Department. Facilities is one of those projects. Support is -- is another and you can see some of the efforts that have gone on Page 24 Meridian City Council Work Session Item#1. October 27,2020 Page 21 of 25 here and we do have some great projects in front of us, but as we grow we -- we -- we continue to see this area grow right along with us. We have got some responsibilities for managing the environmental program for the city and a lot of that effort's been focused around the environmental program plan that was created, along with the implementation of the new floodplain mapping that -- that occurred and was approved this summer. A couple of future efforts on that front is the Nine Mile Creek flood mitigation effort with MDC and our submittal for grant application to try to get that funded through a grant. That's required to be submitted in January and, then, we do have some sustainability items that we would like to get on our radar. Our HVAC systems in our facilities have never been commissioned and balanced properly. We believe that there is some energy, as well as comfort improvements to make there, and as we see our facilities now reach ten to 12 years old, like City Hall, we are going to be looking at investing in replacements for lights and things and it's probably appropriate that we look at LED and some efficiency improvement projects. On our solid waste side it's been so great to have dedicated resources managing that contract and that franchisee agreement and a no tiers -- we achieve some really good savings to the city by having good dedicated resource effort on that and good negotiations. A couple of things we have going forward is that they are in progress with SWAC and the development of a solid waste plan that, hopefully, will be out soon and be guiding that effort and, then, the orange bag program, not so much a big challenge, other than the fact that it's just kind of -- it's -- it is where it is. We are waiting for further development in the processes to actually convert that into its original intended purpose of fuel and in the meantime we are using it in -- in what we think is a better than just landfill kind of application. A couple of other items here. Asset management. GIS extremely important for us to have that documentation. They have done a great job in reconstructing our inventory process for our utility integrating programs and one of the things we want to try to address this year is we want to bring all that 8,000 plus streetlights into our asset management program where we can adequately manage and -- and track those assets. On the SCADA side we have achieved full staffing this last year. We did a great effort with IT in relocating our SCADA servers to City Hall here where there -- we have the redundancy and the security of that effort and this year's plans is to tackle master planning for SCADA, developing standards and, then, with the approval of our enhancement this year we are updating and revamping our alarm call out systems, so -- and last, but not least, you know, our Public Works inspections team -- man, they get a lot of work done. There is six of our inspectors are out there in the field making sure that all of the infrastructure going into the city associated with water, wastewater, or capital projects are all being completed and completed appropriately and you can see here by the numbers that that included over 160 inspections and one of the things that we do is there is a two year warranty on that infrastructure that becomes ultimately contributed capital and before the city accepts those we have to go out and we have to do a full inspection on those and -- and make sure that they, you know, are holding up well. So, anyway, we appreciate that group. So, like a skipping stone, we -- we -- we touched on a number of things in probably what -- oh, just over 28 minutes, give or take. So, we appreciate the opportunity. I know it was a whirlwind. We always offer our, you know, efforts to dig in deeper on any of the items that we see here and we would be glad to stand and take questions. I also want to say thank you to Liz for being our liaison this Page 25 Meridian City Council Work Session Item#1. October 27,2020 Page 22 of 25 this last year and being kind of a sounding board and taking an interest in Public Works. So, anyway, with that we will stand for questions. Simison: Thank you, Dale. Council, any questions? Borton: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Borton. Borton: Just one -- one quick one, Dale. If you -- if you covered it I missed it, but are we on pace -- a few years back when we got the second camera truck for the sewer inspection to get us up to or ahead of schedule, are we on schedule as scheduled with the camera inspection on our lines? Bolthouse: Mr. Mayor, Councilman Borton, the short answer is no. However, part of that has been challenges with labor and having the personnel to operate our vehicles. The other challenge is that thank goodness we procured newer equipment, because we have been having a fair amount of repair and maintenance on the old equipment. So, we are -- we are not at the target that we would like to be, but when we are fully staffed we certainly have that capability and we have -- we have seen signs of greatness on that front, but -- but overall average for the year we did not -- we did not achieve what we originally targeted to hit. Borton: Okay. Thank you. Strader: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Council Woman Strader. Strader: Thank you so much, Dale. And being the Public Works liaison has been one of the most interesting things I have ever done and I just want to say how much we appreciate the employees in the Public Works Department. They truly are essential and it's the foundation of the city to have potable water and when you flush it it goes. We can never lose sight of that. It's just such a basic thing, but it's so complicated as you spoke about all the regulatory compliance issues, et cetera. I wondered if you could touch on -- I know LED streetlights have been a hot topic. Council has been very interested in accelerating our LED conversions, I think as well as working on new streetlights. We clearly need a more sustainable funding source. Any preview as to when we might have a few options to consider? Bolthouse: Mr. Mayor, Council Woman Strader, what -- we are going to look to FCS to assist us in that. You know, they have got exposure to hundreds of municipalities across the country that do have streetlight programs. There -- there are options -- different options being deployed across the valley here. Caldwell actually runs their streetlight program through their enterprise fund and charge customers based on their -- I guess their access to or their proximity to streetlights and things of that nature. So, I would -- Page 26 Meridian City Council Work Session Item#1. October 27,2020 Page 23 of 25 would assume that that could be one of the alternatives, although Todd Lavoie has done a -- done a pretty extensive research