City Council Special Meeting · Tuesday, November 10, 2015 · City Council Digest

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0:14 ↗ Welcome. I'm going to call to order the Issaquah City Council budget deliberation meeting of

0:19 ↗ Tuesday, November 10th. on today's agenda. We're going to open up the meeting with

0:25 ↗ an opportunity for members of the public to make comments. I'll talk about that

0:31 ↗ in a moment. And then we're gonna move into actual council deliberation on a

0:37 ↗ list of items that we identified in our previous council meeting, budget meeting last

0:42 ↗ week on the fourth. And so this initial public comment period, it is,

0:48 ↗ I'm glad to be able to offer the opportunity. I think the very transparent and

0:54 ↗ very open and deliberative process by which we set our budget for coming years, it's

1:00 ↗ vital that we have these opportunities for members of the public to offer their comments

1:06 ↗ for the city council. As we mentioned last week as well,

1:12 ↗ when we opened for public comment, that items for comments

1:18 ↗ must be restricted to items under, related to the budget.

1:24 ↗ And so, you know, it's very specifically, we have a proposal from the mayor, the

1:30 ↗ council has been reviewing that and there are items, potential items on there that, you

1:35 ↗ know, that we're gonna be voting on this evening. And so items related, anything within

1:41 ↗ the scope of the budget. If you're a representative of an agency that has

1:47 ↗ been in the proposed budget for funding, we ask that your comments

1:52 ↗ be, we have a single representative from your agency to provide those

1:58 ↗ comments. This is, again, this is for the benefit of the council

2:04 ↗ as we make our deliberations on the 2016 budget. And so I don't

2:10 ↗ know is the we did not unlike our regular council meetings. I didn't provide a

2:14 ↗ list for sign up. So it's going to be all available. I'm going to ask

2:19 ↗ people to raise their hands. And so we're going to limit the comments to

2:25 ↗ five minutes. And again, I think a lot of you should be familiar,

2:31 ↗ I hope, with what our mayor usually announces about the purpose of the

2:37 ↗ comments and how they're supposed to be directed and respectful, directed to the

2:43 ↗ council and respectful of everyone. And so with that, I'm gonna open it

2:48 ↗ up for public comment. Is anybody who would wish to make address the council, sir,

2:54 ↗ please, when you come forward to the microphone, state your name and your relationship to

2:59 ↗ the city before you begin your comments. Thank you.

3:05 ↗ Evening, my name is Chris Hawkins. I'm a resident of Issaquah up in the Issaquah

3:10 ↗ Highlands neighborhood. And I'm here to talk about one item in the parks budget. One

3:16 ↗ of the items under consideration for next year in the parks budget is the addition

3:21 ↗ of all weather play fields and lighted areas in the city of Issaquah. Currently the

3:26 ↗ plan is to place those up in Issaquah Highlands, and while there are some issues

3:31 ↗ with that, I think that an important alternative has been overlooked in the Lakes of

3:36 ↗ Mamish State Park soccer fields. There are currently nine different soccer fields at Lakes of

3:42 ↗ Mamish State Park which are used by different soccer clubs but which could be used

3:47 ↗ by other facilities, but they're hampered by the lack of all-weather turf fields and lighting.

3:53 ↗ Obviously the monies that are set aside would not solve the problem for all those

3:58 ↗ fields, but the money that's being proposed, the $600,000 state bond measure and the money

4:03 ↗ that was, some of the money that was approved in the, I think, $10 million

4:08 ↗ bond issue could be used with those. It would obviously take some rethinking about the

4:13 ↗ relationship of how those fields are managed because they're not actually within the city parks

4:18 ↗ boundary, but I think that it's worthy of consideration. The item that I'm asking you

4:23 ↗ to consider tonight is to rethink the budget item for the soccer fields for next

4:28 ↗ year from implementing the existing plan to instead funding further study of these. While there's

4:33 ↗ a need for soccer fields, I don't think that there's such a pressing need that

4:38 ↗ we can't reconsider a decision under slightly different parameters. And I think that If the

4:44 ↗ budget item were to ask the parks department to work more closely with the state

4:49 ↗ parks department and understand what the management implications were, what the cost implications were, how

4:54 ↗ those fields are managed right now that we might benefit long term because those fields

4:59 ↗ are located in a much better location for all the citizens of Issaquah. They're very

5:04 ↗ central. They have much better transportation links. so again in terms of budget items i'm

5:09 ↗ not asking you to make a decision about where the soccer fields get to put

5:14 ↗ tonight but rather to say would it be wise to defer that a bit why

5:20 ↗ we put on some additional study on that and to focus on changing the budget

5:25 ↗ item to fund a study of an alternative at lake sammamish state park thank you

5:30 ↗ very much thank you would anybody else like to address the council

5:38 ↗ Good evening. I'm Karen Abel. I'm the executive director of Art East at 95 Front

5:44 ↗ Street North. And I have to say, after observing the thoughtfulness and thoroughness and often

5:50 ↗ intelligence I observed last week, As you deliberate, it's an honor and a

5:55 ↗ pleasure to be here addressing you tonight. I want to talk about our

6:01 ↗ request for funding for art programming from the general funds. Last year, your

6:07 ↗ funding helped us deliver five community programs and ten exhibitions, both at downtown

6:12 ↗ Front Street as well as our Blakely Hall exhibition space. And it included, I won't

6:18 ↗ go through all of them, but it included over a dozen free art making experiences

6:23 ↗ for families. It included field trips for every Grand Ridge second grader to our African

6:28 ↗ American quilt exhibition and it ended up the season with a successful attempt at the

6:32 ↗ Guinness Book of World Records for most people painting on a mural during salmon days.

6:37 ↗ And we plan to do all those sort of things again next year with the

6:42 ↗ exception of the Guinness Book of World Records. But we also plan to expand the

6:47 ↗ free art making activities at sort of almost a street level if you want to

6:51 ↗ talk Think of it that way. And we plan to partner with the Issaquah Schools

6:57 ↗ Foundation and Healthy Youth Initiative group on a program called The Incredible Intensity of Just

7:03 ↗ Being Human. And it is a series of art exhibitions and panel programs that address

7:09 ↗ the issue of youth mental health. We do all these things because we believe in

7:15 ↗ two key things. One, that nothing like the arts brings people together in a common

7:21 ↗ place. And as Issaquah continues to grow and become more culturally diverse, we think the

7:26 ↗ visual arts are particularly important in bringing neighbors together who wouldn't otherwise gather together. The

7:32 ↗ second thing is we honestly believe that the arts are a great way to open

7:37 ↗ dialogue on important subjects such as youth mental health. So going forward, you can expect

7:43 ↗ us to do those, the type of programs we've done in the past, plus more.

7:48 ↗ You can always expect us to partner. You will see that all our key programs

7:53 ↗ involve a community partner. We don't go at any of them alone. Downtown Issaquah Association,

7:58 ↗ Issaquah Highlands Council, Friends of Lake Sammamish, the list goes on, Eastside Rights. You can

8:04 ↗ expect us to engage whenever possible. We try to make programs that actively engage invite

8:09 ↗ people to get involved as compared to expect them to passively view the art. And

8:14 ↗ you can count on us to put our best foot forward with our best teachers,

8:19 ↗ great art materials, even a street level type programs, and ideas that push things a

8:24 ↗ little further 'cause that's just kind of in our DNA to do things that are

8:29 ↗ a little bit more fun and at times a little bit more zany. Your support

8:34 ↗ of these type of programs is absolutely critical Because to be honest, many of the

8:40 ↗ other funding partners we seek all year long, we seek them all year long,

8:45 ↗ have very specific missions that don't necessarily align with the type of community-based, family-friendly,

8:51 ↗ street-level, festival-level programs that we bring Issaquah. They have other missions and our programs

8:57 ↗ have to meet those specific other missions. So we absolutely count on local support

9:02 ↗ for these local programs. So thank you again for all the support you've given ArtEast

9:08 ↗ in the past and your belief in ArtEast. And we look forward to continuing

9:14 ↗ support, be as generous as possible, and we'll help build a healthy community together.

9:20 ↗ Thanks. Thank you. Is there anybody else who would like to address the council?

9:26 ↗ Sir. Good evening. David Kapler, 255 Southeast Andrew Street. Four park items. There's

9:32 ↗ talk about a second park plan that the city might be looking into. I think

9:38 ↗ it's really necessary to really look at projects and figure out what projects we need

9:43 ↗ to be budgeting and working on in the near future. And bringing in the different

9:49 ↗ user groups and really have a comprehensive planning process and working with those different groups.

9:56 ↗ There's item in the budget for extra help in parks, especially I think Matt in

10:01 ↗ the open space could use extra help. I would hope that that would kind of

10:06 ↗ be tied in with some of that job. If we expand that, we need to

10:11 ↗ expand help there, but we're looking at somebody that's more on a Thursday to Sunday

10:16 ↗ type of job or something that covers weekends at least frequently is on weekends. So

10:21 ↗ they're available to work with volunteer groups and also be a person that would really

10:26 ↗ be a contact person for volunteers. I don't think we have the, they've taken advantage

10:31 ↗ of our volunteers as well as we could and should. And then there's the item

10:37 ↗ about brochures, which are really in need of being updated. But like the DNR is

10:41 ↗ working really hard on their mapping for all of Tiger Mountain. And we're getting it

10:46 ↗ down so it's all going to be on your phone. So you can just get

10:51 ↗ it right there. And the work I've done on truthing some of the maps that

10:56 ↗ DNR has done up there, they're unbelievably accurate and work so well on the phones.

11:00 ↗ So anything we do like that, or the-- There's hardly ever any of the brochures

11:05 ↗ up there about the bus. And so do you want to keep filling up, using

11:09 ↗ all the paper, filling the brochure thing, where you got those numbers up there, if

11:13 ↗ that was all on somebody's phone, that little program was on their phone, they could

11:17 ↗ get a lot more information than about the bus and why it might be there,

11:21 ↗ what it looked like originally, and that kind of thing. You could have really excellent

11:26 ↗ information and it's all an area where a good cell phone reception

11:31 ↗ occurs so people could really get a lot of information that way

11:37 ↗ and it could be updated. Whereas once you start printing these things

11:43 ↗ it gets out of date real quick, especially with trails. Thank you.

11:48 ↗ Thank you. Is there anybody else? Ma'am? I brought a couple pictures

11:54 ↗ to show you on a thumb drive. Can I do that? I

12:00 ↗ just don't know where to put it. Do

12:05 ↗ I, does my five

12:10 ↗ minutes counting down? It

12:15 ↗ is. Yeah. Okay. Thank

12:19 ↗ you, Paul, for helping

12:24 ↗ me. Okay. You know,

12:29 ↗ I can't talk without

12:34 ↗ showing you a couple

12:39 ↗ of pictures. Sure. Open

12:44 ↗ folder to review files.

12:49 ↗ And here we are. Good

12:54 ↗ evening everybody. Most of you know me. I am Chris Brandt. I'm the CEO of

12:59 ↗ At Work, which is located at 6690 Northwest Juniper Street here in Issaquah. I wanted

13:04 ↗ to give you a quick update about all the changes that have been happening at

13:09 ↗ At Work because you have a new and different proposal before you this year after

13:14 ↗ many years of supporting us at the recycling center. So back in 2006, AtWork served

13:20 ↗ 200 people in three sheltered workshops, one of them here in Issaquah, one

13:26 ↗ in Bellevue, and one in Kenmore, and group supported employment, which was a

13:31 ↗ janitorial business, a landscaping business, and the recycling center that you see there

13:37 ↗ with bales of cardboard in the background. The city supported that recycling center

13:43 ↗ with $20,000 grant from this budget for seven years. and really made a difference in

13:48 ↗ us being able to provide that as a public service and to serve a number

13:53 ↗ of people with disabilities. At one time, there were 16 people with disabilities working there

13:57 ↗ and many have gone through that program. Work has really transformed in the last

14:03 ↗ nine years. We have gone away from segregated, isolated services, programs and businesses that

14:09 ↗ pay people with disabilities sub-minimum wages and have become a national leader in a

14:15 ↗ new model of integrated and community employment. And we're getting better results. And we're

14:21 ↗ asking in this new budget year for support of our new enterprise model,

14:27 ↗ and of Atwork University, which are the two components of how our sheltered workshops have

14:33 ↗ transformed into helping people with disabilities transform their lives through the power of having a

14:39 ↗ job that they love. So we closed our last sheltered workshop here in February of

14:45 ↗ 2014. We closed our last group site here, the recycling center, in July of this

14:51 ↗ year. And when we did that, we ended sub minimum wages for everyone that we

14:56 ↗ employ and everyone we serve. One of the first organizations like that work to do

15:00 ↗ it in the country and on the 25th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act.

15:05 ↗ So behind Ted right there, You see Mike's hat and here you see Mike and

15:10 ↗ Mike has a job at the Snoqualmie Casino. He likes cars but he's not working

15:15 ↗ at a car job. This is his first job. He may eventually work in an

15:20 ↗ auto body shop or somewhere but he really likes working at Snoqualmie Casino because he's

15:25 ↗ good at cleaning. He gets bacon before he starts his shift and he gets to

15:29 ↗ wear a uniform and those were two really important things about his work environment. Since

15:35 ↗ 2006, we've been able to bring 282 people who have had no employment services

15:40 ↗ whatsoever into At Work and help them find jobs. 311 community job placements in

15:46 ↗ that time. 182 employers since 2008 have hired a person with a disability for

15:52 ↗ the first time and about 45 of those are here in Issaquah. And you

15:57 ↗ see Margaret and you see Mike. Margaret now works at the Seattle Goodwill Donation

16:03 ↗ Center. which is at the site where the recycling center was and continues to collect

16:09 ↗ e-cycle and household goods. And Mike is working at one of the cafeterias at Microsoft.

16:15 ↗ He's shown there learning new jobs while he's volunteering at Rite Aid as part of

16:20 ↗ his discovery process. Folks have earned seven and a half million dollars and the average

16:26 ↗ wage is $11.75. We used to pay some people 50 cents.

16:32 ↗ So our businesses have transformed too. We don't have a recycling business anymore. We

16:38 ↗ have a landscaping business. We have a document management business, which you can see

16:43 ↗ Ricky and Jing Jing in that business working, and a landscaping and packaging assembly

16:49 ↗ business, all of which now employ people at prevailing wages. Same benefits, same wages

16:55 ↗ as anyone doing that job was. Throughout at work, 28 people with disabilities are

17:00 ↗ employed. And together, our social enterprises and network university create jobs and opportunities for

17:06 ↗ learning and discovery. So we want to thank you because without you, we wouldn't have

17:12 ↗ had that miraculous transformation. Our success is this community's success. I am being asked to

17:17 ↗ go around the country to show other organizations how to do it. And what do

17:22 ↗ I talk about? I talk about the community support that Issaquah and other communities in

17:27 ↗ our region give us. And those organizations are going out and asking their communities to

17:32 ↗ become as inclusive as Issaquah. So please continue to support us in our new model

17:36 ↗ and continue to come by and see us as we change and grow. Thank you.

17:41 ↗ Thank you.

17:47 ↗ that's okay that's okay here we go you're fixed thank you

17:53 ↗ very much anybody else who would like to address the council

17:59 ↗ is there anybody else who would like to address the council

18:05 ↗ during this public comment period on matters of the budget third

18:10 ↗ and final call is there anybody else who would like to

18:16 ↗ address the council during this period of public comment okay not

18:22 ↗ seeing none public comment is closed

18:27 ↗ okay so now we're going to move on to

18:33 ↗ the next portion of our meeting where we are

18:39 ↗ going to so before we get started kind of

18:44 ↗ picking up where we left off i wanted to

18:50 ↗ ask bob if you had any other was there

18:56 ↗ anything that the staff had prepared in response did

19:01 ↗ you have any other action items at all coming

19:07 ↗ forward let's see yeah thank you

19:13 ↗ for i heard that eltac did you get a summary of that did

19:18 ↗ you get a report on that yes we'll have that a little later this

19:24 ↗ evening still this evening still i hope to have it yeah for you this evening

19:29 ↗ i think i just have to pull it up in the email and we should

19:34 ↗ have those recommendations there's nothing new other than what had already previously been presented so

19:39 ↗ i think um john trager is going to be coming a little bit because he

19:44 ↗ had asked for some information on office 365 regarding that admin proposal there was materials

19:49 ↗ submitted previously about those other projects. So other than

19:55 ↗ that, we don't have anything new. All right, thank

20:01 ↗ you. So in a moment here, I'm going to

20:06 ↗ bring the spreadsheet up on the screen so everybody

20:12 ↗ can see that.

20:49 ↗ So just as a reminder where we left off, so this is the exact same

20:54 ↗ file without being modified that we all looked at when we last looked on the

20:59 ↗ 4th of this month. This is the tab. Let me scroll down a little bit

21:04 ↗ to make it a little bit more -- well, actually, that's it. So you can

21:09 ↗ see -- well, let me just kind of go through the structure first. Again, this

21:14 ↗ tab represents changes, potential changes that we're going to deliberate to the general fund. There

21:20 ↗ was one example of mitigation where the --

21:25 ↗ this is issue related to funding more funds for the skate park and of course

21:30 ↗ that's really um is something that requires a transfer over to the capital fund so

21:35 ↗ that's with this entry so the the mitigation fund tab and the capital fund here

21:40 ↗ really kind of work together they really just show the accounting but i want to

21:45 ↗ make it so perfectly clear that our finance department has no doubt about about what

21:49 ↗ the what it is that we are are going to be discussing so is anybody

21:54 ↗ um Okay, and there actually was one more, excuse me, and these did

22:00 ↗ not work their way in. So this is the last item that we discussed last

22:05 ↗ time. These were the projects proposed by the administration and that we agreed last time

22:11 ↗ that we would have more discussion about these. So I wanted to, first thing I

22:16 ↗ wanted to check, are these, Bob or Diane, funding for these from the general fund?

22:26 ↗ A portion of the installation of Office 365 would have based upon

22:32 ↗ the number of users and the utilities. So it would be allocated

22:38 ↗ on a per capita or per unit. So I would assume the

22:44 ↗ majority of Office 365 would be in the general fund with maybe

22:50 ↗ 20% going to the other funds. OK. So I'm just

22:56 ↗ going to work these in here, just because what

23:02 ↗ this spreadsheet does is offer kind of a real-time

23:08 ↗ update to the actual-- You just typed over mine.

23:14 ↗ Control-C, Control-C. No worries. There's this thing called undo.

23:19 ↗ It's kind of hard to do this. Really? Yep.

23:25 ↗ Sorry, everybody. And

23:31 ↗ so you said about 20%. All right. Okay. So we'll

23:37 ↗ get these items in here. So sorry, I didn't really

23:42 ↗ mechanically put this together ahead of time. So please bear

23:48 ↗ with me. And you know what I'm going to do

23:54 ↗ is I'm going to do something different. And we'll get

23:59 ↗ the amounts for these here in a moment. Sorry, you

24:05 ↗ have to watch my, see my plumbing, but this is

24:10 ↗ what we're going to do.

24:20 ↗ And then the last one was, and I

24:26 ↗ think what we had agreed last time that

24:32 ↗ it was just four of those items that

24:38 ↗ we were discussing with, going to be discussing

24:44 ↗ this evening. And so, but the parks maintenance

24:49 ↗ worker, that's, is that general fund as well?

24:55 ↗ Okay. I missed that one. So bear with

25:01 ↗ me. And actually before I go, well, that's

25:07 ↗ not right. And

25:13 ↗ who knows off the top of their head what the real

25:19 ↗ estate was. Which one was? Sounds like 10,740 would be 20%

25:24 ↗ of the office 365. So, okay. All right. So let me

25:30 ↗ just. Real estate consultant makes you. There's 50, 22,

25:36 ↗ and 53, 7. CHRIS JERRAM: So Paul, we have a couple

25:41 ↗ addendums. PAUL SPIEGEL: Yep. CHRIS JERRAM: Go ahead. The first one.

25:47 ↗ In the mixed use-- developing the mixed use, we spent some

25:53 ↗ time between the council meeting and on Friday. And staff has

25:58 ↗ reduced that request to 25,000. i believe they can

26:04 ↗ get it accomplished within that dollar amount the second real estate consultant makes

26:10 ↗ use 25 so you're you're you're now for 22 500 25 000 25

26:16 ↗ 000 yes but in half uh the last item that um you had

26:21 ↗ crossed out up there that we wanted to uh talk about was the

26:27 ↗ affordable housing strategy and so It unfortunately got framed around the multifamily tax exemption. And

26:33 ↗ so it was really supposed to be that was one piece of the overall housing

26:37 ↗ strategy. And so I wanted to give Emily at least an opportunity to talk about

26:42 ↗ that and what the plan was regarding the funding for next year as the MFTE

26:47 ↗ would-- what we were anticipating was going to be a portion of that overall strategy.

26:51 ↗ But we had talked about that at the committee the whole last year. So Emily?

26:57 ↗ All right, just a few words on that. All of you know that as part

27:02 ↗ of our comp plan development over this past year, we identified that we still need

27:07 ↗ to complete our housing strategy plan. And part of our ARCH work program for the

27:13 ↗ next year is to make some progress on that plan. It's actually been on our

27:18 ↗ work plan with ARCH for the last few years. And so we would like to

27:24 ↗ make some significant progress this year. In order to do that, we think one

27:29 ↗ of the things we need to study in depth is what are the best

27:35 ↗ strategies for preserving existing affordable housing and how might we stimulate the development of

27:41 ↗ more of those affordable housing units. Um in terms of carving them

27:47 ↗ out of projects that we anticipate are already going to be pursued by

27:53 ↗ the marketplace. And so one of those issues is studying multifamily tax exemption,

27:59 ↗ but that is only one of several strategies that we would look into,

28:05 ↗ research what other communities have done, what success they've had with those methods

28:11 ↗ and come up with some options for the council to then review and

28:16 ↗ decide which ones they want to work on policies for. So that would

28:22 ↗ be the plan. It's broader than MFT. I think our concern Around this

28:28 ↗ was one we had mentioned at the very first budget meeting, which was we had

28:33 ↗ over 2,000 housing units that were going through our DSD program for permanent approval, and

28:37 ↗ we had no affordable housing within that. And so obviously we have a disconnect between

28:42 ↗ existing policies and what we'd like to accomplish, what the council told us we'd like

28:47 ↗ to accomplish, what the mayor would like to accomplish, and then what we're actually seeing

28:51 ↗ out of the marketplace. So the hope was this study would help us develop some

28:56 ↗ strategies to be able to accomplish those goals that are in the comp

29:02 ↗ plan. - Okay. - So when I saw this item in the work

29:07 ↗ plan for the human services piece, I assumed it was already included in

29:13 ↗ the funding. It was part of the work plan. So this is, what

29:19 ↗ this is, this is the budget document and it's for the community services

29:25 ↗ and part of the 2016 work plan was support development of affordable housing

29:30 ↗ strategies and actions. How does this differ than that? We believe

29:36 ↗ there's probably a benefit from utilizing a consultant or purchasing some

29:42 ↗ market data. It may go so far as us pulling together

29:47 ↗ focus groups or getting some training for our staff around those

29:53 ↗ strategies. We certainly do anticipate that we will work with ARCH

29:59 ↗ our staff will perform a great portion of that housing strategy development

30:04 ↗ work. But we think there's some market research in particular that we

30:10 ↗ could use some external assistance with. Does anybody else have any questions?

30:16 ↗ Tola? Process. Is this the point where we're deciding yay or nay

30:21 ↗ on that item? Well, actually, this is the point where I'm deciding

30:27 ↗ whether or not we're going to deliberate it. Because it's

30:33 ↗ not, we did not end up the meeting last time. So this is a walk-on

30:38 ↗ request, more or less. We decided actually against to consider that further because it was

30:43 ↗ positioned a little bit differently and we got, you know, so this looked like a

30:48 ↗ decision on specifically whether or not to offer the multifamily tax exemption as incentive to

30:52 ↗ create more affordable housing. And I think the discussion was the context of that decision

30:57 ↗ is really within creating the housing strategy, which is something that we had a presentation

31:02 ↗ on earlier in this year. i i asked because uh as i had the

31:08 ↗ good fortune of being a growth management planning council uh uh last week and we

31:13 ↗ discussed affordable housing and i actually had a chance to ask seattle's uh representative there

31:19 ↗ about uh mfts and she was generally positive and i was going to talk to

31:24 ↗ her some more about it but i mean it it seems like seems

31:30 ↗ like there's opportunities to get some information on this without necessarily engaging consultant i may

31:34 ↗ be getting too far into the weeds here but i mean the thing that for

31:38 ↗ me the proof in the pudding for mfte is going to be when somebody comes

31:42 ↗ with a proposal to the city and says look here's what it looks like with

31:46 ↗ an mfte here's what it looks like without an mfte and the city gets a

31:50 ↗ chance to review it and you know maybe services gets a chance to look at

31:54 ↗ it but that's where you'll start to see like the the power of what is

31:58 ↗ or isn't in an MFTE and how it affects potential builders. So I don't

32:04 ↗ know until we have something like that in front of us. I don't know

32:10 ↗ how much a consultant can add versus just looking to other municipalities. So one

32:16 ↗ thing I'm trying to understand is this is labeled MFTE. What should it be

32:21 ↗ labeled? So the goal was to get market-based data that would enable us to

32:27 ↗ look at a variety of strategies that would help us achieve our affordable housing goals.

32:32 ↗ So you may remember the first time this came up when we developed the CIP

32:37 ↗ plan was around we may need to incentivize people just to build more dense housing

32:42 ↗ in the CIP. What we found very successfully is the market shows us that they

32:47 ↗ didn't need the MFTE to do that. But what we are seeing, what the data

32:53 ↗ is showing, is that we're not getting any affordable housing as part of that. So

32:58 ↗ the marketplace isn't supporting it. Conversations we've had with developers reflect that. the marketplace

33:04 ↗ isn't supporting it. And so then the question is, is there a place, is there

33:09 ↗ a role for the government to play in that? And so the consultant we were

33:14 ↗ hoping to assist us in looking at what the marketplace is and looking at the

33:18 ↗ tools, MFTE was one piece, was one tool in the toolbox that could be used.

33:23 ↗ You know, we've been successful with some other ones, but there was frameworks around that,

33:28 ↗ like the zoning requirement that we had in the two development agreements Taliesin and the

33:33 ↗ Highlands. And I think our concern is that we, you know, which is what Kirkland

33:38 ↗ is dealing with now, which is there's been so much development and very little affordable

33:44 ↗ housing that got provided that we get to the horses get out of the barn

33:49 ↗ and we're too far developed without an effective strategy in place. Because the proof is

33:54 ↗ in the pudding at this point, you know, over that many housing units with no

33:59 ↗ affordable housing coming in, I think we're, the existing policies just aren't working. So

34:04 ↗ this is an ask to complete our housing, affordable housing

34:10 ↗ strategy. Yes. Of which consideration of MFTE is still just

34:16 ↗ one of them, potential tools. Anybody have any comments? Yeah.

