HomeMy WebLinkAbout2010 05-26 SpecialMeridian City Council Meeting ' May 26, 2010
A Council meeting of the Meridian City Council was called to order at 7:03 p.m.,
Wednesday, May 26, 2010, by Mayor Tammy de Weerd.
Members Present: Mayor Tammy de Weerd, President David Zaremba, Charlie
Rountree, Keith Bird, and Brad Hoaglun.
Others Present: Bill Nary, Jacy Jones, Jaycee Holman, Pete Friedman, Sonya Wafters,
Bill Parsons, John Overton, Bill Johnson, Kyle Radek and Dean Willis.
Item 1: Roll-call Attendance:
Roll call.
X David Zaremba X Brad Hoaglun
X Charlie Rountree X Keith Bird
X Mayor Tammy de Weerd
De Weerd: I'd like to welcome you all for coming and joining us this evening. For the
record it's Wednesday, May 26th. It's three minutes after 7:00. We'll start tonight's
meeting with roll call attendance.
Item 2: Pledge of Allegiance
De Weerd: For the record, Councilman Zaremba is at an Ada County Highway District
hearing and he will be joining us after he provides his testimony there. Item No. 2 is our
Pledge of Allegiance. If you will all rise and join us in our pledge.
(Pledge of Allegiance recited.)
Item. 3: Community Invocation by David Butler with the LDS Church.
De Weerd: Item No. 3 is our community invocation. We will be led tonight by David
Butler with the LDS Church. If you will, please, come forward. I would invite the public
to, please, join us in the community invocation or take this as an opportunity for a
moment of reflection. Thank you so much for joining us. Yes, please.
Butler: .Our Father in Heaven, we are grateful to meet in this Meridian City Council
meeting. We are thankful for this opportunity. We are grateful to meet in such
favorable circumstance and we are grateful for this great country that we live in, for this
state, and for this community. We thank thee for those who direct the affairs and lead
us in this community and pray that thou will bless them and their families as they
contribute to our welfare and the welfare of the citizens of this community. We pray that
thy Spirit might be with us this night and especially with the Mayor and City Council, that
they might be blessed with thy inspiration and guidance. Help those who will participate
that they will be able to explain their needs and desires and positions in a clearly
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May 26, 2010
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understandable manner and pray that we will be able to listen and learn from each
other. We pray for this opportunity to have free deliberations and to discuss. Bless us
with open hearts and minds and listening ears and pray that the evening will be
profitable for all who are here and for the citizens of our community. We thank you for
our many blessings and pray for these in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.
De Weerd: Mr. Butler, if I can present you with a City of Meridian pin for joining us this
evening and thank you.
Item 4: Adoption of the Agenda.
De Weerd: Item No. 4 is adoption of the agenda
Hoaglun: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Mr. Hoaglun.
Hoaglun: I would recommend for the Council Members that have their agenda and for
those in the audience to get it out, we have got a lot of things we are moving around
tonight. Under the Consent Agenda, Item G, staff is requesting that we vacate that
item. So, that will be removed. The second page at the top you see Item H, which is
MDA 08-002. The next paragraph, that is Item H-A. It was just inadvertently missed,
but it is a different item. And that resolution to amend the future land use map, staff is
also requesting that we vacate that item. Item I is also requested to vacate, so that also
will be removed. And under Item 5-J, that resolution number is 10-725 and we would
like to add an Item L, which is a short-term lease agreement and -- with the parks
department, so we will be adding that onto the Consent Agenda. Continuing on, under
Action Items, under 9-A, we have a request to continue that to July 6th. Item B is also a
request to continue to July 6th. Under Item 9-F, request to continue to June 1st. Item
G, request to continue to June 1st. Under Item I, the applicant is requesting to withdraw
that application, contingent upon the action taken on Item 9-H, so that will occur later
on. Moving on to Ordinances, Item 11. 11-A is ordinance number 10-1446. B is
ordinance number 10-1447. And C is ordinance number 10-1448. And under Item 12,
the Executive Session, we want to add an item, so we will be going into Executive
Session under Idaho State Code 67-2345(1)(c) and (1)(f). So, with all those changes,
Madam Mayor, I move adoption of the agenda.
Rountree: Second.
De Weerd: I have a motion and a second to approve the agenda as amended. All
those in favor say aye. All ayes. Motion carried.
MOTION CARRIED: THREE AYES. ONE ABSENT.
Item 5: Consent Agenda.
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A. April 27, 2010 Pre-Council Meeting Minutes
B. April 27, 1010 City Council Regular Meeting Minutes
C. May 4, 2010 City Council Meeting Minutes
D. May 11, 2010 City Council Workshop Meeting Minutes
E. NEW Beer/Wine/Liquor License Approval for Catfish LLC., dba
Schooners Located at 499 S. Main St. This Application is
Pending Ada County Recorders Office Approval
F. Lease Agreement with Union Pacific Railroad for 3.12 Acres of
Parking at East Broadway and East Third Street for Meridian
Business Day, 2010
H. MDA 08-002: Approval of Second Amendment to the
Development Agreement Dated February 17, 2006, Filed March
7, 2006 (Instrument No.106034786): Request to Modify the
recorded Development Agreement for Volterra Subdivision
and Create a New Development Agreement for a Mixed
Use/Commercial Employment Area by Primeland Development
Company
L. Short Term Lease Agreement Between Boise Presbytery
Property Management Committee and Meridian Parks and
Recreation Department for the Property Located at 201 W.
Ustick Rd
De Weerd: Our next item is Number 5, our Consent Agenda.
Hoaglun: Madam Mayor, under the Consent Agenda, items I noted, item G, we are
going to remove Item 5-G under Consent Agenda. We are also going to remove Item 5-
H-A and also 5-I. Under 5-J, that resolution number is 10-725. And we are also adding
-- making sure that we have on there under the Consent Agenda, Item L, a short-term
lease agreement between Boise Presbytery Property Management Committee and
Meridian Parks Department for the property located on the 201 West Ustick Road. And
with those changes, Madam Mayor, I move approval of the Consent Agenda.
Rountree: Second.
De Weerd: I have a motion and a second to move -- or to approve the Consent Agenda
as changed. Is there any discussion? Seeing none, Madam Clerk, will you call roll.
Roll-Call: Bird, yea; Rountree, yea; Zaremba, absent; Hoaglun, yea.
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MOTION CARRIED: THREE AYES. ONE ABSENT.
Item 6: Community Items/Presentations
A. 2010 City Scholarship Award Winners
De Weerd: Well, if you will give me a moment, Council, I will move down to the podium.
Hoaglun: And as Madam Mayor moves to the podium for the next item, we just want to
let -- for the record show that David Zaremba, Councilman, has returned from the ACHD
meeting, bearing great news we hope eventually. But welcome.
Zaremba: Thank you. I am here.
De Weerd: Our first item we have the honor of recognizing some of the youth of our
community for their service in our community. We established aMayor -- a city youth
scholarship and these are in recognition of the numerous acts of benefit to our
community by our youth. The funds come from State of the City sponsorships that are
dedicated to these youth scholarship programs. So, we don't use taxpayer dollars, but
these scholarships are dedicated to City of Meridian youth that give back to our
community. So, it's my pleasure tonight to recognize three of the four recipient that will
be receiving these and next week, because one of the youth had a conflict tonight, we
will be awarding her scholarship next week. If you would allow me to give a little bit of
description on each of our scholarship recipients and, then, I will ask them to come up
and join us. The first one, Carly Campo, is from Rocky Mountain High School. Carly
plans on attending Brigham Young University in Provo to study music education. Some
of the accomplishments that we pulled out of their application and letters of
recommendation and such, I'll note her accomplishments and activities and I would just
like to highlight a few of these. She created the Read With Me program in 2008, which
has high school students that go out and read with our youth in our community and
elementary schools. Volunteers for World Special Olympics. Was avolunteer -- does
volunteer work with her church youth group. She testified before the house and senate
education committees regarding funding for the Idaho Digital Learning Academy. She
was the Miss Idaho's Outstanding Teen of 2009. She's president of the honor --
National Honor Society at her high school. She's a member of the Business
Professionals of America and because she has a whole lot of free time after that, she's
involved in multiple high school drama productions and choir. These -- reviewing these
applications I think struck each one of those that judged these to figure out who to
award it, as we have some very busy youth in our community and most times we don't
stop and recognize the accomplishments of these young emerging leaders that do
amazing things in our community. So, that is our first one. And, again, if you will bear
with me, I will go through all of these and, then, I will get to the presentations. Our
second one is Alysa Hoskin. She's from Mountain View High School. She plans to
attend Brigham Young University in Provo to study broadcast journalism. Her
accomplishments and activities include coordinating and participating in multiple service
activities and local charities, active in youth -- church youth group, Key Club, Young
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Republicans, fluent in America sign language, interpreted and attended community
events with the -- utilizing this talent. Journalism Education Association. A National
Student Press Association are some of her activities. She was the year book copy
editor. She was -- participated in the Boise Valley Junior Miss Pageant. She's in
basketball at the JV level and she lettered in that. Cross country JV captain and
received a varsity letter. She's with the Boise Youth Dance Festival and also involved
with the National Honor Society as their treasurer. Merrily -- okay. If I mess up your
name -- Marley. Malarie. Well, that one was difficult. Okay. Malarie Stout. And I
should have known that. Malarie is from Meridian High School and we just saw a
summary on Malarie and some of her activities at Meridian High School last night on
one of our news channels. She plans to attend Lewis-Clark State College to study
nursing. Her accomplishments are volunteer for the Buddy Walk benefitting the Downs
Syndrome Association. The city and our youth council was involved with Inclusion
Revolution last year and this was born out of Meridian High School where their goal was
that everybody, regardless of any of their abilities or restrictions, should be included in
all things and they -- they went out, embraced this and offered it to the community,
which it was embraced and I think Mallory's friend Jamie was recognized with a Mayor's
award last month, but this program really touches out -- reaches out into our community
and touches a lot of hearts and so I -- this is -- this is such a cool program and I have
been personally involved with that. Sang the National Anthem for the Idaho Veterans
Memorial. Raised funds for and awareness of breast cancer, supporting the Susan B.
Coleman Foundation. She is with the ASB vice-president, the Boise Leadership
Academy, huddle leader for fellowship of Christian Athletes. National Honor Society.
Varsity volleyball. And varsity choir. If I could ask these three recipients to, please,
come forward, I would love to give you a plaque and your check will go to your school.
Carly. I will just read what the plaque says. In recognition of your high level of
community involvement, academic merit -- and I get emotional on everything, so forgive
me. Had to take a breath. And outstanding leadership potential, we award this to you
for what you have done in our community to make it a better place and to show your
leadership and we wish you great success in your -- your next chapter in your education
and beyond. Congratulations. Alysa Hoskin at Mountain View. In recognition of your
high level of community involvement, academic merit, and outstanding leadership
potential, we wish you great success in your future endeavors and we hope that you all
remember to come back home and be leaders in our community, too. And to Malarie.
Just a different spelling on that. In recognition of your high level of community
involvement, academic merit, and outstanding leadership potential, it is our honor to
present this to you and wish you success in future endeavors. We'd like to also thank
the families. We know, because it's -- we all have very busy kids. as well, we know that
the support from home is an absolute must and we appreciate what you do to support
your high school students, to get them to and from activities and be a support system to
them, so that they can continue to spread their wings and I know having worked with
youth -- with our Mayor's Youth Advisory Council, all's you have to do is give them
opportunity and they take it and run. Amazing what our youth do in our community. So,
thank you for being here and, you know, if you'd like to leave you're certainly welcome
to do that. We will not make you wait around.
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B. Recognition of a Hometown Hero
De Weerd: It is also my honor to -- our next item is something that we want to start
doing. We have a number of citizens that on occasion they go above and beyond to
save a fellow resident or someone in need and we have decided, instead doing this on
an annual basis and, then, looking through submittals on who might be worthy, we want
to recognize every act as we hear of them and would ask that our citizens let us know
as you learn of these acts of kindness, acts of bravery and acts of heroism, to bring it to
our attention, because it's always the bad stuff we hear and not always the good and
we'd like to celebrate what -- the good things that happen in our community. So, let me
give you some background on who we are recognizing tonight. On the afternoon of
Friday, May 14th, Meridian resident Kelly Lloyd was driving past Tully Park to run an
errand she had delayed from earlier in the day. In passing she noticed a dog near the
bank of an irrigation ditch, running along side the parks walking path. The dog is here
with us tonight. The dog was pacing back and forth and acting in an agitated manner.
Curious about the lone dog, Kelly pulled into the park's parking lot and began walking
across the park towards where the dog was. She noticed that the dog was dragging its
leash. Kelly, then, spotted something in the water and began to run. When she got to
the ditch bank she spotted an overturned wheelchair and, then, an elderly man almost
fully emersed in the cold water. She grabbed the man's hand and attempted to lift him
out of the water, but could not. She dialed 911 for help and continued to keep her grip
on the man, who told her he had been in the water at least 20 minutes prior to her
arrival. She talked to the man and kept him calm and lucent and soon Meridian police
officers arrived, followed soon after by additional paramedics. The elderly man, 86 year
old war veteran Bob Hiller, is also with us here tonight, explained that he had gone to
the park in his electric wheelchair to visit a tree planted there in his diseased wife's
honor. He had been too impatient to wait for one of the several caregivers who
generally accompany him and had ventured out alone. His dog began moving too fast
and pulled Mr. Hitler's wheelchair off course. Fearing he would hit a fence post, Mr.
Hiller rode out and accidently tumbled into the water. Mr. Hiller has fully recovered from
this ordeal and Kelly Lloyd has visited him at his home. Kelly is the wife of a former
Meridian city resident and employee and also the mother of one of our employees and it
would be my honor, Kelly, if you would come and join us up front. And, Mr. Hiller, it --
Shelly, if you would bring Mr. Hiller up as well. Oh. And Cody, the dog. No one ever
wonders why I love this community when we get to do things like this. I would like to
read our plaque. It's the Hometown Hero Award, presented to Meridian residents who
perform selfless acts of heroism, going above and beyond the call of duty in service to
others in our community without regard for attention or personal gain. It's presented to
Kelly Lloyd in recognition of the role she played in saving the life of an elderly resident
who had fallen out of his wheelchair and fell into an irrigation ditch. We thank you for
your selfless act and appreciate you joining us tonight and, Mr. Hiller, thank you as well.
C. Discussion with Valley Regional Transit (VRT): Bus Service
Options for Fiscal Year 2011
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De Weerd: I think Council will have to admit, I'm getting better at doing these without
too much interruption. Our next item is Item 6-C, discussion with Valley Regional
Transit on our bus service options for fiscal year 2011. Oh, I'm sorry. Kelli, you might
just wait a short moment. Okay. There we go. Hi, Kelli.
Fairless: Members of the Council, I provided your clerk with a white paper, so,
hopefully, that got to you. It looks like it did. Mary was here several weeks ago from my
office, Mary Barker, to talk with you about kind of visioning for the future of public
transportation services for the City of Meridian and in the meantime we are now in full
effort of just developing our 2011 budget of our existing services. I have provided the
white paper as a background for you, just because I know with all the things that you do
through your busy public life, sometimes it's hard to track a lot of the details, so I'm not
going to go through every detail in this paper, but it is available to you, then, as you're
reflecting back over the next few months on -- as we move through the budgeting
process. This is going to be I think our challenging budget year. I have been telling the
staff over the last couple of years, as we have all been watching the revenue shortfalls
and kind of observing how things have been going in local jurisdictions that things tend
to roll downhill and I know this is the year that we are going to have to probably deal
with some more difficult financial circumstances. Just a very brief background. You all
remember in 2003 the Nampa Urbanized Area was formed. We began to operate the
services that are out of what we call the Nampa Urbanized Area, which is comprised of
Nampa, Caldwell, and a portion of Middleton. We bring those services through Meridian
and serve Meridian residents through the Nampa urbanized area services and those are
the inter-county limited stop routes that we have talked with you about many times. In
2005 we went through a competitive procurement and procured the management
services of -- actually, the contract management services of First Transit, which is a
public transportation operator, and we did it under a turn key, which meant we paid an
hourly rate and they provided the service and took care of all the -- you know, hiring the
employees and managing the system. In 2009 Valley Regional Transit board
determined that a better model for us to operate our services under is a management
services contract through a subsidiary corporation where the employees are still hired
under a private subsidiary, but the budgeting and the management of the -- of the
oversight of the system would be more directly done through Valley Regional Transit,
which is currently -- or just recently established that system in our Boise operation and
we are in the process of starting that up in the -- in the Nampa system as well. This will
allow us to have more direct oversight of the actual budget and financials. Under the
turn key contract you never know exactly how much of that is actual profit and how
much is -- is going toward the system. The one issue we found in negotiating ashort-
term extension of the existing contractor's budget is that -- or hourly rate is that they
have had -- been claiming that the service is actually a lot more costly to operate than
they were getting reimbursed in their hourly rate and we did do a pretty detailed
analysis, hired athird-party consultant to -- we did our own independent budget of what
we thought the system would cost to operate, had that compared to -- by a third-party
professional and that determined that the system probably does cost about 25 percent
more to operate than what we have been paying. So, as we go forward in this coming
year's budget, not only are we addressing issues of possible revenue shortfalls, but
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May 26, 2010
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service itself we are anticipating is actually going to cost more to operate. We are still in
the process of refining those budget projections, but feel comfortable that the 25 percent
is the highest end of that and we hope that it will get better. There are a few things I will
talk with you about that may make that a little better going forward. So, where we do
our budgeting through voluntary contributions from our local jurisdictions and there are a
lot of moving parts in this process, because as everybody -- if -- if one partner
decreases their contribution, it's up to the other partners to even increase theirs more or
we have to look at how we provide that service and I want to point you to the
attachment on the document, if you're interested. It's the actual break out of the
financial contributions that all of our local jurisdictions provide. The City of Meridian has
provided -- this last year it was 25,330 for dues and, then, 75,211 that supports the
inter-county services and, then, the federal portion of that covers the remainder of the
budget to support that service. So, we get about 60 percent of the budget is funded
through federal dollars, leveraging those local contributions. So, we are in a fairly
complex situation where we need to try to develop a -- some service plan concepts that
are going to meet the revenue projections that we are hearing from our local
jurisdictions. The board members representing those local jurisdictions have indicated
that they don't believe that their communities will be able to increase their contributions
over last year and so we are facing the possibility of having to really seriously look at
our service levels. Because the services are operated over multiple jurisdictions, it
means that we can't actually save costs by not -- well, for example, a hypothetical, if one
thing is we can't save costs by not serving the City of Meridian, because we need to
pass through here anyway. So, that's part of what makes this a little more complicated
to -- to do is that the way the services are so interrelated among the jurisdictions it
makes it a little harder to -- to try to deal with -- with possible shortfalls. And that any
fare or service changes that we -- that would need to go in effect, we need a target to try
to have those in effect at the beginning of our new fiscal year, which is October 1st,
which means we need to do the service planning, the budgeting, get all of the
concurrence from our -- our local funding partners and, then, have our public hearings
and get all that squared away and implemented by October 1st, which is a really
challenging effort for us to accomplish, but we are committed to do the best that we can
on that. To that end I have offered in this paper, basically, an outline of what that
process looks like. We will be completing the preliminary budget and financial analysis
tools -- I think we are going to confirm that preliminary budget at a staff level tomorrow
and we will be providing that to our -- one of our committees within the next week. We
are going to also we just -- this is the first of all of our local jurisdiction meetings, so we
have initiated that process. The one thing we are going to do to try to save some time
in this analysis is doing a survey with the local elected officials of each of the
jurisdictions to kind of help us understand what your orders of priority are for this short-
term kind of issue that we are dealing with, so that we can have a better understanding
as we do the service planning of where your priorities are and that -- that survey should
be distributed by tomorrow or Friday. It's very close. And it may have even gone out
today. In June we are going to go complete our meetings with our local jurisdictions to
continue to seek input on priorities and revenue assumptions. We will be completing
our service scenario planning and scheduling public hearings to be held in July. We
hope, then, from the response in the public hearing process to be able to complete the
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May 26, 2010
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service planning, prepare a recommendation for the board and find some way to
distribute that information, probably through our board members, back to the city
councils and the commissions and, then, in August conduct our final budget hearing to
adopt the fiscal year 2011 budget. This -- I will quickly go through what we are looking
at in terms. The first part of the bookend would be a lifeline level service and what we
mean by lifeline is identifying the most needy constituents in your communities and the
highest activity centers that they would need. This would probably prioritize disabled,
elderly, low income people who really are what we call transit dependent and to identify
ways of serving them and, then, looking at what -- we are using the available funding,
looking at if there is any additional funding how we might still gap the commuter
services. Right now we do provide inter-county routes for commute times as well and
that those might be additional van pools or maintaining some of the most active trips
and identifying those. The other extreme is where it's our primarily commuter based
system that we use some of the additional revenue to do more of that lifeline service.
