HomeMy WebLinkAbout2001 05-08Meridian City Council Workshop May 8,2001
The planning session workshop of the Meridian City Council was called to order at 6:30 PM on Tuesday May 8, 2001 by President Keith Bird.
Members present: Mayor Robert Corrie, Keith Bird, Cherie McCandless, Ron Anderson, and Tammy De Weerd.
Others Present: Bill Nichols, Janice Smith, Stacy Kilchenmann, Gary Smith, Bill Musser, Shari Stiles, Will Berg, Tom Kuntz, David McKinnon and Brad Watson.
Bird: Planning session workshop for Tuesday May 8, 2001. I’d like to welcome you all here especially Scout Troop 144 from the LDS Church 14th Ward and Troop 61 from the Y side Bible
Church. With that roll call Mr. Berg please.
Roll Call: _ X___Tammy deWeerd ___X__Cherie McCandless
___X___Ron Anderson ___ X__Keith Bird
___X___Mayor Robert Corrie
Issue #1 Discussion of Urban Renewal Area
Bird: Item on our agenda No. 1 is the discussion by Urban Renewal area by our committee, downtown committee, Chairman Mr. Jim Johnson.
Johnson: Thank you very much Mayor, President of the Council, City Council Members, City Clerk and interested parties. We appreciate this extra opportunity to come before you again to
lay the roadwork, roadmap for you on what we’re trying to accomplish how we think we can get there. We certainly appreciate all the support you have given us thus far as a Council. Our
focus tonight will be an attempt to explain why we feel we need a greater geographical area from which to draw the necessary tax increment financing funds in order to make tax increment
financing work for the City of Meridian. This is an effort that demands a lot o f foresight and forward thinking, literally years into the future and we’re going to use visual aids that
have been prepared by both Steve Siddoway, City Planner with the City of Meridian and Clair Bowman in an effort to keep it as simple as we can. Although we realize this is a very complex
issue and you will have questions. In the interest of time and our allotted time, we’d be glad to answer questions. It might be best to defer most of those until the conclusion of our
remarks at which time we’ll be glad to answer any questions. At this time, I’ll ask Steve Siddoway City Planner for the City of Meridian to begin the formal presentation. Thank you.
Siddoway: Good evening. Thank you Mr. Johnson. Mayor, Members of Council. Well, it’s my job tonight to set a stage for what’s soon to come from Mr. Clair Bowman. I’m going to paint
the picture for you, if you will of what we’re trying to
accomplish. Talk about some of the goals, what we hope to accomplish and visually what some of that might be. Let’s talk about where we are today first of all. We do have a lot going
for us in Old Town already. We do have a lot of buildings that have historic character that we can build from. We have some streets that are lined with trees and sidewalks in place.
Thanks to an effort that went on in 1991 to put sidewalks in Old Town and replace a lot of the old deteriorated ones. Quite frankly there is just a lot potential in Old Town to make,
to reinstate Old Town as the true City Center And the canter of activity for the City of Meridian. Some of the things that help accomplish this is the civic buildings and plazas that
we have in Old Town. We have City Hall where we’re meeting tonight. We have the post office. We have a branch library. We have Generations Plaza. These start to form a backbone of public
spaces and public buildings to draw from in this effort to revitalize the downtown. We also have the rail corridor, which happens to be a great opportunity for us. There are several
efforts going on in the Treasure Valley to institute transit. That transit when it does happen will go right through the heart of our city. There is talk of Meridian being the transit
hub for the Treasure Valley that would feed in from Kuna and Eagle and have the major transfer station here. So, we would see things that we do downtown as needing to be transit oriented
and to help facilitate that end. We also have a lot of, to put it nicely, redevelopment opportunities. Areas that are unsightly, run down, vacant lots, some deteriorated structures.
There is a lot of interest in the creamery specifically as an enormous redevelopment opportunity. Those are some of the things that we would take on. At the top right is an existing
photo today of Old Town Meridian. The street along the top would be Idaho. This would be City Hall where we currently sit tonight. Broadway, the creamery, the railroad tracks, Meridian
Road and east First running through here. As you look at the arial photo you’ll see there’s a lot of vacant ground. Things are fairly disconnected and some of the things that we would
be trying to do with our revitalization efforts would be to select those existing buildings that do have character and keep those, build on it. Take the vacant land and in fill it with
new structures and add in additional public uses like the future City Hall. We need to look at parking structures. We need to accommodate the transit and we need to have more tree lined
streets. The list could go on. This isn’t an all-inclusive list but this gives you a flavor for the types of things that we’re trying to do. Some of our goals would be to reinstate old
Town Meridian as the true City Center, the place that people think of when they think of Meridian. We want to make it a vibrant and lively place, a place that’s full of people, places
to go, things to do. We want to make it bicycle and pedestrian friendly so that people can come from all sorts of modes of transportation and use the area. We want to make it a true
mixed-use area. We want it to have stores, we want it to have offices, residences and recreation spaces all within walking distance of one another. It’s also important that public buildings
and plazas be downtown to help form that spine, that core that keeps it all together. We’d also focus on economical development, bringing business into the old town area and trying to
sell developers on old town as a great place to be. We’d also want to look at historic preservation, keeping the quality buildings with historic elements that we currently have. We’ve
already
talked about transit. We want to think about the design of these places. Make sure they’re human scale, not overwhelming to people as they walk down the street, places with store fronts
and windows and awnings and places to look and shop, places where people want to be. We also have a great need for improved parking. I think everybody realizes that and that would be
something that we could take on. Then generally just looking at beautification of the area. So, if you think that’s a great idea, the question is how do we do it? We think that we have
done some homework and figured out how to make downtown urban renewal work. We need to set an urban renewal district boundary that works and will provide us with the opportunity to do
the work that needs to be done. I think that sets the stage to talk about generally some of our goals. Clair Bowman’s going to talk specifically more about the numbers and how this works
financially for the City of Meridian. But, with that I will stand for any questions on the general concepts. Okay. Thank you.
Bird: Tearing our seats up again?
Bowman: Get another show up here. My job is to present to you this evening as Steve pointed out the numbers side of it. How do we get to the point of say what we think can happen over
time? I’m going to make several assumptions along the way. One of those as we get into it is that whatever proposal I’m talking about and the numbers that I’m going to be talking about
are looking at a 10 year future for whatever agency is established. I’m also, instead of calling it an urban renewal agency, we have decided that it ought to be called the Meridian Development
Corporation and I’m using that acronym MDC in here. You’ll see that show up a few times. (inaudible) excuse me. There we go. The committee is chaired by Jim Johnson, members, most of
whom are here tonight you see next. Terry Sacman has provided minutes and organizational structure and things like that. There are several of us who have sat in part time as ex-official
members of this committee. The committee’s goal No.1 can best be said as we want to leverage the financial benefits from development that is already going on to generate revenue for
downtown revitalization. That is really what this committee is about. Secondarily, we have a goal for this evening, which is, establish the Meridian development Corporation by City Council
action at the earliest possible moment. My question now is how, following on Steve’s. We believe we can demonstrate to you that the city will receive substantially greater benefit with
this corporation in place than it will without it. I think we’re prepared to try to show you what that looks like. Let’s look at the geography that we want to talk about. There are 2
distinct geographic areas proposed for inclusion. One of these we’ll call the initial focus area, is the downtown area. The other is a resource area. We could conceivably remove the
resource area from the equation but the committee does not want to and when I run the numbers it turns out that adding the resource area as a second area in here will more than double
the benefit to the City of Meridian. It does not increase the cost that much. I think I can show you what those look like. The initial focus area is downtown, the area in which projects
would be planned and implemented. It’s what Steve showed you is a bit of that already.
The resource area we picked as an already developing area. I’ll show you where both of those are here. Here’s the initial focus area. We have the 4 Fs, Fairview to Franklin, Fourth to
Fourth was the acronym we ended up using after a while for it. I didn’t say it any better tonight than I have at some of our meetings. Here’s what it looks like from a parcel based prospective.
This shows you what Steve was talking about. A lot of this is already developed but there are some big parcels that still exist and it’s at a point where a number of those smaller parcels
have the potential to be recombined into development opportunities. The resource area we’re looking at is north of the interstate, south of Franklin road between Stratford Drive and
Meridian Road. The industrial park is in there, the racetrack is the obvious feature that you see in the overhead photograph. This one’s in much bigger chunks than the other one when
you look at the parcel pieces of it. We look at valuation, Will Berg gave me the information on assessed valuation for the City of Meridian just to give you some idea of what’s happening.
If you note the shape of that, you’re revenue tracking from property taxes has pretty much followed that. It’s been very close in the kind of increments that you see there. A growing
area, I don’t think you need me to tell you that. When we take that whole city down and carve it down into the 2 pieces now, we see a substantial difference between the 2 pieces of ground,
the 2 geographic areas that we want to talk about. The initial focus area has the bottom line there, an annual average growth rate of approximately 8 percent per year. Later on when
we look at the scenarios with and without the Meridian Development Corporation we will use that 8 percent projected on into the next 10 years. This is a 5-year historic pattern and we
use that projected on into the future as the growth rate for this particular piece of the geographic area. The resource area has had an average annual growth rate of 23 percent for the
last 5 years. To be on the conservative side we will assume only two thirds of that growth rate on into the next 10 years when we talk about what the benefits are to the city. I’ll show
you those in more detail later on. Taxing entities, all of the areas in both geographic areas are in Meridian City tax code area No. 03. Those are the nine agencies who collect funds
from taxes in that area. The actual levy rates for current fiscal year, excuse me, current tax year, yours shouldn’t be any surprise to you. It does show a little bit of a perspective
of others and you can see the school district is the largest and more than twice what the city gets. Here’s the gross tax collections for those last 7 or 8 tax years. These are property
tax receipts. That looks a lot like the valuation graphic that we had up here earlier. Pretty similar profile. Pretty rapidly increasing over time. If we go just to the initial focus
area, I want to use a slide to give you some sense of what the city collects in real dollars out of these areas as opposed to these other taxing agencies. 275,000 for Meridian City,
Ada County 260,000, the largest one, joint school district No. 2 582 and so on. In the event that an urban renewal district through the Meridian Development Corporation is implemented,
the levy rates for all except Ada County Highway District and joint school district No. 2 become usable for the Meridian Development Corporation. Okay, enough background. On to what
we look at in the future. The initial focus area, the rate of revenue growth, this is just the chart, I’m going to show you 2 sets here. One is if you do not have Meridian
Development Corporation in place. We’re assuming an 8 percent annual average growth rate there. That’s continuing the trend of what the last 5 years has been and we are assuming that
with the Meridian Development Corporation in place we would have an incremental bump of an additional 2 percent per year, oops, excuse me. So that we start at 8 percent the first year,
go to 10 the second and so on until you get to 26 percent in the 10th year. That’s the profile of what we think can be impacted and we think this is actually a rather conservative assumption
on the change in the rate of growth that could be stimulated by the Meridian Development Corporation. I’ll show you why when you get to what the numbers are. Yes.
Corrie: Can I ask a question? Why would it stay flat without the Meridian Development Corporation?
Bowman: That isn’t flat. That’s an 8 percent addition each year. The rate is flat because your rate for the last 5 years has been almost flat in the downtown core area that we’re looking
at here, the initial focus area.
Corrie: The mill levy rate?
Bowman: No. This is the valuation level --
Bird: Valuation rate.
Bowman: -- has been almost flat and your mill levy rate has generated almost an 8 percent annual increase out of this area. The property taxes you’ve collected on an annual basis have
gone up by about 8 percent here for the last 5 years and the valuation has gone up by about 8 percent. Your levy has remained really pretty consistent and constant for those years. Okay.
Resource area, same kind of graph. Here we are assuming that without the Meridian Development Corporation that resource area will have a 16 percent average annual increment in its valuation
and in the revenue from it. We are making the same assumption with the Meridian Development Corporation in place leading to the conclusion the growth in the resource area will not be
effected by establishing the Meridian Development Corporation. That is not where the focus is going to be. The focus on projects will be in the initial focus area. Look at a10 year revenue
forecast. This is now combining them. If you want at some point I could split those out. I’m not sure I could do it for you tonight but in the interest of trying to keep this simple
and make a few points I’m combining the revenue stream that would be generated from those 2 now. The first graph is the what goes to the City of Meridian if the Meridian Development
Corporation does not exist. That’s the pattern of what you would expect to see with accumulative growth rate of 8 percent in the focus area and 16 percent in the resource area. That’s
what the tax revenue, it goes from approximately $500,000 for the combined 2 areas in year one to just a tad over 2 million dollars in year 10 at those rates of growth. In the event
that you do agree to establish the Meridian Development Corporation,
you would be locked at the revenue for the first year. That’s what you would get would be the red line across there at the $500,000. The cumulative dollars between those 2 lines would
be the cost to the city. That’s what you give up and what you get in return is this line. That money is what goes to the Meridian Development Corporation over those 10 years. The reason
that line goes up so much faster is that you are leveraging not only the dollars between the black and the red lines but you are also now leveraging dollars from the 6 of those other
9 taxing districts. You get all the increment that would have gone to Ada County. That now comes to the Meridian Development Corporation as an example. So, here’s the 10-year summary
of what the totals are. Without the Meridian Development Corporation the city receives approximately 10.5 million dollars in total tax based revenue from these two areas combined over
the 10-year period. If you recall that’s the one that went from 500 to about 2 million in the last year. Adding that all up comes to 10.5 million. If the Meridian Development Corporation
were in place, that revenue stream would be approximately 5 million dollars for you, $500,00 times 10 years basically a frozen level. So, the investment that the City of Meridian would
be making would be approximately 5.5 million over a 10-year period. That’s what the city would be investing into this. In return what you get back into the Meridian Development Corporation
is 18.6 million dollars. That’s the dollars that they have to work with during that period of time. That’s the revenue against which bonding can take place in order to start projects
right away so we can expect to see that additional bump in the valuation. There has to be some bonding against that revenue stream to kick things off. It doesn't matter whether it’s
for a new city hall or whether it’s for a 40 story hotel or whatever you want, no that’s not true, whatever makes financial sense for folks downtown. Rich will shoot me if I say whatever
you want. Okay. How can that be? Well, here’s the first piece. We’ve already spoken to this a little bit and here’s the second piece. Now look at what happens in the 11th year. The Meridian
Development Corporation goes out of existence. You’re now looking at the same graph we had earlier but you have an 11th year in there. Without the Meridian Development Corporation you
simply get one more incremental bump of this 8 percent in the initial focus area, 16 percent in the resource area. So, that original graph just has one more tickle on it. That’s what
the city gets, approximately 2.5 million dollars in year 11 if you do not implement the Meridian Development Corporation. If you do implement the Meridian Development Corporation, here’s
what happens in year 11. The city’s goes from approximately 500,00 to a little bit over 5 million. So you take in an additional 4 and a half million dollars approximately in the 11th
year over what you did in the 10th year just off these two areas. There’s what happens to the revenue stream for the Meridian Development Corporation at that point, it goes to zero.
Yes. Here we go. Here’s the numbers again in the same kind of comparison. Now remember the contribution of Meridian City was 5 and a half million dollars over that 10 year period. Essentially
you’re getting back 4 million dollars, you’re (inaudible) of that if the assumptions about what the Meridian Development Corporation can stimulate to grow and we believe they’re very
conservative in here. I mean we sat around here Thursday morning, the 4 or 5 of us talking about what to use and we ended up sticking to a reasonably
conservative review. Okay and there is a typo down here I know. (inaudible) I had the calculations at 50 percent and then I realized it was more than that. First of all the city invests
approximately 5 million, it’s 5 and a half. MBC receives approximately 18, the city recoups more than 50 percent. That’s still a true statement it’s just an underestimate of what you
recoup in the first year. What more can you ask? End of show. I’d be happy to try to answer any questions.
Bird: Questions, Council?
Anderson: Mr. President.
Bird: Mr. Anderson.
Anderson: What happens Clair, if at the end of that 10th year and you eliminate the Meridian Development Corporation for one year and reestablish your tax base for the city and then
re-implement Meridian Development Corporation again the following year?
Bowman: Good question. In the event, let’s assume that that 11th year value was at 5 and a quarter million dollars tax revenue from that parcel. That would be the new floor. Where 500,000
was the floor in year one of the Meridian Development Corporation, if you allow that to expire, reestablish a new one, have a year gap in there, then you would in essence raise the floor
for the city to the 5 and a half million dollar level and the graph would play out on into the future again based on the assumptions that you make and the stimulus that you’re able to
provide to the economy and to the valuation.
