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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2003 05-20 Pre Meridian City Pre-Council Meeting May 20, 2003 The Pre-Council Meeting of the Meridian City Council was called to order at 6:00 P.M. on Tuesday, May 20, 2003, by Council President Tammy de Weerd. Members Present: Tammy de Weerd, Keith Bird, Bill Nary, and Cherie McCandless. Members Absent: Mayor Robert Corrie. Others Present: Bill Nichols, Anna Powell, Brad Watson, Doug Strong, Mike Worley, Gary Smith, and Sharon Smith. Item 1. Roll-call Attendance: X Tammy de Weerd X Bill Nary X Cherie McCandless X Keith Bird O Mayor Robert Corrie De Weerd: I will go ahead and call the Pre-Council Meeting on Tuesday May th 20. At 6:00 I’ll call the meeting to order and ask the Deputy Clerk to call roll. Item 2. Adoption of the Agenda: De Weerd: Item Number 2 adoption of the agenda. Bird: Madam President. De Weerd: Mr. Bird. Bird: I would move that we approve the agenda as published. Nary: Second. De Weerd: It’s been moved and seconded to adopt the agenda as presented. All those in favor say aye. All ayes motion carried. MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES Item 3. Discussion of Valley Ride: De Weerd: Item Number 3 discussion of Valley Ride. Kelly is here with us this evening. Fairless: Madam President Members of the Council I’m going to hand out some interesting information (inaudible). Meridian City Pre-Council Meeting May 20, 2003 Page 2 of 19 Bird: Thank you Kelly. De Weerd: Thank you Kelly. Fairless: Thank you Members of the Council for giving me the opportunity to speak with you today and to express my appreciation for the support we’ve gotten from Meridian City over the last couple of years. I’m here to update you on what Valley Ride’s been doing over the last year. I think it’s important that you understand as dues payers of our organization what are we doing with the funds that we’re getting from our members and also look into the future and what we’re going to do with our future fund request. We as you all know we’ve been in existence since 1998. Valley Ride was created out of a citizen referendum 70 percent of the citizens in Ada and Canyon Counties voted for the formation of a regional public transportation authority. With the legislation that created us, though we weren’t given a funding source so we rely on our members to provide us with the funding we need for the local match for the dollars that we spend. Every dollar that we get from our member agencies equals four dollars from the federal government is matched by four dollars from the federal government. The request from Meridian this year for example is 25,489, which actually equals 127,445 dollars to us in our efforts. In this last year we have completed our Strategic Plan and what you have in front of you is the executive summary that we got from our consultants on that plan. There were five priorities that were established out of that process. They’re not necessarily in order of importance any one of those priorities without the other couldn’t stand alone so we had to put them in some order so I’ll tell you what order that is. One is secure stable funding which is something that if we aren’t able to accomplish that in the next couple of years it’s going to be very difficult for us to accomplish the kind of public transportation system we would like to have. Also promoting public transportation through public outreach and education, enhancing and maximizing – enhancing existing services and maximizing the resources, we already have. Also developing partnerships such as the partnerships, we have with our member agencies and other members of the community and developing a rail strategy both short term and long term. In this last year, we’ve also entered into agreements with Commuters Bus and Treasure Valley Transit for the services they provide in Canyon County. We – I included just for your information some facts about Treasure Valley Transit and Commuters Bus as well. We are the designated recipients for federal funds for the Nampa and Boise urbanized areas and also began the Garden City – we began operating the Garden City service this last year. We really are looking for opportunities as they present to create a more regional system and we’re going to move forward farther in that in this next fiscal year. I don’t know if you’re aware but Commuter Ride has been working with Treasure Valley Transit to establish more stops in the Meridian area and we’re very excited about that starting in June. They’ve added additional stops in Meridian now we have up to six stops in Meridian on the Treasure Valley Metro. nd The mid day service is going to resume again as of June 2 so we’ll have the Meridian City Pre-Council Meeting May 20, 2003 Page 3 of 19 Nampa to Meridian to Boise route for all day again. What I have enjoyed about watching this process is that the private sector has really stepped up to help fund this and I don’t think it would have happened without that kind of support. As we look forward to next year one of the things we’re really emphasizing in our program is the private sector and the employer support for these services. One of our projects that we’re bringing forward is called a Commuter Pass Program and we’re going to do that in conjunction with ACHD Commuter Ride. They all ready have the infrastructure to do the employer outreach so we’d like to enhance that through our federal program and to be able to do some incentive programs with employers where we can actually track our progress on their participation. Also, get them more involved in the planning of services and the implementation and marketing and outreach of those services. We’re very excited about that project. It’s actually planned to be a three-year project where the employer contribution to the program increases each year so by the time we’re done with