HomeMy WebLinkAbout2003-04-21 Transcription April 21, 2003 Council Work Session Page 1
April 21, 2003 Council Work Session 6:35 PM
Council: Champion, Kanner, Lehman, O'Donnell, Pfab, Vanderhoef; Wilburn
Staff: Atkins, Dilkes, Franklin, Helling, Karr, Kopping, Miklo, Nasby
TAPES: 03-33, BOTH S1DES; 03-34, BOTH SIDES
TAPE 03-33, SIDE ONE
JOINT MEETING WITH PLANNING AND ZONING COMMISSION
P and Z: Anciaux, Boubjerg, Chiat, Freerks, Koppes, Shannon
Lehman/If the Commissioners would care to come up and take a seat? (People come sit down.)
OK. Let's get started. Karin, I think, one of these is the TIF District.
Franklin/OK. Right, that's the first is the Sycamore-First Avenue Urban Renewal Plan, which
as you all know, it had to go before the--wait, I've got the wrong one here--OK. It needed
to go before the Planning and Zoning Commission for review as to its consistency with the
Comprehensive Plan. This is a proposal that the Economic Development Committee has
brought forward to expand the Sycamore-First Avenue Urban Renewal Area to include the
Kirkwood Community College Property, which is this, which is zoned P, MidAmerican
property here, the Oral B property, and this area right in here which is east of Sycamore.
And it is the residential and CO-1 area in this triangle which is the area that the Planning
and Zoning Commission recommended not be part of the expansion of this urban renewal
area. Inclusion of this area was done in order that, at such time, and this is not something
that is in the capital projects now, but at such time as the intersection of Sycamore and
Muscatine is improved, that that could be done with TIF financing. In order for such a
project to be done, it needs to be within the district. So that was why we looked at it.
Champion/Karin, is that Sycamore Street there?
Franklin/Right here. Right. Right up Sycamore.
Lehman/Karin, would TIF funds--TIF funds would not be available if there were T1F District on
one side of the street?
Franklin/Mm-nnn (negative). The project needs to be within the urban renewal district. So
whatever this line is ought to come up at least to that side of Sycamore Street. We don't
know exactly how we would do that project at this point in time.
Lehman/OK.
Franklin/That is exactly what the configuration of the road would be. We're kind of ahead of
ourselves in that regard. But that was the rationale behind why we were looking at that
expansion. Irvin?
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Pfab/It looks like we still wouldn't get the intersection as it's laid out now.
Franklin/I see what you're saying, and this may be the graphic as opposed to be the way it's
supposed to be, because that was the intent.
Pfab/If we can't get the intersection in, maybe we ought to just leave the whole thing out.
Franklin/What we would do is bring it up the west right-of-way line.
Vanderhoef] But, remember, also, that on Lower Muscatine there that we have a whole piece of
street that is not in the widened section. It's stopped off right there about where the P is
placed.
Franklin/Yes. This is the old entry to the Hardee's, which is now part of Kirkwood. In fact,
we've got the rezoning on the agenda tonight, I think, for pass and adopt tomorrow night,
which would bring that into the Kirkwood. But, yeah, we're looking at not just this
intersection here but also possible improvements along Kirkwood, or along Muscatine
Avenue, sidewalks along Muscatine Avenue, some way to deal with the crossing of
students across Muscatine. So there were a number of projects that were part of some
possible capital improvements in this area, which was the reason for looking at this
expansion.
Lehman/Is there any reason why that TIF line couldn't be on the other side of the street?
Franklin/No. It should be.
Lehman/If it were on the other side of the street, then the street would be in the TIF District.
Franklin/Yes, and that was the intent, and that's what I say, I think it's this graphic. So---
Lehman/ So. OK, now let me get something clear. If the TIF line were on the southwesterly side
of the street, any improvements done to the street then could be financed by TIF whether
or not that residential area were TIFF'd or not.
Champion/At the Sycamore side though.
Vanderhoef/Yes, it's supposed to include the---
Lehman/No, the way it's drawn up there, the Sycamore side would not, but Lower Muscatine
could be. Is that correct?
Vanderhoeff The way it's drawn but---
Franklin/Yes. The way it's drawn, but the intent was to have Sycamore in it all the way.
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Vanderhoeff All the way up because that street is breaking up drastically and the traffic is
increasing so much on that street, that that's part of the reason we really need to do
improvements.
Franklin/But the question before the joint bodies tonight was the Planning and Zoning
recommendation to take the residential out and I think it would be appropriate at this point
to have the Planning and Zoning Commission chair, Ann, if you want to start it off, to
discuss what the Commission's thinking was there so that you can address that issue of
whether that triangular area should be in the district or out of the district.
Bovbjerg/At its very base, residential cannot be in a T1F district, so putting that in the TIF
District, as we understand it, can't occur. So that can't be done. The only way you could
put it in there, as I understand it, is to rezone it. If at some time that comes up and it's
appropriate for rezoning, it could be rezoned and put into the TIF district. It seems to me
that you could do Sycamore or Muscatine or whatever, and then if everything else is being
worked on under TIF, you could do that under non-TIF, so it doesn't seem to me that
where that line goes is any restriction to developing the rest of the area.
Vanderhoef/I would like---
Franklin/ Steve Nasby, correct me if I'm wrong, but residential can be in a TIF district.
Vanderhoef/Yes, it can.
Franklin/In this and in many communities, there is residential in TIF districts. Now, this is a
commercial district and the intent of this whole district is for commercial revitalization.
We would need to connect the capital project of the reorientation of Sycamore to
Muscatine and that intersection improvement to the need for that for commercial
prosperity in this area in order for us to do it under the TIF. But there is nothing legally
that precludes the residential properties from being included in the TIF district. We would
not use TIF money, however, for residential development or redevelopment. Is that clear?
Freerks/It's not clear to me that there was that distinction. I was under the impression from our
discussion that the urban renewal district and the TIF could not have residential properties
in it.
Franklin/No. And it does have residential properties in it. I mean, there are properties here
which have residential above the commercial. So you can have--we have downtown an
urban renewal district in which TIF is enabled.
Freerks/But those are commercial zoned.
Franklin/Yes. What you do in your TIF district when you are describing the urban renewal
district, you describe what your goals are for that district. It is not about the zoning per se
but about what you're trying to accomplish in that district. We have in our community
except for one case, which is the Villa Garden Apartments for low- and moderate-income
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housing, done TIF only for commercial development. Except in the downtown, if you are
restoring a historic building, you can have TIF for residential in a historic building. So, it's
the framing of the description of the district and what its purpose is that is central, and
there you get the distinctions between residential and commercial, but not by the zoning.
Pfab/OK. So, you're saying that no matter what the wording of the document is, is that creates
this TIF district--does it have to say that it's can be used for residential also?
Franklin/No. That's your choice when you form the district.
Champion/Karin, is it my understanding that you would TIF it because it would enable
commercial development?
Franklin/No.
Champion/No.
Franklin/The reason that we have looked at this for T1F is for us to enable us to use that TIF
financing for capital projects.
Champion/Right.
Franklin/For the capital project of improvements to Muscatine at the intersection of Sycamore
and Muscatine.
Freerks/But, during our meeting, it was stated that there were people interested in a number of
those properties. I mean, that was knowledge--it's in the minutes.
Franklin/Sure, there are people interested in that area for commercial, but that would mean that
you would have to rezone the property.
Freerks/ Right, and I think---
Franklin/But that's been that way for years.
Freerks/It was clarified for us at some point in the meeting, I think, to not really talk about
zoning so much as to talk about the Comprehensive Plan. I mean, our charge wasn't to
discuss the merits of TIF districts; our charge was to discuss whether or not according to
law, the underlying zone uses were consistent with the Comprehensive Plan.
Franklin/Right.
Freerks/And it was stated that we would have to make a change at some point to either industrial
or commercial in order for those funds to be used on those properties---
Franklin/ Right.
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Freerks/...for the TIF funds to be used and so that's when we looked at the Comprehensive Plan
and noted that that was supposed to be low density residential and not commercial or, and
that was made very clear at some point then during the meeting.
Franklin/OK, but there's a, when you say that in order for TIF funds to be used on those
properties, those private properties, those properties would have to be either commercial
or industrial because--well, commercial because that's what this TIF district is about. That
does not mean that you have to rezone them to those uses. You can still have those uses
within that urban renewal district and that zoning because you are saying that that
particular area is going to be residential. So, the choice of the land use is a process that
will go through Planning and Zoning and the City Council. The TIF is about financing of
certain improvements, whether it's on private property or on public property in the district.
And this district says if it's on private property, that private property has to be used for
commercial purposes.
Chiat/The issue was a little big vague and we weren't very clear about it. But what was clear
was that, at least in my mind, that residential could not benefit from TIF.
Franklin/As this district is configured, that's correct.
Chiat/Right. Right. And when we voted on this, I think that we were thinking that the
residential, the triangle would best be excluded for reasons that I think now are not valid;
you know, what you're saying is that residential can be in the TIF but residential can't
utilize the TIF funds.
Franklin/Can't utilize the TIF.
Lehman/Right.
Chiat/And I think our biggest concern was that, thinking that it had to be commercial and that
it's residential now, that it wasn't consistent with the Comprehensive Plan, and that's the
reason that we voted against it, thinking that it would have to come back for rezoning, you
know, at which time we could address the Comprehensive Plan. But what I'm hearing
now is that it can be in the district. It can be residential without any further action for that
land to be, you know, sought by developers, it would have to be developed commercially,
it would have to be rezoned.
Franklin/Absolutely.
Chiat/And in order for us to comfortably rezone it, we would have to amend the Comprehensive
Plan.
Franklin/Mm-hmm.
Chiat/So, you know, it seems to me now, having two weeks to think about it, that having it in
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the district is not an issue. Having the district on the west side of the street allows for, you
know, the infrastructure to be improved for the property then to be made commercial
would have to be rezoned, the Comprehensive Plan would have to be modified, then that
property would then be eligible for TIF. And that's the way that I think it would have to
happen.
Wilbum/In our conversation at the Economic Development Committee was how to, if need be,
with growth happening around the Kirkwood area to utilize T1F funds to improve the
street, the infrastructure, and as a side benefit, I mean, residents in there would, you know,
if people are always, whenever there's traffic concerns, wanting to, you know, figure out
how the City can address those, and that was the focus of our discussion was that
infrastructure.
Chiat/Our big issue was residential's not consistent--I mean commercial's not consistent with the
Comprehensive Plan and we had to amend one to do the other, but nobody's asking for
rezoning at this point and therefore including it is fine. It can't benefit the property and
then, you know, it would be rezoned, then the Comprehensive Plan would be modified.
That was the thrust of our conversation was around the Comprehensive Plan.
Vanderhoef/And the need has shown---
Kanner/I had a point---
Vanderhoeff Go ahead.
Kanner/...needing for comment on this issue. First, an aside though, can't you use TIF for certain low-
income housing projects?
Franklin/Mm-hmm.
Kanner/So within that area you could use it?
Franklin/Only if it says in the district--it does say that? OK. In this particular, and every urban renewal
plan is different so if you want to amend that, you need to amend that. In this particular
urban renewal plan the focus is on commercial. We have allowed it for low and moderate
income housing in the downtown urban renewal. We've allowed it for the preservation of
historic properties that have residential uses. So each one, you need to look at the district
document to determine what it can be used for.
Kanner/So, it seems to me that if we do have an expectation that this would stay residential, we might
want to, the route to go would be to first to amend the purpose to include housing, to help
with housing for TIF. Otherwise, it seems that even though legally you can include it,
you're putting tremendous pressure to, within the Council, and perhaps Planning and
Zoning and the community at large to rezone. Zoning is to say to people this is what we
expect of an area in the near future at least and perhaps in the middle future. When we
include that, we're basically saying we want you to come to us with ideas for rezoning
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and it will be hard to resist those. And it makes sense to me to exclude that at the present
time and if we feel in the future that we want to rezone that and have that be commercial,
that's the time to include it. Also, the final point is, we have no history of putting--in the
near past, we have no history to my mind of putting money into streets. It seems that our
history is putting TIF back into developer's pocket.
Franklin/Well, actually what we have done is we've done tax rebates.
Kanner/Tax rebates are sort of an abatement of sorts. And so I don't have a sense that it's going to
change.
Franklin/And I can't stand here now and say that that would happen absolutely. I'm giving you the
reason why we looked at the expansion. There's some question as to whether we get
enough value in this area to actually support capital projects. But that's something also
that can change over time. But you're right, we have not done public capital projects with
TIF to date. And remember that was one thing we talked about in this area was to look at
it for public, capital projects, which is what started this whole conversation. To put in
sidewalks on Muscatine and that sort of thing.
Pfab/I think a couple of things. There is a quite a bit of moderately priced housing there, which I hate to
see go away that close to the school and close to a lot of other services that would be
within walking distance of that area. I'm more interested in putting offthis TIF district
until we amended the TIF document to do public works if it's not in there. And I'm not
sure if it is.
Franklin/Public works are in there.
Pfab/OK. And also I think this would be a good time to add the possibility of using it for a lower
income housing. I think that's really where we should start because otherwise the TIF
will go on and that will drive that to, that will take away that housing stock there. It looks
like that housing stock is in great jeopardy right now.
Lehman/Well, let me say that the issue and the reason we're talking to P and Z about this, ifI
understand and correct me if I'm wrong, the objection of P and Z was that you were not
aware that a residential zone could be TIFF'd.
Boubjerg/I think that our interpretation was that way, and if in fact, black line can go around there and
can say essentially the streets can be fixed, but this, but we are not going to go into the
residences, that might, for me, would clear it up. I don't know about the rest of the
Commission.
Lehman/Well, I'm sensing and I don't think it's--we're not here to decide whether or not Council thinks
that should be a TIF--we're here to decide whether or not there is a basic disagreement
between Council and P and Z as to whether or not that TIF is viable. Now whether or not
we choose to do it for reasons that you've heard are another issue. But my understanding
from this discussion is that your reluctance to do that was because it was residential and
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your understanding of TlF then was for commercial, which it is. But it would require
rezoning before anything in that area could take advantage ofa TIF. The only advantage
that could occur if it were included and public improvements needed to be made, those
public improvements could be financed with a TIF the way it's presented now.
Boubjerg/Because our feeling is ifa residential group cannot be within an urban renewal TIF district,
then it was against the Comprehensive Plan. If, as has been said, streets and the houses
only incidentally are there, if that meets the Comprehensive Plan, if that meets how this is
defined, then it would seem to me personally that that would be OK. I don't know how
the rest of the Commission---
Shannon/I had a question earlier. I heard the question asked, but I didn't in my mind, get it answered.
Why do we have to include those houses? Why can't we have the streets or Lower
Muscatine included in the T1F and four feet on the other side of the sidewalk, which is
the City right-of-way? Is it necessary that the private homes have to be in the T1F district
or could you not put this---
Franklin/ We could potentially bring this boundary down along the southwest side of Muscatine
Avenue.
Lehman/Right.
Shannon/Would that get you where you want to go if you did that?
Franklin/Which would allow us to do things within this right-of-way here.
Freerks/It seemed to me like we were, we would be sending a signal to developers and people that it's
OK to go ahead and maybe come up with a plan to try to do something in this area and
one of my concerns was that, I asked during the meeting, had the landowners who have
property there been notified of, you know, this TIF, and they said, no, that they hadn't
been. And to me it seems like kind of maybe a domino effect, and if that's where the City
would like to go, with that to be commercial, we need to change--or industrial--we need
to change the Comprehensive Plan and the zoning and then to do this. It seems like
perhaps we're sending signals that we want to see redevelopment there and maybe the
people who live there and the Comprehensive Plan doesn't necessarily support that and
that was just a concern of mine.
Franklin/Mm-hmm.
Vanderhoef/Well, the thing I was going to point out was that all of Sycamore needs work on it so it isn't
just that section in Lower Muscatine, and the district goes clear out to Sycamore as it is at
the southern pan of the district. So to make that a continuous piece is another and to
square off the district a whole lot better.
Kanner/Why not just do Sycamore, the road, also and leave out the triangle in between---
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Vanderhoef/Well, I'm not sure you can do a string on a road like that. That's what it would be.
Kanner/Well, it looks like Coralville did it.
Champion/Yeah.
(Laughter)
Champion/The exact spot too---
Franklin/Not exactly the model we would maybe use for--I think going along Sycamore as Dean has
suggested is certainly viable. On first blush I feel a little bit uncomfortable going down
Sycamore Street and leaving that triangle out; it just doesn't feel quite right but I don't
know that we can't do it legally. We'd have to consult with our bond counsel.
Chiat/I believe that Planning and Zoning's concern had to do with, you know, what was, you know,
appropriate, and I think, Ernie, you know, made the point that the policy is set by Council
and, you know, the technical aspects are reviewed, you know, by Planning and Zoning,
and, you know, for us to say that we don't want to set a precedent, well, that's not our
position to do. That's Council's position to say that, you know, we think that this will be
this way someday and by virtue of the TIF district. The fact is, in my opinion, having the
residential in a TIF district causes no harm, you know, to the residents. They can't use it,
you know, and if it does in fact put pressure on that area to be, you know, rezoned to
some higher use, that's certainly not our position either. It's Council's position to be able
to, you know, make that judgment. So, looking back at the concerns that we have had as a
Commission, I think that, you know, there's no downside technically to having it, having
residential in the TIF district, and then it becomes a policy issue as to, you know, what
the highest and best use of that land is, which is not in our purview. So we're not doing
any harm to the property owners technically by having residential in that TIF district, and
the pressure issue comes from, you know, the direction of City Council.
