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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2025-08-19 Work Session Meridian City Council Work Session August 19, 2025. A Meeting of the Meridian City Council was called to order at 4:30 p.m., Tuesday, August 19, 2025, by Mayor Robert Simison. Members Present: Robert Simison, Luke Cavener, Liz Strader, John Overton, Doug Taylor, Anne Little Roberts and Brian Whitlock. Other Present: Chris Johnson, Bill Nary, Laurelei McVey and Steve Taulbee. ROLL-CALL ATTENDANCE X Liz Strader X Brian Whitlock _X_Anne Little Roberts _X_ John Overton _X_ Doug Taylor _X—Luke Cavener X Mayor Robert E. Simison Simison: Council, we will call this meeting order. For the record it is August 19th, 2025, at 4:30 p.m. We will begin this afternoon's work session with roll call attendance. ADOPTION OF AGENDA Simison: Next item up is adoption of the agenda. Cavener: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Cavener. Cavener: Pretty simple agenda tonight, but I'm going to ask that we add an additional Executive Session, 74-206(1)(d) to our already noticed Executive Session agenda. With that, Mr. Mayor, I move that we approve the agenda as presented -- as amended. Excuse me. Strader: Second. Simison: Have a motion and a second to adopt the agenda as amended. Is there any discussion? If not all in favor signify by saying aye. Opposed nay? The ayes have it and the agenda is agreed to as amended. MOTION CARRIED: ALLAYES. CONSENT AGENDA [Action Item] 1. Prescott Ridge Subdivision No. 3 Sanitary Sewer and Water Main Easement No. 2 (ESMT-2025-0095) Meridian City Council Work Session August 19,2025 Page 2 of 18 2. Vision 20/20 Water Main Easement No.1 (ESMT-2025-0097) 3. Adler Building 514 Benchmark Water Main Easement (ESMT-2025- 0098) 4. Final Order for Southridge South (MFP-2025-0002), by The Land Group, Inc., generally located on the south side of W. Overland Rd., approximately 1/4 miles east of S. Ten Mile Rd. 5. License Agreement between Nampa and Meridian Irrigation District and City of Meridian for a Pedestrian Bridge across the Fivemile Creek in conjunction with the Ustick Rd. Widening Project 6. Memorandum of Agreement for Contribution for Downtown Trash Receptacles Between Meridian Development Corporation (MDC) and the City of Meridian Simison: Next up is the Consent Agenda. Cavener: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Cavener. Cavener: Move that we approve the Consent Agenda, for the Mayor to sign and the Clerk to attest. Strader: Second. Simison: Have a motion and a second to approve the Consent Agenda. Is there any discussion? If not, all in favor signify by saying aye. Opposed nay? The ayes have it and the Consent Agenda is agreed to. MOTION CARRIED: ALLAYES. ITEMS MOVED FROM THE CONSENT AGENDA [Action Item] Simison: There were no items moved from the Consent Agenda. DEPARTMENT / COMMISSION REPORTS [Action Item] 7. City Hall Space Planning Study Results and Recommendations Simison: So, we will move on to Item 7, which is Department/Commission Reports for City Hall space planning study results and recommendations. Turn this over to Laurelie. Meridian City Council Work Session August 19,2025 Page 3 of 18 McVey: All right. Good afternoon, Council. So, we have the long-awaited space planning study results to talk about tonight. This would be really hard without pictures, so -- all right. So, I did want to let you guys know we do have LCA, the professional architectural firm that we engaged to do the space planning study, in the audience with us. If the questions get too technical they are here to help, but did just want to acknowledge that they are here. So, a little bit of background. So, you will recall in the FY-25 budget process we had several Tls as budget requests. We were asked to kind of slow down, do a study, make sure these were the priorities of the city -- of City Hall before we went forward and spent money on those tenant improvements and I think that was a good thing. It really allowed us to look at the building holistically, make sure that we were addressing things now and also had a vision for the future. So, with that we were given a hundred thousand to spend on the space planning study. You will be happy to hear we spent much less than that, which I think is great, and we have been working on that over this -- this last year. You guys did allocate a little over 300,000 to work on projects that were identified and so that's kind of the stage that we are at now is present this study to you, answer any questions, make sure that we have alignment moving forward and if there is some alignment at least on one, two -- all of the projects we can get started on -- on one of them potentially. So, one of the things that we did -- we really laid out some key objectives for the study. We wanted to make sure that our space planning standards were consistent with what we are seeing in other organizations and apply those standards to any Tls now and, then, into the future. Wanted to make sure that we did address any immediate space constraints and develop conceptual layouts for those. Some of those you have already seen, some were new and, then, identify any mid-term or long-term space plan layouts and, essentially, get a full build out of this facility. So, whether or not we ever get there is a big question, but at least we know what every area of this building now could look like in a full build out. So, some of the things that we did is the study determined that a phased approach is definitely going to be necessary. So, displacing one department at a time is really all we can probably logistically consider with both size, where to put those people, project management needs. I wanted to emphasize the cost estimates that you see in here are truly that, cost estimates. Until we take a project out to bid we don't know what it is. But these are our best guesses. I know there has been a lot of discussion on is it really going to cost that much. They seem really high. But those are our best estimates from professionals in the field that -- but we truly won't know until we take these out to bid. And a lot of them haven't been designed yet. So, you pull that estimate even higher in its level of uncertainty. The near term project layouts were designed to be able to accommodate those future expansions. I think that's one of the good things about pausing and sort of doing this future vision is that none of the near term remodels, if they go through, would have to be torn down and redone in ten or 20 years. So, they were all developed so that future expansions could