their schedule is such that they need to
do that at their December 16th meeting
hence we needed to take action before
that all of this information on the time
sensitivity of it was provided to us
late last week um much to the
I guess the Chagrin of of a number of us
who had to scramble to to make sure that
this would be able to take place tonight
and we're going to be calling upon Diane
marot our finance director to speak to
this topic however um there was a signup
sheet out in the lobby
and because of the shortness of this
meeting and the specificity of the
topic I'm going to ask that people take
no more than three minutes if they wish
to speak to the
topic
and the criteria aside from that three
minute
limitation are the same as at any city
council meeting a regular city council
meeting and that is that we ask you to
please come over to the Lector and use
the microphone there let us know your
name your address and if you feel that
you have some specific thing special
thing that you want to identify for the
council that might help them better
understand your concern or your interest
such as you're a resident you're a
property owner a business owner whatever
you think is important please please
feel free to tell us that at that time
and um if you have written comments
please feel free to submit them those
will go to the clerk and with that I'll
ask if anyone has signed up to
speak
sure this fine okay hi my name is tor
Cole and I've been a resident of um
brickshire Estates for 20 years and uh
came here from Seattle love the area
still like my home and I like the
opportunity of being part of isqua
formally part of isqua um my concern is
is that if for some reason because I
don't understand the ins and outs of the
way processes work in this manner or in
this matter that uh we may end up back
in square one which is uh un
Incorporated King County uh when you
compare the way that they don't do
business and the way you folks do
business and the way
uh that occasionally samamish apparently
does because I'm very uninformed about
them they don't brush against me in any
sense it Brookshire States is on the
south side if you would of Clan itself
uh that would be the Fate that would be
the worst of all Fates I do want
positively to be a member of isqua the
city um and uh the small things that
matter when they become crisis points
snow removal um I'm a commercial estate
broker I need to get to where clients
are in in in the age of email that works
to a degree and then to a point past
that it doesn't work and I want to just
go and make
sure that at least you've heard from
just an average um person um someone
that has not been really working in this
Garden a whole long uh long time but I
feel strongly about it and I just hope
that whatever you folks can do to push
this forward in a positive way for us to
be part of you eventually uh can happen
and I appreciate the time thank you
thank you is there anyone else who
signed up yes Mike
Foss hi my name is Mike boss I like Tori
live in Brookshire States and I've have
always thought that uh I was an isqua in
fact it was the first three years we
lived there we thought we lived in isqua
and it wasn't until the 2005 uh campaign
did we realize we weren't um and I I
just wanted to kind of share something
we've been on kind of a a campaign to
communicate with our paa neighbors to
kind of get a feel for how they're
feeling and we have so far at least from
what results I've seen from the phone
campaign a very very very positive
feeling from them we're very high on the
yes we want to be part of isqua they
there were several people in my calls
and we had like 10 or 11 people making
calls but there was several people in my
calls were on the On The Fringe they
didn't know enough information yet I
actually had two phone calls where I was
talking to uh people who were the same
way as I was when he move up here and
this one lady I talked to has been up
here for 10 years and she said we're not
part of isqua
I was said uh no yes we are no and I
said technically we're not but we have
the address but we're not so I was able
to explain things to her and she was
very positive then so we have a very
strong population at least I think we've
been able to talk to uh on the hill on
the plateau that are feeling very
positive about uh moving and becoming
part of the city of isqua and we're
quite excited about doing that uh and we
hope that the February date works the
sooner the better we get away from from
unincorporated King County I hope it
doesn't snow in the next couple of weeks
you know if it snows we're in deep
trouble because they've told us already
they ain't coming up to the hill so um
you know I just hope that we can move
forward and get a February election so
thank you thank you sorry dick
l
good evening Madame mayor Mr Mayor elect
uh City Council Members dick Laro uh my
address
4652 238th Way Southeast in Brookshire
uh consider myself to be an Esquire
resident I got left my jacket on even
though it's kind of warm in here so you
guys have no question about who to root
for uh when the next football game is
played but I got one other thing to ask
of
you please would you reflect the whole
Council vote that happened a while back
that overwhelmingly said we want to put
this
subject to a vote that's all we're
asking we've been at this off and on for
near 10 years now we just want to be
part of your beautiful city thanks and
uh I look forward to February 11th
thanks thank you folks thank you is
there anyone else signed
up is there anyone present who wishes to
speak who hasn't had an opportunity to
speak yet thank
you uh David kler 255 Southeast Andrew
Street the council seen my most recent
letter on this um one clarification I'd
like to make sure um on the state law
with um allows um state sales tax to
subsidize
annexations some parts of the the
studies that I've seen kind of shows
that we can use that to make a profit
and it only can be used as my
understanding of the law and reading it
to make up for costs that are not
covered by the uh the annexation area to
suggest that this this is going to be a
a profit from the annexation I think is
um is not fair
Fair
um huge future obligations you're
assuming on Transportation especially as
much as you say the isqua Fall City Road
isn't that important it is an important
road for the
area and it's going to have to be
addressed at some point and the $38
million is getting to be an old number
for the that that
project
um you might want to consider um using
48th plus Brookshire is a different line
for this and uh people I taught to and
more in the Northern Area are very much
associated with samamish already their
kids their younger families their kids
are associated with all the different
things going on in suami associated with
the high schools and the middle schools
and elementary schools it's a whole
different situation in the northern part
of khani there's also the part that is
the most difficult for the city to serve
and the most expensive part to serve
thank you thank you is there anyone else
present who hasn't had an opportunity to
speak who wishes to
speak yes
sir hi my name is Mel Morgan my address
is 4018 240th Place Southeast isaquel
Washington it would be nice to have the
address actually count for something
after 20 years uh I don't live in Clan I
don't live in Brookshire but I do live
in the Northern portion of the paa and I
would suggest that I know myself and my
neighbors would like to be part of isqua
so we hope you we get a chance to vote
on it thank you thank you anyone else
present who wishes to speak who hasn't
had a
chance second call anyone else who
wishes to speak third call anyone else
who wishes to speak hearing and seeing
no one else who wishes to speak the um
comment period is now closed and now we
will ask our finance director Diane
marot to speak to this topic good
evening mayor and Council um tonight
before you is a resolution that would be
um recommending an election on February
11th for the residents of the Kahani
potential annexation area to consider
annexing into the city of isqua in
addition to the vote of annexing in they
would also be
approving um acceptance of our existing
outstanding debt as well as the pre-
zoning that we went through in September
and October um to get us to this
juncture where we're at today this has
been a very long and deliberative as
well as a very open and public process
and working both with the city of isqua
community residents and citizens as well
as Kahani we've been very thoughtful in
our process we've been very we've done
considerable amount of research and
Analysis to um support the
recommendations that the administration
is bringing forward to you tonight um so
uh with that I will keep this short
because we have been presenting a lot of
information over the LA last um 17
months nearly as as far as where we are
go where we are at tonight as the mayor
indicated part uh there we received some
additional clarifying information late
last week both from the County Council
legal council as well as our legal
council as well as the King County Clerk
and as a result of getting additional
clarifying information we became to
understand that the County Council
wasn't having any other meetings for the
rest of the year so that necessitated
bringing forward the special meeting to
you tonight originally we were under the
assumption we had until December the
27th so um we since you know it's
regrettable but U it's fortunate we came
to understand the process thank
you thank
you this is
um do you have any questions I guess
before of the finance director
okay this is um coming with a
recommendation for motion to
approve the date of an
election and I will ask the council how
you wish to proceed on
this council member winterstein yeah I'd
like to make a motion right
uh I would uh move to approve re res
resolution number
2013-20 20 requesting that the King
County director of Elections hold a
special election February 11th
2014 for the purpose of placing on the
ballot a proposition concerning the
annexation of certain property known as
the Kahani annexation area an assumption
of existing City indebtedness by
property within the Kahani annexation
area if annexed second moved by winterin
and seconded by
Butler the item is now open for
discussion and questions amongst the
council council member Sher thank you
guess I'll go first
um by now my opposition to this
annexation is well documented and
despite there being no reputation of my
prior analysis and points raised on the
subject the drive to move Full Speed
Ahead with the February vote is clear
tonight I offer some additional points
as to why this proposed ballot measure
is not in our best interest and it's not
in my opinion even in Quan's best
interest first I must note the haste in
which the special meeting was called
however inadvertent and unfortunate the
timing may have been at the last
announcement of committees and reports
the public was informed we would be
getting an update on the annexation
effort at 4 pm last Friday there was
suddenly an announcement of tonight's
meeting and a bill came forth now I
don't understand how the county
council's deadline became quite so
suddenly known but we've not heard a lot
of comments tonight I counted five and
it doesn't seem like there's been a full
opportunity uh even though this has been
a fairly long process to actually
comment on the substance of this
particular ballot
measure secondly the costs of the
potential annexation are already being
felt the 2014 isqua budget includes
$120,000 for an annexation analysis
which is above and beyond the cost of
the Nesbit study that we already
incurred so now we're already fairly
deep into this in terms of cost and
there hasn't even been a formal decision
by the residents of Kohan third I
believe Kohan itself should be given a
choice of jurisdictions to consider
annexing two which this ballot measure
does not Encompass I again ask you to
look at the geography of our city limits
there's a map right behind
me
it's up to the upper right hand corner
you can't really see it from where
you're sitting because it's shaded in
white but right up there there's only a
tiny little piece of the paa that's
contiguous with the borders of isqua
that's not at all like South Lake
samamish South Cove and this South Lake
samamish triangle that was annexed in
2005 that's not at all like other
annexations that have come into the city
in the past this is not contiguous
whatsoever additionally at a previous
meeting it
wased that isqua would not commit to any
specific Road Project improvements even
the miles of substandard pavement not
identified as funded in the nesbet study
and one need only look to the Providence
point intersection realignment or Lake
samamish Parkway improvements near South
Cove for the impact of annex
neighborhoods not receiving road
projects that they desire it further
appears that our neighbors in samamish
who have no bonded indebtedness would
not even need the state annexation sales
tax credit as we would to support
kohan's
infrastructure in some increasing our
carbon footprint stretching city
services while delaying important
spending on projects already within our
limits and denying kohani residents an
opportunity to choose their Destiny is
in my opinion a regrettable decision
that I cannot and will not support thus
I will continue my resolve as the
minority voice against this course of
action thank you thank you I will take
that as being in opposition to the
resolution to set the date it is okay
thank
you other questions or discussion
council member winterstein um I
certainly do support the resolution I
made it and of course um I think it's
really important that our constituents
and members of the viewing public in
here tonight to know that I also view uh
without a shadow of doubt that we are
denying nothing to nobody in fact we are
giving giving access to the question
that we were asked and so by the
resolution of asking the county to put
it on the ballot for February 11th is
exactly
how um our country Works uh it follows
the laws and and so um this is not
denying this is actually granting a vote
uh to people who have asked for a vote
and um I it's it's wonderful that this
uh date of February 11th that where this
resolution proposes uh will give the
residents of that area uh this
opportunity um and because it does it
does rest with them and I'm glad we're
giving them that opportunity I'm kind of
repeating myself but uh um um we need to
look at the $38 million too because
that's five
projects and they're not all within the
uh annexation area so that
misinformation is
unfortunate thank
you other comments or questions from
Council
Members council member but
uh thank you madam mayor uh uh the
Council made a a decision uh back in
July to go forward uh with annexation
the boundary review board spent uh uh
two meetings in issaqua and uh
unanimously supported uh
uh isqua assuming the
responsibility uh this Proclamation
tonight or this resolution tonight uh is
just the next step in a process uh that
uh uh we are moving towards and I
believe from what we heard this evening
the residents in the potential
annexation area have waited uh long
enough let's put it to a vote so that uh
we can settle this
issue I will be uh supporting uh the
motion other questions or discussion
council member
Goodman thank you m mam mayor I haven't
changed my support either since the July
vote I think the only thing that's
changed for me is the boundary review
board hearing uh that process and from
what I understand isqua received
incredibly High Praise for the
presentations and the professionalism
that we presented and so I'm uh proud to
be a part of this city and I know that
there are a lot of people who are
excited and anxious to be a part of the
city
and so the vote I agree with Paul on
February 11th is an important one and it
does provide that opportunity for the
decision to finally be
made any other discussion or
questions is the council ready then to
proceed on this uh motion to approve
resolution number
2013-20 as just described and
discussed all those in favor please say
I I opposed name all right so that was
um five in favor and one opposed in
opposition council member
share that was the sole purpose
of this special council meeting was the
only item of business that could be
addressed during the special council
meeting and because it has been
addressed we are now adjourned at
623 I'll call to order the council
committee work session uh this uh
December 9th
2013 there are two items on the agenda
this evening one is a Communications
update and the second is a an Eastside
fire and rescue interlocal agreement
update uh beginning with the
communications update we have utum
manahan our Communications manager
Warren kagari our
Communications coordinator and Tim Smith
our TV coordinator here for uh the
present ation uh during the council's
workshop there's was some discussion
around a gold called Community
engagement and I think we will hear uh
uh some of the the ways that uh in 2014
we intend to uh uh uh begin that effort
and uh for those of you that have seen
the city's new website which has been in
operation for about a year here this is
an opportunity uh uh for those at home
watching uh this work session and for
the council to uh review how that's
working and is it meeting uh the needs
of the community and uh uh the council
and uh the city so with that utum are
you going to kick things off how do you
know
yes hi so again my name is utum manahan
I'm the city's Communications manager
and I've invited the whole team here for
the presentation tonight we have about
an hour so we're going to run through
things because we have a lot of
information to share tonight um to start
out with though I did want to address
two items and two concerns that have
come up with our website in the past
year uh the first is our search
function so when we first launched the
website last November so more than a
year ago we were using um our new vendor
Civic Plus's search function and after
about a month we realized this was not
meeting our needs we were not getting
the search results we wanted so we
integrated Google search into our
website um and after a lot of testing in
many months um those two programs did
not play very well together and a lot of
that deals with how our website was
built and the ne navigation so um things
that you would search for on Google were
not coming up on our website so the two
systems don't talk very well together
but luckily our vendor Civic plus did
launch a new search module uh just a few
weeks ago so we implemented that into
our website uh it's been about two weeks
and we're still in kind of the test beta
mode for that um some things we like
about this new search function is in the
advanced search there's a lot of
different fields to help you narrow what
you're looking for also here under um
content type you can search by content
so if you only want to look for news
items or calendar items or you're
looking for a staff member you can um
you can narrow your results that way and
also when you do your search it tells
