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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2025-04-15 TranscriptionIowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 1S, 202S (audio and video recordings can be found at.https:/,Icitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [00:00:21] [MUSIC] It is now 6:00 PM on April 15th, 2025. I'm gonna call the City of Iowa City meeting to order. Roll call, please. [00:00:33] Alter. [00:00:33] Here. [00:00:34] Bergus. [00:00:341 Here. [00:00:35] Harmsen. [00:00:36] Here. [00:00:37] Moe. [00:00:37] Here. [00:00:38] Salih. [00:00:39] Yes. [00:00:40] Teague. [00:00:40] Here. [00:00:41] And Weilein. Page 1 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at httl2s:///citychannel4.com/city-council.htmi) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: Al -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [00:00:42] Here. [00:00:43] All right, welcome to your City Hall, to everyone that is in person and to those that are joining virtually. Welcome, as well. First, um, we're going to move on to items number 2, Proclamations 2(a) is Arbor Day. Whereas the coming of spring produces a renewal of interest in tree planting for beauty, shade, conservation, and many other purposes beneficial to all people. And whereas the, observation of Arbor Day has long been characterized by the planting and pre- preservation of trees. And whereas trees in Iowa City beautify our community, increase property values, reduce p- pollution, lower interest energy costs, and enhance the economic vitality of business areas. And whereas because trees absorb carbon monoxide and release oxygen, having a diverse and healthy tree population constitutes a major part of Iowa City's effort to mitigate against climate change. And whereas trees can provide natural air conditioning, the evaporation from a single tree can produce the cooling effect of 10 room size air conditioner operating 20 hours a day. And whereas evergreen trees can be used to reduce wind speed, and thus, loss of heat from our homes in the winter by as much as 10-50%. Now, therefore, I Bruce Teague Mayor of Iowa City, do hereby proclaim April 25, 2025 to be Arbor Day in Iowa City, and I urge all community members to participate in tree planting and preserving projects throughout this year. And receiving this is Julie Sid Johnson, our Parks and Rec director. [APPLAUSE] [00:02:35] Thank you, Mayor and Council. As you know, this is an annual thing that we do here in Iowa City. Um, and as Parks and Rec director, I have to thank you. Since I came in January of 2016, we have planted over 6,000 trees here in Iowa City. So at a time where there's so much, like, uncertainty around us and things happening, what's going to happen in the future, you've had 6,000 pieces of hope planted throughout to grow into the future. So I thank you for that and thank you for the- having the staff and equipment to actually service those trees because it's not just planting them. It's coaxing them along in these first few years and keeping them healthy. I also want to remind people we have a volunteer tree planting coming up on Arbor Day this year. So, Friday, April 25th, 1:00 PM at the Oakland Cemetery, we're looking for volunteers in conjunction with the Heritage Tree program to plant 20 trees actually on the day of Arbor Day. So we hope to see people out there at the cemetery making that happen. Thank you. [00:03:44] Thank you. [APPLAUSE] To be day of no Service silence, and this is going to be read by Councilor Harmsen. [00:03:58] Whereas, to date in 2025, 563 Anti-LGBTQ plus bills have been introduced across the country, 19 of them in Iowa. And whereas, youth are especially vulnerable with over half of LGBTQ plus youth reporting bullying or harassment in school due to their sexual orientation or gender identity each Page 2 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at.https:./,Icitychanne]4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. month. And whereas every April, since its founding in the 1990s, students and allies protested discrimination by observing a day of silence followed by breaking the silence rallies to bring attention to discrimination against LGBTQ plus students. And whereas, in 2023, this tradition morphed into the day of no silence in opposition to the current surge of anti LGBTQ plus legislation, which was observed nationwide this year on April 4th. And where whereas LGBTQ plus students must be able to learn, socialize, access support, live freely and safely as their authentic selves, and whereas racial equity, social justice, and human rights together serve as one of three key values in the city's strategic plan. Now, therefore, I Shawn Harmsen on behalf of Bruce Teague, Mayor of Iowa City, do hereby proclaim April 4, 2025 to have been the Day of No Silence in Iowa City. And encourage community members to advocate for the rights of LGBTQ plus people, especially vulnerable youth, and to fight oppression wherever and whenever it occurs. And accepting the award is Doug Klash, the chair of the Human Rights Committee. [APPLAUSE] [00:05:40] [LAUGHTER] You doing a new tradition up here. [00:05:46] 1 am. [00:05:47] Welcome. [00:05:49] Thank you, Mayor Teague, Council. The Day of Silence was created to show the importance of diversity and inclusion within schools and academic communities and what the impact of silencing those voices might look and feel like, since its creation has expanded beyond the school and academic communities to community in general, as you've recognized tonight. In recent years, one goal of right wing government, including our governor, the bully in chief, has been to eliminate that diversity and criminalize inclusion. We can no longer afford to stay silent. As MLK junior said, our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter. The day of no silence sends an important message to those who are attempting to push our community into the shadows of society. We will not go back. But more importantly, it sends a message to our allies. Again, quoting Dr. King. He who passively accepts evil is as much involved in it as he who helps to perpetrate it. He who accepts evil without protesting against it is really cooperating with it. I'm also reminded when we talk about silence in the Day Of No Silence of the at up slogan from the 1980s, silence equals death. Which was a response to the Reagan administration's inaction and silence regarding the AIDS epidemic, which led to a devastating loss of life within the LGBTQ community. The phrase continues to be used as a rallying cry for the importance of speaking out against injustice and silence. At this moment in history, it is imperative that our allies speak out against the injustices being perpetrated against our LGBTQ neighbors, family, and friends because, and I'll close with one more quote from Martin Luther King junior in the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends. Thank you. Page 3 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at.https:.I.Icitychanne]4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [00:07:43] Thank you. [APPLAUSE] We're gonna move on to item number 2(c), Fair Housing month read by Mayor Pro Tem Salih. [00:07:59] Whereas, April 2025 marks the 57th anniversary of- of the Basic of the Fair Housing Act, which initiate is a national policy of fair housing for all who live in the United States. And whereas, the Fair Housing Act prohibits discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, handicap, family status, and national origin. And whereas the City of Iowa City additionally prohibited discrimination because of creek, age, the status, sexual orientations, presence or absence of independence- of dependence, gender identity, and public assistance source of income. And whereas fair housing is a positive community good. And whereas economic stability, community health, and human relations in all communities are improved by diversity and integration. And whereas, act of housing discrimination and barriers to equal housing opportunity are re bogate to a common sense of decency and fairness. Now, therefore, I Mazahir Salih on behalf of Bruce Teague Mayor of Iowa City due here by Brook Leman, April 2025 to be Fair Housing month in Iowa City to establish Iowa City as an inclusive community committed to fair housing and to promote appreciation activity by private and public entities. Intended to provide or advocate for equal housing opportunity for all residents and prospective residents of Iowa City. And here to accept is Rosina Malone and Katherine Davis. [APPLAUSE] [00:10:10] Thank you, Mayor and Council members for the proclamation regarding Fair Housing Month. My name is Katherine Davis. I'm a board member of the Johnson County Affordable Housing Coalition, where we remain committed to advocating for fair, inclusive communities where everyone has the opportunity to thrive. I'm also the housing manager at DVIPRVAP, where I work with members of our community who at times have to put their own safety at risk because they see it as the better alternative to housing instability. We observe Fair Housing Month every April because the Fair Housing Act was signed into law by President Johnson on April 11th, 1968. However, the Iowa City Human Rights ordinance has prohibited discrimination in housing since 1964. Equal opportunity for all is a fundamental goal of this city. We should continue to set the standard of free and equal access to housing opportunities in our area. Only through continued cooperation, commitment, and support of all Iowa City residents can barriers to fair housing be removed. Thank you for your time and your continued support of our most vulnerable populations. [00:11:15] Thank you. [APPLAUSE] We're moving on to item Number 2d, Sexual Assault Awareness Month proclamation, read by Councilor Alter. [00:11:32] Whereas, sexual abuse, sexual violence, and stalking affect everyone, including anyone, sorry- including children causing long term physical, psychological and emotional harm, and whereas, every 68 seconds, an American is sexually assaulted, and every nine minutes that victim is a child. And whereas approp- Page 4 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at httl2s://citychannel4.com/city-council.htmi) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. approximately 70% of people affected by rape or sexual assault experience moderate to severe distress, a larger percentage than for any other violent crime, and whereas sexual violence in rural communities exists as a hidden, silent, and often unrecognized crime that is often underreported, it's widespread and affects every community member. And whereas, through the inspiration, courage, and resilience of people affected by sexual violence, our communities are learning to better respond to the life changing impact of sexual violence on individuals through systems and in the community. And whereas DVIP and RVAP has worked to end violence and abuse for more than 45 years through the collaborative partnerships of staff, volunteers, local municipalities, criminal justice, health and human services, faith communities, business leaders, and private community members. And whereas our community's achievements should be commended, and we must continue our commitment to respect and support those affected by sexual violence and to prevent future violence in our community. Now, therefore, I Megan Alter, on behalf of Bruce Teague, mayor of Iowa City, do hereby proclaim the month of April 2025 to be Sexual Assault Awareness Month in Iowa City, Iowa, and urge all people to work together to eliminate sexual violence, sexual abuse, and stalking from our community. And accepting this proclamation is Alta Medea, the director of Community Engagement at DVIP. [APPLAUSE] [00:13:40] Thank you and welcome. [00:13:41] Yeah, thank you all so much. I first want to say thank you from the bottom of our hearts for all of the financial support that the city of Iowa City has contributed not only to our programming to the services we provide, but also to the shelter we're able to offer victim survivors. I also wanted to just highlight some of the statistics. Ah, DVIPRVAP took on sexual assault services programming on October 1st of 2024. The numbers on your handouts, the 58 individuals served through our sexual assault services programming is actually just for October 1st through December 31. Those are individuals we served in all eight counties. We do not have the individual community breakdowns like you're used to hearing from our- our staff available to us at this time, as we are still inputting and gathering data on those individuals. We'll have more reports in about a year with the full numbers. I also wanted to point out that we have provided over 600 services to individuals, and that is everything from peer to peer counseling to accompanying folks at sexual assault, forensic exams, uh, getting them resources, hanging out with their children while they are meeting with law enforcement and other programs. So lots of different ways that those support services look. We know that this impacts our community greatly, and we could not do this work without the folks here in Iowa City. So thank you so much. One last thing, and then I will, uh, step aside. But April 22 is- is the annual Take Back the Night rally in partnership with the University of Iowa. Take Back the Night Rally has been going on longer than I can even remember since the 70s. In addition, we will be hosting the Clothesline project on April 22 from 2:00 PM to 6:00 PM prior to Take Back the Night Rally. Um, at the Chauncey Swan Park, and that will be a display of approximately 100 shirts made by victim survivors telling their own stories. I strongly encourage all of the council and mayor to attend, as well as our community to show victims that they are not alone in our current political climate with so much uncertainty and so many barriers being placed upon folks. Having the ability to see the community stand up for you is more impactful to your healing process than anything. Page 5 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:.//citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. So encourage you to join us on April 22nd, and a full list of Sexual Assault Awareness Month activities is on our website at dvpiowa.org. Thank you. [00:16:32] Great. Thank you. [APPLAUSE] [00:16:37] [APPLAUSE] Thanks to everybody that came for the proclamations. We're going to move on to our consent agenda, which is items three through seven. Can I get a motion to approve it, please? [00:16:47] So moved. [00:16:48] Second. [00:16:49] Moved by Moe, seconded by Alter. Anyone from the public like to discuss a topic that is on our consent agenda? I want to remind everyone that we do have sign in little stickers at the back, so you can fill that out in advance and drop it in the basket. [00:17:07] Got it. [00:17:08] And welcome. You'll have up to three minutes. [00:17:10] My name's Mark Preece. First, I wanna thank you for appointing me to the Human Rights Commission for a second term. Uh, the first term I learned a lot, and now I know more. I also noted that in the consent agenda, I'm learning things. It reminds me of the last scene and Raiders of the Lost Ark. That if I don't say something about it, it might not be heard. So that's why I'm here. I want to say something about the all are welcome resolution. You'll notice, um, in the minutes that I think this is in your agenda packet that referring the resolution to the city council for adoption, it's already been adopted by Johnson County, Rachel Zimmerman, and the county supervisors helped me with this. Eric and Geoff helped me with this along the way. I'm gonna suppose you have the all are welcome resolution available to you. I would simply highlight for the public, whereas many Iowans are experiencing anger and fear due to several laws passed in Iowa and 23 and 2024, including the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, known as RFRA, which codifies religious exemptions, allowing individuals to use religious beliefs as legal justification to discriminate against other Iowans who are then deprived of their rights and liberty. Therefore, the resolutions that are promoting a united vision for where all are welcome in Johnson County, and you can refer onto that. I wanted to also remind you these quotes are significant, but this Page 6 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https://citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. one's from Reinald Nebr. You maybe know him best for the one who wrote the Serenity Prayer. First, they came for the socialists and I did not speak out because I was not a socialist. Then they came for the trade unionists and I did not speak out because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak out because I was not a Jew. And then they came for me, and there was no one left to speak for me. I bring you this light to illuminate this opportunity for you to adopt the all are welcome resolution. Thank you. [00:19:15] Thank you. Anyone else like to speak on any item that is on our consent agenda? If you're online, please raise your virtual hand. See no one in person or online, Council discussion? [00:19:33] 1 just want to say thank you for bringing this out of cons- consent agenda and pointing the public as well as us to this. [00:19:41] Thank you. [00:19:42] 1 want to thank you. Um, I would like to ask on Item 60 Taft Avenue Reconstruction. I know we've all received several emails concerned about that. Geoff, can you remind us what the time frame is for the Taft Avenue reconstruction project? [00:20:01] Going off memory here a little bit, as I flip through, I believe it's 27 and 28. That is correct. So construction in 27 and 28, it's currently in the design phase. [00:20:11] And it's the middle portion? [00:20:13] Correct. Lower West Branch Road to American Legion Road. [00:20:18] Okay. I we received a lot of questions about that. And then the other one I had a question about on the consent agenda was 61. And that would be the Geo Bond bidding procedure. Normally, it's something I wouldn't think at all about, but I know that, like, last week was the worst day for bond markets ever. Um, what does that mean for the city if we have a really bad bond bid? How does that impact our budget, and how do we navigate that? [00:20:45] Page 7 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:llcitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Well, we- we are pretty conservative on the interest rates that we budget. I Might need some help from Nicole here, but I believe we budget 5%- 5% on our interest rates, and we historically have come in well below then. Um, if, uh, the bond market is disrupted on- on the day that we take bids, and it's a little higher, uh, we can generally accept that, you know, and if we have to do a budget correction in the following year to make up for some of the larger debt service payments, we can. But even a slight - slightly high interest rate in one year is not going to disrupt our financial projections enough. That's why we carry fund balances as well. So if we- if we do need to tap into a fund balance to pay a little bit of a higher interest rate, we can. But generally, we're able to- we're prepared to handle that kind of fluctuation. [00:21:39] Yeah. Thank you. Does it- would this concern you in our ability to sell munis or if something like this happens? [00:21:48] No, I don't think we're concerned right now. It certainly was a disruptive week, but I think things have settled out, and at least today we're feeling okay. [00:22:00] Okay. Um, I had one thing on 6A, the ASM tentative agreement, just one kind of procedural question. Um, this was just a wages negotiation, correct? [00:22:19] That's correct. [00:22:20] Um, during wage negotiations, are there any outside council procured by the city, or is that just for full contract? [00:22:29] Um, we have the ability. So we- we have an outside labor council on kind of retainer. We didn't utilize it for just a wage reopener. We could, but this time, we did not. [00:22:43] But for, like, a full contract negotiation, that's kind of like the norm? [00:22:47] That's correct, yes. [00:22:48] Okay. Thank you. Page 8 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychanne]4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [00:22:511 Okay. Hearing nothing else? Roll call, please. [00:22:57] Harmsen? [00:22:58] Yes. [00:22:58] Moe? [00:22:591 Yes. [00:22:59] Salih? [00:23:00] Yes. [00:23:00] Teague? [00:23:00] Yes. [00:23:01] Weilein? [00:23:02] Yes. [00:23:02] Alter? [00:23:03] Yes. [00:23:03] Bergus. Page 9 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 1S, 202S (audio and video recordings can be found at.https://citychannel4.com/city-council.htmi) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [00:23:03] Yes. [00:23:04] Motion passes seven to zero. We're on to Item Number 8, which is community comment. Public comment isn't- is intended so that members of the public may be heard by council. Because community comment is for items not properly noticed on the agenda, council cannot engage in discussion or debate due to open meeting laws. I am going to ask to see a raise of hands of everyone that want to speak during this time. I see one person. All right, we'll invite you up at this time. Welcome. And you'll have up to three minutes, and there is a sign in. I've already done. [00:23:39] Great, thanks. [00:23:39] Thank you. My name is John Colon. I'm the chair for the Johnson County Livable Community for Successful Aging. [00:23:46] And please state the city you're from as well. [00:23:48] Iowa City, as well. I'm here just to notify the public and the council that we are in the process of our Phase 5 for our survey, community survey for Johnson County on, um, areas that affect seniors and people that are aging. The survey is really focused on the AARP, eight livable domains- livability domains, and council members have this card in front of them right now. Folks that are in the audience, if you'd like one, I've got a stack with me. Uh, we're inviting residents of the county and of the city age 45 and above to participate in the survey. The survey is designed to assess folks impression and encounters with various services within the county and the city. That's anything from medical services, transportation, housing, um, so we would like to invite everyone age 45 and above to participate in the survey. Some of you will be getting a postcard in the mail. it'll be a large version of this. It will be going out this week. But as I said, anyone is eligible to participate. You can go to livablelecommunity.org to fill out the survey. It's electronic if you'd like a paper copy. There's information on our website about how to obtain a paper copy and a return envelope. So it's short and it's sweet. We'd love to have everyone participate to get an understanding of how people are perceiving services that are available, and if they're not, what we can also do to help them connect with those services. We added a ninth area to the survey, which is disaster preparedness. I think all of us that lived through the derecho a few years ago and were impacted by it, realized that we weren't prepared. And I think some people are still in that mode of, it's not gonna happen to me. We have a section on that that's also very important. We'd love feedback from the community on that. Thank you. [00:25:47] Page 10 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https: [/citychannel4.comlcity-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Thank you. All right. [00:25:49] 1 raise my hand earlier. (00:25:511 Yes, please welcome. Please state your name and city you're from. [00:25:59] Hi, I'm Doctor Emma Denny I'm from Iowa City. Um, I'm sure that everyone present here and everyone on the council has been hearing reports of ICE targeting college organizers, particularly this week in the University of Iowa when five international students had their visas pulled. We suspect for participating in protests. We're not fully aware of that yet, because, you know, the government right now is pretty impenetrable. Um, part of why that is allowed to happen is because UIPD has direct agreements with ICE. UIPD has enforcement and investigation agreements with ICE that this city doesn't currently have. I want the city to think long and hard about its policy regarding ICE and make sure that in the future, nothing like these agreements with UIPD can exist and that nothing like the kinds of enforcement that is allowed to happen in this city despite a lot of the local citizens wishes because of the UIPD's presence in this city, I really want the council to think long and hard about any potential policy like that in regards to ICPD and ICE and any potential enforcement or investigation policy outside of it. Thank you. [00:27:24] Thank you. Anyone else wanna take some time and discuss any item that is not on our agenda? Seeing no one. We're gonna move on to Item Number 9, which is planning and zoning matters, 9A, rezoning north of Melrose Avenue and east of Camp Cardinal Boulevard. Ordinance conditionally rezoning approximately 7.2 acres of property located north of Melrose Avenue and east of Camp Cardinal Boulevard from Interim Development single family residential zone to mixed use zone. This is second consideration, and the applicant is requesting expedited action. [00:28:14] 1 move that the rule requiring that ordinances must be considered and voted on for passage at two council meetings prior to the meeting, which is to be finally passed, be suspended, that the first consideration of vote be waived and that the ordinance be given second consideration vote at this time. [00:28:27] Moved by move. [00:28:27] Second by Salih. [00:28:29] Page 11 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[.Icitychannel4.comlcity-council.htmi) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. All right. Anyone from the public like to discuss this topic? If you're online, please raise your virtual hand in person, please raise your hand so I can see. Seeing no one in person or online. Council discussion? [00:28:49] No. [00:28:49] Roll call, please. [00:28:51] Moe? [00:28:51] Yes. [00:28:52] Salih? [00:28:52] Yes. [00:28:53] Teague? [00:28:53] Yes. [00:28:54] Weilein? [00:28:54] Yes. [00:28:55] Alter? [00:28:56] Yes. [00:28:56] Bergus? Page 12 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:.//citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [00:28:57] Yes. [00:28:57] Harmsen? [00:28:58] Yes. [00:28:59] Motion passes seven to zero. Can I get a motion to pass and adopt? [00:29:02] So moved, Alter. [00:29:03) Second, Moe. [00:29:05] Roll call, please. [00:29:06] Salih? [00:29:07] Yes. [00:29:071 Teague? [00:29:08] Yes. [00:29:08] Weilein? [00:29:09] Yes. [00:29:09] Alter? Page 13 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https://citychannel4.com/city-council.htmi) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [00:29:10] Yes. [00:29:101 Bergus? [00:29:11] Yes. [00:29:11] Harmsen? [00:29:12] Yes. [00:29:121 Moe? [00:29:13] Yes. [00:29:14] Motion passes seven to zero. Can I get a motion to accept correspondence. [00:29:18] So move, Salih. [00:29:19] Second, Bergus. [00:29:20] All right. All in favor say aye. (00:29:221 Aye. [00:29:23] Any opposed? Motion passes seven to zero. Great. We're on to Item Number 96, rezoning portion of 691 East Foster Road, Ordinance conditionally rezoning approximately 0.06 acres for a portion of the property located at 691 East Foster Road from high density single family residential zone with a planned development overlay to low density single family residential zone. I'm gonna open the public hearing. And welcome, Danielle. Page 14 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:/Zcitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [00:29:561 Thank you, Mayor and Council, Danielle Siman, Neighborhood and Development Services. As the mayor summarized, this is a request for rezoning. It is preceded by or continue- also accompanied by a request for a transfer of land between two adjacent property owners for the triangle shown here on the screen. Because the two properties are not zoned the same, we can't administratively approve that boundary line adjustment until the zoning is aligned properly so that all of the land would be assembled by the transfer would be under one zoning district. So the request before you tonight is to resolve that difference by rezoning the area in the triangle to match the area of the lot to its East, which is RS five. The applicant, in this case, is requesting this because they believe that will make the lot more interesting to buyers, so they hope to sell the land for eventual development as a single family dwelling. So that is Lot 25 of the subdivision to the east. And as I said, this is a rezoning to resolve that split zoning that would be created by the boundary line adjustment. And this case, it's being essentially down zone from an RS 12 zone with an OPD to it to an RS five zone. The additional land area would be assembled into one single lot. So let me go back to this rezoning condition. As I've already stated, the boundary line adjustment that would, uh, actually change the boundary of the lot is administrative, but, um, this rezoning needs to occur first, so that's one of our conditions. With all rezoning, we do look at the standard criteria of whether it's consistent with the comprehensive plan and compatible with the existing neighborhood. In this case, both the overall citywide comprehensive plan and the district- North District plan envision open space and or housing in this area, so it would be consistent with the comprehensive plan. There are also several goals and policies in the comprehensive plan that would support additional housing development in this neighborhood. Um, it's compatible with the character of the neighborhood. The land, as it's being transferred, already has an easement on it, though, that would prevent development on that- on the part of the land that has the easement. It's a conservation easement. That conservation easements in place. It's maintained as the land gets transferred. So it's still protecting the sensitive are- sensitive areas that exist in the area, just simply adding an overall square footage to the lot. We do need to ensure, though, that city services can adequately service this lot. The road layout is already developed in front of this lot, but not in a manner that would allow, let's say truckers- a trash truck to adequately pick up trash without having to make a complicated maneuver of backing up. So the request is accompanied by another condition that pavement be installed similar to what you see on the upper right hand side of this roadway where there's kind of that circular ball with driveways coming off of it. A similar amount of improvement needs to be made in front of this lot to allow those city services to be provided without having to back up. So just a quick overview of the land of process as it relates to this land, there are two subdivisions that were established, um, in the 1950s in 2018, that are being combined into one lot, resolving the zoning, so it's similar across both areas. Uh, the staff will take care of the boundary line adjustment once the rezoning is approved, [NOISE] and then any building permits that occur in the future. So again, just to summarize, there were two conditions envisioned with this rezoning as promoted by staff and agreed to by the Planning and Zoning Commission. Uh, so based on a review of the relevant general criteria staff made that recommendation, and at its March 5th, 2025 meeting by a vote of six to zero, the Planning and Zoning Commission concurred. The CCA has been signed and is in our possession. I'm happy to answer questions. Page 15 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:/.Icitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [00:33:46] All right. Hearing no questions. Thank you. Is the applicant present, and do they want to speak? Welcome. [00:34:00] Thank you. Good evening. John Martin with MMS Consultants, representing the developer. I have nothing to add. Just available for any questions. If you have any, again, the goal is to create a more desirable lot. We understand all the conditions. As she said, the CCA has been signed, and they're ready to move forward. [00:34:16] Great. Thank you. [00:34:17] Thank you. [00:34:20] Anyone from the public like to address this topic? If you're online, please raise your virtual hand. If you're in the building, please raise your hand so I can see you. Seeing no one in person or online. Before I close, the public hearing, just wanted to ask counsel if they're inclined to vote with the P&Z. All right, great. I'm going to close the public hearing. Could I get a- get a motion to give first consideration? [00:34:45] Motion moved now. [00:34:46] Second, Harmsen. Counsel, discussion. Makes sense. [00:34:51] Yeah. [00:34:51] Yeah. Roll call, please. [00:34:54] Teague? [00:34:54] Yes. [00:34:55] Weilein? Page 16 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:/Icitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [00:34:56] Yes. [00:34:56] Alter? [00:34:57] Yes. [00:34:57] Bergus? [00:34:58] Yes. [00:34:58] Harmsen? [00:34:59] Yes. [00:34:591 Moe? [00:35:00] Yes. [00:35:00] Salih. [00:35:00] Yes. [00:35:01] Motion passes 709(c), Rezoning North Governor Street, ordinance conditionally rezone in approximately 5.49 acres, a property located between North Dodge and North Governor Street from medium density, single-family residential zone, high density single-family residential zone. Medium density multi -family residential zone and multi -family residential zone to high density single family residential zone with a planned development overlay for approximately 0.17 acres, and to medium density multi -family residential zone with a planned development overlay for approximately 5.32 acres, I'm going to open up the public hearing, and welcome. Page 17 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.htmi) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [00:35:45] Thank you, Mayor and Council Ann Russe, senior planner. As the mayor mentioned, this is a proposed rezoning. Here's an aerial of the subject property. It's located just north of Happy Hollow Park in between North Dodge and North Governor Streets. Here's the current zoning map. The subject property is a mix of single family and multi -family zoning, including the three lots that remained zoned R36, which is a zoning designation from the 1970s. RM-20 is also a multi -family zoning district. There's also RS-12, which is a high density single-family zone, which does allow multi -family uses provisionally. And then there's some RS8 in the corner, which is a single-family zone. As you're aware, from the staff report and from the memo from the city attorney's office, this property has a long and complicated history. In the 1980s, there was an Iowa Supreme Court decision related to this property. At the time, there were properties zoned R313, and a developer obtained building permits to construct an office building and an apartment building. The city revoked the building permit and rezoned some of the parcels to only allow single-family and duplex residential. The owner sued the city. And the court determined that the city's actions were unreasonable. As a result of the Iowa Supreme Court decision, several lots still remain R36. In 2011, there was a rezoning request to rezone a portion of the subject property to RM-12. That rezoning would have allowed approximately 18 dwelling units. City council denied that rezoning and directed staff to explore designating the properties to no longer allow multi -family. Based on the council direction, the city initiated a comprehensive plan amendment in 2012. The proposed amendment to the central district plan would change the future land use map from low to medium density multi -family to single-family duplex. The comprehensive plan amendment was accompanied by several city initiated down zonings, and these actions by the city also resulted in a lawsuit. In 2018, there was TSB Holdings versus the Board of Adjustments, and the court determined that the Kemp decision from the 80s prohibited the city from enforcing the new zoning ordinance. So the property owner was permitted to move forward with multi -family development consistent with the R3B zoning. And they remain zoned R36 today. Uh, for the proposed rezoning, the city is acting as a co -applicant for several reasons. The city would like to see a cohesive development