Anderson: But, it would cut considerably the money that Meridian Development Corporation would have to work with when you reestablished it. So, is that why we see in most of these
cities where they have these, they want to continue them after the 10th year?
Bowman: The simple answer is yes. Just think back to those graphics and think of what those graphics on that 10-year profile would look like. In fact I can give you one. I can put them
back up here and you can imagine where they go for another 10 years if you establish that for a 20-year horizon. The return on your investment is absolutely incredible if you do that.
Anderson: My other question is then, if it does end in 10 years, then any improvements or anything they built or, does the city become the owner of that, any improvements they’ve made
or anything they built, how does that work?
Bowman: You’re in an area where I am not the expert. If Jim has an answer to that I’d be happy to hear it but I can talk about one or two illustrations in other places. One in Twin Falls
and one in Boise. I’m not intimately familiar with them from those two examples I believe it can be worked out with the development
Corporation and the manner in which the city sets it up as to who owns what when the agency expires. I believe it is part of the structure of how the city sets up the agency or how it
defines the termination circumstances for the organization. That’s not a technical answer. Bill, do you know more than that about it.
Nichols: Mr. Bowman I have to plead ignorance on the ownership issue. I’m sure that Terry White from our office could address that to the Council with regard to the way Nampa’s done
it.
Bowman: You want to have someone who’s paid to do that instead of me.
Bird: You’re paid. In CCDC downtown they don’t wind up actually owning any of that stuff do they? They just help finance it and either private or somebody owns it, I thought. I didn’t
think any of it reverted back to the public sector. They just help finance them and help get things going.
Bowman: I do believe Keith that the parking garages are owned directly by –
Bird: CCDC
Bowman: Yes.
Bird: That would be the parking garages but I know like the Sedwick Center, Mark Clegg’s thing down there and stuff like that was helped with CCDC I believe. Gary can probably answer
some of this. And that reverts back to them as private owners, maybe not the parking garages. You’re probably right there Clair, but I never gave that a thought.
Bowman: We simply did not explore that right now. I’m quite certain that the parking garages are owned by CCDC.
Bird: I can’t remember what Phil told us in that meeting anyway.
Bowman: I know very little about that aspect of it as well. I do know that that’s addressed under the act, the ownership part of it. We can research that or Bill Nichols can research
that for you. I also know that the parking garages are owned by CCDC at this point. I understand your question, what happens at the end of 10 years if we disappear? What happens to what
on going projects we have that are not yet completed I guess would be the question you really have right?
Anderson: Well, part of it. I guess I mean I see it too that you’re making improvements and building things that if the committee goes away or the corporation goes away after 10 years
then the city’s going to basically own those assets I think is the way I understand it.
Bowman: I don’t know that for a fact.
Anderson: They’ll be things for us to maintain and stuff like that.
Bowman: I don’t recall that coming up in any of our other discussions. That’s a good point. We need to find out what’s up. The main purpose of course is to spur the partnership of development.
A lot of that takes place in the private sector because they feed off one another. For example if we were fortunate enough to get the City Hall complex located in the downtown core,
which all of us want on our committee, there’s several ways to structure the ownership of that facility. Either the city own it, a lease back program or whatever. It could generate additional
revenue for the city. Paturity of that, how that is finally wound up at the end, I’m sure it’s got to be addressed in the act. I don’t know the answer to that.
Bird: Any more questions for the committee?
Corrie: Mr. President.
Bird: Mr. Mayor
Corrie: So, in other words at the 10 year period if the city wanted to continue with that same base, they could renew it again for 10 years or at the 11th year put it out?
Bowman: To stress again, under the act, the city would have complete control on anything we did at any time. So, you could pull the rug, so to speak, at any time you felt like it because
you’re empowered to do so.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Bowman: Everything we do is with City approval.
Corrie: Explain to me how do we have that power? I don’t know how that works.
Bowman: Go ahead Bill, we did some research on it.
Nichols: Mayor, members of the Council. Under the terms of the urban renewal agency law that we have on the books in the state of Idaho, the Council has the ability to effectively make
itself the board of directors. Most often you don’t have the Council involved in it but I mean essentially the way it works out, if something was going wrong the Council could effectively
take over the development corporation and run it.
Anderson: That brings up another question for me. I’m a little bit familiar with how Nampa’s operate, but I’m not real familiar with Boise’s so I don’t know the
make up of Boise’s. In Nampa, I think they have 2 of the City Council members on that board.
Bowman: They do in Boise as well.
Anderson: Do they? And so, I kind of see this as we’re entrusting this group to go ahead and collect some of the tax money and to generate additional revenues and to make sure that
we develop this downtown area or this focus area. So, it would seem like we would want to have somebody on that board or (inaudible) and remember your list of people. We have a couple
Council people that are ex-officials, are they on the board?
Bird: No.
Bowman: We have some people that have attended meetings and initially Keith Bird came to quite a few meetings and Tammy’s been to quite a few meetings. The committee is very anxious
and open to having a City Council representative on the committee or on the board of directors. We see that as nothing but an asset. It would greatly improve communication and there’s
just so much you can do in a presentation like this. Whereas the workshops that we have, we have another on tomorrow morning, is where you really get the nuts and bolts of what’s going
on. It’s been an educational process for us all. If we had a City Council member on that committee that could help feed that information back to other Council people. I think that would
be nothing but a help to us.
Bird: We haven’t set up a board yet. This is still in the committee section –
Bowman: There hasn’t been (inaudible)
Bird: -- right now. We had basically set up an Urban Renewal district but we set the fourth to fourth, Fairview to Franklin.
Bowman: Yes.
Bird: They want a larger –
Bowman: They want the 5 Fs. Now they want –
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Bird: The freeway, yeah.
Bowman: Four Fs has a bad connotation to it unless you were back in the draft.
Bird: We would probably have to go through a whole new, change the ordinance is that what we would have to do Mr. Nichols?
Nichols: Mr. President, Mayor, Members of Council. The Urban Renewal agency does exist. I mean it’s not called the Meridian Development Corporation but it does exist. It’s project area,
if you will, or the boundaries of the Urban Renewal agency are set by resolution not by ordinance.
Bird: Right.
Nichols: It’s the existing resolution that has the four Fs. It seems to me that was back in February I think that –
Bowman: Yes. There was a resolution made by you people that used those – we’re somewhat remiss as a committee and openly admittedly so in not stressing enough our need to have a larger
area in order to accomplish what we think we can accomplish within a reasonable time frame. That’s why we’re here today is to try to get you to reconsider that resolution and increase
the geographical area. That’s what we’re here to stress today. We need a larger tax allocation area than what has been graciously given by you people today in order to really make any
noticeable change in the downtown area. We just can’t generate enough revenue. Its not that the development isn’t going to take place some day on its own because some day on its own
it will. But that will be a long way down the road from what we could accomplish. In addition to that, I’m losing my train of thought here. You can’t sell bonds to generate any kind
of operating funds unless the bonding company can see the revenue stream. The revenue stream right now in the so-called, initial focus area is insufficient to sell bonds of any magnitude.
Bird: Any other questions for the committee?
Corrie: I don’t have a question. I just want to make a statement from the Mayor’s office concerning this. I think it’s very important that we have set up the area from the four Fs
as the case may be but I think from the demonstration tonight and the presentation that it’s very important that we enlarge that area so that you do have that stream of money and be
able to do the bonding. I think the town has grown immensely in the last 10 years as everybody knows and I think it'’ going to grow in another 10 years. I think under the circumstances
of what was presented here tonight we should take advantage of that and it’s only going to help the city. I think it’s a smart move for the Council to consider this and make the Meridian
Development Corporation in existence as you would ask for. From this office as one of the banks says, I’ve got 110 percent behind you. I just hope that the Council will agree with me
and go with that. With that being said, I would really thank you for the presentation and I just hope that they do that.
Bowman: We thank you. I won’t remind you that that bank that has that phrase is now out of business.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Bird: Any other questions from the Council?
De Weerd: Mr. President.
Bird: Yeah.
De Weerd: You know I agree with the Mayor and you know I appreciate your presentation today. I think coming back and really putting it in prospective with the numbers and – I swear Steve
you took some of your key points of pedestrian friendly and all of that off of every member up here’s campaign literature and how they visioned downtown Meridian. You know it was very
much in line to what I think we envisioned downtown to be pedestrian friendly, a place to gather and I appreciate that. I do have a question for the Mayor, I mean for the, I’m sorry
Mayor, for the attorney. In changing our resolution on the boundaries, that would be one step. The second step would be to form the committee for the MDC so what kind of actions do we
need to take to get this accomplished?
Nichols: President, Mayor, Councilwoman De Weerd, members of the Council. There are several steps in this. Essentially what the committee I believe is looking at is in the initial boundaries
of the Urban Renewal agency there was insufficient potential growth area to use as a revenue allocation area. The revenue allocation area is determined in a plan for renewal and so they
needed a big enough area. That’s their pitch, we need a big enough area in order to be able to come back with a plan which then sets what that revenue allocation area is. Because you
can’t set the revenue allocation area outside of the boundaries of the Urban Renewal agency. I mean, I want to emphasize that because just because you say the Urban Renewal agency boundaries
would be from Fairview to freeway, fourth to fourth. That doesn’t necessarily –
Bowman; Excuse me can I interrupt just for a second? The Urban Renewal boundaries are not as you are defining them . It’s actually the city limits of Meridian within a 5-mile radius
of the (inaudible) as long as it doesn’t cross another incorporated city. The area you’re talking about is what we’re calling step one or our initial focus area or our revitalization
area. Our first district of revitalization. I think that’s what we’re trying to say here.
Nichols: I may –
Bowman: The tax revenue allocation area has to be within the Urban Renewal area, which is the entire city limits, plus the perimeters I described.
Nichols: But, the way it is worked in other places and I’m more familiar with is that the revenue allocation area is within the boundaries of whatever that Urban Renewal project
area is.
Bowman: Not the project area.
Nichols: Well, I’m just telling you that the one I’m familiar with has a very, you know has cast a very broad net and then there are specific projects within that that are done from
revenue which is generated from the very broad area.
Bowman: We may just be hung up in semantics. I think we’re actually saying the same thing.
Nichols: To address Council on De Weerd’s question. There has to be a plan. The plan has to be proposed to the Council. The council has to adopt that plan by ordinance. When this started
the city didn’t have a finance director, which now you do who could assist in some of these issues. There has to be a plan developed before there is any of this tax revenue allocation
area or any of this tax increment financing. So, there’s quite a bit more work that has to be done.
Bowman: Right, and two of the steps that need to be taken I think even before that is number one as we see it anyway, a board of directors has to be appointed from which bylaws will
generate. We don’t have a board of directors or bylaws at this point.
Bird: You have to pass an ordinance—
Bowman: Then we would go to the plan. I think those are the logical steps as I envision them or that we’ve discussed in the committee.
De Weerd: And that’s what we’re trying to determine. What are those steps? What order do they come in? It looks like we have a difference of opinion per –
Nichols: Do you want me to come back with a punch list of things that need to be done?
Bird: Yeah.
De Weerd: Yeah.
Corrie: Mr. President, I think that would be –
Bird: I think that would be –
Corrie: -- so everybody’s on the same page and we know what we’re doing here. If I might Mr. President –
Bird: Go ahead Mayor.
Corrie: I want to personally thank the committee. You’ve done a heck of a job. I think whenever we appointed you I think we did a great job and the Council approved it. I just want
to go on record as saying thank you so much. I think we’re going to get it done and all your help and all your support and all your work is what’s doing it. Thank you.
Bowman: we appreciate that. This is a working plan, a successful working plan in 20 cities in Idaho right now. We’d like to be the 21st.
Bird: That’s right.
Corrie: We’ll get you there.
Bird: Yep. I think the whole Council would like to echo the Mayor’s sentiments on you guys. We appreciate all the work you’ve put into this and stuff. We will make it work. Any other
questions on this? If not we’ll move on.
De Weerd: Mr. President. I would like to have a date set on when we might have this information.
Bird: Probably this is not a non land issue so maybe we’ll have it on the –
De Weerd: The fourth?
Bird: -- the fourth Tuesday if Mr. Nichols can get it done. He’s very busy but he will try to get it done.
Corrie: Be the 23rd?
De Weerd: The 23rd
Nichols: The 23rd because the 22nd is the election.
Bird: Oh that’s right. It would be the 23rd. (inaudible)
Nichols: We’ll sure try.
De Weerd: Thank you.
Issue #2 Discussion of Cherry Lane Golf Course Location of Out Buildings for Maintenance:
Bird: Okay. Mayor and Council. The next item is Cherry Lane Golf Course location of an out building for maintenance. I think I see Jennifer, (inaudible) is she leaving?
De Weerd: We know how to clear a room don’t we?
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
De Weerd: Oh, it’s you.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Bird: Jim.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
***End Of Side One***
Bird: Nice presentation Clair, appreciate it.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Lovan-Holloway: Mayor, Council. Here we go again. Tonight I’m not really sure exactly what I’m asking for from the Council. We do not have, there was never property set-aside for maintenance
sheds. Wally and Nita’s property since Wally passed away, Nita is selling her property. That is where the current usage, that we are keeping our tractors. I can’t even come before Planning
and Zoning with w plan for maintenance sheds because I don’t have a design because I don’t know where to put them. There was never, our forefathers didn’t set aside, didn’t make the
developers set aside that property. This is just a big layout of the golf course. There’s a couple, there’s about 3 areas that there is room to build the maintenance sheds. What I’m
asking Council is where would you guys like to have the maintenance sheds. I guess is my first thing. The offer for Nita’s house will be coming back in probably next week.
De Weerd: Mayor Corrie you have a house on the golf course right?
Lovan-Holloway: We can put them right there?
Corrie: Yeah, we’re downsizing –
Lovan-Holloway: Can we bring out –
Corrie: Put them on that little par 3. I’ve never hit that green yet.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Corrie: Mr. President.
Bird: Yeah.
Corrie: I guess my question would be where would you like to see it and then what can we do to make it blend in with the golf course? I don’t think it’s going to be that difficult.
Where would you like to see it?
Lovan-Holloway: My first problem, or not my problem but the first area I would like to see it is it would be across the parking lot. The par 3, I don’t know my north, east, south and
west. I don’t know.
Bird; Over by the tee on –
Lovan-Holloway: It would be behind the par 3 facing the new clubhouse, which is if you look here, this is Black Cat Road, Cherry Lane. This is where the existing clubhouse is right now.
Bird: It would be right over there.
Lovan-Holloway: This is Talamar. This would be the parking lot. This is the par 3.
Bird: That’s where you got that little portable restroom?
Lovan-Holloway: There’s a little portable right there. We would like to put the maintenance sheds right here. One of the biggest problems is we also have to have access off the road
when they bring in the sand or gravel. We have to have trucks that can be in there. That would be our first request. Our second request is down here on the par 5.
Corrie: Can you pick that up?
Lovan-Holloway: Oh, sorry. Oh, sure, it tries to wipe me out. To come down – there is enough area I think a long here. Here again, up here basically there’s no home. There’s one home
right here. There is a ditch that runs right here. So, basically this wouldn’t be blocking very many houses. This one would get a little bit. By putting it down here, These houses are
not developed yet. You know there is area, there’s more area down in here. But then again like I said you do have homes.
Bird: How about your access though to get trucks and stuff in there?
Lovan-Holloway: We can come in here –
Bird: That’s just your little cart way though isn’t it Jennifer?
Lovan-Holloway: No. We have the mound there, the little cart path that goes to that house. That is our property so we could use it as an access road.
Bird: Which is the most practical for this golf course?
Lovan-Holloway: This is the most practical. The other option, we could have done it would have been along nine. We are now in the process, the developer is putting in drainage ponds
so that is our other option.
Corrie: Probably get less public sentiment if you put it up the first choice.
Bird: I think I’d agree with you Mayor.
Lovan-Holloway: That’s where we, you know it would be a less nuisance –
Bird: And better access off the road too.
Lovan-Holloway: And by doing that you know we will have a fence around it. It will have the same you know coloring and shape you know the asphalt and all to blend in. The problem is
like I said, meantime, we can put the tractors right now next to the clubhouse. You know we can park those if she does decide to sell before we can get all of this through.
Corrie: Are you talking about building new sheds or moving sheds from the old property? What are you talking about doing?
Lovan-Holloway: I believe we are going to build new sheds. I have. Like I said I have a plan that they just kind of half way sketched out. My problem was that we couldn’t bring any plans
to the council until I knew where the land was going to go.
Unidentified Speaker: The shape of the building will be determined by the location of the building itself.
Anderson: How big a building are you talking about? How many tractors do you have and stuff?
