HomeMy WebLinkAbout1997-05-20 AgendaSubject to change as finalized by the City Clerk. For a final official copy, contact the City Clerk's Office, 356-5040.
CITY COUNCIL MEETING ~~
May 20, 1997 - 7'00 p.m. ~Lt~~
Civic Center
ROLL CALL. ~/t~ ~"~
OR A~ENDED.
Approval of Official Council Actions of the special and regular
meetings of May 6 and the special meetings of May 12 and
May 13, as published, subject to corrections, as recommended by the
City Clerk.
Minutes of Boards and Commissions.
(1) Design Review Committee - April 21.
(2) Design Review Committee - April 28.
The following are recommendations to Council:
(a) The Sign Regulations be amended to allow portable signs as a
provisional sign in the CB-2, CB-5, and CB-10 Zone
subject to the following conditions:
One portable sign per first floor exterior store-front business
provided:
it is placed only on private property or a designated
sidewalk care area
it does not block access to any doorway
· it is moved inside the business when the business is
closed
it is anchored at the base to provide stability as approved
by the Building Official or designee
· the maximum area of the sign face be limited to six square
feet
· the maximum height of the sign be limited to six feet
above grade
· the design of the sign receives Design Review Committee
approval, according to the procedures and guidelines
established by the Design Review Committee, prior to
obtaining a sign permit
,May 20, 1997 City of Iowa City Page 2
(3)
(4)
(5)
(6)
(b) The Performance Standards Section of the Zoning Ordinance
be amended to add the following describing glare regulations:
· All lighting used for the purpose of illuminating the area
underneath an awning shall be downcast and shielded in
such a way that the light is only directly illuminating the
area beneath it. All such lighting shall also be shielded so
that no bare, exposed bulb is visible from the public right-
of-way.
(c) There be no change to the definition of changeable copy signs.
(d) The projecting signs continue to be prohibited.
Iowa City Board of Appeals - April 7.
Iowa City Human Rights Commission - April 28~
Iowa City Planning and Zoning Commission - May 1.
Iowa City Public Library Board of Trustees - April 24.
c. Permit Motions and Resolutions as Recommended by the City Clerk
(1)
Consider a motion approving a Class C Liquor License for
Pershell Corp. dba Colonial Lanes, 2253 Old Highway 218
South. (Renewal)
(2)
Consider a motion approving a Class C Liquor License for Linn
Street Care, Inc., dba Linn Street Care, 121 N. Linn St.
(Renewal)
(3)
Consider a motion approving a Class C Beer Permit for FAP
Enterprises dba Gasby's Downtown, 114 E. Washington St.
(Renewal)
(4)
Consider a motion approving a Class C Beer Permit for Suburban
Investors, L.C., dba Suburban AMOCO, 370 Scott Court.
(New)
(5) Consider a motion approving a Special Class C Liquor License
for OM, Inc., dba Masala, 9 S. Dubuque St. (New)
(6) Consider a motion approving a refund of an unused portion of a
Special Class C Liquor License for Masala's, 9 S. Dubuque St.
(7) Consider a resolution to issue a Cigarette Permit to Suburban
Investors, L.C. dba Suburban AMOCO, 370 Scott Court.
May 20, 1997 City of Iowa City Pag. e 3
d. Setting Public Hearings.
(1)
CONSIDER A RESOLUTION SETTING A PUBLIC HEARING
FOR JUNE 3 ON PLANS, SPECIFICATIONS, FORM
OF CONTRACT, AND ESTIMATE OF COST FOR
CONSTRUCTION OF THE WYLDE GREEN SANITARY SEWER
PROJECT, DIRECTING CITY CLERK TO PUBLISH NOTICE OF
SAID HEARING, AND DIRECTING THE CITY ENGINEER TO
PLACE SAID PLANS ON FILE FOR PUBLIC INSPECTION.
Comment: This project consists of reconstruction of the sanitary
sewer in the area along Wylde Green Road from Highway 1 to
Talwrn Court. The estimated cost of the project is 9450,000.
Community Development Block Grant Flood Disaster Recovery
Funds will cover 9400,000 with the remaining 950,000 to be
funded by Sewer Revenue bond proceeds.
(2)
CONSIDER A RESOLUTION FIXING DATE FOR A MEETING ON
THE PROPOSAL TO ENTER INTO A DEVELOPMENT
AGREEMENT WITH AL AND MARY JO STREB, AND PROVIDING
FOR PUBLICATION OF NOTICE THEREOF.
Comment: The Council will hold the public hearing regarding the
development agreement on June 17. The agreement outlines
the complete partnership between the developer, AI and Mary Jo
Streb, and the City in establishing the Scott-Six Industrial Park.
In particular, the agreement addresses the use of tax increment
financing.
e. Resolutions.
(1)
CONSIDER A RESOLUTION AUTHORIZING AND APPROVING AN
AMENDIVIENT TO THE 1994 SUPPLEMENTAL COMMUNITY
DEVELOPMENT BLOCK GRANT (A.K.A. FLOOD #2) PROGRAM
BUDGET.
Comment: On April 17, 1997, the Housing and Community
Development Commission reviewed and approved a change in
the budget that would allow flood funds to be used for the
Wylde Green Road Sanitary Sewer Project activities according to
HUD guidelines. The Commission recommended that 9400,000
in unused flood funds, earmarked for relocation, be reallocated
for the Wylde Green Road Sanitary Sewer Project.
May 20, 1997 City of Iowa City Page 4
97-/53
97-
(2)
CONSIDER A RESOLUTION AUTHORIZING AND APPROVING
885,000 IN CITY GENERAL FUND AND 8100,000 IN FY96
HOME INVESTMENT PARTNERSHIPS (HOME) FUNDING FOR A
PROJECT TO PROVIDE HOUSING FOR WORKING PERSONS
LIVING ALONE (SINGLE ROOM OCCUPANCY HOUSING).
Comment: On February 20, 1997, the Housing and Community
Development Commission (HCDC) by a vote of 5-1-1 (Eastham
voting no, Stewart abstaining) recommended that 8100,000 in
FY96 HOME funds be allocated to this project. In addition,
885,000 in City General Fund monies (part of the City's
obligated HOME match) will also be allocated to the project. A
memorandum is included in Council packet.
(3)
CONSIDER A RESOLUTION AUTHORIZING THE MAYOR TO
SIGN AND THE CITY CLERK TO ATTEST THE RELEASE OF
LIENS REGARDING MORTGAGES FOR THE PROPERTY
LOCATED AT 326 EAST FAIRCHILD STREET, IOWA CITY,
IOWA.
Comment: The owners of the property located at 326 East
Fairchild Street, received a loan through the City's Housing
Rehabilitation Program on May 7, 1996, for 833,961. The
financing was in the form of Mortgages. The legal description is
wrong; thus, the liens need to be released.
(4)
CONSIDER A RESOLUTION ACCEPTING THE
WORK FOR THE STORM SEWER PUBLIC IMPROVEMENTS FOR
LOTS 22, 23, 34 AND 35 OF WEST SIDE PARK.
Comment: See Engineer's Report.
(5)
CONSIDER A RESOLUTION AUTHORIZING THE MAYOR TO
SIGN AND THE CITY CLERK TO ATTEST THE EASEMENT
AGREEMENT FOR TEMPORARY USE OF PUBLIC RIGHT-OF-WAY
BETWEEN THE CITY OF IOWA CITY, AND OUT TO LUNCH, INC.
D/B/A/ BLIIVIPIE AND UNCOMMON GROUNDS. (RENEWAL)
Comment: Out To Lunch, Inc., (Blimpie and Uncommon
Grounds), has filed an application (including fees) for permission
to operate a sidewalk care on the public right-of-way in front of
118 S. Dubuque Street. City staff inspected the area and
recommends approval. A memorandum to the Design Review
Committee from Economic Coordinator Schoon is included in
Council packet.
f. Correspondence.
(1) John Gross - parking lot (64-1a).
(2) Candida Maurer- First Avenue extension.
,May 20, '1997
ITEM NO. 3.
END OF CONSENT CALENDAR.
City of Iowa City Page 5
(3) JCCOG Traffic Engineering Planner:
(a) Removal of On-Street Parking Prohibition on the South Side
of the 2500 and 2600 Blocks of Walden Road.
(4) Civil Service Commission submitting certified lists of applicants
for the following position(s):
(a) Maintenance Worker II - Government Buildings
(5) Joan Kennedy and Tammy Salm - Public Works facility. [City
Manager response included.] [previously distributed]
Applications~or Use of Streets and Public Grounds. (all approved)
(1) Sarah Barrash (alley behind 520 1/2 N. Gilbert) - May 17.
(2) Jim Swaim (United Action for Youth garage sale) - June 7.
Applications for Use of City Plaza. (all approved)
(1) Emilie Ann D'Artagnon (Ronald McDonald House bake sale)
May 17.
(2) Susan Calimeri (Spiritual Assembly of Bahai distribution of
literature) - Fridays throughout summer.
(3) Susan Rogusky (Council of Elders raffle ticket sale) - July 28 -
August 1,
PUBLIC DISCUSSION (ITEMS NOT ON THE AGENDA).
#2 page 1
ITEM NO. 2 CONSIDER ADOPTION OF THE CONSENT CALENDAR AS
PRESENTED OR AMENDED.
Nov/Consider adoption of the Consent Calendar as presented or amended. Moved by
Norton, seconded by Vanderhoef. Is there any discussion?
Kubby/On page 4, the resolution about the HOME moneys for the single room
occupancy. Why isn't that a separate vote? It seems like a major investment that
deserves a separate reading that is buried with house decisions.
Nov/Here is an answer.
Franldin/I think I can address that as to why we put it there. This is something that you
have already voted on in terms of the principle of it. That is that you voted for
allocation of funds for the single room occupancy housing but not the specific
acquisition.
Kubby/Thank you.
Nov/Okay, any other discussion. I would like to say that included in this Consent
Calendar, we are setting two p.h.s. The first is a p.h. on June 3 for plans,
specifications and contract, etc. for the Wylde Green Sanitary Sewer Project. And
the other is a resolution on a partnership between the City of Iowa City and the
Strebs for new development of industrial property and that one will be on June 17.
