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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2007 12-11Meridian City Council Special Workshop Meeting December 11, 2007 A meeting of the Meridian City Council was called to order at 6:00 p.m., Tuesday, December 11, 2007, by President Joe Borton. Members Present: Keith Bird, Charlie Rountree, and Joe Borton. Members Absent: Mayor Tammy de Weerd and David Zaremba. Others Present: Bill Nary, Will Berg, Anna Canning, Joe Silva, Len Grady, Keith Watts, Matt Ellsworth., Pete Friedman, Tracy Basterrechea, and Dean Willis. Item 1: Roll-call Attendance: Roll call. 0 David Zaremba X Joe Borton X Charlie Rountree X Keith Bird 0 Mayor Tammy de Weerd Item 2: Adoption of the Agenda: Gorton: Moved and seconded to adopt the agenda as published. All those in favor say aye. MOTION CARRLED: THREE AYES. ONE ABSENT. Item 3: COMMUNITY ITEMS /PRESENTATIONS (b) Update on City Hall Building -Petra, Inc. & LCA Architects Borton: Item No. 3. We have got a list of community items and presentations, but first, Gene, we are going to have you come forward, before we go on our tour across the street and give us your update and, then, we will head across over there, if that works out. Bennett: That's fine. Thank you, Chairman, for -- Members of the City Council. I have two documents before you tonight. First is a monthly report for December and that's for your .review and the second item of business that I bring before you is the low bidders on plaza -- for plaza work and those are listed before you. The companies listed are the low bidders. Their paperwork is complete, bonds are current. Public Works numbers are on file and they are qualified for their specific bid packages and they have a noted addendum one for the bid. It will end in December -- or November. We need to make award within 30 days, which would be prior to Christmas and so I leave this for your review and approval. Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 2 of 46 Bird: Mr. President? Borton: Mr. Bird. Bird: Gene, would you explain that this is not complete on the plaza? Bennett: That's correct. You will see that bid package number three is yet to bid. Bid package three is the concrete and the water feature. If you will turn to section four of your monthly report that bid package will bid in the tail end of January and we have estimated what that bid package is going to allow, have here for bid with an allowance. That will bring in the -- the plaza somewhere between 2.2 and 1.7 million dollars, depending on which alternates you decide to take at that time, so we will bring back to you that decision in February. The overall project budget is behind that on the next two sheets, depending on which alternates you pick, building construction in total on the second sheet will be somewhere between 19.9 and 20.4 million, depending on which alternate you take in February. Bird: Mr. President? Borton: Mr. Bird. Bird: One more clarification. Gene, these plaza bids, it's a full bid and, then, on some of the alternates, which are deducts, that we will take that off later; right? Bennett: That's correct. This is for the full amount. The contracts would be awarded. It's a provision that we can take those alternates in February at the`same price that they bid and those contractors have agreed to that. Borton: Counsel, do you want to bring these back on the 18th? Bird: You know, we have got to get -- Rountree: We could do them now. Bird: We could -- I could do them tonight. I have no problem with it. Rountree: Comment from Keith? Watts: Well, Ijust -- Keith clarified my -- my concern, too. I just wanted you to know, as Gene talks about the alternates, the 2.1 is as specified in the drawings and what we originally intended. Bennett: That's correct. Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 3 of 46 Bird: And that's just an estimate, because we haven't -- we haven't got building package three in. Bennett: Correct. Bird: And.., hopefully, they will sharpen their pencils. Mr. President, Iwould -- Borton: Mr. Bird. Bird: --Iwould have no problem making a motion now to accept the bids for the new City Hall plaza site work, Terra West for 338,000; landscaping, Sunshine Landscape, $199,678.75. Masonry, Alpha Masonry, $194,585. Metal is KB Fabrication is $130,450. Mechanical is Page Mechanical Group for $29,064. And Tri-State Electric has the electrical for $344,090. Rountree: I'll second that motion. Watts: Iwould -- Borton: It's been moved and seconded. Keith. Watts: Can we also include to authorize the Mayor to sign and the Clerk to attest to the AIA document contracts as modified by our legal department? Bird: We would allow the -- that would be included in my deal, but I -- the Mayor isn't here, so it would be the Council President and the Clerk to attest. Watts: Okay. Rountree: Second agrees. Watts: Thank you. Borton: Thanks, Keith. Any further discussion? Bird: I have none. Rountree: I have none. Borton: No further comments, it's been moved and seconded to approve the bid packages for phase four as described. Mr. Berg, would you please call roll. Roll-Call: Bird, yea; Rountree, yea; Zaremba, absent; Borton, yea. Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 4 of 46 MOTION CARRIED: THREE AYES. ONE ABSENT Borton: Thanks, Gene. (a) Tour New City Hall Building Construction Site -Petra, Inc. Bennett: Thank you. Are we headed over for the tour'? Borton: We are headed over for the tour. (Recess.. ) (c) Arts Commission Update -Meg Peters -Arts Commission Chair Borton: Item 3-B -- or, excuse me, 3-C, Arts Commission update. Meg Glasgow, Nancy Rountree, welcome. I don't know who is -- Meg, you're up. Thanks for coming. Peters: This is wonderful. I am going to pass along some notes. Well, Mr. Councilman and Council members, we are happy to be here and we are happy to report that we have been busy at work for the last nine months we have been at it and I have kind of detailed a few things that we -- we have accomplished in the short time that we have been in existence and that is, first of all., developing our logo, which is designed by Ann Hottinger. We are grateful for her donation in kind services for that. We have created our slogan, which is Take Part in the Arts, which is something we wanted to really be proactive in letting the community know about our role as being advocates for the arts. We have met initially with LCA Architects and seen the plans, the potential for public art in City Hall and after hearing the plaza plans tonight and seeing the facility, we are really excited to be -- become more involved with certainly planning with the architect and hearing the opportunities there are for City Hall and so I'm hoping to get more involved in that and be involved in the meetings as we were planning in the very short about securing financing for public arts in City Hall and we will talk about that more in just a minute. We sponsored our first concert during the Scarecrow Festival. We received our first 500 dollar corporate donation from Key Bank, so we are grateful for them for supporting the arts. We have also recently just assisted the parks department with holiday decorations. You notice the banners we have downtown on Main Street, as well as giving some artistic input to that. We were -- our committee has been joined by members of the Youth Advisory Council, so we are seeking outside input. Recently, we have done a couple community outreach presentations what the Meridian Arts Commission is doing.. We have presented to the Meridian Chamber of Commerce last week and Thursday morning I present to the Meridian Kiwanis Club. And we have also appointed subcommittees, chairs are listed below, subcommittees for finance, web development, events and public art. So, we felt like we could accomplish more if we Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 5 of 46 kind of divided and conquered there. Looking ahead to 2008, we have avery -- very big ambition and we are certainly limited by both time and money, but what we have set forth for ourselves is, first, we have seen the incredible need for strategic planning regarding public art policy and that's -- I'm working with city leaders, people in the art community, parks and rec to put together a comprehensive strategic plan that models the city's Comprehensive Plan in identifying places for public art throughout the City of Meridian. That would also include a partnering with MDC, looking for possibilities of public art spaces, working in the redevelopment area as well. In helping us with the strategic planning, we find that hiring outside expertise is going to be critical for us to move forward. We are a good natured group with big hearts, but certainly we know our own limitations on our areas of expertise and we are lucky enough in our area to have a gal Delta James, who just recently left the Idaho Commission on the Arts to go into a private practice and she has prepared a proposal for contracted services for me that I'm hoping to get approved and those professional services would include helping us with a three day -- or three hour planning session, a two day workshop on strategic planning, as well as write our grants for us as well.. So, in the short term -- I mean she is ready once these documents are signed., the contract's signed, ;she's ready to get started work on Monday and which is critical, because as it would have it, the deadline for us applying fora 10,000 dollar grant is the end of January and we would like to secure -- do our best to secure that grant to use that money to purchase art for City Hall. So, we are looking ahead to that, so we are hoping to get some input from the Council on that. Borton: Meg? Peters: Yes. Borton: If I could interrupt real quick, has that proposal gone to the legal department yet to take a look at? Peters: It has gone -- Emily Kane received a copy of -- including the amendment. Would you like me to leave it with you? Nary: She has it. Borton: Okay. Peters: She's got it. So, she's reviewing it and she said that there were a couple just little notes that she had to make on it and it was going forward. So, I'm hoping that that can be taken care of quickly, so we can get going and so we will work on that. Borton: Okay. Peters: Purchasing art for public -- or public art for City Hall is certainly first on our agenda and that requires a lot of pre-planning that Delta, James has agreed to help us Meridian city Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 6 of 46 with, as well as putting policies in place on how to go about the selection for the public arts. I mentioned MDC and fostering the development of public art downtown. We certainly see a huge opportunity there and we want to provide helpful input. Adoption of an art in public spaces ordinance we see as kind of the key piece of this equation. Many cities throughout the state of Idaho, as well as nationally, have adopted a percent for art, so like, for example, Boise, I believe, is a one percent for every capital improvement goes to public art for that project. That we see as a critical funding source for public art moving forward and so we are looking at that option. We have also talked about a Take Part in the Arts arts and humanity advocacy series to bring awareness to the arts that already exists in Meridian, as well as fostering and developing community awareness. We are preparing a web database of artists, events, resources and info. Initially this is going to be the MAC -- the MAC page as part of the Meridian city web page and we are already working with the IT department on that. We have just established our own a-mail account, so we are moving rapidly forward with that. Seeking corporate and private sponsorship funding for the arts is on our agenda., too, and Nancy Rountree is chairing that committee. Ultimately, looking for a performing arts center in Meridian, because as I found out in a meeting that I attended today with BVAP and Eagle Arts Commission, Boise Arts Commission, Nampa Arts Commission, that what we lack in coming to the table and trying to recruit a national ballet company out of San Francisco looking at relocating in the greater Treasure Valley, what Meridian cannot offer, although we are the fastest growing city and we have a great population base, as they are looking for, you know, audience goers, what we lack is a public performing arts space. So, that's something that we certainly need to be thinking about -- forward thinking and I just heard that Eagle is pursuing -- they have got some land set aside that they are looking at putting one in. They are like three to five years out I heard on that. But I thought, gosh, our city is quite a bit larger and I would just hope that we can kind of pursue that a little more seriously going forward. So, that is what we have going on. I'm certainly open to any questions if you have any other comments for me. Borton: Thanks, Meg. Peters: I wanted to make you aware of what we have got going on. Borton: It sounds like the first thing on the burner is the proposal from Delta to get that back before Council for us to discuss and review. That's going to guide a lot of your plan in '08, so -- Nary: Mr. President? Borton: Yes. Nary: Mr. President, Members of the Council, I did speak with Mrs. Kane this afternoon and she was reviewing that document. I'm hopeful that we could have it on your Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 , Page 7 of 46 agenda, then, for next Tuesday, since you don't have another meeting for a few weeks after that. Do you want that on for a discussion item as well? Borton: Yes. Nary: Okay. So, maybe we will put it on as a department report, so that there is an opportunity for discussion and maybe Mrs. Glasgow if you could be here again, so -- Borton: That's great. Peters: Okay. Nary: Peters. I'm sorry. Rountree: Meg, I know you're new at this and it's -- it's always tough to get something like this going, but is there anything that the city can do in the way of guidance or fostering information exchange, et cetera, particularly in the strategic planning piece for the public that -- Peters: I think -- yes. I think there is a lot that the city could do. It's really going to take a collaboration. When you're talking about establishing a public art policy, it's going to require a people certainly with artistic vision, but also people that are interested in, you know, certainly identifying where it's going to be placed, how it's going to be maintained, how the selection of the artist is going to happen. I mean it needs to be a very very public process in getting public input and whatnot. So, I. think it's going to be important to -- for the Meridian Arts Commission to have a liaison with the City Council, as well as MDC, in the short term here working with the architect i;n talking about planning public art spaces with the new building. We have got that on our agenda for the short term. I think it's going to be critical that there be a lot of collaboration and communication among ail the agencies. Rountree: Has a liaison been established at this point? Peters: Joe has been working with us and attending -- attending some of our meetings. Borton: Very spotty. Rountree: That's your duty as president. Bird: That's great. You're doing a good job. Mr. President? Borton: Mr. Bird. Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 8 of 46 Bird.: Meg, I agree wholeheartedly and it's been a dream of mine for years to have a Nampa Civic Center sitting in Meridian. I can't figure out -- I can't talk them into moving it over here, but -- I don't want -- I don't want that to die and we can't do it as a city on the whole. We can help, I think. But we need to really work at it from the private part and get something, because I feel that could be the centerpiece of Meridian, Idaho, to have something like that where we could have ballet performances, concerts, plays -- Peters: That's right. We have got, you know, that New Heritage Theater Company in town,, we have got the Meridian symphony -- there is certainly enough organizations to keep a place like that. Bird: We don't want to put that on the back burner, we want to keep that out front. Peters: Great. Well, I'm glad to hear your enthusiasm. Bird: I have discussed it with a couple of people, hopefully, they can come through with some cash. Peters: That would be great. That would be wonderful. Borton: Meg., we love what you guys are doing and how you're going about it. You're not getting lost in the forest. You know, I think this attack of trying to get the strategic planning set first is a great idea and as much as contact -- it sounds like you had from -- you met somebody over at City Hall tonight to communicate with -- Peters: Yes. In fact, I have met with the LCA architect that was here tonight and we are going to set up a meeting and talk about spots that they have identified for public art, so we can move forward in going through the, you know, soliciting for artists. Borton: Super. Awesome. Peters: Okay. Rountree: Just a final thing, Joe. At least from this Council person, I can, obviously, every evening thank my wife for the time she puts in, but express our thanks to your committee for taking on a challenging activity. Anytime you do create something new it takes time. I know it's frustrating, having done -- not a number of these in the city, but once you get rolling and once you find that spot, it will be more rewarding and keep up the good work. We appreciate it. Peters: Thank you very much. Appreciate it. Borton: Thanks, Meg. We will see you next week. Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 9 of 46 Peters: All right. Perfect. (d) ACHD Roundabout Siting & Design Critera -Peter Friedman -Planning Dept Borton: Thanks. Thank you, Nancy. Well done. Item D on tonight's agenda we have got materials passed out before today and, then, again today some additional materials, so I'll turn it over to Pete to start the next presentation. Friedman: Thank you, Council President Borton, Members of the Council. Item D has been put on your agenda as the ACHD roundabout siting and design criteria, but, really, when we planned tonight's Council presentation we wanted to bill it as everything roundabouts and so we have three presentations for you tonight. Justin Bledsoe from ACHD will be here -- is here to discuss the Amity Road core intersection study, which they looked at traditional intersection designs, as well as roundabout designs. Eric Drose from ACHD is here to talk about the draft design criteria that the highway district is developing for roundabouts and, then, Deanna Smith and Rocky Bogart are here to give you kind of a general presentation on roundabouts. A lot of it is information that Councilmember Rountree and I saw in a presentation last year by a roundabout consultant that's been doing a lot of work in the area and most particularly working on the Harris Ranch project in Boise. So, we are going to turn the discussion -- turn the presentation over to those folks. On your agenda it said action needed to endorse or modify recommendations for transportation task force. That, actually, is a misprint and goes to Item E, which will follow this. So, tonight is a presentation on roundabouts for you and I'm going to turn it over, I believe, you're going to kick off first? You want to do the Amity Road study or do you want to do the design? Borton: Is there a schedule issue? Friedman: Okay. Drose: President Borton, Council members, my name is Eric Drose, I'm an assistant traffic engineer with the highway department and I have copies of the guidelines here. I don't know if you guys want some sleeping material, but I could give you guys one of these. Rountree: That way you won't have to take them back home. Borton: Yeah. Lighten your load. Drose: I will warn you I have never spoken in front of an elected body before, so if I mess up a little bit, forgive me. Bird.: Don't worry about it. Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 10 of 46 Rountree: We will correct you. Drose: This was -- this was a slide I was thinking we were going to go after these guys over here, but we are not. So, the question is is this the modern roundabout that we are dealing with here in the United States? No. No. This is a giant rotary. They haven't looked at the path, it's kind of a mess out there. Now, here is a question. This one's kind of local. This one's out in Paramount Subdivision. Is this a roundabout? The question is no. It's a circular roadway, but it's not a modern roundabout. You can see the stop on there. This car back in the back over here, this guy is parked, actually. Everybody comes up, makes left turns in front of it, I have seen someone parked in the middle of it before. So, this is part of why we had to come up with some guidelines. We need to get this down on the ground before we get anymore of these out there that we have to worry about. Give you a quick history. Thirteen years ago Terry Little, our department manager, wanted to get a set of guidelines going, but he got scared off, because we weren't sure about pedestrians at the time. Well, things have come around now and, actually, the public is demanding them so much that they made us look at them again and we weren't still going to do it. Okay. We always thought we were on the cutting edge, but we kind of fell off. There is -- you know, Canyon county now has one, so -- and there is 20 proposed out there, we figure we better get on the ball. So, we have -- we didn't want to just sit down with a bunch of engineers to do this, you know, they can kind of be bull headed and you come up with something that no one would like. So, we figure we better come up with a steering committee with people from the -- you know, from your sector we got Matt Ellsworth, he was on the steering committee, Kenny Bowers., we had utilities contacts, policeman -- we are trying to get a general feel from everybody's concerns on these guys. Go ahead, Matt. We didn't just go off of one consultant and these -- these 17 members either, we went nationally, we got a ton of experts to give their inputs, and from that we decided that what we are coming up with is not -- not -- you know, not meant to be the ultimate, we want -- we want trained people doing this and it shouldn't -- it will never replace the FHWA or the bigger guidelines. What we want to do is -- go ahead.. We came up with siting and design criteria to compliment those, basically. Go ahead. The siting guidelines, something you guys are probably pretty interested in. We came up with three major areas, that's the inappropriate locations, places where they are really good to have one, and ones that you're not quite sure and you need to look at it a little closer. inappropriate locations -- well, once you build this split corridor and you got all these new big, businesses here, we probably don't want to tear out a corner to put in a roundabout, so with the costs of right of way in, you know, urban core is probably not the best place. This one may never be a big one here in Idaho, not yet at least. You know, if you have got more people than cars at a location, you probably don't want a roundabout. Here is another one that if you're in San Francisco it's a big deal, but here not so much. Four percent. We have a few sloping hills that may come into there. And for now the two lane, the 50,000 max, is kind of what the -- the limit of what you can do without a -- without looking at it pretty close. Where they are good at is high accident Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 11 of 46 locations, you know, if you get a three leg intersection or an odd ball one, they can really help there. They can increase capacity, especially on the smaller ones. If you don't have a lot of -- for cues, they tend to move cues out faster, so they are good there. Gateways. This is probably a big one for you guys, you know, separate yourself from I<una a little more, we are going to put these on the edge of our area. And if you -- they can be used to help speeding. You got to slow way down to get into them. Now, where you get in the tricky part is so in the middle, a set of five signals, is that roundabout going to take the platooning away from it or not. It's something that can be analyzed and that's what we expect the consultants to do. Some grades of four percent, if they flatten out, you're not sure, they will take a more detailed analysis. Close to a railroad track, where a signal will -- you can put a red light on one leg and you can't get to the railroad track, with a roundabout you can, you got to do some pretty good analysis to make sure it doesn't happen like that. Large splits -- you know, I have heard everything from -- some consultants out there say, oh, 60-40 and you can't do that anymore. Well, I'm thinking more 80-20 and you do a detailed analysis and prove to me that it still won't work, but a good designer should be able to make it work, so it's something you have got to look at. And if you have got a huge canal on a corner or some, you know, big -- one of those monster power poles you got on Franklin there, you may -- a signal may end up working better. We look at four types, the mini, urban compact, single lane and double lane in our guidelines. There is a whole bunch of stuff that you guys probably aren't all that interested in. I could bore you to death with circle size and the truck apron and I'm going to try to skip on that. If you have questions about it, go ahead and hit me, but I'll go to the stuff you might be a little more interested in. Lanes I want to touch on again. Right now we are only looking at -- at two lane roundabouts. There is not a ton of three lavers out there across the states. There is a lot of conflicting information if they are -- if the accident rates actually decrease once you get that big or not. So, we are just -- we also know that this is a work in progress, these things are changing every year, and we plan on looking at this again in five years, if new data comes in, then, we will increase the -- what we think is acceptable size around here. Our goal is just to get them in the ground right now. Borton: Eric, is Figure Two, from what you have passed out, the two lane that you're .making reference to? Drose: Hold on a second. Bird: That's a two lane right there, isn't it? Drose: Mr. President., Council members; that would be the equivalent of a five by five intersection. A two lane would be -- yeah, this would be a two lane, the one up on the -- Borton: Okay. Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 12 of 46 Drose: It's a single lane roundabout. A dual lane -- you're thinking -- looking at a dual lane roundabout there. Borton: Okay. Drose: Which is equivalent to a five by five. Sorry. Gorton: Okay. Bird: There is dual lanes in here. The one at Nampa is just a -- Drose: It's asingle -- Bird: Yeah. I'm sorry. Single lane. Drose: Councilmember, yes, it's a single that's planned to be expanded to a dual as -- as they -- as they grow out there. As development comes in each corner they are going to require them to do the landscaping, sidewalks, and everything else. Bird: Let me ask you a question. I have never seen -- and I haven't been on a lot of roundabouts. Bend, Oregon, is the best example, they got about six in three miles on one road. But I have never seen one signalized.. You signalize them at all, do you? Drose: No. There is some concern with ADA requirements coming up that possibly it looks like more of the dual lane roundabouts, the -- where the ADA might push some sort of ped signal on the end of them, and they are throwing around a couple different new ideas. Bird.: That actually gets -- that's -- in my thinking, that actually takes away the theory of a roundabout, if you -- if you have to signalize it. Drose: Yeah. And that's why they are fighting back and forth. They know these things are good., they are good and safe for people, they are not sure how safe they are for -- most of the time -- 99 percent of the pedestrians they are safer for; right? It's the blind where you can't hear the differential directions on a normal intersection, they are not sure about on these, and they are coming up with not full signals, they are thinking more of these little hocks that would be for each crossing, you only cross one direction at a time, right, so it would be just stopping there for a few seconds while they get across and, then, cross again. Bird: Is there -- I don't foresee us in years of having a roundabout in pedestrian friendly locations. I mean you can see -- you can look at Amity and Happy Valley, which is where the one over at Nampa is, and I'm sure they put that in because of the school there and it was an area and they had a lot of accidents there and it's calmed it down Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 13 of 46 and -- and I don't see much pedestrian traffic at those and the five or six that's over at Bend, (wouldn't -- I mean you wouldn't be walking on that. Drose: Well, the one at 36th and Hill and Catalpa is right next to the junior high, it's going to have a ton of kids and that will be a dual lane. It's really -- it's still a lot safer, instead of having to cross both directions with a turn lane or so, they only cross