you what type of uh item you'll be
clicking on so you don't have to go
through a whole bunch of different links
to find what you're looking for you know
you'll be finding a for under that link
or a contact us under that link um the
other thing that we like about uh using
our vendor search function is that uh we
can see what people are searching for
and keep kind of tally of what people
are looking for and what words they're
using and then attach those words to the
pages they're trying to find so in the
back end there's a way for me to tag
those um so that we can link the search
words people are using to the content
they're trying to find so um so we're
still testing that it's going to be an
eventual process through search it's um
you never always find exactly what
you're looking for even on Google it's
it's um it's always an evolving process
so that is search the second concern
I've heard is about um how the type of
content and how much content we have on
our website and concerned that people
that are doing a lot of research are not
finding a lot of archived items on our
website and I wanted to remind council
tonight that when we launched this
project what two years ago now our main
goal was to provide the best online
customer service possible that was our
main goal and um Tina and I and I've
invited Tina tonight to come talk about
this issue too um we worked on this
project together and we talked with lots
of Staff about what items are you seeing
that are customer service issues what
kind of calls do you receive uh what
kind of emails do you receive what are
people looking for that we can provide
online to reduce the amount of um
inquiries that people have um we also
looked at a lot of metrics on our old
website and saw what people were looking
for so that's why you see wedding and
event rentals as a main link on our
homepage because that's one of our top
pages to this day um so we did a lot of
research on what people were looking
for um this quote came from a study that
was done this year at a conference that
looked at human and computer interaction
and they did a study just on government
websites and this quote um really struck
home to me about the difference we're
talking about tonight early government
websites seem to be built as if they
were virtual file cabinets offering
people access to paper documents today
that metaphor is dead a better metaphor
is to think of websites as replacing the
telephone so what you're you're looking
at at our website is really an online
customer service desk that's what we're
doing and that's the purpose of our
website it is not to be a virtual file
cabinet um of all of our archived
items um so why not just add all of our
other content why not add virtual file
cabinets to our website that it's it's a
lot of noise so the the more content you
have on our website the harder it is to
use the search function and the harder
it is to navigate to what you're looking
for um typically you have one to two
minutes um when someone's visiting your
website for them to get what they need
before they leave because people will
just up and leave and try uh another way
to find the information they're looking
for so we want to make sure we're
providing the best online customer
service possible very very quickly so
the more stuff we keep adding to our
website um all of that noise can
sometimes detract from what people are
looking for which on our website are
mainly Parks and Recreation programs
who's in our jail how can they rent our
uh Pickering Barn for their wedding it's
a lot of the day-to-day uh operations
and customer service we provide as a
city
um as you'll hear a lot tonight we uh
Communications lives a lot off of
metrics and um this is just a visual to
show that uh the top 20 pages on our
website receive 40% of the hits um so
it's and again like I mentioned that's
our Park and Recreation programs it's
police it's we know what these pages are
and those are the most the most popular
pages on our website and if you see this
tiny Circle here at the very other end
this is the uh percentage of our page
views on our agenda in minut page in
October it's less than one half% % and I
would guess that those are staff uh
councel
Peter um and a few citizens who might be
doing some intense research so um it
just gives you perspective on what
people are coming to our website for and
it is for those dat day items um and not
so much doing a lot of that
research so um so you know I've talked
about the fact that we've been really
careful on what we put on the website
that doesn't mean there's no content on
our website since we launched a year ago
um City staff have made 28,000 changes
to the back end of our website so that's
updating calendar items that's updating
news items that's making changes to our
web pages uh this is a lot of work um
and it it's key that we have information
on our website that's current for people
that are looking for it at that moment
and a story I like to tell is when we
still had our old website project a I
got a call from a woman who had an old
Christmas tree strapped to her car and
she was in the highlands in some parking
lot and she goes where's the drop off
area and I I said I don't know she goes
well there's a news item on your website
so I Googled it and Google had captured
a news item from three or four years ago
and even though there was an old date on
it she saw it and thought it was the new
item um and went to it and there was no
drop off so we have to make sure that um
the items on our website are current for
people because they'll look at something
for a few seconds and then and then move
on with their
day so I've talked a bit about what our
goal is with the website and and that is
really for customer service and for
people who are looking for kind of
day-to-day interactions with the city
and a very different project is serving
people who are doing research for the
city uh or on the city um so I've
invited Tina to talk a bit more about
you know the idea of a virtual file
cabinet um that is a separate project
and one that the clerk's office would
manage um because she is the one that
that holds the records for the city so
I've invited her to come talk a bit more
about what that project would look like
if it's something that's of interest to
council thank you
so I I have two slides I don't want to
take away from the communications time
um but I do want to give you just a top
overview of Records Management systems
and how the virtual fining cabinet comes
into play so uh there's some items
listed here so I'll just walk through
those so with records retrieval uh
you're talking about systems are best
used for in-depth research locating
responding to requests whether it's the
public uh State
Auditors or other staff uh index
so how we best organize our information
making sure that we're following the
record series set by Washington State
it's a really critical element making
sure that we're following uh State rules
retention schedule well you know how
long do we keep the records for we don't
keep everything indefinitely um and
doing so has a risk associated with it
uh and let's see we what we we really
want to make sure that we're destroying
records at the right time uh
classification uh we we want to
determine what has value uh what we want
internally versus online uh that's an
access issue and then making sure that
we're looking at Cross departmental uh
we want to make sure that we work with
other systems that are already in place
throughout the city and that uh ones
that we are uh purchasing or new systems
that we're adding that they can work
into records management system as well
so we look for things that have o Open
architecture and that can communicate
with third party systems so when looking
at
basic components of a records management
system you want something that you can
capture in import so those are the tools
that you would use uh methods for
storing And archiving indexing and
retrieval to locate distribution tools
for exporting and security to protect
the
document there we
go so with it equipment project
management and funding uh so this isn't
new uh it's items that we have
identified this need in the 2008 M Adam
strategic plan it was a technology plan
that we did uh we looked at a council
goal in 2011 that talked about the
paperless initiative and most recently
the technology Gap analysis that was
performed in
2012 so while records Management Systems
didn't receive um the highest priority
uh it was identified as a need uh we
certainly are looking to provide
city-wide records manage management
solution uh We've looked at SharePoint
initially is providing uh elements of
that uh We've also looked more recently
at the munis uh Financial system and is
that something that we want to invest in
that specific module or not um we're at
the beginning stages of review and of
course there's other systems laser fish
is a well-known company name uh that's
been known and heard of throughout the
years so um it doesn't mean we're not
doing anything we certainly are uh
examples of that uh are just at a
smaller scale so trackit is used to
deliver product uh project information
online and we also use our meeting
management system uh and an example of
that would be we've uploaded essential
records to the file pro component of our
meeting management system and that was
possible through a grant that we
obtained through the state archive
office so that was um good our our uh
meeting management system also works
with thirdparty uh systems so if we get
to the point where we have uh something
more robust we can uh plug that in and
uh deliver our information uh
electronically so if you're looking for
more information I'm happy to come back
back um a committee meeting a work
session I can bring the right people
there it should be included um but I
didn't want to take away from the
communications element tonight so if you
have any questions or guidance Josh oh
thanks p i I have two two questions two
issues one is um you know Tina we copy
you quite often at least I do on emails
that we send to members of the public or
correspondence that's outgoing would it
be a better use of staff time
particularly your time uh if there was
some separate email address set up
within the city that could be copied to
for record archiving purposes as opposed
to always naming you or is there a legal
requirement that it has to be the city
clerk that gets copied on those sort of
emails well the using the city clerk as
the sort of secondary copy it's sort of
turned into a courtesy now the system
that we have Barracuda uh does capture
any outgoing and incoming
email so uh does require some extensive
um searching it does have some archive
retention to it but ultimately you want
to take that system and merge it into a
records management system for the city
um so again it's a siloed product but
you really want to put it in something
that's Citywide and then my thank you
and and my other question maybe Autumn
can address this because it goes back to
the search uh issue that was raised so I
tried to find an old agenda bill and I
picked a completely random number uh I
picked 5960 just out of the air and it
turns out that that was 2009 Arts
commission Grant something pretty
esoteric and I I don't think a lot of
people would be frankly looking for but
I did a Google Search and I I tried
isqua AB 5960 and you know sure enough
there's the first few items on here you
know are links that report to be uh you
know getting me to the bill I tried uh
isquad 2009 Arts commission grants in
Google and that didn't really help me so
the agenda Bill itself very specifically
Google search got me to when I tried the
same thing on our City's search function
uh AB 5960 got me three results none of
which pertained to that bill and when I
tried 2009 Arts commission grants it
gave me 50 results none of which
pertained to that bill so then I looked
at you know the the actual archive uh of
agendas and bills and unless you know
the actual ordinance number or
resolution number it's sort of difficult
to find and so when we talk about
archiving information and making it
available to the public you know the
agenda starting in 2012 when this effort
started but it's almost as if everything
that happened before then is in the
midst of History somewhere so how how do
we get or how much would it cost to
allow the public to look for information
prior to 2012 so I heard two different
questions and the second one is probably
it's better for Tina to um respond to
but the first about the search fun
function and find and using agenda bills
to search we just launched this new
module a couple weeks ago and what we
need to do is all of the agendas and
minutes are on that file pro system that
Tina uses that's on a separate website
so we're we're looking for ways to
integrate the two so that the search
function will pop up the file pro search
is very very uh Dynamic and you can use
any keywords and I've had a lot of great
success in finding what I'm looking for
um but we're trying to find a way now
that those that those systems can talk
together so that's an evolving project
and one we're working on now that we
have this new search uh function up and
running and I'll let Tina answer the
second question about 2012 yeah I can't
tell you the pricing but that was your
question about costs associated how do
we do it and and if we can do it is it
is it a really expensive proposition or
can we just integrate and up it CPS on
the website you know time and money it's
um there's a an evaluation yeah
equipment project management funding and
it's been identified so we we have
information that we can bring it to you
that the experts have said this is about
what it cost this is about you know how
much time it takes you implement in
phases um you know I I'll just say I I
just think it's important for the public
to be able to access agenda information
prior to 2012 and it's really hard to do
right now
thanks
Paul okay so thank you for this because
because you named the very thing that we
were struggling with and that we do not
have this records or as you were calling
this this record management thing so you
named that's the issue that's the very
issue that you came to talk about that's
the very issue that he just asked about
which you had already talked about and
so and so you've named that and so
that's not hasn't been wasn't a goal of
our website so so so we can proceed from
this and I think we will look forward to
talking with you more about that and and
I'm also uh sat really uh satisfied to
hear as well in that um that you do need
to integrate those two backend search
functions right you cannot you you know
currently what what doesn't happen is
that we don't look inside the agendas
and bills and doesn't keyword search on
that you have to go to the Civic website
to do that so you recognize that so I'm
satisfied with that too because that is
exactly the functionality that's missing
you know what the user experience should
be I'm on is a.gov I do a keyword search
and if it hit a word inside a a council
packet that that shows up in the results
and if that's your goal then that's
we're on the right path
thanks okay so we're going to get on now
with the of our Communications
presentation and I'll invite Warren to
come up to um we're do this together um
so we launched our social media accounts
back in April and um when we first
started war and I sat down and talked
about our commitment to this project and
um early on we made the commitment this
would be a 247 operation for us so um
it's it's literally Warren and I and um
we do give each other breaks at times
but um we wanted to provide the best
customer service possible online and um
people people don't only use Facebook
from 99 to 5 they use it at all times as
we found out as we know we do yes we
learn um and you know a lot of other
government agencies if you look in their
profiles they'll say We'll respond to
you uh Monday through Friday 9: to 5 and
that's not uh the interaction we wanted
to have with our community uh we had a
commitment that once we had the
resources to do this we would do this
right so um we'll show you some of our
successes and some of the lessons we've
learned um tonight um so since we've
launched in April on Facebook alone
we've seen a huge growth in our
followers um we have more than 1600
likes now on our Facebook page page um
and this is just a fun visual to show
you just that these are actual people
and these are people that aren't um that
aren't always coming to city hall or
coming to meetings but um we've been
communicating with and and growing
relationships with and it's been a
wonderful Adventure so
far so here's where we are we're on
Facebook Twitter Instagram Pinterest go+
YouTube for square and Vine that's uh
from what we can tell more than any
other public agency in our area and
perhaps in the region um the reason
we're on so many is we wanted to capture
folks where they were literally in the
palm of their hand in a lot of cases on
their devices uh on their tablets on
their phones so the best way to do that
was to uh capitalize on all the
platforms that we had available to us so
we don't use everyone in a in the same
way um sometimes need a saw sometimes
need a hammer and we have learned
through this process what works on some
platforms won't work on another so it's
constantly an evolution of what uh
what's going to resonate with folks for
instance we thought Instagram which is
primarily a photo sharing site would be
uh just a showcase
for the uh beauty of our community what
we've learned is that we do a lot of
interacting on Instagram we let people
know about our events about our
initiatives we answer a lot of questions
that's been a a pleasant surprise for us
Facebook oh uh quick question yeah so uh
interaction uh do you track the
interaction we we push information out
people respond to some of the things
that we push out and I'm sort of
guessing that some people actually would
use all of those in some way some more
than others to to uh interact or uh with
us on their own initiative is that a
true
statement okay that's
great and so what what are they ask what
are they saying what are they say we
have an hour tonight to go over a lot of
these things you got a lot of examples
for you well this is good can't wait yes
you'll see plenty of you'll see plenty
of that tonight um just a quick overv of
these tools Facebook I think I think
most of you are on Facebook
um we use this for more Evergreen
content so um as you may know when you
see look through your feed if we post an
item um in a few you know a few minutes
ago that might not show up in your feed
for seven hours so we try to post
content that's not extremely um you know
breaking news that it's something that
can live on in your feed for a couple
days and it still makes sense um Twitter
on the other hand is all about breaking
news it's all about in the- moment uh
people need information right away um as
Warren mentioned Instagram is um
definitely image based and we're seeing
that a lot of our younger followers are
connecting with us on Instagram um