Unidentified Speaker: It’s not just tractors, it’s fertilizer –
Lovan-Holloway: Don’t ask me. I’m not the architect on this stuff.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Anderson: Seven bays and then it looks like some additional workspace area off over in here. All the office and restroom and stuff.
Corrie: I think this is what’s here. Is this here?
Lovan-Holloway: (inaudible) This is looking at it.
Bird: That’s the floor plan down there?
Lovan-Holloway: It would just be a (inaudible) building.
Corrie: Oh, okay.
Bird: What is it Ron? What’s the size of it?
Anderson: 3750 square feet.
Bird: What does it say? There’s a number right there.
Anderson: 125 by 30.
Bird: 30 by 125?
Lovan-Holloway: Yes.
Bird: That will fit on that property real good and still give you access off of the main road?
Lovan-Holloway: Yes.
Corrie: What about that piece of property right up along Black Cat Road? I don’t know what number of hole that is.
Bird: That’s got –
Anderson: That goes all the way out to Black Cat.
Lovan-Holloway: That goes all the way out.
Bird: That’s 8.
Lovan-Holloway: That’s hole number 6. That is the drainage ponds.
Anderson: Oh.
Bird: That’s 8.
Lovan-Holloway: Eight?
Bird: That goes all the way out to Black Cat. It’s got the sloping green.
Lovan-Holloway: This is in green?
Bird: Yeah. That’s the –
Anderson: Now is that some trees and shrubs kind of back in there?
Bird: They’re developing –
Anderson: A wooded area?
Lovan-Holloway: Those are houses.
Bird: Yeah and they do have some ponds in there. Isn’t that got some drainage ponds? Yeah.
De Weerd: How about by the clubhouse where the second parking lot will go?
Lovan-Holloway: the problem we are having right now with, if we do not add additional parking right there, there’s no cart parking at all. So, if you build them there, you’re going to
have the trucks that are delivering your products in you know, Pepsi or whatever and then if you pull all of our carts out and the additional homeowners that have carts, there’s not
enough parking. We are also having problems. There was not enough parking planned when we did the parking lot. We are also having problems with cart trailer parking at this particular
time. We are trying to locate trailer parking also because for every, right no they basically take up 2 parking spots.
Bird: Council?
Corrie: (inaudible)
De Weerd: (inaudible)
Corrie: I’m sorry.
De Weerd: Go ahead.
Corrie: Go ahead.
De Weerd: Have you met with staff and kind of showed them the site plans and what you want to do to parking and maybe looked at, asked them to see if they had any suggestions?
Lovan-Holloway: I haven’t done anything at this time right now. Like I said I was just coming before Council to see what their suggestions were about how about going about doing and
getting this done.
Bird: (inaudible) Any other questions? Mayor did you have something?
Corrie: She just answered it.
Bird: Okay.
McCandless: Mr. President.
Bird: Cherie
McCandless: She did show me the area that we’re talking about one day when I was out there. It looks to me like a real good location.
Bird: I think you’ve got an access off the road already don’t you, one entry cut in?
Lovan-Holloway: Yes.
Bird: Would you need more than one cut in? That would work fine?
Lovan-Holloway: Yes.
Bird: I’m like the Mayor, I think to me, if it works out for you, that’s the logical place to me (inaudible). I’d a lot sooner see it there than over in houses where you would be hitting
and everything else.
Anderson: And I agree. I mean that’s the logical place. I’m just anticipating that when we try to put a shed or garage building that homeowners near there are going to crawl out of
the woodwork and start complaining you know that (inaudible) but not in my back yard.
Unidentified Speaker: That is our concern too. But not having a plot set aside previously, we’re wondering what to do ourselves. And the other thing I think that needs to be considered
is we know that you want this to blend into the neighborhood and certainly we do too. But it can’t be a $500,00 maintenance shed.
Anderson: How come?
Unidentified Speaker: (inaudible) So, we want to find the best (inaudible) that we can to serve the needs of the golf course and still meet the needs of the neighbors.
Anderson: Is this big enough to accommodate any future needs or is it too big? Or is it over-sized?
Lovan-Holloway: They did make it a little bit over- sized just right now the company that we are working with for fertilizers. They actually store it at their location so we don’t have
to bring it. This does allow if at any time if they choose not to keep it at their location if we had to haul it in that we would have that.
Bird: Any other questions?
Corrie: Mr. President
Bird: Mr. Mayor
Corrie: Have you thought about making it the same type of material as the clubhouse, the siding? I notice you have the wood to match the clubhouse, but so they wouldn’t stand out any
different then you got the clubhouse. It’s a beautiful clubhouse. Rather than have (inaudible) maybe have the same kind of siding where it blends together. I think you’d have less people
hollering at you. There’s going to be a few that’s going to anyway but I agree with Councilwoman Tammy that you need to run this all by the staff and see what they come up with as well.
I like the area that we’re talking about.
Lovan-Holloway: Okay.
Corrie: Whether that goes over, I don’t know.
Anderson: My other suggestion would be to you know if we’re talking about that area, is maybe go talk to some of the homeowners near there and find out what kind of opposition we can
anticipate.
Lovan-Holloway: I already know that they will have very big oppositions. Mr. Ashtonburner as you know, if you guys know him has already said I mean it’s –
De Weerd: Mr. President
Bird: Mrs. De Weerd.
De Weerd: I guess that’s why my suggestion would be to work with staff. They know the drainage in some of those areas and the possibilities on that. Also and maybe locating it near where
you want to extend your parking lot in and have a row of maybe parking for the golf carts on that site. You know there must be you know some different –
Unidentified Speaker: The problem is that with the ditch area that’s being tiled there, there is not enough room for this building and cart parking. It’s an either or. It’s not a one
and.
De Weerd: It’s not a big place.
Lovan-Holloway: There’s not a big enough area there with the ditch.
Unidentified Speaker: We just had a tournament there and pulled out just the carts that we have now. That doesn’t include future carts and there just wasn’t enough room. We were parking
out in the unpaved areas in order to get enough room to –
Bird: What is to the south of the clubhouse there, that area there where the pine trees are? If you put the maintenance building on the north end where, move the trailer (inaudible).
Could you make that into cart parking over there?
Unidentified Speaker: One of the things –
Bird: I know it’s rough coming out –
Unidentified Speaker: -- is part of the amenity of the clubhouse is to extend that area into the area that contains the scoreboards, barbecue area, that would allow for those other kinds
of activities that you associate with a clubhouse.
Bird: Okay.
Lovan-Holloway: The other thing it is also in the process, we are putting in practice bunkers there that we have not been able to have.
Bird: Okay.
Anderson: Since you’re doing different things in here, some of its fertilizer storage, some of its tractor storage, could this be broke into like two smaller buildings? And then one
of them over there by your clubhouse and then one in this other? I mean if size becomes an issue that could be a negotiating point that you might be able to use with these neighbors
to pacify them. I guess the comment would be that neighborhood opposition really has a lot of influence with Council so anything you can do ahead of time to work through those issues
and to resolve them would help the chances of approval. (inaudible)
Lovan-Holloway: Yeah. We already know that. (inaudible)
Bird: Any other questions, Council?
Lovan-Holloway: Oh, I –
Bird: Yeah.
Lovan-Holloway: I have one question. Just on this issue, I mean we’ll go to staff and we’ll do all the stuff that we need to do. The other thing is so that when you
guys get the phone calls because if Nita does sell this, we are going to have to have tractors sitting out on the golf course. That’s going to be, I’m sure the city will get phone calls.
Well they have all of this tractors and all of this stuff sitting out. How would you like us to address that?
Anderson: I have a question on that. I don’t know if they’re done yet but they’re building a new mini storage unit up on Ten Mile. Is there a possibility that as a temporary solution
maybe something could be rented there and the tractors housed in there? I mean it’s not a whole lot further than going there than it is to Nita’s house.
Lovan-Holloway: They could. I’m just looking at it as an expense as you know by renting those.
Corrie: Mr. President.
Bird: Yes.
Corrie: I can assure you that you will get and I will get phone calls.
Lovan-Holloway: Yes. I mean they’re going to –
Corrie: They’re going to get very upset and then trying to get this on top of that could be a real problem.
Anderson: What about as an interim solution I guess I mean the city owns the golf course basically. What if we offered to park, is there space at the waste treatment plant where they
could park those at night that would eliminate the phone calls?
Corrie: We’d have to talk to Gary about – Is there Gary? Any extra space out there? I mean they’re going to have to go aways but—
Bird: That’s quite a ways.
Corrie: That’s (inaudible)
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Bird: I know.
Smith: Mr. Mayor, Council members. I guess I’m not sure what kind of equipment we’re talking about, how much space we need. We’ve obviously got some space out there and how often it’s
going to be accessed. With all the construction that’s going on, people coming and going, I just don’t know the logistics of being able to
do that. I can certainly find out if Jennifer can give me a number of equipment pieces that you’d need to park.
Lovan-Holloway: Great. Thank you.
Bird: Okay. Any other questions? Any other statements? Thank you very much Jennifer.
Lovan-Holloway: Oh. Thank you guys (inaudible)
Bird: Okay.
Issue #3 Presentation from Ada County Assessor Office by Marilee Fuller, Chief Deputy Assessor (about 8:00 PM)
Bird: Item No. 3 is a presentation by Ada County Assessor’s Office by Marilee Fuller, Chief Deputy Assessor. I believe she just walked in. We hit her just on time. Been making the rounds
today, giving all the reports?
Fuller: Well, I’m making a couple of rounds today anyway.
Bird: I reckon you were either in Eagle or –
Fuller: Garden City.
Bird: -- Garden City that was it.
Fuller: Thank you for having us. I need to tell you Bob LaQuaid was very sorry he wasn’t able to make it here, a conflict in his schedule. I know he enjoys getting a chance to visit
with you and you’ll just have to take me this time.
De Weerd: Well, welcome.
Fuller: I do have a couple of handouts that I’d like to give to you before I start reeling out a lot of numbers.
Anderson: If it wasn’t here by Friday we don’t open it.
Fuller: And then this is the second document that (inaudible). The reason we make the rounds at this time of the year is because our assessment notices go out at the end of May and we
are pretty sure that you’re interested in what kind of results we’re seeing on those assessments. So, what I’ve done here is recap the changes in overall value from what they were last
year to what they are this year. If you look at the top line it shows that your total market value – market value is the value we estimate the properties would sell for if they came
on the market. That’s the definition of market value. So, the total market value in the City of
Meridian is 2.2 billion. Last year it was only 1.8 billion. You can see you’ve had an increase of over 20 percent. I looked at your percent change last year too and it was also in that
range. It’s no surprise to you guys I’m sure that you’re having some really, really healthy growth. The next line shows your taxable value in the City of Meridian and that’s your value
less the homeowner’s exemption. That’s the number you’re going to be looking at when you fix your levies this year. When you do your budget and fix your levies. That has an even healthier
growth and as we get on down through some of these other numbers you’ll understand why that is. Your commercial growth is going bonkers and I don’t have to tell you about that. I notice
it really when I come to Meridian. I don’t get over this way really often and every time it seems like the traffic has doubled and the new shopping opportunities have doubled. It’s really
something. The next line down shows your residential market value. In residential I’ve included manufactured homes. You actually do have a couple of farm properties still within the
city limits and so those are included in this residential property total. You’ll notice that’s gone up 12 percent from a year ago. There’s been a healthy increase in the parcels though
of nearly 20 percent in the number of residential parcels if you look at the next line down. Oops, I’m looking down at commercial already. I’m sorry.
Bird: I was going to say –
Fuller: I skipped a line. That wasn’t a good deal. So, you haven’t had such an increase in your residential parcels. What you probably are seeing is that some of those vacant lots are
getting built out. Then let’s go down to the commercial area. What was 500 million last year is over 700 million this year for a whopping 42 nearly percent. That’s just a huge increase
in the value of that commercial property. That’s what pushes your taxable value up because there’s no homeowner’s exemption on all that commercial property so that shifts the tax burden
onto commercial property when there’s growth like that. The next line down, I’ve given you a recap of your new construction roll. That new construction role is a value that you need
to have from us in your budget calculations in the 1995 Governor Batt tax legislation that allow your budgets to go up 3 percent plus a component for new growth. Well, this new construction
roll is your component for new growth. Just because it’s interesting I broke that new construction roll down so you can see that out of that 150 million of new construction, 73 million
is residential and 41 million is commercial. That’s actually a little less in commercial value than what you had a year ago. Then we have another component, which is new subdivisions.
You’re allowed to capture that value when property goes from a farm to a subdivision or when a property goes from a farm to commercial or some other use. That changes status where new
subs is that last line item and there’s been a real healthy growth in that column. One of the reasons for that is that we’ve done a thorough reevaluation of all commercial land in the
county. Commercial land in Meridian was a prime target of that because you’re seeing so many changes quickly changing from transitional use to full on commercial use or commercial potential
that’s very close. So, you see a lot of increase in value up in that total commercial value for
those changes in use. That’s going to turn around to construction probably in the following year. Another thing that I’m showing you that I think is quite interesting is the percent
of the tax burden that’s born by residential versus commercial property. Do you see where that is? When I calculated that, that’s based on last year’s numbers because this years not
final. When I did that calculation I included operating property, which is utility property, and also the sub roll because that’s mostly commercial property. Personal property is usually
on our subsequent roll. So, I included those two components as commercial. When you include those and weight it out against the residential you have over 60 percent of your tax burden
is paid by residential and nearly 40 percent is paid by commercial property. In Garden City they just asked me well what’s that in the rest of the county? What kind of percentages do
you see? Well, in Boise you see close to 50-50 and in Garden City you see close to 50-50 and I’m guessing if commercial development continues in Meridian at the pace that it’s going
now you’ll eventually get to that spot too where it’s more equalized between residential and commercial property tax payers. Anybody have any questions on this data?
Bird: Questions, Council, Mayor?
Anderson: I have none. It’s just very nice.
Fuller: Well, it’s good to have a little bit of heads up. People might be asking you. People are surely going to be talking about their assessment notices. You can see these increases
over time but to say what the increase is going to be on an individual property owner it’s pretty difficult to say. We know that the median increase for commercial was around 3 percent
but that could be all the way from a slight decrease to 100 percent of what it was last year. So, it’s a little bit deceptive to talk about averages when you see we’ve done a lot of
equalization what you would say. If you go down a commercial street, you see real consistent values all the way down the street. Embarrassingly I would have to say that up until now
you would see some ups and downs if you went down any commercial strip and looked at the land values under those commercial properties. We’ve made a huge effort to equalize that out.
We’ll real proud of that effort. We’ll see what the property owners think when they get their assessment notices.
Bird: Yeah.
Fuller: Speaking of assessment notices, that is the second piece of paper I gave you today. That is an example of the new assessment notice we’ll be using for this year. Do you all remember
what our assessment notice used to look like? It use to be a little 5 by 8 card, kind of a buff card. Well, over the last couple of years, at the direction of some legislators, the assessors
have gotten together with the tax commission and have come up with this new design. The legislature's desire was that we provide more information to property owners on their assessment
notice. This is the result of that effort to provide more
information. You can see the top part of the form has pretty much the same kind of information that we always had. Last year and the year before we showed property owners last year's
assessment versus this years assessment. Now we’re going into more detail to show them the change in value. This particular property that’s in front of you doesn’t show change in value
but I have to tell you that many, many, many parcels will show a change in value this year. We have new appraisal software and in this new software we have the ability to apply trends
much, much more efficiently than we use to. So, we appraise 20 percent of the property each year. That means we physically go and look at the property and evaluate whether our property
characteristics are right. That’ll usually result in a value change. Sometimes up and sometimes down. Based on the sales and based on that appraisal work, we have to adjust the values
on all the properties that we didn’t look at. Now we have a much better ability to fine tune that and do that. So, you’ll see very properties that don’t have any change in value such
as what is in the example in front of you. In fact that particular property I looked today and it is going to have a different value than it did last year too but we’ve dummied this
up a week or two ago for you just so you could see what the notice is going to look like. You’ll notice that all the taxing districts with their phone numbers and the amount of the tax
payment that’s going to each of those –
De Weerd: There you go (inaudible) –
Fuller: -- taxing districts. The far column in the right is going to have the meeting dates. I believe we’ve gotten the meeting dates from most of the taxing districts that’ll be published
on there. Hopefully you’ll have more people attending your budget hearings and getting involved with how their tax dollars are being spent rather than just complaining about it from
a distance. I think that’s what –
Corrie: That’s what they do. Yes.
Bird: Yeah.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Fuller: It would be nice if they would get involved up front. That’s what we think and give the input up front instead of complaining about it after the fact.