Lehman/OK. I think we've got a pretty good understanding of where P and Z was coming from. Can we
move on to the next ?
Franklin/Yes, we can.
Lehman/Block 67.
Franklin/OK. This one is the rezoning application that was brought by Kevin Hanick for the property at
Market and Dubuque Street and then was expanded through the deliberations with staff
and brought onto the Planning and Zoning Comanission for the consideration of rezoning
this entire block to CB-5. So there are two issues before you. One is the rezoning of the
entire block. The other is the rezoning of the one parcel. However, if you elected to not
rezone the entire block but just this one parcel, we have been cautioned that that might
constitute spot zoning. That's our consideration of the entire block. In one look, one
should look at those zoning decisions in the contexts of blocks at least and not just single
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pieces of property. So the question before you is whether or not to rezone from CB-2 to
CB-5 the block that's defined by Dubuque, Jefferson, Linn, and Market. There is a
protest that has triggered the extraordinary majority vote on the part of the City Council.
At last discussion there were five Council members who were inclined to vote favorably
for this, two who were not. Or it was at least undecided. The recommendation from the
Planning and Zoning Commission was to rezone, thus, your consultation.
Kanner/Was it a 7-0 vote?
Freerks/No.
Kanner/What was the vote?
Lehman/(Can't hear)
(Can't hear)
Vanderhoef/Six of seven.
Freerks/However, we did not have the seventh person ..... (can't hear)
(Several talk)
Lehman/Well, I guess I would suggest that the Council folks who have problems with this discuss this
with the Commission.
VanderhoetY Do you want to go?
Kanner/You go first.
Vanderhoef/I'm looking at the size of that property and what I had stated earlier, I've had continuing
discussion with Karin about was that I didn't want to do any rezoning until we were done
with the Code review. Karin says this isn't going to affect the Code review per se. That,
yes, you may decrease or eliminate the one zone, the CB-2, and that then this would be
probably what would happen. But what I have been looking at was the bigger picture
where we thought four different zones fairly close by and when we started talking this
afternoon again, I was talking with Karin, and I said I've tried to keep this zoning thing
separate from the issue and what is being envisioned there that I don't want to put a
project and a face and a name and all that onto it. But I said that is our Dubuque Street
entry and what we have to the north of that property is a mini-mart and then we have all
of that RM-44, so we have residential. South of that property we have churches, then we
have University buildings, so I don't call that commercial. In use of parking, maybe it
acts more like commercial, but it isn't commercial. It is University buildings and it is
churches that use the downtown all over for parking when they have functions at the
churches. But my vision is that that should continue residential down there. It's not an
entry into the northside neighborhood in my mind partly because that Market Street is a
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one-way going west. So nobody tums at that comer and heads into the near northside
commercial area, a neighborhood commercial kind of area. So in following through with
that, then what I think is rather than having CB-2 or CB-5 there, we ought to be RM-44.
We ought to go all residential in there. And why I say I want RM-44 is because the size
of that property is so small. It presently has two curb cuts. So if you have two curb cuts,
both onto arterials, and you put more commemial in there, trying to get in the parking or
are we going to have people going across to Mini-mart to try to park, to access the
commercial that goes into, that we're forcing by the zone to put on the lower level?
We're going to allow apartments above, so why are we adding commercial into that one
little spot when it doesn't have any parking? The parking has to go under.
Lehman/Isn't that consistent with Brewery Square? If that were 44 on the comer, then that entire, the
other two-thirds of that half of the block would be nonconforming.
Champion/The whole block.
Lehman/Well, but the churches don't have to---
Vanderhoef/You've got a continuation of RM-44 coming down from the north.
Franklin/I think what Dee is saying is that you would come down with your boundary here and then
across, well, maybe this one, because that's a house there.
Vanderhoeff That's a church office.
Franklin/And then you would continue your RM-44 down this property line. Is that what you're saying?
I didn't mean to do that.
Freerks/Well, the church, the churches are---
Lehman/Any zone.
Freerks/...in any zone by exception.
Vanderhoef/...so it doesn't matter truly what zone the church is in. And if the other house is a
possibility of being combined with this property---
Freerks/It's owned by the church.
Vanderhoef/Well, maybe, maybe not. If the two properties could be combined together and move the
entrance onto that small property on the comer, then there would be the possibility of
doing larger residential with better parking underneath or it could be anything else that
fits.
Lehman/lrvin?
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Pfab/I have a question. Ifa person, I am intrigued with this RM-44, that's what I feel--and is it, what is
the parking requirement there as you go into residential? How do you solve that?
Franklin/The parking requirement for what?
Pfab/If it's RM-44.
Franklin/Well, the parking requirement is determined by the number of bedrooms in the unit. So it's
very difficult to say exactly what the parking requirement would be but you would likely
have to put it, be subterranean parking. I don't know how many units you could get on
there in actuality.
Freerks/Isn't it true you can have five people living in a unit next to, I mean, excuse me, in a (can't
hear)---
Franklin/ Mm-hmm. Five unrelated people. But the parking requirement is determined by number of
bedrooms, so if you had five unrelated, you probably have a four- or five-bedroom
apartment, which would be four parking spaces--I don't know, I'd have to look it up in
the Code.
Lehman/Karin, let me just, I have a question. Obviously, I don't think that this project is going to wait
until we do the rezoning whether it be RM-44 or Agricultural. I think something's going
to happen with that. It's not going to be a parking lot. Now, we have a proposal that
apparently the person making this proposal has agreed to work with the staff in design
work and whatever to build if it can be rezoned to CB-5. If it cannot be rezoned CB-5 and
it stays CB-2, what could be built there? I don't think it's going to be a parking lot.
Franklin/Well, you could reuse the building that's on the site.
Lehman/OK. What could be built?
Franklin/What could be built?
Lehman/Mm-hmm.
Freerks/Or what could be (can't hear)
Lehman/Yeah, what could that property be used for?
Franklin/You would have to have one parking space for every 200 square feet of commercial and you'd
have to have commercial on the ground floor. Subterranean there's enough space to get
10 parking spaces. Correct, Kevin? OK. So, just working backwards, you could have, I
can't do this in my head---
(Laughter)
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Lehman/Let me reconvene.
Freerks/There was a difference of five spaces whether it would be a surface spot or underground
parking.
Franklin/You could have 2,000 square feet of commercial space and that would be with underground
parking.
Lehman/OK.
Franklin/Now if you had surface parking, it would be diminished because you'd have to have enough
room. Ten spaces would take up the whole lot.
Lehman/Right.
Franklin/So you'd have to back off of that. Say you could only get five spaces and so then you would
have 500, no a thousand square feet.
Champion/Which you'd never be able to (can't hear---pay??)
Franklin/A one-story, 1,000-square-foot building, if you could get five spaces in there and meet our
design standards.
Lehman/But you'd have to have---
Franklin/But that's it. That's it.
Lehman/OK.
Franklin/Because you don't have enough to have residential above because you can't provide the
parking.
Pfab/OK.
Vanderhoef/But why would we want commercial there?
Lehman/It isn't what we want, it's what they can do. You know, we don't have to rezone this to have
them do something with this.
Karmer/Well, Ernie, let me partially answer your question. I think with some of my thoughts and
concerns. I'm not quite sure how I'm going to vote on this. I'm still waiting for more
people to give input on that, on this issue. But I generally like greater density and so I
would tend to like rezoning for increased density use on this area. But at the same time,
things are working fairly well in this area and so I'm somewhat reluctant to mess with the
zoning in this area, up here on the north side. It seems to be thriving and there's a pretty
good mix. I did like the car repair, even though, again, I'm not a big fan of cars in
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April 21, 2003 Council Work Session Page 14
general, but I think it's a good thing to have. It was a good thing to have in there. One of
the reasons I said I would not vote for it at the previous meeting is I wanted to have a
chance for the church, especially the Wesley Foundation, the Methodists, to talk with the
owners. And I think they are talking. I understand that perhaps there's negotiations that
are going on. So another possible use is the church could buy this and maybe they
wouldn't put a commercial space. They could put green space there with a garden. They
have the Wesley House, I think it would fit in with part of their mission, and that is one
thing that I heard is a possibility is putting green space in there. So take the parking and
take the (can't hear) away and that's one possible use. And that would keep the same
zone. I also have some concern about if we rezone, there'd be greater pressure on the
churches in that block to sell. We just lost one church and especially a jewel like Wesley
House with all the services it offers and the architecture of the church, I would hate to see
that church feel economic pressure to sell because of a rezoning that makes it even more
enticing to buy them out, tear it down, and put up a big apartment building. So those are
some of the things that are going through my mind and ifP and Z and other Council
members would want to respond to any of those, I'd appreciate that.
Bovbjerg/As we understood it, having it as a surface parking lot was never something that the buyer, the
seller, that possible developer thought of. Keeping it as a parking lot is a nice idea, but
apparently that wasn't part of it. A person could build on this now, in this zoning, almost
exactly what CB-2 or CB-5, there are some uses that can be used. There are parking
differences and still build a several (can't hear) residential place and you would still have
to have commercial on the ground floor, I guess if I'm understanding that correct.
Franklin/In terms of the zoning, that is correct. But there is a factor that comes in. This is where the
zoning requirements and the economics have to both be brought into the equation to
make a determination as to what you can do with that property. And what we have been
told is that when you have the CB-2 zone and you put on that the layer of the economic
constraints--the cost of the land to providing the parking, construction--that it doesn't
work.
Champion/It's not economical.
Franklin/It's too small. This is a very small piece of ground.
Champion/It is too small.
Freerks/I just think personally that inactivity of--as far as if we don't rezone it to the CB-5 would be
detrimental to that piece of property. I think that you'll see something happen there that
you probably wouldn't want to see. And that's just a fact of life that things happen
sometimes. I think we have an option here, a possibility to bring this into really
conformity with the rest of the block. Many of the, much of the area that is in this larger
block is historic, is it not? So I think that some of our worries are maybe a little far-
fetched, I would hope. I think the churches probably are there to stay for quite some time
and the Wesley Foundation. I think that we're seeing that we're going to remove the CB-
2 in the future. It seems natural to have that commercial and residential use, that mixed
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use and it's something that's in the Comprehensive Plan to have that are be a mixed use
like that. So this really isn't far removed from anything. It's also an opportunity for us to
have design review on this property. And that's something that the church, the Wesley
Foundation, when people came, it's an (can't hear), that they saw it as maybe being a
benefit is the fact that they were able to have design review with this change of zone. I
think that it would be a project that's put forward, I think would be a good project. I think
that---
Pfab/I have a question. How, if you change to the zoning that's requested, does it allow lower
residential units?
Franklin/It allows more to happen on the lot because there is no requirement for commercial parking.
And in that, yes, it would allow more residential units.
Pfab/So, how tall--what is the--how tall could a residential property be built?
Franklin/In terms of the zoning, it could only be five stories, but in terms of the practicality of it
because of the limitations on the mount of parking that are allowed, what did you get to,
Kevin?
Kevin/Two and a half.
Franklin/Two and a half stories.
Pfab/To what?
Lehman/Two and a half stories.
Pfab/That's at the zoning that you request?
Franklin/Yes.
Pfab/And what would it be now with zoning as it is?
Franklin/One story. Only commemial. You wouldn't have enough room because you have to provide
the parking.
Pfab/I think this is--I like the idea of residential there because it's walking distance from downtown.
And the other uses in that property--I'm reluctant to change the rest of that block, the
zoning, and if--this is one case where I'd either like to see the RM-44 which looks like it
would be the--would that change the amount of residential units you could put on there?
What would RM-44 do?
Lehman/It won't change it.
Franklin/Not unless you combine it with some other property.
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Pfab/But as it is right now, if you went to RM-44, how many residential units could you put in there?
Franklin/Maybe three.
Pfab/Because of the parking, the parking requirements?
Lehman/Well, that, and lrvin if you look at the other part of that block, the Brewery Square basically is
the CB-5 use, is it not?
Franklin/If not, CB-10.
Lehman/I mean, most of that, that lot presently is churches on a little over half of it. The remaining part
of that lot is CB-5 use anyway. Just that one comer is not. I can't see an RM-44 going
down the edge of that block.
O'Donnell/That makes absolutely no sense, Emie.
Freerks/You'd have a nonconforming commercial area with the---
O'Donnell/Yeah.
Vanderhoef/You'd have one.
Shannon/Karin, isn't it tme--I think we heard the CB-2 is probably going to go away sometime in the
not too distant future all over?
Franklin/Well, that's under consideration but that is not really the issue here.
Shannon/No, no, I'm just saying that CB-2, if we kept it CB-2, it may be an island all by itself.
Franklin/There's CB-2 is this whole thing. If we get to the point where we don't have a CB-2 zone, then
we have to figure out what to do with this whole area, which may be a combination of
zoning categories. It depends what you want to have here, whether you want it to be
commercial, whether you want to have the residential concidor and residential entrance as
Dee is suggesting. Those are all issues that are for another day that you will need to
address. But the question right now is do you intensify the zoning here to allow at this
time redevelopment of this comer with that higher intensity? Now, if you are in line with
Dee's view of the entrance to Dubuque Street, you probably do want to vote no because
CB-5 will allow the redevelopment of this property for commercial use. CB-2 is not
going to make it go to residential just because of the economics of it all.
Champion/I just want to clarify something for myself now because I think this is really a good project.
There is actually no residential houses basically--I mean there's residential above
commercial space from Dubuque to Dodge. There's a few interspersed houses.
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Franklin/This is--I don't know if this is used for residential or not. This is the historic white brick house
that is owned by the church. Is it used for residential?
Champion/But it's mainly a commercial area with Linn Street and Market Street. That's all commercial
development.
Franklin/Everywhere it's zoned CB-2. Yeah. And then you've got the hospital.
Champion/You have those little shops down there, you've got the hospital---
TAPE 03-33, SIDE TWO
Champion/...and made them provide parking. It's economically impossible to do it--they couldn't
possibly afford to redevelop that lot. But if you don't want that lot redeveloped, then I say
vote no. If you want it developed into what I think is going to be a really nice addition to
that block instead of--frankly, I think what's there is pretty ugly--and as far as another car
place, well, cars are too sophisticated now. You don't really have service places around.
They're all done by computer. Cars are really too sophisticated for small repair shops.
Vanderhoef/So where are you going to get parking for the commercial piece? If you make that CB-5
and you have commemial on the first floor and the parking underneath is for the
apartments up above---,
Champion/Right.
Vanderhoef/...where do you park?
Champion/I go down there. I go down to that area a lot. I have never had trouble finding a parking
place.
Lehman/Do you park at Gilpin's?
Champion/I park at Gilpin's; I park right on Market most of the time. And Linn Street--I have never had
trouble parking there. Why would you want residential parking, I mean the lot would
never be developed, Dee, it would just not be economically feasible. And that's an
entrance that, to me, is a commercial small neighborhood commercial development, and I
can't find one good reason not to support this project.
Lehman/Is there anything else that P and Z wants to add to this discussion?
Freerks/Well, I think part of the idea in the neighborhood commercial there is that people can walk to
the commercial, whatever it is. You don't necessarily have to have a car. And that's some
benefit of having the transitional zone in the area where you can have residential and
commercial. It's a place where maybe you don't have to have a car to go to---
O'Donnell/Good point.
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Champion/There's a lot of people who live around there who don't need a car to, they're (can't hear)
Lehman/Only about five or six thousand.
Champion/Only five or six thousand?
Vanderhoef/Now the parking lot, the City parking lot, put your arrow on it. So it's three-quarters of a
block. That's the piece I hadn't thought about.
Franklin/Yeah, that's a lot and this is Pagliai's lot.
Freerks/There's a lot behind Hillel to park.
Lehman/But that's private.
Vanderhoef/That's private. That's tow.
Lehman/Irvin?
Pfab/Is this--are we voting on the whole block or just this one parcel?
Lehman/We'll probably do the whole block. That's first on the agenda.
Pfab/I guess I would be a lot more comfortable voting for that thing without the whole block.
Champion/You can't.
Lehman/Irvin, the rest of the block, with the exception of churches which fit in any zone, so it doesn't
make any difference whether it's an RS-5, an RM-44, or a commercial zone, churches are
conforming regardless of the zone. The rest of that block, all of Brewery Square,
basically is a CB-5 use anyway. So if that comer were rezoned CB-5, it would be
consistent with the rest of the block that isn't presently being used for churches.
Pfab/But the rest of the block is not zoned that though.
Lehman/No, it's CB-2 with the use, the use of that property is at least a CB-5.
Pfab/Now, is that a historical district?
Freerks/Part of it.
Champion/Part of it.
Freerks/It's historical structures, not---
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April 21, 2003 Council Work Session Page 19
Franklin/ It's historical structures; it's not a district. No, we never got that one passed.
Pfab/What does that mean to keep those, to preserve those buildings? If we change the zoning, does that
put those buildings in jeopardy?