Pinterest is an online um an online
bulletin board if you will or you can
collect ideas and images and post them
to your own board and then come back to
them later and I'll show you some
examples of how we use that as an agency
um I'll let you describe Google+ Google+
Google+ does not have a lot of users but
one of the big selling points of Google+
probably the biggest selling point of
go+ is that it helps with your search
engine optimization and in basic in in
layman's terms that means your search
results uh Google is looking through
your content that you post Google+ and
then if you have a presence on Google
Google plus it's helping to rank you
higher in results so when we post
something there we get a better return
when somebody Googles it and wants to
find that content related to an event or
an initiative that we're working on um
and then uh YouTube has transform the
way that we do video at the city and how
we connect with people using video and
um Tim will talk a bit more about that
in a moment
um and I'll let you describe that to for
square for square is a location based
it's a check-in service we um learned
when we started our social media efforts
back in the spring that a lot of City
locations had been created on for square
so we scooped those up and um put
correct information so people could get
all the customer service information
that they might want about say the barn
or the Farmers Market or the pool
through 4 square and then we hooked it
up to our other social media accounts so
when folks uh say go to the pool and
want to check in which is what you do on
Force Square they then see that we have
a presence on other platforms so it's
another way that they can connect with
us through an app that they've already
decided they want to use Vine is
incredibly popular with uh with
teenagers um I've talked to our youth
Advisory board about this they love Vine
they live on
Vine it's an incredibly fun platform
it's a it's sixc looping videos we use
it occasionally we're always looking for
ways to use it more because of how it
engag PES and uh how popular it is with
folks so this was our first interaction
on social media and you'll see that it
was back in March instead of April we
were getting our social media account
set up and uh someone tweeted at us and
said are you waiting to be verified by
Twitter before you send out your first
tweet and Warren and I went oh my gosh
somebody found us and are interacting
with us online so we talked about it for
a second and we said you know no we're
just getting ready and tying up some L
SS before official launch and he said
we're honored to be your first tweet in
uh the hashtag making history so there
was a lot of excitement uh for us to
start engaging online and we could see
that right away so um that was really
fun first interaction for us so um as
far as growth here is a chart of our uh
Facebook followers and you'll see that
we we have a steady growth and we'll see
a steady trickle that comes in but
you'll see these big jumps one of them
is salmon days that was very very
popular for us and we'll show you a bit
about how we engage with Folks at salmon
days and the other is um we purchased
about $300 in ads this year um to get
people to know that we existed on
Facebook specifically and we had a long
talk about that as far as um as as far
as using ads um but and talked with a
lot of other agencies that as you're
building your base for followers um
people don't always know you're out
there so once you get that base going
and people are interacting with you then
their followers and their friends start
to see that you also exist and that only
raises your profile so we've seen a a
huge success in just a minimal amount of
money um you know the way that we've
described it is how much do you spend at
one public meeting on staff time alone
for people to sit around and wait for
people to come give us input we have
these people um interacting with us now
on a range of topics so we found it's
been really well worth
it Twitter we've also got steady growth
um Twitter's a little harder to capture
followers nowadays and it's almost cost
prohibitive to adverti so we haven't
gone the advertising route there but we
have noticed the where we do get jumps
is when there is breaking news in isqua
um whenever there's a power outage we'll
have questions we had an inent at the
high school that we'll talk more about
in a moment where we got a lot of
attention um and as AUM mentioned
earlier it is primarily a breaking news
tool and that's when we've noticed our
folks coming on board and starting to
follow it's during those breaking news
events so we guarantee that our
followers will jump once there's a snow
event or a flood or any kind of
emergency event so um we haven't had one
of those yet but um we know that's when
we'll we'll see a lot more
followers so here are some of our most
popular interactions so that ra is an
interesting question because you are not
Emergency Management right or are you I
I'm the official Pio within our so so
under emergency situations I mean still
it's still you know an emergency in town
and so that is the direct most direct
route there is no other kind
of or or kind of Rel or organization
change or responsibility change that has
to make happen to get emergency
information out through these channels
no
man we had a retreat in talking with um
Bret Heath and our emergency management
team about the um the whole other layer
now of interacting on social media uh
it's great that well we talked a lot
about priorities so I have priorities
when there's an incident on what tools I
use first and um it used to be our
website and now it's Twitter so um and
as I was going to describe too we've had
a few incidents where reporters have
called me on a breaking news story and
I'll say follow us on Twitter here's our
handle that way I can reach not only
reporters but are followers at the same
time so um I've been educating internal
staff um for a while now about the idea
of the death of the press release I
whenever I have news now I don't pull up
a Word document with our letter head on
it write a press release and send it to
reporters all of that information is
pushed automatically online it's on
social media it's through our website um
E news so um so it's a much more
powerful tool and a lot of reporters
prefer working through Twitter than even
getting emails now so um so anyway as we
talked about what our prioritize are my
first would be Twitter and the second
would be our website um and then
depending on what kind of emergency it
was would also the amount of
communication tools I would use to
change so but there's no change in that
process it's it's still Warn and I but I
do have another person now to help me on
the 24-hour shifts um so what's
popular um this is a metric um from our
Facebook account that shows you the
average reach on different types of
posts that we have posted on Facebook um
video and photo
are are way more effective in
communicating than on links and and text
and you can see that if we post a video
on our Facebook page the average reaches
about 5,000 people if we post an image
it's about 800 people and if we just
post a link that's about 400 people so
um an example of this is we had a
windstorm a few weeks ago and we wanted
to get some information out on Facebook
about here's the number you call if you
have a power outage but instead of just
writing that as text or putting it up as
a
link and I talked about it and we took a
photo of some leaves to show that it was
windy out and um and that was more
effective in a couple different ways one
is the algorithm of Facebook that the
nobody understands it exactly it is
proprietary and if we didn't understand
it we'd probably be working excuse me at
Facebook but the way Facebook ranks uh
post if it's um first of all if it's a
if it's a video or if it's a photo it's
going to get ranked higher than just a
link because there's an invitation there
to interact with it a link you might
click it but all of our metrics say that
if you just post a link they're probably
not going to click it so the algorithm
takes what you put on Facebook it
figures out what its potential
popularity would be and then it starts
to rank it so we knew that if we posted
this safety message with a photo that we
were going to reach more people than if
we just posted a link or a text or a
piece of text that said it's windy be
careful so what we did Autumn ran
outside got the photo we we crafted our
message and then we went out with it and
we ended up reaching several hundred
people
whereas if we just done it with a piece
of text and a link we probably would
have only reached about 100 people and
if you think about it on the way you
interact on Facebook um I don't read
through a lot of text I scroll through
my feed and sometimes I'll look at an
image or sometimes I'll play a video but
I rarely read a whole bunch of text um
and so it's just it's kind of the it's
it's the way that Communications is is
happening these days online is it's a
lot more visual than it is using
text so as I alluded to earlier we had a
spike in Twitter followers this day uh
October 7th and what had happened was um
there was a lockdown at is high school
and the other schools um on second after
um somebody called 911 and thought they
had seen a man with a gun now um we we
were monitoring all the Twitter chatter
about this because there were students
in school who were tweeting about it
there were parents who were concerned
about it they're tweeting to the news
stations they're asking what's going on
so I worked with police and um figured
out what we could say that wouldn't
compromise what they were doing and got
this out as quickly as possible as you
can see it started to take off uh people
started favoring it retweeting it
interacting it asking fall-out questions
and then what we were able to do when we
got calls from media um this was all the
information we had and our police were
engaged in the incident so when media
called we could direct them here and say
this is all that we have but um in
addition to alerting Media we were able
to reach everybody in our community who
was asking questions about it in real
time as it
happened so I I bet Council remembers
this
image um we Council received a lot of
concern about um this sign when it went
up on Newport uh earlier this year and
uh we were we were under an active
investigation with our Police Department
so uh crafting a message as far as a
response was pretty difficult because we
didn't want to compromise the
investigation uh once an arrest was made
we did post this online to kind of close
the loop with people and say there was
an active investigation there was an
arrest something an action was taken um
this was also very popular because of
the image um and also people recognize
it because they've been driving by it um
and it was one of the first times that
we sat down with police and talked about
what was appropriate to post and what
wasn't and you'll see on this image we
cropped out the image that was on the
sign and the phone number for it too um
so it was enough where it was identifier
but at the same point uh we were just
making sure that we were still being
appropriate and when we posted
online this is our most popular video to
date hope that it
loads
so a couple points with this video um
which literally took off online it went
very viral uh one is that we uh had
communicated with internal staff about
our our work on social media and when
they saw this video and while they were
joking about it within the department
someone called us and said hey this
might be really cool to put online um so
it was great that we get our our
internal staff involved and they're the
ones that are um doing the day-to-day
work that have these stories we can tell
um secondly this video was great in that
um it was organic it was from our
security cameras we didn't do some you
know you know fluffy interview with our
Police Department about community
policing we showed it um so that made
people really excited too um
and I think in the end it just it as you
I we can't show you all the comments
tonight but um um that week was a really
fun week on social media and the amount
of people who said I love our Police
Department I love the city I work for or
that I live in um this is such a safe
community and thank you for your
community placing a lot of people knew
the officer personally so um it was just
a a very successful video in the end it
had more than 20,000
views these are some of our most popular
images on Instagram Autumn and I talk a
lot about the battle between personality
versus pretty a lot of what you'll see
from other public agencies on Instagram
are professional photos that they've
then asked for the the photographer for
permission to repost and it's gorgeous I
mean they're beautiful photos but you
don't really get a sense for what the
personality is of the community and what
people are engaging on what the place
looks like what what the real feel is so
what we've tried to do is um the two of
us and we've also asked staff for when
they see things to that are interesting
to capture them and send them to us we
can post them um we've tried to give you
a real feel for what life is like in
isqua and what we've got going on here
so we've got salmon days we've got our
market we've got um you know just
beautiful scenery around town events and
as I mentioned earlier we use this a lot
to promote um what we've got going on
and it's it really resonates with folks
and this has been the platform that's
been most successful in interacting with
people around the globe so we've had
interactions with we've we've gotten uh
attention from the American Cancer
Society when we had some uh photos from
Relay for Life um The Hermitage Museum
in Russia um interacted with us on a
photo which we thought was fascinating
that they managed to find it um but it's
been really cool to see not not only
around the globe the fact that people
are engaging with these photos but uh in
issaqua we're getting a a young audience
we're getting a lot of students from the
high school we're getting a lot of uh
young families who we might not connect
with otherwise who might just be too
busy to interact with us in a
traditional way who are now uh
comfortable asking questions and talking
to us through this through this
medium let Warren tell this story The
Snake so back in July we had a power
outage um and we reached out to PSC we
wanted some more information about why
the power had gone out that we could
share with with our residents and I got
an email back and it said well you know
it's interesting we had a we had a snake
that caused the outage and I asked for
some more details and and got got a
response and then utumn and I sat down
and thought well how can we share that
message in a creative way the power
outage was by that point a couple days
in the past but people were still
curious as to why the power had gone out
so we sat down to photoshop and um
modified a sign that you would see uh
telling you not to get shocked and we
put the snake in we posted this to
social media and just sort of watched it
go viral people were fascinated by this
um they had lots of questions we had fun
with the post that we put with the photo
a lot of s jokes a lot of elong snake
talk and um it was really interesting to
see how people how people responded and
and their level of curiosity and we
later heard from from psse that they
found this internally and um they liked
it they thought it was a fun way to
share a message and this is a good
description you'll see this throughout
our presentation of um we're providing
this is the term I use all the time but
we're providing um a dessert and then
slipping in the vegetables so we're
providing a really funny image or a cool
video but there's always a message
behind it of something we're trying to
reach out to and the message here was
there's power outages even in summer so
you need to be prepared at all times not
just when there's a windstorm coming up
um so we have to do that a really you
know sometimes funny and sometimes
engaging way to make sure that people um
find it
interesting um so so here are some
examples of how we are actually an
online customer service desk uh for the
community this woman was watching one of
the council budgets budget uh study
sessions a few weeks ago and um and
noticed that as you guys were talking
she couldn't see your name plates
because you don't have name plates down
on the floor and um so she sent this uh
to our Facebook account and it was at
7:30 at night on a Friday so at that
point I didn't have the answer so my
first response was I'm looking into it
and you know here's what I guess it's a
usually a less formal meeting but I'll
look into it uh then a few days later
when we were all back in the office uh I
talked with Tim and it just happened to
be a technical hiccup because typically
on ictv your name comes up on the screen
but it just wasn't that night so as you
can see here she liked both of my
responses um and it's a question that
she probably wouldn't have called about
or sent an email about but just had a
curiosity sake she asked about it and we
were able to respond to it pretty
quickly so this came in through Twitter
back in July um I'll give you some setup
on this we um we weren't connected to
this person at the time but one of the
things we do on on Twitter specifically
but on all of our platforms we're always
searching for the word issaqua and
because it's such a distinctive word
whenever somebody tweets it they're
probably talking about us unless they're
talking about the fairy but 90% of the
time they're talking about us so this
popped up in our search feed uh with a
photo of a bike lane that was
overgrown and we immediately thought
well we should be able to address this
uh in some way so we we connected with
with the person and um asked for some
more information and she did us one
better she sent us a link to a Google
map that showed exactly where the
problem was and we were able to um we
were able to connect with code
enforcement and help address the
problem this is one of my
favorites and um this citizen had called
our Parks and Recreation Department and
had asked for a long time for a garbage
can to be placed in one of our Parks uh
once we placed the garbage can he went
back and had his friend take a photo of
him with the garbage can and then sent
us a message on Twitter that said me and
the City of isqua make a good team um so
we loved that that he took that much
time to go take a photo afterward to
show his appreciation and it's it's
again it's the customer service we do
all the time but we don't always hear
that feedback on uh so that's fun to
share with staff afterward that he
really appreciated the garbage can in
the
park so one of the other things we're
able to do on Twitter is correct or on
all social media rather is correct
misinformation and in this case we um we
woke up to this uh recently um but Tracy
is the traffic reporter for King five
she has about 8,000 followers and what
she says goes people look to her for