that, they’re actually 100 percent funding the services that are being provided to their employees. Where that’s been used was King County Metro did this type of program and they had a 95 percent retention rate of employers continuing with the service even after the incentives went away. We’re hoping that we can see those kinds of successes and the more the private sector sees a value in this the more they’re willing to contribute. I think that says a lot to our elected officials about how much their support is needed as well. We’re also working with the Capital City Development Corporation to do a downtown mobility study. Why this is important to the other communities, it is a Boise study but it really for us is a template for how we can do transportation studies in downtown areas. I see Meridian as a prime candidate for a study like this in the future. It’s looking at integrating the transportation system rather than looking at it from different kinds of modes instead of ACHD doing their traffic modeling in one study, us looking at transit and CCDC looking at parking and pedestrian we’re going to pull that all together into one project. I think the outcome of that is a template that we can not only use in downtown areas abut regional areas such as the town square mall or some of the high congestion areas Eagle Road might be a real good candidate for that kind of study again looking at an integrated transportation system. We’re also working with COMPASS, CCDC, and BSU to secure some federal funds in the reauthorization and the top priority in that COMPASS list as you all know is securing the rail right of way so we’re working on that. Then again, I mentioned engaging the private sector and really focusing on that. I included in the packet for you the map. This is the conceptual map I brought to you about a year ago or a little more than a year ago. We are continuing to move forward on this plan. This year we are going to do what’s called an operation and capital improvement plan. What that will do is start drawing lines on the map. How that effects Meridian is your citizens will be able to look at that map, see where they can pick up routes, where those routes will take them and how Meridian’s service fits into the regional picture. What we’ll be able to also do is look at the specific cost for that and each year we can come back and if the Meridian City Council would be inclined until we get a stable funding source there may be opportunities for us to Meridian City Pre-Council Meeting May 20, 2003 Page 4 of 19 start putting some services in place even before we get that funding source. The more there’s an interest in that happening I think the more it’s going to – it’s easier to convince the Legislature that this is something that the community would support. We’re moving forward on that and also I included in this packet a public opinion survey just again, we’re hearing from the public that they support us building this transportation system and putting this in place. Only two percent of the people asked this was a 600-person survey 300 in Ada County, 300 in Canyon County, only two percent said they opposed public transportation and 82 percent support the implementation within one to three years. We’ve got a real strong sense of urgency from the public that they would like to see us moving forward as quickly as possible on this initiative. The last page is a very broad summary of our budget. I do have more detailed information if you would like to have that a few of our members have requested that. As I mentioned before the Meridian dues are 25,489 dollars. Those are – we use the 2003 COMPASS projections that COMPASS adopts and that’s 60 cents per person. Nobody’s duplicated so the county pays 60 cents for all the unincorporated citizens. The citizens in the unincorporated area and the cities pay for those within their boundaries. Then we do have special member dues that we negotiate separately with those. That’s all I’m here to tell you about and I would be happy to answer any questions if you would like or if you have any. Bird: Madam President. De Weerd: Mr. Bird. Bird: Kelly on your budget request deal you guys – I see you took the labor just off of last years actual cost I guess. (Inaudible) salary or medical benefit increases. Fairless: Right. Bird: I’m sure you’re going to have some of them so we probably need to figure a little bit more money for that. Fairless: Yes and one of the things thank you Councilman Bird. One of the things that we are looking at is we are working with the City of Boise to negotiate our budget for the transit services there. That’s not included in this because that doesn’t come from our member dues at all it comes directly from the City of Boise. They’ve asked us – we’ve kind of been basing a lot of this on what their requests are of us and we will go in and insert especially the medical benefit increase – Bird: Yes I know it’s going to – Meridian City Pre-Council Meeting May 20, 2003 Page 5 of 19 Fairless: -- yes our staff increases I mean there may be some if we do need to do those and how we do those if – I think we can work within the existing budget and be able to work through those. De Weerd: Kelly as you know the rail corridor goes through our Urban Renewal Area. I know you’ve been working very diligently on right of way issues and that sort of thing. We hope that as we move forward because the City Council and I know the MDC Board have recently sent a letter to encourage acquisition or a partnership with the Railroad Company. The title would be given to you but how – have you given some thought on how you would interact with the cities whose districts it runs through. We have 20 acres in particular that we’re very interested in. Fairless: Madam President we really haven’t given a lot of thought to those kinds of details. I think we do need to have a conversation about that, as