2021-12-15 Joint Meeting Packet Agenda for the Meridian Development Corporation Board Meeting – December 15, 2021 Page 1 of 2
All materials presented at public meetings shall become the property of the MDC.
Anyone desiring accommodation for disabilities related to documents and /or hearings, please contact the Meridian City Clerk’s
Office at 888-4433 at least 48 hours prior to the public meeting.
104 E. Fairview Ave
#239
Meridian, ID 83642
208.830.7786
www.meridiandevelopmentcorp.com
SPECIAL MEETING AGENDA
JOINT MEETING OF THE MERIDIAN DEVELOPMENT CORPORATION BOARD OF
COMMISSIONERS AND THE MERIDIAN CITY COUNCIL
Wednesday, December 15, 2021, 4:30 PM
Meridian City Hall, City Council Conference Room
33 East Broadway Avenue - Meridian, Idaho
Via Zoom (PC):
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/88333164681?pwd=ZTNqc1FnVW5rcEdwLzAzWkxMb3lEQT09
Meeting ID: 883 3316 4681
Passcode: 305565
Via Zoom (Phone):
Call In Number: 1 (253) 215-8782
Meeting ID: 883 3316 4681
Passcode: 305565
1. Call Meeting to Order [Winder]:
2. Meridian Development Corporation Roll-call Attendance [Winder]:
______Dave Winder – Chairman ______Dan Basalone - Member
______Nathan Mueller– Vice-Chairman ______Tammy de Weerd – Member
______Steve Vlassek– Secretary/Treasurer ______Rob McCarvel – Member
______Diane Bevan – Member
______Treg Bernt – Member
______Kit Fitzgerald – Member
Meridian City Council Roll-call Attendance:
______Robert Simison – Mayor ______Joe Borton
______Treg Bernt– Council President ______Liz Strader
______Jessica Perrault ______Brad Hoaglun
______Luke Cavener
ACTION AND DISCUSSION ITEMS
3. Action Item: Confirm the Agenda [Winder]:
4. Action Items: Civic Block Request for Proposal:
A. Staff Update [Cameron Arial]
Agenda for the Meridian Development Corporation Board Meeting – December 15, 2021 Page 2 of 2
All materials presented at public meetings shall become the property of the MDC.
Anyone desiring accommodation for disabilities related to documents and /or hearings, please contact the Meridian City Clerk’s
Office at 888-4433 at least 48 hours prior to the public meeting.
B. Respondent Addendums:
1. River Caddis Presentation
2. Pacific Companies/Novembrewhisky Presentation
C. Meridian Development Corporation/City Council Discussion
D. Motion from Meridian Development Corporation regarding
respondent selection
E. Motion from the Meridian City Council regarding respondent
selection
F. Motion from Meridian Development Corporation regarding
forthcoming Memorandum of Agreement project negotiation
priorities
G. Motion from Meridian City Council regarding forthcoming
Memorandum of Agreement project negotiation priorities
5. Adjourn the Meeting [Winder]:
Executive Session per Idaho State Code 74-206: The Board may go into executive session
pursuant to Idaho Code Section 74-206 with the specific applicable code subsection cited as
part of the motion to go into executive session.
Regular meetings of the Meridian Development Corporation Board of Commissioners are
scheduled for the second Wednesday of each month at 7:30 am and the fourth Wednesday at
4:00 pm in the North Conference Room at the Meridian City Hall.
Civic Block RFP
Respondent Follow Up Presentations
Joint MDC –City Council Meeting
December 15, 2021
Civic Block Site
Process To-Date
X RFP Issued –May 3
X Pre-Proposal Meeting, Site Walk –June 7
X Addendums Issued –June 17 and June 24
X Proposals Due –August 24
X September/October –Review Committee Meetings, Respondent
Presentations/Interviews
X November 16 –Joint City Council/MDC meeting, continued to today
X December 8 –Receipt of follow up information from two Respondents
Scoring Criteria
X Iconic, mixed-use development -15 POINTS
X Economic benefit -15 POINTS
X Team qualification and experience –20 POINTS
X Financial viability –20 POINTS
X Destination Downtown, URD Plans, and Comp Plan –10 POINTS
X Detailed plan and completion timeline –10 POINTS
X Adequate parking –5 POINTS
X Creativity, innovation and sustainability –5 POINTS
X BONUS: Additional Parking –5 POINTS; Family wage jobs –5 POINTS
X TOTAL: 110 POINTS
X 11 Review Committee Members = 1,210 POINTS POSSIBLE
Review Committee
Council President/MDC Commissioner Treg Bernt
Councilman Brad Hoaglun
Mayor Robert Simison
MDC Chairman Dave Winder
MDC Commissioner Dan Basalone
Meridian Chamber Executive Director Sean Evans
Meridian Chamber ED Committee Co-Chair/ICCU VP, Comm Lending, Clint Shiflet
Parks and Recreation Director Steve Siddoway
COMPASS Executive Director Matt Stoll
Parks and Recreation Commission President Jo Greer
unBound Manager/Planning & Zoning Commissioner Nick Grove
Scoring Results
Project Related Public Improvements
X Community Center Site Improvements $1,500,000 –2,000,000
X Community Center Parking, 170 stalls*$6,000,000 –7,000,000
X Hunter Lateral Relocation (Union URD only)$276,000
X Outdoor Public Gathering Spaces (preferred element)Unknown
X 2nd Street Revitalization Improvements Unknown
TOTAL $7,776,000 -$9,276,000
* Community Center was not a requirement. It is likely that any project will include some public parking.
TIF Generation
Procedural Guidance
X Not bound by Review Committee recommendation, but will consider
it as well as all Respondent materials and presentations
X May seek clarification
X If a Preferred Developer is selected:
X Parties should cite any “non-negotiable” project elements
X Staff enters into negotiations to develop DA/OPA terms
X Parties decide whether to execute DA/OPA at their sole discretion
X If Parties cannot agree on a Preferred Developer, the project will be
tabled for future consideration and direction
* Not approving transfer of properties or reimbursement of TIF revenues at this time
Minimum Agreement Requirements
X Developer has sufficient, viable financial resources
X TIF reimbursement used for qualifying public improvements
X TIF sufficient to complete public improvements desired
X Performance milestones and liquidated damages
X May engage a third-party audit
X Developer return considerations:
X Developer upfront equity contribution for public improvements
X Cap rate comparisons by agreed-upon uses
Staff to seek Parties’ direction if negotiations stall with Preferred Developer
Current Actions
Two Motions Today:
1.Select Preferred Developer
X Accept Review Committee recommendation and direct staff to enter
into negotiations with River Caddis
X Direct staff to enter into negotiations with The Pacific Companies/
Novembrewhisky
X Reject all proposals, table project for future consideration and direction
2.Specific Direction
X Provide staff with direction, citing any desired project elements and/or
future actions
Future and Ongoing Actions
Immediate Future
X Begin negotiations with Preferred Developer to ensure project features desired
elements and minimum agreement requirements are met
X Work with Preferred Developer to engage downtown stakeholders
X Collaborate with Preferred Developer, ACHD, and downtown stakeholders to
explore revitalization options for 2nd Street
X If negotiations mutually-agreeable, staff will present a summary of terms and a
DA/OPA for the Parties’ consideration
X If negotiations stall, staff will seek Parties’ direction
Ongoing
X Staff will continue to work with NMID and ACHD on relocation of the Hunter Lateral
Questions?
34672621.2
34886958.2
1038 Trowbridge Road
East Lansing, MI
Office: 517 703-2107
Mobile: 517 420-7393
Email : jmcgraw@rivercaddis.com
Web : www.rivercaddis.com
www.rivercaddis.com
December 8, 2021
Ashley Squyres, Administrator
Meridian Development Corporation
104 East Fairview Avenue, #239
Meridian, Idaho 83642
meridiandevelopmentcorp@gmail.com
RE: City of Meridian Civic Block Project Cover Letter for RFP Submittal
Dear Ashley,
Pursuant to the Meridian Development Corporation and City of Meridian’s (“Municipality”) Request for
Information (“RFI”), we have developed additional project concept program designs to which we believe
outline our versatility and collaborative potential as your development partner in this Civic Block Project.
The following submittal will outline multiple options we could pursue alongside and as partner with the City
in seeking to achieve more holistic objectives. Through redirected due diligence and understanding what
the Municipality is looking to achieve, we believe we can significantly reduce or remove the financial gap
shown in our initial design and presentation, specifically through our collaborative development approach.
Immediately below, please find the considerations included in our approach:
Goals/Objectives taken into consideration and met through these revised designs.
1. Provide commercial (retail and/or Class A office) instead of municipal space to energize and activate
the street front
2. Provide potential additional parking for existing and future demand (collaboration required)
3. Significantly reduce or remove financial gap from the equation
4. Include options to collaborate with the municipality – showing versatility in partnership
5. Integrate replacement of existing park/plaza into the development plan, either on-site or off and
coordinate with the Municipality to maximize community benefit.
6. Provide substantial increase of taxable value and bring more residents downtown
7. If selected, RCD will engage the public through its design process to collaborate through ideas and
include public input into the programming of the site where possible
The following options are weighted by quickest potential delivery timelines, and least to most complex.
Therefore, the project option listed first will have the quickest turnaround time and the least complex.
Concept A: We have removed the Community Center from the development per the request of the
Municipality and replaced the 20,000 square feet in the site plan to show 15,000 square feet of commercial
space (office, retail, municipal, flex, etc.). We have also taken out one full floor of parking and the partial
underground parking. We have replaced the fourth floor of parking with residential units to increase the tax
base, increase density downtown and provide a positive impact to the community. In turn, we have provided
a progressive vertically integrated building with a 1:1 unit/stall parking ratio and additional parking for
commercial tenants and their patrons aligning with the City’s comprehensive development aspirations.
34672621.2
34886958.2
1038 Trowbridge Road
East Lansing, MI
Office: 517 703-2107
Mobile: 517 420-7393
Email : jmcgraw@rivercaddis.com
Web : www.rivercaddis.com
www.rivercaddis.com
Concept B: Similar to Concept A, but with additional parking in lieu of additional residential units. We have
removed the 20,000 square foot Community Center and replaced with 15,000 square feet of commercial
space identical to above. The difference between the two plans allows for the Municipality to lease or condo
a portion of the parking for public use. We would still provide a vertically integrated development with a 1:1
unit/stall ratio and we would also allow for an additional 200 public stalls for future use leased by the
Municipality using our TIF generation.
Concept C: We continue with our original submittal meeting programmatic requests of the authored RFP
where we outline a Public Private Partnership including the community center into our development. We
believe this concept does meet many of the Municipality’s goals, the additional public parking options and
an iconic community draw to the downtown area.
We would like to remind the Municipality that we have surrounded ourselves by team members that are
best in class. This includes: (1) National Parking Developer/Consultant; (2) Boise legal counsel whom
specialize in municipal incentives; (3) etc. We believe we have a very strong plan, including our original
proposal benefits such as the festival street improvements, to move forward on but need support from the
Municipality. Our team has a lot of experience in turning obstacles into opportunities and we collaborate
wonderfully with communities and their stakeholders. We appreciate your consideration of our team,
process and concepts and look forward to your final decision.
Sincerely,
RIVER CADDIS DEVELOPMENT, LLC
John McGraw
Director of Development
Ashley Squyres, Administrator
Meridian Development Corporation
Mailing Address Only:
104 E. Fairview Avenue #239
Meridian, ID 83642
RE: Civic Block Project – Additional Comments
Ms. Squyres,
Thank you so much for your hard work on this solicitation. On behalf the Pacific Companies
team, I also want to thank City staff and the selection committee for what is an arduous and
complex process. This is NOT our first rodeo with a municipal partnership, and we can
appreciate the challenges contained therein.
The clear takeaway, based on our observations, from the November 16th joint meeting was the
following:
1. Both companies presenting, suggested that there was capacity and experience for either
company to be awarded the project
2. Both companies conveyed the need for further engagement with the City to define
WHAT the project would contain and HOW best to deliver said project
3. Both companies conveyed that the real decision that was needing to be made was to
select a partner and NOT a project at this point
4. Both companies warned against another RFP being competed as the URD is ‘on the
clock’ and you have two great companies to choose from
As such, TPC would offer the following reiterations of what a partnership with us would entail
for the Civic Block Project. Contained in these comments are a clear delineation between us
and our competition and should afford the voting body a path to selecting the right partner.
1. We proposed a mixed-use project that led with workforce housing and Class A office
space. These are both current gaps in our downtown and are well suited for the location
of this property near our legacy downtown residents. We chose to place the Class A
office space on the corner of 2nd and Idaho Ave to further ‘activate’ business and energy
on 2nd Ave. We see this as a critical area for our downtown as reinforced by the other
respondent. We anticipate that a final design would further promote 2nd Ave (between
Idaho and Broadway) as an area for activation in our downtown core.
2. We proposed a traditional URD model that delivers financial resources to the district.
Based on the City estimates, our project was delivering $6.4M of tax revenue to the
district, with a requested, estimated reimbursement of $2.3M for infrastructure
improvements. This leaves over $4M of URD funds to further invest and develop the
district over the life of that entity. This was in sharp contrast to the other respondent
who had a gap of $14M in their project, without a clear plan of how that would be
addressed, or by whom.
3. We proposed a parking deck below our residential footprint to support all the
residential and office users. We further shared a willingness to work with existing
stakeholders (VRT and MLD) on optimization of the site to improve upon our plan. We
further expressed a willingness to add a deck to this structure that could be beneficial to
the City and its parking goals. All of these would be addressed during the proposed
design process.
4. We proposed our project with a clear understanding of Downtown Meridian. Our
proposal is grounded in nearly 10 years of development in our downtown core,
including the Old Town Lofts project. It includes discriminators from the Destination
Downtown and Comprehensive Plan for the area. We did NOT propose a community
center or park based on this knowledge. This is NOT the site that should accommodate
these products, and I look forward to a City Council vision for these services and their
locations in the future. This is an Urban Renewal project, not a replacement for City
services.
One of the realizations, that became apparent in re-watching this session, was the need for
collaboration and partnership in this project during execution. As such, the Pacific Companies
has asked me (Josh Evarts) to play a more central role during execution. We don’t have a title
for this, but we do know that ANY time required to do the following will be committed to by
myself:
1. Meetings with stakeholders during the design process
2. Meetings with City staff during the plan submission and project groundbreaking
3. Partnering in communication with the public (specifically residents east of the project)
on impacts of the project
4. Meeting with the Chamber of Commerce, Downtown Committee, and other property
owners on development of 2nd Ave as a ‘Festival’ concept
5. Ongoing support of the Pacific Companies and their commercial leasing team on
capturing key tenants for the Class A office space
As a resident who lives on 3rd (one block north of the site) and a business owner who runs his
business kitty corner from this project site on 2nd and Idaho Ave, I am committed to getting this
project right. This project will have challenges to overcome, and the right partner will be crucial
when facing them. We proposed just such an invested, knowledgeable, and experienced team.
We look forward to the fruits of your continued deliberations and selection. We standby for any
further questions or clarifications.
Sincerelly,
Joshua Evarts, The Pacific Companies & Novembrewhisky Properties, LLC
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corp - Joint November 16, 2021.
A Joint Meeting of the Meridian City Council and the Meridian Development Corporation
was called to order at 3:00 p.m., Tuesday, November 16, 2021, by Mayor Robert Simison.
Members Present: Robert Simison, Luke Cavener, Treg Bernt, Jessica Perreault and
Brad Hoaglun.
Members Absent: Joe Borton and Liz Strader.
ROLL-CALL ATTENDANCE
MERIDIAN CITY COUNCIL ROLL CALL ATTENDANCE
_____ Liz Strader _____ Joe Borton
__X__ Brad Hoaglun __X__ Treg Bernt
__X__ Jessica Perreault __X__ Luke Cavener
__X__ Mayor Robert E. Simison
MERIDIAN DEVELOPMENT CORPORATION ROLL CALL ATTENDANCE
__X__ Dave Winder __X__ Nathan Mueller
__X__ Dan Basalone __X__ Tammy de Weerd
__X__ Rob McCarvel __X__ Diane Bevan
_____ Steve Vlassek _____ Treg Bernt
_____Kit Fitzgerald
Simison: We will call this meeting to order. For the record it is November 16th, 2021, at
3:03 p.m. for the joint session of the Meridian City Council and Meridian Development
Corporation Board of Commissioners. We will begin this afternoon's meeting with roll call
attendance.