So, it's really just two sides of -- of the same issue, which population are we going to
focus on, and, then, within those two are local fixed route with limited commuter service,
where that would be kind of the localized line a little more enhanced with commuter
services or more commuter focused with some limited fixed route service. And I guess
I'd caution -- I don't mean to paint the most dire picture. I don't know that it will be that
dire, we just want to be prepared, given the short time frame that we have, that we have
evaluated every possible option and that, then, we can test those options against the
feedback that we get from our leaders and our communities that we serve. The other
part of this project for us is to really look at how we can improve the coordination of the
services that already exist. For example, where senior centers are providing those
services, are there ways we can support those efforts to increase and enhance that
coordination in a more effective way. So, those are -- that will be woven into each of
these scenarios and in our process and how we accomplish that, again, we are really
early in this process and so it's evolving over time and we will definitely be staying in
touch and maybe if I could get some feedback from you today that would be helpful to
us, it would be whether or not our assumptions about your revenue projections are
similar to the other jurisdictions that we have and how best can we keep you in the loop
in terms of this process, given that we are trying to accomplish it on such a short time
frame. Thank you, Madam Mayor, and those are my formal comments and I'd be happy
to answer any questions.
De Weerd: Council, any questions?
Bird: I have none
Rountree: I have none. Madam Mayor, the only question I would have would be -- we
have not seen the budget in context of this particular item. I assume the budget
continues the funding at the current level and I think that's the kind of information Kelly
needs, so they can move forward as they prepare their budget. Is that correct?
De Weerd: I think staff had called you for any anticipated numbers and I assume those
numbers are the same as what is in this chart, not the 25 percent increase.
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Fairless: There is -- what we provided in the chart is what we have today, which would
be the status quo, basically, going forward and, then, we have provided you the amount
if we did need the 25 percent, so you would know what that number would be.
De Weerd: Okay. I think we took it -- it was with the three percent, but not with the 25
percent. I will have to verify that. But we -- yesterday the senior management team
balanced our budget that we are bringing to Council and so, then, it will be in your
hands.
Hoaglun: Madam Mayor, I have a quick question. As we go through that budgeting
process, you know, we will be looking at everything and trying to sort the priorities just
as you are. I'm kind of curious if we are able to come with the funding that -- for our
funding that meets the 25 percent, there is no guarantee that other jurisdictions will be
able to do that. So, what happens then? I mean, you know, this money is Meridian
taxpayers and we want to benefit those taxpayers. We -- we'd like to think Meridian is in
the middle of the valley, where we are situated in our geography things do run through
Meridian and does that mean we will be able to see full utilization of that funding? I don't
think you would be taking that funding and utilizing it in other communities, but how do
we -- how do we make sure that if we fully fund that that money is not going elsewhere
and residents don't benefit from that?
Fairless: Madam Mayor, Councilman Hoaglun, that's an excellent question and one of
the things, because we do get fund -- have funding partners from all the different
jurisdictions, we have avery -- it's just a fairly complex financial system where we track
those dollars, so that they aren't -- if we had funding from the City of Meridian that was
above and beyond that inter-county service, because one scenario might be that the
rest of the partners, as you mentioned, don't fund the 25 percent. The amount that you
would be providing us that would be that 25 percent more than you have today, we
could look at helping to fund some other mobility programs, like I had mentioned, you
know, in improving services that would be more directed to the City of Meridian. So,
those would be used within the City of Meridian.
Hoaglun: Okay. Thank you.
De Weerd: Okay. Anything further?
Fairless: Well, thank you very much for your time and we will stay in touch.
Item 7: Items Moved From Consent Agenda.
De Weerd: Okay. There were no items moved from the Consent Agenda.
Item 8: Department Reports.
Meridian City Council
May 26, 2010
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A. Mayor's Department: Mayor's Youth Advisory Council (MYAC)
Update
De Weerd: Item 8-A under the Mayor's Department, we have our MYAC update and I
see Eli is here to provide it to you. Thank you for joining us, Eli.
E.Nary: Good evening, Madam Mayor, and Members of the Council. As you know, my
name is Eli Nary and I have been the chairman of the Meridian Mayor's Youth Advisory
Council for the past year. And it's been one exciting year, I must say. Last year we
went to the Association of Idaho Cities and came away -- come with what do we want
out of this year, what are the things that we saw that we liked about MYAC before and
what are the things that we thought we could change and all these ideas that we had
and all the ways that we planned, in what way can we affect our community, affect our
youth, affect everyone in this valley. Those were the things that we have really cared
about and this year I feel like we did exactly that. We started off with things like the
Harvest Festival where we volunteered. We scooped ice cream for MADC recognized
event twice. We found willing youth delegates to be members of our Youth On
Commission program, which included our arts and our historical preservation and
Meridian's Promise and MADC and many more. We also divided into three different
subcommittees. We had our government affairs, which we took the texting while driving
bill this year to bat. We spoke down at the house and at the senate in committee about
how important of a bill this was. We created a Facebook group that the last time
checked had over 700 followers saying the Idaho teens don't want to text and drive
anymore. We were also featured in an article with AAA on all of our work that we did
with that and we also received a grant to do some anti-tobacco PSAs and all these
different things, our advisor Adrian Casper was really a huge help to every person on
our committee that worked as hard as they did. Next we had a Teen Activities Council,
which featured different events that reached out to our middle school and high school
age groups, reaching out into our community and trying to help teens find a positive
outlook and find a positive way to have fun and we had different projects throughout the
entire year and one of those included our Boondocks event, which -- which, I believe,
we actually did sell out with. And this all became a part with our parks and rec
department, with our advisor being Allison Kaptein, who did quite a few great things for
us this year. Our final subcommittee is our community involvement committee, which
this year we really worked on finding different projects outside in our community where
we also really focused on our dinner auction that we have done the last two years. This
year we supported the Meridian Food Bank and that night we raised about 4,000 dollars
for them, which is enough to feed them for -- feed the homeless in Meridian that are in
need for an entire month. Luke Cavener in the Mayor's office and our advisor for
MYAC, did so much work, not only with that event, but with every event this year and to
not acknowledge his name at least once this year is a gross understatement of
everything that he's done. This summer we will be attending the Association of Idaho
Cities and we will also be doing some planning sessions and as of our last meeting I
elected our chair again for next year, so you will have to deal with me again. And I just
would like to thank all of you as well for all the opportunities that you created with
everything that you were able to do for us and I'm just glad that I have this opportunity
Meridian City Council
May 26, 2010
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and every youth in Meridian does as well, because it doesn't make us the leaders of
tomorrow, it makes us the leaders of today. Thank you. Now, Iwill -- if there is any
questions.
De Weerd: Council, any questions?
Rountree: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Mr. Rountree.
Rountree: I'm looking forward to another year of hearing from you, Eli.
E.Nary: Thank you, sir.
De Weerd: Eli, I think that you recognized our adults that were involved, but not the
youth that led the different events. If you could kind of give a summary of who were the
chairs and that sort thing.
E.Nary: Absolutely. Well, our government affairs committee was led by Janelle de
Weerd, who did an outstanding job this year with everything that she was involved in.
She lead the push for everything that we did with the texting while driving bill, with
countless hours to support not only -- not only the texting while driving bill, but also the
grant that we also received for tobacco education, she was there at everything, she did
a great job. Next we had -- next we had our Teen Activities Council, we had Saraya
Sheets in her first year and Saraya came in there and really embodied that positive
attitude in everything that she did. She was at every event. She gave everything to
MYAC for everything that she did and I'm proud to say that she will be back next year as
well, along with Janelle.- Next we had in our community involvement Aubrey Grant and
this was her final year in MYAC and Aubrey has been a dedicated member and she did
a great job with community involvement and like the other two chairmen, like every
member that we had on MYAC this year, they gave themselves wholehearted to this
cause.
De Weerd: And, then, Jessica with the historical preservation.
E.Nary: Oh. Right. Yes. Jessica Proctor was on the historical preservation and she
was at everything and, then, we had Megan Murphy, who was also on our parks and rec
and, then, Janelle also served on the Mayor's Anti Drug Coalition and I served on the
Meridian's Promise and Aubrey Grant served on our arts commission. And those are
just the ones off the top of my head and I can't remember everyone right now, but it was
-- honestly, it took -- for me to speak right now is just to say that I may have done some
good stuff this year, but if it wasn't for every other person that put in all those hours this
year, the efforts that MYAC had -- the success that MAYC had this year would be not
nearly as great.
De Weerd: Thank you.
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May 26, 2010
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Bird: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Mr. Bird.
Bird: Thank you, Eli, for your service and I know you will continue to do it for us and
understand that next year if we raise 5,000 that you're going to shave your head?
E.Nary: No, I -- I don't remember agreeing to this.
Bird: Mr. Rountree agreed to it.
E.Nary: I think they are agreeing on my behalf.
De Weerd: I think we will accept that challenge.
Bird: Yeah. We are going to accept it. We are going to get it.
Zaremba: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Mr. Zaremba.
Zaremba: Eli, I have appreciated your enthusiasm and your dedication and your reports
to us have been delightful, we have enjoyed them, and I'm glad that you're getting to
repeat again next year and I only had one question, if you repeat as chairman -- or
president, does mean that you also have to repeat the same grade in school?
E.Nary: I was planning on it, but that's just because the school said I have to, you
know. I'll actually be a junior next year, so --
De Weerd: Very good. Well, thank you for the summary. It was a very active year and
I know that you all can take pride in the accomplishments and amazing results that the
youth council has had in their activities and their efforts.
E.Nary: Well, thank you all as well, because all these efforts all come from you and you
guys create a great example for everything that we get to go this year. Also show us
that, you know, the leaders of tomorrow are -- can be us, but we have these perfect
examples here today. Thank you.
Item 9: Action Items.
A. Continued Public Hearing from March 2, 2010: VAR 08-008
Meridian and Amity by Hawkins Companies Located at the
Northwest Corner of W. Amity Road and S. Meridian Road,
South of Harris Street:Request for Variance to UDC 11-3H-4
Which Prohibits New Approaches From Directly Accessing a
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State Highway to Allow 2 Right-In /Right-Out Access Points
(Approximately 660 Feet From the North and South
Intersections) and 1 Right-In /Right-Out, Left-In Access Point
at the 1/4 Mile to State Highway 69 /Meridian Road
B. Continued Public Hearing from March 2, 2010: AZ 08-005
Meridian and Amity by Hawkins Companies Located at the
Northwest Corner of W. Amity Road and S. Meridian Road,
South of Harris Street: Request for Annexation and Zoning of
73.10 Acres from RUT in Ada County to R-15 (Medium High
Density Residential) (5.68 acres), L-O (Limited Office) (3.22
acres) and C-C (Community Business) (30.72)and C-G (General
Retail and Service Commercial) (33.47 acres) Zoning Districts
De Weerd: Thank you. Okay. Item 9-A has a request to continue to July 6th and also
9-B.
Rountree: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Yes.
Rountree: I move that we continue Items 9-A and 9-B until July 6, 2010.
Bird: Second.
De Weerd: I have a motion and a second to continue Items 9-A and B to July 6th, 2010.
All those in favor say aye. All ayes. Motion carried.
MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES.
C. Continued Public Hearing from April 27, 2010: AZ 09-010
Southridge West Commercial by Cabra Creek, LLC Located at
the Northeast Corner of S. Ten Mile Road and W. Overland
Road: Request for Annexation and Zoning of 5.63 Acres From
RUT in Ada County to the M-E (Mixed Employment) District
D. Continued Public Hearing from April 27, 2010: RZ 09-006
Southridge West Commercial by Cabra Creek, LLC Located at
the Northeast Corner of S. Ten Mile Road and W. Overland
Road: Request for Rezone of 9.33 Acres From the R-8 Zoning
District to the C-C Zoning District
E. Continued Public Hearing from April 27, 2010: CPA 09-010
Southridge West Commercial by Cabra Creek, LLC Located at
the Northeast Corner of S. Ten Mile Road and W. Overland
Road: Request to Amend the Comprehensive Plan Future Land
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Use Map to Change the Land Use Designation on 60.74 Acres
of Land From Medium High Density Residential (MHDR),
Medium Density Residential (MDR), Green Space and Park
Land (PARK) and Mixed Use Commercial (MUC) to Mixed
Employment (ME)
De Weerd: Item 9-C is a continued public hearing on AZ 09-010 and Item 9-D is also a
continued public hearing on RZ 09-006. And I believe also Item E is part of that
continued public hearing on CPA 09-010. I will go ahead and turn this over to staff at
this time.
Wafters: Thank you, Madam Mayor, Members of the City Council. The property before
you is located on the northeast corner of South Ten Mile Road and West Overland
Road. The first map there shows the current zoning of the property. The second map
is an aerial view. The first application is a Comprehensive Plan map amendment to
change the land use designation on 60.74 acres of land from medium high residential,
medium density residential, green space and park land and mixed use commercial and
mixed employment. And that does encompass the whole site outline there. The next
application is annexation and zoning of 5.63 acres of land from RUT in Ada County to
ME, mixed employment. This map -- to back up just a second. This map shows the
current adopted future land use map in the Comprehensive Plan and the second map
shows the proposed zoning -- or map amendment. And this is a map showing the
proposed zoning. The annexation area I just spoke of is right up here, the blue area. It
does exclude the blue area up here, it's just only this little sliver right here, the 5.63
acres. And a rezone is also requested of 9.33 acres from R-8, medium density
residential, to C-C, community business. Highlights of the request -- the applicant has
submitted a conceptual plan shown here for the portion of the site proposed to be
rezoned to C-C, that lies directly on the corner of Overland and Ten Mile. The concept
plan depicts aright-in, right-out access via Ten Mile Road, a convenient store or gas
station, retail, and two quick service restaurants, drive-thru service windows are
proposed for the C store and both restaurants. A 75 foot wide Williams pipeline
easement also exists along the north boundary of the site. Staff is recommending a
development agreement with the rezone application, with the provisions listed in Exhibit
B of the staff report. The applicant did not submit a concept plan for the property
proposed to be annexed north of the rezone property. Due to the size and configuration
of the property, staff does anticipate the piece will develop by itself and, therefore, staff
is not requiring a development plan to be submitted at this time, nor is staff requiring a
development agreement. Staff anticipates that when the larger surrounding area is
rezoned consistent with the proposed change to the future land use map, a
development plan will be submitted to include the subject annexation area. Staff
anticipates this area will be included in a future development agreement when adjacent
area proposed solely for the map amendment north of the pipeline is proposed to be
rezoned. The Commission recommended approval of the subject application at their
March 18, 2010, public hearing. Summary of the Commission hearing. In favor of the
application was Van Elg. No one testified in opposition. Janet Puga, Scott Nichols,
Scott Gruba, Liz Terko all commented on the application. There was no written
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May 26, 2010
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testimony submitted. The issues of discussion by the Commission was the
development of property adjacent to the Northwest Pipeline and any applicable
restrictions. Direct access to Ten Mile Road for the property proposed to be rezoned
and whether or not drive-thru establishments are consistent with uses desiring mixed
employment designated areas and, if so, should conditional use approval be required.
Key Commission changes to staff recommendation. The Commission voted to
recommend approval of the development provision recommended -- excuse me. The
Commission voted to recommend removal of the development agreement provision
recommended by staff prohibiting access to Ten Mile Road in order to give the
developer an opportunity to demonstrate how it could work for further consideration.
That is DA provision H. Outstanding issues for City Council. The first is Council should
determine if direct access to Ten Mile, an arterial street, should be allowed as requested
by the applicant. UDC 11-3A-3 requires access to be taken from a local street where
available. Staff determines the driveway off Overland Road into the site that stubs to
the north boundary of the proposed C-C district shown on the site plan serve as a local
street. However, Council may waive this standard and allow access to Ten Mile if
deemed appropriate. If Council was to allow the access to Ten Mile as proposed by the
applicant, development agreement provision H should be modified accordingly. Just to
note that ACRD site specific condition number 7.1.7 in the staff report states that other
than one access specifically approved with this development application on Overland
Road, direct access is prohibited to Overland and Ten Mile Roads consistent with the
original conditions of approval for South Ridge, except for emergency access restricted
with bollards or a gate if needed to Ten Mile. Additionally, the existing development
agreement for South Ridge, which encompasses this property, also prohibits direct
access to Ten Mile. The second outstanding issue for Council is regards to the multi-
use pathway along Ten Mile. Because there is not adequate area to construct a ten
foot wide detached multi-use pathway along Ten Mile adjacent to the ACRD drainage
pond, staff recommends development agreement provision A be modified. A drainage
pond is noted here on site plan. Staff is recommending provision A be modified to read:
In accordance with city's master pathways plan as standards listed in UDC 11-3A-8, a
ten foot wide multi-use pathway is required to be constructed along the Ten Mile
frontage near the west boundary of the site from the Overland -Ten Mile intersection
north to the drainage pond the pathway shall be detached adjacent to Ten Mile. South
of the drainage pond the pathway shall split into two separate facilities, a five foot wide
detached sidewalk along Ten Mile and a ten foot wide multi-use pathway around, east
and north, the ACRD pond, tying back into the sidewalk along Ten Mile and continuing
as a ten foot wide detached pathway to the north. Or, instead, the applicant may pay
ACRD for the additional cost of widening the pathway from- five feet to ten feet along
Ten Mile in front of the drainage pond. That is an option for the developer. No written
testimony has been submitted since the P&Z Commission meeting. Staff will stand for
any questions the Council may have at this time.
De Weerd: Sonya, the recommendations regarding the outstanding issues for City
Council, did the applicant have any comment about that?
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Madam Mayor, Members of the Council, I believe the applicant probably will address
the access to Ten Mile in their presentation and the applicant is on board with the
pathway provision that staff is recommending.
De Weerd: Thank you. Any questions from Council? Yes, Mr. Hoaglun.
Hoaglun: Sonya, a question on that pathway, just looking at that where the pipeline
easement goes through, is that pathway to be required to be ten foot or just are they
just putting it in as a five foot or what do we know about that particular pathway?
Wafters: Madam Mayor, Councilman Hoaglun, Councilmen, I believe that's a five foot
wide pathway. I can't say that for sure. There is called out on it. That's just something
the applicant was proposing to do within that open area, since they can't really build
within that area or encroach, so --
Hoaglun: Right.
Wafters: -- that's just a separate deal that the applicant was proposing.
Hoaglun:. Okay. I was just curious about. Thank you.
De Weerd: Well, I guess that raises a question. Could that -- can that meet the needs
of the pathway by expanding that?
Wafters: Madam Mayor, Members of the Council, the pathway -- if it -- let me back up.
The multi-use pathway is designated to run along the -- from the east along the south
side of Overland Road and it -- south or north. South, I believe. And it was supposed to
come out -- we wanted it to come out at the intersection, the signalized intersection, that
people could cross the road or continue north. So, the purpose of the pathway is to go
north. It could at the end of that pathway that the applicant is proposing go around the
drainage facility and, then, come out again on Ten Mile.
De Weerd: Okay. Thank you. Any other questions?
Nary: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Mr. Nary.
Nary: Madam Mayor, Members of the Council, no matter how many times you look at
these agendas, I noticed as we were discussing this that -- I'm sure all of you noticed
the Comp Plan amendment probably needs to get done before the other two items, so
when you get to that part of your discussion we just need to reverse that order.
De Weerd: Okay. Would the applicant like to make comment?
Elg: Good evening.
Meridian City Council
May 26, 2010
Page 18 of 79
De Weerd: If you will, please, state your name and address for the record.
Elg: Sure. My name is Van Elg. I'm with the Land Group. 462 East Shore, number
100, Eagle, Idaho. Representing the applicant this evening. Madam Mayor, Members
of the Council, it's been awhile since I have been before you. We are glad to finally be
here. We -- Sonya, could you go up -- can I put up on the screen what you see up
there? Which one do I speak out of?
De Weerd: It's your choice.
Elg: Could you put the overall -- the master plan up there? Yeah. Well, that's fine for
right now. That one's good. I'll try to be brief with some of the comments that -- that I
had this evening. As I -- as we went through this application with Planning and Zoning
Commission, there was some concerns, obviously, about three specific points of
interest. One was the approval, as our concept plan shows here, for some potential
drive-thru quick serve restaurants. The second was the Williams pipeline easement.