we get closer. I don’t know that a firm decision has been made that it necessarily has to be Valley Ride that that rail corridor goes to either. It’s something that seems like the logical choice but we really haven’t had I don’t think enough dialogue at our board level and with our member agencies to determine if that really is the best option. Again, it seems like the most logical one but it’s not necessarily the decision that’s been made. We’re on the proposal as the sponsor and we’ll continue to work through that. As these issues come up, I think it’s definitely something we need to be talking about. De Weerd: And if you can really keep close contact or communication with us and the MDC Board in how we can support your efforts and compliment them and contacting our legislative delegation or anyone that you need to shoe extra support from the city certainly we would be willing to do that. Those really are crucial to renewal efforts. Fairless: Up to this point we have been in touch with our consultants on that project. Our rail corridor evaluation have been in touch with some of the folks from the Meridian Development Corporation so I know those conversations have been occurring in terms of just the negotiation strategy, how that might look and the best way to approach that. I appreciate what you’re saying and we are defiantly keeping that in mind as we move forward on these things. De Weerd: Also, at the MDC they will be doing a traffic study or a traffic flow. I don’t know if it will be some time during this budget year or next budget year but if that could run concurrently with something that you could do with Mass Transit certainly that would be a great component of whatever they do. Fairless: Madam President that gets to my point of looking at the system as a system and making sure that – it may not be that every single component can be implemented but at least you’re looking at it and determining where it will fit. I think that I would propose having a discussion with them about maybe finding a Meridian City Pre-Council Meeting May 20, 2003 Page 6 of 19 way to combine some efforts. We do have some of the federal transit resources that we can use for doing these kinds of studies. That’s what we’re funding the CCDC study with. Some of those monies still are sitting on the table for next year and I would be happy to talk with them about looking specifically at the downtown Meridian area and seeing if there are some things we can do. If the Urban Renewal District is willing to provide the local match, we can do quite a bit with that money. De Weerd: That’s great. Fairless: It just maximizes the money that they have on the table. De Weerd: Sharon could you make sure to make a note of that that maybe we nd can get that on the MDC Agenda. Then we meet what the 2 Wednesday at 7:30 so let’s see that you’re on their agenda to talk about that because they are doing their budget. I guess my last question is with our populations usually your budget requests are based on population numbers is that correct? Fairless: That’s correct. De Weerd: And so I would anticipate ours will be going up a little bit. Have you gotten those numbers to our Finance Director? Fairless: Actually, this is the number for this year. De Weerd: Okay that will be our number. Fairless: Because we already used the 2003 COMPASS projections. They adopted those in April and I plugged those into our budget so this will not go up from what our request is. We will be getting that in a letter to your Finance Department. De Weerd: Did I see Stacy sitting over there? Unidentified Speaker: She’s back in her office. (Inaudible discussion amongst Council Members) Fairless: Part of my reason to come today is just to in advance of you considering that in your budget just to have this face to face. We do send a letter and it’s actually due to go out in the next few days. De Weerd: Thank you. Fairless: Thank you. Meridian City Pre-Council Meeting May 20, 2003 Page 7 of 19 De Weerd: Council is there any other questions or comments? Bird: Just thank you. Fairless: Thank you very much. Again, I appreciate the support we get from Meridian. This is a great partnership and I also get to walk here. Every time I come here, I’ll remind you how great it is to get to walk here. De Weerd: Well I think you’ve taken the awareness level – it’s just increased a great deal over this last year in general and have really appreciated what I’ve seen from your agency. Fairless: Well this has been actually a real delight to be able to come and talk to the member agencies. I can see just in the last year, the kinds of questions we get and the kinds of comments that I hear back that people are engaged in this dialogue and that’s what I was hoping. I’ve been real pleased to see that. De Weerd: That’s great well thank you Kelly. Item 4. Discussion of Sewer Easement Acquisition Policy for Black Cat Trunk Sewer Project: De Weerd: Item Number 4 discussion of the Sewer Easement Acquisition Policy for Black Cat Trunk Sewer Project. Brad. Watson: Thank you Madam President and Council Members. I have brought along Candy Miller from JUB Engineers tonight and she will be able to explain in depth I think what we’re doing here a lot better than I can. I need to hand something out to you. I didn’t get it into your packets Thursday we were still going through a couple of revisions so I’ll just take a minute to pass that out. De Weerd: Okay thanks Brad. Well welcome Candy. Watson: As you will read on my very short little memo, there we are very experienced in Sewer Easement Acquisition over the last couple of years and not all of it is good experience. When we start the design on the Black Cat Trunk JUB recommended and we agreed that we needed a standardized process by which to acquire these. They’ve gone to quite a bit of effort to draft this proposed policy and we have worked with the City Attorney’s office