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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2003-04-22 TranscriptionItem 2a Page 1 ITEM 2a MAYOR'S PROCLAMATIONS a. Arbor Day: April 25 Lehman: (Reads proclamation). Karr: Here to accept is Terry Robinson, City Forester. Robinson: Mr. Mayor, Council I'd just like to thank you very much for your past support and I hope continued support. And I think you've always helped us a lot and helped our forestry division and the Parks Division and I'd like to thank you very much for that. Thank you. Champion: Thank you. Kanner: Terry, are there any programs out there where people can get free trees to plant? Robinson: There are programs through the state - the Department of Natural Resources. What those particular are I'd have to look at them to be exact because as we all know the state is going through their funding issues also. But there are some programs from the state. It has to do with the type of property you own- things like that. So it's possible yes. Karmer: Thank you. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 2b Page 2 ITEM 2b MAYOR'S PROCLAMATIONS b. Volunteer Week: April 27-May 3 Lehman: (Reads proclamation). Kart: Here to accept is Janie Jeffries representing VAN - Volunteer Administrator Network. Jeffries: I would like to thank the Council for this recognition and on behalf of Volunteer Administrators Network I'd like to recognize the work the volunteers provide for our community. Last year alone volunteers in the Johnson County area combined to provide over 1 million of hours of service and that doesn't begin to include or account for the service hours put forth by school, church, neighborhood groups and families. Volunteers are essential to our community at a time when all service agencies are stretched to the limit. Again National Volunteer Week is recognized this coming week - April 27 through May 3rd. During this week the Volunteers Administrators Network will be sharing the importance of volunteering with the community by promoting volunteerism through the media and each agency will be recognizing their volunteers in their own way. We encourage everyone to take time to thank those volunteers that are giving back to their community. Thank you. Lehman: Thank you. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 3a Page 3 ITEM 3a OUTSTANDING STUDENT CITIZENSHIP AWARDS a. Weber Elementary: Natalie Manhica, Katie Monson, Jake Zubrod Lehman: Item three are the Outstanding Student Citizenship Awards. If the students from Weber Elementary would come forward please. This is probably in many council meetings this is the high point of the entire evening. I promise you this is something that Council very much enjoys. And as Mayor and frankly as grandpa I thoroughly enjoy this. So what I would like you to do is read your name and why you were nominated. Katie Monson: Okay. My name is Katie Monson. I am 12 years old and the daughter of Kevin and Julie Monson. I am completing 6th grade at Weber Elementary where I have been active in safety patrol, conflict manager, media helper, school store and the elementary band where I play the French hom. I also enjoy being matched with a younger student as buddy. Outside of school I am a 4-H member, soccer and softball player, member of the Iowa City girl's choir and a volunteer at the Iowa City Public Library and at my church. Being involved with these activities has allowed me to put into practice the core virtues that are taught and incorporated into all we do at Weber. Those core virtues are honesty, respect, responsibility, compassion, self-discipline, perseverance and giving. Using these virtues allows us to understand what being a good citizen means. Natalie Manhica: Hi. I'm Natalie Manhica. I'm 11 years old. Thank you everyone for giving me the opportunity to receive this award. I make it a point to help all students when needed. I always treat everyone with equal fairness. I helped model the virtue respect. I never disrespect my teacher or classmates for any reason. I demonstrate responsibility and self discipline by helping out at the school store to support the store. I set examples for older and younger students. I always do more than expected. I try to be a leader and mother of the classroom as my teacher Mr. Lawson often says. I do well academically using Weber's core virtues as my guide for success. It is an honor for me to receive the Outstanding Student Citizen Award from Iowa City. Thank you. Jake Zubrod: Hello. I'm Jake Zubrod and I'm 12 years old. The Outstanding Student Citizen Award is a big honor to me. Thank you very much. Here are some of the ways I show the Weber core virtues. I try to be a good person and show the Weber core virtues at school. Some of the core virtues are important to me like responsibility, respect, perseverance and giving. Things I have done for Weber school - in team 3 I did conflict managers and then in team 4 1 did school store. I helped kids go to their heating test one day. And I helped my teacher This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 3a Page 4 Mr. Lawson after school. I like to help people and I do my assignments on time. I get along with kids and adults. I like playing my trumpet in band. I always like to include people. I like to help my mom clean and my dad sometimes too. In my future job I think I would like to be a vet or a lawyer. I'd like to live in Utah, Wisconsin, Wyoming and maybe I'd like to live in Iowa. Thank you. Lehman: See what I mean. This is the best part of the meeting. You know it occurred to me many, many times as I hear these young folks reading those things how much better I'd feel if I could read those honestly. Think about that. These young folks are really special. We're very proud of you. I have the certificates for each of you. And I'm going to read one of them. For outstanding qualities of leadership within Weber Elementary as well as the community and for sense of responsibility and helpfulness to others we recognize these as Outstanding Student Citizens. Your community is proud of you. Presented by the Iowa City City Council. By the way so are your parents and especially your grandparents. Thank you guys. You know I guess I've never said it, but I can't imagine how proud those teachers must be of those kids as well. You always think of the parents and the grandparents and the brothers and sisters, but those teachers have got to be really proud of those kids too. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 5 Page 5 ITEM 5 PUBLIC DISCUSSION Lehman: Item 5 is public discussion. This is the time reserved on the agenda for folks to address the Council on items that do not otherwise appear on the agenda. If you would like to address the Cotmcil sign in, give your name, address and limit your comments to five minutes or less. And before we start we have to keep the doorways clear to keep the fireman happy - keep them happy, we're happy, everybody's happy. Tom Padley: Mayor Lehman and Council I'm Tom Padley from MidAmerican Energy Company. Over the past few weeks we've been providing you with some information about our wind farm project which is construction of a 310-megawatt wind farm in northwest and north central Iowa at a cost of 323 million dollars. Along with that proposal was a proposal to freeze our electric rates through the year 2010. I wanted to bring you up to date on the status of those. The enabling legislation that was necessary was passed by the Iowa legislature and it has been signed by the Governor. As far as the rate freeze goes that still has to be reviewed and approved by the Iowa Utilities Board. But we have no reason to believe that they wouldn't approve that. And I wondered if you just had any further questions about any of these items. Champion: I have a simple question. I caught a headline. What about birds in these windmills? Do they...are the birds being hurt by these windmills - running into them? Do you know about that? Padley: I don't know anything read specific. I remember reading a few years ago about some wind farms that were erected in migratory bird flight patterns. So that is one of the things that is looked at when you're siting these to try to avoid those flight ways. Champion: Thank you. Wilburn: Wasn't it Ames that was doing some type of study? Is that what you saw? Yeah. Kanner: Tom, didn't the consumer advocate propose that your last rate freeze which is now in effect - your rate request - to lower the rates by something like 10%? Padley: I don't know that. I'd have to find out. Kanner: You don't know that? Didn't you reach an agreement with them where you wanted greater rates, they wanted less? They felt the rates should be going down. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 5 Page 6 Padley: We reached an agreement to freeze the rates through 2005. Kanner: Right. It was a compromise. You don't know that what they proposed? Padley: My expertise is in distribution of electricity and gas. I don't really deal with the rate making process. If that was the case you know the agreement between the utility board and the consumer advocate and the company was to freeze the rates rather than to raise, lower...it was just a freeze. O'Dormell: So there is more than one division with MidAmerican? Padley: Yeah there is. Vanderhoef: I think it's interesting to note this and thank you for coming and alerting us to this Tom because with all of the energy building projects - not only the wind farm, but the other two plants that are being built in the state of Iowa and still be able to freeze rates for an additional 5 years beyond the '05 into the year 2010 1 think is pretty remarkable considering the amount if I had it correct...what was the total amount that you were putting out for these three different projects? Kanner: 300-megawatt. Vanderhoef: But the total cost on it. Padley: The total cost... Vanderhoef: 323 million? Padley: Total investment with...it's 323 million for the wind farm and then the two generating stations - one at Des Moines and one at Council Bluffs it's a total of 1.4 billion dollars investment. And the rates have been frozen since 1995. We're proposing to extend that through 2010. That's 15 years. And with an investment of 1.4 billion that's a feet, a task that we're going to have to work hard to do. Vanderhoef: Fairly remarkable in this day and age of inflation and so forth. Thank you very much. Padley: Thank you. Jean Marie Volk: Good evening. I'm Jean Marie Volk of Iowa City. I would like to ask the Council if this is the appropriate time to talk about the 21 measure. Lehman: That comes up later in the agenda. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of ApriI 22, 2003 Item 5 Page 7 Volk: Later on the agenda - I would like to reserve that time. Lehman: You can speak at that time. Volk: Thank you. Lehman: And that will probably be much later. O'Dormell: Three hours. Champion: No. Brandon Ross: Hi. I'm Brandon Ross from Iowa City and I would like to bring up an issue that many of us are concerned about. And we're all happy that it's spring which it's very beautiful outside and some of the gardens are coming out and everything. And with that the children are out playing. And it's quite beautiful. Yet some of us are inside. But one of things that is negative about this time of year for many people is that along with spring also is the problem of the yellow and white signs which basically represents the poisons that are spread on the lawns each year in order to have green lawns. The studies have been proving for almost 40 years that many of these chemicals that are in fact being used on these lawns are carcinogenic and in fact neurological poisons. And some have been banned already. But many of them still are in use. There's a high rise in child leukemia. There's a rise in soft tissue sarcoma and non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. And there's a rise in neurologic diseases such as Parkinson's disease. Those of you who know Michael J. Fox know that he's spoken out about this in recent events that he has been coming to for the Parkinson's Council. The most vulnerable to these problems to these chemicals are children. Children their metabolisms are moving at 20 times what our are and they are the most vulnerable to these types of diseases. These diseases have been on the rise. Unfortunately if you choose not to use these chemicals on your lawn you still can get them because of drift and because when you walk down the street those chemicals are all over. They do not necessarily disappear within 24 hours. And in fact studies show that they are around for 30 days. And it's in the Iowa City water. It's a community issue. It's for community health to have some kind of idea as to what we should do in our city regarding the health of our people, regarding this type of process. And what I'm asking is for the Council and for the City to take an interest in this because it's so prevalent. How many people here use bottled or filtered water as opposed to tap? Would you rather drink tap water in Iowa City or would you rather drink bottled water in Iowa City? I'tl just let that sit up there. When you use company...it's not only what you get over the counter because most lawn chemicals that you get over the counter are dangerous. And the clerks at the This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 5 Page 8 counter are not necessarily trained to know what these things am about. Companies like Quality Care and True Green, Chemlawn they tell you that things are safe because they're told to say that. They say that the chemicals are in an organic base. That's like saying if you take Strict 9 and you put it in water it's okay because the water is safe. Really that is not the case. Why are these chemicals not banned? Well the reason is...well some of them are banned and some have been like Dursbane. But companies like Monsanto and Dupont they lobby with a lot of money to try to make sure that they can keep their products on as long as they can. Even the EPA is helpless when it comes to these things. Even thought the EPA has listed that these chemicals are in fact dangerous they're not allowed to ban them because the lobbies are so strong and it takes some times up to 10 years. Whereas the tobacco companies spent a lot of money to prove that cigarette smoking was not a dangerous thing it took many, many years to be able to have places where you could have no smoking - to have a healthy environment. You wouldn't want your children to be at a daycare center where all the daycare workers were smoking. Lehman: You need to wind this up. Ross: Alright. So basically what I'm asking the public to...what I'm asking the Council to do - and I'm providing a packet of material that I'll give to Marian over there - is to consider doing some things about this. Them are safe ways that you can have a lawn. There are companies like Safe Earth Lawn and Care Company for instance is one - I'm not trying to (can't hear) for them but they are - and there are many ways. There are booklets that you can get through the Rachael Carson's Council that are located out in Maryland. They stand behind trying to eliminate these chemicals. And I'm hoping that the City Council will consider something for our people here so that when I take my 2-year- old daughter, Oriona, down the street I don't have to try to pick her up every time I see a lawn has chemicals. I personally am chemical sensitive too. I have chronic fatigue syndrome. Lehman: We tried - and you're done - but we tried in '93 I believe pass an ordinance and the state preempted our ordinance so we had to rescind the ordinance. And it was relative to chemicals on lots. But give the information to Marian. Ross: I will. Thank you so much for your time up here. Kanner: Unfortunately I think those companies you mentioned lobbied hard at the state house to pass that law that preempted us. But we did talk at one time about the City's use of pesticides and I think it's appropriate to bring that subject up again in the future. Brandon perhaps you can send us a note regarding the City's use of pesticides and what we This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 5 Page 9 might do for alternatives. And then the Council can then decide if it would like to go down that court. Ross: Okay. Thank you. Lehman: Thank you. Karr: Motion to accept correspondence. Pfab: So moved. Wilbum: Second. Lehman: Motion and seconded to accept correspondence. All in favor? Opposed? Motion carries. Nick Herbold: Hi. My name is Nick Herbold. I'm from 319 East Court Street. I'm here to talk about an issue that's not on the agenda. It's how the citizens of Iowa City use their time. And I think that there are a lot of people here tonight that want to talk on item number 15 and number 17. And I would appreciate it if you could move it to earlier in the agenda because a lot of the students have jobs because the tuition is going up and things like that. A lot of adults have other things they need to be doing. It's nice outside. So I would really, really appreciate it if you could save everyone a little time and move items 15 or 17 - preferably....17 would be best to earlier in the agenda. Thank you. Sandy Kunde: Hello. I'm Sandy Kunde. I'm here representing the Business and Professional Women of Iowa City. And on April 15th the Iowa City City Council recognized a proclamation for equal pay day. And I would like to thank them for that. Business and Professional Women mobilized on April 15th to call attention to the wage gap. Tuesday is symbolic of the point in the new week that a woman works in order to earn the wages paid to a man in the previous week. Because women on average earn less and they must work longer to earn the same pay. In 1963 when the Federal Equal Pay Act was passed women were paid 59 cents to the dollar men earned. In 2001 women were paid 76 to the dollar. At the current rate of change the wage gap will not be eliminated until 2039. A college degree does not protect a woman from the wage gap. Women who graduated from college earn 72% as much as men with the same education. So as they have in the past the Iowa City City Council took time to recognize April 15th with a proclamation and we appreciate their acknowledgement of this issue and their continued support hopefully until the wage gap is closed and the proclamation can go away. Thank you. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 5 Page 10 Lehman: Thank you. Dawn Mueller: Good evening Mayor and Council and City Staff. My name is Dawn Mueller. I reside at 1220 Village Road, number 7 and I just have a couple of announcements that I would like to share with Council and Staff and the rest of the City. As you may already be aware April of 2003 was proclaimed Sexual Assault Awareness Month and a number of activities have been going on and will be going on throughout the month largely sponsored by the Rape Victim Advocacy Program and other groups that work with them. And if you have had the opportunity to walk through the pedestrian mall today until 8:00 this evening the Rape Victim Advocacy Program will be featuring the clothesline project which is a display oft-shirts created by women survivors of violence or by family or friends of women who have been violated or murdered. And if anybody happens to get out before the Council session ends I would encourage you to head up there to take a look at that project. At this time also from 7:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. at this time there is a candlelight vigil devoted to survivors and victims of sexual violence on women. The second announcement that I wanted to make - I appreciated the comments that the gentleman from MidAmerican Energy made here earlier this evening. As you know...many of you know I've been a part of the group Citizens for Public Power. My particular interest is in the engineering aspects of renewable energy programs particularly with respect to wind power and hydropower. And I will be pursuing in addition to the physics degree I have also an engineering degree in the fields of fluids dynamics. I'm very interested in wind power and have been following a lot of the legislation that has been going on. I won't comment on that right now, but if anybody has some questions regarding some of the legislation that has gone through I'd be happy to discuss some of that with you. I want to announce, particularly for Dale Helling our Assistant City Manager and for Steve Atkins our City Manager and for any other City Staff who are interested citizens that on April 24th the Iowa Department of Natural Resources will be holding a conference on wind power up in Mason City. I will be attending that conference. Persons invited to that conference include CEOs, utility managers of both the privately owned utilities and of the municipally owned utilities, other city managers and other personnel and interested citizens who are aware that wind power is beginning to become more prominent in our state. And if you would like more information on that I'd be more than willing to carpool with you. I'm also making plans on attending in May from May 18th to the 21st in Austin, Texas an annual event that is put forward by the American Wind Energy Association called Wind Power 2003 which is an industry wide conference. I've been contacted by the regional director of the American Wind Energy Association and others and will be becoming a This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 5 Page 11 member of the American Wind Energy Association and I'm making plans to travel to that conference. If anybody would like to speak with me about these matters feel free to contact me at area code 319-338- 9696 which is my home phone number and also several people on Council have my e-mail address if anybody needs to get in touch with me that way. Thank you. Lehman: Thank you, Dawn. Ann Bovbjerg: Good evening Mr. Mayor and Council. I'm Ann Bovbjerg. I live in Iowa City. I'm Chair of the Planning and Zoning Commission and I'm speaking this evening on behalf of the Commission and we'd like to say thank you. Most of the public probably doesn't know this because you're discussion of Dubuque Street traffic occurred a couple of weeks ago at your informal session. You people all know about Noith Dubuque Street and when P&Z sent you our minutes that you had that night for a project which is on the P&Z calendar tonight. We also sent a motion asking you to look very carefully at the traffic on North Dubuque Street. It's already a problem. The Dubuque/Foster is a problem. It's a problem for buses, for cyclists, for walkers, for school buses. And at that meeting you all said in effect that you would want to look at North Dubuque Street sooner rather than later and so we're very happy that...the neighbors spoke to us very strongly, very tellingly and I certainly hope...the Commission certainly hopes that this is something you undertake in the next year or so. There are lots of projects that require the City's monies, but we think as citizens this is a very, very important corridor. It's very important for safety. It's very important for getting people in and out. And we're very pleased that you are going to be looking at it very seriously in the near future. Thank you very much. Lehman: Thank you Ann. Karen Pease: My name is Karen Pease and I'll be brief here. I've noticed this before and it seems to have happened again and it's been recurring pretty often. It would seem that whenever there is an issue that is controversial and the majority of the people come to speak about it that that issue is pushed towards the end. I know most of you would like to portray yourselves as supporters of open government. How open is it when you try to drive off people by delaying towards the end from speaking about what they're concerned of. Not very. Thank you. Lehman: Any other public discussion? This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 6e Page 12 ITEM 6e PLANNING AND ZONING MATTERS. PUBLIC HEARING ON AN ORDINANCE CHANGING THE ZONING DESIGNATION FROM HIGH DENSITY SINGLE FAMILY/SENSITIVE AREA OVERLAY (RS-12/OSA) TO PLANNED DEVELOPMENT HOUSING OVERLAY (OPDH- 12/OSA) FOR 2.12 ACRES OF PROPERTY LOCATED AT THE SOUTHEAST CORNER OF MEADOW RIDGE LANE AND NORTH DUBUQUE STREET (REZ03-00009) Lehman: (Reads item). Public hearing is open. Dean Spina: Members of the Council my name is Dean Spina and with me here is Corey Hodapp the applicant for CJ's Construction. We would like to explain a little bit about this project and how it fits into the comprehensive plan for the City of Iowa City. We particularly like to appreciate the action by the Planning Commission two weeks ago in voting recommend approval. And we would also like to extend our appreciation to the analysis by Staff which has confirmed that this is a matter that fits within the planning goals of the City of Iowa City. Since 1983 the property has been zoned RS-12. Subsequent to that time the adjacent property was zoned for a lower density. The application tonight will allow the development of 13 town home units on this property recognizing and protecting the sensitive area, providing affordable housing at a rate of about $150,000 per unit. They're about 2,000 square foot units. They'll be in a condominium regime. So there will be home ownership. And in addition to that it will be an effective use of the land. The total 2 point plus acres will average per unit at about 6800 square feet, over twice the minimum required for this zoning district. This will afford City Council and the City to have a different style of housing in this vicinity which is within their comprehensive plan goals. It will provide for higher density. The particular layout of this plan will reduce the amount of concrete that is required. It does so in part by asking for a reduction in the 40- foot setback to a 30-foot setback. That allows less concrete for the driveways to the interior of the parcel. We also providing in the plan for the use of grass crete in parking spaces so that it won't be solid concrete where they'll be required for additional parking that the Planning Commission and Staff requested we provided. Karmer: What's that word - gross what? Spina: Grass crete. It's basically tike concrete blocks where there's holes in it or concrete bricks where there's holes in it. So the holes are then filled with dirt and grass is grown there, we understand that there is that use somewhere around the University. I was at a local car dealership a This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 6e Page 13 couple days ago and they happened to use it there in the parking area and they put a car on it for display. But it allows green to come through...the grass to come through and the water then to soak through rather than just running off. And if we use in this particular plan in an area where there's parking required for additional parking on site. In addition this will...the plan allows preservation of certain trees. If we were to meet the 40-foot setback we could still have the number of units that we were asking for on this parcel, but it would take out some existing trees. So by reducing the setback we can save some of those trees. We believe also that this will be a pedestrian friendly in that there will a limited amount of cars moving in and out of the complex. Complex is too big a word for 13-units in reality. It does provide cluster housing which is one of your objectives. We're not going to talk about the safety issue that neighbors have talked about eloquently at Planning Commission and Planning Commission itself has made a recommendation and we understand from the Planning Commission Chair that you have a desire to address that in the near future as well. However, we would like to point out that the Sensitive Area Ordinance under which this property is currently controlled does recognize the possible transfer of density from part of that property which is being preserved through the open sensitive area law to the remaining property so that the density that we're asking for is supported by the existing language in your zoning ordinance regarding sensitive areas. Lehman: You need to wind this up. Spina: I'm getting there. Lehman: Okay. Spina: Finally I think what I'd just like to focus in on is that the number of proposed units will have a positive impact on the City. And this comes about by inducing the density that is within your planning goals. It allows more people to live closer to the area...to the downtown. If you eliminate 13 units or you take this down to the current three units that can be built on this property you've got ten more units somewhere and those people are going to live somewhere, probably farther out of the community, perhaps North Liberty, perhaps Coralville. They're going to come into town some way, probably by car, not by bus or bicycle. Whereas people living here with ultimately the traffic light and that will have ready access to the downtown area through the bicycle, through the bus, through walking. I was impressed tonight driving in that a number of people walking, using rollerblades, etc. as a mode of transportation. This is what you can encourage by endorsing the 13 units that we are asking for. Finally, we've underscored repeatedly that the language in your comprehensive This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 6e Page 14 plan requests diversity, requests density. The density that is proposed is well within the guidelines that you have of 5.7 units per acre as being the most effective or the least expensive for the City to provide services for. Thank you very much. Lehman: thank you. Pfab: Could I ask a couple questions? Lehman: Yeah what did we not learn last night? Pfab: Okay. how...there's a tradeoff between setting the homes back and the absorption of noise from the highway and the saving of the trees. Is it...will those housing units be relatively quiet for people living there? Spina: We believe so and in fact the reason for the 40-foot setback is from the right-of-way of Dubuque Street which in fact actually includes old Highway 218. So we have a frontage road between the busy street - Dubuque Street and the property line or the homes. So there is more space in there than 40 feet. The buffer is really including the frontage road as part of that buffer. Pfab: Okay if you went back to the normal setback how many trees would you lose? Spina: There were several like in the center that we were saving that would have to be removed in order to go back further as I recall. Pfab: One, two, 107 Spina: A number of them actually. Pfab: Do you think if you went back the normal setback that you would lose a dozen trees? Lehman: Irvin that was...we talked about that last night. Karin told us that if they move it back it takes the trees out of the (can't hear). Pfab: I was just wanting to know what the trade-off was - the number because that is really a noisy place. I spent some time up there, my first concern was it looked like it was a very densely populated area and I realize...there's a lot of things about this that I really like, but I'm just wondering is that noise at some point become normal for those people living there. Corey Hodapp: I think with the buffer and those trees in the front that are already growing too. That's going to help substantially. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 6e Page 15 Lehman: You need to give your name please. Hodapp: Sorry. Corey Hodapp, applicant. The buffer between the buildings and the street that is more or less a private street - it's old 218 and Dubuque Street sits a lot lower. The elevation of these sits a lot higher. And the frontage between the buildings that we are proposing to build have a nice...I think they're 12, 15-foot tall trees. I think they're apply trees...I'm not for sure what type of tree, but they provide a nice buffer too by the time the noise get to that point I think it's going to be minimal. Pfab: Have any noise...have people determined how much noise is there? Has anybody looked at that with that idea mind? O'Donnell: There's nobody there yet, Irvin. Pfab: No, no but there will be. By that time it will be too late. Hodap: No they haven't I guess. Pfab: I'm a little uncomfortable. Overall I think it's a great development. O'Donnell: Did I understand that with this zoning you could put like 24 units in this area? Hodapp: Correct. O'Donnell: I think you've got a very good project. You've got 13 units. You've paid attention to the sensitive areas and you've got green space. So I think it's a very good project. Hodapp: Staff and I have met and we've reviewed and talked about all that anyway. Lehman: Thank you. Kanner: Dean and Corey I've got a couple questions, some concerns from some of your future neighbors. One was parking. They feel that there will be not sufficient parking and residents will tend to park on Meadow Ridge Lane and then perhaps walk through the yards of residents of Meadow Ridge Lane. I wonder if you could address that concern. Hodapp: Right. These units I think the neighbors were aware that there were tandem stall parking garages so that it means that you drive underneath two cars can park in the garage. And then we did allow two parking stalls for outside of the house. And then in addition to that we put in grass crete which Dean was talking about earlier for additional parking say if one of the tenants or someone had a cousin or a relation or some This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 6e Page 16 come down and need somewhere to park that was allowed. I think we put in 13 units or 13 additional stalls throughout the development where they could accommodate that problem. Champion: Good job. Spina: As a clarification also the...none of the lots would have to be gone over pass through by anybody parking on Meadow Ridge. The property fronts on Meadow Ridge as well as on old Highway 218. so if they were to park on there they wouldn't be crossing anybody's lot to get access. Kanner: And the other concern and I don't think this effects it directly, but I'll ask it anyhow. Are they going to be rental or condo? Spina: It will be placed in a condominium regime in the expectation that they will be sold to individual home owners. Kanner: Thank you. Lehman: Thank you. Karr: Motion to accept correspondence. O'Donnell: So moved. Pfab: Second. Lehman: Motion and a second to accept correspondence. All in favor? Opposed? Motion carries. Anyone else like to speak to this issue? Public heating is closed. Kanner: We've got one more. Lehman: Oh, well then the public heating is open again. Mike Cardane: There are several of us here to talk about this. I'm Mike Cardane and I live at 1949 Meadow Ridge Drive. And at the meeting for the Zoning Commission - the Board - it's important to notice that this is not a unanimous decision. It was actually a rather spirited discussion concerning it. And it was a 4-3 split of which at least one member voted positively had reservations about the project. This is all in the minutes of the meeting. And it was suggested that this is the better format for us to bring our complaints than actually the Zoning Board because you all can do more about it. And at least one member said they felt that they didn't think it was a good project, but they couldn't really come up with a good reason to deny it. Okay? So the other thing that I wanted to point out is that I noticed on the agenda that it This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 6e Page 17 says only 14.2 percent of the people have filed protest. In your packet you'll see that there are actually seven filed protests so I don't understand where... Lehman: That's a legal requirement. It refers to the percentage of those folks who are within a certain distance of the property and when it reaches 20% it requires a supennajority. Cardane: Right. There's two who are here who have filed it and that's over 20%. Kanner: No, it's square footage of property. Cardane: Oh, it's for square footage? Okay. Kanner: You have to have 20% of that. Cardane: So basically we probably could not have gotten it in any instance. Lehman: Right. Cardane: Okay. this is...one thing I wanted to point out is in 1996 there was a, you know, sensitive areas development plan that was brought in designated (can't hear) 12OSA and part of the reason for that...and it actually defined what the maximum levels considered to be okay is three duplex units as well as the additional... (End of Tape #03-32, Beginning of Tape #03-35) Cardane: ...the concerns was about the slope that is on the east side and that that was a protected and regulated slope. Now on the other side of this is of course some storm water management easement area and an overflow storm spillway. And at the time that this was considered all that was found and this is why it was set as a maximal development for this area is that. This was not addressed actually in Staff's planning. You'll notice one of the significant deficiencies that is sited is the fact that engineering needs to be consulted. So the Staff plans that you have actually really didn't look at this issue at all. In fact when you look at the Staff plan the justification they talk about is not whether we should really change this to a RS 12-OSA, but if the plan is going to meet a zoning change to the OPDH. There's no...even the stated purpose is supposed to assess this, it doesn't. Okay? the thing you want to consider as well is while this may be 2.1 acres most of that you can't build on. At least 30% is this protected slope, there's an easement for the road. Okay? there's an already existing house that's there, so when you're talking about putting 13 units in you're not putting 13 units in 2.1 acres which in that case it's great. That's about This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 6e Page 18 like 6 levels which is about twice the density of what our neighborhood is. What you actually have is you actually have about...when you take the 30% out and you take that house out you actually have just slightly over an acre. So they're actually putting 13 units into one acre. The limitation is 14.5. so there is not a big difference here in this thing. They're building almost to the maximum. The other thing to look at is there is this concern over preserving trees. There are two trees in the center that they want to preserve. These are not the big trees that we can see from the road which is the nice thing when you come driving in you see that. We have that nice corridor. A very positive thing for the community. I was recruited to the University two years ago. Coming in via that route was one of the reasons that they were able to recruit me. And that will be gone when these trees are gone. When you come down that comer all you're going to see is this development. It's going to dominate everything in its sight. You're not going to have that nice bend when you come along and you see the Iowa City, the river and the thing is going to completely change the main entrance to our community is. So this is not a standard plot that you consider separately because of the water problems, the grade, the position. And this was all addressed in 1996. However, it seems that this was not brought out. So... Lehman: You need to wind this up Mike. Cardane: Huh? Lehman: You need to wind it up. Cardane: Okay. I will. So this is going to have a big impact on our neighborhood. We have a nice neighborhood - varied, different people, professionals, blue-collars. We're about 30% minority. And we have a very nice community. This is coming in basically to exploit that. It's going to change it. It's going to increase our density. This will become the dominant feature in our neighborhood. And I can only tell you not only is that going to change how we live, but it's also going to affect all of our property values. In fact most of the people who have moved into that area if I came in there and I saw this I would not have bought my house. It's that simple. So thank you for your time. Lehman: Thank you. John Rimmert: My name is John Rimmert. I live on Meadow Ridge Lane. I have a master's degree in urban planning and I'm very concerned about what went on in P&Z on hearing this issue. I wanted to bring up a few points. What Mike just mentioned this required a majority...in order This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of ApriI 22, 2003 Item 6e Page 19 to create a majority vote for the Council you had to have a least 20% of the people living within 200 feet of this property. We got 100% - all five of the people living adjacent to this property signed notarized petitions. I don't know where you're getting your 14% at. 100% of the people living on Meadow Ridge Lane signed petitions which I brought and they told me that it wasn't allowed because they're weren't notarized plus two other residents on old Highway 218. sowe have 100% objection to this development on Meadow Ridge Lane. Property values. I went to the first P&Z meeting and talked about property values - the negative effect of this development on our property on the single family dwellings there. P&Z says that they aren't interested in property values. They're interested in developing land. So they weren't interested in hearing my point on that. In fact it wasn't even in the minutes that I complained about property values. I hope the City Council takes this sort of thing a little more seriously. Neighborhood diversity is one of the building blocks of P&Z's plans. This neighborhood is very diverse and we're very cohesive. We have a nice mix of age and backgrounds. This rezoning will throw that way out of whack. It will skew it way to one side. Now I was told not to say anything negative about student populations or under 25, but I had an offer on the house that I'm living in and as soon as that sign went up the people withdrew their offer to buy the house because they did not want to live anywhere close to that type of housing. Now why did I say that type of housing? They lived in apartments in downtown and were fed up with students and singles who make a lot of noise, make a lot of trash, cause a lot of trouble. They wanted to get into a single family dwelling area. They looked at Meadow Ridge Lane, thought it was perfect and then saw the rezoning and they pulled their offer. So that's a negative effect on property values. Parking - there simply isn't enough room to park all the cars. The developer says he's planning two garages per unit and two parking stalls. What about visitors? If they're students they're going to have friends coming. There's not enough space to park and 218 there is no parking on that. Mike mentioned the sensitive areas issue. P&Z went through this exhaustively in '96. they came up the three duplexes was the adequate use of that land. Why did P&Z now in 2003 want to go back and rezone it again to let him build more units? Well the obvious reason is that it didn't sell from '96 to 2003. nothing happened. So they want to make it easier for a developer to come in and make more money and put more units in, in order to develop that land. That's P&Z's directive is the develop the City. But at what cost to the neighborhood, to the neighbors? Mike mentioned the entry points. I'll just reiterate that. The natural attractive look of North Dubuque Street is gradually being eroded. This will be just another cutting down of those trees and that natural entryway that's so beautiful right now. His setback request - there's only one reason why he wants that. He has to This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 6e Page 20 get that request approved otherwise he can't get all of his units in there, the effect is going to be cut down all the trees. I live at the top of Meadow Ridge Lane. I've got a big buffer - a couple hundred feet and a lot of trees. And it's still noisy up there at the top of the hill. These people living will never be able in their windows facing North Dubuque Street. His question about landuse is smoke and mirrors. He's counting a lot of land that he can't build on. It's sensitive area land and he's adding that into his calculations to make it look like the density is lower. That's not true. There is no buffer zone there. anybody can buy these properties. Once he builds them they're up for sell. Anybody can come in here. We've got a nice neighborhood mix rightnow. People take care oftheir properties. Some ofthese people that buy rental properties don't take care of them. So we're concerned about the eventual effect on the neighborhood if these properties not run down, but just not taken care of. Please take these issues seriously. The P&Z didn't. I hope you do. Thank you. Champion: Thank you. Lehman: Thank you. Is there anyone else who would like to speak to this issue? Then the public hearing is closed. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 6g Page 21 ITEM 6g PLANNING AND ZONING MATTERS. g. CONSIDER AN ORDINANCE TO AMEND AN EXISTING PLANNED DEVELOPMENT HOUSING PLAN (OPDH-8) TO ALLOW A 64-UNIT RESIDENTIAL DEVELOPMENT FOR LOT 255 OF WINDSOR RIDGE, PART 12, A 7.93 ACRE DEVELOPMENT LOCATED AT COURT STREET AND ARLINGTON DRIVE. (REZ01-00022) Lehman: (Read item). This is first consideration. Champion: Move first consideration. Vanderhoefi I move that the rule requiring that ordinances must be considered and voted on for passage at two Council meetings prior to the meeting at which it is to be finally passed be suspended. That the first consideration and vote be waived and the ordinance be given consideration and vote at this time. O'Donnell: Second. Lehman: Moved by Vanderhoef and seconded by O'Dormell for expedited consideration. Discussion? Roll call. Motion fails...is that we have to have six? Dilkes: No, you need five. Lehman: Oh, five. The motion carries 5-2, Kanner and Pfab voting in the negative. Kanner: What's the percentage again? Because at previous times I thought it was 6 was needed - 75%. Lehman: We did it wrong. I think that was what it was. The motion is defeated. Now do we have a motion for first consideration? O'Donnell: Move first consideration. Vanderhoef: Second. Lehman: Moved by O'Donnell, seconded by Vanderhoef. Discussion? Roll call. Motion carries 6-1...is that correct? Pfab voting in the negative. Karr: Motion to accept correspondence. O'Donnell: So moved. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 6g Page 22 Champion: Second. Lehman: Motion and a second to accept correspondence. All in favor? Opposed? (Motion carried). That...this item will appear at the special meeting at the next work session. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 6h Page 23 ITEM 6h PLANNING AND ZONING MATTERS. h. CONSIDER AN ORDINANCE TO REZONE FROM NEIGHBORHOOD CONSERVATION RESIDENTIAL (RNC-12 & RNC-20), HIGH DENSITY MULTIFAMILY RESIDENTIAL (RM-44) AND MEDIUM DENSITY SINGLE FAMILY RESIDENTIAL (RS-8) TO CONSERVATION DISTRICT OVERLAY (RNC-12/OCD, RNC-20/OCD, RM- 44/OCD & RS-$/OCD) FOR THE DESIGNATION OF THE COLLEGE HILL CONSERVATION DISTRICT WITHIN THE COLLEGE HILL NEIGHBORHOOD (REZ03-00005). Vanderhoefi Mr. Mayor I must recuse myself. I have a conflict of interest with items h, i, j, and k since I am a member of a fraternity that lives...that resides in that area. Lehman: Pardon me for asking you by why are you a member ora fraternity? I wondered that. Sorority I can understand, but....never mind. It's okay. Vanderhoef: The title is fraternity. Lehman: It's okay. (Reads item). Wilburn: Move first consideration of the ordinance. O'Donnell: Second. Lehman: Motion by Wilburn, seconded by O'Donnell. Discussion? Roll... Mike Brennan: My name is Mike Brennan. I live in the Longfellow neighborhood so I'm not directly affected by this proposed ordinance, but I'm still speaking out against its adoption. I just don't think it's wise public policy for three broad reasons. First it's been adopted to fast and too quietly - not enough public participation, not enough participation by the property owners in the area. I just became aware of it a week ago. I'm not thoroughly familiar with it. I've had a chance to reread, skim over the minutes for the year 2002 for the Historic Preservation Commission and very briefly skim their minutes for this year. The minutes are replete with references that a conservation district can be done more quickly than an historic district, that it's easier and quicker. That they can do it without having to convince the state as much approval and things for approval to get it passed. At the meeting in October it was brought to the Commission's attention that notices for a neighborhood meeting prior to that have been sent to utility holders rather than to the owners of the property. At the time the Commission This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 6h Page 24 downplayed it. It was a mistake that they didn't intend to do that. One Commissioner even noted the fact that the neighborhood meeting was not necessary to the process. At a different meeting a Staff member told the Commission that a point in fact all they need to do after the neighborhood meeting is be present and be available for questions. The clear implication was that they don't have to actually really give any weight to the homeowners' consideration or property owners' consideration. Show up, pay lip service to their concerns and pass...make your recommendation. The real decisions were made before property owners were ever notified of this. The boundaries of the district if you compare them to other districts in the town, other districts are very compact, very small. This one sprawls from just behind the Pioneer Co-op on Van Buren Street all the way to Muscatine Avenue, from Burlington Street over to Iowa Avenue. It's an enormous area of territory. There's no consistency in the architectural integrity. If you just simply walk through this neighborhood it's just ridiculous. The Commission even said...one of the Commissioners that their own historian, their own consultant said that structures and siding should be non-contributing structures, but the Commission was going to include them as contributing structures. A former member of the Commission, Susan Licht, did a meeting in November. Said she had concerns about the letters that were eventually sent to the owners that they were seriously misleading in their representations of stabilization of prices - home prices, and the overlay having no effect on the underlying zoning. She urged the Commission to take time, table the proposal, research it some more. What they did at the end of that particular meeting was make a (can't hear) motion to exclude the several properties Ms. Licht was concerned about for the expressed purpose of saying they didn't want to slow down the proposal. So they excluded those, we'll study that later. We might get back to them; propose them as a part of a later district. We're not going to slow this down for anything. At a meeting in June one of the Commissioners said that nobody knows that eventually a demolition permit will be required to remove porches and other features of the house. Historians want to exclude property because it produces tighter, more uniform districts as we see in the districts that have been approved in the distance past in town. Finally there's a question of what the Historic Preservation Commission while there is some thoughtful commentary in reading through the minutes since January - their meeting in January of 2002 to their meeting two weeks ago not one single dissenting vote on any issue before it. Any vote they've taken has been unanimous. And I can't imagine this particular body going a year and a half without a single dissenting vote on an issue before it. Champion: It's never happened. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 6h Page 25 Brennan: See. You really have to wonder what the Commission is doing. And I think that plays into my second concern that they're on a mission to increase their power. The references throughout the minutes...there's to them gaining control over more properties, that property owners should not be able to control what they do to the exterior of their houses. We started a few years ago at the Summit district, College Hill districts, the Brown Street district. Now we have the Longfellow area, the Governor Street area. The minutes in the last year indicate the Commission has plans to eventually propose districts that encompass from Dubuque to Dodge Street, Fairchild to Ronalds, a district on Jefferson Street, an extensive district downtown. They mention Manville Heights, Kirkwood, Melrose. They mention neighborhoods east of Muscatine Avenue. In separate places they mention the entire east side and the entire north side. When one Commission said at some point they anticipate seeking approval for as many as 2,000 properties to fall into the jurisdiction of the Commission. They've also talked about how you have expressed concern that the Commission is overburdened and is getting too big and yet they have plans to be adding to their (can't hear) and their inability to do it. And another Commissioner for this College Street district mentioned that we can pass it as a conservation district now and in six or eight years after enough time has passed so it doesn't look so bad we can come back and at that point ask for it to be an historic district. If it's historic, it's historic. They should do it now. They shouldn't be doing this incrementally so that people are going to overlook the abrogation of their property rights. Lehman: Did you say that you don't live in this district or that you do? Brennan: Yes. I live in the Longfellow district which abuts it. Part of my concern was when I bought my house in the Longfellow district I didn't want to live in a townhouse, a condominium, a planned development with their restrict covenants, their by-laws, their home- owners association and all the rig-a-ra-mall that comes with that. A couple of years ago you all saw fit to put a historic district on me so now I do have to deal with all that if... Champion: You're a conservation district. Brennan: Historic district. Longfellow, Sycamore Avenue is an historic district. So I do have to deal with all of that ifI do want to do anything to the exterior of my home and that's what this ordinance is about for this area of town. People make choices about whether they're going to buy property based on what the zoning is. And when you change it and take away their rights you're not giving...you're not paying for any of these improvements. They're rather expensive to use the materials the This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 6h Page 26 Commission recommends and requires. But the City is not going to pay for any of these benefits. Lehman: You really need to wind this up. Brennan: Okay. my final point is simply that these ordinances...there's also references throughout the minutes that they only touch on the facades of the buildings. They don't get into the interiors. That points to the problem with these ordinances. They preserve the facade of history, while betraying the substantive legacy which is freedom and property rights. 90 plus years of choice by individuals has created these very nice neighborhoods. This ordinance proposes to take that choice away from the people who have created the neighborhoods and place it in some outside body that doesn't pay mortgages, doesn't pay taxes, and doesn't pay for the repairs. It just says you have to do this. 90 years ago when they went to the lumber yard they bought whatever materials they had. Today if we go to the lumber yard we have to buy specially special order lumber because current, modem two-by-twos and two- by-fours are only 1 ½ by 1 ½ instead of 2 by 2. 90 years ago... Lehman: Mike you really need to wind this up. Brerman: Okay...well one Commissioner said the proposed district is made of previous single family dwellings that give sense of evolving residential preferences. This ordinance stops the evolution of residential preferences in these zones. You really ought not pass it. Lehman: Thank you. Karin, may I ask a question. The process of...that precipitated this recommendation involved...would you tell the Council and public what the process was involved from the Historic Preservation Commission's perspective, P&Z and how did this get to us and what was the process it went through. Franklin: Well it started out in the early '80's with the historic preservation plan that is part of our comprehensive plan. This particular conservation district is one that has gone through a process of two neighborhood meetings prior to a public hearing before the Historic Preservation Commission and then a subsequent public heating before the Planning and Zoning Conunission and now the public heating before the City Council. It's something that the Historic Preservation Commission has been working on the substance of it for at least two years. Conservation districts are different from historic districts in terms of the degree of control that is exercised. Conservation districts are about preserving neighborhoods as opposed to preserving individual buildings. And the reference that was made to a conservation district being easier I believe in the minutes if one were to read those would find that that is in terms of the requirements of the state for historic This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 6h Page 27 properties and the study and the documentation that needs to be put into that. But the focus of a conservation district is very different from an historic district. Lehman: Thank you. Pfab: Can I ask a question? Okay I had several people contact me about this which was not on my radar screen and I...them was a lot of questions left in my mind. If we postpone this or defer this for a week or until next meeting, I think it's May 6th, would that cause any big problems? Franklin: No. Pfab: Okay. That's what I'm going to move to... Champion: We have three readings Irvin. This is only the first. Pfab: I'd rather not vote no, but I'll vote no if that's the way you do it. It don't make any difference. Kanner: Karin I had a question for you. Could you describe how the size of the district was chosen? Franklin: I can do it somewhat sketchily. I would rather have Mike Maharry or Shelley McCafferty respond to that question and can do it at a subsequent meeting. But from what I understand that there were property surveys that were done. And those property surveys were done for the purpose of looking at where potential historic districts would be. that then they look at the commonality of an area both in terms of age, the type of architecture that's there, the history that is there and make a determination then as to what those boundaries would be. this is a conservation district of significant size. There was quite a bit of controversy when it was before the Historic Preservation Commission as Mr. Brennan has indicated. As a consequence of the public interest at the Historic Preservation public hearing they did delete the commercial properties from it so that it applies just to residential properties. It was not just Ms. Licht's properties. It was a whole commercial area. Lehman: Okay. Pfab: Is them a question why the commercial properties were removed? Franklin: As I recall Irvin that the reason that the commercial properties were removed had to do with the public input that was received about it and then also a concern about the impact on those particular properties. But I would ask you to ask that question of Mike Maharry the Chair of This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 6h Page 28 the Historic Preservation Commission who I will be sure will be here next meeting. Pfab: I just have some...I don't have a strong opinion, but I have some really serious questions that I don't think we're going to be able to... Franklin: I think Mike could handle them...answer them much better than I. Lehman: Thank you Karin. O'Donnell: Thank you. Lisa Schintler: Hi. I'm Lisa Schintler and I'm a property owner on Burlington Street. We are resident owners and we also own a rental further down Burlington Street. And we specifically chose our house on Burlington Street because we did not want to live in an historic district. We had actually looked at a couple houses on Summit and decided we did not want to deal with those sort of regulations. And I feel a lot of people on our street in the proposed district have also made decisions like that. I really believe the City should proceed with caution and passing this ordinance as I feel there have been some serious oversights most of which Mike already presented. The first mailing that we received went to the water bill which since we live on the street we did receive it. However, a lot of people in the neighborhood did not. In addition to that the mailing itself that was sent out I feel was misleading because the only things that it stated in there were about new construction. It really didn't mention anything about the ordinance about what it would do to the existing property owners and what we would need to do. So we like many others that first time ignored it. We thought well this is new construction it's not going to effect us and it wasn't until the second or third mailing when people started talking that we realized what this would mean to us as property owners. And that was also brought to the attention of the committee...the Commission in their meetings. A former member brought it up that this is misleading in what was presented. And especially people who are not resident. A lot of the land owners don't live in the district or even in Iowa City because they're rental properties. They probably thought the same thing as I did on the original reading. And I've been told that this will add value to my home. I'm not sure I want value added to my home. Most people who are historically preserving their houses tend to want to buy a lesser expensive home because they know that how much money is ahead of them in terms of repairs and what needs to be done. And since my husband has owned the rental property down the street we've seen the houses that have been repaired have been the ones that have gone for cheaper prices. So I think we're going to be pricing a lot of lower income families out of the market by increasing the value of our affordable housing. There's not a lot of This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 6h Page 29 that in Iowa City. We're taking a good chunk of it and raising the price. I also don't believe it's a solution to controlling the uncontrolled rental properties. Some people have said well it will prevent the students from overtaking the neighborhood. And when I bought the property on the street I knew it was surrounded by rentals and I'd have to accept that. You can't go into a property buying it and expect to push everybody around you out. That's not a way to control it. If they want to control things like that you need to enforce the current zoning and not do specific spot zoning to allow bigger complexes in. basically as you drive down Burlington Street - the block between Summit and Muscatine - on the south side you'll see three red houses owned by Mr. Hays. One of them is painted and two of them are sided and look at the condition of them. He keeps his lots up very nice. But I'd hate to see that those two sided houses would no longer be acceptable to this community because it's now in a historic district. To me that is unacceptable that you can't make a house look nice with current materials because you can do siding in an historic manner and have it look nice and meet historic looks. So in closing I'm not against historic preservation. I'm all for it. That's how we're going to be doing our windows in our house and anything that we do to it, but I don't feel that it should be forced onto people of the community without serious consideration. There are certain streets that are fine with that but Burlington Street to Iowa Avenue and between Muscatine and Van Buren are not them. Thank you. Lehman: Thank you. Karin I had just one more question for you. This conservation district is not as strict a district when it comes to remodeling and whatever on homes. I mean historic district does require replacing siding with I think aren't the standards much stricter? Franklin: Right. Well first of all neither district requires the replacement of siding. If somebody is going to get a building permit and they come into change something - the siding for instance - that is where there is the discussion of the vinyl siding versus the (can't hear). In a conservation district there are guidelines for each district which are pertinent to that particular district to try to keep the character of what's there. It will not require that somebody take artificial siding or vinyl siding or aluminum siding off of their house and replace it with something else. Lehman: Well I know that but if they want to reside. Franklin: If they want to reside in a conservation district I'm fairly certain that that issue of siding is not an issue. I mean you can have vinyl siding in the conservation district and that's the confusion with the historic. Lehman: Right, but perhaps not necessarily in the historic. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 6h Page 30 Franklin: Correct. Kanner: Doesn't it depend if it's a contributing or non-contributing unit? Franklin: I can't answer that. Again I'm sorry I think Mike Maharry needs to be here to answer these questions. O'Donnell: Could the two houses Karin that are sided the third house that is un- sided, could that one be sided to match with these in a conservation district after this is passed? Franklin: I believe so. But I don't...don't hold it to me please. I don't know the details of all of these districts. Lehman: Other discussion? Pfab: Okay. are down to the Council? Lehman: Yeah. Pfab: Okay. I would move that we defer this to the May 6th meeting because there are questions...and that was one of the questions that was brought to me by several people in there and obviously there's a difference. It appears that it is not something that is extremely timely although we always want to move things along. But I think this needs more discussion. Lehman: A second? Kanner: I'll second. Lehman: Discussion of the motion to defer. Champion: Well there's going to be a lot of questions. As everybody knows I'm a great supporter of neighborhood conservation districts. I don't think they're very difficult to deal with. I think it's very important that we preserve our older neighborhoods not only because they provide affordable housing, but they're part of the character of Iowa City. I don't think there's ever been a conservation district established to force students out. A lot of students live in conservation districts. And that's not the reason to do one. The reason is to preserve the character of the neighborhood as it is now. It doesn't mean that apartment buildings have to be tom down and replaced with single family dwellings. It doesn't mean anything like that. It's to preserve the character of the neighborhood as it is now. And I think it is a great tool that we have especially in a University town where out of town landlords and other people want to take the interior of the City and turn it into huge apartment complexes. And that becomes detrimental This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 6h Page 31 to the inner part of the City. And it's an economic liability to the City. So I totally support this. I don't mind putting this offifpeople have questions that they need to have answered. We just need somebody that knows what they're talking about. Pfab: Can I address Connie's comment? Lehman: We're talking about whether we're going to defer it. Pfab: Right and I would support her. I just have questions. I believe to if we want to conserve what we have, but there seems to be more questions than there are answers right now. Lehman: Other discussion on the motion to defer. O'Donnell: Why would we defer it when this is the first of three readings? Champion: It's only the first reading. Pfab: Then you're going to get "no" votes. Lehman: That is a good point. We can have first reading and have the Historic Preservation folks here at the second. Anytime up until the third reading it can be defeated. O'Dormell: Right. Kanner: But I think Mike there's a certain momentum that's gained and things tend to move along if you go through the first one. And if you hold off it's saying as a Council perhaps there's some reason to hold off. And maybe people will want to look into it. There seems to be some questions about how well were people notified. Were property owners notified or just utility holder notified? And there's some questions about what type of repairs and revisions can be done to households in the conservation district. And then also the question of does it need to be this big. And so I think though most people were notified, but just to err on the side of giving a bit more time and no pressing needs I would move that we defer this. Champion: It's already been moved. Lehman: We already have a motion. You seconded it. Kanner: Right. I know that. O'Donnell: But we do have three readings on this Steven and we allow discussion at each time and we can change our mind. And we may do that later on another issue tonight. But that's just a side note. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 6h Page 32 Wilburn: And in terms of momentum we've seen with another item later on tonight that people can change their minds between readings with more information. Lehman: All those in favor of deferral indicate by raising their right hand. Kanner: Aye. Lehman: He's a slow learner okay. I think we have two in favor. Those opposed raise their right hand. O'Donnell: Aye. Lehman: Alright the motion is defeated 4-2. now any more discussion on the original motion? Roll call. The motion carries 4-2, Kanner and Pfab voting in the negative. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 61 Page 33 ITEM 61 PLANNING AND ZONING MATTERS. I. CHANGING THE ZONING DESIGNATION FROM CB-2, CENTRAL BUSINESS SERVICE ZONE TO CB-5, CENTRAL BUSINESS SUPPORT ZONE FOR BLOCK 67 OF THE ORIGINAL TOWN PLAT, EXCEPTING THE 6,000 SQUARE FOOT PROPERTY AT 130 NORTH DUBUQUE STREET. Lehman: (Reads item). This is a continuation of a public heating from March 11th to April 8th. The public heating is open. Kevin Hanick: I'm Kevin Hanick. I'm the applicant on behalf of the owner Patricia Lenoch. Very briefly - I know you have a full schedule here. I mostly wanted to make myself available for any further questions. But I did want to reiterate very briefly the history of this application. We've worked with the planning staff, obtained their endorsement, worked through Planning and Zoning Commission receiving an unanimous vote for this and we've come to the determination with the Staff, with the Planning and Zoning Commission that the change of zoning would be required for any feasible economic development of this comer. The current zoning is inappropriate we feel and the only difference between.the CB-2 to the CB-5 is the omission of the automotive use. The description of use is exactly the same between CB-2 and 5. the difference of course if the parking requirement. And we feel this is an appropriate use given the changing nature of this neighborhood and would ask for your approval. Any questions I could answer for you? Pfab: At this point I told you from what I heard I was going to support it, but I don't think I am now and it's not the property, it's not the developer, it's not the devil as we talked about. That has nothing to do with it. But in jest I said that. But I have some more serious questions on that so at this point I will not be able to support this. I want to continue the public hearing but I'm not willing to support it. Lehman: What are your concerns? Pfab: They're quite...it has to do with what is on that block. There's not an agreement. There's new work coming up. I'mjust not comfortable. O'Dormell: But what is your disagreement now? Pfab: Well I just said. It's as we talked through this what does it do...is it just that one zone? Is it just that one lot? Lehman: We're talking about the entire block. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 61 Page 34 Pfab: No, I'm not ready to do that. Hanick: It is I think worth noting that the change of zoning would in fact make Brewery Square which is the predominant even more so than the churches landowner in that block more in conformity. It's out of conformity now. So you've already got a situation there where in some way inappropriate with the current zone. Pfab: There's a lot of transition going on there. I'm just not... Hanick: Actually there's no transition going on. The churches are there. They've been there. Pfab: Well there's transition is we rezone it. There will be change there. Champion: No. Pfab: Yes. Champion: What change? Pfab: Whatever he's going to do. Hanick: Whether you rezone it or not, there will be change there. If it's not rezoned then the only use left is to rent out the current and existing property to whomever we would choose to rent it out to. It would stay a recycled gas station on a prominent entry point into downtown Iowa City. So you're right about that. It will change. Pfab: Right. Hanick: But it will not change with the cooperation of the design review staff input and historically appropriate redevelopment. It will not change with that if you do not change the zoning. That is correct. Vanderhoef: Irvin... Hanick: And I think that's more for the community. Vanderhoef: Irvin, you heard me say last night that what I was hoping to go forward with was all housing rather than any commercial which is what I vision as the Dubuque Street interest, but there isn't any interest on this Council in doing that. So then when we get down to the choice between CB-2 and CB-5 certainly CB-5 is moving towards the highest and best use and creating the density that we have talked about always in our comprehensive plan. So I'm going to support the CB-5... Pfab: That's fine. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 61 Page 35 Vanderhoefi ... since there's no interest in this Council in making it a RM-44 for residential. O'Donnell: And I agree with you Dee there is an interest in making it non- conforming. It would also if we extend RM-44 down Dubuque Street it would make everything non-conforming on that side including the gas station where the corn grows. Vanderhoef: We're not talking about that anymore... O'Dormell: Well but we are. We're talking RM-44. Vanderhoefi It's a done deal. O'Donnell: This entire block is predominately conunercial outside of the churches. And I think this is a great project for this area. Champion: And he's going to support it. Lehman: Any other questions for Kevin? Kanner: Kevin I think we did talk about this perhaps not with you, but could you refresh my memory are there any environmental concerns about underground? Hanick: The former gas tanks have been removed some time ago. We are within probably a week of commencing excavation and remediation on that site. That really has nothing to do with the rezoning, but we've been in long term conversations with the DNR and Seneca Environmental and there's a plan that we're just currently waiting for the return from the DNR. We would expect that remediation action to occur within the next 30 days. And upon completion of that remediation that site would then be deemed "no further action" that's the status that we have right now. So that could happen literally any day. We're just waiting for some paperwork to be exchanged and we hope to get that going. We think that's also in the interest of the community. Kanner: You're hoping that they'll say "no further action is needed" on that property? Hanick: Correct. That's one of their classifications - no further action. And there will be some fairly extensive excavation in the section where the tanks and the islands were, but that should be all. Karmer: You're saying this was done in the past or will still have to be done? This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 61 Page 36 Hanick: No that's what will be done. That's where the excavation will occur out front where the former islands and tanks were. The tanks have been removed, but in the past there's been some leakage. All that soil is going to be removed and replaced with clean fill. And as I say that plan we're waiting final approval from DNR for that paperwork. Actually I think it's been approved, but we're waiting for the paperwork to come back and then we have a contractor who will begin doing the work on that comer. Lehman: Thank you Kevin. O'Donnell: Thank you. Lehman: Anyone else wish to speak to this issue? Bob Downer: Mr. Mayor, members of the Council I am Bob Downer. I am here this evening as an attorney with the Wesley Foundation. There have been negotiations ongoing between Mr. Hanick and the Wesley Foundation with respect to resolving certain issues with respect to this property and I feel that those negotiations are moving along well and that we're close to a resolution on this matter. We are not prepared at this point to withdraw the objections that have been filed, but I'm also not going to discuss those further. In the event that the Council did desire to defer this for two weeks to discuss some of the matters that have been talked about here we wouldn't object to that, but I'm hopeful that we could come in, in two weeks and advise that the issues with respect to this property have been settled. If there are any questions I would be happy to... Lehman: Thank you Mr. Downer. Did I hear a motion to continue this public hearing until May 6th? Pfab: I made the motion. Vanderhoef: Second. Lehman: I hear a motion and a second to continue the public heating. All in favor? Opposed? (Motion carries). We also need a motion to defer first consideration of the ordinance... (End of Side 1, Tape 03-35, Beginning of Side 2) Vanderhoef: So moved. Pfab: Second. Lehman: Moved by Vanderhoef, seconded by Pfab. All in favor? This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 61 Page 37 Wilbum: Question. Lehman: Yes. I'm sorry. Wilburn: I guess this is a question for Mr. Hanick. Would it be beneficial for you to have this extra time or would you assume Council just... Hanick: It's been deferred twice. It's actually been deferred more than that because it was deferred informally at the Staff request when we first initiated this because they wanted to incorporate a larger zone. Then when we brought it forward it was deferred at Planning and Zoning once. I'm under the impression and maybe I'm wrong here that we have a consensus. Whatever negotiations that Mr. Donner referred to that is true are going on I think they are separate from the issue of asking the Council for their endorsement of a legitimate rezoning. We've discussed all those issues and I think we satisfied all the questions. I'm very surprised that Irvin Pfab has changed his mind. I thought we satisfied all your objections and I'm still not at all clear what they are. So I... Wilbum: I guess my question is if this fails what...are you planning on continuing speaking with the group or I mean... Hanick: That's a possibility and the possibility is that we'll put a tenant in the space. I mean we have to derive some economic benefit from the property. So I can't tell you for sure what will happen. Wilburn: If this gets deferred...I know you don't know what you are going to do, but is one of the options possibly just withdrawing the request and proceeding with whatever it is you might do. Hanick: I guess I'm not exactly sure... Wilbum: Do you want us to go ahead and take action if it looks like this is going to fail or not? Hanick: Obviously if it looks like it's going to fail if I don't have the votes... Wilburn: Would you rather us just move on? Hanick: I would ask for a deferral. I'm under the impression that we may have the votes to do that even though it's a supermajority being required here. It's unclear to me whether Councilman Kanner is for or against it, but... Champion: Let me ask you something though. If we do defer this and hopefully I really like your project and I don't want it to fail. I don't know how everybody's going to vote. I know there are at least some of us on This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 61 Page 38 here who would be willing to...what do you call that when you pull the (can't hear) together? Expedite. So it might not take any more time. It would be nice if we could do this without objection. I mean there are obviously many of us who really like your project and we don't want you giving up. Hanick: The problem I have is it's not at all clear to me what the objections are. Champion: No, me either. Hanick: And I think it's fair when a member of the public comes forth with a legitimate proposal that you get some...that you have a chance to address those objections if they can be. so I think it's important...I think it's fair to ask. And I think Irvin has said some things and Dee has come forth with her thoughts. I've heard from everybody else. I think it's fair to ask and then we can proceed accordingly. I want to do something of good quality and right for the community, but at the same time it's a fair request. O'Dormell: I agree. Lehman: Alright. Actually I guess the question is pretty much directed to you Steven. Kanner: We're at a deferral for...we passed a deferral for the first. Lehman: We deferred the public...or continued the public hearing, but that can be reconsidered in a heartbeat because it was a unanimous vote. Anybody can make a motion to reconsider that. There's no point in going that far. Kevin is asking if this is a project that you can support. Kanner: Well right now I would like to defer it is my wish. That would be my vote and I will vote for that. And I've explained my position at other times, but I think it's in the best interest of the City and the surrounding community and the direct neighborhood to have continual negotiation - to give that time. Lehman: We said that two weeks ago. Kanner: What? Lehman: We said that two weeks ago and they've been negotiating for two weeks. Kanner: I don't know if we heard directly that they hope to conclude it in two weeks Emie. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 61 Page 39 Lehman: I think you have your answer Kevin. He's not going to support it. So we... Kanner: Well I'm going to support a deferral right now or a continuance however you want to term it. So I would hope that we can have the vote on this continuance. Champion: And Irvin you still haven't stated a reason why you don't support the project. Pfab: They're long and it's going to be a long evening. Champion: I know, but how can people address your concerns if you don't voice them? Dilkes: I think Mr. Hanick has made a good point. You all have considerable discretion when it comes to rezoning, but you still cannot act arbitrarily which.., so it's incumbent on you to give a reason...some reason. Kanner: I feel I gave sufficient reason for why I'm deferring. That's all I'll say at this time. Pfab: That's what I say now. Champion: You haven't given a reason. Karmer: I think it's sufficient...Connie I think in good group process we should help people that have concerns that can't really express it. Often times people have concerns that they're not able to express. And I know you don't agree with it and certainly we're not doing consensus, but we can learn from that. Part of that is to help people express something and it shouldn't always be incumbent on them. But Irvin obviously has some concerns and we should explore it. And I think giving two weeks would be helpful for the process. Hanick: I'll attempt to address those concerns in the next two weeks. Lehman: We have a motion to defer the first consideration. All in favor. Opposed. The motion carries This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 19 Page 40 ITEM 19 CONSIDER A RESOLUTION TO ADOPT THE COMPREHENSIVE SET OF RECOMMENDATIONS AND SCHEDULE OF MEMBERSHIP FEES, OUTLINED IN PLANNING FOR CHANGE: FY04 FUNDING, OPERATIONAL AND PROGRAMMING CHANGES AT THE IOWA CITY/JOHNSON COUNTY SENIOR CENTER, THAT WERE DEVELOPED AND APPROVED BY THE SENIOR CENTER COMMISSION. O'Donnell: Mr. Mayor I would like to move item 19... I would like to move that we move item 19 to be next on the agenda. Kanner: Second. Pfab: Which is 197 O'Donnell: That's the Senior Center Irvin. Pfab: Okay. Lehman: Okay. all in favor of moving 19 say aye. Opposed. Alright. (Motion carries). Pfab: Then I believe we'd like to move... Champion: I think we have to wait until we're done with this Irvin. Lehman: (Reads item). Vanderhoef: Move the resolution. Champion: Second. Lehman: We have a motion by Vanderhoef, seconded by Champion. Discussion? Bob Welsh: My name is Bob Welsh, 84 Penfro, Chair of the Johnson County Task Force on Aging. In light of your discussion last night and previous discussions earlier had gathered that you all were going to defer this item until May 6th. About noon this morning I started receiving some calls saying that you might not be deferring it. I then talked to the Mayor then the middle of the afternoon. And the Mayor suggested that I needed to come and formally ask you to defer it. We think that we would be able to have a better presentation. We had understood on as early as Friday that it made sense to defer it. And then last night you all indicated that you wanted to defer it. At the time the City Manager discussed with you agenda items. And we think we'll be This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 19 Page 41 able to have a better presentation. You'll have time to read that and you'll be able to get to the masses that await you outside. Vanderhoef: Could you tell me what is different in the presentation from what we have already received. We received the letter with all the points and signatures. Welsh: You receive that. We'd like to explain those to you and there are other people that we would like to have here to explain to you the implications for other programs, Champion: Didn't your group present these to the Senior Center Commission at the public heatings and discussions when they were asking for input on the recommendations? Welsh: We presented a statement. This is in a different format and some different things Connie. And again I'm just saying telling you what I heard you all say last night. What I heard earlier and I realize you all can change your mind. But we're asking you for a deferral. Vanderhoefi Well what came up for us last night was the fact that you had asked prior to the meeting of the Mayor. And then when the presentation was made the Commission itself is not choosing to have a deferral because they feel that they have a considerable amount of work to do to implement their new process and have it ready for FY04 that starts on Julyl. and it's imperative that they move on and they encouraged us to move on. So I'm conflicted here on whether there's anything new or different or if you can explain anything. Welsh: In light of your discussion last night we set a meeting tomorrow with the person for example who is not here tonight to discuss how best to present this to you. And I was floored when I heard that maybe you had changed your mind. You are sure able to change your mind. But I did in all fairness I think understood you all to say when you discussed agenda items that this item would be deferred. Champion: Is there anything different you're going to present to us... if anything different than what you presented to the Commission? Wilburn: If I could...if you wouldn't mind me and you can certainly comment. Judging by some of the comments that I heard last night maybe it's not unfair to say that there are some members of this task force that don't quite feel that their views or their emphasis was adequately represented by the presentation last night. And there might be some items they might want to highlight or emphasize within the context of the material they did present. But you can certainly jump in Bob if you want to... This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 19 Page 42 Pfab: I have a question. I'm tom here between whether to defer or not to defer. Yeah to defer it until May. And I have strong feelings on both sides that they both have their point. I think what I'm leaning here when I look at what' s ahead on the agenda I'm kind of leaning to if we could move this to the next week I might be a little bit more comfortable, but I'm open. I just look at what's ahead of us...what's ahead of us in here. And I'd like to get home before midnight. But I mean that's my only concern for whatever it's worth. I don't have... Champion: I really object to us deferring this. However, I might support a deferment because I think we did indicate to the public last night that we would and I think it would be unfair to change our minds on this particular item. Wilbum: I would go ahead and make that motion to defer until May 6th. Lehman: May 6th. We have the motion. Let me just say and I really, really, really have a concern as far as the Commission is concerned and their proposal is going to take a great deal of time to implement what they're trying to do. At the same time I think that we did indicate last night perhaps not explicitly, but certainly the indication was that we would defer this to May 6th. I think Council better be ready to vote on this on the 6th. Champion: I'm ready to vote on it now. Lehman: Because the Commission cannot...really cannot let this thing go any farther. Pfab: Well... Lehman: I also think that Mr. Welsh and his folks probably feel that they would like to make their presentation to the Council rather than to Commission which they've already done and let us draw our own conclusions. Wilburn: In response I will be prepared to go ahead and make a decision the next time. I think while they can't...the Commission can't and Staff can't fully implement or set the stage for some of their recommendations there are...I did ask something about a fundraising plan. There are some things they could at least do the preliminary planning for. And I understand it's not the same. Lehman: Can we have a vote on whether or not...all in favor of deferral indicate by saying aye. Karr: We have a motion to defer on the floor. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 19 Page 43 Vanderhoef: I will withdraw. Karr: You withdrew? Vanderhoef: I will withdraw. Champion: I'll withdraw my second. Karr: Okay, now... Wilburn: I'll move to defer it. Lehman: We have a motion to defer by Wilburn. Pfab: Second. Lehman: Seconded by Pfab. All in favor. Opposed. It's deferred to May 6th. Karr: Motion to accept correspondence. Champion: So moved. Wilbum: Second. Lehman: A motion and a second to accept correspondence. All in favor? Opposed? Motion carries. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 7 Page 44 ITEM 7 A PURCHASE AGREEMENT BETWEEN THE CITY OF IOWA CITY AND 1 TOWER PLACE LLC FOR CONDOMINIUM UNIT 1-D IN TOWER PLACE AND PARKING AND THE DISPOSITION OF SAID PROPERTY IN ACCORDANCE HEREWITH. Lehman: (Reads item). Public hearing is open. Public hearing is closed. O'Donnell: Move the resolution. Lehman: Motion by O'Donnell. Champion: Second. Lehman: Seconded by Champion to approve the resolution. Discussion? This is the last... Atkins: This is it. Lehman: This is the last condo in Tower Place. Champion: Wow. Atkins: That's correct. Vanderhoefi And what is the business? Atkins: It's being purchased by a law firm. I can't think of their names. I'm sorry. Dilkes: No, it's being pumhased by a company called One Tower Place LLC. Atkins: Thank you. Represented by...sorry. Dilkes: It has been signed on behalf of that entity by a lawyer at the Bradley and Riley law firm in Cedar Rapids and our understanding it will be used for professional law offices. Lehman: Okay. roll call. (Motion carries). This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 9a Page 45 ITEM 9a PUBLIC HEARING REGARDING THE PROPOSED FY04 ANNUAL ACTION PLAN, INCLUDING THE COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT BLOCK GRANT (CDBG) AND HOME INVESTMENT PARTNERSHIP PROGRAM (HOME) BUDGETS. THE FY04 ANNUAL ACTION PLAN IS A SUB- PART OF IOWA CITY'S 2001-2006 CONSOLIDATED PLAN (CITY STEPS), AS AMENDED. Wilbum: Mr. Mayor I have a conflict of interest on Item 9 as I am employed by an agency that receives Commanity Development Block Grant funds and I will not participate in the discussion. Lehman: Thank you sir. (Reads item). Public hearing is open. Kanner: Ernie I'd just like to present a point of information in regards to my participation. I noted at a previous meeting that there was a potential conflict of interest. I did consult with the City Attorney and it's not quite clear about HUD regulations, but it was recommended that perhaps I wish to disassociate my independent contract status with the ARC which I had minimal employment from them. But as of today I did send them a letter in the mail noting that I would no longer be in contract with them. So I feel there is no conflict of interest. Champion: Thanks. Lehman: Okay. Amy Correia: Good evening, my name is Amy Correia and the current Chair of the Housing and Community Development Commission. And first I want to start out by thanking you for the opportunity to serve the Iowa City community in this capacity. First I want to open the public hearing by explaining the process to you and to the public. The very deliberative process that the Housing Commission went through to be before you today with this action plan and the funding allocations that we made. In late December the City of Iowa City opened up a request for proposals to the entire City of Iowa City community for eligible applicants who are CDBG and HOME funds to apply. That application deadline was some time in mid-January. There's a very firm deadline. We received 25 proposals for CDBG and HOME funds. Two of the applicants took back their applications so then we received 23. the first thing that happened was we all - 8 Commissioners, 9 Commissioners received a booklet of all of the proposals for our review. We scheduled site visits and Commissioners who were not familiar with some of the applicant programs visited, spent two afternoons visiting those sites. Then we spent an evening of hearings where applicants came down to the Senior Center and we This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 9a Page 46 held a public meeting where we asked questions and applicants were able to explain more fully if we had any questions. So after that all of the Commissioners read every single application and scored them using the score sheet that is in the Council packet in our memo in the materials that you have. And there are a variety of points by which we review and rank those applications. And each applications was given a score based on does it meet a priority in the consolidated plan that is passed by the City Council, does it allow for reuse, is there volunteers, private resources and does it primarily target low-incoine and very low-income - giving higher points to those projects that serve very low-income residents of our community because that is the priority for these funds. The Council or the Commission had $351,000 in CDBG money to allocate. Once the CDBG money comes into the City about $350,000 goes to other City projects set aside by the City Council. That amount is excluding the administrative fees. So that includes that CDBG economic development fund, the Aid to Agencies and the housing rehab program, the $350,000 of CDBG is taken offthe top before we even had a chance to allocate funds. After each application was scored City Staff averaged all the scores. Applications that had an average score of less than 60 as passed by City Council on our score sheet is not recommended for funding. We had a meeting where we all came to consensus and ranked the projects. And then we had another night of meetings where we came up with - as a group - with our funding decisions. A small sub-committee of the Commission met to put together the application or to put together the funding justification memo. And so that was the process that we went through to get to tonight. Only three of the projects that we recommended for funding were funded at 100% and those projects were under $15,000 requested and had very high private support and volunteers. All of the rest were funded anywhere from 70% of funding request and that also was for an under $5,000 project down to about 19% of the funding. So very small percent of the projects were allocated at 100% of funding. And as you may know the state budget is very tight with many programs serving homeless and low-income residents of the state are being cut significantly or eliminated. And so that is another decision that we factored in when we were deciding how best to serve the low- income residents of the City. Lehman: Thank you. Dottie Persson: Mayor Lehman and Councilors my name is Dottle Persson and I'm President of the Shelter House Board. It is the hope of our board that City Council will uphold the recommendations made by the Housing and Community Development Commission. The money that Shelter House has requested will benefit the poorest and most vulnerable among us. Citizens of this commtmity expect City Council to show This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 9a Page 47 leadership in setting priorities and dealing with the realities of the homeless. Allocation of resources sends a message to the community not just how public monies should be spent, but also perhaps how private monies should be donated. Decisions made by City Council have more of an impact than Councilors may know. It is essential that City Council send a clear and strong message to the community about the Council's understanding of homelessness in its mist and resolving the issues related to it. Thank you for your time. Lehman: Thank you. Sandy Pickup: My name is Sandy Pickup and I work at the Free Medical Clinic and I would just like to thank the Council and the Commission this evening for the hard work that goes into making these tough decisions when there wasn't much money to go around. They worked really hard to find money for the Free Medical Clinic to continue our case management program to help working people in the community who have chronic health concerns such as diabetes and hypertension. And I just wanted to thank you all for that. Kanner: I had a question for you. Pickup: Yes? Kanner: You had asked for close to $40,000 and it was reconunended that you get $7500. how much will that impact your program if you only receive the $7500. will you have to cut resources? Pickup: I hope not. We'll try to look for funding elsewhere - grants and other kinds of funds to supplement that program. Kanner: But you plan to keep the program at the same level that it is currently. Pickup: Yeah that's kind of what we do. Lehman: We need to keep the doorway open for the fire folks. And there are some seats up here. So if you would move away from the door. You can move up along the wall if you would like. Okay. go ahead. Jerry Anthony: Honorable Mayor (can't hear) Council my name is Jerry Anthony. I'm an architect and urban planner. I'm very concerned about the quality of the earth's environment and deeply aware of the effect that (can't hear) environment has on the health, safety and welfare of the citizens of the City. Therefore I strongly endorse the City's housing inspection program and expansion of that program, however, I disagree on how this expansion should be funded and strongly disagree if monies intended to help poor Iowa City families living below the poverty level This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 9a Page 48 have been diverted to fund a housing inspector's position. And let me briefly present five reasons for my disagreement. First, the City of Iowa City derives its authority to zone from the Constitutionally defined principle of police powers. These powers allow cities to implement policies such as zoning and comprehensive plans for the health and safety of its citizens. An exercise of these policies places some restrictions on the property rights of private property owners. However this authority comes with some responsibilities for cities. They have to take on necessary actions for maintaining the health and safety of its citizens. And one of the ways in which the City can do so is through code enforcement using housing inspectors whose salaries are fully funded through general revenues. For the City to do anything else may be construed as a violation of the moral compact that it has with private taxpaying citizens of the City. Second, when the Federal government started giving out money to cities for urban improvement in 1954 it required cities to develop and implement housing inspection programs for a prerequisite for receipt of federal funds. CDBG are federal funds and the City has an ethical compact with HUD to mn a housing inspection program with its own funds. Third, HCDC evaluated 23 applicants using a ranking system approved by the City Council. One of the criteria that HCDC was required to use was that no project receiving less than 60 points out of a total of 100 be given any funds. Based on this criteria HCDC recommended 16 of 23 applications for funding. The housing inspector position received 49 points and therefore was ineligible for funding. If the City now chooses to ignore its own criteria other unsuccessful applicants may have just cause to question the process. Perhaps they will not litigate, but they can certainly report the unfairness of the process to HUD. Fourth on February 20th in a presentation before the HCDC two City officials - Mr. Doug Boothroy and Mr. Cate were asked if the additional housing inspector position would lead to additional housing inspections. To which they immediately, categorically and without hesitation responded "no" that it would not lead to any additional inspections. If the additional housing inspector would not lead to additional housing inspections than the hopes and expectations of many of us here that this position will help implement the nuisance ordinance if approved are clearly, clearly in vain. Finally, if this position is funded through CDBG funds than this year many more homeless persons will not have shelter, many more poor families will not get the free medical help that they would otherwise get, many more low-income renters wanting to transition to homeownership and become taxpaying citizens of the City will not be able to do so, and many senior citizens wanting to stay in their own homes and age in place will not be able to do so for want of $500 to fix a handrail and a bathroom. So if this position is funded from CDBG funds we don't know if there will be any public benefits, but we most assuredly know This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 9a Page 49 that there will be public disbenefits. For all these reasons I call upon the City Council to display once again the infinite wisdom that it has displayed repeatedly in the past and choose to fund the housing inspector position from general funds. Thank you very much. Lehman: Thank you. Mariah Edington: Mr. Mayor, Council members, fellow citizens I'm Mariah Edington. I'm a fortunate person to be a resident of Iowa City, Iowa. Iowa City offers a great wealth of services. O'Donnell: I can't hear you. There. thanks. Edington: Thank you. We have the University of Iowa here that offers high- ranking education and medical facilities. Iowa City has recently ranked highly by the AARP magazine, Men's Journal and USA Today. These things do not just happen. These things happen because of hard-working, dedicated, competent, contentious people as the citizens of Iowa City and you. They happen because we have hard-working people here in Iowa City. There are many times that the things you do go unnoticed. And tonight I'd like to say thank you to you all for the hard work that you do here in Iowa City. Iowa City is a hub of culture. It's a wonderful environment. Although Iowa City is not always a field of dreams for everyone. Most of us have not had to tell our children "I'm sorry I've lost my job. We won't have a home to stay in tonight." Iowa City has an opportunity to get behind and support the HCDC's recommendation of the $230,000 that they have to be applied towards the land acquisition to build a new shelter facility. Recognizing and acting on this need illustrates the Iowa City we alt know and love. Iowa City community people are faced with the fear of having to be homeless. The citizens here do not want to be unhelpful, ungrateful. We all are thankful for everything we have. We need to go further. We need to lend a hand. We need to make a difference. That's the type of people we are here in Iowa City. It demonstrates by saying that these are not acceptable things. Iowa City people do not find it acceptable to have homeless people sleeping on the floor of someone else's house, on stairwells or in their cars. We here in Iowa City do not find it acceptable to have over 450 homeless children in Johnson County. We here in Iowa City do not find it acceptable to have a two-story, single family dwelling house built in 1900 as our only homeless shelter housing 29 people a night, 11,500 stays in 2002. our community's contentious people, people like you, people like us, need to come together and break the cycle of homelessness. We need to build a facility to help address the issues of health, safety and welfare concerns of the area homeless children and adults. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 9a Page 50 Lehman: You need to wind this up. Your time is about up. Edington: Let's demonstrate that we not only see the need, but we're willing to lend a hand to make a difference and to support the HCDC's recommendation. Mr. Mayor. Lehman: Thank you. Tom Blogett: Good evening Mayor, Council members and City Staff. My name is Tom Blogett. I live at 2442 Walden Road. And I'm a student at the College of Nursing here at the University of Iowa and I represent students, faculty and staff there in support of the cause of the Shelter House and of expanding its current services. The services provided there provide us a unique, clinical opportunity to serve a huge population in need - and it is a huge need. These people can be rehabilitated to boost our economy here at the City level and provide kind of a good...what am I trying to say...to provide a good service to the community in their citizenship here once rehabilitated. I had the unique oppommity through a clinical experience last week. I was just about to wrap up the clinic that the College of Nursing hosts there on Thursday mornings and I was just about to head out the door. And on the porch was a man who had been denied access due to the lack of room and he slept outside that night with just a t-shirt and a pair of jeans. And it was about 45 degrees that night. We was obviously very cold. He was bridging on illness that way. And through talking with this man I learned that he had a problem with alcoholism and that he really wanted to stop and he didn't know where to go. And through the Shelter House services we provided him with the opporttmity to contact Alcoholics Anonymous and get enrolled in their program, and we provided him with a hat and gloves and things like that. Because again there was no room for him to stay the next night for him. So we were just providing him the ability to stay warm for one more night - hopefully for just one more night until he can get room there at the Shelter House. And I guess my point in being here is don't let this type of emotional and very important clinical opporttmity be denied to our nursing students because we are the future of healthcare. And this population serves as our population for rehabilitation and has a huge potential for improving Iowa City in general. Thank you for your time. Lehman: Thank you. Michelle Hankes: Good evening, my name is Michelle Hankes and I work for 4-C's community (can't hear) childcare resource referral and I would like to hope that you go with the CDBG HOME funding recommendations. My organization mostly services through my staff and through the people who work to childcare improve to increase childcare. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 9a Page 51 However, my staff need to work someplace and we need to teach someplace. And though the recommendations were not for all that we asked for we'll be able to fix the biggest leaks. So thank you for your time and please help us. Thank you. Lehman: Thank you. Heather McDonald: Good evening Mr. Mayor, Council members and City Staff. My name is Heather McDonald. I'm also on the board of Shelter House and I'll keep this really brief because I know you have a long procession of people, but we're all very committed to the project that we have started. And we attended this meeting this evening to reiterate our support for the recommendations of the Housing and Community Development Commission. Since the shelter was established in the early 1980's Iowa City's population has grown significantly. Over that time do to more careful enforcement of fire regulations the capacity of the shelter has shrunk. Shelter House is Johnson County's only general purpose homeless shelter that houses single men, women as well as families with children. Families with children make up an increasing proportion of the residents of the shelter and the facilities that are currently available for them on the second floor of the existing single family house are severely inadequate. That's why as a board we decided to move ahead with this project. And I'd like to add my support to that of others who have gone before me for the full funding as reconunended by the Housing and Community Development Commission for the acquisition of the land. Thank you very much. Lehman: Thank you. Betty Norbeck: My name is Betty Norbeck. I'm also a member of the Shelter House Board. Mayor Lehman and members of the Council I'd like to direct my comments to the matter of timeliness for this request. During the time that I have been on the board of Shelter House which is now three years I have seen that the gap between the need for providing shelter for the homeless and the amount of facilities that we have has been getting larger and larger. Even in this last year there has been a great increase in the number of people that we've had to turn away. Up to 100 in a month coming to the house. And that's not to mention the people who've heard it's hopeless and don't even come. There's another reason why I think this funding for the land is particularly timely and that is that we have done a lot of the spade work in order to move ahead with the development of a new facility. We have...we've done focus groups and involved leaders that work with...encounter homeless people in our community like police and healthcare workers and educators. We have done a community forum. We have a design for this site that has been designed by an architect. And this was This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 9a Page 52 donated work that he did for this site. And we have already hired a person to develop a fundraising capability for the development of the project. So we are really ready to move with this. And so if you support us we will move ahead on getting a new facility for folks. Thank you. Karmer: Thank you. Lehman: Thank you. Karen Pease: I don't know her name and she doesn't appear to be here anymore, but I'd like to thank you to the woman who was up here dressed in black. I strongly agree with her statements that it is wonderful to see how much the care and the hard work of the people of Iowa City have done to help those less fortunate. However it is unfortunate to see that in this time when unemployment is sky high, when our economy is having problems and when the poor on minimum wage jobs struggle just to get by. But you would rather grant TIF's - tax breaks to large corporations than to make it so that our tiny social service budget has to be cut to fund the housing inspector. When at a time when Ernie well knows because he was at the same public forum that I was 90% of homeless veterans who needed shelter had to be turned away for lack of space. And the ranks of uninsured are swollen. Either this did we ask for the tired, the poor, the huddling masses yearning to be free so that we can chain them to two minimum wage jobs to make ends meet and then kick them out in the street in hard times so that a handful of major corporations could relish in corporate welfare. No we did not. Thank you very much. Jean Volk: Hello. I'm Jean Volk and I live in Iowa city and I want to thank the Board and the Council for offering the Iowa City Housing Authority to help us out in a time of need. But I'd like to offer a challenge to each and every one of you. I'm a registered nurse. I've been homeless as a registered nurse in the state of Iowa. Not here in Iowa City. Because I had to go through open heart surgery and have my heart for four hours and be dead. I'm going to offer a challenge to you and think about this please. I'm not offering it in a negative way. I want each of you to accept the challenge. Not just to take an offer, but accept the challenge. Try this - for one month to be under a bridge. I don't care what kind of weather it is. You don't have funds to go on bus to get somewhere. Take all your funds - all your money that you rely upon for your monthly income - strip it from you. Live out on the street and see what it's like to be homeless. I as an advocate and work as a volunteer at the free lunch program, go down there sometime. Chat with the people. Be out there and be active in the community and show your interest in them. I know as a homeless person formally the impact it did on my health and my life. Now if you want to go through This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 9a Page 53 open heart surgery I can tell you what that's like. I've been there, if you had 24 hours to live what would you do with it? You'd try to see your family. These people a lot of them don't even have family. Their family are their friends or their compadres. A lot of them are good. Some have problems of their own. But they stick together like family. I want to offer you just one little challenge - and it's not little. Take a month off - a month of your pay stripped from you. No money. We're talking no pennies in your pocket. Take your time out to go live with the homeless and see what it feels like. Not to (can't hear) in your home. You can't go home. You have no home. Strip that from you. You have the street. We are thankful in this community in Iowa City for the generosity of the free lunch program, the free medical clinic that provides care to those who can't even get help at the hospital because they're turned away because they're looked at as if they're crazy or lunatics because they are hungry, they are hurt, they are sick. They have the problems of their own. But the family medical clinic - the free medical clinic helps people out in times of need and they don't ask for one penny from the people because they can't afford even a penny. I've been there. Take it for one month. I offer you this challenge that each and every one of you who live comfortably in your homes with your lights, your electricity, your power, your cable - everything. I'm not making a derogatory statement. I'm making a statement until you walk in the shoes ora homeless person you do not know what it's like. And try being a RN and being homeless. When there's a nursing shortage and you can't find work for whatever reason and your health does not allow you to work. I'm talking from everything from a lawyer to the Assistant City Manager to the Mayor. Mayor Lehman I'm sure wouldn't even try it for a day. We see the kids do it. (End of Tape 03-35, Beginning of Tape 03-36) Volk: Try it for a week. Stripped of your money. You have no money, no friends. You have no money, calling money. You can't call anybody. Go to the free lunch program, go to Agape Caf6 that is offered here Wednesday morning for breakfast that serves a dignified meal to people who are in need irrespective of income. The college community here provides a free breakfast every Wednesday morning from 7:00 to 8:30. now if you can't get your butts out of bed to get down there to see what it's like and the beauty that they give to these people you ought to be ashamed of yourselves. Now I'm not saying it in a derogatory way. You ought to be ashamed of yourselves. Lehman: You need to wind up Jean. Volk: My point is this I tell you walk in the shoes of someone homeless. You do not quite understand it. You try it for a month. I bet your This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 9a Page 54 perception will change. And I support the grant program and this Sandy has saved many lives from being hurt. Thank you again. Lehman: Thank you Jean. Linda Nelson: Hello. My name is Linda Nelson. I'm here tonight as a volunteer. And I'm on the site council of the HACAP Headstart preschool over on Bloomington Street. And we have one of the proposals here. and I just wanted to come and thank Council and thank City Staff and thank the committee because as a volunteer I've never gone through one of these processes before and for the last year and half the parents at the Headstart center, the other volunteers on the site council we've gone around. We've done chili suppers. We've collected pop cans. We've gone to many service organizations and churches and businesses and asked for donations to come up with a cash match. And that itself was a wonderful process o f getting to know our community, talking about the Headstart, partnering with the parents there and the kids. It's a little past the kids' bedtime or they'd be here to thank you I'm sure. But I also wanted to say that the process was amazing to us as a site council because we really had to talk about it. Together we put the proposal together with much help from City Staff because none of us had ever done a CDBG proposal before so we really appreciated all the assistance we got. And then the process with the committee was just wonderful. Going and talking to them, answering their questions and feeling like we knew what we were being judged on and what we needed to bring forth to have a good proposal. So again I wanted to thank the community on behalf of all the kids and volunteers. Thank you. Lehman: Thank you. Karen Kubby: Good evening. I'm Karen Kubby with the Emma Goldman Clinic one of the folks who put a proposal forth that did get through the recommendation process. And I want to talk about a different part of the quandary that you have. I want to talk about the new policy that you put out for housing projects that would have to pay 1% as a loan back with 1% and for any of the public facility, non-profit proposals to have to do a conditional occupancy loan. And I know that there is a temptation to say we have a new policy. We want to do it for a year and then tweak it. But I think so many of us are asking you for exceptions that the impetus that you had last night to have flexibility I hope you maintain that stance. And I want to use the Emma Goldman Clinic proposal as an example of why it's important to maintain that flexibility. We are asking for things that are capital improvements, but it's not new construction for a new clinic. It's not to expand our square footage so that we can see more clients. It's so that we can make our facility accessible. It's so that we can have energy This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 9a Page 55 efficiency lighting. It's so that we can have replaced flooring that is something that needs to be replaced every 7 to 10 years. We see 6,000 clients a year. That's just the clients. Then we have clients' family members, kids, parmers coming in, friends. We have people coming in for over-the-counter products. We have people coming in for meetings and we have the general public coming in to view our facility. So we may have 10,000 people coming through every year. And it doesn't make sense to me to get money for flooring that will last 7 to 10 years, but then have a conditional occupancy loan agreement that says even in 20 or 30 years if the clinic should move to another location that we have to pay the full amount of the grant back. so all of the things that we are asking for are things that will...that are part of the CITY STEPS. That are priorities in CITY STEPS, but they are things that do depreciate in shorter periods of time. What we have requested though is so that we can be accountable to the community is that we not just have a grant, but that we have a declining balance loan. We're suggesting 7 years because we think that's how long the flooring will last. We're negotiable on if it's 7 years or 10 years or whatever years you want to put on it. But it means that if we should stop doing business in that facility that we would owe back to the program a prorated amount. So we're not asking for the full amount as a grant up front. But if we are there for that period of time where that depreciation is fully realized, we get the full life out of it, then that we wouldn't owe back. so I hope that you will take that as a serious consideration in your deliberations. Thank you. Champion: It's a good idea. Lehman: Thank you Karen. Other discussion? Council. Vanderhoefi Okay. how many...the recommendations I believe matched all of the requests that we had letters for in terms of grant or interest. Champion: Dee I can't hear you. Are you mumbling? Vanderhoef: I'm mumbling. It isn't that late yet. I'm sort of thinking out loud here. I'm quickly looking through these. I was looking for Karen's - Emma Goldman to see what... Atkins: Last one Dee. Vanderhoefi Last one. That was the one that I believe HCDC did not set the terms on. So I think Karen's proposal is something we ought to look at. I think it meets the need of declining depreciation and doesn't encumber them for a long period of time. So I would...I don't know whether you want to move or just nod heads or what whether anybody agrees with that one. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 9a Page 56 Champion: I think (can't hear). Lehman: Well my suspicion is that any of these that we're going to approve could have minor modification terms. I don't think that's an issue. I don't think that's a problem. Vanderhoef: Well I think HCDC was looking for direction on that one. Am I right? Nasby: Not so much the Commission, but Staff because we would be putting together the agreements for them. So... Vanderhoef: But the rest of them... Nasby: But if you're comfortable with us negotiating that with the applicants we can sure do that. Champion: That sounds like a great idea. Lehman: You got to go on that one. Vanderhoefi Okay. the other one that I remember specifically on terms was the request to Habitat to Humanity wanted a no interest loan that they were not able because of their national organization to encumber their organization with a loan. Lehman: Recommendations is zero interest. Vanderhoef: Well that's the recommendation, but that does not meet our policy. Lehman: I realize that. But the motion is as it appears. Champion: (Can't hear). Right. Vanderhoef: And I support that for a non-profit organization which the reason that I would support that is in the fact that they have their own loans that are being paid back by the person who buys the house pays back to Habitat to Humanity so they're meeting the guise of what we wanted in the first place is we want to recycle dollars into the community. Come on up Brad. Brad Langguth: Thank you Dee. I'm Brad Languth. I'm the President of our Habitat affiliate this year. What we actually had requested was a declining balance lien. So that would be our formal request. Vanderhoef: And not the conditional occupancy? This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 9a Page 57 Langguth: Correct. Champion: If you remember that when we suggested that we add this little interest charge on. We said that if it was going to really affect our people who provide low-income housing and housing needs for people that we would think about it again. And I think probably we learned that we probably made a mistake. Vanderhoef: On the non-profits. Champion: On the non-profits. It '~,as not a good idea. And I thought we said last night we were not going to have any interest on non-profits. Didn't we decide that? Vanderhoef: Well we talked about it, but we haven't done anything formally about it. Champion: But that we would still maintain an interest charge on the for-profits. Vanderhoefi Yes. Lehman: Okay. Dilkes: Is there a resolution Steve that sets that policy or was it done by memo from you or what? Nasby: They discussed the housing...or the criteria yet of meeting I believe in September and then we revisited that in November before the applications. So it was something we discussed but that there was not a formal solution. Atkins: I don't believe... Champion: There wasn't a resolution. Dilkes: There was nothing formal? Lehman: No. Atkins: Steve prepared a confirming memorandum and that's what we placed in file of our understanding of what you wanted to do. Dilkes: Well we'll need to confirm this change then by memo. Vanderhoef: Uh-huh. Lehman: Okay. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 9a Page 58 Pfab: Am I missing something here? I was thinking that we were going to have the public hearing and then vote on this the next meeting. Lehman: Well I think that's...we do vote on it at the next meeting. Pfab: Well I'm saying....I'm saying let's move on. But I may be wrong. Lehman: Well is there any other discussion? Pfab: I think they made their points. O'Donnell: This is the public heating Irvin. Pfab: Right. O'Donnell: Well what's the question? Lehman: His question is if we're done with the public hearing move on. We don't have... O'Dormell: What a great idea. Lehman: We don't have to vote until next week. Well obviously last night there was some discussion among the Council relative to a request from the Council for CDBG for a housing inspector. Is there discussion relative to that? Champion: I'm very disenchanted about the housing inspector right now. I may have to think about it. Atkins: I had understood that what you wanted to do was have the hearing tonight. A number of folks make their presentation. And then we would take this to your work session on the 5th. YOU have to confirm it because you do need to vote on it officially on the 6th because we have to file it by the 15th. That's a process...I'm pretty sure that's how we've done in the past. Lehman: So we've done what we need to do tonight? Atkins: As far as I'm concerned. Dilkes: Well I think there was some discussion last night about having a discussion among yourselves in the event you were going to change the recommendations of the HCDC so that there could be reaction to that. Pfab: Is that not something that we want to do at a work session? This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 9a Page 59 Champion: It would be too late. Dilkes: That's up to the two...that's up to you all, but it's the night before you vote. So I think there was that discussion last night. Vanderhoef: If there is sentiment to fund a housing official from CDBG monies we need to notify HCDC now so that they have an opportunity to react to it. O'Donnell: Could we not...you know we're going to need to fund the housing inspector. We have a nuisance ordinance going into effect and we do need a housing inspector. Could we not reach a compromise? I'll just throw this out as an idea. $25,000...fund $25,000 from our community development money and maybe our task force can...I don't know how much we have in there. Is it $170,0007 Our economic development fund. Atkins: Oh the economic development fund is about $140,000 or $150,000. O'Donnell: $140,000. Nasby: $145,000. O'Donnell: Could we not take $25,000 out of that and then... Vanderhoef: You're saying out of CDBG economic development. O'Donnell: Economic development. Pfab: I believe the question is if we're going to fund it out of here and if not... O'Donnell: Irvin that's what I'm saying. Pfab: And I don't see any support at least that I can see... Champion: Irvin we're discussing it. Pfab: To support it? I'm going to strongly oppose it. I don't think this is place to get this money. Champion: You've already said that. Pfab: So and if that...well then I call the question. Lehman: There is no... Champion: We don't have a motion. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 9a Page 60 O'Donnell: But save that thought for the next meeting. Champion: Yeah I'd like you to do that. Pfab: That's what I'd like to do. Lehman: What your proposal Mike is that if I'm hearing you correctly we had originally asked that the funding for housing inspector be from CDBG money. What you're saying is a compromise with the economic development monies that we have allocated from CDBG be reduced by $25,000. in other words providing half of the cost of the inspector from economic development funds. O'Donnell: Correct. Kanner: I think that sort of does the same thing that was proposed before in a round about way. And I think we ought to keep those funds...we removed them once from HCDC recommendation to put it into the City Council economic development committee and I don't think that was the best move. And this takes more away from HCDC and puts it into an area that they and a large amount of the community reconunended against. And I think we should look for other sources of funding for this. I think there are other options available that I and other people in the community have suggested. So I don't think that's the right move. But I do agree with Irvin's sentiment in the sense that calling the question is a parliamentarian procedure that can be used not in general sense too. And I think the sense that I get is that let's see if there's...vote first to see...let's see if there's sentiment first to see if we don't want to fund HCDC...use HCDC/CDBG funding for the inspector. Let's go that route and then we'll go and look for sources elsewhere if we even want to fund it. O'Donnell: My suggestion was nothing more than an idea. If there isn't support here I'm prepared to live with that Steven. Lehman: Well I guess... Kanner: Well I hope you're not going to kill yourself over it Michael. O'Donnell: I'm not going to be nervous at all about it. Kanner: That's good. But we're in the business of discussion ideas. O'Donnell: Exactly and that's why I threw that out. And you commented. Now let's see if there's any interest in it. Lehman: Is there any interest in Mike's suggestion? This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 9a Page 61 Champion: What happens if we take...what did you say $25,000 out of the economic development committee? O'Donnell: Right. Champion: And then could we raise housing inspection fees to come up with the other amount of money or we've already raised them? Atkins: We did - I think it was about a year ago. It had been a long time. I don't remember the exact number of years. And you did raise them rather substantially. But can you raise housing inspection fees legislatively? Absolutely. That's your call. Pfab: I guess I'm going to ask about the (can't hear) of the discussion here. Are we planning to take money from CDBG to fund this? Champion: If we're going to take money from them they need to know tonight so they can find out where they're going to take it. Pfab: Is that what we intend to do? Champion: That's what we fully intended to do. O'Donnell: We're trying to find out how we're going to come up with this money Irvin. Pfab: No, no that's not the question. Are we going to... Champion: Irvin we're discussing it. Pfab: Is the intention to take money from the CDBG to fund this position? Champion: It could be. O'Donnell: We don't know. Champion: We could find out if you just quit asking us that question. Lehman: What...Connie? Pfab: I'll make an offer. I'll take a 5% cut in my pay to help support that. Champion: Irvin, please. Pfab: Just as a token thing, but I'll donate 5% of my generous pay to help fund this discussion. Correia: If I...I'm clear you haven't closed the public hearing. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 9a Page 62 Lehman: No, I have not. Correia: Okay. just based on what you just said in terms of wanting to know where you're at to bring it back to the Housing Commission. The Housing Commission met tonight and we're firm on our recommendations that we spent a lot time on and we recommended to you. So we would not be revisiting to figure out where it could come out from that. I just wanted to let you know that we're firm in our recommendations to you. Lehman: Okay then I think you've made it simpler for us because if we choose then to fund it from CDBG we will make the decision as to where the cut comes. Alright. Are we okay to close the public hearing? O'Donnell: Sure. Lehman: Public hearing is closed. And we will discuss that at the next work session. Atkins: Okay. Karr: Mr. Mayor could we accept correspondence? Pfab: So moved. Kanner: Second. Lehman: Moved and second to accept correspondence. All in favor? Opposed? Motion carries. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 12b Page 63 ITEM 12b PLANS, SPECIFICATIONS, FORM OF CONTRACT AND ESTIMATE OF COST FOR THE CONSTRUCTION OF THE OAKLAND CEMETERY DEEDED BODY MEMORIAL SITE, ESTABLISHING AMOUNT OF BID SECURITY TO ACCOMPANY EACH BID, DIRECTING CITY CLERK TO PUBLIC ADVERTISEMENT FOR BIDS, AND FIXING TIME AND PLACE FOR RECIEPT OF BIDS. b. CONSIDER A RESOLUTION APPROVING. Lehman: (Reads item). Do we have a motion? O'Donnell: So moved. Kanner: Second. Lehman: Moved by O'Donnell, seconded by Kanner. Discussion? Vanderhoefi Just that this is a joint project with the University of Iowa. They're making a contribution to the cost of this. And the total cost is $67,300. Lehman: Roll call. Motion carries. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 14 Page 64 ITEM 14. THE CITY'S INTENT TO PROCEED WITH AND AUTHORIZING THE ACQUISTION OF PROPERTY RIGHTS FOR THE SCOTT PARK TRUNK SANITARY SEWER PROJECT. Lehman: (Reads item). Public hearing is open. Glenn Siders: Thank you. My name is Glen Siders. I'm here representing Southgate Companies - one of the property owners in which this trunk sewer is going to go through. Excuse me. You might recall a few months ago I was here addressing the Council on this very same issue and was endorsing project. I still think the project is a good project to do for the City. It will promote growth and economic development out on the north end - a badly needed area for development. However, it's my understanding the proposal I offered to Council previously - really wasn't a proposal - was to allow us to put in as a developer the sewer ourself and it under the same system that is afforded in the subdivision standards. Apparently there's not a mechanism to allow us to do that. And the way this project is going to be put in and funded I'm estimating could cost Southgate Companies upwards of $25,000 more to install the sewer than we could do if we did it ourself. Therefore, I must say I'm opposed to the project. And I find it absolutely hard to believe that we can't somehow instigate some mechanism to allow us to put a sewer in just like we would if it was subdivided. Thank you. Lehman: Have you talked to engineering? Siders: Yes. I wrote a letter back in March and I think it was in the Council packet. I have talked to Rick Fosse who's been very cooperative - the City Engineer. And I believe the owner is somewhat familiar with...apparently there is just not a mechanism we can put in place to make this thing work. Champion: Why can't we create one? Dilkes: I think allowing them to do that quite arguably runs afoul of the state code which requires the public bidding of public improvements. Lehman: Oh. Vanderhoefi So if the state legislature moves up the amount from $25,000 for bid projects to the $50,000 would that make a difference? Lehman: No he's talking about the difference in price. Dilkes: No I don't think so because we're talking about taking a piece of a public improvement project and allowing the private construction of it This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 14 Page 65 rather than having it publicly bid. And if the whole public improvement project is what...it's going to cost more than $25,000 or $50,000 so I don't think that makes a difference. Siders: That's my entire point. Ordinarily if that were a subdivided project we as a developer would put in the sewer, pay for it, give it to the City. Would they reimburse the cost difference between an 8-inch and an 18-inch. That's what I'm offering to do. I don't know why we can't put the sewer on our own property. Have it inspected, dedicate it to the City and somehow get reimbursed. I've been told you can't get reimbursed because we haven't officially subdivided the property. Now it's subdivision standard that allows that reimbursement and I still can't believe that's there's some mechanism that we couldn't be repaid even if it were sometime down the road when we actually did subdivide that property. Lehman: The sewer line goes through the property. It doesn't end? Siders: Right through the middle of it. Lehman: You're not at the end of the property. Siders: Correct. Lehman: It goes right all the way through. Siders: Yeah it hooks on a matter of fact it hooks onto the sewer that we just put in last year and had a subdividers' agreement with the City of Iowa City that said we could put it in and you will reimburse us for anything over 8 inches. O'Donnell: Is there no way we can do that? Lehman: The owner has got to be the word on that. I don't have any idea. It sounds like a legal issue. Vanderhoef: It sounds like the homebuilders have a project that they could take to the state house. O'Dormell: Could we not have (can't hear)? Pfab: You have an idea to whom (can't hear). Siders: Yeah let us put in the sewer and reimburse us the difference between 8 and 18 inches. Dilkes: You know I communicated my opinion to Southgate. If their attorney has an opinion that's contrary to mine. You know I'd welcome that This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 14 Page 66 and we can talk about it. But at this point I haven't heard anything. So that's my opinion. Siders: Actually I don't think we got your opinion. I got a letter from Rick who kind of indicated... Dilkes: I reviewed that letter. Siders: Thank you. O'Donnell: Thank you. Lehman: Sorry. Siders: Oh, no problem. Pfab: So what do we do here? Lehman: I don't know that there's much that we can do. Pfab: Do we defer this or... Champion: No. P fab: ...vote it down? O'Donnell: (Can't hear) opinion Irvin. Lehman: Is there anyone else who would like to speak at the public heating? Public heating is closed. I would like a motion. Vanderhoef: Move the resolution. Lehman: Moved by Vanderhoef. O'Donnell: I'm going to second this but I think that's a very legitimate point that he brought up. Lehman: Thank you. Champion: It is. Lehman: Fine. Discussion. O'Donnell: It's a legal issue. Lehman: Moved by Vanderhoef, seconded by O'Dormell. My suspicion is that time is of the essence on that particular project. The sewer line has to go through and the time that we're going to spend discussing. I totally This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 14 Page 67 agree with you. It seems rather unusual except the sewer line goes through the property. It services this property on both sides. I have no idea. There is not a legal remedy that we're aware of at this point and we do need to build the sewer line. Dilkes: I think you face claims for violation of the public bidding law if you do it in the manner that's been suggested. Lehman: Alright. Vanderhoef: And unfortunately it's costing us more. Champion: We've got to move on. Pfab: Is there any reason...do we have to act on this? Lehman: People can't flush their toilets without their sewer. They're building houses. Pfab: Alright. Champion: Can we vote? Pfab: Can we defer this or...? Lehman: We can, but we're not going to. Champion: We're not going to. Pfab: Okay. Lehman: It needs to happen Irvin. Roll call. Motion carries 5-2, Kanner and Pfab in the negative. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 15 Page 68 ITEM 15. CONSIDER AN ORDINANCE AMENDING CITY CODE TITLE 14, ENTITLED "UNIFORM DEVELOPMENT CODE," CHAPTER 5, ENTITLED "BUILDING AND HOUSING," ARTICLE E, ENTITLED "HOUSING CODE," TO ADD REGULATIONS FOR RENTAL PROPERTIES WHEREON TWO OR MORE SEPARATE OCCASIONS WITHIN A 12- MONTH PERIOD OF TIME THE ISSUANCE OF A CRIMINAL COMPLAINT, MUNICIPAL INFRACTION, OR A WRITTEN NOTICE OF VIOLATION HAS OCCURRED. (FIRST CONSIDERATION). Lehman: (Reads item). Vanderhoef: Move first consideration. Champion: Second. Lehman: Moved by Vanderhoef, seconded by Champion. Discussion? Matt Blizek: Hi. My name is Matt Blizek. I've been a citizen...I live at 628 North Linn. Right now I've been a citizen of Iowa City for four years. And during that time I've rented from four different properties in this town. I've spoken to Council to kind of address my concerns with this ordinance before. At the last meeting I was told by you Mayor Lehman to re-read the new changes in the ordinance and then I would be happy. But I'm sorry I'm still not happy with the ordinance. Yeah, surprising. I really actually concur more with the Press Citizen who in their recent editorial on April 17th said well how to make a bad idea worse. And that probably more accurately reflects my views then hoping that I would be happy. I think it's clear there's a connection between this nuisance ordinance that is coming out now and the 21 ordinance that you'll consider later on tonight. It seems the perception seems to me that the Council intends to deal with the potential problem of increased house parties and residential parties to be a social scene by putting more ordinances like this into effect that will just if they're having parties at their house we'll just kick them out. So what the appearance to me and I think to a lot of young people in this town is just that the City of Iowa City has declared war on the young people in town who want to go out and socialize with their friends in any good way. And you might go and say that well this isn't targeted at students or something like that. Okay well it's targeted at property renters. It says nothing about property owners. But about 99% of all students who aren't living in University property rent their property from a landlord or a property owner in the City. Very few people can afford to buy their own homes here during their short stay. So this ordinance will definitely affect nearly every student who goes to rent a This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 15 Page 69 property. But when I was going through and I was reading this I could barely tell if it was written by the City Attorney of if it was written by Kafka. It seems like it's paraphrased by something directly out of The Trial by Kafka. I get two noise disturbances or minor infractions it's like a $50 fine or something small like that and I have letters being sent to me, meetings I have to go to and basically thrown into the bureaucratic gears of the City with the possibly outcome that I might be evicted from my home. So ifI can barely understand how this thing works how do you expect a 19-year-old renter who's getting a property and living on his own for the first time to be able to understand this whole process that you want to subject them to. So there's a lot of problems like that. But this ordinance a lot like the 21 ordinance it's targeted at a small number of very specific properties or very specific violators that are repeat violators that are causing a lot of problems. The problem is that you can't just target a law at those specific properties. You have to make it a blanket thing. So like the 21 ordinance this is going to have a lot of consequences that you didn't foresee or it's going to target people you didn't intend it to target to. I guess I just ask the Council if they've gotten any of these nuisance complaints from the areas in like south Johnson or south Van Buren or that south side of town where it's almost 100% of students who live there. I mean I imagine that you got very few of them. I mean students don't really care if someone is having a party next door we'll go over and tell them, you know, keep it down, shut up something like that. But the problem is the main place that these problems are happening is where we have mixed communities where we have residents who've lived here for 50 years and then someone moved out of the house next door so someone bought it and is now renting it out to five college students or younger residents of the town. Those are where the property thing is. But what I'd like the Council to consider is not only have those people respond to it, but have the large property management companies that most of the students live with will have to deal with these ordinance - places like Keystone, AUR - ones like that. For them I mean renters are not unlike the houses. Like my landlord we have a good relationship. You know we talk...we talk about things. It's good. Those places - AUR and the big property management the renters are just names on paper and if you don't believe that look at how much security deposit you get back when you move out. But that's a different issue. What I'm implying is though I don't...I'm not...I don't have faith that these property management companies will sit down and try to work with the City and try to come up with a compromise solution or compliance settlement or however it was worded in this. I think that at the slightest hint that they're going to be in trouble with the City and something they're just going to take everything they can to just kick that person out of their place. And that's a very concern I have of mine because those people aren't This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 15 Page 70 causing problems. Alright they might have had two violations of minor infractions in a year, but they're not the ones causing problems and they're not the ones you're trying to target with this ordinance. There was a lot of talk earlier tonight about - and I just read in an article in the Press Citizen again today about how in order to enforce this new ordinance you have to hire a new inspector. And I guess I was just asking with what funds? I mean I know your budgets like most government budgets are stretched pretty thin and now I've heard you might be taking them out of grants that are supposed to be used for things like homeless shelters and stuff like that. And to me that just seems immoral and possibly illegal. But there's another problem with this ordinance is that it also targets people because as Mr. Boothroy pointed out in order to wait for a conviction on something like this the person may have already moved out of their homes so this basically targets people that are just merely accused ora crime and not convicted of one. And that I'm sure also has some legal liabilities in it. I guess I'd also wonder how a landlord can evict one tenant. Say four people are living together - one of them is rowdy and out of control and two violations - how can a landlord...how can they legally evict one person while leaving the other four in there without violating the legal contract that is the lease that all four of them signed together. So for all these reasons and for several other reasons I urge you to vote down this ordinance. There's other ways we can deal with these problem properties. Just tell the police, the city inspectors to do more aggressive and enforce the laws that are already on the books. They're there for a reason - will do the job if you enforce them. I think this is just full of potential lawsuits and loopholes and nightmares that the City doesn't want to face. And I urge you just to hear what we're trying to say and vote it down. Thank you. Lehman: You have to clear the door. They doorway cannot be blocked - the fire code. So there...you know some folks can come up here... Pfab: There's room up over here. Lehman: But we can't have the doorway blocked that's...it just isn't going to work. I don't care, but the Fire Chief really does. There's still a little room up here too. Nathaniel Gavronsky: Alright. My name is Nathaniel Gavronsky and I wanted to agree everything that Mr. Blizek just said. And the reason why I decided to talk against this ordinance is that I think it's ill-timed. Primarily many of the problems that we're having with residential areas as far as property cost and people wanting to move into places that don't have a lot of students and not a whole lot of nuisance. As going back to what John Remert said earlier about problems that he's having with college students and stuff like that. I also agree that it has a lot to do with the This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Rem l5 Page 71 21 and up ordinance. And that before we consider this ordinance here as far as passing or not to see how the 21 ordinance goes. If it passes or not and then see what the ramifications would be as a result of having possibly more house parties in the residential areas before we decide if this is a good idea or not. All I ask is maybe put this off until a later to see what else will come about as if the zoning problems that the City is currently facing. Thank you. Lehinan: Thank you. Just a bit of information this was proposed long before the 21 ordinance was even talked about. Gavronsky: I am aware of that and that they weren't brought up together. But I do see that they do have some impact on each other. Lehman: Okay. Gavronsky: With the section 8 primarily. And also the definitions you know what defines a nuisance. I mean is it because you know there is a difference between, you know, having a dog that gets barking at night and having parties. I mean both can be considered a nuisance. What is going to be considered a reason to evict someone out of their home? (Can't hear), thank you. Lehman: Thank you. Mike Wright: I'm sorry they were all out of decals. My name is Mike Wright. I'm the.., among other things I'm president of the Longfellow neighborhood. I live at 815 Roosevelt Street. And I just had a thought a little while ago that when Shakespeare wrote that brevity was the soul of wit I don't think he was talking about this meeting. Nonetheless I'll try to bring in a little bit of brevity and probably not much more wit. I do want to speak in favor of this proposal. I find this to be a very moderate approach to solving some of the problems that we have here in Iowa City. This doesn't propose new regulations. It doesn't propose to burden folks with new rules to follow. This is really an enforcement tool. It provides us with some teeth for ordinances that are already on the books. I do agree it does only address rental properties. My observation and those of some other folks that I've spoken with is that rental properties have been the problem houses - a very small number of them are problems. But they are indeed the problem properties. I think this is going to be a tool to help keep our neighborhoods livable, particularly some of the core neighborhoods that are mixed. I don't think Iowa City is declaring war on students. Many of us live here because we like the environment of a mixed town with a lot of students with older folks, with people from all over different backgrounds. It's certainly one of the things we like about living here. And it's one of the things we like This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 15 Page 72 about living in our neighborhood. But problem houses are another matter and we don't like those very much. I don't like being awakened at 2:30 in the morning by consistent parties. I don't like non-responsive answers when people are approached about these. Right now what we need is some tools to deal with the problems that are facing us. I think this is a good tool and I would really urge the Council to support this resolution. Thank you. Lehman: Thank you Mike. PamEhrhardt: My name is Pam Ehrhardt. Iliveat 1029 East Court. Andlwould like to publicly thank the tremendous amount of work that the committee members who have worked on this for over a year have put in. and not only have they contributed countless hours, but they've also suffered a lot of grief from the public on this issue. In fact one member of the committee's property was recently vandalized very cruelly with verbiage which referred to her work on this committee. And I think the majority of landlords and renters are responsible. They're not fearful of this ordinance as the individuals who did this vandalism must be. if landlords and renters are truly responsible and respectful of neighbors and accountable for what happens on their property they should not be opposed to this ordinance. They have nothing to fear. This ordinance address repeat offenders - those landlords and tenants who are not responsible. They are not good neighbors. Thank you. Lehman: Thank you Pam. Jean Walker: My name is Jean Walker, 335 Lucon Drive. And I am grateful that this City is considering adopting this nuisance ordinance. In my neighborhood I've noticed in the last five years, particularly the conversion of resident owned homes to rental units primarily for students. This has resulted in increased noise, trash and over- occupancy problems in the neighborhood. Many of us have worked long and hard on our houses and yards to make them into places for peaceful enjoyment which is now being disrupted by what can only be described as (can't hear) behavior. I think as others have said that only those that are causing these problems will be affected by the ordinance. The other people will have nothing to fear. In the properties behind my house I have witnessed the shooting ofbb guns into the side of a garage, loud volleyball parties held until after 11:30 at night, loud parties at all hours especially on football games, over- occupancy, garbage spilled in the street and destruction of property. Other neighbors have reported similar experiences. In many instances these problems are exasperated by consumption of alcohol. This has resulted in many calls by many neighbors to the City's police and housing departments. We are extremely grateful to the city This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 15 Page 73 departments for helping to control these situations. However, in many cases the occupants in the rental units resume their disruptive behavior soon after the police have left. It does not seem right that so much police effort paid by the City's taxpayers' needs to be put into controlling these activates. The nuisance ordinance is essential in helping to curtail them. It would also be helpful if the City had an easily accessible list - perhaps on its website of landlords, managers for each rental property so that neighbors could alert them of complaints in a timely manner so that they could take responsibility for them. The City could be copied with those complaints. For those properties rented to students it would helpful if the University took a leadership role by letting the students know what is expected of them as temporary members of our community. That is they be responsible adults considerate of other people, the University could also set up a mechanism whereby the neighborhood residents could alert its officials to problems caused by the students so that those problems could be addressed by the University. The University's ongoing education of students concerning alcohol abuse will also be helpful in this regard. Thank you. Lehman: Thank you Jean. We have to keep the doorway clear folks. If you could just move aside. Thank you. Mark Danielson: I did pick up one of the name tags, but I don't know that it's doing any better in helping me get my name down in a timely fashion. My name is Mark Danielson. I'm from the law firm ofLeffHaupert Traw & Willman LLP here in Iowa City and I'm here at the request of the Greater Iowa City Area Apartment Association. And I've read a couple of editorials in Iowa City and Cedar Rapids papers recently and in response to two of those I simply want to make it clear that the Association simply cannot support this ordinance. We've attempted on more than one occasion to continue a discourse with the City and have tried to work with the language that's contained within the draft ordinance, but any ordinance that attempts to focus upon the rental permit as the enforcement mechanism is simply not acceptable. I do applaud the task force in their efforts that they've done. I think that several of the outcomes from that task force - housing task force over this past year have been very helpful. I do feel though that this ordinance is not one that is appropriate. And while the task force did report and recommend that the City identify properties that are subject to numerous or serious complaints and to establish a process to work with the owners the task force did not recommend rental permit sanctions as an enforcement tool. The proposed ordinance intends to hold Iowa City landlords responsible for the moral behavior of the tenants. Currently is and it should be the responsibility of the City Attomey's office and the Iowa City Police Department to enforce the This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 15 Page 74 provisions of the Iowa City and state of Iowa criminal code provisions. Representatives of both City Attorney's office and the Iowa City Police Department have acknowledged that a policy change could be made to be more proactive in seeking enforcement of the existing criminal and civil penalties, the City could seek higher initial fines than are requested under current policy. The City could pursue more proactive and vigorous enforcement of the existing code provisions in those problem areas before seeking to enact a broad, sweeping ordinance that's intended to target less than 1% of the landlords in the Iowa City area. The Iowa City Police Department is currently staffed at a level such that according to reports of many of the landlords that they're unable to respond in a timely manner to the existing calls and complaints. As we've heard earlier tonight with the City currently reviewing an ordinance to exclude individuals under the age of 21 after a certain time in the evening from being in establishments that serve alcohol or have more than a certain percentage of their sales in alcohol. That strain upon the City's police force to respond to calls and complaints is going to be greatly exacerbated. Don't believe that the City should be shifting its police responsibilities to the landlords. The proposed ordinance requires landlords to attend code compliance settlement meetings, prepare property management action plans, provide a property management performance guarantee, execute code compliance settlement agreements, evict or attempt to evict by commencing and pursing with due diligence all legal remedies to evict those tenants charged with one of the specified violations and undertake and pursue a due diligence reasonable means to avoid a recurrence of code violations on the premises by the present and future tenants or occupants of the premises. All the above mentioned actions to be taken by the landlord result in substantial time, cost and expense by the landlords to attempt to comply with an ordinance with no assurance that the nuisance or disorderly property or issue at hand has been corrected. The goal of the ordinance as it's stated is improving the peaceful habitation in Iowa City. I don't believe that the ordinance as it's drafted reaches that goal. (End of Side 1, Tape #03-36, beginning of Side 2) Danielson: ...in the ordinance, but be unsuccessful in evicting a tenant or stopping nuisance behavior. If the tenant remains on the property the problem for which the ordinance was created remains unresolved. If the root of the problem is either prop specific landlords and problem areas or unruly tenants then the focus should be upon those individuals not upon the group as a whole. Within the provisions of the ordinance it references two or three violations in a 12 month period will be considered a violation. Is that numerous? This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of Apr/1 22, 2003 Item 15 Page 75 Lehman: Mark you need to wind this up. Danielson: Alright. Is a rental property with chronic code violations one that has two issues within a 12 month period? The City should be aggressive and proactive in the enforcement of its existing and civil ordinances and code provisions specifically disorderly house, nuisance property should be cited and fined. And the fine should be enhanced - rather than a $50 fine a $500 fine can be sought. That would have much more of a deterrent effect upon someone who has a disorderly house. The police officer should direct and focus their attention to the problem areas. Much more review and input is necessary from both several City departments that are going to be impacted by this as well as input from landlords and members of the community such as before a broad sweeping ordinance like this is enacted. At a minimum I believe that a 12 month period should be set aside where this ordinance is tabled to allow a shift in the current departments' policy toward more vigorous and proactive enforcement of the existing criminal and civil penalties. It's only after this additional attempt at enforcement of these existing and criminal and civil penalties would the City be in a better position and the community in a better position to analyze the needs for further legislation. Lehman: Thank you Mark. Pfab: Could I ask you have you been in touch with the Iowa City Attorney on these? Danielson: Not directly with City Attorney, but have with Sue Dulek and members of City Attorney's staff and have met with Doug Boothroy and others on behalf of the group. Pfab: Alright. I think that you have potentially some good input and we appreciate that. Lehman: We have to keep the doorway open folks. Dilkes: But just to make it clear I mean we act at the Council's direction. And the Council's direction was that the Housing and Inspection Services and the City Attorney's office draft this ordinance. Lehman: Right. Dilkes: It's not our place to make policy. Pfab: Right, but I'm saying that he might have ideas that may be we can bring up to us. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 15 Page 76 Ann Estin: My name is Ann Estin. I want to speak in favor of this ordinance. First of all in support of the work that the task force has put in over a long period of time. I think it's important to support the process for working through these kinds of problems as they arise and that's strength of this proposal. It seems to me clear that this is independent of the 21 ordinance. But there's also no reason to think that the ordinance - the 21 ordinance - if it's adopted will make the situation in the neighborhoods any better. So to that extent this is still important. It's really very important I think for Iowa City to preserve a balance between rental and family properties in the City's neighborhoods and primarily for that reason I urge each of you to vote for this ordinance. Lehman: Thank you. Kevin Perez: Hi. My name is Kevin Perez. I live at 161 Columbia Drive. I was just reading this and I think it's...first of all I'd like to thank goodness I am rich and white because this law doesn't effect me because I own my own home and I can't even imagine how you could possibly write a law that only effects people that rent their houses. Because if you break the law and you own your own home you can't be kicked out. If you break a law and you rent you can be kicked out of your home. It absolutely on the face of it makes absolutely no sense. It's not...you know I think equal protection under the law. Two people break the same law twice in a year one person loses his home, the other person doesn't because he's well-off enough to own his own home. And that is straight off does not seem fair to me. And it's really all I have to say. But I think that is a key component to this. You know and I understand where everybody is coming from because less people live in fraternities and sororities and less people live in the dorms because of all the restrictions that have been placed upon them. So more apartment complexes stretch out farther into the neighbors. And I know that we need to protect different neighborhood from larger homes like the Longfellow district and everything. And to respect the people that have their homes, but it's sort of like the country club mentality. You know you go play golf at a public course and they're playing slow in front of you and your pissed, but that's why you join a country club so you don't have to deal with people playing slow. You know these are your neighbors. You got to deal with them. You know we cannot keep coming to you guys and say fix it, fix it, fix it and only have people...only some people effected by the law. And it's just totally unfair across the law. Thank you. Lehman: Thank you. Keri Hornbuckle: Hi. I'm Keri Hombuckle. I live on Washington Street amid quite a bit of rental housing. And I'm glad to report that I have good experiences This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 15 Page 77 with the renters that live around me and feel very fortunate that the renters and the owners respond rapidly when I have complaints about the property. However, there are occasionally and certainly not the rule some places that do not respond rapidly and again and again over and over again, year after year continue to be problems. The cost of the disruption from a very few facilities is paid for by the neighbors. And the neighbors are not making money off the property, but the owners of these places are making money and I think they should incur some of the costs of the disruption that right now the neighbors are having to absorb. Lehman: Thank you. Nick Herbold: Hi. My name is Nick Herbold. I'm from 319 East Court Street. I heard someone earlier talk about this ordinance as moderate and I really had to respond to that. I do not find this ordinance moderate at all. I think this is very extreme. I think kicking people out of their homes is very extreme. I just wanted to talk a little bit about how this could affect the life of a student. If they're kicked out of their homes they might have to return home. They might not be able to continue school. I mean these are things that are really changing the lives of students. They could potentially really change the lives of students. And especially about two noise violations I think is one of the...is it two noise violations? Is that what could kick someone out of their homes? Does anyone know? Two noise violations? Lehman: I can't say... Wilbum: It's two or more separate occasions of criminal complaints being issued. And if...I'm assuming that's a disorderly house that would fall within that category. But it's two or more separate occasions of a criminal... Dilkes: Doug is in the audience. He can respond to that. Kanner: It's also City code chapter 4 noise control. Lehman: Yes. Boothroy: It does say two or more criminal complaints and noise ordinance is listed. So it's possible although it's not required by the ordinance. Champion: Right. It's not required to evict somebody after... Boothroy: Absolutely not. It's not part of the ordinance. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 15 Page 78 Champion: But that keeps coming up. I've been meaning to interrupt and ask because everyone keeps saying I'm going to get evicted for this. That's not part of the ordinance. Herbold: So what would happen then? Champion: Well there will be a meeting between the renter, the landlord and the City to try to find some way to solve these problems. The part about the eviction was part of the original nuisance ordinance. That's been removed. Lehman: No, no it can still occur. Champion: It can still occur, but it's in different wording than it was in the original ordinance where it said they had to start eviction proceedings. Herbold: So potentially if someone got two noise violations it's possible that they could be kicked out of their home. Champion: I don't think so. You would have this meeting. And then I think you might be told by your landlord if there's another conviction you might be kicked out. I don't think it's going to happen automatically after a second conviction. Dilkes: No, but that is a potential result. Champion: It is a potential result. Herbold: Right. That's what I said. Okay and the reason why I bring this up and I think it's so important because I've had problems with noise myself. And the reason why is I don't think it's because I'm particularly loud. The law is so subjective that I think that all you have to do is be able to hear the noise from the sidewalk. Is that correct? Could I ask the City Manager's office? Dilkes: What ~tre you talking about? A disorderly house charge? Herbold: A noise...being charged or being...having a noise complaint on you. Dilkes: I'm assuming you're talking about a disorderly house charge. It has to be a disturbance to the neighborhood I believe is the standard. Herhold: But that's very subjective tthough. I mean... Dilkes: Well it' s determined by a judge. Herbold: Okay. so I'm just asking this subjective thing. This could possibly just hearing the noise from the sidewalk though? I mean I've talked to This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 15 Page 79 the City Manager's office about this before and I just wanted to make sure everyone knows about this because I think this is very serious. So could I...? Dilkes: You can't make a flat statement. It's always facts specific. A judge if they're hearing one disorderly house charge may conclude that it's not a violation of the disorderly house ordinance. And the next one may conclude it is. Herbold: Okay so potentially. Potentially? I'm sorry Mr. Atkins... Atkins: I'll accept potentially. Herbold: Okay. okay. I just wanted to bring that out because I knew that was very important. I was very surprised when I had a noise complaint called on me and I didn't think I was being very loud, but I was told that the person could hear my radio from the sidewalk and so that was considered a violation because it is that subjective. So I just wanted to bring that out. And I really hope that you do not support this ordinance. I think that it will have some consequences that...I just hope that you're all on the same page first of all about this. And second of all I hope that you do not pass this because I think that it's going to be bad for a lot of people, so thank you. Lehman: We're going to go for about another five minutes and then we're going to take a break. Go ahead. Champion: Because we got to... Newman: I'm going to take 20. Lehman: No you're not. Newman: Well I have no cookies today for you, but I do like to talk to you about your nuisance program, we sat down together... Lehman: You need to give your name Newman: What? Lehman: Give your name please. Newman: Oh, I'm sorry Mike Newman. I'm sorry. We sat down and worked on this for approximately 9, 10 months without conunittee. And we knew that this would probably be the hardest one to get across. This is made for this purpose only. It has three potential meanings to it. One - it helps the landlord. Two - it helps the renter. And three it helps the law. It may be funny to you. You sat and laughed. I won't. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 15 Page 80 Lehman: Talk in the microphone please. And hey folks let's show a little respect please. Okay? go ahead Mike. Newman: The purpose of it was to try to come up with something that we could all work with. I know I don't like to make laws for them to be. but unfortunately there's a few that don't care. so we have to make these laws for that purpose. That's the point of it all. It isn't the point we like to make the laws or the rules. But as this kid said he just come up here and said well I was a little loud. I didn't know it. He will know it when this law passes. And ! hope we do pass it to help others - not just me, but this young lady and other people that have the problems with our neighbors. I thank you very much for your time. Lehman: Thank you Mike. Gillian Dosenberg: Sorry. Hi. My name is Gillian Dosenberg and I live at 728 East Washington Street. I wasn't going to talk about this issue, but after Nick Herbold just spoke I really couldn't help myself. Regardless to whether or not this ordinance is right or wrong I'm really concerned that no one understands what its implications are going to be. it seems like I mean if you guys have to ask audience members about what's going to happen if you know.., how it's going to portray itself if it's passed I think that that is really something to be concerned and maybe not voting this until you understand what you're passing. I think that's...you know please keep that into consideration. Dilkes: I think we really do need to clarify that the audience member being asked the question was the Director of Housing and Inspection Services who drafted the ordinance. Dosenberg: Alright. Well still I mean even though...thank you. I'm glad that she knows. Lehman: You know it's getting late. This applause business just drags the meeting out. I know you agree with folks and not other folks, but let's be more respectful of the folks not applauded. Go ahead. Dosenberg: Thanks guys, but I understand. That's great then that he knows what it is. But I just think like you guys are the ones that are voting. I'm on the student government, you know, for the University and when we're going to vote in a resolution I'm not going to pass something if I don't understand what it's going to do - what its implications are. I just think that, you know, reconsider that. Thanks. Lehman: Thank you. You ready to take a break? O'Donnell: Yes. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Rem l5 Page 81 Lehman: We're going to take a break for about 10. and then we're not going to have a lot more discussion on this. Champion: Maybe we should finish this before... O'Donnell: How many more speakers are there? Lehman: How many more people want to speak to this? O'Donnell: Let's take a break. Lehman: Yeah we're going to take a break. O'Donnell: Another half hour. (Break) Lehman: ...doors so Mr. Kanner come in. we have to keep the doorway open folks. We do have to clear the alleyway to the door. We can't have that crowd of folks. You can move up along the wall, move across the back. Them are a couple more chairs up here. Pfab: There's spaces up here. You're welcome to come up. You might have to come up this way to get here though because of the (can't hear). Lehman: Okay. Jerry Hansen: Good evening, my name is Jerry Hansen and I'm chairman of Weatherby Friends and Neighbors. For years I've sat on the neighborhood council -the conglomerate of neighborhood associations in this town and heard the complaints lodged by neighborhoods about the parties, about, you know, the trash in the lawns and all this kind of stuff. The neighborhoods have really suffered. And as rental properties have moved into them it's exacerbated the problem. I've heard, you know, that this is kind of an anti-student type of thing and I really don't believe that. I think that this is personal responsibility type of thing. I don't want to go into anybody's house and tell them what to do. But when the problems that they create in their houses spill out into the neighborhoods then it's a matter of the public that is suffering the problem. We're not asking for anything in this ordinance that state and federal law doesn't already address. HUD housing regulations and the state's clear and present danger law already allow people to be evicted from their homes before a conviction. The problem that we've had in this town is that the only people that can evict somebody from their home in a rented place is the landlord. And the landlords have not done their jobs. It's as simple as that. Right now they talk about more enforcement of current laws. And we've been enforcing these things until we're blue in the This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 15 Page 82 face. We keep going back and back and back and giving warning after warning to people without issuing citations. And the citations by the way have been just miserably low. They haven't been any deterrent whatsoever. The end result of that is that we're draining our City services dry. We're draining our Police Department dry. And we're just windmilling the whole thing here. Personal responsibility is the issue. If you want to have a party in your house and you want to serve beer and you want to drink or you want to do whatever I don't care, but don't affect your neighbors. I think to the landlords this issue has riled them because it's a matter of inconvenience to them. They don't want to have to file paperwork. They don't want to have to attend a meeting. But let me tell you something that if landlords want to mine this town for gold, then they're going to have to take the same responsibilities for the property that they have in the neighborhood as everybody else does. Recently I've become a landlord in this town and I went out of my way to make sure that the person that I got into my place is going to be a good neighbor to my neighborhood. You know we talk about trash. We talk about the nuisance ordinance as far as loud parties and stuff like this. And everybody that I've heard has avoided the criminal issues. My neighborhood is different from all the rest of them. We have drive-by shootings. We have gangs dealing drugs on the corners. This stuff has got to stop - the fights that have been involved. We had the other day...I mean we're talking about dysfunctional families here that just cannot get along in society. We had a fight at a bus stop on Broadway. Eight kids, 8 grade school kids and 9 parents are involved in this thing. Where are they getting their idea from? They're getting them from home. You know I don't know what to tell you. Something has to be done about the drug dealing. Something has to be done about the terrorism. And if you notice both of those are on the lists. The terrorism comes from the gangs in the neighborhood that are silencing people. I've had people that have written letter to City Council supporting the nuisance ordinance, but would not sign them because they're afraid for their life. This has got to stop. I can file an anonymous complaint with the police and start an investigation, but I cannot get an anonymous letter to City Council. Something has got to give. Now I could take a while lot more time. I've invested 4 72 years of my life in getting this hear and I hope you support it. Lehman: Thank you Jerry. We're only going to do about five more minutes and then we're going to have Council discussion to decide what we're...where we're going to go on this. Kanner: Well there were about what five more people that wanted to speak. Maybe we could (can't hear) get those. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 15 Page 83 Lehman: We need to, you know, I think the point is we could talk about this all night and if someone has something new to say I'd be more than happy to hear it. But if we're just going to hear reiterations of what we've hear. go ahead Woody. Daryl Woodson: My name is Daryl Woodson. Very quick and very short. The problem that I have with this ordinance is that the final enforcement is eviction and that can happen - may not likely happen - but can happen without a conviction. And even though federal law in some instances does allow that I don't think that Iowa City should. To evict someone from their home - and a rental property is their home just as much as if you own it - to evict them without being convicted, only being charged with a crime I think is morally indefensible. Thank you. Lehman: Thank you Woody. Anna Buss: Hi. My name is Anna Buss and I live on Miller Avenue in Iowa City. I found it interesting that Jerry Hansen has invested 4 1/2 years of his life to this issue while there are many of us who have made this issue our livelihoods. He has that only people...only people who can evict a tenant is a landlord, well that's not true because there was an incident that happened in our neighborhood. I manage property over on Hollywood Boulevard. There are very few incidents on our property. I will tell you that getting that property rented I have managed it since '96 and all I have to do when someone calls is say Hollywood Boulevard. And I want you to know that it is very difficult. My owner has taken rent cuts to and again if we want to mine this town for gold when one of my owners has to dig in his pocket to make sure that these apartments have new carpet, new appliances and are a nice place to live for the tenants who live there. We have tenants who have been there for 14 years. We have tenants who have been there for 1 year. It goes from one end of the spectrum to the other. We have people who work. We have students. We have elderly people, when the drive-by shootings were in the neighborhood we got together and we - call it what you will - bombarded one of the owners of one of the properties because they were having drug deals in and out of that apartment all the time. All of us called the police repeatedly and said there's another Tupperware party over here on this property. It's on the 1st and the 15th of the month pretty much when some of the checks from the state and the government come out to support them. If you want to take a little bit of ease off some of your social services maybe you should review some of the people who are getting some of the social services. Not all of these people are "homeless." One of the things that has climbed up my backside for a number of years and this year it has really been a real problem. There have been literally busloads of people who have come here from Chicago seeking places to live and This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 15 Page 84 have gotten them because their vouchers will go anywhere. And it's not just them that is the problem. I don't even want to go to that situation. The other thing that I do want to ask though - and there are some questions that I don't think have really been looked at. One of the things that I want to know is will the City owned and publicly funded properties be held to the same standards as the other landlords and managers? Has this been run by any of our local magistrates? While I cannot speak for any of the magistrates I am unsure that they would stand up to some of the grounds for eviction that you have. I have been in small claims court many, many times. Many years ago my job was to go and help clean up Meadow Brook Trailer Courts so they could get it resold. With the help of a local attorney I learned a lot about evictions. And I will tell you that I was in the Johnson County Courthouse every day morning and afternoon on evictions. Yes the magistrates have turned over, but they have certain guidelines. Many of the magistrates will bend over backwards to assist the tenants in not being evicted or to help them out. I as the landlord do not feel that is wrong. I think that we as landlords need to know the law and we need to deal with it and follow it. But I also think that you folks as a whole do not realize the can of worms that you are opening. What are you going to do with the properties that the owner decides there's a problem on it and they no longer want to deal with it. I want to know if the problem property will this go with the property or will it go with the owner? If the owner decides to sell the property will this issue be carded onto the new owner if the permit has been jerked or will you just go ahead and reissue a permit to someone else? The City's social services are already very taxed... Lehman: You need to wind this up Ann. Buss: ...we all know that. If the landlords start evicting people with any sense of vigor we're all going to check their references. Most of us - and I do say most of us - do credit checks. We do criminal background checks. We are constantly on some of our...on most of our applications we have. Have you ever been convicted of a crime and we have a whole list and we check them out. But again it comes back to why do you want to use a baseball bat when a little rolled up newspaper will help. I'm sorry if you give the police the authority and let them go with the things that are out there to deal with this I cannot help but believe if you don't tell them "write a citation the first time and there will be a fine the first time. No ifs, ands or buts about it." That you won't get people's attention. And then you will absolutely be getting those people who are causing most of the problems. Thank you very much. Lehman: Thank you Ann. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 15 Page 85 Jean Volk: Yes I'm back, but I'm offering to be a volunteer to help out the City of Iowa City combat the problem. If all these people are waiting to hear what's going on it's an important issue. This Council cannot stop us from hearing our concerns. That's against the law. But number one I'll volunteer my services. I don't want one penny from the government. I'll work and I'll try to help issues - 15, 17, 19 all of these that are concerns for everybody. I'll volunteer my time. I'll get people out there to clean up the trash that is flying through the street every single day of this year that I've gone down City streets and is an embarrassment of this community to see the City trash to see the way it piles up. You think you got problems now. You wait until after 10:00 at night and the kids are out there and they have their trash all over. and then you think you got problems on Monday morning with your staff. I'll volunteer. Now if you can pass that up test me. I'll volunteer my services to help you the Council out. I'm not asking for a free ride. I'm volunteering. Volunteerism is the key to this community. But I'll volunteer to help you guys out with your budget. I'll help you out. And I don't know how you can pass up a volunteer who's willing to do it free as an inspector to watch over these things, make sure they're properly followed through. I will help. I'm a pre- law student. I will help until the day I die for this City if I'm going to live here. Thank you. Lehman: Thank you. Karen Leigh: My name is Karen Leigh. I live at 809 East Bloomington. And I would like to speak in support of the nuisance ordinance. I've heard a lot of concern expressed tonight for renters and for landlords. And I feel obligated to say that them should be some concern for property owners who do not have the opportunity to enjoy their property and that of course would include sleeping through a night at their property you know when there are party houses in the neighborhood. And having said that I'd like to mention a problem for landlords that comes from a totally different direction that has previously been discussed. This is a letter to my parents who have an income property on the north side from their tenant. She is writing to say that she is leaving the neighborhood. In part she says, "one of my concerns was that the neighborhood has changed demographically so that the college stage residents outnumber the middle-age, the elderly, the young families. I noticed last summer that this shift created an atmosphere that was uncomfortable for me. Peace and quiet during the afternoon and at time in the late evening were rare." Thank you. Lehman: Thank you. Hillary Sale: Good evening, my name is Hillary Sale and I just want to correct a few of the statements for the record that have been made tonight. This This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 15 Page 86 particularly piece of legislation is the final piece of legislation from the task force. The task force as you know worked very hard to come up with creative ideas. Most of the people in this room were not present for those meetings nor did they offer any suggestions to the task force to help develop those problems. This particular nuisance ordinance deals with, as suggested by the landlord representative tonight, only the bad apples, only the people with whom the City cannot find any other way to deal with the problems. It focuses largely on creating a dialogue although eviction is a part of it as a backup remedy and only as a backup and also not as a final remedy, but only as something that landlords can attempt to do. In part this ordinance deals with landlords and tenants who are unwilling to negotiate or work with housing inspection in any other way. The landlords unfortunately have drawn a line in the sand saying that anything tied to rental permits is completely unacceptable to them. We hope that you will draw a line in the sand tonight and say the reverse to them. Permits are a privilege, not a right. No body is entitled to have rental property in this conununity and they should respect the community when they do it. This particular ordinance was in fact a recommendation of the task force although not in its current drafted form. The task force specifically recommended that there be some type of provision tied to rental permit. And it's not clear to me and someone else said tonight what anybody who's doing their job and doing it right should be afraid of. Finally, other property owners have plenty of provisions to the code to which they are subject and which can be enforced through housing inspection. It's not as if the only people who are subject to City code are somehow landlords. In some people in the neighborhood should not have to be subject to whims of whomever the current landlords are or who the current tenants are. Instead all people in the neighborhood should be working together to have a dialogue to resolve problems and that's what this ordinance would do first and foremost. Thank you. Lehman: Thank you Hillary. Council discussion? Karmer: I had some questions for Eleanor and for Doug if Eleanor can't answer. In section 8 it talks about the director may issue rebukes to term rental permits for any of the following reasons. Number a, it talks about being on the premises of the rental property. But yet there are some such as number 4 and number 9 that talk about doing things, breaking a lot of public place. That seems contradictory. Or is it to be that breaking the law in a public place counts as one of the convictions or one of the citations that might be used for future removal from property? This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 15 Page 87 Dilkes: No, I think it would have to occur on the premises. There's some ambiguity in term of...in the law in term of what constitutes a public place for purposes of possession of alcohol in public and public intoxication. In fact that issue is heading to the Supreme Court. And there are some common areas of a premise that can...on which that activity can occur that still would be considered public. Champion: Are you talking like a hallway in an apartment building? Dilkes: Yeah. Kanner: But maybe we have to be more specific. But if you're on a single house property it doesn't seem to me that any court would rule that as public property. Dilkes: Right. Kanner: So we need to exclude that I would assume. Dilkes: No, I think that what you would do is you would take that criminal charge and if the incident leading to that conviction occurred on the rental premises then you would have something that fell within that section. Kanner: Okay. I think I see what you're saying although I think it's something that weakens the ordinance. That maybe we need to make it a little bit more specific or eliminate some of those. Champion: Well I am going to support this ordinance. I think along with rental housing and like myself somebody who owns their own property in town I think there's a responsibility of property owners too. For instance I do have young people living in the house next to me. They have very loud parties once in awhile and I tolerate them because I think my family is big - we have loud parties too. But sometimes they're playing their music so loud that my windows shake. Now I don't call the police. I go over and ask them because ifI call on the phone I can they can't hear the phone ring. But I do go to the house. And then you know they don't even understand that it's making my windows in my house actually shake. It's an old house. It's 103 years old. it has old windows. And then they turn it down and it doesn't happen again for maybe three or four months. And then I go over and knock on the door again. And if they had loud parties every week I would probably go over and knock on their door and tell them that's too frequent. When I have a wedding reception at my house which is going to be noisy with music I notify my neighbors to let them know what's going to be happening. So I mean there's part of being a good neighbor as a property owner too. It isn't just the renter that has to be This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 15 Page 88 a good neighbor. And I would hope that property owners who support this ordinance will remember to talk to those renters and tell them there's a problem before they call the police or have a citation issued. I think that it is two handed. And I think we've heard tonight the renters causing the problems and sometimes it's the property owner who hasn't bothered to let somebody know there is a problem. So I don't think I've ever...I've never called the police on a loud party in my neighborhood. I've certainly tried to talk to my neighbors or a barking dog or anything like that. And it seems to correct it. So I hope that all property owners - not that I'm a total angel - but I am fairly forgiving of loud parties. So I am going to support this. I don't think it's going to be a big problem. I think it's a positive thing not only for the property owners, but also for renters who might want to study at night and are afraid to ask other people to turn things down. So I am going to support it. Wilbum: Well Council knows that I have not and do not support this ordinance primarily because it deals with the underlying premises of criminal complaints and not the adjudication of it. I acknowledge, understand that the task force worked long and hard on this and on other recommendations. I did support some of the other recommendations. For example I did support our...someone did bring up earlier the issue of over-occupancy and that's something we have enacted. I don't support this. I do appreciate some people don't like it, but I do appreciate that you did include the chance for some dialogue. But again for the reason I just stated I won't support this. Also I've supported, you know...there have been efforts by some of the community and some Council members to...there's a question about the number of law enforcement officers that we have. I've supported the number that we have and some tools that they have to try and have an impact on some of the problem behaviors that we have. And I don't think that this is a tool at this time that I'm willing to sanction to deal with some of the problems that we've had. Some of the other things...some of the gang problems that we've had I think law enforcement has tried to be on top of that. Our scat team has done some effort trying to work with in dealing with some of the gang problems. So I guess I'll just stop right there. Lehman: Any other discussion? Vanderhoefi Well I guess I'll weigh in here. I have some of the same concerns that Ross has and I should have asked earlier about whether there's a line in there between complaints that are of noise, nuisance maybe not the drug dealing and that kind of thing because I think law enforcement needs to be out there and on top of that and I trust my Police Chief in putting in staffout there when those complaints come in. but I think This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 15 Page 89 before all the fines and so forth come in I like the idea of having people talk about it and if they can't feel comfortable talking with their neighbor about it then is the place to sit and talk at City Hall with someone else in the middle of it. To go further and move towards any of the eviction and so forth I'm not comfortable with having that happen until the person cited has had their day in court. So yes this tool could be used for getting their attention and giving them the opportunity to change some of their behaviors. That still puts me on this fence that I've been on all along because I see some real positive things that can come out of this and I'm glad some of the later speakers finally spoke about rental properties that are not student. This is not a student problem in my mind as a single group. In this City we have so much rental property and certainly there are young people who are not students who also rent in this town. So whether it be this issue or whether it be alcohol issues I for one do not believe that all of the activity is from University students. So if you feel like you're being unjustly accused please accept my apology because I don't think of it in that way. ! think I will support this if we can get a little better clarification on the citation versus the actual charge being...what am I trying to say? Kanner: Adjudicate. Vanderhoef: Adjudicate by the judge. If the judge rules that it's a criminal offense then moving forward with the rest of the tool part, but I would like to see if we could put in there somehow that we still ask them to come in and talk about the problem and see if we can get it remedied there before we go any further. Lehman: Well first of all I think this ordinance probably wouldn't apply to a single person in this room. I find we've had a tremendously long discussion over a very, very small problem but a very pesky problem in some neighborhoods that we have not been able to address. This is nothing more than asking people to be responsible for their actions. And the ordinance specifically indicates nothing happens the first time you get cited by the City. My suspicion is that if we raise the fines to the levels that we could and started fining people the $500 fines which are allowable under I think the Iowa law for trashing your yard or parking across the sidewalk or loud parties that we'd be run out of town and we probably should be. I think this is a very benign way of handling this. My understanding from Housing Inspection Services is that apparently there are more than one city that uses this procedure. And if I recall correctly Doug you said that nobody has been evicted as a result of this procedure. So it basically appears to be an opportunity to work and I will support the ordinance. Other discussion? Roll...go ahead. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 15 Page 90 O'Donnell: No, let me ask you a question. Ann asked a question of whether this City is held to the same standards. Is that yes? Dilkes: Yeah I think the answer is yes, but I think you need to remember that in connection with the subsidized housing the HUD rules for termination of assistance are far, far more broader than this even. There's no conviction required. There's no...it's a hearing held in from of...just a very informal hearing. So that's likely a remedy that would be used in those cases. We would continue...it's a quick remedy that we use now and probably would continue to use. Lehman: That's much more severe -the HUD remedy. Dilkes: The HUD rules are...yeah I would call them more severe. Lehman: Okay. other discussion? O'Donnell: No, go ahead. Kanner: Were you done Mike? O'Donnell: I'm done yes. Kanner: Yeah at first...when this first came up I was opposed to it. Then concerns brought up by myself and others such as the issue of initiating the process with people that weren't convicted and then not having dialogue - not having official dialogue started to be addressed. And I think that was a good move and I appreciate the work that Doug and others did on that. But after...especially after hearing testimony tonight I've moved back to feeling that we can do better than this. I think that we can do abetter form of dialogue to try to initiate change then at the stage that we're talking about. I think it's a bandage when we can get it at the root of the problem - preventive healthcare instead of emergency at the end when it's a lot more expensive and more damaging perhaps. I'm also moved by the fact that it does seem to be unfair on the face of it that it targets renters such as myself and others as opposed to property owners. In regards to the neighborhood council I'd like to know how many are renters. I have a feeling that maybe there's one or two, bm the percentage probably is not a majority. And I would gather that the majority of the people in this town are renters. I think we need to have those people represented. I think we need to use our UISG City Council committee Dee and I are on with Nate Mayrose and work to empower folks through that and look for solutions there. I think we have some good possibilities with that committee. There were some suggestions that I think Council should take up again such as student representation... This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 15 Page 91 (End of Tape #03-36, Beginning of Tape 03-37) Kanner: ...deal with some of these problems. I'm concerned about the noise violations and we're not sure of what exactly the law is on that. I haven't heard a clear definition of that. I would like to hear about what the noise violations are and if it is true that it's noise just being heard at the sidewalk which I would tend to agree that that's the law that if it goes past your property at a certain decibel level you can be issued a citation. I think that's a problem. So I think we can again we can do better and I'll be voting against this proposal. And I would urge my fellow Councilors to vote it down and let's keep working at it. I think the small problem like you said Emie that can hold off for right now. Lehman: Okay. roll call. Motion carries 5-2, Kanner and Wilbum voting the (negative). Kan': Motion to accept correspondence. Pfab: So moved. Vanderhoef: Second. Lehman: Motion and seconded to accept correspondence. All in favor? Opposed? Motion carries. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 92 ITEM 17. CONSIDER AN ORDINANCE AMENDING TITLE 4, ENTITLED "ALCOHOLIC BEVERAGES," CHAPTER 5, ENTITLED "PROHIBITIONS AND RESTRICTIONS," OF THE CITY CODE TO PROHIBIT PERSONS WHO ARE UNDER THE LEGAL AGE FOR LAWFUL PURCHASE AND POSSESSION OF ALCOHOLIC BEVERAGES FROM ENTERING OR REMAINING IN ESTABLISHMENTS WITH LIQUOR CONTROL LICENSES OR WINE OR BEER PERMITS BETWEEN THE HOURS OF 10:00 P.M. AND CLOSING. (SECOND CONSIDERATION). Lehman: (Reads item). Vanderhoef: Move second consideration. Lehman: Moved by Vanderhoef. Champion: Second. Lehman: Seconded by Champion. Discussion? O'Donnell: I would like to hear the bar owners suggestion to us before we get into anything. Lehman: Well I understand that there are obviously lots of folks who want to speak to this. My understanding is that there may be a proposal I think from the student senate perhaps also one from the bar owners. And I think the Council would appreciate those folks having an opportunity. My guess is we're not going to go all night. We're not going to go till 2:00 for example. But it would be nice if those folks have an opportunity to speak sometime at the begiuning of discussion. Wilburn: Emie last time you took pro and con... Lehman: It would be nice also to do those who favor the ordinance and then those who don't so we get.., so people get an equal opportunity to speak. Okay. go ahead. Sarah Brazee: Nate has asked me to talk. My name is Sarah Brazee. I live at 815 East Washington. Forgive me I didn't know I was going to be speaking until today. I've very nervous. Lehman: You're doing fine. We're all tired. Brazee: Well first of all I'd just like to say I appreciate the opportunity to speak to you. I understand your motivation behind this is a positive one. I do think that binge drinking is a problem in our society not just in This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 93 Iowa City. I also urge you to please listen to me as a representative of my parents that carmot be here, not just someone that is a student at the University of Iowa because I do feel that the student voice gets lost sometimes. I'm here to talk to you about this point because...to talk to you about a point that has been brought up, but has not been personally touched on. I'm here to talk to you about sexual assaults at house parties. I myself am a victim of sexual assault at a house party. When I was a senior in high school I went on some college visits. At one campus which did not have 21 bars the majority of students spent Friday and Saturday nights at house parties. I attended one of these with someone I was dating at the time. I met a gentleman there and was attacked. I suffered two broken ribs, damage to the right side of my face and some injuries that I don't care to disclose at this time. I bring this very personal experience to light which I have not prior to this because I do feel that perhaps the City Council has not thought enough about the tremendous consequences that I foresee happening if the 21 bars are taken out. My point basically is that I don't think that the responsibility issue has been brought up enough. And I was not drinking that night I would like to make that point very clear. I did not drink until I came to college and I'm not saying that I drink often. But what I'm trying to say is that when you're in a bar...when I'm in a bar ifI feel threatened I can go to a bouncer or I can if need be go outside and within seconds finding a police officer and have them handle it. When you're at a house party it is incredibly hard to find someone to handle it. At the house party I was at that I was assaulted at there were people less than 10 feet away from me that heard me screaming, but since they did not want to be involved they did not put themselves in that situation. And that's fine. I don't blame them at all, but at the same time I want to know who's going to be responsible if this moves to house parties. I understand that you have had information from Ames saying that if you move it out of the bars that there will not be an increase in house parties. However, I think that it's important to remember that these are not comparable situations seeings how Iowa is dry campus and Iowa State fraternity and the Greek system are allowed to have parties in their fraternity houses. I'd just like to bring up the point that in safe havens as the bars we have that now where you have the bouncers and the police and those bouncers and those owners of those bars know it is their responsibility to protect the patrons that are there. When you're at a house party with people that are obviously going to be under 21 I want to know who's going to take the responsibility to call the police if there is a fight or a sexual assault or alcohol poisoning. Last year at the University of Madison there were 127 sexual assaults reported. At the University of Iowa the Daily Iowan reported as 18. I have looked into this. Obviously I just found out I was speaking today, but I have decided that they main reason for that is that many of the majority of parties at Wisconsin take place in This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 94 residential neighborhoods and house parties. Also last week when I was at Summit I saw an underage girl that had alcohol poisoning. I understand that obviously that's something that Council is trying to get rid of. However, at Summit it took them less than 10 minutes to have her on a stretcher and take her to the hospital and she lived. At a house party I am telling you that that would not have happened. People would not be responsible to call the cops. No one would tell anyone. 911 would not be dialed that girl could very well be dead right now. I also would like to say that I understand that you're trying to stop binge drinking however I do not believe that this will accomplish that. I went to high school...I mean in high school many people under 18 know alcohol is readily available. I don't think that's going to be a problem. I'd like to know what the Council is going to encourage to compensate. Are you going to encourage cab companies to have larger routes and how are you going to do that? What are you going to do about drunk driving because I already know that there is a problem when people do attend house parties with who is going to drive home at the end of the night. Are you going to encourage the police to patrol residential neighborhoods to protect the people that choose to walk home from these parties? And...basically I don't want to see this happen to anyone else. I know that possibly you haven't been in the situation, but I have. I do know other people who have been sexually assaulted. I'm telling you it's been one of the worst experiences of my life and I would like to save anyone else from having this happen to them. I do think that this will be a very large problem if the bars do not remain under 21. O'Donnell: Thank you. Lehman: Thank you. Nate Green: Hi. My name is Nate Green, University of Iowa Student Body President. I reside at 702 North Dubuque Street. Before I get to the student proposal I'm going to talk about a few instances that I think really show how the 21 ordinance would have adverse effects. First of all I've also heard that you've had some correspondence with Iowa State University and how they're 21 ordinance...how successful it has been. And some say it's drastically reduced underage drinking at ISU, but any student - and you can ask any student here who's recently been to Iowa State - would tell you otherwise. Iowa State has a very large house party and Greek party atmosphere. In addition Iowa State has a wet campus. Students can drink in the doors and at fiat parties both of which are unregulated and unpoliced. Iowa has a dry campus so the drinking if the 21 ordinance is adopted will move to house parties. There is no where else for the drinking to go if the bars go 21. in one of its recent issues Playboy magazine rated Iowa State in their This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 95 top 10 party schools in the nation. Is this the kind of reputation that we want the University of Iowa to have? In Ames there was I think last there was 436 PULAs issued and in Iowa City it was 2200 or over that - something like that. And at first these numbers strike you as wow you know they really did something to curb drinking at Iowa State. Well I say no that's not the case. They did something to sweep the problem out of the public's view. The reason there wasn't that many PULAs at Iowa State is because these unregulated, unpoliced house parties and frat parties were allowed to go on without any police presence there. At the University of Iowa there is accountability. In Iowa City there is accountability in the downtown atmosphere and I think that's a major reason that all those PULAs were issued. And I think it's the Police Department doing their job in regulating underage drinking. At UNI also adopted a 21 ordinance, but they say the harmful effects that a 21 ordinance had on their city and on their university. And I urge you to look at that situation and listen to those councilors because I think they bring up some good points and good concerns about how the 21 ordinance adversely affected them. And lastly I'll point to an instance that happened at Ohio State University about a week, week and a half ago where five students at Ohio State University attending a house party died in a fire caused by a fight at that house party. And many of the people at the house party were underage. Many of the students who died at that house party had drank too much. they'd passed out basically impairing their ability to escape from the fire. Is this what we want in Iowa City? Please consider these examples. House parties will devastate this community and I think it's bringing in a lot of problems that aren't foreseen. Circumstances like these ones I described are very real reminders of what could happen if the 21 ordinance is adopted. Please consider these consequences. And now I want to submit to you the student proposal for the 21 or for I guess compromise on the 21 issue. Kanner: While we're doing that I'll thank Irvin for submitting an article about the issue at Ohio State pointing out some of the dangers involved. Irvin put that in the packet last week about Ohio State. Champion: I think it's also important to know that we do have house parties in Iowa City. Green: Oh, I agree. No, I'm not saying there aren't. I'm just saying that the ones you see right now, multiply that by about 10 and that's going to be the situation. And that's not like any kind of threat or anything. That's just what I see as an inevitable as a student. Alright. This is... O'Donnell: Are you about through? Green: I've just...I was going to run through this proposal real quick. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 96 Okay. this is student proposal was created by the student 21 policy - STOP is the acronym for that task force and it gives recommendations on dealing with the 21 ordinance. And we go through and identify some key areas that we think should be looked at as far as alternatives to going to 21. As far as bar policy goes we advocate a 19 ordinance instead. I think some of the concerns brought up before were that high school students who are 18 and attending either City High or Iowa City West could go to the downtown area and get into bars and I guess have access to alcohol if they got someone to buy it for them. So what a 19 ordinance would do would be to eliminate that problem. And the only exception to the 19 ordinance would be students with a college id would be allowed admittance also. We have to give the freshman, I mean, the people that are 18 at the University an alternative also to go to, you know, go dance downtown, to go play pool. That's...I think that's essential. Also wristbands - advocate that all bars use wristbands. We want every single bar to have a 21 sign as you enter that would basically remind any customer that entered the bar that it is law in the state of Iowa and that that bar will be enforcing a 21 only drinking law in the bar. And monitoring - we want and I know the bar owners...I think they have a similar proposal unto this. We want at least one person in every single bar to be devoted specifically to stopping underage drinking if it's happening in the bar - to monitoring the situation, to making sure that drinks aren't passing from people who are 21 to underage patrons. We also advocate free soda and water in bars as an alternative after 10:00 p.m. for people who don't want to drink so that they don't have to and they don't feel pressured to. We also want mandatory training for all bar staff such as the TIPS program I guess basically through the Iowa City Police Department. As far as advertising we want the bar owners to commit to not advertising drink specials in the newspapers or I'm sorry in the Daily Iowan. The Daily Iowan is geared specifically towards students. I would say that's the major constituency that reads the paper. And we believe if these drink special advertisements are eliminated I guess that will reduce the influence that such ads have on pressuring people or getting people to come out and drink. Also we want in these ads when they have the ads we want bar owners to commit to putting a disclaimer also on the ads that says something about we advocate or we follow Iowa law that says you can only drink if you're 21 - something to that effect. As far as alternatives we took the Council's advice at the last City Council meeting and we've been trying to develop alternatives to the bars and some of them are listed here. A really good opportunity called the 10,000Hours concert would reward students with a free concert if they were to complete I think it's between 10 or 20 hours of community service. That's still being worked out. And we'd like to get a big name band or a big named yeah band to come play for that free concert. So I mean that's one thing I think that will be a one night This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 97 thing I guess, but I think that will help. We want to work with you guys to possibly revamp the Old Capital movie theater. We think that could be a viable late night alternative for students. And I think that if the facilities there were improved - they got a few better movies in them for students to watch I think that could be a very popular thing for students during, you know, weekends. And another possible one we thought of was a bowling alley in the old J.C. Penney place in the Old Capital Mall. I think that'd provide a good forum for student activity. Then this one we...I'm sure most of you know Planet X is in the process or maybe they've already moved everything out of their place in the Old Capital Mail. We'd like to work on changing that to I guess a student...kind of student activity center where students could I guess play pool. They'd have a coffee shop and kind of like the Java House atmosphere where students could either student, talk with friends for half of it and the other half of it be a 24-hour study area where students could go at any time to study because currently there's I guess no place like that as far as a 24-hour study area for students. The last one is...talks about I guess extending hours at the FitZone. We talked to George who owns to FitZone and he said he'd be willing to work with us to set up some nights where...to set up some nights where he would open FitZone up to like 3:00 a.m. so students could go there and lift weights, work out, whatever. And the last two - one deals with zoning. We'd like to propose or we'd like to encourage the City Council to consider a more other than bar friendly zoning policies. Basically I guess making it so the restrictions aren't so high for things like retail stores to come into the Iowa City downtown areas. And the last one and I think probably the most important one - in order for these recommendations to work there needs to be some kind of monitoring, some kind of I guess accountability to make sure that bars are following these things - that they're upholding the rules that they commit to. And what we want to have is a task force composed of a broad range of community leaders, students that would I guess look into how this new like 19 ordinance would work, how successful are these bars in policing themselves. And I think this is important and I'd like this task force or whatever it's called to report the City Council regularly because I think that's important to ensure that these recommendations are being upheld. And I'll take questions if you guys have them on the policy. Lehman: You did a lot of work on that. Green: We spent a lot of hours. Champion: I think we should hear the bar owners. Vanderhoef: I am really impressed. Good for you guys. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 98 Lehman: Thank you very much. Green: Thank you. Karr: Can we have a motion to accept correspondence? Champion: So moved. Wilbum: Second. Lehman: A motion and a second to accept correspondence. All in favor? Opposed? Motion carries. After this speaker if there's someone here who wishes to speak in favor of the 21 ordinance let's get some alternate. And I would also like if the bar owners have a proposal to be somewhere near the front so we can get that one as well. Karen Pease: That's kind of a hard act for me to follow there. My name is Karen Pease. I'm from district A. well thanks to the U.S. Patriot act the government can listen into our libraries, can check on what books you've read. Police can enter and search your house without notice. Yes in many ways civil liberties are going the way of the stellar c cow and the spectular (can't hear), so it should be of no surprise that in this age of freedom roll backs some members of the City Council have embarked on their own crusade to take away the rights of others. Now I should back up for a minute, not all of you deserve this condemnation. For two of you initially voted against the resolution- Mike, Steve. And one since then - Irvin - has refined his dance so he no longer supports the penalization of those who have not committed a crime. These three should be commended. As for the other four I do not understand what you are thinking about on this issue. For what could drive a city to want to drive out long standing food and drink establishments, local businesses which serve most of the downtown area's night life from bands to comedy to dancing when no other businesses could afford those property values. Why would the Council sabotage both the City's heart and general revenues which we were so unwilling to spend for shortage in this manner. I have attempted to try and figure this one out. Please Emie, Connie, Dee and Ross let me know if I omit a possibility that might be in the conductor's seat of your trains of thought. Perhaps you think this might drive down the number of people who turn to excessive drinking in their life. Could that be a possibility? I decided to check on this and spoke to some former alcoholics that I knew. By the next Council meeting I should have the signed statement by them. I'd hoped to have them today, but didn't have enough time. Here let me summarize the typically conversation. Me: what do you think of the 21 ordinance? Them: I think it's pretty stupid. Me: do you think it will do anything to help prevent alcoholism? Them: laughter. Them: of This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 99 course not. It will make it worse. It's a lot more dangerous in house parties and they'll all go there. Everyone that I spoke to who was a former alcoholic said almost the exact same thing. These are the very people who had to suffer from what you may be trying to prevent. If this is your reason I may ask who are you to think that you somehow know better than them to the degree that you would take away the rights of others. I might also add that one person that I spoke to worked at MECCA. For those unfamiliar with it it's a program that works to treat addicts. That's just an aside. Perhaps another possibility is you decide you want to remake downtown - local businesses and property owners being trivial in this matter. Well you'd also do a great job of remaking the residential districts at the same time as one resident quoted in the Press Citizen stated they did not live downtown because they wanted to avoid this. Would you support.., if you had to make the choice would you support drinking in your neighborhood or downtown because that's pretty much what it's coming down to. Perhaps you feel this is your moral duty to do so. Well if that is your view let me say fight your crusade in the name of the father, but not in my name. not in my name will you take the fights of people other than yourselves. Not in my name will you put local businesses out of business for issues that are none of your business. Not in my name will you decide that people the age of Jessica Lynch and her not so fortunate colleagues can die for this country's foreign policy, but not dance or listen to a band at night. We need not Council members willing...who act like generals who are willing to fight to the last drop of someone else's blood. And if it takes competition to bring this home so be it. I will be running for City Council District A this fall. Lehman: You need to wind this up if you would. Okay? Pease: Yes. It surprises me not that this is the same Council who voted down a peace resolution. For in the words ora full-blooded Zapatech Indian who went on to become the President of Mexico, Benito Juarez, respect for the rights of others is peace. Thank you very much. Lehman: Thank you. Ralph Wilmoth: Good evening. I'm Ralph Wilmoth, the Director of Johnson County Public Health. In your meeting two weeks ago Councilman Kanner noted that this ordinance addresses a public health issue. I agree. In a community health needs assessment and health improvement planning process led by the department - a group of over 70 persons representing service providers and community members identified alcohol as the public health issue of greatest concern in Johnson County. Creating and implementing policies such as this ordinance are public health interventions that help prevent establishing behaviors This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 100 that have immediate and lifelong effects. Thank you for your interest in health and well-being of the youth of this community. Thank you. O'Donnell: What is your name? Don Stalkfleet: Don Stalkfleet, local entrepreneur. I should say good morning, but we're not there yet. Champion: It's past your bedtime isn't it. Stalkfleet: Yes. I guess I just need to reiterate what Nate Green has said from the University of Iowa student government that as far as I'm concerned with the coalition of bars that have been in meetings on several occasions that we'd be more than happy to back every thing that he has given you in his affidavit as far as a 21-year old ordinance and perhaps bimonthly meeting where we could get together and work with the Iowa City Police Department as well as the Council to do the best that we can do to make the situation better than it is today by having our own people help the Police Department by monitoring underage drinking. By hopefully enacting an ordinance that goes to 19~year-olds and give us one year to try to prove ourselves. If in one year we don't and if the students who have talked here tonight and two weeks ago don't prove themselves then I guess you can pretty much have a free hand to do whatever you need to do. But as bar owners I think I have a wide coalition of people who are behind the 19-year-old ordinance and the stuff that is stated in his affidavit he just presented to you. And anything else would be redundant. Thank you for your time. Lehman: I have just one question. If...obviously you...you're endorsing pretty much what Mr. Green presented. Stalkfleet: Yes, sir. Lehman: Are you telling us that you believe that within a year that the bar owners and the patrons can get a little better hand on the difficulties that we experience presently downtown? Stalkfleet: Well first and foremost I think if we go to a 19-year-old ordinance and we do distance ourselves from the high school age people and it's kind of ironic because I don't think anybody...has any impetus to go out and get a 19-year-old id to get themselves into a bar - a fake 19-year- old id. So you know if we're going to look at it from a pragmatic standpoint I think that us as bar owners know that it's going to go 21 unless we put our best foot forward. We need to police ourselves along with the Iowa City Police Department. And the bar owners that I've talked to, particularly the bar owners that would be "college This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 101 orientated" we are ready to use our staffs to always have at least one individual - of course according to the size of the establishment that you're talking about -that would be designated solely to walk around and monitor underage drinking. And he would have the authority to take away alcohol and escort someone from the premises. And I would like to have the situation in most of these places where any officers who works that night as we well know after a certain mount of time would be able to say "who's your man on the floor tonight?" "It's Tom." "Okay I know Tom." He walks around. He sees him in the area walking around, talking to people, and we have cooperation and it's not a zero sum equation where somebody wins and loses. We're working together. And I think it could work out really well that way. I'd like to investigate how we could get more across the board standardized form to where we could ail have the same wristbands or at least the same rules that we all adhere to so that we have some continuity across the board and everybody knows how the whole system works. And then along with that we're all going to be trained in TIPS and everything that he brought up. Lehman: Then let me ask you this if we were to amend the ordinance to state that this would be a 21 ordinance. The first year would be 19 and would be reviewed at the end of 10 months to see how the bars have been able to comply with it you're telling me that would be acceptable? Stalkfleet: I think that would be fair. I think that would be fair on our part. And I think that would be fair on your part. It gives us one year to straighten up and fly right. Lehman: I think that would be fair. Stalkfleet: Other than better words than that I don't know what else to say. But one year to try to do our best foot forward not only from a bar owners standpoint, but from a student standpoint also. Lehman: Alright. Thank you. O'Donnell: Ernie I really don't understand...you know I agree with the 19. you know we've had that from the student body and the bar owners now. But I don't know why we would confuse things by putting 21 in there. Lehman: I don't think that's very confusing. It's pretty clear. O'Donnell: Well I think it is confusing. You go 19 for one year to see how it works and then you have the option of going 21. I don't know why... Lehman: Well let's hear what the rest of the folks here. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 102 Pfab: I have a question. Stalkfleet: Yes sir. Pfab: Am I correct that any bar owner has the legal right to kick anyone out of a certain age? Stalkfleet: Sure. Lehman: Sure. Pfab: So I mean it's something that you could put something on your door or on your window right now. Stalkfleet: Well we would have to try to get together and with you people to try to come up with a sign. If you pass an ordinance that was 19 years old then of course we could all come up with something that you would probably deliver to us. But if you don't pass an ordinance that is 19 years old then we'll get together and we'll try to get the right verbiage in that signage to put in front of all the...at the entrances to all the bars to say you must be 19 to enter this establishment. And again I like it personally because we do distance ourselves from high school age people and the freshman class. I know the freshman class might not like to hear that, but I'm trying to find the best solution for both parties involved and I think a 19-year-old is a great place to start. Pfab: Okay. I'm going to pick up something that came up earlier in a different context here. And at this point I'm questioning whether -and I'm going to quote - "fines should be enhanced" for the people who are breaking...who are not obeying the law which is no drinking till 21. Stalkfleet: Who are you fining the bars or the patrons that are breaking the law? Pfab: I think it should go both ways and I think that you also have to any other third party and I think the fines have to be enhanced considerably. If you're going to follow the law there's no problem. If you're not... Stalkfleet: With all due respect I know of no bar in Iowa City and I've been here...well I'm kind of the grandfather of the town now - I know of no bar that tums a deaf ear to underage drinking. I think everyone tries their hardest. It happens. It's going to happen. You're dealing with underage people in a college community. But nobody's turned their back to it and we damned...we tried damn hard to try to help out to try to alleviate the problem. We just need to work together to try to refine it to get it to where it's going to do its best. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 ~eml7 Page 103 Pfab: I'm all... Lehman: Let's get some more folks up. Pfab: No, I'm all for that, but I really think that if you're serious you have to look at... Champion: That would be us, not them. Lehman: That's us, not them. Champion: So why discuss it with them. Kanner: I had a question for mostly Eleanor, but Don if you could stay here. To me one of the key components of this proposal is the advertisement proposal. I have some concerns if that might be a violation perhaps of free trade or restraint of trade. The DI certainly has the right to reject ads. They said clearly that they don't want to reject those ads. So then it would be up to you as put in this proposal for no drink specials. They get hundreds of thousands of dollars from the local establishments advertising drink specials. Eleanor do you foresee any problem if we were to write an ordinance or even if we didn't write an ordinance, but a group came together and said we're going to not place ads? Dilkes: I haven't looked at the anti-trust issues. I know we identified some first amendment issues in addressing advertising when we looked at that at the time you were doing the specials restrictions. Stalkfleet: I think one thing that comes to mind point blank is that a new owner just moving to town, a new business that's just opening up that would try to live under the same guidelines as the Sports Column that's been there for 20 years that everybody knows where it's at how is he going to try to advertise him to come to your place and try to match the specials that I may have and someone else may have. He would be working in an unfair environment because he wouldn't be able to advertise. And that would probably be able to work out. And then you're also trying to judicate advertising and capitalism at its finest. I think that we're kind of maybe going in a different direction. That's not going to happen. I think I brought the situation up to Connie that you know is she going to sign an agreement not to advertise the prices of her clothing when across the street they sell it for $50 cheaper. She's not going to sit there and say no I'm not going to advertise. I mean she's going to have to fight back. Kanner: So you don't agree with this point then in the proposal by STOP task force? This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 104 Stalkfleet: Well I don't think you're going to find out the DI's going to be any part of that whole thing anyway. Kanner: No, but from your angle it's saying no drink special ad. There should be an agreement between all bar owners to eliminate usage of drink specials in their advertising. Champion: It won't happen. Stalkfleet: It's not pragmatic. It's something that's not reality. It's not going to happen. Lehman: It's not going to happen. Stalkfleet: I just don't think that's going to happen. Champion: The DI would have to...the University would have to do that. Stalkfleet: I'm just being honest with you. I'm not trying to... Lehman: It's not going to happen. You're right. Champion: The University would have to make that decision. Kanner: I'm just trying to clarify that you don't agree with all the proposals. Stalkfleet: Well I do agree with that, but that's in a perfect world. But that's not going to happen I think with the Daily Iowan. They're going to get their revenue however they want to get their revenue and I don't think that we can write in any ordinance that says they can't do what they're going to do. And if they're going to have that forum, that paper, there's going to be advertisements in it and there's nothing we could probably do about it. Lehman: Let's get some more folks (can't hear), thank you very much. we may ask you some more questions later, but thanks. Stalkfleet: Thank you. O'Donnell: Thanks Don. Champion: Don't leave. Lehman: Yeah, don't go. Art Schut: Hi. I'm Art Schut from MECCA. And I'm the real MECCA representative as opposed to the person mentioned earlier. I have a couplebriefcomments. And I'd like to talk about science. I'vedone This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 105 this professionally for 33 years now. And the last 21 of them have been in Iowa City. It is very clear that there's an alcohol problem that exists. It's very clear that there's a significant amount o£binge drinking among younger people primarily those people of college age including people who are under the drinking age. When you took at alcohol problems in the community the science says that the amount of problems are related to the amotmt of consumption. And the amount of consumption is related to access. Okay? problems are related to consumption is related to the amount of access. And if you don't limit access you have more consumption and you have more problems. Now that's real simple, but that's the science. It's not anecdotes about how much they drink in some other town or how much they don't drink in some other town. That's the science. The more access, the more consumption, the more problems in a community. And that's what we have here. And so from our perspective anything that limits access is a positive. It is something that will limit consumption and it will limit problems in the community. And so we support the ordinance. As I was standing in line obviously it appears that some compromise is in the making. And I would urge you if you decide to make a compromise that you're going to say if this doesn't work then we're going to do something else that you need to clearly define what is working and what's not working. Pfab: I have a question. Are you willing and interested in getting involved in the dialogue that's going on now with the bar owners and the underage or the student... Schut: The underage drinkers? Yeah I've talked to a number of those. Champion: He talks to them every day. Pfab: No, but I'm serious. I mean this is a community... Schut: As an organization we are interested in talking with everybody and having a conversation. That doesn't change the science. Okay? Pfab: No, no I agree. But I think by working through here there is a solution if everybody comes to the table and says we know we've got a problem. And we've got to solve it somewhat. Schut: Thank you. Pfab: Thank you. Megan Heneke: Good evening ladies and gentlemen. My name is Megan Heneke. I live at 100 Slater Hall. And I'm a newly elected member of the student...of the University of Iowa student government executive This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 106 cabinet. And as you can imagine I have been speaking to senators about this issue as well as students. And a lot of the arguments that you've had before you deal with the safety of the students being sacrificed, deal with the economic condition of downtown Iowa City. But an often very vital element that is often overlooked is simply what downtown adds to the lives of students. I'd just like to touch on this briefly. As an 18-year-old student I've tried to enrich my life as much as possible as a student here at the University. I became involved in local politics. I joined student organizations and I became active in student govermment. I would like to share with you exactly how downtown adds to my life as well as other students here at the University. This year the University of Iowa hosted the Association of Big 10 Students conference. Students from many other schools gathered at the University of Iowa and we discussed issues that our student governments can tackle to make our schools a better place for students and community members. Often when our work was done and our discussions were over we would go down to downtown venues in Iowa City. We would talk. We would dance. We would socialize with students from the other schools and talk about how we can make our schools better. The harm in this situation I fail to see. I fear that in the future these types of social situations would become an elite 21 and up only club. Secondly, I'd like to talk to you about another example. My pre-law fraternity went out for pizza one night past 10:00 at the Airliner. Again the harm in this situation I fail to see. Let me note that I understand and honor the laws of this country. But I see no law against or no harm in drinking 7-Up, dancing or socializing with friends. As an 18-year-old I feel that although the law of this country doesn't allow me to drink I feel that I am old enough to decide where I should spend my Friday night. Lastly I would like to thank you for your dedication and commitment to this City and I would ask you to exercise this commitment this evening by voting against the ordinance. Thank you very much for your time. Lehman: Thank you. Karmer: Art, could you send me a copy of one of those studies, a summary, and/or to Council about what you just cited? Heneke: I'm sorry. I didn't mean to walk away. I'm sure that the student government could work together with the STOP task force to provide you with and we could interview student organizations and put something together if that's what you' re requesting. Kanner: I'm sorry. I was talking to the previous speaker. Heneke: Oh. I apologize. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 107 Kanner: No, I apologize. I'm sorry. Jessica Fischoff: Hi. My name is Jessica Fischoff and I'm an out-of-state student here at the University of Iowa. I live at 100 Burge Hall. And while I feel that maybe I'm going to repeat some points tonight they are very important points to repeat. One of the main reasons that I and my parents felt comfortable spending the large sum of $23,000 a year to come to the University and send me 9 hours away from home for school where they couldn't look over me is because they felt that Iowa City was such a comfortable, safe city to go to school in as opposed to Columbus, Ohio. I'm from Ohio and Ohio State which is a much more dangerous Big 10 school to go to. They felt that here I could go to places such as bars on weekends because in the dorm rooms you can turn up the music and have dance parties. That would be disrespectful to your neighbors - as the ordinance that we talked about before. And if you go to a bar you can go there...if you're thirsty and want a glass of water or a non-alcoholic beverage like a Diet Coke you can watch the bartender poor it, know that it's most likely going to be drug-free. And you can hopefully is a fight breaks out bouncers will come and interact in that and then you'll be in a much, much safer environment. If the City Council thinks that by keeping adults under the age of 21 out of the bars it's going to completely eliminate the drinking problem or even have some sort of effect in all due respect it's very ignorant because what you're going to do is move the underage drinkers from the bars and put them in the house party settings like the girl was talking about before where if something does go wrong there aren't going to be cops out on the street to protect you or bouncers to break up fights. When I went home for spring break and talked to many of my friends who go to universities across the country I thankfully had no horror stories about going to a bar and having a friend date-raped or drugged or in a fight, but my finds who go to schools who can't go to bars and go to house parties came back with really disturbing stories of things that had happened to them there and I feel thankful that I have on my Friday night someplace safe to go and enjoy myself and dance. Okay again bringing this up economically the students do play a huge part in Iowa City. We rent apartments here. We buy gas at the gas stations. We go to restaurants and eat food. we buy groceries. I mean granted this is a university city and the University of Iowa is here. Iowa City survives offofthe University. By eliminating adults under that age of 21 from going into the bars you're kind of showing no gratitude to the students by taking away some place they feel they can go that's safe. And while you may compare this to other schools like Indiana University where they have a 21 bar ordinance. We also don't have a union like they do at the University of Indiana. I know they were talking about building up downtown which would be a great thing to do whether or not the ordinance passes. University of Iowa This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 108 thrives mainly on kids who like to go out and dance and like to have fun and go see bands at bars where they serve alcohol. And just by eliminating that completely you're kind of giving away the students' life at night I guess. Okay. thank you. Lehman: Thank you. O'Donnell: Ernie I'm looking out here and I'm seeing another hour Ernie or another hour and a half of basically heating the same thing. Champion: Over. O'Donnell: And I think... Kyle Fitzgerald: I'll change it up a bit. O'Donnell: Well I think I know how everybody feels and they know how I feel about the drinking age. But...and poor Don's back there ready to fall down he's so tired. I'd like to see if we can't bring this thing to a conclusion and get a vote. Fitzgerald: I'll make this two seconds. Lehman: No, let's folks. I don't know who we got - 6 or 8. let's take two minutes a piece and I really am not going to go past 12:30. (End of Side 1, Tape #03-37, Beginning of Side 2) Lehman: ...longer than we should, but let's try to keep it to two minutes. Fitzgerald: My name is Kyle Fitzgerald. I'm from Dubuque, Iowa. I live in Iowa City in a home. I'm up here because I'm red in the face over this. But I'm not red in the face with anger. I'm full of love. I'm full of love for this - for the 21 ordinance. Although I oppose it and I encourage you to do so as well. I love you guys. This is great. I love democracy because look at this is great. Look at how many people came to this meeting and we've got to call this thing off short. This is a party. We could be here till 2:00 in the morning - till the bars close. You know. This is great. I think that we should applaud all of you for entertaining all these thoughts and everyone who's spoken tonight because this is a great thing and I'm very glad that we see democracy working here. So thank you. Champion: Well we have kept you out of the bars tonight. Steve Bergerud: Good evening. My name is Steve Bergerud. I live at 913 Gilbert Court here in Iowa City. I've lived in Iowa City since I was about 7 years old. back in July I made a decision to purchase a local business This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 109 from a man who retired here. No liquor license involved. Most everything I've heard out of everybody who's for or who's against this ordinance is either in the newspapers "bar owners" or students. I'm different than that and I wanted to share my position with you folks. I spend a substantial amount of money on this business and if you chase the students...the majority of the students out of the bar because seniors is all that's left at 10:00 at night I stand to lose probably 30 to 40 percent of my business. Now that's annual income and I'm trying to pay for it not to mention the value of the business going down. You know it just doesn't seem fair to me. I don't see why 19 through 21- year-olds should be restricted. The ones who are in the bars drinking are going to drink somewhere. Not all of them are there drinking anyhow. They're shooting pool. I sponsor pool leagues, dart leagues things like that. Some of the members on those leagues are under 21. are we supposed to chase them out at 10:00 if their games aren't done? It just doesn't seem right. I don't know. I just kind of wanted a little different perspective for you folks to think about other than just a bar owner or a student. So... Karmer: Steve, what's your business? Bergerud: Regal Amusements. I have jute boxes, pool tables, video games in the bars throughout Iowa City. Kanner: Thank you. Lehman: Okay. Thank you. Bergerud: Yep. Drew Bielduski: Hello. My name is Drew Bielduski. I'm an Iowa City resident. Recently graduated from the University of Iowa. I live at 16 Green Mountain Drive in Iowa City. Just again for interest of time I'm just going to cut my whole speech I had down quite a much because I have the same opinions basically everyone else here has tonight. Mainly the one reason I live...my apartment is way off campus. It's actually out by City High School. And I like living out there because I can get away from the noise of the downtown atmosphere. (Can't hear) 24/7 is quiet. No matter what day of the week it is. And I'm afraid that if the 21 ordinance passes it won't be so quiet anymore. I'm afraid some house parties might start leaking in here and there. And I would not like that at all. Also I'm concerned for the safety of the patrons in general. I much prefer to have students, legal and underage alike, to be at a bar where a bouncer can say okay, you've had too much. you're going home. Or if they get disruptive they can get a police officer in there and take them to jail or whatever. At a house party no one's going to do that. If someone get really drunk people will try to This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 110 get them to drink more to see how much they can do. If someone starts throwing up, people will start laughing and taking pictures of the person because oh look he's really trashed. And then the parties don't end at 1:30. at house parties they go on until 4:00 or 5:00 in the morning sometimes. And you know the parties are on random streets in Iowa City that aren't really lit well and people will walk home alone. Women will be at greater risk for getting assaulted on the street. Drunk people might have more tendency to vandalize some cars or some house or City property along the way on their way home. And then finally I hear always that you know we need more alcohol alternative events downtown or venues and I highly agree on that. But every time there's any effort it kind of fails. Planet X being the big example there. Planet X opened and it was just a ghost town the entire time it was open. And...what else? And then whenever there's an empty storefront downtown bars are continuously allowed to take its place like the Cage over Rentertainment, the Pizza Palace took over the Burger King. How about a bowling alley or leaving the IMU open till 2:00 in the morning and have bands play so we can actually use the Wheel Room for what it's for. Because I know many people, friends of mine and myself who a lot of times will go out to the bars just to dance and just to talk with friends and just to play pool. They don't even think about drinking. So yeah I oppose the ordinance not to promote underage drinking. I'm opposing it to promote the safety and well-being of the students. Thank you. Lehman: Thank you. Champion: This guy has already spoken. Kevin Perez: I'll make this fairly fast. Kevin Perez again, 161 Columbia Drive. I think that you guys should make a 21 ordinance. And I think that...I have the absolute solution here. If you make the 21 ordinance, you grandfather everybody in that has a business. Therefore what he was just talking about if it's an empty storefront it won't be a bar because you make the rule strong enough to say the...people...okay I'll back it up a little bit. So if you have a 21 ordinance and you grandfather everybody in that built their businesses playing by your rules how you first had them it allows them to pay back the money they borrowed over the next 10 years. Say let's use the Summit for example. They have a large loan out. Well they need that income. So that comes from 19- and 20-year-olds through the door of cover-charge. So if you pass the law and have everybody else grandfathered in which would be fair then you would force other people to be creative in the businesses they have to bring into Iowa City because it's easy to open a restaurant and open a bar. It's hard to run it. It's easy to open it. Right? So I think if you make...you don't have to convolute it by saying a bowling This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 111 alley is okay, but dancing is not okay. a bowling alley is okay, but pool playing is not okay. if you make the law straight and then grandfather everybody in then everybody wins. The people that started the business under the original rules win. The people that want to stop the expansion of bars...nobody is going to open a bar if you have to not let 19- and 20-year-olds in because it's not going to make it. So you stop the expansion. You add more businesses through creativity. And that's just my idea. And I think it could...I think that's a possibility that hasn't been brought up. Therefore you don't have to make a bunch of laws. You know you break this one down it says you have a year. It just puts the problem offinstead ofjust saying alright starting August lst done. Everybody that's had a liquor license up until then these are the rules you have to follow. Thanks. Lehman: Thank you. Kanner: Eleanor does that appear legal to be able to do that kind of division? Dilkes: I don't know. You know and I'm not going to give you a legal opinion at 12:15. Champion: No. Dilkes: I'm going to have to think about it. It might have possibilities. Kathy Huedepohl: Good morning I guess. My name is Kathy Huedepohl and I oppose the 21 ordinance. And let me just say I hope to be up there with some of you in the near future. And I'm so glad you had the forethought to put in this nice ramp for me when I'll arrive in January. And anyway so some of the reasons I oppose this is I feel that City Council is not exactly an innocent party in the drinking that goes on downtown as City Council has approved and continually renewed over 20 alcohol permits in the downtown area largely businesses who appeal to the younger population by you know techno music, the types of drinks they serve, the type of entertainment... Lehman: Let me interrupt you here. City Council does not approve...we do not issue liquor licenses or beer licenses. That's all done by the State of Iowa. Dilkes: We can't limit the number of licenses we issue. Lehman: We can't limit. Those are issued by the state. Champion: That's out of our control. O'Donnell: And approved by the County Attorney. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 112 Lehman: But go ahead. Dilkes: If they meet the standards under the state code you have to give them a liquor license. Lehman: We don't have any choice. But go ahead. Huedepohl: Oh, I'm sorry. I had a misunderstanding on that. Lehman: That's okay. I just wanted to be sure that people didn't think that we were approving all of these things. We have no choice. Huedepohl: Okay. and... Kanner: We could recommend or not recommend Ernie. Lehman: We have no choice. Kanner: We do have some choice in recommending or not recommending. Lehman: The fact of the matter is we have no choice as far as opening or closing because the state controls it. Go ahead. Huedepohl: Thank you. So... Champion: (Can't hear). Huedepohl: I'm sorry what was... ? Champion: We are innocent of that. Huedepohl: Okay. and the City is all too happy to benefit from the revenue that the students create, but doesn't take their wants or needs into consideration often. And so that's why I feel that I'm lending my voice to running for City Council and taking into consideration what the younger population needs and wants. And I've had lots of...I spoke to the students for maybe a half an hour before this meeting and I got 25 signatures of people who were supporting my campaign. So the students are interested in politics and they are interested in change and they will come forward if they feel they are not being listened to. Thank you very much. Lehman: Thank you. You know we got six people and we've got 12 minutes. So I would appreciate it if you would keep your comments to a minimum. Nathaniel Gavronsky: I'll try my hardest. I'm going to try to hit on different aspects of this ordinance besides just the drinking. I'm primarily targeting This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 113 towards the economics of the City. My name is Nathaniel Gavronsky and I live in Mayflower Hall. I do think that there is a problem here in Iowa City as far as underage drinking and binge drinking is concerned. I also believe that the Council and its attempts to do something about this is very noble and I praise you for your attempt to assist with this problem. For nearly 40 years the downtown part of Iowa City has been incorporated with the businesses surrounded from the kids going out, going to the bars not necessarily drinking or getting drunk, but going there, spending their money. And then after the dancing and the bars close they go to the after hours restaurants. Then they take the taxicabs home which (can't hear) taxicab companies as well. If you through out these students away from the downtown area you're going to have the problem with the house parties. Yes there are house parties in Iowa City at this present moment, but chances of them increasing are very likely. And again that would compliment the problems with sexual assault so on and so forth increase along with that. I don't think the problem itself is with minors going to the bars and having the bartenders serve them. I think it's primarily with the fake id situation. A lot of bars that I know of won't knowingly serve underage patrons. Most of them use the fake ids to get the drinks. And from my talk to Eleanor Dilkes this morning that fake ids are really, really easy to get a hold off And I agree with the student government as far as showing student id as well to get into the bars for people that are in question. Possibly better economic development of the downtown area deter people from the bar scene. It would be a good idea before you start to outlaw people under the age of 21 to enter the bars. Because there is a huge economic push from the students at the University toward Iowa City economy as a whole. And I think it would be very wise to take these into considerations. With Iowa City and Ames with two different, very different economic states. Iowa City is primarily university where Ames is not necessarily all university derive their economy. People in Ames have other ways to entertain themselves being located so close to Des Moines. Iowa City not as close to metropolitan areas. There's a limited amount of things to do at least in my perspective. So I think you've got to reevaluate other ways to going about this before kicking minors out of the bars as far as the economic standpoint of the people of the City of Iowa City. Thank you. Lehman: Thank you. Brett Castillo: Hi. My name is Brett Castillo. I've been a resident of Iowa City a little over 7 years now. I'm also currently a student of University of Iowa. I've also worked downtown during the past 7 years. While I'd like to acknowledge the presence of the Iowa student body and UISG here I have to wonder of their concern about this measure. A minority This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 114 of students drink downtown on the weekends. A majority of(can't hear) drunken students. A minority of students go downtown on any given night. A minority consistently use downtown as an entertainment alternative. A majority of them don't know what to do with the Friday night. We consistently hear entertainment alternatives linked to drinking. You go out for pizza, but you go out to a restaurant that has alcohol. You go out to dance, but you go out to a bar that has alcohol. We all know about Planet X failing, Can you name me a dance venue that is alcohol free? Can you name me any other sort of entertainment venue downtown other than the movie theaters that are alcohol-free. It's not the City's job to provide entertainment alternatives. As we heard UISG hopes to do this. The City's job is protect residents including and in this case especially students. They are the ones that live downtown. Students are the ones that get arrested downtown for alcohol related offenses. They're also the ones that are assaulted by other students. They are the ones who have their property damaged. The students in UISG this problem is partly your responsibility, you need to provide those alternatives and alist the City and University as allies. I think this ordinance actually goes towards the City being an ally. Money not spent in the bars, not spent on alcohol is money that can go to a non-alcohol alternative. With the 21 law an alcohol-free dance venue can compete with a venue that provides dancing and alcohol. The income as I mentioned the income that is not spent can go to that as well. Remember this law doesn't apply to restaurants. If you want to go get pizza after 10:00 you can. If you want to go dancing at a restaurant that has a dance floor after 10:00 you can even if you are under 21. just remember that only a minority of students drink and I hope the UISG representative who are elected remember that as well. Majority of students do not know what to do with their Friday night. It's up to students with the help of the City and the University to create our own alternatives to the bar scene and the drunkenness, violence, vandalism and regretful decisions that go with it. Thank you. Lehman: Thank you. Eric Scogman: Hello. Eric Scogman, 216 East Market Street. I just wanted to tell you that I feel like students are not necessarily respected in this venue. We've been called temporary citizens or temporary residents and I feel that that's not necessarily relevant. Yes we are only here for four years, but the student body has been here and will be here long before the people in this room have come and gone. So they need to be respected as a whole institution. And I think that that's one thing that needs to be stated. Second thing that I need to say....sorry I'm a little tired so I'm stuttering is that I feel like that you guys are looking for the best interest in this City and that you have good intentions. And This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 115 while the students may feel that you're at war it's not a word that I would use. But I do feel that you are afraid of this problem and don't know how to handle it, so you're having a reactive response to this. And I feel like the students are having a reactive response to your response and then people are butting heads. But instead let's be proactive. Let's integrate our efforts together. Keep the 19-year-old ordinance. UISG will work with the City Council. We'll have this in a central area. The problem instead of just being brought up all over the City and the doors still going on in bars, it's going on in house parties it will be in one central area where we can actually affect change. We have a huge target market if you will in the Iowa City ped mall area and we can take advantage of that. This is perceived in the wrong way. It's perceived as a threat by the community and by the City Council. It's an opportunity. We have a humongous opportunity to affect change in the lives of these students through education and through policies that allow them to say okay we're going to regulate it. We're going to put people in place to regulate this behavior. And I think you guys should take this opportunity to help keep women safe, keep small guys like myself safe from some of the bigger guys at the bars. I mean come on I don't want to go to a house party and get beat up. I'm not very tough. No, this is a great opportunity for us to effect change in these people. It's not a problem, it's an opportunity. As opposed to being all over the City we have this great opportunity and let's work together to make change and to educate these students so that they behave safe yet have a good time. Thank you very much. Lehman: Thank you. Tom Blogett: Hi. I'm Tom Blogett again, 2442 Walden Road. I'm here representing the College of Nursing and the University of Iowa student body at large. I agree with the speaker from the Department of Public Health. Alcoholism is a major problem. It ruins families. It ruins lives. It ruins the social and economic systems that those people are members of. However, alcoholism should not be expected to decrease if policy is passed that would limit those who can enter alcoholic based establishments. From a nursing standpoint not only is physical safety like from sexual assault, that type of thing at the forefront of this issue also we need to be thinking about how these establishments that happen to serve alcohol, but also provide for other social activities like dancing and conversing and that type of thing. They also provide for psycho-social development which is normal for people in my demographic age group. It encourages opportunities for students under the age of 21 to learn properties of behaviors of self- determination in turning alcoholic beverages in a situation where alcohol is very much the forefront of that venue. And we just need to keep in mind that by allowing people into the bars it's not a problem to This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 116 those people. It's just actually encouraging their own psycho-social development. Champion: Thank you for that perspective. Lehman: Thank you. JeffNimits: Hi. My name is JeffNimits. I live at 108 River Street. I can't offer any provisions or any clauses to put in this 21 ordinance. All I can offer you is my opinion and I think that's the important thing here - the opinions of everyone around you. Attempts to curve underage drinking as well as binge drinking although a noble cause will not be solved by enacting the 21 ordinance. It will only spurn an increase in criminal activity and as Miss Braze pointed out an environment that will be unsafe and uncontrolled. As clich~ as it might be this is a part of college and as many of us choose to attend this school because the atmosphere appealed to us in pursuit of a well-rounded college experience. It is a part of growing up and will continue to be. Iowa City is not a utopia. The sign off of 1-80 does not read City of Mayberry. It reads City of Iowa City. And no where on this campus have I seen Beaver Clever or Theodore Huxtable walking around with little halos around their head. We are not perfect. We as students, residents, renters or what have you are not perfect little angels and will never be. but we will have our college experience and we prefer to fulfill that in a safe, controlled environment. Thank you. Lehman: Thank you. Steve Parrott: I'm Steve Parrott. Lehman: You are the last speaker Steve. Parrott: The last speaker. I apologize. I live at 2562 Catskill Court. I'm also a member of the Stepping Up Project. I guess my feeling is that there's been a lot of talk tonight about safety. I applaud that, but I would point out that under the current environment in which we allow underage people into the bars 67% of our students say their studies or sleep have been interrupted by somebody who's had too much to drink. 33% say they've been pushed, hit or assaulted by somebody who's had too much to drink. And 25% of those students say their property has been damaged. So I think those people have some rights too. I think by passing this ordinance you're standing up for their rights. Somebody needs to do that. I encourage you to do that. Thank you. Lehman: Thank you. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 117 Kanner: Steve...I had a question Steve. The study shows what percentage of those people, you know 60% who were affected in this way were underage in drinking in liquor license establishments? Parrott: I don't think they show it, but I think if you look at the study that we provided to you from Harvard about where most of the drinking goes on in Iowa City it's in the bars. 86% of the underage students who go into Iowa City bars say they're able to get alcohol. 65% say they drink to get drunk. I think it's hard to believe that that doesn't have some effect on the harmful effects that the other students experience and people in the neighborhoods experience. Lehman: Alright. We're going to take a quick break. A motion on the floor. Is there discussion from Council? Champion: What is the motion? Lehman: The motion is second reading of what we read about a year and a half ago, but I think it was two weeks ago tonight. O'Donnell: I agree with a year and a half. Champion: Well I'd like to discuss a few of these proposals. I did...I'm sorry as everybody knows I'm a real strong proponent of the 21 law mainly because I think we have a real problem downtown. And we've tried to get the bar owners and the students to deal with it for five years. And frankly it hasn't been dealt with. So I think what's happened with the first reading of the 21 ordinance we've gotten reaction and we've gotten reaction a lot negative, but a lot positive. I'm sure the bar owners have never tried to work together like they're doing right now. And I did meet with them. I'm not...I've never been really interested in keeping kids out of bars. I've been interested in keeping kids out of alcohol. Over alcohol consumption is a terrible problem in Iowa City. And it's kind of sad that the entertainment venues in Iowa City have developed around bars and mainly because it's accessible and it's there. And so therefore we don't have a lot of non-alcoholic venues. It would start to develop if we did pass a 21 ordinance. However, I am totally willing to see if the bars can pull this together and see if we can cut down the binge drinking and the underage drinking in downtown Iowa City which I think is unsafe and costly to the City and more costly to the young people who are consuming the large amounts of alcohol than to me personally. So I'd like to make an amendment that we go...that the amendment to the ordinance reads 19 instead of 21. O'Donnell: I'll second that. Lehman: Discussion? This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 118 O'Donnell: I want to say too first that you know all these young adults who got up and spoke tonight I really appreciate the way you did it and the way you conducted yourselves. This is an emotional issue to a lot of people because we are taking away an entertainment venue. I've said before I'm not ready to assume that every young adult that goes downtown goes downtown to leave the planet. I didn't support it the first time. I will not support it this time. I will support Counie's amendment to go to 19. and Don I appreciate the bar owners getting together. And we've been asking for a good faith effort. You've done it and I'm really happy with this tonight. Pfab: I'd like to vote on this and then afterwards I'd like to make another amendment. I'd be happy to... Lehman: Well other discussion of the 197 Wilbum: The only thing that I will add, you know thanks folks for coming down and the majority of you respectfully expressing your opinions. You know Connie you did say...you pointed out some of the issues, concerns that we have to do. It's (can't hear) conversation has changed from a couple years ago from don't to anything to enforce what you've got and now that 21 came to at least potential fruition here that a lot of the great ideas that you all came up with that I pointed out to you are not...it's great that you came up with them. Thank you for your work. They're not new ideas because a lot of those ideas came up when we started this conversation 2 1/2,3 years ago. I certainly...I'm not going to support the amendment. But it appears my punches there's going to be enough to go to the 19. and when the amendment passes I will go ahead and support the 19 again. I'm going to take my first vote to stay with the 21. you know bars again...you know a couple of years ago there was an opportunity to do this. I certainly hope you follow through with this. Like what you were saying Don and Woody and all the others thanks for coming down tonight. I appreciate your time. Champion: I don't know if it should be part of my amendment or not I would hope that we would review this in a year. And we'll have to decide who we're going to measure whether there's any effect. I mean it's going to be more complicated than saying 19. but I was really...I've said all along I wish somebody would come with a counter proposal. I've said that f~om the very beginning. And finally you have. But I will still be here in a year. You won't be rid of me yet. I will watch this very closely. Wilbum: And I want to thank the folks who were against the 21 who acknowledged that house parties do go on now. You know somebody suggested that a problem is going to be relocated to another area. You This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 119 know I think there are ways other ways that we would have dealt with this with law enforcement, but some of those problems are going on now. I want to thank the young woman who disclosed an unfortunate incident that she had gone through in a residential area. But I will point out again that a lot of that goes on now and those folks get...they drink downtown and take that to the after-hours party. Again I've already said what I'm going to do so. Lehman: Connie I would...I absolutely will support an amendment that would make the bars 21 starting the first of August for one year. But I would be much more interested in an ordinance that makes the bars 21 with the first year being 19 and having the Council having the ability to review it after 8 months and decide whether or not to continue at 19 or whether it automatically goes to 21 so that we don't go through this same exercise a year from now or two years from now. Champion: Well I think we always have the right to review it. Lehman: We do, but if we go... Champion: I think I find...well Ernie I don't want you to add that to my amendment. You can... Lehman: No, I'm not adding anything. I'm just asking if that is something you could support. O'Donnell: I think that confuses the issue Ernie. You have the same option in one year. Lehman: You have the same option of sitting here for three hours and listening to the same conversation if you decided it didn't work and you have to go to 21. it would eliminate that. O'Donnell: Well as pleasant as it was tonight I wouldn't mind it. Champion: You're still going to have that. You're still going to have that. You're still going to have to have three readings isn't that right? Dilkes: No I think what Emie is suggesting is including in the ordinance that you pass now a provision that says on August 1st, 2004 it goes to 21. as I understand what you're talking... Lehman: (Can't hear) 19 the first of August of this year and then it would automatically go to 21 without...unless there was action on part of the Council to reflect the ability of the proposals both from the student senate and the bars. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 120 Karr: Connie I think an example would be similar to what you did with the no-smoking. Lehman: Right. Karr: That you had a different percentage in there automatically. It would just change the mechanism. It would be already in the ordinance. So if you wanted to repeal it, you would repeal it. But if not it would take effect. Champion: Oh, I see, I see. Well can we vote on my amendment? Wilbum: A point of information. Does this substantially change it that...we're starting over again? Lehman: Yes. Dilkes: Yes. If you pass the amendment you'll be then voting first consideration. Wilbum: Thank you. Vanderhoef: Okay. and yes thank you for coming tonight and I applaud you for your behavior and your hard work on sticking with this issue and bringing us some possible changes. And I heard one speaker say something about the bar owners becoming responsible if this goes to a 19. it's a combination in my mind - it's both bar owners and young people - not necessarily students, but all young people, and that may involve you folks having to monitor each other. I mean there is a responsibility issue here folks. And unless you live up to the responsibility as well as the bar owners living up to the responsibility of not making alcohol available. I rather like Emie's approach to it versus just a straight out 19. but I think Council needs to have some more discussion on what the standards would be and what would constitute going right on to 21. I mean there has to be something measurable here. Lehman: That could be ready by two weeks from tonight. Vanderhoefi Well we need to have some things in there. And I'd be willing to listen to some standards presented to me by all the interested parties. So I'm not going to support the straight out 19. I will look at the 21 with the first year being 19. Pfab: So do we vote on the amendment? Lehman: Yes we can vote. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 121 Pfab: What is the amendment say? O'Donnell: 19. Pfab: No, no, no. State the amendment. Lehman: The amendment changes the age from 21 to 19. That's all it does. The ordinance that we have the motion on is to prohibit anybody under 21 form being in a bar. That changes from 21 to 19. that's the only change. That is the amendment. Pfab: Okay. if that's where we're at I think what I would do...okay we still have to vote on it if we make the change. Lehman: Yeah. Pfab: Okay I'm going to make the change to get through this amendment. Lehman: Alright. Yes Steven. Kanner: Yeah and just to ma3ce...a couple things, but first to make clear to the public and to ourselves we're not adopting the proposal as put forth by Nate. There's not going to be an exception for students who are 18 with college id. So we should all be clear on that. Pfab: This is just to change the number from 21 to 19. Lehman: Right. Pfab: So then we can discuss something else. Kanner: No. Champion: The reason I don't support that part of the change is that there are still...I think it would be healthier for college freshman o a lot of them are still 18 - if they didn't get into a bar the first night they're here. Pfab: I guess at this point I'd like to call the question on the 19 amendment. Karmer: Irvin I just want to. P fab: Okay. O'Donnell: I don't think you can after it's called to question. Dilkes: Well is there a second? Lehman: Is there a second to calling the question? Dies for lack of second. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 122 O'Donnell: Now you can. Lehman: Now you can say whatever it is you wanted to say. Kanner: I think there's still problems. We had a letter and it had been brought up before. We still don't have adequate answers to how we deal with determining spouses and parents and when a parent leaves in the middle. I think we still have to confirm that. But because I think there's a compromise that's been reached I'm going to also compromise and vote for this amendment. And then if the amendment passes I'll vote for the ordinance. Pfab: I want to make another amendment. Kanner: I do think that we need two other things. One I agree with Dee we need some measurable measurements that we can look at to see if we're meeting our goals such as perhaps PULAs or something else to see if it's working. Two I think we need to have a task force. We have the makings of one. Champion: Right. Kanner: To deal with this. And they could help put out recommendations for measurements that if we can't add in this ordinance, maybe we could have another ordinance that would establish that. Champion: We're going to work down this paper. Lehman: Well if we don't get the ordinance passed we don't have to worry about any of those things. All those in favor of the amendment indicate by raising their right hand. This changes it to 19. I see one, I see three, I see four. All opposed? The amendment carries 4 to 3, Lehman, Vanderhoef and Wilburn voting in the minority. Now we have... Pfab: I would like to make an... Lehman: Go please. Pfab: An amendment since we have details to work out that we either defer the vote on it until we work out the details. Lehman: What details are you thinking about working out? Pfab: Okay. just by changing to 19 I'm going to vote against. Lehman: Okay fine. Any other discussion? This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 123 Pfab: (Can't hear) to 19. but we had to get through that. Lehman: Right. Pfab: My point is that I think we're getting...we're starting to get this thing sorted out. But as it is at 19 I'll vote against. Champion: Then vote against it. O'Donnell: Help me out here again. Pfab: I think we're getting awfully close here. If we just... Lehman: Closer than you think Irvin. Okay. Champion: Irvin vote anyway you want. Lehman: Any other discussion? Vanderhoefi I just want to add one caveat on all of this. As you all well know the Council - all of us - made a commitment to have this take place before the students left town. With a rewrite of this you recognize that we have to go back to square one and first reading... Lehman: This is first reading. Vanderhoefi This would be first reading so this would be pushing it back folks and we can't push it back much more and have it implemented by August 1. And that was the question I was getting ready to ask you Eleanor whether because of the additional two weeks do we need to make the enactment date two weeks later or do you still think we can accomplish it? Dilkes: No, the August 1st effective date was proposed assuming that you would be done by June lst. and you could do second and third readings on the 5th and the 6th. Vanderhoef: So we don't need to change the enactment? Dilkes: No I don't think so. You do need a motion to amend the first consideration rather than the second. Karr: We have Vanderhoef, Champion some time ago moving second consideration so you could withdraw that or... Champion: I withdraw mine. Vanderhoefi Uh-huh. This represems only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 124 Kart: Okay. so now we're to first consideration as amended. Lehman: Do we have a motion? Do we need a motion to that effect? Champion: I moved. I move first consideration. Lehman: Of the... O'Donnell: Amended. Lehman: Of the amended resolution and we have... O'Donnell: And I second it. Lehman: And we have a second. Motion by Champion, second by O'Donnell. Let me just say there's been a lot of talk back and forth, but I can tell you this I honestly believe as much as a lot of you folks probably don't believe this we care about the kids in this community. I mean we've got kids of our own. Some of us have grandkids that we do care about the kids in this community. If we didn't care about them we wouldn't be talking about this. Now you can talk about taking away rights and doing all this kind of stuff, but we do care about what happens to the young people of our community. We care about the number of kids who drive here from all over the state because they know they can get a drink here. And they do. I mean we talk about there's all kinds of problems associated with over-consumption and I don't think it's underaged nearly as much as it's over-consumption. I really don't want anybody to think...I don't think there's anybody who's up here that's anti-student or anti...if we were anti-kids we wouldn't frankly give a damn. But we do. So don't...I know some folks aren't going to like this and they think this is something we're doing to punish students and that absolutely is not true. Any other discussion? Vanderhoef: One more question. Eleanor do you think that we'll be okay doing our standards in a separate piece following the ordinance or does it need to be in the ordinance? Dilkes: No I don't think the standards in terms of how you're going to measure whether there's been improvements - I don't think that's something you'd probably put in an ordinance. I think... Champion: The other thing I want to ask the bar owners and I guess we've talked a lot about this at our meeting, but the signs, the wrist bands...you're going to stay together as a group and see that that gets done and then you're going to try to get together some sort of task force to monitor this? Stalkfleet: Yes you have our undivided attention. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 17 Page 125 Lehman: I think we do. Champion: We did get your attention. Stalkfleet: Whenever you want to call a meeting we'll get together. Lehman: However, Connie I think we all have to recognize that this is not a mandatory membership in this group. Champion: I know. Lehman: Certain bars may or may not participate. Some may participate and drop out and the whole thing could fall apart. I think we need to understand that just as well as I think Donny understands that. Roll call. Champion: Well the 19 they have to abide by. O'Donnell: Yes, absolutely. Lehman: So what we are voting on...? Lehman: We are voting on the 19 ordinance that was 21 when we started three hours ago. Pfab: And this is the first reading? Lehman: This is the first reading. Pfab: Okay. Lehman: The motion carries 6 to 1, Pfab voting in the negative. Thank you folks. Karr: Motion to accept correspondence. Lehman: Do we have a motion to accept correspondence? Vanderhoef: So moved. Lehman: Second? O'Donnell: Second. Lehman: All in favor? Motion carries. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 18 Page 126 ITEM 18 CONSIDER A RESOLUTION AUTHORIZING THE MAYOR TO SIGN AND THE CITY CLERK TO ATTEST A LICENSE AGREEMENT FOR THE TEMPORARY USE OF PUBLIC RIGHT-OF-WAY BETWEEN THE CITY OF IOWA CITY, LUBIN TRUST AND MOTIF, LTD. D/B/A BO-JAMES FOR A SIDEWALK CAFI~. Lehman: (Reads item). Champion: Move the resolution. O'Donnell: Second. Lehman: Moved by Champion, seconded by O'Donnell. Discussion? Champion: I'm just really excited about all the little sidewalk cafes that we're getting downtown. It's just really a nice ambience. O'Donnell: I would be more excited if it wasn't 1:00. Lehman: Right. Roll call. Motion carries. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003 Item 20 Page 127 ITEM 20 CONSIDER A RESOLUTION APPROVING THE DESIGN OF THE EXTERIOR ARCHITECTURE OF PLAZA TOWERS LOCATED ON BLOCK 64-1A. Lehman: (Reads item). Champion: Move the resolution. O'Donnell: Second. Lehman: Moved by Vanderhoef...or Champion, seconded by O'Donnell. Discussion. Too bad it's so early in the morning. A wonderful, wonderful project. Pfab: I have a question. Lehman: Yes. Pfab: Has the property been purchased yet by the developer? Lehman: Nothing can occur until the design is approved. They come to the City... everything has to meet our approval. Pfab: You answered my question. Lehman: Alright? Roll call. Motion carries. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of April 22, 2003