Roll call- (yes). All right, we have adopted the Consent Calendar.
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ITEM NO. 3 PUBLIC DISCUSSION (ITEMS NOT ON THE AGENDA).
Nov/Public Discussion. This is for items not on today's agenda. Please come forward,
sign your name and address and speak no longer than five minutes, please.
Diana Sulg/I am the Executive Director of the Iowa Arts Festival. I thought I would just
take a few minutes to inform you about how your investment in our event is
coming since we are only a couple of weeks away from the Arts Festival. We
received permission to use the lot. I thank you all for that. And also on Sunday, a
little closure of the street of Linn Street so that we can move some of our
children's activities closer to the street and have some safety now that the
Butterfly Garden is in bloom, in the progress of blooming in our lot. We have
done a few things a little differently this year which is five days but we have a
very compact schedule and I think that schedule looks wonderful. I will just hit a
couple of highlights. One is our Festival Orchestra and the soloist is Robert
Bonfilio. I think some of you who might have lmown Robert's father and we are
just thrilled. I talked to him just today. He is just thrilled to be coming back to
Iowa City. He is our 1997 Arts Champion. Each year we are going to select a
native lowan who has achieved pre-eminence in the arts. It is sponsored by
General Mills but kind of as an antidote that you can only have success as an
athlete and beyond a box of cereal. I think you can be an arts champion, too. In
addition to that we are doing a lot of PR. We are trying to bring people to Iowa
City this year. We published about 20,000 of these brochures. I am sure you have
seen them out town. I have plenty. I will leave some off at City Hall. There is a
brief schedule on the back. The Visitors and Convention Bureau allowed us to use
their telephone number, the 800 m~mber which is wonderful. A little plug for the
CVB here because they can answer. We have put ads in 70 newspapers. We got a
grant from the Eastern Iowa Tourism Association and we put ads in 70 papers
throughout the state and it will appear three times each with this telephone
number and a little plug for the event where you can call for this and the CVB will
be the fulfillment agency for us and mail this back out and answer any questions.
We are hoping that this begins to raise some awareness of our event in the western
part, the central part of Iowa and bring some people into Iowa City. Other than
that I think the event is moving along extremely well and given that the weather
will be good and it will be warm, I lmow it is suppose to be hot that week. We are
also this year, one other little thing we are doing is we are selling festival button
for just $2.00 and we have a campaign going to button up for the Festival. Show
your support because we really have some wonderful things. A night of light
classical music for just $2.00, a wonderful day of children's activities for just a
button. It is really a good investment in our event and will help us out a lot. So I
would like to thank all of you for your support of the Iowa Arts festival. We really
deeply appreciate it. We needed that support and we are happy to bring lots of
people in for an exciting week in Iowa City. So thank you all very very much.
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Nov/Thank you. Before you sit down, repeat the dates.
Sulg/June 11 through 15. And I may also say we are still looking for volunteers. So if
anybody is watching this that would like to give us a few hours, two, three, four
hour shift. You can call the Iowa Arts Festival at 337-9637. Thanks for the added
plug. Thank you all very very much. We really do appreciate it. I hope to see all
of you at the event as well. Thanks.
Nov/Is there any one else who would like to address council on an item not on today's
agenda?
Jay Shaw/When a man intentionally kills a man and there is no justification, it is murder.
Gillaspie, Office Gillaspic has stated that he did not intend to kill our son, that is
flinched. A flinch is an un-purposeful jerking of muscles. A flinch cannot move a
man to an upright position, raise his arm, aim his gun and only then pull his
trigger finger with 14 pounds of pressure. Gillaspie reacted with threats that
existed only in his own mind. He killed first and checked for danger later. Intent
to kill is obvious. Even White admitted on tape on a local radio talk show and on
the Today Show Gillaspie intended to pull the trigger. As to justification, what
possible reason could Gillaspie give for killing our son as he sat facing the
doorway in his brightly lit shop, talking on a tan colored phone which had a 12
foot cord attached. Kelsay and Gillaspie had absolutely no reason, no legal
justification to enter Eric's shop with their guns drawn. According to their own
testimony there was no report of suspicious activity and they hear nothing and
saw nothing from inside the shop that could have aroused their suspicion. Yet
they attempted an illegal entry which was reckless and dangerous in the extreme.
A killing which is a result of illegal and reckless action cannot be called an
accident nor can these officers claim self defense because there was nothing to
defend themselves against. Our son was murdered and everyone lmows who did
it. Yet Pat White refused to prosecute. Evidence that would unquestionably
convict anyone else of a crime all to often does not even result in a prosecution of
a police officer. Consider that a video of five officers repeatedly beating Rodney
King was not enough to convince the Los Angeles prosecutor or a Grand Jury to
charge these officers. When we fail to prosecute the police, we give them a license
to commit crimes, even a license to kill. The Rodney King video did outrage
millions of people. The question in Iowa City is why would people be outraged
when a man is beaten by police officers but not be outraged when a man is killed
by police officers. The answer is of course video. A video is more powerful than
words because it is much more difficult to lie your way past the pictures and
because a video keeps it shock value longer than words. It can be shown over and
over again. In my mind and in my wife's mind there is a video of these officers
murdering our son. It will be with us all of our lives. I have been trying all along
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to create that video in your minds, too, to make you see the images of Kelsay
hurrying around outside the well lit building, ignoring Eric's van parked right
outside the shop, spending only a few seconds listening at the door, failing to note
that the door had been open with a key, advancing through the alley window,
running out to the street to flag down Gillaspie and Zacharias. I want of all you to
watch the 49 second horror video of Gillaspic parking his cruiser, talking over
entry plans with Kelsay, instructing Zacharias in what to do, checking his bullet
proof vest, walking to the shop, getting his gun out and checking it, hesitating for
one split second outside Eric's door and saying to Kelsay that there are lights on
in there. Shoving the door open after Kelsay motions impatiently for him to go on
in, moving to an upright position, raising his gun arm, aiming and firing a bullet
through our son's heart. We should not have to be the only ones forced to watch
these horrible images of a police officer skulking around Eric's shop and the
concurrent images of our son innocently talking on the phone to his best friend,
totally unaware that he is about to be murdered by police officers in his shop
where he has felt himself to be safe for 12 years. You, too, should hear Eric's
startled voice say what is going on as his door is kicked open and see the fear in
our son's face as he looks up in horror at a cop with gun pointing at his heart.
You, too, should hear that gun shot echoing forever in Eric's shop, feel the bullet
tearing into his body, see the phone failing to the floor, hear Eric's screams as he
falls and see the blood pouring out of the wound in Eric's chest. I want you to see
Kelsay move a critical piece of evidence and turn out the lights. I want to force
you to hear Eric's friend telling us that something terrible has happened in Eric's
shop, that he has heard a gun shot and screaming and gasping and the sotrods of
police officers. I want to force you to listen to the police interrogating Eric's
friend over a three hour period without telling him that a police officer fired this
shot that he has heard. I want you to hear Eric's friend several times how did the
police get their so fast and hear the silence from the pleas. I want you to hear
Kelsay say that he should not have to see this, referring to Eric's mother crawling
in the alley toward her dead son. I want you to hear a police officer, almost
certainly Kelsay's, say to Eric's mother, stop laying in the dirt. I want you to
experience first hand that these officers were not arrested, were not sequestered,
they were allowed to talk to each other, that their official statements were not
taken until two weeks later, that contradictions between statements made that
night and their official statements were ignored by Pat White. I want you to hear
Kelsay and Gillaspie begin lying to avoid the punishment that would almost
certainly come to anyone except a police officer. It will take courage and
imagination to really see these horrible things, to experience them as we do every
hour of our lives. Please look at this video and see what these officers and those
who are protecting them have done. They do not deserve your sympathy. I want
you to play this video over in your minds a few times, you, too, will be horrified
and outraged and you will insist that Kelsay and Winklehake be fired and you will
insist that justice be done for our murdered son. We, Eric's parents, are
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condemned to wake up every morning for the rest of our lives to a nightmare that
we cannot end. The first thought that we have every morning is that the police
officers murdered our son. It wasn't some disease or some accident. It was the
police who are suppose to protect life above all else who took our son from us and
whose crime the city wants to forget. This city has condemned us to a hell on
earth where police can get away with murder and in the process, get more
sympathy than our murdered son. We are suppose to accept, as so many people
seem to having said that it is okay for the police of murder because they are
fighting crime. Everybody wants closure, wants us to get on with life. But the real
message here is that people want us to forget that the police have murdered our
son and to accept that the police are beyond the law which they are sworn to
uphold. That they can enter without probably cause, without warrants and scare
themselves into killing innocent people and then say it was part of my job and
since nobody is perfect, you should give this little error. For God's sake, nobody
should have the right to murder, it is a horror for us to know that policemen
murdered our son. It is a horror to know that this council, this city, cares so little
about accountability and about our murdered son and about us that they will not
even insist that the man responsible be fired from positions of power. Winkelhake
and Kelsay should not work for this city another minute. They don't tell me you
do not have the power to do that because you do. You found a way to "fire" Woito
whose biggest crime was that she didn't agree with the council. You can find a
way to fire these men whose negligence and reckless action led to a death and
instruct your City Manager, Mr. Atkins, that if he doesn't fire these men, he will
be fired. I am going to end with a quote from Lincoln and read a short version of a
Fourth Amendment. The Fourth Amendment says that the rights of people to be
secure in their person's houses, papers and effects against unreasonable searches
and seizures shall not be violated and no warrants shall issue but upon probable
cause supported by oath or aff~rmation and particularly describing the place to be
searched and the person or things to be seized. Lincoln said this, "it is much the
duty of government to render prompt justice against itself in favor of citizens as it
is to administer the same between private individuals." God, how I wish Lincoln
were here because he would have the power to make all of you who have stood
silent in the face of this crime ashamed of what you are doing to concept of
justice. Thank you.
Nov/Thank you. Is there someone else who would like to address the council on a topic
that is not on today's agenda?
