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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2007 10-02Meridian City Council Meetinu October 2, 2007 A meeting of the Meridian City Council was called to order at 7:05 P.M., Tuesday, October 2, 2007 by Mayor Tammy de Weerd. Members Present: Mayor Tammy de Weerd, Keith Bird, Charlie Rountree David Zaremba, and Joe Borton. Others Present: Bill Nary, Sharon Smith, Caleb Hood, John Overton, Bill Johnson, Bruce Freckleton, Terry Paternoster, Keith Watts, and Dean Willis. Item 1: Roll-call Attendance: Roll call. X David Zaremba X Joe Borton X Charlie Rountree X Keith Bird X Mayor Tammy de Weerd De Weerd: Okay. Sorry we are getting started a little bit late. We welcome you to the City Council meeting. It is Tuesday, October 2nd. It's five minutes after 7:00. Tonight we will start our meeting with roll call attendance. Item 2: Pledge of Allegiance: De Weerd: Thank you. Okay. Item No. 2 is the pledge of allegiance and since I don't see a victim, we will just lead you ourselves. If you will all rise. (Pledge of allegiance recited.) Item 3: Community Invocation by Pastor Randy Rodes with Vineyard Church of Meridian: De Weerd: We are usually fortunate to have a youth member in our community that leads us in the pledge. Generally we have Boy Scouts or high school students or someone here, but nothing about the people sitting out there, but none of you look young enough to be a Boy Scout or a high school student. Maybe a former one. Item No. 3, now that I have offended everyone here, is our community invocation. We would ask you all to join in the community invocation or take this as an opportunity for a moment of reflection. We will be led tonight by Pastor Randy Rodes and, Randy, what church are you with? The Vineyard Christian Fellowship. And thank you for being here. It's been way too long. Rodes: I count it a privilege to be here. Thank you very much. Let's pray. Lord Jesus, you know all about our community, all the growth, all the responsibility that goes with it. Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 2 of 35 And, Lord, we thank you for our Mayor and each of these City Council members and each member of the city staff that helps our community to work and, Lord, tonight in this meeting would you just give insight and wisdom that is needed, Lord, for every decision that is to be made and we ask this in Jesus' name, amen. Item 4: Adoption of the Agenda: De Weerd: Thank you. Okay. Item No. 4 is adoption of the agenda. Bird: Madam Mayor? De Weerd: Mr. Bird. Bird: On the Consent Agenda, Item No. K is resolution number 07-581. Item M has been asked to be pulled to 7-M on the regular agenda. Items 8 and 9 and 10 and 11 on the regular agenda has been asked to be continued or pulled and tabled to October 16th, 2007. And ordinance number on Item 19 is 07-1341. With that I move we approve the revised agenda. Rountree: Second. Zaremba: Madam Mayor? De Weerd: Again, this is not a motion that has discussion, but, yes, do you have a correction? Zaremba: I was just going to comment that I would ask that 5-D be moved to 7-D. Bird: I have no problem with that if the second don't. Rountree: Second agrees. Bird: Okay. With that I move we approve it again. De Weerd: Okay. Council, we have a motion to approve adoption of the agenda as changed. All those in favor say aye. All ayes. Motion carries. MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES. Item 5: Consent Agenda: A. Approve Minutes of September 11, 2007 City Council Regular Meeting: Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 3 of 35 B. Approve Minutes of September 18, 2007 City Council Regular Meeting: C. Approve Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law and Order of Approval: PP 07-013 Request for Preliminary Plat approval for 11 building lots and 2 common lots on 26.35 acres in an I-L zone for Kennedy Commercial Center by DBSI Meridian 184, LLC 1250 West Overland Road: E. Development Agreement: AZ 07-007 Request for Annexation and Zoning of 1.56 acres from RUT to R-8 zone for Amar Wapoot by LandPro Development, Inc. - 2400 West Wapoot Drive: F. Sanitary Sewer and Water Main Easement Agreement for Medina Subdivision by William Howell: G. Water Main Easement Agreement No. 1 for High Desert Marketplace by Thomas Motors, Inc.: H. Water Main Easement Agreement No. 2 for High Desert Marketplace by TMI Investments, LLC: I. Water Main Easement Agreement for LDS Church (6575 South Eagle Road): J. Approve Agreement for Personnel Services with AspireOn: K. Resolution No. 07-581 VAC 07-011 Request for a Vacation of the 10 foot public utility easement platted on Lots 1 - 12 of the Queenland Acres Subdivision for Queenland Acres by James Prather -Southeast Corner of South Stoddard Road and West Overland Road: L. Change Order No. 2 for the Water Division Building Proiect (Construction - Joslin Millwork, Inc.) for $9,838.00: De Weerd: Item 5 is the Consent Agenda. Bird: Madam Mayor? De Weerd: Mr. Bird. Bird: I move we -- on the Consent Agenda Item D will be moved to 7-D. Item M will be move to 7-M on the regular agenda and the resolution number for Item K is 07-581. Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 4 of 35 With that I move we approve the Consent Agenda and for the Mayor to sign and the Deputy Clerk to attest. Rountree: Second. De Weerd: Okay. I have a motion and a second to approve the Consent Agenda as changed. Mrs. Smith, will you, please, call roll. Roll-Call: Bird, yea; Rountree, yea; Zaremba, yea; Borton, yea. MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES. Item 6: Department Reports: A. IT Department 1. Update on IT Department 2006 Audit: De Weerd: Thank you. Okay. Under 6 -- Item 6, Department Reports, we will start with Terry with the IT Department. Paternoster: Well, Madam Mayor, Members of the Council -- can you hear me okay? All right. We will wait for the projector to get turned on and while that is happening, just to give -- ask one question. In your packet you should have had an IT audit status update, October 2007. Everybody have that? Okay. And just for Councilman Zaremba's benefit, just to briefly go over what this is about, is that last year in 2006 we hired a consulting company to come in and do an audit of the IT Department to just figure out, you know, what processes are we doing good, what things could use improvement, and, basically, come up with some recommendations for how we could better serve the city and integrate the Information Technology Department with the city and this is just an update following up on those recommendations and giving status as to each item. So, if there is no questions I will get the presentation going. De Weerd: Okay. Paternoster: Just a little quip up there to kind of add a little light to things. It's better to do the right thing wrong than the wrong things right. The righter we do the wrong things the wronger we become. So, basically, I just followed the outline that was used last year in the presentation, which lists each item of the recommendations. The black we were to start or implement immediately. The orange we were to do within six months. And the green were within 12 months, just to kind of give you a brief idea of what each color means. And the first one is -- I'm going to go through the items that were completed and that we have got out of the way. The first one is the IT manager needs to delegate and be proactive and outward facing. We have completed that with the Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 5 of 35 addition of the -- some additional IT staff. We have added a programmer and another network analyst and we have been working our intern full time. It's allowed me as the manager to delegate a lot more of my tasks, the daily regular things that were more of the firefighting activities and push those onto some of the other staff to allow me to spend more time managing. We also reviewed the training requirements, which is another recommendation. We reviewed the plans and we didn't ask for additional funds during fiscal year FY-08, which you did appropriate, so we have that in place. We also budgeted for contract staff and temporary staff, which also was appropriated in FY-08. Another item was -- is in the past we had not really had a formal process for interviewing our interns for programming skills to make sure our -- or for other development staff to make sure that they really knew what they were doing, other than just being able to talk and sound like they could talk a good game and so one of the recommendations was is that we introduce a technical questionnaire program -- technical test to determine if the applicants know their subject with practical skills, and weed out the good talkers. We did that and we, actually, did use that process of having additional interview questions and having an actual hands-on test to verify that our candidates did know what they were doing and it worked out, because we have a very good programmer at this point. Going on. What is often overlooked is that if one person can single handedly save the ship, that one person can probably single handedly sink the ship, too. And I put that up there, because I thought it was kind of relevant to the MIS committee. Some of the recommendations -- especially on this page go specifically to us implementing a management information steering committee to help coordinate the city with information technology. The first recommendation was is that we implement that, which we did in November 2006. One of the first items on our agenda was to implement a service level agreement, which was also a recommendation in the audit, which we had -- did in April 2007 and can be found on the city's internal Intranet. We also -- one of the recommendations was to put the management committee in place, which we just chose for our purposes to use the MIS committee for