Franklin/No.
Champion/No.
Franklin/It makes---
Lehman/No, it doesn't change that.
Franklin/It approaches having them be more conforming than they are right now.
Pfab/But it does not, does it either make them more secure as historical buildings?
Franklin/In fact, Brewery Square will become conforming whereas now it's not because it's all
commercial.
Pfab/OK. One other point. How are negotiations going with the other people?
Franklin/I have no idea. We have not been part of that at all.
Lehman/Well, we may find that out tomorrow night. But I just want to be sure if there's any questions
that P and Z has for Council or Council has for P and Z, then we're going to wrap this up.
Pfab/I've had my questions answered.
Champion/Irvin, there might even be, it might be an aspect of historic buildings that are there if this
rezoned to CB-5, because of the design review. The building will have to fit in to the
area. They can't just go in and put up a blue-frame building.
Lehman/Well, that's part of the proposal, isn't it?
Franklin/Yes.
Lehman/I mean, that is part of the agreement to go through design review and have the building
designed in such a fashion that it fits into the block.
Pfab/The part that I have difficulty with is it's such a strong church area right in there; it's so strong;
and it fits the access well. So I'm concerned if something goes in there that is not
supportive of that area that would---
Franklin/In terms of the type of use?
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April 21, 2003 Council Work Session Page 20
Pfab/Yeah.
Franklin/The types of uses in CB-5 are the same as CB-2. There's no change.
Freerks/Just the auto.
Franklin/Just the auto, yes.
Boubjerg/I think that's a point that should be understood that no matter whether or not this is rezoned,
you could see commercial; you'd have to see commercial on the first floor and you'd see
residential on the second floor, but--if that's the person's idea. The kind of parking and
where it would be and the amount and the auto use is the difference. So this is not
drastically changing what could already be there.
Pfab/My questions are answered.
Lehman/OK. Thank you, folks, very much. Appreciate it. I have a request from another grandma for a
five-minute break, so we will accommodate you, grandma.
REVIEW OF PLANNING AND ZONING S
Lehman/Planning and Zoning s.
a. CONSIDER A MOTION SETTING A PUBLIC HEARING FOR MAY 6 ON A
RESOLUTION AMENDING THE SOUTH CENTRAL DISTRICT PLAN TO
CHANGE THE FUTURE LAND USE DESIGNATION FROM OFFICE PARK /
COMMERCIAL TO INTENSIVE OR HIGHWAY COMMERCIAL FOR
PROPERTY GENERALLY LOCATED EAST OF MORMON TREK
BOULEVARD EXTENDED.
b. CONSIDER A MOTION SETTING A PUBLIC HEARING FOR MAY 6 ON A
RESOLUTION ANNEXING APPROXIMATELY 150 ACRES OF PROPERTY
GENERALLY LOCATED EAST OF HIGHWAY 218, WEST OF THE IOWA
CITY AIRPORT, AND BOTH NORTH AND SOUTH OF HIGHWAY 1. (ANN03-
00001, ANN01-00004)
c. CONSIDER A MOTION SETTING A PUBLIC HEARING FOR MAY 6 ON AN
ORDINANCE REZONING APPROXIMATELY 6.1 ACRES FROM COUNTY RS,
SUBURBAN RESIDENTIAL, TO CI-1, INTENSIVE COMMERCIAL FOR
PROPERTY LOCATED WEST OF DANE ROAD, EAST OF MORMON TREK
BOULEVARD EXTENDED. (REZ01-00017)
d. CONSIDER A MOTION SETTING A PUBLIC HEARING FOR MAY 6 ON AN
ORDINANCE REZONING APPROXIMATELY 144 ACRES FROM COUNTY
CH, C2, R1A, RS & A1 TO P, PUBLIC, CH-l, HIGHWAY COMMERCIAL, AND
ID-RS, SUBURBAN RESIDENTIAL, FOR PROPERTY GENERALLY
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April 21, 2003 Council Work Session Page 21
LOCATED EAST OF HIGHWAY 218, WEST OF THE IOWA CITY AIRPORT,
AND BOTH NORTH AND SOUTH OF HIGHWAY 1. (REZ03-00013)
Franklin/OK, s a, b, c, d are all related to the annexation and I brought the map tonight because
at the joint meeting on Wednesday, there's an that's on the agenda about this annexation
and I don't think the Council's seen it yet so I just thought I'd show it to you. What we're
looking at annexing is this property that I'm outlining with the arrow; it takes in some of
the highway right-of-way that's not in this triangle over here which includes Hargrave-
McEleney and Burg Auto Supply and then comes down along 218. OK?
Lehman/OK.
Franklin/This is the Davis property, Dane, and then this is all Airport property here. So, now
you know.
Lehman/Boy, you're awful fast.
Franklin/Yes, that's all for some other time.
e. 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)
Franklin/OK. e is public hearing on a rezoning to an OPDH-12 OSA for a housing development
on 2.12 acres, the southeast comer of Meadow Ridge Lane and North Dubuque Street.
This property was zoned in 1983 from R1-A to RS-12. In 1989, Meadow Ridge Part 1
was platted. That's this area up here. And then in 1996, Meadow Ridge Part 2 was platted
at that time for six duplex units and a single-family house, an existing single-family
house, which is right there, which will remain. The rezoning that is before you now is for
13 townhouse-style units and one existing single-family. This is the old plat to show you
what the change would be. The two duplexes would be on these two lots and then the
existing house here. Remember, it's zoned RS-12. The request is for an OPDH-12, in
which there would be townhouses that would define the area along North Dubuque and
then townhouses toward the back of the property; the existing single-family would
remain. Let me see if I have--that's a little clearer. With this, it's. as I said, a planned
development because under RS-12 in order to have these attached units, you would need
to have a planned development. There is a request for reduction of the front yard from 40
feet to 30 feet; 40 feet would normally be required because this is on an arterial street.
The reduction is permitted under the OPDH Ordinance and that is to allow the whole
development to be pushed west and away from some of the trees that are existing in the
area. The OPDH then obviously also allows the attached units. It gives you a sense of the
green space, where the drives are, where the garages will be approached from these units
in the back. Trees will be maintained along this boundary and a particularly sensitive
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April 21, 2003 Council Work Session Page 22
boundary because of the single-family development to the north and then this drops off in
this area here.
Kanner/Show where again with these pictures the decreased footage.
Franklin/OK. The property line is here. Normally it would require a 40-foot setback because of
it being on an arterial street, and this is a 30-foot setback. In a typical area, there's a 20-
foot setback, in most neighborhoods. In some of the older ones, it's 25. Another--the
variation in the setback is allowed under the Sensitive Areas Ordinance and under the
OPDH. There's two reasons why we thought it was advisable. One was to keep it more
away from some of the existing trees there. But also, this is technically on an arterial by
the fact that it's on North Dubuque Street. But this is the old Dubuque Road, well, old
Highway 218, old Dubuque Street; it is set back considerably from Dubuque Street
proper, if you can picture the area. It is recommended for approval on a vote of 4-3. The
three Commission members who voted against it, two wish to have fewer units on this
property, and then one was concerned about the access to Dubuque Street. If you'll note
in the minutes and in the comment, there is an ancillary recommendation from the
Planning and Zoning Commission suggesting that the Council strongly consider doing
the intersection at Foster Road and Dubuque Street sooner rather than later. This is
something that we have in our capital improvements program but it's in an unfunded
year. It is, ifI recall, the intersection improvements because they are geometric as well as
signalization is about a $1 million to $1.5 million project.
Lehman/Or more.
Franklin/$1.9 million.
Lehman/Yeah.
Wilbum/Did they make any recommendations as to the specific year they hope, I know, sooner,
but given some of our constraints and some things happening in Des Moines now, which
fiscal year to fund it?
Franklin/I think the Commission understands that the City Council is the one that makes those
kinds of decisions. What they're pointing out and they got a lot of input at the
Commission meeting from the neighborhood to the north was the difficulty in getting out
onto Dubuque Street, and so in response to that and in response to the pleas from the
neighborhood to not approve this development at least until this intersection was
resolved, although I'm not sure that there's support from the neighborhood to the north,
regardless, but that the Commission heard those comments and was concerned about that
access point and felt that it should move forward but will leave it to you as to the
appropriate year.
Lehman/Karin, relative to the access, my understanding is that Interstate 80 is going to be
widened in 2004, adding the other two lanes; they're doing the bridge work now.
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April 21, 2003 Council Work Session Page 23
Franklin/Yeah, '04 or '05, yeah.
Lehman/Do you know whether or not the entrance and exit ramps are going to be redone in
conjunction with that widening?
Franklin/I don't know that for sure.
Lehman/I really think this is a project that's---
Atkins/Ernie, I'm pretty sure they're not but they are scheduled. But it's going to be like at least
'06 or '07, I thought.
Lehman/And I'm not sure at all that we're going to be able to wait that long and especially with
the peninsula development. There's already a huge problem there.
Wilburn/So, sooner sooner, rather than ....
Lehman/Yeah, I just think we're going to have to address that one sooner rather than later.
Franklin/Well, it certainly will be something that will come up as you review your capital
projects when we get into that in fall of '03 and into January of '04. If you were to decide
to do this project now, like say, now we're going to do this one, you're going to have to
drop something else and so we'd have to go through that whole process of what is it
you're going to drop--S1.9 million of something else.
Lehman/We don't drop it; we just move it out.
Franklin/Well, right.
Lehman/We did that with Mormon Trek.
O'Donnell/It's called "tweaking."
Lehman/Thank you.
Franklin/Yeah.
Lehman/Irvin?
Pfab/A couple things. At our JCCOG they talk about upcoming projects as changing that
intersection up there on Dubuque. I'm quite sure that that's--I may have it with me, I may
not--but I don't think I do.
Champion/I thought that was a 380.
Pfab/No, it was and I had a question. I was going to question what that was about, but there's
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April 21, 2003 Council Work Session Page 24
another. There's three or four questions here. I go up in that area. That looks extremely
crowded area to get that many units in, but I understand or what I was told, that if you
don't---
Franklin/This is a planned development, PDH.
Pfab/OK. All right, the letters weren't coming. But I understand that as it sits right now, this is a
reducing the number of units on that, that would be permissible on this unit. And that's
what has me concerned.
Franklin/There's approximately 24 that you could get on this area, but in terms of if it were a
flat piece of ground and you had 2.12 acres, that you could get about 24 units on there
under the zoning. Now, this is not a flat piece of ground. You could get more units by
putting in an apartment building and building underground parking. But that's not what is
being asked here.
Lehman/Well, this is 13 units when it could conceivably have as many as 24.
Franklin/Fourteen total, when it could have 24, because I'm counting the existing single-family
house in that.
Lehman/OK.
Pfab/OK. There's another thing. When you go out there and you look at that, that intersection is
just almost a suicide as it is right now. But that's not part of the zoning.
Franklin/Well, I would ask you not to use that sort of terminology with an intersection. We have
warrants for signalization here. We do not have a--I'm not going to say we don't have
any--accident record, but I have to go back and look at the statistics. But I ask you not to
use the word "suicide intersection" referring to a public intersection. Because there's
nothing to substantiate that.
Pfab/All right. Let me put it this way. It is an intersection that I will avoid at all costs ifI want to
stay alive. But anyway---
(Laughter)
Pfab/...but it also looks like when you go into it to change that intersection, you're almost going
to have start cutting over. You're going to have to straighten that road out.
Franklin/The reason it's $1.9 million is because there are geometric changes. You have to level
it out and you have to accommodate Foster Road coming in on both sides and that's why
it's so expensive. Yes, we do have to do that.
Pfab/I had difficulty when I went out trying to visualize that in those units and in that area, but
I'm not sure how I feel about it.
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April 21, 2003 Council Work Session Page 25
VanderhoefJ Karin, how many units total would we have on that dead-end road right now if all
14 of these came in?
Franklin/I don't know. I'd have to look that up because we'd have to count the ones. It's not just
Meadow Ridge. It's also Ventura and---
Atkins/Tanglewood.
Lehman/The one that goes up along---
Atkins/Tanglewood.
Franklin/Tanglewood and Ventura.
Vanderhoeff Has the fire chief signed off on this?
Franklin/Yeah. I mean the fire chief is in on all of our staff meetings. That issue has not been
raised.
Vanderhoeff OK.
Franklin/But I don't know what the number is off the top of my head.
Lehman/OK.
Kanner/When you talk about 2.12 acres, does that include the Sensitive Area?
Franklin/Mm-hmm.
Kanner/So what would it be, what's useable area number of acres?
Lehman/1.78.
Franklin/Yeah.
Lehman/It looks like about under 2.
Kanner/And so how many units would be allowed on that. So when we talk about density---
Franklin/You would take 12 times 1.78, or whatever it is. The mayor has eyeballed it at 1.78.
(Laughter)
Franklin/I mean, you know---
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April 21, 2003 Council Work Session Page 26
Kanner/OK. Let's say one acre, you could have 12, so it's, one would say it's added density. So
if we're going to use words like saying it could have a lot more, we should have a little
more honest accounting, I think, of what's useable.
Franklin/No. I would debate that with you because---
Kanner/The reason I'm asking---
Franklin/...because when we look at properties in which there is rough ground, we have as a
matter of policy allowed that transfer of density. That's why we have planned
developments is so that you can get out of those sensitive areas and get your development
density on the area that is buildable.
Kanner/Well, yeah, I would agree with you to a certain extent but we're talking about as if the
whole 2.1 is developable and we're talking about under normal circumstances are non-
sensitive areas that that's something that there could be more units. So what I had heard, I
think from Planning and Zoning, and perhaps some other people and complaints is that
it's too crowded. I don't know if I'm going to agree with that assessment, but I think
when we talk about it, we should talk about what's the useable part of it instead of saying
that it's way under the density that would be allowed on 2.1. We should say one acre is
perhaps what is useable.
Franklin/You can do that if you wish. As a matter of law, there are property rights that go with
the property and as it has been zoned, there are allowable on that property 2.1 acres at 12
units per acre. That is allowable under the zoning. So you can make a judgment that there
may be fewer, practically speaking.
Pfab/Is it possible--there'd be no reason why somebody couldn't build a fairly large
condominium unit there?
Franklin/You could put 24 units in an apartment house on it.
Kanner/All right, but the thing that we're talking about in planned development is that we're
saying we want to allow it or not allow it. That's our decision to say whether it's too
dense or not. To transfer some of that density and increased density because there's
tradeoffs involved. And so I'm just saying that--I'll just drop it at that.
Franklin/And one of the judgTnents that was made here that I think is reflected in the staff report
is that this is infill. It's close to the University, it allows us an opportunity to get some
density in this area without overbuilding it, and that's a judgment call. But it's in one of
those locations in which that might be prudent in terms of public policy to look at that
higher density.
Pfab/I think it's a very desirable piece of property there because you're also close to the
interstate. You're two minutes from the interstate and close to the University. So I'm
reluctant not to get the best use, the maximum use of that property. But boy that's, I don't
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know.
Kanner/Karin---
Franklin/(Can't hear) why you get to vote.
Vanderhoef/What's this with the interior streets? They're on John's property, aren't they?
Franklin/Yeah, they're private. It's a driveway. I would imagine, I would say 18, but I'd have to ---it's on there, but I can't see it.
Pfab/Is it easier to read upside---
Franklin/You might be able to see it well--oh, you don't get paper anymore.
Pfab/Is it available up above, behind you? Can you read it easier there?
Franklin/Heck, no.
Pfab/OK.
Franklin/I can't.
Pfab/OK.
Franklin/I don't know if you all can.
Lehman/OK. Any other questions on this one?
Kanner/To get to the bus, the public transit, it goes on Foster on the other side of Dubuque,
doesn't it?
Franklin/Mm-hmm.
Kanner/OK. And that's the concern that P and Z is talking about in a sense that it's hard to get
across there for pedestrian or vehicles.
Franklin/ Yeah. Right. Yeah, the trail is on the other side, too.
Pfab/At some point in time, will that road come out or go out another end?
Franklin/This one in front here?
Pfab/No. The one that you enter Dubuque Street on.
O'Donnell/(Can't hear) Foster.
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Pfab/Yeah, Foster. No, going east, up--will that---
Lehman/That'll be Foster Road.
Pfab/How far?
Lehman/All the way to Prairie du Chien.
Pfab/Prairie du Chien, so there is another outlet or is it ever possible---
Franklin/Yes, one of the things, well, maybe this is the, I don't know. This is the alignment of
Foster Road here as it would come off of Dubuque Street and as part of this, get out of
there---
Wilbum/Just click in.
Franklin/Part of this project we got additional right-of-way for that to bring this road around so
that it will T into Foster Road, get it away from the Dubuque Street intersection, so
ultimately when we do that intersection, there will be a significant improvement here,
even if we don't pave Foster Road. OK?
Pfab/To me, and also there's a tremendous amount of highway noise there. I'm not much in
favor of--what is the term--you build a little unit where you put a little gate on it--gated
community, and move as far from the road there. I mean, that piece of ground just
puzzles me how, who's going to--where's the attractiveness of those people--how those
units are going to be attractive and who's it going to be desirable to live there because of
the tightness and the noise and at the present time, getting on and off that highway.