pattern as opposed to that, which would be allowed under the current zoning. We'd also like to see compliance with our modern zoning regulations. This includes compliance with the multi -family site development standards. City Council's strategic plan includes a goal related to establishing partnerships and collaborations, particularly in the interest of advancing the city's housing goals, and meeting our housing goals requires increasing the overall supply of housing, which this rezoning would do. Here's a few pictures of the site on the top left. This is a photo looking north along North Governor Street. You can see the vacant office building on the left in the upper right. This is looking west from North Governor Street. You can see the vacant office building. And in the distance, you can see the existing apartments that exist along North Dodge Street. From the bottom left, this is looking south on North Dodge. The subject property already, um, this apartment building exists here, and there's also a duplex on the subject property. This- this image here is kind of looking southwest. From North Governor Street, you can see the surface parking that exists in some of the trees that exist on the southern end of the property. Here's the current zoning map, again, which I went over earlier. I did- I just wanted to mention that the R313 zoning district does allow up to 15 dwelling units per acre. Based on the size of these parcels here, 85 dwelling units max would be allowed, and the maximum height in this zone is 45 feet and three stories. The proposed zoning is a planned development Page 18 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https://citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. overlay with the portion zoned RS-12. The majority is proposed to be RM-20. The maximum density in the RM-20 zone is 24 dwelling units per net acre, and the maximum height is 35 feet. The planned development overlay, the applicant is not requesting any waivers from zoning standards. The OPD is required due to impacts to critical slopes, and any future development must substantially comply with the- with OPD plan. There is one rezoning condition that we're recommending that uh subsequent to the rezoning that the land is re -subdivided to follow the lots and the new zoning boundaries. Here's the preliminary plan development overlay plan. The project proposes to redevelop the land along North Governor Street. This would include the development or the demolition of two existing single family homes that are currently located in this area, as well as the vacant office building. To multi -family residential buildings are proposed, each containing 42 units for a total of 84 units. The plan shows stormwater being located on site. Open space is proposed in this area here. Parking is internal to the buildings, and surface parking is proposed behind the buildings. The plans also show the inclusion of a sidewalk along North Governor Street. Here is the landscaping plan. They are proposing to keep approximately 15 mature trees on the southern end of the property and proposing to plant another 54 on the property, several of which are street trees along North Governor. In addition to what you see here, the Planning and Zoning Commission is recommending a condition that S3 screening be provided along the southern retaining wall in this location. There are two criteria that we use when we review rezonings. The first is consistency with the comprehensive plan. And the future land use map of the IC 2030 plan shows that the majority of the site is appropriate for multi -family residential development. All properties along North Dodge Street in this area here are identified as appropriate for multi -family, up to 24 dwelling units per acre. The central district plan also shows a majority of the site as appropriate for multi -family. And unlike the IC 2030 plan, there are some areas that are identified as appropriate for open space and single family. The future land use map functions as a conceptual future vision, both plans and vision multi -family in this area up to 24 dwelling units per acre, which is the maximum density of the proposed zone. In addition to the future land use map, there are several goals and strategies that align with this rezoning, including encouraging compact efficient development, encouraging a diversity of housing types, ensuring a mix of housing types in all neighborhoods and supporting infill development and redevelopment. In terms of environmental goals, our environmental goals also encourage compact and efficient development and discouraging sprawl by promoting infill development and also improving overall access to parks. In the Central District Plan, there is a goal to promote the Central District as an attractive place to live by encouraging reinvestment and supporting new housing opportunities. The proposed rezoning would allow for more housing and the removal of the vacant office building. The plan also notes the existing R3B zoning in this area and states that the area should be rezoned to a valid designation such as RM-20. Next is compatibility with the neighborhood character, and just to provide kind of a summary of the context of this- this neighborhood. Happy Hollow Park, again, is directly to the south of the subject property. Across the North Governor Street, um, there is some single-family homes. To the north, there are duplexes, and further north there are single-family. There's existing multi -family on the subject property, and further to the south, there's a single-family. In terms of compatibility, I want to talk about site design, open space, landscaping, as well as substantial compliance with the OPD plan. I did want to mention that one of the rezoning conditions that is being recommended is that prior to that re platting of the property that the duplex that is located in this area be converted to a single unit to comply with density requirements. So here's the preliminary OPD plan again, and it was Page 19 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at httl2s:./,Icitychannel4.com/city-council.htmi) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. developed to fit into the existing mixture of residential buildings and that the neighborhood contains. The two block scale buildings front North Governor in a matter that aims to reduce their visual impact from the public right of way. The Northern building is positioned in such a way that the shortest end of the building fronts North Governor. For the Southern building, it is positioned at an angle, which the longest side is also kind of pushed further away from North Governor as it extends. Open space is provided at the southeast corner of the site. The open space area is at an elevation that is higher than the building. So as people come up north Governor Street, they should see the open space area and in the background the building, which would be at a lower elevation. Both buildings will be 35 feet in height. And to the south is Happy Hollow Park. The proposed project will not impact any of the trees that are currently located on the city's property, and that project also maintain- will be maintaining these 15 trees in this location here. Oh, there are no plans for redevelopment of the North Dodge Street site, any future redevelopment will need to be substantially compliant with what you see here. The rezoning would not allow any more dwelling units than currently exist. Additionally, the existing development pattern provides a transition from the single-family home here, which is just south of the subject property. It goes from a single-family use to a duplex to the apartment building, so there is that existing transition that is maintained within these OPD plans that would need to be insured if any redevelopment were to occur. Here are the elevations for the proposed buildings. They have incorporated entrances to individual dwelling units from the exterior to create more of a townhome style feel. And this also helps to break up the long facade. As I mentioned, the property is bordered by North Governor Street and North Dodge Street. Both of these are arterials. They are currently operating under capacity. The site also has access to Iowa City Transit. This is an infill project, so there's access to existing sewer and water lines. Some rezoning conditions that are being recommended include the dedication of public right of way and easements along North Governor Street to increase the right of way and allow for the construction of a sidewalk, dedication of a temporary construction easement along North Dodge Street, which will help with the reconstruction of North Dodge. And the abandonment of existing water lines for the North Dodge Street apartments, which currently come off North Governor Street, those new service lines will connect the water lines to the North Dodge Street Main. This site does contain regulated critical slopes, and the proposed development would impact 86% of those slopes. The site- this site and the site to the south have been altered by humans over the years. This is an infill site which has access to city infrastructure. There's access to transit, and the subject property is close to a park, grocery store, restaurant, elementary school, and even the downtown. And this fill project will also bring much needed housing to our community. So in our review of the sensitive - sensitive areas, uh, we felt that the 86% impacted was kind of overcome by these other benefits that the project would provide. I also want to note that, um, in comparison to some of the other sensitive area plans that the council has reviewed, there's only a little over 4,000 square feet of critical slopes. So even though it's 86%, around 3,000 square feet would be impacted. And I just wanted to note that the process whereby these impacts are allowed is through this OPD rezoning process which the council is currently considering. [00:49:39] So right now, we're at the rezoning phase. Uh, we do have a final plat application in, uh, a site plan in and a design review case in, uh, the final plot will come back to city council. The other applications will Page 20 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at.https:llcitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. be reviewed by staff. The applicant did hold a good neighbor meeting in August of 2024, um, based on the review of the relevant general criteria. Staff recommended approval of the proposed rezoning with five conditions at the February 19th meeting of the Planning and Zoning Commission by a vote of 6-1, the Planning and Zoning Commission concurred with staff's opinion and recommended approval of the five staff -recommended conditions, and they also discussed and added one additional condition. So these conditions include that the subject property must be replotted prior to issuance of a building permit, prior to approval of the final plat, that duplex on North Dodge must be converted. Dedication of right-of-way and an easement along North Governor Street, dedication of a temporary construction easement along North Dodge Street. The water ser- service lines for the apartments must be fixed to come off of North Dodge. And the one condition that was added by the commission was the retaining wall being screen- screened on the southern end to the S3 standard. The conditional zoning agreement has been signed, and staff has received several protest petitions. Um, the 20% threshold was met, and the approval of the rezoning will require a supermajority by council. And that's all I have. Thank you. [00:51:17] Any questions for Ann? Real quick one. [00:51:201 Um, just remind you, the density, um, per acre between R3B and the proposed new density. What was R36? I just missed that. [00:51:30] Fifty-eight dwelling units per acre. [00:51:32] And then the proposed, if we do this, the change would be to- to max of? [00:51:37] Twenty-four. [00:51:37] So 58-24. Okay. [00:51:42] Ann, can you speak to the, uh, just describe what the S3 screening is like? [00:51:49] 1 made a note of that. Hang on. So the S3 screening is a high screen, and there have to be enough shrubs and small evergreens to form a continuous hedge that's between 5' and 6' in height. [00:52:12] Page 21 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https://citychanne]4.com/city-council.htmi) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Um, the question about building height, um, specifically how it's measured? Is it only measured at the base of the building for the purposes of zoning? I know in building code, it's at the base of the building, but do you consider the retaining wall as part of the building height? [00:52:27] The retaining wall wouldn't be included in the building height. Uh, the building height is measured based on an average grade of the property, uh, around the building. [00:52:37) At the foundation. I have a question that might be more Eric, but maybe it's both of you. Um, and that would be the- I'm still trying to tease out what it means to have these strange R36 zones trapped in the middle of Iowa City and what our responsibility is to align that with our comprehensive- current comprehensive plan. And specifically, does being in R3B zone mean that we completely omit all of our Chapter 14 zoning requirements or just the density requirements in consideration? [00:53:14] Right, it's- it's certainly a fair question. Um, no, the court ruling, that is the second of the two cases regarding this, made clear that the city could rezone, but that the three lots, uh, in question, uh, that remain, uh, able to be developed at R3B standards, just that need to be developed by R3B standards, which means, you know, anything that was not required by R313 back in 1978 would not be required of those properties. And I want to be careful to distinguish those lots as opposed to the others. But as Ms. Rossett made clear, what we're really hoping to achieve is, yeah, you know, something that's congruent, um, that you don't have kind of ISOS and so forth on three lots, and then, you know, modern zoning standards for the others. [00:54:05] Well, that's kind of what I- the R3B zoning, that- as far as I can tell from that zoning ordinance, has no requirements for screening, no provisions for sensitive areas, nothing, right? It's just built to 45' to 20' setback. Is that- then there's no other rules? Is that how that R3B zoning works? [00:54:25] Oh, sorry, did you want- you want. Is that your understanding of the zoning? There's really, like, very few requirements for the site. [00:54:31] Yes, I would generally agree with that characterization, and I'll confess I am not an expert on R3B zoning. It's been obsolete for decades, but I did review it ahead of this meeting as I figured this might come up. Um, there are some parking standards, and there, uh, are front back and side yard setback- setback requirements. I mean, there are some things, but to compare the requirements back in the'70s to what's present now is apples and oranges. I mean, we have a far more comprehensive zoning code now than would have been the case back then. Page 22 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at httl2s:/Icitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [00:55:03] They would have to follow our current building codes, but nothing in Title 14, is that? [00:55:09] Yeah. Uh, they would have to follow our building codes. I'll definitely agree with that part of it. Uh, would say, insofar as other Title 14 standards are concerned, I would say that, yeah, anything that is incongruent with 11313, we would not be able to enforce. [00:55:25] Okay. [00:55:26] On those three lots. [00:55:27] And I also noticed that the R313 allows something called apartment hotels. What the heck is that? [LAUGHTER] [00:55:34] 1 can't recall if that was a defined term or not. Uh, I assumed that that was for a hotel with longer stays as opposed to, uh, kind of single -night stays. [00:55:44] Okay. [00:55:48] And so this would be be- if I'm tracking the argument correctly, the argument in favor would be that by doing this voluntarily in combination, we would basically be getting, like, a voluntary withdrawal of the R36. Like, they would be agreeing to not develop to R313 if we give the OPD. [00:56:09] Right. This rezoning [OVERLAPPING] would forever put to rest this- this issue. 11313 zoning would be dead in Iowa City. And yes, I would characterize, clearly this as a compromise. Um, certainly, the city is not getting everything it would love. Uh, neither is the developer. Uh, I think we're getting about the best project we can expect to get, uh, given the court's ruling in 2018. [00:56:31] So I'm just going to keep rolling questions. So our options are to accept this proposal, or if we deny it, we just can allow development at these strange, different hodgepodge conditions that if we just deny this application, they can develop at will on the parcels that exists? [00:56:48] Page 23 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:/Icitcitychannel4.com/city-council.htmi) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Well, there would be a couple- couple of things in response to that. One, uh, is, I suspect we would face litigation to see whether, uh, in- in rejecting this rezoning, we are essentially not allowing, uh, for the 2018 ruling to take effect. Maybe, maybe not. But in answer to the second part of your question, yes, uh, certainly one potential outcome could be that, uh, the property owner could develop those three parcels at R36 zoning to the extent that they could, uh, and would have to follow modern zoning on all the parcels that are not R36 zones. [00:57:24] May we approve RM20 density, but not the PUD at this- at this moment in time and ask them to come back if we're concerned about sensitive areas? Is that an option in front of us? [00:57:37] Well, this is an OPD RM20 zoning application, so I don't think you can pick and choose if I- I may be misunderstanding. [OVERLAPPING] [00:57:461 I'm asking, can we? [00:57:46] Yeah. I'm afraid you cannot pick and choose. You either need to accept or reject this proposal. [00:57:51] We can make non -substantive small conditions at this juncture. [00:57:56] Well, it- I'm going to be careful on my response there. Uh, I would want to hear what the conditions are. If they are really anything of substance, anything that's more than a de minimus change, then we would probably have to have a discussion about whether there would need to be a consult with P&Z or maybe it even needs to go through P&Z through the whole process, if it's particularly if it's something that they haven't had a chance to weigh in on. [00:58:20] Oh, that's not for now. [00:58:21] Yeah. [00:58:21] Question time, so. [00:58:24] 1 have a question that is not technical. Um, how long has that office building been vacant? Page 24 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at.https:/Icitychannel4.com/city-council.htmi) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [00:58:31] Oh, um, since I've lived in Iowa City? [00:58:34] I'm trying to match it against my memory when I moved here '90. No. Yeah, '95. 1 want to say it was- it was vacant at that. [00:58:43] I- I don't know when it was vacant. I'm not sure. [00:58:44] 1 can say it was vacant since 2014. [00:58:47] Okay. [00:58:471 But it's probably been longer than that. [00:58:49] Yeah. Okay. [00:58:55] You're in no other questions? [00:58:56] Sorry. I got one more. [LAUGHTER] [00:58:58] So one thing about this site would be the sidewalk that is provided on the lot. If you go to the site, you see it terminates at a strange hillside. Like, because of the topography of Happy Hollow Park, it- I don't - was there consideration for where that sidewalk goes and how it connects to anything? [00:59:19] There's no- there's no connection. There's no sidewalk to the South of what's being proposed. [00:59:23] So just sort of a sidewalk to nowhere right now, and, I don't- like, how does that work? I mean- [00:59:291 Page 25 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https://citychannel4.com/city-council.htm]) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Typically, we would get new sidewalks with infill development. So since they're proposing to develop this site, they're required to provide a sidewalk on their property. [00:59:39] Great. [00:59:391 Um, if the- [00:59:42] City were to want to add a sidewalk. [00:59:43] Yes. [00:59:44] Does that sidewalk actually work to add additional sidewalks to it? [00:59:48] It- it would need to- we're reviewing plans right now as part of the final plot. The sidewalk would need to be able to be extended to the South. [00:59:56] So that you would not just kind of hit a cliff. [00:59:58] Yes- yes. [01:00:03] Um, I had a question. I know that it goes by North Governor Street, which is technically a state highway, right? [01:00:12] Yes. [01:00:14] What type of regular- I don't know. I'm not privy to this information. Um, what type of, uh, maybe traffic -related regulations go along with zoning, if any? Um, yeah, that's my. [01:00:321 Yeah, we looked at traffic counts on North Governor to see what the current, you know, number of vehicles that are traveling there per day right now are. And based on our traffic counts, the number of Page 26 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:/(citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. vehicle trips is well below the capacity. It's around 5,000-7,000 trips per day, I want to say, and the capacity for this state highway is probably around 16,000-18,000. [01:01:00] Actually, can I follow up on his question? Good. Thank you for that. Um, given that then this would create much more density and residence. I- has there been discussion or, possible, I don't know, forecasting of whether there would need to be some kind of signalization or something like that, given the- the number of units and then potential people with vehicles? [01:01:24] Yeah, since the- since North Governor is well below capacity, there's enough capacity for the proposed development, and there were no offsite improvements recommended as part of the project. [01:01:39] Do we even have the authority to do that on the state highway? [01:01:43] Any project in the state highway would have to be in collaboration with the DOT. [01:01:47] Okay. [01:01:47] Um, the council does have the ability to add off -site conditions when they can demonstrate a public need is created. [01:01:59] M h. [01:02:02] So just to be clear, so what you're saying is that if this were to pass, if it were to be built, and it would- to the cities and perhaps MPOs studies, say, this looks like this needs some- some kind of changes, we could take action with DOT or, um, request that the DOT look at this to make changes to make it safer if need be. [01:02:29] Yeah, I guess the assessment and the determination that was made by transportation planning staff is no additional improvements would be needed to accommodate the proposed development. [01:02:38] I'm just saying that if in future, if this were developed and there was - Page 27 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,//citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [01:02:44] Achievements. [01:02:45] And that door is open for investigation to- to make this. Okay. [01:02:49] Yeah, I think so. Yeah. [01:02:51] Uh, just to kind of put it out there. Um, or just to ask the question to get it out there, this is something that I've tried to get the answer to for a long time. It's- it's kind of hard to get a clear answer. So if this unit is or if this land is sold and another developer comes and wants to develop the land, it doesn't necessarily have to be an exact fit of the proposal, but the wording used is, correct me if I'm wrong, a substantial change. And is the substantial change kind- is it- who is the ultimate decider of what a substantial change would be? [01:03:36] Yeah, it's- it's something that we would discuss as staff with myself and my colleagues. Um, the substantial changes that we would be looking at or maybe change this wouldn't apply here, but changes to a street network, changes in proposed uses. The other thing that we're looking at is the character of the development. Just to give you an example, where we have required, uh, we have considered it a substantial change is if you're familiar with Oak Nill East off of Scott Boulevard, East of North Dodge, they had an OPD rezoning that was approved for three buildings, and they came back and wanted to add an additional building. And even adding that additional building, it could comply with the zoning regulations. It could comply with the density requirements. But just adding that additional building, staff felt, was a substantial enough change to the character that we required that they go back for another rezoning. So that's just one example. [01:04:341 Okay. [01:04:35] Can you talk a little bit about city infrastructure that travels through this site? Is that a storm that goes diagonally through the site? [01:04:43] In a sanitary trunk line. [01:04:45] And they're both existing to remain, and that's why the buildings are positioned to avoid disturbance. Page 28 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:.//citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [01:04:50] Yeah, that's part of the reason of those existing easements. [01:04:57] And the retention pond is for additional stormwater on the parking lots and rooftops, effectively? Is that what the southwest corner is? [01:05:07] Yeah, the new stormwater basin is required with this development. So it's accommodating the storm water for this project. [01:05:16] I'm gonna go back to my first question. If we allow or require 1136, is there any provisions for stormwater management in R3B? [01:05:24] 1 don't- I don't think so. [01:05:26] 1 reviewed again, skimming a deep dive, but I didn't- I didn't see any. [01:05:32] 1 didn't either so. [01:05:38] 1 guess, there's one more question following up on, um, Oliver's question about the amount of change. The final plot for this rezoning, if it goes through, would come back to council. Can you characterize, maybe a little more what differences we could see between what's in front of us now on the final plat that would not require going back to the drawing board as far as the zoning. [01:06:04] So the final plat is just going to show the lots, and they align with what is shown here, Lots 1, 2, and 3. So that will be the same. The final plant won't show any of the buildings. The final plot will show the additional right of way that we've requested as a condition with the rezoning, the temporary construction easement, and those types of things will be shown on the plat. [01:06:29] And the site plan review then would have the buildings and the pond and the screening. [01:06:37] Yes. Page 29 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https://citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [01:06:381 And that would be just at staff level? [01:06:40] Yes. [01:06:40] Okay, thank you. (01:06:43] Real quick question. And maybe this is what the satellite view would be helpful to this one. I'm just wondering because there's a stand of timber, small stand of woods or trees there between the park and yeah, the proposed changes. This this kind of answers my question a little bit. Sort of where does that cut across into what we would be preserving and how much of that would be the city side, just in terms of that tree cover there. So if I were to look at this the- if I were to draw a line straight up the middle, of this white, sort of rectangular ish shape like this. Yeah, right about right there. That's the part that would stay that they would not be developing, is that correct? Or can you like I'm trying to- I'm trying to overlay these two things in my mind, the proposed part that's, yes. So that's- [01:07:38] So here's here's the lot line, I guess, for Lot 1. [01:07:42] Right. [01:07:42] So it's closer to that existing building, I would say. So it might be something more like- something more like this, maybe a little bit to the left of center. [01:07:581 Yeah, just curious what exactly that looked like compared to what's currently there. So that would be- so some of those that little bit of wooded area, and there's a lot of dead -falls and stuff in there, too, so I don't know if that's something that we get cleaned up or not, but, uh, just kind of wondered about that. So thank you, that answers my question. Like, this might be more for Julie or Cheff. I'm curious if there's any effort in our parks master plan to address or invest in Happy Hollow Park in the near future. Just redid some start. I know we just invested some there, and I wasn't sure if there's that's. [01:08:36] Yeah, I don't believe that there's anything in our five-year CIP for Happy Hollow. There's been some recent investments in the playground, shelter and restroom. [01:08:44] Page 30 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. And the field. [01:08:45] Anything and the ball field? Yes. Anything new would be minor, but no significant changes. [01:08:54] And so no sidewalks planned for that site. [01:08:59] No, but, you know, it's common when you get a development to move forward if there's gaps in sidewalks that the city would take a look at that. And I've shared the example currently with monument Hills on the east side. That's a subdivision at the corner of Scott and Rochester that just started within the past year or so, and after that was approved, the city moved forward with an infill sidewalk trail connection into Calder Park to connect that new subdivision with a nearby park. A very similar situation to this. That was not on our radar at the time, and we made that a priority. So if this moves forward, staff can certainly begin the investigation of that sidewalk down governor to provide access to Happy Hollow. Anybody that's kind of been by that hill, there's some- there's some sledding paths over there. So many are familiar with it. It's very steep and it's a quick drop. So I would expect that there'd be some a significant work to put a sidewalk in there, and there'd be a lot of tree removals and a retaining wall that may not be ideal, but that could be a future discussion that we have with counsel on whether you want us to pursue that or not. [01:10:22] You're in no other questions. Thank you. Anyone from the public like to address this topic? If you're in here, please raise your hand so I can take a count. [01:10:35] Mayor, I want to make sure you offer the applicant an opportunity to speak if they wish. [01:10:38] Sure- sure. Yeah. And 1 second, I'll get the applicant up the applicant want to speak. Oh, okay. You do want to speak? Okay, I'll have the applicant come up and speak, and then I'll take another round of hands when they're done. Welcome. [01:11:03] Thank you, John Marner again with MMS consultants. I just take a moment to thank Ann for that detailed staff report for all the questions from counsel so far. I would echo her statement early on in the development of this site. I think staff and the developer and MMS saw an opportunity to- to work towards a site development that would be more cohesive for the neighborhood as opposed to, again, a piecemeal, you know, trying to match the existing R3B zoning. So a lot of our efforts at that point, shifted to trying to develop that site again in that manner, working with some of the conditions that Ann already referenced, certainly concerned about the traffic concerns, sensitive areas, the existing Page 31 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:llcitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. infrastructure for the sanitary sewer and the storm sewer, the existing trees. Those were all things we considered the visibility of those buildings as you drive down Governor Street. Those are all things that we worked at- looked at and tried to review and work towards the best option. I'll answer a couple of questions that I think came up the sensitive areas, most of them as Ann alluded to are man made as far as the slopes. So it is 86% impact, but the majority of them are focused in the southeast corner and they are manmade. They're related to the construction of those homes when those homes were built quite a while ago. The other question regarding the sidewalk connection, I think that's something we're considering, as Ann noted, and this would be another comment. We've actually already submitted the site plan, so one of the concerns or comments expressed was how much could change. We've already submitted a site plan for staff review. We've submit submitted building plans for the development review committee to try to ensure that we can meet some of those objectives that are consistent with this zoning application at the same time so that council can have the confidence that we're working towards the same solution. And I think that's all I want to add if I'm available for any questions if you have any. [01:13:03] Hearing none. Thank you. [01:13:04] Thank you. [01:13:041 All right. I'll take those hands again, and if you're online, please raise your virtual hand if you want to speak. Okay, so I am seeing three individuals that want to speak. There is a sign in here, but also in the back, there was a sticker. You can throw it in the basket. We ask that you come up this- come up at this time and please give your name and city you're from. [01:13:28] Hi. [01:13:33] Welcome. [01:13:34] Thank you very much. Those are my P&Z notes, but, uh, Matteo Bije, Iowa City, Iowa. That seems silly. This big sticker. [01:13:43] Oh, you can just throw it in there. You don't have to unstick it. Yes, thank you. [01:13:48] Page 32 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:llcitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Okay, thanks for- thanks for having us today. Dear councilors, I'm here to express my concerns regarding the proposed zoning and development of the Coos town apartments. As a longtime resident of the Northside neighborhood and user of Happy Hollow Park, I feel compelled to highlight several critical issues, some of which may be reiterated later. Our neighborhood does have a mix of single family homes, duplexes, and larger scale apartment buildings. However, the proposed development is significantly larger than anything currently present. I looked at maps and GIS and used a fancy little pointer there to calculate things. Facades of proposed buildings match the width of North Dodge HV as seen from the parking lot, for instance, or I work on campus. The footprint is about the same as McLean Hall or Jessup Hall on the Panic Rest. So I imagine that as you approach the building. This was his concerns about the compatibility with the existing neighborhood character, and I would say that we should ensure that any development fits harmoniously within our community, preserving the unique cultural essence of the Northside and Goose town neighborhood that we so cherish. Regarding rezoning itself, um, it does, based on what I've seen, comments, read, rezoning 900 North Dodge Street appears to be a violation of the comprehensive plan, at least maybe not the 2031, but the other one that was shown earlier. Historically, city council and PNZ have recognized the three B density on portions of the proposed zoning as a spot zone that was called a mistake. The Supreme Court did not obligate the city to include North 900 North Dodge in this decision, nor did it again, from what I've read, North 10 or any of the RS-8 or RS-12 lots on the property, and doing so seems to undermine the principle of fair and transparent urban planning. This was brought up at PNZ and was acknowledged by PNZ members before they voted despite it all. Um, regarding housing goals and strategies, while the project aims to provide housing options for households of all types and incomes, the term market prices has become an ugly and contentious buzzword. We need to ensure that new developers truly offers affordable housing options that cater to the diverse needs of our residents. Building more housing, um, equating lower prices is also contentious. I only have 15 seconds. Oh, boy. Um, so regarding the grove of trees, there's a whole acre. So it's small, but it's a whole acre still. Let's see. The plan does not seem to ensure safe and convenient access for bikes and pedestrians. Thank you. [01:16:43] Thank you. [01:16:441 I'm sure people will use that. Thank you. Welcome. Please state your name and city you're from. [01:16:59] I'm Audrey Barrick. I'm from Iowa City. Good evening, councilors and Mayor T. [01:17:05] Welcome. [01:17:05] Thanks for having me. So everybody wants 911 