occur. One of the things that, you know, I told the director's team this when I showed them the plans and that I would tell you or a member of the public is I don't want to get too hung up on the future layouts, because they are just that, they are just concepts. There is a million different configurations as far as office space, cubicle layouts, but really we wanted to -- on each of those areas get a kind of -- here is what could happen in this area. None of those future layouts are in the CFP in the plan and so we have a lot of time on those to adjust, Meridian City Council Work Session August 19,2025 Page 4 of 18 to reconfigure, and so if there is -- you know, I would caution us to get too far into the weeds of, you know, hey, I don't think this office is good here or, hey, I think we could put other cubicles here. We absolutely can do that. I think when the time comes in the future, because we could spend an infinite amount of time tweaking this for projects that may never even happen in this building and so the good news is that over half of the building is in good shape today as far as space constraints. So, all of the departments on the right-hand side of the screen currently are fine and their spaces are making their spaces work. The spaces on the left side of the screen are areas with some space constraints that exist today. So, we will talk through each of these areas and the plan is to cover each of these in a consistent way. So, this to kind of just orient ourselves. We have talked about the fire area before, but what I'm going to show you is the plan for the near term, kind of what drove that need, what the remodel would build and, then, whether or not we have designed it. Some of these you will see we haven't designed them yet. One of the things that I would also like to mention is -- so, we have -- we have currently gone through full design of the Fire remodel and the IT remodel. That doesn't mean we can't change those. It just would incur additional cost if we want to go back to the drawing board on either of those two. So, I thought the fire was a good one to start with. Their -- it was one of the highest needs identified in the building. So, they currently have supervisors in cubicles. There is concerns with the ability to have private conversations to keep information confidential, to have meetings with subordinates and so the plan that's currently designed would build six offices and another constraint that they had was having a dedicated logistics organization area. They receive a lot of equipment and tools and things into their department and while this one storage room doesn't necessarily solve that it at least gives them one space to start -- start organizing. So, this remodel is estimated to take about eight months and the budget estimate is 360,000. What we will do for each of those is as we look at the near term remodel, then, I'm also going to show you the future build out concept. So, again, these future build out concepts are not in the current plan. They are just something down the road. What could we do? Their future build out shrinks cubicles. So, that's one way that we can add more people in is -- is reduce the size of our cubicles and builds an additional three offices and, then, adds another cubicle space over to where they currently just have office files and storage. So, that is a future fire build out concept. The next area that was identified as a high area of concern was the IT area. So, again, the biggest driver in this area is, again, supervisors needing offices to conduct private business, discussing confidential issues, having discussions with subordinates. IT is also really limited in space for adding additional cubicles. They are pretty packed in there and so the concept builds three offices and, then, it also takes their existing conference room and -- or their training room and converts that into cubicles. We would add one today and have space for additional growth. The IT department has indicated that their training room is used less and less frequently as trainings are now mostly held virtually and online where people are actually on -- in front of their computer is more useful for them. So, that remodel is estimated to cost 160,000 and take about seven months. The IT area is one that I'm not going to talk about future -- future layouts until a little later in the presentation, because their future expansion contemplates going into the art gallery space and so we can talk a little bit about what that looks like. The Mayor's area was the next area that was identified as needing some space changes and theirs is Meridian City Council Work Session August 19,2025 Page 5 of 18 actually the opposite issue of what a lot of the other departments were facing. So, they have two really large offices and they would prefer to convert those into cubicles. So, currently the Mayor's office is -- three of their staff members are displaced and are working on the first floor in community development and they would really like to have everybody in the same area for work continuity, organizational efficiency and so what this would do is it would take out offices and add cubicles and, then, it would add a office with a -- with access to the Mayor's office. That would presumably be for the chief of staff position to allow that work to go back and forth there. So, this remodel has not been designed. So, there is some flexibility there. But it is estimated with design and construction to be a little over 175,000 and take ten months. The Mayor's office future expansion does a couple of things. So, it reduces the size of the Mayor's office and adds two additional cubicles and, then, it splits their -- one of their conference rooms and creates a shared work room. One of the concepts we tried to include throughout the building is as you develop more cubicle spaces to at least preserve some of these smaller work rooms where staff can have Zoom meetings or take phone calls in those areas and, then, it has the other side of that room becoming our respite or our mother's room and actually pulls that out of HR to make it more accessible for people, so they don't have to go all the way through the HR office. The other thing it does is that office -- the lobby space in the Mayor's office is pretty large and it splits that and contemplates a future shared lobby with another department. So, the other immediate need identified by the study was in the community development, the building services section specifically. So, this is the group of community development that's on the second floor across from