their morning commute their afternoon
commute she's very influential on
Twitter so her commute that morning took
her through isqua and she thought that
she saw a broken pipe and water running
down the street um we knew from working
with our uh Public Works operations
Department that it was water main
flushing that had been sched sched and
we' noticed and we'd let people uh know
was coming down the pipe to use a to use
a cliche um so we were able to just
double check with uh pwo realized that
there was not a problem and let her know
what was going on she was appreciative
that we were able to correct that
information and most importantly she
followed us so now when she has future
questions about the city of isqua about
traffic about anything that's related to
us we have a relationship and if she
wants to ask us a question it's easier
for her she knows we exist and she knows
that we'll respond to her in a fast
way uh as Warren mentioned we always
Search the word isqua and sometimes when
people are visiting our community and
they'll talk about being here in isqua
we'll start a conversation with them uh
we try not to be too creepy about that
so only in certain situations but here's
an example where a couple that are
Seattle bloggers uh were visiting our
Hatchery and we said thank you for
sharing the photo and they follow they
responded back to us and then they
followed us so once again we've created
a relationship now with um online
bloggers about isqua that uh we would
not have connected with before it's also
a great way to welcome people to our
community too who are just visiting it
puts kind of a human touch to
it I'll start this one out so we we get
a lot of um we get a lot of useful
information we get a lot of positive
feedback occasionally we will get um
questions about why we've done something
a certain way or criticism in this case
um this was the day that we were opening
Confluence Park and we wanted to do a
last minute push to get folks to come
out and so about uh three or so hours
before the party started we posted this
to Facebook and um then we heard back
from a citizen and she was upset that we
hadn't given more notice well the
problem here was that we'd been giving
notice all summer we'd been talking
about how the park was going to open we'
posted video we've been posting photos
as the process uh went along and as we
neared opening day but unfortunately
because of that algorithm that I
mentioned uh this post was the one that
she saw she didn't see the other stuff
so 3 hours before go time she's learning
about this event and she wants to come
she doesn't have time so she's upset so
we were able to connect with her and
help her get another way to get
information as it happens and that's
through our e notify system through our
website um and uh she liked that post
she liked that response we thought that
was thought that was nice she uh
acknowledged that we responded to her
and then on the same post we had some
comments about uh how we had to tear
down the barn in constructing the new
park and we were able to um offer some
more information about why that took
place and um then another citizen was
able to weigh in on some of the history
of the site so it was a great way to get
a dialogue started about something that
again somebody probably wouldn't have
called about but we were able to uh
connect with them
anyway so uh as Fred mentioned a lot of
this involves citizen engagement and
this was Eileen's goal um for the coming
year and in talking with Eileen one of
your concerns is Citizens um can have a
hard time following an agenda bill from
start to finish and knowing when they
can engage with us and and provide you
feedback um so so we've talked a lot
about you know and and we have staff
meetings every week where we go through
a council agenda we go through major
projects that the city's working on we
go through community events and we look
at what items are our priority to be um
be promoting um so here are some
examples of where we've done that
citizen engagement or said here's a time
and the process we'll need your input or
here's what's happening now so that you
don't have to follow theenda bill or the
council committee process all the way
through but instead here's your time um
so the first one um is the budget
process and and Warren covered the
budget process on social media from
start to finish he live tweeted the but
the mayor's um budget address um and
then and then covered it all the way
until you passed the budget and um
we use hashtags on Twitter and actually
all of our social media accounts um when
you create a hashtag in social media
that becomes a link and when you click
on that link it provides you the entire
conversation of everyone that's also
used that hashtag so it's a good way for
Community dialogue to happen um so we
create hashtags for certain events and
this one was for our budget so we titled
it is budget and here was somebody who
had a concern about you know are is the
budget process going to include any
money for making uh welcome signs to is
a CLA so we had a lot of those types of
questions of people coming back and
forth on what was in the mayor's
proposed budget what was not um so that
dialogue was happening um online pretty
frequently one of the other things that
we reached out to folks for feedback on
was the uh skate park which um you guys
decided you'd like to move forward with
replacing the skat Park we created a
hashtag escap and asked people to use
that as they were conversing with us and
um we were able to sort of start the
dialogue with this person she wanted to
know if we had potential sites already
in mind um and that's where we sort of
threw it back to her and said what do
you think and it was a great way to get
what she was thinking and collect that
and pass it along to our Park staff as
they start this
process uh here's an example where we uh
we were just getting into the marijuana
zoning which was very very popular
online people did have a lot of um input
on that and we used the hashtag joint
effort 13 and um we posted the draft
regulations um uh back in July and
Gabriel Here said seriously not in
residential areas that's insane post
areas on your GIS system for public
comment so you'll see it took us three
days but we then posted a map that
showed the proposed zoning so that you
could actually visually see it instead
of trying to read the proposed code and
he got back to us and said thanks for
the follow-through I didn't expect you
to actually
remember hashtags are also a great way
to have Community dialogue at events so
this one we use the hashtag BB qua and
in our handouts we uh encourage people
to interact with us online so people
were taking photos and then we were
talking with them during the event um so
it was a really fun way to to get
engaged even if you're not talking to a
person one-on-one um and then we can
dialogue with this person and use these
photos too if we want to for further
promotions this is another example of
where we created a hashtag to Foster the
conversation this was National Night Out
the hashtag we came up with was party
with police that was popular with folks
um which was great that was our goal and
this was just a nice way to hear back
from her about what they like doing and
uh she shared this beautiful
photo uh this was a really fun project
we did in the summertime art East came
to us and they were doing their
Menagerie Art Festival and they wanted
to do a photo contest but they wanted to
do something different online so they um
they came to Warren and I and said that
they understood the city was active in
social media um and did we have any
ideas so we proposed doing the contest
on Instagram so um the participants were
given a word or several words and they
they were challenged to go out into
isqua and take photos of what that word
represented to them as an image uh and
then we asked them to hashtag it with
capture is a claw so that way we could
search for all of the entries via
Instagram and we had about 70 entries
and then Warren and I were the judges um
and then the winning entries were then
displayed at the next artwalk so it was
a great way to interact with people
online and then also in person during
our walk so it was a fun partnership
that arst would like to continue next
year so this is our latest effort um as
you're familiar with the police
department uh during the holiday season
will step up its Patrols in our uh
commercial areas and one of the things
that they do is if they see you if they
see that you've left your vehicle
unlocked if they see that you've uh
engaged in unsafe Behavior by leaving uh
packages on your backseat or visible
they'll leave a card with some
information about how to avoid that next
time and how to shop safely so police
came to us uh earlier this fall and
wanted to figure out a way to interact
with people a little more during this
process so we came up with the idea of
instead of a business card let's give
them a gift tag from a police and we
knew that that would be provocative and
that folks would um would want to know
why they were getting something from the
police and why does it look like a gift
card so if you flip this over there's a
hashtag and we encourage people to use
the hashtag uh when they got one or when
they saw somebody getting one and um
we've been monitoring for folks using
this and then one day we were looking on
Instagram and this popped up and uh
we immediately wanted to know um you
know how this came to be so we commented
and we said looks like somebody's on the
naughty list which is what it says when
you flip this over and um we were able
to start a dialogue with this person
explain what it was so it was just a
great way of of seeing this campaign
through um so while we do see some
negative comments on our social media
accounts it's not as much as we
anticipated so I think we were thinking
the worst when we started but in the end
uh people really love isqua and there is
a lot of positive comments that come
through every week um about our
community um here's one of a a person
that just reached out to us and said
that he's trying to relocate here and I
love this town it's clean friendly
nature all wrapped up in hospitality and
respect that was not something we we we
even engaged with him beforehand he went
to our page and he posted this so um we
see this quite often of people who are
who just love living
here this was uh this was a citizen last
month who um saw the street sweeper and
wanted us to see a photo of it she was
just so happy that it was that fast
after a windstorm we thought that was
great here's an example again of where
we found this post not because we were
already interacting with her online but
we searched for the word is a CLA and uh
this is an amazing Circle that happened
she was using our new public Wi-Fi to
post on uh Twitter that she was happy
that uh she could use it online for free
and then posted a photo to um to Twitter
so it was an awesome Loop of just of the
surface that happened there that number
one she was able to use our Wi-Fi the
number two start to engage with us
online so this was uh October 7th uh
that was the day of number one the
mayor's budget address and number two it
was the day that the high school went to
lockdown because of the man with the
umbrella so that was a busy day on
social media for us there was a lot of
activity Twitter especially um and that
evening we got a tweet from one of our
residents who um was appreciative that
we had been able to keep them in the
loop as everything happened so just to
reiterate Twitter is a great real-time
tool to deliver breaking information
either on uh police activity or a policy
initiative um all at once and like I
mentioned before you've got it in the
palm of their hands and they feel
comfortable interacting with
you uh so you'll see this video later
but we to timed a wonderful video about
our ZB from our Zombie Walk that also
went quite viral um and this is an
example of where one of our followers
who um does not have English as his
first language at least on Facebook
shared this photo um and in Spanish it's
it's translated to so I like where I
live because they all agree to do stuff
like this so this shows the power of of
video and of images that can tell the
same story um to people that aren't even
um speaking
English um so as Warren mentioned we're
we have the most amount of um accounts
that I I can think of at as a local
agency here um and we're definitely a
leader when it comes to Instagram in the
region um Sabra who is the director of
online Communications for the city of
Seattle started following us on
Instagram and then invited us to come do
a presentation to all the posos in in
Seattle um about our work on Instagram
and since then they've launched a few of
their own accounts so that's been fun to
watch um and then just last week Tina
hosted a conference of um local city
clerks and we went and spoke to them too
about our efforts so um it's been fun to
get involved in that community and um
learn from each other and um kind of
share our
experiences so one of the great things
about social media and the interaction
between our website and our social media
accounts that we can do campaigns from
start start to finish and the first big
one that we rolled
out was uh when we were at your
direction collecting information for U
potential Park Bond projects so this was
back in early summer when we wanted to
hear from folks what they wanted to see
um in a potential Park Bond so this is a
sampling of the images that we put
together to share across all of our
social media platforms letting people
know when they could come and physically
say what they wanted but also directing
them to how they could do online and on
social media and
um we also were able to pull another
lever at our disposal and that is our um
e- system and we sent this out to all of
our Parks and Rec subscribers which I
think ended up being about 3,000 people
encouraging them to come to the meeting
to interact online and to share on
social media and so that was another way
that we were able to get information
from folks about what they
wanted and then when uh Council decided
to move forward with a park Bond we put
together a mailer that was sent to all
of our voters here in town so that was a
that was a physical component and again
it directed people where they could find
more information online and how they
could connect with us and we also
produced a video that showed people what
the projects would be if the bond were
pass
oh
it's it's images its video it's um it's
it's all very Visual and this was the
the last this is the last image we
shared about the Park Pond announcing
that it had been approved so another
campaign we worked on very heavily that
was very rewarding to us as far as
followers was sammon days here's our boo
booth at salmon days and we had a line
very exhausting line for a lot of the
events
we had two components to our booth one
was a spinning wheel where you could get
a prize and the other was a green screen
where you could come take your photo or
have your photo taken with a really
large salmon so here's some of the
photos that we took this was a great way
to kind of break the ice and get start
talking with people um and then when
they wanted their photo we gave them a a
little sheet that said go to our
Facebook page and then they could tag
themselves in our post so that got them
engaged online to come find where we are
on Facebook and then once they taged
themselves then all of their followers
saw that they had tagged themselves at a
city of isqua um um event and then they
could see that the city was also on
Facebook so that saw a huge Spike and it
was a very creative way uh to get more
followers um we also at our spin Booth
gave out little trees that people could
plant and with those trees we said if
you go home and plant them take a photo
and then hashtag it um and we use the
the hashtag izy Legacy so here's a
picture of a little girl taking her tree
home and planting it at home so that was
really fun to see that that we
happen one of the other ways that we've
we've used social medias to reach out to
businesses that are either interested in
isqua or have recently relocated isqua
um over the summer we were messaged by
um lost treasures which is a thrift
store here downtown and they just wanted
us to acknowledge them on Twitter okay
well we're happy to do that but would
you like to meet somebody from our
economic development team and um they
love that idea excuse me so later that
day I was able to connect with economic
development and we sent one of our uh
one of our staff members out and she was
able to meet them hear their concerns
answer some questions for them so it was
a great way that we took something that
was virtual they weren't expecting a
whole they weren't expecting a big
interaction and we were able to turn it
into something that was uh able to
answer all of their questions all within
the same day and then as aam mentioned
sometimes we'll just welcome folks to
isqua for for coming here for salmon
days or just to spend a weekend we also
do that with businesses when they open
um so it was nice to interact with Mod
Pizza just to let them know that we were
happy to have them Regency centers which
we're all familiar with they're great on
social media we're able to interact with
them on a frequent basis and top poot
Donuts which is a leader on social media
in our area um they've been uh always
willing to interact on social media so
it's been it's been fun people like
donut news I think uh so now we're gonna
invite Tim to talk a bit more about um
about our partnership as a team now um
and how how videos changed with our use
use of
YouTube sorry I was just watching
tonight's council meeting on my Android
phone because up to um a year ago you
couldn't do that um basically you could
use uh desktop PC um if you're a Mac
User couldn't really use it um if you
wanted to watch an archive video it was
a hyperlink buried on our old website
somewhere now we use Ustream you can use
it on your iPhone your iPad your PC your
Android phone you can see it anywhere so
that's one of the new things that we do
um one of the other things that's been
great about video is um it used to live
buried on the website and also live on
the channel but now it goes through
Facebook YouTube It's On Demand you can
see it when you want to we also get
feedback we know who's watching it um
when they're watching it how many people
are watching it where I had never had
that information before before this
group was together I'd produce it it
would go out but we'd have no feedback
you know um so we still cover everything
still ends up on the channel we still do
salmon days we still City C Council
Planning Commission Urban you know it's
all on the channel but it's also on
demand at C citizens can get it at any
time so that's a really great thing and
it's easy to find
um do we want to go show show the videos
videos so here's a few of our um our
most popular
videos this one um
I went to a party and remembered what
you said you told me not to drink mom so