this purpose. The committee was also tasked with the duty to sign off on application purchases and decisions and this is, actually, proved to be quite an effective process. We have brought numerous applications -- for instance, our Barracuda spam firewall, which I'm not sure during the time of the original implementation -- there was a little kick back, but we actually ran that passed the MIS committee to say do you support this, do you think we should go another way, and we did have their support. We have also recently received their support with purchasing an a-mail management system, which will help to better facilitate some of the larger mail boxes within our organization. We have quotas in place and occasionally some users get messages saying, hey, you're over your limit, we are not going to let you send anymore a-mails until you clean it up. And, you know, although it works, it isn't the most popular tactic and so we have purchased an application with the approval of the MIS committee to address that. Going on. Another recommendation within that was that we upgrade our help desk software. We had a help desk software previously that had been programmed by one of our interns and although it worked for its purposes it wasn't really designed as we grew and so one of the recommendations was is that we budget funding to purchase a Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 6 of 35 new system. Rather than purchasing a new system -- we evaluated a couple systems, but through discussions with some other directors in the area we ended up getting a system from the City of Nampa which they developed themselves and so we have implemented their system, which I'll just show you a brief little picture of, which, basically, is used for project management and help desk creation. This does all of the items that were listed within the IT recommendations and it's deployed to every desk top. It's also used in addition to Information Technology, it's being used by the purchasing department to do purchase requisitions and it's being used also by the attorney's office to manage their project workload, so that that way you can track status and updates. It's proved to be quite an effective system and the price was definitely right, Nampa gave it to us for free, they gave us their source code, their only requirement was that if we make anything cool with it, that we reciprocate, which seemed pretty fair. And as I stated that inside this application it allows us to do time sheet and recording of IT staff time to issues and project. And also does project recording on issues, which is much better than our previous system. Going on. Several of the requests were directly related to data retention and physical security. Since the audit took place we have put in place an annual backup and so one of our backup tapes from each department we take out and we have been separating to insure that we could go back further than a year if need be to recover information. We also did a review of our physical security. As you may have known due to the beeping that goes on sometimes during the Council meetings is that we do have a security system that takes place and protects the IT rooms and the servers to insure that not only are they adequately backed up, but they are physically protected from any intruders. And in the new City Hall we have planned for a much better security than even we have in this facility where the server room is isolated, we have key card entries throughout the building, there is security planned in place, cameras, and so we are really looking forward to the new City Hall where things are -- definitely will be a great improvement. De Weerd: Hey, Terry, excuse me. Paternoster: Yes, Mayor. De Weerd: I'm sorry to interrupt you. Paternoster: No, that's quite all right, Madam Mayor. De Weerd: I had just heard that Items 13, 14, 15, and 16 have been requested to continue and since I know at least one member in our audience is here to probably hear that one item -- or those four items, I did want to bring that up. So, our apologies. We just -- we just heard about it, so -- Paternoster: Quite all right. Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 7 of 35 De Weerd: Thank you, Terry. Just didn't want anyone to have to sit here unless they had to. Not that you're not really really interesting. Paternoster: I did try to put a couple of quips to make this as interesting as possible -- De Weerd: You did. Paternoster: -- because sometimes I think that -- De Weerd: I was going to comment on that later. Paternoster: All right. Thank you. So, as I stated, we do have physical security in place planned for the new City Hall. I think it's going to be a much needed improvement. I know that many of the people at City Hall are desperately looking forward to having those key cards to give us access to where we need. We also have a retention policy set for each backup type, as you may well know, since you approved the actual item, that there has been a policy developed by the city clerk's office to address data retention, which has been put in place so that we can insure that different data types are backed up appropriately and that they are kept for the appropriate amount of time. We also have a central repository of licenses that was recommended, which we have put in place. We have the majority of licenses not only physically, but we also have scanned most of them, so we have electronic copies of them also, so that in the event something was to happen to the physical copy we would still have an electronic copy of the license. One thing that I think's always important for us to recognize is that controls don't slow down the business. Like brakes on a car, controls actually allow you to go faster. And I think that that's one important thing to come out from this audit is that we have definitely analyzed a lot of the controls in place to make sure that we are trying to figure out effective ways to run the business. Going on. These last few slides, basically, address items that are in progress. I think one thing that's kind of important is even though you have closed items on the list, it's difficult to really say that something's really closed, because most of them are really ongoing issues that we have a responsibility to continually keep up with and so although it might be closed at the moment, given a month or two, if we are not doing it it will probably open back up and so, going on, are some miscellaneous recommendations that I have felt that the fT Department was specifically responsible for making sure that these things take place. Planning of IT staff time -- I listed this item as in progress, because given that we just implemented the new help desk system in September of 2007, so last month, we haven't had a lot of time to adjust to trying to plan time through it and so it's kind of been a learning process. I expect as time goes on that through the use of that tool we will have much better management of what happens with staff time, but at this point it's kind of that learning process to figure out what's going on. And if you have any questions regarding this item, feel free to stop me and interrupt me. We also were to define a process for projects and also introduce -- well, I'm -- let me just do the define a process for projects. At the last MIS committee meeting I actually gave a draft to the Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 8 of 35 committee members that I wanted them to take back and review for a project process. I expect that, you know, just given that we meet with the MIS committee every two weeks, that it will probably be around December of this year that I would expect that our process for projects has been completed, reviewed, approved, so -- we also are in the process of introducing a standards manual. Unlike the process for projects or even the software selection process, the standards manual really is more our development process for how we go through the analysis phase to finding a project, making sure that it meets the scope, making sure that our coding standards are consistent, so that as we continue to develop staff, even if we have turnover, that there is still consistency between members and we have a lot of this done, but we stil{ have a few things that we need to finalize. The last item on this slide is monthly visits to each department to discuss with the IT director performance, future plans, and current sources of pain. Although I have been doing this -- it hasn't been as consistent as what I would like. The recommendation was to do it monthly and I can't honestly say that I have done this monthly. I'm hoping that as time goes forward that it becomes more consistent, so -- going forward. These are all issues that are with the MIS committee and one is clarify and communicate the city IT strategy and, basically, almost every item on here is currently under review, task this committee with the details of the strategy and the plan to get there. Confirm the strategy direction for the applications within the city, include futuristic technology in the strategy -- strategic direction. Right now we feel like we have finalized these items and we are waiting to present them to the directors to get their final approval. And so I expect these items mostly to be complete by the end of this month. Other items our city manager should be involved in prioritizations of projects. This goes along with first coming up with that project process that was the previous slide and, then, making sure that as we go forward that the different members on this committee get the right to give their input and help prioritize those projects, especially when it comes to our development staff, because since we only have one developer at this point that works in the IT department, it's a limited resource and they definitely are going to have to wait, depending