ADOPTION OF AGENDA
Simison: Next item up is the adoption of the agenda.
Bernt: Mr. Mayor?
Simison: Councilman Bernt.
Bernt: I move that we adopt the agenda as published.
Hoaglun: Second the motion.
Simison: I have a motion and a second to adopt the agenda as published. Is there any
discussion? If not, all in favor signify by saying aye. Opposed nay? The ayes have it
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 2 of 47
and the agenda is adopted.
MOTION CARRIED: FIVE AYES. ONE ABSENT.
ACTION ITEMS
1. Civic Block Request for Proposals Review Committee
Recommendation, Respondent Presentations, City Council/Meridian
Development Corporation Board of Commissioners Discussion, and
Staff Direction
Simison: So, with that we will begin with item one, Civic Block Requests for Proposals,
Review Committee Recommendation, Respond and Presentations, City Council and
Meridian Development Corporation Board of Commission, Discussion and Staff Direction.
Borton: Mr. Mayor?
Simison: Councilman Borton.
Borton: At the outset I have and will continue to recuse myself from any consideration
and discussion of these projects or others, so I will continue that now.
Simison: Thank you, Mr. Borton. Cameron, turn this over to you.
Arial: Mr. Mayor, Members of the Council, as well as the MDC Board, it's a pleasure to
be with you. Cameron Arial with the city and the Community Development Director. Also
have many colleagues here with me. Ashley Squyres with MDC and others. But we are
really pleased to be with you, particularly with this -- the presentations that you will see
and the prospects that -- that will be before you and what it means for our city and our
downtown. So, I wanted to just briefly give you a quick background and summary, chart
a path for this evening and, then, also get -- get right into the -- the meat of it, which is the
presentations and the deliberations. So, real quickly as a -- just a backdrop, the city and
MDC have been hard at work on doing something here on this project for a number of
years. I think it's safe to say maybe even over a decade, but we put this out for RFP. We
got three fantastic responses, two of which you will -- you will see to -- see tonight and
just to give you an overview, here is the -- the block that we will be talking about. Just a
few elements to be particularly aware of is the city's properties, the -- the current
community center, Centennial Park, and -- and, then, also the -- MDC's property, which
is the -- the parking lot to the southeast there. I will point out to you as well there is that
blue -- kind of light blue lines right through the middle of it bisecting it is the Hunter Lateral
and we will talk about that -- that improvement, as well as potential improvements along
2nd Street and 3rd Street as well. So, just to orient you to -- to the -- to the site and to
the -- to the proposal. Let me now kind of dive -- let's see -- right now. Okay. There we
go. So, I wanted to just touch briefly -- really what we were going for with this -- with this
RFP. I think it's -- it's safe to say that we need something special. Iconic mixed use
project. Economic benefit. We are really looking for a team that can deliver it with the
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 3 of 47
financial wherewithal to do that. Also it's something that's going to be in compliance with
our visions, not only for MDC, but also certainly for the city and the urban renewal plans
in place. Parking is a big aspect of this and, of course, just the -- the overall project itself
and what's being proposed and what we -- what will be delivered. So, I will just point you
to that, that we have those components baked into -- into this and, then, of course, the --
the total possible points of 1,210. I wanted to just briefly highlight those that have been
participatory in evaluating these proposals from the review committee. We brought
together 11 individuals from across, you know, diverse backgrounds that really helped us
evaluate them and you will be hearing from the lucky one. We -- we have Sean Evans
from the Chamber here who will be representing the committee this evening. So, the
results of that. What you will see here is there was a recommendation from the committee
-- and I won't -- I won't steal Sean's thunder, but here is the results of that and you will --
you will hear Sean's detail on -- on the scoring and -- and the recommendations there. I
wanted to highlight -- and you will -- you will have seen this in the staff report as well, but
some of the key elements that we are trying to achieve from the public's interest out of
this proposal both, from the city, as well as from MDC. So, there is the -- the community
center site improvements. There is an estimate there of cost. Community center parking
-- and/or parking. The relocation of the Hunter Lateral, potentially public gathering space
improvements and the revitalization of 2nd Street. So, just to give you a taste for what
those potential public items that we would need to cover in order to have a -- have a good
project. And, then, again, I do feel it's important to note -- and this was in the staff report
as well, that the community center was not a requirement of a response, but was certainly
there for respondents to bake in if they so choose -- chose. So, from that and from the
proposals, just to really focus you on the bottom line here, you have the two proposals
that will be presented tonight, the River Caddis proposal, as well as the Pacific Companies
November -- November Whiskey proposal. Based on what their project value we were
able to generate a TIF revenue generation calculus for you and so you can see here River
Caddis would generate roughly 11 million and, then, when you back out -- or adjust that
for the community center, it's approximately eight -- 9.8 million in TIF generation and,
then, the Pacific Companies would generate around 6.4, 6.5 million. Again just to kind of
highlight, you know, what we were trying to accomplish, at least from the public's interest
and, then, what the projects would actually generate. Now, I'm going to turn some time
over to Ted briefly for some procedural comments.
Baird: Good afternoon, Members of the Council and the Commissioners. I am Ted Baird
with the city Legal Department and I just want to briefly go over what's happened up to
now and what will happen when you take over. According to the specifics that were
contained in the request for proposal, you are not bound by the recommendations from
the review committee. You can consider that recommendation, along with the
presentations that you hear today. You can ask for clarification. You can ask for additional
information to the presenters after they have made their presentation. The most important
thing about -- about your task that's ahead of you is that the intent is that an award, if one
is made, would go to the proposer that both MDC and the city feel is in their best interest.
The interest of the parties was a recurring theme of the RFP. So, after your deliberations
today, if you are ready to move forward and pick a preferred developer, you can give
guidance to staff regarding contingencies and requirements that the staff would enter into
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 4 of 47
negotiations for a DA, OPA, and other guiding documents. Those documents would come
back to you for approval and you could approve it at your sole discretion. Just a brief
jump ahead, if those discussions with the first preferred developer are not successful, the
staff will come back and let you know where we are and it would be your choice whether
to terminate negotiations and whether -- after that whether you want to engage the second
preferred developer and, finally, just the asterisk at the bottom of your screen, we are not
approving the transfer of the property at this time and we are not approving the use of the
TIF revenues at this time, so -- are there any questions with that legal overview? Thank
you for your time.
Arial: So, just -- as just a quick overview, as next steps from staff. So, you know, we --
we as staff are -- stand ready to listen to or take any feedback, any commentary that you
would like to see going forward, but we would look to vet the preferred developer for their
ability to sufficiently complete a project and that would include their financial viability. So,
just want to make that clear, that we would go through that due diligence. Obviously, if
there is -- to verify that any TIF supported infrastructure improvements were -- are
qualifying, so that, you know, they comply with state statute and what have you. Also to
make sure that the TIF, in order to support those improvements, is sufficient to do so and,
then, we would also negotiate and consider milestones that would need to be completed,
as well as any, you know, liquidated damages for nonconformance or nonperformance.
We also may consider, if you so choose, an audit from a third party of any pro forma or
financial information and, then, also, you know, make sure that we are validating, you
know, developer equity and those types of things, as well as cap rates and assumptions
behind that. So, we can -- you can validate a proposal. And, then, of course, if that isn't
-- doesn't meet the specifications that you put forward, we would come back to you, report
regardless, and seek your guidance as to how you would like to proceed. If you would
like to go to another respondent or so on. So, to that point, you know, there really is three
possible outcomes. You can accept the -- the committee's recommendation and Sean
will get to that. To go forward with River Caddis with any other, you know, additional
considerations or direction there. Go with a negotiation to enter negotiation with Pacific
Companies or reject all proposals. Those are certainly all on the table for you. And, then,
again, to -- somewhat to Ted's point, there are future considerations as well. So, enter
into those negotiations, see where that takes us, bring back a potential for a development
agreement and owner participation agreement for your consideration and that's when,
you know, it gets real; right? So, we are talking transference of property, as well as
commitment of revenues on city and MDCs part. And, then, of course, we would continue
to work with Nampa-Meridian Irrigation District on the relocation of the Hunter Lateral.
That's certainly a big part of what staff would be a part of, as well as the -- the revitalization
of 2nd Street. And with that I think I'm going to turn it to Sean.
Evans: Thank you, Cameron. Mr. Mayor, City Council Members and MDC
Commissioners, I want to thank you for inviting me to speak today on behalf of the review
committee and the review committee would like to also thank you for inviting members of
the community to participate in the review process for this project that were submitted in
response to the RFP for the civic block project in downtown Meridian. Our purpose to
review -- our purpose was to review and evaluate the submitted proposals and
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 5 of 47
recommend to the -- to these bodies a preferred project and developer. The review -- the
review committee had the opportunity to meet with and discuss the goal of the process
and review the submitted projects prior to interviews and presentations from the
developers. It was clear that the goal was to identify an iconic signature mixed use
development that enhances the character and vitality of downtown Meridian. The projects
that we reviewed all had their own unique and creative perspectives of the project, ranging
from three stories to eight stories, from 124 units to 173 units. Some utilize the second
street for public space, while others included an outdoor plaza and rooftop gardens. The
committee posed great questions to each of the developers based on the submitted
proposals. Some projects did not necessarily meet all of the requirements. Net parking
was one of them that was a great concern to this committee and some questions about
how they would continue to meet those needs. Some of the projects included a
community center in the proposal, even though that was not a required element of the
RFP. Respondents were asked about changes to their proposals that might include
including commercial spaces, increasing parking and what their projects might look like if
the community center was removed from the project or added to their proposals. In the
end we reviewed three proposals that all had their merits and asked to be scored on the
project criteria that included is the proposal likely to deliver a signature iconic mixed use
development? Is the proposal likely to achieve substantial economic benefit to the
community? Does the respondents and their team have the qualifications and experience
necessary to deliver the project? Does the proposal substantially conformed to the vision
of the destination downtown, the Meridian revitalization and union district plans and the
Comprehensive Plan of the City of Meridian? And, finally, does the proposal demonstrate
creativity, innovation, and sustainability regarding the scope and design of the project?
All of this was subjective to each of the committee members view of the presentation and
what they, too, had envisioned for downtown. After each committee member submitted
their score cards, it was clear that one project stood above the others in the view of the
committee. The review committee officially recommends the River Caddis project to be
considered by the City Council and MDC board as the project to -- for the civic block and
to continue the redevelopment of downtown Meridian. We wish you the best in reviewing
the proposals yourself and have confidence that you will make the best decision for this
piece of land in our wonderful downtown. Thank you.
Simison: Cameron, anything else or would you like to see if there is any questions?
Arial: That's staff's presentation. Again appreciate Sean's commitment there, but, yep,
we are open to any feedback or questions and now leave it to you and the presentations.
Simison: Thank you. Any questions for staff? Okay. Then who do we have presenting
first?
De Weerd: I guess I do. I was looking at the overall scoring and I did not know what all
of them weighed them, because there are more than nine lines. So, can you maybe go
over the scoring and what they represent?
Arial: Mr. Mayor and Commissioner De Weerd, one moment, let me pull that slide back
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 6 of 47
up for you. Happy to do it. All right. Hopefully you got -- you all can see that -- that rubric
there. Okay. So, what you see on the far left here is the -- the total composite for those
that scored the -- each of the proposals. You see on the far left column is the River Caddis
scoring, then, the Pacific Companies and LCSG, which, of course, they have withdrawn
their -- their proposal at this point. So, we are really just looking at the two. You can see
there River Caddis had a total of 912 points and Pacific Companies had a total of 786
points. The far right column indicates the number of first place, second place, or third
place scores that were given.
Simison: I think he's going to get into what your question was, what are the category
scores that were selected.
De Weerd: I guess there is -- if you look at the RFP there is nine different spaces and
what you scored points on and there is 11 lines and so I just was trying to line them up
to --
Arial: Sure.
De Weerd: -- what the committee's thinking was and what they were scoring to.
Arial: Perfect. So, Mr. Mayor and Commissioner De Weerd, so what you are looking at
here is each individual scorer's total scores for each proposal. So, this is not the individual
breakouts of each of those. If that makes sense. So, each -- so, each proposals -- so,
for example, the top left there, River Caddis, it was given a score of 90. That's the total
score from that committee member, which, of course, is a total of 110 possible. They
gave them a 90, if that helps.
De Weerd: That makes more sense and trying to make sense of trying to see --
Arial: Yeah. Fair enough. And, then, just real quickly, so you see on the right there is the
number of first place, second place, third place scores they received and, then, we assign
that a point value and so you can kind of get a sense for that with the bottom column, but
that's -- that doesn't necessarily have any relevance in the scoring, it just gives you a
sense for the number of first place, second place, and third place scores that -- that each
respondent received.
Simison: Any additional questions?
Cavener: Mr. Mayor?
Simison: Mr. Cavener.
Cavener: Thanks, Mr. Mayor. Cameron, I know you kind of moved through some of the
scoring stuff a little fast for me. I assume no deference or bonus points awarded for a
local applicant versus somebody from out of state?
Arial: Mr. Mayor and Councilman Cavener, that's correct. So, there was no -- there was
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 7 of 47
no point value for a local developer.
Cavener: Okay. Thank you. Thank you for putting those back up, too. That's helpful.
Simison: Any additional questions? All right. And, if not, who is going to be our first
presenter?
Arial: Mr. Mayor, I believe we have the River Caddis team on deck first, so we will turn
some time to them --
Simison: Okay.
Arial: -- if you are ready for that.
Simison: I think we are ready and are we limiting time in presentation?
Arial: Yes , we are. So, limit of -- I believe it was 20 minutes and, then, ten minutes for
question for each.
Johnson: The mouse is very touchy. The keyboard will work great.
McGraw: Well, can you guys all hear me? Okay. Is this better? All right. My name is
John McGraw from River Caddis. Thanks so much for having us. It's so nice to be here
in person other than on a screen. Maybe it's a little bit easier to judge everybody's
reactions as well. So -- well, we have a presentation designed for today. We have a
timeline to go through a lot of what we have designed and I sent over the -- the
presentation into a PDF as well, so it could be printed if you guys have seen it. If you
have gone through our presentation there is a lot of similar things that you are going to
see today, so the flow of this presentation is going to be more dialogue, hopefully, rather
than just me talking at you guys. We have not had a lot of feedback on our project that
we have -- we have presented and so I'm going to kind of jump into who we are as a
group and you can see our team here.
Simison: Just for the record no one has seen your proposal yet. This is the first time
everyone has seen it.
McGraw: Oh, really?
Simison: Yes.
McGraw: Okay.
Simison: If that helps adjust your timing.
McGraw: Yeah . Thank you so much for letting me know. Okay. So, River Caddis. We
are from East Lansing, Michigan. We are not from Idaho. We have built and designed
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 8 of 47
and developed and own a project downtown Boise, Idaho. We are a family company. We
have a company of seven people. Our -- how we structured, how we look at projects
really is -- we walk into each project -- and I can get into this a little bit more, but we walk
into each project with the idea of community engagement, with adding value to
communities. You know, a lot of times we are from out of state and being not local, coming
into a place and developing, it's really hard to understand what people want. So, we ask
a lot of questions, we try to collaborate a lot, try to work with people and, then, reverse
engineer a plan that works. That enhances the identity of a location, not says River
Caddis has a plan and they want to put this idea in a location. So, from that respect we
have really backed into public private-partnerships, because that way we are able to take
ideas from municipalities, from stakeholders, from community members and reverse
engineer what this deal could look like and that's why this project was intriguing to us. It's
not the first time we have heard of it. I did meet some folks within Meridian when this first
came up and I didn't believe it was necessarily ready. I thought this project was too -- too
challenging. The rents weren't quite here yet in Meridian and what was looking to be
done was complex and we have just gone through it -- through it in Boise. So, we
understand the complexity of these public-private partnerships and we were concerned
back then and, to be honest, concerned now. This is a very complex project that we are
proposing. When you start working with government, with municipalities, and you are
trying to take an idea from what people think or want, to see now and, then, into the future,
you run into a lot of challenges and, to be honest, it's not really the first plan that you see
that you need to choose, it's the group -- our presentation, our RFP is designed as such
to say, listen, we are taking from 15 pages what we think you guys want and we are
backing into this idea that we think we can make work, but I also know I cannot make it
work without full collaboration, without us working together, without a give and take
relationship, without dialogue from each member community engagement. Stakeholders,
working with you folks. Now, this is such a hard process that if we are just coming to the
city of Meridian and saying this is what we see here, this is what should be here, you are
not going to get the best project. You are not going to get what's best for Meridian and
we don't want to be involved if we are not going to be able to provide you with the best
project that you are going to be looking at for the next 50 years. This is a big structure
and we don't know if this is what you want or need and we can't wait, if we are selected,
to get into the nuts and bolts of what this looks like. But it requires a lot of work. So, our
presentation -- and I'm sorry, I didn't know that -- I thought everybody had time to review
the 57 pages or such, but the slides are showing here our experience and it feels a little
egotistical to show these things, but I -- it is important for us to look at.