34:23 ↗ I would support that if it was a more broad conversation about the tools that

34:29 ↗ are in front of us rather than just burrowing down on one particular, you know,

34:34 ↗ choosing, burrowing down on the hammer versus the saw and the chisel and the plane

34:40 ↗ in the toolbox metaphor. I actually think I like this a lot better

34:45 ↗ because of the word strategy instead of just talking about this one exemption that is

34:50 ↗ that the lands that we are currently in the central area as things get built

34:55 ↗ there's more and more demand put upon those lands some of them already have affordable

35:00 ↗ housing in them so the strategy to me is just you have to have some

35:05 ↗ idea of how you might be able to preserve what you have as well

35:11 ↗ as incentive to grow the number of units. So I like this approach a

35:17 ↗ lot better than just talking about one thing. Just talking about MFT. Okay, so

35:23 ↗ I'm going to put this in the, it's made the list for deliberation. And

35:29 ↗ I think, and I'm going to title this as tell me if this is

35:34 ↗ accurate for your intent is to complete, nah. The center key is in the

35:40 ↗ wrong place. My apologies. it's kind of hard

35:46 ↗ to do both to look up

35:52 ↗ here oh the shift key's in

35:57 ↗ the wrong place it's really affordable

36:03 ↗ housing strategy yeah so oh this

36:09 ↗ keyboard is odd sorry all right

36:14 ↗ so um that amount was tell

36:20 ↗ me again 20. 20. okay all

36:25 ↗ right And someone had done the calculation. 1,740. Is it 20%

36:31 ↗ out of general or 80%? Opposite. Oh, so it's a number minus

36:37 ↗ 1,740. You're going to make me do a second calculation. Yep. Or

36:43 ↗ you can let Excel do it. And I did the calculation. Ooh.

36:49 ↗ Okay, so this is quite a long list Josh I have a figure for you

36:54 ↗ now on the transportation project that I said I would meet with Sheldon and get

36:59 ↗ back to us on so Why don't you address that? Because that so this is

37:04 ↗ so this is something we discussed last time There was a couple comments from more

37:09 ↗ than one council member Council member Marta expressed support as well that if we were

37:14 ↗ to do other capital-based projects specifically for to address transportation you know

37:20 ↗ that would be something we'd be willing to discuss so I don't

37:26 ↗ know really now my spreadsheet might not work anymore because this is

37:31 ↗ probably funded at somewhere else where is it funded I'm proposing to

37:37 ↗ use a portion of the general fund ending balance okay so it

37:43 ↗ would be here okay all right All right, so I want

37:49 ↗ to get to this as soon as possible. So what are we going to call

37:54 ↗ this, Josh? Well, I have a specific proposal in mind. Public Works Engineering provided three

37:59 ↗ options, but I believe one of them is probably the best to pursue. So I

38:04 ↗ can explain if you want to give me a minute what those options are. Okay.

38:10 ↗ So I spoke with Sheldon Lynn, Public Works Engineering Director, and discussed the possibility of

38:16 ↗ using additional general fund dollars on projects that are listed in our TIP or other

38:21 ↗ transportation related projects in the city, given that that is a really high priority for

38:27 ↗ the public and the council. Sheldon came back to me with three potential projects and

38:32 ↗ And I'll work in reverse order to the one at the end that I think

38:38 ↗ is the one we should look at doing. So one is the Three Trails Crossing

38:43 ↗ project, which has been on the TIP as a high priority for a number of

38:48 ↗ years. And that's the intersection I'm sure you're familiar with over near Gilman and Rainier,

38:54 ↗ where there's some significant intersection alignment issues and additional needs for pedestrian crossing improvements. That

38:59 ↗ is forecasted to be designed in 2018 to 19 currently in the

39:05 ↗ CFP at $325,000, but it could be moved up to 2016 for

39:11 ↗ design. The second project that was discussed was the intersection or driveway at

39:17 ↗ Northwest Maple Street that you're probably more familiar with being the Target or Trader Joe's

39:22 ↗ intersection. That project is actually not on the TIP, but it came up in the

39:28 ↗ crossing study. And according to Sheldon, it would be possible for $300,000 to begin and

39:34 ↗ possibly complete the design of the project in eventually in 2017, but these funds would

39:40 ↗ get us started. The project, the third project, which I believe is the one we

39:45 ↗ should look at pursuing is Northwest Holly Street. This project will provide a pedestrian

39:51 ↗ connection along Northwest Holly between Fifth and Rainier, including a new pedestrian crossing

39:57 ↗ of Issaquah Creek. It's partially funded currently in the existing 2016 budget at

40:03 ↗ $150,000. The capital facilities plan shows the remainder, which is $265,000. I'll just

40:09 ↗ round it off. There's a couple hundred in there. $265,000 in design funds

40:15 ↗ to be expended in 2017. If those funds, the 2017 proposed funds,

40:21 ↗ were put into this 2016 budget, the city could contract with a

40:26 ↗ consultant for complete design in 2016 and likely apply for a TIB,

40:32 ↗ Transportation Improvement Board grant, in August of next year for construction funding

40:37 ↗ in 2017. So, why I believe the Holly Street project, which is $265,000, is

40:43 ↗ a good use of city dollars for 2016? For a number of reasons. First,

40:49 ↗ we can complete design in 2016 instead of bifurcating it between 2016 and 2017,

40:54 ↗ when we know we're going to have to spend those funds in 2017 anyway

41:00 ↗ to get us to 100% design, so the plans don't get left sitting on

41:06 ↗ a shelf somewhere. The completion of design in 2016 will better position us to leverage

41:12 ↗ getting Tibb grant funds for construction, which will overall reduce the city share of the

41:18 ↗ project so we can leverage those dollars better. This has also been a high priority

41:23 ↗ project in the CFP. Holly Street, I would say, if memory serves, has been somewhere

41:29 ↗ in the top 10 of our projects for many years. I think some of the

41:34 ↗ other projects, although they're extremely important, the Three Trails Crossing project in talking to Sheldon

41:39 ↗ may not score as highly for grant funding as Holly Street, at least in the

41:44 ↗ short term. And the Trader Joe's Target driveway, I think there's additional information that we're

41:48 ↗ gonna need on that. I mean, it's not even on the TIP yet. It just

41:53 ↗ came up as part of the crossing study and it may be more appropriate to

41:58 ↗ look at in terms of a bond package that might be put together next year.

42:03 ↗ We're already starting design work on Holly Street in 2016. And so getting the

42:09 ↗ design to 100%, again, allows us to leverage the funds and get the project

42:14 ↗ moving forward to construction an additional year faster than we otherwise would have. And

42:20 ↗ that's a net positive benefit to the city since I believe we do have

42:26 ↗ the 265 available to allocate. And this gets us that much closer to a

42:31 ↗ necessary important uh transportation project in the city that again we would otherwise be doing

42:36 ↗ in 2017 anyway according to our capital facilities plan so why not do it now

42:41 ↗ so I labeled this the Northwest Holly Street pedestrian improvements to lines with what it's

42:46 ↗ in the it's already in the but to complete design for the point we want

42:51 ↗ to be more specific on what's actually being accomplished it's not the construction That's correct.

42:56 ↗ That would enable us to get potentially TIB funds for construction in 2017

43:02 ↗ instead of waiting an extra year. Okay, thank you. Mary Lou? Yeah, I

43:08 ↗ actually have something I'd like to add as well. I had mentioned at

43:13 ↗ the last meeting that I would be working with staff between that session

43:19 ↗ and this one tonight. to come up with a proposal um for what we

43:25 ↗ were calling a post two plan which is parks recreation open space and trails plan

43:31 ↗ and just for a quick little um update this uh plan the first version of

43:36 ↗ this plan has already been at services and safety it is to

43:42 ↗ be or should be submitted to the state by the spring of next year in

43:46 ↗ order to make sure that we still qualify for funding for some of our projects.

43:51 ↗ I brought this up because in looking at the document and the information that we

43:55 ↗ have, I felt that there was still some large policy questions that we as a

44:00 ↗ council have not talked about and need to talk about in order to come up

44:04 ↗ with I called it pros to but a plan where residents businesses can look at

44:09 ↗ a document and see where we're headed in 20 years and how we're supposed to

44:13 ↗ pay for it so I put this up here and sad news is that it

44:18 ↗ was not that easy to actually come up with a number and figure out what

44:22 ↗ to do so I had worked with Emily on proposals back and forth this week,

44:26 ↗ but there really is a lot of discussion that has to happen to frame this

44:30 ↗ out and how it would work. I was going to make a recommendation that it

44:35 ↗ be included as a work item in your letter and potentially not have funding in

44:39 ↗ this budget, but I have been talking with some other council members and there seems

44:43 ↗ to be a lot of energy around getting this done. getting this part two of

44:48 ↗ the plan put together. So it's up there right now with $50,000 placeholder amount, but

44:53 ↗ I have no specific written proposal to go with it. So I can ask questions,

44:58 ↗ or I can answer questions about it. - But this line item captures that intent.

45:04 ↗ - It's going to stay. - Tola, do you have something to add? - Related

45:09 ↗ to that, I think that in discussing this, we would need to clarify. I think

45:14 ↗ that this would be, up to 50. If one doesn't need to

45:20 ↗ spend 50, one doesn't spend 50. But that also, the actual

45:26 ↗ spend would be contingent on the council approving a work uh

45:31 ↗ statement of work statement of work associated with what this would be understanding that there's

45:36 ↗ a lot of aspiration around what this document is and so i would want to

45:41 ↗ see that statement of work from the administration before we actually released the

45:47 ↗ 50,000. So as a matter of process, if

45:53 ↗ the council were to proceed and accept that

45:59 ↗ and their intention to be for approval of

46:05 ↗ a statement of work, then that would be

46:10 ↗ reflected, an item that we would reflect in

46:16 ↗ the council, my letter to the administration. Okay.

46:22 ↗ Thank you. Thanks. Okay. Okay. So, okay.

46:29 ↗ So last time there had been some

46:35 ↗ questions around Office 365. And so John

46:40 ↗ made it back in and got through

46:46 ↗ traffic. So if there were any, he's

46:51 ↗ available now for-- those questions. If not, and there's clarity around that, then we

46:57 ↗ can release john and he can head home for the evening if he chose. I

47:02 ↗ think it's good to take advantage of our director of I. T. Here to get

47:07 ↗ some some staff input on this. This is an item that council will be deliberating.

47:11 ↗ Um, matter of fact, I'm gonna keep things interesting. This is after, John,

47:17 ↗ you have some statements to make or some information to share with us. And

47:23 ↗ then we're gonna take this item and our protocol is gonna be as usual.

47:28 ↗ Everybody's gonna have an opportunity to make their own comments about this item afterwards.

47:34 ↗ Go ahead. - Okay, well I think you saw the outline or the request

47:39 ↗ that was a response to the questions from last week. And so I'll go

47:45 ↗ over those briefly. So what we're looking for is to move from the

47:51 ↗ standard Microsoft Office Suite, which sits on every computer, to the Microsoft Office

47:57 ↗ 365, which is a cloud-based service and has additional functionality that we don't

48:02 ↗ currently own. Right now we're on Office 2010, and so that's nearing the

48:08 ↗ end of life for the software licensing on that. And so it's about,

48:14 ↗ it's after implementation and then the, License fees it's about 53,000

48:20 ↗ next year and it would be about 51,000 subsequent years so you move

48:26 ↗ from a buy it once and Use it for a few years to

48:32 ↗ a rental model So it is a change in how we approach the

48:37 ↗ desktop software, but there's a lot of benefits from this Right now our

48:43 ↗ current Internal work processes are pretty far behind and So we don't

48:49 ↗ use any instant messaging. We don't have virtual meetings. We don't have an intranet

48:55 ↗ that really is useful that people go to. Most documents are exchanged either via

49:01 ↗ email attachments or in a very large shared drive that you can't find anything.

49:07 ↗ So we have a really kind of a primitive configuration for desktop interaction between

49:13 ↗ the employees in the city. So this implementing the system would be moving

49:19 ↗ away from that and using more sophisticated tools. We have four buildings in the city.

49:24 ↗ There are different locations to meet with somebody. You have to drive over there instead

49:29 ↗ of just doing a quick virtual meetings. Every little message has to be an email

49:35 ↗ instead of a short instant message. So there's a lot more email traffic than It

49:40 ↗ probably needs to be. We don't have video conferencing capability with outside entities, which more

49:46 ↗ and more are expecting that. And then we don't have a decent sort of document

49:52 ↗ management for working in progress documents. So we have a good document management system for

49:58 ↗ finished, completed documents and like the system we use to manage the agenda bills.

50:04 ↗ And we're implementing a really good system now for through munis, for contracts, and those

50:10 ↗ type of working documents. But for work in progress documents and collaboration, we don't have

50:16 ↗ a good system. And you end up with multiple copies of works in progress, which

50:22 ↗ can create problems down the road. So if we implement this product, and we're going--

50:27 ↗ we'd like to ask for the full suite of product that comes with it. So

50:33 ↗ it's the SharePoint. And the instant messaging is called Skype

50:39 ↗ for Business, which has audio as well as messaging capabilities.

50:45 ↗ And then the Office suite that's typical, which is your

50:50 ↗ Excel, Word, PowerPoint, and the Office standard package. So implementing

50:56 ↗ these more advanced features are kind of important for us

51:02 ↗ in the Long run as we modernize our desktop environment and work

51:08 ↗ environment, where the city is facing a demographic shift as most cities are,

51:13 ↗ where we'll be seeing a turnover in the workforce through retirement. And the

51:19 ↗ new workforce will expect these tools to be in place, and we don't

51:25 ↗ have them. So it will be an important recruiting tool to get our

51:30 ↗ work environment up to the modern standards. Any questions? Questions for John? Tola?

51:36 ↗ First question, does that include an Outlook server? - Yeah, so that's a hosted Outlook

51:42 ↗ email server. So the first step in the deployment is to migrate from our hosted

51:47 ↗ server, which is an Exchange Server 2010, and move it on to their server in

51:53 ↗ the cloud. And I know in the past with Outlook servers, there was a certain

51:58 ↗ amount of a la carte, like if you wanted to have, I once had a

52:02 ↗ situation where I wanted to add a conference room and I was told we didn't

52:06 ↗ have enough, you know, whatever resource tokens or whatever that's called. Do you project that

52:10 ↗ this will cover those aspects of an Outlook server sufficiently? Yeah. of course we've actually

52:15 ↗ already resolved that so the conference rooms are now in outlook and that's why i

52:19 ↗ didn't know this was actually a problem in the city i was talking about for

52:24 ↗ my job in general yeah so it's it's more advanced yep okay the second question

52:28 ↗ is um sharepoint is not an entirely trivial uh implementation as in terms of change

52:32 ↗ management is there a cost associated with implementing sharepoint So this does not include like

52:38 ↗ any consulting fees or any of that. So our plan for SharePoint is to do

52:43 ↗ a very incremental rollout. So we have some really immediate needs like HR. So how

52:48 ↗ do you get HR forums out? Consistent forums posted so people can get ahold of

52:52 ↗ them. So we'll do an internal stand up of the HR intranet site and a

52:57 ↗ document library there that can be controlled by them. I mean, I'll tell you for

53:03 ↗ us, for a comparably sized organization to the City of Issaquah, we were probably half

53:08 ↗ FTE times a year or a quarter FTE times two years to implement that. So

53:13 ↗ is that cost going to come back to the council at some point as an

53:18 ↗ ask? I don't know that. So it has to do with our internal communication strategy.

53:23 ↗ What do they want to do with it as a tool? The SharePoint is very,

53:28 ↗ very powerful, but it's not trivial to install. It's not as bad as an ERP

53:33 ↗ system, but it's approaching implementing an ERP system. If we just keep it to a

53:37 ↗ very limited use, some simple document libraries, it's an improvement over what we have. It's

53:42 ↗ not the best, but if you take it all the way, yeah, there's a lot

53:46 ↗ more you can do with it. And that does take time and energy. Thank you.

53:51 ↗ Naini, did you have a question? Thanks, John. So my question

53:57 ↗ last time regarded the change that you had mentioned going from a license purchase

54:02 ↗ to a software as a service. And do you have the details of the

54:08 ↗ increased cost or cost savings over time of making this change? Well, some of

54:14 ↗ the numbers are in the right up there. They price it so it's pretty

54:19 ↗ close. In our case, it's more expensive because we're buying more software we don't

54:25 ↗ have. more and getting more yeah yeah so we don't have the instant messaging we

54:30 ↗ don't have virtual meetings we don't have a bunch of other we don't sharepoint but

54:35 ↗ if we were to buy those separately and then re-buy them every three to five

54:39 ↗ years which is an industry recommendation it comes out pretty close but then you have

54:44 ↗ to also factor in the cost of managing the hardware on site and so there's

54:48 ↗ additional labor cost of running your own servers as opposed to a hosted service

54:54 ↗ And then as a term, the term of the agreement when you go to the

55:00 ↗ software as a service? The term? Are you committed for a certain number of years

55:06 ↗ and then what if you don't want to do it anymore and how much does

55:11 ↗ it cost to get out? No, it's an annual sign up. You don't sign up,

55:17 ↗ they turn it off. Any other questions for John? I'll just add that Not

55:23 ↗ the first. Noqualmie, Mercer Island, a lot of surrounding cities are already using the service.

55:28 ↗ Cities of our size, it's pretty typical because they're small shops, don't have a lot

55:34 ↗ of staff, trying to keep the number of physical servers or have to run down.

55:39 ↗ So it is a pretty standard path. And this is all on the state contract

55:45 ↗ pricing we've got for it as well. Josh, thank you. Quick question, John. Do

55:50 ↗ we have a policy with respect to private or personally identifiable information that would

55:56 ↗ be stored on a cloud-based server? Is that allowable? Do we have a policy

56:02 ↗ on that? So, yes. So these are through a different subservice from Microsoft. And

56:08 ↗ so they actually have federal government security certified data centers, and that's where this

56:14 ↗ stuff is hosted. So it meets those requirements for security. And people who go and

56:20 ↗ work in those data centers have to meet the federal FBI clearances. So it's different

56:25 ↗ than a commercial Office 365 you get for business or personal use. Thank you. Any

56:30 ↗ other questions? Okay, so what I'd like to do next -- thank you, John. You're

56:35 ↗ welcome to stay or not, if you like. But I actually -- now I want

56:39 ↗ to open up kind of to give every council member an opportunity to speak to

56:44 ↗ this item or not. This is your chance to indicate whether you support it

56:50 ↗ or not. We are gonna do like traditionally, we're gonna do thumbs up, thumbs

56:56 ↗ down on each one of these items. But the process is everybody's gonna get

57:01 ↗ a chance to speak on each line item and then we'll vote afterwards. And

57:07 ↗ so, Tola, I would like to actually open it up with you. We'll go down

57:12 ↗ to Josh through me and then we'll end up with Eileen for comments on this

57:17 ↗ item. So one is naturally cautious about moving everything to the cloud and whether that's

57:22 ↗ a money grab or not, but by software companies. But if you look at it,

57:28 ↗ you know, this works out to be approximately $200 per employee per year. A seat

57:33 ↗ of Microsoft Office Professional costs 250 bucks and you assume a three-year lifetime for any

57:39 ↗ particular piece of software and you're probably going to have to buy another one. So

57:44 ↗ it's really, is it worth $600 versus the old model. And this is why my

57:49 ↗ questions really revolved around the Outlook server and SharePoint. Outlook servers are absurdly expensive in

57:55 ↗ the old world. Just blindingly expensive compared to what they should cost, in my view.

58:00 ↗ So when you add SharePoint and you add the Outlook server, I think if it

58:06 ↗ doesn't exactly match cost-wise, it matches close enough that it resolves any question that I

58:11 ↗ have about the fiscal probity about moving to this model. Although I continue to be

58:16 ↗ concerned that SharePoint will cost more to implement than we might think. But that's a

58:22 ↗ topic for another day. All right. Thank you. Josh? um well i don't have the

58:27 ↗ same level of expertise that the tool does on these subjects but you know it

58:31 ↗ strikes me that that every few years or so software companies and i mean they

58:35 ↗ do like the cell phone companies they make you buy a new package of some

58:39 ↗ kind and so you know i have a feeling somewhere down the road the city

58:43 ↗ is going to be looking at replace if we approve this replacing office 365 with

58:47 ↗ the next best iteration of os uh that comes out for our needs and I

58:51 ↗ mean, that's just unfortunately the way it rolls. I mean, that's how technology is. It

58:56 ↗ progresses and the city has to keep pace for our systems and so forth. So,

59:00 ↗ you know, it's a price tag and it's one of these things that I feel

59:05 ↗ you just have to kind of do on an every so often half decade or

59:09 ↗ decade basis. And then they cut off support for these things too, you know, that

59:14 ↗ you're really forced to buy a new package. So I'm more supportive than not of

59:18 ↗ doing it. Okay, thank you. Mary Lou. No questions or comments. I'm supportive of it.

59:23 ↗ All right, thank you. Nina. Yeah, I was showing a little, not reluctance, but caution

59:28 ↗ because of the same reasons that Tola pointed. I don't want to get into something

59:33 ↗ that has a never-ending purchase, especially something that when sometimes you own it, you can

59:37 ↗ use it for quite a lot longer than the manufacturer recommends. But the last couple

59:42 ↗ things you said, John, contributed. convinced me about the special protocols for data management

59:48 ↗ that can be a great burden and a liability for us if not handled

59:54 ↗ carefully. And this has an investment in that that gives us a great deal

59:59 ↗ of protection. And the fact that we don't need to keep it for a period

1:00:04 ↗ of time, for any length of time. We can always change our mind and go

1:00:09 ↗ to the other model or whatever new model, as Josh says, comes up in the

1:00:13 ↗ future. So those are the things that convinced me that I was showing caution. Thank

1:00:18 ↗ you, John. Thank you, Nina. Stacy? I don't have any big concerns. I think if

1:00:22 ↗ I had comments, they'd be pretty closely aligned to Josh's comments. I'm supportive. So I

1:00:28 ↗ will add to that. Actually, this model means that we will get updates as the

1:00:33 ↗ supplier makes them available. So you're actually not buying into a single version. That's part

1:00:38 ↗ of it. And, John, you can confirm that. So as they come up with features

1:00:43 ↗ and enhancements, I have experience with a rollout one of these. There are definitely

1:00:49 ↗ productivity gains to be made, especially with messaging. And I think when you

1:00:55 ↗ said virtual meetings, you were talking about using the Skype capability. I think

1:01:01 ↗ that now I'm speaking to all city employees that sit at a desk

1:01:06 ↗ and would use this software that I'm going to personally ask you if you're using

1:01:12 ↗ that because it is definitely a productivity enhancement tool for the reasons that John talked

1:01:17 ↗ about. I have personal experience with using that. And also for all of us as

1:01:23 ↗ well, for OBMA considerations, the messaging capability is something that every one of us could

1:01:28 ↗ put on our smart phone. And then as we use the messaging capability to conduct

1:01:34 ↗ city business, all of that would be server based so it all becomes discoverable which

1:01:39 ↗ is actually one of the challenges with using text messaging today. So we get that

1:01:44 ↗ benefit of easier compliance with open records requests. It is, we are, if we do

1:01:50 ↗ this, we're talking about a yearly, we are buying into, I think John said 51,000

1:01:55 ↗ a year. So that becomes a reoccurring cost. I don't know if we would be

1:02:00 ↗ retiring machines, but it definitely would be one less item on the work plan for

1:02:06 ↗ staff to maintain that. We saw that in my company as well. We made a

1:02:11 ↗ similar cost-based decision to go from on-premise to cloud software for 365 over a year

1:02:16 ↗ ago, and I think it was definitely, it's proven to be the right move for

1:02:22 ↗ a company my size, so I'll be supporting this as well.

1:02:28 ↗ Eileen, do you have any comments? Just a couple quick ones. From reading through what

1:02:33 ↗ John has provided us with, there's just two quick simple things. I mean, if this

1:02:39 ↗ reduces our total costs and has the potential to provide staff productivity increases, I am

1:02:44 ↗ very much for it. And also instant messaging and a couple of other things that

1:02:49 ↗ are in here. But yes, definitely for the cost and hopefully for some cost savings

1:02:55 ↗ and productivity increases, I would approve with this. Okay. Thank you. So with that, and

1:03:01 ↗ if those of you who, and all council members are familiar with our process, for

1:03:05 ↗ those that aren't, as we discuss each of these items, it's up to my discretion

1:03:09 ↗ on whether or not to actually hold a vote on any one of those. So

1:03:13 ↗ this, and we do that, and this is not, this is on a line item

1:03:18 ↗ by line item basis. There is further formal action that the council takes by approving

1:03:23 ↗ agenda bill, which will happen during regular business. And that is the ultimate final approval

1:03:28 ↗ of any potential budget. So this is just the direction of what the pieces that

1:03:34 ↗ comprise the budget. And so that's what we're doing here. So are we ready to

1:03:40 ↗ vote on this item? So what we're gonna do, it's gonna be a thumbs up,

1:03:46 ↗ thumbs down. You're gonna hold your hand out and all in favor, thumbs up, thumbs

1:03:51 ↗ down if you're against it. So that is seven O in favor of this line

1:03:57 ↗ item, thank you. Now, I'm going to take this opportunity,

1:04:03 ↗ and Bob, before you sit down, I'm going to

1:04:09 ↗ call a very brief two-minute recess, and I need

1:04:14 ↗ a conversation with Bob. So we'll be right back.

1:04:20 ↗ Thank you.

1:07:55 ↗ Okay, so we're

1:08:00 ↗ ready to get

1:08:05 ↗ started. Thank you.

1:08:11 ↗ Okay, we're back

1:08:16 ↗ on the air.

1:08:24 ↗ I'm not going to be calling

1:08:29 ↗ anybody Nigel. Okay, so let's continue. I do want to make a

1:08:35 ↗ comment. I've highlighted up on the screen in the revenue area. This is not something

1:08:41 ↗ we're deliberating. This just reflects an October 16 update from the county assessor on what

1:08:47 ↗ our likely collections will be around property tax for the regular levy that we issue.

1:08:53 ↗ So this is not a deliberation thing. This is just an update to... um it's

1:08:58 ↗ i'm sorry it's where the cursor is right now so it's this one right here

1:09:03 ↗ so this was just a later information that we got uh compared to the budget

1:09:07 ↗ that was prepared in the early october later in october there was an update from

1:09:12 ↗ the assessor's office and this indicated that the regular tax levy amount that we would

1:09:16 ↗ be collecting is it would be going up by this much so that this is

1:09:21 ↗ not for council deliberation so i just wanted to wanted to point that out okay

1:09:25 ↗ so um i'm now going to just go down the list and we took advantage

1:09:30 ↗ of one staff member being here. So yes, Diane. I was just going to quickly

1:09:35 ↗ add with regards to the property tax levy, that number can keep changing up until

1:09:41 ↗ the first week in December. And if you'll recall last year, we adopted the ordinance.

1:09:46 ↗ And then after we adopted, they gave us updated numbers. So we had to do

1:09:51 ↗ an amendment at the last minute. So you just never know with a We're required

1:09:56 ↗ to provide it by November 30th, but they do, if they come in with new

1:10:02 ↗ numbers, they'll allow us to amend as long as we get it in the beginning

1:10:08 ↗ of December. - Okay, so the next item to deliberate was on the, an actually

1:10:13 ↗ expenditure reduction side. And actually, I meant, I'm sorry, I wanted to do one thing

1:10:19 ↗ first. So just so you know what this does down here, you might recall, so

1:10:25 ↗ this bottom line here you can see the top line is what's been proposed

1:10:30 ↗ in the original budget. The bottom line is, would be the net effect of our

1:10:36 ↗ changes. Now, currently, it includes everything that we're gonna be deliberating. But you can keep

1:10:41 ↗ an eye on that to kind of see kind of a rolling amount as well.