Governor Street Area to be developed and the old Social Services building to be gone. And the city has worked hard, but we think the city can do much better Page 33 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,/./citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. than the current plan. Um, I have three points to make. Number 1, much more is being granted to Mr. Barcolo than is required by the Supreme Court decision. The court decision permitted up to 84 units to be built on three non -adjacent R36 plats. What is permitted, though, is not the same as what is feasible. Regardless of the court order, development potential for the 1336 area is physically limited. Due to the odd shape of the court imposed R3B zoning, the diagonal sewer easement that cuts across the properties and the steep slopes on Lot 51, to which there is no building planned for that lot in the current proposal. It seems the city is concerned that if they don't go along with the current proposal, the development could be worse. However, it's unlikely Mr. Barcolo could in practice, achieve the theoretical density permitted by the R36 zoning. Point number two, the up zoning of the duplex at 900 North Dodge Street is in violation of the Comprehensive Plan. That duplex is designated as a single- family and not multi -family and as intentional- intentional transitional zoning between the RM 20 to the north and the RS-8 building to the south. The transition that transition is removed by up zoning it. This property has nothing to do with the Supreme Court case. It was actually quite difficult for me to understand why it's being included in the OPD, as no rationale is provided in the staff report until it became clear that up zoning it is for the sole purpose of capturing and transferring unused density to apply to the 84 units. Rezoning 900 North Dodge Street is an overreach, which sets a precedent for future inappropriate rezoning and undermines principles of fair and transparent urban planning. The area is especially pedestrian unfriendly. Rather than taking this opportunity to improve that situation for the neighborhood, the development as planned- as planned adds substantially to and even entrenches the- the pedestrian hostility. The comprehensive plan does stipulate pedestrian access and safety as priority values in any new development. This development also has no walkway or trail into the park. There's no relations with the park. Thank you. [01:20:04] Thank you. [01:20:11] Welcome. Please state your name and city you're from. [01:20:141 Uh, my name is Sharon de Gran. I'm from Iowa City with this. Um, can I pass these out to the councilors? [OVERLAPPING] [01:20:23] You can hand it to the. Can I get a motion to accept correspondence? So moved. [01:20:30] Second. [01:20:30) Second. Page 34 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,I/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. (01:20:31] Move by Moe. Second by Bergus. All in favor say, aye. [01:20:35] Aye. [01:20:35) Aye. [01:20:36] Any opposed? Motion passes 7-0. We'll start her time over again. [01:20:43] If you- I'll wait. [LAUGHTER] The clock is still running. Okay. If- if you look at the number of petitions that have been signed, um, representing property owners who are against the intensity, how intense the number of units and the number of bedrooms and the number of cars and vehicle traffic that will be coming in and out of this area, that's what all of those yellow houses represent. And it's significant to me to see that kind of citizen voicing its opinion and realizing that you as counselors, you're the people that we rely upon to further the wishes of what makes sense to the people living in the area. It's an area that is mostly single family or duplex housing. There are some apartments. The number of apartments going in there is just way too intense, way too many. If it could be reduced, that would be great. And it would be also nice to see a development that incorporates some affordable housing and some lower income housing along with market rate. But what you have proposed is only market rate. Um, in order to get the lower income over affordable, we all know that you have to have an organization like a nonprofit that's dedicated to that- that interest, specifically. So I would recommend at this point, rather than voting in favor of it, to hold out and do better. You can do better by simply reverting back to the R3B. Even though that seems static, you'll buy time, you'll get a better development in the end. Um, one of the other main problems that I see with this is the impact that will happen to Happy Hollow Park in the way that, um, Is there an overhead that shows how close the building is to the park? It's really only 20 feet from the retaining wall to the basketball court. There's really no way you can put up five or six feet of foliage to conceal the retaining wall. But that's a huge, like, 45 feet tall, very close to the basketball court. And I think what I'm saying when I say 45 feet is getting at what Josh was- was wondering about, if it's a 10 foot retaining wall and then a 35 foot building, that's 45 feet. And the impact visually of having a building backloaded onto the park as you're trying to use a joy and admire the park is totally antithetical to what I think park design and city design is about. Um, if there were a way that the city could purchase the land at a reasonable price, perhaps before the rezoning, that sounds good to me. So I- I hope that you vote it down tonight knowing that you need a super majority and take some of the good and do a better design. Thank you. [01:23:51] Thank you. Anyone else want to add- add to the conversation at this time? Welcome. Any other hands, because this will be the last opportunity. All right, and no one online. Welcome. Page 35 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:/.Icitychanne]4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [01:24:09] Hi. [01:24:10] State your name and city of origin. [01:24:11] [OVERLAPPING] I'm Johnson. I'm from Iowa City. I live like six blocks from here, and I wasn't expecting to speak tonight. Didn't we just get through regrading, like, all of the side lawns on Rochester, and it expanded, like, the length of the project for, like, a year or something to cut into people's yards and to have to redo, like, retaining walls and stuff like that. Like, doesn't anybody else think that this is gonna cause that exact same problem? Because like, on the south side, we were talking about the sidewalk, right? That grade is ridiculously steep on that South's steep in the opposite direction in the people's yards there for the sidewalk to extend north, if you were going to extend it in either direction, you'd have to regrade those. And then also, North Governor is like the primary way that people in Goose town get to North Dodge Hive, right? So are they gonna be diverting traffic through like around Oakland cemetery up north Summon? And that's like a brick road, which is barely one lane, and people park on one side of it. So how long will North Dodge or I'm sorry, North Governor be out of commission while we potentially make all these changes to it? And how will the traffic work in the interim period of time? I guess, is what the point that I wanted to make up was just logistically, this could have an impact on- on businesses north of this location and on the community itself and their ability to go get groceries for an indefinite period of time. That's all. [01:25:29] Thank you. I'm gonna have you sign in at the desk there, please. Thanks. All right. So I've allowed for public opportunity to speak before I close this opportunity. I just want to make sure that we have six votes that are going to vote or tend to be inclined to vote with P&Z. And I'm gonna look to make sure that I see six. Okay. So I do not see, um, a total of six. So at this point, we're gonna have a- we need a consot with P&Z. That's right. [01:26:12] Okay. All right. [01:26:18] So shall we defer this item? [01:26:20] So we're gonna. Yeah. So if someone can make a motion to defer? [01:26:25] 1 will move a motion to defer. Page 36 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,I/citychannel4.com/city-council.htmi) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [01:26:28] Move by Salih. [01:26:29] Second move. [01:26:30] All right. And all in favor say, Aye. Oh, well, we should probably do a voice vote for this. [01:26:36] Well, I was thinking not only actually, a voice vote would be fine as opposed to a roll call, but I wonder if we want to pick a date certain, um, when you'd like to defer this too. Now, to be clear, we normally have the consults at work sessions, and so you would be looking at the formal, presumably, for when you would follow up with that. [01:26:56] May 6. [01:26:59] The only trick about May 6 that I'm trying to remember the dates, I believe that planning and zoning meets on the first and third Wednesday I'm looking. Yes. So I think they meet on- with next meet tomorrow? Sorry. Well, yeah, it would be what- tomorrow and then the seventh? Am I getting that? No. Oh, okay. So the next meeting would be on May 7th, so not that we can't, um, you know, bring them in for the consult on the sixth, we could do that. Should we? Would you like to handle it that way? [01:27:31] Yeah. Yeah, I think we reach out on the see if they can attend the sixth. [01:27:36] Okay. I see. [01:27:37] Yeah. That's what I'm seeing from council. [01:27:39] That's okay. If possible. Yeah. [01:27:42] And then, if not, we go to May 20th. [01:27:45] Page 37 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at httl2s://citychannel4.com/city-council.htmi) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Okay, I think it was Mayor Pro Tem's motion. I assume you consider that a friendly amendment to, ah. [OVERLAPPING] [01:27:521 Six defer to May 6. [01:27:55] And seconded by Moe? [01:27:56] Yes. [01:27:57] All right. All in favor say, Well, any other discussion? [01:28:01] All I wanted to say was this is, um, extremely difficult zoning, I'm sure, for staff and, you know, the city attorney and all of your people, like, planning to like- everybody's trying really hard. I just wanted to thank everybody for answering all of our millions of questions about this because it's so weird. Um, I just wanted to acknowledge that. So thank you. Great. [01:28:27] Thank you. All right. Any other discussion? All in favor, say, aye to differ? [01:28:36] Aye. [01:28:37] Any opposed? Motion to defer pass 7-0. Can I get a motion to accept correspondence? [01:28:46] So moved? [01:28:47] Second. [01:28:48] Moved by Bergus. Seconded by Alter. All in favor say, Aye. [01:28:51] Aye. Page 38 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:.//citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [01:28:51] Aye. (01:28:52] Aye. [01:28:52] Any opposed? Motion passes 7-0. Okay. We're on to 9(d), Zoning Code Amendment related to the form based code zones and standards, Ordinance amending Title 14 zoning code in Title 15, and subdivision to adjust standards, increase flexibility, and clarify language related to form based zones and standards. I'm going to open the public hearing, and welcome. [01:29:19] Thank you, Mayor Danielle Sisman, Neighborhood and Development Services again. As you introduced this, this is a zoning code text change. And I just want to start with probably the most important part of this. I'm going to go quickly through the actual code language itself since that's pretty crunchy and, um, just kind of treat that with high level. But I want to give you the context, the background, and the intent of these changes, which is really the most important thing going into any zoning code text amendments. I just want to highlight that the city has a history- a long history of implementing zoning innovations. This slide just shows from the beginning of the inception of zoning in the 1920s, all the various tools that have kind of been developed over the years. Our code involves every one of these. There's a remnant of every innovation shown on the slide somewhere in our zoning code. And that includes form based codes, which is the most recent, uh, on this slide, beginning in the 1970s, really more of an early 90s architect design based thinking. Our code does have form based code, and that's what these code amendments are going to deal with tonight. Little background on form based codes. Again, form based codes foster predictable built environments and a high quality public realm by using the physical form rather than the separation of uses as the organizing principle for the code. So form based codes deal with forms. And they really arose primarily because there was architects thinking about these things and realizing that modern zoning- modern zoning in the 90s, was promoting two- two ends of the spectrum, either really slow density, single family or really dense block scale mid rise, multifamily, but the missing middle housing in the middle, which was around before zoning came around, had been kind of excluded, kind of regulated out by the standards of use based zoning. So duplexes, triplexes, fourplexes, small apartments, kind of the cottage court developments, all those things are missing middle housing. And they were meant to be revived through the movement towards form based codes. And form based codes were organized around principles that architects understood called transects. Our particular code focused on just a couple of transects in the spectrum- in the spectrum of all kinds of urban forms and designs because we were writing our form based code for the South District at the time, and we were thinking about green field development or land that had never been developed before. And- and fitting in to our urban design standards, those standards that made most sense for the South District, which is really a suburban, maybe general urban transect in the scheme. So rather than using use based descriptions to distinguish zoning districts, we use transects, and we use buildings and street inspired language to describe what our foreign based code should do. So we did adopt a form based code. It was Page 39 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,L/citychannel4.com/city-council.htm]) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. in a process between 2019 and 2021. Where used Opticos Design as our consultant. They are a nationally known architecture and urban design firm. They helped us draft the maps that went with this and all of the code standards. Um, as I said, that was adopted in 2001, and it was intended to support high quality, walkable vibrant neighborhoods to guide the physical development in the South District, following those codes themselves and the maps in a green field environment, to create this area that's safe for pedestrians, encourages walking, preserves important environmental resources, contains a connected street network for streets and paths, and allows a variety of housing types, really focusing on mixing housing types together in an unconventional way, in a way that conventional zoning had kind of excluded from being, ah, just organically developed. Now, with innovation, we know there's always opportunities to get things wrong, that there's always corrections that need to be made as they're actually tested. So we've identified challenges with our form based code. Primarily, we've really not had any significant developments since we adopted our code in 2021. We have tried to incentivize developers to take the plunge and develop to form based code standards. We actually had a grant program in 2022 that gave out money to developers if they were interested in looking at how they currently operate conventionally and shifting to an unconventional method shifting to the form based code. So since 2022, we've been working with Navigate and they took us up on offer of a grant, um, to kind of retool how they produce housing. And what they've done with us in collaboration with these proposed changes is actually get down into the weeds into the nitty gritty of floor plans, house sizes, and tell us as feedback, what's not gonna work that they need help, tweaks made for in our code so that they can proceed with development. Now, as we looked at those, we didn't say yes to everything because we have to hold true to the principles of the foreign based code. So the intent of these obvious changes, as presented by staff is always still thinking in terms of, this is a foreign based code. It needs to hold true to the principles in which it was developed through that long process with the community 2019-2021, and that anything that we're suggesting tonight still holds those principles and still distinguishes itself from a conventional zone. So we didn't want to just say, Okay, uh, we need to adjust these standards and then end up basically taking two things that were farther apart and just kind of blending them so you couldn't tell anymore what was a foreign based code and what was a conventional district. So at the heart of it, the intent of all the staff proposed changes that you're going to hear about tonight, try to keep true to those principles. Um, so I think I'll just move on and say it's a zoning action. It's a zoning code text change, but it's still a zoning action. So we always look at, like I said, consistency with the comprehensive plan. The foreign based code is part of our comprehensive plan, so that's why we're staying true to those principles. And there are still plenty of policy guidance in the comprehensive plan that helps us identify what those values are looking again at all of the desire to provide a variety of housing choices, housing types, a different type of housing, a different mix of housing, really to get at that missing middle ideal. It also reflects our City Councils strategic plan and values. We're talking about partnerships and engagement, so we're working in partnership with the developer community, taking feedback from them, helping to incentivize them to retool and to give us feedback. [01:35:52] So the proposed amendments, there's about eight different, um, code sections that are included in this, um, proposal tonight. Overall, as I said, the intent really is to just improve and adjust our regulations to make them more feasible for actual development, to clarify the standards and remove unnecessary Page 40 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:/.Zcitychannel4.com/city-council.htmi) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. complexities. Unfortunately, we may have used some terms in our wording of the form based code that they're not standard terms for developers to understand. So we've had to explain them maybe too many times and realized there are other words we could use to accomplish the same thing. So maybe it's, ah, removing that complexity of language. We also want to improve the code's effectiveness and support its intended outcomes. And so we propose, as I said, ah, a group of code changes under these eight different ess- essentially chapters. So I'm going to go a little bit more quickly through these eight, ah, large areas because I think of zoning code as a very crunchy, heavy on mechanics, heavy on the rules, and lots of calculations or number crunching, and that's not really the important takeaway here. The important takeaway here is the intent of what we want to maintain and the way that we're going to make it more feasible and flexible. So moving into the first of the eight, um, building placement is really regulating setbacks and the orientation of buildings to create cohesive streetscapes, support walkability and protect privacy between neighboring properties. And what we've done here is adjust several standards. We have three diff- two different standards here related to setbacks and when we start tinkering with setbacks, there's some other changes later in the code that I'll mention that flow out of once you change a setback, you have to change some other standards as well. But really, this is maximizing of a- the- the building footprint on a lot. So we've- we've minimized lot size by- in the form based code by creating small lots, but really what we're doing here is adjusting the standards for the setbacks. So the proposed building on each lot could be a little bit bigger. Um, it is a big leap for a developer to build a small building on a small lot. They're just simply asking us to allow them to build a slightly larger building on a small lot. Um, the form based code really is intended to create small buildings on small lots and keep prices low. And the other change here is shown in these two drawings is to allow basically these rear- rear garages to be for duplexes or side beside townhomes to basically eliminate the separation between each one. Um, it's less efficient to build four little boxes and one long rectangular box. You basically build extra walls you don't need. And, um, by eliminating those extra walls, they can reduce costs. So this is another one where this is in the rear, it's not visible. It's a lesser important standard. Staff is proposing this change. This second chapter has to do with building types. So this would be a mix of housing options, so things like houses, duplexes, townhomes. The standards here again, are related to some of the nitty gritty. Um, th- this particular standard is for the houses that are large and small house types, tinkering with the, um, wing dimensions. Um, really, the change in dimension here is to allow attached garages to be built to a more modern standard, so you could fit a car in your attached garage, have an attached garage. Um, really, the developer is telling us that live in a climate where people want to have their vehicles protected and too easily get to them without going into the elements. So this dimension change allows a car to fit in a garage, as well as possibly stairs in the garage needed to circulate in the building. This set of drawings illustrates, again, how we'll- we would be eliminating some extra walls to eliminate extra costs. Basically, some of the wings of a building shown in the dark blue scenarios here, some of them are required to be offset from the corners of the main building. The developer or community asked us to eliminate some of those again, on the less visible rear facades, eliminating additional walls that would be built just to move that wing in when it could just as easily flow from the main wall. Ah, this particular standard is limited only to one story, um, ranch style homes. Ah, the developer community indicated to us that single story ranches were particularly attractive to individuals such as seniors and those with accessibility needs because they're easy to get into and out of. So we wanted to allow some code changes to encourage that particular type Page 41 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https: [/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. of housing, but limit it to buildings that are, um, only one story in height because the standard is essential moving from a long narrow building to a slightly wider ranch building, we didn't want the bulk of that wider building, um, to be added to. So it's limiting this particular flexibility to just one story buildings. This standard is related to cottage court. Um, the cottage court building type and this is, um, 192 square foot increase in the lot dimensions that would be allowed for cottage court. This is, again, cottage court, but dealing with lot depth, basically, ah, allowing cottage courts, which are still the- the smallest, ah, housing type, allowed to be just slightly larger. A cottage court building would still be larger than our typical ADU building in a conventional neighborhood. So again, just slightly increasing the- the size of the smallest types of housing. Um, this third chapter has to deal with architectural elements, and these are, um, um, the physical, ah, characteristics of the building from the outside. So one of the standards that we had a request to change was the amount of glazing or windows on the ground floor of a building. Our current standards that requires that 30% of the ground floor be glass of some type. Um, and this was a really hard standard for the developer to meet. They actually convened a room full of architects and designed homes and then thought that this would not be an issue. But when they talied it up, it really was quite a big dill- difference between what they were proposing and what our code standards said. We actually took this one back to opticos designed to ask them what their opinion for the proposed reduction would be. Um, and they told us that they've actually had similar edits to the standard in other communities that they have designed codes for. So again, innovation, learning, ah, from things as you go. This one is proposing the standard to go down from 30%-15%. That seems like a large jump, but what we're really trying to ensure is that no side of the building is blank. So there's still a standard that there's one window per building side minimum. Um, what we find is that typically the rear of the home has more windows, perhaps in the front, and so it would be unlikely to have no windows on the front, but we were concerned about sides, as well. So the standard simply drops that percentage, but still maintains some glazing on all sides of the building. And again, it was only intended to regulate the first floor. The building code still requires egress windows, so there still would be, ah, the windows needed for, ah, the building safety. The fourth category is frontage types. I think that's things like porches. And there are several standards related to porches. The first one has to do with basically simplifying the language we use in our code about how to measure the side- size of the porch. We had some standards that would have been- that were pointed out to us would have been hard for, ah, us to even check at a building plan set stage because some of the elements of a porch aren't really finalized by the builder or the person buying the home until the ve- very end. So we moved away from words like clear- clear dimension and overall to make it easier for us to measure. And we also reduced some of the widths and depths for the porches. We sill wanted to ensure that a porch was not a token effort, that it could be a usable space. But this was, um, responding to, um, helping us do the review and also helping the developer design a home, um, that they thought would be salable. Ah, the next type of frontage type is a- a door yard or stoop. Ah, some of these, as you can see in the top dr- drawing, were limited in how far into the face of the building they could recess. We had a 1 ft, ah, limit and we've basically increased that the three feet at the request of our developer partners because they've, ah, indicated to us that works, ah, best for them and so the way they lay out their flow plans on the inside with foyers. Also, it's, you know, still a usable space to come out of the building, ah, meet the building code for landings and for, ah, circulation. The third one has to do with glazing. Ah, we simply eliminated this standard. Um, we still have the 15% g- glazing standard on the ground floor that would address th- this Page 42 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:./citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. part of the building anyway. So it seemed redundant to have additional standards for glazing around just one particular frontage type. And then finally, um, the stoop frontage type, we clarified this standard so that the measurement that was being taken was an easy to understand measurement, that it matched the way the designers talk about designing entries, so that there really was a way to have a smooth entrance up to your door without having to have, um, a short ramp or very steep ramp, but that there was still a separation from where your door on the front of your house was and where you entered from, so that that, um, really wasn't just a door out to the sidewalk, but that there was still a- a ramp with a very smooth transition for acc- accessibility. The fifth standard has to do with parking, um, parking spaces, where they are, how driveways are located. Um, in this standard, um, we had, ah, some wording in here about curb cuts, um, and we wanted to, um, mitigate concerns about the visual dominance of curb cuts and to prioritize streetscapes. So, um, we reduced our standard in the form based code. It's still well above what a conventional standard or conventionally zone district would require. So we still preserve the ability for a pedestrian to walk down the street without having driveway after driveway that they have to traverse. The sixth chapter has to do with flexibility for unique sit - situations. And so built into the form based code are, ah, standards that can be tweaked a little bit or administratively waved a little bit through- through the process itself. This would be adding to that, because as we started to talk about, um, the most likely land to be developed first in the Form Based Code District, it was clear that it was adjacent to conventional zoning districts, which we already built and had already kind of established block sizes and street networks that didn't work with the standards of the form based code. What we heard from our developer partners was that we were going to have a hard time meeting the form based code standards because they had to build off of what was already there. So they were inheriting a conventional zoning district neighbor, and it was hard to fit into our form based code standards entirely just along those transition areas. And we also wanted to make sure that regulated sensitive areas and other topographic constraints that might come up just on one off situations could be handled easily without needing additional code changes or a lot of additional zoning, um, actions. So this adds new administrative adjustments in those types of areas. Um, another kind of odd ball, um, flexibility that we needed to think about was driveway widths when two way traffic has to occur when it's not an alley loaded situation. And there are a couple instances with possibly cottage court where cars might need to go quite a bit of ways to get behind a building. They might need to pass each other. And so this was allowing an additional width in just those very rare circumstances. And finally, language, clarification. Not finally, second to last, language, clarification and code cleanup. So, again, I mentioned sometimes we use words, um, as designers as architects that don't mesh with the way things are discussed in the industry. Sometimes we just get things wrong. So this is us responding to the really fine tooth look that navigate took, ah, to our code and helped us identify. Some of the things like encroachments into setbacks, we just needed to standardize typical encroachments into setbacks and itemize them here. We just missed itemizing things like bay windows and door surrounds and canopies and balconies and all the things the conventional code had already thought of, but were really top of mind, um, with a form based code development. So this is just standardizing that. This change has to do with curb cuts. We were kind of using curb cut out of context when we really meant driveway width. So we're just saying driveway width so that it's clear when we talk about the width of a driveway where we're measuring it. Ah, this standard, um, basically dealt with a very minor word that was causing a lot of concern about how much separation was a minimal separation. We like to use dimensions rather Page 43 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:1.1citychanne]4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. than some sort of subjective, you know, what's minimal. We simply eliminated the word minimal here. When we say separation, we mean separation. So again, word choices. And then, uh, neighborhood plan is a unique feature of the form based code. It's intended to, um, itemize the changes- the little changes that add up over time as developments occur in series, one after another, potentially different developers kind of getting that flexibility here and there. It was going to change the overall map for what we expected to see in the Form Base Code district. Previously we were making it the responsibility of each developer to uh, revise the entire form based code district and give it back to us once they'd gotten their flexibilities. This code change basically says, no, you just need to track the ones in your own subdivision, in your own development and city staff. We'll take over, um, tracking the whole so that no one developer is responsible for the entire thing. Um, and again, this is code cleanup in this section just to add features to match a conventional zoning standard list of things that typically come up that just were not itemized. It's better to itemize so people know exactly what you're talking about rather than have the or similar category and then have to find out each time whether your thing is similar or not. And then code clean up, we had several just typos and s- some scripts and fonts and things like that. So we're taking an opportunity this time to clean them up. And finally, we have Title 15. So Title 15 is land subdivisions. It's not something that's the purview of the Planning and Zoning Commission, so you won't see a recommendation from them on this one. But these are all changes that tie into the Chapter 14 changes. So this one has to do with block size adjustment. Um, the four base code really encourages smaller block lengths. Um, if you can't get a street to make the separation in blocks, you can also use a pedestrian street like is shown in green here to essentially make two functional blocks for a pedestrian, even though the car has got to go around the long way, a pedestrian still has an opportunity to traverse only a short block. Without a pedestrian opening, um, this is an option for basically when it doesn't make sense to do that. We wanted to have the opportunity to create the flexibility to determine kind of on a case by case basis whether a pedestrian passage really made sense. [01:51:55] And this is, again, responding to situations where you're inheriting conventional zoning, conventional development next to your form -based code. So you really have to deal with, let's say, uh, a street network that's already laid out that doesn't quite work for your block sizes, or you've got neighbors, uh, along the edge who have lot sizes and don't have street connections where you need your blocks to be determined. So this allows the option, again, for flexibility, dealing with those first form -based code style developments to build off of conventional, um, uh, neighborhoods. And also when there's sensitive areas or other features that we want to basically not have blocks built through. So talking just a little bit about this form -based code and the area that we anticipate, uh, in Sand Hills Estates, with Navigate being the next most likely development. As I said, this is kind of the history of the adoption of the South District Form -Based Code, um, the comprehensive plan amendments that accompany it, uh, its adoption, and the grant program in 2022. Highlighted in blue are these text amendments. It's very possible. Hopefully, as development happens, we learn more. We innovate more, and there might be some more changes that come your way. But at this point, we think this is a very comprehensive set that will, uh, incentivise and allow for development to happen. Um, for Navigate, any developer really in the Form -Based Code district, there still would need to be a rezoning to a form -based code zone. And then we- they would go through the typical plotting, preliminary plat, final plot, and building permits. So Page 44 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at.https:,/,Icitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. based on a review of those key intents and the context of the form -based code, staff drafted and recommended for approval of the proposed zoning code, text amendments in Chapter 14, also in consultation with, like I said, our developer partner in Navigate, helping give us valuable feedback. At its March 5, 2025, meeting by a vote of 6-0, the Planning and Zoning Commission concurred with staff's opinion and recommended approval of the staff's proposed changes. Um, there is also included in the ordinance changes to Title 15, like I said, that do not go to Planning and Zoning Commission and simply are coming to you with a recommendation of staff tonight. Happy to answer questions or my staffer Rachel Shaffer, who diligently drafted all these, is here tonight if we get too crunchy. [01:54:17] Right. [LAUGHTER] [01:54:18] It's a lot of stuff. Thank you. Quick question. Um, on the glazing, the 15-30%, 1 was just wondering from an environmental perspective, what the trade-off was between natural light and less R value that you get when you have windows instead of solid walls. So how does that balance out? [01:54:35] 1 can tell you that was not a thing that Opticos designed built into their original proposal of 30%. 