Anderson: I notice they don’t show the mill levies anywhere on there though.
Fuller: Well, it doesn’t show the mill levy no but you can back into that pretty easily by taking the tax dollars and dividing it by the value. But it doesn’t show the mill levy. They
had to make decisions about how much to put on there. It’s a bit of an overload anyway when you look at how much information is on that sheet. Some people when they look at all these
numbers all laid out on a page, their eyes kind of roll back and they don’t pay much attention.
Anderson: That would be better than the phone numbers on there.
Fuller: Do you think? Okay. Well, I’ll pass that on (inaudible) the rest of the assessors, or the meeting dates.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Bird: Mr. Clerk
Berg: Thank you Mr. President. I know that some current legislation that was being proposed this last year was asking to put more information on the notice like area of impact if you
are in one or not. You said they’re trying to determine how much information to put on and this was maxing it out. Is there any leeway to add more to this?
Fuller: I believe there is. There’s a lot of white space on there. These as you can see are going to be in an envelope from now on instead of just that card. We think people will pay
more attention to something that comes in an envelope. A lot of times people say well I didn’t ever see my assessment notice and it’s because those cards look like maybe they were junk
mail. So, there is more room on those forms to give more information and there’s also the ability to add some kind of a flyer or another piece of literature in the envelope with those.
We’re going to have these notices printed and sent by AutoSort. If you’re familiar with AutoSort it’s a big, has big mailing machines. It’ll save us a lot of money having them do the
work. Then they will group the assessment notices together so if you have an owner that owns a number of properties they’ll be combined in a single envelope which I think will be a good
convenience for property owners.
Anderson: On that new construction deal, if I can back up on that, did you say the 35 million is the number times our last years mill levy?
Fuller: The new construction, no. It would be the total. The 150 million.
Anderson: So, that top one is total.
Fuller: The top line. That top line if you add up those other three, the residential, commercial and change of status. If you add those all up that equals the 150 million. I was just
showing you that breakout because I thought it was interesting to know how much of your new construction was commercial versus residential. It’s also interesting to know that that new
residential construction included 758 new homes and the commercial included 63 new businesses or commercial remodels.
Bird: Mr. Clerk.
Berg: Mr. President. Just to clarify something also, the residential homes do not get to be on the tax roll until they’re occupied.
Fuller: That’s right. So, these are homes that were occupied last year.
Berg: They may be built, they may be sitting there. They’re not on the tax roll yet.
Anderson: Good point.
Fuller: Now these were built in the year 2000, built and occupied in 2000. If they weren’t occupied yet, then they don’t show up on here.
Bird: Any other questions for Marilee? Okay. Thank you very much.
Fuller: Thank you for having us.
Bird: Very nice. Thank you.
Fuller: We enjoy providing the information to you.
Bird: Okay. Thank you very much.
De Weerd: Thank you.
Fuller: Bye bye now.
Bird: Okay.
Issue #4 Discussion of Copier Expert.Com Proposal for Services
Corrie: Mr. President.
Bird: Yes, Mayor.
Corrie: Item No. 4 has been removed.
Bird: Okay.
Corrie: They’re not ready yet.
Bird: But I believe that Stacy and Janice wanted to go over some budget things in that slot if it was okay, Mayor.
Corrie: That’s fine.
Bird: Stacy did you want to take over, or Janice?
Anderson: Which one? The copy machine?
J. Smith: Thank you Mayor and City Council members. Talking with our financial director, going over the service proposal with copier expert, we opt not to use it. There are other options,
working with state bids and using the audit report that they did prepare for us. Maybe leasing versus purchasing options so we totally did not want to use this proposal at all. We wanted
to bring up your budget calendar again. I have some extra copies here if you didn’t have it. That was that tentative calendar.
De Weerd: Thank you, Ron.
J. Smith: Hopefully, you all went back to your significant other and checked your vacation schedules. We need the dates –
Corrie: (inaudible)
J. Smith: The financial director was going to go ahead and fill in the dates but we need to find out your vacation if you’re going to b you know what the majority will be available.
Other than that we were just going to have the – the dates that I have that are in question are just question marks for will you be available and other than that the financial director
was going to review those and go with what we have. We’ve also been updating the budget software and we need some guidance from the Council members on how we’re going to be working the
budget this year. I’m going to at this time put Stacy on. We kind of went over it briefly this afternoon and she has some great ideas and I think it’s really going to be helpful to the
Council and to the department heads on projection of where we can go. We’ve no got some guidance from our county assessor that was here. She gave us the new construction roll so we can
use that formula (inaudible). At this time I’m going to bring Stacy in and she can go over her ideas on the budget.
Bird: Janice, before you leave, on these dates is it okay if the Council goes over and gets this back to you guys, if the Mayor and Council goes over this and gets it back to you later
this week?
J. Smith: Oh that’s fine.
Bird: Because you know everybody’s got to kind of make sure whether –
De Weerd: I think I’m gone the week of the ninth –
Bird: She thinks she’s gone or something but we need to find out.
J. Smith: Some of these dates we wouldn’t need the Council so you’re going to be gone the week of the ninth? Okay.
Bird: Which would be the 11th and 12th which you’ve got scheduled in for us. If, Council, Mayor, if we all get back to them this week and let them know if it conflicts with us, any of
these dates, let them know. Okay. Thanks Janice. Would that be all right with you? We don’t have to let you know tonight?
Kilchenmann: Mayor, Council. We’ve just been kind of brain storming this afternoon on your budget process. I think I have some ideas that will change the procedures that you go through
and the process that you go through. We won’t be able to do everything this year because some of the things, I mean I visualize us starting the budget process in October in the future.
So, it’s kind of a continuous process but we’re not going to do it all the time. You know, don’t worry. One thing I’d like to do is approach the budget a little differently than we have
in the past. So, instead of giving the departments, kind of pushing everything out to them, we bring some of that back. In other words, accounting would develop a base using where you’re
at right now, what you approved for the year. We’d add base adjustments which are those things like insurance increase and so forth that you have to do to maintain current level of operations.
Then we’d calculate what the revenue is or what the total you have to spend per each fund. Then we give the departments that information but what they would be providing are what we
call their enhancements or those increases to their base operations. Then those would come back to you and they would prioritize them. They would present them to you with our help in
calculating personnel cost, operating cost to go along with the tenant personnel cost and so forth. Then you would have that to look at, ask questions, and get feedback. Then based on
what your revenues are you would prioritize them, give them back to accounting and we could run scenarios for you like if you wanted to do an across the board operating cost inflation,
what you wanted to add for employee cost of compensation, you know do you want to do 3 percent? Do you want to 5 percent, et cetera. Then we can roll that all up and have a finished
budget. It kind of changes, as I understand it, and I don’t know completely how the budget process works. But that would be kind of how I see as an outline. What I could do is maybe
put that in writing when I get back your, when you give us back your vacation dates and so forth. We can kind of use that for the development of a calendar.
Bird: Okay. It sounds like a winner. That’s a good idea.
Kilchenmann: Oh, one more thing. I put together kind of an information sheet that you can use for the mill levy. We only have one color copy because that’s all we can afford, no. But
we would have this available tomorrow night as kind of an information sheet. Ron has one so he doesn’t get another one. I just wondered if you look at that and then maybe let me know
tomorrow morning if you have any problems with it and we can change it.
Corrie: (inaudible) I’ve seen it.
Kilchenmann: Then we’ll take it and get it printed. It’s pretty basic. It’s just – we talked to Boise and they said it was helpful to have just some really summarized concise information
that you could use for the public or the press.
Corrie: Mr. President. I got that this afternoon. It’s really good.
Bird: It looks good.
Corrie: It would be good in color for basics. (inaudible)
Bird: Okay. Any questions for Stacy or Janice?
Corrie: I have none.
Bird: Okay. Any more Ladies? If not thank you very much, very nice presentation. We appreciate it.
Corrie: Okay.
Issue #5 Update of White Sewer Trunk Project Completion Date
Bird: Next item on the agenda is update on the White Sewer Trunk project completion date. Mr. Watson.
Watson: Thank you Mrs. President, Mayor and Council. The standard white drain trunk project hasn’t moved any as far as easements as you probably know. We have, Gary and I have, contacted
Keller Associates to evaluate an alternative to getting the upper two miles of the white trunk sewer service in the absence of that downstream easement. I talked to the project engineer
this afternoon, gave him some information and he’s going to put together some cost estimates and run some scenarios for us and have those to us by next Tuesday. Are there any questions?
Bird: Brad. Once the easements are in and everything’s ready to go, how long will it take to build that trunk line?
Watson: I think we’ve got probably, including the bidding process, ninety days from the time we get the easement until we bid it. Then another month, paperwork, contracts that sort of
thing. I think they had a 4-month construction period until a substantial completion. Then there’s another month probably closing it out getting it finaled, tested that sort of thing.
So, we’re looking at, what’s that 4 –
Bird: Eight.
Watson: Four, eight, nine.
Bird: Eight months, eight nine months?
Watson: Yeah.
Bird: Okay. You said Keller would have something back on the easements and stuff Tuesday or something –
Watson: No. They’re not working on the easements at all. I mean that’s totally dependent on the Bridgetower project. What they’re going to look at for us is an alternative to sewer the
upper two miles from Linder Road east via a pump station, a temporary pump station.
Bird; Okay.
Watson: We have asked them to put together some cost estimates and timelines in order to do that. We have signed easements for the upper mile. They’re not recorded yet. We have commitments
to donate easements on the middle mile which I’ve been told shouldn’t be too difficult to get. We just want to be able to present another option to the Council in order to get the upper
two miles going.
Bird: Okay. That’s from Linder east?
Watson: Linder east.
Bird: Linder to Meridian to Locust Grove?
Watson: To Locust Grove. I might remind you that the Vienna Woods area as soon as this white trunk has service, the Vienna Woods can go too. It’s not just those two square miles that
are being held up. There’s other stuff that’s being impacted, putting aside the annexation issue of course.
Bird: Okay. Any other questions for Gary, or for Brad?
De Weerd: Mr. President. Brad you’ll get us both scenarios then in writing?
Watson: Councilman De Weerd, Mayor, and Council. I’ve asked Keller and Associates to give me a letter report listing ballpark estimates for both design and construction of a temporary
lift station to serve the upper two miles of the White Trunk. The other option is just the original project and that’s totally dependent on getting easements from Bridgetower owners.
De Weerd: I guess my question is, can we look at both of those in black and white? You know of you get the easements from Bridgetower this is a tentative or a guess at a time frame and
the steps that need to be done versus your second scenario as your back up plan?
Watson: Councilman De Weerd, yes. We have all the costs. We have the time estimates. We have everything except the easements for the original project and that I can present that to you
along with the new information we get from Keller Associates so that you can compare time for completion, costs, that sort of thing. I will have both scenarios side by side.
De Weerd: That would be very helpful.
Bird: Yeah.
De Weerd: Thank you.
Bird: Thanks Brad. Any other questions for Brad? Okay.
Issue #6 Update of South Slough Sewer Trunk Project Completion Date
Bird: While you’re on the hot seat there Brad let’s go on to the next item. South Slough Sewer trunk project completion date. Gary gets that hot seat?
G Smith: Mr. President, Mayor and Council. We’ve met in the field with a property owner going into Carroll subdivision and with our consulting engineer and we have I believe the general
agreement that we can cross their property with the trunk. It’s going to be a bore project in order to get the sewer through the property. That would eliminate any open cut, get us out
into public right-of-way. From that point then, it’s just excavation in the public street to get to Ustick and to Eagle. I have not been able to have any further conversations with Mr.
Vern Allman. I tried today again and wasn’t able to make contact with him. I left message. The thing that I need to do with him is to find out what he needs. I’ve already told him what
we can do. The last time I talked to him he wanted us to build a lift station at the east boundary of his property. I told him that was not an acceptable alternative. Short of being
able to get the easement from Mr. Allman, the only other alternative we have in order to meet the existing trunkline in Chamberlain Estates on his west boundary is to condemn an easement
across his property. There are no other alternatives.
Bird: I thought we did something, an agreement, an actual agreement with him on –
G. Smith: You did and it was sent to him and he reviewed the agreement and came back with a statement that – Mr. Nichols probably remembers better than I
what his comment was. I think our city attorney was uncomfortable in committing the language of the agreement to a Mayor and Council beyond that that’s presently sitting. Is that correct,
Bill? Am I phrasing that correctly?
Nichols: Mr. President –
***End Of Side Two***
Nichols: -- then we were looking at that there were additional property owners that were going to ask for the same thing and so on down the line. It didn’t make practical sense to go
beyond what we’d done. I mean that was my opinion. If you tell me to do something different, I’ll do it. In my view, given the relatively short space across Mr. Allman’s property and
the condemnation being much cheaper and surer route and you’re not obligated to not annexing everything else that goes along with that. That’s where I was coming from.
Bird: I thought the agreement that we had passed was agreeable to him but evidently it was not agreeable to him after --. We basically did everything he asked us to within the law with
that agreement that we passed and then he changes his mind.
G. Smith: Mr. President and Mayor and Council. The agreement was prepared by Mr. Nichols and it was prepared based on what Bill and I felt was appropriate for Mayor and City Council
to be involved in. Then it was presented to you for your review and approval prior to being sent to Mr. Allman for his review so that we knew from your standpoint it was okay. That’s
the reason that you saw it first. We just didn’t want to send something to him, have him agree to it then bring it to you and say no (inaudible) something different. He felt differently
about it. As Bill said he didn’t feel that it was an absolute guarantee. We read it and felt that it was very fair and thought that it included the concerns that he had, or addressed
the concerns that he had. I can go back to when Packard Estates was being developed, being engineered and the conversations that they had with Mr. Allman and the laundry list that grew
over a period of time as they discussed an easement with him. It became a matter of finally the developer saying let’s do something else and they spent their money on a lift station
and pumped the sewage.
Bird: Gary, basically if we had to go in for condemnation and stuff, what are we looking at in a time period of getting it out there?
G. Smith: Mr. president, Mayor and Council. I don’t know what the timing is for condemnation. I’ve never been through the process maybe Mr. Nichols knows.
Nichols: Mayor, members of the Council. The first thing is that there has to be an offer made for the easement. There has to be some kind of determination of what’s a fair value for
encumbering the property with the sewer trunkline easement. There has to be some good faith negotiations to purchase that
easement. Then there has to be an offer from the city for that and if the offer is rejected the city can file a condemnation lawsuit, can ask for --. There’s a quick hearing procedure.
When I say quick, it’s like within a few weeks of the filing to actually get possession of the easement itself so that construction can begin. The valuation is left for a later date.
The valuation actually goes to a jury trial. Chris Nigh, in our office just finished one for the city of Nampa on a right-of-way acquisition for an intersection expansion. The jury verdict
was less than the pre trial offer.
Corrie: Mr. President. We started this procedure on the Elixir, I believe the elixir company and they decided that they would rather let us go through –
Nichols: Yes sir.
Corrie: They never –
De Weerd: Mr. President.
Bird: Mrs. De Weerd.
De Weerd: Haven’t we already been negotiating in good faith and a lot of that what you have said is part of the process of going, the steps before going to condemnation?
Nichols: Councilwoman De Weerd, Mayor, members of the Council. In an effort to try to keep sewer costs down and connection fees down, Gary has been pretty persuasive over the years getting
property owners to donate, if you will, the easement across their property and do it for very little if any monetary consideration or maybe some other aspect, moving the line or doing
some different things. So, he’s continued that approach in order to try to keep the overall cost down. But once in a while you run into somebody where that doesn’t work. So then you’ve
got to actually offer to buy the easement and that’s a little different reality than what the city’s faced in the past as I understand it from Gary.
G. Smith: Yes, correct.
Bird: But in the same token. If we have to put a lift station in, what’s one of those cost?
G. Smith: Mr. President, Mayor and Council. I don’t think that that’s an alternative. I mean it just doesn’t make sense to me that we have a 350 foot piece of sewer in exchange for a
lift station, the pressure line that will have to be routed through a subdivision, two subdivisions to get back to the point that’s 350 feet away. It’s just dumb.
Bird: I agree.
De Weerd: I guess my question is how long do we have to do these negotiations before we actually start changing our plan of attack and getting something done?
Nichols: Councilwoman De Weerd, Mayor and members of Council. There’s no specified time period that good faith negotiations occur. There has to be some kind of a determination by somebody
that knows what easements cost or what impact it has on the property. There are appraisers and so forth that can come up with that and once you’ve got that range, you go in and negotiate.