Public Works and their area actually has no office space. It's all cubicles. So, they have supervisors working in cubicles. Similar constraints. And one of the things that this identified is that we actually have offices that back up to it. So, this area next to it is Public Works and we have non-supervisory staff in those offices. So, we said, hey, we could move those staff into cubicles and we could just flip the doors on that and for a relatively low cost of about 25,000 dollars we could give that team two offices in that space. Oh. I did -- the future build out for this area actually contemplates on the first floor when Community Development undergoes a large remodel, that all of their staff would, then, be housed in that one workspace, which would, then, free up this area for something in the future. There is no identified need necessarily at this exact juncture and so our next area with need is actually the Council's area and so looking at the Council area there was a desire expressed for more secure and private working spaces, as well as a desire for an area that was dedicated to meet with constituents. There is also an additional benefit of moving the Council out of the current space on the third floor in that it gives us a really important staging area to conduct all of these remodels. So, as we displace all of these staff during remodel we kind of need a place to put them. That isn't the only option, so there is -- there is things that we will talk about, but this is one option is to move Council into the Council meeting room or Council conference room. The interim option that the survey -- or the survey -- the study actually suggests is that we hold off on building those offices and just do cubicle set up in there while we are conducting the rest of the remodels in City Hall and, then, come back to you guys when we are finished with those remodels and really talk about where is the future vision of Council. Did that space work well? Is that -- do we need to look at another space in the building? Did it meet your needs? And so I think it does Meridian City Council Work Session August 19,2025 Page 6 of 18 give us a good interim option to potentially move in there with very little cost. Let's see. So, looking at future Council options -- so, there is a lot of -- there is a lot of options. So, we were -- and I know it's kind of hard to envision this today, but potentially in the future we could have full time council members. We could have staff members that are dedicated to council. So, we really looked at what does six council offices with a dedicated staff member look like. Not next year, probably not next ten years, but what would this future space look like for the Council? And so one of the first option -- we will kind of go from left to right -- is to expand that area off of the Council conference room. This would require us to move the building inspectors to another area of City Hall. We have some ideas for that. But would essentially accommodate -- Council could have that whole area. One of the benefits is it's nice first floor access, easy for constituents to get to, really nice proximity to this room and that option actually gives you the -- the biggest future square foot area. Another option is we could relocate Council back to the third floor where you guys currently are and we could rebuild -- we could do offices up there. Cubicles. Really open to ideas. But we could move Council back up there and do some construction to create a different environment than what's up there today or the area that we just talked about on the second floor Com Dev is once that group moves back downstairs to be with the rest of Community Development that would open up another office area that could definitely accommodate future City Council. So, some options to think about there. So, what does this look like as far as the near term options and how do we kind of stage those and get through those. With the budget that's already been allocated we -- we would need additional budget to get through all of these expansions. The nice part about these expansions is they are -- they are really independent of each other. So, we don't have to do all of them. We can do one of them. We can do two. We can do none. We can do all. It's really flexible. So, they are not -- it's not contingent on another one being completed. We did try to lay out how could this occur over the next two years as far as who moves where and when does funding happen and when does design happen, when does construction happen and one of the important things for you guys is if we talk about an interim Council move out of your current space is what does that mean interim. Probably about two years. So, something to think about when we think about where to move you guys. Or not move you guys, too. I will talk about another option that we can do. So, I wanted to go through the future high level concepts. Again wanted to focus on -- these are just concepts, but at least shows you kind of where we can go with full build out. So, we can essentially add -- I think it's 118 or a hundred and -- 110 additional employees to the city and fit them in this building. I'm not saying that's ever going to happen. That's a lot of additional staff, but we did want to get that -- what is the future count that could be housed in this building. So, as file storage starts to really become digital, one of the things we could do is we could add a department down in the basement. Not that anybody necessarily wants to work in the basement full time, but this could be a great location for maybe a team that does most of their work in the field and only comes into the office for part of the day. So, there could be future room down there to add approximately 20 workstations. We could build out offices, conference rooms, multiple areas for expansion of the existing offices and desks that exist for the building facility staff over on the left and, then, that still leaves one half of this -- of the basement as storage, which is needed for several of the departments in City Hall to utilize that Meridian City Council Work Session August 19,2025 Page 7 of 18 storage pretty heavily. So, what does future build out look like on the first floor? So, we already talked about the Council area expansion. If you jump down to the Community Development area, the concept here is that when the historical center moves out of the building you could flip the lobby and that does a couple of good things. It allows contractors, developers, the people that are accessing this building a lot to bring in plans and get permits