on when their project is and how it gets prioritized. And so we definitely support this idea of having them prioritize projects. Also on this is define the software selection process. This is something that was also given at the last MIS committee meeting and it's under review and we expect that, you know, by December this item will be approved and completed. Going on. We had a couple other items. The city needs to do a competitive analysis of IT pay in the Boise area. I spoke with Mr. Nary and he has plans of doing this as part of their regular process in FY-08 to go off and do a competitive analysis to see how does the city compare with other organizations within the area. The next item, which is green, which was a yearly one, is that this was to elevate IT to department level. This item has been discussed and at this time the decision's been made to leave It as a division and as it becomes relevant in the future they will address this and see when it actually becomes appropriate in time to do this. Going on. The IT manager should attend department director meetings and strive to educate department leaders on technology. I would say that f have been included in most of the meetings that have been relevant to IT and the technology that I have been invited to the meetings. I haven't went to all meetings, but from my Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 9 of 35 understanding that the meetings that I need to go to I have been invited to and so this is taking place. Going on. These are the last two items -- and these are items that I think are a little bit more complicated, because they don't really have a plan for how they are going to get resolved and the first one is central control and coordination of any development staff and resources via IT and what makes this issue a challenge is that the city's invested in development staff outside of IT and so we have people who are developing applications and writing code outside of the technology department and so it's not really under the direct control of information technology, which makes it difficult for us to really coordinate and control and manage and so I really think that, you know, for this item to be addressed properly, the city needs to determine, you know, if it's best to centralize development so all development takes place out of IT or whether or not the city wants to continue to allow development to take place in departments and invest in that. And the last item on here is develop a disaster recovery plan for each department and I -- this issue's been discussed at the MIS committee meeting and it's also planned on being discussed at the upcoming emergency management committee and I think that this item has a little confusion to it when people think about it. I think oftentimes when people think about disaster recovery their first thing is, well, we are backing up our data, shouldn't we be able to recover it. And this is really more of a nuts and bolts thing that's really directed more at each department. Although IT does back up data and we do disaster recovery and we are every five minutes backing up a lot of our data between us and the police department, is this really doesn't address, well, what happens if City Hall burns down, where are you going to put the MUBs department, the utility billing department? Where are we going to go set them up? Where are we going to go do this if this data is lost? What are you going to do? What are those plans? And so this is really more directed at each department where those departments need to come up with their own disaster recovery plan and, then, with Information Technology we can integrate our plans to make sure that we are in harmony with each other. That's it for the recommendations. Are there any questions? De Weerd: Council, any questions? Rountree: Madam Mayor? De Weerd: Mr. Rountree. Rountree: Terry, I may have missed this, but I didn't see anything on databases and any recommendations towards enterprise database development and did they mention that at all in the audit? I know that's something we have talked about and some place we want to go. Paternoster: Absolutely. It wasn't specifically mentioned as a recommendation per se in the audit, but I think that it's indirectly mentioned in several of the areas. With the MIS committee, that's something we have actively spent a lot of time on addressing. I know that the department directors have also identified that we all agree that having a Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 10 of 35 single application that really centralizes the overall function of a lot of these databases is key to those departments. And so it is being addressed in the MIS committee meeting and I know that it's a priority for the directors and for the Mayor. It's also addressed kind of in the coordination of city development and staff, the last item on the slide that was right here is that -- is that this one kind of addresses that, because development and how the city continues to develop applications really impacts that overall vision of having that single database or one source of information and I think that this is something that the city has to determine do we want to continue to allow individual departments to develop code and I think that that's something that really has to be decided by, you know, really, the Mayor and the Council, you know, is if they want IT to be in charge of that, that's something that IT can do and that better insures that applications are all coordinated through a central source, but as long as individual departments have their own development staff, it's difficult for IT to say what happens that way. Rountree: Madam Mayor, one comment on that particular subject is that if you don't have controls of some type, you don't know what you're spending on IT in the end. You could think you're budgeting for a million dollars or two million or three million a year and when you analyze how much everybody is spending time and resources on it, it can be ten or eleven million dollars year. So, I think we need controls so we can keep an eye on what's going on in that arena. Now, I don't begrudge the departments to develop the systems and enhance the systems they utilize, but there needs to be a network of that information centralized so we can see what our costs are. Zaremba: Madam Mayor? De Weerd: Yes, Mr. Zaremba. Zaremba: Along those same lines, I -- it worries me that there may not be a standard coding protocol, if that's the right term for it, if the departments are doing their own coding and you mentioned earlier the issue of if you have in your own department a turnover in staff, you want the new person to be able to figure out what the old person did and that has to do with a coding standard that everybody follows. So, I -- along with what Councilman Rountree said, I would be supportive of pulling all development into one place that was under one control, unless somehow just makes it unworkable for the departments, but I -- I feel if there is going to be standards and a way that one person could pick up somebody else's work, it should be in one -- one department. Paternoster: Yeah. And if I could just briefly address that. I think that not only is it coding standards that we fight with a little bit, but it's also which languages are they programming in. You know, within IT we have tried to centralize on a couple languages, you know, for consistency and other departments don't necessarily have to follow those standards for how they program and so you could have my programmer, couldn't even Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 11 of 35 go over and do what someone else's programmer's doing, because it's different coding languages. De Weerd: So, what are you doing about that? Paternoster: Well, I think that, you know, within Information Technology that the area that we really have the control over directly is that we have been developing standards to make sure that we are consistent within our practices. I think that, you know -- and I guess -- De Weerd: So, you're saying you do have standards in place. Paternoster: For the Information Technology Department, yes, we have been developing standards in place for coding that takes place within the IT Department. De Weerd: Okay. No, I'm talking city wide. Paternoster: I'm saying no. De Weerd: Is that something the MIS committee is looking at? Paternoster: it's not something we have directly looked at. I mean we have looked at database consolidation and we have also looked at, you know, the enterprise application, but that doesn't really address the different coding standards for other platforms. You know -- and I think that, you know, just to be specific and to not really single somebody out, that, really, where this area is taking place is within the GIS system, is that that's the area where there is other development taking place. The other person is that we have Bob Fields, who is a volunteer who does great work for the city, you know, at no cost, but his development is still taking place independent of Information Technology and our purview. De Weerd: Well, I think that's probably something you need discuss at your meeting. Nary: Madam Mayor? De Weerd: Yes. Nary: Madam Mayor, Members of the Council, Terry and Ihave -- excuse me -- Terry and I have discussed that as probably the first step. I mean we are talking really -- again, we have changed how we have done information technology for the city significantly over the last five years, from the contracted person, Terry, to in-house people to now a number of in-house people that are now the support and ability for Information Technology to be able to manage that is more available now than it has been in the past. Departments -- some of the departments have gotten used to the Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 12 of 35 methods