And third was the access to Ten Mile Road. Other than that I think that the Planning
and Zoning Commission was comfortable and staff has been wonderful to work with in
getting us to this point. I think what we are presenting to do is a -- given the market that
we are in, the buyer that has purchased this property from the South Ridge developer --
the original South Ridge developer and is a -- is a reasonable alternative -- not
reasonable, a great alternative to what was originally there and complies more with
what the city has envisioned, I believe, in this area. The issue that we have before us
right now -- let's talk a little bit about our access to Ten Mile Road. When we originally
submitted plans for South Ridge, as this process was rolling forward -- and, of course,
remember this has been -- this had been ongoing process for years -- our plans showed
an access, aright-in only, to -- off of Ten Mile for northbound traffic. That right-in only
we felt, as does the developer, is an essential part for acommercial -- a budding or
developing commercial development, whether it be a campus community that would
develop in the future on the site as is anticipated and for any commercial development
that might desire to be closer to the intersection of Ten Mile and Overland Road. I think
you could probably stand up almost any developer here and I'm sure you can all see the
wisdom and know how important it is for a property to have convenient access. When
you look at the access that we have off of Overland Road, we have one access that
comes in that -- for anybody entering the property from the west, it requires another left-
hand turning movement across traffic. This right-out turn lane for those that are
northbound, instead of having to turn on Overland and, then, westbound against traffic
-- or left against traffic, would provide them the opportunity to flow freely into the
development with aright-out. Again, if we were to develop this site with acampus-type
feel, we believe that that's an essential element to have some convenient access. Now,
back to our plans. We submitted and discussed with ACHD the plan for the right-out.
chatted with Gary Inselman. Gary Inselman said he felt that he could live with that
given the offset that we have there and believed that that was an acceptable option for
us. We proceeded forward with construction. At the time of construction I don't recall
who was the ACHD representative or inspector out there at the time, but he indicated
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May 26, 2010
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that he couldn't approve that access, even though it was approved on the plans, without
Meridian city first approving it, which is probably an appropriate step and I think that's --
that was a good move and we are here today to talk to you about that -- about that
option. So, ACRD has since submitted some letters and I think Sonya presented one
that says that they don't approve that, but I did present information to Sonya showing
that they had signed off on the plans and that it did show aright-in, right-out there at the
time. So, we proceeded fully, as has the developer and the buyer of the property, with
an understanding that aright-out would be an acceptable option for that site. Now, as
Planning and Zoning Commission and staff has pointed out, Council is the only body
that has the authority to waive that requirement and so we are here today to ask you for
that opportunity. Now, we don't necessarily need cart blanche. We understand from
Planning and Zoning Commission that we are going to have to hit it out of the park with
a plan that comes in. The concept plan that you see before you, as we have mentioned
to staff and has been pointed to P&Z, is really conceptual in nature. We are presenting
a plan showing what could reasonably happen. But given the market and the economy
today, it's tough to know exactly what will finally develop there. But this is to our best
guess, a plan that the developer bought off on and felt that could reasonably develop.
Of course, the -- some other options that will occur, as right-out develops we may have
to provide another access across the Williams pipeline. As you know, the -- the canal
has recently be straightened out, which provides us a lot more opportunity and much
more flexibility on that site for development of that entire property. It's tremendous -- or
fantastic change to that site and with that I think we are going to find that we will have a
lot more -- as things begin to turn around, we are going to find that things are going to
heat up and we are going to have a lot more opportunity for development there. And as
mentioned by staff, we will be back with development agreements and everything else
that we need for the development of that site. But with that we will most likely have
some sort of a -- crossing that will occur there, there will be some sort of connectivity to
that site and, again, that's why the right-in, right-out is so vital to us there. With respect
to the drive-thrus, again, conceptual plan. We don't know if we will need three drive-
thrus and we explained that we need two. We don't know if there will be -- officially if
they will be quick serve, convenience stores, or restaurants. What we do know is that in
this location and what we firmly believe is in a -- that C-C type zone, that drive-thrus are
an essential part of many businesses, not just quick serves, not just convenience
stores. We could have a drycleaner -- I mean I don't know what other uses, but there is
a number of other uses that could provide -- or could be serviced by a drive-thru. So, as
we pointed out to Planning and Zoning Commission, they, again, said we just -- we are
just asking for the opportunity to present it. Rather than kick it out now, let us bring in a
plan. and, again, hit it out of the park for you and if you're comfortable with it at the time,
then, you can approve it. They felt that maybe the best way to do that is just to say that
all drive-thrus require a conditional use application and we are comfortable with that, if
that's what it takes. If you want to limit the number of drive-thrus I think we could
probably come up with that -- we could live with something like that as well. But we are
asking you to allow us some flexibility, especially in such a difficult environment, to
entertain and to plan for all contingencies on the site and bring something back to you
that we believe -- and future owners and developers believe will be agreeable and
amenable to you folks. The Williams pipeline is the -- is another issue that was brought
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May 26, 2010
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up and I think it was brought up more in passing, but I want to make sure that you
understand that the developer and our engineers have been in contact with Williams.
We have been since the beginning of South Ridge and we all were aware that they are
there and when things begin to develop we will develop that site in accordance with the
requirements that our local codes and with the easement that's in place for the site. If
we don't, we simply won't get approved, because there is a requirement in the
conditions of approval for Williams pipeline approval. So, I don't -- I think that issue is
really not a significant issue, although I think we are probably sensitive, because of the
BP stuff going on right now, too. But we will -- we will address this as carefully as we
can and with all diligence in accordance with all the provisions that are in place. There
is some question about the -- this is a new item, I guess, regarding the multi-use
pathway and the developer has been talking with the city, he's talked with the economic
developer with parks and recreation, with staff, as I understand it Sonya and is
comfortable -- as Sonya said, we are on board with the pathway. I understand -- as
somebody mentioned how wide the pathway is currently that's shown there, it's at seven
feet. We understand it's a ten foot pathway that they are requesting and we are on
board with. The -- Diane Bevins over at ACRD spoke with Jeff Blackstock, one of the
developers -- one of the partners in this and they had indicated that -- she indicated to
Jeff, although we don't have it in writing, that they are more -- they are fine, even
comfortable with putting a ten foot pathway that is attached along Ten Mile Road.
There is room to do that and we are comfortable with that, too. It seems to me as I look
at the -- the option to bring the pathway all the way around, that we are adding
additional -- quite a bit of additional expense to bring that pathway all the way around
that -- that pond, plus it's just inviting -- it's not a -- it's not a pond that is there for beauty.
or for anything other than it's a drainage pond and, you know, it may be dry and
depending on how ACHD maintains it, it's their pond and I just don't think that we need
to have amulti-use pathway circling a drainage pond that's -- that's not really -- it's not
this green, lush, little pond that's going to be there. And the extra expense of this just
doesn't make sense to me at this point, especially if ACHD is willing to allow us to make
a connected ten- foot pathway and everybody gets what we need ultimately anyway.
And we can still provide the -- all the connectivity that's required. So, with that, that's
our -- I guess one of the key issues that we have to present before you today and I'll
certainly open myself up for any questions that you might have at this point.
De Weerd: Thank you. Council, questions? Mr. Rountree.
Rountree: Madam Mayor, thank you. I have a question either for Van or staff, but I'm
still not sure what ACHD's position on access on Ten Mile here and we read on the
handout it's not going to happen and, then, I hear that there has been discussion and it
is going to be approved. So, what's the final analysis or is it still up in the air?
Wafters: Madam Mayor, Councilman Rountree, Councilmen, from what I understand
from Mindy Wallace at ACHD, the plans that Van referenced were an earlier set from
2008. The plans have been since changed and there is -- the as-built plans show no
access to Ten Mile and the staff report from ACRD for this project has specifically
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May 26, 2010
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prohibited access to Ten Mile and is the previous and current development agreement
for this site.
Elg: Madam Mayor, Councilman Rountree, if I might. The plans do show and the as-
builts do not -- I mean the plans do not show and the as-builts do not show the right-in,
right-out. That's correct. We did that, because ACHD said we -- we had an approved
set of plans and they said you can't have it, unless City Council approves it. That's what
we were told. Gary Inselman told us we had it and approved the plans. The approval
with the stamp on it is there and that's the plans that were built to. They just put a
concrete curb in front of it. It just wouldn't happen. So, I guess what I'm saying is let us
-- if you would, let us go back to ACHD with your consent that aright-in, right-out is okay
and see if we can get it -- if you don't approve it, they don't approve it, but at least we
have the opportunity to discuss it again and -- because they did approve it and we have
the evidence of that submitted for the record as well and now there is some -- there is
some confusion internally as to ACRD -- what they did or didn't approve and we would
ask that you allow us that opportunity once we come back to you with our development
plans to present it and say we have got their approval, we have got their blessing. But
they are not going to move forward unless City Council says that it might be okay.
That's what they told us.
De Weerd: Follow up?
Rountree: Do we have anybody here from ACHD? I don't see Gary. He's not in the
audience. I'm just confused with -- I guess they have opted to give control back to the
city. I don't understand that, because it hasn't happened in the past.
De Weerd: I don't think you want me to comment.
Rountree: Well, I know. I'm just confused what -- the spot that they have presented,
because we could go one way or the other and appears that they still hold the final say.
I read from ACHD they have said no.
Elg: Although there is another plan approval that says yes. So, I -- it is a little bit of a
quandary. So, we ask you to allow us, if you could, Madam Mayor, Commission --
Councilman Rountree, let us work this out -- this detail out as these plans unfold in the
future, as we get developers to look at these sites and want to develop them. I'm not
saying it will, but we may perhaps have somebody who -- it's not a quick serve
restaurant, it's not a big deal, but if we have a campus that wants to come in and wants
to develop on that site, I think you can see how vital that right-in, right-out's going to be
and that quick access to Ten Mile Road, instead of having to force everyone back up to
Overland, up to the intersection and out.
Friedman: Madam Mayor, Members of the Council, if I might throw in another
opportunity in order to move this forward. As Sonya pointed out, the restrictions on the
access are based in code and as Mr. Elg has indicated, their plan is conceptual right
now, so if Council chooses to leave that provision in the development agreement and
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May 26, 2010
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they come back with a new development scheme and an opportunity to talk with ACRD,
they could always either pursue a development agreement modification if the Council is
to approve it with a restriction similar to the existing development agreement, or,
conversely, if it doesn't go into development agreement, it still remains the code
requirement at least today and if they were to come in with a CZC, typically the staff
would, in an instance like that, would -- in going through our analysis of the
development and if it still showed an access to Ten Mile, we would most likely deny that
they can seek Council's review at the time and in that case you would have a specific
development before you to handle that and a decision upon.
Elg: Madam Mayor, Council Members, I see what Pete's trying to accomplish there and
I think that's a great idea, but the problem that we are vexed with is that ACRD is not
going to give us an approval unless they know that City Council is okay with the right-in,
right-out. Their letter -- their recent letters have indicated that. But as Council gives
them the direction that says we may be okay with this, we ask you to reconsider this.
We may have the opportunity.. They are not going to consider, though, unless we do
something -- unless you do something about that right-in, right-out access. That's what
the inspector told us. So, it's going to require -- the access is going to require an
approval from ACRD. Now, that's what the inspector told us that is going to, again,
approve it, but at least we removed one of the variables that's caught us in a -- we are
caught in a round -- you know, in a round robin here, we can't get ahead of the circle.
De Weerd: So, then, what plan was it in that they were okay with?
Elg: Sonya, do you have that one?
Watters: Madam Mayor, Member of the Council, I have it. I can put it on the overhead.
It was dated November 18th of 2008.
Elg: Can you see that? It's the lower left-hand corner of the project -- of the design
there. Stamped approved ACRD. It's been highlighted in yellow where that right-in,
right-out is.
De Weerd: Okay. Council, any further questions? Mr. Hoaglun.
Hoaglun: Van, just to switch gears a little bit. On the pathways and the sidewalk, I have
heard two different versions there in terms of where the pathway would be located. One
would be ten foot attached up against Ten Mile and yet some of the things are calling
for it to be detached, having a space. What --
Elg: In that location -- Madam Mayor, Councilman Hoaglun, in that particular location,
as I understand it, the -- Diane Bevins indicated it would be an attached ten foot
pathway there by the -- by the drainage pond.
Hoaglun: I know we are developing pathways throughout the city and different things,
you know, that pipeline easement is kind of a natural -- it's not a water feature, but it's
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just kind of a natural thing, because we can't be building on it, any structures, but to
include pathways and I don't know if that is an option where instead of the ten foot along
Ten Mile -- because traffic -- that's going to be a busy road and that's why we got
concerned about access and different things and we move that to -- to where they can
access -- it is still five foot along Ten Mile, but to have that a ten foot, I mean if you're
already going to build a seven foot, you save five on one side and add three together,
you know, I think we all win on that, but, you know, it sounds like, Sonya, what I have
heard you say was the pathway coming up Overland going west was going to be on the
south side of that road, so there would have to be a crosswalk, some sort of mechanism
to get people across if we were to do it that way. So, that kind of -- and because I was
also think if the requirement was going to be to go around that drainage basin and
drainage basin is probably a better word than a pond, because, you're right, it's not
going to be a pond as people think of a pond. What's to bring it in and attach it to the --
to the pathway that you have there if -- if that was going to be required and still having
two pathways, just bring it in, attach it to that one, make it ten foot and, then, run it back
out to -- out to Ten Mile.
Elg: Detach it from Ten Mile there by the -- by the drainage basin --
Hoaglun: Right.
Elg: -- run it directly east -- northeast, connect to our pathway, which goes out to Ten
Mile anyway.
Hoaglun: Exactly.
Elg: I think we are probably okay with that.
Hoaglun: And that just -- but say ACHD will stand by the five foot sidewalk, that's still
there, but the pathway itself would be tied in and tied into that and it's a little bit of
savings for everybody and we got anice -- a nice feature where people can bike and
walk and those sort of things. So, that's an option I was looking at as well, but -- but,
yeah, detached and attached, those are -- those are two different things there and there
is some property that has to be added to that, if that's the requirement, so --
De Weerd: Well, Mr. Hoaglun, I guess, you know, it shows a ten foot wide detached
sidewalk. That's going to be a busy road and it's got an elevation on it as well. You
know, I -- to me, it's detached in light of public safety and I'm sure our police department
would probably agree, is that the detached element is -- is much more desirable in light
of the amount of traffic that will be going up and down that road. I would almost wonder
if -- well, yeah, I'm not going to redesign it.
Friedman: Madam Mayor and Council Members, if I might put a little bit more light onto
this.
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De Weerd: But, Pete, too, if you will address -- I don't know why you want to loop
around a drainage pond. The drainage ponds I have see are really ugly and --
Friedman: I agree. Just -- this came to light this afternoon before, because we had the
Ten Mile pathway plan shows the pathway going up Ten Mile and we didn't have the
ability to get the ten foot wide pathway along Ten Mile until we got the news this
afternoon that they were willing to participate. So, yeah, our feeling is if you can do the
ten foot detached sidewalk -- pathway from intersection of Ten Mile and Overland, up to
where it meets the drainage pond and, then, you would have a section there -- because
there is not enough room between the pond and the road to detach it, so we would have
a short section there that would be attached, if you will, then, it would detach again once
it leaves the drainage pond area and as it traverses north up to the -- joining the seven
foot sidewalk from the interchange.
De Weerd: Well, I guess, Pete, why would you put the five foot wide pathway in there
anyway, if you can get them just to go down that and, then, on the south side of the
drainage pond to connect to Ten Mile, it's just a slight jog and, then, you keep people off
of a narrow piece anyway.
Friedman: Madam Mayor, Council, I think the concern was where they would cross
Overland over to join that pathway along the gas line easement, you would have an
uncontrolled crossing there.
De Weerd: Well, I just mean take out the -- the area you say is five foot wide detached
pathway by ACHD, because you don't have enough for ten feet. Remove that
completely and you're continuous with the more -- it would go down Ten Mile, then, it
would go east of the drainage pond and, then, south of it and, then, reconnect to Ten
Mile and go on down. So, then, you wouldn't have any sidewalk between the drainage
pond to the west to Ten Mile. Am I making any sense?
Friedman: ACHD may put the five foot sidewalk in, but our pathway would, yeah, do
that --
De Weerd: Then, it's just a real detached sidewalk.
Friedman: Five feet wide.
De Weerd: No. It's a detached sidewalk on the other side of the drainage ditch.
Friedman: Well, that's true.
Hoaglun: And, Madam Mayor, that's --
De Weerd: Maybe it just makes too much sense.
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Hoaglun: I guess, yeah, the one down the side is the uncontrolled pedestrian access
that Pete pointed out that if we made that a ten foot wide all the way across -- we are
just thinking here. What I was thinking, instead of having ten foot -- yeah. Van has the
one up there. But, yeah, you know, to use the ten foot all the way across just to keep
people off of Ten Mile, yes, you have the five foot along Ten Mile, but -- there. So, if we
go detached ten foot where, Van, you just pointed out from Overland Road in the red to
where the drainage pond is and, then, that's ten foot and the ten foot connects into the
-- the pipeline pathway and, then, make that ten foot -- yeah. And I guess ACHD may
require five foot there. I mean if they do they do, there is nothing we can do about that
and, then, just attach it to your pipeline pathway and make that ten foot and that way at
least there is a little bit of savings of having two pathways, a pipeline, and going around
the basin and, then, attach it back into the ten foot where it shows on the deal, so --
Elg: I think we are still going to end up participating in the five foot pathway here, this
pathway here, and, then, another pathway back -- you know, of course, this pathway
coming back around here. So, we are still constructing a roundabout around that pond
in effect. We are saying if we can eliminate -- I'll get a different color. If we can
eliminate that leg and ACHD's indicated that they believe a -- that's not a very good
color, is it? A ten foot detached -- or attached sidewalk right here, is ample room, and
would provide that connectivity back up here, then, it comes back to a detached up
here.
De Weerd: I guess we have -- we have primary responsibility for public safety and a
attached sidewalk on a busy road is -- is just as insane as the suicide lane in the middle
of a busy road. You know, I guess that's a personal feeling and I don't think the city --
well, I'm assuming. I don't know if the city has told you we want a pathway along the
easement. That's something that you have built in. That's a long linear grass amenity,
that -- are we asking that theirs would be halfway along that --
Wafters: We are not requiring a pathway within the gas easement, no.
De Weerd: Yeah. So, I mean this -- this is more of a priority than the path along the
easement. You can easily remove that.
Zaremba: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: I'm trying to help you to remove pathways and that goes against my grain.
Yes, Mr. Zaremba.
Zaremba: If just wanted to throw in my support for what I understand to be your
suggestion and I would couple that with insisting that there be no sidewalk between the
drainage basin and the road. I don't think we even that want option, even whether it's
five feet or three feet or ten feet. If we agree that the ten foot multi-use pathway is
going to go around the drainage basin to the east, whether it uses the pathway you
have already planned in the easement or not, it makes sense to me to use the pathway
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in the easement, but I would couple that with the condition that there would be no way
to walk along Ten Mile Road between the road and the drainage basin.
Elg: So, you're saying basically like this and eliminate this all together.
Zaremba: Yes.
De Weerd: Yeah. And I would almost do it on the other side of that island if you do get
the right-in and right-out. You -- you're saving them from crossing that and only at one
point, so --
Elg: So, come back -- come back behind the island here.
De Weerd: Yeah.
Elg: Okay. We can work on that.
De Weerd: You can't see on that. It was worth a try. Thank you, Jaycee.
Rountree: Madam Mayor, I just have to comment that I suspect that for maintenance
and whatnot, that ACHD is going to want the hard surface between that drainage basin
and the back of curb, since that's going to be urban section and whether it's the flat top
of a vertical curb or a ten foot wide sidewalk down that, we folks, by our very nature, will
go from point A to point B via the shortest route. So, people will be walking along Ten
Mile, I can guarantee it. You can see it out in our landscaping in front of the building
and any building where there is an opportunity to take two steps across the grass, as
opposed to use the sidewalk. So, you know, I don't disagree with what you're saying,
but I'm not sure how you keep people from walking down Ten Mile.
De Weerd: And there will be -- you just don't want to invite it and, you know, people will
walk through bark or over shrubs, but we can minimize the numbers at least. I don't
know -- what are your thoughts on that, the trying to minimize the tasks or the pavement
certainly, but -- our city has really tried to maintain the detached approach, in particular
near these extremely busy roadways.
Elg: Uh-huh. We come with a potential pathway -- to come with a potential pathway up
here and up here, then, it's got to be ten foot all the way back here. So, we would be
constructing -- and, then, if ACHD still requires us to go in here, we have still got to loop
around that --
De Weerd: Well, I would agree with Councilman Zaremba to make a statement of our
preference that there be no invitation to stay close to the road there.
Elg: Are you okay with that? Yeah. I think Justin Blackstock, if you don't mind, one of
the owners, would like to --
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De Weerd: Respond.
Elg: -- respond.
De Weerd: If you will, please, state your name and address for the record.
Blackstock: Justin Blackstock, 2238 West Piazza, Meridian.
De Weerd: Thank you.
Blackstock: Okay. So, the deal with the pathway -- we are not opposed either way.
mean whether we do a ten foot around the pond -- the only one that came up this
morning was ACHD is going to build -- if we don't do a ten foot attached, they are going
to build a five foot detached. So, the conversation, really, was -- is it a waste to go
around the storm drain with a ten foot when you're going to have a five foot anyway. I
mean if people are walking down that road, are they really going to walk around the
storm drain pond and back out or are they going to take the five foot sidewalk that's
going to be there anyway. I don't know that any of us can say at this point whether they
can or can't build that five foot sidewalk. They have already designed it and have a plan
for it and I don't know -- you know, maybe you guys can help me with that, but that was
the conversation with Diane this morning. I mean we are fine with whatever. I mean we
are not trying to get out of the pathway. We anticipate a seven foot pathway on that
Williams pipeline. You know, we want to encourage foot traffic in the development, so
we are not -- we are not opposed to any of the pathways, it just might not make a lot of
sense to have a five foot detached sidewalk, you know, probably a ways from the ten
foot pathway around the storm drain pond. So, I think that's really the only question.
De Weerd: I think we are agreeing with you and would like to discourage ACRD from
that requirement.