At some point, somebody has to have the authority to say this is as high as we’ll go and at that point if you don’t have it done then you start the process. I mean it would, to me it’s
viewed as an administrative function Gary and his staff do the best they can to try to determine what damage, if you will, it will cost to Mr. Allman to have this line go through his
property. They then offer up to that amount and then (inaudible) if its not agreed to we go forward.
G. Smith: Mr. President, Mayor and Council. The appraisals are in the process of being done right now so we’ll have a value of the property on which to base an offer for the easement.
Bird: The only thing, Gary, is once we get through, how long do you suppose it would be out and go through Eagle and going on through?
G. Smith: In terms of completing the design –
Bird: Yeah.
G. Smith: -- and actually doing the construction? Brad’s thinking it’s probably pretty similar to the white drain.
Bird: Eight, nine months?
G. Smith: Yes.
Bird: The problem is we, 2 years ago put this in the light as a priority set forward as a priority. I realize that certainly isn’t all our staff’s fault that (inaudible) a long on that.
I don’t know what we’d do with – Seems like our priorities went down. We cot a couple bad hold ups coming on both lines. I don’t know how we sole the problem other than just go out and
offer –
De Weerd: Mr. President.
Bird: Yeah, Tammy.
De Weerd: I guess that’s what I’m trying to understand. You know I don’t by any means understand the time frames that a lot of these steps take but when we set
a priority of these two areas it seems like. I know you guys know where you’re at and how far you’ve come since the priority was set but this just seems to take forever. That’s kind
of why I’d like to see it in black and white you know from step one to, from A to Z and what that means in a reasonable time frame. And then what it means in the time frame that you’re
dealing with because you’ve had some bumps along the road. I’d like to put it in prospective so that I can at least answer any questions that I might get to even understand the process
as it is. Yes, a year ago, more than a year ago we set it as a priority area and it seems like we’re still doing step A as far as I know. But you know we could be at M but I’ve never
seen anything and I don’t know what that process is so I guess I would really like to have a little bit of something in front of me that shows us at least we’ve gone past A.
G. Smith: Okay. We can certainly do that.
De Weerd: Thank you.
Bird: Any other questions?
Anderson: Mr. President
Bird: Mr. Anderson
Anderson: I have a question for you Gary. I know we’ve done a master plan of our sewer but I was sitting in the city council meeting at Nampa last night and the public works director
over there was outlining the sewer expansion over there. They’re going right down the center of a road. That way the only person that they have to negotiate with is the Highway District
for the easement to right-of-way.
Bird: Yeah.
Anderson: Is there a possibility and how expensive or how far down the road are we? I mean it seems like taking this route through these property owners, that’s our problem because
everyone of them wants to hold us hostage to get something that he wants for us to run our sewer across there.
G. Smith: Right.
Anderson: How hard would it be for us to redesign these trunklines to go down McMillan Road and Ustick Road and just forget about all these easements through these people’s property
and take a different route. I mean it seems like we’re going to be battling these people for years. We’re going to be sitting here 10 years from now still trying to figure out how we’re
going to get our sewer lines to the other end of the –
G. Smith: Right.
Anderson: -- area.
G. Smith: That’s a good question, Councilman Anderson. The problem that we have with the roadways, at least in Meridian, I don’t know how they lay out in Nampa. But we need to run our
sewers in low areas of the ground elevations and those always follow along the drainages and the roads, the section line roads are --. I don’t recall ever having run into one that was
in the really the low area of the ground elevations. What we’ve tried to do is, where we know that developments are going to take place, or even if we don’t know where developments are
going to be taking place, if they’re small developments, we try to figure out where a future roadway would be so that at the time that the property is developed the sewer is in a road
rather than along a back lot line or along a drainage. Years ago when trunklines were extended in Meridian they were along drainage, the banks of the drainages, Nine Mile drain, Ten
Mile drain, Five Mile drain. All of those had our trunklines right along the banks and it was through property that was on private property but in those days as bill mentioned, easements
were much easier to obtain.
Bird: Right.
G. Smith: That is the low area of the ground. So, everything flows by gravity to those low areas. Without, you could locate them in roadways away from the drainages but you’d end up
with pumping situations where you’d need to have lift stations. I’m not saying that couldn’t be done. It’s just one of those things where you have an added cost of a lift station, large
lift stations on these trunks.
Bird: And I think that’s what, if I read in the paper right, Ron. I think that’s what Nampa’s coming down the deal was putting in two lift stations out there.
Anderson: Yeah. But I mean, what’s the alternative? I mean to be sitting here not getting easements? A lift station isn’t desirable but if you do a large regional one with a large
transmission line then –
G. Smith: Right.
Anderson: I mean I guess at this point, I’m thinking we need to start looking at some alternatives because this seems to be going nowhere in a hurry.
G. Smith: Yes. And it, part of it’s been I guess my reluctance or my background of trying to deal with people without going through the legal process of obtaining, forcing an easement
and trying to get them to agree that yeah this is appropriate for their property, that it adds value to their property. We’ll be able to restore things as they existed prior to getting
on the property. The property owners have developed a different attitude toward that approach. We’ve just been butting
heads and I guess it’s been my reluctance to turn it over to the legal end and just force our way through. That’s what we should have done.
Corrie: Mr. President.
Bird: Mr. Mayor.
Corrie: I think the Council is going to have to play hard ball on these easements because, first thing is a person says you want an easement. Then the next thing they think of is how
much money can I get for this. If they know up front that the city has a timetable and they want to work it and get it done. And they’re willing to go to court and do a condemnation
it’s going to be either or for them. One or the other. If we continue to like Ron said, we keep butting heads with them and try to talk to them and they’re going to go as long as they
can and get as much money as they can and if the Council is under the frame of mind that they will deal with this right but they’re not going to spend all day on it and go through condemnation
and legal with it. If they know that’s the consequences then they should –
Bird: I agree with you 100 percent.
Corrie: -- But if we start playing games we’ll never get this thing done. That’s the way I look at it. I may be wrong but I think the Council –
Bird: Gary? I think what the Council would like to see is we had set this a priority. You know these two high priorities. In black and white a timetable by you and Brad on both the South
Slough and what we need to do. If we need to go condemn the property, let’s get going after it.
G. Smith: Okay.
Bird: If it’s a developer holding it up, we condemn his property too.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
G. Smith: All right.
De Weerd: Well, Gary. You know I appreciate your approach. You know I think that it serves the city very well but at this point you know like Councilman Anderson said we can drag this
out into an eternity or we can set a date that we need their answer by. Then proceed at that point.
G. Smith: Right.
De Weerd: I’m sure it’s probably more frustrating for you than it is us. It’s extremely frustrating to see that and maybe again I was naïve to the process that
a priority that we set seems to be no further along than where it’s at now. I would imagine the development community has similar frustrations as well.
G. Smith: Yes. They do and I’ve heard those frustrations.
De Weerd: I’m sure you have. Thank you Gary.
Bird: And, Gary, you know what we said in here an year and a half ago when we said you know by this year we’ll have white done. By fiscal year this year we’ll have south slough and then
we get held up on this. I think we’re just going to have to set a timetable and if it don’t happen, just go after it in court or whatever we have to like the other cities do. Don’t play
with it.
G. Smith: Okay.
Bird: That’s my opinion.
G. Smith: We’ll do. And we don’t have that problem on the water lines.
Bird: Thank goodness.
G. Smith: It’s because of the, as Councilman Anderson noted, they were located in the roadways and they’re pressurized.
Bird: Mr. Cavens, you have a question?
Kevin: (inaudible) getting a sewer there the one item and annexation. Another would be the city’s position as this condemnation takes place.
De Weerd: Do you want him to –
Bird: Well, I think you probably ought to come up here so we can get you on tape.
De Weerd: Let’s swear him in first.
Bird: Yeah.
Cavens: Mayor, Mr. President, Councilmen. I guess my question is I appreciate your stance on the condemnation. It has been a time we’ve tried to work with the different people. They
aren’t going to move. What my question is, as far as annexation, then to take the property that the sewer is going to serve, would they be willing to force annexation along with that
sewer to allow the development to happen that’s going to go on that sewer?
Bird: Any answers?
Anderson: I have to guess I’m not exactly sure what your question is. Are you talking about that we force annex everybody who butts up to that sewer line to get to somewhere else?
Cavens: I assume the reason you’re condemning property to run sewer line is to get to developed property that needs to get developed or is desired to get developed.
Anderson: The condemnation would be to get the right-of-way to go across there.
Cavens: Right. But what is the reason you’re condemning, why are you trying to extend that sewer?
Anderson: Our goal isn’t just to annex property. No, we’re trying to get that extended across for future development.
Cavens: Right. That’s what my question is. If you’re extending the sewer for future development and there’s a timetable on getting that condemnation taken care of the sewers and the
construction done in that sewer in a nine month period, it’s good to get the sewer out there but there’s no development going to happen unless those properties are contiguous to the
city limits. So my question is, if you’re going through the condemnation process to get sewers extended out the purpose is to put things into that sewer line and those properties need
to be annexed or next to the city to be annexed to be able to do that. So that’s what my question is, while you’re thinking through the process is that another cog to the process is
annexation of properties to allow people to use these sewers that you’re trying to get extended?
Anderson: That’s all a balancing act because typically we don’t like to try to force anybody to annex. Hopefully, we’re hoping that that property is willing to be annexed and most
of that property like we’re talking about up there is all owned by the developer. So, yes they are willing and ready to be annexed at the point that the sewer goes across.
Cavens: I guess my concern is the subdivision that it does need to go through needs to be annexed and I imagine that would be where the cog might take place. So my question you know
is a time issue of we took a lot of time of trying to condemn property, we’ve come to the point of saying we need to condemn property. When is the point when you’re going to come and
say we need to annex when the people don’t want to annex? Is the city going to take a stance in that direction, or not?
Corrie: The simple answer is no.
Cavens: Okay.
Corrie: I mean we’re condemning the land to put the sewer in not for annexation. Once the sewer line goes in, we’re not going to have a problem with annexation being contiguous because
we’re trying to get the lines in so that you can develop further north. At least I wouldn’t if I was sitting on the Council, I would not say that that would be a condemnation to put
it into the city limits. In a real short sentence the answer would be no.
Nichols: Mr. Mayor.
Corrie: Yes.
Nichols: President, Mayor, members of the Council. You’re not going to be able to force annex anything that’s above five acres in size unless it was part of another parcel in which
there was a smaller lot split off and so a lot of this is much larger parcels. They’re not developed yet. They’re still being farmed or whatever so you really can’t do that. If there’s
a subdivision and it goes through, that’s a different issue. There’s nobody in this room including you and the other developers that are here that aren’t aware of some of the problems
that force annexing has created, not just for the city of Boise but for every city across the state.
Cavens: I just ask the question because I’ve got to make decisions and so I need to know where you stand on. Sewer’s one thing but there’s more than sewer that need to take place. So
yeah, there’s a timing issue on sewer but there’s a timing issue on other things that allow a developer to develop inside the City of Meridian. So that’s why I addressed the question.
Bird: I think Mike, what you’re basically asking, once you get the sewer there are you going to allow the property that it’s coming through to be sewered even if it can’t be contiguous
to the city at that point? Are you going to allow it to hook up and sign as soon as they can annex an annexation? We’ve already turned down one with a letter of Will. I for one would
never vote for force annexation. Now, I’m not going to say I wouldn’t once we got the sewer out there, that I would not allow them to do the sewer with hook up with an agreement. When
you’ve got the sewer out there you might as well with an agreement that once they are contiguous they have to annex. At the same token if they don’t come in the city we lose the building
permits. That’s the way I look at it there. We get the sewer and stuff. That’s basically I believe what he was asking. When you get the sewer there are you going to allow us to develop
whether we’re in the city or not?
Corrie: (inaudible) is that what you meant?
Cavens: Well, that would be an alternative if we can develop. I was here at the meeting when the last developer asked if you get the sewer to me can I develop
and the answer was no. If that’s a possibility I’m okay. The hook is yeah you have the sewer there but I can’t, what good does the sewer do me if –
Corrie: If it’s not contiguous.
Cavens: -- if I’m not contiguous to the boundaries to be annexed and do development? It’s a hard issue just like condemnation. You don’t want to do it, but at what point?
Anderson: I guess when I look at the map though, there’s a whole bunch of different avenues to be contiguous. I mean it doesn’t all just have –
Cavens: I’m sure.
Anderson: -- to flow like that. I mean it seems like there’s a lot of little fingers that have spread out there so there might be some other avenue. I don’t know what probably you’re
talking about.
Cavens: You know when you’re looking at these avenues look at the possibilities for timing issues for annexation and how that domino effect, or whatever you want to call it, might take
place. I know the subdivision are tough to annex when they’re one acre in size and where the sewer’s going is probably commercial development that’s right in their neighborhood. There’s
a lot of issues besides just sewer. Thank you.
Bird: Thank you Jerry.
De Weerd: You know I think that’s –
Anderson: Caven, Mike and jerry.
Bird: Caven, it’s Mike Caven. I’m sorry. Jerry’s his dad. I’ve known him a lot longer.
De Weerd: I’m sure he gets that from his parents. Mine do. They go through the whole list. You know that’s just a different topic and it’s also, who knows what shapes out in the time
period it takes to get the sewer line out there anyway? You know I guess it would be at that time you need to evaluate those things. You know at this point that’s kind of a non-issue
until we get sewer there. That sewer there is a priority because of our commitment to our area of impact and getting services extended there and then the annexation routes in most cases
naturally occur and that’s how we like to see them happen. You know I think a lot will be known as that gets closer to it anyway.
Issue #7 Discussion of Park Department Issues
Bird: Okay. Any other discussion on this, Council? Hearing none, we’ll go to item No. 7, discussion on Park Department issues. I hope you’re short and sweet Mr. Kuntz.
Kuntz: Never.
Bird: I figured that.
Kuntz: First off, since I know that that barbecue didn’t come out of my budget, I would certainly like to thank the Council and Mayor for the free dinner tonight.
Corrie: Don’t assume anything. How do you know that?
Kuntz: Again, I’m just assuming.
Bird: Mayor hasn’t gotten his paycheck for this month.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Kuntz: We’re trying to cut down on the number of copies that we make every month.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Kuntz: There you go. Item No. 1 Mayor, Council and Mr. President, the Five Mile Creek. You should have in your packets a memo dated May 4th which is the deadline Friday to have everything
into the packets. I wanted to make sure I met that deadline.
Bird: You’re the first.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Kuntz: Just had to adjust those dates on Will’s (inaudible) it worked out just fine. We’re finding that there are some wet spots at the Five Mile Creek pathway. We’ve attempted to dry
those spots out naturally by scarifying the soil and then allowing the sun to work. We’re not having a lot of success. Although I drove the site today and it’s better than it was a couple
of weeks ago. ITD and Central Paving are recommending we go to an option where we put fabric down, 12 inches of pit run and then the gravel sub-base and paving. I’ve discussed this issue
with both Gary Smith our public works director and Tim Burgess who is our engineer from Civil Survey. I believe there’s a consensus that instead of delaying this project two or three
months letting it dry out naturally because it may not ever dry out completely because of the depth of the wet areas that to go with option B as outlined in number 1 is the best option.
What I’ve tried to show in this little handout that I gave you tonight is that most of the money that was committed
from the city was actually paid out of September which was last years budget. So, the money that we have in this year’s budget which is about 143,000 is still in tact. I know you can’
take any action tonight but some direction would be helpful because we are holding up construction at this point. Now, I will tell you that I plan on working with Central Paving and
ITD to make sure that all of this fabric and material in the wet spots, that we’re not addressing problems that have gone away within the last couple of weeks. So, what I’m asking here
for as far as the change order would be the maximum that would be warranted to address the problems.
Bird: Is that the 12235?
Kuntz: Yes sir.
Bird: We can’t make a decision but maybe the Council would like to –
De Weerd: I think each of us could give –
Bird: -- give our own opinion.
De Weerd: -- our own ideas.
Bird: Mr. Mayor do you want to start off? What’s your idea?
Corrie: Yes, Mr. President. I’m just a little confused. Change order requested here is 13,361, here it’s 12,325 –
Bird: That’s including (inaudible) change too.
De Weerd: Plus the ten.
Kuntz: Plus the fence. I’m sorry.
Corrie: Oh, okay. Thank you.
Bird: What’s your opinion on it?
Corrie: Good. It’s fine. Are we going to – I hate to take up anymore time –
Bird: Cheri, what’s your opinion?
McCandless: I agree.
Bird: Okay. Mr. Anderson would you state your opinion?
Anderson: Well, since you asked.
De Weerd: Well, you just had to ask.