one direction there is still -- it's a crossing guard right now, anyways, out there, so, then, they will just have a crossing guard for smaller sections. So, we think it's going to be just as safe or safer for them. Bird.: Thank you. Drose: I think I have touched on lanes enough. Something you guys are probably pretty interested in . is what can we do for these guys out there. They -- we really encourage landscaping and art in the middle, basically. What we don't want is things that have intricate details or legends, something that we don't want to drag pedestrians to it. That's forbidden.. That's taboo. No fountains out there. Fountains are huge kid collectors. The funny thin is without these guidelines we are getting tons of requests for that sort of thing, fountains, and, oh, it will make our subdivision so much prettier. Well., great, you got your kids out there playing in it. Let's go back a second. The splitter islands -- we did -- a lot of standards out there say six foot. The pedestrian crossing, if you see it in between them there, we went with eight that would hold a bicycle and a kid carrier behind it, kind of stretch that out. And you can put landscaping in those, as long as you're not impacting your sight distance, so it would have to be low shrubs in those guys. Bird.: Do you elevate the center? Drose: Yes, you do. You don't -- you don't want people to see across to the other side, to give them the impression that they could go straight through, especially at night where you can see the other headlights coming at you, so it's kind of a -- it's a safety thing that adds to it. A lot of this will be answered in their overview, so I have kind of skipped over a lot of this. Sorry. Practical ped facilities. Like I was saying before, you cross one direction of travel at a time. We want them perpendicular to the road, so they are as short as possible crossings. The yield line will hold a car in front of it, so when a car is coming up they will have to stop on either side of it to -- to give the pedestrian more access. Of course, now everything is ADA compliant, so we have that written in the guidelines. Bike lanes -- bikes have to think of this two ways, either you're the serious biker and you take the lane -- because we slow them down, these are designed to slow down traffic to about the speed of a serious commuter bicycle, 20 miles an hour range.. The ones that don't feel comfortable in that we are leaving -- down at the bottom of that picture little angle ramps for them to exit and get off into the -- the sidewalks around it and walk their way around it where they feel safe. Access control -- we haven't changed as much. Basically, it's the same as what we have got in our policy Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 14 of 46 manual right now. Where we can't get full access, saying right-in, right-out -- there is some -- there is a little bit of discussion now on the locals in an established area if someone has a driveway right on the corner there is -- there is some train of thought out there that you can actually exit into the roundabout itself if the volumes are low enough. So, that's another possibility we might put in there. With the Happy Valley -Amity, one of the big things is expandability. We are growing so much around here, we really need to look at making these so they are -- so in five years, the way we are growing, we got to build them out another lane and there is -- there is pros and cons to doing inside and out. The biggest thing to it is designing it for both right off the bat. If you don't, you can get a really good single lane, but if you expand it to a dual lane you're going to have some serious problems, so it's making the consultants aware that they really got to look at both at the same time. So, from here we are sending it back to you guys. We have done our rounds of reviews. We will hopefully get one more review from all the cities. We will take it to our commission for adoption and, then, hand it out to the public, and, hopefully, get some of these built right around here. Borton: Thank you, Eric. Council, any questions for Eric or -- Bird.: He's answered all the ones I had. We will move through the rest of the proposals -- or presentations. Bledsoe: Mr. President, Council members, Justin Bledsoe, Ada County Highway District capital projects. The second part of this is the Amity corridor roundabout study. You should have received a copy of a little memo with some attachments to it last week. The purpose of this study is we wanted to take these guidelines that had been developed and see what it means in real life applications for some intersections, and so we took the Amity corridor to look at. The study looked at six intersections ranging from Eagle Road down to McDermott. We didn't do Meridian Road, obviously, it's built out with signalized intersections and a roundabout wouldn't work there.. Did some initial traffic analysis. We looked at all the different traffic forecasts that we could think of, dropped two of the intersections out, Eagle Road and Locust Grove. The forecasted traffic counts said that a two lane roundabout or a dual roundabout wouldn't work with these for long term and., then, so we went into the further analysis of the next four intersections. The only one that's currently scheduled in the near future is the Ten Mile intersection. Right now we anticipate designing that this year. If the -- if the study is adopted by the commission, then, we will jump into that design with construction scheduled for 2011. The other three intersections, two of them are on the CIP in the 11 to 20 years. One is not in the CIP, so we are 20 years out. What we plan on doing for these ones is we will take the study -- we have sketches of what the roundabouts may look like, what the impacts would be for right of way, that as those areas developed, we would be able to get the right of way necessary for when we do do a roundabout we have it and we can proceed forward. So, really, at this time what I wanted to do today is, one, update you on -- that we are -- have the study out there on Amity Road. We are looking at doing roundabouts there, continuous corridor roundabouts, and, second, Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 45 of 46 wanted to give you the opportunity to, one, either ask me questions about this or to be able to supply comments. I will be going back to our commission next Wednesday for adoption of this study and wanted to allow you the opportunity to comment, questions, or any additional information you'd like me to look at. Rountree: Mr. President? Borton: Mr. Rountree. Rountree: All the intersections you propose to do with roundabouts you propose to do as single lane initially, with expandability and you showed a cost for both single and dual lane ultimate and projected out 15 to 20 years, I think, in most cases where you would be expanding. The cost differences were not quite, but close to double between the initial construction and, then, the expansion. Does that take into account inflation and does the original right of way acquisition with the first project include all the right of way necessary for expansion and are those cost figured in with the first phase or the expanded phase? Bledsoe: Mr. President, Council member, the thought is is when you go to do the initial one, where possible you would get the right of way for the ultimate. And, then, that way you would have all the right of way up front. You could -- then, you could build out you - - you can build your single, but, yes, all of them do plan on an initial build single lane, being able to expand to a dual lane roundabout. And it all would be depending on when those traffic numbers hit to require that. Rountree: So, the initial cost of the single lane includes the cost of the ultimate right of way? Bledsoe: Yes. Rountree: Or has that been pro rated out? Bledsoe: It's not been pro rated. It's at today's dollars. Rountree: At today's dollars. And as well as the projection for the expansion based on today's dollars? Bledsoe: Correct. Rountree: Okay. Bird: Mr. President? Borton: Mr. Bird. Meridian City council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 16 of 46 Bird: What -- what's the difference between a roundabout, a single lane roundabout, I'll call it, and a signalized intersection? Bledsoe: For traffic capacity? Bird..: Well, no, for cost. Is signalized half the cost or -- Bledsoe: Mr. President, Council member, we didn't look at if you just went with a signal without the ultimate, we only looked at if you built an ultimate, basically, widened the intersection to five lanes for capacity, what did that mean versus the ultimate for a roundabout and compared., so -- and the comparison there really came out at almost the same, if you're going to blow an intersection out, add your turn lanes, versus doing a dual lane roundabout. I wouldn't be able to say if you just signalized it, because you can go out and, you know, drop poles in and if you didn't do any improvement for a fairly cheap project, but we didn't look at that for comparison purposes. Borton; Justin, I think Eric wants to -- you got to come on up into the mike if you want to add some information. Rountree: One more time. Drose: Mr. President, Council members, we looked at that in the study, we just -- we did generic -- I think you're looking for generic. If you plop two in the ground at the same day, what's the difference. Well, a little more right of way in the corners for the roundabouts, it's a little more right of way on the straight-aways for the widened road on the other ones. They actually came out to a wash. I think the single lane was 70,000 dollars more for the signal than it was for the roundabout. We didn't -- we didn't count into any cost benefits of safety or anything like that, it was just, basically, cost of right of way, plus the -- putting them in the ground. So, it's a wash. Bird: Basically, a roundabout is just as safe as a signalized., isn't it? Drose: Oh, it's -- no, it's a whole lot safer. Bird: That's what I was going to say. Drose: Yeah. There is about a quarter of the conflict points. Thank you. Gorton: Thanks, Eric. Bledsoe: Any additional questions? Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 17 of 46 Bird.: I welcome your Amity Road deal and I'd like to see one at Ten Mile and Linder and down at Black Cat and get rid of those stop signs. Well, Black Cat isn't a stop sign. Both Linder and Ten Mile are both four way stops and it's -- I think it's a good place to start. Bledsoe: We think so. Borton: Justin, this is -- it's great work. I appreciate seeing all of this information. One question that came to mind is -- is there any requirement that it's sort of all or none? You know, the success of the Amity corridor that -- that each of those intersections be built out ultimately with the roundabouts versus just having one and the rest signalized, I mean does success depend on all of it going? Bledsoe: Mr. President, no, there is -- there is -- I believe there is enough distance between them that you could have a roundabout at one location and a signal at another location. Gorton: Okay. Do you need any additional comment, action, from us, seal of approval? Kudos. .Bledsoe: It would be nice if we could just receive some -- just the City of Meridian support for roundabouts on the Amity corridor or something along that line, just so when I go back to the commission I can say this has been presented to the City of Meridian and they concur with the -- with the study. Borton: Okay. Bledsoe: It may help with it in proceeding forward. Borton: Council, any preference or comment on that? Bird: Oh, I'm a hundred percent behind it. Rountree: Sounds great to me. Let's move it forward. Bird: If he needs it in a letter form, I would recommend that we have the clerk write a letter and get it over. Gorton: Okay. When do you need that? Rountree: Pete's got a comment he wants to -- Borton: Pete. Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 18 of 46 Friedman: Mr. President, Council members, depending on what your feelings are, we would be happy to draft aletter -- Borton: That would be great. Friedman: -- of support. I think I heard that, you know, there may be support for more than one in that corridor if it's possible to -- whatever you want us to do, we would be happy to get the letter out for your. Bird: I'll take one, but two and three would be nice. Gorton: Yeah. Ten Mile for sure, but -- Bird.: Yeah. Ten Mile for sure. Gorton: The entire project. Absolutely. Okay. Bledsoe: Thank you. Borton; Thanks, Justin. Friedman: We will take care of it. Borton: Thanks, Pete. Bogart: Mr. President, Council members, it sounds like a very positive audience here, so I'm not going to worry about it too much. I'm not too nervous about it. My name is Rocky Bogart, I live at 2105 Warm Springs Avenue, Boise, Idaho. 83712. And I am a neighborhood activist, but I'm also on the ACHD bicycle advisory committee, the ACRD neighborhood advisory committee, and wrote a grant for a roundabout at Warms Springs and Penitentiary Road, which we hope some day to have in. So, I have worked on this quite a bit and to start this off, there was some concern initially that we were going oppose or counter to ACHD's proposals. That is not the intent at all. I'd love to see roundabouts, just like you, sooner rather than later. I will have a qualification on -- and ask on your recommendation to ACHD, but I will come to that in a few minutes. I just wanted to ask a point of clarification. On the cost comparisons that you had for the Amity project, I am reading that it's only 500,000 more on top of the initial build out of the roundabout by the graph here. It's not 2.5 million. But I'd like that clarified, just for the benefit of everybody. Is that -- Justin, is that -- on your chart it has an initial roundabout costs a million, ultimate build out is 1.5. Is the total two and a half or is it 1.5 for the ultimate build? So, it's only 500 more expensive. I think that was where you were going with your question, Councilmember Rountree. Rountree: Yeah. Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 19 of 46 Bogart: Roundabout corridors. Okay. This is quick and dirty on advantages. Roundabouts improve efficiency of traffic flow, reduce vehicle emissions and fuel consumption, enhance esthetic by providing landscaping opportunities. I'd like to emphasize that one. And reduce vehicle delays 62 to 74 percent. Remember that number on the delay, because that's going to be important later on in the presentation. Safety. Roundabouts promote safety. Vehicles travel in the same direction and they are traveling at low speeds. Generally, the interactions are at 20 miles an hour -- or approximately 20 miles a hour. This results -- and this is data from the Insurance Institute -- 80 percent injury crashes and all crashes by 40 percent. A 61 -- 41 to 61 reduction on injury crashes and 45-75 -- this is an FHA report in 2000. So, go ahead.. Slide from the Ada county roundabout guidelines that wasn't shown.. These are the cost comparisons and how -- what they studied when they looked through the -- for the costs on there two -- three lane roadways, a three and afive -- a three by five and two five by fives. Next slide. And here is a comparison of the cost benefit differential and actual costs. And, then, also cost benefits that weren't quantified and I'd like to -- the one cost benefit that favored the signals with the landscape maintenance, but -- and, then, I talk about the power consumption and signal equipment maintenance. I have been told that it's about 10,000 dollars -- that might be exaggerated -- per intersection per year for those power consumption and signal equipment maintenance, even if it's only a couple of thousand, you can see the payback on a roundabout over time, quickly eats up that extra expense on a three by five. Next slide, please. Now, this presentation was roundabouts in an arterial network. This is an example of an installed arterial network roundabout. The first two are exits off of the interstate, I-70, in Avon, Colorado, and, then, you have a series of three more roundabouts. The intent on this was -- they had a choice of widening the streets on the signals or leaving the street cross-section the same and putting in roundabouts. They went this way. Go ahead. What this leads to is wide nodes and narrow roads. Wide nodes and narrow roads are critical for -- go back for a minute, Matt. Thank you. When you say wide nodes and narrow roads, the red indicates the impact on the right of way around the intersection with a roundabout. The blue is what you have if you signalize and expand the intersection. Why is this important? I believe this -- and this is the crux of the issue on this -- on a corridor is what you do with the blue section is extremely important. Go to the next slide, please. The normal connection between the two roundabouts would be a -- correct me if I'm wrong, but it would be a 96 foot right of way, would allow five lanes, bike lanes, and sidewalks. That's what the expectation is for Amity Road at build out later downstream. Ninety-six foot. Here is where Ithink -- looking at -- excuse me -- roundabouts in a corridor allows you to do something different. As I show up here, you can use a 76 foot right of way and still get the same capacity. In fact, you actually improve on the quality of the corridor, because instead of having turn lanes, you can have landscaping, median refuge for your pedestrians and things like that, you still have the sidewalks and the bike lanes, so -- one important thing I think that is standard right now is we have to go wider with roadways. lanes need to be wider. Ithink as Mr. Nolen points out, as we increase the width of lanes, traffic fatalities and injuries increase. Another issue that I think is Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 20 of 46 important when you have -- go ahead. That narrower cross-section is -- you can have some nice elements on the corridor and the roundabouts allow you to have this for a couple of reasons. What's the average speed on these roads out in southwest Meridian and things like that, posted average speed? I think it's about 45 miles per hour. Because of the efficiency -- remember the efficiency, 62 to 74 percent efficiency in delays -- reduces delays, you don't have to have 45 miles per hour speed limits on the corridor. You can actually go down to 35 miles per hour, move across the entire corridor faster at a lower speed. The picture at Avon, Colorado., that's exactly what they found. They took the signals out, people could move all the way across that corridor faster at a lower speed. What I'm suggesting here is that with a corridor of roundabouts you have the option of changing the cross-section. Commission -- Councilmember Bird, you mentioned what about pedestrians and things like that, why would pedestrians be there and interacting with the roundabouts. I maintain that if you can take and recoup some of that land from being a wasteland of pavement and have it look like this and have the ability for pedestrians and bicyclists to cross those corridors every mile, you're going to have much more connectivity. I know you just recently completed your trails plan and things like that. It runs across all of these major corridors. So, if you have that ability, then, I -- you know, there is an option out there. Now, this -- this portion is not where ACHD is at this time. They don't look at anything but a corridor of 96 foot of right of way. But if we narrow the streets down, they are safer for everybody. Vehicles also. So, I will turn it over to Deanna Smith for a little higher elevation picture. Thank you. Borton: Thank you, Rocky. Smith: Good evening, Council members. Is this on? I can't bring it down any further, so -- it keeps bouncing up. My name is Deanna Smith and I am also a neighborhood activist, I also work for Idaho Smart Growth and serve on the Blueprint For Good Growth steering committee and have since its inception. And I wanted to speak to you a little bit this evening about roundabouts from a land use perspective., Roundabouts are really something of a paradigm shift in this valley in terms of road design and construction and you have heard tonight about the many transportation reasons to consider roundabouts, including your congestion management, safety, improved pedestrian access, et cetera. But I believe there are also some really important land use reasons to consider roundabouts and, in fact, there are now jurisdictions around the country who have included roundabouts in considering -- for consideration for every intersection they look at and some of them have even gone so far as to prioritize roundabouts as the first thing you will look at. This does not mean that every intersection should become a roundabout, but in recognizing the value that they bring and communities who are beginning to use them are starting to say, you know, we need to look at them first. And that's some of what I'm advocating here tonight, whether it's first or just that they are always on the plate of possibilities and considered and it's really exciting to me and encouraging to me to see ACHD embracing that. So, I'm excited to see the design guidelines they have developed and to see them really looking hard at these. Perhaps the jurisdictions in this valley can appreciate how critical land use -- the Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 21 of 46 connection between land use and transportation is in Meridian. As Meridian has become the crossroads of this valley, you have more regional traffic moving through your community than any other community in Ada county and as a result you have some of the most congested intersections and roadways. There are policies in Blueprint For Good Growth and the ACHD's KILA for their transportation and land use integration plan that they are developing that provide some guidance to begin addressing these challenges. Among these many strategies, roadway design has emerged as an important element in maintaining and creating pedestrian friendly environments, transportation options, helping neighborhoods and vibrant commercial activities in our communities. I think roundabouts need to be considered in the role that they play in helping us get to better land use and transportation patterns. Roundabouts help reduce congestion by allowing a continual movement of traffic, where the lights increase congestion. One of the primary results from this is the need for fewer lanes. This holds an economic benefit, as well as the obvious transportation benefit. From a land use perspective, roadways are one of the least beneficial developments. Narrow roadways allow more land to go into productive development, expanding the tax base, rather than a greater tax demand that they would be as a roadway. In addition, roundabouts have a lower maintenance cost overall, which Rocky showed you. The initial cost sometimes can be greater. That depends upon at what point in time it's done. If it's done at the beginning of development, not necessarily. But everything we have seen out there nationally shows that in the long run their maintenance costs are significantly lower. In replacing a light with a roundabout, only the intersections need to be widened, rather than the entire roadway. This can also lead to a cost savings, particularly in a situation where you're looking at having to -- you have got a congested road, it's already developed, how much right of way are you going to have to buy. Those are in situations where you have an existing developed corridor. In looking at those corridors and thinking you have to buy right of way for a roundabout, but particularly along the entire corridor, based on the wide nodes, narrow roads slide that Rocky showed you, you don't have to buy all of that right of way. That doesn't impact this jurisdiction directly, since you're not the ones who have to buy right of way, but it's important in terms of freeing up monies that do go to ACHD, which all the jurisdictions do pay into., to maybe do some of the other things your community would like to see done. Roundabouts have been shown to reduce travel time, while slowing the speed of traffic down when used in a corridor. Thus, they provide safer passage for pedestrians and bicycles through the intersections. All of these get to the potential for better land use around and along your roadways and around your intersections. As we look more and more to developing mixed use developments in some of our more congested corridors or high traffic corridors -- and as we look to developing transit-oriented development, we will need to become increasingly creative about how we provide a full transportation system, one that responds to all modes. And I suggest to you that roundabouts are one of the most critical elements in looking at that. They reduce -- they increase safety, they provide narrower roadways, and, as I said, there is the economic benefit of not having to put your land into road, but, instead., into development. So, roundabouts provide many incentives and we believe they should always be considered Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 22 of 46 when developing or improving a roadway, especially where there are congestion management problems and/or when safety is a concern. Thank you. Gorton: Thank you, Deanna. Pete, it's back to you. Is there any other information you or Matt or Anna want to provide on it? Friedman: I don't believe we have much more information than you have received tonight. Borton: Okay. Friedman: Probably have got quite a bit coming at you. We may have a possibility of another presentation in the next month or two by the gentleman that Councilmember Rountree and I heard,. I was -- talked to him the other day, he may be out here. I'm not sure if the stars will align to get him come before you, but if they do we will certainly try to get that onto your agenda, too. Again, given a much larger -- both national -- almost international perspective on the evolving part of roundabout design and one thing I think that I have learned through all of this is we look at these varying drawings of roundabouts, but I think what I came away from the presentation was is that there is no one size fits all and there is all kinds of variations being -- being constructed around the country and used to successfully manage traffic flows. So, if we can get that to work out, we will be back to you with that. Borton: Okay. Rountree: Mr. President? Borton: Mr. Rountree. Rountree: A comment and maybe somebody can answer my comment, but all presenters talked about deficiencies, moving traffic, cost savings, that sort of thing, but didn't hear anybody mention anything costs related to road user benefit and it seems to me that's what it boils down to. It was alluded to in fact of moving more people through a pipe., but what's the cost savings to those road users. I know there is ways to calculate that. Has anybody done that and is there a break even point at some point between a roundabout and/or a signalized intersection related to traffic volumes and road user delay. Smith: All the studies show that a roundabout corridor, which is separate from, you know, a mixed corridor, or I don't know if studies have been done on mixed corridors, but a roundabout corridor clearly shows that people get from point A to point B quicker at a slow speed. So, from an efficiency perspective, from the user, the driver, efficient in terms of our time, you don't have as much idle time, that you use less gas, because you're not sitting anywhere, you pollute the air less, which doesn't directly impact that Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 23 of 46 person immediately, but it impacts all of us. So, I don't know if that gets to some of what you're asking. That's the one piece of information I have related to that. Rountree: And I understand that, but it seems to me that that's only going to work as long as there is somebody at the end of that corridor metering the traffic. You know, at some point in time -- at 35 miles an hour you can only get so many cars through a one lane road for however long you want to do it. So, at some point in time that's going to breakdown. So, in looking at road users cost, which is what I'm concern about driving my vehicle at three plus dollars a gallon and even though I'm retired my time's worth something. Anybody else who is working sitting in a car it's taking away from your productive time. So, somewhere the grandiose aspects of either multiple lanes or roundabouts or signalized intersections converge and one's better than the other. Now, ACRD indicated that if it's 50,000 ATD or more, probably roundabouts aren't going to work. But I suppose there are -- in your case if you had a roundabout corridor that was built for 50,000 ATD, it would work better than the signalized corridor. Is that bad logic? I know Eric's back there trying to figure that out. Smith: All the research I have done shows that, in fact, the high capacity really is the primary place where people are trying to use these. So, I know that ACRD has that 50,.000 mark, but that's not necessarily -- that wouldn't