really easy front door access and, then, essentially the rest of their layout, like I said not getting into specifics, but essentially it shrinks cubicles, it splits large offices and allows them to add a significant number of additional staff into that space. We have plans where we could build out conference room A and B. We have heard that the overwhelming desire is to leave that space. So, there is no department that's currently banking on that space or planning to take up that space. But we wanted for -- for full build out count to kind of say, hey, here is -- we could develop that area into office space if needed and, then, the finance and clerks area, again, kind of -- you will hear the same theme of shrinking cubicles, splitting large offices and just reconfiguring some things for access and adding additional -- additional staff. One of the concepts I did want to -- which I touched on a little bit, but as adding that dedicated phone room, conference room, work room to each floor, so that each floor at least had one of those spaces, which we think is important as you shift to these high utilization cubicle areas to have that ability to jump into those -- a little private room. So, if we look at build out on the second floor -- so, similarly, in Public Works shrinking cubicles, splitting oversized offices -- it does add cubicles into our large conference room space. The parks area adds cubicles and, then, adds some additional offices. The parks group was one area that today has existing supervisors in cubicles, but they would like to wait until the Community Center is built and they do some of the staffing movement that is going to happen with that before they think about any City Hall remodels. So, I think that's a really smart thing. We have already discussed the fire future expansion and, then, one of the things to note is that we didn't anticipate growth into the area that's currently occupied by the Congressman's office, but that's an area that could be expanded into the future and, then, on the third floor what full build out could look like is -- although legal didn't identify that they would need more staff housed at City Hall, we still -- if the Council doesn't occupy that area in the future space you could do a shared lobby with Legal and the Mayor's office and some additional office space there. The HR office includes adding some additional cubicles and some additional office spaces and, then, the real future discussion kind of is around the art gallery. Again I want to highlight that none of this is planned. There is not a deadline or a -- like, hey, we are going to -- the art gallery is going away. This is a very future discussion and would kind of be contingent on the art gallery maybe finding a different location, but we did want to do some layouts of if that space were to be used for city offices what would that look like and, again, there is an infinite number of possibilities, but, essentially, it could expand either HR or IT's areas and it could include another large shared conference room. So, those were just a couple of ideas of office space and conference rooms that could occur in that area. So, the study essentially recommended proceeding with the near term TI's. They address some key area constraints in the building. Really focus on a phased approach with staging areas identified for critical project success. So, essentially, we would like to, in FY-25, figure out where we are going to relocate Council. The other option that's available -- if you guys don't want to move we could take the large Public Meridian City Council Work Session August 19,2025 Page 8 of 18 Works conference room and use that as a space. There is -- there is pros and cons; right? That room is utilized a lot. This room downstairs does get used, too, so, you know, gives and takes there. But we are prepared to if -- if you guys want to stay in your current location that's completely understandable and we will -- we can accommodate that and we would like to move forward with bidding the Fire project and, then, move forward with bidding and constructing the IT project and getting the design complete on the Mayor's near term and the Com Dev Public Works office flip on the second floor. One of the most important things, though, is that any future tenant improvement that's brought to you guys, whether it's us in the future or not, should really take a look back at this planning study and make sure that their ideas are jiving with what we put into here and that the space standards match, that the future -- that any interim remodel doesn't impact future growth. So, really, kind of tonight some -- open to discussion if you guys want to talk about some of the details of the study, but we are looking for decision points on do you want us to proceed with bidding the fire remodel? You would have a chance; right? So, saying, yes, proceed with bidding does not lock us into anything; right? Because we would have to bring the contract forward once we have prices, but we would like to do that. We would like to understand your guys' desire for the staging area and are you open to relocating to the first floor in a temporary way. Do you guys want to decide on the ultimate Council layout or would you like to wait and have us do some of the other projects first and see when that kind of shakes out? Are you good with us bidding the IT remodel and are you good with us moving forward with the Com Dev office flip and the Mayor's office -- design of the Mayor's office remodel. So, again, all of these would have to come back in front of you once we have actual budget numbers. But with that I will stand for questions, comments, ideas. Simison: Thank you, Laurelei. Council, questions, comments? Strader: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Council Woman Strader. Strader: Just a general comment. I'm really pleased that everybody got the space study done and I feel like this gives us a great long-term road map and really good sense of kind of what our future space needs should look like and kind of how to stage them. So, I think that's all great. It's a lot to chew on. Like the Council remodel, I don't know how -- like how we even want to start tackling that. There is a lot to consider there. Maybe helpful to bring up the visuals, honestly, of each of these bullet points as we are discussing it, just so we have something to look at. I think it -- it kind of helps. McVey: Did you want to look at anyone first? Strader: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Council Woman Strader. Strader: Maybe Fire service, since that