Elg: Okay.
De Weerd: And we can put it in our findings and certainly be willing to write it in a letter
and --
Friedman: I think that would be most appropriate, Madam Mayor, Council, I think if
that's your inclination, your inclination is to approve this, then, we can certainly change
that recommendation where we just delete the whole sentence about participating with
ACHD and just leave the condition that it go around the back of the pond there and,
then, for your separate action draft a letter to ACHD expressing the Mayor's and the
Council's concern about that sidewalk along Ten Mile Road.
Hoaglun: But as I understand, Madam Mayor, if they put in the five foot, it will be
detached, which meets the safety requirements, but we were saying, well, we want a
ten foot one, there is not enough room, if they were going to make it attached, it, then,
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becomes a safety issue. So, we are kind of -- well, what are we going to do with that,
so --
De Weerd: Write a letter.
Zaremba: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Mr. Zaremba.
Zaremba: Not that we need to engineer this, but one possible solution to what
Councilman Rountree suggested is that -- that they will want hard surface access to this
pond, there are a number of places where they have just small pads, that it wouldn't
have to be -- that their access wouldn't have to be a sidewalk that goes the whole length
of the pond, it could beaten foot by ten foot pad that they could get a truck in. I mean
they have done that other places. Just a thought.
De Weerd: Yeah. And I don't know if they will want an access to it off of a busy road.
They will probably go more interior, if it were me. Unless they just like danger.
Hoaglun: Through that right-in, right-out long Ten Mile, I'm sure.
De Weerd: Yes. The accelerating lane. I think we have beat that one to death.
Elg: Thank you for your --
De Weerd: Council, did you have any other questions, other than the sidewalk at this
point?
Hoaglun: Madam Mayor, Idid -- one quick question for Van. We talked briefly about --
you talked briefly about the drive-thrus and you understand the need for flexibility. You
thought -- one of your suggestions was maybe we could determine that, well, it's only
going to be a limited amount. Did you have a number in mind what you might be
flexible enough to allow you to do what you need to do without --
Elg: Going overboard.
De Weerd: As far as the -- you said we would grant one and anything over and above
that would be a conditional use permit or --did you have anything like that?
Elg: No. We were thinking that -- we have requested three, we would like that, but if we
-- if we can get two, that's great. But this option, if we can have one and come back
with conditional use on the others, we can live with that. We just -- we just need the
flexibility to have -- or present some drive-thrus that might be essential to somebody
who wants to develop on this corner.
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De Weerd: Pete, with drive-thrus do you have design review? We have seen horrible
examples all over this city of drive-thrus and how not to do it.
Friedman: I agree. We are getting there. I think we have had some examples of some
better ones recently and we are always learning. Hopefully, our design guidelines are
helping us out on that. I think one of the bigger issues, in addition to this, the esthetics I
think that you're talking about is the place hunt, because oftentimes they are trying to
put them between the road and the building I think we can mitigate some of that through
landscaping and so forth, but I think to address what -- if I hear your concern is directing
some of the architectural style and detail and so forth --
De Weerd: I think it's Jimmy Johns that --
Friedman: That was a bad design. I think there are some others that are working fairly
well, but they are a little bit closer with that. I think in order to build upon what I'm
hearing Council say, all drive-thrus typically will require conditional use permit
regardless. Council won't see those, those will go to Planning and Zoning Commission
only. So, if you're -- again, if your pleasure is to either set a base and, then, allow them
to go forward conditionally, you may never see those again. That would be P&Z,
typically, on a Conditional Use Permit. And the basis of our recommendation on that
was going back looking at the Ten Mile plan, looking at the intent of the mixed
employment area, so that, you know, we saw accessory restaurants, retail and so forth,
and office campus type environment, rather than a multitude of drive-thrus that would be
more focused towards that drive by public, rather than serving the customers and the
workers within the mixed employment area.
De Weerd: Well -- and, Pete, that make sense north of the state where most of that
plan contemplated, because you have the larger tracks. This is more southeast to a
certain degree in its use, so I guess --
Bird: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Mr. Bird.
Bird: Van. Would you be agreeable on drive-thrus -- I think it's very important that they
go through CUP to everyone of them. I wouldn't want to award you a single one without
going through a CUP, because the fact is the layout to me is a very -- most important
thing in a drive-thru, how -- the location and how you present it and how it goes. So,
would you be in -- willing to live with that?
Elg: Certainly. And we expressed that to Planning and Zoning Commission as well. I
think one important point to remember, Madam Mayor, Councilman Rountree, is that --
sorry. Councilman Bird. Sorry. Is that I think a lot of these drive-thrus that you have
had were approved before -- were probably done, for the most part, before your design
review ordinance got kicked in as well. So, there is going to be some of those -- there is
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May 26, 2010
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going to be another level that is going to control how these drive-thrus look and how
these buildings look, for that matter.
De Weerd: I guess Carl's Jr. is one of those, but Jimmy Johns, I -- that's death. Death
by sandwich.
Hoaglun: I thought you were referring to the Papa Murphys on Fairview by Idaho
Athletic Club.
De Weerd: We have a lot of good examples. Okay. Anything further from Council? It
is a public hearing. Is there anyone who would like to provide testimony? Okay. If
there is none, do you have any further comment?
Elg: Just thank you for hearing us tonight. Appreciate it.
De Weerd: Thank you. Okay. Council, do you have any additional information needed
from staff or would you like to discuss it before closing the public hearing? What is your
pleasure?
Rountree: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Yes.
Rountree: Before we close the public hearing, we may need to have Van come back
up, but it seems like the outstanding issue is who has got the ball with Ten Mile access,
whether it's us or ACHD, and it appears that ACHD is waiting for us to make a move. I
would suggest that if we are inclined to look at a right-in, right-out, that we not create the
same situation with right-in, right-outs here that we have on Eagle Road that we all saw
evidence of in the random aerial photo that we saw not long ago from ITD with the
proposed project they had on Eagle Road with the installation of the median barrier. I
would propose if, in fact, we do entertain that, that there would have to be a decel lane
on Ten Mile for aright-hand turn into the right-in only, so those folks exiting on the right
turn exit have an opportunity to get in the travel lane, because it's awfully difficult with
somebody coming down Ten Mile or any road where there is two lanes and one of them
is turning in and somebody is not signaling, so you don't know whether you can merge
into traffic or not. So, it would be nice to see an acceleration lane as well, but I don't
know that that's going to be accommodated with the need for a drainage basin, let alone
a deceleration lane. And I'd also like to see raised medians on Ten Mile at that point be
of sufficient length to discourage the left-hand out and the -- which will happen if it's not
prohibited by something other than a sign and I guess that's my comments that I would
want to see as a minimum if that were to be allowed.
De Weerd: This is still open. Would you like to have any comment from the applicant?
Rountree: I guess if Van wants to comment on -- on those remarks, I --
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Elg: I will be brief. My understanding when we talked with Gary in the initial design we
didn't have a deceleration lane there, because of the -- it was designed with a short
offset here and the feeling was is that that traffic is not going to have a good head of
steam coming up around that -- on that lane there and require the deceleration lane to
get out. And I think there is -- there is several places where that functions like that.
guess you can think of -- although we don't like to make references to Eagle Road, but,
you know, there is some ham bones like that that function fairly well without a
deceleration lane.
Rountree: Of course, my response to that, that works real well from a red light, but
when it's a green light and you're going 40 miles an hour, it doesn't work very well
coming through the signal. People are concentrating on getting through the signal, not
about somebody slowing down or turning that short of distance from that intersection
and it's going to be in the intersection, you're going to have people making aright-hand
turn from a stop off of Overland onto that, so you're doing to have a lot of potential
conflicts right there and it's -- well, it's worrisome to me and I'm not out there on patrol
and Ithink -- I see our police lieutenant's head shaking, that that's where the accidents
happen.
Elg: Well, given that concern and knowing that we probably can't get the acceleration
lane there as you mentioned, I think we would be willing to -- if Council could say we
could consider aright-in, right-out here that with a decel lane and we present that --
now, Iguess Ishould point out -- and I'm sure you're all aware of this, but the letter that
you received from ACHD is not afinal -- not a formal letter, it just says if we had a
development in today this is something that we would probably -- how we would
probably respond. That's the way they do that until you actually have an official
application in. But given that Council -- this allows Council to present this -- you know,
this option that says we will consider right-in, right-out with a decel lane and, then, it
gives ACHD an opportunity to approve it. Maybe they won't -- maybe they still won't,
but at least we take out one variable so that we can move forward and not get stuck.
And we are more than willing to look at that decel land as well.
Rountree: How about the raised median?
Elg: That one is already designed --Ithink the median is already past that, if I
remember right, so --
Rountree: I couldn't tell from the teeny tiny print whether that was a striped median or
that's actually a raised median, so --
Elg: It think there was a raised median. It's beyond that, if I recall, but --
Bird: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Mr. Bird.
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May 26, 2010
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Bird: Van, while we are talking about that, if we -- if it was -- if we did give you aright-in
also, how about a merging lane?
Elg: A merging leading north -- north for north bound?
Bird: If you're going right out --
Elg: Yeah. I don't think we have the room, because that's going to be ACHD's pond
right there.
Bird: Right of way.
Elg: Yeah. That would be their --
Bird: Yeah, you wouldn't have --
Elg: I don't think we have the room, because that's going to be ACHD's pond right
there.
Bird: Right of way.
Elg: Yeah. That would be their -- we actually have to dedicate that to them.
Bird: Yeah. You wouldn't have --
Elg: I don't think we will have room.
Hoaglun: Well, if there is no sidewalk there, Imean --
Bird: Eliminate the sidewalk.
Hoaglun: That's right.
Rountree: Have a motorcycle acceleration lane.
De Weerd: Anything further, Council?
Rountree: That was my only comment.
Bird: I have none.
Elg: Thanks again.
Bird: Thank you, Van.
Zaremba: Madam Mayor?
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May 26, 2010
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De Weerd: Yes.
Zaremba: Just to throw my two cents in. I would be happy to have ACHD consider the
right-in, right-out, as Councilman Rountree has described it, but I would add one other
thing that we would -- we are phrasing it that we would consider it, but it would be up to
their engineers if it meets all the safety standards.
Rountree: Definitely.
Zaremba: Distance from the intersection and there is a terrain change in there
someplace that visibility is an issue. Rather than say we would recommend the right-in,
right-out, I would phrase it that we would consider it if it meets engineering safety
standards.
Hoaglun: And just a comment further. I agree with that approach to the right-in, right-
out and meeting the safety standards and see if that's something that can be developed
and give them an opportunity. Drive-thrus I think Councilman Bird had a good
recommendation, do it through the conditional use process and see if we can
accommodate some of those that way by taking a look at it and going through design
review and those processes and make that happen and -- and have a ten foot wide
detached pathway from Overland Road coming down and, then, scooting around back
behind that basin along the pipeline path may be the best option we have for that and
what ACHD does going in a straight line is what ACHD will do with a straight line. If we
want to recommend certain actions, I'm open to that, but we can only control what we
can control and I think that going around and making that ten foot and tying into the
pipeline pathway would be a good approach to that, so --
De Weerd: Okay. Well, Council, if you would so desire, we could close the public
hearing on this and you can address each of these three items first with the CPA.
Bird: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Mr. Bird.
Bird: Do you want to close? I move we close Items 9-C, D and E.
Rountree: Second.
Hoaglun: Second.
De Weerd: I have a motion and a second to close the public hearings on 9-C, D and E.
All those in favor say aye. All ayes. Motion carries.
MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES.
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De Weerd: And as our city attorney noted, we need to address Item E first.
Hoaglun: Madam Mayor, just to make an inquiry, I think that would -- that approval --
that does not contain any of the issues or items that we have been discussing, does it?
So, Madam Mayor, I would move approval of CPA 09-010.
Rountree: Second.
De Weerd: I have a motion and a second to approve Item 9-E. Any discussion?
Madam Clerk, will you call roll.
Roll-Call: Bird, yea; Rountree, yea; Zaremba, yea; Hoaglun, yea.
De Weerd: All ayes.
MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES.
De Weerd: Okay. Items 9-C and D.
Hoaglun: I guess, Madam Mayor, I want to inquire -- or, Council, the annexation and
rezone for these issues, which -- which one would they be part of?
Friedman: Madam Mayor, Council Members, that would be Item D, the rezone.
Hoaglun: Thank you, Pete. Appreciate it.
Rountree: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Yes, Mr. Rountree.
Rountree: For clarification on the comments I heard for the item C, the annexation, it
was understood that annexation was coming forward without a development agreement
and it should be stated that upon annexation there is understanding and agreement with
the applicant that there will be DAs developed in the future as it comes forward.
Zaremba: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Mr. Zaremba.
Zaremba: I have a question for Mr. Nary. That the annexation is our opportunity to ask
for a development agreement. Do we need a development agreement that states that
there will be a future development agreement?
Nary: What I thought I heard was, basically, the annexation right now is really just --
this district, so any future development that's going to require a rezone, which, then, is
also an opportunity to do a develop agreement. Is that --okay.
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Page 35 of 79
Friedman: Madam Mayor, Councilman Zaremba, I can address that. The reason we
did not recommend the development agreement for this annexation is because it's a
very long narrow skinny piece. It's about 130 feet wide at its widest point, by the time
you add pathways and some other things it's just not realistic to expect the annexation
and the zoning tonight. The larger piece that you approved for the change to the ME
Comp Plan designation still requires a future rezone and it's our anticipation that when
they come forward with that rezone that we would, then, have a master plan that
includes the bulk of that ME area, plus this small sliver, so --
Zaremba: Thank you.
Hoaglun: So, with that explanation, then, Madam Mayor, I would make a motion that we
approve Item 9-C, AZ 09-010.
Zaremba: Second.
De Weerd: I have a motion and a second to approve Item 9-C. Any discussion?
Rountree: None.
De Weerd: Madam Clerk.
Roll-Call: Bird, yea; Rountree, yea; Zaremba, yea; Hoaglun, yea.
De Weerd: All ayes. Thank you.
MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES.
De Weerd: Go to Item 9-B.
Hoaglun: Well, I can give this a try, Madam Mayor. I move that we approve Item 9-D,
RZ 09-006, with the following: That we would recommend approval of a right-in, right-
out to ACHD on Ten Mile with safety considerations, including a deacceleration lane,
medians to prevent left-hand turn exits and any other safety items that ACHD would see
fit. That we also consider drive-thrus through the conditional use process when that
time comes, when it moves forward, and that a ten foot wide detached pathway is
added from Overland Road down to the drainage basin, coming back behind the
drainage basin and continuing along the pathway easement where ever is best suited
for a ten foot pathway back to Ten Mile Road and that we recommend to ACHD that any
way to discourage pedestrian or bicycle traffic on -- along the -- between Ten Mile Road
and the basins be recommended. Did I get that one right; Madam Mayor`? And I think
that covers it.
Rountree: I will second that.
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May 26, 2010
Page 36 of 79
De Weerd: Do you have a comment?
Rountree: I just was going to ask the maker of the motion if he would also stipulate that
our recommendation on Ten Mile be subject to ACHD's engineering and traffic engineer
approval.
Hoaglun: Yes. Madam Mayor, Councilman Rountree, yes, that definitely was part of
what I intended to make in my motion, so --
Rountree: Thank you.
Hoaglun: Definitely want to include that.
Zaremba: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Mr. Zaremba.
Zaremba: Again, to the maker of the motion, I may not have heard it correctly, but
believe I heard you say that we would discourage anything that would have pedestrians
between the drainage basin and Ten Mile. Do we specifically want to request that there
be no sidewalk there?
Hoaglun: Madam Mayor, Councilman Rountree -- or Councilman Zaremba, my -- it
would be a recommendation to ACHD that they discourage that and not have that
pathway there, but --
Zaremba: By not having a sidewalk.
Hoaglun: By not having a sidewalk. We could amend that to -- to go that way. I'm
good with that.
De Weerd: Second agrees?
Rountree: Second agrees.
De Weerd: Okay. Thank you. Any further comments? Madam Clerk, roll call, please.
Roll-Call: Bird, yea; Rountree, yea; Zaremba, yea; Hoaglun, yea.
De Weerd: All ayes. Motion carries.
MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES.
F. Public Hearing: MDA 10-005 Five Twelve Subdivision by
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints Located West Side
of Stoddard, Midway Between Overland Road and Victory
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May 26, 2010
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Road: Request to Remove the Five Twelve Subdivision From
the Recorded Development Agreement (Inst. #1061511232)
G. Public Hearing: TE 10-015 Bridgetower Crossing Subdivision
No. 14 by Primeland Investment Group, LLC Located North of
Ustick Road, East of Towerbridge Way, Approximately 1/4 mile
West of Linder Road: Request for Approval of an 18-Month
Time Extension to Obtain the City Engineer's Signature on the
Final Plat
De Weerd: Thank you. Items 9-F and G have been requested to continue and I would
need amotion -- first, let me open the public hearings on MDA 10-005 and TE 10-015.
And, then, I will ask for a motion to continue.
Bird: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Yes, Mr. Bird.
Bird: I move that we continue MDA 10-005 and TE 10-015 until June 1st, 2010.
Rountree: Second.
De Weerd: I have a motion and a second to continue Items 9-F and G to June 1st,
2010. All those in favor say aye. All ayes. Motion carries.
MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES.
H. MFP 10-003 Bridgetower Crossing Subdivision No. 14 by
Primeland Investment Group, LLC Located North of Ustick
Road, East of N. Towerbridge Way, Approximately 1/4 Mile
West of Linder Road: Request for Approval to Modify the
Approved Final Plat to Allow Multiple Development Phases (3)
De Weerd: Item 9-H is MFP 10-003. I will ask for staff comment.
Parsons: Madam Mayor, Members of the Council, before I get started I just want to let
Council know that we had several items on the agenda tonight for the Bridgetower
Crossing development and so three of them are related and some of them are
unrelated, so I just wanted to put that out to you as we move forward tonight. The first
item that we are going to be discussing is a public meeting item and it is a final plat
modification. You can see on the exhibits in front of you where the site is located. It's
number 14 of Bridgetower Crossing. It's on the east side of North Tower Bridge Road
and approximately a quarter of a mile east of Linder Road. The site is approximately
23.9 acres. And so with the modification request the applicant is proposing two of those
tonight. The first is to incorporate a new common lot, which is adjacent to Lot 1 and Lot
19 and I have highlighted it here on this exhibit for you. The reason for the addition on
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May 26, 2010
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the common lot is to accommodate their new drainage plan for the subdivision per
ACHD's new requirements. The addition of this common lot, it does increase the open
space and all the lots still conform to the R-4 standards, so staff is supportive of the
change, because it hasn't really diminished from the final approval -- the final plat
approval that's already been reviewed by you. And the second request includes
developing the plat in several stages. With stage one, if you look in the southeast
corner, you will see three lots called out in Bridgetower 14 and the applicant would like
to get that moving forward as quickly as possible. The infrastructure for those lots that
already exists in the adjacent cul-de-sac to the west of this property, so we feel if we get
this plat -- this stage of the plat recorded quickly, so that they can take advantage of the
current housing market, with additional stages they propose on doing number 17, which
would include 32 lots and, then, Bridgetower 18 would come in with 25 lots and the
reason for the request is the applicant would like to move forward -- try to be flexible in
moving forward with creating lots and so staff with the public -- Planning and Public
Works have both come up with a creative solution, because this plat was already
approved for 60 lots and with this application staff is recommending that they submit
additional final plat, they will only have to submit three sets -- three individual sets that
they might have for each stage and so staff has worked with the applicant to try to build
that flexibility so that they could move forward with recordation of the plat. Again,
because we did analyze this plat as a one lot final plate -- excuse me -- not a lot one
final plat, but aone-third final plat, staff is recommending that the applicant get --
receive the city engineer's signature on all three sets prior to the submission of their
final plat. With that I'd be happy to answer any questions you may have.
De Weerd: Council, any questions?
Rountree: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Mr. Rountree.
Rountree: Bill, would you go back to the aerial. Neither on the vicinity map or the aerial
map do I see a road. Is there a road that would go to that three lot subdivision?
Parsons: Madam Mayor, Councilman Rountree, there is already a road constructed. If
you look -- Tiano Drive runs southeast and, then, goes up to a cul-de-sac here and
that's -- those three lots will take access from that cul-de-sac to the west. So, right
where my arrow is -- I apologize it's not blown up larger for you to see that, but there is
a cul-de-sac in the roadway there and those -- that infrastructure is in place to serve
those three lots already.
Hoaglun: And, Mr. Rountree, since this is my neck of the woods, I was surprised to see
it just because I thought that was part of the other plat and those three -- they are just
like three lots that are waiting to be built on and part of that street. So, yeah, it definitely
has access.
Rountree: Thank you.
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May 26, 2010
Page 39 of 79
De Weerd: Okay. Council, anything further? If there is no further information needed --
does the representative want to make any comment on this? It seems so straight
forward I almost forgot.
Christensen: Well, I'd definitely like to comment, even though I don't have much to say.
My name is Chuck Christensen, Madam Mayor, Members of the Council. My address is
1904 West Overland in Boise. I'm here representing the property owner. We have
reviewed the staff report and are happy to comply with all the conditions outlined
therein.