Simison: Yes , Mayor Tammy.
De Weerd: I think it is important that you know that we did get it in our packet -- our
packets were the first time we saw it, so --
McGraw: Okay.
De Weerd: -- we have seen your packet of information.
McGraw: Okay. So, you have seen my --
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 9 of 47
De Weerd: I just wanted to make sure that was clear.
McGraw: Yeah . Well, I mean if you have seen our packet, it's an inch thick, so there is a
lot of stuff to go through in 20 minutes, but, yeah, if you guys have seen it, you know, we
are -- collectively we have a strong group. We have people that are local, hyperlocal,
regional and, then, national and we did that on purpose. I understand that I'm not from
here, but it doesn't mean I don't have an immense amount of passion for this region. It
doesn't mean that I come here and I feel something special, that I have this intuition that
this place is an awesome place, that I like spending time downtown and getting lunch and
-- and I believe it can be the difference between a house and a home and I think that we
can present that and propose that and develop that for each one of these folks that are
potentially going to live here and it's not only just living here and taxable value, but also
increasing the sales tax, increasing the butts and seats for the restaurants, allowing
people to be downtown, live downtown, walk downtown, sit and enjoy everything. So, we
have a case study. Jules On 3rd. Now, if you -- if you have seen -- this is the rendering,
but if you have seen some of the other drawings that we have shown the site plans, you
will see that the structure is very similar to what we are proposing here for Jules On 3rd
and there is a couple comments also to the fact that it's duplicative or it's similar to our
project in Boise and I do want to clarify that we are not trying to recreate anything that we
have done in Boise. This is a Meridian specific project. The structure can be similar. This
is an L-shape. It is .02 acres difference. It is almost the same exact layout in terms of
land as -- as Boise and we had a project that works that we spent years creating efficiency
from. So, we are using a very similar structure in that, but the outside will be different and
that takes stakeholder interest, that takes communication dialogue. We want to work with
you guys on what this looks like. We want this to be that iconic feature that you guys see.
Here is a couple of pictures from the 5th story pool deck. Here is another one. I mean
I'm from Michigan and there is mountains in this. We don't have mountains. When I sit
out here and I see this I have a wonder that I can't explain. I grew up with flat everything.
So, seeing mountains means something and it -- it truly is special. Being able to see this
on a 5th story pool deck I can't imagine what this would be like to live at. So, I have a --
I have a video here, kind of does a time lapse. I don't know if you guys have seen from
the PowerPoints, but this -- this should give a pretty good idea quickly, hopefully. Does
the build -- this is the building in pretty much 30 seconds and I don't want to -- since I'm
probably going to run out of time here, I don't want to go into all the subtle differences,
but you can see on one of them just the outset of the bricks. You know, there is little
subtle things that we can do to make this uniquely Meridian and we intend to do that with
-- with all of your help really. I don't want to take on this project by myself. It truly won't
be as good as it can be if there is no collaboration. This slide is a good representation of
the things that we were trying to achieve through our objectives. You know, 414 parking
stalls, 137 units. We -- nobody's really brought this up yet, but we have -- a mind of its
own. We have integrated into our pro forma a ten percent workforce housing. I don't
know if that's something that is -- well, I have read your master plan and I have seen that
it is part of your plan of providing a diversity in housing and so we have included that into
our design. It's like that all across the nation. You know, affordable housing, housing
that's affordable for people to work and live downtown is incredibly important and so trying
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 10 of 47
to do that with you folks is -- is one of our goals. We have also provided a structure that
includes the community center into this design. Here is our site plan. You know, some of
the main things that we are trying to do here, based off of the -- based off of the RFP is
to create two iconic corners, create an excess of parking for residents and for public use.
Create an activated street on 2nd Street, a festival street, to -- to represent what the
master plan is trying to achieve really a publicly engaged place for -- for people locally
and regionally to participate and to patronage, to -- all -- all of these different things that
-- that this street can be and, then, tie all of this into a complimentary design, while keeping
in mind that it's one of the first eight story buildings in this area. So, as you can see, this
is our site plan -- and we can get into this. I would rather talk more about a couple of
different other things. This has been in the plan. We have built this. We understand that
there is efficiency that we know how to get through this building from our team, both our
national and local team. We have taken this design and inputted the 20,000 square foot
community center, which we intend to work directly with the -- the governing body of -- of
that community -- community center in providing this turnkey building if they would like
and that can look like a bunch of different things and someone's opinion today of what
they want to see might change in six months. We don't know and we have to work through
that. This is a hands-on iterative process and it takes more than just talking to get through.
We got a lot of work to do. Here we just show our matrix of -- of units versus stalls. I just
have a couple pictures in the -- in the presentations I went into far greater detail to discuss
certain different things in here that I wanted people to see, subtle details, the difference
of materials going from the street level all the way up to the top of the roof. The
introduction of live walls. The trees on the amenity deck. Just different little design
features that we like today, but I don't know if you like and we have to walk through and
see if this is a compliment or if this needs to be altered and you can also see in that other
drawing here the festival street and what that could look like if there is a semi-consistent
farmers market or art show or -- of some sort. And, then, this is the community center.
So, we wanted to tie in some historical representation of what we believe an iconic
community center would look like that would -- that would be a draw. We have included
many different features into this that are wider, quicker, cheaper or easy changes. There
are inset of windows that -- that create benches for people to sit and have coffee. A place
for you to walk your dog and stop. A place for you to talk to a friend. Just small things.
Biking. Lighting. Plants. Just things that make this feel like home and make it feel safe.
They make it feel clean. They make -- make it feel like they -- if they are not from here
they want to be from here. So, jumping into our financial, which is something that we --
we took an interesting approach to I guess you could say. So, instead of saying, hey, this
is the project, this is what we can make work, we are showing you a gap. Showing you
a gap in the process. We are showing that we are not fully going through all of the
revenues that can be gained, but this is a public process. This is a competitive process.
This is a process, in my opinion, where if we are qualified and we know how to do this,
then, we are asking the City Council to choose us and work with us, because this is hard
and there isn't an answer today in my opinion and if anybody says that there is for this
type of project that is this complex, then, I would be leery of that. But we are ready to get
-- in get in and work with you and figure out a way. But as I said in the beginning, this is
collaborative. If the city is willing to work with us, we truly believe that we can make this
work. It wouldn't be the first one that we have made work and we are good at working
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 11 of 47
with people and I'm sure you are going to have questions on this and I'm just going to
keep going. Three minutes. So, pros and cons. This is kind of the list that we have
gotten and I could go through these, but from what I have seen -- and I don't mean
anything by this, but from what I have seen if -- if I solve for one I'm going to make one
side angry and if I solve for the other I'm going to make the other side angry. So, I put
them side by side. Sometimes there is enough parking, sometimes there is not enough
parking. Sometimes there is enough community space, sometimes there is not. But the
main takeaways from this are we have not provided enough commercial space. There is
a lack of public space, plaza space, and there is a lack of finance information. So, we
can walk through all of those things, but these are all things that we solve collaboratively.
We don't know how much retail. We do know the market. We do have brokers in the
market. We -- if I put in commercial space, then, I would have had to add to the gap,
because we don't know if we can fill it. We don't know if it's five years it's going to take to
fill or if it's going to take two years. So, we wanted to be realistic with this process. We
wanted to walk through with -- with you all and say this is what I see today. This is what
we think we can do. Now, if this needs to be changed let's work at it together and that
goes for financial, the plaza space, and that goes for the commercial space. So, here's
our opportunity. Now, I can go into -- these are all of the people that I have talked and I
can give soft commitments and I can say a bunch of different things, but none of them
are concrete. I can't promise anything today. I can tell you that I have -- I'm working with
a local hotel group to put in a boutique hotel. But as you can imagine if we take out the
community center and put it in a boutique hotel what's going to happen to the site plan.
We have a complete restructure of the entire deal. The amount of parking, what the
design looks like, what ownership looks like, the difference in -- in so many different things
and we are just not going to go through that entire process until this is something that the
city wants to go through with us and it's also a process that that hotel group won't call a
market study for unless we are chosen. So, again, it's something I can say, but it doesn't
mean anything in my opinion; right? So, we do believe that that is an option going forward,
but real opportunities here are you have a group that came here from Michigan; right? I
have got my architect who is from Minnetonka. Jay is here to talk about the design if you
want to talk about. Got Mark Sindele, who is from Boise and from Seattle and I have got
my father, who traveled from Florida today. So, we are from four different states, just
happened to be today. I think, actually, Art came from Chicago. So, I don't even know
how many -- three different time zones -- four different time zones and we came here for
this. We are pumped about this. I'm excited. I really want to work with you guys, but
saying all that, we don't know if you guys want to work with us and we have questions,
too. We don't know if this relationship makes sense. We don't know if the project makes
sense and I'm concerned about wasting my time and wasting your time. You should go
with the group that you feel comfortable with and you go with the group that you think that
can deliver this and I don't know today if I'm that person, but, hopefully, we have provided
enough -- time is up -- enough for you guys to decide. So, thanks so much.
Simison: Thank you. Council, Commissioners, questions?
De Weerd: Mr. Mayor?
Simison: Yes , Mayor Tammy.
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 12 of 47
De Weerd: So, I will tell you, if you are looking for feedback, I was really appreciative of
some of the different elements that you built into it, including your amenity deck, although
I think you really need to have a view to -- to the Boise foothills, which you block with your
building, but I -- I thought that was an excellent amenity. I got excited and I spoke to our
parks director on our way in and -- and festival street is really exciting. 2nd Street has
always been an interest of mine as I saw this great amenity down the middle of it. So, I
would love to see that vision for fruition. So, I saw a lot of possibilities and I -- I also do
Like the design of -- of the building. I do think that you hit the cons correctly in terms of -
- I did question, you know, is mixed use really a community center an apartment and so
that was a question of mine, so thank you for throwing that out there and letting us know
that you have work ahead of you. So, appreciate that. I do have a couple of questions
in terms of what did you do in advance to create the proposal that you brought to the
committee. That's question number one.
McGraw: So, can you clarify --
De Weerd: Yes . You mentioned that you like a community engagement and a
collaboration and you tried to understand the community before you. You really work with
them. So, when you created this proposed did you come to Meridian and do some
advanced work to understand our downtown and what elements that you are proposing
in what we are seeing today?
McGraw: Yes. So -- thank you, by the way, for clarifying. So, I think it was 2018 or '19
was the first time I stepped foot in Meridian. I met with Cameron and Ashley, I believe,
about the -- this RFP. I only knew about the RFP. I wanted -- I didn't know if I was going
to respond to that RFP, just because I didn't know if I was the right fit at the time and also
there was some things in there that I think, as I said earlier, I didn't think that -- I thought
it was too complex for the moment and we are in the middle of going through some heavy
condo association negotiations with Ada county. So, that was my first time in town. Since
then I had -- I have been searching in Meridian for a place to do something. Now, there
is land around that we could have assembled and build three story walk-ups, garden style
and there is nothing wrong with that and we do it -- we do it in Michigan and I like doing
it. But I didn't feel like it was impactful. I didn't feel like it was the right fit for us to come
and build that unit when I know that there was a need and until this was like -- this -- this
felt more real. I really started diving into trying to make it work. Talking to the right folks
about assembling a team. But when you asked how much can you know about a
community, I grew up in one place and I still barely know that place. I know some thinks
about it, but it's all my own opinions and conditions and what I think I see. So, I try to do
most of it through conversation. I try to sit done with coffee and get to know people who
are from here, what they like to see, different brokers, met with Cameron quite a few times
well before this. Came out just to find out -- because he knows quite a bit about the area.
He is able to talk very honestly about the city and I don't know if you own this, but The
Vault? Yes . You own The Vault? I spent too much time there. Yeah . I really enjoy it.
But I really can't speak to how well I know it, because I am not fully involved yet. This is
kind of my first step. My opinion.
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 13 of 47
De Weerd: Mr. Mayor, just --
Simison: Yes .
De Weerd: -- another question. One is rental versus own. You mentioned that you were
doing some work or in Ada county with the condominiumization -- did I just make up a
word? Doing condos over there and I assume that that was the county space versus the
private space, but will you have a mixture of rental and the potential of condominiumizing
some of the units, so that people can buy it?
McGraw: We have not gone through that analysis. We have only gone through the rental
market. From our -- you know, again, this is going to be a different project. There could
be a lot similarities with our Jules On 3rd project, but the condo there is a vertical and
horizontal condo structure between River Caddis and Ada county where they own the
parking structure, but we have shared ownership of stairwells and roof, building envelope,
elevators and, then, we also have commercial on the outside of it. So, while that's a
condo, it's the -- the condo is the difference in ownership between the parking structure
and the commercial and residential.
De Weerd: Sorry that --
McGraw: No. That's okay. So, on this project we are -- we have only talked about and
done our resource based -- based off of rental units. For rent.
Simison: Have one more?
De Weerd: Yes . But I don't want to dominate.
Simison: Well, what I was going to make a suggestion -- I don't think we can get through
questions in ten minutes for people. I would like to think that we can do minimum 30
minutes if -- as long as we are not delaying people from catching flights or other things
this afternoon. So, we give adequate time for people to ask questions. Does that create
problems or challenges? Okay. Then we will put on for 30 minutes. You have used eight.
So, 22 minutes left and we have people -- Councilman Bernt.
Bernt: Mr. Mayor, there is -- I was on the -- the committee and so I don't have a ton of
questions myself, but we have a Council Member who is not with us today and she wanted
to have some certain questions asked, so I'm going to ask you some questions on behalf
of Council Woman Strader. First question she had was in regard to cash equity that you
and your group are putting in the project yourself.
McGraw: We are the owner investor.
Bernt: Okay. So, no type -- different types of financing will be needed I guess?
McGraw: Well, it's hard to say exactly. We go into our projects as the owner and we
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 14 of 47
invest the equity ourselves.
Bernt: Okay. Fair enough. For clarification, are you going to -- I believe you are going
to own the community center; right? You will -- and, then, what does that look like from
the city in return? Will you consider us a lessee, a long-term lessee? What does that
look like?
McGraw: Well, that's not necessarily -- we have not proposed that. So, I'm not sure. It
kind of goes to the collaborative. It's hard to say. We can consider that as an option if
that -- we haven't been told that's what's wanted; right? So, I'm assuming that they
wanted to own it and so we would figure out a condo structure where they -- they would
own their own community center. That's what we assumed, but I -- that would be
necessary.
Bernt: Yes . Yes .
McGraw: But, again, that -- that all happens with what you guys -- or what the community
center and everybody else wants to do.
Bernt: Okay. That's it. Thank you.
McGraw: Thanks.
Hoaglun: Mr. Mayor?
Simison: Councilman Hoaglun.
Hoaglun: Mr. Mayor, yes. I was on the committee as well and one of the things I think
that's very important as -- as downtown Meridian matures is the fact that we need to have
adequate parking. That's always one of those things. So, could you walk through -- it
was on your slide, one of the things, but it was one of the many honeycombs. Can you
walk -- walk through this -- what your plans are for parking for this facility?
McGraw: So, how we had it -- it's a proposal; right? We have a concept. We have
nothing more than a concept and right now that concept shows 414 stalls. We tried to
add in all the stalls requested for the community center, plus 50 additional stalls to that
and, then, we have one stall per unit for the -- the residential side. So, there are a ton of
questions as to financing, as to how that is operated, how that is managed, how it is taken
care of and that -- that is and could be a six month process. So, that is something I can't
wait to work with you on.