as well throughout this revision. I can give you a moment to read that if you want. I’ll probably just turn this over to Candy maybe she can explain the grand scheme here and answer any specific questions you might have. The one thing I would want to point out is we are really trying to get going on this project. Hopefully this is adequate and complete for you tonight. We don’t want to go out and start talking to people until City Council has bought off on this for lack of a better word. With that, I’ll just turn it over to Candy. Meridian City Pre-Council Meeting May 20, 2003 Page 8 of 19 De Weerd: Thank you Brad. Miller: Thank you Madam President and Council Members. The purpose of putting this policy together was to create a mutual understanding between the property owners and everybody really that would participate in the easement process. That way reduce suspicion I guess on whether they’re getting you know the same deal as their neighbor is getting and just try and streamline and make this a little bit more efficient as far as moving through it without misunderstanding just moving through the process more smoothly. We think if we have this policy, first of all it provides consistent guidelines for who is going out and contacting the public. We’ll create a greater trust within the public I believe and people will feel they’re being treated equally. As I said before it creates greater efficiency. To put this policy together we really have collected information from a lot of different people and had different eyes on it. Mr. Nichols has helped us with it just in looking it over and making very good suggestions on it. We also talked to an Appraiser to get their viewpoint of it and they looked at it. We did look at some other city at the policies that they have and we think that we have put together a policy that is straight forward and really well served the city well. I don’t know if you want me to read through this or you’ve had a chance to read through it there. It refers in here to Idaho Code and I do have copies of that if you have any questions on what that is. Where would you like to go we have 10 minutes? What would be most useful for you? De Weerd: Council I don’t think we necessarily have to read through it. I guess we would ask the attorney he’s looked at it and feels comfortable with it. I think he nodded his head. Nichols: Yes Madam President it’s actually been several weeks we’ve been kicking this back and forth, tweaking it and fine tuning it. The prior Easement Acquisition Process we did we – you know historically you did not have to pay for any sewer easements. Then the construction of the White Trunk it became necessary to do that on occasion. How you get there and how you get it done was at times difficult. This at least lays out what has to be done. It probably goes maybe a little bit beyond technically what the imminent domain statute requires in that the written notice to the owner by statute refers to takings of fee simple property. This is an easement not a fee simple. When you look at the notice and what’s in the notice it’s all really up front stuff. What we’re taking it for, what’s necessary all of these different things so it just shows more I think a more open approach from government in this process. I think it’s ready to go. De Weerd: Council do you have any specific questions or is there a need to walk through this? Nary: I guess I had one question Madam President. Meridian City Pre-Council Meeting May 20, 2003 Page 9 of 19 De Weerd: Mr. Nary. Nary: Following up a little bit of what Mr. Nichols said. The intent in trying to secure these easements hasn’t changed from the White Trunk. I mean we’re obviously still looking for donated property really not trying to purchase all of this right of way or all these easement all the way on this but that’s the philosophy that we’re going from. When we run into those situations like we had a few occasions on the White Trunk that’s what the intent of this agreements for is that right? Watson: Council Member Nary, and Council Members. They’re simply going to be approached with this at face value where there are two options a cash payment for that easement or if they so elect a donation. I’m not sure that we would or can push them one way or another. Most of the easements that we’ll need are through large parcels that are prime for development. My intuition is that these people and maybe I’m totally wrong would like to help us out in getting that sewer to them sooner and maybe not go through the negotiation process. I think this is just a very up front, here’s what it’s worth, and here are options donation or payment. I think it is a change. Nary: Okay so and I guess that’s where I wasn’t clear. What I thought I heard Mr. Nichols say was that traditionally we haven’t done it that way so this is really a change in our whole approach not just in the change in how we’re going to deal with the ones where they want payment and we don’t have any other options. This is really from the get go doing that right up front. Watson: Council Member Nary that’s correct. I don’t know if you recall but on the South Slough Sewer Project, we ended up negotiating over things like horse feed and renting of stables and just this weird stuff that just consumed so much of our time. This is what it is it’s a cash payment or it’s a donation. I don’t anticipate dealing with those a whole lot. I’m sure there’s going to be relocation of fences and maybe some things like that but I think this will stream line it. De Weerd: Will some of that be taken care of Brad in the Trunk Line Assessment that you’re putting together? What is it called? Is that going to be kind of considered as a cost? I would also and I’ll add to my question now if we could even introduce us with a paragraph of historically the City of Meridian has worked well with property owners in gaining easements through a