Bird: I was holding Tammy off until last so it wouldn’t be too long.
Anderson: I think since these are along ditch banks and that if there are wet or soggy areas at this point, they’re not going to get any better. The only way you’re going to cure that
is to excavate that soil and put some pit run in there. I would agree. I think that’s the way to do it.
Bird: Councilwoman De Weerd?
De Weerd: I have no problem with it.
Bird: (inaudible)
Kuntz: Okay. Thank you. Item No. 2 is changing the fence out from the five-wire barb –
Bird: We included that in there.
De Weerd: We already did that.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Kuntz: Then I would like to bring just a real quick caveat. I want to make sure that before we do that that the type of fencing that we go to is compatible, Mr. Simwich is going to run
cattle in there. I’m going to go out on site with ITD, make sure the place where this fence will be is not going to be a problem with the children plus compatible with the cattle at
the site.
Bird: Something that’s safe –
De Weerd: Cows and kids?
Bird: -- something that’s safe for the kids and the bicycles?
Kuntz: Yes. You bet.
De Weerd: Get an electric fence.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Kuntz: Item No. 3. We requested the developer for Bear Creek to submit their cost to complete phase 1 of the park and in your packets you’ll see that the first proposal, which was
dated April 2nd, came back at a cost of about 219,000. The
developer met with the parks commission following that. As a compromise came back with a proposal of 190,000. I’ve had some discussions this week with the developer to see if we can
sharpen our pencils anymore than that especially in discussion with who is responsible to fill the Harden Drain. I know the developer’s here tonight, I don’t want to speak for them but
I guess I’m hoping that we can reach some kind of compromise and that the Council will give me some direction so that we can move ahead with this. I know the developer would certainly
like to move ahead with getting phase 1 of the park completed in the next 30 to 60 days.
Anderson: Tom, would you give me a little background again on that Harden drain? That used to run right across the center of the property?
Kuntz: Yes sir.
Anderson: And it was rerouted around it, at our request or the developer’s request?
Kuntz: I pulled out my original memo to the City Council when this development was being considered for approval. There were several things that I requested. One of them was that the
drain be piped on the boundary of the park, not through the middle of the park. So, it was done at my request, the Parks Department request as part of the original development agreement.
Not anticipating there to be a big whole to be left. That was a detail that was never really discussed or thought through. So, I certainly don’t, I don’t know if it’s fair to unload
that full responsibility on the developer and I’m hoping that there can be some kind of a compromise made tonight on the cost to fill that Harden drain that will be deducted from the
$190,000.
Anderson: Is there a cost estimate separate on what it would cost to fill that? I see you’ve got a yardage or a linear price here.
Kuntz: Yeah. If you’ll look on the first proposal Councilman Anderson, they’re estimating 24,400 of it.
Anderson: Thank you.
Kuntz: Any direction on this, or would you like to hear from the developer to see if he’s got any compromises in mind?
Bird: What kind of a budget, how much line item do you want to switch Tom? Is it the 190,000? Do you have 190,000 to switch?
Kuntz: No sir. I guess what I would recommend to the Council is we have 90,000 left in that budget. If we can squeeze this down a few more thousands of dollars then I would recommend
that we look at a line item transfer from the Five
Mile Creek pathway project that will have an excess of $100,000 over it in that account. That we look at transferring funds from that account to take care of building phase 1 of Bear
Creek Park.
De Weerd: Tom, you already talked with Janice and –
Kuntz: Yes, ma’am.
De Weerd: -- and you’ve worked that detail out?
Kuntz: I should probably answer no to that because the 143,000 should almost have been shown as, I don’t know how to say this, a non-carry over and it was not shown that way because
we’ve already got one report that showed there was a surplus of about 63,000 I believe. We talked about using 60,000 of that for the expansion of the Chamber restrooms. This money being
spent in September, and I know it was late in September still should be shown that basically that $143,000 is pretty much in tact and won’t be spent except for the items we talked about
tonight earlier.
De Weerd: And the Chamber expansion?
Kuntz: The Chamber expansion is exclusive of that 143,000. That’s in addition to the 143,000.
Nichols: Mr. President.
Bird: Mr. Nichols.
Nichols: Members of the Council and Mayor. One of the things about the chamber expansion project is that the proposed expansion be right on top of Nampa Meridian’s Nine Mile drain. And,
we haven’t yet found out if they’re going to reroute that drain as part of the Franklin expansion or what. I mean as it stands now, I don’t think Nampa Meridian would allow that chamber
building to be expanded because where their proposed expansion would go right over the top almost right to the center of where the drain is. There’s already an existing Encroachment
Agreement for I think, is it 20 feet Gary? I can’t remember. There’s some portion of the building that already encroaches into that easement but it’s a wide enough easement and so forth
that that little encroachment was allowed. I don’t know where that comes into on the budget part of it but just to tell you that there’s a major problem there that the Chamber’s looking
at.
Anderson: Are they aware of that?
Nichols: Yes. They’re the ones that brought it to our attention.
Bird: Council, any questions or verifications from Tom?
De Weerd: I believe we were going to hear from the developer.
Bird: Do you want to hear from the developer? Okay. Tom.
Kuntz: I thought it was going to be Tim.
De Weerd: They sent the big gun.
Johnson: I’m Greg Johnson, 2433 Can-Ada Road, Melba. The Harden drain seems to be the biggest issue. When we initially proposed the park it was my intention to slope the drainage banks
and that that would be a water amenity in the park. Tom didn’t, at that point and time I had envisioned more of an area-wide park but not a regional sports park what I see it being designed
now. More of, used for the occasional soccer game but not for the whole Pal program or whatever. Tom objected to having an open water in the park and so we agreed to tile it at the city’s
requirement. We did spend about 55,000 in tiling that drain. In our original proposal to the city we had planned on leaving that as an amenity. Now to complete the park that drain has
to be filled and compacted so that it doesn't settle. Right now it will sit about, the ball fields will straddle that drain. It needs to be done well and it can’t just be pushed in.
We planned on grubbing out the vegetation that was there, rolling in pit run and then using other good compatible material there to build it and that’s why it is expensive to fill. That’s
why I haven’t felt that it’s part of our responsibility. That wasn’t our initial proposal and we already have spent a lot to get around it. On the other hand I want a first class park
there and we will do all that we can to help that occur. One of the things that isn’t in this phase 1, is trees. We would some how like to work with the Jaycees or Lion’s Clubs and others
to some how get those trees in the park this year. Maybe it’s us supplying some of the trees and them supplying the labor with the supervision of the Parks Department. I think there’s
some creative ways but I would like to see the trees in before we plant the grass so that we don’t have to tear everything up to put in trees and do that. I don’t know. Whatever your
suggestion is. You know I don’t want to lose more money on it but we would like a nice park there too. There are some areas that we’re not going to be able to finish because of the well
that’s going to be put in. That well construction probably will not be completed until fall. There’s going to be a swap out from Stoddard Road back to the well. I’m not sure how large
the construction area will be. Do you have an idea Brad?
Watson: Mr. President, Mayor and Council. The well site’s not really that large. The land lease agreement that you approved with the Bear Creek developers 200 feet square next to Stoddard
Road. The construction will be totally within that. I talked to Tom and it’ll be on the west side of the planned sidewalk.
Johnson: So, everything will be able to be contained in that whatever they need to a slurry pond or whatever to drill the –
Watson: Yes.
Johnson: Okay. Good. I guess we would propose to lay our sprinklers so that we’ve got zones that come up to that point and then we cap them off and then as soon as the well’s completed,
those could be extended and finished and we will finish seeding this fall when that’s completed. With this proposal I believe everything except trees would be done in the park. Is that
right, Tom?
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Johnson: In phase 1, okay. There are a couple of areas that Council probably needs to be aware of. The ball fields still haven’t been totally designed. We’re waiting for that design
criteria so that we can finish designing the sprinkler system so that when the fences are put in for the ball fields and stuff it separates, we have separate zones on each side of the
fence so we don’t have dry spots in the park.
De Weerd: I thought there weren’t fences. There’s fences in this for the ball fields?
Johnson: There’s fences and dugouts and lots of things.
Bird: (inaudible) ball field (inaudible)
Johnson: That’s a little different than sprinkling an open field and there are going to be additional costs to that sprinkler system in order to divide that up. We’re expecting the city
to pay for whatever hat extra expense is. We don’t know because we don’t have the plan to bid yet and know what that’s going to be. It does require extra zones and extra, you have double
heads because they’ve got to spray on both sides of the fence and stuff. The other thing that has come up is conduits need to be run out to these ball fields prior to our construction
and we really need those done between the window of May 15th and May 25th so that we can complete our seeding of the park on time and get that done.
Bird: What size conduits? Are we running out there for future lights? Are we running out big enough that if we want to put future lights up there --? That’s something that if you’ve
got a deal, your park department can lay some conduit, can’t they?
Anderson: Is there a specific plan or a blue print for this park that you’re putting this bid or estimate together off of, or are you just going by kind of what Tom tells you?
Johnson: We have the (inaudible)
Kuntz: CTA provided the bid specifications for phase 1. Instead of going out to bid on them we want to try to work with the developers to save money since the equipment will already
be there. To give them an opportunity to reply with their cost. But, yes there is some specific plans set and ready to go to be bid if we want to bid this.
Anderson: My question, legal Counsel then with the project being over 25,000 can we do this without getting bids?
Nichols: Because it involves the expenditure of some development impact fees and some waiver of some development impact fees and it’s been done in other places there’s a specific provision
which allows for the developer to receive either a credit toward future impact fees or be reimbursed at the developer’s choice for the excess construction funding or contribution. So,
there is this particular provision which has been used in Boise for Hobble Creek and because it avoids a move (inaudible) move out cost there’s also Tom has checked with his consultants
in terms of the prices the Mr. Johnson’s development company has quoted and double checked to make sure they’re in line and all of those things.
***End Of Side Three***
Nichols: This is the one time you don’t have to go out to bid because it was a requirement that they do a certain amount of the development of the park. So, to get it up to the next
level as an additional to the developer which can either be reimbursed cash or in the form of future park development fee credits on some other development that Mr. Johnson might have
or the owner of the project might have, whatever that entity is.
Bird: Any other questions, Council? Mayor
Corrie: Mr. President. Tom what did you say the cost to fill that Harden drain might be?
Kuntz: 24,000
Corrie: 24,4, is that the figure? Okay. I wrote it down but I didn’t hear (inaudible)
Kuntz: I’m still hoping for a little bit of compromise on that cost.
Corrie: I haven’t heard it yet.
De Weerd: Yeah. I’ve been waiting for that but I hadn’t heard it either.
Anderson: How do you plan to fill it? You’re going to put pit run and you’re going to compact it but the top soil you’re just going to roll that off of somewhere else on the property?
Johnson: We’ll take that off of our second phase streets. Where our second phase streets will roll, we’ll take that off with a scraper and top it with about a foot and a half of topsoil
so that, hopefully when we get all these conduits in and done we don’t end up with piles of gravel on it. We have good top soil there but the more trenches we dig and other things, it’s
very difficult because 18 inches down you hit pit run but we’re trying to keep it separate. If we have to we’ll go through with, they have rock rakes and stuff and in the areas that
it’s bad we’ll have to go back and do that to get the rock out of there so that it’s –
Anderson: Have you ever done a project like this, building a park? I mean you do residential construction or subdivisions.
Johnson: I’ve never built a park this size, no. We do have a consultant that will be helping us with it and that’s Darwin McKay with the turf company. Darwin knows how to grow grass.
Bird: Is it your actual machinery and stuff or is it your Sub’s?
Johnson: Most of this is subcontracted. Most of the work that we’re talking about in here is curb gutter and paving in the parking lots. One of the prices that was a little bit high
according to Tom on his estimates was our curbing. We use Hess Construction. Buzz is not the cheapest guy in town but it’s good quality work and he does it timely and I just won’t have
anybody else on my jobs. There are others that will do it 10 percent cheaper than he will. In curbing like this you have a lot of tight curbs. It’s in a parking lot and you’re talking
about small radiuses and that’s very difficult to do with machines. A lot of it is hand done and it is expensive but it’s going to be expensive no matter who does it. They have already
done our sidewalks on Stoddard. They are pulling into the subdivision next week. We plan on having this done by the end of May and we need to be moving on it now. I would be willing
to absorb 10,000 of that Harden drain if we can move forward and if we can have some cooperation from the city to help promote some of this with trees. We’ll contribute some of the trees
and there has got to be some other organizations around town that will help a little bit with those trees so that we can, by the middle of summer have a very usable park. I would be
glad to contribute so that we would make the contract price 180,000. We will complete all those items for that.
De Weerd: How many trees are you thinking about?
Johnson: You know, I don’t know that. Do you have a number Tom?
Kuntz: (inaudible)
Johnson: Is it in the hundreds?
De Weerd: Hundreds? And you think –
Johnson: At 20 a club –
Corrie: It’s getting late.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
De Weerd: -- that service organizations are going to plant 100 trees? Do you have some Eagle Scouts that have a lot of extra –?
Johnson: We might have 5 Eagle Scout projects that would do 20 trees a piece and the Lion’s club can surely do 50, couldn’t they?
De Weerd: You know, it seems to me like the Kiwanis used to participate in a tree farm over in Boise. I think one of the Kiwanian’s Glenn Harris has a tree spade or at least access to
it.
Johnson: The problem is, we’re too late to dig now with everything budding out. The trees have to be bald by now in order to do them this season.
De Weerd: And you have this nice piece of equipment I think that we bought.
Kuntz: Thanks to the Council and Mayor, we have a skid steer that has a 36 inch aug on it that’s so sweet to plant because the dirt that comes out is very fine and the holes are perfect.
We have connections with Jacker to get trees at wholesale. They do not sell retail at all. They’ve come to us last year and are offering us some really good deals on trees. You know
I’d sure like to take Greg up on his offer to provide some of those trees for the park.
Bird: Seriously, how many trees in that park? A 15-acre park?
Kuntz: Tully Park had approximately 180.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Kuntz: Whether they’re all there or not –
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Bird: I’d like to go count them.
De Weerd: I don’t think so.
Bird: I’ll guarantee you, there aren’t no 180 trees in Tully Park.
Kuntz: Well, remember Council member, President Bird, along the eastern, or excuse me southern boundary there’s trees about every 15 or 20 feet there.
Bird: You must be counting the owners that are in their backyards.
Kuntz: Yes sir, we are.
De Weerd: On the other side of the ditch.
Bird: Yeah, on the other side of the fence.
Corrie: Mr. President.
Bird: Yes, sir Mr. Mayor.
Corrie: Tom, you heard Greg say that he was willing to put $10,000 in that filling that Harden drain. I was thinking more 12,200 but, splitting it down the middle, but I think we don’t
want to necessarily get it towards the mouth but do you think 10,000 would be a generous offer? I think it is.
Kuntz: Staff would certainly support that. You are the Mayor and I think the 12,200 probably is fair but the 10,000: we certainly wouldn’t turn that down Mayor.
Bird: Tom, tell me about your creative financing again, how you’re going to pay for it. I just don’t believe what you’re going and what you’ve got wrote down here I’m absolutely not
going to do.
Kuntz: We have $143,000 in the Five Mile Creek line item this year. 111,000 of that was paid out of last years budget. So, in essence we have $111,000 in this year’s budget that could
be transferred, a portion of that. If we went with $180,000 we would be requesting a $90,000 line item transfer from the Five Mile Creek into Bear Creek.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
De Weerd: Boy, you’re really pushing it.
Kuntz: I’m happy to just still be standing up here.
De Weerd: We’re just trying to find someone to dig the holes for you.
Bird: So, you’ve got all this within this year’s budget to take care of it?
Kuntz: Yes sir.
Bird: Well, how come we’ve got eleven and a half percent interest from 5 June –
De Weerd: (inaudible)
Kuntz: That interest will not be paid.
Kuntz: The developer will waive that because we will pay the developer this year at the conclusion of the construction.
Bird: (inaudible) We’re not paying that kind of interest.
Kuntz: No sir. They gave that up the first day. It’s really proposal No.2 you need to be looking at.
Bird: That’s 180?
Kuntz: Yes sir. That would be 90,000 that we have in the budget right now plus another 90 that would be a line item transfer from the pathway into Bear Creek.
Bird: The pathway was carry over from last year?
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Bird: It wasn’t counted as carry over?
De Weerd: It just wasn’t counted as carry over. It was put into the budget and so it was actually re-budgeted.
Bird: That’s the way it is suppose to be done.
De Weerd: That’s right.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Bird: Re balance wasn’t it or (inaudible) wasn’t it?