on that and his opinion is that he doesn't believe that that's necessarily a possibility in Idaho here today. But there --we will see what other options come out of our cost of service study effort and -- and hope to have those back around available for discussion, you know, later this winter. Strader: Thank you. Mr. Mayor, one more. Simison: Council Woman Strader. Strader: And one thing you touched on was the water quality and I think maybe just to expand a little bit for people watching at home if you could, one of the comments was that the regulations are lower, but I'm assuming that means that the allowable amount of contaminants is getting lower. You know, we saw uranium, we saw a few different things. I know from our conversations that overall water quality is very good here and it's within our regulations and that we can manage that, but if you could just maybe characterize the quality of our water in general at this time. I think for people watching at home I think that might be helpful for members of the public. Bolthouse: Yeah. Mr. Mayor, Council Woman Strader, we -- you know we -- we are fortunate in terms of the fact that we have a very good supply of water. We actually have some parts of our city and some of our wells that produce very good water quality, but as regulations evolve, as constituent levels and contaminant levels continue to be lowered, it's going to put pressure on us and manganese is one of those that -- that is doing that. So, a lot of our effort the last several years has been to manage and reduce the exposure to the manganese. That was largely an aesthetic effort, because it was causing discolored water as you chlorinated it for the distribution system and that has been a very successful effort in putting these treatment facilities in and actually removing that. Eventually if we are going to fully leverage all the wells that we have across the city, there are some other challenges that we have, one of those being a number of wells that don't exceed regulation on uranium, but certainly have the potential to -- either through excessive use or the reduction of, you know, the regulatory requirements on that. As I mentioned, we also have one well that has surprised us with fairly high arsenic levels and all of those do have the opportunity to be treated and improved, but, you know, overall our water quality certainly meets or exceeds the regulatory requirements and we are just trying to make sure that we stay there. Strader: Thank you. Cavener: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Cavener. Cavener: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Dale, I got to echo Council Member Strader's comments about your team and staff and, you know, yours is one department that I think the vast majority of the public takes for granted until they turn on their faucet and they don't have Page 27 Meridian City Council Work Session Item#1. October 27,2020 Page 24 of 25 water, go to flush and it doesn't go away. So, I know that we need to do a better job of focusing on the things that you and your department do so that doesn't happen and want to appreciate you for that. But I did have a question that I'm hoping you can -- you can help me get to and I don't want you to take this as a knock against the department, because I know how hard your department works, but I think along with all Council were also forwarded a copy of the Idaho Conservation League's report that showed the City of Meridian had two discharge violations last year. I'm not so much focused on the violations, just give you an opportunity to respond and let Council know how you and your department got together and what your plan of attack is to resolve those issues and to prevent that from happening in the future. Bolthouse; Mr. Mayor, Councilman Cavener, I'm not familiar with what those two discharge violations are. Laurelie McVey is -- is -- is on the call here and could easily probably jump in. One of the challenges that we have had is -- is the poor record keeping by regulatory agencies and making sure that we stay ahead and keep those things cleaned up. I'm not sure if that's the case on this particular one, but I'm not familiar with the specifics, so I will -- I will shut up and let Laurelie jump in. McVey: Sure. Mr. Mayor and Council Members, I can definitely speak to those. So, those violations -- so, the Idaho Conservation League's report looks at the past 12 quarters and those violations have actually now since dropped off since they did the report, so that they were previous to 2017, and the two instances were violations of E. coli limits and those actually occurred before we upgraded our UV system. So, we haven't had any recent regulatory violations. However, when that --the report doesn't necessarily quantify what those were or when they occurred. So, we are hopeful that the next round when they run their next report we would now be included in the zero violation group, which we are really proud and excited to get into that category. Cavener: That's awesome. That's great to hear. Thank you. Simison: Thank you. Council, any further questions for Mr. Bolthouse? Okay. Thank you very much, Dale. Council,just for the record we --we do have the next deputy director of plans and projects from Ada County Highway District that was just announced today in the room, Mr. Justin Lucas, we have had an amazing working relationship with him in this current role and I'm sure that goes for Public Works. I thought is appropriate, since we are in Public Works, to at least mention that, but just want Council to be aware of this -- what I think is a great recognition of talent to ACHD and look forward to continue that operational working with them. So, welcome, Justin. Look forward to seeing you at 6:00. EXECUTIVE SESSION 24. Per Idaho Code 74-206A(1)(a) To deliberate on a labor contract offer or to formulate a counteroffer; and 74-206(1)(d) To consider records that are exempt from disclosure as provided in chapter 1, title 74, Idaho Code Page 28 Meridian City Council Work Session Item#1. October 27,2020 Page 25 of 25 Simison: Council, we do have ten minutes before our next meeting. Would we like to move the Executive Session until after -- Nary: I have checked, Mr. Mayor, and they are available after. Simison: Okay. Bernt: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Council Member Bernt. Bernt: Excuse me, Mr. Mayor. Mr. Nary, do we need to take care of this item on our agenda or can we just adjourn? Nary: Mr. Mayor, Council President Bernt, we can adjourn. It's also listed on the regular session, too. Bernt: Perfect. Simison: I have a motion and a -- Hoaglun: Mr. Mayor, second the motion. Simison: -- second to adjourn the meeting. Is there any discussion? If not, all those in favor signify by saying aye. Opposed nay. The ayes have it and we are adjourned. MOTION CARRIED: ALLAYES. MEETING ADJOURNED AT 5:52 P.M. (AUDIO RECORDING ON FILE OF THESE PROCEEDINGS) 11 / 17 / 2020 MAYOR ROBERT E. SIMISON DATE APPROVED ATTEST: CHRIS JOHNSON - CITY CLERK Page 29