Osha Gray Davidson/And I have a question about the memo, forgive me if this was
already discussed but I just found out about the memo and went in and picked up
a copy of it from the City Manager about the number of times that police officers
have drawn their weapons in the past year and this was for '95 and I noticed on it
that Badge #3 which is Jeff Gillaspie's number, he has reported two weapon
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draws. When I looked at the DCI's investigation he was asked how many times he
would estimate that he pulled his gun over the past year and at that point he said
20 times, maybe more. And I am wondering what accounts for that discrepancy
between the memo that was released to the press and from the reports that I read
and maybe it was misinterpreted but it was presented as this is an accurate
reflection of the number of times guns had been drawn when obviously there is
something that doesn't match.
Kubby/I think the discrepancy comes in is that the '95 figures are coming out of a hand
sorted files because we didn't use to consider drawing your weapon under any
circumstances to be a use of force and now we do. So you have to write a report
so we can easily track whether anybody is around or not. People didn't use to
have to- Officers did not use to have to report that and so in 1995 there must have
been only two incidents where Gillaspic wrote down the body of the report that
his firearm was drawn and that is where the discrepancy comes in. So there must
have been approximately 18 times from his memory that he drew a firearm when
it wasn't being used as a use of force and not in the presence of people where he
did not write it down in the body of his report.
Davidson/And was this memo prepared at the request of council?
Lehman/Yes.
Davidson/And can I ask what the purpose of the memo was?
Nov/Basically to see a trend if there is a trend.
Kubby/Are there certain officers who are drawing their weapons more often. Are there
certain situations where officers feel endangered that they have to draw their
weapons. And if so, maybe we can look at tactics and training so that there are
more tools for them to use versus the firearm.
Davidson/Then I would just hope then the public doesn't get the idea that the numbers
given here is an accurate reflection of the number of times guns were pulled and
that if that was what the council wanted to see, then what could have been done is
asking each officer how many times they pulled the gun. Then you would have a
record that more accurate as-
Nov/You may not have it more accurate because when Gillaspic was speaking to the
DCI, he was talcing a number off the top of his head. he was not keeping records
and he may have been including part of 1996.
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Davidson/Well, he was asked over a period of a year. So same basic time frame unless
you are saying he drew his gun 20 times one year and only two the other. It is
more likely that this is an average amount that he drew it in.
Thornberry/Osha. I think you got your answer.
Nov/It is basically we have better records now than we did in 1995.
Baker/
And one of the things we did discuss when we started talking about compiling
these records and this particular item came up, not Gillaspie's number but in
general, we aclmowledge that the formal record keeping, even those hand records
back in the past, probably would not reflect the actual number of times the
officers in this department of any other department actually drew their weapons.
So the public believes literally that is the only time. The council certainly did not
believe that and I hope we didn't lead the public to believe that.
Davidson/That is what I wanted to make sure is that that was understood.
Baker/It is understood.
Davidson/Thank you.
Norton/It is.
Nov/Is there anyone else who would like to address the council on a topic not on today's
agenda? Okay, moving on.
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May 20, 1997
ITEIVI NO. 4.
City of Iowa City
PLANNING AND ZONING IVIATTERS.
Page 6
Consider a motion setting a public hearing for June 3 on an ordinance
amending Title 14, Chapter 6, entitled "Zoning," Article P, entitled
"Fences and Hedges," to change the vision triangle requirements at
intersections.
Comment: At its May 1 meeting, by a vote of 7-0, the Planning and
Zoning Commission recommended approval of the proposed
amendment. Staff recommended approval in a report dated May 1.
Consider a motion setting a public hearing for June 3 on an ordinance
amending Title l Z~, Chapter 6, entitled "Zoning," Article O, entitled
"Sign Regulations," Section 5, entitled "Signs Permitted by Zone;
Regulations," to permit projecting signs in the CB-5 and CB-10 zones.
Comment: At its May I meeting, by a vote of 6-1 with Chair voting
no, the Planning and Zoning Commission recommended that projecting
signs continue to be prohibited. Staff recommended that projecting
signs continue to be prohibited in a report dated May 1.
Action:
Consider a motion setting a public hearing for June 3 on an ordinance
amending Title 14, Chapter 6, entitled "Zoning," Article O, entitled
"Sign Regulations," Section 5, entitled "Signs permitted by Zone;
Regulations," to permit portable signs in the CB-2, CB-5, and CB-10
zones.
Comment: At its May 1 meeting, by a vote of 6-1 with Supple voting
no, the Planning and Zoning Commission recommended approval of
the proposed amendment. Staff recommended approval in a report
dated May 1. The staff recommendation is consistent with the
Commission recommendation.
.May 20, 1997 City of Iowa City Page 7
q7~ IS&
d=
Consider a motion setting a public hearing for June 3 on an ordinance
amending Title 14, Chapter 6, entitled "Zoning," Article O, entitled
"Sign Regulations," to adopt design criteria for changeable copy signs.
Comment: At its May 1 meeting, by a vote of 7-0, the Planning and
Zoning Commission recommended that there be no change to the
definition of changeable copy signs. Staff recommended that there be
no change to the definition of changeable copy signs in a report dated
May 1.
Consider a resolution amending the Comprehensive Plan to increase
the density from 2-8 dwelling units per acre to 8-16 dwelling units per
acre for an approximate 2.38 acre area located at the northeast corner
of the intersection of Scott Boulevard and Lower West Branch Road.
Comment: At its April 3 meeting, by a vote of 6-0, the Planning and
Zoning Commission recommended approval of the proposed
amendment. Staff recommended the proposed amendment in a report
dated March 20.
Action:
Consider an ordinance amending the Zoning Chapter by changing the
use regulations from RS-5, Low Density Single-Family Residential, to
OPDH-12, Planned Development Housing Overlay, for a 2.38 acre
property located at the northeast corner of the intersection of Scott
Boulevard and Lower West Branch Road to permit a 37 unit mblti-
family building for elderly housing. (REZ97-0002) (First
consideration)
Comment: At its April 3 meeting, by a vote of 6-0, the Planning and
Zoning Commission recommended approval of the rezoning and
preliminary OPDH plan. Staff recommended approval in a report dated
March 20.
Action: ~/J~t~//~(~~ /'~T)~/~OJ~6~
#4d page 1
ITEM NO. 4d CONSIDER A MOTION SETTING A PUBLIC HEARING FOR JUNE 3
ON AN ORDINANCE AMENDING TITLE 14, CHAPTER 6, ENTITLED "ZONING,"
ARTICLE O, ENTITLED "SIGN REGULATIONS," TO ADOPT DESIGN CRITERIA
FOR CHANGEABLE COPY SIGNS.
Nov/(Reads agenda).
Kubby/I move we set p.h. and request no one second it because we want to drop this
because we don't want to change the ordinance.
Nov/Moved by Kubby. I hear no second. Motion dies.
Kubby/Dies.
Norton/That is a left handed maneuver.
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ITEM NO. 4f CONSIDER AN ORDINANCE AMENDING THE ZONING CHAPTER
BY CHANGING THE USE REGULATIONS FROM RS-5, LOW DENSITY SINGLE-
FAMILY RESIDENTIAL, TO OPDH-12, PLANNED DEVELOPMENT HOUSING
OVERLAY, FOR A 2.38 ACRE PROPERTY LOCATED AT THE NORTHEAST
CORNER OF THE INTERSECTION OF SCOTT BOULEVARD AND LOWER WEST
BRANCH ROAD TO PERMIT A 37 UNIT MULTI-FAMILY BUILDING FOR
ELDERLY HOUSING. (REZ97-0002) (FIRST CONSIDERATION)
Nov/Lehman moved, Norton seconded this. Okay, any discussion?
Thornberry/What is the address of this, do you know?
Nov/Karin, is there an address on this? Probably not.
Franldin/You mean of the property being rezoned, Dean?
Thomberry/The address of the 37 refit multi-family building.
Franldin/It is on the corner of Lower West Branch Road and Scott Blvd. but there is no
address yet.
Kubby/Because it is not in the city.
Franklin/No, it is in the city.
Kubby/I mean because it is not rezoned.
Franldin/It is not there yet.
Norton/They are just barely into it.
Nov/Any other discussion. Roll call- (yes). We have approved first consideration.
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Consider an ordinance amending Title 14, Chapter 6, entitled
"Zoning," to provide elderly housing alternatives. (Second
consideration)
Comment: At its April 3 meeting, by a vote of 6-0, the Planning and
Zoning Commission recommended approval of the proposed
amendment as revised by the Commission on April 3. Staff
recommended approval of the elder housing amendments in a
memorandum dated Marcia0./
Action: ~
Consider an ordinance amending Title 14, Chapter 6, entitled
"Zoning," Article N, entitled "Off-Street Parking and Loading,"
Section 1, entitled "Off-Street Parking Requirements," to allow
existing fraternity/sorority houses to be converted to rooming houses
without having to provide additional parking. (Pass and adopt)
Comment: At its March 20 meeting, by a vote of 6-0, the Planning
and Zoning Commission recommended approval of the proposed
amendment. Staff recommended approval in a report dated
March 20. An updated staff memorandum indicates that this
ordinance is not necessary in light of the Zoning Code Interpretation
Panel decision.
Action: "~ (~0~ J~j(,y/('j~J~/~ ~
Consider a resolution approving the final plat of Walden Hills, a 40.7
acre, 53-1ot residential subdivision located on .the north side of Rohret
Road, east of Highway 218. (SUB97-0010)
Comment: At its April 3 meeting, by a vote of 7-0, the Planning and
Zoning Commission recommended approval of the final plat, subject to
the approval of legal papers and construction drawings prior to
Council consideration. Legal papers and construction plans are being
reviewed. Staff recommended approval in its April 3 staff report.
Consideration was deferred from May 6.
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ITEM NO. 4g CONSIDER AN ORDINANCE AMENDING TITLE 14, CHAPTER 6,
ENTITLED "ZONING," TO PROVIDE ELDERLY HOUSING ALTERNATIVES.
(SECOND CONSIDERATION)
Nov/Moved by Vanderhoef, seconded by Thomberry.