1:10:47 ↗ And just so for all the ups and downs, the additions and the subtractions in

1:10:52 ↗ the general fund, you know, the net effect for the is, uh you know you

1:10:57 ↗ can see that it includes a reduction in the ending fund balance of 352 000

1:11:01 ↗ but the uh actual and there's the actual ratio of expenditures to ending fund balance

1:11:05 ↗ so that will just be updated in real time as we make changes so what

1:11:09 ↗ i'm going to be doing if we vote against something i'm going to zero it

1:11:13 ↗ out okay so that so that's just something that you can kind of keep an

1:11:17 ↗ eye on as you as we go through this So the next item on there

1:11:23 ↗ I want to have a conversation about is the classification and compensation study. This is

1:11:29 ↗ a proposal to actually not fund that work. And we discussed it last time. We

1:11:34 ↗ had some Q&A with staff. And I'm actually going to start now the deliberation, starting

1:11:40 ↗ off with who's making the proposal, and that was Josh. Okay. So I

1:11:46 ↗ did not support this for a number of reasons. Number one, my

1:11:51 ↗ first thought was that it just struck me as government funding, studying

1:11:57 ↗ government. And I was trying to figure out really the public benefit

1:12:03 ↗ of doing this particular study. Then we got some information in terms

1:12:09 ↗ of the need to look into salaries and class levels and such.

1:12:15 ↗ it was still unclear to me whether this was across the board or whether this

1:12:21 ↗ was non-union employees. I still don't think I fully understood that from our last conversation.

1:12:27 ↗ But what I heard is that there are certain positions that the city has had

1:12:32 ↗ difficulty recruiting for and or filling and it just struck me as a little too

1:12:38 ↗ overbroad to spend seventy five thousand dollars for it across the board study if we're

1:12:43 ↗ having issues in really certain departments or certain positions uh and that perhaps if we

1:12:48 ↗ were going to look at that it could be much more narrowly tailored the the

1:12:53 ↗ price tag to me just seems very very high uh And I understand that's what

1:12:59 ↗ it would cost if you did it across the board. I mean, I don't doubt

1:13:03 ↗ the number. It just seems high for what we need, which is a much more

1:13:08 ↗ limited analysis of positions we're having difficulty recruiting for. When I look at $75,000, I

1:13:13 ↗ think that's more than a lot of people earn in a year sometimes. And then

1:13:17 ↗ I think about just studying more government for that kind of money, it doesn't sit

1:13:22 ↗ well with me. So I would be willing to spend a little bit of money

1:13:26 ↗ to look at a much more narrowly tailored proposal or to just defer this altogether

1:13:31 ↗ for another year until we get more information. Okay, just to be sure, so the

1:13:36 ↗ question we're considering tonight is the amount that's on the screen. Right, but what I'm

1:13:41 ↗ saying is my recommendation is to delete it, but I'm throwing out there that if

1:13:46 ↗ there was a desire to fund it up to some level because of this issue,

1:13:51 ↗ I am supportive of some funding, just not $75,000. Okay, thank you. Mary Lou. I

1:13:56 ↗ actually think that every so many years we should be doing a study like this

1:14:01 ↗ because of the changes that you see in all different jobs within an organization. So

1:14:05 ↗ I think just pulling out a few outliers and setting them in isolation is not

1:14:10 ↗ the best business practice. So because of the length of time since they've done the

1:14:14 ↗ last study, I think this would be very beneficial to the organization. So I'm in

1:14:19 ↗ support of leaving it in any amount that it's in. All right, thank you. Nina.

1:14:24 ↗ I too am in support of leaving it in as the amount that's in it

1:14:29 ↗ based on the information that was presented by staff last time. There was a compelling

1:14:34 ↗ argument about the risk that we have when we don't do this and the costs

1:14:40 ↗ that are known and unknown when we don't do these. It's an investment in potential

1:14:45 ↗ savings and also in our ability to staff adequately to meet our objectives. I'm in

1:14:50 ↗ favor of putting it back. - Thank you, Stacy. - I agree, I would leave

1:14:55 ↗ it in. I don't see a whole lot of value in doing it piecemeal. One

1:15:00 ↗ of the positions could be vacated anytime and then you're maybe stuck without a classification

1:15:05 ↗ and compensation study in that area. So I would leave it in. - All right,

1:15:09 ↗ thank you. I have no additional comments to add. I will be supporting this item.

1:15:14 ↗ - I'll be supporting it also. as i mentioned last time i think this

1:15:20 ↗ sort of activity is uh is critical for organizations to find talented individuals and i'm

1:15:26 ↗ looking forward to the city poaching some good employees from less scenic and pleasant states

1:15:34 ↗ Got it. Okay, so this is an item that we are going

1:15:40 ↗ to, we're going to do a council vote on this right now.

1:15:45 ↗ So all of those in favor of retaining this item in the

1:15:51 ↗ budget, thumb up. Those who don't approve, thumb down. So this passes

1:15:57 ↗ six to one. So

1:16:03 ↗ again, I will, of course, zero these out

1:16:08 ↗ if we actually have any true change. If

1:16:14 ↗ we don't-- So isn't that the zero out

1:16:20 ↗ change? Yeah, you're right. You're right. Thank you. so

1:16:25 ↗ highlighting it means we're done we've considered it now this site and

1:16:31 ↗ this next item is a consideration of of the budget the mayor's

1:16:37 ↗ recommendation to fund 99 000 to isaac valley seniors And it also includes

1:16:42 ↗ the amount that was in the proposal to spend up to $65,000 for performance and

1:16:48 ↗ management audits during some early part of the term of the contract should we approve

1:16:54 ↗ that. So this line item amount is for approval or not of all of these.

1:17:00 ↗ Now, I'm going to, this is the first the council is hearing this as well,

1:17:05 ↗ is that this evening we're going to deliberate this, but I'm going to hold off

1:17:09 ↗ a vote on this line item this night. We are not going to be, as

1:17:13 ↗ a council, voting on this line item this evening because I believe that there is

1:17:17 ↗ more time needed to work through some of the issues and the considerations that are

1:17:21 ↗ in front of us. But we are going to have an opportunity to deliberate. And

1:17:27 ↗ just so everybody knows, there's going to be a when we'll actually vote on this.

1:17:33 ↗ There's an opportunity. It might be at our next make it an item as part

1:17:38 ↗ of our next regular council meeting. This is a tentative in the first council meeting

1:17:44 ↗ in December is the possibility. But OK, so with that, Mary Lou, because we're doing

1:17:50 ↗ a round robin, can we start with your comments? This is probably one of the

1:17:56 ↗ tougher decisions I think that I've even had to ponder in the two years that

1:18:02 ↗ I've been on council. But I spend a lot of time thinking about our comprehensive

1:18:07 ↗ plan and our vision for how the city funds the service providers for our human

1:18:13 ↗ services. And some of the words that really stuck out to me was that we

1:18:19 ↗ would provide integrated, effective human service delivery systems. Systems that support a

1:18:25 ↗ strong coordinated local response. And with those words in

1:18:31 ↗ mind, a couple of the actions of one of

1:18:36 ↗ our service providers for the senior center, in particular

1:18:42 ↗ the use of trespass notices and also lack of

1:18:48 ↗ coordination with other providers. I am not in favor of the

1:18:54 ↗ City granting money to the same service provider for the next year. That's

1:19:00 ↗ where I am. Okay, thank you. Nina? Yeah, thank you. I don't think

1:19:05 ↗ I have much to add to Mary Lou's. This has to do with

1:19:11 ↗ an application from a grant, grantee, and the, I have not also been

1:19:17 ↗ in favor of supplying the grant funds to that provider at this time.

1:19:23 ↗ Stacy? I don't think I have anything to add

1:19:29 ↗ to the previous comments I had. I, at this time, also wouldn't

1:19:34 ↗ support granting the money at this time. All right, thank you. So

1:19:40 ↗ I have also expressed my comments previously in public and yet I am hopeful

1:19:46 ↗ and hence the reason as I announced earlier we're not going to be voting

1:19:52 ↗ on this this evening that we will still have opportunity to for an outcome.

1:19:57 ↗ I support providing services to our seniors at the Senior Center. That is what

1:20:03 ↗ I want. I do not have confidence in the way

1:20:09 ↗ we would go forward with the current proposal from the mayor's

1:20:15 ↗ office, but I'm still optimistic that we can find a way

1:20:20 ↗ to do that. So that's where I stand. Eileen? This

1:20:26 ↗ has been a really difficult conversation and review for many of those in

1:20:31 ↗ Issaquah. I also strongly support the services to seniors. With an aging father

1:20:37 ↗ and the support that he receives from his organization, it's very important to

1:20:43 ↗ him. With that, there are issues that I'm seeing and observing and have

1:20:49 ↗ concerns in regards to that. So I think bringing this back again and having

1:20:54 ↗ further discussion not necessarily will be very beneficial. Thank you. Eileen Tola. Thank you. At

1:20:59 ↗ the October 19 City Council meeting, I had a number of questions for the Issaquah

1:21:04 ↗ Valley Senior Center regarding statements made in their prepared comments delivered at the October 13th

1:21:09 ↗ Council Services and Safety Committee. These questions revolved around the breakdown of a service partnership

1:21:14 ↗ between the Issaquah Valley Senior Center and the Issaquah Food and Clothing Bank. In response,

1:21:20 ↗ on November 2nd, the Issaquah Valley Senior Center Board of Directors and Executive Director sent

1:21:25 ↗ a letter to the Issaquah City Council. The two-page cover letter addressed the questions directly,

1:21:30 ↗ and then the following 49 pages were supporting materials. Except they weren't. Instead of satisfactorily

1:21:36 ↗ answering my questions, the materials presented by the Issaquah Valley Senior Center actually turned those

1:21:42 ↗ questions into serious, deep reservations as to the Issaquah Valley Senior Center's ability to partner

1:21:47 ↗ with other local social service organizations, which is absolutely critical in order to balance strengths

1:21:52 ↗ and weaknesses between different human service organizations and therefore maximize limited human service dollars delivering

1:21:58 ↗ services to our residents. Four issues that deeply concern me are a matter of public

1:22:03 ↗ record as I went through them at the last council meeting, so I won't go

1:22:07 ↗ through them in detail again unless the council would like me to do so. But

1:22:11 ↗ based on these issues, I do not feel comfortable voting to award any money to

1:22:15 ↗ the Issaquah Valley Senior Center this year. I do not make this decision lightly, but

1:22:19 ↗ by their own presented materials, the Issaquah Valley Senior Center board and executive director have

1:22:23 ↗ unfortunately shown that they are not competent stewards of our citizens' money. Tola, thank you.

1:22:28 ↗ Josh? So, a few points. One, if we're talking about not providing the 164, you

1:22:34 ↗ also need to build in the audit cost because it would seem to me that

1:22:39 ↗ there'd be no need to conduct the audit either, which is contingent on providing a

1:22:44 ↗ portion of those funds. That's what this represents. $65,000 of the 164 is the audit.

1:22:49 ↗ Is that included in there? Yes. Okay. So, If we're looking at doing

1:22:55 ↗ that, I also noticed there's a corresponding line item below and these are

1:23:00 ↗ obviously connected at 164. I think that not providing the funding, the 99,000

1:23:06 ↗ at this point, would cause short-term harm. I think it would result in

1:23:12 ↗ a reduction in programs and it would produce short-term harm to the users

1:23:17 ↗ of senior services in our community. I don't think that the city is

1:23:23 ↗ in a position to fulfill providing senior services at $164,000 for 2016. We simply

1:23:29 ↗ do not have a plan in place. That 164 may go towards hiring a

1:23:35 ↗ consultant or doing other things to develop that plan. but in the interim there would

1:23:41 ↗ be a significant and in my opinion harmful gap that's why i supported the

1:23:46 ↗ mayor's plan in committee i have not heard anything that necessarily changes my stance

1:23:52 ↗ from doing so i do think that it would be important to conduct the

1:23:58 ↗ financial audit and continue resolving many of the issues that have been raised in

1:24:03 ↗ the first quarter of 2016 as opposed to waiting six months. You know, let

1:24:09 ↗ me be clear, I am very concerned and I do not doubt that many

1:24:15 ↗ of the issues that have been raised, the allegations of misconduct and improper treatment

1:24:21 ↗ are extremely concerning to me. And I too lack confidence in the way that the

1:24:27 ↗ center is being managed at this time. But I also believe that we should not,

1:24:32 ↗ as a council, be inserting ourselves into the board decisions of a nonprofit organization, whether

1:24:37 ↗ we like them or we think they're reprehensible or not. and I think there is

1:24:42 ↗ legal recourse available to individuals who have been aggrieved by an organization such as this.

1:24:48 ↗ I don't think that eliminating funding without a long-term strategy in place and a decision

1:24:54 ↗ about how the city should provide senior services would be prudent at this time because

1:25:00 ↗ it simply cuts off the funding without anything really to replace it. And I think

1:25:06 ↗ that that's more harmful than beneficial at this point. um and i hope that as

1:25:11 ↗ this moves forward we can continue to look at ways to uh mend the rift

1:25:16 ↗ that's been created but again i i want to underscore i don't think it's being

1:25:21 ↗ managed very well but there's a clear division between providing grant funding and inserting ourselves

1:25:27 ↗ in decisions of a non-profit all right uh thank you josh Okay, so

1:25:33 ↗ again just to repeat myself we are not gonna vote on this and

1:25:38 ↗ we are looking at an opportunity at perhaps our next regular council meeting

1:25:44 ↗ to make a final call on this item. Okay, so moving forward.

1:25:51 ↗ The net now we're going to move down to new expenditure items that the council

1:25:57 ↗ is proposing that we make now this title on this one and Mary Lou, this

1:26:02 ↗ is your the sponsor behind this one and it's I pulled it the actual line

1:26:08 ↗ item in there has to do we tied the efforts to the council goal for

1:26:14 ↗ increased neighborhood engagement, but extending the scope of that effort

1:26:20 ↗ for communication efforts related to major projects and pushing

1:26:25 ↗ messages to the community. I think I got that right. You got it right. It's

1:26:30 ↗ the title that really doesn't work so well with it, but this was, uh, We

1:26:33 ↗ can work this. Let's actually correct that if we need to. If you suggest something,

1:26:37 ↗ I can update that. Because it's really not neighborhood engagement, but, uh, I understand why

1:26:41 ↗ it's come up as this line item because staff has proposed some additional labor resources

1:26:45 ↗ this year in order to work on our neighborhood engagement goal and there is some

1:26:51 ↗ extra availability. I think it's five hours, Emily? Five that was put in. Five to

1:26:57 ↗ eight hours a week of this particular position that could be used in this year

1:27:03 ↗ to work on Another task which is to make sure that we

1:27:09 ↗ are doing everything we can do to keep neighborhoods informed of construction

1:27:14 ↗ projects and impacts. So are we keeping up with the most, the

1:27:20 ↗ best available methods we can find to keep citizens and businesses notified

1:27:26 ↗ of those impacts as construction starts to really uptick again. So that's

1:27:32 ↗ the additional $35,000. Okay. Naino. I'm sorry, before I move on. So that was like

1:27:37 ↗ an introduction. Do you want to? And I am in support of that because I

1:27:42 ↗ feel like we are heading into an era of a lot of construction activity in

1:27:46 ↗ a short period of time and in particular in one area of the city. And

1:27:50 ↗ I think it needs to be managed. I think we really need to do everything

1:27:54 ↗ we can for those residents that live here, those businesses that work here to make

1:27:58 ↗ this work. So I think we have to put in some additional resources here and

1:28:02 ↗ make sure we're doing more. I just wanted to say that I would support it.

1:28:08 ↗ Glad you brought it up. I don't know what the price tag is on that.

1:28:13 ↗ Emily said a day a week or something. Is that what you're saying? But as

1:28:18 ↗ a council member, one of the critical things that I've learned this year, last year,

1:28:23 ↗ is that communication is the hardest thing to keep up on. There is a huge

1:28:28 ↗ demand, huge demand to learn and understand what's going on in the city. if this

1:28:33 ↗ is something that helps supply that. -Stacey. -I agree. I don't think

1:28:39 ↗ I have much to add. I do actually have a question. So

1:28:45 ↗ it's still unclear to me what these funds, what they would fund.

1:28:50 ↗ It's not a capital expenditure, it's labor hours. So we're stuffing something

1:28:56 ↗ into existing staff's work plan. And so why more money? So

1:29:02 ↗ our proposal, our recommendation, was to add hours to

1:29:08 ↗ a part-time position that was also newly included in

1:29:14 ↗ the 2016 proposed budget. And that position was as

1:29:19 ↗ a result of the council goal. adoption of the council

1:29:25 ↗ goal around neighborhood engagement. And then I think this new proposal from Council Member Pauley

1:29:31 ↗ was to really augment our level of communication in these particular areas and

1:29:37 ↗ having some additional hours to do that will enable a staff person to

1:29:43 ↗ spend more time sending out those electronic notifications, working with Public Works Engineering

1:29:48 ↗ or Ops as we do road projects to make sure messaging happens around

1:29:54 ↗ that to our business community, to our communers, and to our residents. Okay.

1:30:00 ↗ - Thank you for that. And so I'm really torn here because I think the

1:30:05 ↗ purpose and the aim for the goal is absolutely spot on. My belief is that

1:30:10 ↗ what has to be developed is a process that doesn't exist. So there's an upfront

1:30:16 ↗ cost, but ongoing kind of, it becomes something that then just runs. There will be

1:30:21 ↗ forms of communication that are made and that you're updating information. You have channels through

1:30:26 ↗ which you push it. um i'm just this amount um i mean this is that

1:30:32 ↗ we're basically we're up are we you know i i take this by your answer

1:30:38 ↗ to be that since we're we're adding a position and we're actually expanding the actual

1:30:43 ↗ funding for that position so this is something that now becomes part of our our

1:30:49 ↗ ongoing expenses Let me clarify that. Thank you. The initial

1:30:55 ↗ portion of this position that related to the original council goal

1:31:01 ↗ you look at the council goal language, it describes that position as sort of

1:31:07 ↗ a pilot position. So we are planning to fill it as a temporary position.

1:31:13 ↗ We expect we will have conversations throughout the year with council about how that

1:31:19 ↗ position is working, if it fulfilled the goal desires, and then I think there

1:31:24 ↗ will be a subsequent conversation during budget development next year as to whether or not

1:31:30 ↗ to make that a permanent position or pursue it in a different manner. All right.

1:31:34 ↗ Thank you very much for that. I mean, that actually helps quite a bit because

1:31:39 ↗ I can see... we've said it before it's very you don't legislate engagement right you

1:31:45 ↗ actually have to invest into it and and and you know with the the proper

1:31:51 ↗ use of tools and some creative problem solving and and and somebody who's an expert

1:31:57 ↗ in this establishing some practices that maybe we can inherit so Again, the objective is

1:32:03 ↗ absolutely spot on. And I think we've spot I've spot I've mentioned in maybe not

1:32:09 ↗ in these public meetings before, but in other in other opportunities when we meet that,

1:32:14 ↗ you know, we do our committee and regional committee updates every time. And and I

1:32:20 ↗ think that that that those even our regular council meetings are just yet another opportunity

1:32:25 ↗ where major project updates could be made not necessarily from us but from staff or

1:32:30 ↗ the mayor or something i mean this is this is really important information and that's

1:32:35 ↗ just yet another channel on which we can get the messages out and there are

1:32:40 ↗ multiple channels so so i i support the goal i supported the uh the the

1:32:44 ↗ engagement goal originally and this expansion of this I think is nice and it's sensitive

1:32:50 ↗ to an emerging need that's putting more of a focus on this. So knowing I

1:32:55 ↗ just heard that this is a temporary position and that we will be reconsidering it

1:33:01 ↗ and finding ways that we could bring the work in house through existing work plan

1:33:06 ↗ items for staff is a lot easier for me to support, thank you.

1:33:12 ↗ I think I

1:33:17 ↗ have a little

1:33:23 ↗ bit different information

1:33:28 ↗ because I always

1:33:34 ↗ was homing in on the neighborhood and understanding that this

1:33:40 ↗ was more of a neighborhood engagement projects that would be working in the neighborhoods

1:33:46 ↗ as opposed to the entire community and the business community as you were just

1:33:51 ↗ saying the idea that this is a partially funded and to be expanded is

1:33:57 ↗ the 35 would be the yearly expenditure for this particular line item and that

1:34:03 ↗ If you're asking me, I'm going to tell you what I just heard is that

1:34:09 ↗ this would be staffed with a temporary employee. The project space communication, traffic project based

1:34:14 ↗ communication would be added to the work plan and that will be making an assessment

1:34:19 ↗ whether or not that work can be brought in house with existing staff in future

1:34:24 ↗ years. So it's not going to automatically be a permanent position going forward. That was

1:34:29 ↗ what I heard, and I'm basing my decision partly on that information. Okay. So from

1:34:35 ↗ what I'm hearing you say, that this is a somewhat pilot project for this year,

1:34:40 ↗ not necessarily a project that we have great confidence in that would be a continual

1:34:46 ↗ project unless there's dollars available and the project has merit at the end of it.

1:34:51 ↗ I am originally was very supportive of it, but have concerns

1:34:57 ↗ in regards to expending the dollars right now and bringing forward something and then

1:35:03 ↗ there not being the continual follow through on it in next years. So I'm

1:35:08 ↗ on the fence. Thank you. Tola. um before i give my opinion a question

1:35:14 ↗ as i recall because i was involved with council member paulie on the discussion around

1:35:19 ↗ this item and being engineers we requiremented the heck out of this wasn't there um

1:35:24 ↗ there's a feedback loop on this isn't there as part of this larger position i

1:35:29 ↗ thought we put some elements in there around checking in i think halfway through the

1:35:34 ↗ year or something there was wasn't there i am failing to recall

1:35:40 ↗ but that's certainly been our intent was to because of its pilot nature

1:35:45 ↗ was to have periodic checks i can't remember the specifics but that's the

1:35:51 ↗ intent is to make sure that we are providing you with enough information

1:35:57 ↗ about how we're utilizing that position and our perceived effectiveness in doing that. Gather input

1:36:02 ↗ from you, gather input, of course, from the neighborhoods as we're engaging with them. So,

1:36:08 ↗ yes, there's feedback. Because wasn't it in total 18 months, not 12? I thought when

1:36:13 ↗ we actually mapped it out time-wise that it wound up being an 18-month, at least

1:36:19 ↗ the goal had an 18-month implementation all total. The goal may have in terms of

1:36:25 ↗ developing the scope of work, the job description. And as I recall, the idea was,

1:36:30 ↗ as we got to major milestones-- again, when you work with engineers, we just-- we're

1:36:35 ↗ all about requirements and milestones-- that we would see where we were at. So that

1:36:39 ↗ may address some of the questions around this new thing that's sort of-- this is

1:36:44 ↗ something new. And so we all are eager to see how it-- we'll check in

1:36:48 ↗ on it, right? Yes. So I'm supportive of this. I think that there's not too

1:36:53 ↗ long ago that this city, if you were a city council member, you might have,

1:36:58 ↗ you know, 1,000 people per council member, and we're at 5,000 now per council member.

1:37:03 ↗ And, you know, it's not like King County Council. It's not 300,000 per council member.

1:37:08 ↗ But the city's changing, and I hear on Squawk Mountain, I hear from neighbors who

1:37:13 ↗ say they don't see me often enough, and they don't. And so they feel a

1:37:17 ↗ little disconnected from the city, particularly the ones who have been here for a while.

1:37:22 ↗ And so in general, this effort to reach out to the neighborhoods, I think is

1:37:27 ↗ very important as we transition to being a larger city. Some of this is modeled

1:37:31 ↗ right on the Bellevue. Bellevue has a very successful program similar to this. They're obviously

1:37:36 ↗ a lot farther on that whole growing into a big city business. But for all

1:37:41 ↗ those reasons, I'll be supporting this this evening. Thank you, Tolan. Josh? You know, when

1:37:46 ↗ I lived in Bellevue when I was growing up, I was for a little while

1:37:51 ↗ the chair of an organization called the Bellevue Neighborhood Network. It was a citizens group

1:37:57 ↗ that came together to provide input to the city on significant issues in various neighborhoods.

1:38:02 ↗ And it was a highly successful organization. I think it's very important, as Tola mentioned,

1:38:08 ↗ as this city grows, hopefully not to the size of Bellevue, that we also further

1:38:14 ↗ our neighborhood engagement efforts. As was mentioned about people in the neighborhoods where each council

1:38:19 ↗ member resides coming forward with concerns, it's important to note that after the first of

1:38:25 ↗ the year, there are certain neighborhoods where there will be no council member who resides

1:38:31 ↗ in those particular neighborhoods. whether that be Talus or South Cove. And so, you know,

1:38:36 ↗ it's not to say that we represent districts or particular neighborhoods, but perhaps we are

1:38:40 ↗ a little more attuned to what's going on in our backyards and our neighbors that

1:38:44 ↗ talk to us and bend our ear about certain things. And so we might know

1:38:49 ↗ a little more about those types of issues. And so having that neighborhood engagement for

1:38:53 ↗ areas that do not have a direct council member that you can walk down the

1:38:58 ↗ street and talk to or see on a daily or weekly basis, I think is

1:39:03 ↗ very important. And what's compelling for me about this proposal is that it is aligned

1:39:08 ↗ with a 2016 goal. And I believe the budget should align itself with the council's

1:39:13 ↗ goals for that year. And this, in my mind, fits the bill. Thank

1:39:19 ↗ you, Josh. Mary Lou, you had another point? Thanks. So I just wanted to

1:39:24 ↗ check, Emily. When I envisioned that this task got added to this temporary position,

1:39:30 ↗ it was because the skill set to complete the first portion of it, the

1:39:36 ↗ neighborhood engagement, action plan and activities, It's the same skill set that you would

1:39:42 ↗ want if you were going to assign somebody to look into how is it best

1:39:47 ↗ to get the information out, what's the available technologies. But I wasn't thinking this was

1:39:52 ↗ actually creating necessarily 100% a city responsibility. I thought that if we have a person

1:39:57 ↗ with that kind of communication background, it may be that there are changes in the

1:40:02 ↗ permitting and in the IMC where we would put some of these requirements for public

1:40:07 ↗ notification onto those who are completing the work. So not that we're necessarily creating something

1:40:12 ↗ that is now going to be this position forever, but who's looking at those ideas

1:40:18 ↗ and it actually might be the builder who actually has to do some of

1:40:23 ↗ the stuff, not staff. We heard you. And we've already had staff meetings to

1:40:29 ↗ discuss some of those opportunities. And yes, that task would be part of this

1:40:35 ↗ person's work plan. OK, thank you. So are we prepared to vote on this

1:40:41 ↗ item? Looks like we are. So this is a

1:40:46 ↗ vote to increase spending by $35,000 for the reason given.

1:40:52 ↗ So a thumb up is in support of the increase.

1:40:57 ↗ Vote. That is 7-0 in favor of the increased. Thank

1:41:03 ↗ you very much. Okay. So I'm going to do it

1:41:09 ↗ again. So the next item is the... real

1:41:14 ↗ estate consultant mixed use. So this was a project that was not in

1:41:20 ↗ the original. It's one of the ones that wasn't in the original budget

1:41:26 ↗ proposal. And we've heard about it a little bit last week. And so...

1:41:32 ↗ Because we're around Robin, we're going to be starting with you, Nina, but if you

1:41:37 ↗ need any additional information or anything, free field, take advantage of the opportunity. Thank you.