Bevan: Mr. Mayor?
Simison: Commissioner Bevan.
Bevan: Thank you. So, a lot of your presentation was talking about the relationship side
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 15 of 47
and wanting to listen to the thoughts and views of the community and -- but, then, when
you mentioned a potential hotel boutique and that you weren't going to enter into those
conversations unless you were chosen, I completely understand that. So, as you go
through this process and you have the conversations about the community center versus
a hotel boutique, can you -- and I know that you said many many times that you wanted
to hear from us and that you wanted to hear and have that relationship, but I would -- I
would suspect that you have a choice, personal idea of a hotel boutique versus a
community center. Can you share with that -- with us -- and maybe you can't because
you still haven't like penciled in the numbers, but if you were to have that conversation is
there an area which you are leaning towards? Thank you.
McGraw; That's a -- that's a tough question. So, that -- that would depend on a lot of
different things; right? A lot of what -- what I want is probably going to be tied to what you
guys want to see; right? So, if you don't want a hotel, but I do, then, it becomes a weird
process; right? So, if you guys are like we really want to see this community center --
and, again, it's hard for me to present what's best for me. So, what I would be looking at
in this situation that you are talking about is I really want to find out which one you would
rather have and, then, we would have to redesign the entire building around it. If you are
asking me today, making the assumption that you guys wanted a new community center
and you wanted it here and what you have seen today is a good product and that you can
work with me on and we can have an open book discussion about how the thing gets
delivered, I would rather do what we have planned today.
Perreault: Mr. Mayor?
Simison: Council Woman Perreault.
Perreault: Can you share with us more about 2nd Street and how the festival concept
came to be? Are you anticipating that this be a walking only street where it's going to be
designated that way and you are going to go through the public process to section that
off or can you give us more understanding of what that looks like for pedestrian access
versus vehicular access? I have some concerns with the project that's going in on
Broadway, that 2nd Street traffic is definitely going to increase and so I'm curious if we
are now moving -- you know, if we are losing a really critical block, considering that there
is retail and apartments going in just on the corner.
McGraw: So, I would love to say that it was my idea, but it -- it wasn't. I mean I think that,
you know, the masterplan and the corridor authority -- the downtown plan, it's had this
plan to increase downtown. So, I just -- we just check what we have seen across the
nation in different areas and said, well, this is a prime spot for a festival street and a
festival street can be whatever you want it to be in terms of an operating agreement. You
can close the street. I'm not proposing that today. It can be closed for certain portions,
but that's something that we all decide on. But we are going to have to look into traffic,
we are going to have to look into a bunch of different things before we really make that
decision. I think what the goal is within this public-private partnership is to give it the look
and feel of a festival street. We don't have to close it down, right, but we can give it that
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 16 of 47
look and feel where it is different, it is distinct, it is unique compared to other streets.
People know when there is not tents up, when there is not a festival, when there is not an
art show, that that's the festival street and maybe there is something else going on there;
right? It's placemaking. It's -- it's to create place. But the logistics, the operation, all
those things are all something that we -- we work through with you. Again, just like you
can make any decision tonight, this isn't a concrete plan. This is a concept and I want to
find out more from you guys.
Simison: Commissioner Mueller.
Mueller: So, I have practical numbers here. So, the 12 -- roughly 14 million dollar gap
between the community center and the parking stalls, a majority of the gap comes from
the parking stalls. We have seen quite a few developments down here -- or at least
proposals. So, the interesting thing about this is you have got 174 apartments, I'm looking
at the build out, you know, you have three bedroom, two bedroom in there, so one parking
stall per apartment won't be enough. So, the overflow -- you know, roughly you are really
talking about maybe less than a hundred truly public parking spots would be my guess
by the time this is all said and done. So, what I'm curious on is this is all math, so, I -- I
believe in the whole -- like we have to work through some of these problems together. I'm
trying to understand how the math works here, though, because the parking -- you know,
when you would get TIP dollars or city dollars toward parking, it has to be towards public
parking generally for the most part. We have got a 12 million gap on 414 spots and best
case in 80 to 100 of them are truly public. How do you -- and, then, you have a 20,000
square foot community center that really probably isn't very well revenue generating for
you that's using a lot of real estate; right? How does the give and take on this structure
work eventually to try to solve that gap?
McGraw: That's a fantastic question. So, as I mentioned, I purposefully put in a gap
analysis and I also purposely left out the intellectual property of how we would do this. All
right? So, there are many different structures and I could propose one. So, when -- when
we talk about these numbers, right, where there is a lot to solve, all right? I don't know
how we are going to pay for this deck, you know. How are we going to operate this? How
are we going to regulate how many cars someone has. All right? If they have three cars
and they have a studio apartment, then, we have got a wonky number here; right? So,
we have these questions and we have to work through those. We have to put in strict
management agreements; right? We have to have an operator who understands that
there is people that have more than one car, there is different gates that we can put up to
-- to stop that, to regulate that, but, again, I mean I don't -- I don't want to keep coming
back to this. We have to work through all these issues, but we really do. But on the other
aspect when we talk about revenue, if we want to talk about bringing more revenue in for
who is going to pay to park here to pay for this, well, if there is free parking downtown
who is going to pay to park; right? So, how -- how are we going to do it? And this is a
question -- this is -- it's not just one, I mean we are talking about a process. We are talking
about ten, 15 years into the future, right, and if you can't -- I mean revenues pay for things
and we got to work through it and I don't know the answer. Wish I did. Hoping we can
get there.
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 17 of 47
Fourniea: My name is Jay Fourniea, I'm with Opus Architects Engineers. I'm one of the
design architects on the project. Just wanted to touch on the parking ratios. So, you are
right, we -- we use the zoning of the City of Meridian as a mixed use vertically integrated
project, which is one stall per unit in terms of analysis, but if you look at the overarching
numbers, if you take one and a half stalls per unit, which is I would say across the nation
a pretty standard number for development teams, where it's pretty comfortable. Usually
It's more than the 1.25, because we are coming in a multi-modal community across the
country as well, but if you take a 1.5, you would have 260 stalls for the apartments at that
case. That still leaves you 150 stalls that could be towards the community and, then,
there is also the opportunity with shared parking. So, there is night and daytime
opportunities, because a lot of the time people in the apartments are gone during the day,
which is maybe when there is more community events going on and so there is an
exchange of sharing that parking, so you don't overbuild for the future, just like John is
talking about. You want to make sure you build the right amount for today and be able to
flex with what's going to happen in the future and, really, if you are looking at the
development across the country as the future it's actually people driving less and less
ownership of vehicles as they share more through, you know, shared cars, Ubers, that
type of opportunity. This is still a pretty transportation heavy community, but you are trying
to work into a more multi-modal community and we want to be a part of that opportunity
as well.
Mueller: One quick question just for clarification, because I know you will know the
answer to this. The most expensive construction in here, when you are comparing like
parking -- additional parking to like -- I mean it is the parking; is that true? If you had to
add more parking versus like a community center style building, what costs more? If you
move things back and forth, what generates a small gap and a big gap?
Fourniea: So, price per stall, it -- it's very expensive to park and put it in a structure, you
are right. Going down to build basements doubles, triples the cost of every parking stall,
which is why if you look at our plans we really don't have a basement parking solution,
we had to go up top. That saves everyone cost. When you get into -- is that cheaper
than the community center, the community center is in the same structure as the parking,
but now you are paying for maybe tile finishes, sheetrock, paint, how -- how dressed up
do you want to be or dressed down and so on a square foot basis the community center
is probably going to be more expensive than the parking, but if you say your value and
return, where are you going to get the most bang for your buck, if parking's free in the
city, is that the Community Center and the return to the city or is it the parking and having
more parking as you continue to develop and increase density downtown.
Cavener: Mr. Mayor?
Simison: Councilman Cavener.
Cavener: Thank you. First just kudos to Commissioner Mueller for really drilling deep on
kind of a question I had and he presented it in a very articulate manner and I appreciate
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 18 of 47
the response. My question is a little bit going back to -- and something that I applaud you
for doing this kind of shining a light on -- on some of maybe the cons of the project. One
that stuck out for me that I'm hoping you can walk me through is absence of, you know,
open space, playground space, green space. You r, you know, Jules on 3rd product has
a great natural amenity across the street in that great city park and on this particular
project we are losing city parkland and I'm just curious maybe if the team can summarize
the thought process that went into that and maybe what we tell our downtown residents
that are losing access to some really key green space that not easily found in downtown
Meridian that's accessible to the public.
McGraw: Great. Thanks so much. So, I have Mark Sindell from GGLO and I'm going to
have him touch on some of those, but I -- before he does, one thing I would like to bring
up is that I have talked today about this iterative process, this public-private partnership,
and we understand that we are displacing something, that there is a park there. We don't
know where that park is going to go. We don't know if we are going to replace it. It is
something that we want to work with you on. Can we replace that? Is there something
that's in this design or is it something that's off site? These are all things that we want to
work through. You know, there might be extra land that we can create a -- a new park
that involves the same or some of the same equipment, because equipment looks like it
can be moved. At least some of it. So, I don't know what that -- what that looks like, but
from the design perspective the placemaking perspective, I have Mark here to help kind
of touch on why we did this this way we did it today.
Sindell: Thanks, John. Mark Sindell with GGLO. Pleasure to be here. Work mostly out
of our Boise office at 1199 Shoreline Lane. So, I had the benefit for being on the Union
93 Team -- am on the Union 93 team and also I had the benefit of working with several of
your staff who have been fantastic on the prior rendition of this before and we really tried
to sort through a process -- and back to some of the questions that were asked earlier
about priorities for you and for the community and, then, we look for those overlaps where
we are trying to fit a lot on this site. So, for this proposal, as John says, it's flexible, we
looked at everything holistically. We have heard about the festival street desires and we
tried to do something that could meet that and back to the other question, I think John
answered it properly, we have done a fair amount of these and we have found that leaving
them open to traffic and closing them for events and giving you flexibility to go back and
forth is a good start, much like we did for Caldwell and Indian Creek Plaza and Arthur
Street, if it organically is so successful that it closes, that's better than forcing it, so we
can get into that later. But we looked at festival street, community center, private
amenities and we also looked at Union 93 and what would be designing across the street
with a pretty generous plaza that hopefully you have all seen and know and we thought,
okay, priority wise if we look at the projects together, we have got a significant plaza,
public plaza, for Union 93 that faces this. We faced the community center towards that.
We have a festival street. So, as a competition of activated urban open space that
complements what the rest of the City of Meridian has, we felt that's pretty good and,
then, getting, as John said, the rooftops or the people with the unit, getting the community
center and the other things In an iconic build that held the street and the corner, much
like we have heard from you on other projects in other forums, seemed like the right mix
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 19 of 47
for your downtown. Now, again, that's just our thinking from what we have heard and
trying to put things together and, obviously, there is some flexibility in that, although there
is a lot of stuff, as you all know, that we are trying to fit on this site, so we thought that that
was the best balance that we could accomplish with the time that we have. As someone
who works on a lot of downtime urban open space and streetscapes in mixed use
environments, I feel pretty good about it, but happy to have that dialogue if we are
selected.
Simison: Mayor Tammy.
De Weerd: I guess that was -- were you part of the design in Caldwell of their plaza over
there? Okay. I saw that in the packet. I know at one time the -- the city was really looking
at -- in your proposal you talk about limiting curb cut. I don't even want to see a curb. I
-- I know our staff has been looking at the -- no curb and building swales or drainage into
kind of a streetscape, unlike I think City Council Woman Perreault, I would love to see
that street closed in that space, so that you really can create a lot of street activity and --
and that sort of thing. By removing the curbs and -- and finding other drainage systems
that give you a little bit more seamless and maybe not close it completely, you can have
some limited traffic through there, is that something that -- that you have worked on and
have designed?
Sindell: It is. Yes . And we can certainly do that here. Probably know too much, but,
again, the details, but the trick with that is making sure that we are designing things
adequately for the visually impaired, so when you take away curbs you just have to make
sure that you have clear delineation of the roadway versus the pedestrian way when it's
open to traffic. We have worked through those issues and challenges before. I come up
with some pretty good solutions. So, yes, we can do that.
De Weerd: Because, really, this is the shortest block area, so 2nd Street really does
present opportunities to do something really creative and unique.
Sindell: Absolutely.
De Weerd: Okay. Sorry. I just got excited.
Simison: Commissioner Basalone.
Basalone: Yeah. Mr. Chair, Mr. Mayor. Yeah. Thanks for your presentation. I really
appreciated the last comments from the gentleman who just sat down regarding the
interrelationship of these three major projects that we have going on downtown, because
my concern is that just the River Caddis project alone in that one area or the Pacific
project alone in that area can't accomplish everything. There is too much limited space,
as has been mentioned. There isn't enough space for green area. There is probably not
enough space to have an adequate community center, retail, everything. You can't put
all of that into one year area. But you can spread it out over our whole downtown by
integrating it. I was impressed with your festival street, just like Mayor Tammy just
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 20 of 47
mentioned, because it did get people out and around the downtown. My big concern is
that these apartment complexes don't become silos for living in terms just a place to bed
down and not a place to truly live. To live they have got to get outside. People have to
move around. That's why I have the concern as a member of the review committee
regarding the lack of retail space that -- I had the opportunity to live for two years in an
apartment complex just like this on a 5th floor where my balcony faced Disneyland and I
could watch fireworks every night. It was a great place to live. But I could also walk
across the street to Angelo's and Vinci's and get a great, great Italian soup dinner. I could
also go down into the first floor of our apartment complex to a mini mart and buy a quart
of milk if we needed it. I didn't have to run to Albertson's three blocks away. So, I think
having an integrated community is important. So, that's why I'm glad that you mentioned
that if people got out and walked they could find the green area. Hopefully they can find
the mini mart. Hopefully they can find the restaurant to sit outside on a nice summer
evening and enjoy what we have here in Idaho, which is nice clean air most of the time.
Right? Thank you.
Simison: Thank you. We have reached the end of that half an hour, so I would like to
move on to our next project, but don't go far in case there is additional -- if we have
additional time and additional questions there may be more.
McGraw: Great. Thank you all. Really truly and sincerely it's been a fun process, so
hopefully we can keep to it.
Simison: Thank you. Next. Josh? And that will be yourself?
Evarts: You are sure? Okay. Mayor, City Council, MDC, thank you guys so much for
having us here today. Myself, Josh Evarts, 303 State Avenue, Old Town, Meridian.
83642. And I have got Don Slattery here from Pacific Companies to back me up with
questions when we get to that point. So, I really appreciate the opportunity. When this
first came around, the proposal for this space, we -- we were busy getting across the
street out of the ground. Many of you are aware of the challenges that exist -- to Caddis'
point that these are very very different projects. I appreciate the thoughtfulness that they
brought to this, even -- even as they are traveling across country and utilizing teams here,
that it is very, very difficult. These aren't large footprints, there is lots of unknown under
the ground, but the opportunity to come back and revisit this and be able to provide
something of value to the city is important to Caleb and I, so thank you for the opportunity
to do that. What we are going to cover today is a walkthrough of the high level of the
response that we made to the RFP. So, there is some key elements that we want to
cover, but probably the most critical element -- and, again, I appreciate Caddis for this --
is the why of what we are doing. I think you are going to see a lot of similarities between
our approach to this and what they approached in this, because there just are a lot of
unknowns. This site is very, very complex. There is lots of things going on. You have
other projects that are in the area that are being developed and there is just a
conversation that's going to need to happen and what I would offer is that even more than
picking a project today, what we are really picking is partnership. What we are really
narrowing in on is what -- what -- what team can we, you know, count on to go and deliver
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 21 of 47
this and, hopefully, I can make a strong case for that today. I think regardless of what
developer is selected, I just trust you guys as a group. I just know all the hard work that's
been put into this and that all these considerations are going to be covered. I was
certainly encouraged -- I intentionally did not read their presentation, I wanted to kind of
experience it today and I'm encouraged, I think you have got a couple great teams to look
at. So, thank you guys for doing that. Pacific Companies, just kind of in review, this is
Caleb and I. So, we are both privately owned businesses. My adventure started here in
downtown with the Heritage Building. Continued with the Bank of Meridian building and,
then, obviously, with the Old Town Lofts over the last three years. Caleb has been doing
this much Longer than me. So, you know, when we got to a place where we needed to
find that great partner for helping us develop, because if we -- if we rewind the clock here,
the six years that we go back, we weren't talking about anything like this. I mean we had
-- we had plans and we were -- we had lots of great slide decks to look at, but it took
somebody going first, somebody had to go swing a bat, they had to knock some buildings
over, including Old City Hall. They had to find, you know, prohibition era tunnels on their
site and collapse those. They had to find sewer that was 38 feet deep on Idaho Avenue.