donation or through the cooperation just a statement that traditionally easements have not been paid for. I don’t know if we can do that or not maybe I’ll defer that question to Mr. Nichols. Nichols: Madam President part of the reason you didn’t have to pay for them is that most of them were derived from developments. The White Trunk as I understand it was the first big major city funded driven project. In the South Slough, extension as well there may have been somewhere you know to get from Meridian City Pre-Council Meeting May 20, 2003 Page 10 of 19 one place to another. As far as a big project goes it was out of the norm. I see it’s a change but it’s kind of a maturing change in that staff is having to go out and do some things that you didn’t used to have to do because the development community was taking care of it and building from one place to the next to the next and building it in that fashion. You can probably in a cover letter to the owners have something like that as to the cooperative part of it. I fully expect that in the person-to-person contact that it will be stated in terms of what this can do for the value of the property as far as potentially being developed in the future to help people see the value that comes from having that sewer trunk go through. De Weerd: Thank you Mr. Nichols. I guess the remaining question Brad to you would be is this a cost that is being considered as you develop the assessment fees? Watson: Madam President and Council Members the cost for all future trunks major trunks Black Cat, North Slough, McDermott are all rolled into that system development fee right now. Once it’s constructed and those costs are finalized then it’s no longer a future project and it gets rolled into the assessment fee. The one caveat to that is we do intend to convene I guess a Finance Steering Committee for this project in the very, very near future that hopefully will involve one of you sitting up there. There may be a special fee a special Black – this thing is so huge that maybe that’s worth looking at. We’ll be looking at that. The one thing I wanted to point out Mr. Nichols mentioned a cover letter. We do intend to put together a cover letter that accompanies Candy when she goes out into the field and hopefully have that signed by the Mayor just introducing the project what we’re doing and maybe that would be an appropriate spot to talk about the history of our sewer projects. Nary: Madam President. De Weerd: Mr. Nary. Nary: I seem to recall that there were occasions with the White Trunk that we had to look at some redesign issues because of either some where topography and some of it was because we’ve reached some impasse with people and we basically sewered around them because they weren’t very willing forthcoming to grant some easements and such. Isn’t that right? Watson: Council Members Nary somewhat. We never did go around anybody. We did switch sides of the drain at one point. The problem we ran into with that project is there was so much pending development that we had to keep working with changes and alignment continually. Well even after it was being constructed we were still making changes to conform to these peoples alignment. We’re really intending with this project to go in with a preliminary alignment, a map saying this is where it’s going to go through your property more or less and we’re going to do an appraisal and here’s what it’s worth or here’s the change in value Meridian City Pre-Council Meeting May 20, 2003 Page 11 of 19 to your property. There’s not – we don’t really have the time or the patience maybe patience is a bad word but – (Inaudible discussion amongst Council Members) Watson: -- I won’t speak for the rest of the city -- to be changing alignments for the next two years. Miller: Council what’s your pleasure? Bird: Madam President. De Weerd: Mr. Bird. Bird: I think we ought to go forward with it and get it taken care of. I think you’ve got the power to have them bring it forward and get this on a Regular Agenda we’ll get it passed and go after it. I don’t see any better way. They’ve reviewed it. Nary: Madam President do we even need that? I mean I think – Bird: No I don’t think we need it. Nary: I think they just want to know if this sort of philosophy change and direction is okay. I don’t have – Bird: No do we need to pass on a policy, a new policy change? De Weerd: Mr. Nichols. Nichols: Madam President Members of the Council we generally wanted resolutions if there’s something that becomes a matter of city policy. Often those are personnel policies, things that you have to put in a manual to refer to from time to time this one is kind of – is a little different but it wouldn’t take much to have a resolution done. We can have it next week on the agenda, approve it, it’s part of the Regular Agenda, and then there’s something that can be attached to it if necessary. If somebody says well is this really what the city’s doing. Nary: That’s great. De Weerd: I guess through that suggestion you can get a resolution prepared for the next meeting. Thank you. Is that sufficient Candy and Brad? Watson: That’s great I appreciate it. Thank you. Meridian City Pre-Council Meeting May 20, 2003 Page 12 of 19 Item 5. Discussion of Skate Park Policy: De Weerd: Okay Item Number 5 discussion of Skate Park Policy. Doug Strong. Strong: Madam President Members of the Council what I’m bringing to you tonight is the results of discussions since we last met regarding security at Tully Skate Park and a possible way to at least address that issue for this summer. After discussions with staff, Captain Musser and Chief Worley what I’m proposing is that supervision at Tully Skate Park be by a Seasonal Recreation Facility Supervisor. That’s a title that we’ve kind of created to deal with not just facility supervision at Tully Skate Park but also potential facility supervision at other park facilities