1:41:42 ↗ I'm sure I could, but I can't think of anything right offhand because in Land

1:41:46 ↗ and Shore we've been dealing with this sort of thing quite a bit as we're

1:41:51 ↗ looking at the Phase I, Phase II, Central Issaquah Plan amendments, and one of the

1:41:55 ↗ real buggers is mixed use, which we wish we had and we don't yet. And

1:42:00 ↗ I for one have been visiting with staff and fellow council members and other people

1:42:06 ↗ to try to figure out how do we crack this nut. And I'm not a

1:42:11 ↗ real estate consultant. So I haven't done it. And this seems like a reasonable approach.

1:42:16 ↗ It's an investment in a tool and an understanding of a marketplace that's changing all

1:42:21 ↗ the time. I'm hoping that it's right time to bring this in now. I'm in

1:42:27 ↗ support of this, the price tag. Like the others, I don't know why it's $25,000.

1:42:32 ↗ That would be my question. Why is it $25,000? And how long does it take?

1:42:37 ↗ And can it be done by January 20th or something? But those would be my

1:42:43 ↗ only questions. How long does that take? Why is it $25,000? But let's do something.

1:42:49 ↗ Thank you. Stacy? This is long, long, long, long overdue, as in

1:42:55 ↗ three years. So I'm greatly supportive. I'm happy that this has finally

1:43:00 ↗ come to the top of the list so that we have, you

1:43:06 ↗ know, so we have the means by which to get this looked

1:43:12 ↗ at. We're not going to really probably get mixed use unless we

1:43:17 ↗ figure out some way to make it happen. So...

1:43:23 ↗ my additional thought would be that I hope that this continues to be a top

1:43:29 ↗ of the list work item and not just continue to be a we'll deal with

1:43:35 ↗ it next year thing. I think it's really important. So I will definitely be supporting

1:43:40 ↗ it. Okay, thank you. I'm going to start off my comments and just respond to

1:43:46 ↗ something Stacey just said is that I view this and really with the exception

1:43:52 ↗ of the parks maintenance worker that we're going to discuss in a little bit. I

1:43:57 ↗ see all of these are one-time expenditures. And so that

1:44:03 ↗ is a deep part of my consideration that as in generally, we're not using

1:44:08 ↗ excessive and funding fund balance to fund ongoing expenditures. So I do agree too

1:44:14 ↗ that we knew when we passed the Central Issaquah plan that adjustments would need

1:44:20 ↗ to be made and I view this as a critical fine tuning of the area

1:44:25 ↗ to help us assure, based upon the information that we've, the activities we've seen and

1:44:30 ↗ are in the pipeline, that we need to fine tune that part of the plan

1:44:35 ↗ to make sure we get the outcome as it relates to mixed use. So this

1:44:40 ↗ is a necessary one time spend to fine tune that plan, so I'll be supporting

1:44:45 ↗ this. Eileen? - I couldn't have said it better. It definitely is, it's this very

1:44:50 ↗ necessary piece right now to make sure that that area is design the way we

1:44:56 ↗ need it to be. It is as central as the clause is growing. We

1:45:01 ↗ definitely need to have this particular consultant and I am fine for it. Thank

1:45:07 ↗ you. Tola. Ditto. Thank you, Josh. Maybe it's too simplistic of an approach, but the

1:45:12 ↗ way I see it, if the city wants mixed-use development in the central area, we

1:45:17 ↗ can either one, legislatively mandate it as part of the design standards for the central

1:45:21 ↗ area plan, or two, we can let the market take care of it, and then

1:45:26 ↗ we're going to end up probably with no mixed use, like the weird-looking buildings near

1:45:31 ↗ the Safeway. So... i see those as kind of the two ways that this can

1:45:36 ↗ go and i'm honestly not convinced that hiring a consultant for 25 000 taxpayer dollars

1:45:41 ↗ is the best use of our money because one of those options letting the market

1:45:46 ↗ take care of it that doesn't require any expenditure the other option legislatively mandating it

1:45:51 ↗ that's a policy-based decision for the council that doesn't require 25 000 either If you

1:45:55 ↗ give me 10, I'll tell you how to do it. But I don't think we

1:45:59 ↗ need to spend a consultant for 25. So I understand the appeal in wanting to

1:46:03 ↗ do this to get more information and market data. I just don't think practically the

1:46:07 ↗ effect of it is going to provide any benefit to the city. All right. Thank

1:46:11 ↗ you, Josh. Mary Lou. Yeah, this one was a tough one for me. I'm on

1:46:15 ↗ the page with Josh that I think there's just two ways to do it. You

1:46:19 ↗ legislate it or you let the market take care of it. And I do have...

1:46:23 ↗ Some contacts in the building industry and I talked to them about this a lot

1:46:29 ↗ this is a regional problem of trying to get a developers performer to make sense

1:46:34 ↗ with mixed-use having retail or commercial on the bottom and residential above so I'm I

1:46:40 ↗ guess I'm a little I'm going to vote for it, but I'm unsure of exactly

1:46:45 ↗ what we're getting for that I've got to tell you, I'm not 100% in favor

1:46:50 ↗ of one of those outcomes, which is I don't think we should be legislating it

1:46:54 ↗ necessarily. And I haven't heard any creative ideas. So I'm on the fence on this

1:46:58 ↗ one, but I'm probably voting for it just because I think we need to get

1:47:02 ↗ some more information. But this was not so cut and dried for me. Thank you,

1:47:06 ↗ Mary Lou. sure is a follow-on that it's my understanding i've talked to city council

1:47:11 ↗ members in both redmond and kirkland who have had some success in getting mixed use

1:47:15 ↗ it's my understanding that both of those accomplished it through incentives which is the third

1:47:20 ↗ path but that it took a while It didn't happen overnight, but as those incentives

1:47:25 ↗ kind of percolated into the market, it resulted in the multi-use that you see downtown.

1:47:30 ↗ Thanks. All right, thank you. So I believe everybody's had an opportunity to comment. Are

1:47:35 ↗ we ready to vote on this item? Okay, all in favor of this item, thumb

1:47:40 ↗ up or thumb down if you're against. So that is six in favor and one

1:47:45 ↗ against. So that one passes as well.

1:47:56 ↗ So the next item on here is to discuss

1:48:01 ↗ are the Old Town Standards updates. Stacy, we're starting

1:48:07 ↗ with you. Can I have a brief reminder of

1:48:13 ↗ what this is? It looks self-explanatory, but...

1:48:19 ↗ Hopefully it is. So this would be to, again,

1:48:24 ↗ have some staffing assistance and expertise to help us

1:48:29 ↗ to update the sub area plan and to make

1:48:35 ↗ some recommendations about any possible code changes that would

1:48:40 ↗ enable us to carry out our vision for what

1:48:46 ↗ we want Old Town to be and also to help

1:48:52 ↗ us better execute, implement the Old Force Task Force recommendations.

1:48:58 ↗ So what we would envision those standards addressing is all

1:49:04 ↗ sorts of things related to street design, streetscape,

1:49:10 ↗ It could go as broad as signage and height and anything that's

1:49:16 ↗ code related that we think may be either outdated or not in

1:49:21 ↗ sync with the vision for Old Town or that has been recommended

1:49:27 ↗ through the task force. So it's just it's a general update. We

1:49:32 ↗ don't have any particular problem we're trying to solve. Well, I

1:49:38 ↗ think the task force recommendations are going to

1:49:44 ↗ outline quite a few things that they think

1:49:49 ↗ are problematic for the type of either new

1:49:54 ↗ development or retaining those characteristics we want to

1:50:00 ↗ retain. This one's a little harder for me.

1:50:05 ↗ Not because I don't think that it needs

1:50:10 ↗ to be done, just wondering how much we

1:50:16 ↗ can take on at one time, how much can we get

1:50:22 ↗ done with the list of things we're looking at. So I'm

1:50:28 ↗ on the fence. I'm gonna listen to my fellow council members.

1:50:34 ↗ - Okay, thank you. So I see this as a very

1:50:39 ↗ complimentary step that we need to take. The central Issaquah plan

1:50:45 ↗ clearly directs that you know our our growth

1:50:51 ↗ be concentrated in that in that core area and yet there's plenty

1:50:57 ↗ of opportunities based upon current land use and code in areas like

1:51:03 ↗ odetown that also there is incentive there is financial incentive for some

1:51:09 ↗ of that to be redeveloped under their existing standards and And I see

1:51:15 ↗ this might just be the first of, if we approve this, the first of

1:51:20 ↗ maybe a sequence of looks that we take to make sure, you know, where

1:51:26 ↗ there's an outcome that we want, and that is that the majority of growth

1:51:32 ↗ happen in the core area. But there is plenty of room already to actually

1:51:38 ↗ absorb, more of that growth outside into existing neighborhoods such as Old Town. We have

1:51:43 ↗ a sub area plan for Old Town and we did ask the task force to

1:51:47 ↗ take a look at it in terms of economic vitality. I think the scope of

1:51:52 ↗ their effort is grown a little bit and it's gonna give us some feedback related

1:51:56 ↗ actually, and I think as Emily just mentioned, maybe in something like Heights. And based

1:52:01 ↗ upon this past season, in these last few months and some conversations I had with

1:52:05 ↗ neighbors down there as well, um I think this is the perfect time to take

1:52:09 ↗ another look to make sure that the sub area plan for Old Town actually um

1:52:14 ↗ is in concert with our with our vision for how we want to see the

1:52:19 ↗ city grow so I'm going to be supporting this item I'm in support of

1:52:25 ↗ this, and I think there's a couple of things that we need to understand for

1:52:30 ↗ me as being a past merchant down there, that the restrictions that govern Old Town

1:52:35 ↗ are more restrictive than those that govern the rest of the town in regards to

1:52:39 ↗ design standards and land use codes. You're talking about heights that are different, signage that

1:52:44 ↗ is different, the use of your back door is different. pervious surface. There are a

1:52:49 ↗ number of other things that are hindering the competitiveness between the downtown area and

1:52:54 ↗ the other rest of the business district within Issaquah. I think it's time that

1:53:00 ↗ we review these standards and these land use codes and make sure that there

1:53:06 ↗ is no restrictions any longer on Old Town. Thank you. - Thank you, Tola.

1:53:11 ↗ - So I support where we're going with this. My problem is that it's a

1:53:17 ↗ line item in our budget, and here's why. I went and looked back at the

1:53:22 ↗ Central Issaquah plan. We did not line item out things from the Central Issaquah Plan.

1:53:27 ↗ They were part of the DSD work package. And so I want to be really

1:53:32 ↗ careful on consultants versus what we expect the city to have capability in. And I

1:53:38 ↗ don't understand if that could be part of core DSD work package for Central Issaquah

1:53:43 ↗ Plan, why it has to be a separate call out here. So can I? Not

1:53:49 ↗ to put you on the spot, but can you help me understand that? Sure. I

1:53:55 ↗ think we tried to lay out in one of the responses to this question that

1:54:01 ↗ a potential impact of not having the funding is simply that we will reincorporate this

1:54:07 ↗ into our staff's work plan. It may not be our highest DSD priority for the

1:54:13 ↗ year, and therefore, we may have to stretch it out a little bit may

1:54:19 ↗ extend into 2017 and we may take it more piecemeal at a

1:54:24 ↗ time as opposed to getting it all done um you know as

1:54:30 ↗ one project we might take the signage issue we might then analyze

1:54:36 ↗ parking okay um as part of the committee that authorized additional dsd

1:54:42 ↗ head count this year it's a it's a I struggle a

1:54:48 ↗ little bit with that. I just I think that my reflexively, I just feel

1:54:54 ↗ like this is something that staff should be able to do and hearing that

1:54:59 ↗ we can pay to up it in the priority is this seems it's a

1:55:06 ↗ Not entirely happy with that answer, to be honest. I understood. It's a choice. We're

1:55:11 ↗ putting that out as a choice. We certainly have had some conversations with you about

1:55:17 ↗ how we're going to go about prioritizing work during the year. We've had some conversations

1:55:22 ↗ tonight about which things seem to be top priority, and certainly we have a lot

1:55:28 ↗ of development activity. We have long-range planning efforts that are underway. And so this is

1:55:33 ↗ just an effort to put it into the mix in such a fashion that we

1:55:39 ↗ get it done as one complete project and ensure that it gets done wholly within

1:55:45 ↗ 2016. Okay. I will not be supporting this one. Thank you. Tola? Josh? So I've

1:55:51 ↗ got the plan up here. It's about 76 pages. It has, strangely, a lot of

1:55:56 ↗ pages about coloring. color of buildings. But you know, this plan wasn't written in like

1:56:02 ↗ the 50s or 60s or something and you know, it's super outdated and we've got

1:56:07 ↗ to completely overhaul a look at these design standards for Old Town. This was written

1:56:12 ↗ in 2001 and adopted by the council in 2002. So you know, okay, it's been

1:56:18 ↗ over a decade. Do we need to spend over $20,000 reformulating it? It's a pretty

1:56:23 ↗ comprehensive plan. And I just sort of feel like if we're looking at updating standards

1:56:29 ↗ that obviously a lot of folks spend a lot of time going through and developing

1:56:34 ↗ in the first place, Either it can be done in-house through staff or, you know,

1:56:39 ↗ put together a citizens group, put together a citizens board of interested stakeholders who can

1:56:44 ↗ then look at, you know, the issues that Eileen raises about whether there's regulations that

1:56:49 ↗ are affecting the business community in Old Town that should be changed and have that

1:56:54 ↗ group make recommendations back to the council and the council can then change this document.

1:56:59 ↗ I guarantee that's going to cost us a lot less than $20,000 to proceed in

1:57:04 ↗ that manner if we're truly interested in looking and changing these standards, which you know

1:57:09 ↗ I'm not even sure how much of this would be subject to change or not.

1:57:13 ↗ So I don't particularly see the value in doing this type of study or update

1:57:18 ↗ for this kind of money. I think there's alternative methods that are far more cost

1:57:23 ↗ effective than this. And I'll just, the last thing I'll say is The general mantra

1:57:28 ↗ I'm using in looking at a lot of these is less planning, more doing. And

1:57:32 ↗ this falls under the planning as opposed to doing. If we were to put this

1:57:36 ↗ money towards pedestrian park, put an extra 20 into that, I'd probably be much more

1:57:41 ↗ supportive. Thank you, Josh. Mary Lou. I think this is part two of a bigger

1:57:46 ↗ question that we looked at. So I do see this as a natural progression from

1:57:50 ↗ last year where we gave Old Town some attention in the goal setting and had

1:57:55 ↗ a task force set up. And I think the update does have to happen. I

1:57:59 ↗ think Eileen is correct that There may be some things in those guidelines that are

1:58:04 ↗ the standards right now that may be inhibiting the kind of redevelopment that we are

1:58:09 ↗ expecting to see in that area. And I think because we're seeing development pressures in

1:58:13 ↗ other parts of the city, we should be looking at the other neighborhoods where we're

1:58:18 ↗ talking about maintaining the character of those neighborhoods. I think Old Town, I think that's

1:58:22 ↗ the time to update the standards. I think it's a, I'm in favor of doing

1:58:27 ↗ it. Thank you. Nina? well first of all i just want to

1:58:33 ↗ know how much it would cost to get rid of the e in old from

1:58:38 ↗ the beginning of the goal setting exercises in my first year in the council and

1:58:44 ↗ last year too i spent a lot of time concerned about old town and tried

1:58:50 ↗ to invest my efforts and goal setting process in this because Old Town is the

1:58:55 ↗ heart and soul of Issaquah and when we looked at the tourism plan, we look

1:58:59 ↗ at why do people move here? There are a lot of great things about Issaquah

1:59:03 ↗ but a real strong anchor is our Old Town. I think there couldn't be, Central

1:59:07 ↗ Issaquah is all jazzy and hot right now and it's got so many goals but

1:59:11 ↗ really if you didn't have Old Town to anchor it, what would you have? So

1:59:16 ↗ I think it's very important. The reason I think that the investment is important,

1:59:21 ↗ it's like two others. It's like real estate and consultant mixed use and I'm

1:59:27 ↗ sorry, the affordable housing one. These matters are urgent today. We are in a

1:59:33 ↗ We don't see the end of an upswing in development anytime soon. So matters that

1:59:38 ↗ are on the books today are going to continue to happen. Stacey had asked about

1:59:42 ↗ what are the problems. Well, if you remember back about 15 months ago, one of

1:59:47 ↗ our residents came in and said, I can't believe there's another three or four story

1:59:52 ↗ condominium building going in up in Old Town and it's out of character with my

1:59:57 ↗ neighborhood, don't you agree? And I would think, well, yeah, I do agree, but that's

2:00:01 ↗ part of the sub area plan is to allow that. Part of the sub area

2:00:06 ↗ plan is to have parking garages on the main floor without any retail facing sunset.

2:00:10 ↗ That was okay as long as you put a pretty design on it. These are

2:00:15 ↗ problems that if we don't handle them now, Up search of development, we're going to

2:00:19 ↗ miss an opportunity. There'll be a whole development cycle gone by us without us attending

2:00:24 ↗ to it. I'm glad for the frank planning of the development services saying, yeah, we

2:00:28 ↗ could do this, but we can't do it now unless we get a little support

2:00:32 ↗ from outside. So that's why I'm supporting it. I think it's urgent, and I think

2:00:36 ↗ they can get rid of it. Actually, I just did it for free.

2:00:42 ↗ It's free. Thank you. It's all electronic. Did you have something? Just to

2:00:48 ↗ supplement what Emily had said earlier, there's a couple things that are happening

2:00:54 ↗ on the outside that may influence this. One is the grant funding that

2:00:59 ↗ the DIA is getting from the State yeah the BID green Main

2:01:05 ↗ Street program and so one of the things they've talked about is a facade improvement

2:01:09 ↗ program So an incentive program that would allow improvements to be made So if those

2:01:14 ↗ happen those improvements will be made to the existing standards So if you're happy with

2:01:18 ↗ the existing standards, you know, they'll be made to that reflection if you want some

2:01:22 ↗ upgrades to meet the you know some of the recommendations out of Old Town and

2:01:26 ↗ you should look at funding this sooner the other item is the since the house

2:01:31 ↗ got demolished over at Confluence Park, there are funds available for improvements

2:01:37 ↗ of facades to restore to the historic structure, you know, the historic

2:01:42 ↗ facade of the of what was there. So again, those are natural

2:01:48 ↗ buildings, you'd think that would that could be available for those types

2:01:54 ↗ of grants. So Just to give you an idea, there's a couple

2:01:59 ↗ things going on in the universe that may or may not influence that. Thank you,

2:02:04 ↗ Bob, and that's your one opportunity to sell one of these items without being asked.

2:02:09 ↗ Is there any other questions or comments? Are we ready to vote on this item?

2:02:14 ↗ Stacey. I just, I understand it's important. I'm concerned about the number of times we

2:02:20 ↗ have to turn to consultants to get the work done. And we heard comments that,

2:02:26 ↗ you know, we could get the work done. And it just, if it's a priority,

2:02:32 ↗ it's a priority. But that's really what my concern is. Okay. Thank you. So are

2:02:37 ↗ we ready to vote? Okay. So all in favor, thumb up. Thumb down if you're

2:02:43 ↗ not in favor. Vote. Okay, there are four thumbs up and three funds down

2:02:49 ↗ that passes. Okay, so we're roughly halfway through and we spent some of the time

2:02:55 ↗ earlier just handling regular business. So at this time, I'm going to take a small

2:03:01 ↗ break. And when the big hand is on the two, I'm talking and we're going

2:03:06 ↗ again, people. So when that clock that big hand is on the two, we'll take

2:03:12 ↗ a break until that time.

2:09:21 ↗ Nine up. It's after the two. Council Member Milligan. Nine up. We're ready to

2:09:27 ↗ get started again. Thank you. Okay, we're ready. Oh, thank you. We're back on

2:09:32 ↗ the air after that short break. Parks Maintenance Manager. We're going to start with

2:09:38 ↗ the parks. Thank you. Yeah, we're going to be starting with the parks maintenance

2:09:44 ↗ manager. - Actually, Eileen, it's the parks maintenance worker. - Worker,

2:09:50 ↗ okay. - Not a manager position. - Totally different. - Okay.

2:09:56 ↗ - Okay, so this again was another one of those items

2:10:01 ↗ that was requested by the administration but not in the original

2:10:07 ↗ budget. And this is a, and I'm gonna look for some

2:10:12 ↗ acknowledgement. This is a position. It's already covered in

2:10:18 ↗ the job schedule, the position. This is authorizing funding for

2:10:24 ↗ the position. It's hiring into an existing job description and

2:10:29 ↗ a pay scale. And this is for a part-time. No,

2:10:35 ↗ I'm good. Full-time. Okay, and so like last time, I

2:10:41 ↗ asked is this about cutting grass or is it kind of the open space

2:10:47 ↗ steward type work? And I think the answer that I got that it was

2:10:52 ↗ for park maintenance. It's not intended to augment the services provided by our open

2:10:58 ↗ space steward. And so it's for the maintenance of our parks. And it is

2:11:04 ↗ very clear to me, we got a lot of work done

2:11:10 ↗ I think we could do better at maintaining our parks. I got evidence

2:11:16 ↗ of that, photographic evidence, in fact, that I submitted earlier in this year.

2:11:22 ↗ And I know it's... So, you know, this is... Adding a position is

2:11:27 ↗ always a big deal. Now, that's the fully burdened cost for a parks

2:11:33 ↗ maintenance worker. We're talking about a generally entry-level position, really kind of service-oriented

2:11:39 ↗ work that is... that is hopefully will free up existing staff,

2:11:45 ↗ other staff for more times. I generally agree that we are

2:11:51 ↗ just upon my own observations and comments that I've got from the public as well,

2:11:55 ↗ that we do not keep up with the maintenance of our parks, just even in

2:12:00 ↗ the mowing of the grass and clearing the brush. We have a good working example

2:12:05 ↗ of that. I think it's hard for us to do even on the one park

2:12:10 ↗ that we have up in Squawk Mountain. So I like the idea of adding that

2:12:14 ↗ capacity. And I'm leaning towards supporting this but I'm looking forward to hearing the

2:12:20 ↗ comments of the rest of my colleagues on the council. Eileen. -

2:12:26 ↗ For me, this is an easy one. 2001, we had nine full-time

2:12:32 ↗ employees. 2015, we have nine full-time employees. 2001, we had 57 park

2:12:38 ↗ acres. 2015, we have 197 park acres. 2001, we had 16, excuse

2:12:44 ↗ me, 619 open space. And in 2015, we have 1,390 acres

2:12:49 ↗ of open space, and we still have only nine full-time employees. So

2:12:55 ↗ I think that's my argument. How can we keep up? If there

2:13:01 ↗ is conversation in regards to the fact that we're not maintaining our

2:13:07 ↗ parks well, we still have only nine full-time employees. All right. Thank

2:13:12 ↗ you. Tola. It's hard to argue with those numbers. But the only question

2:13:18 ↗ I have is, why is this special? Why is this not being treated-- remind me

2:13:23 ↗ why it's not being treated like a regular additional head? No, it is. Oh, it

2:13:29 ↗ is? It's just-- but why wasn't it in the-- It wasn't in the original proposal

2:13:34 ↗ or ask from the administration. And we have elevated this to now-- we're considering adding

2:13:39 ↗ it to the budget. Oh, based on conversations since the budget was originally put together?

2:13:44 ↗ Was it-- submitted like this in the original budget? It was not submitted in the

2:13:50 ↗ original proposed budget. And the reason for that is we go through an internal process

2:13:55 ↗ after we look at early estimates of revenues and make determinations about which things

2:14:01 ↗ can be funded. We received additional information after we put the proposed

2:14:07 ↗ budget in print, and that allowed us to contemplate those high-priority items

2:14:12 ↗ that we had to leave out. Gotcha. So this was the next person

2:14:18 ↗ on the higher list, basically. Correct. I need a mechanical engineer like that in my

2:14:24 ↗ department. So I'll be supportive. Thank you, Tola. Josh? You know, I agree with everything

2:14:30 ↗ you said, Paul. And I agree with Eileen's comments as well about the additional acreage.

2:14:36 ↗ I do have concerns though, because this is an ongoing expense and this becomes not

2:14:41 ↗ just as I think while you've pointed out the one time type of things that

2:14:47 ↗ we're just taking out of the general fund ending balance. Um, but it becomes a

2:14:53 ↗ permanent in theory position. And so now you've got $70,000 That's going to go up

2:14:59 ↗ with COLAs and other adjustments. And so now you're taking on a burden on an

2:15:05 ↗ annualized basis of a pretty significant amount of money. Now, do we need a parks

2:15:11 ↗ maintenance worker? And do we need to spend $70,000 on an annualized basis? That's really

2:15:17 ↗ the question. And I think the PROST too, in some ways, feeds into this in

2:15:22 ↗ my mind because when I looked at the existing PROST plan that's being brought before

2:15:26 ↗ us that we talked about in committee last night, one of the things I noticed,

2:15:31 ↗ and I think it's chapter 13, if I remember correctly, talks about parks maintenance. and

2:15:36 ↗ i didn't see anything in that chapter that really informed me whether we have a

2:15:40 ↗ strategic need for additional maintenance workers or not i didn't see any of the the

2:15:45 ↗ information that tied the data that eileen gave us to the actual need for hiring

2:15:50 ↗ a maintenance worker and i i kind of thought that kind of stuff was going

2:15:54 ↗ to be in prost but maybe it's going to be part two that really deals

2:15:59 ↗ with the the strategic element so my preference is before we just start hiring people

2:16:04 ↗ on an annualized basis that we actually ensure that we have a more strategic part

2:16:10 ↗ of our parks plan, which is PROS 2, and that we decide through that process

2:16:16 ↗ how many maintenance workers do we need. Do we need just one? Do we shift

2:16:22 ↗ around responsibilities? Where is the need greatest? I just think before we jump to that

2:16:27 ↗ step and begin that snowball rolling in 2016, that it would be more prudent to

2:16:33 ↗ get the strategic parks plan completed and then decide before we start hiring more personnel.

2:16:38 ↗ Thank you, Josh. Mary Lou. Thanks, Josh. Actually, I appreciate what you said because for

2:16:44 ↗ me, the linkage between that and the PROS, I call it PROS because it sounds

2:16:49 ↗ funnier, PROS 2 plan, is very, very strong. However, I think the question is more

2:16:54 ↗ around do we need more than one parks maintenance worker. So at this point, even

2:16:59 ↗ without having that second document, I am okay with hiring the single maintenance worker. I

2:17:04 ↗ think we don't have enough, and I don't think one is enough. But in order

2:17:09 ↗ to make a decision beyond that, you need the data that shows where the needs

2:17:14 ↗ are in our park system and what the maintenance costs are. And we haven't had

2:17:19 ↗ that before. And that is one of the things we definitely need in order to

2:17:23 ↗ make decisions like this. However, I think it's the parks maintenance worker compliment right now

2:17:28 ↗ is grossly lacking. And I think this one needs to be added. Having said that,

2:17:32 ↗ thank you so much for making a big pitch for the post, too, though, on

2:17:37 ↗ your little thing. Because that is the framework I need to make decisions like this.