Vanderhoef/Karin, do we have any update on that possible change of owner occupied
versus responsible party.
Franklin/We will have a report for you for your final consideration on June 3. But we
have received a letter from Mr. Greenleaf and they have withdrawn all of their
points except the responsible party.
Vanderhoef/Thank you.
Nov/Any other discussion? Roll call- (yes).
Walsh/Could we have a motion to accept correspondence?
Nov/Moved by Lehman, seconded by Kubby, that we accept correspondence. All in
favor, please say aye- (ayes). Motion carried.
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ITEM NO. 4h CONSIDER AN ORDINANCE AMENDING TITLE 14, CHAPTER 6,
ENTITLED "ZONING," ARTICLE N, ENTITLED "OFF-STREET PARIGNG AND
LOADING," SECTION 1, ENTITLED "OFF-STREET PARKING REQUIREMENTS,"
TO ALLOW EXISTING FRATERNITY/SORORITY HOUSES TO BE CONVERTED
TO ROOMING HOUSES WITHOUT HAVING TO PROVIDE ADDITIONAL
PARIGNG. (PASS AND ADOPT)
Nov/We need a motion to do this and then we need to vote no. Moved by Thornberry,
seconded by Vanderhoef. Now, roll call-
Kubby/I have a question for Karin. I had a couple of calls from people. Some people- I
spoke with some people who lived in the neighborhood who watched on
television who aren't in that neighborhood where a lot of the discussion was
surrounding asking about a lot of process questions in terms of when this- what
the time frame was between when staff and P/Z was talking about dealing with
this issue as a variance and then it changing to an amendment and when the
Zoning Interpretation Panel met, the afternoon before we voted. And just why the
Zoning Interpretation Panel didn't meet sooner. It just looked bad.
Franklin/It did look bad. The issue first came up as you stated as a variance request or
not as a variance request, as a special exception request to reduce the parking that
was required for the particular use that was contemplating buying property. We
looked at it and at that point were looking at the parIcing requirements for both
fraternities and sororities and the rooming house use because often conversion
factor. In doing that research and discussing it at our joint staff meetings prior to it
going to the Board, we looked at the whole concept of the conversion and what it
meant in terms of going from fraternities to rooming houses and decided that
really there was a larger issue than just this one case that we ought to be
addressing. So we started the ordinance amendment process. We went through
that all and this was all calculating those rooming house parking spaces as we had
done originally. That is based on the entire square footage of the whole building.
It was when it got to the council level and one of your colleagues approached one
of the staff members and said this doesn't look right. It doesn't make sense, Mr.
Norton. And so we looked at it and said okay, it doesn't seem quite fair to be
calculating the parking based upon the entire square footage of the building and
calculating the occupancy on just what you could use for rooming house use
which was less. So that in essence you were requiring parking as if you had 72
people in this house in this particular situation as opposed to 21. That was
between either the p.h. and first consideration or the first consideration and the
second consideration that that came to our attention. The process then, if there is
to be a change or there is a question of interpretation of the Zoning Ordinance, the
proper procedure is to go through the Zoning Code Interpretation Panel which is
made up of myself, the Director of HIS, and City Attorney. We all agreed that it
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seemed to be more reasonable and also based on previous interpretations that we
had about rooming houses, that it was more reasonable to calculate the paricing
based upon the occupancy indirectly as opposed to the square footage of the
building. So although it appeared contrived, it was not.
Kubby/Why don't we calculate parking for fraternities or sororities or rooming houses in
a similar manner to apartment buildings per bedroom and do the calculations in
terms of the size of the house, the size of the structure, or occupancy or how many
roomers can be there and then have a formula for how many parking spaces per
rooms? Why is that inconsistent from other multi-family?
Franklin/The only think I can attribute it to is history which is not a good reason.
Nov/I will give you one more.
Franldin/We are going to be re-evaluating that as a consequence of all of this discussion
as to how to calculate parking for fraternities and sororities and rooming houses
and try to make them more equal and make more sense.
Nov/There was a time when fraternities and sororities had dormitory style bedrooms so
they might have a huge house and they might have only two rooms that were set
aside as bedrooms and they might have had two dozen people in each of those
bedrooms.
Kubby/Or one rooming unit with four people living in one room.
Franklin/Yeah, I don't know if you can do it exactly by bedroom. There may be some
other way to do it to link it more to occupancy as opposed to square footage.
Nov/Occupancy is a better word for it.
Kubby/Or maximum occupancy allowed.
Thornberry/Karin, while you are still there. I have something to clarify and I think we
got it last night during a work session. What if the sorority/fraternity house is
converted to a rooming house and then they for some reason or some time want to
convert that rooming house back to a sorority or fraternity, that would then change
the grandfather clause of the fraternity/sorority as far as parking is concerned? Is
that correct?
Franldin/The fraternity sorority would not longer have that grandfather claim. Now the
only stipulation which Ron Boose and I talked about today, the building official,
was this year in terms of a conversion of use. There is some question that we have
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about exactly how you would deal with that year in which you can have a
grandfathered use without abandoning it. So ifa use were established in a certain
time period and then six months later is changed back and wanted to go back to
the old use, could one do it. We are still investigating that. But we will have to do
another interpretation.
Thornberry/Change of use of what you said last time.
Franklin/Change of use is the important issue and that if you change to something that
requires fewer parking spaces, that is the new grandfathered number of spaces that
you are going to have to work with.
Thornberry/Wait a minute. So if it converts back from a rooming house to a fraternity or
sorority house or an apartment house.
Franldin/If it went to a higher amount of parking- Now remember, when you do your
conversion, you can convert to a use that requires as many or fewer spaces
without providing any more parking. If it requires more spaces, then you have to
provide that difference on site. So as you have uses come into this structure that
require fewer parking spaces, your ability to convert is constrained.
Thornberry/Again, it depends on how you, apparently, how you determine the parking
spaces needed whether it be size, number of occupants, bedrooms, what have you.
Franklin/Well, at this point, we have that set by a recent interpretation until we change it
by code.
Thornberry/So if is turns into an apartment building, it would definitely increase the
paricing requirements.
Franklin/Assuming that there were enough units in there with enough bedrooms that
brings it over that level of parking spaces.
Norton/But there is a time factor in which the grandfathering doesn't disappear. Is that
what you and Ron-
Fralxklin/That is what Ron and I were debating today because remember last night, I told
you that once it converts, you have lost it. It is a provision in the Code that says
you can have a non-conforming use for a period of a year and if you have not
abandon that use within that year, as soon as that year is up, then you lose it but it
is what happens within the year's time frame that we are debating and hopefully
we just won't have that situation.
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Nov/Okay, thank you. Any other discussion?
Kubby/So it is whether you agree with the Panel or whether you want or don't want
conversion. No is still the right vote.
Thomberry/Again, I was voting no for the wrong reason. It is just-
Nov/Bottom line is we don't need an ordinance for this purpose. Okay, roll call- (no).
We have really stopped it now, right.
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ITEM NO. 4i CONSIDER A RESOLUTION APPROVING THE FINAL PLAT OF
WALDEN HILLS, A 40.7 ACRE, 53-LOT RESIDENTIAL SUBDIVISION LOCATED
ON THE NORTH SIDE OF ROHRET ROAD, EAST OF HIGHWAY 218. (SUB97-
0010)
Nov/Eleanor, do we have all of those papers approved?
Dilkes/I believe we do.
Franklin/The legal papers, yes.
Dilkes/The legal papers, yes.
Franklin/The construction plans, no. So we need to have you defer it one more time.
Nov/Moved by Lehman, seconded by Thornberry, that we defer and what date do you
want?
Franklin/Let's do it to your next meeting, June 3.
Nov/June 3.
Kubby/Why aren't they finalized?
Franklin/Well, we got them this morning f~rom comments that we had submitted on May
1 and some of the same errors were there so they have to go back to their
engineer.
Nov/Okay, we have a motion to defer this item to June 3. All in favor, please say aye-
(ayes). Motion carried.
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ITEM NO. 5.
PUBLIC DISCUSSION ON AN ORDINANCE AMENDING TITLE 8,
ENTITLED "POLICE REGULATIONS," CHAPTER 3, "ENTITLED GENERAL
ANIMAL REGULATIONS," SECTIONS t, 3, AND 4; AND AMENDING TITLE
8, ENTITLED "POLICE REGULATIONS," CHAPTER 4, ENTITLED "PET
ANIMAL CONTROL," SECTIONS 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, 11, AND 12 OF THE
CITY CODE TO PROVIDE NEW REGULATIONS REGARDING ANIMALS.
Comment: This ordinance repeals the current list of exotic animals and
sets forth new lists of prohibited and restricted animals; requires pet shops,
animal acts and exhibitions, kennels, breeders, and owners of restricted
animals to comply with certain minimum regulations and obtain permits;
regulates current pigeon and dove lofts; and prevents future pigeon and
dove lofts from being constructed or maintained within the City.
Correspondence included in Council packet.
ITEIVI NO. 6.
AMENDMENT OF THE FISCAL YEAR 1997 OPERATING BUDGET.
Comment: This public hearing is held to receive public comment
regarding the proposed FY97 budget amendment. The amendment
includes both the Operating and Capital Improvement Program budgets
for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1997. State law requires that cities
amend their annual budget by May 31.
PUBLIC HEARING
Action:
CONSIDER A RESOLUTION APPROVING
Action:
#5 page 1
ITEM NO. 5 PUBLIC DISCUSSION ON AN ORDINANCE AMENDING TITLE 8,
ENTITLED "POLICE REGULATIONS," CHAPTER 3, "ENTITLED GENERAL
ANIMAL REGULATIONS," SECTIONS 1, 3, AND 4; AND AMENDING TITLE 8,
ENTITLED "POLICE REGULATIONS," CHAPTER 4, ENTITLED "PET ANIMAL
CONTROL," SECTIONS 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, 11, AND 12 OF THE CITY CODE TO
PROVIDE NEW REGULATIONS REGARDING ANIMALS.
Nov/Public discussion is now in order. Please sign your name and limit your comments
to five minutes.