necessarily hold true with some of the engineers out there who are building in places around the country, they wouldn't say that 50,000 is the limit. Rountree.: Which is, in fact, what Pete and I heard when we listened to the gentleman from Canada; right? Friedman: Well, Canada and now as of -- by a conversation with them last week, Madison, Wisconsin. Rountree: Madison, Wisconsin. That's close. Friedman: Probably just as cold. Rountree: Eric. Drose: The 50,.000 is just what a two lane can take right now. I think -- I only know of two three lanes in the United States. There is a couple in Vegas. I know there is a couple more planned in Iowa, I believe. So, there is not a lot out there right now. I'm all for them.. If we can get up there 70,000 on a corridor, great. If that's -- if they can still prove to be safe. Going back to the dollar value for when one is better than the other, right now in this guideline we are saying once you get to an all way stop and you want to do any improvements out there, or even put an all way stop in, you should be looking at a roundabout now. If you take it lower than that, someone is proposing -- we get developers coming all the time. This is where it's going to get tricky, at a place where a Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 24 of 46 two way stop is -- should it be a two way stop? They are saying let's throw a roundabout in. Now, you got to assign a dollar value to that delay, because you're inducing delay on a 35 mile an hour road and you're slowing them down to 20, where you may only have a few cars a day that actually stop and cause delay on the sides on the side streets. So, it's kind of that -- Rountree: So, you're taking that into consideration. Drose: Yes. We are looking at all of that. Rountree: That's what I wanted to know. Gorton: Thanks, Eric. Rountree: Matt wants to jump into the learning experience here. Ellsworth: Mr. President, Members -- Members of the Council, as a member who sat on the steering committee that put together ACHD's roundabout guidelines, jumping back over the two -- to the two versus three lane consideration, the analyses that we were looking at said that, as Eric just mentioned, 50,000 ATD was about the max that a two lane could take. While we recognize the benefit of the three lanes, at some point in the future we thought from a user standpoint, jumping from no roundabouts into a situation where you have potentially three lane roundabouts, my be a bit of an extreme jump and it may wind up negating some of the safety -- safety elements of the roundabouts that were initially intended. As Eric mentioned during his presentation, these are guidelines on the one hand, so each location is different, a lot different considerations are going to have to play into it. And, on the other hand, it's not -- it's not carved in stone. This is the sort of thing that they plan to revisit and especially in a lot of locations that they are looking at right now up and down Amity Road, 50,000 ATD isn't necessarily an issue there today. But presumably further down the road that's something that ACHD may want to take another look at, but the gist of the conversation of the committee on which I sat was there is a time and a place, we aren't necessarily there now, and that was why -- why the two lane cap ended up making it's way into the guidelines. Gorton: Thanks, Matt. Rountree: Thank you. Gorton: Council, any questions of -- anybody? Bird: I have none. Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 25 of 46 Borton: No? Okay. So, we will get a letter, Pete, from you to review for support and the siting and design criteria. Okay. Thank you. I thank everybody for coming -- Rountree: Yeah. Thanks for you time. (e) City Transportation Corridor Priorities - STP-TMA Funds - Matt Ellsworth -Planning Dept. Borton: -- and presenting and sharing the information. Deanna, are you heading back down to Boise right now? All right. Safe travel. One hearing to the next. Matt, you get to start the next Item E, the transportation corridor priorities. We have all got materials passed out regarding that. Ellsworth: Mr. President, Members of the Council, thank you very much. This is a -- this is a previous item that was before you several months ago and just to back up before we dive into that, as you know, each year the federal government filters sort of a separate type of fund into each -- each local area, based on population for -- for discretionary funding for transportation projects, essentially, is what it boils down to. And those funds are filtered through the regional NPOs, which in our case, of course, is Compass, and Compass recently ended up developing a new approach to spending these dollars. These are the surface transportation program, transportation management area funds and the major shift comes into more of a focus on corridors, as opposed to piecemeal projects scattered throughout -- throughout the jurisdiction. As a result, Compass has asked member jurisdictions to prioritize some of the corridors that are identified in Communities in Motion and when this item was before you previously, the Mayor and Council directed staff to -- to communicate with Compass to figure out what corridors are being identified as top priorities by some of the other jurisdictions in Compass' jurisdiction. As the handout that I gave you guys earlier mentions, there was no official response from any of the other member jurisdictions. Compass staff was able to touch base on an individual basis with staff from some of the other jurisdictions and their response is identified there. The city of Nampa identified Highway 20-26 as their top priority. Nampa Highway District had the same top priority. And the other entity that Compass staff had spoken to is Notus-Parma Highway District, excuse me, which identified Homedale Road as the -- the informal top priority for their jurisdiction. This matter came before the transportation task force on October 11th of this year. The top three roadway corridors that the task force identified were Meridian Road from Waltman to Chinden. Ten Mile from Lake Hazel to Chinden. And U.S. 20-26 from Exit 29 to Eagle. The task force forwarded an addition to their top priority a couple of caveats to go along with that. On the one hand, they wanted to stress the fact that -- that that segment of roadway is not appropriate for use of federal funds. Federal funds kind of come with a lot of additional strings and they can complicate projects at times. So, for that reason the task force felt that it was important to note that Meridian from Waltman to Chinden is more appropriate for use of local funds than federal funds. In addition, as outlined in Communities in Motion, Meridian Road is only considered north Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 26 of 46 up to Ustick and the task force felt that it was more appropriate, if that corridor is going to receive any attention, that they look -- take a look at it all the way out to Chinden. And, finally, there was some lane recommendations that the task force integrated into this recommendation and specifically that is to plan for a five lane section all the way north to Chinden, rather than the three lane section as identified in Communities in Motion. Excuse me. Gorton: Matt, did you -- I think I heard you wrong. Did you say that the Meridian Waltman to Chinden is not an appropriate project for the federal funding? Ellsworth: That's for the use of federal funds, Mr. President, Members of the Council. That's correct. And as it's currently programmed through ACRD, that project does not use any federal funds and the transportation task force felt that that's a good thing. While the federal funds are great to have and they lead to a lot of great projects, Ten Mile interchange, for example, will be funded by -- by federal processes. It initiates a lot of additional processes, NEPA and so forth, that can considerably increase both the time and the cost for those projects in the long run. So, the recommendation that the task force ended up mentioning is this is the city's top priority. However, we would like to see it built with local funds, rather than the additional complication and in some cases uncertainty of using federal funds. If you look to some of the projects further west over on Franklin Road, Black Cat to Ten Mile and also Ten Mile to Linder were previously programmed with federal funds and due to uncertainty and cost escalations and so forth, ACHD is now taking another look at those two segments and they are figuring out different ways that they can approach those with local funds, rather than the federal funds. So, that was sort of the short version of the rationale that the task force provided for emphasizing that while, essentially, a split corridor is a top priority for the city, it's -- they are not recommending the use of federal funds for that project. Borton: Which means the request is to remove it from the recommended priority list for fihis. Ellsworth: As far as consistency and message is concerned.., I think that's the main reason that Meridian from Waltman to Chinden is included on here. If you think back to the recommendations that both the task force and City Council ended up sending to ACHD for their consideration and the five year work plan and some of the other planning processes that they will do, Ten Mile interchange was the number one priority for the city and part of that is just to look at -- at the network as a network, if you install Ten Mile interchange, that has implications for the local system and that's something that they wanted ACHD to keep in mind.. So, on the one hand it's consistency in message and on the other hand it's in recognition of the fact that it's a single transportation network for the purposes that Compass is soliciting this information for, it may be appropriate to focus only on the corridors where the use of federal funds is deemed as appropriate and essentially take the inverse of the recommendation from the task force in this case and whatever explanation the city forwards onto Compass, it Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 27 of 46 could be noted that while project X has been identified as the number one priority, were it not for the consideration or the expended time and cost associated with federal funds. This is project Y in this case the split corridor may be the -- may be the top priority of the city. Borton: Okay. Ellsworth: So, the question was before you this evening, again, is -- is to consider the recommendation as forwarded by the task force and., again, to feed back into Compass board's consideration of future use of STP-TMA dollars, again, as noted in the handout there, the STP-TMA funds are already committed through at least 2012, after which time these projects would be considered -- or this recommendation would be considered for the future use of that source of funds. Rountree: Mr. President? Borton: Mr. Rountree. Rountree: Matt, does the task force understand that these recommendations for -- in Meridian for north-south corridors just exacerbate the existing problem? We need to get east and west done. We have got to get Pine done. We have got to get Ustick done. We have got to get Amity done. The interstate is only going to handle so much traffic and it isn't going to get any bigger than what we got going through the major part of our community right now. I don't see it ever getting much beyond eight lanes. So, to continue to funnel traffic to the interstate in my mind is -- is not the solution. We have got to get some alternative corridors. I agree with 20-26. I think that's significant. That would be my number one. My number two for federal dollars -- and keep in mind Pine was improved with federal dollars from Meridian Road to Linder. So, federal dollars could be spent on that system. Pine, as soon as that piece from Eagle this direction opens up, from Locust into downtown Meridian is going to be a mess and it's going take significant dollars to make those improvements, because you're constrained by a rather large drainageway and a fairly extensive residential community. Ten Mile will serve the Ten Mile interchange, but there is going to be significant improvements on Ten Mile hopefully between now and 2012. So, I guess just looking at this -- that's my initial reaction. I think there is some -- I can appreciate people wanting to get to the interstate and wanting to alleviate Eagle Road, but the real issue is give me another choice to get to Nampa or Boise, besides the interstate and having to drive -- it takes me longer to drive through Meridian to get to the interstate than it takes me on the interstate to get to anyplace in Boise, to and including the skating rink. Bird: Mr. President? Gorton: Mr. Bird. Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 28 of 46 Bird: To echo Councilman Rountree's deal, I think U.S. 20-26 has to definitely be number one and I -- Pine's very important -- now that we have got that Locust Grove overpass, I had the opportunity morning Monday to take that right in the busy time at about 7:15 and I took Pine down to Locust and., then, went over it and went that way. And it's being well used, but we have got -- we have got to get our east-west and I -- Ustick is a very important east-west, because it goes from the river to Boise, just like 20-26, and we have got to alleviate all the I-84 traffic. Amity also is very important, in my opinion. I'm like Councilman Rountree, the north-south corridors don't worry me right now as much as east-west, getting from town to town, not through the city. Borton: Matt, did the task force address that issue and purposely decide let's focus north-south versus east-west or -- were some of those concerns discussed? Ellsworth: Mr. President, Members of the Council, as I recall the conversation that was not a conscious decision that they made to focus on those north-south versus east-west and I know that they previously had considered -- and to back up briefly, I ended up presenting to the transportation task force a list of projects as conveyed by Compass and Communities in Motion for them to range and they each gave a number ranking to those. Staff, then, went back and with the raw scores tallied the totals. At the subsequent task force meeting, the group ended up taking a look at -- based on the raw scores what that priority list would have been and, then, they ground truthed them and they started applying the common sense factor to it and they adjusted that list from there. I can't remember offhand, for example, if Pine Road was one of the Communities in Motion corridors that Compass asked that the group prioritize -- Rountree: Probably wasn't. Bird: It wasn't. Ellsworth: So -- and, again, this is -- this is based on somewhat of a new direction that Compass is taking with the use of these STP-TMA funds. And, then, maybe a high level discussion that could be addressed at the Compass board level, but for the purposes of this discussion here, staff decided to isolate the top three as handed forward by the transportation task force for Council's consideration and a lot of the reason that I did that was because Compass staff said that, if anything, they expected to get a number one priority from the other jurisdictions, so I was trying to narrow things down a little bit. Rountree.: Mr. President? Borton: Mr. Rountree. Rountree: Matt, was future 16 one of their corridors to prioritize? I guess if I'm going to look at anorth-south, that's the one I -- Meridian City council Special Meeting December 11., 2007 Page 29 of 46 Ellsworth: Mr. President, Councilman Rountree, that was one of the corridors that was considered and it was within certainly the top ten and from what I recall at least the top five of the groups prioritized and I apologize I did not grab their top ten list on the way over this evening. Rountree: That's fine. I just wanted to make sure it was something that was considered. Borton: Well, it sounds like the choices before us are -- follow some, all, or none of the task force recommendations in the priority list to Compass. Rountree: Mr. President, question for Matt. We are, obviously, not going to get three. We will be lucky to get one. If our first three choices were 20-26 I don't have any problem with that, you know. Ellsworth: And., Mr. President, Members of the Council, I guess what I envisioned coming into this evening was for -- for Council to choose their number one priority and -- because that's consistent with the conversation that I had with Compass staff was similar to what Councilman Rountree just identified. Typically, they expect between five and. six million dollars annually to come into the northern Ada county transportation management area. When you start talking about intersections that could, hypothetically, cost up to eight million dollars. One mile roadway segments that can cost up to fifteen, all of sudden five to six million dollars doesn't do you all that much, especially when you're talking about 16, 20 mile corridors. So, what I'm hearing, I suppose, from Council is that 20-26 is the city's number one priority for the use of these funds as far as this recommendation to the Compass board is concerned; is that correct o r -- Gorton: I think that's what you're hearing, unless you're saying -- you're saying that's a drop in the bucket for putting that at the top of the list? Ellsworth: Mr: President, Members of the Council, I think any -- any of the corridors that are identified within Communities in Motion would take multiple years to construct based solely on this STP-TMA source of funds. So, that shouldn't weigh into Council's decision I don't believe. Borton: That's fine by me. Make it number three and number one? One, two, and three. Rountree: Yeah. I'm comfortable with that. That's kind of our northern border. I would., Matt, however, like you to point out that Pine is going to become an issue in the not too distant future if we don't start thinking about it. Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 30 of 46 Borton: We ought to put that as a two just to have it on the awareness -- Rountree: No, because it -- really, it's -- it's new. I don't think anybody's really given it a lot of thought, because it's been kind of developer driven on the one end, but, boy once that -- once it gets to Locust Grove, it's -- I mean look what happened to Locust Grove in a week. And it's not done yet. Borton: Matt, is that -- is that sufficient direction for that recommendation to Compass? Ellsworth: President Borton, Members of the Council, it is. Borton: Okay. Thank you. Ellsworth: I can relay that sentiment to them. (f) Support Proposed Legislation for Local Funding Options for Transportation -Matt Ellsworth -Planning Dept Gorton: Okay. Now, you're up for Item F as well, the local option funding for transportation that we had before and brought back today. Ellsworth: President Borton, Members of the Council, this is sort of an interim follow up to the pre-Council discussion on November 13th where Matt Stoll from Compass presented the draft local option sales tax bill that Valley Regional Transit and Community Planning Association have been drafting over the course of this past year. I imagine you will recall that during that presentation Mr. Stoll indicated the desire for each member jurisdiction to consider a resolution in support of the proposed bill once the final adjustments and so forth are made. Compass and BRT are in the process of making those final revisions right now and in conversations with staff I'm told that those revisions will be available and complete by the end of this week. My request for you tonight was, essentially, to -- green light staff moving forward with drafting the language and bringing back to you next week on the one hand some proposed -- or proposed draft resolution and on the other hand all those recommended changes that are going to -- or, excuse me, the final changes that will be coming forward prior to presenting that bill to the legislature this spring. Borton: Okay. Council, any -- it sounds like a great idea to bring it forward.. It would be nice -- I don't know how quickly you can -- it will be done this week., we will have ample time to take a look at it, maybe make some comment in advance, but good by me. Rountree: Let me see if I understand what you said, Matt. You want to move forward with preparing a draft letter in support of the legislation in anticipation that it's going to be acceptable, so after we see it we can get it in the mail? Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 31 of 46 Ellsworth: Mr. President, Councilman Rountree, that's, essentially, the case. Rountree: Okay. Ellsworth: They asked specifically for a resolution, though, rather than an informal letter. Rountree: Okay. Ellsworth: And at this point I'm not sure that even more iterative comments from the city would make -- would make further adjustments in the proposed legislation, so my thought was at this point the city would either endorse it or they would not and all those changes will be attachments to that resolution. The final bill will be an attachment to that resolution and., again, in conversations with staff, this is identified in the handout there. They indicate that some minor tweaks will be made, basically, to allow localities in other parts of the state to use the same tool that this could potentially create, the same premise for the local interest in this would remain the same, is the conversation that I have had with staff, who has been involved so far. Bird: Mr. President? Borton: Mr. Bird. Bird: I'm not for passing any resolution until I see the final draft. I don't want a draft, I want the final bill in its entirety that's attached to it. Rountree: Mr. President, I feel the same way, because I happen to sit with a group pulling the comments together and some of the comments are not mine. There is some pretty significant redrafting they had to do to make it palatable and depending on how that's done, I'll either have more to say about it or I'll support it. I support -- I support the concept. Some of the language was very vague in some areas and needed some major rewriting. And I have not seen that. I suspect that if they are anticipating the end of the week, that we should see something soon. Ellsworth: President Borton, Councilmen, would it be a better approach, then, to identify a future date for afollow-up presentation from Valley Regional Transit and/or Compass to unveil all the changes in the final draft legislation prior to considering a resolution or any language to that effect? Gorton: I think it depends on the gravity of the changes. I know one of their concerns was to get our action one way or the other I thought before session started, you know. If It's not the 18th, it's January 8th will be the next time that we are all together, so -- Meridian City council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 32 of 46 Rountree: Right. Borton: Kind of depends on what it looks like right now. Rountree: Mr. President, I don't have a problem getting the resolution put together, but I would take no action on it until we have had an opportunity to look at the draft and if the draft seems to address the comments that either the city made or that some of us made in particular, I don't have a problem moving forward with approving it. If there is still some issues with understanding what's said, I'm sure that Compass or Valley Regional Transit or somebody will come and talk to us about it quickly, because I know they want it done. But I don't have a problem being posed and ready. Borton: For the 18th? Rountree: Yeah. Gorton: With an understanding that it may or may not be ripe for action. That's fine. And Mr. Berg said that the Chamber had comments on it I guess today. That's something that you can gather and circulate to us as well. Be interesting to see their perspective. But we will leave it on for the 18th for -- and to the extent a resolution in support be drafted in anticipation, but I guess it depends to see what the most recent version of it. Does that work? Ellsworth: President Gorton, Members of the Council, it does. Borton: Okay. Council, any other comments, questions on the local option? (g) Issues /Items for Joint Workshop with ACRD 1-7-08 - Peter Friedman -Planning Dept Borton: Okay. Item G, the joint workshop on January 7th. Pete, we saw the short list. Friedman: Yeah. Thank you, President Borton, Council members. You do have a list before you tonight of items for your next joint meeting with the ACHD commission. This list was jointly put together by ACHD staff and City of Meridian staff. The purpose of us coming to you early -- this is a new protocol we have worked out with the district, so that we can make these meetings more productive for you. But I think I'm hearing another topic that you might want to add to this list for early consideration and that's the possibility of maybe starting to bring Pine Street into a little higher level of exposure. So, if you want us to, we could easily add that to the list or we could just as easily add that to the list and delete the -- for example, the update of the split corridor. That's moving along enough that we can -- actually, staff can update you on that at some point in the future. So, we wanted to bring this list to you. These were our thoughts. Are Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 33 of 46 there other thoughts that Council had, so that if there are we will have time to work on them and. develop appropriate background information for the meeting. Borton: Pete, that's -- I think Councilman Rountree's comments on Pine Street make great sense to get that on everyone's radar. I don't know if -- the Overland Road realignment status. Friedman: That would -- Mr. President, Council members, that will actually fold into the south Meridian transportation plan. One of the things that both staffs are going to be seeking from -- or at least kind of getting a -- kind of a thumbs up, thumbs down direction on it is that the south Meridian transportation plan draft is completed.. One of the things that ACRD staff is looking at is that Overland Road extension question and one of the questions that we are going to bring to both bodies will be do you want that south Meridian transportation plan to come up for consideration currently and, then, come back with an Overland Road extension or do you want to hold off on the adoption of the south Meridian transportation plan, do the examination of the Overland Road extension and, then, fold that in and bring it back for consideration. So, that was the idea of bringing that forward to both bodies. Borton: Okay. Rountree: We need to do that. Borton: Okay. Anything else, Council, with ACRD discussion? Okay. Thanks, Pete. Friedman; Thank you. (h) Kit Kat Club Construction Improvements - Barry Tassler /Anna Canning Borton: Anna, did you have something? Okay. You're just getting up and ready? Okay. Item H is a discussion and request on the Kit Kat Club construction improvements and, Anna, I'm going to -- if you're willing, start with you to sort of introduce what got us where we are. Canning: Yes, sir. I will certainly do that. The owner of the Kit Kat Club requested sewer service in the fall of 2006. They cannot request annexation at this time because they do not actually adjoin annexed property and the City Council denied that request for services. The Kit Kat Club did, then, submit arequest -- or has concurrently submitted a request to Ada county development services to expand their kitchen facilities and remodel the interior of the existing building. At that time the city -- I believe it was a letter signed by the Mayor, but we did respond to Ada county with a number of concerns, including traffic safety, future functioning of the transportation system, having the site in -- sufficient in size to accommodate the use, and that the use was not Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 34 of 46 consistent with the, then, draft Ten Mile specific plan or the then -- our Comprehensive Plan in effect for the area. So, the owner sought out advice from staff as to how he might gain City Council approval of the request for sewer service. With guidance from Council I suggested that Mr. Tassler, the owner, should develop a site plan that brought fhe property into closer compliance with our development standards, with particular attention to a parking arrangement that did not require backing out onto an arterial roadway. We have received a couple of different landscape plans. This is the most recent landscape plan in front of you and it does address many of those initial concerns. With regard to -- this is Black Cat. Here is Franklin down at the bottom. So, they would actually come into a parking lot. They have moved this building, so that they can build a parking lot. There is parallel parking on the west side of the building and 90 degree angle parking on the north side of the building. Here is the building. You can see that they have landscape buffers in that are heavily vegetated. So, the current configuration with the current right of way or the current land available that's not constructed as roadway, does meet our