1 don't think that that was part, uh, of the reason that they proposed that, because when we went back to them and asked them, is 15% okay? What- what are we trading off for 15-30? They really didn't have an answer for us. Uh, they had said that they had- had adjusted that standard in other communities. So, you know, you have- you have natural light. You also have an opening in your wall that you're losing heat through when you have a window. So there's all kinds of trade-offs. I don't think that was part of the- the calculation at any point. [01:55:15] Thank you. Thanks for all of the work in developing this, and thanks to the Builder partners who helped work through this process. I know that probably took a lot of time and effort. Um, on the glazing issue, you mentioned that Optico had a chance to kind of weigh in on that change that we were proposing. Did they- did they weigh in on all of these changes or just- just some? [01:55:38] Just some. We didn't ask them on every single item. Um, first of all, they're not under contract with us anymore, [LAUGHTER] so they kind of- we didn't want to wear them out with the small ones that we were comfortable with. Uh, so we just hit them up with the bigger ones, like the glazing that we thought was substantively different. It could be. [01:55:56] And that's kind of a lead -up to my second question. And that's the memo for this does not have a fiscal impact. And I know that we hear all of the time that the staff time is always growing and growing and Page 45 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:/Icitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. growing to review. Can you tell us what we're doing here with more form -based code revisions? Is this helping you guys review faster, or is this alleviating something? [01:56:15] So we haven't had one to review yet. [01:56:17] Okay. [01:56:17] Which was part of what we were realizing with the porch standards. If we had one to review and we needed to make measurements and check off whether this a proposal was going to meet the Form - Based Code that we would have some challenges with clear, you know, uh, rather than outside dimensions, trying to measure inside porch dimensions, that's not a detail that comes across on the building typical residential building permit plan set. And then you have porch columns that get wrapped in things and would eat into that clear distance inside the porch. So we certainly didn't propose anything here that we thought would make our jobs harder. [01:56:52] Okay. [01:56:53] This is all intended to streamline it for both staff and the developer. [01:56:57] Um, it seems like the larger developers are more equipped to deal with this, maybe the smaller ones might take more time, though. [01:57:05] 1 think any developer is gonna need to think about something entirely differently to do a form -based code. [01:57:12] So everything seemed to make sense, and it all, as I was looking at it, it's like, these are ways to maximize land use and, you know, make housing as economical as possible but maintain its attractiveness, except for one where it seemed like the cottage court concept was you were looking for bigger, less like, more space. What was the driver on that one? The other one seemed to be economizing, like, making these things more affordable, potentially, but that one didn't seem to work in that direction. [01:57:39] Page 46 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:llcitychannel4.com/city-council.htmi) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. You know, I- I don't know exactly which- what the push and pull and the dimensions of that were. Rachel, do you know? [01:57:46] Yeah. [01:57:46] We're coming up. [01:57:52] Welcome. (01:57:52] Hi, Rachel Shaffer, I'm associate planner. When it came to the cottage courts, that's a maximum dimension. So it just gave flexibility where the developer thought it would be more sellable for not such a small property. They could still build them smaller, a unit smaller, but to allow the maximum, which is still under 1,000 square feet, footprint -wise, would be something that they could gradually, um, introduce into the market since these are a fairly new building type to the community. [01:58:21] Okay, yeah. [01:58:22] Thanks. [01:58:26] Um, thanks for asking that because I was going to ask that. Um, you know, it's- a lot of these things that are being touched on and mitigated in all of this, uh, you know, it's, um, like, for instance, the- the proposed wing on a main body of a house that, um, the proposed update allows you to have one less wall construction. Um, I'm just curious if you know if there is any like what the reasoning of the existing code was or is for being the way it is. [01:59:051 Sure. I mean, opticus is- the whole purpose of describing a wing at all is to say that the principal building is most important, and anything else is kind of secondary to it and that you don't want your secondary things to overpower your- your primary thing. Um, so the intention was that when you talk about the size of a house, you're talking about the principal main body of the house. You can have some extra things added onto it, but they shouldn't overall increase the area of the house, make it bigger and bigger and bigger, use the foreign base code is looking for smaller houses on smaller lots. And so I think that was just a way of describing that the main body needed to meet that maximum. But you could have some extra things on, like wings, but they needed to stay small and stay, um, just lesser of an importance and still very kind of interesting if you're going to do them. Page 47 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,I/citychannel4.com/city-council.htmi) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [01:59:56] Mh. All right. Thank you. (02:00:00] I'm not an architect, but I play with on TV. [LAUGHTER] [02:00:02] No, you're spot on. It looks a little nicer, and it costs more. [02:00:08] Thank you. All right. Anyone from the public like to address this topic? Please come. I- if I can see all the hands at this time, yep. Please come on up, and we ask that you sign in, state your name and city you're from. Welcome. [02:00:24] Hi, I'm Emma Denny from Iowa City. Um, I just wanted to make a- a brief statement in listening to this presentation. The phrase developer input came up a lot. A lot of developer consultation, but, like, people live in homes and people need to use zoned areas of a city because cities are for people, and not hearing that input on zoning changes is worrying to me. I don't know if the process allows for that input or if this kind of public input is the only thing like that that exists, but a community review board or a tenant review board or something that could also dictate these changes would be incredible because only designing codes to benefit developers, sort of has a lot of inherent wealth incentives and Things like that that can get out of hand and be pretty worrying. Thank you. [02:01:18] Thank you. Please, come on up. [02:01:23] I'm the developer. Do you want hear? [02:01:24] Oh, sure. So we'll have the developer come up first. Sorry about that. I should have had you come first. Yes. [02:01:32] Yes. Sorry. Hold on. [02:01:37] To be clear, this is a text amendment, not for any specific developer or any specific plan. So she's a member of a public clinic anyone else. Page 48 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https://citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [02:01:44] Correct. [02:01:44] So okay. So you are given three minutes. [02:01:48] Yes, that's fine. My name is Gina Landau. I'm from Navigate Homes. And, yes, I was the one that was the- the point of contact with city staff. I started at Navigate Homes a year and a half ago, and I've been working on this since day one with the city staff. Um, and they've been wonderful to work with. It was amazing the discrepancies that we uncovered, both the city staff and myself, as a developer and our architects that things were just not working at all. They just weren't going to work. And Danielle did a great presentation to make it as concise as possible. And as understanding as possible. Um, you know, she did say, and I want to point this out, "The foreign -based code has a lot of complex language, and they had to explain it too many times." Yes, they had to explain it too many times. I get it. Facade zones and wings and clear dimensions. Those are just not words that are used if you build homes. Uh, I've been worked in the development industry for quite a few years, and I- I had no idea what some of those things meant. So doing these code changes is really going to make it easier, not just for Navigate Homes, but for all developers or all people that own land in the form -based code zone. And I do have to say, we - we want to build high -quality homes, but we want to be able to sell them, and we want to make them attainably priced and economical. So we're all on board with that part of it, too. So any questions for me as the big bed developer in the room? [LAUGHTER] [02:03:35] Just allowing for the opportunity for folks [OVERLAPPING] [02:03:38] You're right. Thank you. [02:03:40] Yes. All right, you're the last one up. Welcome. [02:03:44] Well, good evening. Nice to see you, John Balmer, 10 Princeton Court, Iowa City. I wasn't going to speak on this, but I travel that way out southeast Iowa City, uh, every- every day, and I've noticed to my great concern that nothing's happening down there. And this is great, developable area. Uh, you have- you have an elementary school, Alexander, that's there. You have a great park, Trueblood Park. And it's- and I've seen their sign for Navigate Homes every day for probably two years now, and then there's the land of the Lehman. So I hope this will help that facilitate because unfortunately, Iowa City sometimes has a reputation of not being particularly user-friendly. So I hope this will assist that towards that end, um, because certainly, I go by there every day, and it looks like it would be just a great spot for residential medium-priced homes. I mean, it's not- and the area around there is of like nature. So I would hope that Page 49 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https://citychannel4.com/city-councit.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. that is the case, and I'll be watching very closely as this unfolds. But I encourage you if that is the case, I hope- I hope it happens. So thank you very much. [02:04:58] Thanks, and now I'll have you sign in. Thank you. All right. [02:05:02] 1 changed my mind. [02:05:03] Okay. Yes, yes. You're welcome to come out. [02:05:08] Matthew Binger, Iowa City. Um, I'm- my- my tiny concern. I didn't see the- the difference between, uh, we mentioned the glazing 30-15. 1 didn't see how many windows per side or what was the code before that to one window per side. I- I mean- I mean, I'm not in the district. I'm in the North side, which is partially historic and there's a lot of windows there, but the few houses that have some homes- some houses that have come before you, uh, or at least zoning, uh, have one window per size, and maybe it's normal in a more modern home, but I know I'm not an architect either, but my concern is it doesn't- it just doesn't seem very appealing to me to have one window. Nice- nice save cost. A good window costs money, but that's really my only- my only note. Uh, I didn't see the change, so. [02:06:04] Thank you. Yeah. Welcome. Please state your name and city you're from. [02:06:23] Good evening, council. My name's Nancy Bird. I'm president of Greater Iowa City Inc. and I wanted to thank both staff and Navigate Homes for the work they did to really work on the form -based code. We heard a lot about this during our, um, open advocacy calls for the city of Iowa City. We had a lot of businesses involved in that, and development regulations often come up. And the Form -Based Code, in particular, recognizing that the city is looking towards walkable neighborhoods, we want to support that 100%, and also appreciate the fact that city staff listened to the comments and worked really hard on working on this. So thank you very much. I'm just here to commend you all. [02:07:01] Thank you. Anyone else? I'd see no one online. Seeing no one present. Before I close the public hearing, I'm just gonna ask counsel if they're inclined to vote with PNC? [02:07:15] Yes. [02:07:16] Page 50 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https://citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Okay. Great. [02:07:18] All right. I'm gonna close the public hearing. Can I get a motion to give first consideration, please? [02:07:23] So moved. [02:07:24] Second. [02:07:25] Moved by Alter, seconded by Salih. Council discussion. [02:07:29] Actually, I want to hop in first, if I may. Because I was not on council, I was simply a interested resident of the South District when Oh, my God. Tell me again the name of the consultant. [02:07:45] Opto. [02:07:45] Opto- Optocos. Thank you. When they came in. And so I was a part of that initial community feedback, and it was sort of a visioning project. What do you want in a neighborhood? Um, and the things- and the way that it was explained to us was, like, you know, how does zoning in any way, shape, or form, contribute to, like, the actual area that we're gonna be living in. And they did a really good job of explaining, if it is deliberate and strategic and we gather input, then we can actually work towards what kinds of buildings and neighborhoods can be built, allowing more clarity for the developers that also has from us doing this community input, ways for us to know that indeed this is what the people who live in this area would want. So with that as the backdrop, I listen to what these changes would be, and I think this is absolute- they- it is to use the cliche. It's a win win. The developer feels that they can create affordable or more affordable homes, um, in neighborhoods in a way that they can understand what the intention is. And the people who will want to live in homes, and there are plenty of people in the South District and beyond who want to have neighborhoods that are deliberately designed so they're walkable, near a retail, although we'll talk about that later. But have an area that is amenable to where they live so that they can walk close to parks, close to schools, churches, etc. I feel like the changes that were gone through by Danielle and staff, thank you so much for walking us through them, um, I think that they seem to be absolutely in keeping with simplifying for um, developers with the backdrop of input from people who want to live in these homes, what that looks like. And these are simply the- the language and the codifications to be able to make that clearer to developers. I fully understand that simply having sort of this notion of developers dictating how neighborhood should function, we- we have some of that here, and this is a different model of it because this actually was based on a Page 51 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:/.Icitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. consultant coming in and saying, What does a good neighborhood look like in a way that's affordable? And these changes to me still reflect that streamlined intention while being true to it. So I just wanted to- I'm completely proselytizing right now. I recognize that. But because I was in on this before I had any thoughts of being on council, um, I think that this is- these are some really good moves, and I hope that there is some movement that people will take a chance who build homes to say, now we can work with this, and we can create more of a missing middle for a really great neighborhood that needs some more houses because we've got a lot of people who want to be homeowners. Right now, it's still a very high rent district, and there are people who would like to own homes. We need more. [02:10:57] Thanks for that, um, Megan, I had a similar experience, you know, starting in the planning process and being able to provide input. Um, I remember meeting at Grant Wood Elementary, you know, and talking about the South District plan, probably 2013 or so and just sort of every iteration of engaging the community and coming back, um, to talk about walkability, to talk about how many families in that area already live so close to the school, to talk about how the form based code would allow for neighborhood commercial so that people could, you know, have areas nearby to- to shop. And integrating the amazing parks that we have in the South District. So I think there was a really solid, robust process that also reflects the development values, I think, that are expressed in our strategic plan. Um, and some of those were spoken to this evening, too, in terms of prioritizing, um, for bike and pedestrian access, you know, that well, maybe we changed a couple feet of, you know, a driveway, that kind of thing, but being able to really maintain the approach to the residents as being the street, not the garage, right? [LAUGHTER] So if we were making changes like that, I would feel very differently, you know, if we're like, Oh, well, we decided we now want snout houses in the South District foreign based code. That'd be really different. But I think we're really maintaining the integrity of the intent of this neighborhood scale walkable dense, um, ability for development. [02:12:41] Go ahead, Oliver. [02:12:411 [LAUGHTER] Okay. Don't want all of us to talk at once. Um, I would also like to say that, you know, we are trying to become a developer ourselves as a city, and we last meeting voted to such a degree. Uh, and so to me, reading this, it makes it in this particular area more cost effective and easier to develop. So I mean, stuff like that, while it can- well, it does benefit private developers for us trying to build social housing and, like, affordable housing, this could also cut costs for us and mean that we are able to get more bank for our book in this regard. So yeah. [02:13:311 1 was just gonna say, I'll be voting for this. I think it's great, and I appreciate the process, and I appreciate that as a note, this also went before P&Z for review, which is a a board that we- of citizens. And there's been public input before this council meeting on these proposed changes. I would like to say that I hope we keep circling back and talking about how form based code is working and how it can get better and Page 52 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https://citychannel4.com/city-council.htmi) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. compare it to our use based zoning because we've got two different things going on in our city. And my question earlier was just sort of, you know, constantly asking that question is, are we really happy with what we're getting? And we have this really great opportunity in Iowa City to see two different kind of zoning modes move forward, and are we getting what we want? And is it easy enough to figure out that system? Because that would be my only hesitation about adding more foreign based zones is it makes it harder for people to enter the marketplace and, you know, start a one person construction company and build a house. But I'll be voting, yes, because I think this is a very good process and a good thing. [02:14:34] Roll call, please. [02:14:36] Weilein? [02:14:38] Yes. [02:14:38] Alter? [02:14:39] Yes. [02:14:39] Bergus? [02:14:40] Yes. [02:14:401 Harmsen? [02:14:41] Yes. [02:14:42] Moe? [02:14:42] Yes. [02:14:42] Page 53 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:Z/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Salih? [02:14:43] Yes. [02:14:43] Teague. [02:14:44] Yes. Motion passes seven to zero. We're on to our regular formal agenda items. We're gonna start with 10A, fiscal year 2025 payment rehabilitation project. Resolution Improving project manual estimate of costs for the construction of the fiscal year 2025 pavement rehabilitation project, establishing amount of bids, security to accompany each bid, directing city clerk to post notice to bidders and fixing time and place for receipt of bids. I'm gonna open the public hearing. And welcome. [02:15:19] Good evening, Mayor and Council. [02:15:22] Good evening. [02:15:24] My name is Justin Harlan. I'm a senior civil engineer here with the city. And this is the 2025 Pavement Rehabilitation Project. Um, it's one of our annual pavement rehabilitation projects, annual project funded by the CIP. This project is very similar to what you saw on Park Road this past construction season. Uh, it consists of milling the existing asphalt, patching the existing pavement beneath. We also do curb and gutter repairs, curb ramp replacements, uh, and then follow that by an asphalt overlay, we've also have segments of roadway that we do chip and seal. So we have 13 locations identified. All these locations were identified through our pavement management plan. How we develop that is we have a consultant that kind of rates the age and condition of our roadways. We also use staff and resident inputs. With this, you'll see in red, we'll do chip and seals, and then the blue is the middle and overlays. Draw your attention to some of the downtown items in College Street and South Dubuque. Um, these items are gonna be a phase construction, so we want to get these done prior to our students coming back with the U of I in August. Our es- estimated construction cost for this project is 2.46 million, um, with your approval, we'll do the bid opening in May. Award the contract a little later in May, and then that phase construction will be June to November. A couple other things to mention is we do this annual pavement rehabilitation project to add value to our roadways. When we extend the life of our pavements, that tends to add value to make those go a little further. And with that, I'm going to open this up for questions. [02:17:35] Page 54 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https://citychanne]4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Asphalts just oil and rocks, right? Is there any concern for, um, tariff concerns for bid opening rate escalation in costs you guys are worried about? [02:17:45] Certainly in today- today's conditions, there could be a cause for concern, but from what we've seen in the bit environment around Iowa City, I don't believe that will be a concern with this project. [02:17:56] Okay. [02:17:59] Hearing no other questions. Thank you. [02:18:02] Thank you. [02:18:02] Anyone from the public would like to address this topic? I see no one online. Seeing no hands in council chambers. I'm gonna close the public hearing. Can I get a motion to approve, please? [02:18:16] So moved, Moe [02:18:17] Second, Harmsen. [02:18:19] Council discussion. Roll call, please. [02:18:24] Alter? [02:18:25] Yes. [02:18:251 Bergus? [02:18:26] Yes. [02:18:26] Page 55 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at.https:llcitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Harmsen? [02:18:27] Yes. [02:18:27] Moe? [02:18:27] Yes. [02:18:28] Salih. [02:18:28] Yes. [02:18:29] Teague? [02:18:29] Yes. [02:18:30] Weilein? [02:18:30] Yes. [02:18:31] We're on to- motion passes seven to zero. We're on to Item Number 10B, Iowa River Trail Bridge replacement project, resolution approving project manual, an estimate of costs for the construction of the Iowa River Trail Bridge replacement project, establishing amount of bids, security to accompany each bid, directing city clerk to post notice to bidders and fixing time and place for receipt of bids. I'm gonna open the public hearing, and welcome again. [02:19:01] Thank you. Great to be back. [LAUGHTER] [02:19:03] Are you here all week? Page 56 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:.//citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: Al -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [02:19:11] So this time, I'll be presenting on the Iowa River Trail Bridge Replacement Project. So as you can see, the project is kind of located behind what would be Kelly's Auto and the Dairy Queen in that intersection Myrtle Avenue and Riverside Drive. Um, this area is right along the Iowa River Trail. It's known for its great views and access to both pedestrians, bicyclists, and various multimodal traffic. So kind of how we got here. I'll use the illustrations. The general trail and the trail bridge, both the North and South bridge are in poor condition. We had a consultant evaluate the bridge. They rated it as in poor condition and recommended replacement of the trail bridge. With that, just using the equipment that we are going to need to do that, it will likely deteriorate the trail far enough that we're gonna have to replace. Uh, they further recommended that we replace the bridge with a segmental block retaining wall. There's some advantages to that, um, reduce maintenance cost, it makes people feel a little more confident using that. And with the trail replacement, again, increasing that pedestrian and bicyclist confidence. With the trail at the south end, this would be located kind of underneath the railroad tracks there. Um, there's several panels that need to be replaced, several supports that need to be replaced, and that's gonna be included in this project. And, of course, once we get done, we need to restore those, uh, disturbed areas that we've, um, kind of used for construction and put those back. This fits into our strategic plan under the area of mobility. We continue to wanna grow and prioritize those bike and pedestrian accommodations. We do want the trail improvement, and we do want to reduce that maintenance with city staff. Like I said, with the trail bridge, they have wo- wooden panels. Uh, they don't hold up well to some of the staff's equipment, and they don't like salt in the winter times. And usually it's our staff that's going out there to replace those to make it safe for the general public. With this one, estimated construction cost 460,000. It is a capital, uh, improvement funded project. We did hold a public meeting. That was in July of last year. Obviously, this public hearing, with your approval, we'll be opening a bid here at the very last part of April. We'll be awarding with that first council in May. The construction timeline is phased. We do want that bridge to be open and so with a trail prior to the U of I coming back to school. We understand that a lot of U of I students use this, and we want that available to them when they come into classes. With the final completion in September, what the final completion means is that we want some of that seating established and have that natural aesthetic environment kind of put back in place. If there's not any I'll open it up for questions. [02:22:31] The area north of there that travels behind, like, hydraulics and the University parking lot, is that the city's trail or the University's trail, or is it shared? [02:22:41] It- it is our trail. (02:22:43] It is the City of Iowa City's trail north of that spot, too. [02:22:451 Yes. Parking lot is U of Is. Page 57 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,/,/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [02:22:48] Okay. [02:22:52] The area on the University- I'm sorry, Ron Kenuky Public Works Director. The area that's on University property is maintained and owned by the University of Iowa. Okay. So that trail section is actually the University of Iowa. And they actually also maintain the section that we've talked about before between Burlington Street and Iowa Avenue along Highway six. And you're designing all of it in a big master plan with the university, right? [02:23:13] Exactly. [02:23:13] Okay. [02:23:16] Justin, this might be outside the scope of your role, but I just want to make sure, since it's going to be closed for a lot of the summer that we have some kind of detour markings or suggestion or something because there's a lot of folks that do use that trail to avoid Riverside Drive and just getting north and south. [02:23:36] Yes, we do have a detour plan in place. We'll actually be going in front and utilizing that sidewalk through there and then coming back down to the portion of the trail that will not be under construction. [02:23:49] Thank you. [02:23:50) Cool. (02:23:53] Hearing are no other questions. Thank you. Anyone from the public like to address this topic? I see no one online. If you're present, please just step forward. See no one present or online. I'm gonna close the public hearing. Could I get a motion to approve, please? [02:24:11] So moved, Moe [02:24:12) Page 58 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https: //citychanne14.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Second, Alter. (02:24:13] Council, discussion. Roll call, please. Bergus? [02:24:19] Yes. [02:24:19] Harmsen? [02:24:20] Yes. [02:24:20] Moe? [02:24:21] Yes. [02:24:21] Salih? [02:24:22] Yes. [02:24:22] Teague? [02:24:23] Yes. [02:24:23] Weilein? (02:24:24] Yes. [02:24:24] Alter. [02:24:251 Page 59 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:/.Zcitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Yes. [02:24:25] Motion passes 7-0 10C, transit funding application. Resolution authorizing the filling of the consolidated transit funding application for Iowa City Transit with the Iowa Department of Transportation for fiscal Year 2026, State Transit Assistance and Federal Transit Administration funding. I'm going to open the public hearing. And welcome. [02:24:54] Good evening, Mayor, Council, Darian Nagle Gamm, Director of Transportation Services. Every spring, we come to the council and we ask you all for authorization to apply for our consolidated transit funding application, which is an annual application we file with the Iowa Department of Transportation, um, that lists all of our capital and operating expenses that we are seeking funding from both the state and from the Federal Transit administration for. The projects will be included in the FY'26 Iowa DOT Consolidated transit funding application that the Metropolitan Planning Organization of Johnson County or MPOJC completes and in their FY'26-'29 MPOJC Transportation Improvement Program. So we may- um, Iowa City Transit may not seek funding for all of the projects, but essentially each project needs to be in, um, the consolidated transit funding application in order to become eligible. So this is really an eligibility requirement. Iowa City Transit is requesting approximately $3.5 million in federal operating funds and approximately $36 million in federal capital funds. And the total amount of the federal and state funding that we're requesting in the application is $40.3 million. And there's four different funding programs. I just want to highlight really briefly that we are asking for funding through. One is the state Transit Assistance program, and this is a fund- the formula funded program. So funds come into the Metro area and are distributed to Iowa City Transit, Coralville Transit and to Campus. And we're requesting hundred thousand, 810,000, approximately, through that revenue stream. Um, federal operating assistance for transit, otherwise known as 5307 funding. We're requesting approximately $3.2 million from federal funding that helps us to provide transportation and transit services to elderly persons and those with disabilities, otherwise known as 5310. This is another federal funding source. We're requesting $257,000. And again, these are formula derived for our agency. We use that to help fund our seats service that we paratransit- that we contract for paratransit services through Johnson County seats. Uh, and last statewide and federal capital assistance for transit, that's through another federal program called 5339. And through that program, we're requesting $36 million in funding, and that's to fund the - this is to enable the funding for our transit facility grant that we had received. That's to, er, replace buses, our fixed route buses. As they age out of production to request funding for, um, support to help pay for our para transit vehicles, bus spare parts and bus shelters. So really, that's the sum total of all of the items essentially on our wish list for both the state, um, our state and federal partners. And I'd be happy to answer any questions you have. [02:27:49] 1 just have one quick one for my own confusion. So even though we were awarded the money for the new transit facility, it has to also be included in this as and ask, even though we've been awarded it. Page 60 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[.Icitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [02:28:06] Yes. So every year, and some of these very specific numbers you see are actually formulas that- we receive from them that this is the amount we are going to receive, but we have to go through a formal process to allow you all to comment and the public to comment on our receipt of those funds, um, whether it's funds that we've applied for from a competitive program, such as the Lono, where we received the transit facility funding or just funding that we receive every year. So we still have to formally, you know, let the public have a chance to weigh in. [02:28:36] 1 see. So that's- and that's the logic for doing it in that? Okay. Thank you. [02:28:40] It's a great question. [02:28:46] Thank you much. [02:28:47] Thank you. [02:28:47] All right. Anyone from the public like to address this topic? Seeing no one online. Seeing no one present. I'm gonna close the public hearing. Could I get a motion to approve, please? [02:29:01] So moved. [02:29:02] Second, Salih. [02:29:03] Move by Bergus seconded Salih and counsel discussion. Roll call, please. [02:29:11] Harmsen? [02:29:12] Yes. [02:29:12] Moe? Page 61 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:./.Icitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [02:29:12] Yes. [02:29:13] Salih? [02:29:13] Yes. [02:29:13] Teague? [02:29:14] Yes. [02:29:14] Weilein? [02:29:15] Yes. [02:29:15] Alter? [02:29:16] Yes. [02:29:16] Bergus. [02:29:171 Yes. [02:29:18] Motion passes 7-010D, fiscal Year 2025 budget amendment, uh, public hearing. A resolution amending the current budget for fiscal year ending June 30th, 2025. I'm going to open the public hearing. And gonna have our city manager come and speak to us. Welcome. [02:29:42] Okay. You guys doing okay? [02:29:44] Page 62 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https://citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Yes. [02:29:46] We're getting ready to go through four budget items. So if there's a need for a break. [OVERLAPPING] [02:29:52] Can we take a quick break? [02:29:54] Ten minute break. Sure. We're gonna do a 10 minute break. [02:29:57] Okay. [02:29:57] Thank you Geoff. [02:30:00] Great. All right, we are on item 10D, and this is the fiscal Year 2025 budgeted amendment public hearing. Um, and we have our city manager Geoff Fruin to kind of lead us through this. [02:30:17] Thank you, Mayor and counsel, uh, you have four budget items remaining on your agenda tonight, and if okay with you, I'm just going to speak to all of them at once. You'll still have to go through each of those public hearing processes, if that's okay. All right, so for the fiscal Year 25 amendment, which is the, uh, vote in front of you, this is our second budget amendment of the year. This is a routine time of year in which we will come and offer a budget amendment. Most of the changes that you see in there are related to, uh, changes you would have reviewed with the Capital Improvement program. So we look at all those capital projects in the fall, and then in January, we walk you through those changes. Some of those changes affect the current budget year that we're in, and those amendments would be before you. There was also $100,000 transfer that was missed from the road use tax fund to the capital fund to support our infrastructure projects. That's recognized in there, and everything else is very small, uh, routine with no substantive impact. There are no impacts to property taxes or changes in the