that are being developed right now. This person would provide on site supervision for the Skate Park. Potential expanded duties could be supervision for picnic shelters and playground areas and up to 19 and a half hours a week. It would be on a rotating schedule between afternoon and evening hours probably Wednesday through Sunday since we’re looking at a lot of hours to cover in the park with some type of on site supervision. During the week the Monday Tuesday hours on site supervision can be provided by maintenance staff in the park during those periods. The Wednesday through Sunday timeframe would allow some easing of the pressure that supervisor issues that take place during the day that the maintenance worker that’s in the park has to address as well as covers weekend activity at the park. The department staff would be empowered to enforce park rules and would be trained to know when to call the police for involvement in a situation that can’t be resolved by requests to respond to a park rule like removing a bicycle from the Skate Park. If that didn’t occur, then a situation like that would become trespassing and police would be called. The hourly wages that would be proposed for this would be about a nine dollar an hour position. It would cost about 175 dollars a week or about 700 dollars a month and proposing it as a four month seasonal position. The reason I’m doing it this is we have seasonal positions within the Park’s Department this kind of fits in the structure that we currently have. It keeps it under the hours that would be required to pay benefits for an employee. It would be a way to look at whether this works and whether it would be practical then to add it in future budget years for facility supervision. That’s the proposal that I’m bringing back to you for discussion. De Weerd: Mr. Bird. Bird: Yes Madam President – and I feel something’s got to be done immediately out there. Since school’s out, we’ve got to have some kind of supervision out there and get it under to control to start with. The Park’s and Rec Commission I felt the same way. As a whole, I took it and I’m sure Doug compares that. I’m for doing anything that they think is the best way to get in. Let’s get the thing out there and get it stopped right now. Get it nipped in the bud then maybe we won’t Meridian City Pre-Council Meeting May 20, 2003 Page 13 of 19 have to worry about it after that. If we nip it now that definitely will help us, all we can find the money can’t we (inaudible)? De Weerd: Yes, we had already mentioned that we would fund it out of our budget for the summer. What he is proposing is this be tested and might be a budget request for this next year. Bird: That’s right that’s what we agreed upon yes in the Park’s and Rec Commission. Nary: Madam President. De Weerd: Mr. Nary. Nary: Doug was there some discussion in creating some Park Ordinances for ejection as – I’m uncomfortable using the state code trespass as our only real means of ejectment from the park because I think there’s some legal issues surrounding that to do that very effectively. Has their been some discussion about instituting some Park Ordinances for that? Strong: Councilman Nary that’s the next step that we will be addressing is the creation of a general Park Ordinance with a specific Skate Park Ordinance of part of that. I used the trespass example because that’s what currently exists in City Code as a way to – the first step as an employee in the park would be to ask someone say on a BMX bicycle to leave the Skate Park. If they fail to do so then it becomes an issue of trespass and then the Police Department has something to enforce that exists in City Code. It’s a sequential way to control a situation without having Law Enforcement present at all hours to make it a (inaudible) situation. As we look at the development of a general Park Ordinance we look at how to make that work so that we can enforce park rules, general park rules in the park then when it becomes a police activity. Nary: And I understand that. What I’m saying is in the City Code and the State Code has the same problem is there’s no continuing ejectment. That’s why I’m saying – because in the City Code once they leave then they can return. That’s why I’m saying it’s not very effective means for what you’re trying to resolve here. You’ve got a problem person in the Skate Park you want to eject them out of the Skate Park you don’t have an ordinance that ejects them for more than a moment and that’s the problem. They leave for five minutes they come back and you have to eject them again so it becomes a problem enforcement wise to deal with. That’s why I’m saying they need to probably move a little faster in creating a Park Ordinance that allows for ejectment for a longer period of time because that’s really where your problems going to be is just dealing with that enforcement side of it with police. Meridian City Pre-Council Meeting May 20, 2003 Page 14 of 19 De Weerd: That was my concern and that’s why I talked to the Mayor and Mr. Bird about trying to find someone that while they’re creating this ordinance that we have some presence there to deal with the issues that seem to be cropping up at the Skate Park. If there – where are we at in the process of this ordinance that has been construction? I think it’s been at least a couple months that I’ve been hearing it. Is there any way we can expedite that somewhat? Strong: Captain Musser and I are meeting on I believe on Friday of this week or that’s our target date with the attorney that I mentioned in our last meeting that helps write City Code so that we can move to the next step to actually get it in some kind of language. We’re looking for that kind of guidance so that what we put in place is practical, enforceable and can become a good working document which will likely need changes as we add park space and encounter other situations