development standards with regard to streetscape buffers and I'll talk about the feature situation in a second. So, the traffic safety is much improved. Instead of backing out onto Black Cat or onto Ten Mile, you would be coming out as you would from a typical commercial development. And, again, by removing the existing home on the property, the size of the property is now sufficient in area to accommodate the parking. Okay. Now, you're going to have to kind of squint and look at some lines here. This line is the existing right of way, that heavy dashed line. At some point in the future ACHD -- their plans show for a right of way that would come to this dashed line. That -- if it doesn't clip the corner of the building, it's within inches. So, at that time, if ACHD were to take that right of way, then, we lose our street buffer there. There is -- they have got the sidewalk shown and, then, the parking lot immediately on the other side. Now, on Franklin -- this is the right of way, so that, again, they have got the sidewalk shown just on the other side of the right of way. There is some landscape buffer before you hit the building. At this -- at this point they don't anticipate -- ACHD does not anticipate taking right of way on the north side of Franklin to accommodate the development. I think that there is also a question say if somebody wanted to do a roundabout at this location, then, ACHD would end up buying the whole property, because there is just -- that building is too close to the right of way. So, there is always that possibility. So, I think that that's why, you know, the -- Mr. Tassler, if he had tried to accommodate our full landscape buffer even at ultimate right of way, then, the site does become insufficient in area to get the parking that he needs. So, I think what he's shown is about as much as we could expect from anyone given a building that's this close to the roadway. So, with regard to that, I think the site plan is -- comes as far as I would expect anybody to come as a nonconforming use. With regard to the Comp Plan; this property is designated as low density employment on the Ten Mile interchange specific area plan.. An industrial zoning, which is what would be needed to accommodate this use, is not one that's suggested as being appropriate within that zone. So, there is still some question as to the use issue. Mr. Tassler was also asked to give Council an idea on the timing of the improvements. You had an a-mail from him, 'but Iasked -- specifically asked Mr. Walker, who is here representing Mr. Tassler, to Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 35 of 46 discuss some of the timing issues related to if Mr. Tassler can get the sewer service and., then, seeks his -- his application with Ada county, then., he would need some time before he could' install the improvements, so -- and I'll let Mr. Walker address that. Do you have any questions from the President or Council members? Bird: I have none.. Borton: Thanks, Anna. Frank, you're up. Walker: Mr. President and Council, my name is Frank Walker. My address is 200 North 4th, Boise, Idaho. That's my office. The question really is that this property does need sewer and it should be severed. There is challenges to it, but, again, we -- it does need to be severed. The timing -- Mr. Tassler would like to submit an application with Ada County for a small remodel. If that conditional use is granted., he would., then, commence with that conditional use and, then, once that is finished, then, do the landscaping. He anticipates no later than probably September 2009. If you have any questions, I would be happy to address them. I think Mr. Tassler's come a long way in adjusting his approach and that the City of Meridian is going to benefit from what he's willing to do here. Borton: Council, any questions needed? Rountree: I have no questions. Bird.: I have none. Gorton: I:t sounds as --from every indication that at the very least -- Silva: Mr. President, Members of the Council -- Borton: At the very least, I would defer to Mr. Silva to speak. Silva: Thank you. Mr. President, Members of the Council, I would like to share with you a memo. Once I became aware of this issue being put in front of Council for consideration, I conferred with the fire chief, Mr. Tassler, and Len Grady to see whether or not it would be possible for us to provide a fire hydrant to protect Mr. Tassler's property. I consulted via phone with Mr. Tassler today and he had no objection to placing a hydrant that we would locate on his site at his cost as a condition -- as a condition of hooking up to city sewer should the Council decide to support that decision for hooking up to city sewer. So, that would enable us to -- one hydrant would enable us to properly protect Mr. Tassler's property with pressurized water. Borton: Okay. Thank you. Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 36 of 46 Walker: And I didn't mention the right of way. I mean, obviously, at some point in time ACRD may eliminate that building, because of right of way. That's something in the future. But, you know, as far as providing sewer and water today, I think it would -- Central District Health certainly supports it and I think Public Works does as well. So, it would be a benefit to the area. Borton: Okay. Thank you. Bird: Mr. President? Borton: Mr. Bird. Bird: Is it just request for sewer or is it sewer and water? Yeah. Sewer and water, Frank? Walker: I always presumed it was sewer and water. I can't definitely answer that, but always presume that it was. Borton: Okay. Bird: Maybe Len can -- Grady: Mr. President, Members of the Council., yeah, we would require sewer and water to the site. We have both stubbed and ready to go. And as far as Public Works supporting this, we supported him so far as we like to get rid of septic systems. We are silent on anything else, so -- Canning: President Borton, Members of the Council, I just noticed that Mr. -- Mike Reno is here with us in the audience tonight and he's with Central District Health. So, if you have any questions regarding the septic ability or need for -- the ability for septic or need for sewer in this area, he can answer those questions. Borton: Council, any questions in that regard? Anna, it sounds like despite many changes there is still several items of either the zoning and UDC compliance., which, for whatever reason, can't be met with these revisions and there is still some insurmountable -- insurmountable hurdles we are seeing. Canning: Mr. President, Members of the Council, there are some uses that will likely always be nonconforming as the city expands into the area.. I think this is probably one of them. It's -- from a planning standpoint, I try and get any property that's nonconforming as close as I can to our development regulations and at the time of annexation is an opportunity with this one to get it with the sewer hook up. Should the Council never want to annex it, at least we have the opportunity to bring the site closer to our norms with regard to the development standards. Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 37 of 46 Borton: Okay. Bird: Mr. President? Borton: Mr. Bird. Bird: Anna, if we water and sewer it, when they -- become contiguous they automatically have to come in, don't they? And does the business get grandfathered? Canning: Mr. President, Members of the Council, I asked Mr. Grady if the sewer agreement expressly said that they needed to request annexation. It is not his understanding that it is not. It is -- it is an express agreement for consent to annexation, but it does not require them. So, we could make that decision -- Council could make the decision as to when or if to annex the property, but it does say that he consents to annexation when Council chooses to annex the property. Nary: Mr. President? Borton: Mr. Nary. Nary: Yeah. Depending on the application, the Council has certainly taken a number of different approaches. I would agree, I think the standard is exactly as Mr. Grady said., that the consent to annex is a standard part of the agreement. It has been the direction of this Council on occasion to direct that they were required to request annexation and still the discussion comes before the Council at that time whether or not they choose to annex that property at that time. The obligation on the land owner is simply to make the request. If you make it simply a requirement to consent to annex, then, at the point in time that the city felt compelled to want to annex that property, whether it's to clean up enclaves, whether it's to deal with some other issue, whether it's right of way or adjoining property issues and things like that, the city would have the ability to move forward with -- with an annexation under the current statute with that consent and it wouldn't require the property owners to do anything. So, it's really your -- your direction as to how you would like that done.. Borton: Okay. Council, any other information needed or any action you want to -- Rountree: Mr. President? Borton: Mr. Rountree. Rountree: I assume the action is whether or not we would approve the request for sewer. My point is that it seems we have difficulty enough with conforming annexation Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 38 of 46 and uses in Meridian, why do we want to pursue a nonconforming use in that regard. So, I'm just looking at our full plate now and why do we want to fill it up with some more. Borton: That's the same question we had before. Rountree: Same question we had before. Bird: I certainly haven't changed.. Borton: Mr. Nary, the way this is on the agenda is it somewhat discussion -- or discussion format, does it need a formal motion to act on it, to approve or deny the specific request or -- Nary: We11, Mr. President, Members of the Council, I guess I put that back to the -- either the Planning or Public Work staff. I believe they want to bring -- my understanding is this property owner wants to bring forward a request for service. You see those requests for service on your agenda all the time. Rountree: Right. Nary: So, I think because of the prior decision of this Council to not approve that request for services is the reason you're having a discussion tonight. Certainly they can apply, just like they did in the past, you can have it back in front of you for discussion. I think all the -- all the staff was looking for was some general direction from you, not a specific ruling tonight on this request, but merely general direction. Now, am I incorrect? Is that -- were you wanting more than that? Canning: Well, I -- Mr. President, Members of the Council, I think the applicant wanted some clear direction as to whether this would suffice to gain your support and I think the answer has been pretty clearly no. So, in that sense whether or not you vote on it or make a motion, I think that they have what they need. Borton: Okay. Rountree: I guess the question is we haven't received a request, this is just kind of a tester. Nary: This appears to -- I think from a procedural standpoint he's looking for smily faces or frowny faces. I think he's looking to see whether or not you are receptive to their request. But you certainly aren't required to make a decision tonight, because there is no active application in front of you. Rountree: Okay. Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 39 of 46 Nary: If they want to apply based on the general comments you have made certainly they understand there are still some concerns, but you don't have a full Council here or the Mayor, so certainly there is certainly opportunity for further discussion and actual vote. Rountree: Okay. Borton: Okay. Nary: Did I get it wrong., Mr. Grady? Were you looking for more than that? Grady: Mr. President, Members of the Council, no, that, basically, sums it up. We are looking for guidance. I think in the end I think the city engineer does have authority to grant that, we are just looking for guidance. So, I think I have the authority to grant that service, but I certainly wouldn't do so without your permission on this one. Borton: I think the guidance from Council that at least from what I have heard tonight, is that in light of the various nonconforming concerns that we are not supportive. Rountree: And I think that's consistent with our past guidance in terms wanting to provide services to properties that are within the annexed boundaries of the City of Meridian and I just don't see that happening here. I don't see how it would ever conform. Well, it could., but it doesn't, so -- Borton: Is that good enough? Canning: Yes, sir. Item 4: CITY POLICY REVIEW (a) Policy on Surplus Property -Joe Borton Borton: Okay. Okay. That ends Item H -- 3-H. I'll move onto 4-A, policy on surplus property. This came up very briefly in our discussion a couple weeks ago about a request that I had made concerning donating -- or if the city was able to donate surplus computers to the Big Brothers, Big Sisters, and -- and while that seems to be a good worthy cause, do we have a policy set forth -- and we should get a policy set for going forward that will govern any nonprofit contributions of surplus property and put some parameters on that before one of us -- somebody makes a request to donate to some organization or the other that people don't like. So, with that vague introduction, Mr. Nary. Nary: Thank you, Mr. President, Members of the Council. Basically, I had asked President Borton if we could have this discussion with you, because there is a couple of Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 40 of 46 different parts to this request. President Borton had asked if the city would be able to donate as surplus property some of our computers as roll out of our inventory each year. I spoke with Mr. Paternoster, our IT manager, and he was certainly not concerned about that. These are five year old machines, they come with -- they don't come with screens, they don't come with -- they don't come with keyboards, they don't come with any software. The value to the city is minimal. I# probably has a higher scrap value, in our opinion, than it probably does for usable value, but they can be used by people for certain functions. So, from his perspective for IT's needs or for the city's needs, there is no objection, we have enough machinery to be able to donate that. ~ The city has the authority to donate property to either nonprofits or other governmental entities. My quesfion more from the policy standpoint isn't just for computers, but we get requests from other agencies or other people for other equipment. Computers themselves, again, probably