levy included in this amendment. With no questions, we'll move on to the fiscal Year 26, er, budget. This is the budget year that will start in July and carried through June of 2026. Just as a reminder on the schedule for this budget, we start in September. So in this case, September 3rd, 2024, we talk big picture priorities with the council, make sure staff is aware of any new initiatives that you would like to see funded. And then you really, it's staff work during the fall, and then you start to review that budget in January. So you see all these touch points, I won't go through them all. But beginning on January 13th with the all day review, you go through and pretty much close to every agenda that you have between that January meeting, and tonight, there's something budget related on your work session or city council agenda. We are at the April 15th public hearing and the vote on the budget adoption, and we do have to Page 63 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https://citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. certify with the county auditor our budget by April 30th, coming up here in a couple of weeks. I want to talk through a few details on the fiscal Year 26 budget and start with some of the challenges that we're facing. This is the final year of the state commercial and industrial backfill. So this dates all the way back to 2013 property tax reform, uh, legislation. Um, when, uh, there was a break given to commercial and industrial properties, the state told us at that time, we'll make you whole, and they wrote us a check for about 1.5 million for many years. And then several years ago, they decided that was enough, and they're going to phase us out. We are in the final year of that phase out. So in fiscal Year 26, we will have the three- we'll get roughly about 308,000 of that original $1.5 million backfill. And then in fiscal '27, we will no longer receive any backfill. We are currently phasing the loss of the library and the emergency levies which were removed with the latest round of property tax reform back in 2023. Uh, the value of those former levees is about $2.6 million in what have been lost annual revenue. So we are still phasing that in, and we have until fiscal year 29 to fully phase that loss in. There's also been increases in the military and senior homestead exemptions that were passed by the state in recent years. That has reduced our revenue by 440,000 in the 2026 budget. And then, um, we spent a lot of time in January talking about rollbacks, and I can go through that if you want, but we are at a historically low residential rollback that's, er, currently 47.4%. Sorry. We'll be 47.4% for this fiscal Year 2026 budget. Uh, that is the percent of the property value that is taxable. So if you own $100,000 home, you pay taxes on 47.4% of that 100,000. Um, that also affects our multi residential property, and you'll see that 82% of Iowa City's valuation is considered residential, which means that rollback has a huge effect. The lower that goes, the bigger effect it has on our budget. Our taxable valuation growth from fiscal Year 2023 to this projected budget has only averaged 1.26%. Now, that's the taxable. We've been growing more than that, and over the last five years, we're about 5.5% total valuation growth. But the state property tax reform is dialing back the taxability of that growth. So we can- you can see a lot of building take place in our community, but that doesn't necessarily mean the tax base is growing, er, at that same rate. So 1.26% annual growth in that taxable range is certainly not sufficient in the long term to sustain current service levels. Much like our residents and our businesses are experiencing, there's also a whole lot of volatility, um, in our supplies, if you will. Um, so whether it's, er, fuel or chemicals to support our operation, there's always increased volatility that we have to account for, and one of the big things that's impacting property owners and cities across the country are insurance rates, and so we put some statistics there. These are things that we have to pay, regardless of whether our taxable value is growing. And you can see that between our property and liability insurance over the last two years, it's been almost getting close to a million dollars in added costs. We have to pay that before we can start to look at all those other discretionary things that we would like to see funded. During your budget review, you spend most of the time talking about the general fund. That's our main operating fund. It includes general government, public safety, culture, and recreation and other non enterprise operations. Property taxes on the revenue side, make up 65% of the money coming in. We don't have any other single source of revenue that's more than 4%. So we are very heavily dependent on property taxes. That's not always by choice. That's by the constraints, um, that we have to raise other revenue sources. On the flip side, when you look at the expenses, personnel expenses are 75%. We're a very labor intensive organization. And as we talk about a lot during budget, labor expenses, generally, you should count on growing anywhere from 3-5% per year. That's not just wages. That could be health insurance, that could be pension costs, any number of things like that. So you can see how dependent we are on Page 64 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,//citychannel4.com/city-council.htmi) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. those property taxes. We really have to see that major revenue source, that 65% of our revenue grow in order just to maintain the level of personnel we have, much less grow that level of personnel in a growing community. Looking ahead to this budget, the fiscal year 26 budget, we are asking for a 2.7% increase in property taxes collected, and our general fund expenditures are growing at 3.5%. So again, another mismatch. We're going to be asking for less property tax dollars, but we're maintaining expenditure growth to keep our status quo operations. Some of the notable impacts that we covered during our budget review. This budget puts a pause on the pursuit of the Fifth fire station. For those of you that have been on council for several years, you know that's been a multi year process of trying to build up funds to pay for the staff to- to open a new fire station, and we've had to press pause on that not only because of the current fiscal Year 2026 environment, but what we foresee in the next few years. We've had a freeze or a minor reduction in a lot of our discretionary programs. We have no new staffing request in the general fund, and we've reduced our transfers to the capital, meaning, we're doing less pay as you go on the capital and more borrowing. And those are all some side effects of the property tax reform legislation that we're navigating. To summarize taxes, rates and fee changes, property taxes, uh, has a flat levy rate. So this will be the fourth straight year of a flat levy rate, and that was preceded by 11 straight years of a levy rate reduction. And if you receive a tax bill, Iowa City's ask is about 39% of that bill. So every dollar you pay in property taxes, 39 cents comes to the city. Our utility franchise tax is proposed to increase from 1-2%. This is part of the fare free funding strategy. We are exhausting the federal funds that we used for the two pilot years for fare free. And because of the success of that program, you all directed us to develop some options for continuing that fare free operation and the utility franchise tax, uh, increase of 1% will generate approximately $1 million to help sustain that fare free, er, operation. A reminder, cities are able to go up to 5%. There are a number of cities in Iowa that are at 5% or levels higher than us, 2% is still relatively low compared to a lot of our peer cities. We do have a water rate increase of 3%. This is really just to maintain status quo operations. And we're increasing housing inspection fees for the first time since I believe 2016. Um, that's expected to generate about $60,000 more per year. Those funds that we get through our housing inspection fees pay for the housing inspection services that we provide. So we just adjust those when we need to to ensure that we're breaking even on our housing inspection operations. We have two new public works related fees, a $2 curbside waste sticker. So if you're familiar, if you're a customer of ours on the waste side, if you fill up your bin on the waste side and you have extra bags, you can buy stickers. We don't have that same system on the yard waste, and what we give is a lot of super users that will fill up their bin and have a lot of the extra yard waste. So as we need to bring in more revenue to support yard waste, we're really targeting some of those super users to pay for that, as opposed to spreading that cost across all users who may not be using that service quite as much as others. And then we also have a $5 minimum landfill fee for anybody taking in residential yard waste. [02:41:29] If you don't mind, Geoff, before we go off this, can you just remind me what the utility tax is? I just forget that. [02:41:37] Page 65 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https://citychanne]4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. So utility franchise tax is going to be a tax on your gas and electric bill. So that's going to be charged in our case, mostly by Mid American and then passed on to us. [02:41:53] A few budget highlights that I'll touch on the Fare Free pilot. I think it's a huge success. We've, uh identified alternative revenue to continue to support Fare Free transit. That's not an easy thing to do. There's a good reason that that is a rarity in cities across the country, because it is not an inexpensive service to offer. We've seen huge ridership growth, and, uh, I commend the council for following through on a revenue source to continue to support that effort. Uh, despite the loss of the emergency levy, which previously was funding our climate action, er, activities, we've been able to maintain our commitment to the community with our climate action activities, including our resilience hubs and a lot of the grants that we do for businesses and homeowners. Then we've maintained the general fund affordable housing investment level. You may recall that the council directed, uh, the r- um, the additional 200,000 back in that staff originally recommended that we reduce that line. So this budget that you're approving on does recognize that direction, and there is a million dollars in the general fund to support affordable housing, uh, investment. It also implements our pro housing grant, which is the $3.75 million federal grant that we got to reduce barriers to housing and begin to develop our own capacity to produce, uh, and own affordable housing. We're, er, maintaining a strong capital improvement investment. That's one of the things that I'm really proud of, despite all the pressures on our budget right now, we are not taking a step back on our infrastructure investment. When you do that, you end up paying more down the road. So I'm really proud that we've been able to continue to expand that, especially in this era of inflationary drivers that are impacting the cost of those investments. And then over the past year we've- past couple of years, we've talked quite at of the need to invest in a lot of our public facilities. We've talked about substandard work environments that we have for public employees, and we've talked about constraints that buildings have on improving service levels to a growing community. All of the bullet points that you see there are projects that are either underway or funded in part, uh, with dollars in this budget. And I'm- I'm uh, proud that we're remaining focused on investing in those areas that we can. We continued implementation of the wage and classification study recommendations, and those have come forward to you in large part through the collective bargaining agreements that you've seen over the last two or three months. The police fire you have asked me on your agenda. Had on your agenda tonight. You'll formally approve those pay schedules at your next meeting, as well. So some final thoughts on the'26 budget, and then a preview of what we might see in fiscal Year'27. Um, by far, the most challenging budget environment that I've seen since being- since- since I've been here, um, and it's likely only to get a little bit more difficult with the additional challenges that I touched on on that first slide. We have a 2.8 million dollar budgeted deficit in the general fund, and while I'm hopeful that we can overcome that in fiscal Year'26 through some of our conservative budgeting practices and making prudent decisions throughout the year, it should be a signal as that projected deficit grows that it's going to be harder and harder to maintain our current service levels and all of the partnership- partnerships that we have requiring financial investment. Um, we are extending the fare free. We've got housing investments. So I think we're hitting on your still top priority strategic plan items. We've expanded our debt service capacity again to keep up that investment with our capital projects during this inflationary period, and again, the significant investments in public Page 66 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:./citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. facilities. And it's important that we're not only making those investments in public facilities, but the users aren't seeing a tax and associated tax increase. So when you can pursue a nearly $40 million wastewater project and not have to push rates up 5, 10, 15%. That's a rarity in- in local government, and that speaks to, er, prudent budgeting from decades, um, prior. Looking ahead, we're going to have to deal with the loss of the $300,000 in commercial backfill next year, right? And then we still have that $2.6 million to make up between fiscal Year'27,'28 and'29. So it doesn't necessarily have to be in thirds, but we're going to have to, uh, realize that loss of $2.6 million over those next three fiscal years. Much like we did now, I think a lot of our external partnerships, it's going to be hard to maintain those at the current level, uh, without sacrificing some of the CORE municipal services. So that's going to be a challenge because we know a lot of those partners are facing similar budget pressures, and they provide extremely valuable service. We're going to have to continue to increase the debt service levy, so we can't continue that infrastructure investment at a flat levy rate. So what we're trying to do is the state forces us to take down our operating levies, we're pushing our debt levy up a little bit so that we can continue to invest in infrastructure without changing the rate that the public is paying. You're probably likely going to see continued modest utility rate increases. This is a 3% water rate increase in front of you for fiscal Year'26. You might see a similar type of scale increase in fiscal Year'27, '28, as we look at sanitary sewers, we look at stormwater and water. We should expect some of those smaller increases to, um, to come along with those budgets. Our facilities reserve budget got a little bit of a reprieve with the good bids from City Park Pool, but it will still mostly be depleted, and we will still have a lot of facility investments that I think we- we need to be, uh, serious about and making funding plans for. So we're going to have to either try to build back up that facilities reserve or we're going to have to rely on voter referendums to get the spending authority to invest in some of our key public facilities. And we have an emergency fund. We actually established that emergency fund after the 2013 property tax reform, thinking that we might need it during times of tax reform. We haven't had to tap into that very much over the past decade. But depending on what happens the next few years and what kind of legislation passes this session or next session, that 5.4 million emergency levy, I'm sorry, emergency fund balance may be needed to sustain, uh, any type of period of sudden loss of revenues that we have due to those reform efforts. Happy to answer questions on the fiscal Year'26 budget. I will just note, you also have to vote separately on the utility rates. They were as described in that presentation, and then your final vote tonight on the budget is a simple resolution approving the three year financial plan and the five year CIP, which is also kind of wrapped up in this. So I'll happy to answer questions, and then I'll sit down, I'll let you work through those four items. [02:49:39] 1 have a quick question about the last bullet that you just talked about with the emergency fund, um, at least at the beginning when everything shut down in COVID. Was the emergency fund utilized? [02:49:52] 1 never had to tap it. Uh, we have used the emergency fund probably less than five times, and I think all for flood buyout properties. So one of the reasons we established the emergency fund in addition to reacting to property tax reform was to make our community more resilient post the 2008 flood. So we Page 67 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https://citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. have- when there hasn't been federal grant funds available, we've used local funds to buy out properties that the floodplain. [02:50:20] Okay, thank you. [02:50:27] Don't hear any other questions for you. Um, for the public, we are on item 10D, so I'll do each item separately. So item 10D is fiscal Year 2025 budget amendment public hearing. So this is the current budget that we're in that ends June 30th, 2025. So if anyone wants to speak to that at this point, I invite you up at this time. And if you're online, which no one is, okay. Seeing no one in person. I'm gonna close the public hearing. Can I get a motion to approve, please? [02:51:11] So moved Moe. [02:51:13] Second, Alter. [02:51:14] Counsel discussion. Roll call, please. [02:51:19] Mo? [02:51:19] Yes. [02:51:20] Salih. [02:51:20] One second. Sorry. [02:51:22] Hold on. [02:51:24] This is for the current budget. [02:51:25] Page 68 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:/Icitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. For the current- the current budget, we are using the- we're gonna use the swimming pool fund from it, or no? [02:51:34] No, that is not in the budget amendment. [02:51:37] Okay. Roll call. Yeah. [02:51:40] Okay. Roll call, please? [02:51:41] I'll start from the top again, sorry. Moe? [02:51:43] Yes. [02:51:43] Salih? [02:51:44] Yes. [02:51:45] Teague? [02:51:45] Yes. [02:51:45] Weilein? [02:51:46] Yes. [02:51:47] Alter? [02:51:47] Yes. Page 69 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 1S, 202S (audio and video recordings can be found at https:/Icitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [02:51:48] Bergus? [02:51:48] Yes. [02:51:49] Harmsen. [02:51:49] Yes. [02:51:50] Motion passes 7-0. Item 10E, fiscal Year 2026, budget, public hearing. Resolution adopting the annual budget for the fiscal year ending June 30th, 2026 next year. I'm going to open the public hearing. And, er, invite folks that want to speak to this. Um, yes, if I can see how many hands raised. Great. And also, I want to, um, remind folks that there are stickers in the back that you can prefill out your information and just drop it in the bucket. Please state your name and city you're from. You have [OVERLAPPING] [02:52:33] Mr. Mayor, members of the Council, John Balmer, 10 Princeton Court, Iowa City. Um, I want to commend you for your diligence in considering your budget for this coming fiscal year and realize that it's challenging. No question about it. But I think we're fortunate here in Iowa City to have had a well managed budget, and kudos should go to Mr. Fruin and his staff because that's kept us, frankly in good stead. Now, having said that, it's obvious that we need to expand our economic growth opportunities here and get the, uh, expand the tax base. That's- I think that's critical. I- I don't see much happening in this budget or from the council to promote that. And I would encourage you to consider that also as part of this. Now, also, in regards to your funding, I'm never one to give a blank check, but certainly for the basic services of this community, Le, public safety, police and fire, I think, are very important and critical, and I would hope that you will fund those fully to their maximum. It would send a poor message to the community if you start taking money away from the police department. And that is- I know that's out there, and people are talking about it. So, um, just be aware. I think there are a lot of people that are concerned about that, certainly as a homeowner, as a small business owner. That's something that concerns me. So I would like to have you consider that funding fully for those basic services. One other thing I just want to clarify this bomber that's the person that did the bombing in- in the governor of Pennsylvania, that isn't my relative, so just- just be aware of that. I want to clarify that was- that guy's a knucklehead. Anyway, um, the- the budget that you create is probably the most important thing you do as a city council. That's the message it sends to the community. And I would wholeheartedly ask you to make sure that you fund your basic services. Now, having said that, there's challenges ahead and what you might consider doing with a city manager, is form some sort of a community task force to look at future potential revenue streams, get some- people that are in the community that, you know, some good, some financial minds, just a general broad cross section. I think it would be helpful to have an Page 70 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:llcitychanne]4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. outsider's viewpoint, because it just seems to me that we need to look further beyond what we have. And I know we're a creature of the state legislature, no question. So we have to follow what they are giving us. So anyway, thank you. [02:55:37] Thank you. (02:55:381 Welcome. [02:55:39] Hello. [02:55:40] Hello. [02:55:41] My name is Meghan Valenweiter. I'm a resident of Iowa City. Um, I do not live in Iowa City because it is cheap. I live here because it is nice. And one of the things that makes Iowa City nice or the thing that makes a city nice to my mind, there are two things opportunity and amenities. And part of the amenities is strong public services. Property taxes are a substantial part of how we pay for these public services. Now, the cities as mentioned, city's tax levy has not changed in four years, and they're not proposing an increase now. And before that, it was falling for a long time. The amount- so if the amount of taxes someone owes in this city goes up, it's related to the value of their home. Um, and not something that the city is doing to manipulate that. Does this mean that the city is rolling in dough now? No, it doesn't. Much like your own household, the cost of everything has gone up from well, the city buys things like rocks and oil and, you know, pays people to do their jobs, not buying whatever it is you buy at home. But all of those things have gotten very expensive. And the state has not only not abated the financial headwinds, they have gone out of their way to create and aggravate them. The city has thus far been able to absorb these financial challenges, but I fear or really has been stated, we're reaching an inflection point where we are either going to well, the order of the day for government forever, as long as I can remember, has been doing more with less. We're going to reach a point where we will either need to pay more or we're going to have to do less with less. Um, I simply want to state my preference for paying more to maintain the services we have or even paying more to get more, especially when it comes to things that are really important to me, like increasing affordable housing, transportation, parks, especially the pools. That's my jam. And the library, amongst other cultural offerings that I think make Iowa City unique and attractive. Thank you. [02:57:47] Thank you. Welcome. Please state your name and city you're from. [02:57:52] Page 71 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at httl2s:/Icitychannei4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: Al -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. My name is Kelen. I'm from Iowa City. I'm going to disagree on the point that we should not be cutting the police budget. I think your ultimate goal should be to eliminate the police department entirely. You all got an email from my partner about my experience at the library the other day. I won't go into it fully. But essentially, I was immediately threatened with arrest for trying to help de escalate a situation that was so clearly being escalated by police didn't go well, right? I didn't want to get arrested, so I just kind of stood there and watched police further. Re traumatize a homeless person, um, and it sucked. So I think you could start by not funding the open positions that are no doubt in the police department right now. There's no reason to set money aside for staff you don't have. And I think anything less than attempting to bring the police budget down to zero is just completely misguided and should not be the direction the city is going in. I'm soon to be a homeowner. Um, I have never felt safe around police, so I don't get that sentiment at all. And frankly, I'm only about to be a homeowner because of amazing programs that the city is doing, like the downpayment assistance program, that it would be so, so terrible to cut something like that before cutting the police budget. Thank you. [02:59:25] Thank you. Welcome. [02:59:31] Hi. Emma Denny from Iowa City. I understand the legislative challenge that this board has in front of it when it comes to the police budget. I understand the requests that come from Des Moines in this case. And it- it's your duty and moral obligation to do everything you can to fight the fundamental violence of police, right? Police don't exist to do anything else other than conduct the state's violence and defend property. That's what they're for. Right? I, as a human being, don't tend to feel safe around police. I know that police, for example, in their normal operations conducting traffic stops, those traffic stops have recently been used as justification for deporting legal residents by ice. Why would we continue to fund institutions that collaborate with such fundamentally violent acts? In the past, members of this council, including Sean Hamson have pointed out that police do things for sexual assault and domestic violence victims. As a victim of domestic violence and sexual assault, the police have done nothing for me in my life. Every interaction I have had with police has only made me more scared. The things that have done something for me in my life have been things like DVIP and RVAPH, have been things like community support and resource programs, have been things like community counseling programs, things that are a much better use of what's approaching $19 million than violent thugs on our streets. I do understand, like I said, the challenge. But I think, especially in the climate of fear that currently exists in this country, you are doing your community a disservice by continuing to fund the police like this. Thank you. [03:01:44] Thank you. Welcome. Please state your name and city you're from. [03:01:52] Uh, my name is Belona Lou. I live in Iowa City. Um, I'm here today to say that I think you guys should be lowering the police budget, not raising it further. I was here last year around this time saying the exact Page 72 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:/,Icitychannel4.com/city-council.htmi) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. same thing, and it went up, and it's about to go up again. I, like Emma, have never had a good interaction with a cop. I have never had a good interaction with an Iowa City Police Department cop. I have never had a good interaction with the University of Iowa Police Department cop, etc, etc. The interactions I have had have made me realize that they do not care about the majority of this community. They do not care about the people who don't own a business. They don't care about the people who don't own a house. I wouldn't even say they care about the people who do. I think they only care about themselves. As the political climate at both the state and federal level moves in a direction I can only describe as fascist, I am worried about the message that increasing the budget of the people who will enforce the laws that will send immigrants out of the country, that will throw me and my trans siblings in jail simply for existing. What message does that send to those communities? Even if you think, Oh, well, the Iowa City Police- Police Department is one of the good ones. They would never cooperate with that. I doubt that from what I've seen. I think the message that increasing their budget sends to underrepresented communities, the trans community, the immigrant community in Iowa City, it shows them that y'all don't care, that you are not willing to do the bare minimum to keep them safe from the state, that you don't care if they're thrown in jail, if they're kicked out of the country, that you are willing to be collaborators with Donald Trump, with Kim Reynolds, that you don't care about us. Thank you. [03:04:41] Thank you. Welcome. Please state your name and city you're from. [03:04:48] Yeah, my name's Nick. I live in Iowa City. Um, I don't plan to speak long'cause I know you don't really listen to us anyway. But I'm sure that y'all know that trans people had their civil rights taken away from them, and in July, your police will be enforcing laws that will jail trans people. We will not be able to use the bathrooms that we want without fear of getting arrested. And that's pretty shitty. Um, seems like y'all are the city and some counselors are delusional that the Iowa City Police Department will not be enforcing laws that will deport citizens in your city and jail trans people. Yeah. So I really just urge you to decrease the police budget by literally any amount at all. That'd be awesome and put it towards things that actually help people like housing. If people weren't homeless, then your police wouldn't harass homeless people. Yeah, so house them. Thank you. [03:05:48] Thank you. Welcome. [03:05:54] Hi. My name is Maeve. I'm from Iowa City. We've heard for years now that now is not the right time to stop giving the police department more money. If now is not the time, when will it be? It is clear that there will never be a palatable time for you to do this. We are in a moment of severe crisis and you want to give more resources to the people who work with ice to kidnap our neighbors. This will directly put more of our community at harm, and you are willfully signing off on it. History will not remember these decisions kindly. It is also clear that there is a massive appetite for the city to actually do something, as evidenced by Oliver's recent landslide victory. Sean, Megan, and Bruce, you are all up for reelection Page 73 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at htti2s:/Icitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. soon. People here desperately need material support. This is top of- this is top of mind for essentially everyone I know. One great example of material support you could provide is something that was actually already mentioned tonight, ensuring we do not sign any cooperation policy with ICE. Another great example would be to not increase the police budget. I suggest you get off your asses and protect your community with the institutional power that you have. You work for us. If you're not meeting the needs of your constituents, we can and will replace you. One last thing. I've been a homeowner for multiple years now, and having secure housing has only made me realize how much more vulnerable you are to state forces when you don't own property. I think it's ridiculous to say that you're a homeowner and think police protect you more because of that. Thanks. [03:07:35] Thank you. Welcome. (03:07:39] Welcome. Good evening, Mr. Mayor and City Council. My name is Jay Honahan. I live at 420 North First Avenue, Iowa City, Iowa. And I just want to point out my dad sent a letter to some of you about not - about funding the police and giving your funds to police. I believe that we shouldn't cut funds of the police department. They do a lot for us. And since December, we've had three murders in Iowa City. And I live on the corner of a very busy street Rochester and First Avenue, and there's cars speeding going down that street, and there's not enough police out patrolling the area, and they run red lights and going up Scott Boulevard, I've had cars pass me at a very high rate of speed, and we just need our public service, like the police and the fire department, and they need to be fully funded, and you need to allocate your money to the police department and the fire department. Thank you. [03:09:03] Thank you. Oh, no, you put your name in the basket. That's all you needed to do. Thank you. Yep. Welcome. Please state your name and city you're from. [03:09:18] Hi there. I'm Monte. I'm from Iowa City. Um, I also wanted to speak against raising the police budget. I'm sure you all know the saying, if the best time to plant a tree was 25 years ago, the second best time is right now. There probably is not going to be a good time or a right time or a convenient time to start putting together alternatives to law enforcement. It's currently right now. It is not against the law to divert money that would go to the police department to other things, harm reduction services for one, or things that would really materially and meaningfully affect the people in this community. Um, you already can't walk two blocks downtown without seeing some kind of police vehicle or having some police presence. There's cameras everywhere. Frankly, I don't know what else. I mean, I would- I know there's other things that could be done. I hope that- I hope that doesn't happen. Um, one more point I suppose that I want to make is that every dictatorship for the past 100 years has made some practice of disappearing people, minorities, political opponents, communists, labor leaders, agitators, any kind of undesirables. This administration has proven no different in its first 100 days. I urge you to stop adding fuel to this fire and do anything else. Thank you. Page 74 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [03:10:301 Thank you. I will have you sign in. Did you sign in? Thank you. Thanks. Welcome. Please state your name and city you are from. [03:10:44] My name's John Tycho, Iowa City. I didn't plan on speaking tonight, but I want to endorse the police, endorse fire. I certainly don't agree with what's going on in Washington, what's going on in our state house, but I want to echo what this gentleman said about the traffic, the speeding. I mean, we've seen deaths lately and terrible accidents. I believe we need more police, more police presence, at least out on the streets. So that's all I wanted to say. Thank you. [03:11:18] Thank you. Okay. All right. Is there anyone else that want to speak during this time? Seeing no one. I'm going to close the public hearing. Can I get a motion to approve, please? [03:11:36] So moved. [03:11:39] Second. [03:11:39] Move by Moe, Second by Alter, Counsel discussion. [03:11:47] I'll jump in. I have been in touch with you in the past, and you've heard me the last several years talk about how I believe that enhancing and improving public safety is a primary role of local government. That continues to be true. I think where we have learned where we missed the mark in providing safety is how exactly we define it. And I know that we all know and understand the challenges that we have in our community, in the wider community in the United States with the disproportionately harmful impact that policing as an institution has on vulnerable people. And while we have made some reforms over the last few years, we have not addressed those structural and systemic issues in the ways that I believe we have committed to our community multiple times that we would seek to do. And I know from speaking with several of you that my insistence on tying the question of funding for our police