2:17:41 ↗ You're out of order. - I'm in favor of this. -

2:17:47 ↗ Thank you Mary Lou. Nina. - Without repeating the complexity of all the

2:17:53 ↗ comments that came before, they exemplify why this is a difficult decision to

2:17:59 ↗ make and I'm not as wholehearted about this. I'm cautious about it because

2:18:05 ↗ of the increasing future costs that a permanent employee brings. Is this the

2:18:11 ↗ right timing? Eileen's statistics were very compelling. And I don't have to vote

2:18:17 ↗ right this minute, but I'm leaning towards supporting it, though it is a cost burden

2:18:22 ↗ going forward, and I'm concerned about that. Thank you, Nina. Stacy? I support it. Thank

2:18:28 ↗ you. Are there any other questions or comments? Are we ready to vote on this

2:18:34 ↗ item? So again, a thumb up is in favor of this proposal. Thumb down is

2:18:39 ↗ not in favor. All those-- so vote. That passes with a six to one vote.

2:18:46 ↗ I'd like you to shade the old town standards update line.

2:18:52 ↗ I'd like him to add the E back. No. You want

2:18:58 ↗ to put the E on the end of town. I'm kidding.

2:19:03 ↗ I'm kidding. OK. So the next item to discuss is-- and

2:19:09 ↗ so let me fix this one. This is a complete affordable

2:19:14 ↗ housing strategy. The shift keys aren't working. And we'll start this

2:19:20 ↗ conversation with you, Eileen. And I'm going to need some

2:19:26 ↗ help on this. I know it's part of the housing strategy and

2:19:31 ↗ working with ARCH in regards to some of their strategies. But I

2:19:37 ↗ don't have quite all the details, so I'm going to lean over

2:19:43 ↗ to get some help here. So this would assist us in taking

2:19:48 ↗ a look at what methods we might be able to use to

2:19:54 ↗ preserve, incentivize, require, the development of affordable

2:19:59 ↗ housing in our community. There have been several methodologies

2:20:05 ↗ that we've discussed with the council as we've talked

2:20:11 ↗ about the use of ARCH's housing trust fund or

2:20:17 ↗ their work program or as we deliberated over the

2:20:23 ↗ comp plan. And this would enable us to

2:20:28 ↗ look into those strategies with greater detail, gather some

2:20:34 ↗ marketplace data as well, so that we could make

2:20:40 ↗ some solid recommendations on which methods we think will

2:20:45 ↗ be successful. So the housing strategy is a

2:20:51 ↗ task that's identified in the comprehensive plan. That's been

2:20:57 ↗ approved by council. In addition, development of the housing

2:21:02 ↗ strategy is part of Arches work plan. It's been

2:21:07 ↗ on the work plan for several years and we're

2:21:14 ↗ Desiring to make some progress on that task this year.

2:21:23 ↗ I'm thinking. All right. Is this the same one we were discussing earlier? OK.

2:21:29 ↗ So I'm going to support this. Why do I support this and not the

2:21:35 ↗ Old Town Standards Update? Because this one is complex and weird, and it's not

2:21:41 ↗ obvious that we have the internal skill set to do it. It involves some

2:21:47 ↗ very esoteric skills. And so I'll be supporting it. Thanks. Thank you. Josh?

2:21:54 ↗ We already have an affordable housing strategy in the central area plan. I'm looking at

2:21:59 ↗ it now at pages 70 through 73 of that plan that was adopted by the

2:22:05 ↗ council and a considerable amount of time and resources were put into it. The very

2:22:10 ↗ last page of the plan actually, page 73, says housing recommended implementation strategies. And it's

2:22:15 ↗ got five things under subsection one, dealing with locating the majority of housing growth in

2:22:21 ↗ central Issaquah by, and it lists a number of tools, policy tools that the council

2:22:26 ↗ can implement. If you look specifically on the issue of affordable housing, that's also addressed

2:22:31 ↗ in housing goal B at page 71. And that, again, discusses potential policy initiatives that

2:22:37 ↗ the Council can take, such as regulations requiring affordable housing for developers that wish

2:22:43 ↗ to build above the base FAR, or considering the MTFE as an incentive to

2:22:49 ↗ provide affordable housing, or using regulatory or other incentives such as bonus density and

2:22:55 ↗ lower parking requirements. pioneer projects, more relaxed definitions of housing affordability and regulations, local

2:23:01 ↗ incentives and public resources. So all the tools are there. And a considerable amount

2:23:07 ↗ of time was already spent on developing these policies and strategies. So I don't know

2:23:13 ↗ what the value of completing the strategy is when we've already assessed what the strategy

2:23:17 ↗ is and the policy is, and then it just becomes a question as to whether

2:23:22 ↗ we want to implement that policy through regulations and incentives. So again, under the mantra

2:23:26 ↗ of less planning, more doing, this is way more planning and far less doing. Spend

2:23:31 ↗ the money on something that actually gets done in the central area and not just

2:23:35 ↗ continuing to talk about things like policies that have already been developed. No way I

2:23:40 ↗ can support this. Thank you, Josh. Mary Lou. So having spent a lot of

2:23:46 ↗ time with the comp plan section that Josh was just talking about, maybe our wording

2:23:50 ↗ up there isn't completely describing what we're trying to accomplish. But I think that we

2:23:55 ↗ need to have some code changes, and I think the code changes are going to

2:24:00 ↗ come about because of policy decisions Council can make next year with this outside expertise

2:24:05 ↗ that Tola is referring to. We have great ideas in our comp plan, and we

2:24:10 ↗ have some vision. We don't have any really solid ideas teeth or code language or

2:24:15 ↗ really exciting incentives that are actually moving the market. So watching the progress report, seeing

2:24:19 ↗ that we're not getting it, I think this is an investment we need to make

2:24:22 ↗ before we are too far down the road in terms of the number of development

2:24:26 ↗ applications that are in. So I'm going to support this one. Well, just to be

2:24:30 ↗ clear, I was referring to the central area plan, not the comprehensive. Oh, sorry, sorry.

2:24:34 ↗ You're right. Central area plan. Yes. Which we were also looking at as well. Which

2:24:38 ↗ is part of the comprehensive plan. Thank you for that clarification. Thank you, Mary Lou.

2:24:42 ↗ Nina? Thank you, Mary Lou. Ditto to all you said. I have a

2:24:48 ↗ question about the source of funding for this. Diane's been sitting here so long, this

2:24:54 ↗ is a question I think that's for you. It has to do with the funds

2:25:00 ↗ that came back from At Work for affordable housing, the 965. Together Center. Pardon me?

2:25:06 ↗ Together Center. Together Center. Thank you. Together Center, located nearer. It would have been.

2:25:11 ↗ It would work. Can any of those funds be used for this? Yes. Okay, then

2:25:17 ↗ that's what I would have liked to do if we had that kind of flexibility

2:25:22 ↗ in the way we're doing this. And maybe we still, I believe in the funding

2:25:27 ↗ of this, but I've thought that maybe we could keep some of that money closer

2:25:32 ↗ to home to develop affordable housing here. I do wholeheartedly support participating with ARCH and

2:25:38 ↗ having a regional approach. But there is so much that we need to do right

2:25:42 ↗ here. So when that pot of money came around, I was hoping for an opportunity

2:25:46 ↗ to snag some and do something like this with it, and then it breezed by

2:25:50 ↗ me too quickly. I would suggest if we had an opportunity to talk about it

2:25:54 ↗ in that vein, I'd like to. And that would be how I would support it.

2:25:59 ↗ And I do think it has urgency, like Mary Lou has said, because a

2:26:05 ↗ lot of development is coming through our door. Market-based affordable housing is almost an

2:26:11 ↗ oxymoron. It needs government support. Thank you. Thank you. Stacey? I agree with the

2:26:16 ↗ comments that Mary Lou made. I also like, similar to

2:26:23 ↗ Ms. The mixed-use piece that I supported, I support this because when we adopted

2:26:28 ↗ the central iso-crop plan, we knew that there were going to be items that

2:26:34 ↗ we needed to further address, and this is one of those pieces. Mr. All

2:26:40 ↗ right. Thank you. I fully support the completion of the development of our

2:26:46 ↗ housing strategy, affordable housing strategy plan. I mean, that was part of that process has

2:26:51 ↗ started. It started with that presentation work session item. I think we had with Arch

2:26:56 ↗ earlier in this year where we looked at a number of different things. I honestly

2:27:01 ↗ was i'm kind of getting back to and i said this

2:27:06 ↗ earlier i thought this was in the work plan this idea that

2:27:12 ↗ we needed to spend more already i mean i looked at the

2:27:18 ↗ budget proposal and as i pointed out earlier in this document you

2:27:24 ↗ know it's it's in this very area where you know support development

2:27:29 ↗ of affordable housing strategies and actions so so i'm i'm i and

2:27:35 ↗ this is vital work I read the original proposal that saying that

2:27:41 ↗ it was in the plan. There it is in the work plan. And to see

2:27:46 ↗ now a kind of a line item to say, to call that out as requiring

2:27:51 ↗ additional funding, It's not the concept. It's as for the reason stated

2:27:57 ↗ earlier about that we do that, you know, the market is forces are what

2:28:03 ↗ creates housing affordability such as it is there do it's well understood science almost

2:28:08 ↗ that we have to create incentives to actually get the outcomes when it comes

2:28:14 ↗ to housing affordability. It's an issue. It's very important to me. I'm just

2:28:20 ↗ it's kind of this, we gotta spend some more to do something we said we

2:28:25 ↗ were already gonna do. So that is, that's where I'm stuck on that. I thought

2:28:30 ↗ this was, it didn't come up when we met a few months ago. It wasn't

2:28:35 ↗ in the original proposal. This is kind of a, it's brought on a little bit

2:28:40 ↗ later. So I'm, and also, it's, I think the issue goes beyond just having an

2:28:45 ↗ affordable housing strategy. I think it's, you know, it's a housing strategy with affordable being

2:28:51 ↗ part of that. And I think that there are other key objectives. If this were

2:28:56 ↗ to pass this evening and we're saying I would expect work still to progress, you

2:29:02 ↗ know, on development of the strategy if it doesn't pass. I mean, it would still

2:29:08 ↗ expect work to proceed on on this strategy because that was, I thought, what I

2:29:13 ↗ heard earlier this year. So I'm really kind of torn. I'm not sure

2:29:19 ↗ how I'm going to vote right yet. So it's going to be a last split

2:29:24 ↗ second decision for me. The outcome is desirable. Do we need to spend more to

2:29:30 ↗ get that outcome? That's what I'm not sure about. Are there any other-- do you

2:29:35 ↗ want to make another comment? No, you just pulled me back to the brink, though.

2:29:41 ↗ You're not quite as sure as I was. Do you want to make a comment,

2:29:47 ↗ Nina? Just about the funding source and whether it had merit to look at whether

2:29:51 ↗ the funding source made a difference. Thank you for the reminder. I'm not sure where

2:29:56 ↗ the earmark lived. Mitigation fund. It lived in the mitigation fund. It lives in the

2:30:00 ↗ mitigation fund. It lives in the mitigation fund. So what we're referring to is the

2:30:05 ↗ balance of the original million dollars, which had been earmarked for the establishment of a

2:30:10 ↗ human services campus, that balance is 965. So I want to do a quick little

2:30:16 ↗ poll here. If this was actually funded out of the mitigation

2:30:21 ↗ fund from that $965 allotment, I think this is what-- -

2:30:27 ↗ $965,000. - Yeah, $965,000. I mean, that is Nina's ask. Kind

2:30:32 ↗ of open up the floor for a little bit more conversation.

2:30:38 ↗ Does it make a difference to people if it's funded

2:30:46 ↗ out of those funds earmarked that we already have earmarked for affordable housing? Just

2:30:51 ↗ open up the floor for general comments. Stacy, then Mary Lou. Can I

2:30:57 ↗ ask a question about the follow-up on your comments about what -- I want to

2:31:02 ↗ make sure everybody's informed before you make a decision. Sure. So what would -- if

2:31:08 ↗ this didn't pass, what would be in the work plan? What would get done? So

2:31:14 ↗ it's like Paul pointed to, support development of affordable housing strategies and actions. What --

2:31:19 ↗ So it doesn't say finish. It says support. And so I think one of

2:31:25 ↗ the items that we had was-- and it didn't make the cut originally. That's why

2:31:31 ↗ this is on the table-- was over what period of time could we get this

2:31:36 ↗ done? And where's the knowledge gaps that we have on staff to support this? And

2:31:42 ↗ so we didn't put this in the original because we know we're going to be

2:31:48 ↗ able to make progress on this on the affordable housing strategy. But if

2:31:54 ↗ we can get closer to finishing it and be able to support the knowledge gap

2:32:00 ↗ that we've got on this, then we would, I mean, that, you know, I

2:32:05 ↗ think we'd make good progress on it. Our biggest concern was just that we've got

2:32:11 ↗ policies, as Josh identified, but they're broad-based. They're not specific tools. They don't define government

2:32:17 ↗ action. That's what we were hoping to get a little more specificity around so that

2:32:23 ↗ we can get that finalized. And we are a little concerned about where the marketplace

2:32:28 ↗ is going and continuing to see those applications come in. The question was really

2:32:34 ↗ around, you know, from our initial evaluation was that knowledge gap and then being able

2:32:39 ↗ to bring this to completion faster than it could potentially be. But they're still going

2:32:44 ↗ to be very active, as Paul identified, staff involvement in developing that. Can you go

2:32:49 ↗ back to the list? Paul, can I ask you a question? Hold on. I think

2:32:54 ↗ Stacey is still in mid-question. Okay, it was Mary Lou and then Tola and then

2:32:59 ↗ Eileen. You can ask a question because I'm commenting. My question is, and I should

2:33:04 ↗ probably know the answer to this, do we always, any time as we look at

2:33:09 ↗ the upcoming year and we're going to have consultants, are consultants always called out as

2:33:14 ↗ a line item or are there times where consultant costs are not explicitly called out?

2:33:19 ↗ So generally you'll see it under professional services. Sometimes they are, sometimes they aren't. In

2:33:24 ↗ this case, there were these five requests that came in that didn't, they were just

2:33:30 ↗ below the cut line. Um, and so that's why you're getting the call out is

2:33:35 ↗ because it was that specific and not necessarily because it was a consultant. I didn't

2:33:40 ↗ understand the end of that. So when you go through the budget, you'll see in

2:33:45 ↗ there there's a professional services and sometimes it talks about, you know, what those professional

2:33:51 ↗ services are. It's not, you don't get into the, uh, 10 items that may or

2:33:56 ↗ may not be within the professional services. It's just within the overall work plan that

2:34:02 ↗ kind of gets spelled out over narrative. But in this case, it got called out

2:34:07 ↗ specifically because it didn't make the cut line. So we ended up with kind of

2:34:13 ↗ the special conversation under deliberations of items that we may want to be able to

2:34:19 ↗ fund on a one-off basis. Thank you. Eileen, then Mary Lou. OK. Bob, you were

2:34:24 ↗ talking-- We did not have the staff expertise to complete this, so this

2:34:30 ↗ is for a consultant to be hired to complete this. - Wanna answer something?

2:34:37 ↗ That's correct. This would allow us to talk to, get

2:34:43 ↗ some assistance from industry experts, perhaps allow us to purchase

2:34:49 ↗ additional market data, but also have the assistance of someone

2:34:55 ↗ who has developed these strategies in the past and knows

2:35:01 ↗ how to look at writing specific code or other policy

2:35:07 ↗ tools in such a fashion that they'll lead us to the

2:35:12 ↗ outcomes that we're looking for. We have some indication of some

2:35:18 ↗ of those things and then others. We think there's a research component to

2:35:24 ↗ this as well. We've identified a few of those potential strategies and various

2:35:30 ↗ plans. I'll throw out an example of something that's not explicitly listed in

2:35:36 ↗ our plan, but that might be researching the effectiveness of a demolition fee.

2:35:42 ↗ If we're concerned about the loss of older, smaller, more affordable housing.

2:35:47 ↗ Maybe that is one of the things that we need to

2:35:53 ↗ research a little bit more and develop some potential policies that

2:35:59 ↗ council can consider. So this $20,000 would complete this plan and

2:36:05 ↗ then the other half is what happens if this plan is

2:36:11 ↗ not completed? if the $20,000 is not put into the

2:36:17 ↗ pot and we can't complete this plan. Where are we? What happens?

2:36:23 ↗ Well, you know, the world goes on. You've got You just work

2:36:28 ↗ within the existing policies and the market's gonna do what the market's going to do.

2:36:33 ↗ So I think the uniqueness of this is in the past we had kind of

2:36:38 ↗ mechanisms to deal with it like the development agreements. And so they were, excuse me,

2:36:42 ↗ negotiated within the whole overall framework and the scope of that so you could take

2:36:47 ↗ into account the economics the developer and the city could take into scope under the

2:36:53 ↗ central area. It's a little it's a little different because there's other than the Raleigh

2:36:59 ↗ development agreement, there isn't necessarily a development agreement that exists that you've kind of got

2:37:04 ↗ to define economic arrangement that's getting made. So this is kind of where we are

2:37:10 ↗ dealing with a unique animal for us. Mary Lou. So my comment on Nina's suggestion

2:37:16 ↗ about perhaps using these mitigation funds to pay for the study, I would agree with

2:37:21 ↗ that. I guess my expectation for that money was that some of the potential code

2:37:27 ↗ changes or incentives we have, we may have to backfill in and I use the

2:37:32 ↗ MFT, the multifamily tax exemption as an example of where you would actually need to

2:37:36 ↗ find a source of money to pay those taxes during that ten-year period and that

2:37:41 ↗ actually gets us units on the ground and I've kind of got my vision locked

2:37:47 ↗ on, I would love to see that $900 and some thousand dollars actually go towards

2:37:52 ↗ the construction of units, not a study. So normally I would say good idea, but

2:37:57 ↗ now I'm thinking, no, I actually think if we can afford to do this out

2:38:03 ↗ of an ending fund balance, we should do it. We should use that money to

2:38:08 ↗ actually help. Okay. Is there any other comments or questions? So is the council ready

2:38:14 ↗ to vote on this item? Okay. So the question is, All

2:38:19 ↗ in favor of the proposal to spend $20,000 for

2:38:25 ↗ completing the affordable housing strategy, thumbs up, thumbs down

2:38:30 ↗ if you disagree. There are four thumbs up and

2:38:36 ↗ three down, it passes. Okay, the next item on

2:38:42 ↗ the list in no particular order is the one

2:38:47 ↗ that we put on, it was a walk on

2:38:53 ↗ today. It was the funding of the completion of

2:38:59 ↗ the design of the Holly Street project. It's already partially funded

2:39:04 ↗ at $150,000 in the 2016. So that initial 150 is actually not

2:39:10 ↗ up for deliberation. The council is implicitly saying we're supporting that. This

2:39:16 ↗ is a proposal to appropriate the rest of the monies to complete

2:39:21 ↗ design in 2016. And I'm going to actually, whose turn is it?

2:39:27 ↗ It's yours. Okay. So Tola, we'll start with you.

2:39:35 ↗ so the fundamental idea of putting some money towards uh something that improves uh mobility

2:39:40 ↗ within the city i think is a great idea my challenge here is that i

2:39:45 ↗ like josh's number two choice more than his number one choice here's why um there's

2:39:50 ↗ there's already a creek crossing a block north and in less than a block south

2:39:55 ↗ there will eventually be a creek crossing as part of confluence park so So I

2:40:00 ↗ feel like comparing that to the intersection in front of Trader Joe's, I think if

2:40:06 ↗ I, I'm pretty confident if I went out and talked to people in the community

2:40:12 ↗ that they would say making progress towards solving the intersection in front of Trader Joe's

2:40:17 ↗ is a bigger deal. So, I am not in favor of supporting this item as

2:40:23 ↗ currently written, but I would support it if it was changed to Josh's number two

2:40:28 ↗ choice, which was $300,000. And I don't know if it was complete to study in

2:40:33 ↗ front of Trader Joe's, but it's to make progress on that. That's where I'm at.

2:40:38 ↗ Thanks. All right. Thank you, Josh. So the Trader Joe's intersection is not on the

2:40:43 ↗ TIP. It came up in the crossing study. And there's, according to Sheldon, there

2:40:49 ↗ would need to be some interim improvements as well as a larger scale intersection control

2:40:54 ↗ project. He says it would be possible for approximately 300,000 to begin and possibly complete

2:41:00 ↗ the design using consultants of the larger scale project. Now he says in 2017. And

2:41:06 ↗ I didn't really get into that with him because I just noticed it doesn't actually

2:41:12 ↗ say 2016. So I'm a little unclear on what the 300,000 would go towards in

2:41:17 ↗ 2016 for that particular project. I think I agree it's a significant intersection and it

2:41:23 ↗ needs to be addressed and the public is very concerned about that intersection. I also

2:41:29 ↗ tend to think that if it were part of a bond package that the city

2:41:34 ↗ puts out next year that it might improve the passability of the bond. because of

2:41:39 ↗ that very concern. And so I have to look at also not just the short

2:41:43 ↗ term game, but also the long game. And so, you know, is the public going

2:41:47 ↗ to be more excited about passing a bond that improves a pedestrian connection along Holly

2:41:51 ↗ Street? maybe some people are you know are people going to be really excited on

2:41:56 ↗ getting that driveway fixed absolutely and so when we look as a council at are

2:42:00 ↗ we creating a bond measure that's subject to pass which is one of the principal

2:42:04 ↗ concerns that we look at as as an entity um i think that's that's a

2:42:08 ↗ really big significant hook for getting that package passed um and so i'd like to

2:42:12 ↗ see that in that bond package you know in terms of holly street i'll just

2:42:17 ↗ reiterate something i said earlier In 2017, the CFP already projects that we will budget

2:42:22 ↗ $265,000 to complete design on Holly Street. So this is already projected for the 2017

2:42:27 ↗ budget. It's just a matter of moving the dollars up a year so that we

2:42:32 ↗ can complete the design instead of just getting us to 50% and having the plan

2:42:38 ↗ sit on a shelf for an entire year. It also puts us in a position

2:42:43 ↗ to leverage tib funds which can then cover a portion of the city cost and

2:42:48 ↗ ultimately save the city money and childen is very confident in our ability to get

2:42:54 ↗ tib funds being both pedestrian improvements and a safe routes to school corridor and so

2:42:59 ↗ this has been a high priority for the city on our cfp for many years

2:43:05 ↗ and i think since we're already going to probably do it in 2017 since

2:43:11 ↗ we're committing ourselves to completing design, I agree, it doesn't get us an actual lane.

2:43:16 ↗ It doesn't get us, you know, more signals or huge corridor improvements, but it gets

2:43:21 ↗ us one step closer to fulfilling a transportation project. And when you look at what

2:43:26 ↗ the community told us in that survey that we put out last year, transportation was

2:43:31 ↗ the number one issue. They didn't tell us they wanted maintenance workers and consultants and

2:43:37 ↗ standards updates. They told us they wanted transportation. So I feel like we just have

2:43:42 ↗ to do something more. And I have fought for eight years to improve transportation in

2:43:46 ↗ this city. And I really want as part of my legacy leaving this council to

2:43:51 ↗ say that we did one more thing to further our transportation efforts in the city

2:43:55 ↗ and improve our network. I fully support this. Thank you, Josh. Mary Lou. I have

2:44:00 ↗ no comments or questions on this one. I support Josh's rationale for adding this one

2:44:05 ↗ in. Thank you. Nina? Since we're looking at all of them, Tola's

2:44:10 ↗ looking at number two, I liked the trails crossing. Can you remind me, just give

2:44:16 ↗ me the little short thing what that was again? You bet. I just closed out,

2:44:21 ↗ but I'm going to do it from memory. The three trails crossing is the intersection

2:44:27 ↗ area near Gilman and Rainier where the streets are somewhat misaligned. And there's a need

2:44:32 ↗ for non-motorized improvements at that particular area. That project is slated, I believe, for the

2:44:38 ↗ 2018 to 2019 biennium, according to our six-year TIP. And so in order

2:44:44 ↗ to put funds towards starting design on that project, you would essentially be

2:44:49 ↗ putting funds towards partial design of Three Trails Crossing and some funds towards partial

2:44:55 ↗ design of Holly Street. And so that's why I suggested Holly, because it puts it

2:45:00 ↗ all into getting one project moving forward instead of 50 here, 50 there. What was

2:45:05 ↗ the price tag on? $300,000. $325,000. So they're all about the same. OK. I'm looking

2:45:10 ↗ forward to hearing the rest of the table, because this is a complicated topic. And

2:45:15 ↗ the comments-- I've only added to my complicated approach to it. The spending dollars

2:45:21 ↗ now that may be fewer than the dollars that you spend in a few

2:45:26 ↗ years is part of your logic too. Maybe you said that something that cost

2:45:32 ↗ $265,000 this year in two years or three years or whenever it was that

2:45:38 ↗ we might have done it would likely cost more. So there would be a

2:45:43 ↗ savings. The capability of our public works engineering director and his team of

2:45:49 ↗ leveraging funds is well proven. So I have a lot of confidence that this would

2:45:54 ↗ manifest the way that you hope. I'm totally on the fence for those reasons. It's

2:46:00 ↗ a heck of a lot of money and it's in the plan and it'll get

2:46:05 ↗ done when we get there. But that value of the dollar today might be enough.

2:46:10 ↗ I want to hear what the other folks have to say. Thank you. Well, Josh,

2:46:16 ↗ I appreciate you making the proposals. I would prefer, however, that this be a different

2:46:22 ↗ process. This feels like this should be going to one of our committees, probably infrastructure,

2:46:28 ↗ to look at to give the public more of an opportunity to weigh in on

2:46:34 ↗ how maybe we should be spending spending this money if we

2:46:39 ↗ want to make a decision about what we're going to move to the top

2:46:45 ↗ of the list. So it's not that I oppose a project, but I would

2:46:51 ↗ prefer to see it be a different process, our regular process. - Thank you.

2:46:57 ↗ And actually really thank you for those comments. I was thinking I wanted to

2:47:03 ↗ add to Josh's legacy and support it since he brought it up. I mean,

2:47:09 ↗ it's a really good realization that I mean, I've been saying this for a

2:47:14 ↗ couple years, that if we're going to use ending fund balance, let's make sure it's

2:47:20 ↗ either one time or we create an asset of lasting value for the community for

2:47:25 ↗ immediate benefit. And this certainly fits within that. One of the things, we had a

2:47:30 ↗ council goal to develop kind of a citywide master mobility plan, and we parked that

2:47:35 ↗ once we completed the project. the concurrency study and said, "We've got a pretty good

2:47:40 ↗ list of things that we know needs to be done." It's not comprehensive because it's

2:47:45 ↗ largely capacity related issues and mobility needs greater things than that. But it's really a

2:47:50 ↗ very comprehensive and well vetted list of projects for well known reasons. And

2:47:56 ↗ so let's continue down that line and that's why we're now, the call

2:48:02 ↗ has been out to convene for applications for the citizens task force for transportation

2:48:08 ↗ funding strategy and but i mentioned that because what we didn't do what we kind

2:48:14 ↗ of parked is completing the city-wide mobility plan which i which i would think when

2:48:19 ↗ it comes to non-capacity related projects would really whether they you know mobility not just

2:48:24 ↗ motorized not just pedestrian but also potentially parking that you know working within that framework

2:48:30 ↗ would be my preference So I have reasons to support it because

2:48:36 ↗ of what it aspires to do and we have the capability to

2:48:42 ↗ do that. And just so you know, even if we were to

2:48:47 ↗ fund this, just so you know where we are, this needs a

2:48:53 ↗ little fine tuning, but our budget would be at about a 20,

2:48:59 ↗ if we approve everything that's on here and don't make any other

2:49:05 ↗ changes, we're still at about a 20% ratio of expenditure to end-to-client

2:49:11 ↗ balance. Eileen. way to pass it um for me

2:49:17 ↗ this is as i'm understanding it this is for the completion

2:49:23 ↗ of it and currently design just design just the design and

2:49:29 ↗ potentially construction in 2017. but yes But even with just talking about

2:49:35 ↗ the completion of the design, it is to start and propose to start

2:49:40 ↗ this year with its completion of the design next year and then the

2:49:46 ↗ actual construction of it. So we are only delaying this by a limited

2:49:51 ↗ amount of time. I'm not sure for the 265 that pushing it

2:49:58 ↗ into this year's budget just to complete the design. I do understand that this, by

2:50:04 ↗ completing it this year, that gives us the ability to move forward with the actual

2:50:09 ↗ construction of it next year. I think I will be not

2:50:15 ↗ supporting this this year. Thank you. I'm going to follow up. Absolutely.