after the five year life span of our computers, their value isn't really significant. But in the past we have only donated, that I'm aware of at least, primarily to other municipal agencies or other state agencies or to nonprofits and most of the time to nonprofits it's been local ones here in the Meridian city limits. My only suggestion, President Borton, is that, one, decide the direction we can bring a resolution back to you next week to approve that transfer if you're okay with the Boys and Girls Club and maybe some direction from you as to what type of policy, if anything, you'd like to see, because I don't envision a huge run on equipment or property of the city, but assessing what the value is -- when we deal with another entity many times, like another municipality, we don't get as concerned about the value to transfer it if we don't have use for it. We have to be concerned about the value when we transfer it to a nongovernmental entity and that was more my concern. I just was envisioning people, you know, walking up here with their 5013C paperwork and saying can I have a computer, but I can also see them saying can I have old fire hoses or can I have old boots or can I have old equipment that you have or old tools or old trucks or old stuff that we don't necessarily use anymore and, then, becoming really quite a chore to do that. Right now we choose to do it when the city chooses to, the departments bring them in front of you and you make that direction. I don't necessarily think one request that President Gorton's bringing forward requires a monumental change, but we probably need to look at establishing some criteria and some standard and some policy to go forward., so that you aren't always having to decide is this worthy, is this something we want to be a part of. We don't want to get into a situation where you as the Council are having to make a decision on whether you like one entity over another, because of the type of work they do or the type of -- the type of activity that they perform, if they qualify as a nonprofit and we have given it to everybody else who has asked us. So, those are the kind of questions I had that I thought would be helpful from a discussion standpoint and, then, for you folks to give us some direction a policy. And I'm not suggesting, again, that we establish a policy before we deal with the lone request, but that we at least in conjunction with that request, then, begin a policy process to bring that back to you as well. Bird: Mr. President? Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 41 of 46 Borton: Mr. Bird. Bird: Well, I think a policy would be ideal, but I think you got to look at situations. When we -- when we have had some fire trucks that we have donated when we probably could have recovered some money on some of these tankers out doing it, but something like computers that are outdated and the Boys and Girls Club -- or Big Sister -- Borton: Big Brother, Big Sister. Bird: Big Brother, Big Sisters, man., I'm in favor of it. But Ithink --Ithink we need to deal with it on a per request basis, because some nonprofit organizations deserve it and, to be truthful with you, some of them are fronts. Ithink it's great. If we -- if we need to change it, we can change policy, but I'm for bringing that resolution forward for the Boys and Girls Ciub -- or Big Brother, Big Sisters. Rountree: Whatever it is, Joe, you're asking for. Bird: Bill got me -- I knew it was Big Brother, Big Sister, and Bill said Boys and Girls Club. Rountree: Mr. President? Borton: Mr. Rountree. Rountree: Two pieces. I fully support the donating of used PCs to Big Sisters and Big Brothers or Boys and Girls or whomever they are. Your request, I think that's --Ithink that's a right thing to do. There is another facet of that that is really the right thing to do, because what happens with used PCs is they seem to never go away and pretty soon you will walk around and there will be people with two and three and four of them in their office and they are using them all and they are requesting replacements every three or four years based on a replacement cycle and all of a sudden we have got an inventory of these things. They kind of grow. So, I think it's great that we have a -- we have a replacement cycle. I think we need a disposal cycle to make sure they get out of inventory and to be donating them to these worthy nonprofit the place to go. As far as a policy, I think we need to have a policy related to all that sort of thing. I'm wondering if we ought not to have an estimated value in that policy which can be donated at the discretion of the department director and in the case that Councilman Bird brought up, if it has value in the open market and an auction bid might actually yield revenue to the city, that we ought not to be big hearted in some instances and regain those values, to kinds of things like vehicle trailers that we might have that we no longer need. Our favor discussion topic, backhoes, that we might have and we might need. There is always a market for those kinds of things at auction and I know at the state if they have an Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 42 of 46 auction, if the city wants a vehicle or a piece of equipment, they can go acquire that from the state without going through the auction at its estimated value. So, there is an exchange of revenue there. In, essence, it's almost a donation, because the estimated values aren't great, but we get something we need, they get rid of something they don't need., and they get a little monetary reimbursement. So, I think the policy ought to be kind of formulated in that sort of fashion. Not that we have -- not that we get rid of great amounts of equipment like that, because I think our patrol vehicles are off line there, used up, and a good share of the rest of the equipment that we no longer use and the value has been extracted out of them. Nary: Mr. President. Borton: Mr. Nary. Nary: Mr. President, Members of the Council, we will follow up and start crafting a policy. We will probably maybe even bring it back in one of these sessions in a month or two if even in draft form to get some further guidance. But we can do that. To follow on one comment by Councilmember Rountree, we did -- a couple years ago Mr. Paternoster and I discovered exactly what you were talking about, Council member, regarding computers or laptops that the people that requested replacements kept the old one and wanted to use the old one for something else and buy a new one and all of a sudden we have eight laptops where we think we have an inventory of four. And so at the Mayor's direction she said that IT and part of my department that they were now responsible to track that and keep up with that, so that the departments didn't just keep hording these things, so that we ended up with numbers of them in different departments, so we did try to centralize that process to avoid that very thing. So, we are aware of that what you're saying can happen pretty easily and we wanted to make sure we don't continue to do that. But we will bring a resolution next week on this request for the Boys and -- Rountree: We are all confused. Bird: That's why I'm saying it. Nary: For the children of the Big Brothers and Big Sisters, we will bring a resolution forward for you on your agenda next week for that firansfer and, then, we will begin the crafting of policy that you will, then, have back in front of you. {b) Update on Revised Policies -Bill Nary. Borton: And while you're at it, you've got other revised policies you wanted to comment on? Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 43 of 46 Nary: Yes. Thank you, Mr. President, Members of the Council. There is two policies I just wanted to bring you up to date on. We had adiscussion afew -- the beginning of October regarding travel policies and moving to a per diem process. When we began that discussion the beginning of October the finance department asked if we could wait until our audit was at least initially completed with the IRS, so that we would have some guidance from them, as well as the time that they could devote to the -- the drafting of that policy. So we did, we met the first week of November, they created the first draft of that policy. I revised that, sent that back to them before Thanksgiving and Mrs. Kilchenmann has it at the moment and thinks we are pretty close. I think we have ironed. out as many of the different issues that we have and also in advising the Mayor of the different departments to really keep a much closer scrutiny of these types of expenses, but we should have -- hopefully have a policy back in front of you again to discuss in January, maybe as a department report. The other one we discussed executive benefits and it is the end of the -- the calendar year, so it's our opportunity in time to make sure we have covered all of the different facets of that. In our October discussion we discussed a clean up of that in regards to all the appointed positions in the city. The other part of that, though, we didn't discuss whether or not you, as a Council, felt it was appropriate to include either the Council Members or the Mayor in that policy. A majority of the policy deals with vacation times, so that doesn't apply, generally, to you folks or to the Mayor, but there is a provision of that policy that can be of both benefit to you and to the Mayor -- the Ma or's osition, Y p because there is additional insurance -- life insurance that's provided by the city. We don't provide -- the city ordinance currently says that the Mayor and the Council members receive the same benefits as general employees, unless you specifically designate something else. There is a .provision in the policy that I was planning to bring back in front of you next week for final approval that says any position you so designate can be included in this policy and we are -- in the HR are responsible to track that. Currently it's designated all the directors of the city and all the appointed officials of the city and I just wanted your direction. Do you want me to include either the Council members or the Mayor in that policy, because, if so, we need to do that this month before the end of the month to make sure we notice that with the insurance company. Bird: Mr. President? Gorton: Mr. Bird. Bird.: We have already -- if I'm right, we have already doubled our life insurance, haven't we? Because that's what we did all the -- Nary: All employees' policies went from 25,000 for general life and 25,000 accidental death to 50,.000 and 50,000. Yes. And the directors all receive a hundred. Bird.: And that's fine. We are elected officials, we are elected at that. My personal thing is 50 is fine with me. I think it -- I appreciate it, to be truthful with you. Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 44 of 46 Nary: And the only issue that -- the cost to the city is fairly minimal. The only -- you can certainly opt in or out if you choose. I did request all the directors -- there is a tax implication. Everything above the 50 there is a tax to the individual for the amount of the premium that is paid for them for just that portion. It's a fairly small number. Most of the directors that responded to my inquiry all opted to remain in the program. They felt the benefit of the program -- the insurance was greater than the tax implication of it. So, you could certainly provide that as an option for both yourselves and the Mayor if you wish. If you don't want to do that, that's within your prerogative. Rountree: Mr. President? Borton: Mr. Rountree. Rountree: Personally, it's probably nothing that I would opt into, but looking at the future and I know Councilman Bird and -- I feel the same way he does about it, but as we look two and four and six and eight years from now in terms getting people to serve on the Council, we have all been elected unopposed as of the last election on this Council and., to me, we have got to do something to entice people and hopefully quality folks to get interested and if part of that interest is what do I get out of it and they have a possibility of getting the extension life insurance at a very minimal premium to the city, additive to what the rest of the employees get, if it's an opt in, opt out kind of a situation, I don't have a problem with it. I wouldn't want to see it mandatory. Borton: I agree. Rountree: And that's the only reason I would support it is, you know, I -- I guess I'm just really disappointed that there is -- we're either doing such a great job or that there is just that much lack of interest and lack of people wanting to spend additional time out of their busy lives to be part of the city. So, if it takes additional enticement, then, maybe we ought to start looking at stuff like that. Nary: Mr. President? Borton: Mr. Nary. Nary: I'm sure it is because you're doing an excellent job. If it's all right with -- Rountree: Suck up. Nary: If it would be all right, then, what I will do is I will bring aresolution -- I'll bring the policy back on your agenda next week and include, again, the directors as the appointed officials, any other designees that you make, including the Mayor and the Council and they have -- all have the ability to opt in or out of those benefits if they Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007' Page 45 of 46 choose on an annual basis. If that's okay I'll bring that back for the next Tuesday for consideration. Bird: They have automatically got the 50-50 -- Nary: Yes. Rountree: Yeah. That's -- Bird: -- automatically. Item 5: Executive Session per Idaho State Code 67-2345(1)(fl - (to consider and advise its legal representatives in pending litigation); Borton: Thanks, Bill. Item 5. Executive Session. Rountree: I move that we go into Executive Session per Idaho State Code 67- 2345(1)(f) and any other paragraphs? Okay. Borton: It's been moved and -- Bird: Second. I'm sorry. Borton: -- seconded to go into Executive Session as stated. Roll call. Roll-Call: Bird, yea; Rountree, yea; Zaremba, absent; Borton, yea. MOTION CARRIED: THREE AYES. ONE ABSENT. EXECUTIVE SESSION: Rountree: I move to come out of Executive Session. Bird: Second.. Borton: A motion and a second to come out of Executive Session. All those in favor say aye. THREE AYES. ONE ABSENT. MOTION CARRLED. Meridian City Council Special Meeting December 11, 2007 Page 46 of 46 MEETING ADJOURNED AT 8:52 P.M. (TAPE ON FILE OF THESE PROCEEDINGS) APPROVED: PRESIDEN JOE BORTON ~,~~~.~~ ~~~';p~'°>,,~, ATTESTED: ~ ~~~ ~ WILLIAM ~ '1~ Q` ~~~~~~~~riiii ni~~~``~~~~ l ,z~,©8 DATE APPROVED G. BERG JR.~CITY CLERK