De Weerd: Thank you.
Christensen: Council, any questions for the applicant?
Bird: I have none.
De Weerd: Thank you.
Rountree: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Mr. Rountree.
Rountree: Seeing no more testimony, I move that we close the public hearing on --
well, Iguess it's not a public hearing, is it.
De Weerd: No.
Rountree: Then, I move that we approve Item 9-H, MFP 10-003, .subject to staff
comments and staff report.
Bird: Second.
De Weerd: I have a motion and a second to approve Item 9-H. If there is no
discussion, Madam Clerk.
Roll-Call: Bird, yea; Rountree, yea; Zaremba, yea; Hoaglun, yea.
De Weerd: All ayes. Motion carried.
MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES.
I. Continued from April 27, 2010: FP 10-003 Bridgetower
Crossing Subdivision No. 17 by Primeland Investment, LLC
Located 1/4 Mile West of N. Linder Road and 1/4 North of W.
Ustick Road: Request for Final Plat Approval for 3 Residential
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Building Lots on Approximately 1 Acre in an R-4 Zoning
District Group
De Weerd: Item I, the applicant requests to withdraw the application on this. Council
will need to make a motion to accept that request.
Bird: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Mr. Bird.
Bird: I move that we accept the request of withdrawal of FP 10-003 on Bridgetower
Crossing by Primeland Investment.
Rountree: Second.
De Weerd: Okay. I have a motion and a second to approve the application withdrawal.
If there is no comment, Madam Clerk.
Roll-Call: Bird, yea; Rountree, yea; Zaremba, yea; Hoaglun, yea.
De Weerd: All ayes.
MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES.
J. Public Hearing: VAC 10-002 Bridgetower Crossing Subdivision
Nos. 11 & 12 by Primeland Investment Group, LLP Located
Southwest Corner of W. McMillan Road & N. Linder Road:
Request to Vacate the Public Utility, Irrigation and Drainage
Easements on the Interior Lot Lines of Lots 43-45, Block 32
and Lots 15-17, Block 36; AND Vacate a Portion of the Public
Domestic Water and Sewer Easements on Lots 15-17, Block 36
Platted with Bridgetower Crossing Subdivision Nos. 11 & 12
De Weerd: Item 9-J is a public hearing on VAC 10-002. I will open this public hearing
with staff comments.
Parsons: Thank you, Madam Mayor, Members of the Council. The subject property is
on the southeast corner of Linder Road and McMillan Road.. The applicant is requesting
to vacate some easements that were patted with Bridgetower Crossing Subdivision No.
11 and 12 and some history on this site. Several months ago Council approved
Bridgetower Crossing No. 15 for the site, which included seven commercial lots. So,
with the approval of that final plat the applicant was conditioned to vacate some of those
easements, so they could proceed with development with No. 15. Here is the
easements that are proposed to be vacated. The majority of it is the southern portion.
If you recall, they came back and did a DA mod and a portion of the subdivision is now
one larger lot and so there is some additional water and sewer easements that are not
Meridian City Council
May 26, 2010
Page 41 of 79
necessary for that lot to develop, so they are asking to vacate that. In addition, there
are some interior lot lines -- or interior easements that are along the interior lot lines of
those lots as well that the applicant is asking to be removed. They have gotten the
appropriate relinquishment letters and, as I said, there are no infrastructure or utilities
are within those easements and so to staffs knowledge there are no outstanding issues
before you this evening and no written testimony. I'd be happy to answer any questions
you may have.
De Weerd: Okay. Thank you. Council, any questions?
Zaremba: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Mr. Zaremba.
Zaremba: Just a clarification, because what we have printed in front of you is slightly
different than the way you said it and that is that it says that the city sewer and water
mains facilities within these easements are to be removed. I believe your verbal
statement was that there are no facilities in there. Is that correct?
Parsons: Madam Mayor, Councilman Zaremba, for correction, the five foot easement
on the interior lot lines -- so, the dashed lines are in this section of it, does not contain
any utility easements. The portion of the city sewer and water easements are those --
that square that you see on the southern half of this exhibit in front of you, those are the
city services that are proposed to be vacated That will -- there will be --
Zaremba: What I'm not understanding is there physically anything there, a pipe or
something that needs to be removed?
Parsons: Correct. There is -- in the city sewer -- in the city's easements, the applicant
will have to remove those stubs back to the roadway and cap them off for the center
portion, so --
Zaremba: So, can we abandon the easement before that's done?
Parsons: I'm sorry?
Zaremba: Shouldn't we remove them first and, then, abandon them? Either way.
Okay.
Parsons: Madam Mayor, Members of the Council, the applicant is aware via Public
Works that they have to remove -- once the easement is vacated they have to physically
go in and remove those services there back to the street.
De Weerd: Okay.
Zaremba: Thank you.
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May 26, 2010
Page 42 of 79
De Weerd: No further questions for staff? Would the applicant like to make comment?
Again, if you would, please, state your name and address for the record.
Christensen: I would be happy to, Madam Mayor. I'm Chuck Christensen and my
address is still 1904 West Overland Road.
De Weerd: Thank you. I'm glad you haven't moved.
Christensen: Councilman Zaremba, just to clarify, there are facilities -- City of Meridian
facilities in the little square boxes, so those are sewer and water facilities. There are no
facilities in the other public utility easement areas. The intent of the original easements
was in case the future developer or future owner of those lots wanted to extend either
the sewer or the water stub outs he could -- they could extend them and they would all
rely -- they would be city mains and would already lie within an easement and they
could be extended as city mains. In this case the future property owner won't need a
city main for their sewer, since it's a single user. We maintained one water easement in
case we need to extend a water main for fire protection services. So, if that answers
your question.
Zaremba: Thank you.
De Weerd: Okay. Anything further? Thank you. Okay. This is a public hearing. Is
there anyone else who would like to provide testimony on this item? Seeing none,
Council, if there is no further information required I would entertain a motion to close.
Rountree: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Mr. Rountree.
Rountree: I move to close the public hearing on Item 9-J.
Bird: Second.
De Weerd: I have a motion and a second to close the public hearing on item 9-J. All
those in favor say aye. Motion carried.
MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES.
Rountree: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Mr. Rountree.
Rountree: I move that we approve the vacation request VAC 10-002 for Bridgetower
Crossing Subdivisions No. 11 and 12.
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May 26, 2010
Page 43 of 79
Bird: Second.
De Weerd: I have a motion and a second to approve Item 9-J. Any discussion,
Council? Seeing none, Madam Clerk.
Roll-Call: Bird, yea; Rountree, yea; Zaremba, yea; Hoaglun, yea.
De Weerd: All ayes. Motion carried.
MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES.
K. Public Hearing: Land Trade -Proposed Exchange of Real
Property Located at 213 and 215 E. Franklin Road. Proposed
Transaction Would Exchange Deeds as Part of a Boundary
Line Adjustment in Order to Include the Pool Building,
Sidewalk, and Snow-Cone Shack on the Parcel Owned by
Western Ada Recreation District, Parcel No. 110021878.
De Weerd: Item 9-K is a public hearing on a land trade. I will --
Rountree: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Yes.
Rountree: Before you open the hearings I need to recuse myself.
De Weerd: Okay. See you later. We do have still a quorum. I will open this public
hearing and who is doing it? Mr. Nary.
Nary: Thank you, Madam Mayor, Members of the Council. We have a very quick
overhead to show you. This item I think you have heard this previously. This is,
basically, a cleanup of some property between Storey Park and Western Ada
Recreation District's portion that's adjacent to Storey Park where the swimming pool is.
There is an aerial that I think is the second slide, maybe, Bill. There we go. Mr. Smith
is here from the Western Ada Recreation District to kind of explain their part, but,
basically, this is the public hearing showing the different boundaries adjustments that
we are doing in this and probably Mr. Smith is probably better than me to explain the
specifics of what the -- basically, the little differences in these property lines and what's
being traded between the city and WARD to kind of clean up and make it a clearer
defined parcels in this particular area. Mr. Smith, if you would be able to at least point
out to the Council exactly where the -- I guess the clean ups are, these particular yellow
lines that are on this aerial I think.
Smith: Thank you, Mr. Nary. Madam Mayor and Council Members, my name is Gary
Smith, I reside at 3917 Kootenai Street in Boise. I'm secretary treasurer for Western
Ada Recreation District and I have been working with the City of Meridian Parks
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May 26, 2010
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Department and Legal Department to see that this transfer goes through, so that the
property lines accurately depict the improvements that have been made many many
years ago by Western Ada Recreation District on the community swimming pool. The
present property line is depicted in the yellow line, that's the triangular shape and what
the proposal is is to intercept the existing property line on the east side and proceed
northwesterly around or parallel to the existing improvements out there, jog up around
the little area that we have for a snow cone shack and, then, back -- follow the south
edge of the access road to Storey Park, back to the approximate west existing corner of
the Western Ada property. The exchange is -- that Western Ada Recreation District
would be deeding to the City of Meridian is a small triangular area at the northeast
corner of that triangle. I'll circle it. And the area that the city would be deeding to
Western Ada Recreation District is that area just north of the east-west existing yellow
property line. Presently the east-west property line goes through the swimming pool
building that's existing out there and so this would include, then, all the improvements
that had been made to the swimming pool property and structures. And, like I say, this
-- this building is -- swimming pool was built I think in 1972 and so this situation has
existed since that time.
Nary: Madam Mayor, Members of the Council, additionally in your packets you will see
along with this land exchange there is cross-access -- cross-parking easement from the
city to Western Ada. There is a deed from the city to WARD, there is a deed from
WARD to the city for the property exchanges. So, if all of it's in order for you, it is on
your Item 11-A on your agenda if -- if it's all -- you find acceptable. So, I'd stand for any
questions.
De Weerd: Mr. Nary, I guess we have other clean up issues in this same park and what
-- what has been the discussion is that that's equal trade and by doing this it's another
governmental agency, so maybe that addresses any concern about precedence set, but
do you have any concern with that?
Nary: Madam Mayor, Members of the Council, Mr. Baird from my office is the one that's
worked with the -- with WARD on this particular issue and I think that you're correct,
because we have another governmental entity we really are cleaning up, essentially,
existing encroachments on both sides and that's really it, versus dealing with a nonprofit
entity or someone else in this park, because, you're right, we do have other issues, but
those were based on public land acquisition and those other issues that Mayor and
Council are aware of.
De Weerd: Okay. Thank you.
Hoaglun: Madam Mayor, one quick question. I recall when we discussed this a year,
year and a half ago, was there some utility or something up towards that farther end that
was of concern or -- I don't know if there was a well head or a well something. Maybe
I'm thinking of something entirely different, but Ijust -- in the back of my mind there was
something that everything's okay with that, there is no issue out there. May be it was a
pump -- an irrigation pump. No, that was down there, the -- not the one down by the
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May 26, 2010
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speedway, but -- I just remember that thin strip, there was something in there that we
had discussed.
Smith: Madam Mayor, Councilman Hoaglun, Council, originally my board wanted to
extend this property transfer out to the west to Main Street and, then, come back -- and
it was just a small sliver, yeah, you're absolutely right. Within that sliver of ground there
is a well -- monitoring well -- ground water monitoring well that's existing. There was a
fire hydrant, there were several trees, there was some informational signs, there was
talk about moving the initial point sign in Storey Park out to that area. So, that
discussion kind of went away and moved that property line adjustment back to where it
is -- where I have shown it on the cross-hatched area. But, you're right, that was
discussed atone point.
Hoaglun: Okay. Great. Thanks for that clarification, Gary.
De Weerd: Okay. Anything further? Okay. Thank you.
Smith: Thank you. I want to thank the City of Meridian and -- for your cooperation in
getting this thing resolved and Steve Siddoway and his staff at the Parks Department
and Ted Baird in the Legal Department, have been very helpful. Thank you very much.
De Weerd: Thank you. Well, it's taken how many years to clean it up? We are glad to
see it done.
Bird: Twenty-eight.
De Weerd: This is a public hearing. Is there anyone who would like to provide
testimony on this item? Okay. Council, if you have no further questions, I would
entertain a motion to close.
Zaremba: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Mr. Zaremba.
Zaremba: I move we close the public hearing on the land trade, Item K.
Hoaglun: Second.
De Weerd: Okay. I have a motion and a second to close the public hearing on Item 9-
K. All those in favor say aye. All ayes. Motion carried.
MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES.
De Weerd: Mr. Zaremba.
Zaremba: Do we want to act on 11-A now or just wait it until comes up --
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May 26, 2010
Page 46 of 79
De Weerd: Pardon?
Nary: Madam Mayor, Members of the Council, you can take up 11-A now if you wish or
you can just wait until you get to that section of your agenda.
Zaremba: It's the ordinance that enables this?
Nary: Yes.
De Weerd: Okay.
Nary: It's your function. You can do it now or you can do it in about 15, 20 minutes
when we get to that.
De Weerd: While Mr. --
Zaremba: To prevent Mr. Rountree from coming and going and coming and going,
might offer a motion now.
A. Ordinance No. 10-1446: Approving Property Exchange to
Complete Property Boundary Adjustment with the Western
Ada Recreation District at Storey Park
De Weerd: Okay. I would entertain it. I would ask the city clerk to, please, read Item
11-A, ordinance 10-1446 by title only.
Holman: City of Meridian ordinance number 10-1446, an ordinance authorizing the
exchange of certain city owned real property located at 213 and 215 East Franklin Road
in the City of Meridian Storey Park lying in the northwest one quarter, Section 18,
Township 3 north, range 1 east, Boise Meridian, Ada County, Idaho, the transaction
exchanges deeds as part of a property boundary line adjustment of the site at the
Meridian community swimming pool, owned by Western Ada Recreation District and
Storey Park, owned by the City of Meridian, authorizing the Mayor and city clerk to
execute and attest on behalf of the City of Meridian the deed and other documents
necessary to complete the transaction, providing for a waiver of the reading rules and
providing an effective date.
De Weerd: Thank you. You have heard this ordinance read by title only. If there is a
member of the public who would like it read in its entirety, we can do so. Seeing none.
Zaremba: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Mr. Zaremba.
Zaremba: I move we approve and adopt ordinance 10-1446.
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May 26, 2010
Page 47 of 79
Hoaglun: Second.
De Weerd: I have a motion and a second to approve the --
Zaremba: I'm sorry. Did we need to say with suspension of rules?
De Weerd: Yes.
Zaremba: When does that happen?
Nary: Yes.
Zaremba: I add to my motion suspension of rules.
Hoaglun: Second agrees.
De Weerd: Thank you. I do have a motion and a second to approve Item 11-A. If there
is no discussion, Madam Clerk, will you, please, call roll.
Roll-Call: Bird, yea; Rountree, yea; Zaremba, yea; Hoaglun, yea.
De Weerd: All ayes. Motion carried.
MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES.
L. MFP 10-002 Madelynn Estates by Jane Suggs Located West
Side of Locust Grove, Midway Between Chinden Boulevard
and McMillan Road: Request to Modify Note 3 and 9 on the
Recorded Final Plat to Designate Lot 1, Block 8 as a Common
Open Space Lot in Lieu of a Buildable Lot
De Weerd: Item 9-L is MFP 10-002. I will ask for staff comments at this time.
Parsons: Thank you, Madam Mayor, Members of the Council. This is another public
meeting request for a final plat modification for Madelynn Estates. The subject site is
Lot 1, Block 8 of Madelynn Estates Subdivision. It's located internally to the site.
Approximately a quarter mile west of Locust Grove. The applicant's request is to,
basically, convert the -- change the plat notes approved with the final -- recorded with
the final plat to incorporate Lot 1, Block 8, as buildable lot -- or as a common lot, so they
can commence with construction of a pool -- community swimming pool. I did want to
point out that staff had issued a CZC on the site for those improvements already, so it
has -- it was contingent upon approval of the final plat modification. The applicant's
here in the audience this evening. No outstanding issues for you and I would be happy
to answer any questions you may have.
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May 26, 2010
Page 48 of 79
De Weerd: Thank you. Council, any questions?
Bird: I have none, Mayor.
Rountree: None.
De Weerd: Okay. Would the applicant like to comment? Good evening.
Suggs: Good evening, Mayor and Council Members. My name is Jane Suggs, 200
Louisa Street in Boise, I'm only going to say hello and stand for any questions, because
have been here for two and a half hours, so I thought I would.
De Weerd: Well, we are glad you got an opportunity to say hello. Sorry you had to wait
two and a half hours.
Suggs: No problem.
De Weerd: Council, any questions for the applicant?
Rountree: I have none.
Bird: I have none.
De Weerd: Thank you, Jane. Okay. If there is nothing further from Council, I'll wait for
your direction.
Bird: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Mr. Bird.
Bird: I move we approve MFP 10-002, Madelynn Estates by Jane Suggs, with staff
comments.
Rountree: Second.
De Weerd: I have a motion and a second to approve Item 9-L. If there is no discussion
from Council, Madam Clerk, will you call roll.
Roll-Call: Bird, yea; Rountree, yea; Zaremba, yea; Hoaglun, yea.
De Weerd: All ayes. Motion carried. Thank you.
MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES.
Item 10: Continued Department Reports.
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May 26, 2010
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A. Legal Department Report: Discussion - An Ordinance
Repealing and Replacing Title 4 Public Health & Safety,
Chapter 1, Sanitary Service System of the Meridian City Code
De Weerd: Under Item 10, Continued Department Reports. I will turn this over to Mr.
Nary for Item 10-A and B.
Nary: Thank you, Madam Mayor, Members of the Council. Tonight also Randy Amidon
from SSC is present, too, if you have questions of SSC specifically. Basically what's in
front of you on your -- on your packets, Mayor and Council, is the revised trash
ordinance for -- to, basically, incorporate the automated collection process into our city
ordinance, but there is a couple of things that came up at the last discussion and
wanted to let you know the solid waste advisory committee did meet last week to
discuss those two specific items that came out at your last hearing. One was a spring
clean up week. We had a lengthy discussion -- the special programs, other than the --
other than the recycling program, the special program, oil pickup, sharps container
pickup, Christmas tree pickup, fall leaf pickup, aren't incorporated in the current
ordinance that exists today, they aren't incorporated into the future ordinance as
proposed in front of you, mainly because programs come and go depending on the
need, the availability, how disposals occur, those types of things. So, the special
ordinances have never been incorporated, but the solid waste advisory committee and
SSC did discuss the spring clean up and did agree and SSC was agreeable to finding a
date, probably in the month of May -- in the first two weeks of May -- again, it usually
ends up being somewhat criticized. Some folks find that that's the week they intended
to clean up, some folks find they clean up the third week of May. Sort of the same issue
we have with leaves -- with leaf collection. But SSC had no problem with it. Obviously,
they are going to monitor it, they are not going to change any rates, there is no
adjustment to any of that. At this particular point it's potentially and your discussion
about rates and -- for fiscal year 12, so it's September of 2011, if there is a lot of folks
that -- Mr. Sedlacek, you know, was very committed that, you know, again, not knowing
how many people will take advantage of that opportunity, it's really hard to want to
adjust for anything prior to that. You know, if 10,000 homes use that as a clean up
week, then, there certainly could be an impact to service. If 500 homes do it, it may not
impact service greatly. So, until we really know what it is, the Solid Waste Advisory
Committee and the -- and SSC were very supportive, but that they can get done and,
again, May was the target date. But, again, not wanting to pick a specific date today,
knowing what the weather may be like next spring, we have had some strange weather
in the month of May this year, so it's hard to know, but, anyway, they were committed to
doing it, SSC is on board. They will do -- they will do spring clean up week. The
second one, I'm sure you recall, the gentleman came in and asked if he could drive his
trash can -- if he wanted to do an exchange, if he could drive himself or he and his
neighbor's trash cans down there to exchange them and, then, avoid the pick- up and
drop off fee that's required. And this one was a little bit more of an interesting
discussion for the committee, because from SSC's standpoint and not quoting Mr.
Sedlacek directly, but, basically, paraphrasing, you know, if one person brings a trash
can down to do that, it's probably not a big deal, they could probably deal with it. To
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offer that as a portion of the service makes it a little bit more problematic. One is the
trash can is probably going to have to be cleaned. Secondarily, they are going to have
to have an available trash can to switch. Part of the process in contacting SSC to get a
trash can switched out makes sure that it's available for you when you want it. If they
don't have what size you're requesting, they can order that, it may take a week or two.