They had to go do all this hard work and we called it a catalyst project and it was, indeed,
that. So, we -- we do that project, we lean in, we take the risk necessary and, then, we
see things like Union 93, we see the civic block project, we see all the redevelopment
happening on Broadway and in other areas. We see just a bunch of really great
investments that are happening in our downtown and, then, the other thing that we see is
we -- we see the increased economic development. As I spend time in downtown and
talk to business owners, our problem right now is -- is staffing. We have a lot of pressure
on our businesses in downtown. In fact, restaurants are cutting hours, because we don't
have enough people living and working in our downtown. We got to fix that. So, hopefully,
in April we will start adding a bunch of workforce to the site. So, Pacific Companies. I'm
not going to read a lot of this stuff. You guys have this in your presentation. But these
services and divisions that exist inside of Pacific Companies exist for two reasons, so --
so, this kind of vertical integration of real estate, financing, architecture, construction,
everything that sits under this is intended to deliver two things to you. One is effectiveness
and that is the degree to which something is successful -- or something is successful in
producing a desired result. Am I going to give you what you are expecting. So, we need
to be effective in what we are delivering and having all those kind of integrated services
and support items on one team is -- is part of what delivers that and I think it's very very
important, especially given that this is the second time we have gone out for RFP on this,
that we are looking at can we actually accomplish what we say we are going to
accomplish. The second thing that we deliver with our team is efficiency. So -- and what
we are looking at there is that are we using the least amount of wasted time, money and
effort and are we getting competency in our performance. So, those two things of
effectiveness and efficiency, that's something that Caleb and I are really passionate about.
As we go through our proposal it seems very simple, but I think simple things are the
things that end up getting done. Simple things are the things that end up getting executed
on and that's not to marginalize anything, because Old Town Lofts was anything but
simple. Maybe simple in design, less so as we get out of the ground, but those are the
things that -- that are important and those are the two things that we drive to. So, as we
look at this kind of vertically integrated entity, our words matter; right? So, when we talk
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 22 of 47
about words like collaboration, you know, which is partnership, it's transparency, there is
a bunch of words and -- and emotions that get revoked out of these kinds of things.
Innovation. I think innovation is creativity. That's great. And we can -- we can look at,
you know, activating 2nd Street and things like that, but, really, the biggest part of
innovation is identifying problems to begin with. So, one of the things that in our proposal
as we started talking about things, we were the only group that didn't propose a
community center and we will walk through the why of that, because as we have looked
to identify where the real problems and gaps exist between what we offer in downtown
Meridian currently, as opposed to what's in our comp plan Destination Downtown, we are
going to identify those things. Soundness. Are we using good judgment. Are we
proposing things that make sense, that not only we can agree on, but that as we -- as we
look to the public to be a participant in this, that they are going to agree with and, then,
again, that topic of efficiency and the whole reason that Pacific Companies is able to do
this over 250 projects, 25 projects this year, is because that continuity that all these things
kind of exist in our -- in our world and we get to leverage those up. So, a couple quick
highlights. Lots of projects we do, lots of assets owned. Nearing 20,000 multi-family
units. A million square feet of office, special use retail, 400 in annual revenue. Locally
based, but geographically diverse. I think we have talked about this historically. Caleb
and I do these projects in the state of Idaho, because this is home for us. This is our way
to give back and do things that are impactful for the community we live in. We don't get
to get these wrong. This project specifically rides on 3rd and my home is on 3rd Avenue.
So, I don't -- I don't have an option to be bad at this, I don't have an option to do something
that's off kilter, because all my neighbors that I walk dogs and hang out with on a regular
basis would probably have issues with me. So, let's get to the proposal. There were two
things that Caleb and I spent a lot of time talking through what was going on our approach
to -- I'm painting this picture for you and we kept coming down to two items, which was
can we align with the vision of -- of what the city would like to do and can we make this
really, really low risk. Like how do we make this very easy. We didn't want to add a bunch
of complexity to this and so that -- that was really our goal and when we talked about this
aligned vision, it wasn't just MDC and the decision making committee or even City
Council, it was really what we refer to a stakeholders in our downtown. So, that could be
property owners, that could be businesses, that could be our residence. This is the hard
edge of our downtown. The other side of 3rd is residential legacy homeowners. Those
aren't going anywhere anytime soon, as much we would like to. I have heard visions of,
you know, starting to, you know, buy properties and -- and renovate and expand
downtown. That's not happening anytime soon and so we have to be good fiduciaries
and good partners and our messaging is going to reflect that as we go and do this
development that sits right across the street and, then, how can we make this a low risk
proposition to ensure that we actually get it done. What we don't want to see is -- is -- I
would really encourage you guys as a group, as you go out of here today, obviously, come
back with questions. I'm sure Caddis is -- they have expressed an interest in answering
more. Certainly Caleb and I are available anytime. We cannot run another RFP. I guess
that would be my encouragement to you today is figure out a team, like lean in and go for
it. Like to go through this process again I don't think you are going to net anything
different. You got two great companies here that have track records and passion, so go
pick one and go to work. Yeah . All right. So, let's get into it. All right. Aligned vision. I'm
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 23 of 47
going to spend a lot of time here, other than to say the -- the only item that I do want to
talk about is that bottom item. So, we would go line by line through the Destination
Downtown, Comprehensive Plan, and look to address all these things. So, when we talk
about in-fill, when we talk about traditional architectural themes -- and I will get to the
drawings that you are not looking at -- continuous urban edge, vertical and horizontal
integration uses, but, really, the bottom one -- I am more convinced than ever that we
have a gap in workforce housing in our downtown. This is something that we have to
have. It was a big, big topic of conversation during the election. People are getting priced
out of living down here in -- or living here in Meridian in general. I have two businesses
and then -- and, then, two other businesses that I leased to on Idaho Avenue that their
people commuting in, because there is no housing option for them and, in fact, they are
making commutes -- my employees right now -- two of them live in Nampa, because they
simply can't afford apartment options that exist in Meridian. So, I think, you know, we are
going to lead with workforce housing, because we think it's important. We have gotten
many requests based on Old Town Lofts for condomizing and being able to offer some
for sale and we are certainly open to that conversation, but -- but our passion, really, is
leading with workforce housing, making sure that we are -- we are preserving that -- that
-- that workforce and those people that are living, working, and enjoying business in our
downtown. So, as far as MDC goes, these are a little bit more specific, so I'm going to
go through them. So, number one, strengthening the economic base of the area and the
community and stimulating new commercial expansion. What we have found in the lease
ups that we have been doing and working through for Old Town Lofts is we have a gap
on professional office space. Class A office space in downtown Meridian. It is a gap. We
lost Zennify to Ten Mile, because I simply didn't have enough room in a 150 year old
building to staff them. I love the Keller Williams Building and we see the impact of that
going live, having those people working, eating, doing stuff down here. We need more of
that. So, we did lean in with a 15,000 square foot commercial space right there on 2nd
and Idaho. Again, we are trying to be very protective of 3rd and we are wanting that --
that -- that element to be facing our downtown businesses, the food options and other
experiential options. Second item, strengthen tax base. We are projecting a 34 million
dollar improvement to this physical property and -- and, obviously, that amount, based on
if there was an interest or -- or an appetite in expanding a parking footprint, could be more
than this, but certainly at its base 34 million that we are proposing. Eliminating obsolete
building types. We have a community building and a park that do have to be eliminated
and I appreciate everybody's thoughtful considerations about just the size of this footprint.
I love parks. I love the fact that I do get to be in a downtown where I can go all the way
down 3rd, which is less than half a mile and be able to go to Storey Park. Thank you,
Mayor. I have got green space that's up at the other end that I get to enjoy next to Cole
Valley Christian. So, there is some green space, but we -- we simply just don't have
enough room on this land to create green space. I do think that there are some visual
things that we need to do to make sure that we are being good partners with the neighbors
that are across the street, but we will get there. Modern integrated development. Unity
and integrity of design. So, we decided in this proposal that we were going to invite the
City of Meridian -- meaning MDC and the city -- to be a part of this design process. So,
even though we lay out the foundation for the commercial office and the residential, we
took the approach of there are a lot of things that are happening on this site that we
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 24 of 47
needed to actually sit down and talk to you guys about and so we will get into that a lot
little bit later of what that looks like. And, then, promoting improved environment, new
commercial, residential. This is something that we have been doing for a long time and
we will continue to do. We are going to be very sensitive to what we see in the market,
what we are seeing here in downtown and make sure that we are continuing to be a
catalyst for more great developments. Low risk. Again, the biggest takeaway that we
heard -- and I didn't do pros and cons slide that you guys presented us, but we got it loud
and clear that this -- this item of -- of -- well, I will back it up first. The trusted experience
-- we believe that we have a very thorough understanding of what's happening in
downtown Meridian. We just wouldn't be able to execute on the things that we have done
to date without -- without doing that. Vertically integrated. We have got an entity that's -
- that's built to go do this. We are a long-term partner. I think that's important to highlight.
We have been made offers to sell Old Town Lofts. We have rejected those, not because
we couldn't go make money on that, but because we are in this for the long haul. It would
go against everything that I am if I was to go build these things and talk about Meridian
the way I do and, then, sell that at a profit. So, we are not an investment group, we are
here to be partners for a long, long time with you and financial capacity, lots of projects
and certainly you will see from our debt to equity that we are coming with -- with -- with
all the finances needed to get this done. But getting back to -- the issue of this joint design
and messaging. This was the big thing that -- that I think we got knocked on in our
proposal is I didn't paint a picture for you. So, this was not hubris, this was not me saying,
hey, don't worry about it, It's coming. It really was wanting to enter in much of what Caddis
has described, which is a conversation as to how do we -- how do we make sure that the
product that we put on there meets the objectives of everything else that's going on in our
downtown. I am going to continue to lean in on residential. I am going to be a big
champion for not having a community center, because I don't think it's appropriate, and
having commercial office space there, but I can be strong about those things and have a
conversation with you guys about -- from a design standpoint what that needs to look like
and, again, this is our east boundary of downtown and -- and -- and I think the reason that
we included something in our orals is we put some of these elevations in our oral
presentation. We didn't highlight it when we originally did that, but these are some of the
designs of what we have done already kind of in urban downtown. This is the Adair
Building that's in downtown Boise that you probably drive and look at every time you go
in on 184. But from a visual standpoint we -- we do every kind of design there is. So, I
just didn't get hung up on the design part. The thing that really mattered to me is did we
get the product right. Much of what -- like Caddis described is are we giving something
to the city that they, in fact, want. Are we doing it in a way that is -- is fiscally responsible.
So, some challenges on this site. Obviously, you guys have already looked through this.
I won't spend a lot of time. We have an alley. We have street parking. We have use
interactions. We have two other buildings on this property that we have opportunities or
sharing things, like waste refuge, parking, pedestrian egress, streetscape and, then, we
have the -- the challenges that exist outside of these kind of four streets, which is
residential partners. We have a project, Union 93, that's south of this. We have desires
to see other projects maybe happen in this area that are -- that are on 2nd. So, we have
a very very small footprint and lots of work to do and so what we proposed in this was
effectively two buildings and really I would think notionally of these as two assets. We
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 25 of 47
chose a three story commercial office building, because we felt that visually that would
offset the two story that exists on in COMPASS, VRT, and the Unbound Library and that
we would wrap around to a four story building, which is the large Building B, which is our
residential. So, that's 134,000 square feet. Four floors high. We felt that that was the
appropriate height that we would recommend out of the gate. Again, we have a very very
small footprint here, but the design of which we would be a three over one residential
units over parking, so we could meet the objectives of the parking requirements the per
city, with an additional -- I believe we are at 40 above the 124. So, there is about 164
parking spaces that we would be provided as part of that ground floor footprint. The
beauty of this is that -- much like Caddis, we are very very open and interested in the
conversation. One of the big topics that came out of the last election was parking. So,
we -- we are seeing greater volumes of people in downtown. Big win. But having a place
to park them -- I think part of the pressure we are feeling right now is because we have a
lot of construction trucks in our downtown specifically during the day right now, so if you
are trying to get a parking spot on Idaho Avenue it's not actually available, just because
we have got all the trucks that are -- that are contractors swinging hammers and doing
work on the sites. But it is a -- it is an important discussion that we are ready to have if
there was an additional deck of parking that the city desired or other things, we would be
able to do that for you as part of the process. So, from a scorecard -- I will just kind of go
quickly, you know, are we likely to deliver a signature iconic mixed use development. The
fact of the matter is we have already done it three times on Idaho Avenue. So, I think the
likelihood that we would be in this case unable to deliver, it is -- is unlikely. Are we going
to achieve a substantial economic benefit to the community? We are putting 33 million
plus of taxable improvements in downtown. I know what the bills look like for how many
laborers we have got going into Old Town Lofts right now. I have also seen the boom
that's happened in some of our downtown restaurants, so that's been big. Do we have
the qualifications and experience. I believe we have all those things. And -- and they
have been demonstrable. So, for example, when we enter into Old Town Lofts --
Simison: I assume you are wrapping up?
Evarts: Yeah . I'm wrapping up. Yeah . I'm done here. Yeah . So, just -- just to finish
here, the Old Town Lofts experience the benefit and I think that the partnership that we
were provide here is the fact that you guys have actually got to see -- see us in action, so
as we look back at initially proposing Old Town Lofts with all the unknowns, all the things
we just described earlier, to be able to deliver that and -- and in -- in a time frame, I think
we are going to be right at 12 months delayed on that project, even though we have had
a worldwide pandemic and all the material shortages and people shortages. So, with that
all the rest of the financings structure that's in there, you guys can certainly ask questions
about that, but our -- our loan to value on this effectively is at the 33 million. Fifteen million
of it is out of our coffers where we would be financing 18 million. What we are asking
from the city is we would be paying you about 697,000 that was -- hold on a second here.
I'm clicking the wrong button -- 657,000 for the land and the TIP reimbursements of 2.3
million, which is a small percentage of what was -- it would be generating as a project and
we would also throttle that, meaning that we do 75 percent of those reimbursements in
Eagle right now, but we would lower that to 50 percent, so that you guys would have more
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 26 of 47
money with to pursue other projects during that time frame. So, finally, just -- oh. You
guys did ask about the community center and you will probably ask about it. When we
looked at this, the reason that we did not propose this is we looked at the gaps that existed
as far as the Destination Downtown and the comp plan, we looked at what the current
programming was in that community center, over 50 percent of it was do it yourself arts
classes and we have three businesses that are on the block on Idaho Avenue that are do
it yourself arts classes, so we didn't feel that was an underserved element that was
happening in the downtown and we also felt that -- that we did have a gap in the Class A
office space and we can't do everything. However, comma, we were asked to provide
you guys a response back if you did want to do it and it's actually very simple. So, we
could certainly take that first floor of that Class A office space and convert that a 5,000
square foot community center, much -- just bigger than what it is today, but newer than
we could replace that with if that was something that the city desired. So, that's something
you guys asked for.
Simison: Josh, with that I --
Evarts: Yeah .
Simison: -- want to respect this and get to questions and --
Evarts: Yeah.
Simison: -- if there is other questions you can --
Evarts: Perfect.
Simison: -- use your slides to answer them.
Evarts: I love it.
Simison: Council, Commission, questions?
Cavener: Mr. Mayor?
Simison: Councilman Cavener.
Cavener: I will lead off. Josh, I appreciate kind of your explanation of why you omitted
the community center. I guess similar question to you that I proposed to the applicant.
Recognize you touched early on about living in close proximity to the grass field that's
owned by Cole Valley Christian, that's not designed to be accessible to the public, so I'm
just curious kind of your and your team's thoughts about why removing the -- the park and
kind of with -- there doesn't appear to be a plan in place to compensate or to -- to replace
that for our downtown residents.