I had a Sprite instead I felt proud of
myself the way you said I would that I
didn't drink and drive though some of my
friends said I should I made a help
choice and your advice to me was
right the party finally ended and the
kids drove out of sight I got into my
car sure to get home in one piece I
never knew what was coming mom something
I expect at
least now I'm lying here on the pavement
and I I hear the policeman say the kid
that caused this wreck was drunk mom his
voice seems far away my own blood's all
around me and I try hard not to cry I
hear the paramedics say this this girl
is going to well there's a couple of
great things about this video this video
was was the DUI that uh epher and ipd do
every year up at the high school it's a
very powerful thing if you've ever been
there and seen it so we were able to go
up there and produce a video and I've
done it in the past and then it ends up
on the channel um but we don't know if
the target group sees it but with with
Facebook now we're able to send it out
and a different um group of uh citizens
are seeing it and there was a great
story behind this is that one of the
city's employees went home and their her
granddaughter said hey did you see that
video that the city produced on DUI and
she had not heard about it so then the
the employee went and looked and found
it and then came back and told us about
that interaction is that it was we know
it reached the group they were looking
for and also timing um we released it
right before prom and then again right
before um graduation so we're with with
social media we're now able to send
these messages out in a timely fashion
and really try and reach the the groups
that we're trying to reach so the second
video um our our police dispatchers came
to me and said uh next week is dispatch
week can we do a news item about it and
I went well it's kind of boring um sorry
to say can we figure out another way to
tell your story uh can we do a video can
we talk a bit about what you guys do for
our community and so this was the result
and we're just showing you small clips
of larger videos but um this is the
example of of the video we produced and
nowhere does it say let's celebrate
dispatch week um but instead it shows
you what people are
doing 911 okay what's going on there off
what's going
on 911 police param medical we had an
accident here on black nuget Road right
behind p
mil sign1 what you need please fire
medical um sounded like five gun shots
okay for around what
location me and you
me emergency need police fire
medical it's just we're listening in on
the
domestic 91 ones designed for
emergencies so people should call if
they have any emergency or are reporting
an in progress
crime so that's just a small snippet of
of that video goes on and there's
stories of 911 exper of dispatchers
experience so it's a longer P the next
one's football okay so right now you're
just going to see some highlights from
something that we added this year um
last year we did a pilot program we did
one isaquel high school football game
and then this year we did three we were
going to do a fourth
one
and here was the zombie uh video we
referred to
earlier
so that video goes on a little longer a
little more Undead action later on uh so
the next two videos are kind of what I
was describing for as kind of the the
dessert so these are the feel good
pieces that a lot of time
together
this
video and then lastly this one Tim put
together in I don't I don't know very
the Fall colors one in a very small
amount of time um we sometimes we put
things up
realiz
so that's just a sample of videos that
Tim's put together for us um it's been
really fun to partner with him um in
using video in other ways and it's been
much more powerful for us on social
media uh to communicate a lot of our
messages so um there are two other
platforms we want to just briefly talk
about tonight one of them was Pinterest
um and this is the online bulletin board
our most popular um uh use for this so
far has been with Brides so Brides will
be pinning uh wedding ideas and and um
each of these links go back to our
website so drives people back to our
website uh each time um another area
that we've been experimenting with is
Trails so posting you know the variety
of trails we have in isqua people can
pin it for later and then when it's a
nice day out they can go to their
Pinterest board and look up what isqua
trail they want to um explore that
day Google+ um it probably looks a lot
like Facebook to you folks but uh and
functions a lot of the same way but as I
mentioned its main selling point is that
it's helping with our search results
it's helping people find information and
we do get we do get people that connect
with us on Google+ not a huge amount we
get a lot more on Facebook and Twitter
but um you know if it's helping our
search results it's not time intensive
then it's a it's a worthwhile Venture
for
us so um what's what's great about
online communication is that we have
data as Tim mentioned um in the past 90
days we've had uh more than half million
um views of our content just on Facebook
and Twitter alone so it's been a very
powerful tool
um you can talk B about the so this is
uh this is who likes us on Facebook out
of those 1600 folks that Autumn showed
you earlier we knowe that audience is
68% female 32% male and most of those
folks are within the age group of 25 to
54 which um you know it's a pretty big
chunk of our community that we're
hitting there on Facebook um Twitter
it's kind of the reverse it's mostly a
mail audience uh the age range is more
or less the same but we've noticed that
we do try to tailor um Facebook content
for women and Twitter content more for
men just trying to figure out what
what's going to hit
better um we also know when people are
on Facebook so the most the best time
for us to post content on Facebook is
900 pm on a Thursday uh we couldn't tell
you why I have theories that it's
because most of our followers are
parents and they've just gotten the kids
to bed and now they're on Facebook but
um but who knows but we have that metric
to help us uh decide and and really um
plan for when we're going to post
information to reach the most amount of
people so if we have something really
important that week to get out we post
it at THS day at around 900
PM so on YouTube um again it's a mostly
male audience and if you tally up all
those minutes it's about 20 days of
content that's been watched uh through
our YouTube channel uh and also through
our embedded videos that we've posted
Elsewhere on our website and around the
web um so um with Warren's great graphic
design skills he created a new
e-newsletter for us that we sent out to
all of our um email subscribers and
what's great about the system that we
use is it gives us metrics on what
people are clicking on when they get
their e- newss and we found people were
typically only clicking on the image or
the video and not so much the text um so
we we very very flexible and we need to
really adapt to our users so um knowing
that images are much more effective
especially on social media platforms um
we in redesign the E and we're having
much more success when it comes to click
rates and one quick note about enw that
displays a lot better on a mobile device
and we also know that about half of the
opens on our e-newsletter are occurring
on a mobile device most of which is an
iPhone so we've talked a lot about
social media today there's been other
things that are new from Communications
um in the past year we've launched our
traffic cameras page on our website that
integrates with our GIS
system um we have launched a feature on
our it called check my balance people
can check their balances for
utilities uh we talked a bit about
Tina's um file pro system and
integrating that into our website and
we've done the first step in that is
that uh the past five meetings have both
the packets and the the minutes show up
um under each of those committees or uh
Council Pages um this happens
automatically so as staff uploads
something to file pro to that archiving
system online it automatically feeds
into our website so it looks seamless um
the key here is that we don't have 30
years of all the agendas and minutes and
packets is just what's going on
currently uh at the
city and that was Tina's uh project this
year um thanks to again to Warren's
graphic design skills we're doing a lot
more uh printed materials this was a
handout at the confence park
opening um Tim and I launched a a
magazine show this year for ictv um that
is it's about 30 minutes long and we
have several segments to it and um our
goal is to do one a
quarter and we've integrated Instagram
into the bottom of our website um so
Warren and I we typically post Instagram
almost every day and so this keeps our
website fresh and up to date and very
topical so you can see when an event's
happening or if there's a weather issue
um and Instagram also allows you to do
video so there's little videos here
what's great about this is that people
can can get to know Instagram even if
they're not part of that platform by
seeing it on the bottom of our
website um as I mentioned before our our
team meets every week and talks about
what issues are going on on and then
what tools to use so um just as a
reminder we also have the notify me tool
on our website we have about 800
subscribers to that and people have said
you know email me when there's a news
item about Parks and Recreation or email
me when there's a police alert so that's
those 800 subscribers that have asked
for that to um be automatically sent to
their email um our request tracker is
our web page where people can submit
requests for filling potholes or uh do
they have a code enforcement complaint
um and we've had about 600 uh requests
in the past year um of items that people
wanted the city to do we still have our
radio station we have a VMS sign that we
typically use for emergencies um
Communications team is very active on
any kind of community event that we have
and any kind of printed materials that
we can send out via mail we're also
really um we're really interactive with
our local media uh both the press and
the
reporter and uh we have great
relationships with other communication
teams at the um in the community so uh
every uh month we have a page in
connections uh newsletter uh we're often
in their enus same with the chamber or
the school district so we have great
relationships with um other audiences
too so ideas for the future as we'll
wrap up uh one of them is to be active
on Yelp so El Yelp is a a online review
tool and people are now uh doing online
reviews of our facilities so we need to
get in on that conversation so that's
one area we're going to we're going to
explore in the coming year um although
we no longer have a printed newsletter
I'd like to do something at some point
soon that's a tangible piece of paper
people get mail because not everybody as
we know is on social media or on the web
so I'm figuring out an effective way to
do that that maybe isn't as re you know
as um as often as four times a year but
finding some way to get um paper copy
into people's hands um Tumblr is a a new
blogging tool that we are interested in
um we're also developing a weather page
for our website that has hyper local
information on weather um here next year
we're launching an internet and internal
e newss for our employees to increase
Communications internally uh we've been
talking about the idea of podcasts and
fing what kind of things might be of
interest to
folks and then Google Hangout is a very
interesting idea or something similar in
finding a program where we can have
online dialogues with people to Eng um
um really increase citizen Engagement
online and finding ways to have those
conversations happen um through other
tools so um with that are there any
other
questions Josh uh one thing that I I
wanted to share and and maybe can jot
down a note about is you mentioned about
the traffic cameras and and those are
great and it's great to have that
functionality um Google has a traffic
flow map which interestingly uh has all
of our major streets on it and and I
don't know how Google gets that data but
it's Google um so they have it it it
would be great if somehow that could be
integrated with the camera page actually
the city of Belleview does and you could
actually look at our traffic flow map
through their site but you can't do it
through our site okay so it it could be
useful for folks who are trying to
figure out what's really cool is you can
actually look at not just live traffic
but traffic at certain days and times uh
at other days during the week so uh you
know if you're interested in knowing
what traffic patterns are like but um
that's some information that I don't
think we have through our site directly
at this point that's a great idea thanks
other questions
I not a question but just a comment um
you know when this particular piece was
proposed at our our um goal setting
session I had you guys have far exceeded
anything that I had envisioned but it
hit on so many of those pieces it was
like you know the connections and the
feedback between our citizens and and
not the notify piece how wonderful is
that going to be to allow the citizens
to be able to be notified of something
coming up and the request tracker I mean
I'm just going down I've got all this
whole page list of of different pieces
that you have hit on that I've heard
from so many of our our citizens as
we're going through um as I talk with
them wanting to be able to be better
connected and yay congratulations I
think you you've absolutely hit so many
of them um but I think the one one is to
be able to be so quickly engaged back
and forth with people and have them send
you something and instantly they have a
feedback already uh coming back to them
in regards to what it was they were
looking for we were Force so many times
it would take us uh days and weeks and
and I'll I would get that second email
from the citizens going I haven't heard
from you you know um so congratulations
it's it's marvelous thank you other
questions Paul plus
one yeah any other comments Stacy well I
plus one also I um was wondering and I'm
sure the answer is yes but um compiling
information about um things that we can
do maybe suggestions or things that
you're learning from folks who we
probably don't normally engage with
about about how we might be able to do
things a little different or a little a
little better now that we are engaging
with people that I'm sure we weren't
engaged with before so um as you guys
receive your new tablets we're stly
going to have a lot of those apps for
social media on them so we hopefully you
guys can become engaged too online um
and then Warren and I have talked about
it now that we have a good base and
we're we've got a good program going um
we've been talking about rep reporting
so I think I don't want to overwhelm you
guys because it is a lot of content
every week but our idea was that we pick
something a highlight of the week and
send it to you as just an update um and
then maybe once a month or so we could
do more of a report for you on kind of
what what kind of Engagement we're
having with folks um if that's something
that's of interest to council because
that that does close part of the loop
too that you guys see that that feedback
as
well other questions or
comments Autumn I had a question about
the one where it's report tracker the
one for calling in up potholes things
like that so you're keeping statistics
on per month how many people have called
in or emailed in or filed a report can
you also tell us that when they got a
response like did they get an initial
response that we've received this on a
certain date and then when they get a
follow-up response that's information we
can look at yeah and we we do have that
information it varies by the type of
request if something um is about a
really specific traffic issue that may
take a while for our Engineers to get an
answer back but it's our goal that
there's a response that's by a human uh
within 24 hours so it says we've
received your request uh it's going to
take this process to look into it or it
simply is we've already I've already
taken care of that web issue that you
had an issue on so it varies by the um
by the request that we do have that data
and then I'm assuming you get many of
those by either email or phone now as
well so is the new online version just a
small percentage of the requests for
help it is and some people who receive
uh questions via phone will enter it
into the system oh great to do it that
way um and then we've also talked with
um with Ops and Engineering a lot of
times engineering has requests for
operations about things they want so
we're working on a way to use this tool
so that they can communicate with each
other and track internal requests too
so
super other questions or comments before
I check to see if there's anyone in the
audience Desiring to comment on this
topic is there anyone
Desiring please
Connie yes I go
here uh this is non address one my
name's Connie Marsh and
um I think I need to send them my emails
to the council to make sure I actually
get a response back in 24 hours that
would be awesome
but anyway there is a whole another
thing uh so my
communication with the city is is still
often
frustrating um and
I I I see a lot of the things but mainly
to me they're
puff and friendly and
fuzzy and I seem to want to engage with
the city on how to make the city better
all the time at least from my own
particular
perspective and
um and it sounds like they're working on
giving a more indepth ability to get the
information on the website in the future
as long as it's funded Etc um I
personally have not had any success
initiating anything on Facebook with the
city I type it in it shows up for a
second I go back and it disappears so
I'm not exactly sure how to initiate
something on the Facebook page that just
just doesn't get eaten alive I've tried
it with three different
computers and it seemed here like
somebody's successful I don't know how
they're successful you can comment on on
something that the city pushes out so
I'm interested on I think it hit on the
very last thing on the very last slide
how to engage a conversation so you can
get a communication and a discussion
happening rather than just feeling like
I'm being propagandized instead because
often it feels like propaganda to me and
I don't you know okay but I I appreciate
the YouTube videos I think that's
awesome they're easier to get you can
get them anywhere um I have a hard time
with the mobile website because I can't
can't get still if they haven't solved
the problem to be able to get to the
calendar and to see when or where a
meeting is and if I'm somewhere without
my computer I can't I can't know where
I'm supposed to go and I find find that
to be frustrating and I think they know
it's a problem I just don't know that
there's a solution there so one of my
favorite slides was 0.05% of the people
is interested in count an agenda and it
seems like a goal would be to raise that