De Weerd: It wasn’t. It was just –
Bird: You don’t carry over –
De Weerd: I know but they didn’t, this wasn’t (inaudible) I asked Janice and –
Bird: You’re not tweaking my ear are you?
De Weerd: No, I’m not.
Kuntz: If I could try and simplify it.
De Weerd: Wouldn’t go near it.
Kuntz: We were not anticipating paying for the pathway out of last year’s budget. We had money appropriated in last year’s budget. The pathway progressed to the point to where in September
we had to cut a check to ITD for 111,000, which we did. So, in essence the pathway, the majority of it 99 percent was paid out of last year’s budget. We had already budgeted the 143
anticipating paying for it out of this year’s budget. Basically it was paid out of last year’s budget. The 143 is sitting in that account. That’s what happened.
Bird: Okay. Okay, Council we can’t make a decision but –
De Weerd: No but I just want to make sure. We pay 180,000 plus one hundred holes, right? Is that what we’re doing?
Kuntz: Mayor and Council and President. I would recommend that we do formulate a construction agreement of some sort so that all these details are ironed out in writing.
Bird: Yeah.
Kuntz: So we avoid future confusion on this issue. I know I’ve talked to Mr. Nichols about that.
De Weerd: Is Greg coordinating these Eagle Scout projects too?
Kuntz: Yes, Council member De Weerd.
De Weerd: You’re amazing.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Bird: Okay. Well, why don’t you then, I would say get the thing, get with the Mayor, have a contract wrote up and bring it for us on the next Council.
Kuntz: Okay. I still need to negotiate the sprinkler system around the ball fields.
Bird: Yeah.
Kuntz: We still need to –
Bird: Let’s get that all in there.
Anderson: Have we agreed on the size of trees so we’re not going to be back here arguing about that too?
Bird: Yeah.
Kuntz: two to two and a half inches.
Bird: No. We’ve got to have three-inch caliber trees.
De Weerd: No we don’t. We’ve got a new landscape ordinance.
Kuntz: Two-inch caliber.
De Weerd: It’s two inch.
Bird: Two inch at every two feet.
Kuntz: Yes sir.
De Weerd: Will you shut up?
Kuntz: Item No. 4 –
Bird: We don’t worry about oxygen. Boy we’re going to have it.
Kuntz: Item No. 4 is just a heads up on the pipeline agreement with ACHD. The pipeline is in the ground. They have re-mended the site back to its original state. So, it looks like
we’re actually doing some of the 56 acres and just want to show you this agreement. Both our attorney and Gary Smith have reviewed it. There are a few couple minor changes that I called
into ACHD. They’ll amend this and I’ll bring it back to you for approval at your next meeting.
Bird: Any questions?
Kuntz: The last two items I have is we have been approached by Crown Castle International to put a flag pole, cell tower in Tully Park.
De Weerd: I don’t see that in our packet.
Bird: He’s got it –
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Corrie: (inaudible) free this so you can see it.
Kuntz: I did make one for Will.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Kuntz: To cut to the chase –
De Weerd: (inaudible) house?
Kuntz: No. This would be in Tully Park. Real briefly, as you can see from the drawing the flagpole is 80 feet high. It would be placed in Tully Park at a location of our choice. There
would have to be lights installed on it at their cost. The diameter of the pole is, at the base 18 inches and at the top, I believe is 20 inches. So, it actually gets bigger at the top.
But, it’s all encased in a white flagpole. Now, at 20 inches in diameter, I’m not sure if that’s a flagpole or a telephone pole. The lease agreement that they’ve showed me in the past
calls out for a $500 per month lease arrangement but that is definitely negotiable, per month. But, they are asking for a 30-year commitment. They also have some sort of a switching
box at the base, or just away from the flagpole that normally is above ground. I said well, what if we wanted that below ground? They said well, we could probably work that out. At this
point I just want some direction on whether I should just tell them we’re not interested or give us some designs and we’ll consider it.
Bird: Tom, are they going to bring, where are they getting the power? Are they coming off of our power box or are they bringing in from the road, have their own meter and go?
Kuntz: That has not been discussed or decided.
Bird: At 500 a month with the cost of power, we’re not getting no good deal if it’s coming off our box.
Kuntz: I think all those points are negotiable.
Bird: Well, I just heard the Mayor say something over here and I’ve got to agree with him. I’m not sure I want this kind of stuff in the City Park myself.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Kuntz: Because everything has to go inside it?
Bird: All the electronics have to go in it for this tower. (inaudible)
Anderson: Do they need any type of guide wire thing to stabilize it because this is pretty tall in the air and pretty slender and guide wires would just mess up that park.
Kuntz: Yeah. I don’t see this on a design but I can’t really answer that question.
Anderson: Probably one of them little details that they don’t tell us.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Bird: It would be falling down anyway Ron if you look at their foundation plan here.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Bird: Albertson’s thought they had flagpoles (inaudible) falling over.
Nichols: Mr. President.
Bird: Yes
Nichols: President, Mayor, Members of Council. Tom, first thing that appears to me is that to help the Council make a decision is ask these folks where they’ve done this before or somebody
else has done it before so you can have some pictures and actually show what the thing looks like on the ground, with the flag and so forth not just some sort of a drawing. The second
thing would be to contact some of your, or maybe through the finance director find out how other communities have been compensated on the rental of the site. I know there are some places
where the landlord gets a piece of every call that goes through that particular tower. It typically is a whole lot more money than some sort of a flat amount. That would be better information
for the Council to make this kind of decision.
Kuntz: Mr. Nichols, and we certainly would invite them to come and answer all those questions. I just didn’t want to move forward with this if the answer was going to be we’re probably
not interested in having it in Tully Park.
Corrie: We suggest you do that. Answer or get questions first. Then let us tell you whether –
Bird: Do you realize how tall 80 feet is?
Kuntz: I do and I’m not necessarily in favor of this Councilman Bird.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Kuntz: I just didn’t feel like it was my decision to make.
Bird: It’s as tall as this courthouse building going up.
Kuntz: Yes sir. Are you asking for my opinion on this?
Bird: Yeah. I think all, I’m in opinion with you. I’m not –
Kuntz: My recommendation is that we just tell them we’re not interested in Tully Park. It’s not my decision to make.
De Weerd: Well, it sounds like no one is interested. Then why bother finding out more information?
Anderson: Wait a minute. (inaudible) put it in my yard.
De Weerd: Okay.
Bird: That’s good. Let’s, send it over.
De Weerd: Give them his address.
Bird: Send it over to Ron’s.
De Weerd: Ludder dale, dell, or what was it?
Anderson: How much per call?
Bird: Mr. Nichols.
Nichols: Tom, Maybe, and I don’t mean to, looking at alternative revenue sources for the city. How far away would this site be from the sewer plant?
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Bird: Mile and a half. We wouldn’t want it up there either.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Bird: I think it would go good on Chateau, right behind Chateau off of Linder there.
Kuntz: Yes sir, we need a flagpole there.
Bird: That’s real close.
De Weerd: I think 8th street would be better.
Bird: I don’t think so. We wouldn’t have my Skate Park there so why would you want that there?
Kuntz: Why don’t I tell them we don’t think Tully Park’s the best place but it would –
Bird: No. I think the Mayor hit it on the head. Let’s get more information on it.
Kuntz: Okay.
Bird: It might be a good deal.
De Weerd: Oh, yeah.
Bird: So, we can send it out to Swan Falls.
De Weerd: It looks lovely. It looks real park-like.
Bird: Okay. Mr. Clerk.
Berg: Mr. President, just a comment. A few months ago I did put an article in your box dealing with cell towers and the trend that the national situation has been becoming to put
it on more public ground and having revenues generated but that doesn’t meant that this is the ideal location but I think we need to keep an open mind and say that this may be a revenue
source that we can investigate at each location according to where our property is. I know speaking with the ex- City clerk in Garden City, where their new city hall is going to be at
the shopping center, they had three different poles proposed with three different revenue sources. So, it is something that maybe should keep an open mind but maybe the location might
be more of a concern.
Bird: Okay. (inaudible)
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Bird: Maybe we can get them to use this for our own and not charge us and the city.
De Weerd: Yeah, there you go.
Bird: That would save us a bunch of money.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Bird: Okay. Let’s do like the Mayor asked, get the things.
Kuntz: Okay.
De Weerd: Let’s get creative with this.
Kuntz: Yes.
Bird: What’s your last one?
Kuntz: The last item. I just want to make sure I’m clear on what you, the Council, would like as far as an adoption of our action plan when we bring it back to you after revisions
we make next week. Do you want to adopt it as far as ordinance. Or is there another way you want to go about adopting it? Would you like to have Public Hearings on it?
De Weerd: We need to have –
Bird: We need to have Public Hearings on it.
Kuntz: Okay.
Bird: That’s my thinking on it.
Kuntz: Okay.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Bird: I don’t know, would we have to (inaudible) or what?
Nichols: Mr. President, Mayor, members of Council. Probably by resolution because it would constitute a policy document. You could do it by ordinance. Will and I have been trying to
cut down on the number of resolutions so that we’re not piling them up by the reamful. I think we’ve done a pretty good job of cutting those numbers down. Where we’re talking about a
policy, if you were to adopt a new employment policy, you’d want to do it by resolution so it’s there.
Bird: Okay Tom.
Kuntz: I’m going to go ahead and set those dates then for the Public meetings then with Will.
Bird: Yeah. Okay. Thank you Tom.
Issue #8 Discussion of Flood Plain Overlay District Ordinance
Bird: Council, item No. 8 discussion of the Flood Plane overlay district ordinance. I think David McKinnon is going to take care of that for you. Isn’t he Shari?
Stiles: I just wanted to introduce you. I know that I introduced him to most of you earlier. I don’t think Ron got introduced. David has come to us from Garden City. He has a lot experience
in flood plain issues and a lot of other issues. He’s a real go-getter when it comes to working on ordinances. He’s worked on more ordinances than I’ve been able to read. He’s a good
addition to our staff and we’re lucky to have him. He put a lot of work into this research on this issue about the flood plain. I’ll turn it over to David.
McKinnon: Mr. President, Mayor, Council members. I’m glad to finally have a chance to meet all of you face to face, to put names to faces after all the stories I’ve heard.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
McKinnon: Actually, I’m liable to feel a little red faced.
Bird: all good right?
McKinnon: All good.
Bird: Okay. We feel better.
McKinnon: Absolutely. I feel a little red faced after Shari’s introduction there. I have spent a little bit of time with Flood Plane ordinances and other jurisdictions. I’ve spent some
time looking at the Flood Plane ordinances. I say that in a plural because we have two. There doesn’t seem to be a reason for us to have two. Hopefully you’ve all had a chance to look
at the memo that I’ve put together. I’ll just be really brief with that and then we’ll go straight to the questions if you have any. City of Meridian has two Flood Plane ordinances.
One’s administered by the building department and that meets all the minimum requirements of participation in the national flood insurance program. There’s a few minor items that could
be corrected to make that ordinance a little bit stronger. Those would all be supported by the Idaho Department of Water Resources and the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which
is the governing body for the national flood insurance program. The second ordinance that we have is ordinance No. 11-11 in our code-book and that’s the Flood Plane Overlay District.
What the Flood Plane Overlay District mandates is that all development that’s done in the Flood Plane requires that those go through a conditional use permit which seems like it’s an
additional step that it takes about an extra three or four months. It’s basically a piece of bureaucratic red tape because once that’s been adopted, once the conditional use permit has
been secured they still have to meet all the requirements that are found in the other Flood Plane ordinance. So, it’s like they have to go through one ordinance to get to the other ordinance
but they both have the same goals and purposes. So, one way we could accomplish removing a layer of red tape would be to eliminate ordinance No. 11-11 the Flood Plane Overlay District.
As I mentioned in the memo, there’s a few benefits that we
would get from removing the 11-11 ordinance. The first one would be just to eliminate the CUP requirement. It seems like it’s an awful lot of extra work for the staff. It’s extra work
for the Commission and extra work for the Council to have Public Hearings on all those. That would eliminate the time and the money spent by the City to have those heard. The second
would be that we eliminate confusion generated by having two codes with the same goals and purposes. It’s very confusing for people to say, well I’ve been working with the building department
on this and now all of a sudden I have to meet a separate section of code that’s in a different part of the code book and work with the Planning and Zoning Commission and Council and
Planning and Zoning staff. The third breaks it down into a few things. There’s a few parts where the ordinances compete with each other. I think that has to do a little bit with the
fact that the national flood insurance program is a dynamic rather than a static type of program. Because it’s always making changes and trying to correct itself just like we are with
our ordinances here at the City. Things change, development issues change. Just like that, the national flood insurance program has changed as well. It looks like when the first ordinance
11-11 was adopted, there was still an allowance for people to build within the flood way. The new ordinance that was adopted at a later date, the 10-6 ordinance in the building department,
that does not allow any encroachment within the flood way nor any building within the flood way. The second conflicting language has to tie with the language dealing with allowing buildings
to be one foot above the base flood elevation and allowing the lowest floor level to be below the base flood elevation. It’s really kind of a confusing thing and I wish I had brought
some pictures. I wasn’t planning on coming tonight or I would have prepared for this. Basically what it amounts to is the national flood insurance program has stated that the lowest
floor of a building is that area that is enclosed on all four sides which would include a basement or crawl space. A basement or a crawl space within the 100-year Flood Plane can be
at or above the base flood elevation. It doesn’t have to be one foot above. What they’re really worried about is the finished floor elevation of the decking that you’re actually walking
on. So, as long as the finished floor elevation is one foot above base flood elevation, you meet the minimum requirements. The existing ordinance that we have for the Planning and Zoning
staff, Commission and Council for their CUPs says that that area, the crawl space area has to be at least one foot above rather than being able to be at or above. So, you’re adding an
extra level of fill. Adding fill into the Flood Plane is a bad thing because then you raise the floodwaters for everybody else. So, they allow for that. They do require that if you have
your crawl space at or above base flood elevation but not one foot above, that you provide for hydro-static venting, which is to say you put holes in there with a screen on it so that
water can pass into the crawl space and it can pass out on the other side. So that there’s no pressure inside on the interior walls. They have guidelines for that. I believe it’s one-inch
for every 100 square feet of covered area. The third conflicting language is that the 11-11 ordinance would allow flood proofing of residential structures. National flood insurance program
does not recognize any flood proofing of residential structures. Residential structures are required to be above the base flood elevation on finished floor
period. So, that would eliminate that language. That language is adopted in the 10-6 ordinance and so there’s a bit of conflicting language there. Fourth and final piece of conflicting
language between the two ordinances is that 11-11 requires that all expansions or enlargements of any building within the Flood Plane to raise the entire building to be above the base
flood elevation. National flood insurance program requires only that those buildings that are significantly enlarged or significantly remodeled, that’s to say that they add a value of
50 percent of the existing value of the building to that. All of the building would then have to be raised to the 100-year Flood Plane one foot finished floor elevation. It sounds like
I may be talking around myself but they’re saying that only the new part of the addition has to meet that. The existing does not unless the construction is worth 50 percent of the value
of that. Then they would have to elevate the entire structure. So, you have language that say you have to do it on one but then the other ordinance says you only have to do it if you
reach a certain 50 percent threshold. We need to be able to determine for developers saying if you’re going to build in the Flood Plane or enlarge a building in the Flood Plane, it’s
either one or the other but not you have to do it on one but you don’t have to do it for the other. There’s some confusion that could be relayed there. There are two parts of the existing
Flood Plane Overlay District ordinance that should be kept and that are not included in the 10-6 ordinance. It may just be an oversight. In talking with the public works and building
department who administers the 10-6 ordinance. Right now they require the finished floor elevation of all residential structures be at least one foot above base flood elevation. In the
ordinance it does not say that. That’s found in the 11-11 ordinance. So, additional language could be added to the 10-6 ordinance that says finished floor elevation shall be one foot
above base flood elevation as certified by an engineer’s elevation certificate. Right now they are enforcing that but the language is not there. So, we could just add that to that. The
seconds thing would be that the 11-11 ordinance has some language that’s tied to hazardous, injurious, flammable, oh it goes on for about 4 or 5 adjectives saying that all bad things
can’t be stored in the Flood Plane. That’s probably something that would be good to add to the existing 10-6 ordinance if we do choose to repeal the existing 11-11 ordinance. That’s
pretty much it. There’s a few other items that I would like to discuss with you. The existing ordinances that we have right now would qualify us for a program that’s called the community
rating system. It’s administered by the insurance services offices which is a break off from the national flood insurance program. What this community rating system would do for the
City of Meridian is that upon receival of our application and admittance into the program, everybody within the City of Meridian that’s purchasing flood insurance would receive a discount
based on our participation level, off of their premiums. The city of Eagle, the city of Garden City, city of Boise, Ada County, Canyon County, Hailey, Blaine County. I think there’s
about fifteen communities right now in the state of Idaho that are participants in this program and they receive everywhere from a 5 to 20 percent discount in premiums across the board
for their citizens that have to buy flood insurance. In talking with Shari a little bit ago. That’s not to say that those people that have to
pay a high rate of insurance because their homes weren’t built to a specific standard will be able to receive rates similar to everybody else but they would receive a discount off their
required premium that they’re required to pay. So, with a little bit of work and some changes to the ordinances that we’ve got right now, we could apply for participation in this program.