Natonya Walker/I just had some concerns and questions about this ordinance. I was
curious as to who decides what animals are prohibited or restricted and on what
criteria these decisions are made.
Nov/We did have a panel of volunteer citizen groups and some of them were quite expert
and they advised the city on how to hst animals that are restricted or prohibited.
Kubby/So there is a list, there is a specific list within the ordinance that says these are the
animals that are prohibited and lists all of them. Whales, dolphins, etc., lions,
tigers, bears.
Walker/And where does on obtain a list?
Nov/The ordinance is on the table. There should be extra copies for you.
Norton/This also came from other communities. They got a list. I think they got input
from Cedar Rapids and other communities around the country.
Kubby/You may still have comments but after you have looked at it and other people
have spoken, you can come up again if you have any extra comments.
Walker/Thank you.
Nov/Is there anyone else who would like to talk about this ordinance?
Grace Trifaro/I am a resident of Iowa City and a member of Citizens For Animal Rights
and the Environment. I think it is a good ordinance except for a few things that I
would like to address. I like the fact that there is a list of restricted animals,
prohibited animals in Iowa City regarding exotics. I would like to lobby however
for an amendment to the section pertaining to circuses and rodeos. At the
beginning of the ordinance, Section 2A. as far as animal neglect there is a
definition pertaining to neglect as abusing, torturing, tormenting animals. Based
on what I have seen at circuses and rodeos, animals are very tormented. They are
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forced to do unnatural acts. The training of the animals is cruel to say the least. A
lot of these animals, especially wild animals are forced to do acts that are totally
run against their natural instincts. They travel miles and miles every day and as far
as I am concerned, I think Iowa City can do without cruelty to animals and
entertainment such as circuses and rodeos. There was one comment made by you,
Larry Baker, in the Press Citizen saying that they are part of our American
culture. Well, not everybody would agree that entertainment that torments animals
and forces them to do things such as getting lassooed at 50 mph and getting their
necks broken is a part of American culture. A lot of us would like to see an
America culture that promotes compassion to animals. I believe there are some
circuses that can continue to perform without these animals. We have got several
within the United States that are traveling and don't use animals and some have
limited animals such as domestic dogs. So I would like the discussion to continue
regarding circuses and rodeos and I invite you to come to a public viewing of
videos on the issue June 5 at the ICPL, Room A, 7:30. We have information. I
went to the circus last Wednesday night, the Royal American Circus. I didn't go
in. I didn't want to pay for that but I drove around Clinton Street and there were
two horses that were tethered to the trailer right next to Clinton Street and the
horses were very distraught to say the least, especially the pony was really
stressed out because he couldn't move and there were cars driving by. I did go to
the Police Department to make a report and they apparently didn't find that the
horses were close enough to the road. So I think this discussion, I would like to
see the discussion furthered as far as circuses and rodeos is very cruel. A lot of
people don't see the behind the scenes training of these animals. Currently there is
debate in Congress to ban a certain wild animals in circuses, especially elephants
and we have seen in the past few years elephants turning on the public and their
trainers after many years of stress. This is something that you need to consider
when you bring a circus to Iowa City is if something like that should happen. Do
you have insurance? You will ultimately be liable for any kind of injury that
happens. So I think that part is a major concern for me. Another section in the city
ordinance pertaining to- Let's see ifI can find it here.
Kubby/Will you cite a page number, too, when you find it.
Trifaro/Pet Shops, page 10 at the bottom. I think the pet shop issue is a very real issue in
Iowa City. Currently there are several pet shops, some of which get continual
complaints from the public to be shelter regarding animal cruelty, animals being
sick. A lot of people don't see the behind the scenes of where, for example,
puppies and kittens come from. Puppy mills have a really bad reputation in the
midwest. It is a business. The animals are objects and they are not often times
maintained in very clean and caring environments and by the time they make it to
the pet shop, they are very sick and I would like to see an ordinance that bans the
sales of animals, especially dogs and cats. In Iowa City we have a tremendous a
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terrible overpopulation problem in Iowa City and the state and I would like to see
pet shops which sell animals banned and I will be quite honest with you, it is a
terrible problem and I invite you and I am sure the Director of the Animal Shelter,
Misha Goodman, would invite you to come down to the shelter and see the hard
work they have to deal with regarding-
CHANGE TAPE TO REEL 97-83 SIDE 1
Trifaro/The section of prohibited animals in the exotic animal section and I would like to
see animals prohibited in entertainment in general and that includes motion
pictures as well. Animals are not very well treated when they are trained to
entertain. So I hope that you will continue the discussion on those sections. Thank
you.
Nov/Thank you.
Natonya Walker/I admit, this is an extensive list. I do still have some concerns. Under
restricted animals, ferrets, iguanas and sugar gliders and Vietnamese potbelly pigs
are all listed, all of which are very common pets and I know a lot of people that
own such animals and I lmow that there are probably thousands of said animals,
iguanas and ferrets and sugar gliders in this area and around this area and I would
like to lmow who decides what is a proper environment for these animals. Most of
the time people who own them are the most concerned about their enviromnent
and what type of life they live and for what I found when I have dealt with other
people is an incredible amount of ignorance regarding exotic animals. It is a catch
all phrase that means anything basically other than cat or dog. For some urdmown
reason, rabbits aren't considered exotic when they are just as exotic as a ferret.
Ferrets were domesticated about 500 years before the cat and have less problems
associated with them then dogs or cats. They have less tendencies for rabies, they
have no tendencies for populations as dogs and cats often do. I just
wanted to lmow why we need to restrict these animals? As far as I know, I have
never seen- I mean, it is very very rare to see an unwanted animal of these species.
They aren't bred tinwittingly. It is actually very difficult to breed a lot of these
animals. So it is not a same consideration as cats and dogs, You lmow, there is a
lot of unwanted breeding and unwanted animals. These are normally cared for and
if there is a consideration when an animal is not wanted, it is normally placed very
quickly. I would just like-
Nov/Tell me what your concerns are about what is stated here. We are not prohibiting
these animals.
Walker/But when you start restricting what animals people can choose to have in their
environment and saying that they have to obtain permits.
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Nov/You have to have a permit to have a dog.
Walker/Right. But the reasons for having permits for dogs and cats is due to over-
population and the spread of rabies and when you present your animal for
licensing, you have to prove that it has been either had a shot or been neutered and
most of these other animals that is not going to happen.
Kubby/I think the difference is that many people have been raised around dogs and cats
so they have some idea about what they are getting into and that if their animal
goes astray or if there is a problem, we have laws to take care of it. Some of these
other animals, like the iguana, mots people don't know what their optimum
temperature for eating and digesting well is. And so by going through the permit
process, we can do an education process to say you are welcome to have these
animals but here is the ideal conditions under which to have these animals. That
may be a little more challenging here in Iowa than in some other climate. Same
with ferrets in terms of being around young kids. I mean I don't lmow a lot of
detail about everything on here but Misha might want to add to that or Shawn who
is on the committee is here, too, who might want to respond about why. People
aren't familiar with these and might get the pet because they think it is cool
without understanding what the care is of those animals that is maybe not as
common lmowledge.
Walker/I understand that and I do recognize that, you lmow, most people who try to
obtain these pets, want to do the best by their animals and they, you lmow, go to
the pet shops to obtain information as their best source. The people who have the
animals there are very lmowledgeable and can offer and refer people to other
people that own these animals, have dealt with them for years, are very helpful
that way. But I think that just by thinking that by having to obtain a permit it is
going to prevent animal neglect. I mean, there are obviously right now there are
hundreds of cats in this town that are not licensed animals and so basically who is
a law abiding citizen will do the proper thing and get their permit and those who
aren't won't and those are the ones that you want to have checked out anyway. So
basically it is going to end up hauling as a burden on the people who have these
pets already and are talcing good care of them. You know, there are a lot of people
who have their cats indoors 100% of the time, have no reason to have them
licensed but they do because they follow the rules and it is a burden for a lot of
people. They lmow their animals are never going to be outdoors but they follow it
anyway because it is the rule and I think that that is not exactly what we want to
fall into for every other animal that can fall into becoming a companion pet.
Kubby/Do you suggest that we just have a list of prohibited animals and not have a list
of restricted? Is that what you are suggesting?
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Walker/I think that there should be, you know, some obvious criteria as to why an
animal is prohibited or restricted.
Norton/I think we ought to let somebody speak about that because the logic behind the
restricted list and I think the logic behind the prohibited list is perhaps a little
clearer. But the Committee came up with this list and there is a rationale, I think,
for the reason why they are restricted. We don't have exotic incidentally. That is
not a category anymore. It is just prohibited or restricted.
Walker/Because there are other animals that are not listed that a lot o£people do have
problems with like Macaws or parrots that cause a lot o£noise to neighbors and
what not and they aren't listed and they are by definition a wild animal and they
are considered as a pet whereas domesticated animals are not and I just am
wondering where the criteria came from and I think, you know, a large issue
should be the actual instead of believed danger of an animal, the actual danger of
an animal.
Nov/Okay. Would Misha or Shawn like to talk about this?
Kubby/Or talk about it together.
Goodman-Herbst/We will talk about it together. First of all I will mention that-
Thornberry/Are you going to gang up on us?
Goodman-Herbst/Excuse me?
Thornberry/Are you going to gang up on her or what?
Goodman-Herbst/No, no, no, we are not going to gang up on anyone. But I will mention
you spoke about danger and that was not really one of the major criteria in the list
of restricted animals. We had Shawn Lockhart and we had Mark Wedling on this
committee both of which have a lot of experience with these type of animals and
we really took to heart their recommendations on a lot of these animals in terms of
the care that these animals need, what kind of specialized care they may need as
opposed to something domestic like a dog or a cat. Not necessarily they are non-
domestic at this point but that they do need other types of things. Also we took
into consideration what Animal Control deals with here with these types of
animals and what we see. I will give you an example. The other night I was called
out by the Police Department for a ferret, excuse me- not a ferret but an iguana
sitting in a tree. The animal has not been claimed, probably will not be claimed
because it was probably left behind by one of the students would be my guess and
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this happens every year, twice a year and that is one of the other reasons why at
least Animal Control wanted certain animals on this list. I will have-
Shawn Locichart/We can just do a quick animal by animal. Ferrets were put on there
because of their requirements for shots.