department to other ideas for enhancing community safety, that that is problematic, that that is wanting, you know, that that is a political third rail. And it is. And I understand that. And I appreciate that. I also know that this is a moment in which we have been presented with a status quo budget, and this is not a status quo moment. I agree with the comments, and I said this a year ago and maybe even two years ago as well that as the laws radically change in ways that we can see will continue to make life more dangerous for certain members of our community that increasing the mechanism by which those laws are enforced in our city doesn't make good sense to me, and that we should be investing in Page 75 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https•./.Icitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. preventing harm and diverting away from the carceral system. These are not new things that I'm bringing to you now. I hope that we can take the opportunity of the combination of the worst budget moment that we've had in 15 years. And what we're hearing from the community about the need for safety. And what I would propose is that we just hold the funding level at what we approved in fiscal year 2025. That would be a reduction in the proposed fiscal year 2026 budget of about $880,000. [03:15:06] But it would not be an increase over what we approved originally for the 2025 budget. These are not radical changes. We have 83 sworn officers right now, and that's the highest number we've had hired in a number of years, um. We are not- Le- Le- Let me just- I think we're missing the opportunity to really be bold and say, this is- this is the moment in which we can not anticipate reducing our funding in partnerships, right, which is right there in our- [LAUGHTER] in our strategic plan values, right? We shouldn't anticipate that as things get harder, we're going to give less money to our community partners who directly improve the safety of the most vulnerable members of our community. We shouldn't be anticipating that we can't support mobile crisis, or we can't support um, permanent supportive housing, or we can't support transitioning people from the emergency room into housing. We can't say that we should anticipate lowering investments in the arts or in cultural things that make Iowa City so great. We can't anticipate planting fewer trees or reducing parks and recreation programming. Those are the general fund impacts that we know will be coming. And if we incre- continue to increase what we're defining as safety here with some of the most expensive employees who we have in the city, if we continue to increase it every year, we're just locking that in. We're just locking that in because we do have a collective bargaining agreement. We do pay our employees well. I have never asked to fire anyone. I have never asked to eliminate positions. All I am asking for us to do is turn down the spigot so that the money can flow elsewhere, so that the money can flow to our priorities of social justice and racial equity, to affordable housing, to human rights at a time that they're being stripped away from our residents. And again, I know I've made this pitch. Now, I- it was 2021 that I wrote my op ed coming out as an abolitionist of police and prisons, okay? These are not new concepts, and I have been repeatedly told it's not the time. It's not the time, and we should expect reductions in, you know, some of these innovative things that we're trying to do. We have to try new things. We have to try to build systems of care and safety that work for Iowa City. We are having a hard time hiring police officers. We're having a hard time retaining police officers. And we know that investments in things like guide link, investments in things like permanent supportive housing, right? We have the data from years ago to show that that is a massive cost savings to our community. I think now is the absolute wrong time to say that we should not be leaning in to those diversions, leaning in to ways in which we can reduce conflict in our community, reduce harm in our community. And the question is always, well, what- what are we going to do and how are we going to talk about it? Thank you, Josh, for suggesting we talk about mobile crisis again, right? Because that's an easy one. Sean, you and I serve on the jet board, and we're talking about the possibility of the crisis counselor. That's an easy one, right? A cri- A crisis counselor on the dispatch floor that we might be able to help support. But I- I know that we know the- the economic viability of our community, which is important, and we do need to increase the tax base. What we know from our partners at greater Iowa City is that our businesses need housing for their employees. Our businesses need quality of life amenities for their employees. The people who want to live here, work here, play Page 76 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https://citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. here, grow here, go to school here, need quality of life things. And we are promising [LAUGHTER] to not be able to fund those when we're investing in things that are models that don't enhance that quality of life. So that's my pitch, and I would make a motion to our- in this budget document. So for this agenda item on Page 8 of the fiscal year 2026 budget approval document, I move to amend the police department line from $17,520,200 to $16,000,644. Sorry, $644,190. That amount is right at what was our fiscal year 2025. That amount is 95% of the proposed budget amount because another piece of information that- that- that our city manager was able to provide is that the last two completed fiscal years, our police department isn't spending all their money. We continue to increase the budget, but they are not spending all their money. In fiscal year 2023, there was $678,399 unspent. In fiscal year 2024, there was $822,795 unspent. In fiscal year 2025, which is the current budget year that we're in now, 71% of the budget has been uh, spent to date, so we can expect if that tracks linearly, then there would be about $890,000 unspent. So this amendment should not have a practical impact on the service level for this coming year. Really sorry I put my motion in the middle of that. [LAUGHTER] [03:22:051 So we have a motion by uh, Councilor Bergus. [03:22:09] Second. Sorry. [03:22:11] Yeah. [03:22:12] Second by Weilein. Okay. Alright. Discussion by counsel. [03:22:21] 1 think, you know, what, you know, Councilor Bergus is asking, to me, she- this is not a reductions. Actually, this is the money that we did not spend. And money is sitting there, and we have many things that we need to do. I think we need to use that money. For something else. We- As if we are just like taking out the extra money that the police department is not being using it for. And it seems like it's like the same amount, fairly like 600,800, and now we're rejecting almost 900. So if we can just, like, take that out of the budget and move it to something else, white sitting there and our people are staying homeless. And we just give them time during the winter, and everybody, like, you know, like, a lot of people are homeless. That's what I want to say. And we have money sitting there year after year. And after that, I think I assume, at the end of the year, you take it and budget on the reserve, right? (03:23:24] Well, we- we've been budgeting deficits. So these are- when you- when you don't spend the money in the budget, it goes to reducing in your budget- you don't, it goes to reducing the projected bu- budget deficit, excuse me. So with this budget, we're projecting a $2.8 million loss. If the police department doesn't spend $800,000, then that $2.8 million loss to the entire city is only $2 million. And if the fire Page 77 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https://citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. department doesn't spend all theirs and the parks doesn't spend all theirs, that's how we've been closing that deficit. But you're correct. If the police department does not spend money, it doesn't stay with them. They don't get to keep that money and take it to the next year. It goes to the general fund reserve. [03:24:08] And do you do that like for everything else, uh, you know, department? Like, you- you have uh, and can you tell me which department used it on like- like the past two, three years? [03:24:25] Can you clarify the question, which department used? [03:24:27] The extra money that the deficit. I think you said you- you- you budget, like more than the needs every year for each department. Am I understanding you correctly? [03:24:37] No, we don't budget more than the needs, but we budget at kind of max capacity. So, for example, we budget 100% of salaries um, and it's natural that you might have a position turnover, and then there'll be savings from that turnover. So we don't- we don't budget um, e- e- e- in excess of the needs, we just budget at what we think the capacity would be if we're fully staffed. [03:25:03] And for the bad three years, we've been budgeting for the police, and we're not using that money. [03:25:08] They have not used all their dollars, correct. But we've also been budgeting. [03:25:11] It's almost the same amount, 600, 800, and now 900. [03:25:16] Yeah, the 900 is not a staff projection. That's- that's just a percentage. So what I provided to Councilor Bergus is that we're at 71% of the budget. So I think that's just if that spending pattern continues, that's. [03:25:31] Maybe you're going to have a 800,000 going to the reserve, right? [03:25:37] Correct. Right. Whether that ends up at 800, 700, 650, we won't know until probably this fall when we close out the books. Page 78 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at.https:.Z./citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [03:25:47] 1 really guess propose that we can use this money right now to- to transfer it. We- we- we always say that we don't have money, and why we over budget. And if I see that, the police department is using it. Okay, but they are not for the cons- like consecutive three- past three years. So I propose that to, like, approve this um, you know, this uh, motion, and we can just take that amount and, like, direct it to anything. And even all of us are talking about the mobile crisis, talking about the- you know, if we want to, like, use it for the same cause of the safety of the community, we can just take that money and now use it for the- for like, maybe the mobile crisis counselor or you know, the- the- the thing that we need to keep our community still safe. Not like, take it from the police and go and do something else. In the same kind of, like, safety use. And, you know, I guess you talk about, you know, as you talked earlier about, we need to put this. We need to talk about it. Last year, I heard everybody. We don't want to reduce the police but yet, but do- do you want to talk about counseling, like crisis counseling or like, mental health, mental health, you know, crisis counselor? You talked about it, and I think everybody here agree we need that. You know, I just don't like even the- when you look at what happened at the library, I guess things- this kind of thing cannot be handled by the police. You know, we need that middle person to- to- to address those kind of thing. Those people already scared and feared from the police. That's why we need to think about alternative of ways to address those kind of crisis. And we- we- we will take even- we will take from their plate, we take, like, some of their plate, so they can focus on the - like, something else. So this way is a win -win situation. And- and just in case, down the road, if suddenly they have, like, really major needs, and I don't think it going to happen for the police department, and they need some kind of money that we still have, like, $5 million for emergency. And I don't think we can have an emergency like that where the- we need to have more police department or more equipment in Iowa City. Unfortunately, we have, like, safe city. So I really encourage the council to think about to take that money, but use it for, like, crisis counseling and mental health counseling. Thank you. [03:28:38] 1 think one of the things that um, always makes this a third rail to talk about is that there's so many different strands that are being conflated. Just as a reminder, one of the- the opponents that was on the slides was that 75% of our budget overall is for personnel. Um, earlier this year, unanimously, we all approved an 8% wage um, uh, union agreement to raise wages, right? So a big portion and inflation and, you know, how much it costs for insurance, which is now a 58% bump in two years. A lot of the dollars that are going for that increase, we all agreed on. And well in advance of budget. It was a precursor to say, this is- we all agree that this will become part of the budget, right? There is also to- to many counselors' points, and contrary to what- what uh, some believe, the notion of public safety is not 100% antithetical to the police. We need many, many tools, which is, I think one of your points that has been from the get -go. Councilor Bergus, and- and I think others agree. Um, but the- but some of the discourse that has been happening has been purely abolitionist, that there is nothing good, that there is no public safety component to the police force. And I believe that this is itself, while the component of saying now is not the- to use the language of someone like me saying now is not the time is itself a way in an- in a rhetorical argument, to be able to say, okay, so we're going to take away some here, even though we've all agreed that we're going to increase their um, union agreement by 8% because they're the lowest paid among cities of their stature, and as union members, they should actually get a living wage Page 79 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:llcitychannel4.com/city-council.htmi) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. themselves and have benefits. Um, it feels to me like this can become a slope to say, great, we did fine this year. Let's winnow it down this way and this way and this way, in this way and lower and lower. And that is you've stated. You're an abolitionist, and that is absolutely your want. And those and- and- and to the people in the audience and other community members who have stated the same. Absolutely. I respect that. And we need certain components of public safety. And as someone who also has experienced sexual assault in the past, I didn't have resources, and it was the police who helped me through it. So it's not a universal thing to say that one person I'm not universal. My situation was not universal. But nor is someone saying that they haven't had help. I think that we need a yes and- and within the confines of talking about this is budget, we have belief systems, we have personal experiences. We have dollar amounts, all coming together to talk about things in blu- in- in a- in a yes or in a either or kind of situation. I think we need to continue to fund the police at levels that are feasible. [03:32:44] To the city manager's point that if we're not spending that money, it's not that the police are sitting there holding onto it. It is reducing an overall deficit, which means that we can continue providing agencies with the level of funding and service and support that they need. That kind of gets left out when we're just talking about dollars, but that is what reducing the budget means. It means that we can maintain the levels of support that we are for affordable housing, that we can for these others. So I just want to- I realize I'm a bit here there and everywhere, but so too has this conversation. There are multiple strands, and they're all getting conflated into this is a good idea or this is not. When it is very complex, I'm not saying something as simple as now is not the time. I am saying, right now, there's a lot of conflation happening among different things, and we need to think very clearly about what is the budget at hand and it is not simply move it. I mean, to what I was understanding, Mayor Pro Tem, was that perhaps it was like that we take it from the police budget and to some of my councilors points, and earmark it up front. When, in fact, it may be that we need that for some basic services, as- as opposed to additional because we are operating at almost a three million dollar deficit. So are we gonna take away some of the potential the supports that we have in previous years or in- in future years because we've added these additional things? I'm just saying, and I'm not saying that that is what happens. It's saying we need to think about that, as well as a potential. It is. [OVERLAPPING] Anyway. [03:34:361 The money is gonna go, Megan. The fund will be still on the city. I'm sorry, I'm just going to reply to what she said. You know, the- the money is not like we are taking it to B somewhere. It's still on the city, but we want to the service that we don't have, like the Bobbi crisis, councilor and those. Can we just use money for those services? And maybe you don't need all of them, but the money is still going to be Zaya, not like we take this money immediately out of the city. And I think we are, like, financially, we're really well positioned. We have over $26 million in general reserve. We have five million dollar, and it's not like we're going to hire two, like counselor for mental health that will reduce the budget of the city or make the city in deficit. No, I don't think so. [03:35:31] We're already in deficit, though. Page 80 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,Ilcitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [03:35:33] We have reserve. We do have $26 million in reserve. We have five million in emergency also. So I think we- the way they budget it because they over budget every single department, that's why it looks like we're in deficit. Because we over budget. And every year, we have money. We take it out from those, you know, department and put it on the reserve. This means we're losing. We're not, but- just in case we are over budgeting so that not over budget just to make sure we are doing 100% from everything that we need just in case. That's why we say that, but we are not in deficit. [03:36:161 Okay. Can- can the city manager respond to that, 'cause I think that what you just said might not be fully in alignment with my orders feeling [OVERLAPPING]. [03:36:24] He told me. I know. [03:36:251 1 mean. [03:36:26] Yeah, I- I just want to make a couple of factual corrections to multiple statements that have been made. The police bargaining agreement that you, uh, approved earlier this year, just a couple of months ago, we estimate that first year cost to be about 6% wage increase, not- not an 8% increase. And then the subsequent years are 2.75. So you are correct. We were trying to do a higher wage increase to correct for some discrepancies between our starting wages and our peer wages in other cities. Um, and not all departments finish under the budget, right? So the police department has finished under budget the last two years, but I can look, uh, several budgets, um, several departments that have been over their budgeted amount. So, for instance, the fire department, Parks and Rec, city council budget, they've all spent over 100% of that authority. So it's- it's not a universal. Everybody is, um, is- we're budgeting, um, more than we need. That's not a universal across all departments. It just so happens that the police department, because they've been working hard to get to full staff and haven't been able to get there, there's more savings in that department. For those departments that are fully staffed, you're much closer to that 100% threshold. Some are over, some are under, and it hopefully, again, washes out with us being a little bit ahead at the end. [03:37:58] Can you give me the- an example of a number? Like, for example, the fire department budget has increased. They use over their budget by one million dollarl. The city council member, they use by 500,000. Can you give me a numbers, please? [03:38:15] Page 81 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:/.Icitychannel4.com/city-council.htmi) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Yeah. I mean, just looking- so the recreation department, that's not all of parks, just the recreation side appeared to be about, ah, 120,000 over their budget last year. If I go up to the fire, finished about 40,000 higher. What's the other one you asked about? The council was about $1,000 more over budget. I just don't- I don't- I'm not trying to- I'm trying to correct a statement that said, you know, all departments we're budgeting all departments too much. We're not. We're budget at [OVERLAPPING]. [03:38:59] A 100%. [03:39:01] We're budgeting at 100%, and some departments are over 100, some fall under 100. [03:39:06] Yeah, so it- it makes the balance because some of them is over. Some of them they use 100% and maybe 10% more. But some of them are not- using blow the budget by $800,000, which is that's why I see every year, you have money transferred to the reserve, which is good. You know, like we are not become deficit completely, so we will need that money. So I- I understand what you're saying completely. And I hope everybody like the city council, Oh, my gosh, we spend $1,000 more. So we can take that from another department to, like, fill that gap. But still, at the end of the day, we never ended by deficit. We ended with extra money that has been transferred to the reserve. And we're fortunate to have that. [03:40:00] The 800,000, was that unspent or is that the difference between fiscal year 25 and 26? 1 just want to make sure I'm not mixing my number. [03:40:08] Unspent. [03:40:10] Um, let me get the unspent. So, if you look. [03:40:14] Just have the numbers straight. [03:40:15] Correct. Councilor Bergus had the correct numbers. Fiscal year 23 budget, which is completed, 678,000. And then fiscal year 24, last year's completed budget, 822 unspent. [03:40:28] Okay. Thank you. Yeah. Just making sure I wasn't confusing my numbers here. Page 82 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [03:40:34] One thing just- and I look at this in a couple of different ways, and one of them kind of tying into this discussion about budgeting practices in general. And so, um, budgeting for 100% of personnel, knowing that in an organization this size, any organization of any size, you always have a certain amount of turnover. Um, one of the things about that and having the reserve that I think is critically important, or at least to me, having been in organizations that have to do find themselves in financial difficulty and have to start handing out pink slips. One of the things I very much appreciate and I've come to appreciate more and more in my time here on council is this budgeting practice that leaves us with the ability to when we do get and we don't know what's coming out of Des Moines. It has been so volatile and so unpredictable. But one thing that we have not talked about has not come up, we've not seen a budget, at least in my time here, and hoping never does is we haven't talked about firing people, blaying people off. And I think that is so critically important. Um, thank you for the point made earlier. We'd love to be able to do more with more. And I agree. You know, and I think- we take a look, I'm not going to call it property tax reform because I'm not going to use that language. It's property tax mismanagement from the state level. If you take a look at some of these landlord giveaways, that plugs our budget hole. Like, that's almost exactly the same amount. And, you know, it's ridiculous. And it's - whoever said that it was manufactured from Des Moines, you're right. Our city has been growing. We shouldn't be here talking about, can we afford to pay for this or afford to pay for that? You know, this is - this is foisted upon us to a great degree, and that's very frustrating. But one of the things about the current budgeting practices that gives us that insulation, and I see this when I look at Des Moines, which had to cut its climate action agency, its division or whatever they had department, whatever they had over there, we're not talking about that. We're not talking about pulling back on our stuff. And I think one of the reasons we're not talking about that that we're talking about, um, you know, stagnation, which is not great, um, is because of these- these budgeting practices. So I don't think they're wasteful. I think they're thoughtful. And, you know, another point, too, like, we say a status quo budget, it's not meeting status quo in the larger sense of we're not doing anything to advance the needs of the community. In fact, quite the opposite. If you look at our budget, we're spending money on, you know, on housing, on all kinds of crisis services. In the past year, we've been expanding the police departments, has been expanding, having the counselors, uh, a second counselor and out in the field with officers. So we're seeing some things actually happening. So I think that's important, um, in law enforcement and other places in our community that we're able to do and keep doing because of what I think- what I think are actually the only time I'll ever say I appreciate something that's been called conservative would be with this particular practice. Um, but I think that keeps us from being able to do that, and I think it keeps us from not having to fire people and lay people off. And if we have to do that kind of thing, we're kind of chasing one problem with another. And so I appreciate that. I think that's a good practice, um, you know, I don't think it's- it's harmful to do that, for those reasons. Yeah, so that's on- on that point. And again, the status quo means status quo in that we're not letting people go. We're not cutting our employees, which to me is absolutely critical. Um, because again, I've been in places where they've had to do that, and it is it's heartbreaking. It's awful. Um, and I appreciate the fact that unlike other cities in Iowa, we haven't been asked to do that, and I value that, so. [03:44:22) Page 83 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at.https:./.Icitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Um, a lot of tenacles to this conversation. Um, I appreciate our budgeting practices in Iowa City, and I'm glad that we have a city manager and finance office that did manage that well, and we need a reserve. And so, um, I- I don't feel like we have an opportunity to right now at this point in the budget process, allocate funding to somebody else or some other initiative, like that ship sailed, we should talk about next year's budget regarding other expenditures. I want to talk about what we can do to fund mobile crisis, and we want to have that work session. I don't think that we need to tether it to harming the police or defunding the police. I think we should talk about how we get mobile crisis to be better. I think that what we heard the very first speaker today on this conversation was, let's have a conversation, our community taskforce on revenue generation. I think that's Number 1. Like, we can afford these things if we just do better, um, if we figure out ways to earn more money, and we can spend that money on. Also hear you mentioned the jack- the jack crisis counselor. Let's do that. And what's- we have an EMS tax levy. You're on the EC board. Look, let's just do it. And by the way, let's have the county pay for it, because they got a lot of money, um, and use the EMS to pay for that. So as far as the idea of this current motion on the floor, I will be voting no for it. And that's because, um, we have a really small- a small police force. And I think your advocacy has been successful in that as our city continues to grow, our police force as per 1,000 people, it's one of the smallest in the country, that number continues to get smaller as we grow as a city. So, um, we aren't adding police officers. We haven't since I've been on council. And I think that if there are genuine concerns about our police not doing something in the right way, it's our responsibility to make that right, not to just take money away. I think we need to do- figure out what exactly it is they're not doing right. And- and have corrective action for that. I want a well trained, responsible police in our- in our city. I want the best for Iowa City. And I want the best here, and they don't need to be big. They just need to be efficient and they need to be lean, and they need to be serving our community. And I honestly want control over them locally. I don't want it to be someone from the outside, and I don't want more outside policing or private, which is something we did also see in other cities that did a defunding, um, process. We saw private security forces filling the gap, and that is something that I really don't want to see that in Iowa City. So I'll be voting no for this amendment. [03:47:19] Well, you know, as you said something really important that we are not adding more police. You know, the police that we have right now is enough for our City, even though we are growing. [03:47:29] Well, they're being a lot of overtime, and we continue to have problems with that. And the biggest problem that we have is that we have some specialty- some specialty slots that we have that are very tied to things we want the police to be doing that are not just patrolling the streets. And we can't fill those top 5 slots when we're not having a fully- a fully filled police force. Like, I want to be able to have all five of those slots that are specialty filled. Like, that's- that's important because those are roles that are not just patrol roles but are specialty things that have been at it over the years that we can't seem to quite get over the hump. [03:48:10] Page 84 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.htmi) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. But if we- we still did not fall, if they work overtime, that means we're paying them more because they work overtime. We still be saving $800,000 in their budget. And if you can- just Jeff if you can tell me last year when we transfer after the end of the year and with transfer some money to the reserve, could you tell me overall that was how much was? [03:48:35] We didn't make any transfers to the facility reserve. We didn't make any transfers to the emergency reserve. I don't know if our finance team knows if the- where we ended the general or the, um, [OVERLAPPING] the general fund. [03:48:51] Eight hundred thousand. [03:48:53] Sorry, it's way past my bedtime at this point. [LAUGHTER] I think we ended 24. And this is going to get a little confusing, technically with about 7 million of surplus, but that's because we transferred ARPA funds in with the revenue replacement weren't going to be able to spend them with the other funds. So that's what bumped that up. Had we not had that, we would have had a slight loss, which is due to- to the 21 South Lind purchase. So I think we would have ended with a million or two if we didn't have that weird stuff happening with 24. And [OVERLAPPING] that's all due to investment income. [03:49:31] Million, too, that's supposed to go to the reserve if not all this happening. [03:49:35] I- it just goes into the fund balance because we wouldn't have had enough to transfer, really, based on our policy. We're getting close to what we want to have and unrestricted in case something happens that we need that fund balance there, that it's just unrestricted funds that we could use. [03:49:53] That's exactly what I want to bring my boy. The money that is like like $800,000, which is maybe half of the money coming from the police department. Not from another, like department because he's staying there. I agree they need training, we need money for the training. I agree, like the if- if we need like something for that, no problem. But right now, this is the only money that for the last three years, we did not use it, and we need to hire we need to take care of the mental health crisis. And can we use money or part of it right now? So just fund those positions. And even if something left over there is still there, something like some money sitting there if they need it. And even if they need more than that, we can go back and see, like, because, as you see we've- we- it come from something else. They are not going to be deficit. But they will at least this is now sitting there. That's what I want to say. [03:50:51] Page 85 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https://citychannel4.com/city-council.htmi) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. I just want to add one more thing that hasn't been brought up. We talk about what was left over in the police budget, what it doesn't account for with those numbers, is what is- what gets carried forward. So a lot of the police budget is their vehicles, and the timing when we couldn't get them, we were transferring 200 and 300,000 to the future year. Because we weren't able to purchase those in this year. So some of that excess got transferred into the next year's budget because we weren't able to buy those vehicles. They didn't come in. So it wasn't really a- a 800 or 600. Some of it moved into the next year and did carry forward with the police department. [03:51:261 And still if we need those things, we can still buy them. That's what I'm coming from. Not like I want to just take it away. They cannot use it. So after that, we can lay people off to your point and all this. You know, that's what I mean. Let us maybe if you want to transfer the whole thing, just let's see how much we can budget for this whole crises because I think this is part of the safety. That's why I'm talking police. You know, I'm not going to take it from the- the utility. I'm not going to take it for capital- capital improvement or those because this is the function for it is safety, too. I don't know. [03:52:02] 1 think that well, I appreciate talking about this from a financial point of view, and there's so much to be said about that and I will probably address it. I- for me, I'm coming at this as what is safest for the community point of view. And we just need what I really want to get- the message I really want to get across is we need to decouple this myth that policing is the thing that makes us safe. When police- when policing solves a problem in the community or a police officer does a good thing that everybody talks about, like, this police officer helped me do this and this very rarely are they talking about things that need an armed enforcer of the state to do. And it is in our comprehensive plan that we want less interaction or response of armed police officers in the community. So a good start that people will probably dispute is what I've read and what you know, I listen- I listened back to the last two council budget meetings in the last two years, and just a lot of the same stuff's been said. Um, it's not- it's not the right time. You know, there's not specific proposals. It's- but I heard a very good piece of information that 10% of Iowa City Police Department calls are determined to have actually needed a police officer. So people will talk about that's an incorrect status or I mean, let's say it's 30%. Let's say it's 40%. What we were talking about is these things are intrinsically linked. That's why it's coming from the police department's budget. It's because we are replacing one set of principles when it comes to public safety with another, and it's not just ideology. It's based in fact, it's based in data. It's based in, um it- it's based in logic. It- it's based I don't know how like, you know, Laura said so many things that I was going to say, and, you know it's- this is something that's such a baby step. And I really think that it's funny when we talk about saving $800,000. Somehow, it's being spun as we're losing $800,000, [LAUGHTER] which I think that's I'm trying to wrap my head around. But like I said, this is intrinsically linked with public safety, not just from- not just from a financial point of view. Um, there's been lots of talk about lots of commentators. Laura mentioned this as well, but, you know, so many people on this council and on our staff, we were posting, we're saying things constantly about how we are encroaching into extremely terrifying territory in the United States. And you see people that have been disappeared, and that's not an exaggeration. That's not hyperbole. They've been kidnapped. They've been disappeared, and a court Page 86 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:.//citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. has told officials that they need to return them, and they said no. And to think that the Iowa City Police Department is not going to potentially be forced to participate in these things because there are police. They're good police. We train them better. That's not how it works. It is because they are law enforcement. And historically, every single like just in American history, every single progression, every single strive for justice, every single fight against oppression, every single thing that has made us grow as a society has been met with abject police violence when we're talking about the labor movement. People were beaten and murdered and oppressed by the police when we talk about the oppression, when- when we talk about civil rights movement, who was beating the people and spraying them with hoses and gassing them? It was the police. When we talk about the queer movement? Did- did they just randomly start spontaneously rioting at Stonewall? No, it was a response to [LAUGHTER] abject extreme police violence and repression. And now and I- I could go on and on- and on. And it's not we also need to uncouple the idea that policing that when we make these criticisms of police, I just think it's like, Oh, they -the police did those things all that time because they were full of terrible individuals that were bad. That's not how people work, you know, it's because they were operating within the confines of the system that they are in. And if we keep putting people in those positions where they feel like they have to continue to oppress and crack down on movements, then I mean, we're going to keep seeing it. What we are going to need to see to get out of this moment to resist against this insanity that we're seeing in the federal and state level is people's movements. It's labor organizing, it's tenant movements. It's all of these things that due to its direct contradiction with the state, it's going to the police are going to have to respond because they're law enforcement. It's not because they woke up one day and just said, I want to do these bad things. We need to uncouple the idea that we're not talking about individually bad people. We're talking about people being put in a situation that makes them do things. And so, like said, it's intrinsically linked. There's a reason why we are taking it from the police department budget and putting it directly- directly into something like Counselors at the jeck. And for those people who are listening and don't know what that is, that's just 911 operators, basically, if you have a counselor in there, they can better direct crisis counselors instead of police to situations where police aren't needed. And downtown counselors, because we see so much of police calls there. I mean, there's just concrete things. There's infrastructure within the city to let it that- that could be just if we get the money, then tomorrow, we will go and we will figure something out and start that process. So, you know, I- it's not singling out the police department. It's because it's intrinsically linked. We are trying to reduce armed intervention in conflict in our community that does not need it. And I could go on and on and on. I have so many notes written down, but, you know, maybe it'll come up in a little bit. [03:59:20] So this is a budget discussion, and I'm going to try to stick to that, because there is a lot of um, just um, defense for or against the police budget in this. Um, I don't even know where to begin, except I will say, I heard Councilor Bergus talk about all of the things that Iowa City wants to do for the public. The social services that we provide, that is something that we absolutely want to do, and we don't want to have a budget that can't support that. Like, we should always ensure that we're doing what we can to provide necessary services to make our community better. Listening to this discussion has been everywhere. I- I think if we are wanting mental health services, and I said this last year, we should be talking about and directing staff right now in this meeting, we could have done it a couple of months ago to find $800,000, Page 87 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. $900,000 for mental health, and that be the end of it. We will direct the staff to do that. They figure it out. If we go in, you know, right now, we have a deficit of $2.8 million, this council has the ability right now to add another $900,000 to that deficit. So if this really is about mental health, then that's what we should be talking about. We should be talking about making that amendment. We're not talking about that. We're talking about we are singling out one department. We have a bunch of departments in the city, and we're asking to pull money from them. I don't think that that is what we should be doing here at this diese. We're not going through their staffing patterns. We're not talking to other departments to find out how can they reduce and trim some of the funds so that we can make some things happen. So if we want to really have a discussion about trimming the fat, you know, from the cities so that we can continue to do things. I think that's a task we say to the staff next year in September, when we start to have our budget discussions, we want staff to bring us some ways that they can trim the fat. Or we can ask because we just finished doing an amendment. We can do amendments every quarter to see what amount of money has not been used. Have we gone below the $2.8 million deficit yet? Once we get below that deficit, that money we can direct whatever funds from that, you know, from our overall all budget. We can direct that to whatever mental health project that we want. I agree that we have a lot of needs continuous outside of the police budget. We have more than $1 million that we can assign to really help better our community. So, for me, I'm going to come back to this budget and the proposal that's on the floor, the motion. So I don't support that. And I really wish that we could have a discussion that does focus in on honestly, if it is an $800,000 $900,000, if that's what we want to do, again, like I said, let's year, that's what we should be talking about. We should not be going through in this moment because we don't know all the ins and outs of the police operations to say, we can cut that right now. Where I understand everything is not being used from past years. But I- I- I just don't think now is the time. So I'm going to leave it at that. And because we have been talking about this a long time, I'm going to ask if we can vote on this motion that's on the floor if council is amendable to that. [04:04:08] Yes. [04:04:09] Okay. So roll call, please. [04:04:13] If I can, I'm just going to restate the motion just so we're all clear if for no other reason than for my benefit. So, Councilor Bergus, this motion was to amend page eight of the budget line, the Police Department crime prevention line specifically from $17,520,200-$16,644,190. So a yes vote makes the amendment, a no vote does not. With that, I will do the roll call Salih. [04:04:42] Yes,. [04:04:43] Teague? Page 88 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at httl2s:///citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [04:04:44] No. [04:04:44] Weilein? [04:04:45] Yes. [04:04:46] Alter? [04:04:47] No. [04:04:47] Bergus? [04:04:48] Yes. [04:04:49] Harmsen? [04:04:49] No. [04:04:50] Moe. [04:04:50] No. [04:04:52] Motion fails four to 04 to three, four to three. So we're on the original motion that is on the floor. And so at this point, council discussion on that. [04:05:08] Did you want a motion for additional funding for. [04:05:11] Page 89 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,(/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. I would like to make a motion for, um how much was the amount of money? [04:05:16] $880,000. [04:05:18] $880,000 to go towards more how should this be put. Is it $860,000. [04:05:31] Eighty-eight [04:05:31] Eight hundred eighty thousand dollars to go towards to be earmarked for Councilors in the check, Downtown liaisons or on call nurse practitioner within the crisis hotline. [04:05:54] Is this amendment? Are you trying to increase the ex- expenditures for next fiscal year or current fiscal year? [04:06:03] Fiscal year 2026. [04:06:06] 2026. [04:06:07] Yeah. [04:06:07] So adding to the police- adding to the police department budget? [04:06:12] Nope, adding to the deficit. Well, that's what it would be doing. [04:06:15] Adding to deficit. You have to put that expenditure in a category, which would probably be public safety. [04:06:22] And it can't be done at this time. We can't increase any line item in our budget at all. It would have to be done with a future amendment. [04:06:30] Page 90 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Okay. I just heard that we could do it right now, so that's why I tried to do it. [04:06:35] You can direct staff as a group. You can't amend what we've already published for the public hearing purpose. You all can direct staff to bring you something, and get those wheels in motion, if you want. You just can't increase an expenditure line item in the budget. [04:06:56] Would that have to be as- as an amendment to the budget as a whole, because we have to have an end by the 30th, right? [04:07:04] No, you wouldn't amend the budget for an increase. [04:07:08] We want you to find out. [04:07:09] At this point. [04:07:10] Okay. [04:07:10] Right. You could right at the start of the fiscal year, you can direct that amendment. You could say, Staff, I want you to amend the fiscal year 26 budget to increase to provide the resources to- to do what was just offered there. So you don't have to wait a whole year. You just can't amend the published budget right now. [04:07:321 So I kind of started that. So if I can step in for 1 second and just offer some more thoughts on that. So we do have a work session that's going to be coming up. This is not kicking the can down the road, but we do have a work session coming up that we're going to talk about that specifically. We also have an invite out to community crisis services to come and speak to us. Um, it's not that I'm not in agreement to citing some amount, but I do think that we have opportunities in the near future where I don't feel so pressured or it's not like we're gonna be not seeing each other, right? So I don't feel so pressured or that we're gonna not have this discussion or someone won't make that proposal. Um, so I'll just leave it at that. I- I certainly know that we can do that, direct staff, but I think we have some great opportunities coming up to have maybe something a little more concrete to direct, but, you know, mental health umbrella as the funding source could just be sufficient, as well. [04:08:55] Page 91 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at httl2s:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. And I would just offer an alternative because we have had this conversation a few years in a row. The reason that I'm saying I want to see more investment in these other things is because I believe that's what we have committed to the community. And I would hope that staff can hear this conversation and hear that there is a majority of counselors who are saying, Yeah, we need to support these things. And what that would mean is in a future budget amendment, or if we were two years ago, it would have been in the last budget, right, to actually have those investments in there so that we aren't in a position a year from now saying, Oh, well, we don't have any money. We know we're in a terrible budget situation. And- and I think from a public health standpoint, like, these are not radical ideas, right? And the reason that they're intrinsically linked, like Oliver was saying is that we can actually reduce harm and conflict in our community, if we're intentional about it. And if we direct staff to you know, if we provide some kind of guidance as far as scoping things to say, we want to divert, you know, 10,000 calls to unarmed response, help make that happen, we're throwing, I'm throwing out ideas that we've talked about, because I know those are concrete things, but, like, I don't know why we aren't approaching this like we approach every other priority for the city. And I think it's because it's linked to the police, and that just creates this, like, black hole where nothing can come out. So I'm really hopeful that maybe we're going to pass that so. [04:10:36] Just for clarity, you mean we should continue and expand, because we already doing a lot of those things. We already fund mobile crisis. [04:10:44] 1 don't think we're funding mobile crisis anymore, correct? [04:10:47] 1 don't know what the status of their ARPA commitment is. [04:10:S0] Or have funded or, you know, I mean, yeah. So one thing too, I do want to point out, too, just so people understand because I know you've been part of these conversations with Jexa and those are ongoing. But some of my takeaways from those conversations, too, is that there's still some, it's not as simple as plugging somebody in and getting a one to one diversion. At least that's what we've heard from them the last few times, that there's one of the things that's like, Yeah, you can say post facto after the fact. Well, this could have been something else. But when they're in the process of going through the flow charts of how they respond to things, you have to, like, assume you need, like, the most response or maybe not most responses in the right phrase, but they have a certain path they have to follow, and if they undersend help, that's a problem, too. [04:11:38] And the reason we're having this conversation with these really specific examples is because we haven't gone to that place of, like, systemic solutions. If we have prioritized fewer interactions with armed officers, we need those solutions to come from the experts. And for how many years in a row now, we Page 92 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at httl2s:/Icitychannel4.com/city-council.htmi) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. use some ARPA funding, but we're not really investing in that in a way that we can be shifting towards that commitment. So I know I talk with Jeff, ad nauseum, talk with Chief Liston, all the time about we agree on most things, right? And I hear what you're saying, Shaun of like, don't say we're not doing anything. And we need to actually be investing in it and not seeing it as something where we ran out of money so we can't have this partnership anymore. [04:12:32] 1 guess my question at this hour is, are we comfortable picking up this conversation in our work session? Are people comfortable? Yes. Because we have a work session that we okay. [04:12:43] And- and if- if I may, suggest that we do let's do this as a continuation. Let's not wait months because this unfortunately, I mean, we've had an incredibly productive conversation. And- and we've gotten better each year with starting the conversation about this in terms of the budget earlier. But we lose the specificity of what we're actually probably the most important conversations happen on voting night for the budget. So let's I'm just- I'm concurring. Let's do it in a work session, but let's do it soon and talk through this so that it can so that staff also has an understanding as the year goes on and as they're ramping up to then look at, you know, how do they prioritize, um, different strategies and different goals that we have, that this can be perhaps cooked and I maintain it as a yes and, but let's definitely strike while we still have the iron hot to talk about this because this has been a productive conversation. [04:13:50] Thank you. [04:13:54] 1 would also, I felt coming into this, I felt obligated to say it. But just to this, you know, I know how it is a monumental task to make a budget, right? So us coming in here is not and potential, you know, like voting against the budget or having a problem with it is not on the staff who put the budget together. You all, I don't know how you do this. It's crazy, it's awesome. It's so much, I just wanted to thank the staff that helped put this together, and it's no judgment on them at all. [04:14:39] And we can continue talk about the budget now, right? [04:14:42 ] So we're going to talk about the fiscal year 2025 budget that's before us, 2066. It's late. It's okay. [04:14:52] Yeah, can I also ask if this budget- we budget the city bull on it, right? Okay, if you can just, like, explain to me. In the beginning, we but get the bull $80 million. And we are fortunate to have the bull coming for $40 million. Can you just tell me exactly? Let us assume we are doing it $80 million. Can you go over how we was funding it? Page 93 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:/Icitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [04:15:30] Yeah, I'm gonna try to bring up spreadsheet here. So, um, the primary funding source for City Park Pool has been the facility reserve. With your bonding that you've been working through this budget session, you're also moving forward with bonding about 1.3 million. So I'm going to go through some numbers. We need to kind of slow down and go through them again, we can, but our facility reserve had $16.5 million in kind of round terms in it. We are intending to use 15 million for city Park Pool. [04:16:23] Is it 15? Hear the number. [04:16:25] Fifteen for City Park pool. And then we have 600 earmarked for the Senior Center project. That leaves what we think will be a projected balance after the pool and Senior Center project of roughly 950,000 in the facility reserve. The pool project itself has about $1.7 million in soft costs, which aren't reflected in the bid document. That's your design costs, okay? That's your architect. That's your engineers working on that. The construction contract itself is that 13.7 million. And we have about 1.3 in contingency. So that's going to bring that city park pool project expense roughly to what we project right now is 16.8. And hopefully we don't spend all that. You never want to spend your entire contingency, but we've been through enough projects, and believe us, we've been over on a lot of projects where we haven't had enough contingency. So that's where- that's where the pool budget is. Now, where were we going to get the money if the bids came in high? If you remember, we had a long list of alternates, right? Probably as long a list of alternates as I've ever seen on a capital project, 8, 9, 10 alternates. And if those high bids were going to come in, we weren't going to select those alternates, right? We were going to cut landscaping. We were going to cut shade structures. We weren't going to heat the pools and all that. When the bids came in good, we accepted all those alternates, so that's- that's- that's one of the ways we would have brought the cost down if we would have had high bids. Then the other thing is, we would have looked to supplement with other funding sources. So, for example, could we have used climate action funds to pay for the electrification of that pool house building? [04:18:14] Yes. (04:18:14] Yes, I could have justified that. Could we have used operating dollars that are in the budget to help pay for some of the equipment that might be used? We could do that, too. So we had strategies in place not knowing what the bids would be, but that's where we've ended up. [04:18:31] And when you talk, like, if the bid come more, you mean more than 18? Because we have 18, 18 was 16.5 + 1.3 from the bond. Page 94 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:/.Zcitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [04:18:45] The 16.5 was the facilities reserve, but we also had 600 of that 16.5 earmarked for the Senior Center project, too. [04:18:55] Yeah, but I mean, I have not finished. I mean, like, it was $18 million already without using any alternative if it's going to be 18, 600 out because we're gonna bund like 1.5, and we have 16.5. That's 18. Am I right? [04:19:14] I'm not- I'm not following. We have. [04:19:16] We have 16.5 million dollar in the facility reserve. [04:19:21] Correct. [04:19:22] That's cash. [04:19:23] Correct. [04:19:24] And we was trying to bond for 1.5, so we make it 18 if the bull came 18. [04:19:30] 1.3. [04:19:31] 1.3. Yeah. Okay. Because that's a max, right? [04:19:35] That's the max, yeah. [04:19:36] Okay. The max is 1.3. So now, it came like 14, which is also, like you said, we have to a little bit, budget more because maybe something will come up. That's why it's not 14, it's 15.5, right? [04:19:57] Page 95 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at.https:llcitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Correct. So we have 1.3 roughly in contingency, right? That could all be spent. It could not be tapped in. It just depends on whether there's unexpected conditions with the construction. And then we have 1.7 million in consultant fees and design fees. [04:20:171 That's on top of the. [04:20:19] That's on top of the bid. The bid is just how to construct, you know, the actual labor and materials to construct the pool. You still have to pay the architects and then the contingencies on top of that. [04:20:301 And if that was the case, where are we going to find the $600,000 for the senior center? [04:20:39] The 600 for the senior center was going to stay there. What we were going to do is start to reduce the construction cost of the city park pool by not doing the alternates. Again, not heating the pools, not putting the shade structures up. We- we structured the bid to where there was a baseline. This is the minimum that we could accept. And then if the numbers come in good, we could accept heating the pools. If the numbers come in good, we could, you know, do landscape, and we could do a demo of a park rest room. What about Right now, how much are we binding for this bull? It's still 1.3 million? [04:21:15] Yes, 1.3, the max. [04:21:18] Okay. [04:21:20] Do you think that there's, like, money leftover? Is that what it is. [04:21:231 Yes it is. It is 900 950,000 over. Yeah. [04:21:27] Okay. [04:21:28] After we do all this, it is almost 1 million. [04:21:31] Okay. Page 96 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,I/citychanne]4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [04:21:33] And, yeah, I'm really interesting to use that leftover. And if even if we can find something else to direct it to the affordable housing. [04:21:47] The council has the discretion to do that. That would be just as the last item. You would do that in an amendment in the fiscal year 26 budget. So much like the amendment that Councilor Weilein was seeking, you would direct staff to prepare an amendment in fiscal year 2026 to do that. [04:22:06] Sure. I just believe the reason of that if we can spend all this money for the bull we need to spend some money for housing. You know, like almost $80 million gain is being spent just to, you know, have a new bull for the city of, like, more than 100 people are homeless. So like a bull that even only will be opened during summertime. And a bull that not everybody in Iowa City go there. So the people like sleep on the street. We have people like double up. We have a lot of crisis of affordable housing in this community. So I want to- I really want to see that equity. If we know who go to the poll. The people are comfortable. They have roof in their head. They eating very good, and now they want to have spend more time. Good time. So but there is many people that cannot do that. And if there is something left, like, there is money left, we need to direct that money to go toward the affordable housing of any kind. And don't ask me what exactly we're going to do with that, because I don't have- I'm not experienced of doing affordable housing, but we can figure it out. That was my proposal. [04:23:42] 1 just have a clarifying question on the facility reserve. Um, I believe when we talked about this last summer, the cash number was always 10 million that we talked about spending. And now it's 15 or 16. Is that just. [04:24:03] 1 don't remember the 10. So as we've gone through the iterations on City Park Pool, when we started the first master plan, I think the pool estimate was eight or 9 million. And then we got into the kind of the conceptual design of the pool, and it grew to 14-15 million. And then once we got to the actual design, our consultants were telling us to expect that 18. So, um, at some point in the process, could we have projected 10 million for the pool when we thought it was going to cost 12 and we were going to bond, you know, the difference roughly? Yeah, that's possible. But the only way to accomplish that pool project outside of this facility reserve strategy was to go to a voter referendum, and I don't think we ever seriously considered that at this table. [04:24:51] Okay. We just had more in that facility reserve than I understood. [04:24:56) Page 97 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https://citcitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Yeah, we haven't transferred to the facility reserve in a couple of years, so that number has been pretty stagnant other than interest earnings. [04:25:03] Yeah. Thank you. [04:25:04] Yeah, we also need that for fire Station one replacement. For I mean, with the facilities reserve, I think that there was a hope that that would support more than a pool once upon a time and that, I mean, we are desperately need to invest in fire stations. And so. (04:25:21] Yeah. [04:25:21] 1 don't think that, sorry. No, I interrupted. No. [04:25:25] A facility reserve is being created by the city staff. And under direction, of course, the council. But we can create any kind of reserve that we want to see and put money there at the end of the day, whether the facility reserve or whether the general reserve and whether the emergency reserve, all of them is general operation fund, like general fund that from the general fund that can be used for anything. You know, if we've been doing, like, facilities, we should have done, like, affordable housing reserve long time ago. [04:26:10] We do, and we spend a lot of money in affordable housing. [04:26:13] Oh. Really, $1,000,000? [04:26:15] We have a massive amount of money in an affordable housing fund for the South District, I mean, and we're being strategic about finding the right opportunity to spend that for. [04:26:27] Oh. [04:26:28] Right? [04:26:29] Page 98 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. I mean, money affordable housing, did we did last year. And the year before- and the year before? Have Have we done like affordable housing in one given year from $18 million? I don't think so. We have not. Yeah. And especially for the 30% of the area median income. You know, and also, you know, I will be really interesting to see how many we done, so we can talk practically. And I will ask the city manager to just give us for the last two-year. I'm not going to go far. Two-year, how many affordable housing have we done for the 30% of the area median income? And we can compare it with a bull. We can compare it with something else. Let's be practical. So I can convince you because sometime when I talk, I feel like, you know, as if I'm not, you know, understanding it, and I just talk like that. And- and I did my- I did my homework, by the way, and Elia, you was saying that maybe I'm not right about that kid and he said the same thing that I said. And, you know, I think I'm doing my homework. I'm not sitting here, just talking. And I ask Jeff immediately, like, personally, during our meeting, I will ask Jeff, and he will explain it to me. [04:27:58] 1 have a question just going directly to the 950,000 that will remain in the facilities funds. So it sounds like you're wanting it earmarked in a way. And that's what you're asking for the council to earmark these funds for affordable housing. [04:28:17] So we can leave it there. We don't have, like. [04:28:22] Staff has no plans to spend that in the next few months. So you have time for that discussion. We have plenty of projects ahead where we will need those dollars because of the bonding restrictions. If you want to move forward with those projects, right? And we've talked about those. We don't need to go into them at this hour, but the funds will still be there in a couple of months if you want to have that conversation down the road. [04:28:48] That in market. [04:28:52] So I guess if the question is to earmark the funds, I don't know if counsel need because I'm conscientious of our time, and I'm conscientious of the fiscal year 2026 budget public hearing that's what we're here for. This is a part of it, the 960. But if the council needs a little more time to talk about that, are you amendable to us having that at a future conversation? [04:29:26] 1 think we just need to see if we are agreeing to transfer the money or ear market as affordable housing opportunity, like, to be used for affordable housing opportunity. If we have enough vote for that, we can just move in with it. Why each time we want to, like, delay things? Page 99 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https://citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [04:29:47] The only thing that comes up for me is that I know that we have 14 million. Wait, no six. [04:29:56] You're right. 14 million. [04:29:58] Fourteen million. Yeah. So we have some funds that are already assigned to the affordable housing fund, not to say that we don't need much, much more. Absolutely. [04:30:08] We just spend 18 million for the whole. [04:30:10] No, we don't- no we don't you're exactly right. We're going to be developers. And so when opportunities come up, it will be great if we have funds on hand and don't be like, Well, we're gonna miss out on an opportunity. So there's lots of good reasons that I think that can support this. I'm just not sure and I'm being just human up here that I can maybe some of the others could just really think about this a lot. I think we can have another conversation. I think we can bring in, you know, the current funding earmarked funds for affordable housing and make a decision. I'm with you. I think that, you know, looking at this, absolutely we can look at it. [04:31:07] Well, you know, even the money that we have, we have certain restrictions for some of them, like, for example, $6 million for, like, Riverfront crossing. So this is a lose money. I want to just, like, capture this, just in case, if we have opportunity to do anything. Tomorrow, if you have, like, this kind of sale of maybe an apartment building that's we want to do it or maybe a land or maybe anything else. You know, I'm not saying what it is because I really don't know. [04:31:37] And because this is facility reserve, I mean, we can make argument at any point. You know, to assign this fund, whether it was a facility reserve now. [04:31:50] Why is any time now? [04:31:51] Because it's 10:45. After a six hour conversation. [04:31:56] Stay here until 12 midnight if there is really. And this is a budget information. Why we just want it late? Page 100 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,(./citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [04:32:01] 1 think it would just be, I'm not saying that we put this off indefinitely in the same way that I was agreeing that we should have. And you and I talked on Thursday. I think that this as an opportunity. I just it is- it has been an intense several hours. I think it is wise for us and responsible for all of us to be able to have the conversation so that we're laser focused on it, and we can look at what we have with our existing and that. I just- I understand the push and the urgency, but I think a quarter 11. (04:32:34] You have any, like, something you want to why- what we want to use that money for? This is I don't have that I can't think straight right now. I'm gonna be really honest. [04:32:45] Yeah, I'm having a human moment. [04:32:47] I'm having a human moment. [04:32:48] That's awesome. [04:32:48] I'm not- I'm not pushing back as a counselor. I'm saying, I'm exhausted and I want to do the smart thing and just be able to think about it, and let's talk about it when we're all focused on it, as opposed to. [04:33:01] We're approving a budget here. [04:33:09] I'm exhausted, and I would like some time to be able to just digest, come back to it fresh. I'm happy to do it at our next meeting, even. [04:33:181 1 mean, I understand what you're saying, but, you know, I just don't think it's particularly what Maze was trying to say. I didn't think that it was particularly not singling anybody out. I didn't think it was particularly hard to understand that it was like we spent 18, $19 million on a pool, and we got the money for it, and we made that happen. But we do not have that amount of money currently set aside for affordable housing. And so, therefore, there's a part- it's a priority argument. And, yes, I agree. And like Maze was saying, we have people sleeping on on the street. We're building a pool, and we don't have- we have millions of dollars less money from a pool into affordable housing, and taking this money that we are saving from the pool or that we are not going to spend probably and earmarking it for affordable housing and whatever reserve we want to, I mean, I just don't think that's I mean, I think we just, like, vote on that, you know. Page 101 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 202S (audio and video recordings can be found at https://citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [04:34:20] And even Geoff, you know, saying he doesn't have any intent to use this money in the near future. (04:34:25] Well, in the near future, yes, one, you can't increase expenditure lines right now, so you're not going to be able to accomplish it on tonight's vote. You're gonna have to do this. It's a very doable thing you're seeking. You can't do it tonight because you can't increase expenditure lines. You would be transferring out of the general fund and increasing resources in a different fund, and we're restricted from being able to do that. [04:34:50] But we can earmark it tonight. [04:34:53] You can direct staff to prepare a fiscal year 2026 amendment after the fiscal year starts in a couple of months. Yes. Regarding the facilities reserve, we have plenty of plans to spend those dollars, just not in the short term, right? We have a whole list of facility improvements that we have talked to counsel about over time that show up in our CIP, in which those funds were going to, you know, ideally support. We were planning to use those funds to help us with the Fifth fire station, right? That's off the table. We've got the interior remodel of the Senior Center, which has a $15 million price tag on the master plan, but we can only bond 1.3. So that's the decision that you have to make. I'm not saying there's a right or wrong decision there, but if I were in your shoes, I would want a comprehensive review of what is this facilities Reserve intended to do over the next five, 10 years? And then make a value judgment on whether you should transfer those dollars to the Affordable Housing fund and be clear about what you want to accomplish with those- with those dollars over there. That would be my recommendation. Right now, the direction that we have from counsel is to take surpluses that we get and put it in the facility reserves. So this would be a major change in strategy that you're working through kind of right now on the spot. And I think it'd be better to take a step back, ask staff to do a comprehensive review of this for you. And if you want to make changes to your strategic plan and shift how we're handling reserves and where we're shifting, okay. You have that discretion, I will help you do that. I just want to make sure that everybody's informed and feeling comfortable about the sacrifices that you have to make and what you're giving up and what you're investing in. And if everybody's comfortable with that or the majority's comfortable with that, we'll absolutely help you and make it happen. [04:36:50] That's what I want to see if you guys, I would like to put a motion to transfer the fund from this reserve doing now, doing later. I don't care. I'm- I'm putting my motion right now to direct staff? [04:37:04] To direct the staff. Page 102 