that we have done. So, to simply just take a left turn and change that is probably not the easiest or quickest or simplest thing to do, but I -- but the committee process is probably the best place to start. So, we have had that discussion and that is an area that we do need to look at that and how would we transition something like that and bringing that back again to you and to the Council. De Weerd: Thank you. Terry, Idon't -- I don't remember hearing anything about a capital improvement plan. Have you started working on that? Where are you in the process? Paternoster: Well, I'm not very far in that process. I think that, you know, there has been some questions exactly of what's required for the capital improvement plan when discussions have taken place between myself and Bill and finance and so I think that -- I think for me what would help is some clarification on exactly what's needed in the capital improvement plan for us to develop that. De Weerd: Well, I think even as you use this audit and some of the system improvements that you're going to need and what are the hard costs for that, how do you start phasing that in and putting costs to it? How is it going to be paid for'? I guess those are the kind of things that I was hoping to get out of that. Paternoster: I think that that's excellent, especially when you're talking about the, you know, enterprise application. I know that when we have been going through and doing our research is that it's definitely been a wide scale where people have some applications. We have one vendor that says, well, we will give it to you free if you just pay the maintenance. We also have some applications where we have done research and they are in excess of, you know, ten million dollars. And so 1 think that, you know, as far as that -- you know, and implementing it in the capital improvement, I think that within the MIS commit tee I think our goal is to come up with some costs and some different recommendations to present, but at this point it's just really soft on where we are at. De Weerd: Well, I guess I'm looking for a little more detail and that way you can start planning for it and it's not always that shock and awe effect when I get your budget request. Paternoster: Right. I think that's reasonable. I will definitely work on it. De Weerd: Because I experienced that this year. Okay. Any other questions? Yeah. Not this year's. Okay. Thank you, Terry. We appreciate the update. Paternoster: Thank you. B. Planning Department Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 13 of 35 1. Discussion of Planning Technician Position: De Weerd: Okay. Item 6-B is our planning department. Caleb. Hood: Thank you, Madam Mayor, Members of the Council. I do you want to start out by -- I don't have a Powerpoint presentation for you tonight, but I'm going to steal one of Terry's quips. I feel like the ship is sinking already, because a full one day that Anna's been gone I have already forgot to mention that there are a couple of other projects that also need to be continued from the agenda tonight, so I think I hit the couple of folks that I thought may be here of interest for those items, but items No. 17 and 18 forgot to post their site, so these ones, when we get to them, also need to be continued. So, just wanted to -- De Weerd: Well, that's excellent. Thank you. Hood: Just wanted to fit that in, so -- De Weerd: It always means that another meeting is going to be longer, but -- Hood: The 16th isn't looking so great these days, but I won't have to be here, so -- De Weerd: So, that was the 17th and 18th items and that would be continued to October 16th? Bird: The 16th. Hood: Correct. De Weerd: Okay. Was anyone here for that item? Either of those items? Okay. Hood: So, our department report has to do with a new position that we were contemplating here recently. The agenda isn't quite right in the title and I will get into that in just a second, but we have had an associate position -- Associate City Planner position open for about two months now. We really haven't had any what we thought were qualified candidates apply and coupling that with the decrease in number of development applications we have seen in the recent past few months and, therefore, the decrease in revenue, we thought it would be better to maybe create a new position where the need is based these days seems to be more at the front counter and processing administrative applications and things like that. About six weeks ago or so we did speak with our Council liaison about this potential creating a new planner tech position. Our front desk planner or planning trainee -- we played with some different names -- and Councilman Rountree was generally supportive of that. We proceeded to talk with HR a little bit about that. However, after we came up with a new job Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 14 of 35 description we realized that -- I think I heard that Mr. Nary said we were slicing the bread too thin and we just found out that the position we are trying to create really could be -- we already had it there. It was -- we are splitting hairs with these positions and so long story short we thought it would be a better idea to not hire an associate, step down one level and try to get an assistant that we think is qualified that can fill the shoes now and meet our need base today and, then, if -- if and when we do pick up again and get more development applications and it's as busy as it has been in the past three or four years, we may come back to the Council, through the budget process, and, then, again, ask for that associate position. Our hopes would be that we can find -- if, in fact, this happens, then, we will have three assistant planners. Our hope would be, then, maybe next fiscal year to come in and maybe move one of those folks in-house up to an associate level position. But just right now we think assistant is where the need is at and that's kind of what we are giving you a heads up that's the direction we are headed. So, I don't know if you have any questions about that, but wanted to give the Mayor and the Council a quick heads up with where our department's heading. This is just -- it -- again, if it didn't come clear, this is a funded position that we have now and we are just kind of knocking it down to an assistant level position for this year, so -- De Weerd: Okay. Councilman Rountree, any comments? Rountree: No. Good explanation. You might give an idea of the volume of administrative type permits that you're still seeing quite a number of. Hood: Madam Mayor, Councilmember Rountree, Council Members, we have this year - - and I know we are in the neighborhood of 230 certificates of zoning compliance permits, which equate to building permits, most of them. The CZC are commercial related building permits and multi-family related building permits. We are also seeing a lot of zoning verification letters and director's determination saying, yeah, own this property or contemplating buying this property, what can I do on this property. Those are kind of the administrative applications that we are seeing -- still a pretty high volume of that's where, again, the need, is to process these. They do take some research skills. I mean this person that we are going to be hiring will have to have a planning degree or background anyways. Research definitely will be involved. But those are the types of applications that we envision this person entertaining, as well as covering for -- you know, we do get multiple people at the front desk at times and we need coverage for those people if someone's at lunch or whatever, so they will be able to answer phones and answer just people cold walking into the office and wanting to know about specific property or projects. So, that's, in nutshell, kind of this position. De Weerd: Thank you. Council, any other questions? Rountree: I have none. I don't know that we need any specific direction or guidance. It's a -- it's a downgrade, in essence, of a position that's approved and in the budget, so Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 15 of 35 Hood: Now, Madam Mayor, if I may just real quick -- I mean the reason -- when it was on the agenda as a new position we were coming to ask you to create this new position and now it's just a downgrade. I would like to still have your blessing, but you don't need to necessarily take any action on it, so if you think that's a good direction to proceed, we will continue on. Nary: Madam Mayor? De Weerd: Mr. Nary. Nary: Madam Mayor, Members of the Council, part of the reason I suggested to Caleb and Anna to at least leave this item on the agenda for discussion is just so that you're aware that this downgrade is potentially temporary, but there may be a need in the future, based on the volume of work, as well as the particular employees to promote a person if the need exists and so I just wanted you to be aware that that was the potential direction, so that in the future we are, again, not expanding the -- the head count of the city or the workforce, but simply that we are taking a position right now and really trying to fill a need that makes more sense. My predecessor sometimes in this position would wedge positions into the -- the matrix of positions and they didn't have very distinct differences between them and what you general end up happening is that the people that work in the position that is rated below it think they are doing the same job as the person above them and the people that are doing the job you have hired them for think they are doing the job of the person above them and it doesn't really make much sense practically from a -- I guess a competitive standpoint for -- for these positions to do it that way if the job can be done more effectively by an assistant, that makes the most sense. That was my recommendation and Mrs. Canning and Mr. Hood agreed with that, so -- De Weerd: Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Caleb. C. Fire Department 1. Fire Prevention Proclamation: De Weerd: Okay. Item C is our fire prevention proclamation. I see Bill here and Sparky. Johnson: Madam Mayor, Members of the Council, as you know October is Fire Prevention Month, so Sparky and I have -- with great excitement bring forth a proclamation to have the Mayor sign and read for declaring -- or proclaiming October Fire Prevention Month in the City of Meridian. De Weerd: Okay. Well, I will go ahead and read the proclamation. Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 16 of 35 Rountree: Maybe Sparky ought to. De Weerd: I don't know. Can you read? Whereas the City of Meridian is committed to insuring the safety and security of all those living in and visiting our city and whereas fire is a serious public safety concern, both nationally and locally -- it's really hard to be serious while he's doing that. And homes are the location where people are at the greatest risk from fires and whereas Meridian's first responders are indicated to reduce the occurrence of home fires and -- home fire and injuries through prevention education and whereas Meridian's residents are responsive to public education measures and able to take personal steps to increase their safety from fire and whereas the 2007 Fire Prevention Month's theme Practice Your Fire Escape Plan, effectively serves to remind all of us the simple actions we can take to stay safer from fire. Therefore, I, Tammy de Weerd, City of Meridian Mayor, do hereby proclaim October 2007 as fire prevention month throughout the city. I urge all people of the City of Meridian to heed the important safety message of practicing your fire escape plan in support of public safety. Dated this 2nd day of October 2007. Thank you for joining us. Johnson: Thank you, Madam Mayor. Item 7: Items Moved from Consent Agenda: D. Second Addendum to Development Agreement: MI 07-004 Request for a Miscellaneous application for a third amendment modification to the previously approved Development Agreement for the Tree Farm Annexation (AZ 06-004) by including a provision to adjust the zoning boundaries to generally align with lot lines or the center lines of streets for Tree Farm Development Agreement Modification by Treehaven, LLC - north side of Chinden Boulevard on both sides of Black Cat Road: De Weerd: Thank you. Okay. From the Consent Agenda we did remove two items, both D and M. So, I will ask Council Zaremba about Item D. Zaremba: Thank you, Madam Mayor. Actually, just a couple of questions and the subject does not surprise me. I remember that there was discussion while I was on the Planning and Zoning Commission that the Tree Farm annexation would be approved without specifically knowing exactly where the zoning. lines would be until they had determined where streets and lot lines would go. So, this does not surprise me and I agree with the process that's going on. However, the devil is always in the details. Their revised Exhibit A-2, which is on page 24 of the staff report -- and one of the purposes of this is to align the zoning boundaries with the lot lines and the center lines of streets. The Exhibit A-2 on page 24 of the staff report does indicate Chinden Boulevard, but it does not show Black Cat, which is not bordering it someplace interior Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 17 of 35 to this property, doesn't show Basco Lane, which also is not a border, it's somewhere interior, and it doesn't show the other streets, so we really don't have a reference to knowing whether these -- whether the final zonings do align with the intent of the streets. We are also apparently not going to talk about the plat tonight, so we don't know about the lot lines either. So, I guess, really, my question is I -- I don't see enough information to actually make the final approval on it, so that leaves me with another question that perhaps is to legal counsel to clarify is what we are discussing or approving on this tonight just to have the legal department draft a change to the development agreement, which we will see later or are we actually approving the changes? De Weerd: Mr. Nary. Nary: Madam Mayor, Members of the Council, Councilmember Zaremba, no, you're approving the change, so -- and I'm trying to pull it up. It takes a second for it to do that, but -- so I can see which specific one you're talking about. This normally -- we look at the -- we are looking at these -- we are normally looking at the legal description, so the one you're referring to is revised Exhibit A-2, the one that says new zoning map. Zaremba: Yes. Nary: Is that -- Zaremba: It's, actually, a drawing, not a verbal description. Nary: Okay. Zaremba: And it does not include roadways, which are the reference points as far as -- Nary: Mr. O'Neil was here and he did say if you wanted to pull this off we certainly could do that. If I recall correctly, the only -- the only roadway on this map for the purpose of annexation is Chinden, because it does not -- it does not abut Black Cat and it does not abut Linder. So, there is no -- there is no other roadway to -- for it to orient to. Zaremba: I can understand -- Nary: I mean I know it goes to Black Cat -- t know that the Tree Farm goes to Black Cat, but I'm not sure if this -- Zaremba: It actually goes beyond Black Cat -- Nary: Right. But I'm not sure if this -- I'm not sure where Black Cat is. I don't think it's on this -- on this -- Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 18 of 35 Bird: Black Cat has nothing to do with this development. Zaremba: Well, yes, Black Cat does go into this development -- Bird: The only thing that it -- Zaremba: And that was my point. If we don't know where the roads are, are we ready to approve adjusting the zoning boundaries to the center line of the roads? Nary: The -- the zoning -- the zoning portion that gets annexed is based on the legal descriptions of the properties that are attached in the other exhibits. So, that map is not -- that map is more -- I guess to me is more illustrative of the -- the entire parcel, but the -- the recorder is only going to record in relation to the other exhibits here as to what each of those parcels are and it doesn't need the roadway for that. So, I guess I'm -- and maybe we are -- maybe we are talking about two different things, but the roadway is not important in relation to the legal description for the purposes of the development agreement, because what gets recorded is against those parcels. Zaremba: I guess what I wanted to confirm is that Basco -- and there were some issues with Black Cat and I think those have been resolved, but I just wanted to make sure that Basco went where it was supposed to go and I can't tell that -- if we are going to change the zoning, I don't want that to disappear. And I'm not sure whether that's the relevant issue to this or not, so I guess that's part of my question is that even relevant to what we are talking about. It sounds like you're saying it's not. Nary: I guess just so I'm clear, Councilmember Zaremba, Basco Lane is approximately -- the Phyllis Canal is the -- is the divider of the -- or the border of this property to the north. Zaremba: Yes. Nary: And Basco Lane, if I recall correctly, is somewhere within an eighth of a mile from the eastern edge of the property boundary along the Phyllis Canal, somewhere give or take -- okay. Zaremba: Something similar. Nary: But where the roadway is in relation to the parcels as they are described in the legal descriptions where Basco Lane is doesn't matter for the purposes of the tax commission or recorder. It only matters for when we have the plat. When we have a plat, so that you know in relation to the -- where the plat is divided along public roadways or private roadways, then, you need to see that. For the purpose of a development agreement, which is only dealing with annexation and -- of this property, Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 19 of 35 because that's the ordinance that's before you on the -- oh, this is an amendment, so it's already been annexed. I'm sorry. I don't think you -- I don't think you need it. Zaremba: Okay. Nary: I mean Mr. Freckleton is here, I don't know if he has a different perspective and I don't think we need the roadway description for this purpose. Did you have a different perspective, Bruce? Freckleton: I -- I would concur exactly with what you're saying. I don't think it's really -- has any relevance. Zaremba: Okay. Then I'm done. Thank you. De Weerd: Okay. Would you like to make a motion to approve it? Zaremba: I would make a motion that we approve MI 07-004, currently being Item 7-D, delta, as proposed. Bird: Second. De Weerd: Okay. I have a motion and a second to approve this item. Mrs. Smith, will you, please, call roN. Roll-Call: Bird, yea; Rountree, yea; Zaremba, yea; Borton, yea. MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES. M. Cooperative Construction and Reimbursement Agreement for North Black Cat Trunk Sewer with Brighton Development, Inc., Treehaven, LLC, Primeland Development Group, LLC and the City of Meridian: De Weerd: Okay. We had also removed Item M. Mr. Nary. Nary: Thank you, Madam Mayor, Members of the Council. I asked you to put this on for discussion. Mr. Varriale and Mr. Turnbull are here and they are two of the signators for this particular agreement. I think we could do it a couple of different ways. You have discussed this North Black Cat Trunk sewer agreement a couple of times and this reimbursement. We did make a decision and the parties involved agreed with that decision that we are going to do a public bid offering for this project that should take a couple of weeks. Normally -- well, generally we usually approve these agreements in conjunction with the awarding of those bids, so we