was your first bullet point. Mr. Mayor? Meridian City Council Work Session August 19,2025 Page 9 of 18 Simison: Council Woman Strader. Strader: Okay. So, this is -- just talking through this. So, this is kind of what we have today and, then, the next slide was where you want to go with it; right? McVey: Actually, no. This is the -- this is the remodel plan. Strader: Oh. Sorry. McVey: So, today where all of those offices are are shared cubicles. Strader: That's right. Okay. And then -- Mr. Mayor? Simison: Council Woman Strader. Strader: Just talking out loud. So, in terms of what we had budgeted for the work so far and, then, all of the projects that you want to do in 2025, 1 guess I would be curious would a budget amendment be needed and how much would it be? And do you have any sense of that yet? McVey: Yeah. So, great question. So, we -- we have 300 and -- well, about 300,000. Six thousand was for the HR card block. So, I'm going to say we have about 300,000 for a remodel. So, the estimate on the Fire is that it would be 360,000. We -- we just don't know until we bid that. So, we would likely need to do a budget amendment to complete the Fire remodel of about 60,000 if it -- if it comes in. Taylor: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Taylor. Taylor: Kind of following along Council Woman Strader's discussion on the Fire. So, when I looked at the future for fire you still didn't project to need any additional square footage, it would just be continuing to reconfigure that to meet their needs. From your discussions with them it didn't seem like there would need to be any additional footprint in -- in anytime in the next, you know, foreseeable future; right? So, any -- any work done in the Fire Department still we are just looking even long term staying within that footprint. Strader: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Council Woman Strader. Strader: One -- one question that I will have -- and I -- I -- I need to follow up with Chief Blume about it -- is just the storage needs for logistics and inventory. Like this is a really small storage closet and I -- and I guess what I was kind of curious about was long term is that eventually expected to be -- you know, I know they have some areas in the Meridian City Council Work Session August 19,2025 Page 10 of 18 basement. Are they expected to sort of stage that out to cover that on like a more centralized basis? Because one thing I have heard is that having inventory and logistics taking place across multiple sites is really challenging for them. Can you speak to that piece specifically? McVey: So, I -- so, I can speak to some and Steve would -- Steve would probably be a better -- I know that they have a vision for a bigger logistics facility. I don't -- you know, I know that there is significant cost associated with that. So, I think this small storage room is not -- does not meet their future needs, but it does get them something today to, you know, be able to lock up some of the valuable items and have a little bit of control over that. But I think it -- it certainly doesn't meet their long-term needs from what I understand. Simison: Yeah. I think it's -- it's pretty clear, since they at one time were proposing a building for this, that a closet is not the thing. So, it's going to be somewhere in between. I think this is -- this is more just a very limited place for immediate storage, not a logistics operations center. Strader: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Council Woman Strader. Strader: I -- I was honestly curious if some kind of a logistics center could go in the basement, but that might be kind of an ignorant question. I think it depends on like what -- what type of materials we are talking about. Like if it's large pieces of equipment, obviously, that's completely different than like, you know, turn out gear and uniforms and things like that. Taulbee: Mr. Mayor, Council Woman Strader, just speaking from -- from my position, currently in the basement what we have is uniforms and some gear that's issued to entry level employees that come on board, in addition to some files. Specifically to logistics, you know, SCBA's, radios, things that are shipped out to stations, that's currently just transitioned through some cubicle space. So, with -- with what we have currently in the basement it's extremely limited and just not -- not ideal for the day-to- day operations out of City Hall. Strader: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Council Woman Strader. Strader: And so would it be fair to say like really your objective here is solving your office space issues and you are kind of punting on your logistics for now? Because I -- I don't think -- at least I'm not seeing a solution that -- that is arriving for that, unless the basement is reconfigured, which I actually think is an open question, because have -- now we have toured it, we were down there, there are tons of files and it -- it seems like Meridian City Council Work Session August 19,2025 Page 11 of 18 that's really archaic and hopefully becomes unnecessary soon and we would have a lot more space down there. Simison: And I will just answer the question. Yeah, this is only for office space needs. This is not meant to be -- I don't want anyone to be confused in the future. This is not to solve any logistical issues that may come before Council in the future. Strader: Yeah. Taylor: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Taylor. Taylor: Can you -- Laurelei, we have talked about this a little bit before, but could you talk a little bit more about sort of the reasoning or rationale or discussion with -- with those that were helping you with the study with sort of -- you know, there is really no discussion about what to do with the congressman's office, if that's something that the city would like to have -- have access to. I mean as you -- you know, the -- the current lease agreement there, they can't lease beyond two years and so, you know, we are always kind of renewing it. You never know who is there, but can you speak to why that maybe wasn't addressed too much in sort of this plan? McVey: Yeah. So, Councilman Taylor, good question. So, we didn't -- I guess with the current space planning projects we didn't see the need to utilize that space yet. I think that it would be wise for the city when that lease comes up, so I believe it expires in January of 2027 -- would be to evaluate, you know, is there a need for that space for something -- something else. Simison: And if you don't mind I would like to -- you know, I can express my viewpoint