If you have people showing up as part of a service program, they are going to expect it
to be there to get turned away, they anticipated that was going to be problematic for
folks. Right now the way the program is structured, if you get a smaller can -- so,
basically, you know, downsize large from the largest to the smaller, doesn't have any
cost to it at all. So, it's only the up sizing that does. So, I'm not sure right now, again,
the recommendation of the commission was -- or the committee was to monitor that,
see what type of interest that there is, if there are a lot of people showing up. The other
concern Mr. Sedlacek had and -- you know, based on their staffing needs there may
occasionally be one person that might be staffing the front desk, so when someone
shows up, they have got a trash can, somebody's got to go inspect it, go find the one for
them to switch out. You know, logistically it sounds very simple for one person to come
in and request that and Mr. Sedlacek was very supportive if that's all that we get and
one person shows up, we will just deal with it, just like we do other things. But if it's a
continuous process, then, they would have to evaluate how to do it, what a rate would
be to make it make sense. Where, again, a part of the program is trying to discourage
that from occurring constantly, because there is administrative costs to making sure that
the bill gets done correctly, that the adjustments get made at the city end, because we
are the administrators of that process and those are the things that were more
problematic from the committee's standpoint. So, right now the committee is not
recommending that it be part of a program or part of the rate structure, again, SSC has
committed that if it's -- you know, it's a few people here and there it's not going to be a
problem. If it becomes a real issue, they will probably come back to address the
Council or address the solid waste committee about that. One thing to note in the
ordinance -- in the existing ordinance that's out there today, there is -- there is
anticipation that there would be a group that's never existed to my knowledge, or at
least hasn't existed since I have been involved in this group, and it was referred to -- if I
can get to it really quickly in our ordinance. It's under the current city code, rules and
regulations 4-1-13 and it's called the board of adjustment and in our city code in other
sections we have a board of appraisers and the board of appraisers deals with water
adjustments. This was to deal with trash adjustments. No one's ever requested this
since I have been here, so I don't -- we have never formed this group, but what part of
that group's responsibility in the existing ordinance was to help SSC -- be a contact for
SSC between the city's administrative side and the SSC operation side. So, what we
felt was that we have been in the process and we have been working at this for awhile,
it's kind of been on the back burner, but we have been looking at adjusting how that
board of appraises is handled currently, because currently the board is made of the
Public Works director, the city clerk, and the Mayor and we haven't had any requests
lately in that, but we have been looking at reconfiguring that type of board so every
single type of trash complaint or trash request or water request -- everything doesn't
come in front of the Council, that it can be handled at an administrative level and
appealed if necessary and the only ones that right now come in front of the Council
Meridian City Council
May 26, 2010
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directly is when their water is going to get turned off and they have the ability to come
and appeal that particular action. So, the recommendation would be that we felt it was
still important to have that contact between the administrative side of the city and the
operation side of SSC and your solid waste advisory committee does the same thing
and that's something that doesn't -- right now it's not quite often, because of this
transition and the recycling program in the future, we would anticipate meeting probably
quarterly, if anything, maybe twice a year, just to address any issues,
recommendations, things like you have done in this past few months. So, that's what's
in the newer ordinance, is that's what that committee and its recommended that it move
to more of a commission status, we could create that through ordinance and, then, the
board of appraisers would deal with disputes over trash, disputes over pricing, and
those kind of issues. So, there is -- that's the only real significant change from an
administrative standpoint. The rest of the ordinance is things that you have been
familiar with, we have discussed a number of times. Location. The fact that it, you
know, requires it be in the containers that are provided. You have to use those. There
isn't other trash that can be used, you have the following and those kinds of things. So,
the rest of this I think is fairly straight forward. It's not urgent for you to pass it tonight,
it's not urgent for you to pass it next week, you certainly have time to that. We would
like to have it, obviously, in place, it needs to be approved and published by the 5th of
July, which is when the transition is to occur, so it would have to be done in the months
of June, but it doesn't have to be done tonight or next Tuesday, unless you're
comfortable going forward. That's all I have. Mr. Amidon is here if you have questions,
again, for SSC.
De Weerd: And maybe you would like to come forward and come say hi as well,
because you waited two and a half hours, too. Do you have any comments regarding
any of the comments Mr. Nary made?
Amidon: Madam Mayor and City Councilmen, my name is Randy Amidon. That's
A-m-i-d-o-n. I live at 12691 West Renwick and that's in Boise.
De Weerd: Thank you.
Amidon: Really, my big concern with our counter carts is when that cart comes to our
facility, whether it's a customer that's moving or an exchange or whatever the case may
be, that cart is brought to our facility and it's assessed whether or not that cart can be
refurbished or whether it needs to be recycled. Really, what I was concerned about is
we do have a lot of customers that return these carts to us in the fall, I'm going to have
to have room for storage for these carts and also we have borrowed money on those
carts and we will not be, you know, generating any revenue from those carts in those six
months that they are sitting in our yard. And, then, in the springtime it seems like within
a week's time spring has arrived and people start cutting their yards and start doing the
tree trimmings and those type things. What I was concerned about is trying to get all
those carts back out to those customers, because now with us going to that cart system,
that's the only way they will be able to remove all the brush clippings and brush and
Meridian City Council
May 26, 2010
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those type of things. So, that was our major concern about that, was making sure that
we have the capabilities of getting those carts back out to our customers.
De Weerd: Any questions from Council?
Bird: I have none.
Rountree: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Yes.
Rountree: Does Bill want comments this evening or how does he want us handling --
I've got a few.
Nary: Madam Mayor, Members of the Council, absolutely, if you have comments this
evening that would be great and, like I said, you don't have to -- we could schedule this
on your agenda whenever you are comfortable, we just want to -- prefer it be done by
the end of June. So, tonight and whenever you have opportunity, that's great.
De Weerd: Do you want it verbally? Do you want it in writing? How -- how best do you
want --
Nary: Madam Mayor, Members of the Council, verbally is perfectly fine. Dean's still
recording it down, so if I don't get it all I can certainly get it from there, but -- and, then, if
you want to provide that in writing subsequently, that's perfectly fine. This is a
legislative action, so having that discussion outside of this hearing is perfectly fine, too,
so --
Rountree: I would be glad to provide these to you at another time, as opposed to spend
more time this evening on this, but I do have about 12 specific nitpicks, if you will.
Nary: That, too. We love nitpicks. That's great.
De Weerd: Well, yeah, in writing.
Nary: I'm going to write down 12, so there won't be 13, but --
Rountree: Well,. there might only be 11.
Nary: Whatever you have is fine.
Rountree: Thank you.
De Weerd: Well -- and I would just comment that I hope the -- if you are looking at the
board of appeals as the alternative to what is in the current code, I want that rewritten
first.
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May 26, 2010
Page 53 of 79
Nary: That was the intent, Madam Mayor.
De Weerd: I just wanted to emphasize that. You will find on the board of appeal I'm not
the right group to really be considering those things.
Nary: Absolutely.
Rountree: Madam Mayor, just a general comment about what I have seen on the
ordinance. I think they did a great job of modifying and modernizing our existing
ordinance and though I do have comments they are less substantive and, again, just
minor details.
Nary: Sure.
B. Legal Department Report: Discussion -Motor Vehicle
Inspection and Maintenance Program Joint Powers Agreement
De Weerd: Okay. Thank you so much for being with us and hang in there. Any further
comment, Council, before we move on? Okay. Mr. Nary?
Nary: Next item B, is that where we are at? The motor vehicle inspection maintenance
program joint powers agreement you recall when we have had this discussion regarding
the air quality -- DEQ and the air quality board and the different cities in Ada County,
one of the things they requested was a joint powers agreement. That's in your packets
in front of you. There has been discussion -- Andrea Pogue from my office has been
really working with DEQ on the language. One of the things she wrote to me that -- in
regard to this final agreement that's in front of you, was that different languages and the
the term and the language of the agreement now says the term of this agreement shall
commence on the date of execution as evidenced by the final signatory and remains in
effect in either DEQ, the county, or the cities terminate the agreement. DEQ, Ada
County, and the cities in Ada County agree to work cooperatively to insure motor
vehicle inspection and maintenance testing now and in the future meets all legal
requirements. So, this is something that was requested about a year ago. When you
sent a letter from the city we agreed to be a part of that once we were comfortable with
the language. Again, if you need some opportunity and time to review that, it's not time
critical that it has to be approved tonight, it can be put on your agenda in the next two
weeks. So, whatever you're comfortable with, but we think the -- basically, what I think
our direction we were trying to do was to make sure that the City of Meridian was a
participant in the discussion, but we weren't committed to any one program and to one
system, that it still has the flexibility of the cities to choose the destiny for each city and
to work with the air quality board and DEQ to look out, again, for the best needs of their
community. So, we don't think this joint powers agreement binds us strongly in one
direction or another, it really allows the city to be a participant and a player. Again, if
you need sometime to review that that's perfectly fine. We didn't anticipate bringing it
forward for approval tonight, we just wanted to introduce it to you.
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May 26, 2010
Page 54 of 79
De Weerd: Thank you. Any comments, questions? Would you like to think about it?
Move forward?
Rountree: Madam Mayor, I think it addressed our concern. I don't see any reason why
we can't approve it and authorize signature. So, I would move to do such, that we
approve the joint powers agreement and authorize the Mayor to sign and the Clerk to
attest.
Zaremba: Second.
De Weerd: I have a motion and a second. Any questions from Council? Madam Clerk,
please, call roll.
Roll-Call: Bird, yea; Rountree, yea; Zaremba, yea; Hoaglun, yea.
De Weerd: All ayes. Motion carries.
MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES.
C. Joint Department Discussion: Legal, Planning, Police and
Clerk's Office Discussion Regarding Non-Traditional
Retail/Service/Drinking Establishments and Considering
Developing Specific Rules/Guidelines Regarding Issuing
Permits
De Weerd: Thank you. And our last item under ten is the joint department discussion.
Mr. Nary or --
Nary: I think it's me first, Madam Mayor.
De Weerd: Okay.
Nary: Madam Mayor, Members of the Council, we tried to involved all the departments
of the city in this particular discussion. We tried to get all of them, we only could get
half. So, this is one that's a little odd and we could have waited probably until your
workshop discussion and it may be in your desire to bring it back for workshop, seeings
how, again, some opportunity to think about this, but we have had people request this
and so we didn't want to let it sit for another couple weeks before we even had the
opportunity to introduce the issue to you. Maybe based on the current state of the
economy people are wanting to be more creative in how they do their business.
Currently under our city code we have bars in our -- in our land use and our planning --
in our planning and zoning code. We have bars and we have restaurants that serve
alcohol as a portion of their service. The state regulates both of those types of activities
in how they issue licenses. Restaurants have particular requirements for how much
sales of alcohol they can have versus everything else. They have requirements on
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May 26, 2010
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separation of minors from where alcohol is actually being served and so they have a lot
of regulation in the state to deal with both of those types of activities. What we have
been getting is requests for different types of -- and I term them nontraditional places for
serving alcohol. We have had requests -- recently you had in front of you Brewphoria
and Brewphoria is a place that predominately sells beer as a retail outlet, but also
serves beer in their location. Now, the reason that was approved by you a couple of
weeks ago is because they also have a restaurant that's a part of it and the states --
they were about a week out of completing their restaurant requirements and they could
get approval by the state, so, then, the rules changed, they were willing to live with the
rule for it being a bar only for a very short window and as they changed and evolved into
a restaurant they were fine. We did advise them that if that restaurant actually didn't
happen, they would have to come back with a CU process and they understood that.
But, then, subsequent to that we had a request from a massage therapy location, they
wanted to serve wine to their customers. We have had requests from -- requests from
-- what was the other -- one of the salons that wanted to serve beer or wine to their
customers. So, there is a couple different issues that touch all these different
departments and I let each of them kind of have their say as to what their issues are,
but I guess the number one concern we have is, obviously, enforcement. There were
different rules that apply to how service can be done and these things. You know, there
is always the risk or the concern that we have from legal and, again, if it's not the same
concern you folks have, that's fine. Somewhat of a proliferation of places serving beer
and wine and trying to keep a handle on that from a licensing perspective, police
enforcement, this types of things. But, anyway, that's kind of the introduction of it, I
couldn't let each of the departments that are here to -- that have what their specific
issues are from planning and police and the clerk's office and, then, we can see where
you would like us to go with this.
De Weerd: Mr. Nary, was there a discussion at all about these fast food places serving
energy drinks? I guess the energy drink has a certain alcohol content to it, is that -- it's
one of those that are flying under the radar right now?
Nary: Madam Mayor, Members of the Council, different issue, but, you're right, I mean
those are ones that are concerning, they don't reach the level of enforcement by the
state of the city. We also have fast food places that serve the mixed cocktail types of
drinks as well, but, again, they are restaurants, so they get regulated by -- as a
restaurant, so you have places that serve mud slides and margarita mixes and those
kinds of things that are low level alcohol, they aren't pouring alcohol in there, they are
prepackaged types of drinks, so those in the restaurants get regulated, but, you're right,
the energy drinks don't, because they aren't -- they don't reach that threshold level that
the state is addressing those. That's a different issue we certainly can have a
discussion about, too.
De Weerd: I think the police department -- and I believe it's a topic that has had some
presence at the MADC, but it's probably something not necessarily part of this, but at
some point needs to be discussed.
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May 26, 2010
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Nary: Sure.
Hoaglun: Question for Mr. Nary.
De Weerd: Yes.
Hoaglun: Bill, does champagne fall under the beer and wine category?
Nary: Yes. In fact, it's even more regulated -- sparking wine is, basically, how they term
that, but, yeah, it is regulated like wine.
Hoaglun: Okay. Thanks.
Nary: Mayor and Council, Planning has different levels of concern and the police and at
least you can hear what those are, and, like I said, if you want some time to just think
about it, we could put it on in a couple of weeks and talk about it again.
Friedman: So, Madam Mayor, Council Members, as Mr. Nary indicated, right now the
UDC really defines and separates drinking establishments and articulates restaurants.
Drinking establishments are what we all think of in the -- you know, the bar, the cocktail
lounges, and so forth. When we get into restaurants it talks about as restaurant being a
place where food is prepared and served and so forth and that's really three definitions
under restaurant and, then, the second definition is one that has a beer and wine
license regulated by the state, with a restaurant endorsement, I guess, if you call it that,
and, then, the other one is a restaurant where you serve food and liquor by the drink
with, again, a restaurant endorsement, much as we had with Brewphoria. What we are
starting to find is these hybrids where you might get a beauty salon, well, when we look
at it somebody comes in for a CZC for a beauty salon, it's a personal service and it's,
you know, reviewed based a personal service. We don't want to -- you know, what we
are kind of concerned about is, well, we get a beauty salon, but when does a beauty
salon become a drinking establishment and feel it probably would be best to regulate
these through the licensing -- through the state liquor licensing and the city commenting
on those licensing procedures, rather than trying to figure out how many different
nuances we can fold into the UDC and try to keep up everyone as they are going along
where as a massage parlor that happens to serve wine or it's -- you know, I think the
other implication is -- and I'm not that clear about it, but in the follow-up conversation
today, I think what some of these folks have to understand is if they start serving alcohol
that may, in fact, impact their ability to have certain customers within their places of
business, perhaps even minors. She starts serving -- I'm not that familiar with it, but this
came up in discussion, if you're starting to serve alcohol at your salon, then, you might
be negating your ability to clip the hair of minors in there. But I guess our concern is,
you know, how many different levels of the onion do we create if we do it from a land
use standpoint.
Bird: Madam Mayor?
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May 26, 2010
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De Weerd: Mr. Bird.
Bird: I got a question in follow up. Bill, I know it's a habit, not that I go to beauty salons,
but I have known in the past that they do -- they don't -- they don't serve, because they
don't charge you for them, you know, they just give you a glass of wine or something I
have been told. As long as they don't charge do they have to have a license?
Nary: Well, Madam Mayor, Members of the Council, Council Member Bird, the state
considers that they do. What they consider is that if they are giving it away, unless they
are falling into the wine tasting, which now there are specific rules in the Idaho Code for
wine tasting, that if it's not a wine tasting and it doesn't meet those criteria, even if they
are giving it away, the state -- the state alcohol beverage control considers that to be
part of a sale. What they consider is that your haircut is included with this glass of wine,
so you're paying for that wine in some fashion, whether you have it or not. So, they
consider that a license is required. What we found when we had the discussion
internally regarding Brewphoria and trying to figure out how to hybrid that operation,
because, again, it was a retail and a serving location, one of the requirements about
beer service is different than wine service, but we also found that wine stores, Divine
Wine and I can't remember the other wine company's name --
Bird: New Heritage.
Nary: New Heritage Wine, serve wine in the store, so they serve -- act as a retail outlet
and serve wine in the store, but at that period of time probably unbeknownst to them
they were violating the state code in the requirements of having a store. So, Lieutenant
Overton did a --afield trip to verify those things for everybody as to how that was being
done.
Bird: He was just a wine taster, uh?
Nary: Just observing.
Bird: Just observing. Okay.
De Weerd: And so what is the -- what do we currently have in that regard and what is
needed as far as clarification?
Nary: Madam Mayor, Members of the Council, what we currently have is we don't have
any way to really track these types of activities, because they don't fall under a land use
and they are an accessory use. Right now in our code -- our code only deals with bars
and restaurants for -- or retail outlets and these are some somewhat both and so I think
what we are wanting to know, first, the example, the Posh Spa, they requested -- it's a
massage therapy place -- they don't use massage parlor anymore, Mr. Friedman, but in
a massage therapy place we denied it, because it doesn't fit into our ordinance, yet I
think Lieutenant Overton would say they are not getting a lot of police calls, because
someone's getting a massage and having a glass of wine. That's not a real problem.
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May 26, 2010
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So, again, if it isn't a problem is that an issue for the Council and do you want us to craft
something in our licensing, so that we can deal with these types of, again, nontraditional
types of location and, then, we likely will get other places that may want to be serving
things that the state will want to regulate or the state thinks a license is necessary,
therefore, they are going to come back to us and it might be a doctor's office, it could be
a dentist's office, it could be an insurance agent, it could be a real estate office, you
know, I mean in the old days of somebody pulling a bottle of liquor out of their drawer
and serving it to their client is one thing, but the state's saying part of these services --
this liquor is included as part of that, therefore, they need a license. So, once they have
to go to the state, then, they have to go back to us and we don't have a way to fit it in at
the moment where it belongs. And, lieutenant, I don't know if you have any police
perspective of what you think.
Overton: Madam Mayor and Members of the Council, on my field trip we met first and
discussed this and discussed the -- trying to fit a square peg in a round hole and where
we were trying to take some of the new fangled establishments and they had to fit into
one of these categories we have and if they didn't what are we going to do with them.
We do have one -- I believe Divine Wine right now that we have kind of got in limbo,
because they are not a restaurant and they are not licensed as a bar and when I visited
with them, they also did not have their premises marked for 21 or older. When they first
went in, they went in -- we believe they went in with the understanding of wine only, no
beer and when they went into beer sales and it was brought to my attention, we went
over and I knocked on their door and talked to them. So, they should have marked their
premises that afternoon,. told them where to get the signs and she was a very nice
person, she wanted to comply as much as she could, but we told her the way she's
operating where she's not a restaurant, the only -- the only option we have currently is
that she's a bar and that is a pretty high cost that she would have to, then, reach to
become a bar. We told her hold, do what you're doing, mark the premises -- please
mark the premises right now. She did. I, then, went to New Vintage, had the same
conversation. My understanding, because I have been on other field trips to New
Vintage, didn't realize they sold beer. I was quite familiar with several of their wines.
They do have a marked premises, they were doing everything the way I believe at the
time they should have been doing it. They are not a restaurant. They are not a bar.
They are in limbo, too. So, the discussion turned to a hybrid and I guess I didn't want to
speak for everybody in law enforcement or even the chief at that point, because I talked
to the chief yesterday and said these are not locations we get a high degree of calls for
service and these have been operating for several years. They attract a different
clientele. I said should we be looking for a solution for them that is just something we
don't do and that's kind of where we started the conversation. Of course, on the other
side of that is where do we stop? I mean we don't -- you might find wine, Councilman
Bird, in -- you will find wine at some of the massage parlors, but, generally, you will also
find a liquor catering permit with my signature on it, because I sign a tremendous
amount of liquor catering permits for a lot of different locations within the city and of all
the problems we have with alcohol, very very very seldom do we ever have a problem
with one of those liquor catering permits, because it comes with its own personal threat
every time when we sign one off on how they have to run them. So, you may have
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seen that, you may heard that story. The idea of having abeer-wine license in a
massage parlor -- now you got me doing it -- in a licensed massage establishment, a
spa, what concerns me the most is any of these other uses we have to make sure that
our code covering the server ordinance covered everybody inside that, not to mention
they have to change their premises marking and limited who can enter that
establishment, depending on what they serve. So, from an enforcement standpoint --
initially Idon't see this as creating a ton of calls for service. Initial licensing, yeah, it's
going to cause a little more information needing to come to us on doing some of the
background information, but on the end run Idon't -- I don't initially see it being a huge
increase.
Rountree: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Mr. Rountree.
Rountree: I got to go back to the beginning. Are those establishments that you
identified, John, the first couple you talked about, are they in violation of the state
statute?