number because clearly you all are
simply not sexy enough there are not
large enough pictures with little enough
content on there to engage the public in
our actual governance which seems to be
mainly the city's reason for being so it
seems like that is an
obvious clue as to how to really engage
the people in in something that is a
little more
meaty um and so I'm sure you can all jog
around and and do all of these things so
I think it's fascinating to watch I
think it's pretty um I think it's nice
to have people around the world checking
in I I want to see the information that
they're getting communicated to you guys
during the budget session so you can
hear those voices at the proper moment
in time for you to hear hear the citizen
saying these things I didn't see that
come across maybe it did and so as I was
watching this presentation those were
the things that came to my mind so well
this may be doing it for
many for me and my ilk even if I'm only
that
0.5% way up on that tilty thing um I'm
an audience
thanks uh thank you for those comments
is there anyone else in the audience
Desiring to
comment seeing no one then I thought
that was fascinating and enlightening
and I learned a lot from it and uh it
really seems like we are moving in the
right
direction and we are on The Cutting Edge
of uh social media and uh it's exciting
thank you very
much okay our next topic this evening is
a uh an update on the uh Eide fire and
rescue interlocal
agreement
and Paul I believe has a slide
presentation and and is going to lead uh
this discussion for
us and there it
is and if you thought what we just did
was exciting wrting you're hold on to
your
seats this one's going to be over the
top by the way this is Powerpoint and
there's no animation there's no well
there is some
color my gosh this is going to be I'm so
last
Millennium holy cow there's not a single
hashtag or at sign or anything in here
so yeah so I've prepared a presentation
um
uh I'm currently the uh our council's
representative on an ad hoc committee to
advise the Eastside fire and rescue
board on changes to the interlocal
agreement uh and uh the we're we're
doing this because the current
interlocal agreement seven-year contract
it's going to it's up at the end of
2014 um any member who would want to
leave epher has to give notification by
the end of January
2014 so and um the board and some of its
and the various members of epher over
for a while now I've actually been
considering certain changes uh but we're
down here the 11th hour and um and in
particular um one of our our our
partners samamish had actually has
passed a resolution ask asking for
specific changes to the Ila uh and so
that that prompted a couple different
activities ities one of which was one
separate activity was just making uh
changes to the funding formula uh which
is part of the Ila uh and then and that
and we have already I'm not I'm going to
touch upon that uh we've already taken
action on that and that one is behind us
but then there were other there were uh
seven or eight other issues that were
more of terms of the Ila uh language in
the Ila and so that's what this ad hoc
committee is working on
and so this is this is my presentation
uh and um my goal tonight really is this
this very work session you sitting here
right now I mean your um your interest
in your response to your uh uh to these
topics are a vital part of the process
going forward um you know isqua was one
of the founders of epher in the
beginning uh and we're still looked at
as you obviously a leading member I mean
there's five I mean everybody's
obviously is important but um uh at this
stage of the game I think this Council
sediments and reactions are are being
watched closely and so I'm going to
first start out with kind of going
through the timeline and the of what
we're coming what we're going to be
doing here and how it kind of fits
within a certain timeline I mentioned
too West Collins and Greg Tron from
eeper are both here in the audience I
really appreciate you guys being here
because I'm sure I'll say something
wrong and I know that you'll correct me
so I appreci appreciate that because
this is actually moving pretty fast I'm
going to ask uh both uh Greg and uh uh
if youall would come
up to the table
please and if you could Wes why don't
you get in front of one of the mics over
there in case you have
to and please share with your uh your
hashtag so we can record
it yeah that was close I did want to
make one comment about the last
presentation that one of the things they
didn't say is that video about the DUI
drill we've actually been able to use to
leverage a uh a Troublesome school that
really didn't want to get involved in
that program and by showing that very
short powerful video we've now in a
constant dialogue with them so I really
do appreciate um Autumn and Tim for put
putting that together because it's made
my job a little easier and twisting some
elbows for a good cause so
fantastic all right so like I said this
is going to be way more exciting than
any of that um so what I put up here
okay we can see the whole thing so just
some timelines to be aware of across the
top is you might recognize the color
scheme that's kind of the eer one so and
then on the bottom are all our city of
isqua actions so uh we had a discussion
about these that about these potential
term changes at services and safety last
week on the 5th so uh Stacy and Eileen
and I had and that was a great service
to me because it led into an ad hoc
committee meeting that we had on the
next day uh on Friday so that's when all
five uh parties had representatives
there along with uh Wes was there and so
was Chief saich and and so today
obviously we're at December 9th this is
our work session where I wanted to give
you the results of that conversation but
then and where does this fit and why are
we doing this now well look at the top
line so there's a Neer board meeting on
December 12 and the way the process
works is is the board May the board will
adopt will will will adopt maybe not
might not be the right word but it will
accept proposals here we're we're
proposing changes to an Ila now the way
they take effect is that that then goes
to all five of the partners there's
three City councils and two fire
districts fire commissions and all five
must it must be unanimous all five
Partners whether three commissions and
councils and two commissions uh will
must uh in affirmative adopt those and
then it goes back to kind of the eper
board for final adoption so that's a
very important process um and so and so
um uh the ad hoc committee has made its
recommendations uh and the eer board
will be considering them um in three
days on Thursday and the 12th and so
this is F this is our opportunity to get
the rest of um um you know your comments
as well and eileene definitely you're
planning on being there in the 12th
right and I think I'm going to be the
other member there as well I think so I
think so so it also is the other
opportunity for the rest of our
colleagues on the council here to give
us your indication of how you want us as
board members you know to be voting and
that's that's pretty critical now
for us to adopt it if you look at the
bottom line there is that following our
regular process it would be you know
probably on around the first business
meeting of January there'd be an agenda
Bill we refer to services and safety we
and that's our normal process right
services and safety uh then would
finalize the terms uh or make its
recommendation and then that agenda bill
would go back to regular Council and we
and that would the earliest it would be
on the 21st of January where then we
would uh be considering action to
formally adopt the changes now there's
there's one problem with this timing and
as you can kind of see up there is that
our partner is a excuse me samamish and
their resolution had asked for all of
this to be finalized by the 17th of
January which would be it obviously
would be prior to us meeting on the 21st
and so and so this is potentially
problematic so I'm just going to show
you an alternative schedule and then
we'll talk about it again uh after we've
gone through all of the items and that
would be potentially based upon the
amount of information we have right now
and how well we understand the potential
changes that already exist is that maybe
without going back to services and
safety we could be entertaining an
agenda Bill uh at our next regular
meeting next week where I would probably
do a similar presentation for our
consideration uh that is the really the
only way that I can see how we can get
it done before the 17th of January there
may be some other ideas but it is one I
shouldn't say it's the only way but it
is one way and so I'm not asking for
that right now but after we go through
all of these uh I'll come back to that
that kind of question of the timing um I
think it's important um I think that you
know uh some of our partners and
samamish has done a lot of work and
brought it to this stage and and so um
I'm very interested in honoring that and
making sure that we can um do we do what
we can to to wrap things up prior to the
date that they had
asked okay so that's so so i' now I've
got eight slides and each one of these
are pulled right off the Samus uh
resolution so they did a resolution
there eight points on there uh and and
so I have one slide for each of their
points I'm going to talk a little bit
about what the ad hoc committee where
where it kind of pertains to in the Ila
and also what the ad hoc committee uh
recommended and just and then look for
any kind of comments or feedback from
from you this evening so hopefully these
won't won't take very long and so these
are in the same order that they are in
their resolution the first one says the
funding formula shall be re revised as
described above okay I don't reference
that here but as described above and
incorporated into the new interlocal
agreement and what it was describing
above is the
8515 split for AV and actual cost so
operational cost so that so um that in
the inner local agreement is is
reflected in something called exhibit a
I have the language for that I think we
I just got it or from dawn today Don
jiren happened to give it to me today so
I've kind of seen
that so that one's actually kind of we
have already passed a resolution in
support of that part of it so for our
action in this regard you know we've
this is the one bullet item from the
resolution we're already done on so
there's really nothing to ask for there
so so but I'm going to ask Wes right now
in that you so you just came up with the
actual changes to exhibit a i how was
that that was recently uh and have what
is the status of the other partners on
on the language for the funding
formula on the funding formula all the
partners have agreed to it in principle
at the last board meeting okay so what
all we're trying to do is get convert
their language that was agreed to in
principle and get it into exhibit B or
exhibit a language so that and that's
just kind of a step how to do the turn
your mic on please was not on U well it
is on but pull it speak into it speak
into it would be helpful speak into the
mic I told you didn't want to be
recorded no um
so that's what we're at that stage right
now we're trying to get the language to
be kind of more common and easier to
understand one of the drawbacks of the
old way the exhibit a was written was if
you weren't doing it like we were doing
it every year you didn't understand
there's no way to read it and go you
could recreate recreate it so we sent
that off to we made the changes we sent
it off to the attorney and the attorney
basically
said I can't tell what you're doing um
it's still too confusing so tomorrow is
going to be a big day of getting the
language he gave us a lot of suggestions
getting the language to be more common
so that somebody can just pull it out
read it understand it um not change any
of the things that everybody wants to do
but just to get the language so that it
can be followed Easier by a lay person
not somebody who knows what CAD is knows
what a response area is kind of putting
some of those definitions into it so
anyway that's where we're at tomorrow
we'll rewrite it some more get to be
more common language then it goes to um
finance and Ops committee they're going
to review it make sure that we haven't
lost any of the intent from from the
meeting of the last board meeting
so from there it goes to the the board
on Thursday and we hope we can get them
to agree to it has to be an unanimous
vote they'll have to agree to it and
then it will become part of the current
interlocal agreement it's kind of
outside of what we're
doing with this because it actually
applies to the current interlocal
agreement but then when we change the to
the new 2015 interal agreement and that
language will just carry forward okay so
the funding formula change has kind of
been through the process what's left is
the board finalizing it but it won't
come back to the partners that
particular item at all no
okay okay all right seven
more so the second one uh and I've added
the emphasis of the other lines the
requested change was changes in
governance and membership and epher
shall require unanimous approval of all
Partners uh inter inly enough now um you
know we really didn't talk about the
word governance last Friday uh and I
don't know um so I'm I'm at fault
because I had identified I and we didn't
bring that up there and and so um my
comment on here is really um uh we may
have to take up further consideration
but I added the comment the current
practice has illustrated by the pursuit
of the nonprofit status so there is
there is a CH proposed change in
governance is to convert to a nonprofit
that would be an example of a change in
governance and that practice being
followed right now is that that agenda
bill has been delivered to all the
partners it's only once everybody has
approv that you know unanimous so all
five Partners before it could be cons
making uh uh become a change you know to
the Ila so and so so that's I guess this
is really the one maybe one area where I
don't know if you comment about this W
West but I don't think we we didn't
touch upon this the word governance on
Friday we spent some time talking about
the next one about
membership uh and let me just and and
and then basically what we've discovered
is that uh there is a section Ila
article 21 it's called addition of
members basically it already says that
it requires unanimity so uh really no
change is needed so what Samus was
asking for a was already in the
agreement for membership so we're good
but uh what they asked for regarding
governance um you had a reference in
some of your material West but it seems
to be pretty indirect rather than a
direct mention of governance so it
doesn't mention it directly
but um throughout the interlocal
agreement it talks about what you can do
with board has the authority to change
and what the board doesn't have
authority to change and so it it doesn't
have the authority to change a
governance or you know a way of doing um
um that kind of business so not
everything in the interlocal agreement
is
specified it'd be a really long one if
you had to go through and specify
everything but yeah it is you know if
you were to change governance that's
anytime you change the interlocal
agreement or the makeup of the
interlocal you have to go back to all
the parties which means all five have to
vote for it so without saying governance
I know it doesn't say it but I think
it's covered
right so comment question can ask a
question yeah why are why is there move
to go to a nonprofit what is the
different why change the governance okay
so so I don't have the sound bite for
that maybe these guys do it is a it it
probably will come back to us and we'll
have but this is we are not considering
the change for the nonprofit right now
this is not part of our consideration at
this moment if that's who you're want so
we're not taking action on nonprofit
status tonight all I was just curious as
to why it was even a talk of CH I'll
I'll see if Wes or Greg can answer the
main reason that the nonprofits come up
is that interlocal agreements cannot
have employees and so right now district
10 is the employer of record and so they
carry a higher degree of liability
because they carry all the employees for
eper and even more important than that
is they really carry a major veto or
major stick and they feel the district
10 board feels that it's it's unfair for
them to wield that kind of power they
don't want anybody to wield it and
because what could happen right now is
that we could have a
a a CVA go across a um bargaining
agreement with the
employees the board could vote against
it and district 10 could say oh we like
it and they could pass it which would um
you know kind of
destroy the whole purpose behind behind
having the board so they don't they
don't like having that power and they
don't think anybody should have to have
that power so what they would like it
they would like to get rid of being the
employer record now a nonprofit can have
employees and it cleans up a few of the
employment issues that's the main reason
there's other little benefits but that's
the main reason the nonprofits being
discussed
okay all right so so the third issue
from the samamish list of changes
individual Partners shall continue to
retain ownership and title of their
respective fire stations which is real
property and then also vehicles and
Equipment which is personal property
consistent with with with the fire
stations vehicles and Equipment each
entity brought into the partnership now
this
is this is a very important issue uh for
for samamish and um I understand why and
I think it's my read and I'm new to the
whole eer thing I think it's clearly a
very important issue for district 10
it's an important issue for us um
District 38 and Northbend brought a
little bit less to it but it's important
it's important to everybody though they
don't have quite as much at stake here
and so as it as we looked at this there
uh the actual um issue there is an
article 12.1 titled real property
ownership and that that's that basically
says that the parties will retain their
title of real property
so no change needed which which is good
um there is the following article 12.2
titled personal property
ownership um also um the intent was that
it for it to say the parties retain
title to their personally personal
property however the language in
there was unclear and and so um that is
there is a proposed uh change here and
let me kind of go up to this and I'm not
I'm not going to read this whole
agreement that's not my intent for you
guys to go through all of this but um
just wanted to point out of what will be
the board will be considering and this
by the way is the
form of um wait I have that I said oh
yeah 12.2 this is the form from that was
distributed today Wes yes this is from
the this the ad hoc committe changes and
then the changes that the attorney put
into it after that so this is just a few
hours off the press and um and so there