like at Adventure Land Playground will probably have it’s own unique challenges. We’ll have softball, baseball areas we’ll have an ice skating rink we’ll have a lot of different facilities that will probably require additions to an overall Park Ordinance for some kind of enforcement. Bird: Madam President. De Weerd: Mr. Bird. Bird: If I could add something in there. The thing that I think Doug is come on and using the police help guide us through this is we want to make sure we’ve got something in place that’s enforceable for the police to enforce. Not something that you know you could like I think Mr. Nary said sometimes it’s hard to enforce some of these rules that we have now in our parks but that’s a deal – they are working on it. I would say that we probably another month and we should get this in but I think we need to get the presence of that person up there to do that to start with and get that taken care of. Then the Park Ordinance we’ll get in there but we want to make sure when we get this Park Ordinance in that we have something there with some bite in it for the arresting officers or whoever’s going to be doing it. De Weerd: I guess Doug it sounds like you certainly have the full support in going ahead and pursuing that part time position. I would like to see if in your conversations with the City Attorney that’s working on this ordinance and Captain Musser if you can consider looking at this ordinance in two phases. One is dealing with some of the timely issues now and then looking at those issues that can take a little bit more time to develop, you bring that back as a second part to the ordinance. If maybe during your conversations with the City Attorney and Captain Musser, you can look at it with those goals in mind. I know we like to have the Park’s Commission look at this first if they might even consider a Special Meeting to deal just with this ordinance we just need to get something in place so that we can have some enforcement out there. Meridian City Pre-Council Meeting May 20, 2003 Page 15 of 19 Strong: Madam President I agree with that and I think that we can do that. We started looking at a Skate Park Ordinance and in discussions with Captain Musser that it didn’t seem practical to do just a Skate Park Ordinance and then move onto a general Park Ordinance it seemed like that was backwards. We wanted to have a base of general Park Ordinance that established things like hours that the park is opened, general behaviors that are acceptable within any park in the city and then address specifically issues that are relevant to the Skate Park. We have those pretty well in place right now with the list of Skate Park rules that I presented to you when we last discussed this topic. We want to move ahead and get those rules passed by resolution so that they’re in place and can be enforced by staff then adopt them into a general Park Ordinance. De Weerd: Okay well in light of our time – McCandless: Madam President I have one – De Weerd: Mrs. McCandless. McCandless: Doug do you have any plans on posting rules for the Skate Park there at the park itself? Strong: Yes. McCandless: Okay. Strong: Yes we have to do that I think to make them work. Nary: Madam President. De Weerd: Mr. Nary. Nary: And Doug I would agree with what you’re saying in theory. I guess I don’t want to – sometimes getting a cookbook out takes awhile but right now, we really need this recipe for that Skate Park to get that done. I hate to hold up everything so that we have the whole bowl of wax first when we do need to address a particular problem especially if we’re going to hire somebody specifically to enforce regulations that we haven’t put into place first. I agree with what your philosophy is of wanting to make sure we do all of it instead of just a piece of it but I don’t want to hire a person when they don’t have really a lot of tools to enforce. That trespasses is maybe an interim fix but it’s not a great fix so I don’t think you want to wait too long to get the rest of what’s necessary for it. Strong: I don’t want to mislead you to think that we’ll have all of it done. What we want is general park rules. When I say general that’s general like hours of the park that’s opened and things like that. The Skate Park rules would be incorporated into that. The early discussion was to have a separate ordinance Meridian City Pre-Council Meeting May 20, 2003 Page 16 of 19 for the Skate Park. We didn’t want to begin starting to create separate ordinances for everything that took place within a park. We wanted to incorporate them within a general park ordinance so that as we added facilities like Adventure Land Playground and that they can be adopted into the general Park Ordinance as a portion of that ordinance. De Weerd: I guess our message is if you can give this Doug a high priority and certainly communicated the urgency of getting something that can be used now and then be able to separate out the more technical things that are not of the timely nature. Maybe Councilman Bird can work with your group as well just to see if we can give your part-timer even some tools to be a more effective presence in the park. I think that’s what Council Member Nary’s point is, is once we get a person out there certainly they need to have rules that they can enforce with a presence. Thank you very much. I guess unless we need a motion just go ahead and hire the person you need and let’s get them out there. Strong: Thanks. De Weerd: Thank you. Item Number 6 and Council we may want to look at moving our Executive Session to the end of our Regular Agenda in light of the time. Nary: Madam President. De Weerd: Mr. Nary. Nary: I just thought of one more thing. I guess so it is clear on the record for Doug’s purposes that we have committed from the Council that the Council’s budget will assist funding this particular position. At least through the summer or the