on this is we -- that's a revenue producing part of our building and so long as it's -- they are willing to stay there and produce the revenue and we have got other spaces to grow into I felt like that that -- the revenue we receive in any time period can help do any other build out. I mean if they were in here for the next 20 years let's just talk about these 500,000 dollars in front of you and that's all we did and I think there is a legitimate case. We have been in this building now coming on 18 years and we are doing our first major renovation. Their lease would pay for all those renovations if they were to stay through that period. So, to me it's like if there is a desire to not spend the one time dollars in exchange for the ongoing two years at a time potential, that's where I look at that conversation to say I would much rather have them here paying to help us do this work, rather than just occupying their space and in lieu thereof something -- because we know we are going to do something somewhere else eventually. It may get us out in the Fire one, but it's not going to get you out of doing the others and, then, you have lost that revenue at that point in time. Taylor: Mr. Mayor? Meridian City Council Work Session August 19,2025 Page 12 of 18 Simison: Councilman Taylor. Taylor: Kind of on the viewpoint I think -- you know, the nice thing about that space is it's, you know, adjacent to the Fire Department. It's kind of in a -- right there on the second floor. It seems like it could be pretty flexible for -- for multiple uses. One thing to think about, though, is as an elected office we don't know what their future would be. I don't know -- and I understand your -- the point made about it does help pay for some of the revenue, but if we do want to make some money off of it the lease is pretty cheap. It's been the same -- I don't think it's been raised since it was first occupied. Not that we want to view it as a revenue generator, but I understand your point. It helps to offset some of those costs. But I think as long as we are open as a body to understanding that at some point it doesn't make sense or might not make sense to have them there, I think that's something we ought to keep in mind. Not that we want to kick them out immediately, because that's not what the goal is and I think there is a public service value to having them here for constituents to come. But I think we should think about kind of just sort of the big picture concept. I think at some point it -- you know, depending, again, who is in office or they may or may not want to even be there and so they may not renew the lease and, then, what do you do with the space? So, I think -- that's why I asked the question, you know, do we want to think about what we want to do and maybe that's where Council ends up, you know, many years down the road, maybe that's where you expand some of the Fire logistics. I don't -- I don't really know. But I think it's something that we need to think about. Simison: Thank you. And it was never viewed as a revenue generator. It was a service. That's why it was brought into this building to begin with. It just happens to be something that has been consistent since they came in, but to your point it could change in any -- any two year cycle it could change. Overton: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Overton. Overton: Laurelei, great presentation. I -- I -- for this -- over what we have had in the past I think you have done a really good job all the way around. But maybe just to be right on the point, I support moving forward with a bid for Fire. I think that's the first thing you are looking for. And I really don't have a say so in where City Council gets relocated as long as you tell us. McVey: I -- I will commit to you guys wherever you end up in the interim I will make it nice, usable, professional. I will commit to you on record. Strader: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Council Woman Strader. Meridian City Council Work Session August 19,2025 Page 13 of 18 Strader: So, on the Council piece what direction do you need from us tonight? Do you need us to actually choose one of those future areas? McVey: So, I -- I don't and I would actually recommend that you guys not. So, my recommendation would be to have us do a temporary set up in there and when I say temporary I mean for the next two years while we are doing the remodels. The vision would be to set up some cubicles in there. We would restrict access so that it would be Council only with access to that room. The -- the office area in there and I think that would do a couple of things. One, it would let us see how that space functions for you guys. Does it -- does it cause issues with people not being able to reserve that room? Does it give you guys the space that feels comfortable to bring constituents in? Does it give you enough private office space? I think it's an improvement over where you guys are at today, because it would be restricted access. You know, today you have staff members throughout the area and it's used as the interim workout room and, you know, it just -- I think this would be a more professional environment for you. So, really, the only direction that I need for you guys is if you are okay with the interim move to this area with the commitment that when we finish the other TI's we should have another discussion about what does long term look like? Does it remain there? Does it move to one of the other areas in the building and so that's -- that's where we would -- we would like direction on the Council area. Cavener: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Cavener. Cavener: Laurelei, I -- I echo my colleagues compliments of -- of the effort put into this. While I know this started a little over a year ago as part of a budget and I know that many of our employees have been kind of itching to kind of understand what their plans are, I do think this kind of measuring twice cut once approach makes the most sense. -- I also want to commend you for evaluating space out of our basement. I recognize as someone who has worked out of a windowless conference room there is some benefits of vitamin D and I know that we will evaluate when and if those decisions make sense at the appropriate time. To your specific I think kind of questions tonight in terms of decision points, I am supportive of moving forward with the Fire TI's and I am begrudgingly supportive of the move for us and -- and, honestly, I think the reasons is that I think Council probably feels the same, we should be the bottom of the barrel when