Franklin/Anything else?
O'Donnell/It's just one of those things, Irvin.
Pfab/I know, I know. The location is just--it's 100 percent almost location.
Wilbum/Kafin, are they being required to, I know, it talked about preserving trees to help with
buffering.
Franklin/Right.
Wilburn/Are they going to be adding to that then or to help buffer?
Franklin/As I recall, there was inclusion of more trees along that north buffer particularly. Along
that north property line.
Wilbum/OK.
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Franklin/But I'll make sure that that's so. Anything else fight now?
Lehman/OK.
f. PUBLIC HEARING ON AN ORDINANCE COMBINING THE LONGFELLOW
HISTORIC DISTRICT AND THE MOFFITT COTTAGE HISTORIC DISTRICT
INTO ONE HISTORIC DISTRICT NAMED THE LONGFELLOW HISTORIC
DISTRICT. (REZ03-00004)
Franklin/OK, then we've got the--and Dee I'm not going to talk about these, so--oh, I'm sorry.
We've first got the public hearing on Moffitt and the Longfellow Historic District that's
combining those two so we don't need to have two different reps. We talked about that a
long time ago.
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, LOT 255, A 7.93 ACRE DEVELOPMENT LOCATED AT COURT STREET
AND ARLINGTON DRIVE. (REZ02-00022) (FIRST CONSIDERATION)
Franklin/G is first consideration on the Windsor Ridge change.
O'Dormell/But we've been asked to condense this.
Lehman/Oh.
Vanderhoef/Which one?
O'Donnell/Did I switch---
Lehman/Expedite?
Kart/Yes.
Lehman/No.
Champion/Which letter?
Vanderhoef/G.
O'Donnell/Can I say something?
Franklin/On g?
Lehman/Yeah.
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Karr/Yeah, there's a letter in the packet. They're in the handouts tonight.
Franklin/Oh. I didn't see.
Pfab/Which one is that then?
Franklin/ g.
Lehman/ g.
Franklin/To expedite.
Vanderhoef/But we wouldn't be doing it this time anyway. This is first consideration.
Franklin/Whichever. OK. Then, h, i, j---
Karr/OK, if we could, just to note, Dee's right. We wouldn't do it this time unless there were a
majority of you to collapse. I mean, the procedure you have established is if there's a
majority of you to collapse a reading, you certainly could collapse the first, give it
second, pass and adopt the 6th. If not, then our policy is you would give it first, we would
have a special formal on the 5th.
Lehman/OK. So we could expedite and give it two readings.
Karr/You can expedite at any time that you have enough votes, yes.
Lehman/OK.
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-8/OCD) FOR THE
DESIGNATION OF THE COLLEGE HILL CONSERVATION DISTRICT
WITHIN THE COLLEGE HILL NEIGHBORHOOD. 01EZ03-00005) (FIRST
CONSIDERATION)
i. CONSIDER AN ORDINANCE CHANGING THE ZONING DESIGNATION FROM
NEIGHBORHOOD CONSERVATION RESIDENTIAL (RNC-12), TO OVERLAY
HISTORIC pRESERVATION, (OHP/RNC-12), DESIGNATING THE
PROPERTY LOCATED AT 30 SOUTH GOVERNOR STREET AN IOWA CITY
HISTORIC LANDMARK. (REZ03-00001) (FIRST CONSIDERATION)
j. CONSIDER AN ORDINANCE CHANGING THE ZONING DESIGNATION FROM
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NEIGHBORHOOD CONSERVATION RESIDENTIAL, (RNC-20), TO OVERLAY
HISTORIC PRESERVATION, (OPH/RNC-20), DESIGNATING THE
PROPERTY AT 802 WASHINGTON STREET AS AN IOWA CITY HISTORIC
LANDMARK (REZ03-00002) (HRST CONSIDERATION)
k. CONSIDER AN ORDINANCE CHANGING THE ZONING DESIGNATION FROM
NEIGHBORHOOD CONSERVATION RESIDENTIAL, (RNC-20), TO OVERLAY
HISTORIC pRESERVATION, (IHP/RNC-20), DESIGNATING THE PROPERTY
AT 726 IOWA AVENUE AS AN IOWA CITY HISTORIC LANDMARK. (REZ03-
00003) (FIRST CONSIDERATION)
Franklin/Thanks, Marian; h, i, j, k are all related to the Conservation District and the landmarks.
We talked about those before; i and j, we've already talked about with Block 67.
Lehman/Well, just before we go further.
Franklin/No, that's 1 and m. I don't know my alphabet.
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. (REZ03-
OOOO6)
m. AN ORDINANCE CONDITIONALLY CHANGING THE ZONING DESIGNATION
FROM CB-2, CENTRAL BUSINESS SERVICE ZONE TO CB-5, CENTRAL
BUSINESS SUPPORT ZONE, FOR A 6,000 SQUARE FOOT PROPERTY AT 130
NORTH DUBUQUE STREET. (REZ02-00021)
Lehman/If, do I understand from the discussion earlier this evening, that m--is m a legal
ordinance if we do not pass 17 If we don't pass 1, we don't worry about m. But if we don't
pass 1, is m, in fact, a spot zoning and something that we should not do?
Franklin/Correct.
Dilkes/Yeah, our advice is that you not pass m unless you pass 1.
Lehman/If we pass 1, we don't need to pass m.
Vanderhoef/Well,---
Lehman/ Oh, never mind.
Franklin/Yes, you do.
Vanderhoef/Wait a minute. Where are you?
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Franklin/It's there, it's broken out.
Lehman/OK.
Franklin/You were right what you said. You just need to remember what it was.
(Laughter)
Lehman/At my age, I can't even remember my name. All right.
n. CONSIDER AN ORDINANCE REZONING 1.6 ACRES FROM COMMUNITY
COMMERCIAL (CC-2) TO PUBLIC (P) FOR PROPERTY LOCATED AT 1828
LOWER MUSCATINE ROAD. (PASS AND ADOPT)
Franklin/ n is pass and adopt on rezoning the Kirkwood property to P.
o. CONSIDER A RESOLUTION APPROVING TItE FINAL PLAT OF RUPPERT
HILLS, IOWA CITY, IOWA. (SUB02-00025)
Franklin/And o is a final plat for Ruppert Subdivision which is--we finally got the papers all
together and this is the Calloway Project and dedication of outlot A to combine with the
parkland that we have on Miller and Benton for the Miller-Benton park.
Lehman/That will facilitate that park being a reality, won't it?
Franklin/Yes, it will.
Lehman/After 30 years. Cool.
Franklin/I'm done.
Lehman/Thank you, Karin.
Franklin/You're welcome.
REVIEW AGENDA ITEMS
Lehman/OK, agenda items.
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.
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Atkins/Before you're looking, Ernie, you want to make note of Item 19; you have
correspondence handed out tonight about asking that you not vote tomorrow evening on
the recommendations for the Senior Commission.
Lehman/We just ask for it to be deferred?
Atkins/You can defer it with the understanding that I think there's an interest in having some
folks comment to you and this was not scheduled for public heating.
Lehman/OK.
Atkins/Unless you want to have public heating.
Kanner/Who's asking that it be---
Atkins/There's a letter in your packet, Steve, from, hang on a sec, I got to find it.
O'Donnell/So we defer item 197
Lehman/Yeah.
Atkins/Johnson County, the Heritage of Johnson County Task Force on Aging.
O'Dounell/To when, Steve?
Atkins/That's really sort of up to you. Well, we assume you probably want to do it fairly
quickly.
Lehman/We'll defer it to the first meeting in May at which time we can either go through it or
defer it again.
Atkins/OK.
Lehman/But the first meeting in May is the 6th.
Atkins/Tomorrow night when you're thinking about that item and deciding what you want to do,
if you want to pick that day, because we do need to inform those folks.
Lehman/OK.
Atkins/What they've asked of you.
Vanderhoef/So they want to do a work meeting, you mean?
Atkins/I have the impression they want to address the Council so really the format is sort of up
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to you. Traditionally, you know, Dee, we don't do it at a work session.
Lehman/Right.
Atkins/We schedule a public discussion item.
Vanderhoef/But they're not ready to do it tomorrow night.
Lehman/We may not have time tomorrow night.
Atkins/No, I don't think so. That's what I understand.
Karmer/And if we do vote to defer, there's been a request that we do it earlier in the evening.
We can move it up on the agenda to---
Lehman/ Well, I think that we can decide--is there a consensus that we will defer this tomorrow
night?
Vanderhoef/It's all right with me.
O'Donnell/Yeah.
Wilburn/Sure.
Lehman/All right, it's deferred. We'll do it officially at that time on the agenda, but those folks
who have interest in item 19 can rest assured it will be deferred till May 6th.
Kanner/Emie, did you say you can do it earlier on the agenda?
Lehman/I don't know any reason to do it as long as we have agreement that we're going to defer
it.
Kanner/No, no, when it's deferred, when it is---
O'Donnell/It's going to be closer to---
Lehman/ Oh, you mean for the next meeting?
Pfab/Right.
Kanner/Earlier in the evening. It's hard for some seniors to get out.
Atkins/I think what you have to do in response to that, Ernie, is you set the agenda by resolution.
You just have to ask the Council's consent to move an item up.
Kanner/No, no,---
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Dilkes/You can move the item up by motion and then vote to defer it.
Lehman/We're talking about the meeting and date.
Kanner/I'm not so concerned about this one if we're going to defer it, but I'm saying when you
set the agenda, when you and Steve set the agenda for the meeting in May---
Lehman/Can it be earlier?
Kanner/Keep in mind that you do it earlier in the evening.
Atkins/Yeah.
O'Donnell/That's a good idea.
Lehman/That's no problem. I don't see a problem.
O'Donnell/Write that down, Emie.
Dilkes/You can't do that. You can put it after the Planning and Zoning items, but you can't put
it before the Planning and Zoning.
Lehman/Right. No, I understand that.
Karmer/No.
Lehman/Other agenda items?
16. CONSIDER AN ORDINANCE AMENDING TITLE 3, ENTITLED "CITY
FINANCES, TAXATION AND FEES", CHAPTER 4, ENTITLED "SCItEDIJLE
OF FEES, RATES, CHARGES, BONDS, FINES AND PENALITIES," TO ADD
CERTAIN SECTIONS TO SECTION 8, ENTITLED "VIOLATION OF VARIOIJS
CODE SECTIONS" AND ADD A NEW SECTION 9, ENTITLED "NON-
MOTORIZED VEHICLE VIOLATIONS," IN ORDER TO SET SPECIFIC FINES
FOR CERTAIN VIOLATIONS. (SECOND CONSIDERATION).
Vanderhoef/Yes, 11. I just have a question about it. This is second reading and I was skimming
through it again today and s0mething jumped out at me that we are charging a fee for
someone who reports a diseased animal and we're charging a fee for someone who is
reporting animal bites, is that---
Dilkes/Which, you must not be on 11, Dee.
Atkins/Eleven is the housing authority.
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Dilkes/Eleven is the Housing Authority.
O'Donnell/That's housing.
Atkins/I don't think we do that.
Dilkes/Are you talking about the fines?
VanderhoetY It was 11 in the previous packet, excuse me.
Dilkes/You talking about the setting of specific fines?
Vanderhoef/City Finances, Taxations, and Fees, whatever number that is.
Atkins/Sixteen.
Vanderhoef/Sixteen this time? Excuse me, sorry about that. And I'm presuming this is true that
you're charging someone who calls and says there's an animal that appears to be diseased
out on my street or in my yard or something, is that correct?
Dilkes/If it's on there, then it has been charged or can be charged, yes.
Vanderhoef/I'm real uncomfortable with doing that because I think that's a good citizen who
calls and says---
Atkins/Yeah, how about I check that for you?
Vanderhoef/Well, yeah, that one and---
Dilkes/Which, wait a minute, Dee.
Vanderhoef/...report of animal bite.
Champion/I've never been charged.
Lehman/Fine the animal.
Vanderhoef/Well, otherwise, I don't understand what that charge is for.
Dilkes/Reporting of animal bite?
Vanderhoef/Uh-huh. And reporting of diseased animal.
Dilkes/I'll look it up.
Vanderhoef/If you would, please. Thank you.
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Lehman/OK.
Vanderhoef/I want those things reported.
Atkins/I can't understand.
(Laughter)
20. CONSIDER A RESOLIJTION APPROVING TItE DESIGN OF TIlE EXTERIOR
ARCIIlTECTURE OF PLAZA TOWERS LOCATED ON BLOCK 64-1A.
Franklin/Can I ask if there's any questions on item 20?
Lehman/Item 20.
Franklin/That's the design of Plaza Towers.
Lehman/No, it looks great.
Vanderhoef/No.
Lehman/I think it looks great.
O'Donnell/Looks great.
Lehman/I have no questions. Anybody else?
Franklin/I'm just wondering if I can tell the architect that they don't need to come and sit
through the entire meeting tomorrow night.
Lehman/All right.
Vanderhoef/For number 20?
Franklin/Yes. I mean you're going to have a long meeting.
Lehman/Are there questions that we feel it necessary to have the architect here for at quarter
after 12:00 tomorrow night for number 20?
(Laughter)
Pfab/I have only, I have one questions when I looked at this, and I don't know where it fits in. It
seems like there's an awful lot of glass on the north side of that.
O'Dounell/The better to see you, Irvin.
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Vanderhoeff The better for the birds to---
Lehman/ I think it was designed that way.
(Laughter)
Franklin/There is.
Pfab/I noticed that.
Champion/We're not the Design Review Committee.
Pfab/I'm sure that they're looking for a low-cost utility.
Kanner/What was the--well, that is a concern when you said that they're meeting the state---
Franklin/Yeah. And all the glass is tinted, too. One of the reasons for doing that also is so that it
doesn't emit a lot of light, for instance, in the evening, that you don't have this glowing
thing sticking up in the sky. And so, the glass is all treated, and of course, it's an R factor
that's going to meet the energy standards that are required by the state.
Pfab/I would really be interested if the people that designed this would kind of go through and
explain, I mean, obviously, somebody put a lot of work in it. It would be nice if it would
be a chance for the public to be introduced and also the City Council as to what the
concepts are that they're working on.
Franklin/OK. I'll tell them they should be there.
Kanner/Karin, yeah, I would---
Lehman/Now, is it necessary that they be here?
Champion/No.
O'Donnell/I don't think so.
Lehman/I mean, I have no problem, Irvin, if we want to sit down and talk to them, but having
them sit through three hours of meeting for a question or two, I mean if we have a
question that we could ask them, we could also do that privately.
Pfab/OK, that's fine. I just thought it was an opportunity to highlight something that's going to
have a pretty prominent place in the City.
Lehman/My suspicion is this is going to get a lot of highlights.
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Franklin/We might be able to do something through cable, too.
Pfab/OK.
Kanner/Karin, yeah, I had a question. There was mention of asking them to redesign something
to allow more light into the pedestrian walkway. Can you tell me what that was and how
that was accomplished here? I remember reading minutes from before, that that was one
of the--I think Shelly---
Champion/It was in the memo that that was corrected, that they took care of that.
Franklin/Of letting more light into the pedestrian mall?
Champion/Or providing more light or something.
Kanner/Yeah.
Vanderhoef/It was the lobby.
Kanner/Moving something back so more natural light could shine into the mall so that it
wouldn't block it.
Franklin/I don't recall that being a discussion of Design Review. It was about lighting, but just
so the lighting would not be imposing was Shelly's issue.
Champion/Steve's right. It was to light the pedestrian area, but it said it had been addressed. I
mean, was it in the Planning and Zoning minutes, Steven?
Kanner/It might have been Planning and Zoning.
Champion/I did read it but it---
Kanner/I don't recall where.
Champion/It said it was addressed.
Lehman/I can't remember what it was.
Pfab/It was something about over-flooding the area with light.
Franklin/Right.
Pfab/And the light being directed to certain areas for---
Franklin/There was discussion in Design Review about how much light was going to be on the
exterior of the building and trying to minimize that because there's so much lighting in
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the pedestrian mall. And what they indicated was that there would be some sconces on
the entrance; there might be some subdued lighting on that upper level.
Lehman/Yes.
Franklin/In fact, the architect and I are meeting with a faculty member from the astronomy
department Wednesday to go over any concerns that they have about lighting. But the
lighting that they're going to have on this building is minimal. There'll have to be
something at the very top so that planes don't---
Lehman/Right. It'll be red and blinking.
Kanner/Thank you.
Lehman/Other agenda items?
Item No 16 Continued
Dilkes/Ernie, Dee's question on the reporting of animal bites. It's a violation of the section that
requires the reporting of animal bites.
Lehman/If you don't report you get--°
Dilkes/By certain, by owners, by vets, and that kind of thing. So it's a violation of that section. It
would be a failure to report would be the charge.
Lehman/That's a big difference in reporting and failure to report.
Vanderhoef/OK, and the diseased animal is what?
Lehman/Same thing. Failure to report.
O'Dolmell/Well, whose dog gets it?
Dilkes/It's probably a similar thing. I mean, I can look it up if you want. But what this ordinance
does is it establishes certain violations, or certain fines for violations of these particular
provisions. So you have to look at the provision, see what the provision says, if you don't
do what the provision says, then you're cited for violating it.