so we're so the ad hoc committee
recommended like striking the first one
and um and and I think the clarifying
language that down there is pretty clear
is that um uh that was added I think by
the attorney in the white down here and
indicates whether the personal property
of the party is considered separate
personal property of the party or joint
personal property of The Joint fire
department so what what what this
language now says is basically it it
restates what I think some of the other
members thought was true already and
samamish wanted to be clarified and and
I think samamish is is their
representative is comfortable with this
this says exactly that if you came into
the partnership and you own personal
property you had title to that that you
retain ownership you retain title and so
I think this is an improvement to uh get
it back to the original intent of the
agreement Stacy do you have a question
or comment well my question is is this
are we doing this by practice anyway so
we already know it's just the okay so
the intent and the this is current
practice okay and what we're trying to
do in this agreement is just make
current practice clearer so anybody
reading it would understand that this is
what we're we're doing now and and the
context for the discussion as I
understand it perhaps had to do with the
desire to know
um the outcome
regarding property if a member
leaves what they then take exactly upon
their leaving the part the partnership
okay exactly and this is where I don't
have really good Illustrated material
here but the last sub bullet says
requires exhibit B to be updated and and
and clarified an exhibit B in the Ila is
where exactly that is like here's the
property that each partner has title to
it has other things but in addition
here's the property that each uh partner
has title to so it's very clear on what
they own oh I got let me start with Mary
Lou who's first okay go ahead friend and
so uh personal property uh that confused
me a little bit we're talking about
equipment we're talking about apparatus
where how how far down does that that go
on the exhibit B MH it's very detailed
it it focuses mainly on equipment that's
titled equipment engines ladder trucks
eight cars that's where it spends most
of its time but also all the staff
vehicles but then it gets into air packs
rescue tools um thermal so it gets into
that kind of depth yes okay so all of
those items are in there what it where
we kind of draw the line is we don't
classify you know know the desk and no
individual computers and um brass and
hose and those kind of things those are
what we consider more of a operating
expense you know they come and go and
gotta we don't run them through that
process okay that's
helpful so in simple language if you
when everything came together and they
formed the joint fire department you
brought in everybody brought certain
things in is that their only real
personal
property are assets that were purchased
for fire stations after they joined then
joint property um it's actually I think
it can be a mix of both for example we
actually on our own so um one of the
there is a an equipment replacement fund
that we pay into and that just like the
title suggests it's used for replacing a
piece of equipment but if we our own
ourselves city of isqua wanted to buy a
piece of equipment and kind of and add
it to our list of assets are Neer that's
covered as well and I think that
happened when we o Open station
73 73 within the last couple of years so
so the answer to your question is it's
not just when we started it's anything
else that we on ourselves would buy and
and give over to ephra as well we retain
that a second part to that would be if
somebody came in with three fire trucks
and over time they get
replaced out of these funds do they are
they still the they get the title to the
replacement
equipment repl mhm and so the drill so
Station 72 which is a new
station
uh we purchased new equipment for that
station some new equipment no you didn't
so where did that equipment come from
that came from that from that was an
existing um station we just moved that
we moved it that's the probably the best
one examples when we opened station 73
which was a new station in in the city
of isqua and the system uh we determined
that we we had enough equipment and
engines to staff staff that station so
you in the original plan you the city
was going to buy an engine and an a car
for that station we determined well we
already have enough engines City doesn't
need to buy an engine but the city did
need to buy an aid car and so the city
bought the aid car that got added to
your
inventory you you also bring things on
like air compressors as you build new
stations those are considered separate
equipment we don't really put them in
part of the
station um just because they can be
unbolted and moved around if we need to
so those get added to your
inventory but we don't inventory Small
Things Stacy is
the is the proposal or the idea to uh
update exhibit B before that late the
mid January time time table to on the
titled property exhibit B is done and
it'll be brought forward on this
Thursday okay so that the board can
review exhibit B also and basically
again that was a clarifying of of
language exhibit B if you read it in the
past was kind of how we started the fund
and it was a lot of accounting um and a
lot of accounting e a lot of Gap
discussion uh now we've kind of
simplified it and it just says here's
how it works oh okay I thought exhibit B
was the uh the actual um list of all the
properties it is as well it is as well
workbook yeah it's the summary page that
everybody was having difficulty with so
we' fixed the summary page the rest of
it is all it's just here's how we're um
depleting and saving money to replace
equipment okay so so from Sam amish's
perspective they came in with real
property they want it's they retain
ownership of that real property they
came in with other personal property
with title they retain ownership and
even uh if it's replaced they get the
replacement the title for the
replacement piece as well and that was
one of that wasn't as clear I think as
Wes said there people were having
problems with some of that so that seems
been clarified and the the existing
intent and practices was already this
isn't really a change it's a
clarification which is
good uh the next one in the samamish
list was depreciation and maintenance of
vehicles and Equipment shall be the
financial responsibility of the partner
assigned the vehicles and equipment so
um
this and and we didn't again on Friday
quite discuss and when I was sitting
down trying to do this presentation it
wasn't as clear to me on really what we
said about this one so I did review this
uh earlier today with another member but
um it really epher maintains the
vehicles and I don't think it says does
it say that anywhere in the Ila but
epher maintains the vehicles if they
need regular maintenance epher does that
and so um though this was one of the
proposed changes to the Ila in the um uh
in the resolution from the city of
samamish I think they're going to be
satisfied with uh the fact that e
maintains the vehicles that's the
indication that I have and so I don't
think we're recommending any we the the
ad hoc committee didn't recommend any
changes to the Ila in per this request
from
samamish just a couple more um
um vehicles and Equipment considered to
to be Regional assets such as the boat
or emergency trailer she'll have the
depreciation and maintenance paid by all
Partners in the same proportion as their
respective operating
contributions um and so this really we
we we started talking about this as
we've talked about property personal
property that you had the title to you
owned an engine you had the title to
that but what about other property that
epher owns where no individual party has
the title where epher owns it uh and it
is quote shared and that's really where
this conversation has gone what about
the shared
equipment and and um
uh you know the where this went and this
phrase of partner so everybody there is
some language
in exhibit
a uh about how um each
some partner equity and shared there is
a a way for every partner to know what
percentage of epher that they owned some
of it may be their own personal property
but the balance of that would reflect
shared property and and so um and and
ephra has a method by which to compute
that partner Equity or uh the other
phrase that we started using this n
percent booked value thank you Diane
where where there is this on the books
value for these shared assets what
percent of them does each member
have um and so there is a formula for
calculating this net percent Book value
and uh we reviewed that um as part of
the ad hoc committee and um um I think
so I think samamish is satisfied with it
and is not requesting any change to it
going forward uh however the exhibit B
which is supposed to list the still
needs to be updated and I I get the
sense that
that all of those updates to exhibit B
which was all the shared may or may not
be done in the same time as the titled
equipment I'm looking for some
confirmation from you I think we have it
done at this stage it's just a matter of
whether or not I haven't run it past the
attorney for an attorney review okay you
always you never know what's going to
happen there but uh for the most part we
think we' we've Rewritten the language
it's to us it's very clear what you do
with all of the different equipment and
all the the different um areas so we
think we've hit the mark but again it'll
be one of those things once more eyes
have seen it that whether or not we it's
very clear and concise is to us but we
live it and breathe it so it may not be
as clear and concise to others Mar a
question on this one and the last one
are these again just housekeeping ones
where this is the current practice and
the wording is getting better or is
there a monetary change attached this
looks like it's all just clarifications
there is no re change in calculation
it's all just clarification and my the
indication I've seen is that uh samamish
is the representative is satisfied with
that and believes that they're they're
Council should be you know expects them
to be as well because again they came in
with stuff they owned it y they still
have it and oh by the way there the
shared assets as well uh what percent
what percentage percentage of those are
ours and the methods for determining all
that already existed we're not changing
any of those but we're going to clarify
how they're done and the bookkeeping of
those and there's a monetary value
that's connected with each one of those
and it's depreciated over time so that
at the end of the life of the boat that
would be zeroed out yeah and we kind of
do it in re reverse because we don't
really depreciate the vehicles we save
for their replacement so it really
doesn't matter what they cost at the
beginning but we're doing is we're
saving amounts of money every year on
their life so that at when they at the
end of life that we have enough cash to
replace them well for for those
particular vehicles that are owned by
the partners but the shared pieces are I
mean are we actually saving forward for
the both we're projecting what it looks
like it's going to cost us in 15 years
or 20 years that's the goal and then how
much do we have to save per year yeah
we're doing it for all the e assets and
the individual partner assets okay I
didn't realize we were doing it on these
smaller shared pieces as well
okay okay so and so now um the next few
deal with some actual language changes
uh the other ones were clarifications so
uh each partner shall select its
representatives to the epher board of
directors and currently in the Ila
article 3.2 titled appointment it says
um there's language that says shall be
members of city councils and Boards of
fire commissioners of the
parties and and the proposed change is
to shall be elected members of the
parties so what that does is that um it
retains it as elected members so uh a
mayor an elected mayor could be
appointed be it's anybody who's
elected Josh there there's language
there that the one thing jumps out at me
using that that term talking close
enough to this that that seems
Troublesome okay um which is the use of
elected because it would appear to
preclude appointed Council
Representatives which means like when
Joe forkner was serving technically that
wouldn't have been sufficient under this
Ila so get it so is is is Joe was in
that example was Joe technically elected
or
appointed he was a he was appointed to
an elected
position so when he was appointed that
wasn't the wording that was used so
that's something that we can you caness
around with cuz that would have been
proper under the previous he was a
member of the city council but he was
elected and or appointed to an elected
position and so it looks like
uh under the current language a mayor
could not correct and what this does is
provide that as an option it provides
that as an option another reason this
came up too is was there was discussion
does it have to be an elected or ano
person appointed to an elector what
about a staff member and so we discussed
that and the ad hoc committee was uh
achiev consensus on it should be
elected so thank you for that clar
clarifying language but I'm hoping that
our Council won't won't have any issue
with the proposed
change this is definitely one of the
language areas
so so Fred as the mayor-elect we're
going to appoint you no I'm kidding um
but that but I can see how it's you know
so so I think I think of myself is that
is that you know each partner um you
know the fact that would have be an
elected member you know they've got some
Authority they got some budget making
and approving Authority spending uh and
that's that's what we want on the board
and I have no problem okay adding you
you know the language change as long as
we can clean up a little address the
appointed issue that Josh brought and I
think that's a simple enough uh change
to what you've been talking about so
Josh brings up a good point uh
and he
also solidified his chances of being
appointed to the next Ila atw committee
thank you Josh having served on the ETP
rules subcommittee this is somewhat
familiar uh process to
me you might even finally get through
the process this Friday
okay okay there are two more um then
second last an operations committee
composed of staff from each of the
partners shall be formed um now there's
actually more in their resolution than
this but this is the top title and I
want to point out too is that um though
this was found its way onto Sam amish's
resolution it was actually put there um
it was actually a member of our own City
staff who suggested it and and and Sam
amish's representative kind of
aggregated all the various suggestions
and they took them up under their own
resolution so these didn't all just come
this is one that actually came from our
suggestion now the good news is is again
U as article 3.4 on committees and task
force point out is that this is already
completely doable no change is needed
and in fact there's been a lot of
discussion about that it seems to be
that um I don't think the ad hoc well
the board will probably take this up in
the near future but uh the ad hoc
committee has no recommended changes to
the Ila other than to say that this
operational committee which totally up
to the discretion of the board to
allow parties to appoint staff to this
um and and I think that's the key thing
in that in that um um many times staff
because of it's their sweet spot it's
their area of expertise uh their ability
to uh get involved with an issue and
understand it and help uh work with the
other partners can be an make vital
contributions to those of us who may be
on the board and then it can provide
that um guidance and advice to the
actual uh voting board members and so
this this isn't the way it's working
right now I think there seems to be a
lot of interest in all the partners
partners to at least I picked up on this
to do something like this and allow it
to be open to staff as well well this
this is I mean as we are able to do this
right now I mean the board can um add
additional um committees as needed
that's right and as they see that the
need for um I think the change would be
that now staff
members um in and that has always been a
possibility in the past previously also
it wasn't just simply board of
directors right and then in language in
in section 3.4 it really doesn't say
anything about the composition of the
committee or task force so it's kind of
Silent on who so it's really I would
read this as the up to the discretion of
the board on how they could compose uh
committee or task force so no change
there this and so the final one um oh
I'm sorry Mar sure and this would be a a
committee that is formed and meets
before the board meetings provides
information in the board me like I'm not
really sure what they would do you know
it's uh it's not entirely clear to me as
well but the model I have in my mind is
I um it's probably the same one I'd ask
you to consider is like like we here at
the city have boards and commissions and
there are certain topics that they're
experts on that come to them they're
appointed you know by you know by the
mayor uh and and and there's certain
issues they've got a charter and they
come to them and they deliberate and
they come to uh conclusion and they make
recommendations to the mayor and to the
city council and I would see it
operating in a similar Way East Side
Fire and Rescue now currently has two
subcommittees that are operating one is
regional personnel and the other one is
finance and Ops U so the the desire to
have a third um will come before the
board Andor I mean Regional Personnel is
not always that busy so it could
possibly some be some kind of a
combination of some of those or a third
uh committee as needed and and Eileen I
I understand that those two that you
mentioned are staffed only with board
members currently and this would be an
so this general practice what I'm seeing
is this general practice change you know
maybe we need to actually get people who
know how to let me say a little bit
differ U maybe may maybe maybe the
electeds and board members you know um
uh if they were supported by staff and
could get advice from staff that the
overall operation and efficiency of the
E for upper management would be improved
how's that but just the one example we
hear a lot is well I need to take this
back to my city manager or city
administrator yeah and so if we could
reverse the order so that the board
member said no I know my staff has
looked at this and now I can weigh the
actual policy decision instead so you
know and I think always being directors
has just simply been practice um I don't
no one has even perhaps even pushed
until now in regards to having staff
members being on these different
committees and it's it's it's it should
be very good
I think it was uh Bob Harrison that made
the first suggestion so he had he had an
honorary appointment for Life uh
last
was okay I was just kidding but but