I spent some time already with Idaho Department of Water Resources and with Rob Flanner, the ISO officer that works for the state of Idaho. HE has sent us the documentation in order
to apply for that program. He was very encouraged by the fact that the city of Meridian would like to participate. He felt that it would be very easy for the City of Meridian to at least
gain a 5 percent, if not a 10 percent reduction in premiums for the city. With that, I know I tend to ramble once I get going. I hope I haven’t created more confusion than necessary
but I’d open myself up for questions if you have any.
Bird: Questions, Council? The question I have is does anybody know how many people in the City of Meridian have flood insurance? A Half dozen?
McCandless: There are a lot.
De Weerd: No. There are a lot of them. Everyone on the other side of Tully Park is paying it. The first example and –
Bird: You’ve got to be kidding me?
De Weerd: No.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Bird: How many floods have we ever had?
Corrie: Well, if we have one it’s too many.
De Weerd: Well, if it’s 100 or above –
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Bird: If I lived in Garden City and Eagle and stuff where I had the Boise River flowing through I’d worry about it. What is the biggest flood fear we have in Meridian Idaho? Where’s
is going to come from?
De Weerd: Our sewer treatment plant.
McCandless: The Five Mile Creek.
Bird: The Five Mile Creek. And where does that come from? Where does that drain from?
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
McKinnon: It’s headworks is up above, oh, Isaac’s Canyon.
Bird: Isaac Canyon, right.
McKinnon: It’s up in that area.
Bird: It comes out of Blacks Creek.
McKinnon: Yes sir.
De Weerd: We’re not going to –
Bird: To my knowledge I –
De Weerd: Let’s go.
Bird: I just, I’d be interested to know.
Anderson: Floods can be caused by heavy rain.
Bird: Well, we know that.
Anderson: I mean it doesn’t have to be a river –
Bird: I realize that but where you going to have –
Anderson: That area down there by our new fire station. That’s a Flood Plane. All those buildings in there, that’s because –
Bird: I know that’s a Flood Plane. That don’t make since to me.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
McKinnon: Let me address a couple of things that you bring up President Bird. The Flood Plane is essentially a mathematical equation.
Bird: I know.
McKinnon: And in Garden City, Eagle, Boise City, there hasn’t been a flood stage, while we did reach flood stage in 1983 there was no flood loss that was recorded. Nothing was claimed
against the national flood insurance program premiums that were purchased by those people that lived along the river. One of the things that’s very interesting about the national flood
insurance program is
that any city that doesn’t participate in the national flood insurance program is not eligible for loans that are backed by the federal government and so if you take away all the FHA
loans and all the VA loans, the Fanny Mae loans, the. Let me see if I can think of some of the other federally backed loans, approximately 85 percent of the loans in Meridian are federally
backed by some funding. So, we do have to abide by their rules and we have to abide by their math. The best thing that we can do is just take their math, use it against them and get
a discount against those premiums. They have provided a way to do that.
Bird: I agree with you. I mean I just didn’t, in Meridian I didn’t realize there’d be that many. Because see, in Boise to my knowledge the 50 some years that I can remember the damage
Boise has had has been come from at Shaw Mountain down the creek there running through over to the Boise River. To my knowledge the Boise River has never been, maybe up in Julia Davis
Park a little bit or up at Ann Morrison Park a little bit and some of that. But as far as real floods getting out in the streets, it hasn’t. It’s been coming down from the deal.
McKinnon: Yeah. The 100-year flood stage that they refer to at the Boise River is a 16,600 cubic feet per second figure. In 1983 we hit 13,000 cubic feet per second and there was no
flood loss. It’s just a give and take and we have to play by their rules and this is one way they’ve given us to –
Bird: I agree with you. To play with their rules.
McKinnon: -- Play with their rules.
Anderson: I remember when Settler’s Canal broke in Garden City. That was a flood.
McKinnon: I can get that number for you if you’d like. Those numbers are available.
Bird: I just thought it was a shock with Tammy and them going oh, we’ve got it all over. Because Bill and I had just remarked we would bet there wasn’t 12 people in the City of Meridian
that had flood insurance. I just had never thought about it, you know.
McKinnon: Yes.
Corrie: Mr. President.
Bird: Yes.
Corrie: I question you know that you can remember back 50 years. That would make you 10 years old.
Bird: I can remember.
Corrie: Can you? I thought it would be back a little bit more.
De Weerd: I was going to say that.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Bird: (inaudible) that’s what I’m trying to tell you guys.
Corrie: See, you can’t remember.
Bird: Gary’s older than I am so you’d have to ask him.
Anderson: He’s the guy they go when they try to figure out the 100-year plan.
Bird: I can tell you what. I’ve seen Lakeview Park flooded in Nampa Idaho.
Anderson: When was that, 18 what.
Bird: No.
De Weerd: You are so bad. Well, thanks David for all the work you’ve put in on this.
Bird: Yeah. What do we need to do?
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Nichols: Mr. President, Mayor, members of the Council. I think the easiest thing to do given David’s well done report here is we can bring to you at a future Council Meeting an ordinance
for your review but I would think that David would help me in drafting that ordinance. I mean I can do the repeal part with regard to chapter 11 title 11. But to take those items from
this that you want to add to 10-6 just simply make a of 10-6 and maybe note where you want those added on and Shari’s got here hand up.
Stiles: I just wanted to see, can we do this without going through Public Hearings since it’s not adding anything. It’s more like consolidating.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Nichols: The only question would be, yeah, whether it’s a quote-zoning ordinance. In where we’re repealing a flood overlay zone I don’t know if that has to go in front of P&Z or not.
I just have to look at the statute again. Just for the Council’s benefit, anything that effects the zoning has to go through the P&Z
Commission before it comes to Council but we can check that out. Regardless, whether it needs to go in front of P&Z or not, we need to have a proposed ordinance is what it sounds like
to me. What David could do to help me is just note on existing 10-6 where he would want to see these two things added and we’ll get her done.
McKinnon: Okay. I’ll get those to you.
Bird: okay. Thank you very much David, very good report.
McKinnon: thank you.
Issue #9 Discussion of Future Topics
Bird: Council, what do we want for further topics or do you want to think about it?
De Weerd: Think about it.
Bird: Think about it. We’ve added – Mayor do you have anything?
Corrie: No sir.
Bird: Cheri do you have anything, McCandless? Mr. Anderson?
Anderson: No sir.
Bird: Mr. Nichols?
Nichols: Just a couple things.
De Weerd: Oh, boo.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Bird: You notice who I skipped?
Corrie: Will, De Weerd, do you have anything?
Nichols: I trust the laughter will take up more time than my comments. There are a couple of potential ordinances. I just need you to tell me whether you want me to look into them or
not. John Shawcroft had asked that we have some sort of ordinance that would allow a ticket to be given to somebody that blocks a water meter or somehow does something to prevent the
water meter from being read. If you’re interested in us doing something like that, we’ll bring a proposed ordinance to you at another workshop.
De Weerd: Blocking it in what way?
Anderson: Is that a problem?
Nichols: Well, apparently it is a problem.
Bird: Is it a big problem, Gary? I didn’t realize that –
Smith: Mr. Mayor and Council I don’t know how big a problem it is but it has been a problem for years in the past, particularly the commercial meters. Well, not particular, I guess they’re
easier to get to with a vehicle. They do intentionally pull their vehicles up on the meter lid and park them, lock them, leave them.
Bird: Okay.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Bird: Now, that is a problem then I would say.
Anderson: How does that fit in with this, like the touch meters and then I’d heard a discussion one time about us actually going to a meter that you didn’t even have to touch (inaudible)
that you just drove by or got in the proximity with a wand or so, we probably don’t have that equipment, but we do have most of them changed out to touch meters.
Smith: Yes sir. They’re all changed out to touch read but you still have to get that wand onto that button on the lid.
Anderson: (inaudible) the tire’s right on top of it?
Smith: Right.
Bird: Or the car’s completely over it. You can’t get under it when you’re fat like me.
Anderson: I guess I’m just reluctant to give more people power to write tickets and I’d like to maybe see some statistics about how many numbers of times this happens you know or is
this just –
Smith: Okay. Sure.
Anderson: -- one or two things a month.
Smith: I’ll ask John for some statistics for you Councilman Anderson and get that information for you. You bet. No problem.
Nichols: The second thing I found on my list going through, has there been some talk about a business license ordinance?
De Weerd: Yeah.
Nichols: Do you want me to do something on that or not?
Bird: Council?
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Bird: Mayor, what do you want?
Corrie: I’m sorry, I was –
Bird: Business license ordinance.
Corrie: Well, I’ve always thought we should. We never got that far before.
Bird: Did you want him to draft one?
Corrie: I would like to see it just to bring it before the Council because we don’t know strictly from a safety standpoint for fire and police we don’t know what’s going on with some
of these places. They change and we don’t know who’s in there now. As far as revenue making no I don’t think so but I think for the safety factor of knowing what’s coming into we’re
big enough now that we ought to know what’s in there. The last time I was in a fire it blew me about 10 feet. There was a bunch of chemicals in there and I didn’t (inaudible).
Bird: It’s business license.
Anderson: I think it’s a good deal and I think we ought to do it because a lot of times what we see is a business moves out and a new moves in and that business may not necessarily
be compatible with that building and there may have to be some modifications to meet the building code or the fire code. A lot of times, the individual that’s moved into that may not
be aware that they’re doing anything wrong but they’ve invested a lot of money moving into that building and then they find out that maybe that building’s going to take several thousand
dollars to come up to code or it’s something that can’t even be brought up to code. I think it’s not something that, like the Mayor said, that we try to make money off but it could just
be a nominal fee and something that we at least have the ability to track when a business is changing hands.
Bird: Okay.
Nichols: One of the things that other communities do is that they do have the building department go around and put blue sticker on the front door of any business that’s vacant or
building that’s vacant. They see some commercial building up for sale. Our former Nampa offices over there by the fire station I noticed the other day had blue stickers on the doors
that advised any potential purchaser or tenant of the building that they had to have a certificate of occupancy before the space could be used. That is one way of trying to get to some
of those that are, where there’s a lag between one occupant and the next.
Anderson: We actually assist them with those blue stickers. The problem is that you don’t know the business that moves in and out so if you don’t have the business then there’s still
a lot of them that you miss.
Nichols: I guess my point was that might be something that can be done now until such time as you have the opportunity to address the issues of the business license.
De Weerd: Mr. President.
Bird: Mrs. De Weerd.
De Weerd: I believe that there must be a water sewer issue here too because I believe that someone out in the sewer treatment plant brought this up months ago.
Anderson: Sewer plant will bring it up.
De Weerd: I think there is a need for it (inaudible)
Bird: Okay. Shari, you got anything? Shari. Do you got anymore? You.
Stiles: Just on that business license we had talked about it quite a bit back when Skip was here and we have some draft ordinances that we’ve gotten from other communities. Our biggest
problem is we don’t know who’s coming in and who’s leaving in the middle of the night. One example, Tablerock Brewery out there is now a highly flammable material facility. They’ve got
it clear to the ceiling with no (inaudible) sprinkler system or at least not one that would accommodate that type of facility. Then we have the Snake River, or not the Snake River, the
RV, Maple Grove RV things, and that would help our department a lot and also help those people so they’re not moving in without knowing what the rules and kind of being caught blind
sided. Yeah, I know the sewer department had brought that up a lot too because they don’t know what they’re releasing into the system.
Bird: What’s coming down the sewer.
Stiles: For future topic one thing –
***End Of Side Four***
Stiles: -- more information from Keith Borup today I guess on cell towers. We have been approached by some cell tower companies about these stealth towers which is what they call that
flagpole that they are proposing in Tully Park. We were considering whether we would do that on an administrative level and go ahead and let those in just as a staff level approval.
We’ll be getting somewhere information from this specific company is Cricket that is interested in putting several of these facilities in. They’re going to be proposing one at Linder
and Cherry at the, what is it?
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Stiles: The one with the modular buildings on Linder.
Corrie: Assembly?
Stiles: Assembly of God.
De Weerd: Yeah, Assembly of God.
Bird: Assembly of God.
Stiles: They’re proposing that. We don’t really have anything that prohibits them. I mean we don’t regulate HAM radio towers or flagpoles or, it’s kind of a gray area there. They said
they can’t offer to do the stealth specifically but if the city requests it they can do it. We asked them for some more information so we’re not having to do Conditional Use Permits
in every instance. I just wanted you to think about that.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
Corrie: Mr. President.
Bird: Mr. Mayor.
Corrie: I think, yeah we better look into it real close because there’s going to be a lot of it going up.
Stiles: Right.
Corrie: With the cellular deal. I agree.
Bird: Anything else, Shari? Brad, do you got anything?
Watson: No.
Bird: Mr. Smith, do you got anything?
Smith: No sir.
Bird: Mr. Musser?
Musser: Mr. President, Mayor, members of the Council. Just to let you know we are completing as a department the strategic planning process with ESCG as part of the consultant package
that the city had entered into. We should be finishing up and completing that tomorrow. We should have some additional results coming back to you within the next few weeks.
Bird: Thank you.
Musser: That’s all we’ve got.
Bird: Mr. Clerk, do you got anything? Councilwoman De Weerd, do you got anything?
De Weerd: I wanted to make a note to Captain Musser. I understand you’re now shooting out at the Sheriff’s shooting range and your first shoot went well and that’s pretty neat.
Musser: Yes, we have begun shooting out there. We’ve completed the first shoot and we’ve got another one coming up on the 18th so if you want to come on up, come on up. You can shoot
too with us.
De Weerd: Be careful what you ask for.
Musser: We’ll try to keep you down range.
De Weerd: Mr. President. Now that we have a finance director on board, I would hope that we could get going on a strategic planning type of thing. You know my concern going into
these budget hearings is that budgets are closely tied to goal setting. I really think that it is now time for the city to start setting some goals and trying to fit the budget priorities
within those goals. The sooner we can do stuff like that I think the more efficient we’re going to be and the better direction our staff is going to have on what expectations we have.
Bird: I agree. Mr. Nichols.
Nichols: One final thing, I promise. I feel like the Council needs to make it’s recommendation to Ada County with regard to Powder River subdivision that Lee Centers has proposed.
The way I would see that happening, they’ve also, their
attorney has asked that they know when it’s on the agenda. I would suggest that we put it on the agenda for next week since the hearing is the 24th. I mean Mr. Watson has a very detailed
approach to that and so does Shari. I think the best way to do that is out it on the agenda for the 15th. Then the staff can recommend to you what they would like to see you do. You
can hear from Mr. Centers or his attorney then you can vote on it.
Bird: Okay.
Nichols: Then my other recommendation to you would be and I don’t know that it has to be part of the meeting but if your recommendation is to urge Ada County to deny this particular
proposal, then I think there has to be somebody from this city that goes and makes some of these presentations as part of the testimony. So that it’s not just a written deal or written
report from some faceless Meridian City staff person but somebody actually stands up in the Public Hearing portion and addresses the issues. I think that, in fairness to the developer
by the time we get through the presentation to you the developer will know what those issues are. It’s not like they’re going to be blind-sided by them at the hearing. They’re going
to know they’re going to come up again.
Bird: Mr. Mayor, (inaudible) Hearing no more before we close I’d like to thank the Mayor and Tammy and Will for the barbecue they put on out here. I hope we can make that a yearly thing
for the department heads and the volunteers that give so much time to our city. With that I would entertain a motion to adjourn.
(inaudible discussion amongst Council members)
De Weerd: Second.
Bird: Moved and second to adjourn, all in favor.
MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES
Bird: Let’s go home. That was very good. I thank you guys, the three of you for putting it on.
McCandless: It was good. (inaudible)
MEETING ADJOURNED AT 9:57 P.M.
(TAPE ON FILE OF THESE PROCEEDINGS)
APPROVED:
ROBERT D. CORRIE, MAYOR
WILLIAM G. BERG, JR., CITY CLERK