Vanderhoef/OK. I'll look it up.
Lehman/OK. Other agenda items?
15. CONSIDER AN ORDINANCE AMENDING CITY CODE TITLE 14, ENTITLED
"UNIFORM DEVELOPMENT CODE," CHAPTER 5, ENTITLED "BUILDING
AND ItOUSING~" ARTICLE E, ENTITLED ~HOUSING CODE," TO ADD
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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)
Vanderhoef/I just wanted to double-check on item 15, the nuisance ordinance. At what point in
the process is there a fine assessed? Is it after they don't show up for the hearing? Or is it
after they've had the hearing and then don't follow through with the agreement?
Dilkes/Well, we're really out of the realm of assessing fines here. We have that ability currently
by charging a municipal infraction and proceeding to court and asking for the assessment
of the fine. What this is about, what this ordinance is about is imposing sanctions against
the rental permit, whether it be a limited term rental permit, the suspension of a permit,
etc., and those sanctions cannot kick in until there has been the meeting held and if
there's an agreement reached, it would have to be a violation of that agreement.
Lehman/OK.
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 PM AND CLOSING.
(SECOND CONSIDERATION)
O'Donnell/Just quickly, Emie, item 17.
Lehman/Yes.
O'Dounell/I understand we're going to have a couple of bar owners speak to us tomorrow night.
Lehman/OK. I imagine we'll have probably more than a couple.
O'Donnell/I said bar owners, not bar patrons.
Lehman/Oh. There'll probably be lots of those, too. Any other agenda items?
Karmer/Well, to get back to Dee, what Dee was talking about. There's, what is the disincentive
for people who don't show up for the meeting? What are we holding over them?
Dilkes/The sanctions. The rental permit sanctions.
Kanner/So, we'll say that come to the meeting, hopefully we can work it out, if you don't even
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April 21, 2003 Council Work Session Page 42
show up, there's a very good chance that we'll go to the next level for the landlord. What
if the tenant does not show up for the meeting? What do we hold over them?
(Whispered) I don't know.
Pfab/Would that be a violation of the lease?
Dilkes/No, it wouldn't be a violation of the lease, not showing up.
Pfab/Would it be eventually written into the lease as we went down?
Dilkes/That could be a possible result of the meeting.
Pfab/In other words, it's a City, it would be a City ordinance that they agreed to, is that right?
That they would agree to follow?
Dilkes/You can always cite the tenant under the municipal infraction provision. But these
sanctions that are being authorized in this ordinance are more directed to the rental
permit, you know.
Vanderhoef/You're talking also about the cash deposit, the certified check are irrevocable
standby letter of credit in the amount of the estimated cost of the enforcement costs to be
determined by the City manager or designee. And this sounds like this is way early in the
process. It's under Section 1 Amendments in the smaller, the third paragraph of the
indented paragraphs. Property Management Performance Guarantee.
Dilkes/What section, Dee, are you?
Vanderhoef/Section 1, first page, towards the bottom, and there are three paragraphs that are
indented.
Dilkes/Yeah, that's a, that's just a definition, Property Management Performance Guarantee,
that's just a definition in that section.
Vanderhoef/Well, but what is that cash deposit or, I mean, I don't understand that.
Dilkes/That's something that could be one of the things that was negotiated at the meeting to
assure performance if certain performances were required by the landlord. And, you
know, I mean, I have to apologize, we've reviewed this, but Doug is not here. He's the
crafter of this ordinance and so exactly how he is anticipating it are questions I can't
really answer.
Kanner/So that property management performance guarantee is in here somewhere in regard to
course of action that we want the landlord to take. Is that part of the process somewhere?
Dilkes/Yeah.
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Kanner/The question is where.
Dilkes/Yeah, here it is. The reduced term rental permit can be conditioned on a number of things
including a property management performance guarantee.
Kanner/Where is that?
Dilkes/Section 8 B, the second full paragraph.
Vanderhoef/8 B? Owr~er and occupant and/or other guest on three or more separate occasions.
Dilkes/Page number 4.
Vanderhoef/Mm-hmm. I see it. Down at the bottom.
Lehman/Steve, is Doug going to be here tomorrow night?
Atkins/Can be.
Lehman/I think Doug should be here tomorrow night. I think there are questions that if we have
him---
Dilkes/Yeah, I think so.
Lehman/Yeah. OK.
Kanner/And in regard to 17. Dee, you had suggested Council have a meeting next week I
believe.
Vanderhoef/It was put out as a possibility in exactly what Mike was saying it appears that there
may be some things being brought forward for our consideration, and I just was giving
people a heads up that these might be possible dates that we could do it, and we won't set
anything until after we hear the proposals. I also hear there's another group that may be
bringing some proposals tomorrow night.
Lehman/So, we'll talk about that tomorrow night.
O'Donnell/Tomorrow night. Good idea.
Lehman/OK.
Vanderhoef/I just wanted you to save it (can't hear). We can always cancel.
Champion/We haven't studied that.
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April 21, 2003 Council Work Session Page 44
Lehman/OK. Anything else on the agenda items?
COUNCIL APPOINTMENTS: PARKS AND RECREATION {1)~ PLANNING AND
ZONING COMMISSION (2)[ POLICE CITIZENS REVIEW BOARD (1)
Lehman/OK. We're going to do Council appointments, the first being Parks and Recreation
Commission.
TAPE 03-34 SIDE ONE
Vanderhoef/The gentleman.
Wilburn/Dave Fleener or Margaret Loomer?
VanderhoefJ Dave Fleener.
O'Donnell/Are you making that suggestion?
Vanderhoef/I would make that.
O'Donnell/I would second that.
Champion/OK. Good.
Lehman/Can I nominate somebody?
O'Donnell/No.
Champion/No.
Wilburn/What's our, what's the balance on Parks and Rec?
Vanderhoef/The balance is correct and in our packet we've got the revised list of attendants
because that is all messed up. I talked with Marilyn Kriz.
Lehman/We have three men and two women on the Commission presently.
Vanderhoef/Five men and three women.
Lehman/Oh.
Vanderhoef/Five and three and it's a nine-person.
Lehman/So you want to go six and three?
Vanderhoef/Well, I was looking at the balance of the present Commissioners and I felt like we
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April 21, 2003 Council Work Session Page 45
had considerable presence on there for parks and trails and that kind of thing, and I
thought perhaps someone who was active in the Recreation part would be a better
balance.
Lehman/I know Margaret. She's a retired person, lived here for 40 years, good lady.
O'Donnell/Well, Ernie, would you like to bring her name forward?
Lehman/I would like to bring Margaret's name forward, yes, but I--is there-°-
Wilburn/I would support Margaret, too.
Pfab/I would support Margaret.
Champion/Well, I think they're both really good. I could support either one.
Lehman/I think they probably both are. Well, I mean, how many would support---
O'Donnell/Why don't we vote?
Lehman/Well, how many would support Margaret?
Vanderhoef/I would.
Lehman/Margaret, you got it, baby.
(Laughter)
Lehman/OK. The next is the Planning and Zoning Commission. We have two vacancies and we
have several applicants.
Champion/We usually have a lot of good applicants.
Lehman/Yes.
Champion/I do think that Ann is just finishing a partial term should continue---
Pfab/I would support that.
Lehman/And Dean the same way.
Champion/And Dean is just finishing his first full term and there are really good candidates. I
didn't realize we're going to be having two reapplications, but I think that that's such a
difficult condition that if somebody is finishing a term successfully, we should keep them
on to have a second term. That's a personal feeling.
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O'Donnell/I agree.
Vanderhoef/I go along with that, especially since we're heading into Code review.
Lehman/Oh, yes.
Vanderhoef/And those folks have committed to additional meetings just for Code review. That's
pretty important to have consistency right now.
O'Donnell/OK, I would just---
Lehman/Do we have consensus on Dean Shannon and Ann Freerks?
(Several speak) Yes.
Lehman/OK, Police Citizen Review Board. OK, then we have three applicants.
O'Donnell/I would recommend Dave Bourgeois for that.
Vanderhoef/This particular slot is for a current or former peace officer.
O'Donnell/That is optional though.
Vanderhoef/And it is optional so we would have to waive that choice and I understand that Dave
is a very outstanding candidate for this; however, as I recall setting up the PCRB, it was
sort of put in there as a "last minute," in case we could not find anyone else.
Lehman/So, what are you saying?
Wilburn/You mean the option? Is that what you're saying?
Vanderhoef/Mm-hmm.
Dilkes/The ordinance specifically says that for good cause, you can waive the peace officer
requirement.
Lehman/"Good cause" meaning you don't have anybody?
Vanderhoef/Well, the good cause---
Dilkes/Yeah, that would be one reason.
Lehman/That'd be a good cause, all right. What's your pleasure, folks?
Champion/Well, we do have somebody who applied who was an ex-police officer. Was it
Ronald Fort?
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Wilburn/Ron Fort.
Vanderhoef/Mm-hmm.
Lehman/My only concern and I think his credentials are stellar; my only concern is that having
served on the fome that any decision made by that board would be subject to a certain
amount of criticism because of the fact that he's a former officer of the police force.
Champion/Iowa City Police.
Vanderhoef/That's what I had looked at, too, and I was trying to weigh whether that was good
reason not to put Ron on because I think he could do a fine job.
Lehman/I do, too.
Vanderhoef/But the criticism piece is there and it's been such a short time since he went off the
force that it could appear as a conflict.
Champion/Why don't we send it out for more applications?
O'Donnell/We've got, you know, I had the same concern with Ron.
Lehman/Well, we've had---
O'Donnell/Well, we do have some very good people in there and Dave Bourgeois a wonderful
person to have on this board.
Lehman/Well, do we have four people who would support Dave Bourgeois?
Champion/Well, I would support him but are we going to have trouble with our own ordinance,
the makeup of the---?
Dilkes/No, I mean, I think that's a reasonable---
Lehman/Yeah, you see, we're making the appointment and we don't feel we have---
Champion/No, I just thought that was not a good idea to appoint an ex-police officer.
Lehman/Your choice is not an ex-police officer.
Champion/Someone who has been on our police force.
Lehman/Well, I don't think it's a good idea either, Connie.
Vanderhoef/Either one could do the job.
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Kanner/Well, ---
Lehman/ Steven?
Kanner/Yeah, I'm a little leery of someone who was so intimately involved, this appearance of
potential conflict of interest, and I'm a little concerned about the choice of David when
he puts your present knowledge of the advisory board--none. But hope that he would at
least look at the website as the other applicant did. And so that's why I'm leaning a bit
toward Candy Bamhill as someone who seemed to put a little more effort into what is it
about--Police Citizen Review Board.
Lehman/Well, let's have a show of hands. How many would support David?
Vanderhoef/Well, David called and visited and I'm comfortable with him.
O'Donnell/That's four.
Kanner/What?
Pfab/I'd rather go with Candy.
Lehman/Or Candy, I'm sorry. We have Candy--we have three. Well, David will be the
appointee.
ItCDC RECOMMENDATION FOR CDBG/ItOME ALLOCATION
Lehman/OK. HCDC Recommendation for home funds, Steve.
Wilburn/I will not be a participant in this conversation due to a conflict of interest for reasons
prior stated.
(Wilbum leaves table)
Nasby/Thank you. I'll let you by. OK. You all had, Karin had brought the large green book, I
believe, to your last meeting that had some project resource markets, it's got all the
minutes and applications in it. In your Council packets there was the annual action plan,
and that is actually what we're having the public hearing on tomorrow evening. First the
annual action plan is a part of our City Steps plan. It's the annual piece that we have to
submit to HUD in order to obtain our financing. And really the basis of the annual action
plan are the allocations of the CBDG and Home Dollars. And I just want to briefly let
you know that kind of the amounts of money that we' re looking at. In Community
Development Block Grant, we had $826,000 this year versus we got $950,000 last year,
so we had a 13-percent reduction, which there was memos in your packet a couple of
months ago outlining those reasons. But we did have some program income that we had
included and some unallocated funds so our total CDBG is $871,000, and then our home
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April 21, 2003 Council Work Session Page 49
entitlement actually went up a little bit. We got $716,000 this year versus $714,000 last
year so it was just a minor incremental difference and some program income. So we have
about $141,448 there for a total of about $1.6 million.
Vanderhoef/Say that second total again, please.
Nasby/The total number for home was $741,448.
Vanderhoeff 741,448.
Nasby/741,448.
Vanderhoef/Thank you.
Nasby/OK. The Housing Community Development Commission had their regular annual
allocation process February 20th. They had all the applicants come forward and present
their applications. There were, I believe there were 25 proposals turned in. Two were
withdrawn, so they actually ended up heating from 23 applicants. March 13th they met
and they discussed all the projects and their rankings and had question-answer session.
And then on March 20th they met and made the recommendations that were forwarded to
you, and you also got in your packets a memorandum from the Housing Community
Development Commission that had all their justifications in there as well as another
memo about the Code enforcement position. So, I trust that you've had that in your
packet and (can't hear) go over all those reasons. HCDC, of the 23 proposals they
considered, 16 of them were funded either fully or partially. And I don't know that there
were many fully funded ones, one or two. Three? And then there were seven that were
not funded. So we had begun this process. We started our 30-day public comment period
on the Annual Action Plan. Tomorrow evening you'll be having the public hearing and
we're asking that you approve this at your May 6th meeting. We do have to turn it in to
HUD by the 15th of May. So that's our regular scheduled process. HCDC will also be
meeting tomorrow evening just prior to your meeting. I guess at this point, if you have
questions about the HCDC recommendations, I can answer them. And there are also three
members from HCDC present tonight, Amy Correia, Matt Hayek, and Jerry Anthony. So
if you have specific questions for them, they're here as well.
Vanderhoef/Well, one of the things that I noted was the letter from the chair about not funding
the housing inspector which leaves a question for Council, just in general, because we
have not funded from the General Fund, and with the way things are going in Des Moines
right now, I don't see that that's a possibility at all.
Lehman/You're right.
Vanderhoef/So, how this plays into our whole conversation of do we feel we need it that bad
and it may have something to do also with whether the Nuisance Ordinance is passed, but
I think there's got to be some discussion on it either now, whether we're going to choose
to fund this person out of CDBG dollars or whether we're making a decision now that we
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April 21, 2003 Council Work Session Page 50
won't have one.
Champion/I don't think we can make the decision that we won't have one.
Lehman/OK. Let's just take that first. I think that the consensus has been that we indeed need
another inspector, that we will have one fi.om somewhere. Is that correct?
Vanderhoef/Well, I'm not as positive about--that we need that inspector. But I think I'm not in
the majority on that one.
Kanner/Well, tell us why (can't hear)
Vanderhoeff I know we have put some added onus onto the housing inspectors to do more
things, but I still have this gut feeling, and I can't prove it one way or another, that maybe
we shouldn't be changing how we do, how often we do some of the inspections. And this
is a balancing act and there's no right answer one way or the other for it. I'm sorry, I just,
I weigh it with the other new employees that we need within the City and I'm just not
totally sure that given, if I were to fund one new employee in the City of Iowa City with
General Funds, I'm not sure that I would choose a housing inspector. I would want to
look at all the, if we could find the money to do it, then I want to look at all of the
possibilities for new employees.
Champion/I'm not willing to fund the housing inspector out of the General Fund.
Vanderhoef/Well, see, that's what I'm coming to the conclusion that we can't really afford to do
that. I'm not sure we can afford the other people that we added in this budget, and if we
get budget changes, we may have to look at all that stuff again.
Lehman/You know, one of the things that that Neighborhood Task Force came back with and I
think one of the biggest things were violations that occur in the Housing Code that we
have for whatever reason have had difficulties enforcing. And I think one of the things
that I heard from Doug is just plain lack of personnel to do it. And if we're really
interested in some of the problems that have occurred in some of the neighborhoods, I
think we really have got to have sufficient inspectors and so on to enforce the Code.
Pfab/Is there anyone here from the Board or Commission that could speak to that?
Nasby/Yeah, there are three here. You've got a memo in your packet as to---
Pfab/I mean I think that might be helpful if someone would want to come forward.
Vanderhoef/It won't help me. I've read their memo and I understand the position that they're
taking.
CorreiaJ I'm prepared to address it.
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(Laughter)
Kanner/Well, it's good to hear it.
Lehman/Well, no, no. I think that can happen tomorrow night or maybe later, but the work
sessions are intended to work with Council. The public meetings are intended to work
with the public.
Pfab/I believe you said that there, that you were here to speak to it, and that was the reason I
brought it forth.
Nasby/If you had specific questions that you wanted to ask them, they are here.
Lehman/OK.
Pfab/I mean I wasn't--because you had brought it up---
Nasby/Yeah, that's at your discretion.
Lehman/Well, let's get past the first issue. Do we feel that we have a need, based on what we've
been told, for another housing inspector?
Champion/I thought it's been made quite clear.
Pfab/Yes, I think there's a need for it.
Lehman/And you are reticent?
Vanderhoef/Mm-hmm.
Lehman/Steven?
Kanner/I'm leaning towards the need but I'm, I'd like to discuss it more, what other options
might be available.
Lehman/Well, I, Steve, can you address this? I don't know what options are available.