Nary: I think they were. I don't think they are now. I think they were, because they
were not -- they didn't mark their premise properly, because they are -- under the state
code if they are serving alcohol, it doesn't matter -- it doesn't matter if they have liquor
by the drink or they are serving beer or wine, they have to have a license. When they
come to us under -- under our ordinance the way it's currently configured, if they don't
serve food they are a bar and a bar requires a special use permit, which, again, is a
more expensive lengthy process, for what is in the planning world an accessory use to
this establishment, but -- and I'm not trying to stereotype any type of businesses, but we
have got lots of businesses that would probably like to serve beer and wine or beer that
don't care about 21 and if the Council is comfortable we can create a Hitch for that, like
we did when we had closet bar issues, we can create a Hitch for that, but right now it's a
bar and if you'd like us to treat them like bars, whether it's a tattoo parlor, whether it's a
massage therapy place, whether it's an insurance agent's office, that's fine, we can do
that. If you'd like us to create something different for those that it's accessory to the
use, that's what planning's concern was is they are not going to ever -- they are not
going to look at that and realize they are going to be serving alcohol when they initially
come in for a tenant improvement or the CZC to be a barbershop or to be a tattoo parlor
or something like that. So, we need to find a hybrid to deal with those, otherwise, they
are all bars and they have to go through the bar process.
Overton: Council, to answer your question, we brought them into compliance with state
law when I went and visited them. What we didn't bring them into compliance with is
our current city code.
Rountree: I'm just concerned about the fine line of what's a bar and what's not a bar
and how folks will figure out ways to move around that.
Meridian City Council
May 26, 2010
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De Weerd: Yeah. I think there needs to be some accessory use to it. It's just like we
just identified two businesses on Meridian Road that it's right there in their refrigerator
for their clients, you know, so this is -- you're only touching the tip of this iceberg.
Nary: Our recommendation when I spoke with Anna with Planning was, again, they
would like it to not be a land use, because they don't feel it really is a land use, I mean it
really is accessory. If we model it after the state, the state requires for a restaurant they
have thresholds they have to meet. They have to provide every year when they renew
or when they initially -- well, they don't have to on their initial request, they have to on
their renewal, but they have to provide receipts to show that they are predominately
selling food and not just selling liquor. We could certainly work through with the clerk's
office and planning and police to create the similar types of standards for an accessory
use of whatever that threshold that seems to make sense, to make sure that if it's a
barber shop that wants to have a beer license and serve beer to their customers, that
they meet all the 21 and all the other state code, but they are not going to go through
the CU process as a bar, because, realistically, they are just cutting hair and serving a
beer, versus ones that are generally serving beer and maybe having something else
that's primarily their focus. So, we can do that if that's your -- if that's the desire, we can
work through that. Probably wouldn't have anything to you in two weeks, but we could
work through that with the clerk's office and the other departments and come up with
some kind of threshold and maybe that would give you something that's -- to have more
meat to the discussion to say you like that or you don't like that or you think that's too
high a threshold or that doesn't make sense, so --
Holman: Okay. Madam Mayor, Members of the Council, Mr. Nary, if I can ask a
question. My question is -- I just thought of this now. If they are giving the wine away, ,
they are not going to have a receipt for it, are we talking about the receipts for when
they go buy the wine at Albertson's?
Nary: Yes. I mean they are going to have to --
Holman: Giving it away.
Nary: Yeah. What we would be talking about is they have to show, basically, what they
give away or how much they spend on what they give away versus how much they are
actually receiving in receipts. It's the same thing they have to do if they were a
restaurant. It's going to be an education process, there is no doubt, with folks.
Holman: Okay.
Nary: If they want to serve it -- and, again, if the Council's direction is we don't care,
mean we could certainly figure a way around it, but I'm just concerned that we have
folks that sort of are in the cracks and they are trying to -- and I understand that they are
realistically trying to find a different way to market their primary business, but it is really
on the edge of violating the law.
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Hoaglun: Yes, Madam Mayor and Bill, we are probably not the first ones taking a crack
at this. Maybe in Idaho. I don't know. But I'm sure some other states, if we can do
some research on that, you know, to see if there is some things out there that meet that.
I can see where it's a Hitch and I want to ask John, you talked about a liquor catering
permit that you sign off on. Is that for a specific time period, it's not a -- like for a year
type of thing or is it, if they are a -- if they are a caterer and they want to serve beer and
wine -- and I don't know if that's -- that's a vehicle to be able to put into that.
Overton: Madam Mayor, Councilman Hoaglun, Council, liquor catering permits are for a
one event, one day. In fact, when we do these multiple dates, I get multiple liquor
catering permits for the various dates and it's 20 dollars a permit, if I remember
correctly. So, it can get expensive for them. I mean our Harley shop I sign a ton of
them for this summer for the different events they are going to run and they have done a
really good job of policing their own.
Hoaglun: Well, planning might volunteer now if they get the revenue from something
like that; right?
Friedman: It depends on how many field inspections we have to do for it.
De Weerd: You will have to fight or do it together.
Friedman: We will go together.
Overton: One other note -- we do -- one of the things we did discover is I went to three
different wine shops, basically all doing business the same manner and the third one
was Corkscrews -- Corkscrews is a bar. They went through that whole process and
paid that money. So, I mean we did have one that went through that whole process and
did it and, then, we just have two others that were not required to do that when they
came into being.
Hoaglun: Well, I guess just to comment, one of the concerns Ihave -- if we go this
route and- are looking at things like that, you know, under age kids I don't think should
be part of that deal and that's something we need to enforce and be sure and that make
them think twice about before they exclude some of their clientele coming in to get their
hair cut or whatever or use the spa. So, that's something I'd look at closer.
Overton: Madam Mayor, Councilman Hoaglun, we would actually have more authority
and more power over any type of a license we gave them in a marked premises than we
would over a current liquor catering permit or when I approve a shelter permit for
alcohol for who knows who at one of our parks, because it's impossible for me to say,
you know, I have got to have this and this at one of the shelters. That's -- those are the
ones that worry me and we sign those quite regularly. I think if we had a marked
premises and they have to have server training, we make them go through -- maybe
you don't have the expense of a bar, but we go through a lot more hoops, I don't think
they want to lose that.
Meridian City Council
May 26, 2010
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De Weerd: So, have you looked at what any of the other communities in Idaho are
doing?
Nary: Madam Mayor, in discussing this with some of the other city attorneys through
our process, they haven't had anything to address this in other places or they already
have it, like in Coeur d' Alene they already have ways to address that, they are not all
bars and restaurants, but -- but most of the other cities don't have this. Boise doesn't
have it. They don't have this issue come up. My guess is that this doesn't reach their
radar, because it isn't raised. Brewphoria was the example -- most of the Boise police
knew Brewphoria from going there and patronizing the business, but didn't have any
idea they were serving beer and they didn't have a license and they weren't doing it
properly. So, they didn't know, because I think most of these things are like -- like Mr.
Bird said, people probably have been doing that for years and serving glass of wine and
not thinking twice about it and not realizing that ABC does regulate that and they have
to meet certain criteria. You know, the other problem that's another concern to me and
to police is some of these places want to be some sort of hybrid, which the law doesn't
really grant, you know, we allow kids until 5:00 or 6:00 and, then, we don't allow kids --
there is no such thing in Idaho to do that. If you don't -- if once -- once you're a bar
you're not supposed to have kids in there at all. Not at -- not half the day and half the
day not. If you want -- if you want to allow kids in, then, you got to be a restaurant, but
you can't just be a -- you can't just be a place that serves alcohol all the time, which is
what the lieutenant, you know, talked to Divine Wine and New Heritage about, is that
they couldn't do that. So, again, there is, again, regulations that we can create in our
ordinance to make it clear to folks what the rules are if they want to serve. I'm not trying
to -- you know, I'm not trying to detract from these folks' business, I understand they are
trying to do that, we just want to make sure that they are in compliance, because we are
responsible to regulate that, too. So, to move this along, as I know it's getting late for
everybody, I mean we will be gathering more information, we will get some research
done and we will see what things we could suggest back to you and probably put it on a
future workshop.
De Weerd: My concern is staffing. I mean -- yeah. Staffing and enforcing, you know,
compliance, all of that.
Bird: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Yes, Mr. Bird.
Bird: I have got a -- I have got a real concern on the enforcing, too, because if you read
in the paper when they went out and did the underage liquor deals rating, Garden City
fell on their face, and I think it's because we do not have alicense -- licensing for
servers. I think that's one thing we need to do and if they are -- if they are serving it in a
-- a massage parlor or whatever you want to call it, then, they have to get that license
also. I think that that -- talking to the chief will make a big difference, I was quite
embarrassed when we only got a 50 percent -- 56 percent serving right. That's -- that's
Meridian City Council
May 26, 2010
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44 percent that -- of the establishments that served under age or give -- sold beer to
under age. That's not good. That's what we need to work on.
De Weerd: Okay. Thank you for that can of worms.
Nary: That's what we do.
Item 11: Ordinances.
B. Ordinance No. 10-1447: Junk Vehicles, Weeds, and Other
Nuisances
C. Ordinance No. 10-1448: Discharge of Firearms
De Weerd: Okay. Item 11-B and C are ordinances 10-1447 and 10-1448. Madam
Clerk, if you will, please, read this by title only.
Holman: Thank you, Madam Mayor. City of Meridian ordinance number 10-1447, an
ordinance repealing Chapter 3, Title 4, Meridian City Code, regarding weeds, repealing
Chapter 4, Title 4, Meridian City Code, regarding abandoned or inoperable vehicles.
Repealing and replacing Chapter 2, Title 4, Meridian City Code, regarding junk vehicles,
weeds, and other nuisances. Definitions, nuisance conditions, prohibited. Responsible
party. Abatement of nuisances. Appeals. Failure to abate. Penalties for violation.
Legal action. Hindering authorized persons. Severability. And providing an effective
date.
Holman: City of Meridian ordinary number 10-1448, an ordinance replacing Title 6,
Chapter 3, Section 10, of the Meridian City Code regarding firearms and dischargeable
instruments and providing an effective date.
De Weerd: Thank you. And since we have no members of the public, I will not ask if
anyone wants hear it read.
Bird: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Mr. Bird.
Bird: I move that we approve ordinary 10-1447 and 10-1448, with suspension of rules.
Rountree: Second.
De Weerd: I have a motion and a second to approve ordinances in Item 11-B and C. If
there is no discussion, Madam Clerk, will you, please, call roll.
Roll-Call: Bird, yea; Rountree, yea; Zaremba, yea; Hoaglun, yea.
Meridian City Council
May 26, 2010
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De Weerd: All ayes. Motion carries.
MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES.
Item 12: Other Items.
A. Executive Session per Idaho State Code 67-2345(1)(c) - To
Conduct Deliberations Concerning Labor Negotiations or to
Acquire an Interest in Real Property, Which is Not Owned by a
Public Agency
Amended onto Agenda
Executive Session per Idaho State Code 67-2345(1)(fl - To
Consider and Advise its Legal Representatives in Pending
Litigation
De Weerd: Item 12-A is an Executive Session regarding 67-2345(1)(c) and (f). For the
record, Mr. Nary, can you tell us what (f) is regarding?
Nary: Litigation.
De Weerd: I should have done that when we approved of the agenda.
Nary: Yes. I'm sorry. Yeah. It's potential litigation.
De Weerd: I just said that. I would entertain a motion.
Bird: Madam Mayor?
De Weerd: Mr. Bird.
Bird: I move we go into Executive Session as per Idaho State Code 67-2345(1)(c),
(1)(f).
Rountree: Second.
De Weerd: I have a motion and a second to adjourn into Executive Session. Madam
Clerk, will you call roll?
Roll-Call: Bird, yea; Rountree, yea; Zaremba, yea; Hoaglun, yea.
De Weerd: All ayes. Motion carries.
MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES.
EXECUTIVE SESSION: (10:18 p.m. to 10:56 p.m.)
Meridian City Council
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Page 65 of 79
Zaremba: I would entertain a motion to come out of the Executive Session.
Bird: So moved.
Hoaglun: Second.
Zaremba: We have a motion and a second. All in favor say aye. Any opposed? We
are out of Executive Session.
MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES.
B. Future Meeting Topics
Zaremba: Next item on the agenda is future meeting topics. Caleb, are you running
that or is this just afree-for-all discussion? Or Robert?
Simison: Council, what we were hoping to come and have a brief dialogue with you
tonight -- especially in light of the upcoming ACHD joint meeting is what type of topics
are appropriate for that meeting, but also to make sure that they are topics that the
Council has a general agreement on before we even approach them for discussion.
And some of this relates to a couple of the different issues from the house bill this last
year, 583, relating to what type of things -- either they feel responsibility or inclined to do
and what type of things that the Council may think that they are inclined to do as part of
their roadway improvement projects that they do. I'm going to ask Caleb to come up
and at least give you one specific example of something that's currently taking place
related to the split corridor phase two and, then, also, you know, this just of kind goes in
some of the cost share discussions and landscaping requirements that the city has on
roadway projects, whether it's around retention ponds or everything else. So, Caleb.
Hood: Madam Mayor, Members of the Council, the one specific example I think that
paints the best picture that Robert alluded to for split corridor phase two, there is a pond
site that ACHD's in design for behind Albertson's off of Meridian Road there. I'm trying
to recall the name of the road that goes back in in behind Albertson's. A public street.
This pond site isn't right on the roadway there, but our pathways master plan has a
pathway along the creek that runs through there and on the backside and some of the
back and forth, at least at the staff level as far as has been our pathways plan, shows a
multi-use pathway on the south side, kind. of the southeast side of that pond site, and
ACHD is saying we don't build pathways, we do roadways and the drainage associated
with -- with those. So, some of the concern that we have at staff level is we hold other
developers -- not so much other agencies thus far -- to a certain standard and we think
that the highway district .should adhere to those standards as well, but we don't want to
push that too far if that's something that the Council doesn't believe that should be part
of the project as well as that should be something that the city ponies up for, but the
Parks Department -- again, it is part of the city's pathways master plan and should be
constructed some day and if it's not going to be ACHD with this project, it would have to
be the city at sometime in the future or it doesn't get constructed. So, that's, essentially,
Meridian City Council
May 26, 2010
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what's going on. Landscaping also these pond sites have been a concern and we still
haven't any revisions to that master agreement that we have asked for several times.
They could be working on it, but we haven't seen that and we thought we had some
understanding of at least those minimums that we would like to see along arterial roads
for when they put those pond sites in for fencing and landscaping and whatnot. But,
again, we haven't seen any -- anything back from ACHD with what they are willing to do.
So, I don't know if they are intentionally dragging their feet or not, but, again, we haven't
drawn any conclusions to that issue thus far. That leads into another issue similarly and
this is all generally under the cost share umbrella, which you're all somewhat familiar
with. We do have our first -- just last week I think it was we got our first draft of the cost
share agreement for the Ten Mile -- what I will call the gap project between ITD's project
at the new interchange at Ten Mile and the realigned Overland Road, that segment,
there is going to be two landscape planters and there is an agreement that ACHD legal
has drafted and shared with us, you know, that lays out that the city will be responsible
for the installation and maintenance of the landscaping within those planters. So, that
will be kind of our -- your first blush. I'm not quite sure when that's going to be
presented to you. I need to talk with parks a little bit more and legal on how and when
that gets presented, but that's just another issue of kind of where that line in the sand
has been drawn by the highway district. These certainly could be separate sub topics at
a joint meeting or, again, under one larger umbrella of you're our highway district and
these are the things we want you to do or couched some other way or maybe you feel
comfortable -- yes, we want to see these things, but, no, we should be on the hook for
those things. But those are just some examples in addition to the legislation that Robert
mentioned. I think that all, again, kind of falls under that umbrella of what they believe
their charge is and maybe we are at the staff level again we think somewhat differently
on that, so --
De Weerd: Well -- and I guess to add, we did get aletter -- I think a copy of a letter that
the city of Boise sent and -- on their position regarding cost share and right-of-way
design and maintenance.
Hood: Right. Right. Yeah. I have seen that letter, Madam Mayor.
De Weerd: Okay. But that will get to Council at least for a point of reference and
maybe even whatever else information you need. I guess in discussions from -- with
the other communities, not specifically on this, but there has been concern on other
cities' behalf of the TLIP, that the cost sharing, what's going to be fund -- funded or not
funded and without that local discretionary percentage or whatever, the cities can either
decide they would fund that or an intersection project or something, they feel that our
General Fund continues to take the hit for things that other communities wrap up into
their transportation dollars and we need a better gauge to what the feeling of Council is
on that.
Hood: And, Madam Mayor, if I may paraphrase a little bit of Boise city's letter, it was
somewhat dated, a lot of the tables and charts they used. I think the most recent
numbers they had were from like 2004. It, essentially, showed that the revenue
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generated in Boise city was being used to subsidize projects in Star and Kuna and
Eagle, because their property tax values and registration fees and gas tax dollars and
all these things weren't enough to do some of the projects in those communities, so
Boise is putting all this money in and the projects are being built in other places and
they are -- essentially, what they are saying is we want our cut of what we are putting
into ACHD and we don't think we are getting it. I don't know that anyone knows what --
they are getting, just because the impact fee area that they have got broken up are in
fourths and there is six cities in the county and -- so, that was part of what that letter -- I
think the heart of what that letter was getting at was they think they are subsidizing,
essentially, the rest of the projects in the county. We will share that letter with you, but I
just wanted to give you some of -- and that was shared with them and I believe they
discussed it at a joint meeting between Boise city and ACHD, at least that's what it
alluded to in the letter was a May 5th meeting. So, earlier this month. I don't know what
happened at that meeting. I have not heard anything about that. But I believe that letter
was prepared in anticipation of a joint meeting between Boise city council and ACHD
commissioners, so --
De Weerd: Yeah. This letter was written prior to that joint meeting.
Hood: Right.
De Weerd: Yeah. So, we may want to get the minutes and see what their discussion
was, too.
Zaremba: Madam Mayor, just a comment on Boise's assumption that they are
subsidizing everybody else. It -- it depends on what snap shot of ACHD's program you
look at. If you look at a longer period going back farther, Boise was getting all the
projects and all the other cities were subsidizing what they were getting and because
these are big projects with a long lead time, any year you look at, five cities are going to
be subsidizing the sixth city and it won't always be the same five or the same sixth one
and, yeah, I have no doubt that Boise could pull some figures out and say, okay, these
years we subsidized the rest of the county, but it's a pendulum that swings back and
forth on a very multi-year schedule and it runs the other way around in other years.
Personal opinion. But from being on the CICAC, that's what it looked like to me.
Rountree: My guess is that we could probably get the argument from the county they
don't get -- they are subsidizing everything.
Zaremba: Uh-huh.
Rountree: And everybody. So, I mean --
De Weerd: They should.
Rountree: And, then, you're right, they should. You're not -- Boise is not going to get
anywhere without that argument, nor are we.
Meridian City Council
May 26, 2010
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Bird: No.
Rountree: And I'm not sure we will get anywhere with them trying to make a point of the
TLIP and who pays for what at this point in time, as long as there is that issue that's
outstanding that is our position that they, in fact, are a service organization and do
provide transportation for our plan, as opposed to what they believe they provide the
transportation for their plan where ever they choose to provide it, based on their criteria.
I think that's how it works. I believe we all went through a process to identify projects
and how to prioritize and in the process to prioritize those projects, which ACHD did not
necessarily follow. So, to me the underlying issue is that we have got a position that we
believe in, they got a position they believe in, we got to get through that before we can
get to who pays for what, I believe. And I can tell you from ACHD's point of view, they
probably feel like we have spent the last four or five years trying to get everybody into
agreement and nobody wants to agree. I don't know how much they have moved on
their position and I don't know how much the cities have moved on our position, but we
have not moved together.
De Weerd: I guess, Caleb, what the Council needs is what have we agreed to?
Hood: Right now, Madam Mayor, Members of the Council, we haven't agreed to
anything. ACRD has adopted some policies and some resolutions saying this is how
we will conduct business. If you want to put in your pathways, feel free to. That's part
of our project, but you need to pay for that as part of our project. Again, they said this is
what we do --
De Weerd: So, they -- that's a mandate. They have pretty much mandated we are not
doing these things, we don't care if you want them or not, and if you want them we can
put them in, but you have to pay for it.
Hood: Essentially. Their legal staff has said this is what we can legally do. We can't
pay for these things, because our legislative charge is to be a roadway authority that
does these things. Do those things if you want them. We can put them in with our
roadway projects, but we can't pay for them. It needs to come out of from somewhere
else. So, we can cost share with you on this larger project and do a project that
encompasses whatever the cities want and we will pay for lane miles, five foot wide
sidewalks, and these other things. Any amenities -- what they call amenities, they won't
touch. They will help us get them into the project, but, again, the dime has to come
from somewhere else.
De Weerd: Have we evaluated, Mr. Nary, the legislation to -- to see if their assumptions
are, indeed, correct, that they can't pay for these kind of things, even though for the last
decades they have been?
Nary: Madam Mayor, Members of the Council, I know we have looked at the legislation.
guess I don't know how deep the analysis has been, but in looking at the legislation,
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May 26, 2010
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both myself and Mr. Baird, I mean we disagree with their analysis, because they
wouldn't have to go to the legislature to ask them to make sure it's clear we don't pay for
this stuff, if it was already clear that they don't pay for this stuff. So, I don't believe it's
as clear as they would like it to be. I think they want clarification, which you recall at the
committee level at the legislature there was some legislators who were very adamant
that roadway improvement is asphalt and striping and roadway improvements aren't
anything beyond that and there were other members of the legislature that believed that
those aren't amenities when it's a sidewalk or it's grass -- a separated sidewalk and
there is grass attached to it, there is some that don't believe that, that that isn't part of
the road. When Boise city's project that they finally did agree to with ACHD, which took
them a year to get to an agreement, they also only got to an agreement, but also
included in their agreement that they didn't accept ACHD's policies and they weren't
consenting to agree to that, which I don't think is bad policy, because, again, you're
going to agree to whatever you want to agree to, you don't have to necessarily accept
their policy as law, because it's not. So, I think, you know, what Caleb said is right,
mean we have entered into -- they have created some expectation -- or the city's
created some expectation to partner on this Ten Mile project in some fashion. What
that fashion is, that's what the discussion point is I think for all of you.