Evarts: Yeah . Thank you, Councilman Cavener. No, there is just not enough dirt here.
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 27 of 47
God's not making anymore dirt and we don't have a lot of it. This site is not that big and
when we think about verticality, like certainly we can go seven, eight, larger stories and
create more green space or community spaces on the inside. We just have to talk about
the unintended consequences of what that looks like to the residential partners and -- and
how do you sell that kind of -- I -- I know all the discussions that happen even with Union
93 as you look at the eastern part of that project and I just think that you -- there is a give
and take that has to be had, Luke, and I just feel like the park is just a bridge too far.
Cavener: Appreciate it. Thank you.
Simison: Commissioner Mueller.
Mueller: Go back to the wonderful parking question, the problem -- so, on this site when
you guys programmed it, you were -- you go with a one per unit 1.25, 1.5 --
Evarts: It was one. Yeah. We went with one with 40 extra being available. We were
also looking at the day-night usage. So, the reality is I think there is about 164 parking
spots that we programmed and part of that is dependent on the Communication in terms
of how shared access and what we might do between COMPASS, VRT and the library.
So, there -- there -- there is -- yeah. It's -- it's one with a -- with some additional overflow
for the Class A office space.
Simison: And can I assume that also concludes the commercial? You are meeting the
minimum requirements of the commercial or the office?
Evarts: Yes. Correct. Yeah . Yeah . With a discussion of what to do with the street; right?
Because there is street parking right now. I'm very in favor of some of the things that
Mayor Tammy has been talking about of how do you -- how do you deal with your curbs
and how do you -- how do you be creative about that and create more walkable
experiential space. So, there is just a lot of that and it's very strange, if you look at the
site, it's kind of all over the place between parallel and angled and -- yeah.
Simison: Mayor Tammy?
De Weerd: Mr. Mayor, I guess it's -- it's hard, Josh, to ask any questions because we
didn't see enough detail --
Evarts: Sure.
De Weerd: -- to get there. I did love the location of your retail. It really does pull the
downtown the other side of that street, which is important. I appreciated your commitment
to workforce housing and I hope that Director Siddoway heard your comment about the
art classes. I do think that as we start to evolve in downtown the city should not be in
competition to the businesses that are in the surrounding area, so you raised a very good
point.
Evarts: And I'm not trying to -- and, Steve, I apologize. I am not trying to pick on Parks.
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 28 of 47
There is no bigger fan of parks in our city than me. It is a very complex issue and so I will
be the bad guy, but even when we worked with the Chamber of Commerce for doing this
big big Oktoberfest event in October, parks was the one that pushed back on the timing
and the road closures, because they had dozens of people that -- that they were
uncomfortable having those people park outside of the parking boundaries to walk in to
the detriment of thousands of people that we were going to be bringing in on one day to
grow economic development and I just think that's the challenge when you get these kind
of elements sitting in your downtown that there is unintended things that happen and I
think we just need to tread carefully.
De Weerd: Well, the city needs to be a partner to -- to the downtown business community
and it goes both ways.
Evarts: Yes . I agree.
De Weerd: So, they need to be talking to --
Evarts: Hundred percent.
De Weerd: -- the departments as well.
Evarts: Yeah.
De Weerd: But I -- I do have a couple of other things that he brought up that probably are
not best suited to this discussion, but for discussion afterwards.
Simison: Okay. Additional questions? Commissioner Bevan.
Bevan: Mr. Mayor. So, I do appreciate you addressing the community center. Having
owned an event center in my past professional life, I do understand the pros and cons of
having that availability space and I think that the immediate allure of anything being called
community, right, has that appeal. But certainly taking that opportunity to see how well it
does pencil. Does it compete with other businesses in downtown I think is a very valid
point. I think that, you know, thinking about the community space that's available at -- to
the Meridian library that's just down the street, you know, there are other spaces, you
know, within a very close distance that things like art classes can be held and so I
appreciate -- I appreciate you addressing that. I also really appreciate talking about the
-- the living space, workforce, you know, housing. Certainly is a very -- a very big need,
not just in Meridian, but the entire Treasure Valley. So, I appreciate that. I don't have any
further questions. I just wanted to point that out. Thank you.
Perreault: Mr. Mayor?
Simison: Council Woman Perreault.
Perreault: Thank you for your presentation, Josh. I'm curious how you got to the ratio of
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 29 of 47
the commercial versus the residential? How you came to -- to the size at about 15,000
square feet of office space is what is desired in this area versus the amount of residential
that -- that you are proposing. Can you give us some idea?
Evarts: Yeah . It was simple math. It was just -- we had a 5,000 foot footprint and we felt
like three stories would be appropriate given the profiles of the buildings around it. So, it
was just simply three times five was 15,000 and that made sense. As far as the
residential, we maximized the footprint. We spread it out. We tried to take every inch
and build to the lot lines, because we -- we don't have anymore extra dirt laying around
and felt like four stories was appropriate, you know, especially as we get to look at Old
Town Lofts, that's a very big structure, you know, in our downtown and -- and it has no
residential round it. I think when you put that size of a structure and you put it across the
street where balconies are looking into people's yards and kitchens, it gets to be a much
different conversation. We felt four floors was appropriate. I think if you are -- I think you
can make a strong case for -- if you want to go three over two and do two parking decks
and offer another 160 spaces for our -- what would work out to be 115 parking spaces for
public use. You could go five stories, but, again, I -- I just am pretty sensitive to how this
is going to be perceived from a -- from a public standpoint.
De Weerd: Mr. Mayor?
Simison: I think Commissioner Basalone had a question or comment.
Basalone: I just wanted to clarify something very quickly. You know, we keep talking
about community center being for art classes, which it has been, but when a community
center was first proposed, as I recall, from our discussions from years ago, we were
concerned about performing arts. We were concerned about having the Treasure Valley
Children's Theatre being -- having performances downtown in a community center. We
were concerned about the Meridian Symphony not performing there -- in -- at Centennial
High School in Boise, but rather in Meridian at a location. So, I think that -- that -- I think
you are right, Josh, in terms of the space availability and what you can do, but the reason
for a community center was for performances, it wasn't for art classes necessarily,
although you could certainly hold them there. So, I think the real concern I have for the
city -- county and for the city and for MDC is what amenities do we want in addition to
these projects? Do we want an auditorium district where we could have performance
downtown? Do we want a parking structure that's dedicated to public parking? I
mentioned that I lived in an apartment complex in downtown Fullerton. We had two levels
of parking for this five story apartment complex. The bottom floor, the subterranean floor,
was for the residents and it was gated off, because I don't think you can share parking
between people who are paying and not paying for the same spaces. The ground level
was for the public parking. So, you can do that. But right across the street from this
parking -- from this complex was a public parking structure that was used by an auditorium
across the street, was used by people who were eating downtown and so forth. So, I
think that in terms of the city as a whole, we need to, once again, look at integrated
facilities. What do we need? And I don't think we can rely on a project like this to
accommodate every need in the city.
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 30 of 47
Evarts: Agreed.
Simison: Thank you. Mayor Tammy.
De Weerd: Josh, I did have one question as you were talking and putting 120 plus
apartments over there next to retail and --
Evarts: No retail. Class A office space.
De Weerd: I mean --
Evarts: Yeah .
De Weerd: Sorry. Commercial.
Evarts: Big difference.
De Weerd: Going back to Councilman Cavener's question about the open space, that is
an amenity and usually when we do apartment -- or when City Council considers
apartments, amenities are a part of that.
Evarts: Yeah .
De Weerd: So, what kind of amenities are you anticipating that you would offer to the
residents of -- of your apartment complex?
Evarts: Yeah . Great question. So, very similar to what's happening at Old Town Lofts
right now. So, I don't know how deep you guys have dove into some of the elements that
are over there. It's probably not easy for you guys to get access to, but every floor in that
project has got communal spaces. Everything from dog washing stations, things that --
we kind of criticized for, Caleb did, when they did the urban renewal project in Eagle, that
people were like why are you putting dog washing stations and movie rooms and stuff like
that on the floors. The -- the nature of that building, just the shape of it, lent to a lot of
those spaces on each floor. So, there is quite a bit of that. We actually put a full bike
room that's over there, because we are encouraging people to take advantage of what is
most of the year great weather. So, there is an indoor lockable biking area that's over
there and -- and, again, just in this whole relationship building with downtown, Meridian
Cycle is going to be a part of the branding of that to make sure that we are, again,
promoting downtown businesses in our projects and in trying to encourage, you know,
economic development, not just for us, but kind of across the board. I think when the
ocean rises all boats should float. So, those are the things that are happening there. One
of the things we did look at Old Town Lofts, it just didn't pencil, but it would be certainly
something worth looking at, that Pacific Companies has done, is -- is roof space and being
able to do some amenity space there, given the small footprint. So, I think that would
certainly be something that would be willing to be discussed. I think the challenges --
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 31 of 47
and, again, the -- our other team here mentioned it, is, you know, when you are -- it's very
very difficult to pencil these projects and we are in this period of like unrestrained
prosperity that's fueled by debt. It has to end at some point. And so when it does end we
need to be cognizant of the fact that having big, big dollar amenities, condominiums,
things of that nature, we -- we might not be in an economic place where -- where that's
-- that is really great. But we always know we are going to have a workforce and we
always know we are going to have people that are laboring and so I just think that from a
strategic standpoint making sure that we are addressing that and leaning there, we deliver
that.
Hoaglun: Mr. Mayor?
Simison: Councilman Hoaglun.
Hoaglun: Josh, I have heard both -- both from you and River Caddis talk about the
difficulties of this project --
Evarts: Yeah.
Hoaglun: -- and, you know, the Old Town Lofts, et cetera, and -- and as I -- kind of mulling
this over and the difficulty and the dynamics of the marketplace currently and supply
chains and finding workers and all these good things, none of you -- neither one of you
put in the RFP the first time around and -- for various reasons, but --
Evarts: Yeah.
Hoaglun: -- it was not -- it was not done and now we are here and -- and so I started
thinking, huh, you know, in my mind as I'm listening to this, after hearing their discussion,
but then -- then you kind of switched to -- but go -- so, I'm thinking, you know, is this the
right time? Is this -- is this project ready to be baked right now or do other things have to
happen in downtown before this one's ready. But, then, you had said well -- and I think
you just need to pick somebody, move forward, and get -- get something together and
see if something can happen.
Evarts: Yeah.
Hoaglun: So, just -- I don't have to ask you to shoot straight with me, because, you know,
that's just --
Evarts: No. No. No. I -- I'm incapable of being anything but transparent.
Hoaglun: Is this -- and I wouldn't mind if River Caddis added their -- their two cents on
this, too, is are we too early for this yet for this particular site? I mean we got Unit 93
breaking ground or is it always going to be a difficult project no matter where we are in
the time frame and evolution of downtown?
Evarts: Yeah. So, let me answer that. I don't think this site is suited for anything much
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 32 of 47
more innovative than what Caddis and I are both producing. I love what they have
designed. I think that there is -- I could certainly put together, you know, a proposal that
would have a gap and -- and do something bigger. We wanted to propose something that
could get done, that we knew the dollars and when we tell you this is what we are going
to deliver, we just do it. I don't think this piece of dirt in particular lends itself to some of
the gaps that Mr. Basalone's talking about, you know, being able to do a performing arts
center. I just think that -- that where it's located and kind of where it's seated I don't know
that that's the right piece of dirt for doing something like that. So, I don't think it's too early
and I think we have -- we are always going to be an equity and political refugee location
in this country. That's why we are seeing these great in flows of people and businesses
are taking advantage of it, because we are getting all this great workforce that wants to
live here and, then, brings their talent here and -- and we want those people here and it's
creating pressure. The houses are getting gobbled up, that's great, and even though
housing prices are going up, the problem is all the laborers, all the people that are -- that
are working in our community that maybe aren't making those six figure jobs, they are
getting pushed out of their ability to buy a home and we need -- we need that living space.
So, I would argue that it's a natural location to do -- to do a project, either what Caddis
has proposed or what we are proposing, it's the right time to do that. Yeah. You are
welcome.
Simison: Any additional questions?
Evarts: I'm going to close with this. I really don't envy the decision process that you guys
have to go through, but I really do appreciate all of you and what I will say is whether we
are chosen or not, like Caleb and I's investment, like you are kind of stuck with us, you
know, the work that we do here currently. Certainly we are going to finish the building and
we are going to continue to be great partners in the city and I just appreciate an
opportunity to put this into you guys. So, thank you. And thank you to Caddis for coming
all the way from Michigan. I think that's wicked cool, not just because they went to my
cigar lounge. All right. To peace out.
Simison: All right. Yes. Just an Amber Alert, as we have all seen. So, with that, Cameron,
any comments that you would like to make before we go to the next phase?
Arial: Mr. Mayor, Members of Council and the MDC Board, it's -- you have before you the
two presentations. Now the time is yours to deliberate and you have the three potential
options for action moving forward and, again, as a staff we stand ready to support that
decision whatever it may be and helping you and the city succeed in this. So, looking
forward to your -- your feedback.
Simison: Okay.
De Weerd: Mr. Mayor?
Simison: Madam Mayor.
De Weerd: I guess I have a couple of questions for staff. That -- that maybe can help as
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 33 of 47
we look at the recommendation to move forward, what we can build into some of that.
We have had a couple of projects currently underway, as Josh -- Josh has mentioned and
one that's been completed. What have we learned during those current projects that
might lend to helping either of these two projects being considered as they move forward,
but also to know what to build into some of the recommendations as we move forward
with the project? That would be one question. Second question would be looking at the
current parking scenario, once we build out the two projects that are currently underway,
one further than the other whatever the parking needs coming into having this project
move forward, are we meeting the parking needs? Is this going to have to help look at
that? Can we do a one to one scenario? I guess that would be a second question. The
third question is maybe to City Council, I am concerned having the community center as
part of this, because alls I could see in what I was able to read was money that is -- are
the current impact fee and no additional dollars to pay for parking and the things that
really make this project a challenge. If you include the community center it provides a
gap and it's going to be a hard gap to really fill when you are anticipating or counting on
TIF dollars and you have a city project over there that doesn't generate any TIF money.
So, is the City Council at this point looking at putting additional money into it and is that
-- or is that going to just be an additional conversation to have with whatever project we
choose to move forward. But I think those are three key questions that I'm curious to be
answered.
Arial: Mr. Mayor and Commissioner De Weerd, so to the first two you had asked, you
know, things that we have learned from current developments and things going on in
downtown. Somewhat anecdotal, but certainly, you know, proof in the pudding, we as a
city, certainly in partnership with MDC, our business community, we have got a cool thing
going. Projects are getting done, things are being moved and at scale that I think is pretty
-- pretty incredible, given the -- the opportunity before us. So, it is a -- we are learning a
ton, I think it's safe to say. We have got great partners with everyone that's -- that's
showing up and investing in our downtown. We have got a great business community.
But I think probably an underpinning to your question is -- is, you know, the -- the potential
fragility of that, the sustainability of that, how do we -- how do we be good stewards of
that momentum that we are seeing and that's something that we are abundantly aware
of, you know, how do we make sure we are designing things properly? Parking it properly,
to your second question, you know, and -- and -- and really taking into account the current
businesses and the -- and the residents that -- that reside here in downtown. So, I think
we -- we have a great pulse on it. We have a great partnership with the business
community residents and the development that's going on and, certainly, we are lockstep
with our partners at MDC, which I think is -- is critical to the continuing of the momentum.
But those are some things that I think we could absolutely parlay forward into this project
and into future projects and certainly open to any comments that -- that others may have
on that. To the parking question and parking need, this was, obviously, a big consideration
in the RFP itself. So, you know, I think that was a factor you saw in the scoring with where
parking was a major factor and where the committee ranked parking in that -- in their
decision making. I do think even given our most recent downtown -- state of downtown
forum that we did in partnership with the Chamber, this was an issue and we, as a city
and, again, in partnership with MDC, we have done and will continue to do parking
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 34 of 47
assessments of our downtown. What is the available parking? What is the status of it?