Atkins/Well, there really aren't a whole heck ora lot of them. I mean, the recommendation for
the housing inspector coming from the CDBG program was done with some reluctance,
but we have to be realistic about it. I£you pass this new ordinance, it's going to expand
the duties and responsibilities of our housing inspectors. Secondly, there's no doubt that
the number of housing units that these individuals are responsible for has grown
dramatically. I don't know the number but I do recall at one time we're talking thousands
more units.
Vanderhoef/Well, I---
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Atkins/I cannot think of a general--I'm sorry, Dee.
Vanderhoef/I was just going to clarify again ifI remember correctly when I asked you Steve that
what our percent of administration was out of our total Home and CDBG, you said that
we use about 7 percent and the federal law allows us up to 20.
Nasby/No, 7 percent is about what we don't use. We use about 13 or so.
Vanderhoef/So we've got 7 percent left. OK.
Nasby/In CDBG, in Home it's capped at 10 percent and all that is allocated to the admin.
Vanderhoef/So there would be enough still with 7 percent of our administrative dollars to fund
this? Because I'm presuming a $50,000---
Nasby/It'd be fairly close, the 7 percent would.
Atkins/Steve, can you define this as an administrative position?
Nasby/That would be the difficult part.
Atkins/That's what I---
Nasby/It wouldn't really qualify. It's not the general oversight of the CDBG process, the sub-
recipients or the projects. So it would be very difficult to put it there, and I don't know
that that's what Dee was suggesting, that we put it under Admin, but we use the excess
dollars that we could have used for Admin for something else.
Vanderhoef/Mm-hmm.
Nasby/...or if that's your point.
Vanderhoef/That that's always been going into the programming dollars.
Nasby/Yeah, what we haven't used for Admin does go back into the pot, that's correct.
Vanderhoef/So we've been very judicious in that.
Nasby/The 13 percent is an overall number. That's the whole CDBG combined, so actually the
Home percentage at 10, CDBG is probably a little higher; it's probably about 16 that we
use for a combined number of 13. So there wouldn't be quite 7 percent in CDBG. It
would be somewhat less.
Vanderhoef/But 10 is maximum?
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Nasby/Ten is maximum for Home, yes.
Vanderhoef/Well, it's just another way of looking at it.
Atkins/Anyway, Emie, hopefully back to your original question---
Lehman/Yes.
Atkins/...is that I think Dee's comment right out of the chute was that since we don't know
what's going on in Des Moines and the impact of those kind of changes, I think it makes
the General Fund even more---
Vanderhoef/Sensitive.
Atkins/...sensitive to any kinds of changes you might want. If, again, please, I don't mean this to
sound threatening, but if you approve the Nuisance, the new ordinance, I don't think
there's any doubt it's going to expand the responsibilities of the housing inspection
operations, the number of units has increased. The Commission and rightfully so makes a
strong argument that that's the type of service that should be funded with our General
Fund. And to get down to the bottom line is we just simply cannot afford to do all the
things we want to do out of the General Fund.
Lehman/Steve, if that ordinance were not passed, are you saying we would not need another
inspector?
Atkins/I would say that it diminishes, but at the same time we still have to continue the fact that,
look at our building permit activity and our multiple family units continues to grow. If
you didn't add it this year, I'm sum we'd be back next year. Now, are them other
options? Yeah, you could expand the housing inspection fees. It does not fully support
itself as our building inspection does. But we just went through a rather dramatic change,
if you'll recall, and we boosted those substantially. You could do it again. You could take
other fees from building and help subsidize housing. But then again, and I don't mean to
be the wet blanket, if something comes out of Des Moines in the next few weeks, we're
going to be scrambling anyway and this is going to be really not that big an issue because
you're going to be looking at far more severe budget cuts.
Vanderhoef/And by that time we will have certified this particular pot of money where it is legal
to do it, whether we choose to do it or not. So, it's a large dilemma. I'm inclined to think
that we need to take it out of this if the housing, Nuisance Ordinance doesn't pass. I see
no way we're going to end up taking it out of General Funds.
Champion/Dee, I haven't heard one of us say we're willing to take it out of the General Fund.
Atkins/Yeah. I personally don't think you can.
Lehman/I don't think there's any money there.
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Vanderhoef/And our other choice is that---
Champion/This is a moot point.
Atkins/This is it.
Vanderhoef/This is it or not at all.
Atkins/Yeah.
Champion/Right.
O'Donnell/Well, and we just, we already passed the first reading of a Nuisance Ordinance and I
don't know if I'm willing to proceed with that if we're going to throw more burden on
the existing inspectors.
Lehman/We haven't passed it yet.
Dilkes/No.
Lehman/First reading's tomorrow night.
O'Donnell/First reading is coming tomorrow. Well, we've had our public hearing, Emie, and
this thing is set in motion to go. And I don't know how willing I am to support it if we're
going to put more burden on existing inspectors.
Pfab/I, since Steve made the offer, I was present when this was being discussed at the CDBG
meeting and I was kind of surprised at some of the things I learned. But that was why I
was hoping this would be a chance for the people on this Commission to address us with
what their thoughts were on it, if that's permissible.
Lehman/Well, Irvin, we've had a---
Champion/ Did you read the (can't hear). People don't like it.
Vanderhoef/You got the memo.
Lehman/Pretty clear memo as to their position on it.
Vanderhoef/It's well written.
Kanner/Is there anything new to add to the memo?
Correia/To respond to you?
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Dilkes/I think you have to be a little cautious about forming any opinions at this point before the
public hearing. The public hearing is tomorrow night and you need to listen to anybody
who chooses to come to talk to you about this before you make your decisions.
Pfab/So, Eleanor, are you saying this is not the time to have those people address us?
Vanderhoef/Mm-hmm.
Dilkes/No, that's certainly up to the mayor and the Council, but my only point is other people
may want to talk to you tomorrow night too.
Atkins/Emie,---
Lehman/Let me--I'm sorry.
Atkins/May I comment?
Lehman/Yes.
Atkins/I think I sense that the Housing Commission is due to meet tomorrow night and while
you can't vote, some expression, if this position is something that you make a priority, I
think they'd like to take a look at what other adjustments they might have to make in the
CD, in the Home program, in order to accommodate your interests. If there's no interest
in funding the position, then you have their recommendations and I don't think it
influences tomorrow night. Is that--
Dilkes/But, remember, it's only the public hearing tomorrow night.
Atkins/Right. I understand that.
Dilkes/There's no vote scheduled for tomorrow night.
Atkins/I understand that.
Champion/Except they have to have this turned in by the 15th of May.
Atkins/Well, we have to settle in on exactly how the monies are going to be distributed before
then.
Champion/Right.
Lehman/If there's an inclination on the part of the Council to fund the inspector out of the
CDBG money, it is important that the Committee understand that and have the ability to
reallocate the funds or-and you say they're meeting tomorrow night, Steve?
Nasby/Yeah, they have the regular scheduled meeting tomorrow evening.
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Atkins/Emie, can I just--Steve, have I spoken properly about that issue?
Nasby/Mm-hmm.
Atkins/OK.
Kanner/Steve, would you reiterate what are the key issues of why HC did not want it funded out
of CDBG--what are the top two or three points?
Nasby/Based on the discussion and I believe your memo, that they believe that it is this function
if City is going to take on zoning and enforcement, therefore it's a public safety and
therefore should be a priority in your General Fund versus coming from the block grants.
Dilkes/Can I--I think it is. You're holding a public hearing on the recommended allocations to
change the, we have time to have the public hearing, to have Council give its sense of
what they're thinking after you hear those comments, and then have suggested
reallocations if you need that. But I don't think it makes sense to have a public hearing on
a set of recommendations that are---
Lehman/ No, I---
Dilkes/...now in the process of being changed between now and the public hearing.
Lehman/What I think I hear you say is that if we are interested in changing the allocations that
have been presented to us, we'd need to indicate that tomorrow night at the public
hearing.
Dilkes/That's right.
Lehman/That is the appropriate time to do that, not tonight at a work session.
Dilkes/That's fine.
Lehman/All right. So then we will limit the discussion tonight to the recommendations of the
Commission if there's any discussion on the part of the Council prior to the hearing.
Dilkes/Emie, I think you can talk about it. You just shouldn't cement, I mean, you shouldn't
form an opinion or take a position until you hear the comments of the public tomorrow.
CorreiaY I just have two other comments beyond the issue of, that was raised in the memo
specifically.
Atkins/Amy---
Dilkes/Use the microphone.
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Atkins/Scoot over, OK?
Correia/Around this funding decision besides the specific points in the memo, if you look at the
average score of all eight members who scored it, it, the average score was 49 and the
score sheets that you all reviewed and passed for our use says that average score, scores
under 60, there's no zero allocated funds. There are other areas of the application that
scored low. You compare it to other applications, the medium priority although we do
fund other medium priority projects, it's also, doesn't serve as it states in the application
any beneficiaries in the zero to 50 percent of median family income. And it's 100 percent
publicly funded, and we do score high, and that's been a priority for the Council in the
past to score, or to fund projects that have match with other funds and it is shown that
they have looked for other funding sources. And so those are, beyond the memo, those
are the other factors involved in the decision.
Champion/Amy, I'm not surprised by your rating it low. If I was on your Commission, I would
rate it low, too.
(Laughter)
Champion/But I'm not, I'm on the City Council and I have to deal with other things--they
should be low, if your Commission is dping their job.
Lehman/OK. Thank you, Amy. All right, is there a further discussion relative to this tonight? I
have a question--go ahead.
Champion/Yes, I had another question and I don't know if this is the right time, but the letter in
our packets, I don't have my computer with me, about, remember, we talked about
adding, is that the same money adding that 1 pement payback in terms to---
Lehman/ No, there's several letters relative to that.
Vanderhoef/There's two or three of those.
Champion/Well, isn't that these funds?
Atkins/Yes.
Lehman/Yes.
Champion/Yeah, I think we need to talk about that again because it is going to damage some of
those building projects.
Vanderhoel7 We can do that at the, and the recommendations that HCDC did---
Champion/Right.
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Vanderhoef/...matched up with those with the exception of the one private one and there's no,
that was what I was going to ask--there's no recommendation whether it's a grant or a
loan to the transitional housing, the very last--no? There's no terms listed for the Emma
Goldman Clinic.
Nasby/You asked about the Successful Living, is that the---
Vanderhoef/And the Successful Living.
Nasby/That was 30, or 1 percent, which was on the HCDC justification sheet.
Vanderhoef/And Successful Living said that---
Nasby/They have a letter in your packet asking for that to be waived.
Lehman/Right.
Vanderhoef/But there's no terms on the Emma Goldman and that's the very last one.
Nasby/No, HCDC didn't have any terms on their recommendation. The applicant, I believe, did
request a grant.
Vanderhoef/Mm-hmm. They did.
Lehman/Right.
Nasby/As you, per your policy, public facilities projects are conditional occupancy loans, which
means there's no way, there's no payments for as long as they operate the facility; at such
time they change use, they pay it all back. But there was a letter asking for that to be
waived because they weren't, they didn't feel that they were making appreciable value.
VanderhoefJ Mm-hmm.
Nasby/You know, positive changes to that building.
Lehman/Right.
Nasby/They would instead depreciate over time, so.
Lehman/We got a letter to that.
Kanner/(can't hear) the housing projects are supposed to have that. Or private prior.
Nasby/Correct.
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Vanderhoef/Well, they just had listed---
Champion/So we were talking about, I mean, I was concerned about the letters from the
nonprofits to the---
Vanderhoef/Habitat to Humanity.
Lehman/4C's, Habitat---
Champion/And I don't know if that's where we address this or not, but I think it's a concern
that's been raised and we said we would look at it, it would be a big concern. I think it
has become a big concern. I think we need to rediscuss that.
Vanderhoef/On the nonprofits?
Champion/Right.
Vanderhoef/On Greater Iowa City Housing Fellowship---
Nasby/They withdrew their application.
Vanderhoef/They did?
Nasby/Yeah.
Vanderhoef/For this reason?
Nasby/No, not for this reason. They were able to swing the Student Built House Project with
one of their ongoing activities.
Vanderhoef/Oh, good. OK.
Lehman/We have four letters.
Vanderhoef/So they were the only other one and Habitat had said we'll take another look at it,
but now we've got the letter and they've taken another look at it and I think you're right,
Connie, that we need to take a look on that one.
Champion/It sounded like a great plan, but I think in reality it's going to create problems.
Vanderhoeff Well, on that particular one. And I think we can waive it per project so that we are
looking at individual projects.
Lehman/You mean, without any guidelines?
Champion/No, I think we waive it for all nonprofits.
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Lehman/I think you have to have a policy. I don't think you can go project by project.
Vanderhoef/You don't think so?
Lehman/No, I'd think they have to have an expectation of what to expect from us rather than
have them making a political decision---
Nasby/That will help the applicants when we go through the funds (can't hear)
Vanderhoef/That's true.
Lehman/Well, yeah, somebody likes Habitat and somebody hates it, suddenly they get it or
don't get it, it has to be a policy.
Champion/I mean I'm just suggesting that we waive all those nonprofits.
Lehman/I'm not sure we can talk about this right now, can we?
Nasby/It's part of the criteria.
Lehman/It's close. All right.
(Laughter)
Lehman/We're on the verge.
Kanner/The three nonprofits have all requested waiving for the housing, the 1 percent?
Lehman/Actually there's four.
Champion/Four.
Lehman/4C's, Elder Services.
Nasby/4C's is a public facility but is not a housing project that Steven was talking about.
Kanner/They're, what are they asking to (can't hear)
Nasby/Very similar to the Emma Goldman request, that they're asking that the conditional
occupancy loan be waived and that funds be strictly a grant.
Kanner/Strictly a grant.
Nasby/Yes.
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Kanner/And these were recommended as (can't hear), the Emma Goldman and the--
Nasby/The Emma Goldman one HCDC did not state a term and, but they did ask for a grant; the
applicant did ask for a grant. And 4C's, HCDC did recommend a grant.
Kanner/How does that figure into your planning staff or agency when loans or grants---
Nasby/Well, what it does for---
Kanner/What's your (can't hear)
Nasby/Well, what we're trying to do with, I think, in our discussions with you all for the
program through both CDBG and Home monies, as the federal pot of monies is
shrinking, we're getting less from Washington, we want to recover as many of these
monies as we can for future use within the program. So, you know, you may make a grant
now that helps an agency, but it's, that's a one-time type investment and in some cases,
you know, those investments are going to depreciate and in some cases, they're not going
to depreciate because someone may build a building or something like that, so there's a
little difference in those. But if we had the conditional occupancy loan or we have a
payback loan, as we do for the housing projects, that's revenue that will be coming back
into the program that we can then allocate to other projects in the future.
Kanner/So, Emma Goldman's thinking in maybe 20 years down the road, they might want to
move into a bigger facility and they would at that time they would be subject to paying
back the COL.
Nasby/That's correct.
Kanner/And at that time we could say we're going to forgive it, couldn't we?
Nasby/That is always Council's prerogative.
Kanner/So, yeah, I would, so that's something that we can discuss like down the road that---
Nasby/You've changed your mind on interest rates, so, you can change your mind.
Kanner/But keeping us, the possibility of keeping a COL with the thought that if someone, it
was such dire straits 10-20 years down the mad or perhaps the Council at that time could
forgive that. But I think we need to keep the money circulating as much as possible.
Lehman/I absolutely agree, but in some respects I think some of these are recirculation policy, if
you will, of 1 percent. It seems to be defeating some of the projects that we're trying to
support.
Kanner/Well, that one I think I would tend to agree with you for the housing projects.
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Lehman/Yeah.
Kanner/If they can't swing it at ail, we (can't hear) consider. I don't know about the other ones;
Habitat said that they cannot?
Vanderhoef/Well, they recirculate their money, which when they get paid back from the people
who buy the homes from Habitat, that money does recirculate back into---
Nasby/Within Habitat.
Vanderhoef/...within Habitat so they are meeting the objective that we were looking for in
having money recirculate into more housing.
Nasby/And that's a COL point.
Kanner/I was saying that Habitat has told us that they cannot, unless they're in this letter it says
something, I haven't read the latest letter, but they said that they cannot pay loans with
interest---
Lehman/Right.
Kanner/...rate. Did other groups say that that's their national local policy also?
Nasby/No, no, Habitat was the only one that had a national policy issue.
Champion/It's the only national.
Nasby/I think that is the only national organization that we're dealing with.
Vanderhoef] Mm-hmm.
Kanner/And I thought there was going to be some talk with them if that could be waived or not.
Vanderhoef/Well, we got the letter that said---
Nasby/That's why you got the letter, that's what you're doing.
Vanderhoef/...that they can't.
Kanner/OK. I haven't, but they said that they have no way of waiving it?
Champion/No, we need to waive it.
Nasby/That's their indication to you---
Kanner/No, but I'm saying
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Nasby/...is that they can't take it if the interest is attached.
Kanner/And I, OK.
Nasby/That's their letter.
Kanner/That's their final---
Lehman/Right.
Nasby/That's the final word, yeah.
Kanner/And the other ones though have not said that?
Nasby/No.
Pfab/I think they made a point and I was just looking for it and I couldn't see it here--that of the
money that some kind of a ratio of what they were giving and what they gave back or
what they reinvested or---
Nasby/Habitat's?