2:50:21 ↗ Everybody's had a chance, please. So if this fails, I intend to

2:50:27 ↗ propose an alternate way to use this money in line with what

2:50:33 ↗ Stacey's comments. I'm not sure I understood that. If we should

2:50:38 ↗ choose not to spend it on Holly Street, I think we should set aside

2:50:44 ↗ an amount of money for the purpose of making a mobility improvement and then

2:50:50 ↗ allow the public to be engaged in how to spend that money. Okay. I

2:50:56 ↗ have no idea if it'll pass or not. I'm just telling you a...

2:51:02 ↗ Yeah, that's an alternate idea. You're telling us that you would actually a budget proposal

2:51:07 ↗ this evening, an appropriation or a budget item this evening to just strike the specificity

2:51:12 ↗ on this one around the idea of public engagement. I think Josh's fundamental idea is

2:51:17 ↗ great, but I agree with Stacy that this bears further investigation before you decide where

2:51:22 ↗ to put the money. Okay. Any other questions or comments? Josh? So this

2:51:28 ↗ has been investigated. It's on our TIP. You will be asked next year to approve

2:51:33 ↗ $265,000 to complete design on Holly Street. I'm just asking you to do it one

2:51:39 ↗ year sooner. I don't see any reason to delay the implementation of 100% design on

2:51:44 ↗ a project that you will already be committing yourselves to by funding half of it

2:51:49 ↗ in the budget this year already and the ability to then leverage those funds to

2:51:55 ↗ get a TIB grant to complete this. I think after all the things this council

2:52:00 ↗ has just approved, to not approve a transportation item here is simply absurd And I

2:52:05 ↗ wouldn't be proposing this if this brought our debt coverage ratio below 20 down to

2:52:10 ↗ 15, which is the adopted financial policy. And I appreciate Paul, you mentioning that because

2:52:14 ↗ this does not take as significant of a hit out of the general fund as

2:52:19 ↗ you know, a multimillion dollar type of project would. You know, I'd like to maybe

2:52:23 ↗ hear from the administration on this because we haven't, Sheldon had a good conversation with

2:52:28 ↗ me, but I think the administration may be able to offer the reasons why this

2:52:32 ↗ is a valuable project. Sure. With that invitation, thank you. So, you

2:52:38 ↗ know, many times my comments are based on conversations I've had with the mayor,

2:52:43 ↗ and we also have the advantage of having the mayor over my shoulder tonight,

2:52:49 ↗ too. So he may want to throw in some comments as well. I think this

2:52:55 ↗ would have been a recommended project to include in the budget. We were being very

2:53:00 ↗ cognizant of not spending any fund balance and then as we developed the budget and

2:53:05 ↗ then as we kind of went through this conversation, it was like, "Oh, well, there

2:53:10 ↗ is this opportunity for us to get this project." And it would move up. It

2:53:15 ↗ would make the project much more competitive if we had the design done for the

2:53:20 ↗ TIB and submitted that for the 2017 funding cycle. year. It

2:53:26 ↗ is, you know, a pet improvement, part of our walk and roll. So we would

2:53:31 ↗ be actually making some good progress on getting that first kind of project done in

2:53:36 ↗ that area as well. The administration's in complete support of getting this project completed. You

2:53:42 ↗ know, I will say that Stacy laid out an interesting concept, which there is a

2:53:47 ↗ process question here that if that was a desire to do, you know, we do

2:53:53 ↗ have a process through the normal you know, agenda bill process that this would come

2:53:58 ↗ to council, it would go and get reviewed, and then it would come back to

2:54:03 ↗ council for final decision. And then it would get amended mid-year. So there's kind of

2:54:07 ↗ a two-step process. Alternatively, I think you're hearing our perspective right now, which is we

2:54:12 ↗ think it's a good project. And if you chose to just kind of expedite it

2:54:16 ↗ and include it as part of this evaluation, we wouldn't have any complaints. Okay, thank

2:54:22 ↗ you. Are there any other questions or comments? Is the council

2:54:28 ↗ ready to vote on this? Okay, so a thumb up is

2:54:34 ↗ in favor of doing the project of approving $265,000 for expenditure

2:54:39 ↗ in 2016. Okay, you don't have to look. I don't like

2:54:45 ↗ to look. Everybody must vote. Okay, vote. There are five thumbs

2:54:51 ↗ in favor and two against. So that passes. Wow.

2:54:56 ↗ Just let me use the count. Okay,

2:55:02 ↗ the next item on here is Prost

2:55:08 ↗ 2. Oh, I mean Prost 2. Excuse

2:55:14 ↗ me? You're German, aren't you? Prost.

2:55:23 ↗ Where do we start? I've lost track. Is it you, Josh? I think it's starting

2:55:27 ↗ with you. Tola started with the previous one. I'm trying to keep the same word

2:55:32 ↗ on. So we talked about, I guess I'll steal your thunder since now you're last.

2:55:37 ↗ We talked about this at services yesterday. um and and so fill in any gaps

2:55:42 ↗ that i miss here but um there there was concern i think from

2:55:48 ↗ us on committee um that the the current plan the pros plan that's

2:55:54 ↗ before us now um is not strategic enough and it doesn't contain really

2:56:00 ↗ A plan and the comment I made last night is there's plan with a little

2:56:04 ↗ P and then there's plan with a big P. And the document that we have

2:56:09 ↗ that we're going to be asked to approve at a future council meeting on regular

2:56:13 ↗ business that it was referred to is really a good inventory of the items we

2:56:17 ↗ have. It provides some good statistics and direction, but it doesn't really tell us how

2:56:22 ↗ to get there. And that I think was a significant concern. We heard public comments

2:56:26 ↗ on it at the meeting last night, you know, that this sort of thing has

2:56:30 ↗ been in development year after year after year. 15 years, I think, was the number

2:56:35 ↗ we heard that this has gone by, and we still don't really have the plan

2:56:39 ↗ with a capital P. And I think, Tola, you pointed out last night that as

2:56:44 ↗ part of the comp plan process, that a lot of the comp plan elements pointed

2:56:49 ↗ people towards PROST as a way of addressing some of these issues, but the PROST

2:56:55 ↗ that's before us doesn't really contain all the information we need. So I think it's

2:57:00 ↗ very, very critical that this council moves forward on authorizing an expenditure to do PROST

2:57:06 ↗ B, part two, whatever you want to call it, the strategic planning part of the

2:57:11 ↗ parks, recreation, open space, and trails document and then part one can be approved for

2:57:16 ↗ getting funding and grant purposes and so forth, but you really have to have part

2:57:21 ↗ two to make it all worthwhile and come together. And so, you know, I know

2:57:25 ↗ the number is maybe not quite there, but it gives at least a cap to

2:57:29 ↗ spend up to. So I'm fully supportive for those reasons. Thank you. Mary Lou? Yeah,

2:57:34 ↗ so I introduced this one earlier and actually Josh did a really good job capturing

2:57:39 ↗ some of the why do this plan and I kind of like that analogy of

2:57:44 ↗ the big P and the little p but I found that it's been hard over

2:57:48 ↗ the last two years to make decisions because some of those big policy questions around

2:57:53 ↗ parks and purchases and all and funding for maintenance position seems a little bit I

2:57:58 ↗ can't really see the context of where we're trying to go to understand if I'm

2:58:03 ↗ making a good decision or not on something that's in front of us. So I

2:58:07 ↗ think we need to have those questions answered. We have to discuss them, decide what

2:58:11 ↗ the vision looks like. And I see this document really as a vision piece. something

2:58:15 ↗ that guides us in our future direction and also something that a resident or business

2:58:20 ↗ owner could read and themselves picture what our city looks like, our park system and

2:58:24 ↗ open space will look like in 20 years. Also, I think there's some leveraging opportunities

2:58:29 ↗ with capacity improvements with some partners like the school district and the state park and

2:58:34 ↗ we need to have those conversations and not when people come to us. We need

2:58:39 ↗ to have the conversation. We need to have the discussions of policy before these things

2:58:44 ↗ show up in agenda bill. We're just being asked to approve them in isolation. So

2:58:48 ↗ I am completely in support of this one. Thank you. Nina. Yeah, thank you. Well,

2:58:53 ↗ I'm in support of getting extra help in finalizing the PROST plan. It's been

2:58:59 ↗ frustrating on the Land and Shore Committee to look at this and other decisions, some

2:59:05 ↗ public comment earlier today was revealing some of the things that pop up when you

2:59:11 ↗ don't have a good PROST like Central Park. Things like parking and traffic and other

2:59:17 ↗ things could have a basis and guidance if we had a solid PROST plan. So

2:59:22 ↗ I think we need one. But I don't like the price tag and I don't

2:59:28 ↗ like saying spend whatever you think is right up until 50,000 when two other very

2:59:33 ↗ similar things, hiring a consultant to come in and help our current staff, which is

2:59:38 ↗ what this is about, I think. The others are 20 and $22,000. So why is

2:59:43 ↗ this 150? I want to vote for it, but I don't want to vote at

2:59:48 ↗ that cap. That seems excessive, especially when it's a similar story. service, it's a similar

2:59:54 ↗ time frame. And so I don't want to vote no. I want

3:00:00 ↗ somebody to change the price tag down to 25. Stacey? I, too,

3:00:06 ↗ want to support this. I have the same concern that Nina does

3:00:11 ↗ about the price tag. So my support of it is not supporting

3:00:17 ↗ $50,000. My support of it would be as a--

3:00:24 ↗ having sufficient funding to do the work, but also not sure specifically

3:00:30 ↗ what we would be getting for that besides a plan. So maybe

3:00:36 ↗ additional information about when the administration figures out exactly what that scope

3:00:41 ↗ of work would be, like that to come back to council so we

3:00:47 ↗ can look at that and get a final number. I also continue to

3:00:53 ↗ be concerned about the number of items that we are, the reliance on

3:00:59 ↗ consultants to get much of the work done that I would think we

3:01:05 ↗ could do in-house. With those comments, at this point, I'm going to support

3:01:11 ↗ it. Okay, thank you. I like Nina's

3:01:17 ↗ comments. I'm actually not going to support this

3:01:22 ↗ as presented and I'm going to, if it

3:01:28 ↗ fails, I'm going to propose half the amount.

3:01:33 ↗ Eileen? I'm having difficulties with this. A couple of things. I'm not sure

3:01:39 ↗ what we're going to get. This came about so fast. I mean, literally, it came

3:01:44 ↗ out of services and safety, and all of a sudden, it's here before us this

3:01:49 ↗ evening. We don't even have an outline of what it is we're looking for at

3:01:53 ↗ this time. Is it consultant versus in-house? If it's in-house, their work program for next

3:01:58 ↗ year is already set. And where do we find-- I mean, we still have only

3:02:03 ↗ nine park employees. So who is going to be doing this work if it's

3:02:09 ↗ in-house, if it's a consultant? I'm not sure the dollars amount that's there. I'm having

3:02:15 ↗ trouble with it because we haven't had an opportunity to talk about it. We haven't

3:02:20 ↗ had any feedback. It just literally is something that sort of popped up as we

3:02:26 ↗ were discussing in services and safety. I'm on the fence and would like to hear

3:02:31 ↗ some more conversation. Thank you. Tola? Thanks. This discussion around post to or post B

3:02:37 ↗ or whatever we want to call it did start a couple of months ago in

3:02:42 ↗ various places as we were looking at the post document that was in front of

3:02:48 ↗ us and wanted to see some more of the aspirational side of where we're headed.

3:02:53 ↗ I think we need to do this because it's in our comp plan. The comp

3:02:58 ↗ plan talks about short and long term planning. We don't have it. I think that

3:03:04 ↗ writing eltac okay wrong keyboard sorry continue ignore the

3:03:10 ↗ address from my eloquence it is consulting is expensive

3:03:16 ↗ updating old town standards is a much smaller effort

3:03:21 ↗ than than interviewing lots of different stakeholders and finding

3:03:27 ↗ the common ground between all those different stakeholders

3:03:33 ↗ So I don't think that it's fair to say, and the affordable housing

3:03:39 ↗ strategy is something that's already been started and has a very clearly defined

3:03:45 ↗ goal. I think that it's important for this council to give guidance to next year's

3:03:50 ↗ council that this is important. And that's why I think 50,000, I think it will

3:03:55 ↗ cost 50,000. I mean, I think when we looked at Klahani, some of the even

3:04:01 ↗ small pieces of Klahani, the consulting documents that were associated with that, We're very expensive

3:04:06 ↗ on some of the land use pieces. And so I get that this is more

3:04:11 ↗ than the other two consulting pieces, but it gives us more if we get what

3:04:16 ↗ we need to meet the comp plan or to complete what's called out in the

3:04:22 ↗ comp plan. And by making it conditional on seeing a statement of work that next

3:04:27 ↗ year's council agrees to, I think that we ensure that we won't spend money for

3:04:32 ↗ something that isn't what we're looking for. So I'll be supporting this. Thank you. Is

3:04:37 ↗ there anything you started with you, Josh? I would just like maybe again to hear

3:04:43 ↗ the administration's perspective, especially on the cost issue, because it is kind of ephemeral, you

3:04:48 ↗ know, in terms of what the 50,000 buys us. you know so how

3:04:54 ↗ how close are you aligned on that number um thanks again for the invitation um

3:04:59 ↗ the um so i first of all i want to say that i want to

3:05:05 ↗ i take full responsibility for where this is at because mary lou had a very

3:05:10 ↗ detailed and substantive proposal that she had worked on over several days and the issue

3:05:15 ↗ that it came down to that we had a fairly long discussion around was the

3:05:21 ↗ fact that we have We are lacking a combination of either the capacity or the

3:05:26 ↗ capability to get this work done in-house for a variety of reasons. And so we

3:05:32 ↗ need to hire a consultant to get the work done. What we haven't had the

3:05:38 ↗ time to do was develop a full scope And actually, I think what Mary Lou

3:05:43 ↗ put together is a good basis to start to put that scope together and go

3:05:48 ↗ out and then get some preliminary numbers. And a lot of times what we do

3:05:52 ↗ when we develop the budget, we'll talk to two or three consultants, get a kind

3:05:57 ↗ of a preliminary estimate on what it would cost, and that is what would drive

3:06:02 ↗ that number. And then we go through what we call a request

3:06:07 ↗ for qualifications process. And so we go through, we get the proposals that come in.

3:06:13 ↗ They're not based on price. They're based on qualifications. And then you turn around and

3:06:18 ↗ negotiate the actual contract with them. So the scope of the budget provides a groundwork

3:06:23 ↗ or basis for negotiating the contract based on qualifications. In this case, $50,000 hasn't

3:06:29 ↗ been tested. We haven't gone out and gotten surveys from the marketplace

3:06:34 ↗ yet in terms of what this cost would be because we had

3:06:40 ↗ just started to finalize the scope of services. I think that's why I

3:06:46 ↗ had heard earlier someone say, "Well, the council wants to come back and see," in

3:06:51 ↗ the letter from the council president, "what the scope is going to be and have

3:06:57 ↗ an idea of what the final cost would be." This appropriation gives us a ballpark

3:07:02 ↗ Now the other alternative is to come back with, as Stacy said earlier, an agenda

3:07:07 ↗ bill with a scope. We'd go out, we'd have that done, and in the first

3:07:11 ↗ quarter we'd come back with a recommendation, and then it would be dealt with in

3:07:16 ↗ a mid-year budget review process. So I just wanted to make sure that you understood.

3:07:20 ↗ There would have been a lot more work that Mary Lou had done into this

3:07:25 ↗ and shared with you, but based on that earlier conversation, we were... very concerned about

3:07:30 ↗ the amount that staff would be able to do in-house. And so having

3:07:36 ↗ a consultant do most of this work would, you know, managing contracts very

3:07:42 ↗ different than actually doing some production. But that's where we're at. Okay, thank

3:07:48 ↗ you. Is there any other, you guys, any other comments or questions? Okay, are you

3:07:54 ↗ ready to vote? Oh, Eileen, excuse me. Okay, I'm ready to get off the fence.

3:07:58 ↗ I think for me right now, I can't, approve this, but I agree with what

3:08:03 ↗ I've just heard from Bob, was talking about a mid-year budget process and bringing it

3:08:07 ↗ back as an agenda bill so that we really do understand what it is we're

3:08:11 ↗ looking for and what we want to get back and then bring it back mid-year

3:08:14 ↗ and we've had time to really sort it. I mean, it's a good idea, but

3:08:18 ↗ it just came about so fast and I don't remember two months ago. I only

3:08:22 ↗ remember, yeah. So anyway, I'll be voting no on this, but if

3:08:28 ↗ it's brought back as an agenda bill and looking at mid-year budget

3:08:34 ↗ process, I will support it. - Okay, are we ready to vote?

3:08:40 ↗ So you know the drill, up is in support of the proposal,

3:08:46 ↗ down is against it. Vote. There are four in support and three

3:08:52 ↗ against. So that passes. Make sure I get the right keyboard. The

3:08:58 ↗ wrong key sequence. oh fine okay so the next item on here

3:09:03 ↗ let's see if i can uh we have on here is senior services now

3:09:09 ↗ um um we had a conversation earlier this evening about not funding the the

3:09:15 ↗ nonprofit isaac valley seniors including the this is 65 000 for the performance

3:09:21 ↗ and financial audit when the council put this next line item on here

3:09:27 ↗ it really it was it was a very strong signal that we want

3:09:33 ↗ to fund senior services and i think given that that question has not

3:09:39 ↗ yet been answered I don't unless somebody was to make a real argument I don't

3:09:44 ↗ think that this is in the line item we need to deliberate tonight because we're

3:09:49 ↗ gonna be addressing it again in a future meeting I'm getting a kind of consensus

3:09:53 ↗ with that okay very good so let's move on to our East and and oh

3:09:58 ↗ well before we start this and it's gonna start with Mary Lou we still have

3:10:02 ↗ the funding out of the mitigation fund for the for the skate park to consider

3:10:08 ↗ and I'm going to bring up LTAC as with you as well. So there's two

3:10:13 ↗ other items not on this screen we're still going to talk about if you're counting

3:10:18 ↗ how many we had left. Mary Lou starting with you. This item for $10,000 in

3:10:23 ↗ addition to the the the budget proposal was for $10,000. This is to actually fund

3:10:28 ↗ an additional $10,000 which matches the original request from Artiste. so i'm gonna pass until

3:10:33 ↗ i get a little history on this one this one is not on my radar

3:10:37 ↗ right now so somebody familiar with it go ahead okay you'll have to start with

3:10:41 ↗ the next one then okay somebody's gonna explain it well i'm just wondering if you

3:10:46 ↗ want because this came out of committee yeah um if you wanted to start with

3:10:50 ↗ one of the committee members okay so we discussed it last time but um if

3:10:55 ↗ everybody agrees that would be a good review go um all right mr committee

3:11:00 ↗ chair i think that this is in recognition of the ongoing

3:11:06 ↗ work that we see collaboration downtown you know i mentioned earlier

3:11:12 ↗ human services and the benefit of collaboration between organizations this is

3:11:17 ↗ true in sort of I don't want to say booster because that's not the

3:11:23 ↗ right word but the partnership between downtown Issaquah Association and Art East and the

3:11:29 ↗ Historical Society it seems like it's bearing a particular amount of fruit and we were

3:11:35 ↗ convinced in the application that art east was going to use the money

3:11:41 ↗ wisely and so i think the administration was being reflexively cautious with dollars

3:11:47 ↗ but we thought this one rose to the level of uh being worth

3:11:53 ↗ uh giving the amount the applicant requested okay now i'm gonna go back

3:11:59 ↗ to sequence do you want to start okay yeah i'm in support of

3:12:05 ↗ this one Thank you. Mary Lou, Nina. Yeah, I'm

3:12:11 ↗ in support of it too, especially the leverage that this provides to Old

3:12:16 ↗ Town and the fulfillment of the standards of being a multi-organizational collaborative effort.

3:12:22 ↗ They do prove that in the past and they have it in their

3:12:28 ↗ application for future work. I agree. I support it. And I think

3:12:34 ↗ the visual arts is just growing tremendously. I think we're seeing a tremendous response from

3:12:40 ↗ not only our residents, but from people within the region and the creativity and the

3:12:46 ↗ quality and the true engagement, interactive, hands on touch. I've seen it myself. I think

3:12:52 ↗ it's one of the more powerful features or forces within the community. And I enthusiastically

3:12:57 ↗ support the programs of ArtEast and I'm gonna support this as well.

3:13:03 ↗ Eileen? Tola? Josh? Shocking as it may be to some, I concurred with the majority

3:13:09 ↗ recommendation of the committee to support the 10,000. I only wish that Chris Brandt could

3:13:14 ↗ have put us over the top in supporting Atwork University tonight, but I'll support this

3:13:20 ↗ line item. Are you ready to vote on this item? All those in favor, thumb

3:13:26 ↗ up. Thumb down if you disagree. Seven, oh, in favor. Okay. The final item on

3:13:32 ↗ the general fund are the parks department brochures. And I'm going to ask,

3:13:37 ↗ so this is one you talk about coming up late and having no information about.

3:13:43 ↗ This one is top of the list. So you're getting your machine ready. Like you're

3:13:48 ↗ going to, do you need permission to present something? Okay. Eileen, can you have... Can

3:13:54 ↗ you, this was your proposal, your ask. - It was. - So I'm gonna ask

3:13:59 ↗ you to brief the council before we begin deliberation. - Okay, I think the dollar

3:14:04 ↗ amount may be a bit higher than true needs. And again, it is a fairly

3:14:09 ↗ recent, So it hasn't been fleshed out really well. But it is one of those

3:14:14 ↗ pieces that, as I am involved with the Chamber of Commerce and down there quite

3:14:20 ↗ often, it's always amazing how many people come in still looking for something in hand,

3:14:25 ↗ especially a lot of the senior citizens that come in that are visiting our area.

3:14:31 ↗ And there isn't anything left as far as brochures. Everything that we've been doing basically

3:14:36 ↗ has been photocopies of old ones. and they're looking pretty rough. So

3:14:42 ↗ this would be to provide walking maps within the

3:14:47 ↗ city, within Tiger Mountain, Lake Tradition area. There's a

3:14:53 ↗ number of different other maps that we The one that is

3:14:59 ↗ always used and always asked for is the edible, what's the name of it? Edible

3:15:05 ↗ landscaping. Edible landscaping. Yeah, the Edible, Gilman Boulevard Edible Landscaping Tour. That one is just

3:15:11 ↗ always asked for and it's just always out of print, out of photocopied. um it

3:15:17 ↗ doesn't look well for the city if this is the only way that we can

3:15:22 ↗ provide and this would also be providing maps in a digital format that is available

3:15:27 ↗ on the website so that would help promote produce that and also print a run

3:15:32 ↗ of some of the maps probably as many as we possibly could for the dollar

3:15:38 ↗ amounts available There's needs to be probably some of them redesigned. I think

3:15:43 ↗ a lot of them are still probably effective in the design that they're

3:15:49 ↗ in, but just definitely need to make a better looking more and put

3:15:55 ↗ the city branding and the fact that this is a trailhead for the

3:16:00 ↗ city. So it's a, a piece that brings people into our community

3:16:06 ↗ we have a lot of visitors and a lot of guests a lot of people

3:16:10 ↗ that go through they stop and spend time and so tourism dollars are very important

3:16:15 ↗ to us and making sure that they spend a little bit more time walking around

3:16:19 ↗ our community and seeing what we have to offer thank you okay so that was

3:16:23 ↗ kind of the intro uh rotation wise we would be moving over and starting with

3:16:28 ↗ nino Thank you. When I heard about this last week, I was a little skeptical,

3:16:33 ↗ but I learned more about it and then more even this evening during public comment.

3:16:38 ↗ And I want to make a suggestion that we change the name to rather brochures

3:16:42 ↗ to say media, because I think that the electronic versions of these is one of

3:16:47 ↗ the most important value added. Not that the print is to be neglected, but I

3:16:52 ↗ think that that makes a really strong justification for the price tag. We'd be lucky

3:16:56 ↗ to get media. online media and print for that price

3:17:02 ↗ tag, but let's try. Thank you. Nina, Stacey? I

3:17:08 ↗ guess my comments about this one are similar to

3:17:13 ↗ other comments about PROST or PROST2, whatever you call

3:17:19 ↗ it, in that 25 seems like a lot.

3:17:25 ↗ and not sure if this is, is this in-house, is this consultant,

3:17:31 ↗ is it a combination? I think based on the comment I heard

3:17:36 ↗ it from a resident during public comment tonight, I'm interested in a

3:17:42 ↗ little bit more information about how we can get the information out

3:17:48 ↗ there, you know, a little differently on phones and whatnot. And so

3:17:53 ↗ I'm not, really excited about spending $25,000 on some print materials and I don't

3:17:59 ↗ know why it would be so difficult to include those maps on our website if

3:18:04 ↗ we don't already. So, not really convinced yet. All right, thank you. Do you have

3:18:10 ↗ an example I can see or we can show? Of a finished product? No. No,

3:18:15 ↗ no, of what's the current state. I mean, the basis of this is that we

3:18:20 ↗ have poor quality right now. If we had a

3:18:26 ↗ couple minute break, I could pull it up. It's on the R drive. It was

3:18:31 ↗ in the email that was sent to Council. It's on the R drive? So if

3:18:35 ↗ we had a couple minutes, we could probably pull it up for you if you

3:18:40 ↗ want to take a break. Okay. I'm seeing other indications that we need a break.

3:18:44 ↗ And so in the middle of this item, we're going to take a break. And

3:18:49 ↗ when that big hand's on the five, we're starting again.

3:18:54 ↗ Bob,

3:18:58 ↗ are

3:19:03 ↗ these

3:19:07 ↗ them?

3:19:11 ↗ Yes.

3:19:15 ↗ But

3:19:20 ↗ I

3:19:24 ↗ think

3:19:28 ↗ we

3:19:33 ↗ have

3:19:37 ↗ it

3:19:41 ↗ on

3:19:46 ↗ that.

3:19:50 ↗ We

3:19:54 ↗ can

3:19:59 ↗ pull

3:20:03 ↗ his

3:20:07 ↗ email

3:20:11 ↗ that

3:20:16 ↗ you

3:20:20 ↗ sent.