it comes to, you know, office space needs. We are not here to the same level as our full-time employees. We recognize that we have to sometimes kind of be the first step to be able to get this going, so -- so, I think that this makes sense in terms of it is the least disruptive to Council needs and allows for us to get moving quickly with -- with Fire. I think that allows us to kind of continue to move forth with everyone else. So, I'm -- I'm in support of this recommendation. To Council Member Taylor's conversation, think that we should be evaluating that currently congressional use space, you know, more than just when it's coming up as part of the space study, we should be really evaluating that on a probably every two year basis and if it continues to meet the needs for our communities' needs, well, I -- I believe that there is potential for that to serve our Meridian City Council Work Session August 19,2025 Page 14 of 18 community. I recognize it's not as accessible to our residents to the same level that all of City Hall is and that can sometimes get a little bit of a disconnect with our -- with our residents. So, I'm -- I'm supportive of keeping it how it is now, but I think that when we come to -- before 2027 a larger conversation about how that space could be utilized in the future. Strader: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Council Woman Strader. Strader: This is sort of a random question, but it's kind of hard to get a sense of scale looking at the image. Would the idea be with the City Council offices for it to be kind of like a hotel desk concept where there is just sort of a desk and you just plug into a docking station or would it be like we are going to choose a buddy and we are going to share? I mean what's the plan? Because there are three offices. So, I'm just kind of wondering like how much space is each of these offices and like just from a practical perspective what did you all think would work best? McVey: Great question. So, the offices -- or -- well, the interim cubicles would meet our space planning standards. So, they would be larger than eight by ten and we would -- the thought was to configure those sort of as each one as a double setup. So, potentially, you guys could each have your own dedicated space in one of those and I would leave it up to you guys to pick which ones, but we could definitely -- so, that the area that we -- the little locked room that's back there we would convert that with a couple of desks and, then, there would be the two open cubicles. Taylor: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Taylor. Taylor: I probably had the benefit of thinking about this a little bit more than other Council Members, because I have met with Laurelei, we have talked about it. Also having been someone who served in -- worked in the congressman's office for that space for about six years, it is a good service for constituents I mean with security features, though, it's less available now. There is -- got a lot of complaints about constituents who have to go through a locked door and cameras and -- but it is nice. You know, you would have anywhere from four to six or seven, you know, people come in for some constituent services and different things. So, it is a nice service to have, but I -- I think -- I agree with Councilman Cavener's point, I think it's being open to, you know, every -- every time we are having a discussion about whether to extend at lease for two years, it gives us a natural opportunity to think about kind of where we are. I like that it's in a spot where we can -- it can be flexible for whatever needs we have. With respect to the -- the Council area, I will just kind of make this pitch to Council kind of long term, which I envision being -- coming to fruition after I'm gone from Council, but, you know, I -- I do think that as -- you know, I'm -- I'm meeting at coffee shops with constituents. I'm -- I'm finding random places. Grab the conference room there. I think Meridian City Council Work Session August 19,2025 Page 15 of 18 as the city continues to grow and as Council continues to -- I think become more professional in how we serve, I think having a space where we can meet with constituents and have meetings is very helpful. I have had a number of meetings at coffee shops and, you know, it was fine, but I think -- there is no privacy and I think there is a lot of value in -- in thinking about having a space for that privacy. I don't think the current space we have does that right now. I have had several meetings there. It's kind of strange. It's awkward. Got a printer going off here and, you know, I got Bill coming the other end saying, oh, sorry, I didn't know you had a meeting, but I -- I -- I do think that that space on an interim basis could probably work. I think we -- to Councilman Cavener's point I think we take one for the team and say, hey, we need to move, so that we can make everything else kind of fall into place. I think we trust you to -- you know, to make it work, you know, taking it off limits from like the Meridian Development Corporation has their board meetings once a month, like making that a City Council space I think is important so that there is not people coming in and out. So, I -- I -- I agree with -- we know that the Fire TI, what those need, it's designed, I'm perfectly comfortable with moving forward with that now and kind of preparing to move Council down here. Yeah, I know we can kind of talk a little bit more specifics about maybe what it will look like over there, but that seems to make sense. I think those things need to start now, so that everything else can fall into place that -- that you have outlined with that. So, those are just some of my thoughts on that. I do -- it is nice to have a receptionist to kind of help with Council. So, I kind of like that Josh is there sometimes when we do sort of that interface, we might -- we are going to lose that being down here. So, you know, we just -- we need to be cognizant of that. But I think that makes some sense for us to start moving ahead with that at this point, so -- Little Roberts: Mr. Mayor? Oh, sorry. Simison: Council Woman Little Roberts. Little Roberts: Mr. Mayor. Laurelei, great presentation. Thank you so much. Love all the verbiage and how thoughtful it was regarding focusing on tasks and the space that was needed and I think that that's really great to make the most of our space and I concur with my colleagues that I think down here temporarily, see how we like it and see if that's -- ends up being our final build out or what we do, but we have