Nov/Shawn, are you close enough to the microphone? We have to record this.
Lockhart/Ferrets were put on there because they require not only rabies but also the
distemper shots and a lot of people don't realize that, that they should be
vaccinated every year. Iguanas were put on there because iguanas are one of the
most popular animals but they are also extremely difficult to care for. Most people
who have an iguana for two years, this is an animal that in captivity most likely
lived up to about 20 years and obtains a length of six feet. Most people have it die
after two years on a length of about two feet. So we felt that this was an important
animal that people would come into the shelter and get information on the care.
They require special lighting and a very special diet in order to thrive in captivity.
We thought by having people come in and get a permit and pick up information
that pertains to that particular animal, it would be beneficial to them and the
animal. Chameleons, very same thing. It is extremely difficult to care for
chameleons in captivity. Also vernids which are the monitor lizards. Potbellied
pigs I guess were put on there because of the requirement for veterinary care.
Goodman-Herbst/Ordinarily they have a rabies requirement also in the state because they
are pigs, #1. And because they are housed as pets quite often that was important to
us. The rest are on there because well, some of the livestock is on there because
they are livestock and there are very few places in the city that you can maintain
them anyway. So we put that in there.
Thornberry/Misha, a question.
Goodman-Herbst/Yeah.
Thornberry/Potbellied pigs, you say they were put on there because of the requirement
for rabies? Don't dogs need a rabies shot also?
Goodman-Herbst/Yes they do but they are required by most agencies to have licenses
just as cats are unlike-
Thornberry/Why put it on a restricted list just-?
Goodman-Herbst/Because it is also livestock. It is also a livestock type animal.
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Lockhart/The only restriction is that you need a permit and the only reason you need a
permit is just make sure you are keeping up with veterinary care.
Thornberry/Do cats need rabies shot also?
Lockhart/Yes.
Goodman-Herbst/In the city.
Thornberry/They are a kind of the wildcat and the cougar. They are the same family.
Lockhart/And they also require a permit.
Thornberry/I understand but just because they are in a family of livestock and they
require shots-
Goodman-Herbst/Dean, here is the problem. A potbellied pig, unlike the average
everyday pig out there, is kept as a pet more often than not and it is a difficult
animal to keep. #1 They get much bigger than people ever think they are going to.
Average size is 300 pounds for a potbellied pig. People think they are going to
keep it in their house. Since I have been in here, in the four years I have been here,
we have had seven potbelly pigs come into the shelter.
Thomberry/Average weight?
Goodman-Herbst/Average weight has been about 150 but they are very difficult to find
places for them to go. I mean people don't want them anymore. They use to be
really popular like a lot of these animals. They are not popular anymore. That is
why they are on. Sugar gliders are a new popular pet. They may have been around
for awhile but they haven't been sold for that long, especially in this area. They
are a marsupial. They take a specialized diet, specialized lighting, care.
Thornberry/Don't you get all that information when you buy it from a pet store? Don't
they give you all of this information when you buy it?
Goodman-Herbst/It depends on the shop that you go to.
Don Morrison/Most of these animals aren't acquired from pet stores with the exception
of iguanas. They are acquired at swap meets down in Kalona, places like that,
mail order.
Thornberry/Are these pretty expensive pets?
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Morrison/Yeah, most of them.
Thornberry/If you spent a lot of money on an expensive pet, wouldn't you want to lmow
the best way to take care of it and keep it.
Goodman-Herbst/I don't lmow, Dean. You can get a potbellied pig for $30 now or less.
Morrison/Dean, the main thing about what she was talking about like with the sugar
gliders, I don't have information to give somebody.
Thornberry/I don't lmow what a sugar glider- I know sugar cookies.
Morrison/It looks like a flying squirrel but it has got a pouch on it.
Nov/Okay, put your name into the microphone, please.
Morrison/I own the Pet Degree in Iowa City and a lot of the animals that are on these
restricted lists are on there for a very good reason. You wouldn't believe how
many time a week that I have somebody come in and they want to buy a monkey,
they want to buy a giraffe. These people have no idea how they would take care of
these animals. They think that it is cool, it is a status symbol, and if it weren't for
laws like these that make sense, that protected the pets, the people would become
unprotected. Does that make sense? I mean, an animal like this that gets loose in
the neighborhood can do all kinds of damage, especially a potbellied pig if it got
loose in Iowa City and got into somebody's cattle outside of Iowa City,
somebody's hog farm, could destroy an entire farming establishment of pigs
because of pseudo-rabies and other types of things that they can carry.
Thornberry/Do you sell spiders in your shop?
Morrison/Yes, we do.
Thornberry/I noticed your shirt. I couldn't help but notice your shirt with the spiders on
it and tarantulas. Now are tarantulas a prohibited species? Oh, you can have
tarantulas but not a potbellied pig. I see.
Nov/No, you can have both of them. Do you want them together?
Thornberry/Oh, I see. Do. You just need a permit. Okay.
Norton/It does cost something to take care of these situations that arise. That is another
point of the permit. When you get calls, somebody has to respond and somebody
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has to support the infrastructure to meet these demands that we get with the odd
animals.
Morrison/I would like to add one thing. When this ordinance was originally written in its
first form, I was one of the first people to cry out against it. I think that since it has
been re-written, Misha, the other people on the committee did a wonderful job of
separating out the problems, where they were, addressing those problems, making
sure that the animals were cared for and that people's rights aren't, you lmow.
walked over. I think this ordinance or law is written very well and I think it will
go along way to improving the community as a whole.
Thornberry/We have talked several times. You have called me several times and we have
discussed this ordinance and you were originally dead set opposed to this
ordinance and I am glad to see it cane to a point where you could not only accept
it but endorse it.
Morrison/Yeah, absolutely. I think it is very-
Thornberry/It speaks well for the ordinance.
Morrison/It is very well for everybody.
Norton/Thank you.
Kubby/Natonya, did that answer your questions? Thank you.
Nov/Is there anyone else who would like to discuss this ordinance? Okay, Dennis.
Dennis Mitchell/I thought I would give you a quick update on pigeon lofts.
Nov/One moment. This is Dennis Mitchell, City Attorney. Assistant City Attorney. I am
confused, you are okay.
Mitchell/I met with Don Seydel who is the owner of the one remaining pigeon loft here
in Iowa City as well as the neighbors who had been complaining about the pigeon
loft. Basically we sat down and came up with the following that everybody was
agreeable to. First of all, all of the parties are agreeable to the pigeon number
limitations that are currently set out in the ordinance as well as the non-
transferable limitation in the ordinance and in addition to that, the parties are
going to work out a private agreement whereby the neighbors will pay for an air
filtration system which Don will install and agree to maintain. In addition to that,
they may also work on an agreement regarding some additional fencing in the
back.
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Kubby/There was some talk about some differences in numbers. I heard 40 is in the
current version of the ordinance. Oh, it is down to 30.
Mitchell/Right now it starts out as 40 but within three years you have to get down to 30.
Lehman/Dennis, I would just like for myself and I think- And I lmow for at least another
council person, we appreciate your efforts. This is a situation that was not a good
situation. We had a gentleman who really enjoyed his pets. They were offensive
to a neighbor and either decision was not going to be real satisfactory to one or the
other and I think what you have worked out is a compromise. I think it speaks
well of you and your department and I think it is the kind of thing that we would
like to do for folks.
Mitchell/Thanks. And I think it is a good solution for everybody, too.
Kubby/So there will be a written agreement that both parties sign about the air filtration
system and maybe about fencing and that if one of the parties doesn't follow
through, than that would be a civil matter between the two parties and not with the
city?
Mitchell/That is right.
Kubby/And they are agreeable. They understand that?
Mitchell/Yes.
Thornberry/Were there any other changes in this ordinance?
Dilkes/There were a couple of changes that we discussed at the work session last night
that I talked to Dennis about. You might just want to mention.
Mitchell/Right. The only change I ended up making was just the language regarding that
the c~m'ent pigeon loft shall not be transferable to another person or another
property.
Thornberry/I was more interested in the length of a leash for a dog. I thought 6 feet was
cruel and in-human.
Mitchell/I apologize. I was going to make that. It was suppose to be changed from 6 feet
to 10 feet.
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Thornberry/15 feet. No, no, we talked 15 feet last night because the little thing that you
buy that you hook up to a larger dog is 15 feet long. I just bought one. It cost a ton
from the Pet Degree.
Kubby/Because yours is 15 doesn't mean that there aren't those for sale longer or shorter
and I guess I would like some feedback.
Thomberry/This is for the large dog. This is the biggest one you can get. The ones for
smaller dogs are shorter.
Norton/Micro-managing.
Thornberry/But I- Can I get a refund?
Kubby/(Can't hear).
Thornberry/I have a large dog, 15 feet, to be pulled on by bicycle. I don't want a tail
caught in the spokes. It works out just fine. But the smaller dogs you don't have to
put it out 15 feet.
Lehman/Use a formula, Dean.
Norton/Let's ask for what a number should be.
Thornberry/But if they come standard in 15 feet, why does Iowa City have to stick with
12 1/2 feet sounds good. They come in standard lengths of 15 feet for the largest
one, yes.
Goodman-Herbst/Nationally the standard has always been six feet for leashes. I don't
know where that came from. It was a long time ago. What I can tell you about
these extend a leash is that unless an animal is causing a problem, we don't
enforce the six foot. We don't go out there and measure people's leashes.
However, if the animal is going up onto people porches while somebody is
walking down the sidewalk or going in the street, we will talk to them about it.
Thornberry/You want me to break the law.
Goodman-Herbst/No but what I am telling you- I am not going to tell the pet shops not
to sell them.
Norton/Make it longer then maybe.
Kubby/Right, I mean that means that maybe we could do 15.
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Goodman-Herbst/The question is where do you lose the control over the dog.