Pfab/I think there was, I heard or saw a discussion, if anybody has kind of thumbnail to that.
From what I recall, the money that we gave them, they have at this point already
reinvested more money back into the community than what we gave them. Is that because
of the payments that these are coming in and they're putting it back into new projects
here? Is that---
Champion/It doesn't have to be here.
Pfab/Well, I'm talking here though.
Nasby/No, Connie's correct. Habitat, Iowa Valley Habitat does not have to reinvest just in Iowa
City properties.
Pfab/Right. But I mean, they gave, I thought they gave some kind of a performance of what---
Nasby/They handed out a flow chart to the Housing Community Development Commission that
broke down those investments. I will get you a copy of that if---
Pfab/Yeah, I was wondering if anybody could summarize that.
Nasby/No. It's not (can't hear)
Champion/You know, it's not important to me whether they put it here or somewhere else, as
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they're doing a j ob throughout the country; they're doing a great j ob and I'm j ust--I don't
our 1 pement idea to hamper that program, that's my only concern.
Vanderhoef/I think we were most interested in private development paying back into the
program. So I'm OK with---
Champion/Property linking.
VanderhoefJ Mm-hmm.
Lehman/Yeah.
Kanner/Steve?
Nasby/Yes.
Kanner/Eagle's Flight are they taking flight actually, there's been some holdups on that?
Nasby/They are very close to opening. They've gotten some of their approvals that they needed.
They're waiting, this will fund, I believe, some of the flooring that they need to put in and
then they're ready to go. They did get a grant from the County for some of the
operational dollars. So, they do look like they're about to take off, yes.
Lehman/OK, are we going to reserve our comments for the rest of this for tomorrow night?
O'Donnell/I think we should. I'd like set tomorrow night, Emie.
Lehman/All right. I think that's it, Steve.
Nasby/I appreciate it. Thank you very much.
Lehman/The inner office actually has given me an ultimatum. There will be a short break.
(Laughter)
O'Donnell/About a half an hour.
Lehman/Thank you.
Vanderhoeff Oh.
SENIOR CENTER FUNDING
(Wilburn returns to table)
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Lehman/Jay and Linda, Senior Center funding.
Honohan/Mr. Mayor, members of the Council. Just a little background, for several months the
Senior Center Commission has been reviewing the situation that was precipitated by the
County's decision to terminate the 28-E agreement and not to fund at the same level that
they have funded in the past. We have held four meetings in which we encouraged
participants to attend while we've been reviewing the many aspects of this problem. We
had probably the first three meetings somewhere between 25 and 30 people attending,
maybe a little more than that. Then on the fourth meeting we had approximately 15,
maybe a dozen. We listened and heard a lot of their suggestions. We listened. We didn't
adopt all of the suggestions, although we did make a lot of changes as a result of the input
that we received. And then a few weeks ago, we held a public hearing at the Senior
Center in which at least 50, maybe 60-75, people attended and we got their input and
from there, we made our final decision and adopted the proposal that we sent to you in
your packets, the Senior Center memorandum. I think that memorandum is dated April
1st, 2003. Obviously, the most controversial item was the aspect of membership fees. We
maintained or retained or whatever you want to say the two levels of participation that we
had originally started with. The first level, of course, is no membership fee and you're
entitled to participate in the dining program, ARP, all those things that are offered at the
Senior Center. Then at the second level, we are proposing a membership fee which will
come before you maybe tomorrow night, maybe on May 6th, for adoption. We also
adopted a program for donations towards the operation fund. The membership fees that
we are proposing are on page 4 of your memorandum. I'd like to make one correction.
There's a couple of typos. In paragraph 9, number 9 on page 4, the Iowa City people
would pay $25 and $15 for the second person in the family. We made that consistent and
the same percentage applies then to the non-Iowa City residents of $40 and $25 for the
additional family member and the Johnson County residents, it's $60, non-Johnson
County, I should say, and $36 for each additional member. In addition to that, we have
adopted or proposed for you to consider a contributions that are shown on page 5 in
which we will give recognition to contributors, and we got the bronze, the silver, the
gold, the platinum. This is very similar to what we have done with the skywalk, if you
recall. We gave mention to all those contributors who contributed to the skywalk. We
think the other item that, of course, is somewhat controversial was the question of the
name of the Senior Center. And this proposal is recommending that we appoint a group
of people, both participants and non-participants, to study this issue. This is something
that has been around for a long time. I was on a task force several years ago on the Senior
Center or for the Senior Center and that was something we debated at that time, and it
simply hasn't gone away. And many senior centers throughout the country are changing
the name or getting rid of the name "Senior" because that gives an image that some
people feel excludes them or they don't want to come to the Senior Center because of the
image that it's old, frail, elderly-type people. But this is just a matter of a study at this
time; there's been nothing done definite done by the Commission although we feel
strongly that it should be studied, and many of the Commission members feel that it
should be changed. With that, we explored a lot of alternatives. I think you may know
that we started out with an idea of membership fees of $50 and for out-of-city $75; we
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have reduced that to the $25, $40 level that you see. We are again talking about a
foundation and I have been in contact with the County, the foundation, or the Chamber of
Commerce has started, and we're considering getting into that as part of our program.
The memorandum kind of says it all, and I've kind of summed up the high points. I
would say I was a little disappointed to hear that you are going to defer us or that you are
thinking of deferring us from tomorrow's meeting. We're going to need some time to
implement this program and the sooner we get started with it, the better. And there's
going to be a lot of changes and we're going to have to have a lot of publicity and a lot of
administrative stuff, so. We have received the input. It's my understanding that Heritage
is the one, Heritage Task Force is the one that's asking for the deferral. We have several
recommendations we received from them that we considered. We did not adopt several of
them, but I think all of this input has been given to us. I recognize that we're after the
alcohol ordinance---
(Laughter)
Honohan/...maybe you could move us forward from the alcohol ordinance. Without any further
comment on the alcohol ordinance, I can entertain any questions from the Council. I
don't want to take up any more of your time, it's late--but if you have questions. Yes,
Irvin?
Pfab/On the contributions, how---
TAPE 03-34, SIDE TWO
Pfab/...are these a tax deductible?
Honohan/Yes, they are.
Pfab/They are tax deductible.
Lehman/You know, Jay, I think the only reason that we are considering deferring this, and I
certainly appreciate the amount of work that's going to be involved in implementing what
you're suggesting, but I do think that there are some folks who perhaps do not necessarily
agree with your reconmaendations who feel they had, they need the opportunity to be
heard by the Council. And I think everybody on the Council probably concurs that
everybody has their day to make their presentation, and I, it doesn't say that anything pro
or con as far as your report's concerned, it just says that they need an opportunity, and
they've asked for an oppommity. And if they have the opportunity to make their
presentation tomorrow night, depending on how long this goes, but my guess is that they
make a presentation, Council will want to kind of at least contemplate what they've had
to say. And I have no problem with making a decision at the first meeting of May. I do,
unless they are satisfied that they have made their presentation in total tomorrow night, I
think we probably will wait until the first meeting in May.
Honohan/Well, one of the things you might do, I think Eleanor said that you could, move us up
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ahead of the alcohol ordinance and then that would give them a chance to visit.
Lehman/There might be several benefits from that.
(Laughter)
Honohan/I understand and I know that some of the people that object to some of the things in
the program, we indicated to them that we would have the work session today and we
would have the Council on the agenda for tomorrow. So, it's really not a surprise to
anybody as to what has been going on. We made that clear on the March 24th meeting
that it would probably happen in April. As I say, I think that this has been thrashed out in
five public meetings. We listened. We did not agree. Some of the suggestions are they
want a uniform fee so that the County people would pay no more than the City people.
We rejected that. Some of the, one of the suggestions that they wanted is to invade the
Gift fund. The Gift fund is specifically for programs and services. We have clung to that
for sometime; we have used it that way; the people like myself who have contributed to
this fund contributed on that basis, that it was not for operational expenses. There has
been talk of a sort of a regional Senior Center. Whether we like it or not, we have a
regional Senior Center right now. It may not be sharing the participation by Coralville,
North Liberty, or the County to the extent that they should, but we've got that, and it
wouldn't, it isn't fair to the Iowa City taxpayers to support this without these membership
fees and the City of Iowa City since we contribute the most, I think the City of Iowa City
is the logical entity to direct the operations of the Senior Center.
Vanderhoef/Jay?
Honohan/Yes.
Vanderhoef/When you talk about funding by the various bodies and so forth, was there any
discussion about the double taxation on the Iowa City residents since the County has
assured us that they are paying for the Senior Center participation out of their General
Fund, not out of the Rural Fund?
Honohan/I, sometime ago, Dee, I made supervisors a little upset by saying that I was a second-
class citizen because I was being charged twice.
Vanderhoef/Mm-hmm,
Honohan/I have raised the question of double taxation before. I think at one of the joint City-
County meetings, Coralville raised that same issue. It falls on deaf ears. At the present
time, their $75,000 is a balance. The City of Iowa City has 68 percent approximately, a
little bit over that, of the registered participants at the Senior Center. We have by giving
80 percent, the City is contributing an additional $76,000-$77,000, which equals, as far as
I'm concerned, the County's contribution of $75,000. That's why I'm very comfortable
with the fact that we are charging County residents $40 to be a member, out-of-city
residents, excuse me. Yes, Mike?
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O'Donnell/You know, first, I really think it's disappointing that in a County like ours that we
can't go around to the different municipalities and come up with $50,000. I don't know
how well we've tried that but I do--I think if we're going to encourage membership and
try and grow, now I'm wondering is the $40 going to be a detriment to bringing in real
participants?
Honohan/The only actual survey that was taken shows no. Nancy Wombacher took a survey of
the New Horizons Band and the majority, and in fact, several were very willing to pay
$100. The majority were ready to pay $50 plus. So it did not seem to be a deterrent at that
time. In fact, one interesting aspect was we originally had in the plan exempting people
85 and over from paying the membership fee, and at the public meeting we had
complaints because they were being left out. They wanted to pay the $25 fee.
O'Donnell/Can't you just exempt them and give them parking?
Lehman/ Now you've gone too far.
(Laughter)
Champion/No, no, we don't do free parking.
Honohan/Well, I have an excellent parking plan for the seniors. It is in effect or (can't hear)
Champion/I know you've put in hours and hours and hours of work, and I'm disappointed it
being deferred, too. But I tell you that you've got just as much division on this issue as
we do on the alcohol ordinance. I cannot believe.
Honohan/I don't think so. I don't think so.
Champion/You've got a lot.
Honohan/I think we have some very strong adverse reaction to this program. But the majority of
the people at the meetings that we attended were in favor of paying membership fees.
Champion/I agree.
Honohan/Not 100 percent, not even close. But the majority of the people that attended those
meetings were in favor of paying membership fees.
Lehman/Well, you know, obviously, I think just the fact that there's a significant amount of
disagreement indicates one thing that's very positive, there's a lot of people really care
about the Senior Center.
Honohan/Yes, sir.
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Lehman/I mean, if they didn't care, you wouldn't hear anything. So, obviously, you've got a lot
of people who really care, and I know I speak for Council with--you've gone through an
awful lot of work on this thing, and we appreciate the work that you've done. Obviously,
I don't know of any other department of the City when they're short of funds that sits
down and goes to some sort of program to raise their own money. Parks and Recreation
Commission does what--they try to do 40 percent, I think, on the basis of fees, but---
Honohan/Yes.
Vanderhoef/Forty to (can't hear)
Lehman/ I admire the work that you guys have done. And obviously you're getting shot at all
the time.
Honohan/Well, I see this as both a challenge and an opportunity. I think that when, and this is a
personal feeling, that when you have a stake in the program or the project which is a
membership fee, that you are going to be a better participant because then you're a
stockholder. Yes?
Kanner/Emie, I've a few questions.
Lehman/Go ahead.
Kanner/I'm leaning towards thinking that the fees are excessive. I guess that's my main
complaint then that even your own projections show that too many people are not going
to take advantage of the membership.
Honohan/We no longer have that 40 percent projection. I think it's much less now after going
through the meetings.
Kanner/I'm not so sure that it won't be that high, but I still am leaning towards wanting a lower
amount but let me ask you a few questions about your proposal. First of all, you have an--
and Linda might have to answer this or her staff--you have a proposal that class
instructors are going to pay 25 percent of their gross revenue, what was it before and
have you talked to some of the instructors and is there a sense that you might lose a great
amount of them if you're increasing the take from the Senior Center?
Kopping/The policy for independent contractors has been depending upon the level of support
we provide. We either collect 15 percent of their gross revenue or 25 percent. People
have been paying 25 percent for probably five years and I don't foresee any problems
with continuing with that.
Kanner/So, it's for the most part, it's been 25 percent. You haven't done the 15 percent option?
Kopping/It will be an increase for maybe one of the independent contractors but for all the
fitness instructors, they've been paying 25 percent.
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Kanner/So the art people and the classes, the book reading, are they?
Kopping/No.
Kanner/They volunteer?
Kopping/Right. This would only apply to instructors who want to collect a fee for their services.
And they charge the participants directly, and they, the instructor, has an opportunity
before the class starts to sit down and calculate the number of students they set as the
minimum of eurollees so that they can ensure that they have a salary that will satisfy
them plus the fee that they pay us for the use of our services and equipment. And I also
should add that that fee has typically gone back into our fund to purchase the equipment
that's used in the classes. For instance, the money collected through independent
contractors in the fitness classes, that money is used to buy things like treadmills and
weights and resistance bands and yoga mats and such. That's what it's been used for in
the past.
Kanner/My understanding is that instructors have a choice of whether they're going to charge
money or not and that there's some, whether it's fitness or whether it's a class on the
Bible or a class on painting, some charge, some don't charge.
Kopping/That's correct.
Kanner/And so for painting, what do they, do they typically give 25 percent at the current time?
Kopping/The painters give 15 percent at the current time.
Kanner/OK. So this is going to raise it to 25 percent to everybody across the board.
Kopping/That will be up to how the independent contractor and how he or she wishes to handle
the situation.
Kanner/But if they're going to charge something, they have to give 25 percent?
Kopping/That's correct. They'd be using a City-supported facility to generate personal income.
Kanner/Right.
Kopping/And we charge them for that.
Kanner/So it's going up for those that are charging money, it goes from 15 to 25 percent, and
those people said they're fine with it?
Kopping/I have not heard any complaints from any of the current independent contractors.
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Kanner/Has there been any kind of survey of these people? Julie, you're the person who
oversees some of these folks?
Seal/Yes, I am.
Kanner/You have to talk into a mic.
Seal/The person that I'm aware of that charges 15 percent is aware that it will go up to 25 and
that person is either fine with that or will adjust his fee to recapture the additional 10
percent.
Kanner/So, fees might be rising.
Seal/They might be. It will depend on what he or she chooses to assess.
Kanner/And one of the concerns that people had was there are some funds available for low-
income people and they're feeling that it would be hard for people to come forward and
access that. What's the situation now of how many people are accessing that and how
easy is that to do for people to access funds?
Kopping/The scholarship program we have for classes is, as far as I know, has never been used.
The low-income subsidy program we have for the parking program has been used by
several people, and they go through the person who sells the parking permits for that. It
has not been problematic. And I would anticipate that the, although the policy hasn't been
set yet, but I would anticipate that the membership subsidy program would mirror our
parking program.
Kanner/So, if they signed up for a class and they say they can't afford that class, who would
they go to to get the scholarship?
Kopping/Well, we try to set it up so that everybody goes to, for instance, for a class scholarship
they would talk to Julie. Or they could talk to Michele who handles the registration. For
our membership, that would be handled through our secretary, Michele. That's the only
person who would need to know about it.
Kan_neff I had more but go ahead.
Pfab/OK. I have a quick, real one simple question. What percentage or what is the number of
people who are asking for assistance in the parking program?
Kopping/Less than five.
Pfab/Five percent or five?
Kopping/Less than five total.
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Pfab/Out of how many?
Kopping/About 200.
Kanner/Jay, does it specifically spell out about the Gift Fund is only to be used for programs and
services? Is that in the mission of the Gift Fund? If it is, could you give me a copy of
that?
Honohan/I don't have a copy right with me, but we can get you a copy. But it's a resolution that
sets up the Gift Fund passed by the City Council which said it was for programs and
services.
Kanner/OK. And you're, so you're defining that as---
Honohan/Programs and services. Not, we don't want to heat the building.
Kanner/Capital?
Honohan/No, capital improvements to the building, no heating and air conditioning of the
building. It's for programs and services. For instance, we have supplemented the picnic
from time to time; we have spent some money out of the Gift Fund to add to the
Thanksgiving meal with a special dessert type deal. We recently purchased or authorized,
I don't know if we've actually pumhased it, equipment for the treadmill and Aerodyne
bike and PowerPoint presentation so that the presentations at the assembly room could be
more effective and better operated. We have in the past given money out of the Gift Fund
to the Senior Center television to try to again increase the participation through the Cable
TV operation. These are what we define as programs and services.
Kanner/But it was used for the bridge?
Honohan/No.
Kanner/What gift fund did that come out of, $40,000?
Honohan/Those were direct bequests.
Kanner/No, there were some that came from a previous Gift Fund that was listed as part of that,
a significant portion, I'm pretty sure of that.