know what the amounts are. So, we could pull this until you get that completed. We could also approve this agreement Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 20 of 35 subject to that, so that it's clear to both -- to the parties that are involved that we are not going to approve this agreement until those bids .are complete, so that you're assured that the amount that is intended to be reimbursed fits within your budget. Mr. Grady will have to bring a budget amendment at that point anyway to insert in the budget the ability to pay that reimbursement agreement out when the work is completed. So, it really is -- it was me pushing it forward to kind of make sure it stayed on task and stayed on -- in front of you, but it's probably -- it may be a little premature. Mr. Watts, I don't know if he has any other perspective for the purchasing side of this or if the parties, Mr. Turnbull or Mr. Varriale, have a preference or if you have a reference, but I just wanted everyone to be aware of kind of where this project was at. Watts: I don't know if I have a preference either way. It certainly doesn't hurt to award once we know the bid amounts. Either way you would need to bring it back, if not after the bid amounts -- after the bid is opened. De Weerd: Any comment? Varriale: Madam Mayor, Council Members -- is this on? Bird: That thing springs around. Varriale: Is it on? De Weerd: Yes. Uh-huh. Varriale: The -- actually, the agreement does -- De Weerd: Frank, can you, please, state your name and address for the record. Varriale: I'm sorry, Madam Mayor. Yes. Frank -- De Weerd: I was just waiting for you to not do that. Varriale: Frank Varriale. 1320 West Belltower, Meridian. And I am one of the signators to this agreement representing the developers. De Weerd: Thank you. Varriale: Within the body of the agreement there is a requirement that the -- that it come back to you for approval of the bidder and the bid amount. I don't have a problem with Mr. Nary's suggestion that perhaps we bring all of that back at the same time, provided we can handle it all at that -- at that particular one meeting, approve the program -- the agreement, approve the bidder and the amount and -- and move forward. I don't believe we have a problem with that at all. Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 21 of 35 De Weerd: I don't think that would be a problem doing it all in one meeting. Varriale: Okay. De Weerd: Okay. Thank you. We are glad to see that this is now done. Almost. Almost done. Okay. Any other questions from Council? Rountree: I have none. Bird: I have none. De Weerd: Okay. Well, I do need a motion. Nary: Madam Mayor, all they need to do is vacate this item, because we will just bring it back when it's completed, so that -- you can do that by voice vote. De Weerd: I need a motion to vacate the -- Bird: Madam Mayor, I move we vacate 7-M. Rountree: Second. Zaremba: Second. De Weerd: Okay. I have a motion and a second to vacate this item until it's brought back. All those in favor say aye. All ayes. Motion carries. MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES. Item 8: Tabled from September 25, 2007: FP 07-026 Request for Final Plat approval for 140 single-family building lots and 21 common lots on 89.70 acres in R-2, R-8 and R-15 zones for Javker Subdivision No. 1 by Treehaven, LLC - 4042 West Chinden Boulevard: Item 9: FP 07-030 Request for Final Plat approval for 50 single-family building lots and 14 common lots on 10.10 acres in an R-4 zone for Barava Subdivision No. 1 by Dyver Development, LLC -east of Black Cat Road on Franklin Road: Item 10: FP 07-031 Request for Final Plat approval for 50 single-family building lots and 2 common lots on 10.55 acres in an R-4 zone for Barava Subdivision No. 2 by Dyver Development, LLC -east of Black Cat Road on Franklin Road: Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 22 of 35 Item 11: FP 07-032 Request for Final Plat approval for 192 multi-family units on 48 building lots and 1 common lot on 13.99 acres in an R-15 zone for Canterbury Commons Subdivision by Canterbury Commons, LLC - south of West Pine Avenue and east of North Ten Mile Road: Request to Table De Weerd: Thank you. Okay. Items 8, 9, 10, and 11 were requested move to October 16th. Do I have a motion? Borton: Madam Mayor? De Weerd: Mr. Borton. Borton: I move that we move Items 8, 9, 10, and 11 to October 16th. Rountree: Second. De Weerd: Okay. I have a motion and a second to continue these items. All those in favor say aye. All ayes. Motion carries. MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES. Item 12: Continued Public Hearing from September 11, 2007: VAR 07-016 Request for a Variance to UDC 11-4-3-43.1.2 that requires communication towers to be set back from all publicly owned right-of-way a minimum of two times the height of the tower to be installed, to allow a 50 foot setback instead of a 100 foot setback as required, by T-Mobile - 3100 East Florence Street: De Weerd: Okay. Item 12 is a continued Public Hearing from September 11th on VAR 07-016. I will ask for staff comments at this time. Hood: Thank you, Madam Mayor, Members of the Council. Item No. 12 is a request for a variance to a setback for a communications tower. The site is located at 3100 East Florence Street. It's near the intersection of Jewell Avenue and Olive Avenue, just west of Eagle Road. There is an existing multi-tenant retail building on the site. To the north is a parking lot -- not the dirt parking lot that's shown in the aerial now, but a parking lot associated with the blue Ribbon Artisans building and their facilities there directly to the north. To the west is your Yellow Freight industrial property, commercial trucking. To the south is Primary Health and Simmons Fine Jewelry. To the east are commercial properties, Wendy's, Fed Ex, Kinko's, just to kind of get you oriented there. And the site highlighted in red is the subject site. I'll kind of zoom you in a little bit with the next slide. So, the proposed pole is located on the northwest quadrant of this site. Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 23 of 35 You can kind of see some arrows there. In this general location is where the proposed pole is. The applicant is requesting a variance from UDC 11-4-3-41 -- 43-I-2, which requires communication towers to be setback from all publicly owned rights of way a minimum of two times the height of the tower. The height of the proposed communication tower is 50 feet, thus, requiring a hundred foot setback. The applicant is requesting a variance to allow a 50 foot setback to Olive Avenue. Just as a reference, there is about 275 feet to Eagle Road from the proposed tower location. The applicant is proposing to remove an existing light pole on the site and construct the subject tower. The proposed tower is a slim design. I got some pictures here of that schematic. The pole will be the same color as the other existing light poles in the parking lot and will still include a light at about 30 feet. The antennas are located inside a five foot tall shroud at the top of the light pole, thus, hiding the antenna array from public view. The applicant is proposing this location on the site because it is around the corner from the main building entrances and the parking spaces in this area are rarely used by the public. There is also located next to the dumpster where they will be able to tie the block wall enclosure into the existing one that hides the dumpster. There are three required findings that the Council must make in approving a variance. First, the variance shall not grant a special right or privilege that is not otherwise allowed in the district. Second, the variance relieves an undue hardship because of the characteristics of the site. And, third, the variance shall not be detrimental to the public health, safety, and welfare. Although staff does not believe that the proposed tower would be detrimental to the public health, safety, and welfare, staff does believe that approving the subject variance would grant a special right or privilege that is not otherwise allowed. Further, staff does not believe that a hardship exists because of characteristics of the site. For these reasons staff is recommending denial of the subject variance request. I do not have any written testimony since the staff report and have not talked to any public members at large or anyone curious about this application. I will stand for any questions you may have. De Weerd: Thank you, Caleb. Any questions at this point? Rountree: I have none. De Weerd: Okay. Bird: I have none. Zaremba: Madam Mayor, are we going to have the applicant -- are they here? De Weerd: We will ask the applicant if they have comment. Zaremba: Okay. Then, I think my question is probably for the applicant, not for Mr. Hood. Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 24 of 35 De Weerd: Okay. Is the applicant here? Thank you. If you will, please, state your name and address for the record. Schutjer: You bet. It's Rocky Schutjer. S-c-h-u-t-j-e-r. And that's 2666 Wellington Street in Salt Lake City, Utah. De Weerd: Thank you. Schutjer: 84106. Thank you, Caleb, for that introduction. I can -- I have some kind of prepared comments. I don't know if you want to ask your question or -- De Weerd: If you want to go ahead and state your prepared comments. If they don't answer his question, I'm sure he will ask it at that time. Schutjer: Very good. Thank you. De Weerd: Thank you. Schutjer: Not so much prepared comments, but one thing that I wanted to stress as part of this design and this application and the reason for the variance is the stealth nature of the tower. It is, in fact, to -- I would dare say a hundred percent of the public that's going to drive by this busy intersection in your town, no one will ever know that there is an antenna enclosed at the top of -- at the top of this light pole, which is, in essence, what the pole is, it's a light pole and not a communications tower that we are used to seeing with big arms and, you know, excessive structures on the outside. So, I guess that's the one big thing that I wanted to stress was the stealth nature of the sight. As far as the setback is concerned, the location that we picked on this particular parcel is located -- I don't know if Caleb can go back to the site plan. It is a big busy parcel with a couple drive-thrus. There is a Wendy's and there is a Starbucks. There are other -- when I say a light pole, this is parking light poles that are already existing, but this particular one up in the northwest corner, it's next to the dumpster, which is traditionally where people aren't. The parking is over there that's not used as frequently. The store fronts are to the east on the retail space, just -- just south of the proposed site. But, anyway, we feel that it's the best location on the property for this type of design. We also looked for when we -- when we were looking for a site in this area we were looking for existing structures and not necessarily to have to bring in a new tower, which aren't always pleasing to the eye, but -- so, we thought the replacement of a light pole -- we have done this in other locations and they look great. I mean we are going to use the exact same light that's existing on the 30 foot pole. It will be painted the same color and so forth. So, that's the reason for the application. And I'd love to entertain any questions you might have. De Weerd: Okay. Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 25 of 35 Zaremba: Madam Mayor? De Weerd: Mr. Zaremba. Zaremba: I do. And I appreciate the stealth nature of it. I was on the committee that helped write some of these ordinances and we wanted to encourage the stealth ones. Schutjer: Sure. Zaremba: I guess my question in this particular location is why does it need to be a free-standing tower? Why wouldn't you be able to build what would probably be a fifteen foot tower on the roof of one of the buildings? Schutjer: Funny you ask that. The first -- the first attempt I made at a -- at a design for this site was on top of the retail space. Zaremba: That's what I was thinking, somewhere in that neighborhood. Schutjer: Yeah. Exactly. I would -- I would guess that the top of that roof is about 20 feet and so you definitely could build something on top of that. To -- to get the proper objective as far as covering the area, you know, you have to build something fairly -- fairly reasonable in size and, quite honestly, from an esthetic standpoint. alight pole replacement that's not going to stand out is going to look a lot better than something on top of the roof and roof top mounts, co-locations on top of roofs are very typical and we do those where possible, but I think with the limited height of that building, I think that would stand out a lot more to citizens and the passers by, than something on top of the roof or, excuse me, than this light pole replacement. That's a great question. I -- I don't know if that answers your question, but think you're getting into something that is going to stand out more anyway. But that's -- that's certainly an option. Height would be an issue there in getting to an optimal height to cover the area and to justify spending the money, so -- Zaremba: Okay. Well, that -- the building is shorter than I was anticipating it and I was thinking a shorter tower if it was a taller building, but -- Schutjer: Yeah. It's asingle -- it's just asingle -- single level. I would say 20 foot might be -- might be taller than it is, actually, so -- Zaremba: Thank you. Schutjer: Yeah. You bet. De Weerd: Okay. Council, any other questions? Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 26 of 35 Bird: Madam Mayor? De Weerd: Mr. Bird. Bird: I might have -- this might have went over my head, but what is the height of the existing light pole? I know they said the light was going to come up about 30 feet. Is that what the height of it is now? Schutjer: Correct. Bird: So, you're basically adding 20 feet more? Schutjer: Correct. Which is a permitted use within that -- within the industrial light area. And as far as the other, if I could, just -- I mean the -- one of the big issues I see with the parcel is the -- the equipment at the base of the -- at the base of the tower is really what could interfere with, you know, locating it and meeting that setback requirement. If you go further, you know, to the east you're -- you're getting into having to build an enclosure to -- to house that equipment and with -- with the traffic that goes through there I -- I think putting it in the corner where it is just makes the most sense. De Weerd: So, do you understand what the findings are that our needed for a variance? Schutjer: I do. De Weerd: So, what is the hardship? Schutjer: Well, the hardship -- that's a great question and I've thought a lot about that. I think one of the -- one of the hardships -- and hope -- this may not answer your question completely, but the -- I guess I look at this particular application as not a communications tower, a big ugly monstrosity, but an actual -- in essence it's a pole and so, for example, there is existing light poles that are on that property -- I mean that come down to the south on the backside of the retail space that do not meet that setback on Olive Avenue and I know those aren't communication facilities, but, you know, they are 30 foot poles that are within 20, 25 feet of -- of that road. So, I guess the -- I don't want to use the word discrimination, but I mean there is already existing poles that don't -- that don't meet that setback, so -- and with the kind of design that we are proposing, I -- I think that that's -- especially from an esthetic standpoint makes a lot of sense. De Weerd: So, there is not another pole location that meets all of the criteria? Schutjer: There is one. Can I show it to you? Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 27 of 35 Nary: Use this mike here. Schutjer: Thank you. There is one pole that's right here in this park island that does meet the requirements. There is additional clearance from -- from this main artery street. I think it has to be 150 feet from Eagle Road and a hundred feet from here. There is a pole right here, but the issue that -- that I see with this location is that at the base of the tower you're building that block wall enclosure, which, you know, is going to be six foot high or whatever and you have all this traffic coming around here through this drive-thru, through this drive-thru, and I think this becomes more of perhaps a public safety issue, being in this island as far as -- as far as view through the -- through the circle there, so -- does that answer your question? De Weerd: Uh-huh. Okay. Borton: Madam Mayor? De Weerd: Yes, Mr. Borton. Borton: Rocky, Idon't -- I don't know the specifics of how the business location works, but do you have an opportunity to utilize a facility across the street, one of the commercial roof tops over there that's higher than 20 feet? Schutjer: To the -- to the west you're talking? Borton: No. Across to the east. Schutjer: To the east? Borton: Across Eagle Road. Schutjer: Okay. Borton: Unless that location is -- Schutjer: No. That's -- that's certainly the same area that we are trying to cover, but I think those building root tops are not that much taller. You're talking about the big -- the big lot shopping stores. Yeah. They are not that much taller than what's existing on this parcel. They could be taller, but the 50 feet that we are proposing, there is definitely nothing in that range, so -- Bird: Madam Mayor? De Weerd: Mr. Bird. Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 28 of 35 Bird: Rocky, if you put -- if you put one of those antennas up on top of a building, do you still have to have the -- the base of it covered -- you know, surrounded with -- you use block if it's down on the ground, as I understand, around the base and you can put a screen or something up around on the building. Do you have to still do that? Schutjer: No. In fact, the block requirement is something that I learned from the planners of the city. We -- in fact, on my drawing it shows chain link around the equipment at the bottom and Iwas -- I was told that it had to be a block enclosure, so that's where that came from and I could be wrong on that, Caleb, but anyway -- Bird: Well, what do you do -- what do you do when you put it on the roof, put another chain link around it? Schutjer: No. We wouldn't enclose it. The chain link is strictly for access and for keeping us secure. Bird: Here. Schutjer: Yeah. Bird: Okay. Schutjer: So, yeah, there is -- roof tops we don't -- we don't put fence around the equipment. Zaremba: Madam Mayor? De Weerd: Uh-huh. Zaremba: Is there a required distance between -- between where this equipment that needs to be in the enclosure is and where the actual tower is -- I realize the farther apart those are the more expensive it is for the cable or whatever -- Schutjer: Sure. Zaremba: -- to connect them, but is there a point at which -- what is it you would lose impedance or something like that? The resistance to signals traveling through? Is there a point at which you cannot move the pole -- the tower any farther from the equipment? What is that distance? Schutjer: It's -- the distances are large. What happens is is the size of the coax cable, the farther you get away from the actual antenna, which is at the top of the tower, gets bigger, so there is no loss in the -- of signal -- of signal strength in the -- in the line. So, there -- I mean there certainly are limits. I mean if you -- we work, you know 150, 200 Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 29 of 35 feet is getting really long with cable. So, you can go long, but you beef