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at.https:llcitychanne]4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. (04:37:06] We don't do a motion to direct staff. [04:37:09] What? [04:37:09] We don't do a motion. (04:37:10] Okay, I would like, yes help me with a motion, sit the itinerary? [04:37:14] Not a motion. [04:37:14] So you just. [04:37:15] No, I want to do a motion and after that, let it fall. [04:37:20] Well, I'm not sure what to tell you. I'm not sure what you're hoping to achieve. I mean, I think the city manager laid out kind of how to achieve it, which would be later after the fiscal year begins. [04:37:30] 1 think earlier, Councilor Laura Bergus put a motion to transit fire fund, and we did not do it, right? Can I do the same thing? I would like to put a motion to assign the money on the reserve to be used for affordable housing without transit pairing it. [04:37:47] Oh, okay. But City Council Burgers did not transfer funds as part of her motion. She just reduced expenditures in the budget. But I'm sorry, I missed the last part of what you just said. You said you did not want to transfer funds out. [04:37:58] I'm not saying I said I would like to put a motion to use the fund in the reserve of the facility for affordable housing. [04:38:09) Page 103 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:/Icitychannei4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Well, that sounds like you're transferring funds, and as a city manager, made clear you can't do that at this moment, not at this meeting. You can do that at beginning of the fiscal year when it starts, but not tonight. [04:38:21] The difference in the two motions is that there was not an increase in expenditures anywhere. What Councilor Bergus was trying to accomplish was reducing expenditures, which is allowable under at this stage in the process, and then those dollars could have been reallocated at a future meeting to mobile crisis or wherever. The funds you're looking at are already at that reserve. You can't transfer and increase the affordable housing fund at this time. You'd be increasing the expenditure levels and so you can't do that. Now, you can do it in a couple of months here. And again, we're happy to facilitate that. But she's not on this budget. [04:39:05] 1 cannot change on the budget right now. [04:39:08] You can reduce expenditures right now. Is your limitations as a counsel, you can reduce expenditures. [04:39:14] And when can we amend the budget again? (04:39:18] We can do it right at the beginning of the fiscal year. [04:39:22] Okay. [04:39:22] July 1st. [04:39:241 Yeah. So that's what we're saying. You can direct us. It's not a motion on the ice. [04:39:29] But even after we approve the budget, we can still discuss it to move that fund to do something if we if like, an opportunity come. [04:39:40] Yes. You can do. [04:39:42] Page 104 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,Zlcitychannel4.com/city-council.htmi) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Amending the whole budget, right? [04:39:46] Eventually, it would have to be an amendment. You can discuss it at any time, but eventually we would have to transfer from the facility reserve over to the affordable housing fund, and you don't have to wait for a whole other budget cycle to do that. [04:39:58] But it can be before July. Is that what you're saying? Or it even- even just to use money for anything is not a facility. I'd have to be after July. [04:40:12] We would do it after July, correct. [04:40:16] Okay. But I just want to understand that. That's because I will build my decision for many thing of that. Sure. Thank you. [04:40:23] Yeah. [04:40:24] And do you want to direct staff to do the comprehensive plan, as you said, then or. [04:40:32) Do it now anyway, if you. [04:40:33] Well, just to present it to us at the next amendment meeting. [04:40:371 Okay. [04:40:39] You know, uh, somebody else do it, you do it because I seem like I'm not going forward. [LAUGHTER] Is there's anything here. So, you do it. You can have more power than I do. [LAUGHTER] [04:40:51] 1 don't think it's- uh. [04:40:53] You do it. Page105 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https: [/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [04:40:56] 1 think what I've heard council allude to is, um, having staff just give us a- uh, over arching of both the facility reserve funds, as well as affordable housing funds. And I think the- the council, um, um, I want to make sure I'm seeing some nodding of heads is agreement- is in agreement with that. So if- at a future work session, we'll have you do that. All right. We're coming back to fiscal year 2026 budget, public hearing. Any comments from the council? I do want to take some time to say thanks to the staff for - again, going through all of this, I would agree this is a lot of information. Um, thanks to the professionals that make it happen. All the department heads, thank you. And because 75% of this budget is for our, um, staff, we certainly want to say thanks to them for all that they do. If there is nothing else? [04:42:03] The- the last thing I want- I was trying to talk about was water, but I think since, uh, we have an on- I have another item. Maybe I can talk during that time. Yeah. [04:42:13] Okay. Yeah. All right. Roll call, please. [04:42:17] Teague? [04:42:18] Yes. [04:42:19] Weilein. [04:42:191 No. [04:42:20] Alter. [04:42:21] Yes. [04:42:21] Bergus. [04:42:22] No. Page 106 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https://citychanne]4.com/city-council.htmi) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. (04:42:23] Harmsen. [04:42:23] Yes. [04:42:241 Moe. [04:42:24] Yes. [04:42:25] Salih. [04:42:251 No. [04:42:27] Motion passes 4-3. Could I get a motion to accept correspondence? [04:42:31] So moved Moe. [04:42:32] Second, Bergus. [04:42:34] All in favor say, Aye. Aye. [04:42:35] Aye. [04:42:35] Aye. [04:42:36] Any opposed? Motion passes 7-0. We're on to Item 10(f), fiscal year 2026, utility rates, public hearing, ordinance amending Title 3 entitled finances taxation and fees, Chapter 4 entitled schedule of fees, rates, charges, bonds, fines and penalties. Going to open the public hearing. And anyone from the public like to address this topic? Seeing no one in person or online. I'm gonna close the public hearing. Can I get a motion to give first consideration, please. Page 107 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [04:43:10] So moved, Moe. [04:43:11] Second, Harmsen. [04:43:12] All right. And council discussion. [04:43:18] This is the. [04:43:19] Um, regarding the landfill increases, what's the communication strategy that the city has developed for that? [04:43:28] On the minimum yard waste [OVERLAPPING]. [04:43:30] Still stick in the yard waste stuff. Is that gonna show up in a utility bill or? [04:43:35] Oh, I don't have a communications plan in front of me tonight. I wouldn't but- yes, there would anytime we have a rate increase, it's gonna show up in the utility bill, I oftentimes printed right on the bill. Sometimes we'll do the insert with it, and then there'll be plenty of social media, um, and, you know, advanced newsletters and anything we can to get that word out. [04:43:57] Okay. For clarity's sake, the announcement that if you take yard waste will show up in the bill- it won't show up in the bill as an extra fee, correct? [04:44:03] Yeah. [04:44:04] Thank you, for that clarification. [04:44:07] I- I just want to talk about, like, the increase. Uh, you know, guess, we've been increasing the water, and this is going to be every year, and we- we already increasing the- the what do you call it? The franchise. Page 108 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:llcitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [04:44:25] The franchise fee. [04:44:27] Yes, the franchise fee, which is going to increase from 1%-2% on the electricity bill. [04:44:35] And gas. [04:44:35] And gas. So- and who is really going to suffer from that is the low income people. And who is most of the people who are riding the bus is the low income people. We telling them, You know what? He give you free buses. But at the same time, you're going to pay for it another way, which is by increasing this. All right. Yes, you know, this is something already passed and it's not- we cannot go back to amend this one, the franchise, especially. Coming back to the River sent for the increasing of the water, this is also the really burden. I contacted this city- the city, I think, the city manager, and I contacted the mayor during the, you know, like last winter for a family that their water has been shut off for five days because they are not- they can't afford paying this and they has been disconnected and they have this disconnected fee. They put them in a payment plan. They failed to pay- they pay the first one, they failed to pay the second month, like the first month, the second month. And there is, we do have a policy. If you are in a payment plan and you failed one of the payment, you don't have that payment plan anymore. And you have to pay the full amount. And this family, they failed to pay the second month, and their- their water has been- no, they no longer have the blood, and they have to pay $900. Thank you for Community Crisis Center, who is the one finally, I reach out to the city. Can we do something? No, we cannot do something. I understand we cannot do to individual. If we have to have a policy for the whole city. Got that. But you can check with Community Crisis Center and see how many people come all the time for help of water, even though we have the discount at the city, but this discount is not working. I've been talking about this all the time. The discount is not welcome. Sixty percent or 75% from the basic use with $36 is not working. I really urge this council to think clearly about- just do 10-15% from the usage- from the whole usage. You don't have to do this 65. Do the 10 to like, 15%, for example, from the- if your bill is $100, you have $15 off. You know, and if your bill is $400, maybe you have $60 off if I'm doing that mass right. So that's what I want to see. It is really- the way that even we do it, we're very smart, like, showing the public, Oh, 65% off. But that's not the reality. Not everybody knew that the 65% is from the basic use from on the $36. So if my bill is $400, 1 will get like 75% from the $60. That means somebody whose bill is $50 and somebody whose bill is $400 because like, wherever, it's never going to be 400. 1 don't. So for example, I have five children, and my bill come round like 150-200, and they leave the water on. I count on them all the time. So that- that thing, I feel like I'm getting the same discount for somebody who have $50 bill. We get the same discount. That doesn't work. Really, that doesn't work. That's why bless. Let us think about just across the thing, like 15% off, period. And that's it. And we have only, if I remember right, 400 like families, I think, 400 family only the people are enrolled in the discount is not a lot. It's not. Please, you know, I urge you just to Page 109 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. think about that. And I- I don't mind voting yes for increasing the water. But again, let us think about this population. I see you- you are not experiencing this. I'm sure 100%. Maybe I don't know. I can say almost 90% of the council. They are not seeing the people whose water has been disconnected. I see those every day. They came to my office. They look for it, and I say we don't have. Even community, they- they have help. But for $900 way they go to find help for 900? They always have like this $100 that you can have it every Monday you apply for it. But there is no any another help for water. There is no beside our one. That's why, please consider having a fixed discount percentage doesn't have to be 65. It can be between 15 and 20 or 10 and 15. [04:49:58] It was a long time ago. I think that we got a overview of the way we do water bills and discounts and everything because we forgave a lot of water bills with ARPA money. I wonder if and I know Dennis was here, so it had to have been a while ago. But, um, I wonder if you just informing the council, like, in an IP of our current, um, what that low income discount program is, like, how it works and how we got there. [04:50:29] Yeah, I think we went through this last year, actually. We might have had a couple of works. [LAUGHTER] I think we had two or three work sessions on it. What is- what is the. [04:50:37] Sorry. I don't remember that. Go ahead. [04:50:39] What is the base water unit? Is it $30. [04:50:42] Thirty six, right? [04:50:44] 1 don't have that information. [04:50:45] You told me, 30. 1 was saying, 30 1 remember, guys. I I don't know. I told you this is what happened. You want to make sure, Okay, we have a work session so you can just say what- what I said is right. Okay, so that's gonna make you feel better if- if it come from Jeff. I did my homework, and he come here with a bill, and he have the bill on there. [04:51:04] Okay, you're right. [OVERLAPPING] [04:51:05] Page 110 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:Z/citychannel4.com/city-council.htmi) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. And he was telling us it is 30. 1 was saying 30 and he said, No, it's 36, the average. That's what you said the average is 36. [04:51:131 So if I'm understanding, I just want to make sure I understand what you're saying, correct. So, if someone $36 water bill, and if they only have $36 water bill and they qualify for the discount of 75%, that means that they're paying like 27 or whatever that number ends up being right. But if they like you were saying, have a $400 water bill. [04:51:37] Only 36 of it gets discounted. [04:51:39] Only 36 of that gets discounted. So I just. [04:51:42] No, no. Let us just make it clear. So let us use numbers that really we can find the percentage out of it. Like, for example, I have my water bill is $200, and your water bill is $100. Do you think the discount that we both receive is different? It's not different though. The discount is the same. Why? [04:52:08] Oh, yeah. [04:52:09] Because the basic use that the city identified. I don't know how they come up with that. You can tell us later, maybe is $36. If we apply, our discount that we have, which is 65% of the basic use. And the basic use is $36. Calculate that will be like more than, like, I think, 36, 18 or $20 like discount. That's $20 will be a light because that's a basic use. But it will be [inaudible 04:52:39] to you because you have $50 bill. [04:52:42] Yeah. [04:52:44] To her because she have $100 bill to me because I have 200 bell is the same. So, the people are really suffering to beg, like, because they have big family, they have big kids with are normal immigrant and people of color. So those are people who really needed that discount. But you also in the program, and you are single. That's why I don't use a lot of water and your bill is $50. You get the same discount that I get. I want to see equity. Let's see equity, and after that, we can do something else. That's- that's exactly what I want to see. [04:53:19] 1 just wanted to make sure that that's what I was understanding. It was act [OVERLAPPING] Page111 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,/,/citychanne]4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [04:53:23] Isn't that in English is equality? Like you- you give discount across for everybody, whether they are very poor or that. Yeah. No, I want to see equity instead of equality. [04:53:36] 1 was also just gonna ask if there's any information or if we could get information on just how many water shutoffs typically happen, maybe, like, over the past four or five years. [04:53:481 Maybe ask for that. [04:53:50] See how much that happens, um. [04:53:52] And also the reconnection fee. [04:53:56] Is $40, right? [04:53:57) Forty five. [04:53:58] 1 don't know. If after hours, it is different, right? [04:54:011 1 don't know. I'd have to gather all that information. I don't have that at my fingertips. [04:54:05] All right. [04:54:05] So it sounds like the council is, um, gonna direct staff to bring us some information in the future on that. So this is the thing [OVERLAPPING] [04:54:16] 1 don't remember. [04:54:17] Next meeting? Page112 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,/,/citychannel4.com/cif-council.htmi) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [04:54:21] Next meeting. Next meeting, please. Not in the future, because we're budget mood. [04:54:27] All right. Next meeting if it's feasible. (04:54:31] The only reason I say'cause you and I sit there and we create. [04:54:341 And we create that [OVERLAPPING] [04:54:35] So sometimes it can get a little, you know, we have to maneuver. [04:54:39] So do you want it as a work session item, or do you want it as just a memo with this particular utility rate consideration? [04:54:49] Certainly, it sounds like the council wants to have discussion, so we might as well put it on- on a work session. [04:54:58] Okay. You might need to talk about work session scheduling. I'm stacking up good. [OVERLAPPING] [04:55:03] He's stacking up. [04:55:04] 1 think if you look up, you're gonna find all the information that you have from last year. [LAUGHTER] Just bring that. [04:55:09] Council, you increased the benefits last year. [04:55:12] Yes. Because you and I, we had a talk, and you were thinking it's 65. [04:55:16] Right, and 100. Page 113 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [04:55:18] Right. And then you were like, no, no. [04:55:19] I'm new. I'm sorry. [04:55:20] No, true. I'm just- anyway. [04:55:23] All right, so. [04:55:23] [OVERLAPPING] Back to business. [04:55:24] Yeah, we're going back to fiscal year 2026, utility rates, public hearing. Any other comments on this? Roll call, please. [04:55:35] Weilein. [04:55:35] Yes. [04:55:36] Alter? [04:55:37] Yes. [04:55:37] Bergus. [04:55:38] Yes. [04:55:38] Harmsen [04:55:39] Page114 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https://citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Yes. [04:55:39] Moe. [04:55:40] Yes. [04:55:40] Salih. [04:55:40] Yes. [04:55:41] Teague. [04:55:41] Yes. Motion passes 7-0. We're on to item 10G, parking lot enforcement and pedestrian Mall, ordinance amending Title 9 entitled Motor Vehicles and traffic, Chapter 4 entitled parking regulations, Section 1 entitled Parking Prohibited in specifies places to prohibit parking in City Plaza in Chapter 9, entitled Towing and Empowerment procedures, Section 2 entitled Towing and Empowerment of certain illegally parked vehicles to allow towing of vehicles parked in City Plaza. Can I get a motion to get first consideration? [04:56:15] So move Moe. [04:56:17] Second, Bergus. [04:56:171 All right, and welcome Eric Goers. [04:56:20] Thank you. I'll be quick, Counsel. Um, so we were having- we the city, we're having some problems with, uh, vehicles, particularly construction vehicles parking on the Ped mall and not having, uh, a great tool to deal with that problem. There were two issues. One, because the ordinance that was already in place prohibited operating on the Ped mall not parking on the Ped mall. And the second was that the remedy for that offense was either a simple misdemeanor, which would require a police officer to write a ticket or a municipal infraction, which is not particularly wieldy for that kind of thing. So, um, we had some discussions with the parking folks, and we've offered an amendment to solve that problem, to make it Page115 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:llcitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. illegal to park downtown on the Ped mall, sorry, make it illegal to park on the Ped mall and to be able to tow vehicles if they are found there. [04:57:12] What's the mechanism if there is a legitimate construction project and they need to work on a project? [04:57:17] They can go to the city manager's office and get permission for that. That's right in the ordinance. That already is in the ordinance. [04:57:22] Sure. Yeah, it's equivalent of an orange bag for a meter, but just different. [04:57:26] Yeah. I would designate that to the transportation office, and it would be like a meter hood. [04:57:31] And that would likely be limited by hours or something, oftentimes. [04:57:36] Is that the same? Like if there is an event on the pub and the people are participating, they bring in, like, loading and unloading. [04:57:45] Are you talking about an event on the Ped mall that has a permit or something? [04:57:48] Yes. [04:57:49] Like a festival or something? [04:57:50] Festival, anything? [04:57:51] We would still accommodate all that. (04:57:52] That would be, yeah that would be allowed. [04:57:54] Page 116 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at httl2s:/.Zcitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. And how do you differentiate people are loading or people- [04:57:59] Well, the key is that city manager or designee permission. That's built into the ordinance. You just can't do it without getting permission from the city first. [04:58:08] You mean because all the vestibles have permissions, and on that day, you will figure it out if there's something somebody's barking it or is there something? [04:58:17] Correct. Okay. Sure. [04:58:18] Yes. [04:58:20] Is- is the- sorry, I'm trying to remember every- when I read through this, all the details. Is it, um, towing first offense or a $25 ticket. Is- is that what you're saying? [04:58:36] Well, you can tow, and I think there's a judgment call, and Nagle Gamm is here if you've got specific questions about enforcement. [04:58:45] Yeah. She has stayed here very late to- [04:58:48] With her. [04:58:48] Just in case you had this level of question. [04:58:51] I'm gonna ask you so many questions now to make up for it. [04:58:54] Darian Nagle Gamm transportation services, um, we don't usually start with a tow situation. There's a few reasons that someone could get towed. They could- there could- there could- they could be blocking emergency access. They could be blocking access to another building doorway. So I would say the enforcement mechanism that's going to be the most benefit to us and to the downtown is going to be able to issue a parking ticket we can't do that right now. So we don't have any fast way to address the Page 117 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:llcitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. issues outside of going through this municipal infraction process, which takes weeks, staff time, city attorney's office, a court process, and we're trying to avoid all that and just keep it consistent with you just can't park here. We're going to issue you a ticket, but then we have the tow option in case it becomes necessary. [04:59:40] In case it's like this needs to move right now type of situation. [04:59:43] Yes exactly. [04:59:44] 1 just wanted to make sure it wasn't like if you park down here, we're going to tow you no matter what, because I mean, I don't know how many of y'all have had your car towed, but it costs so much money to get it out. And if you don't have a lot of money, you- and you don't have a way to get to work, you're screwed. So that's why I want to be very cared. I just want to be cautious with this, yeah. [05:00:04] Absolutely. [05:00:05] Yeah. [05:00:05] My starting with ticket is I just, like, overall, like, do the barking to be able to have this and not like the police, do that. I think this by itself is a way of if something that- we don't know- we don't need the police, eliminating some stuff that the police doesn't have to do it. So I really appreciate that. That's really good move to do this. This is- this is great, yeah. [05:00:35] Okay. All right. [05:00:38] All right. Any other questions for either staff or either staff. Hearing- [05:00:53] No. [05:00:54] Hearing no questions, any- did I already ask if the public want to address this? [05:00:58] Page 118 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https://citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. No not yet. [05:00:59] Okay. All right. That's what I was thinking. All right. Anyone from the public like to address this topic? Seeing no one in person or online. [05:01:07] Council discussion- [05:01:08] City Clerk has a comment. [05:01:09] 1 was just gonna say. I'm gonna be. [05:01:12] Hearing nothing from the council, either? [05:01:14] No. [05:01:15] Roll call, please. Alter? [05:01:18] Yes. [05:01:18] Bergus? [05:01:19] Yes. [05:01:19] Harmsen? [05:01:20] Yes. [05:01:20] Moe? Page 119 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:llcitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [05:01:21] Yes. [05:01:21] Salih? [05:01:21] Yes. [05:01:22] Teague? [05:01:22] Yes. [05:01:23] Weilein. [05:01:23] Yes. Motion pass is 7-0. We're on to item number 10H three year fiscal plan and five year capital improvement plan. Resolution approving the three year financial plan for the city of Iowa City and the five year capital improvement plan. I'm gonna open the public hearing. And welcome, Geoff. [05:01:43] Uh, no further budget presentation from staff. [05:01:46] Okay. Yeah, because you already did it. All right. Anyone from the public like to address this topic? See no one in person or online. I'm going to close the public hearing. Could I get a motion to approve, please? [05:01:59] So moved Moe. [05:02:00] Second, Harmsen. [05:02:01] All right. Council discussion. Roll call, please. [05:02:07] Bergus? Page120 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at.https:./,/citychanne]4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [05:02:08] Yes. [05:02:08] Harmsen? [05:02:09] Yes. [05:02:09] Moe? [05:02:10] Yes. [05:02:10] Salih? [05:02:11] Yes. [05:02:11] Teague? [05:02:11] Yes. [05:02:12] Weilein? [05:02:131 Yes. [05:02:13] Alter. [05:02:14] Yes. [05:02:15] Motion passes to 7-0 We're on to 11. Counsel committee appointments, 11A. Page 121 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:Z/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [05:02:22] Thank you both. [05:02:24] Yes, thank you all. And so it's- so we have counsel appointments. Um, we know that Counselor Dunn was assigned some things, and that's what we're trying to figure out. [05:02:40] 1 would like to nominate Councilor Weilein to be the appointee for the Economic Development Committee, and so to replace Salih, which was done, also to be the graduate and professional student government Association liaison and also help me on the third one. [05:03:00] 1 think it shouldn't be like that. Now, you give me a feeling like you want to kick me out of there. I want to say I'm not like, Yeah, let us- [05:03:10] What we just discussed this. Why- [05:03:12] You said I can do the motion immediately. [05:03:15] Then do it. I did not intend. [05:03:17] You did that. [05:03:181 To offend. I'm just trying to move- [05:03:19] You did after me. [05:03:20] -officiously. [05:03:23] Go ahead. Make your motion. [05:03:25] Page 122 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,I/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. I'm not doing a motion. You are the one who was doing the motion. [05:03:33] What's the third position I think rules committee. [05:03:36] In rules committee. [05:03:39] 1 think we should talk about- we already assigned this, okay? We already assigned this, and you should talk about you are interesting on talking that and we can talk about it. Like, after that, if I want to say, I want to give up this because this was approved and voted for, and I think Sean is on the rule committee right now. So after we talk, and we agree that we can give this position to you and after that, we can put a motion. [05:04:12] Yeah. So, um, I uh, for the Economic Development Committee that was done. And then you- and then you replaced him. And I'm willing to take on Dunn's former role and any other former role that Dunn had just to expedite things and because, you know, I, uh, need to get as much experience anywhere, so why not start with these three. So yeah. [05:04:42] It's four. [05:04:43] It's four. [05:04:451 Four? [05:04:45] No. It's three. [05:04:47] Graduate student government Rules Committee, and Economic Development. I'm I missing one? [05:04:52] M PO. [05:04:52] So MPO. Page 123 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:/Icitychannel4.com/cif-council.htmi) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [05:04:53] Well, MPOs all of us. [05:04:54] MPO all of us will go to MPO. [05:04:56] Sure. Yeah. So, I guess, yes, then. [05:04:58] MPO, I went to one. [05:05:00] Already went one? [05:05:00] 1 was there. [05:05:02] Good question. [05:05:03] So I mean, if that's okay with you, I could take Dunn's role that you have on the economic development. [05:05:09] And first, Dunn role right now, I'm- I'm- in the Economic Development Committee and Sean in the Rule Committee. [05:05:16] 1 can step inside Economic Committee Rules if that's fine. [05:05:18] You have to do it that way. And I can step now. But, you know, I was offended by going and put a motion for making, uh, like, put a motion to make him in the economic development committee even if it's not on the role committee- the Economic Development Committee. [05:05:36] And then what was the third one? Sorry. [05:05:39] The graduate and professional. [OVERLAPPING] Page 124 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:././citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. (05:05:41] We did last meeting. [05:05:421 We did that last meeting. Okay. [05:05:43] Confirm that. [05:05:44] 1 don't mind giving up my place. [05:05:47] Okay. [05:05:47] Okay. So the changes, I just want to make sure that we all just do it. Um, everything is remaining the same. Except I'm gonna cover so that we don't miss it, any of Dunn's old positions. So could I get a motion- so we already had a motion, and- no, could I get a motion to appoint? Counselor Weilein to the Economic Development Committee, to the graduate and professional student government organization. Sounds like MPO organization of Jens County. It was already done last week or last meeting, but we'll make sure that it's official. [05:06:38] No, it was not done. The only one is done is, uh, grad students government. [05:06:44] Okay. And then the rules committee as well. [05:06:48] There's- if I may, Mayor, it's a little trickier than that, in the sense that we'll need to also identify who is going off each of the committees. Again, I think the graduate student and professional-. [05:06:59] Already done. [05:07:00] Student that's already done. [05:07:01] Okay. Page125 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [05:07:02] But for the other three, the Economic Development Committee and the rules committee, we would need to probably identify someone who's going off. For the MPOJC, no one obviously, everyone else is already on it, so there's no replacement needed. [05:07:14] Got it. [05:07:15] Is that a motion, too, like getting off? [05:07:18] Yeah, I think we would need to do both of those things at the same time. Because otherwise, you would have too many people, um, on some of those committees. [05:07:25] So- so just- just phrase it. [05:07:27] 1 mean, like, phrase emotion like, uh, I would like to put emotion to appoint Paris get off. [05:07:37] Right. it would probably- [05:07:39] Wait, how are you going to do that? [05:07:40] Sure. I would suggest, like, for the Economic Development Committee I move that we remove whoever you decide to remove, and in their replacement appoint Counselor Weilein, graduate student is already taken care of for MPOJC. I just moved to approve Counselor Weilein to be appointed. And for the rules committee, move to remove whoever you choose and appoint Counselor Weilein. [05:08:04] Okay, I would like to put a motion to remove myself from the Economic Development Committee and put Counsel Weilein in the Economic Development Committee. [05:08:18] Move by Salih. [05:08:20] Second. Page126 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:llcitychanne]4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [05:08:21] Seconded by Burges. All in favor say aye. [05:08:25] Aye. [05:08:26] Any opposed? Motion passes, 7-0. All right. I will go ahead and make a motion to remove myself or be removed from the Rules Committee and have my replacement be Counselor Weilein. [05:08:42] Move by Harmsen seconded by Alter. All in favor say aye. [05:08:47] Aye. [05:08:48] Any opposed? Motion passes 7-0. [05:08:52] And I would like to put- we do- we do that, too, for the MPO. [05:08:56] Yes. [05:08:57] Yeah, I would like to put a motion to, uh, like, appointed Counsel Weilein to the MPO Commission. [05:09:081 Second. [05:09:10] Moe by Salih seconded by Bergus. All in favor say aye. [05:09:13] Aye. [05:09:14] Aye. [05:09:14) Page 127 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at httl2s:/.Icitychannei4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Aye. [05:09:15] Any opposed? Motion passes seven 7-0. [05:09:20] 1 already went to one of those meetings. Yeah that's okay. [05:09:22] Everything's made up. [05:09:23] Okay. [05:09:23] My assumption is the graduate and professional student government organization has already been voted on. [05:09:29] 1 recall that we do last time meeting. [05:09:31] Last meeting. [05:09:31] All right. [05:09:32] Rings a bell. [05:09:33] We are done there. Thank you all. All right. We're going to move on to item number 12, announcements of vacancies previous. It's a lot. Airport Commission, one vacancy to fill a four year term, Community Police Review Board, two vacancies to fill a four year term, Historic Preservation Commission at large, one vacancy to fill a three year term, Historic Preservation Commission Brown Street, one vacancy to fill a three year term, Historic Preservation Commission, Jefferson Street, one vacancy to fill a three year term, Historic Preservation Commission Summit Street, one vacancy to fill a five year term. Sorry, a three year term. Housing and Community Development Commission, two vacancies to fill three year terms. Library Board of Trustees, three vacancies to fill six year terms. Planning and Zoning Commission to vacancies to fill five year terms. Applications must be received by 5:00 PM Tuesday, May 13, 2025. Airport Zoning Board of Adjustment, one vacancy to fill a five year term, Airport Zoning Commission, one vacancy to fill a six year term. Board of Appeals HVAC Professional one vacancy to fill an unexpired term, Page 128 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https: (/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Historic Preservation Commission, Jefferson Street, one vacancy to fill a three year term. Historic Preservation Wollan Avenue, one vacancy to fill a three year term. Vacancies will remain open until filled. We're at item number 13, City Council information. [05:11:04] The library Gala on Friday was fantastic. It was bright future, and there were 250 guests, and they thought they would only have 100. It was a great turnout. Wonderful live stuff. Really, really good sense of, um, togetherness and support for the public library. [05:11:24] Councilor- Mayor Teague and I were at the neighborhood centers Gala on Saturday night. There was also a wonderful community event, highlighting an organization that does really good work in our community. And, um, yeah. [05:11:38] Next. [05:11:39] Um, the- the Pelican migration is happening right now, and there's lots of pelicans, um, on the river, close to where we are gonna be replacing the bridge and also at the Coralville Dam. I if you want to go look at some cool birds, they're there. [05:12:00] 1 just want to thank everyone for great discussion tonight. It's very late. This is very hard, but I appreciate all of you as colleagues immensely. [05:12:09] Yeah, you guys get used to early now. [05:12:111 Got out of practice. [05:12:16] All right, we're gonna move on to item number 14, report from our city staff, city manager's office, City attorney's office. [05:12:23] Thank you. [05:12:24] City Clerk office. All right, we're on to item number 15. Could I get a motion to adjourn? Page 129 Iowa City City Council Formal meeting of April 15, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:/,Icitychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [05:12:29] So moved. [05:12:30] Second. [05:12:31] Moved by Alter, seconded by Bergus and Salih. We are- all in favor say aye.Aye. [05:12:35] Aye. [05:12:36] Aye. [05:12:37] Any opposed? We are adjourned. [05:12:39] [MUSIC] Page 130