remainder of the fiscal year for this pilot position to see whether or not it’s necessary and whether or not the hours work and all the other things work. That would (inaudible) clear later on. De Weerd: And in – ***End Of Side One*** De Weerd: -- next week just on our Consent Agenda or during the Finance Report if we can have a total number of what that Variance will be so we know what’s coming out of our budget. Strong: A quick calculation shows that if it’s a full four months which it’s likely not going to be at this point since anybody that we hire would probably either be going to school or back to teaching or something like that. If we paid the full four months it would be just eight dollars over 2800 dollars. That’s no benefits or anything else that’s just the raw or gross figure. Meridian City Pre-Council Meeting May 20, 2003 Page 17 of 19 De Weerd: Okay thank you Doug. Item 7. Executive Session per Idaho Code §67-2345(1)(b) and (c): De Weerd: Council before we move to six do we want to consider our Executive Session at the end of our Regular Agenda? Bird: Madam President I would vote to do that. Nary: I think that’s fine. De Weerd: Okay. Item 6. Discussion of Solid Waste Franchise Issues: De Weerd: Item Number 6 discussion of the Solid Waste Franchise Issues. Mr. Nichols. Nichols: Madam President, Members of the Council I distributed to you I think it was two weeks ago a copy of a recent Supreme Court case that deals with franchises on solid waste disposal. That case calls into question the exclusivity of a franchise. Our current ordinance doesn’t say specifically that franchises are exclusive. The issue comes up how do you deal with someone if they come and they apply for a franchise for solid waste disposal. The court opinion does give or affirm the cities authority to maintain standards and regulate the disposal of solid waste. What I would recommend that the Council do is to consider imposing a moratorium for 68 to 90 days as far as issuing any new franchises. During that period of time that staff develop a proposed ordinance changes that would set out the standards that any franchisee would have to meet in order to obtain a franchise. That way we can ensure that everything is done the way it should be and that the city has some control over how solid waste is picked up and disposed of out of the city. That it’s done in the right manner at the right times and you don’t have 15 different trash haulers picking different days of the week to haul up and down the same street and those sorts of things. De Weerd: Thank you. I think also we would require in this franchise contract or agreement certain things that are not spelled out in our ordinance. It would be beneficial if we did spend some time with that and examine what all we need to do. Any comments? Nary: Madam President. De Weerd: Mr. Nary. Meridian City Pre-Council Meeting May 20, 2003 Page 18 of 19 Nary: Mr. Nichols do you feel that I guess by resolution of the Council or something we could simply impose a moratorium as you suggest or do we need to have a Public Hearing? Right now, we’re not having anybody come in and asking to – in light of that decision coming and asking to do this. Do you think we simply can just impose that? Nichols: Councilman Nary that’s a great question and I’m not sure of the answer to it other than I think that there’s some plenary authority on the part of the Council to say in order to regulate things if we decide we’re going to – we can basically freeze the status quo while we can develop ordinances or regulations. Certainly there’s a parallel under the Land Use Planning Act but I didn’t look at that one to see if it requires a Public Hearing before you impose a moratorium. I think in that one it’s also limited to a certain period of time and it seems to me the 90 days was the max or maybe 180 in that case. I was trying to figure a time period where we could get it done but it was still short enough that it wouldn’t create any problems. Nary: Yes. I think I mean there are two different kinds in the Land Use Planning Act. One is an emergency, one is based on a plan, and it just uses the term plan it doesn’t tell you I assume it’s a Comprehensive Plan it doesn’t say specifically. Both require a hearing I mean you can declare it by resolution you then have to set a hearing within a certain time period to allow comment before you actually impose it from that day forward for whatever the number of days that are allowed. This is kind of unique because we don’t really have – it doesn’t specifically prohibit general moratoriums it doesn’t specifically grant such a thing. I guess that’s fine. We probably might want to do it by resolution at least and maybe do it by resolution that will allow it with some public to participate if they want to. Someone could be here and ask to speak on it then at least we would have some way to appoint to a (inaudible) if someone were to try to impose some sort of referable believe that that was a reasonable – you have someway to show it at least we try to consider that. That might be a better way to deal with it. De Weerd: Would two weeks for a resolution to be placed on the agenda be a timeframe that is reasonable. Nary: That seems reasonable. De Weerd: Mr. Attorney if we could have a resolution to that matter in two weeks. Sharon if you can make note of that for the agenda. Okay well we will go ahead and move Item Number 7 to the end of our Regular Agenda. I would entertain a motion to adjourn the Pre-Council Meeting. McCandless: So moved. Nary: Second. Meridian City Pre-Council Meeting May 20, 2003 Page 19 of 19 De Weerd: All those in favor say aye. Pre-Council Meeting is adjourned it is 6:55. MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES MEETING ADJOURNED AT 6:55 P.M. (TAPE ON FILE OF THESE PROCEEDINGS) APPROVED: / / ROBERT D. CORRIE, MAYOR DATE ATTESTED: WILLIAM G. BERG, JR., CITY CLERK