3:20:24 ↗ Okay,

3:20:29 ↗ welcome

3:20:33 ↗ to

3:20:37 ↗ the

3:20:42 ↗ final

3:20:46 ↗ act

3:20:50 ↗ of

3:20:55 ↗ the

3:20:59 ↗ 2016

3:21:03 ↗ budget

3:21:07 ↗ deliberation

3:21:12 ↗ meeting,

3:21:16 ↗ at

3:21:20 ↗ least

3:21:25 ↗ for

3:21:29 ↗ this

3:21:33 ↗ evening.

3:21:38 ↗ Okay,

3:21:42 ↗ so

3:21:46 ↗ I

3:21:51 ↗ had

3:21:55 ↗ asked

3:21:59 ↗ if

3:22:03 ↗ I

3:22:08 ↗ could

3:22:12 ↗ see

3:22:16 ↗ a

3:22:21 ↗ copy.

3:22:25 ↗ I

3:22:29 ↗ actually

3:22:34 ↗ thought

3:22:38 ↗ I

3:22:42 ↗ was

3:22:47 ↗ going

3:22:51 ↗ to

3:22:55 ↗ see

3:23:00 ↗ a

3:23:04 ↗ hard

3:23:08 ↗ copy.

3:23:12 ↗ This

3:23:17 ↗ is

3:23:21 ↗ an

3:23:25 ↗ electronic

3:23:30 ↗ copy,

3:23:34 ↗ right?

3:23:38 ↗ That's

3:23:43 ↗ because

3:23:47 ↗ they're...

3:23:51 ↗ We

3:23:56 ↗ need

3:24:00 ↗ to

3:24:04 ↗ have

3:24:08 ↗ them

3:24:13 ↗ printed. Well, so

3:24:19 ↗ this is the PDF of this. So I think just to refresh. Print this. It's

3:24:24 ↗ going to look pretty good. So our goal was to go ahead and look at

3:24:30 ↗ the design of this. So using a design consultant, using our existing GIS and cartographers

3:24:35 ↗ to update the maps that we have and then put them in a format that's

3:24:41 ↗ going to work digitally, both on mobile devices and off the website. Yeah, some of

3:24:47 ↗ these things we could just go ahead and take out to print and it wouldn't

3:24:53 ↗ cost $25,000 to do, but if we wanted to go ahead and update it and

3:24:59 ↗ have it work with QR codes and all the rest, then you'd be able to,

3:25:04 ↗ and that was kind of what the concept was. You said QR codes? Yeah. That's

3:25:10 ↗ pretty good, Bob. Okay, so as it was presented, Eileen, I mean, we had copies

3:25:16 ↗ of copies of copies and they were faded and not good. I mean, I'm looking

3:25:20 ↗ at here, we got an original and then like, go ahead and print this. It's

3:25:24 ↗ going to look really good. But I don't think that's, the need from what I

3:25:29 ↗ just heard. It was more -- it was -- you talked about an actual update.

3:25:34 ↗ You're talking about a redesign where not only whether it be on a monitor or

3:25:39 ↗ a tablet, so using responsive design -- that's another phrase you should learn -- that

3:25:45 ↗ it -- the formatting is good and appropriate depending on the device that's being used.

3:25:50 ↗ So So that's a different ask than I originally understood it. I remember,

3:25:56 ↗ that's why I asked about a copy. I mean, how faded are these

3:26:02 ↗ things? And so I'm just, just, just, I think, and, and, but I

3:26:08 ↗ don't understand why this didn't come through the regular process. I mean,

3:26:14 ↗ i am how did you discover this i mean where did this do you talk

3:26:18 ↗ about something that came out of the blue this one came out of the blue

3:26:23 ↗ i was not on my radar so we had a conversation with council member barber

3:26:27 ↗ and one of the things we've heard from the chamber on a regular basis is

3:26:32 ↗ the fact of what she just said we have these existing maps they take them

3:26:36 ↗ out they either photocopy them or they print them and they're not very good quality

3:26:40 ↗ and the issue has been um this actually went to funding for LTAC in 2010.

3:26:45 ↗ It wasn't funded by the LTAC. So it hasn't been of the most significant priority,

3:26:50 ↗ but I know that Eileen had talked about the fact that this has been one

3:26:55 ↗ of those items that could certainly be improved. And so I think when the direction

3:27:00 ↗ from council leadership back to the council members was, if you have something you want

3:27:05 ↗ added to the list to look at that could be considered, this is one of

3:27:10 ↗ those items that is a gap. It's something that we do. It fits with our

3:27:15 ↗ brand for outdoor Issaquah and could be upgraded and improved. We just haven't allocated the

3:27:20 ↗ funds necessary to do this. Is that fair? I don't want to put words in

3:27:25 ↗ your mouth. That's very fair. And they are used, I mean, we need

3:27:31 ↗ them in all formats, all from the digital. They need to be

3:27:36 ↗ updated some. A lot of the graphics can probably use a little

3:27:42 ↗ updating, factual updating on them, but they are still used, some print,

3:27:47 ↗ probably not a great deal of print, but there is definitely the

3:27:53 ↗ need for print. and also bringing them forward in electronic formats so that we

3:27:59 ↗ can carry them with us wherever we go. It's the piece that sells and hopefully

3:28:04 ↗ we'll be able to have our people that pass through stop at the chambers, stop

3:28:10 ↗ at other locations in town where we could place these and spend a little bit

3:28:15 ↗ more time, encourage them to stay here in Issaquah and see what we have to

3:28:21 ↗ offer. Okay, so this this document actually has multiple in them.

3:28:26 ↗ Yeah, those are all the maps that we talked about. It's

3:28:32 ↗ got the updated logo in this one. So there are seven

3:28:38 ↗ pages of maps here, so I'm not sure. Oh, this is

3:28:43 ↗ the edible garden one. Edible landscape tour. Okay, so okay, so

3:28:49 ↗ the ask is it's to redo all of these pieces and

3:28:55 ↗ why and we have to outsource it. for design? So there's three

3:29:01 ↗ components. Some of this our cartographer could do, some of it our GIS coordinator can

3:29:05 ↗ do, some of it our communications department can do. There you go. And then the...

3:29:10 ↗ Put it on their work plan. Yeah, and then, well, there's some graphic design work

3:29:15 ↗ that a graphic design consultant would be utilized to do that. So...

3:29:22 ↗ So, yeah, I mean, most of it would be done in-house, some of it would

3:29:28 ↗ be done, and then some of that $25,000 includes, you know, printing costs if we're

3:29:34 ↗ depending on what we're going to do. So we just don't envision the same print

3:29:39 ↗ run on this because the goal would be to have more mobile, but there still

3:29:45 ↗ are a lot of people that come in and ask for print brochures. Okay, I'm

3:29:51 ↗ undecided. I'm still thinking it through. Pass. I'll be supporting it. Okay, go on.

3:29:57 ↗ so i i actually like this i think that uh properly done maps i'm actually

3:30:01 ↗ i'm actually glad we don't have a graphic designer on staff because they wouldn't be

3:30:06 ↗ very busy but when the time comes to need a graphic designer i was i

3:30:10 ↗ was lucky enough to find somebody who was willing to do gratis work when i

3:30:15 ↗ ran six years ago and they did a sign that was like a million times

3:30:19 ↗ better than anything i could have come up with and so i'm eager to see

3:30:24 ↗ what um proper modern graphic design would do to integrate this information. I also think

3:30:29 ↗ that there's opportunities now that we have a fully functioning GIS system that it may

3:30:35 ↗ allow rapid addition of data and overlaying of data. And I think if done right,

3:30:41 ↗ this is a good use of $25,000. Thanks. Thank you. Josh? So...

3:30:46 ↗ During the summer, I was interested in taking my daughter on a hike in Tallis.

3:30:51 ↗ And so I went on the city website just to see what trails would be

3:30:56 ↗ around our house. And it's actually really hard to find trails in the city when

3:31:00 ↗ you look on our city website. If you go to the page under Parks and

3:31:05 ↗ Rec for parks and trails, there's three links for trail maps. And one is Family

3:31:09 ↗ Forest Walks, which is a map that appears to be the highlands. There's Lake Tradition

3:31:14 ↗ Trails, which is Lake Tradition. And then there's an urban walking map. And actually, you've

3:31:18 ↗ got the Family Forest Walk thing up there. Some of the stuff that you're showing

3:31:23 ↗ us on the screen is actually already on the website. The exact document is already

3:31:27 ↗ there. But it doesn't really tell you where to link up with the trailhead. It

3:31:33 ↗ doesn't have a lot of detail. It just kind of gives you this sort of

3:31:39 ↗ 10,000 foot map. And so I definitely see the need for improving information about our

3:31:45 ↗ parks and trails. And the issue for me is, Is right now at

3:31:51 ↗ the budget process the best way to do this? And I sort of feel like

3:31:57 ↗ this is an item that needs to come to the Services Committee and be vetted

3:32:03 ↗ in terms of understanding what information the Council believes is important for inclusion in these

3:32:08 ↗ types of brochures. What types of media opportunities do we want to utilize? Just look

3:32:14 ↗ at this from a very broad perspective. And right now it's just sort of looked

3:32:19 ↗ at as well. We'll update the design and we'll print the documents and we'll spend

3:32:24 ↗ money to do that. But I'd rather see this come back to the council by

3:32:28 ↗ way of agenda bill and then perhaps consider a midyear budget adjustment to do some

3:32:33 ↗ of this. The other thing I'll add is I think there can actually be part

3:32:38 ↗ of a broader effort when it comes to updating parks and rec information. Because if

3:32:43 ↗ you go, for instance, to the recreation guide on the city website, right now what's

3:32:47 ↗ up is the winter recreation guide. And there's a little box that says spring recreation

3:32:52 ↗ guide available online Wednesday, February 3rd. Registration begins Wednesday, February 17th. That doesn't give a

3:32:57 ↗ lot of time for members of the public to make decisions about signing up their

3:33:02 ↗ children for sports or camps classes. It basically comes online in early February. You have

3:33:07 ↗ two weeks to figure out your schedule before the registration begins. And then some of

3:33:12 ↗ those classes begin right after that. And so I just think maybe a broader effort

3:33:16 ↗ of getting information out to the public sooner, getting more detailed information something a little

3:33:21 ↗ bit broader than just printing brochures would be very valuable and then i would support

3:33:27 ↗ something i won't get the chance but i would have supported an expenditure to do

3:33:32 ↗ that sort of effort but i think this should come via agenda bill thank you

3:33:37 ↗ mary lou um sure i guess a question for staff first while i'm thinking about

3:33:42 ↗ this so um are are there other funding sources for this such as partnerships or

3:33:47 ↗ other groups that we should be working with where their information and our information would

3:33:53 ↗ be all together. And so we wouldn't be paying $25,000 to design it? Well,

3:33:59 ↗ so I'm thinking of like the Iskua Alps Club. They've got some walking maps,

3:34:05 ↗ but they're not really kind of like these that we've got produced. In the

3:34:11 ↗ past, this was funded out of LTAC funds. And with changes in state law

3:34:17 ↗ now, it's no longer eligible to be funded out of LTAC. might

3:34:23 ↗ be able to get something out of 4Culture. I'd have to, you know, really kind

3:34:28 ↗ of research that and see what we might get. But I think it's going to

3:34:34 ↗ just end up being on us. And other jurisdictions don't do this in conjunction with

3:34:40 ↗ the Chamber and include advertising on it or other means to pay for it itself?

3:34:46 ↗ So I've seen chambers do that, go out and make money off of a project

3:34:52 ↗ like this where it gets incorporated with a band around it. But again, that's print,

3:34:58 ↗ so I don't know how much-- the legacy is the city did create these things,

3:35:04 ↗ and so we got ownership on them. So I guess where I'm landing with it

3:35:10 ↗ is I really want them redone. I'm stuck on the funding, that there

3:35:16 ↗ isn't a more creative way or a different way to fund it. So I'm

3:35:21 ↗ kind of stuck right now. Well, can I comment? OK, now. It's not just

3:35:27 ↗ chamber. I mean, the chamber does supply these two visitors, but so does the

3:35:33 ↗ downtown. The DIA does. So there's other places. So for the chamber to go

3:35:38 ↗ out and get advertisement on the back of it, would be for

3:35:44 ↗ the chamber. So it wouldn't be city used. It wouldn't

3:35:49 ↗ be more available for everybody, kind of. All right, thank

3:35:55 ↗ you. Nina? Yeah, I think I already talked. Wasn't I

3:36:00 ↗ first? I said, yeah, let's change the name to Printed Maps

3:36:06 ↗ Media rather than brochures. OK. Is there any other-- thank you for the reminder.

3:36:12 ↗ Sorry, I lost track. Stacy. I appreciate this coming forward, Eileen. And I support

3:36:18 ↗ it generally. But I think I prefer the agenda bill idea because we've had

3:36:24 ↗ such a good discussion about different ideas that I think it could be more

3:36:30 ↗ fully talked about and with some public input I think it

3:36:35 ↗ could be probably a greater than that thing that we're even envisioning so

3:36:41 ↗ that's so I'm probably gonna vote no but that's the reason it's not

3:36:47 ↗ because I don't support this it's because I think it maybe could be

3:36:52 ↗ a greater thing if it came out of mention about I think questions

3:36:58 ↗ who would own this what department communications

3:37:06 ↗ Okay. Question. I'm just waiting if we get opportunities to follow up after. Yeah, no,

3:37:12 ↗ so everybody's had an initial comment. So, Eddie, do you have any other comments or

3:37:17 ↗ questions to make? Just subsequent to these comments about whether it should be a council

3:37:22 ↗ action or not, this seems administrative to me. There is a lot of work to

3:37:28 ↗ do as council members, and this is a reprint and update of current media that

3:37:33 ↗ already exists. present its more opportunities when they get into the work of that that

3:37:39 ↗ might need some policy input. But this isn't a policy input. I find this

3:37:45 ↗ more of an administrative task. And for my benefit, that means are you going

3:37:50 ↗ to support it? I'm supporting it. All right. So I'll just say again, I

3:37:56 ↗ like the idea of having updated materials, but I'm

3:38:02 ↗ I think Josh's recommendation kind of threw the agenda bill,

3:38:08 ↗ but this is, I feel that there's still too much

3:38:14 ↗ conversation to be had on what's possible. I think we're

3:38:20 ↗ adding something to a work plan for communications that, I

3:38:25 ↗ mean, you were saying that there's some graphic design. I

3:38:31 ↗ think that's the principle piece, oh boy. I'm

3:38:37 ↗ really having a hard time with this one. So, okay, I'll call a vote and

3:38:42 ↗ I'll figure it out which way my thumb goes. Yes? So there is a suggestion

3:38:47 ↗ that said, and I do this before we vote just to make sure that the

3:38:52 ↗ idea itself does not get lost after. If it is voted down, but there is

3:38:56 ↗ this much interest in seeing it come back, is that something you would include in

3:39:01 ↗ your letter? where you talk about budget recommendations, can you talk about budget

3:39:07 ↗ recommendations, non-monitory? - Come back with a new proposal? - Yeah, you could do that

3:39:13 ↗ in the letter. - Updated proposal, I mean, yeah, absolutely, that would be an opportunity

3:39:18 ↗ to do that. Okay, so is council ready to vote on this? Okay, so in

3:39:24 ↗ favor of, oops, make sure it's up on the screen, sorry. The $25,000

3:39:30 ↗ for, I put down Parks Department collateral. It said brochures before I changed the word

3:39:36 ↗ collateral. So, thumb up if you're in favor, thumb down if you disapprove. Vote. It's

3:39:42 ↗ three in favor, four disapprove. So that one does not pass. And Paul, I would

3:39:48 ↗ support Mary Lou's suggestion of including in your letter a request for consideration of an

3:39:54 ↗ agenda bill on the issue. Absolutely. Yes, absolutely. So it can move forward.

3:40:00 ↗ Okay, so we've completed our deliberation of the items that we did not vote on

3:40:05 ↗ two of them. So where we stand, you can see the raw numbers on the

3:40:10 ↗ general fund. It's not the full funding for Office 365. There's still 20% of the

3:40:15 ↗ original amount that comes from somewhere else. where where that is i don't know

3:40:21 ↗ but utilities utilities thank you very much okay the last item uh for a deliberation

3:40:27 ↗ this evening and um before i go for eltac is the um is the request

3:40:33 ↗ to fund out of the mitigation parks mitigation fund amount remember the information up here

3:40:38 ↗ is the entire mitigation account not just the balance from parks impact fees

3:40:44 ↗ And this is currently calculated based upon existing approval of 350,000,

3:40:50 ↗ $75,000 grant, funds raised by external parties, which is roughly $10,000,

3:40:55 ↗ and the final cost, which is currently estimated at around $510,000,

3:41:01 ↗ if I'm remembering that all correctly. So this is an item

3:41:06 ↗ to fund out of mitigation the remaining balance. Tola, you proposed

3:41:12 ↗ this originally. I'm going to ask you to start this off. Sure. So I was

3:41:18 ↗ also one of the people who was most in favor of keeping it to $350,000,

3:41:24 ↗ not $500,000. So why do I want to do this now? Because I don't think

3:41:30 ↗ that we... I don't think I personally expected the community to pony up $85,000. I

3:41:35 ↗ was hoping that some of that remaining 85 would come from in-kind donations from various

3:41:41 ↗ places. That hasn't happened. However, the fact that the community has put in $10,000 to

3:41:47 ↗ me is a significant and good faith effort that the community is engaged You could

3:41:53 ↗ argue that it should be some larger number. I don't think it should be

3:41:59 ↗ 85,000, but it rises to the level for me of significant community contribution. And

3:42:04 ↗ so between having gotten a grant or presupposing we get the grant, that's why

3:42:10 ↗ today I would be okay with doing this amount. It's really all

3:42:16 ↗ about the community engagement and the approximately 10 grand they've raised already. Okay. Thank

3:42:22 ↗ you so much. Josh, I'll just go right with you. What? You're next. Oh,

3:42:27 ↗ okay. I was telling you earlier. Yeah, I said it's a state park to

3:42:33 ↗ address our growing vampire problem in Issaquah, apparently. State park. But anyway, to be

3:42:39 ↗ more serious, you know, i i heard at the last budget meeting for the first

3:42:45 ↗ time that we may be retaining the existing skate park as an asset and and

3:42:50 ↗ now this this concerns me very much because one of the justifications for building the

3:42:55 ↗ new facility was that we had real problems at the existing one and that it

3:43:00 ↗ needed to be demolished and um Now I'm sort of questioning this entire operation in

3:43:05 ↗ terms of the need to build something new and spend all this money on it

3:43:10 ↗ when we're gonna apparently retain the existing asset and continue to maintain it. So I

3:43:16 ↗ think that issue might be coming back to services for further conversation. at least as

3:43:21 ↗ to the demolition piece of the old one. But I'm just really hesitant to keep

3:43:26 ↗ throwing more money into this project when we've already spent a considerable amount of time

3:43:32 ↗ vetting it and determining a dollar amount and being able to get an actual new

3:43:37 ↗ facility for $350,000. Now, granted, there's a lot of additional bells and whistles and capacity

3:43:43 ↗ that can come with spending more money on this. But I do think that there

3:43:48 ↗ can still be opportunities for further efforts. And, you know, it didn't fare so well

3:43:54 ↗ last night, but I still think public-private partnerships are an avenue for exploring opportunities within

3:44:00 ↗ the city. And that may be a possibility with the skate park as well. So

3:44:05 ↗ I don't really see the justification at this point for diving in to spend $90,000

3:44:11 ↗ additional on this project. Thank you. Mary Lou? I do support spending the

3:44:17 ↗ $90,000 in additional funds. I agree with what Tola had said about why he

3:44:22 ↗ changed his mind on now it's appropriate when before he was having concerns. But

3:44:28 ↗ I also agree with what Josh said. It's sort of hard to...

3:44:34 ↗ look at a project like this when we haven't really talked about things like private

3:44:39 ↗ public partnerships we haven't really talked about uh yes this adds a lot of capacity

3:44:44 ↗ but was this the kind of capacity we wanted to add does this serve a

3:44:49 ↗ regional population versus just our local population should citizens be paying for regional capacity in

3:44:54 ↗ a facility so i'm in favor of a approving it because I do want to

3:44:58 ↗ see it built and I think this is an appropriate place for the funds to

3:45:02 ↗ come. But I think we have to start answering some of these other questions. It's

3:45:06 ↗ really hard just to look at projects like this. Anyway, for tonight, I'm supporting this

3:45:09 ↗ one. Thank you. Nina. I want to agree with those who have said that I

3:45:15 ↗ wish there were a more sincere effort to engage public-private partnership. We had a great

3:45:20 ↗ opportunity here and it looks like now we're just going to give up on it.

3:45:26 ↗ We didn't have enough time, maybe didn't have enough support, but I wish there would

3:45:31 ↗ have been public-private. I chipped in on GoFundMe. That's the private part. I know others

3:45:37 ↗ here did too. I have a question for somebody down there. Grateful. Not the same

3:45:43 ↗ as Josh's opinion of the old skate park. I'm grateful that we are planning at

3:45:48 ↗ this time to not destroy the old park because of the improvements that have been

3:45:54 ↗ made, the changes with the new schools coming in, all of the things that have

3:46:00 ↗ shown that that park is usable and an asset that can be enhanced much more

3:46:05 ↗ cheaply than it can be destroyed. How does that $50,000, if you're looking

3:46:11 ↗ at the whole project, so say this was going to be, it was a $350,000,

3:46:16 ↗ now it's a $500,000, but it was $550,000 for the whole thing, right? So it's

3:46:22 ↗ $500,000 for the new park, and then there was $50,000 to remove the old park.

3:46:27 ↗ The original $350,000 had $50,000 for removal. Had $50,000 in it. Well, that was the

3:46:33 ↗ original original. Right. It was two iterations back. My point is that

3:46:39 ↗ The increased $90,000 can be considered to be partly

3:46:45 ↗ offset by not spending the $50,000 on re-destroying the

3:46:51 ↗ old park. Is that fair to say that?

3:46:56 ↗ It's tricky math, but-- Well, no, I think what you're-- yes, it's fair to say

3:47:01 ↗ that. I think the concern is that materials costs have increased a lot over the

3:47:07 ↗ last two years, particularly concrete. And this is a significant amount of concrete involved in

3:47:12 ↗ the project. So I think the design, if we get that bid, We'll have a

3:47:17 ↗ very good idea of where the final number is going to be and we're still

3:47:21 ↗ going to try and raise more funds from the city. So if we can actually

3:47:24 ↗ get a contract that ends up being below that number then yeah, we'd be able

3:47:28 ↗ to return that to the general fund. I'd recommend you spend the mitigation funds first

3:47:32 ↗ and save it to the general fund if you can. Okay, I'm gonna finish. This

3:47:37 ↗ is hard for me to vote to spend more because I was part of the

3:47:41 ↗ original cheer team for the $350,000. This park has already suffered from inflation and Bob

3:47:46 ↗ reveals that it may suffer from some more and I don't want this to drag

3:47:51 ↗ on forever for lack of funding and get even more expensive. But please don't ask

3:47:55 ↗ me to spend another $50,000 to destroy the old park. and i'm gonna vote yes

3:48:01 ↗ for this thank you stacy we don't have a separate line item for the

3:48:07 ↗ fifty thousand dollars no it's just gone right just making that clear uh i

3:48:13 ↗ uh with a little reservation about the cost of the overall project i'm still

3:48:19 ↗ going to support this uh for the reasons that tola and mary lou laid

3:48:24 ↗ out you know again so this is calculated based upon what we think the

3:48:30 ↗ price is going to be and it's the it's the unfunded portion and um

3:48:36 ↗ I mean, I -- though on this spreadsheet is a very specific amount, and I

3:48:42 ↗ think, you know, my -- if this were to pass, I would want to write

3:48:47 ↗ this into the letter where it was -- this is an up to additional funds

3:48:53 ↗ out of mitigation. I also think I heard the general fund portion of any funding

3:48:58 ↗ of this skate park right now, actually, it's -- we get it from REIT and

3:49:04 ↗ we're getting it from mitigation. none of that's general fund. And

3:49:10 ↗ Diane's nodding her head. So gotcha on that one, Bob. You're

3:49:15 ↗ right. Thank you for correcting me. And so yes, it is

3:49:21 ↗ adding kind of that capacity. thing and um I you know

3:49:27 ↗ and when and so last year when we said hey hey you know the the

3:49:32 ↗ ask was for an additional 150 during this time last year we said no and

3:49:38 ↗ go take another year find other sources such as County Parks that was successful in

3:49:44 ↗ my mind however okay you only got halfway there I mean don't stop what

3:49:49 ↗ other means, and I've never heard anything that other means were really explored. If they

3:49:55 ↗ were, I haven't heard that. And so I know that the community did come together

3:50:00 ↗ and actually part of that 10,000 is a donation that I made myself toward this

3:50:06 ↗ because, so just so you know, I think this is important. But I'm disappointed that

3:50:12 ↗ it's kind of like we did the 75 and stopped. I made an application to

3:50:17 ↗ King County for grant money and stopped. And that wasn't my expectation when we went

3:50:23 ↗ into this last year. We haven't stopped trying to raise money. So I mean, the

3:50:28 ↗ mayor, as a matter of fact, has gone out and made several personal asks that

3:50:33 ↗ have resulted in funds being donated to the city on this. So I think we've

3:50:39 ↗ raised more than-- i'd have to check but i'm pretty sure we're over ten thousand

3:50:45 ↗ dollars so far at least and at least are we yeah so i mean our

3:50:50 ↗ intent is to continue to try and raise funds from different individuals uh corporations and

3:50:55 ↗ the community to close that gap so as you said it's gap funding is what

3:51:00 ↗ we kind of view it as get the project out to bid we'll know what

3:51:05 ↗ that number ends up being and then we've got the opportunity to to close the

3:51:10 ↗ gap based out of the mitigation funds OK, so it

3:51:16 ↗ would be a little act of faith there. OK. OK. So again,

3:51:21 ↗ I do support the skate park. This has been back and forth in ways I

3:51:27 ↗ didn't anticipate and really like either. I do agree, retaining the existing asset and see

3:51:32 ↗ if there can be some value to the community and is, I'm totally fine with

3:51:37 ↗ that. And I think there's been enough changes in the Rainier Trail area that that

3:51:41 ↗ is less of a liability to the community than it was when we first raised

3:51:46 ↗ this issue a couple years ago. So in total, with those expressed disappointments on

3:51:52 ↗ how we got to this, with the hope and the intent that the actual

3:51:58 ↗ amount, this allows us to go out to bid, but if we actually expend

3:52:04 ↗ less than this because we raise additional funds, that would be my expectation. So

3:52:10 ↗ I will support this, thank you. Eileen? - I'm in support of this. It

3:52:15 ↗ has been some time. We really need to move forward with this, get this out

3:52:21 ↗ to bid, start construction this summer and complete this project. Also, the preserving of the

3:52:26 ↗ old skate park for the time being, I think is important. There's no need to

3:52:30 ↗ go through and demolish it at this moment in time. Maybe in the future if

3:52:35 ↗ that piece of property is used for something else, but right now the area has

3:52:40 ↗ been cleaned up. um the fence has been taken down and there are kids using

3:52:44 ↗ it um because we don't have the other one done yet so we need to

3:52:49 ↗ move forward and we need to get this project done and get the kids skating

3:52:54 ↗ down there i'm for it okay thank you i think we have gone around is

3:52:58 ↗ there any comments or questions about this item the council ready to vote okay a

3:53:03 ↗ thumb up is in uh support of the proposal on the screen what's your vote

3:53:08 ↗ this is six in favor one against so that passes So fantastic

3:53:14 ↗ work and we have one more

3:53:19 ↗ item that I'm going to want

3:53:25 ↗ to bring up and let's see

3:53:30 ↗ if I can use the right

3:53:36 ↗ keyboard and it has, oh man

3:53:41 ↗ you changed the directory, I got

3:53:47 ↗ to re-navigate. Is there another one?