Hood: And, Madam Mayor, if I can follow up on that last point that Bill made. I mean if
we choose not to recognize the cost share policy or anything in TLIP, they will build five
lane roadways with attached sidewalks where ever they can and that's what we will get
when we get a project. We don't have to partner with them on anything. They will just
build what they want to build and they will go on their way, if they build anything in
Meridian. So, the ball's really in our court to either say -- you know, again, they are
saying these are the rules of the game. If you want to play, here is how we play. And
that's really what's on the table with this first one. I don't know if we want to do what
Boise city did and say we are agreeing to partner with you on this project, but the next
project we think you should do it or we aren't agreeing to this in principle, but we want to
see this project move forward. But, essentially, that's what they have done is for -- on a
project-by-project basis they will say do you want to partner with us on this. If so, here
is what your portion of this project is. We can say yea or nay. So, those are kind of the
rules that have been established thus far.
Rountree: And I think that that's an indication of the economic times that they are going
through, as the rest of us are. If it were a federal aid project, there is no question, the
amenities could be paid for by the federal aid, with matching dollars from ACHD. Just
no question. In fact, if it wasn't included, they wouldn't get the federal aid dollars. If you
want to say, well, that ought to be how it happens locally -- and this is a question for Bill
and I will relate -- the Idaho Transportation Department is specifically excluded by
statute not to have to comply with local land use planning and zoning. Kind of a fluke,
but that's how it reads. But I don't believe that applies to ACRD. I think they have to
comply with our Comprehensive Plan and our land use plan and our vision for our
community. If that's the case, then, they have to build projects that are consistent with
that. I don't believe they can mandate or create a policy that's counter to that. Now, do
we want to have grandiose landscapes and things that we don't really want to have to
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maintain forever in certain areas? Maybe not. To me, the partnering is working with
them, so they understand what our vision and our Comprehensive Plan and what our
plan includes. They don't have to build a Comprehensive Plan plan because they don't
have land use authority and I think that's -- that's where the rub lies, is I believe they
think they have land use control authority, because they, basically have got us. Play by
our rules or we don't give you any money. Ithink the rules are in our favor in terms of
them having to comply with providing us adequate transportation facilities that are
consistent with our plan and if they don't, I think they are in violation of state statute.
That's my position.
De Weerd: So, we need that to have an evaluation and --
Nary: Madam Mayor, Members of the Council, Imean Ithink --Ithink what they are --
what they are doing -- and if I was in their position I would probably do it, too -- is
instead of wanting to have the argument that they have had forever over what can we
afford, what are we willing to do, what do we want to do, which is really where the
arguments have been for the last 30 years, they have said -- they have taken a legal
position that we can't, that the way they want to interpret the law says we can't. So,
what's our remedy? The remedy for the cities -- all cities -- not just us, but all cities is
come sue us if you think it's different. If you want to sue us and get a court to rule in
your favor, then, go ahead. As we all know, that's an expensive way to get to the point
of something, but I believe that's where they, basically, want to, basically, put their eggs
in that basket of you have to sue for us to get -- change our mind, we have made a
decision that this is a legal issue now, not an issue of politics, not an issue of
cooperation or team work, it really is an issue of legality. Ithink we disagree on their
legality, but that doesn't mean much if they want to say come sue us for it, but I think
that's really where they are at.
De Weerd: So, if all six cities say, okay, we will all collectively do this, why do we want
to cost our citizens -- our same citizens that money?
Bird: Twice.
Nary: Right.
De Weerd: That's how Ada County does it and we shouldn't all just make the judge
decide.
Nary: Right.
Bird: The citizen would be paying through the city's suit and we will be paying through
Ada County Highway District's suit.
Rountree: Well, to me that's the question you ask the Attorney General. Not have
ACRD legal's counsel come to that conclusion and advise their board that way. They
have already established precedent. They pay for all of that stuff, their match, on a
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federal aid project. Plain and simple. They do it and they do it already. They don't
build very many of them, but if there is a call for some amenity to compensate aright-of-
way impact or an environmental impact or whatever, it's included in the project, it's
included in the project cost and if it's their project, it's their federal aid, they participate in
it. So, I don't think the argument really washes well that they can't. I can appreciate
they don't want to, because they want to get the most lane miles they can out of their
dollars and I think that's -- I don't disagree with that, but the idea that it's our way or no
way is -- just doesn't work and I think we have to take the same kind of position that it
can't be just our way or the highway on them either. I mean we have got to -- we have
got to make it work within the budgetary constraints and, you know, I think we have got
an example where we did that on Overland, where that's extended and we had visions
of raised medians and planters and all that kind of stuff and, really, all we ask them to
do at this point in time is accommodate that for sometime in the future. We will figure
out how to do it at some point in time in the future, whether we do it or whether we do it
with them or whether they do it, I don't know. And, hopefully, we can do it together,
because I don't think they want us out in the middle of their right of way building planter
boxes.
Bird: No.
De Weerd: I don't want us out there.
Bird: I don't want us out there either.
Rountree: Uh-huh.
Hood: If I may, I don't -- it's all -- there is a ton of thoughts rushing through my head.
Rountree: I'll bet.
Hood: I will try to share some of them and you -- that same Overland -- maybe I will
work backwards, since you talked about Overland. We received a letter today for
possible joint meeting topics about Franklin Road, because that's going through design
now, and those right-of-way owners between Linder and Ten Mile have been contacted
by ACHD about purchasing right of way and they submitted a letter. I didn't count up
how many of the property owners, but it looks like it's the vast majority of the property
owners in that one mile section that signed a letter saying they strongly oppose or
adamantly oppose the center median that's part of that design project now. They have
asked for some time with both City Council and ACRD commission. I didn't know if that
-- if we wanted to have a -- have that discussion -- we could even invite -- Brad Miller is
the one that signed the letter with co-signators.
Rountree: We all got a copy.
Hood: Okay. You already got it. I don't know if that's something you want to do now
or --
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Bird: Brad Miller wrote it. He didn't sign it. He's not a property owner.
Rountree: Van Auker signed it.
Bird: Van Auker.
Hood: Right. For Van Auker.
Bird: Van Auker signed it.
Hood: I didn't know if that was something you all wanted to discuss with ACHD's
commission or just have those property owners or Van Auker come in here or Brad or
whoever is going to represent the property owners out there. Steve Sedlacek, SSC, the
Joint School District, are all in that -- property owners in there as well. So, I kind of
need a gauge of if you wanted to just do that and have it be in this forum, we can do it
similar to what we did with Overland Road or get on the same page with ACHD's
commissioners or try to at least. I don't know what the thoughts are there, but we did
receive that request.
Rountree: I think the -- the concept is a concept that came out of our plan. So, I think
that the discussion probably ought to be with us. Do we want to move forward with it or
do we not. I don't know that ACHD cares one way or another, but I guess if their
position is the same position they have put us in tonight, that Meridian makes the
decisions, I think we will gladly do that, but let's have that across the board. Don't just
put us in that position when they are kind of in the hot seat.
Bird: As I remember, that was just staff, Charlie.
Rountree: What's that?
Bird: That position they put us in.
Rountree: I understand it was staff, but that's -- and that, in fact, is one of the issues
think we have is that staff only has certain latitudes and same as before, the issues I
have had with staff coming and asking for our comments, we give them comments and,
then, come back a month later saying, well, it's going to cost you money.
Bird: Yeah.
Rountree: Don't do that to me.
Hood: Well, on the Franklin -- on the Franklin Road project, to ACHD's credit they did --
mean we did ask them, because it was part of our plan. If we want to step back now
and say it's no longer part of our plan, I think they would say, okay, we are not going to
do that, then, because the city -- but, you're right, it's because, then, you wouldn't have
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May 26, 2010
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20 angry property owners. I mean it's the easy thing for them to do or should. If that's
what the Council decides to do after that testimony, I think they would back down and
say, well, forget that, we are not putting in landscape center medians -- or center
medians at all. Forget the landscaping. I think they will do -- they will do what they did
on Overland Road, essentially, and just do a five lane roadway with possibly
accommodations for them in the future. I don't know. But it's a real similar situation out
there and mostly undeveloped properties.
De Weerd: And it will cost in generations to do it --
Rountree: Well, but I think when -- as they acquire right of way for that corridor, they
have to keep in mind that they still have to control the access to those points of access
that ultimately will accommodate a raised median down Franklin if we opt not to do it
right now. But not just open up all the access to every quarter mile down that thing and
that, to me, is where we partner. Okay. We like the raised median, because it's kind of
entry -- or the planter, because it's an entryway, it's consistent with our long-term vision
out there, but that's along-term vision. That might be 40 years before that comes to
play. But they are building the road right now. Again, that's a situation that we have not
been in in the past where we get a road before we get development. Far too often the
other way around. So, maybe we can -- maybe we can wait for that. But, please, be
consistent with the plan sheets that show that with the points of access as you acquire
right of way and you -- you tell those property owners and put it in the acquisition papers
that this is the access you will have and it's anticipated that frontage roads and backage
roads and internal local roads and/or connectors will be included in the development on
your properties in the future. That's how we can work together. Maybe we could back
off on the planting medians for now. I don't know. That's for yet another meeting, but --
Hood: But what I'm hearing the Council decision --
Rountree: I'm finished talking. Let somebody else talk.
Hood: I mean we will let those property owners come here and pitch that to the Council,
though, right? I mean that's not a joint meeting topic, that's -- at least what I'm hearing
from Charlie.
Zaremba: Madam Mayor, my question would be when we were developing that corridor
and the area plan around there, the property owners were included, ACRD was
included. This is not something that the Council went into executive session and made
up by ourselves, this was a joint effort with the very people who are having a different
opinion now and I wonder how that happens.
Hood: Madam Mayor, Councilman Zaremba, I can try to answer at least what I have
heard from folks. I was wearing a different hat at the time and I was doing more current
planning stuff and I attended a few hours at the charrette, but I was not an active
participant in that. But what I have heard from two or three of the property owners out
there was -- and there is two different things going on. This same project -- ACHD
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project was going through its public involvement process at the same time our Ten Mile
charrette and Ten Mile interchange planning process was going on. So, some people
were going to ACHD's public involvement and they are looking at a five lane roadway
with attached sidewalks, you know, typical ACHD roadway stuff for 2006-2007 when
this was going on. And what we had going on at our charrette, which they were invited
to, was something evolved that was different, that included medians and that was kind
of a later add onto that. The genesis of the medians, though, from what I understand, is
access management and that's the key. That's why I think the critical part is limiting the
access points. It's not that they are these grandios landscape medians. Yes, it's an
entryway corridor into the city and it would be nice for them to be landscaped, but you
got an interchange with who knows how many cars a day day one that opens and you're
going to get a lot of people that are going to be using Franklin, so we didn't want to gum
that up and have a five lane roadway that recently constructed that fails. So, limiting
access was the driver for how we got to -- first of all, landscape -- or medians at all and,
then, later on that they be landscaped. So, yes, they were invited. What I understand
that a lot of them did not participate,. because they thought they were participating in the
roadway aspect at ACHD. We have learned a little bit from that with our south Meridian
plan and that we coordinated better with ACHD on some of that stuff and we did joint
public involvement meetings, but at least that's the -- I don't want to call them an
excuse, but that's the story I have heard from a lot of the property owners where we
didn't know this was going on. Yes, we tried to get them involved, but they really -- they
said they didn't attend or whatever -- oppose us previously if they would have known.
So, I don't know if that fully answered the question, but it's hard for me to answer that,
because I don't know what they were thinking at the time.
Zaremba: I didn't really expect you to plumb all of their minds and answer for them, but
that helps.
Hood: But that was going on. But that was -- ACHD's process with this design was
going on concurrently, so that -- I could see that happening.
Zaremba: Yeah.
Hood: I will --
De Weerd: I think it's so late, you're not going to get very valuable information.
Zaremba:. Some of us are fading.
De Weerd: I know I'm not engaged.
Hoaglun: I just noticed that Caleb never did say when -- when Councilman Rountree
was talking about some things we need to fix, he never did say I will take care of it. I
didn't hear that at all.
Rountree: He will. He will.
Meridian City Council
May 26, 2010
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Simison: Well, just to give you an idea -- if Jaycee could read the two items that are on
the agenda for the joint meeting. ACRD did -- they did ask to take off the Three Rivers
discussion that we had on there, because of the joint workshop meeting that they are
holding on this.
Bird: That's June 9th.
Simison: On June 9th. You know, our thought was to leave it up -- to try to get them to
leave it on there, so there could be a discussion beforehand, but would ask that
question if that's something you guys want to continue to have at that meeting.
Rountree: I don't see any value in talking about it twice.
Simison: Okay. The other things were the MOU for waiver of fees that was on there --
Holman: Fiber.
Simison: And Fiber. So, those are the only two things on the workshop agenda as a
joint meeting agenda at this time, unless you want to delve into any of these other topics
with them at this point in time. We can always just leave it as an other and leave it up to
-- at that point in time for discussion, but these are the two items at this point in time for
the joint meeting.
Rountree: Didn't we have another topic?
De Weerd: Yeah.
Bird: Yeah.
Simison: We had Three Rivers, but it was off.
Rountree: Kleiner Park.
Bird: And Kleiner Park.
Rountree: Yeah.
Simison: But that was resolved tonight, maybe?
Zaremba: Yes and no. It actually wouldn't be a bad idea to have a discussion about
Records Road. Not necessarily Kleiner Park, but Records Road.
Simison: Okay.
Meridian City Council
May 26, 2010
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Hoaglun: And I don't know that it's an issue that Councilman Rountree raised, Idon't --
you know, we aren't going to solve that in that meeting. Is there a portion of that
discussion we can have to kind of say, okay, let's at least take this -- I don't know if
there is. If there is not, then, let's not open the whole Pandora's box and not get
anywhere and waste everyone's time. But if there is some things we can say, you know
what, we need to focus on this and maybe set the stage for future discussions is always
a good thing, but I mean Councilman Rountree raised some issues that I think we need
to -- need to kind of see if we can make some progress on. But I'm not sure how to put
it in that nice neat box to --
De Weerd: Yeah. I don't know if we can do that before our joint meeting.
Rountree: And I'm not sure it's necessarily a joint meeting. I would -- my sense is that
we -- the other cities in the county need to recognize that there -- that, you know, we
have not talked about the elephant in the room for the past four or five years. Hire a
respected facilitator, give that person what the issues are and have him, her, whatever,
get us all in the room together, so we can yell and scream at each other and still come
out speaking. I mean it's -- it's a big issue.
Hoaglun: I guess what I'm thinking is if there is a way to focus -- and this comes from
foreign relations stuff where the two Chinas -- Taiwan's pursuing a strategy of economy
first, politics later. If we can pursue a strategy of certain things -- the economy --
economics of projects and -- and we don't talk about the politics, we just find some
areas we can reach agreement on and work on structure and, then, that evolves into
some of those bigger, tougher issues that might be out there. I don't know. Just a
thought.
Simison: Well, we could narrow it down to one specific topic and ask about the
retention pond and the pathway. If that's something that they feel like they should be
party to that dialogue or part of their plan to meet our comprehensive plans and that
would be one specific instance, which could open the box, and the only reason why we
have been waiting to -- the split corridor is a ways away, but, you know, their staff has
been waiting on our staff to provide them with some information and at some point in
time before too long I think we have to get back to them on what we want to do as they
are going through the design process for that. So, that's at least a topic that could be
timely, but we haven't engaged them at staff level to figure out if we need to be pushing
or not.
Rountree: I don't know as a Council we have consensus amongst ourselves whether or
not that's something we should participate in or not or they should do. We need to have
that discussion first, Robert.
Simison: Okay. Well, we will just leave it with Records Road, add that on. Those will
be the three topics for now and if anything else comes up at that meeting in an
appropriate way, there is always the other on the agenda --
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May 26, 2010
Page 77 of 79
Bird: Guarantee there will be.
Simison: Yeah. Oh, yeah.
Holman: Can task -- so, at this point I believe that Peggy has responded that
Councilman Rountree and Councilman Zaremba would be attending the meeting on the
9th regarding the three cities. Is that it?
Bird: On the three cities?
Holman: Yeah. On June 9th.
De Weerd: Three Cities river crossing.
Bird: I was going to plan an attending. I told -- I thought I told Peggy.
Holman: Okay. I just had been --
Bird: I want to go down and give my opinion on it.
Holman: Okay. So --
Zaremba: I'm a yes.
Hoaglun: Is that the 10th?
Rountree: On the 9th, Brad.
De Weerd: At what time?
Rountree: 11:45 as I recall.
Zaremba: Yeah.
Bird: They are feeding us lunch.
Hood: Or 9:45 I believe it is.
Holman: No. 9:45 is the one on the -- that's the joint meeting. I believe it's at -- I'm
sorry, I'm logged in as Jacy Jones, so I can't access anyway.
Hood: You're right. They are providing lunch, so get there so they can start the
discussion at noon.
Bird: That's what it says.
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May 26, 2010
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Simison: Okay. Thank you.
De Weerd: It needs to go away.
Hood: Maybe just one more. I know everybody is fading. Maybe some -- some happy
news to report or maybe something for the joint meeting potentially. CICAC. We are
making some headway on working -- the system seems to be broken with how projects
are prioritized at ACRD. We send them our priority list and they spit out something
totally different. What we are looking to do is revamp the whole system, all six cities in
the county sit down and we, with ACHD staff, compile a list of five years worth of
projects that are constrained with their budget -- within their budget, that we recommend
as a group to the commission to approve, rather that having ACHD staff recommend a
group of projects. I would like to see an update given to you all on -- it's in its infancy,
but if the commission squashes that, it's going to be the same old way they prioritize
projects for the five year work plan. So, again, I would like to see that added, if it's
something you all are interested in. I know it was -- that wasn't much of an overview of
what it is, but we are working -- Boise city, Eagle -- Kuna is not at the table, Star is not
at the table. We can't get them to come to the table on this thing. But. it's -- the idea is
we wear a regional hat, it's not this -- we put in this, we want that. It's we are looking at
transportation from a regional perspective and we say this group of projects is best for
Ada County, not you get two, you get one, you get half of one, because of population or
whatever you're putting into the pot, but, you know, it's got to be run through models
and all kinds of technical analysis, but we think this is the best group of projects for the
region for transportation, for safety, for congestion, for all those things, but, again, I just
wanted to -- if you don't want to do that, that's fine, too, I can come back later, but I think
it's exciting, I really do think we can make some headway if -- if ACHD commission
allows us to do this, what the CICAC is recommending, which is their charge, is to
recommend to the ACRD commission how their impact fees should be spent and other
fees and how this programing process works. So, do with it what you will, but I thought
would at least put that out there at this late hour. I'm sorry that I had to share that, but
that is some --
Zaremba: I, for one, would like to have that discussion and I have just -- when, their
prioritization point system was put together, the theory behind it was a very good theory,
but you run the projects through that system and you come up with a certain priority
and, as you said, when you see their list a month later isn't following that list.
Hood: Right.
Zaremba: And they have said, well, we changed it, because of this or that and most of
the criteria that they are saying we changed it because of this, already was part of the
point system, and it seems that a few things trump the whole rest of the point system,
so if there is a different way to do that and, then, not allow them to massage it after
the --
Meridian City Council
May 26, 2010
Page 79 of 79
Hood: There would still be that opportunity for -- the commission has to approve the list
of projects. I mean there is still that opportunity for them to massage it, make it -- make
the group of projects whatever they want it to be, but at least there would be a unified --
all six cities in the county saying this is what we believe your priorities for the next five,
six, seven years should be. If they choose to deviate from that, they are choosing to
deviate from that. We have done -- we have some ways we can legitimize that group of
projects and not say, well, we have got this money, we have to spend it, so we pick
priority number 57, because it costs the right amount.
Zaremba: Yeah.
Hood: So -- anyway, sorry I had to --
Zaremba: I think we will be having that discussion with them.
Rountree: I think we talk about it when the CICAC is ready to talk about it. It's,
obviously, not our next meeting with ACHD.
Hood: That's fine. It would be more of an update from their staff, rather than a
discussion across table, so that's fine, too. So --
Rountree: Yeah. That would be good.
Simison: Thank you.
Bird: Mr. President, I move we adjourn.
Rountree: Second.
Zaremba: We have a motion and a second. All in favor say aye. Any opposed?
MOTION CARRIED: ALL AYES.
Zaremba: We are adjourned. Thank you.
MEETING ADJOURNED AT 11:39 P.M.
(AUDIO RECORDING ON FILE OF THESE PROCEEDINGS)
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