Thornberry/You still have to. maintain control over the pet. I understand that. But I hate
like heck to-
Nov/All right. If you are walking your dog on the city sidewalk, how short can you have
that? What is the shortest that that particular leash will go?
Thornberry/Well, I have my dog heel. It is a show dog and he heels by my left and I
don't need a leash. But to be legal, I have to have it tended on a leash. But you are
out in a park, throwing a Frisbee with a six foot leash, that dog hits the end of that
sucker pretty quick.
Lehman/You lmow, Dean, she just said they don't enforce this. You got a $45 million
water plant that doesn't take this much time.
Thornberry/So 15 feet is fine. That is what we talked about last night. Is that correct?
Norton/Give him 15 feet.
Lelunan/Give him six or 15.
Goodman-Herbst/You guys, you really want to change it to 157
Thornberry/I really would like to have 15 feet. I wouldn't have to break the law every
time I walk my dog.
Kubby/If we change it to 15 and someone's dog is going into the street and going into
people's porches and getting wrapped around stuff, is there something that way
we do business to say you need to have better control over that animal?
Thornberry/Karen, if you are walking down the sidewalk with your dog on a six foot
leash and somebody is walking the other way and the dog is six feet away, you are
still going to have problems.
Goodman-Herbst/You can lose control of your dog with a six foot leash, too. It is a
question of the circumstances.
Kubby/But most of us have r.o.w. that is smaller than 15 feet.
Thornberry/I am talking parks.
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Nov/Let Misha talk, please. Go ahead.
Goodman-Herbst/Your extend a leash is 15 feet long.
Thornberry/That is what he sold me.
Goodman-Herbst/Don, do they go any longer?
Morrison/(Can't hear).
Kubby/I would go to 10 but not 15 then.
Thornberry/I am surprised you have a leash.
Kubby/I have three leashes as a matter of fact.
Norton/Let's take a compromise. I don't want to give Dean everything he wants. Let's
just go 10.
Goodman-Herbst/Dean, I am comfortable with 10 and what I will tell you is that soon
you will probably be notified about a dog park by somebody and you can discuss
that then.
Thornberry/We were discussing that.
Lehman/Could I suggest that we go 10 feet and move on?
Norton/That is good.
Thornberry/I don't care as long as I don't get a ticket for going 15 feet.
Goodman~Herbst/Have you ever gotten a ticket from us?
Thornberry/No.
Nov/All right. There are now two amendments to the ordinance as published. Changing
the required leash from 6 feet to 10 feet and changing the restriction or
transferable- No, requiring shall not be transferable if you have a dove loft or
pigeon loft. I wanted to make sure that we let people lmow.
Thornberry/That is four feet?
Lehman/Don't stretch it, okay.
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Thomberry/That is four feet.
Nov/We heard you.
Thomberry/My goodness, this is ridiculous.
Dave Funk/From Iowa City. I just picked up all these laws here and just kind of had a
chance to glance over it and from what I see looks good to me. I mean 10-15 foot
is fine but if that dog of yours, Dean, get to the end of 15 feet and ends up in my
wife's plants up the yard, you are going to wish the police were after you instead
of she. I will tell you that because I have seen her come screaming out of the front
door if people out there even look like they were going to squirt the bush. So I
wouldn't advise it but I think as far as the leash goes, you just going to have to use
a little bit of common sense. You can't let them go all over you know. But as I
read this, too, and I came in here I guess tonight to express my feelings about a
rodeo. Of course I am definitely against that. I am against any cruelty to animals.
God knows that we belong in support. I don't know, the United States Humane
Society, Animal Coalition and the University and animal welfare and not agree
with everything but even PETA and so you can see we are very interested in the
welfare of animals. And maybe when I was younger and that like the rest of them
I went and saw rodeo and thought it was macho to go out and see those guys jmmp
on those horses and lasso and ride those bulls and all of that. That was great but I
guess maybe you kind of change as you get older and mature and I was over at the
Moose Lodge here not too long ago and not by my choice but they had a rodeo on
television and I was having a Pepsi and I just happened to glance up at this time
this beautiful big bull gave a big buck and came down and he broke his leg and it
was so sad because he just stood there on three, tried to, and the leg just swinging
like that. Looked so confused because he could not do anything. And it was so
sad. I hope that we are educated enough in Iowa City to disallow any rodeos
because there are things that he can put his money to, I am referring to Cochran,
that can be as entertaining as any rodeo and not the expense of suffering of
animals. Now, as you all know if you are around rodeos, you know they ride these
broncos, they get their points by how long they stay on and how many times they
can take their spurs and rake down through the side of the animals, you know, the
horses and all of this is torture for these animals. So if we are thinicing about the
and worrying about these exotic animals and the welfare of cats and dogs and that
and you have an ordinance and law prohibiting mistreating of these animals, how
can we turn right around and issue a permit to someone to torture animals and this
is what rodeos are doing. So on one hand we are saying don't do this, it is against
the law, you can kick your dog in the rump or something and I catch you, you are
going to get fined for it because this is animal abuse. But then you tm'n around,
we can't issue a permit for someone to abuse animals on the other hand. And here
on page 5 1 was reading Section 2 and it was more or less take care of rodeos
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because it says no persons shall neglect- okay, maybe not; abandon, maybe not.
But abuse, torture, torment, overwork, overload, beat. All of those fits a rodeo for
a horse or whether it be a bull and it says that this shouldn't be done and this is
exactly what we are doing. So this is how I feel about- And anyway, that poor
little calf out there, Dean, that goes to the end of his rope and jerking his neck,
while suffer him. Eventually he is going to give his life for us and you so you can
eat and serve him down there in one of your big hamburgers. So let's treat him
nice while he is alive, see. Let him enjoy life. Thank you.
Thornberry/That is why I wanted a longer lead for the dog. Then we would probably
have to really consider, if it were county wide, farmers couldn't brand their cattle
either.
Lehman/I don't think they do in Johnson County.
Thornberry/Well, I mean branding a calf, they bawl and I lived in Sioux City for awhile
and they have got a plant there that they dispatch the animals to render them and
they don't die right away and-
Norton/It is not easy.
Thornberry/It is not in Iowa City.
Kubby/But it is not in the county.
Dave Funlc/Such groups as ours are trying to prevent this and it is rough. If you people
up here could see a videotape which I saw that Grace has of all these animals are
being treated just prior to their death at these slaughter houses. I promise you, you
would never want to be abusive to any animals again. How they are dragged
mooing, begging for help by one leg stretched out like this and the other one
broken just with a big winch. T12:owed in the corner, wait for them to die, not
dead but just piled there. It is just horrible and I wish-
Thornberry/Well, I haven't seen that.
Funk/And this is all true because it is on video and we have got to stop this and that is
what we are trying to do and they are using because I was with Shell Oil
Company at the same time we had the Ice Company here in Iowa City before my
retirement and there are some veterinarians now, they are using dry ice, CO2, to
brand animals with because it is painless as to deal with iron, you lmow. So
maybe if we live long enough and we all keep trying and this is a good place to
start, an excellent place to start, maybe we can give these poor things a break.
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Nov/Thank you.
Kubby/There are two council members who wanted to retain the prohibition on circuses
and rodeos. Are there three? So there are three. So people just need to convince
one person. So feel free to do your lobbying during the next week.
Nov/We will actually do first consideration two weeks from today.
Anne Bolen/I live in Iowa City and if all it talces is one more council member to prohibit
rodeos, I urge you please don't allow this in Iowa City. I think the key word he
used was that we all feel that this is an educated community and I think that is all
it talces is a little bit of education to realize that we don't need this here. I have
heard lots of reasons against having rodeos and circuses. I have really yet to be
convinced there is a need to have it here in Iowa City. I think we have plenty of
other opportunities to entertain ourselves and our children in a much more
educational way. If you go to even the mall today you can go see snakes in their
natural environment through promotions of science museums. We have much
better ways of witnessing animals that are not being abused and in their natural
habitats and in a situation like this. So if all these words are hitting you in anyway
and you are on the line, I urge you to please don't do this. I would be very
disappointed to learn that Iowa City is going to mar this wonderful effort to
encourage responsible animal welfare by allowing this in the bill. On that note, I
had a friend once question me recently. Should I come to Iowa City? Should I
move to Iowa City? I hear that it is kind of a California of the Midwest. And I said
well, I have heard that, too. And if there is anyplace to live in Iowa, I was told to
live in Iowa City. Well, I would have to still tell her no if this was here. I am that
much against it. So, please take that into consideration.
Nov/Did you sign your name?
Lelunan/I have lived here 35 years and to my lmowledge, there hasn't been a rodeo here
in 35 years.
Bolen/So why do we need it now?
Lehman/I don't think we are inviting them.
Thornberry/We are not permitting them. We have just never prohibited them. It has
always been an option to have a rodeo in Iowa City. We just never had one. I have
lived here 50 plus years.
Nov/We really don't have a place here in Iowa City that-
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Bolen/No, we don't.
Thornberry/We are talking maybe a petting zoo. When they bring little animals for little
children to look at and pet and these are nice.
Bolen/I have seen these petting zoos and I don't think that they are worth it either.
Baker/Anne, can I ask you a quick question? Would you also favor the prohibition of
horse races in Iowa City?
Bolen/Absolutely.
Baker/Okay, thank you.
Goodman-Herbst/I just want to say one more thing to council. I want the council,
particularly the members who voted against this particular thing to pay attention
to who is telling you don't do this because it is not the citizens, it is the people
who run the rodeos and the circuses. That is who we are hearing from, okay. What
you are hearing from the citizens is don't allow them. There is no need for it. We
don't have a place for it here. And I think you should pay attention to that. The
people who run them don't live in our community.
Nov/And if those people do come to this community, they could use the county fair
grounds.
Lehman/They can anyway. It is in the county.
Nov/Right.
Goodman-Herbst/There are many places that they could use as we already know. We
already lmow that. So I would urge the council to really pay attention to this issue
and pay attention to who is contacting you.