Those studies have shown, at least in the current state, we are not in a crisis scenario,
but given that, we know that when you bring density, when you bring vitality, parking is an
essential element to continuing that and so this is an opportunity to address some of that,
certainly with the uses that are being proposed. So, we do want to be very sensitive to
that and certainly we will be going forward. Hopefully that at least addresses your
question, but certainly those are top of mind for -- for staff and I know it's been a discussion
of -- of both bodies. So, appreciate the questions. As far as the community center, that
is something that we -- we appreciated with both presenters and don't want to speak too
much for others, but just the -- the -- the openness and -- and being forthright with what
that gap is, you know, that took the form in one of the proposals where they just simply
didn't bring -- include the community center in their proposal. The other was is they
identified, if you want that here is what it's going to cost you. So, I think that, again, in my
view and you as decision makers, you see now clearly what the cost of those things are
and now are at a decision point on what you would like to do with them. So, hopefully,
that -- that at least gives you some clarity on your -- your points, Commissioner De Weerd,
but maybe open it to others of staff if you had further comments.
De Weerd: Yeah. And, Mr. Mayor, just to follow up and I appreciate that. From the MDCs
perspective, we have to look at the TIF dollars and when you take out a chunk of that
block and I think that both the presentations kind of have identified that concern, is we will
not be getting TIF dollars off that community center and even if the city were to put money
up to help close the gap, longer term, you know, that -- that lack of generating the TIF
compounds and -- and so I just wondered what conversations the city has had to be a
solution to -- to that.
Simison: I'm happy to answer part of that question, but I can't speak for Council and
alone, I have thought to at least have it be part of the RFP to see what people could
propose, see if there could be something innovative that could be part of this that would
make sense through their project. I think ultimately what I saw is it created more
challenges than solutions and I think that from my perspective I think the city has a better
option to relocate the community center to another location and address the parking for it
and for City Hall. That's not part of this project. That's my viewpoint, so I would not be
looking to the city to fill the -- fill the gap in this project, because I think we need -- we
have a better opportunity to succeed in other ways to fill those gaps for our own needs
and meet the needs of both facilities. That's my opinion. But I assume Council Woman
Perreault also has comments.
Perreault: As the Parks and Recreation liaison for the Council, I have had many
conversations with the parks director about this -- this entire year and agreeing with the
Mayor, we wanted to see what proposals we might get and see if the -- the private sector
could be creative in a way that -- that maybe we hadn't anticipated, but I agree, I don't
think that this is a location for the community center -- for one, we have been waiting on
a study that -- that will be out in the spring on what our community wants from a community
center and until we have that information from that survey I didn't feel comfortable
proposing that we include this. I don't think the timing is right just yet for us to determine
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 35 of 47
exactly what size of community center that we need, what the uses will be. We are just
not there yet from the information we are going to receive from the public and I just don't
think the timing worked out in that regard as well. But I agree that this space is -- is too
small to try to include, you know, such a significant amount of uses, but there has been a
lot of conversation, a lot of concern about what happens when our current community
center comes down as part of this project and the time that it's going to take to rebuild
that community center, what the cost is going to look like. As you saw, the -- the funds
that we have currently will not come close to meeting what we will need for a community
center and so the determination hasn't been made as you asked this Council what will
Council do to contribute additional funds beyond what we currently have and none of
those decisions have been made, of course, because we don't have a set idea of what
that community center is supposed to do and what the purpose is yet and so for me as
the parks liaison, I was not in favor of including -- I didn't have an issue with putting it in
the RFP, but I'm not in favor of including in that location, because of all those various
factors that haven't been determined yet.
De Weerd: Mr. Mayor, I guess just one final comment on -- on that is, you know, the
community center, although it's -- it -- we do have an existing one, there is an expectation
for the General Fund to match impact fee dollars and -- and so whether you put it in -- in
this location or another location -- and I think that's important for the applicants to hear
this conversation, because it's probably one of those questions that has -- that has been
a cause to that big gap. So, anyway, I -- I appreciate the conversation and -- and you
have more discussions to have, but I think, too, it's important to hear -- have MDC hear
some of that conversation as -- as we want to make sure that the TIF dollars can -- we
can be a strong partner with those TIF dollars and we want to make sure that we can
generate what we commit to.
Simison: And my two cents will be as much as you can generate towards public parking
beyond for other needs in downtown, I think that would be the best way to utilize those
TIF dollars, along with the other needs. Two cents.
Mueller: I have got a couple questions, mostly for our economic -- so, I'm curious. I have
an actual -- my own dilemma in my head with these projects. We have only a couple
blocks of true downtown to work with to go very high vertically. I know the neighborhood
pretty well. So, on one hand we have got -- across the street from this development single
level old housing, you know, averaging anywhere from 500 square feet to 1,100 square
foot homes. So, on one level it does make me nervous to see a building as tall as like
eight stories directly across the street from that, but on the other side, we only -- we have
so little space in our little downtown to actually go vertically it seems really important to
make the most of it when we can. So, I am curious with -- with zoning and when we look
at the available -- we are running out of space. You , as an economic development person
for downtown, how do you look at this when you are seeing these developments going?
Does eight stories scare you or is it like this is the best use of vertical space?
Arial: Mr. Mayor and Commissioner Mueller, it's a -- that's a fantastic question. You know,
it's -- it's -- it's -- it's a rub between who you are and your current status and who you want
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 36 of 47
to be or who you could be, I guess, is the way I would couch that. Really ultimately that's
going to fall down to, you know, the decision making. What is our vision for downtown?
What does it -- what does it entail? I personally sincerely hope that includes
redevelopment. It needs vitalization. It needs, you know -- I credit Josh's presentation to
-- to the workforce. We -- if we want vitalization and reinvigoration into our downtown, we
need people here. We need businesses here and people to support those businesses,
both as workers and as patrons. To your point about kind of just the verticality, it's here.
We know it is. We have got Union 93, two towers at seven stories. A p roposal potentially
at the corner of Main and Broadway of more. Eight stories I think, you know, we are right
there. So, that -- that reality is upon us. I think if we are struggling with that, I think that's
natural; right? We are moving -- we are transitioning and, quite frankly, we are seeing a
vision through. It's not going to be without its challenges. It's not going to be without its
conversation and certainly it's not going to be without its trepidation, but I think that's
something that our community in particular, Meridian, is up to and -- and has been and
will continue to be and I think it's one of those where we as a group collectively come to
better solutions. So, it's the -- you are asking the right question and I think we are the
right group to keep it -- keep it on track in a way that will ultimately benefit our community.
Mueller: I appreciate that. I think it's good for everyone to remember an eight story
building is already proposed on -- basically on Main Street. Can I ask one follow-up
question. This is the obvious elephant in the room that we are still not fully addressing.
As long as we have a one parking stall per resident rule in the city, we are steamrolling
head fast towards a parking disaster. We kind of all know this, which means we need to
receive proposals from people that have this type of gap, you know, ten to 14 million dollar
gaps that are mostly funded -- the funding issue is always parking. So, the -- the -- the
thing that I see on these two proposals is I see one that's downsized that's kind of like it
will fit in to what we have currently going on. It doesn't solve -- it doesn't push our parking
problem any farther forward and, then, I see this one, I do think at some point -- Ashley, I
don't know if you can possibly do the work right now, but when we look at the amount of
time that we have left on the TIF and the proposals of dollars that these developments
will raise, you can't get to there. I don't know how far we can get, but we can't get to
there. So, there is a gap to the gap. So, I think what is very important in making this
decision is you have to decide is this the time and is this the development where we are
going to make a push to solve some of this problem or are we going to punt on it? I think
that's pretty paramount and for us to decide that we are going to solve it it is going to have
to be a partnership between MDC for sure for TIF funds and I -- even with it -- with it being
a gap too far, probably with the developer and probably also with the city. So, without
knowing that every buddy's party to work on that, it seems hard to make this decision.
Anybody want to weigh in on that?
Arial: Mr. Mayor --
Simison: You want to take it? Okay. Go ahead.
Arial: Just one quick comment. Sure. Why not. Commissioner Mueller, great questions.
I think your -- your question about the TIF -- and I can certainly defer to Ashley as well on
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 37 of 47
this, but this -- this particular proposal is in the new Union District, so newly formed and,
therefore, you have -- and I'm trying to get to the -- the presentation, but, essentially, you
have new life in that, so you get the full -- full benefit of the term of that. Again, in my
opening presentation you saw kind of the evaluation of what these proposals -- two
proposals would generate in TIF. The one would be sufficient to fund at least the majority
of the known projects. The other was a couple million shy. So, hopefully, that helps
address that question.
Simison: And I think this goes back to the question that you were asking that were the
same questions I was looking at, especially with River Caddis. If you pull out the
community center and you pull out the parking for that, that number gets driven down
immensely. I didn't ask them the question, it's like, well, what if you just replaced that with
now typical -- that may or may not be what they do, you know, they could just downsize
the project and not include a community center and not have more parking, but at least
the TIF doesn't change. But if you throw a hotel in there what does that do now from that
standpoint. So, there are questions, absolutely, but, you know, you got to the heart of the
conversation and I think by us saying that the community center is not part of it, it changes
those numbers dramatically if that's the direction and I don't know if -- honestly, if -- if a
decision can be -- can or should be made tonight without looking at different numbers
without those pulled out. You know, we don't have the full secret sauce on those numbers
if that's a conversation with River Caddis that we want to have or not. And, Ashley, were
you looking to say something as well?
Squyres: Thank you, Mr. Mayor and Members of the Council and the Commission. You
know, the one thing I just want to remind everybody is the Union District was established
in 2020. We only have a lifecycle of 20 years, so we are burning daylight already. I can't
-- for whatever reason I can't pull up the original financial feasibility study for the district
at this time, but we anticipated Union 93 already moving forward with their project and
creating TIF in this next year. The valuation change between 2020 to 2021 is a hundred
dollars. So, we are not going to accrue any TIF this next fiscal year. So, we are now 18
years -- or, excuse me, we have 18 years left. It takes about 18 to 24 months to start
accruing that TIF, so we don't have a lot of time left already and so that's just something
I want this Council and this body to be mindful of in making a decision, is that the clock is
ticking very very fast. Costs are going up very very fast and if we want the chance to be
able to help fund some of these public improvements fully we have to act now. We can't
-- we can't delay this decision.
Hoaglun: Mr. Mayor?
Simison: Councilman Hoaglun.
Hoaglun: To that point, Ashley, not to delay the decision, I am interested in what River
Caddis proposal would look like without a community center and -- and trying to compare
a little bit more apples to apples I guess, but is that a type of delay or you are talking
about putting off to another RFP type of delay?
Squyres: Mr. Mayor, Council Member Hoaglun, I think we -- we need to make a decision
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 38 of 47
within the next couple of months I guess is where I'm going with that, rather than going
out to RFP, rather than delaying a decision in order to understand what the needs
assessment is going to be for this community center and -- and just kind of, you know --
you know, staying on that conversation for the next several months. I think this is
something that we need to act as quickly as we possibly can, because we do know that
the next steps of the negotiation, the development agreement, the OPA or a participation
agreement, that's going to take some time and just to give perspective, we spent 14
months with Galena on the original RFP for this site, so -- and we were back here and it
took that amount of time to figure out we weren't going to be able to get to where we
needed it to be with the project. So, again, time is just really precious.
Hoaglun: Okay. Thank you. And, then, Mr. Mayor, just to follow up. I'm of the mind, too,
for a community center I think we need further discussions on what that looks like. Are
we going to do -- to Commissioner Basalone's comments earlier, you know, do we have
an auditorium facility and, then, we have a spoke -- you know, a hub and spoke type of
system for the city and -- and those types of things, to have it in that space right now I
don't think is critical. We can -- we can do something else and I think parking is more of
a priority for downtown than -- than the community center right now. So, I don't know if
that helps or hinders the time frame, but I am interested is, okay, what does that look like
for River Caddis if they don't have the community center and to your point is it retail, is it
commercial, is it just parking, is it more units, that sort of thing and what does that look
like and where do the numbers land on something like that? I think with Pacific Company
and those types of things, it -- it's there, it's ready to roll and you have got good -- good
numbers I think, a good feel for it, but those are the decisions, four stories, eight stories,
you know, those have a great impact on our -- our community 20, 30, 40 years down the
road. So, something we have to consider.
Simison: Commissioner Basalone.
Basalone: I will try to be real quick, instead of being as verbose as I tend to be. I think
that we do have to make a decision. I agree with what Josh said and I believe the
gentleman from River Caddis has mentioned this also. We have two good proposals
here. I don't believe in going back to square one, new RFPs, all of that. We have two
good proposals. We have two issues. We have been trying to put square pegs into round
holes in a number of areas. The community center. I love the comment about community
input for what a community center should be. It might be a standalone community center.
But it isn't something where we try to force a smaller community center into, essentially,
a private project and take away tax money that could be going for other public good if it's
been earned. So, I think we have the public parking issue and we have the public
community center issue as separate issues. But these two projects, in my estimation, are
great projects. Both of them talked about collaboration, wanting input from us, from the
community and so forth. So, there is room with either one of them to do some negotiating,
as Councilman Hoaglun said. Could retail go in in place of the community center in the
River Caddis project? Certainly it could. That could be negotiated in some way. Could
additional parking be put in in some way? That could be negotiated. We have two
potential partners who want to collaborate with us. I think we should take advantage of
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 39 of 47
them, make a decision after due deliberation and move forward. But let's not move
backwards.
De Weerd: Mr. Mayor?
Simison: Madam Mayor.
De Weerd: Do we want to ask either of these applicants a question?
Simison: If you have a question.
De Weerd: I guess in both the presentations there was flexibility to respond to what the
community needs were. If the community center is -- is not an amenity or a piece that
either the Council or MDC is -- is looking towards and helps address the gap in our first
project and certainly if they fill it with commercial -- and you mentioned a boutique hotel
or -- or other options, that's -- that's certainly going to add to closing the gap and I did
appreciate they had more than -- more than the -- they were looking at more parking than
what was required and I agree with the conversation that we have to look at parking
requirements in our downtown, unless the city wants to be part of that -- that solution, as
well as MDC. But I do think it comes down to which project theme do we want to move
forward with and who had even specificity that it gives us detail on what the creative
solutions and creative elements to a proposal would be.
Perreault: Mr. Mayor?
Simison: Council Woman Perreault.
Perreault: If -- if permitted, I would like to hear from -- from both on why there weren't
other uses considered. Perhaps retail uses. The -- Caddis didn't include any -- any other
uses besides the community center and -- and residential. I just want to understand if
there were considerations made for other uses, what they were and why they weren't
included.
Simison: Gentlemen? Yeah .
Evarts: All right. So -- so, we did -- we did propose office space. So, office space
residential, but not community center and we intentionally avoided retail, because we felt
like being on that edge of that residential part of the -- part of the neighborhood that, you
know, I was asking myself how would I feel if I was trying to court different kinds of night
activity stuff that's going to be happening, again, across from my kitchen and we felt that
based on the inquiries that we were getting for Old Town Lofts is we are getting the right
amount of inquiries and the right product mix for retail that's going to go into that space,
but what we absolutely do not have is commercial office space.
McGraw: You are taller. So, John McGraw, River Caddis. Thanks. So, the -- the
approach that we took was we were given a set of parameters and within our team we
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 40 of 47
decided to include this community center as doing so and we did that because we saw
another path in getting more parking. That was a way that we could point to an additional
however many spots and the community center could be -- I don't know what the
community center is made of; right? I don't know what it wants to be now, what it wants
to be later. I don't know if it wants to be a business incubator. I don't know if it wants to
be a -- an amenity to the public. So, I'm really unsure. But we were given a set of
parameters and we tried to achieve that. We showed that there was a gap, but we still
have a lot to solve. So, can we put in retail? You know, we have approached different
folks for hospitality, for restaurants, you know, we can approach that with -- with
everybody. We don't know today, but that's -- it's, obviously, open for discussion, so --
Perreault: Mr. Mayor?
Simison: Council Woman Perreault.
Perreault: I want to clarify the reason I asked that question. In the RFP it says that --
number -- letter C, preferred project should feature a mixed use development with active
street level uses that will bring visitors to the area, service downtown residents and
workers, and contribute to the vitality of downtown. So, I don't see residential doing that.
I see community center doing that, but I -- if I'm reading things well, that's probably likely
something we are -- we are not going to consider keeping in. So, I just wanted to
understand what your perspective was of that -- of letter C, what that mixed use
development with active level uses looks like and curious if you did have any questions
with the staff about what those elements might -- might be. So, this -- this RFP was a
little general in that regard and so I just want to, you know, make sure I understood that
-- that -- that there was -- you know, just wanted -- just wanted to see what your
interpretation of that statement was.