3:53:52 ↗ No there isn't. Budget questions. Executive

3:53:57 ↗ department. Sorry everybody. 2016 budget docs.

3:54:05 ↗ Ha! There's that LTAC word. Where did that come from? That I typed

3:54:11 ↗ earlier. Okay, so last, on the 4th, prior to our budget meeting on

3:54:17 ↗ the 4th, we had our second LTAC meeting. And I'm chairing that committee

3:54:22 ↗ and there's other, there's four other members from the community, two hoteliers,

3:54:28 ↗ or a chamber representative who's also a hotelier and a member, executive

3:54:34 ↗ director of the History Museum. And what you see here, the

3:54:40 ↗ applications list everything that was applied for. You can see the funding

3:54:46 ↗ that they requested. The next column is the funding that's approved. So

3:54:51 ↗ there was $174,000 in requests. The committee approved $107,500 of that, if

3:54:57 ↗ I can read it correctly. You can see the vote tally there

3:55:03 ↗ as well. A couple comments. The committee expressed some surprise that, it was my first

3:55:09 ↗ year on the committee, some surprise that the actual request for funding, the RFP, if

3:55:14 ↗ I may call it, RFP process, surprised them because they had thought that at the

3:55:20 ↗ end of last year that they, it was clear that there was gonna be There

3:55:26 ↗ was going to be more of a development of the adoption of a plan as

3:55:31 ↗ somewhat proposed by the Roger Brooks. You might remember the Roger Brooks Tourism Plan. Really

3:55:37 ↗ no progress was made along this, along that way. And so this year's LTAC application

3:55:42 ↗ and funding consideration really fell into the same model as it had been done years

3:55:48 ↗ previously. And the majority of the legacy members on the committee unanimously expressed that that

3:55:53 ↗ wasn't what they expected to happen and that they really did expect that there was

3:55:58 ↗ going to be more of an alignment along those recommendations. Well, a couple of things

3:56:03 ↗ that didn't happen to cause that alignment. There really was no more forward motion on

3:56:09 ↗ movement on developing kind of like the Central Tourism Bureau and a kind of a

3:56:14 ↗ restatement of the overall strategy and kind of guidelines for how they're gonna

3:56:20 ↗ use LTAC funds going forward toward a more comprehensive tourism plan. So we

3:56:26 ↗ had quite a bit of conversation about that. And so what you see reflected in

3:56:32 ↗ the vote is the third item on there is actually, it's actually a program to

3:56:37 ↗ be run by the city. And I think it's been positioned as almost like a

3:56:43 ↗ gap fill as well to do event recruitment. So this was a new type proposal.

3:56:48 ↗ I don't think the LTAC committee had seen anything like an event recruitment engine before.

3:56:54 ↗ So it's actually funding work out of our economic development organization to do

3:56:59 ↗ specific event recruitment. A good example, one that came up many times was

3:57:05 ↗ the volleyball tournament at the state park was a good example of absolutely

3:57:10 ↗ an event that drives heads and beds. And LTAC, of course, is funds

3:57:16 ↗ collected for hotel stays. And there is strong state law about how that

3:57:21 ↗ money should be reused and to foster and create more economic activity for

3:57:27 ↗ hotels within communities. But also to general fund the marketing events of other

3:57:33 ↗ organizations within those communities that could benefit and also help and partially drive

3:57:38 ↗ more heads and beds as well. And so the committee was very strong in

3:57:44 ↗ the support of the event recruitment process. So it will probably be outsourced,

3:57:50 ↗ not actually done by city employees. The other two that were approved were

3:57:55 ↗ really kind of a refactoring of the visitor information center. So VIC stands

3:58:01 ↗ for visitor information center. So this includes some improvement in the area

3:58:07 ↗ of the chamber actually obtaining and operating a mobile unit.

3:58:13 ↗ and it had not just static display and not just print copy display, but also

3:58:18 ↗ electronic display of information for people seeking it. Mobile meaning it could be taken to

3:58:23 ↗ events. It's not gonna be a static sitting in one place. There could be events

3:58:28 ↗ around town strategically placed, and so taking it to where visitors are to give them

3:58:34 ↗ more information about the city. And the second item in there is actually to create

3:58:39 ↗ some type of rack and capacity for flyers actually at the, at the Hailstone location

3:58:44 ↗ that DIA uses up here on Front Street. And that's where the mobile unit

3:58:50 ↗ would be stored as well. So the mobile unit would be there at other

3:58:55 ↗ times when it wasn't rolled out to be where visitors are for that information.

3:59:01 ↗ The rest of all the programs were specific marketing programs. the services of those

3:59:07 ↗ various nonprofits. And the committee was pretty firm. It wasn't 5-0 all the time,

3:59:13 ↗ but in general, there were some abstains, general feeling that this kind of one-off

3:59:18 ↗ of funding marketing programs is inconsistent with the direction that they thought that they

3:59:24 ↗ had at the end of last year. It's inconsistent with and then the instruction

3:59:30 ↗ that they thought they had given and that it was also not really consistent with

3:59:36 ↗ the intended use for the LTCH funds. Having said all that, there's a strong support

3:59:42 ↗ for all of these and so for those agencies and for their recognizing that they

3:59:48 ↗ have their need as well, uh, to, to, uh, for their program. It's beneficial to

3:59:53 ↗ them when they get these marketing dollars. So these last two lines on here, so

3:59:57 ↗ the committee is not done meeting. Um, um, they agreed that the continue the L

4:00:02 ↗ tech committee would commit and continue to me to develop a strategy and guidelines going

4:00:07 ↗ forward, like this is what we want to achieve. And so there's a lot of

4:00:12 ↗ guidance given in that Roger Brooks study that they want to make a very clear

4:00:17 ↗ policy and directional statements of what we want to accomplish with LTAC funds going forward.

4:00:22 ↗ So lacking that, and I think that's what created some of the confusion for this

4:00:28 ↗ year. further um if the events committee obviously if they recruit events there's opportunities for

4:00:33 ↗ all of these various agencies to be part of the marketing material that put together

4:00:38 ↗ for event recruitment so we're also going to get back together and talk about how

4:00:43 ↗ to continue to work with a number of these agencies to be part of the

4:00:48 ↗ advertisement and the marketing material packages that are putting together as part of the event

4:00:53 ↗ recruitment process So there's a general consensus that rather than kind of these one off

4:00:59 ↗ programs that there would be a more coordinated kind of holistic city kind of wide

4:01:05 ↗ tourism plan and that every agency would be a benefit. Even those that are listed

4:01:10 ↗ here that applied and even some that didn't could benefit from a more from a

4:01:16 ↗ citywide tourism plan. And that's what LTAC committees intention is going forward and to actually

4:01:21 ↗ put some structure to that by completing more of this strategy and guidance work before

4:01:27 ↗ the next funding cycle. So this was the recommendation and what we have as a

4:01:32 ↗ committee, as a council, we can either accept this in total or reject it in

4:01:37 ↗ total. We cannot pick it apart.

4:01:44 ↗ Starting with Josh. Okay. So I looked that up. Then Nina and then Mary Lou.

4:01:49 ↗ Because I'd always been told that and I looked it up and the municipal code

4:01:53 ↗ actually says in the event the city council in its sole discretion terms it appropriate

4:01:58 ↗ to amend the proposal, it is not required to resubmit such proposal to the committee.

4:02:03 ↗ The code apparently vests the council with discretion to amend LTAC's proposal. Are we compliant

4:02:08 ↗ with the state? No, so that's old code. There was a change in state law

4:02:13 ↗ two years ago that eliminated that exactly, which is the city council only has the

4:02:19 ↗ option to vote up or down, and if they want to make a change to

4:02:24 ↗ it, they have to refer the whole thing back to the LTAC committee. So we

4:02:29 ↗ have a code issue. The The other thing that the code that apparently is no

4:02:34 ↗ good anymore says is that LTAC should consider the extent to which the proposal will

4:02:38 ↗ accommodate activities for tourists or increased tourism and the extent to which the proposal will

4:02:42 ↗ affect the long-term stability of the lodging tax fund. So I have two questions. There's

4:02:46 ↗ the only two that I have. The first one is in terms of the decision-making

4:02:50 ↗ process to not approve funding. When I look at this list, I look and see,

4:02:55 ↗ wow, you know, there's some things on here that might increase tourism. You know, the

4:03:00 ↗ Cougar Mountain Zoo, I think, is an example. undertold, undersold, whatever you want to call

4:03:05 ↗ it, it's late, it doesn't get enough recognition. And the Ranger Festival is a great

4:03:10 ↗ way to bring in tourists and tourist dollars. And so then I start thinking about,

4:03:14 ↗ well, how was it decided that some people voted, one person voted yes, four voted

4:03:19 ↗ no, what are the criteria by which that was rejected, for instance? And then the

4:03:23 ↗ second part is, the funding approved is far less than the funding requested. So do

4:03:28 ↗ we have essentially a very healthy Lodging tax fund and so we do you know

4:03:33 ↗ or did we need to worry about it? And that's why the funding request no

4:03:39 ↗ I think with the beginning fund balance and the estimated what would be collecting the

4:03:44 ↗ revenues available were $180,000 so with this appropriation Approval of funding for 107 it would

4:03:50 ↗ begin next year with you know $93,000 roughly as a beginning balance and And I

4:03:56 ↗ think the committee's sentiment, again, we haven't formalized this 'cause it hasn't been

4:04:02 ↗ voted upon, was that that was the kind of basis that was needed

4:04:07 ↗ to actually get this tourism organization funded and off the ground. So as

4:04:13 ↗ to the criteria, can you address that? Like what was used to determine that certain

4:04:19 ↗ things should be rejected that weren't? Well, every one of these was some type of

4:04:25 ↗ promotion of an individual event or program for each of those agencies. And so there

4:04:31 ↗ was this general kind of this one-off of an individual event or program was, again,

4:04:36 ↗ I'm just repeating what I was told, is that the committee members were very adamant

4:04:42 ↗ that they were, like last year was supposed to be the last year they were

4:04:47 ↗ gonna do any funding like that. And that's what I meant about the fact that

4:04:53 ↗ the RFPs went out for the same kind of thing was a little bit of

4:04:59 ↗ a surprise to the committee members. And so it was really, yes, it wasn't unanimous

4:05:05 ↗ everywhere. You can see by the vote tally that's there. But clearly, it was a

4:05:11 ↗ majority on these. Instead of funding individual programs and events, is that a centralized strategy

4:05:17 ↗ that first, again, to drive events into the area and to do marketing and campaigns

4:05:21 ↗ around those events, which these are not structured to do, and that's what the second

4:05:26 ↗ line of my theory is test, that that would be a better strategy. And there

4:05:30 ↗ seemed to be real general agreement among the nonprofit representatives that were there that, yeah,

4:05:35 ↗ this type of, that type, that's okay. I mean, you know, and we'll see. We're

4:05:40 ↗ gonna have to continue to work with them. There seemed to be general agreement that,

4:05:45 ↗ that being part of that campaign and helping actually recruit events is still a

4:05:50 ↗ very strong, strong programs for them. - Can I supplement that too? 'Cause I

4:05:56 ↗ think your answer was awesome. Just on the criterion, it's overnight stays that you

4:06:01 ↗ mentioned right at the front end that's driving that. The other piece is return

4:06:07 ↗ on investment. There's a lot of conversation around what's the ROI for that investment.

4:06:13 ↗ Yeah, and it's very difficult to actually measure a dollar spent on marketing here, actually

4:06:19 ↗ what that turns into, and whether or not that actually drives hotel stays, or what

4:06:25 ↗ they would call heads in beds. And at best, the claims seem to translate into,

4:06:30 ↗ I spend a dollar, we get a dollar. So it's not really leveraging. and actually

4:06:36 ↗ getting a return on the investment. It was one for one. So there was a

4:06:41 ↗ couple first. There was Mary Lou, Nina, Nina, Mary Lou, and Eileen. So Nina, then

4:06:46 ↗ Mary Lou, then Eileen. Am I looking in the right place here? Launching tax fund?

4:06:51 ↗ Perhaps. So I got one of my questions answered about the fund, and it seems

4:06:56 ↗ that you can roll it over into future years if you don't need to spend

4:07:01 ↗ it all this year. But the... The work plan in here, this

4:07:06 ↗ was aspirational on behalf of the administration and then the LTAC

4:07:12 ↗ makes its own decisions. I'm looking at page 513. And so

4:07:18 ↗ what I'm getting at is that the event recruitment contract is

4:07:24 ↗ one way of doing things, but the really top

4:07:30 ↗ Suggestion help with the form of the Destination Marketing Organization

4:07:35 ↗ visit, ESACWHA board, and the big overarching tourism effort that

4:07:41 ↗ came out of the Roger Brooks would have been another

4:07:47 ↗ choice too, and maybe more overarching than just event recruitment.

4:07:53 ↗ That's right, that's right. Event recruitment is just is not considered the be all end

4:07:58 ↗ all. It was viewed as of all the proposals the most the best use for

4:08:04 ↗ LTAC funds to drive hotel stays. Nobody proposed something that we were looking for and

4:08:09 ↗ we have in our tourism strategy there wasn't a party that came forward and said

4:08:14 ↗ I want to do that for you and I want you to give me LTAC

4:08:20 ↗ funds to do it. Is that what we're waiting for is somebody to and I

4:08:25 ↗ think you know that that's probably a pretty good statement. And though we didn't that

4:08:30 ↗ wasn't made specifically by any committee members while I was there is either. But and

4:08:35 ↗ so I think the committee wants to be much more directional. And then rather than

4:08:40 ↗ just residing in a city budget document, it's very clear that the LTAC committee has

4:08:46 ↗ very clear guidelines, strategies, and what they would like to achieve. It's gonna align with

4:08:52 ↗ the Roger Brooks proposal in many ways and actually also state priorities. And that guidance

4:08:58 ↗ didn't exist. It doesn't exist right now from the committee. - That proactive is new.

4:09:03 ↗ - Yes, yeah, drive it directionally. - Thank you. Mary Lou, then Eileen. Question. Yeah,

4:09:09 ↗ so the ones that fell below the line from Chamber, Salmon Days, all the way

4:09:14 ↗ down to Village Theater Marketing, were those annual requests from those organizations? So now that

4:09:20 ↗ LTAC is not going to fund them, are Are they having all those organizations having

4:09:24 ↗ to go find that money elsewhere? You know, some of it was new funding for

4:09:30 ↗ something they weren't due before. Some of it was to augment some programs. So I

4:09:35 ↗ think the answer was... It didn't shut down things completely. If they wanted to do

4:09:41 ↗ the same amount of marketing, they would have to find other sources or they were

4:09:45 ↗ gonna have to scale back it or they wouldn't scale back what their plans were

4:09:49 ↗ if they'd have got this funds or it was they just wouldn't market a particular

4:09:53 ↗ event or program. And I don't remember, I don't have the details in front of

4:09:56 ↗ me and how they lined up there. In previous years, there were similar requests for

4:10:02 ↗ similar amounts that were granted. This is the first year that...

4:10:08 ↗ That's my understanding, yes. $64,000. Eileen. Just to follow up on

4:10:14 ↗ that a little bit, these dollars that are the unfunded dollars

4:10:19 ↗ definitely were organizations and programs that we had funded with LTAC

4:10:25 ↗ dollars in previous years. I've got to go back to the

4:10:31 ↗ $80,000 for the city events recruitment contract. And first of all, what

4:10:36 ↗ is it? And then you said it's going to be outsourced. So

4:10:42 ↗ I need information on this. Do you have it? So I think

4:10:48 ↗ the intent is that the city would act as the agency to

4:10:53 ↗ issue a request for qualifications and proposals. on behalf of the

4:10:59 ↗ LTAC committee and then there would be a joint city LTAC review panel that

4:11:05 ↗ would work on evaluating the proposals that come in. And so, you know,

4:11:10 ↗ this is the, got the potential to be kind of the initial acorn of

4:11:16 ↗ the DMO, the Destination Management Organization. But I think as Paul talked about, a

4:11:22 ↗ big significant part of this was gonna be around event recruitment. So there was

4:11:28 ↗ still, you know, that opportunity for agencies to apply for this if the Chamber

4:11:33 ↗ chose to, There's other professional organizations that have been approached that could also

4:11:39 ↗ apply for this. So this agency or organization that would apply for

4:11:45 ↗ this contract, for this outsourced $80,000, would then take those dollars and

4:11:51 ↗ do what with them? Are they then going to grant them out?

4:11:57 ↗ So I... So no, I think this

4:12:03 ↗ would fund the initial agency in the organization. And then what we

4:12:09 ↗ had talked about, but as Paul said, it hadn't been finalized, was

4:12:14 ↗ an opportunity in the future to perhaps find opportunities for collaboration with

4:12:20 ↗ the new new organization and partner with some of these other agencies to build

4:12:26 ↗ on our tourism infrastructure and industry. What are we gonna get for $80,000? What are

4:12:32 ↗ we gonna see? So let me read from the project description in the application. The

4:12:37 ↗ funds would be used to contract out for event recruitment services as stated in the

4:12:43 ↗ Roger Brooks recommendations The successful firm or individual would actively recruit events such

4:12:49 ↗ as sports tournaments or small conferences, trade shows, etc. and create package

4:12:55 ↗ deals or cross-promote existing Issaquah tourism amenities such as BOMS, Village Theater,

4:13:01 ↗ the zoo, etc. The Lodging Tax Advisory Committee would be a partner

4:13:06 ↗ in the contract process. LTAC would be would be on the selection

4:13:12 ↗ committee to hire the firm or individuals to perform the work, be involved in creating

4:13:17 ↗ the scope of the work and receive quarterly reports on the progress of events of

4:13:21 ↗ the firm and provide input accordingly. So it is the outcome sought is to bring

4:13:26 ↗ more events like sports events, small conferences and to the city. And the example that

4:13:31 ↗ was cited again was like the volleyball tournament was held at the state park. So

4:13:37 ↗ that the committee was very, very strong that this is

4:13:42 ↗ the kind of use of the dollars that will drive

4:13:48 ↗ hotel and tourism. I felt very strongly about that. How

4:13:53 ↗ do we know what success is with this? Events. Events.

4:13:59 ↗ And overnight stays. Yeah, events. And that's what it is.

4:14:05 ↗ Yeah. And this may be way off the wall because it is like

4:14:11 ↗ 10:15 at night. We are going to look at a proposal at some point in

4:14:16 ↗ the future that's coming back with some new graphics and ways to look at city

4:14:22 ↗ trails, series of maps or whatever it is, they're electronic. And I'm wondering if I

4:14:28 ↗ feel bad looking up here and seeing that we used to support these organizations

4:14:34 ↗ and we're not able to do that because of the changing of the rules and

4:14:38 ↗ a change in approach of how to use these funds. But I'm wondering if there's

4:14:43 ↗ some sort of linkage that we can have with perhaps an agenda bill that Eileen

4:14:47 ↗ is working on that as a way to include some of these within the graphics

4:14:52 ↗ works that we're doing, either include dates of festivals, dates of events or something so

4:14:56 ↗ that we can leverage those other dollars that we're using to spend on graphics so

4:15:01 ↗ that it's not just picking up a trail map but now there's a sidebar that

4:15:06 ↗ lists a whole bunch of events through town throughout the year or something i don't

4:15:10 ↗ know yeah and so so um the thing that i liked about the uh um

4:15:15 ↗ the the idea is so recruitment process uh package so imagine um so i think

4:15:19 ↗ the volleyball group has like signed up to come back for example but the the

4:15:24 ↗ the fly-in that happened at Tiger Mountain with that. That is, what are they

4:15:29 ↗ gonna do? Let's say they went out and they said, let's recruit, let's make

4:15:35 ↗ that even better. So the package will be put together. And what the committee

4:15:41 ↗ is saying with that second comment below, I realize that's hard to read, is

4:15:47 ↗ that they're willing, we should make money available to assist, the

4:15:52 ↗ various nonprofits such as the ones listed here and perhaps others to create materials to

4:15:57 ↗ be part of this package that goes out as part of the recruitment. So a

4:16:02 ↗ good example would be if you want to hold this conference here, what else is

4:16:06 ↗ in the area? Well, we've got a zoo, you know, you've got and here's information

4:16:11 ↗ about the zoo. We've got, you know, we've got the village theater and here's information

4:16:16 ↗ about village theater. We've got RDS and here's other information about RDS. We've got the

4:16:20 ↗ fish, we got the salmon hatchery. As opposed to each of them doing individual kind

4:16:25 ↗ of campaigns on these programs, it was, these campaigns are gonna be tied to this

4:16:31 ↗ event recruitment that we're gonna do. And there seemed to be a very general consensus

4:16:37 ↗ that with this event recruitment, that's actually is marketing of their services, their availability of

4:16:42 ↗ their programs and the like. So there seemed to be a general acceptance that, you

4:16:47 ↗ know, that was a really good alternative to what they were asking for up here.

4:16:52 ↗ But it's not, that isn't the end all yet. That was just kind of what

4:16:57 ↗ we could still do in 2016 to support these organizations. Does that help? - It

4:17:02 ↗ does help actually, that's good. That is one way of doing marketing for them to

4:17:07 ↗ an event that might want to come. And obviously by looking at what they're looking

4:17:11 ↗ for in terms of brochures, they're looking at a broader audience. I just feel like

4:17:16 ↗ if there's some way with the city initiative that we're already working in a direction

4:17:20 ↗ like this, as much as we can leverage effort we're already putting in to assist

4:17:24 ↗ them with their marketing would be great. I just wasn't sure how to do it.

4:17:29 ↗ So anyway, if that helps. It just doesn't go as far as I wanted. Okay.

4:17:34 ↗ Josh. Eileen's point though about return on investment, it's still hard to measure and so

4:17:38 ↗ I'm sort of wondering is there going to be a report produced that says we

4:17:42 ↗ had six more conferences this year than we had last year or is it just

4:17:46 ↗ by virtue of the LTAC fund is going to go up in dollars so therefore

4:17:51 ↗ we must have had more heads in beds? How do we, you know, I'm still

4:17:55 ↗ confused about how success is measured. I get everything you said about the recruitment contract

4:17:59 ↗ and the intent of it and what it I don't have an issue with any

4:18:04 ↗ of that. I just want to make sure that there's some check in to measure

4:18:10 ↗ whether this was a successful initiative. Okay, and yes, the actual, I'm just reading here,

4:18:16 ↗ it just says contract firm will track this, but in terms of the number of

4:18:21 ↗ lodging stays and the project will generate, that will be tracked. So for example, we

4:18:27 ↗ talked about this. I went on a recent conference and part of the conference registration

4:18:32 ↗ was I had to tell them what hotel I was staying in. It's like, you

4:18:37 ↗ know, that's a direct correlation between an event and an actual hotel stay. So that

4:18:42 ↗ type of, and that's a well-deployed, well-understood strategy to create a really strong linkage between

4:18:47 ↗ some event that came to town and what impact it had on the tourism industry

4:18:52 ↗ 'cause someone spent overnight with that. And so tracking those, tracking the distance that they

4:18:58 ↗ came from, including whether they came from other counties or states, that would all be

4:19:03 ↗ part of the criteria that would be put into the contract with the firm that's

4:19:09 ↗ hired. So I would just recommend that perhaps the Services Committee next year get

4:19:15 ↗ an update from perhaps the LTAC Committee on the successful implementation of this so that

4:19:20 ↗ the committee members understand better the success. Well, the LTAC dollars are based on heads

4:19:26 ↗ and beds, but that doesn't necessarily distinguish between they came here as a tourist to

4:19:32 ↗ see a site versus they came here to meet with Costco to sell a good.

4:19:38 ↗ So there's no other numbers or hotel stays may be going up But what's

4:19:44 ↗ the correlation between why they are coming here to the community? So the good

4:19:50 ↗ news is the hoteliers could tell you pretty quick pretty quickly what they're what their

4:19:56 ↗ overnight stays are. And they can tell you where the gaps are. So during the

4:20:00 ↗ summer months, they were getting full price, no discounts on a lot of their hotels.

4:20:05 ↗ And so you look at the additional hotels that are coming in, they all hit

4:20:09 ↗ different niches. You just hit on one. Some are focused on the business traveler doing

4:20:14 ↗ business with Costco. The Motel 6 is more focused on the people that may be

4:20:18 ↗ driving through and visiting the Puget Sound region. I think there are times though that

4:20:23 ↗ they would say that their overall bookings are lower than what they would typically be

4:20:28 ↗ and that's the time that they'd like to get additional bookings and people to come

4:20:32 ↗ into town to fill their spaces. - Yeah, that was actually part of the discussion

4:20:37 ↗ as well. I mean, they have good history of what their occupancy rates are and

4:20:42 ↗ so part of the strategy would be in that event recruitment would be to fill

4:20:46 ↗ in those gaps. Tola. I'd like to request that next year we get

4:20:52 ↗ some sort of little presentation on this. I realize that we're not going to line

4:20:58 ↗ item veto this. We're not going to pick nits piece by piece, but it's over

4:21:03 ↗ $100,000. So it'd be nice to have some of this information in a little presentation.

4:21:09 ↗ Okay. Any other questions or discussion? Okay. Is the council ready to vote on this?

4:21:15 ↗ Okay. So remember, this is the whole thing, and if we say no, it goes

4:21:21 ↗ back to LTAC. So thumb up to support the recommendation for the committee, thumb down

4:21:26 ↗ to not support it. Okay, that's in favor six, six in favor, one against. So

4:21:32 ↗ we adopt the recommendation of the LTAC committee. That's all the line items I have

4:21:37 ↗ for tonight. - Four more sheets or anything? - You sure about that? - I

4:21:43 ↗ don't know. - Oh, but we're not done. we're that's all we have

4:21:49 ↗ for tonight now there is um you know as as we saw here

4:21:54 ↗ you know the the issue of um funding for the senior center or

4:22:00 ↗ senior services in general is still out in front of us um

4:22:06 ↗ I appreciate everybody's comments along those lines, and I think they will help inform the

4:22:12 ↗ process as we go forward, continuing to seek some type of solution. But also everybody's

4:22:17 ↗ investment tonight. Lots of great comments, lots of great insight. I'm extremely proud of the

4:22:23 ↗ work that we do and how we do it so out in public. Hopefully for

4:22:29 ↗ everybody it's getting a little bit more comfortable to do it this way out in

4:22:34 ↗ public and with a lot of detail recorded for posterity's sake. But the vast majority

4:22:39 ↗ of our work has been completed with the exception of the senior services funding, and

4:22:45 ↗ we'll be taking that up at a regular business meeting in the future. So for

4:22:50 ↗ tonight, our meeting is adjourned. Thank you. You didn't ask

4:22:56 ↗ if anybody would make speeches. Yeah, I forgot.

Approved minutes

Extracted from the next meeting's packet, where this meeting's minutes were approved as a consent-calendar attachment.

Open PDF

Attendance

Council / Members (7)

Eileen Barber

Stacy Goodman

Tola Marts

Nina Milligan

Mary Lou Pauly

Joshua Schaer

Paul Winterstein