Honohan/Joella Antes?
Kanner/There was something like $40,000 that came from a gift fund.
Honohan/No, I don't think so. We used the Joella Antes and that was $25,000.
Kanner/And what was her gift fund? This was just specifically set up for the bridge?
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Honohan/No, she passed away and left that to the Senior Center.
Kanner/And it was put into the General Gift Fund. But my point is that you could talk about
going into that and see, you're one person who's opposed to it, but I think other people
would think that that's a good use of the Gift Fund. They give their dollars every month. I
know there's a lot of people that give a dollar a month and that's getting to be a pretty big
amount, but it's something that I think bears looking into, to see who would strongly
oppose that.
Honohan/Well, if I may, in addition to myself that strongly opposes it, one of the first thing that
I see about the Gift Fund, you start spending the Gift Fund and it's gone. It doesn't
replenish itself. So it's not an ideal situation as far as I'm concerned for operational
expenses which go on year after year after year. And also, people like myself and others
who, Mrs. Hirt, I remember I went out and visited her after she gave us several thousand
dollars, the intent of the gift is not for operational expenses. Everybody assumed that the
City and County would pay for operational expenses. Not from the Gift Fund. And that
would be in my opinion a breach of faith for those people if you start pulling that money
out of the Gift Fund to pay for operational expenses.
Lehman/OK. Obviously, this is not just your opinion. This is a recommendation that has come
to us.
Honohan/On a 7 to 2 vote.
Lehman/Right. Obviously. So, that's really not an issue.
Wilburn/Well, the difficulty in the challenge is really making the shift from relying on those two
primary sources of funds to trying to make some type of adjustment and calls to how
much for operations will you be able to support from membership fee and/or any type of
bequeath or gift? Putting aside whether or not, the question about what the Gift Fund, the
intent of folks who gave that, it's looking beyond that. I mean, Parks and Recs has the
experience of knowing how much they're going to get from fees and that. The human
service agencies can plan for some operational costs because they've got a history of fund
raising. Here, we're talking about a, while you could go ahead, and I think this is
probably Jay's point, again putting aside the intent of that Gift Fund, you could go ahead
and if you balance, say a lower flat membership fee, utilize the Gift Fund to balance out
what your operational expenses are going to be, the problem is how much you can rely on
that, you know, in the long-term, and that's where we're stuck here with, you know, and
it's just going to, it's a hard, you know, ! mean, I appreciate the work you all did, but I
don't really have a problem with putting it off for another week so we can take a look at
what we're going to have to do here.
Pfab/OK. I think you probably came as close to what I'm hearing on the street and people I'm
talking to. A number of people are donating it's a dollar a month or something like that,
and ! think those people that have contacted me and I've talked to, felt this was their
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contribution because they felt they were in a position to do this. And I think that their
thought was that this was to help people who weren't in the position that they were. So
because of that, I guess I've come to a--this is my own personal--since it's research it's
not plagiarism from any one person--but it looks to me that the ideal way to make this
work is to go at, say, $10-$20 a year flat fee, and those people who are in a position to
assist and you said a number of them are. A number of them said $100, $50, whatever it
is, and some of those people I think would be willing to do that and I think that that's
probably going to raise more money, as you go down the road, and I think it's also going
to help build community which I think is probably something that's, that the senior
population and the City, they're a little nervous about what goes on there. And I think
that more citizen participation from the bottom up, may be a lot, may be very productive
in that situation.
Lehman/Well, and that's why we're talking about (can't hear)
Wilbum/And you have to be cautious about how much you can rely on that donation, because
you don't, I mean, you don't want to set up a situation where---
O'Donnell/You don't know it's going to be consistent.
Wilbum/Well, I mean, look at the Englert, you know. They had to repeatedly come back and
they're still not there. I mean it's, you can make certain projections on how much people
are going to give, but you know, again I'll point out that situation. They're still not there
and we're talking about ongoing long-term expense so.
Lehman/Well, we've--go ahead, Steven.
Kanner/Well, Ross, that's why I think we have to in the long-term, we have to do a more
systemic job of what direction do we want the Senior Center to go and how's it going to
be funded? And how's it going to interact with the County? I don't think we've really
done that. We've gone and asked money and said give us a few thousand dollars,
Coralville, North Liberty, County give us more; but we haven't said let's work together
and see what's going to be best for our County. I don't think we've done that at our level
on the Council level and I think we need to do that, but, so I think that in the short-term,
it behooves us to make it as accessible as possible and I had a few other questions in that
regard as far as sort of long-term things. Did you explore, Jay, the Commission
integrating Senior Center into Parks and Recreation? A number of Senior Centers
throughout the state do operate under aegis of the Parks and Rec in their cities, and it
seems that that could be a substantial savings i£we look at comprehensive changes in the
administration.
Honohan/We did discuss this to some degree and I did communicate with Terry Trueblood on
this. I think one of the first things that you have to recognize is the goal or the purpose of
the Senior Center is different than the goal and the purpose of the Recreation Department.
They're into recreation and that is primarily their role and they do an excellent job of it,
by the way, and they also have a population that is from 2 and 3 on up to whatever age
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April 21, 2003 Council Work Session Page 75
wants to participate. They are not as much in the educational area as the Senior Center is
and is trying to increase its function in that area. And they as was pointed out here earlier
are a very expensive compared to what we're talking about here operation. I mean, for
instance, you want to go swimming pool for three months for a membership fee, it's 60
bucks. We're talking about $25 for a whole year. If you want a family membership, I
think that one's $180. You want to get into their ceramics class for three months for, I
think it's once a week, it's $70. They're a much higher fee and whatever you call it, a
membership fee or a class fee, they're much mom high cost than we are. And as I said
earlier, they are, well what should I say? After my bypass surgery in 1986, I got an
Aerodyne bike and I ride an Aerodyne bike for exercise, and I went on a cruise with some
friends, and so I was going to do my exercise. So the cruise ship has exercise Aerodyne
bikes, so I went upstairs on the ship, upper deck I guess you'd call it, and I came into the
exercise room and there was this 24- or 25-year-old girl on an exercise bike.
Champion/Did you have another heart attack?
(Laughter)
Honohan/It was a thought. But I tell you what, I saw her working on that bike and I turned
around and went back downstairs, because I did not want to be embarrassed, and that is a
problem with people my age. We do want to interact with young people but not too
much. And we want our own thing. And you will not get that---
Kanner/Jay, I'm not really talking about necessarily programming interacting, but that is
something to talk about. But I guess I didn't really see in the minutes of the Commission
that discussion on that broader way. I think it needs to happen. That's just me, but I didn't
really see it in the Commission. Perhaps you had it and maybe it wasn't conveyed to the
rest of the Commission looking at different solutions, outside the box, administrative
restructuring. Let me, and I think my last question here in regards to your---
Honohan/I want to get back to one other thing you just mentioned. But go ahead.
Kanner/OK. Well, actually two. One is a quickie. You didn't mention County representation in
this proposal. At least I didn't see that. Am you recommending the County still have
representation?
Honohan/We're ahead of you.
Kanner/I think it's a good thing to have them on them.
Honohan/We're ahead of you. At our last meeting, we had an item that I presented that we must
study and decide what we are going to do in view of the fact that the County, as far as the
makeup of the Commission, now that the County has terminated the 28-E Agreement.
The question that will be presented is how many members are we going to have and
where are they going to come from. And I brought this up at that meeting to give the
Commission a month to think about it and I will be making a proposal to them along
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those lines. I also discussed the fact that we may want, if the Council approves, to have a
maybe ex officio members from the County or Coralville or North Liberty, whatever, or
have a, create an advisory committee from County people. But this is up in the air at this
point in time and the Commission has made no recommendation yet. But we will be
making a recommendation to the Council because something has to be done. I have had
two supervisors tell me that their membership ends June 30th on the Commission because
of the termination of the 28-E Agreement. That's what they've told me. So, I'm assuming
that's what they think, so I think we have to meet that challenge. I want to go back to
something else that you mentioned just briefly. There has been talk about cutting staff.
OK. This plan-~-
Kanner/Not necessarily cutting. I'm not proposing cutting.
Honohan/I'm saying there has been talk about cutting staff, OK?
Kanner/OK.
Honohan/I don't see how we can expand services and draw in more people and run the
programs that we have if we cut staff because we don't have a lot of staff now. And if
you recall, at every budget hearing just lately, I have always said we would like more
staffbccaus¢ I think if we had more staff, we could expand our evening programs, we
could bring in more people, more people that arc not 70 years old like I am or such, but
more of the 50s.
Kanner/But you're only 40, I thought.
Honohan/Oh, I'd like to be. I was 40 in 1970. OK. But that's why I think we need to keep the
same staff that we have now and I still want in the future to try to get expansion of thc
staff, not go back.
Kanner/Thanks for your work on this.
Wilburn/I have a question. I'll try and be brief and move on here. It's related to your targeted
fund raising. Before I do that, just so the rest of the Council knows, I was in no way
hinting that we shouldn't try and make membership affordable and wc certainly want to
draw as many folks, but like I was saying before, you've got to balance that with realistic
expectations in terms of fund raising if those are the other two problems that you have.
You know, and I'll just speak for my own, I mean, what is thc, I kind of sec some notes
in here, but how much thought and planning has gone into the fund raising for operational
expenses to date? And, you know, I'll just be honest with you, I've had a few folks let me
know that they, you know, simply hadn't been asked for, and so I---
Honohand We have not started anything, Ross, at this point in time.
Wilbum/That's what, I just needed to know where you were at because that's going---
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Honohan/That's one of the masons I'm anxious to get this moving and---
Wilbum/I appreciate that.
Honohan/...adopted so we can implement these things. Without your consent, we have no
program at this time and that's why we need your vote to, if you vote us down, why we'll
have to go back to the drawing board and then I will do it by the 1st of July, but if you
vote in favor o£this, then we will start implementing it the next day.
Wilburn/The final thing that I would ask is--you know, it sounds nice to try and program and
get, whether it's the County or some other entities in the County, to, you know, to step
forward and be willing to contribute to provide, you know, a great environment for
seniors in the County. I guess I'm just skeptical. I mean, we were all at that meeting
where this came up, that joint meeting that came up at Coralville Council session. I mean,
not only this, but with other we're talking about the 28-E Agreements or, you know,
consolidation of whether it's fire, I mean, we've got to move forward regardless of what
everybody else---
Kanner/Yeah, I don't think we're going to get money from---
Lehman/I think you're exactly right. I think this is the Senior Center is obviously very, very
important to this community. It is not as important to some of the people outside this
conununity. My suspicion is that when they start paying fees, it may become more
important to them. But I think you're right--and I have not for a minute do I doubt that
you have made every effort to enlist the support of the County and Coralville and North
Liberty and all the rest of these folks, it's just you've been rather---
Honohan/Well, if you've, I'm sure you remember better than I that this has been a discussion at
joint City-County meetings three or four times.
Lehman/Right.
Honohan/I tried to get through to Coralville through the mayor and the city manager and they
wouldn't even listen to me. North Liberty was very polite; they let Linda and I talk for
about 20 minutes or something like that, said they'd get back to us but I haven't heard.
Champion/Yeah, and I just wanted to point that out, too. And, Steven, you made some comment
that we hadn't worked with them as a group. Well, you know, we have worked with them
as a group for at least three and a half years. Tried to work out some details of the Senior
Center and it does fall on deaf ears. I can honestly say that they're not interested. So, if
we want a good Senior Center and one that is aggressive and moves forward, we're going
to have to deal with it.
Kanner/So, I agree we have to do--that's what we're at here and we shouldn't be saying they're
going to give us money or this or that. But I think if we have not gone into them with
saying we're willing to--this is not just ours, this is yours possibly.
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Champion/Oh, yes, we have.
Kanner/No, no, we go in with saying this is ours; here is the agreement in the past 20 years, you
pay your 20 percent.
Champion/That's not tree, Steven.
Female/Mm-nnn (negative)
Kanner/I have not seen a substantial community collaboration, something like the Jail Task
Force.
Champion/Well, I think there could be some more community collaboration; I agree, to get a
task fome together and later after all this is approved, to see how we can improve
membership, get more people into the Senior Center. I think that's a valid thing but I'm
sorry. I thought you were indicating that we hadn't worked with these other governmental
agencies to try to get the Senior Center going forward and that's what I was correcting.
Kanner/Yeah, certainly, we've done it. I think we have to do something like the task force and
see what do we want as a County for seniors?
Champion/Yeah, that's a good idea.
Lehman/Well, I also think that we have a Commission that has a vision for the Senior Center;
we appoint that Commission; we expect them to operate the Senior Center and to come
back, as you're doing right now, making recommendations to us as to how you can run it
better. That's why we have a Commission.
Honohan/Dee?
Vanderhoef/I just want to congratulate you in moving towards the Iowa City Community
Foundation and would whole-heartedly say move forward. Before it came to Iowa City, I
was visiting with a financial planner and he was shocked that we didn't have one. He
came down here from Cedar Rapids and his experience with folks is that they don't think
that they don't think that they've got a place, number one, where their contribution is
recognized or that they can give that much. And the financial planners are recognizing
and able to tell people you can give this much this year and still come out financially with
your tax base. And I think the Foundation is a great place to go forward. I think it's a
waste of our time and our volunteers to try and do a foundation on their own.
Lehman/Thank you, guys. Appreciate your time.
Honohan/Do I have to wait till after the alcohol ordinance tomorrow night?
Lehman/Well, unless you can convince somebody to make a motion to change it on the agenda,
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I'm certainly amenable.
O'Donnell/I would do that.
Lehman/All right. You may not have to wait.
Atkins/Go ahead.
Lehman/Lobby these folks tomorrow, and we'll---
O'Donnell/I will.
Honohan/Do we have their phone number?
Lehman/Answer them before they leave.
Champion/Don't call me. We're going to move it up.
Lehman/I think actually there's not much left on the agenda for tonight, so if you just wait a
minute, they'll be ready to leave.
Honohan/Well, I would certainly hope that we could move forward so that we could get started
on this.
O'Donnell/We'll suggest it.
Honohan/Find out what you want to do.
Lehman/All right. Thank you very much.
Honohan/Thank you and thank you very much for your time.
KIOSKS
Lehman/OK. Steve, I understand there's not a great deal to report on kiosks?
Atkins/Not prepared to talk about it tonight.
Lehman/Thank you,
COUNCIL TIME
Lehman/Council time, folks.
O'Donncll/That' s enough.
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Champion/I have one thing.
Lehman/Yes.
O'Donnell/One thing.
Champion/I was driving somewhere, I think from (can't hear) and Riverside Drive and you
know we've talked about this before but that park down there is so pathetic.
Atkins/Which park's that?
Champion/The one on Riverside Drive by, across the airport.
Atkins/Oh, Sturgis Ferry.
Lehman/That's a dump.
Atkins/It's an old landfill.
Champion/Well, could we even take the sign off it as a park. It's almost embarrassing to drive
into town and see that.
Lehman/City dump.
Atkins/Well, yeah.
Champion/I don't know, I'm just, I'm not sure (can't hear), but I think we either six-deep that
park or we don't call it a park.
Atkins/The gazebo every year, no, we correct it every year. It sinks again, but we correct it
because we call it---
Vanderhoef/Are you thinking the Mesquakie or are you thinking---
Atkins/Mesquakie camp.
Lehman/Across from the airport.
Vanderhoef/Well, that's Mesquakie.
Champion/Well, I don't know what that (can't hear) is, it says park.
Lehman/It's not a park.
Vanderhoef/Well---
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Champion/I think it's embarrassing.
O'Donnell/That's grass.
Lehman/If you park, you get stuck.
Champion/There's no grass there.
Vanderhoef/No.
Champion/There's weeds.
Wilbum/There's a proposal out there, the one that---
Vanderhoef/Well, I couldn't, believe it or not, I tried to get that off of there when I was on Parks
and Recreation and I couldn't get it done.
Atkins/Yeah.
Vanderhoef/The largest objector to that was one who lived in the area who has since passed
away so maybe it would be more amenable.
Lehman/All fight.
O'Donnell/That's Sturgis.
Lehman/Right.
Atkins/It's called Sturgis Ferry Park.
Champion/It's an entranceway to the City, that park.
Atkins/Yes. And we did a proposal a number of years ago to just clean it up and it was a million
dollars to bring in dirt to level it off and clean it up. And it's hard pressed to recommend
a million dollars for dirt.
Champion/See, I'm not suggesting that. I'm suggesting that it's pretty hopeless and we should
take the sign down.
O'Donnell/Like mow it or something?
Atkins/No. Excuse me.
Lehman/All fight, all fight, anybody else have anything for Council time.
Kanner/Just to let Dee know, I am available the 28th or 29th if you do plan to have a meeting.
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Lehman/We're going to decide that tomorrow night.
Vanderhoef/Tomorrow night.
Kanner/Well, OK, she has a memo here. And I had a question about the follow-up on the
minutes, a complete description of Council activities in a work session minutes.
Karr/You'll be getting a memo in your packet.
Kanner/Oh, for next week?
Karr/Right. I just didn't get it in this time.
Lehman/See you, guys, tomorrow night.
Vanderhoef/Good show.
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