Evarts: Yeah. Council Member Perreault, just in the -- in the consideration of time,
because you guys are -- are limited. I'm not trying to avoid the question. I think we could
spend hours, perhaps days, nugging through the details of what's -- of what's going on
here. I think that -- I think that the lack of the clarity that existed and I think the -- even
though it was well intended, I think including that community center element created a
certain amount of pain. I think the -- the issue in terms of activation -- certainly the way
we were looking to address it was simply -- was work -- people that were living and
working in downtown Meridian and, then, activating that hard corner that was painted --
or that was pointing on 2nd and Idaho, because I do believe that all the activity is going
to be pushed to 2nd Avenue. Like Broadway is done, because it's the access point for all
the big developments and so 2nd Avenue will be activated, so that's why the office building
with bigger frontage and drawing people, that was -- that was the direction we went with
in terms of pushing people, so --
McGraw: You were correct in why we didn't -- you know, why we put in the community
center as that frontage. That community center across the nation, community foundation,
whatever that may be, is done to activate space. That's why we have big windows. We
thought that's where people work, that's where people play, that's where people learn,
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 41 of 47
that's where people grow. Activation was part of the project. I was looking at this as we
are adding 20,000 square feet of commercial. I mean that's how we -- as designers, as
collaborators, that's how we were looking at this. We were -- we were assuming that this
community center was more of an amenity and that that's what was wanted, but, again,
choosing the group that can help provide the structure, this -- this deal, this development
is -- is probably the most important part. Just figuring out the right team, so --
Simison: Councilman Bernt.
Bernt: Mr. Mayor, I just want to say thank you to these two companies you know, these
two individuals for their presentations today. They -- I think that you both -- both
companies did a great job in casting a vision for what you feel our downtown needs to
look like and, honestly, at the end of the day I think that's what it boils down to me is what
-- what -- what vision are we looking at, because if I'm hearing you both correctly, you are
both willing to negotiate, you are both willing to come to the table, you are both willing to
participate in the design aspect, you are both extremely interested in collaboration. So,
in my opinion that's a tie. I think -- I think there is no doubt that either one of you would
be big supporters with that process going forward. For me it's a matter of which individual
casts a bigger net and bigger vision for our downtown going forward and it's no joke that
I have never been in favor of a community center in that project. I have said it before and
I will say it again, I have never liked it for the -- for the same reasons that were specified
earlier. I -- I think that if there is one thing that this downtown corridor needs the most it's
bodies. It's -- it's bodies coming downtown to live, work, and spend money and -- and in
order for people to spend money in our downtown corridor we need people living down
here and we need people working down here and that's just that simple and so in my
opinion there was one company that did a better job casting that net and -- and -- and
provided the vision that I'm looking forward for downtown and that is residential and office
space. I'm okay to make a decision tonight. I think it's crystal clear in my view who I
support going forward. I would invite other Council Members and other Commissioners
to see if they share that same clarity or that same opinion. If not, then, we need to
probably continue this discussion.
Perreault: Mr. Mayor?
Simison: Council Woman Perreault.
Perreault: I don't yet have the clarity I would like to have to make that decision this
evening.
Simison: While I don't have a vote, I would agree in that context that, you know, personally
if I was plotting their path forward I would give them both two weeks to reply to the
information and the changes that they have heard today and give that back to the group
and we either set a joint meeting or individual meetings to have conversations and make
said motions. I assume that they are done separately and not together by each board it
has the approvals -- we are going to all vote and if MDC goes one way and the city goes
another in the same vote, that -- you will have to excuse me, it's my first time going through
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 42 of 47
a joint meeting dual RFP process for a solution.
Arial: Mr. Mayor, previous precedence would be that it would be a combined vote.
Simison: A combined vote? Okay. That is -- I have learned.
Cavener: Mr. Mayor?
Simison: Do I get to vote in this one, too? Am I still without vote?
De Weerd: You are without.
Simison: Oh. Yeah. Councilman Cavener.
Cavener: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I think I'm supportive of your idea of giving both
respondents a couple of weeks to process the information they have heard today and so
I think it's important at least for MDC Commissioners and City Council Members to make
sure that they are candid with their feedback and I think it's important at least to share my
perspective of that. When this whole concept was first presented to the Council it was a
what if scenario. What if something that's kind of a catalyst project could be launched in
this area replacing our existing community center, replacing our park, and I think that the
feedback from the Council was that we are intrigued to learn more. But I know that many
Council Members were very hesitant about giving up our community center and for me
particularly giving up that little bit of park space in downtown that whatever would come
forth would have to be pretty spectacular for me to be supportive of losing either of those
in downtown Meridian. Now, I know since then there has been other conversations about
potential locations for parks and potential locations for community centers and I'm open
to those conversations, but I'm not one that would be supportive of moving forward with
either proposal in a transfer of land until we have those questions answered about what
is going to happen to the park space in downtown Meridian and what is the vision for a
community center for Meridian residents. So, I like both. I think both projects bring forth
a particular merit. It's apples and oranges. Just kind of depends on which one you would
want to pick. I think both could be really beneficial for downtown Meridian. But it's going
to be really challenging for me to be supportive of either moving forward long term until
those other questions are answered.
Simison: Councilman Hoaglun.
Hoaglun: Mr. Mayor. I have had some discussions with our parks director about what
are the options and -- and I think it's incumbent upon the city, if we utilize this parkland for
this -- one of these projects, it's incumbent upon us to find that replacement property and
figure that out. I mean that's -- it's a city park and we have a priority of redeveloping
downtown, along with MDC as their priority and to do that we are going to need that
space, so we are going to have to figure that out and I think that's on us. I don't know if
others feel that way on the Council or you, Mayor, but to me we have to -- we have to
move forward with something if we want to replace that.
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 43 of 47
De Weerd: Mr. Mayor?
Simison: Mayor Tammy.
De Weerd: I guess I was intrigued with the first proposal by saying, you know, they --
they were not totally opposed to the conversation of maybe looking at replacement
property for the park. So, they did bring that up. In response to -- urban parks are going
to look different than rural parks or suburban parks. You won't have the open space, but
you are going to have the plaza space. I do appreciate the first project and -- and the
detail that they offered with the live walls and the street trees and -- and festival street.
So, there -- there was attempts at -- at creating more of the urban space, the urban public
space that I thought was very creative and innovative. On the second project it didn't give
us very many specifics, but there was nothing that it showed how that urban open space
or public space would exist and maybe it was something that, then, was further defined
in deliberations, but if we are looking at what we asked in the RFP and how it addressed,
we are changing or moving the teeth by saying we are taking out the community center,
which is a destination. If we wanted to really look at what project is going to draw people
to it, it would be that community center in all fairness, rather than the -- the Class A office
space that are going to bring the same people there every time. So, we do have elements
that we could make a decision and say these are the -- the aspects that we need from
the team that we choose to move forward to do if we really do want to move forward,
because we need more specifics or right now we can identify what do we want each team
to bring back. Do we want them to address what is that public -- public amenity, whether
it's an urban design for public gatherings, a draw to our downtown. If it's replacing the
open space that we would lose from Centennial Park and the community center as a
whole, how can we replace that at maybe a different location. We have got to address
the parking aspect and what -- what the community elements are going to be and what
the amenities are going to be for the apartments or the residential that would be in
downtown. I guess if you don't want to pick a team, those would be the elements I think
that need to be at least fundamentally what we need to hear back from both projects if we
don't want to make a decision today.
Simison: Just my two cents. I think if they want to and if they choose not to, well, that
also speaks to the viewpoint on if they are just fine with what their proposal is and, you
know, it is what it is versus invest more time and energy into those modifications. Because
I think that they have been given a lot of good information today. I really do. For them to
either adjust and provide additional or sit back and wait for us to make a decision if they
choose not to make any modifications.
Bernt: Mr. Mayor?
Simison: Councilman Bernt.
Bernt: After reading the tea leaves and hearing the wonderful information that has been
given us to this evening, I -- I really do appreciate the recommendations by former Mayor
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 44 of 47
Tammy and -- and I agree with her wholeheartedly with regard to discussing furthermore
public space, you know, what do these two projects offer in regard to, you know, the draw
to downtown, the replacement of the open space, elements of the community center,
parking and all the things that were mentioned by Mayor Tammy. So, I -- I would be
supportive of continuing this discussion. We have 15 more minutes until our -- our 6:00
o'clock meeting starts and I know that there are some things that we need to do before
then as well. So, I don't know what the time frame looks like and I -- and I ask for guidance
in what that looks like and what we -- the formalities with -- with that before I make an
official motion.
De Weerd: Mr. Mayor, I guess as -- maybe we need to ask the applicants what kind of
time frame they would need, but I would -- just to add to the list is with more specificity
that draw for the public gathering space is important. But also equally important is what
the financials will look like. So, as -- as some of these changes are considered in
particular for the first project, how some of these changes might close the gap and maybe,
then, staff would need to do a new financial analysis at to -- to say what TIF would
generate that would help us make a better decision as well.
Simison: Would the applicants like to provide any feedback on proposed time frames for
any additional changes based on what you heard?
Evarts: Yeah . Mr. Mayor, City Council, MDC Board, I also want to protect Caddis in this
whole thing, so this has gotten very complex, at least in my view as a respondent,
because I think what Mayor Tammy has been talking to in terms of activation on 2nd and
stuff like that, when we were originally putting together our response to this, it wasn't with
the consideration of taking city streets and doing activations and -- and stuff like that. So,
I want to be careful that -- that you guys give us some really clear boundaries for what
you guys want us to address, because I don't want this to be something that is unfair to
them or to us. I mean ours is pretty straightforward. There is not a lot of mystery there.
But -- but I also want to make sure that it's a level playing field, that when we are
responding to these things that we are not unintentionally creating things that are going
to cause hardships and I certainly don't want a group that's traveled here from Michigan
to feel like they are getting marginalized, so -- by a process and their time wasted. So,
that's my two cents. I'm happy to provide anything on -- you know, we are -- we are
committed and already doing things, but I just want to protect them. So, they are probably
better suited to kind of answer that.
Bernt: And, Mr. Mayor, it's -- you know, with -- with all due respect, it's -- it's totally okay
to -- to participate via Zoom, you know. I mean if the folks, you know, want to participate
via Zoom and I -- that's totally respectable and, Mayor, we only have ten more minutes.
Simison: I know. We are just trying to get a time frame for any sort of re -- new information
back to the city and MDC.
K.McGraw: Well, I got up at 5:00 a.m., so I got to talk. At least a little bit. I'm Kevin
McGraw. I'm the president of River Caddis and John's proud father and his brother also
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 45 of 47
works for us. We need at least a couple of weeks. You won't get new drawings. That's
impossible. That would take me a month and I would say two and a half, three weeks.
You got Thanksgiving coming up next week. So, at least two and a half, three weeks.
Zoom would be great for lots of reasons. We travel around the country doing this. But I
just want to emphasize a couple things. And, Josh, thanks for all the nice comments you
made about us and I say the same thing about you and your Pacific Companies. Great
resume. Great everything. No complaints. You have got great choices in front of you.
But you need to pick a team, because what you see in front of you is a placeholder. It's
nothing. You just wanted to see what we could do. That's all that is and so when we talk
about taking out a community center, taking a park, none of that matters. If you are going
to buy a house you got to find out what your budget is. We don't know what your budget
is. We don't know what gap you can fill. We go around the country doing P3s. I used to
be a municipal attorney. At a hundred attorney firm I was a senior partner and that's how
I got into real estate in doing P3s and helping find money and plugging gaps. Every
project, P3 or private, has a gap. We all have to fix it all the time. I know -- I know they
have gaps in every project. You got to fix them. We did it in Jules On 3rd, which is a
great reference for you, by the way. But you need to pick somebody that you are willing
to work with. Collaborate, like my son's emphasized, because that's what we do. We are
good at it. And go. You are going to keep going and going and -- and you are just not
going to make any -- any progress, because what you see isn't going to be what you get.
Because when we sit down and figure out what you can afford and what pays TIF and
what plugs the gap, you are going to see that we can satisfy some of your goals, but not
all of them. But if it pencils for both of us it's a win and, then, you do it the best way you
can with the streetscape. Basically what we showed you is basically what we can do and,
yes, it looks a lot like Jules On 3rd, but it's because of the size of the -- of the parcel here
and what we are trying to accomplish and one last comment on the community center,
we were trying to get public parking, because you can't use CCDC money for a private
lot and you can't build public parking on market rate apartments with -- you just can't do
it. And so that allowed us to possibly do that. So, there is still a possibility a community
center of some sort could work and we did a shared parking analysis with Ada county, by
the way, because they had daytime workers in the county and we had nighttime workers
and so we had like a 40 percent agreed upon shared parking and we used their parking
consultants. I drafted most of the documents with county attorneys and some local
attorneys here and we do have local economic incentive people to help us. But we have
to find out what you can afford, what your budget is and, then, we back into it that way
and alls we really did, both of us, will show you a placeholders of what we are capable of
and so a new drawing, new numbers don't mean anything, to be honest. We will do what
you want us to do, but we won't have time to do new drawings, which will be irrelevant
anyway. If you have any questions I'm here.
Simison: Well, speaking for myself, I'm not looking for new drawings. It is -- the way I
would describe it, you -- you eat what you produce. Your TIF is what you can make and
I think that's really kind of getting down to some of these -- you know, if we can run the
TIF without them, that's fine. But, Council President, I will let you decide on what you
would like to have by when and when to make a motion to continue this until.
Bernt: Mr. Mayor, I was just looking for a date. I know it's two or three weeks. Three
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 46 of 47
weeks? Is that okay with you, Mr. Evarts? Okay. Do we want to maybe move this to --
maybe -- I know that --
Simison: A date to be determined.
Bernt: Date to be determined? Okay. So, let's just move this and very soon we will meet
with staff, we will meet with MDC and staff and we will -- we will work out a date and let
everyone know. Just a heads up. I wouldn't be opposed to having this at an MDC
meeting. I know that MDC comes to our meetings and so City Council going to a MDC
meeting, I wouldn't be opposed to doing that or having that part of the discussion.
Cavener: I'm supportive of that as well.
Simison: December 8th would be three weeks from tomorrow for submittal of information
and, then, we can work on a date for a board meeting.
Nary: Mr. Mayor?
Simison: Mr. Nary.
Nary: Just one piece of clarity. So, you can -- so, one piece of clarity. If we don't pick a
date today we will have to notice. So, it will take an extra couple of weeks.
Simison: I think we will -- we can get it noticed. We are not going to have a date in three
-- we have three weeks before we get the information. We could have a date picked by
the next day or two and notice it appropriately --
Nary: Okay.
Simison: -- without any issues.
Bernt: Anything more from me?
Simison: A motion. December 8th for the information and a date to be determined.
Bernt: Okay. Mr. Mayor, I move that we -- that we continue this discussion to a date to
be determined and information to be submitted by December 8th.
Hoaglun: Second the motion.
Simison: I have a motion and a second. Is there any discussion? If not, all in favor
signify by saying aye. Opposed nay? The ayes have it and the item is agreed to.
MOTION CARRIED: FOUR AYES. TWO ABSENT.
EXECUTIVE SESSION per Idaho Code 74-206(1)(a) To consider hiring a public
Meridian City Council - Meridian Development Corporation - Joint Meeting
November 16, 2021
Page 47 of 47
officer, employee, staff member or individual agent, wherein the respective
qualities of individuals are to be evaluated in order to fill a particular vacancy or
need. (Vacated)
Simison: Do I have a motion to adjourn?
Bernt: Mr. Mayor?
Simison: Councilman Bernt.
Bernt: I move that we adjourn.
Simison: Motion to adjourn the meeting. All in favor signify by saying aye. Opposed
nay? The ayes have it. We are adjourned.
MOTION CARRIED: FOUR AYES. TWO ABSENT.
MEETING ADJOURNED AT 5:55 P.M.
(AUDIO RECORDING ON FILE OF THESE PROCEEDINGS)
_______________________________ ______/______/______
MAYOR ROBERT SIMISON DATE APPROVED
ATTEST:
_____________________________________
CHRIS JOHNSON - CITY CLERK