up the cables, so your conduits are bigger, et cetera, et cetera, so -- Zaremba: Madam Mayor? Mr. Hood, if you could go back one drawing. That one. The reason I was asking that question is even though I know you're trying to locate it where there is an existing pole, is whether or not your equipment could still be there, but the -- if you could move the pole down this property line a little bit, whether you hung a light on it or not -- not. to get it too far away from your equipment, but even if you went like 20 feet -- 20 or 30 feet down that -- that property line and put it -- my hand's shaking a little bit. But you can see where I'm aiming to say. You would be much farther -- this road is also curving away from you. Schutjer: Right. Zaremba: You would be much farther away from that and is there a possible solution like that? Schutjer: That's -- that's certainly feasible, yeah. Like I say, we were just looking for existing structures and not to add structures and so that's why I kind of chose that location and -- Zaremba: You have to take the existing pole down anyhow; right? Schutjer: Correct. Zaremba: So, you're, essentially, building this from scratch. Schutjer: Right. Except there would be one more pole on the property. But, yeah, that's -- and that is feasible. We are -- we are just trying to work with existing structures, so -- yeah. De Weerd: Okay. Council, anything further? Bird: I have none. De Weerd: Thank you. Is there anyone here who would like to provide testimony on this application? Okay. Council, seeing no further testimony, what would you like to do? Borton: Madam Mayor? De Weerd: Mr. Borton. Borton: I move that we close the Public Hearing on Item 12, VAR 07-016. Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 30 of 35 Zaremba: Second. De Weerd: Okay. I have a motion and a second to close the Public Hearing on this item. All those in favor say aye. All ayes. Motion carried. MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES. De Weerd: Any discussion? Borton: Madam Mayor? Zaremba: Madam Mayor? De Weerd: Yes. Zaremba: Oh, I'm sorry. Borton: Go ahead. Zaremba: I was just going to comment that I appreciate the thought that it would be a stealth tower. I'm having difficulty making the finding that there is an undue hardship, given that it could be moved along the property line a little bit and still not be too far from the equipment. I guess that's my answer. I have trouble finding the hardship part. De Weerd: Any other comments? Borton: Madam Mayor? De Weerd: Yes, Mr. Borton. Borton: I agree with staffs analysis. I understand the applicant's in a difficult situation. But there are particular findings that we have to make a record of to grant a variance. In light of the -- in light of the applicant's comments, I can't make those findings. The only -- the only stretch, as I listen to the discussion to try and find some sort of characteristic of the site is that it doesn't contain a natural 50 foot mound upon which to place the top of this tower. It's unfortunately 50 feet too flat, so -- and without the findings available, would be inclined to deny the variance request. De Weerd: Okay. Rountree: I have nothing to add, Madam Mayor. De Weerd: Okay. Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 31 of 35 Borton: Madam Mayor? De Weerd: Mr. Gorton. Borton: If there is no additional discussion, f would move that we deny Item 12, VAR 07-016. Rountree: Second. Zaremba: Second. De Weerd: Okay. I have a motion and a second on Item 12. Any discussion? Rountree: Madam Mayor? De Weerd: Mr. Rountree. Rountree: Though I agree with what Mr. Borton said, I -- I do appreciate the effort that the applicant's gone to in terms of this stealth aspect and meeting the other requirement of the city ordinance, but given his final statements about the feasibility of another location on the site, a finding otherwise is very difficult to make, so -- De Weerd: Any further discussion? Mrs. Smith, will you, please, call roll. Roll-Call: Bird, yea; Rountree, yea; Zaremba, yea; Borton, yea. MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES. Item 13: Continued Public Hearing from September 18, 2007: AZ 07-006 Request for Annexation and Zoning of 94.69 acres from RUT to a C-G zone for Pinebridge by Stanley Consultants -south of East Fairview Avenue, east of North Locust Grove Road and west of North Eagle Road: Item 14: Continued Public Hearing from September 18, 2007: RZ 07-010 Request for a Rezone of 75.67 acres from I-L and L-O zones to a C-G zone for Pinebridge by Stanley Consultants -south of East Fairview Avenue, east of North Locust Grove Road and west of North Eagle Road: Item 15: Continued Public Hearing from September 18, 2007: PP 07-008 Request for Preliminary Plat approval of 61 building lots and 21 common lots on 170 +/- acres in a proposed C-G zone for Pinebridge by Stanley Consultants -south of East Fairview Avenue, east of North Locust Grove Road and west of North Eagle Road: Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 32 of 35 Item 16: Continued Public Hearing from September 18, 2007: VAR 07-007 Request for a Variance Application for two access points to North Eagle Road for Pinebridge by Stanley Consultants -south of East Fairview Avenue, east of North Locust Grove Road and west of North Eagle Road: De Weerd: Okay. Items 12 -- or 13, 14, 15 and 16 have also been requested to continue to October 16th. Council, do I have a motion? Bird: Madam Mayor? De Weerd: Mr. Bird. Bird: I move we continue the public hearings for AZ 07-006, RZ 07-010, PP 07-008, and VAR 07-007, until October 16th, 2007. Rountree: Second. De Weerd: Okay. I have a motion and a second to continue Items 13 through 16 to October 16th. All those in favor say aye. All ayes. Motion carries. MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES. Item 17: Public Hearing: PP 07-014 Request for Preliminary Plat approval for 34 commercial /retail building lots and 1 common lot on 17.84 acres within the C-G zone for Emerson Park Commercial by Kuna Victory, LLC - 2910 & 3030 South Meridian Road and 110 East Victory Road: Item 18: Public Hearing: PFP 07-003 Request for a Combined Preliminary /Final Plat approval of 4 commercial lots on 6 acres located in the C-G zoning district for Intermountain Outdoor Subdivision by Carmen, LLC - 1351 & 1375 East Fairview Avenue: De Weerd: Items 17 and 18 have also been requested to continue. Bird: Are you going to open the public hearings? De Weerd: Yes. And I will open these two public hearings, but I do have a question to our clerk's office on how the agenda is looking on the 16th. Rountree: Pretty full. Smith: It is getting full, Madam Mayor. Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 33 of 35 De Weerd: So, we may want to not contin following week on the 23rd. So, I will ope PFP 07-003 and ask for Council's direction two items to. ue these to the 16th, but rather the -- the n up the Public Hearing on PP 07-014 and on when they would like to continue these Bird: Madam Mayor? De Weerd: Mr. Bird. Bird: I agree with you wholeheartedly and I think that we should continue these to the 23rd. Rountree: Is that a motion? Bird: I make a motion that we continue PP 07-014 to -- seeings how they are not the same item, I'll do them separately -- to October 23rd, 2007. Rountree: Second. De Weerd: Okay. I have a motion and a second to continue Items 17 and 18 to October 23rd. All those in favor say aye. All ayes. Motion carries. MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES. Item 19: Ordinance No. 07-1341 AZ 07-007 Request for Annexation and Zoning of 1.56 acres from RUT to R-8 zone for Amar Ca?_ Wapoot by LandPro Development, Inc. - 2400 West Wapoot Drive: De Weerd: Okay. Item 19 is 07-1341. I will ask the Deputy Clerk to, please, read this by title only. Smith: Thank you, Madam Mayor, Members of the Council. This is a reading of City of Meridian Ordinance 07-1341. An ordinance for annexation of a parcel of land located in the northeast quarter of the southwest quarter of Section 26, Township 4 North, Range 1 West, Boise Meridian, Ada County, Idaho, described in Attachment A and annexing certain lands and territories situated in Ada County, Idaho, and adjacent and contiguous to the corporate limits of the City of Meridian, as requested by the City of Meridian, establishing and determining the land use classification of said lands from RUT, Ada County, to R-4, low density residential district, in the Meridian City Code and providing that copies of this ordinance shall be filed with the Ada County assessor, the Ada County recorder, the Idaho State Tax Commission, as required by law, and providing for a summary of the ordinance and providing for a waiver of the reading of rules and providing an effective date. Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 34 of 35 De Weerd: You have heard this ordinance read by title only. Is there anyone who would like to hear it read in its entirety? Seeing none, Council, do I have a motion? Bird: Madam Mayor? De Weerd: Mr. Bird. Bird: I move we approve Ordinance No. 07-1341 with suspension of rules. Nary: Second. Zaremba: Second. De Weerd: Okay. I have a motion and a second to approve Item 19. If there is no discussion, Mrs. Smith, will you call roll. Roll-Call: Bird, yea; Rountree, yea; Zaremba, yea; Borton, yea. MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES. De Weerd: Thank you. We are at the end of our agenda. Rountree: Madam Mayor? De Weerd: Mr. Rountree. Rountree: I move we adjourn. Bird: Second. De Weerd: All those in favor? MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES. De Weerd: We are adjourned. MEETING ADJOURNED AT 8:24 P.M. Meridian City Council October 2, 2007 Page 35 of 35 (TAPE ON FILE OF THESE PROCEEDINGS) ATTESTED: MAYOR TA de WEERD,,~`~.~'~ ~'~,,~ -~ r ~.~TED: ~1~~11ItI ll itt~~~~\\ `~ ! ~ b ~ D 7 DATE APPROVED SMITH, DEPUTl((CIT'(~ CLERK