got a chance to see how it works and, then, that way you can utilize the space we are currently in to flex and get forward -- move forward with specifically Fire it sounds like tonight and IT, do you need that one as well or are we waiting on that? McVey: If we -- if we have alignment that would be great, but we would move to -- actually should have probably gone to the timeline one. So, we would be looking to bid IT probably in April or May of this coming year. So, I think we have some time on that and so kind of my thought of how this would go forward is that as each one of these comes to fruition of either we finish design or we get a bid or we are ready to move the next department, that I come to you guys, give a quick update. Hey, how did it go? Are there any changes to what I presented here? Are we ready to move on to the next one and it kind of gives us that checkpoint as we do each one, knowing that we all kind of Meridian City Council Work Session August 19,2025 Page 16 of 18 agree to the overall vision of the -- the near term remodels, but that we have that checkpoint after each one to say, yep, keep going or, nope, this isn't working, let's do something different. Little Roberts: Thank you. Strader: Mr. Mayor? Simison: We will go to Councilman Whitlock, since he's also said the same as Council Woman -- Councilman Whitlock. Whitlock: Laurelei, thank you for the presentation. I will just -- my two cents worth on the Council, I'm -- I'm fairly low maintenance and I'm okay with the coffee shops, I'm okay with -- Mayor's let me use his conference room before with constituents. I have met with constituents in this conference room. I'm not sure that -- this is my workspace on Tuesdays from 4:00 o'clock until 10:00 o'clock. I'm not sure I need another workspace. So, that's just my two cents worth. Simison: Council Woman Strader. Strader: I'm good with moving forward on this. I appreciate how it's been stepped through in a very logical way and I -- I think it makes sense. I'm actually more interested -- like for meeting with constituents for me at some point the new Community Center, honestly, is a more natural fit for me to meet with people, if that -- if there is space they are available, just because it would be more convenient, you know, for people in District Two. I -- I also am fine with coffee shops and kind of cobbling it together for a couple of years, but if we have this landing space I think that is a good idea, there are times where a City Hall meeting makes much more sense and -- and the privacy component, I do think that's important for people, depending on what their issues are that they need to talk about. So, yeah, this is -- I -- I appreciate all the work that's gone into this. Thank you, Laurelei. Your team did a great job. Simison: All right. I will just add my two cents. I know I got a few check-ins along the way, but you and the team I know were out there talking with everybody one-on-one and diving in to all these issues to try to -- you know, how we operate today and I think that's the key. Part of this that we wanted to know is long term how many employees, if we had to, could fit into this facility and I think we -- we got a good grasp on that and while it may not seem like forever and who knows how life goes, but we have more than doubled our employees than when we moved into this building 19 years ago and so sometimes it seems like it's way out there and it -- it may be there sooner than you realize for one reason or another, so having this in our back pocket to have the right conversations at the right time is very key and I do want to give, you know, kudos, especially Council Woman Strader pushed this, but also Councilman Taylor, who looked to the future in support of Council and I -- I -- I think that's very you know forward- looking down to what will be the needs in 20 or 30 years for people and make sure we are -- we are trying to plan for that future I -- I think is an important part of this, because Meridian City Council Work Session August 19,2025 Page 17 of 18 as you all understand and we are all just seat holders for today and the next person that comes in they may absolutely need a space and they may want to spend 40 hours a week in a desk environment answering e-mails, meeting with constituents, that may be how they choose to do the -- to do the job and having space for that person at that point in time would be excellent and those who want to go to the coffee shop never have to show up, except for from 4:00 to 10:00 on Tuesday nights on a regular basis. So, having a plan that I think makes the most sense. So, appreciate Council's feedback on this item and I think that you got your direction from -- from folks on how to move forward and we will be seeing more conversations in the future. Thank you. Thanks, everybody. EXECUTIVE SESSION [Action Item] per Idaho Code 74-206(1)(f): To communicate with legal counsel for the public agency to discuss the legal ramifications of and legal options for pending litigation, or controversies not yet being litigated but imminently likely to be litigated and 74-206(1)(d): To consider records that are exempt from disclosure as provided in chapter 1, title 74, Idaho Code. Simison: Okay. With that Item 7. Cavener: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Cavener. Cavener: Move we go into executive session pursuant to Idaho State Code 74-206(1)(f) and (1)(d). Strader: Second. Simison: I have a motion and a second to go into Executive Session. Is there discussion on the motion? If not, Clerk call the roll. Roll Call: Cavener, yea; Strader, yea; Overton, yea; Little Roberts, yea; Taylor, yea; Whitlock, yea. Simison: All ayes. Motion carries and we will go into Executive Session. MOTION CARRIED: ALLAYES. EXECUTIVE SESSION: (5:22 p.m. to 6:00 p.m.) Simison: Do I have a motion to come out of executive session? Cavener: Mr. Mayor, I move to come out of Executive Session. Strader: Second. Meridian City Council Work Session August 19,2025 Page 18 of 18 Simison: Motion and second to come out of Executive Session. All in favor signify by saying aye. Opposed nay? The ayes have it and we are out of Executive Session. MOTION CARRIED: ALLAYES. Cavener: Mr. Mayor? Simison: Councilman Cavener. Cavener: Move we adjourn our work session. Strader: Second. Simison: Motion and second to adjourn. All in favor signify by saying aye. Opposed nay? The ayes have it. We are adjourned. MOTION CARRIED: ALLAYES. MEETING ADJOURNED AT 6:00 P.M. (AUDIO RECORDING ON FILE OF THESE PROCEEDINGS) MAYOR ROBERT E. SIMISON 9-2-2025 ATTEST: CHRIS JOHNSON - CITY CLERK 9-2-2025