there's a great list of of possible um
things to look at on the operations
committee so that will be and another
thing oh I'm sorry no just something to
to for the board to take a look at right
I think what samam samamish had the
practice of actually bringing staff to
board meetings and I think that whole
Loop of you know I would want to you
know get some input or feedback or can
they contribute to the
conversation um uh and so this is one
way an operations committee that
actually had staff of make sure they're
part of that but I also think I heard
that you know there may be uh a board
meeting that and all the members of the
board are you know elected or fulfilling
or appointed to elected positions
whoever that language is going to be
that there may be staff present maybe
sitting in the audience and that there
ability to actually be included in the
conversation and I to me that sounds
just like a practice on whether allow or
not but I think that was just the one
other thing about about um wanting to
take advantage of the expertise uh that
was available and staff and and and
using that in the decision-making
process because I know that at one time
Sam amish's Director of
Finance
attended just about all of those
meetings
but I don't believe I ever heard him
speak at a board meeting he was just in
the audience and was taking
information back following the meeting
they almost always have somebody from
staff you know one of their directors is
there it's been Mike sarne for the last
few years and uh he's at a lot of the
committee meetings and he's lot at a lot
of the board
meetings and I think for their the way
they do business it was frustrating for
them because we Comm communicate
directly to their council member our
board the person that's on the board and
we don't directly communicate with their
staff person so their board member would
come back to the staff person and say
well eeper is doing this and Mike would
go well I don't have all the background
on that and so then that would put them
in you know they feel like they're
playing catchup so that's why they
really want to see an operations board
and we want to see it too we think it'll
benefit East Side Fire and
Rescue and I think it'll also cut down
on the demands we put on our board of
directors we have you know your guys
already have a busy schedule and then we
ask for two more three more meetings
sometimes a month and if we could drop
some of those meetings and get the
information to you in a more direct
format a format that most in the cities
are used to that it comes through staff
up to you you guys get policy direction
or ideas and then you give direction so
we're hopeful that that whole system
could work better yeah and and I think
um I'm optimistic that that samamish
will see it that way but of course
they'll consider that but their
representative and idaw committee was
optimistic that this plan would work for
them as well so and so again the
motivation was can we get staff on the
board well the ad hoc committee said no
let's keep it as um well actually that
was the previous one let's keep it at
elected and appointed but go ahead and
create this operations committee which
no Ila change is required for okay and
then the last one this would be a
language change uh so we really haven't
looking at a lot of language changes and
current uh their last request was budget
approval shall require approval of by at
least six members of the uh epher board
and so article 3.3 dealing with meetings
actually has a has language in the air
that deals with budgetary items or
anything over $50,000 which their budget
is over
$50,000 and that Language basic there is
language in there they compute there's
something called a weighted majority and
I don't have to go into all the details
of right now because the committee had
consensus in VI and in that um that
language be changed and uh and the
current proposed language says five F
five of
eight um and um and that is really
happens to be a simple majority I was
pushing for the language can we just
change it can we just say a simple
majority uh and um but if it comes back
at five well eight I mean five is a
simple majority of eight so I mean it's
still ACH achieving that I think the
changing it to a simple majority simply
means that the language would work if
there's some other change uh in the
board composition uh through some other
change so um and uh the actual language
is also then is removing the definition
of a weighted majority from that section
as well and so I think the Cal
calculation the weighted majority was a
calculate the waiting was a percentage
of contribution
contribution and so what originally
motivated This was um what it said was
um the weighted the language said 71% it
took 71% of the weighted majority to
approve a budgetary item uh and
currently um District 10's contribution
is greater than
40% so technically district 10 with
their great their waiting if they were
to if all six other board members voted
in favor of a budgetary item the two
district 10 Representatives could vote
negative that would be and we would not
achieve the
71% uh and so and so the that was the
original motivation is that one partner
shouldn't even shouldn't be able to
defeat a budgetary
item so so the way the path that this is
taken was it's budget let's just do a
majority or a simple majority or in this
case explicitly
five
so is it is it going to say majority or
is it going to say five well the current
language says five okay that's being
that been put together but you had
indicated that the simple majority might
actually be better because if there were
partnership changes during the Ila
period five would no longer be an
accurate simple majority which there
would have to be an Ila change anyway so
we'd have to clean that part up too okay
is there um is there a quorum
requirement for the meetings out of the
eight what's that uh do you know if top
of your head five
so in this case a budget would have to
have an unanimous vote if only five were
there right so there has to be only five
present and there'd have to be and it
takes this language says there'd have to
be five okay now is this just for a
budget item or is this for
approving the annual budget this was for
both any budget item over 50,000 would
require this and any
annual budget would require that
everything else is just basically simple
majority so if there's only if you only
have a quum of five and it's a you know
signing of a letter of agreement or any
of those other action items and only
takes three of the five that simple
majority but in cases of the way this
language is written in the case of a
budget you'd have to have five votes
regardless of how many people were in
the meeting that day oh Wes what what
you just said kind of confused me
because
if you had a quorum of five and and we
went through this we've been going
through this for about two years at ETP
there's a difference between majority
and majority of voting members present
and what you just described is actually
a majority of voting members present at
a meeting which would then require three
of five but if in fact a
majority is required it would always be
a majority of the total voting members
which would be five out of eight so yeah
and the interlocal agreements written
for both both those occasions so there
are certain things that only need a
majority of the members present okay but
on issues like anything that's over
$50,000 or a budget and then there's
some others that actually require a
unanimous vote of all the parties so
sometimes it takes eight of eight um so
it it names all those different
scenarios as long as that distinction
yeah the distinctions in the interal
agreement yes so when we were at
Services um I think one of the questions
I had
was what the particular issue was with
with this so um you talked earlier about
the scenario that
um there could be a scenario where
district 10 because of their large
contribution could hold up the budget in
so but that's never happened um and I
wondered if there had been any
discussion at the ad hoc committee about
what what the issue was with what was
driving the suggested change here I we
we did have that conversation and
um that would that was repeated that was
it now just just like in
FYI
that um
should clani Annex into isqua that is
clani is currently served by district 10
then our total contribution then uh
including Kahani we would become the
majority uh uh in that size too so in
the future um if they had continued to
use the weighted majority in this then
then we would have had actually that
ability uh our two board members to
um deny passage of a budgetary item just
uh when another all six other voters had
had uh had approved it but um that's
kind of looking forward um the
conversation was simply about that you
know should a single member in this case
the majority member who has greater than
39% be able to um um you know kill a
budgetary item and and and that was the
only reason given and but I think people
seem to be it's budgetary it makes
simple majority makes
sense so that was our conversation
any other
questions so that's so so so there was a
lot about real and personal property no
language changes but things in the um in
exhibit B that need to be clarified so
we'll be seeing that there's this
language change right here about going
from this weighted majority uh and uh if
I and then the other one had to do with
this idea about where it specifically
said City councils and Boards of Fire
Commissioners uh they'll be so these are
these are pretty simple changes in my
mind so and so I'm this is my last slide
one quick question though oh yeah sure
back to if I can ask Wes please
committees and task force in the Ila it
doesn't speak to any number of members
or who can make up those we somewhat
have a practice now what we do but I
mean could we have a committee of six
seven whatever whatever is chosen there
is okay so there could be you know two
members from a district or two members
from a city sitting on any of these
subcommittees they're just whatever yeah
it's totally up to the board on how your
makeup how many committees how often
they meet who sits on them the number of
Representatives that sit on them there's
nothing spelled out okay I couldn't find
anything we specifically tried to keep
when they when we came up with this
interlocal agreement you you'll notice
that this isn't a huge inter local
agreement for such a a major
organization like you Side Fire and
Rescue and that comes from Rod kasuma
who's the attorney and he likes to keep
these things open so that the board has
a lot of latitude to do their business
and they're not bound by little rules
here and there and I think one of the
things by changing some of this language
that we're doing in this amendment we're
actually freeing it up a little bit more
and clar mainly through clarification of
what was meant sometimes when you have
language that that it's very written
very open you also
get confused on it also so we're going
to clarify it which actually opens up
the language a little bit more and with
this clarification I think it'll it'll
be shown the intent of the board is to
have
committees and they they could be
operating committees they could be task
force I I just go back to the same thing
that that we talked about earlier about
how
samamish their staff often times felt
like they were missing information um
but as an elected um with just staff
sitting on a particular committee I
think as a director to Eide fire and
rescue I would feel I would be missing
some of that information that firsthand
information and the ability to
contribute to the discussion also so
that's why I was you know if two can sit
on these committees so thank you so
there actually was one other uh point I
didn't have any material on I wanted to
mention there actually are other changes
to the
Wes and his actually had proposed
they're house cleaning they're kind of
cleanup stuff they're
nothing
um West would is that is that you agree
with that characterization just clean up
the interal agreement had a lot of it
talked about commissions Board of
Commissioners and city councils which if
we ever try to grow it if somebody comes
into epher and they're a regional Fire
Authority and they want to join epher
then they could because you could say
well Regional fire authorities aren't in
the language if the the snowy tribes had
interests in the past of coming into
eper so well you're a tribe you're not a
city council or fire district so we just
changed the took out all the fire distri
city council language and just replace
that with parties the party or the
parties and then that way it opens it up
that just about any entity could come
into the interlocal agreement that the
board and the rest of you would want to
come in you know if a if a Boeing fire
department wanted to be part of it you
guys could look at it and say well yeah
or no about it but instead of keeping it
such strict language to fire districts
and city council so that was one of the
language cleanups we did and then we
just did a few other ones that just
brought clarification
to to um the agreement most of it was
changing from to the the
party okay so this is my last slide I'm
going to oh come on show up in there
actually draw on here and I'm going to
put in uh the uh I'm doing this with my
right index finger now know that I am
left-handed so he said there was no
animation I told you this was going to
be exciting so I'm writing in the 6th of
January of 2014 first council meeting
that's the first council meeting so one
way that we as a participate in
participant in this could be that um now
that you understand kind of the scope of
these changes my own assessment that
these we understand them very well I I'm
getting kind of the sense of the council
that you're uh that the our
representative on the ephra board
Thursday uh are getting the green light
to approve these changes
is that the general sense of the counsel
with some of these change with the
revisions that we talked about and so
one way that we can eliminate this
potential by our own schedule and maybe
cause an issue with the January 17th
date that's in their resolution and not
anybody ask anybody or expect anybody to
change their resolution or dates again
is for us either to resolve it either
our next business meeting a week from
today or on our our next our business
meeting after that which is the 6th of
January
which would mean not going which means
creating an agenda Bill and and not
going to services and safety and then
actually reviewing the contents of that
agenda bill at a regular at one of these
two regular Council
meetings and um i' throw that out there
is that I I'd like us to consider that
and if I need to kind of have a quick
summary of the changes and and review um
and present them to the entire council
at a regular council meeting so that we
can take a final action um I'd be
willing willing to do that and then we
would then then this whole date thing is
off the table and we've we've done that
so it's already gone to safety and
services once so Stacy can weigh in on
whether or not what we've heard tonight
do you feel like there's a benefit to
having it go back through the group
again the committee
again oh I'm gonna have e answer since
he's the chair of
services
um I don't see the need for it to
necessarily come back to services and
safety we've reviewed it um it's been
discussed by the ad hoc committee all
the concerns that we had have been
resolved and if there is something that
pops up which I can't see we have the
opportunity to speak forward at that
that council meeting so I don't see the
need at
all would seem like a regular business
yes so the next regular meeting regular
business
exactly so I so probably that one on the
6th of January makes the most because we
still have to put an agenda Bill
together we still I mean epher has to
have its board meeting the final
language has to be proposed by them we
need to put together an agenda Bill uh
and the time frame of doing that on
January 6 seems to make a little bit
more
sense so will the ad ad hoc committee
meet
again uh it's not currently planning on
it
to
and
uh well you be at the uh eer board
meeting on the 12th the 12th
yes so we'll have two representatives
there MH who are knowledgeable and you
know I uh these
changes don't really appear to be I mean
relatively minor it's actually you know
confirming more than anything our past
practices
uh and making it a little bit
clearer so I uh you know for me
personally I think the you know the 6th
J January council meeting uh is unless
there's a wrinkle as you point out the
the council could take
action without referral to committee
there there is there's one one argument
for maybe doing it a week from today and
that would be what we know for certain
is that the current samamish council is
the one that put forward these changes
and they're having some changes in
Council so you have you know with the
new Council seated things can
change uh and so and so us taking action
prior to that would be the one
motivation that we might use to do it a
week from tonight
so maybe we could let's take this under
consideration perhaps a leadership on
Wednesday I think that's a good
suggestion okay because I you had a good
meeting with uh with Don Jaren of the
samam city council and so you have some
insights from that meeting uh there will
be some changes on the samamish council
right
there will be some changes on the uh
samamish Council and I'm it'd be
interesting to
get some feel or feedback on what
direction because they can still
withdraw regardless of what we do and
it's been very very
controversial discussion up there on
these issues but let's talk about it at
leadership on Wednesday morning
any other questions
comments well
what us taking action on the six
still the smish resolution that's
scheduled to happen on the 17th would
would in include their new Council
makeup so it
doesn't
um
anyway I think there's this timeline it
might be possible for their current
Council to take AC ction before the end
of the year as
well so so that would be that would be
the considerations for us to make on on
doing it a different timeline so what
I'm hearing is there's no need for it to
go back to services and safety so at
least we can
easily um not have conflict with the
January 17 datee uh and whether or not
we do it in a week or the fir or the
next or the subsequent business meeting
is to be determined but we understand
the issues okay good that's all I had if
there's no other comments I think we're
done well uh is there anyone in the
audience Desiring to comment on this
topic anyone in the audience does not
seeing no one then uh is there any other
business uh to come before the council
Paul thank you for representing the city
on the ad hoc committee appreciate that
very very much and the preparation and
the briefing uh Wes and uh GRE thank you
very very much for your support and
Diane I know you have been involved as
thanks has been our city administrator
so this has been a great team effort and
we are
adjourned
that