Furtic/This is kind of pick on Dean night. Just a little bit, not really, Dean, but you here
50 years and don't remember a rodeo. Maybe I am a few years on you. But when I
was a child, yes, we did have a rodeo and I went to it and where they had the
rodeo at was approximately the vicinity of where Gringer Feed is now, down there
in that area down there. It use to be all there and they did have a rodeo with
everything going. You are just a young whipper snapper.
Thornberry/And you remember where the Burger King is now is where the old fair
grounds use to be.
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Funk/Yes, I grew up down around there. Eddie Lucas use to be Lucas Showgrounds-
fairgrounds. All carnivals, fair. In fact I was with Shell Oil Company, Fred
Carlson. I delivered the gas fill to all of the equipment to put in 6 ByPass. So I
remember all of that.
Thornberry/So you remember going down to the railroad station and watching them
unload the elephants.
Ftmk/Absolutely.
Thornberry/That was neat, wasn't it.
Funk/I use to climb up and play in the big old brick chimney they took down, too. Down
where the HyVee was. So I use to go down and dive off the Plug Bridge, too.
Lehman/Did you guys ever go to the Old Capitol?
Thomberry/Thank you.
Nov/Okay, moving on.
Martha Dahlin/I don't currently live in Iowa City. My husband and I and our three year
old daughter are thinking aborn moving up here and I just really really strongly
urge the prohibition of rodeos and circuses. Circuses at the very very least neglect
animals and their basic needs. Just, I have always thought of Iowa City as a
progressive community and rodeos and circuses are just, it seems to me those are
just real obvious examples of where the basic needs of animals are completely
overlooked for the trivial trivial needs of humans, entertainment. Not that
entertainment isn't important, but there are so many ways that we can entertain
ourselves. We're real interested in raising this little girl to have compassion for all
other human beings and all other sentient beings. And we zap past on the
television we're very very careful what she watches. We don't want her to see a
lot of violence and become insensitive to the suffering of others, human or
otherwise. Rodeos, hey she doesn't see that. We do not let her see that stuff.
That's basically all I have to say. I really urge the prohibition, and the ban on the
rodeos and circuses. If nothing else, they're just low level and tacky and this
community should be into more intellectual pursuits in the arts and the finer
things in life.
Nov/Thank you. Martha, would you sign you name and address?
Dahlin/Sure.
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Nov/There's a pad right here. We just need to keep records. Is there anyone else who
would like to address the council on this topic? Okay. We're going to close the
public discussion.
Walsh/Could we have a motion to accept correspondence?
Nov/Moved and seconded (Baker/Norton) that we accept correspondence. All in favor
please say aye- (ayes). Okay. To continue, we will accept correspondence until the
time we have to actually vote on this ordinance. So anyone who has heard this and
would like to write a letter on the issues, please do so.
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ITEM NO. 6 AMENDMENT OF THE FISCAL YEAR 1997 OPERATING BUDGET.
b. CONSIDER A RESOLUTION APPROVING
Nov/Moved by Kubby, seconded by Thornberry. Now questions.
Thornberry/Don, what is the total budget for the year?
Yucuis/As amended?
Thornberry/Round numbers.
Yucuis/The total expenditure budget for the year including transfers is $115,832,206.
Oh, back up, down a little lower. $187,164,191, that includes transfers.
Thornberry/And there is nobody here to talk about $187 million and the room was filled
for the pet ordinance?
Nov/Yes.
Kubby/You gave us a cartoon about that once.
Thornberry/That was my question but I guess there is no answer.
Norton/And we did the budget originally, there wasn't a lot of-
Thomberry/$187 million and nobody is saying hey.
Lehman/Dean, do you have as much comment about this as you do about the length of
leashes?
Thornberry/Do you want me to start?
Norton/No.
Thornberry/Crnel and in-human.
Lehman/Don, just briefly- a brief synopsis.
Yucuis/We have a couple of items that occur. When we finish one budget year we have
certain dollars that we budgeted last year but we haven't finish or we haven's
spent all the money on those projects. We have to carry over the budget authority
from the last fiscal year to this fiscal year and you will see in pages 3 through 16
there is an original budget column and a carry over colunto which is the prior
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fiscal year moneys being carried over. And we carried over approximately $50
million from the prior fiscal year to this fiscal year and those are pretty much on-
going projects. A lot of your capital projects that we have had in place.
Lehman/So this is really just to adjust our budget to actual?
Yucuis/Correct. $50 million was carried over, of that $44 1/2 million was capital
projects. It is a significant amount of our budget carry-overs. Actual amendments
were approximately $31 million in expenses. It is a variety of items. We had $25
million of that was capital projects. We sold some bonds during the year that we
didn't originally budget for. We had some major projects that were funded from
those bond issues and unfortunately the way our budget process works is that we
have to budget not only for the bond issue but then we budget an expense transfer
to fund those projects. So it is like a double accounting. So it is important when
you are talking about the budget to look at how much is transfers because it is
usually duplication of an expense someplace else.
Kubby/The changes look like there are twice as many.
Yucuis/Correct. You might have a $187 million budget but of that maybe $60 - $70
million is transfers. So your budget is a lower ammmt in actual expenses. As fat'
as a quick summary-
Lehman/That is good.
Thornberry/Than/cs, Don.
Nov/It is difficult to summarize quickly if you are talking about a budget.
Norton/I should say that I have been talking with Don and looking for some additional
ways to present the budget in a more manageable form. I thiak we have
considered several means of conveying in an easier fashion of what is going on
with the budget. That is one reason we don't get the comments. It is just too hard
to get a handle on. So we need to thin/c about it a lot. I am sure Don is.
Thornberry/There are so many facets of the city that you know, each one of us could take
ten areas and go into depth and explain it to everybody else. There is a lot there
and a lot to this business.
Nov/Okay, any other discussion? Roll call- (yes). We have approved this resolution.
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May 20, 1997 City of Iowa City Page '10
ITEIVI NO. 7.
PLANS, SPECIFICATIONS, FORIVi OF CONTRACT, AND ESTIMATE OF
COST FOR THE CONSTRUCTION OF THE WILLOW STREET
RECONSTRUCTION PROJECT, ESTABLISHING AMOUNT OF BID
SECURITY TO ACCOIVIPANY EACH BID, DIRECTING CITY CLERK TO
PUBLISH NOTICE TO BIDDERS, AND FIXING TIME AND PLACE FOR
RECEIPT OF BIDS.
Comment: This project consists of the reconstruction of Willow Street
between Muscatine Avenue and Brookside Drive, installation of new
water main, storm sewer, and sidewalks and also sanitary sewer repair
work. The preliminary estimated cost of this project is 9500,000.
Funding will be provided by Road Use Taxes.
a. PUBLIC HEARING
Action:
b. CONSIDER A RESOLUTION APPROVING
ct,o :
ITEIVi NO. 8.
CONSIDER AN ORDINANCE PROVIDING THAT GENERAL PROPERTY
TAXES LEVIED AND COLLECTED EACH YEAR ON ALL PROPERTY
LOCATED WITHIN THE SCOTT-SIX URBAN RENEWAL PROJECT AREA,
IN THE CITY OF IOWA CITY, COUNTY OF JOHNSON COUNTY, STATE
OF IOWA, BY AND FOR THE BENEFIT OF THE STATE OF IOWA, CITY OF
IOWA CITY, COUNTY OF JOHNSON, IOWA CITY COMMUNITY SCHOOL
DISTRICT AND OTHER TAXING DISTRICTS, BE PAID TO A SPECIAL
FUND FOR PAYIVIENT OF PRINCIPAL AND INTEREST ON LOANS,
IVIONIES ADVANCED TO AND INDEBTEDNESS, INCLUDING BONDS
ISSUED OR TO BE ISSUED, INCURRED BY SAID CITY IN CONNECTION
WITH SAID URBAN RENEWAL REDEVELOPMENT PROJECT.
(FIRST CONSIDERATION) '
Comment: The adoption of this Scott-Six Tax Increment Financing
District Ordinance establishes the mechanism by which incremental
property tax revenues will be made available to the City for the purposes
of financing public infrastructure improvements and providing financial
incentives to qualifying businesses. The third vote on this ordinance
should not occur prior to adoption of the Scott-Six Urban Renewal Plan,
which is scheduled, for the City Council's June 17 meeting. Staff
memorandurp included in Council packet.
Action:
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ITEM NO. 8 CONSIDER AN ORDINANCE PROVIDING THAT GENERAL
PROPERTY TAXES LEVIED AND COLLECTED EACH YEAR ON ALL
PROPERTY LOCATED WITHIN THE SCOTT-SIX URBAN RENEWAL PROJECT
AREA, IN THE CITY OF IOWA CITY, COUNTY OF JOHNSON COUNTY, STATE
OF IOWA, BY AND FOR THE BENEFIT OF THE STATE OF IOWA, CITY OF
IOWA CITY, COUNTY OF JOHNSON, IOWA CITY COMMUNITY SCHOOL
DISTRICT AND OTHER TAXING DISTRICTS, BE PAID TO A SPECIAL FUND
FOR PAYMENT OF PRINCIPAL AND INTEREST ON LOANS, MONIES
ADVANCED TO AND INDEBTEDNESS, INCLUDING BONDS ISSUED OR TO BE
ISSUED, INCURRED BY SAID CITY IN CONNECTION WITH SAID URBAN
RENEWAL REDEVELOPMENT PROJECT. (FIRST CONSIDERATION)
Nov/Moved by Vanderhoef, seconded by Norton. Discussion.
Kubby/I have a few things I want to say and I am going to try to be as concise as I can.
This is a really important thing that we are talking about. As the note said that
Naomi read that there is really two things that this money is going to be used for.
For financing public infrastructure for the overall development and for providing
financial incentives to qualifying businesses. I don't have a problem at all with
giving the money to individual businesses because when they received this public
assistance, what the community is going to get back in return is that business
going through a process whereby they meet most of our guidelines about wages
and benefits, environments protection, energy efficiency, and those kinds of
responsible aspects of businesses. I was concerned about the time frame of the
TIF and we were talking about 20 years and I wanted to go 15 years and I thought
about it a lot and started feeling a little more comfortable with the 20 years. I
didn't like it but it was acceptable. But what I can't- What I don't feel comfortable
is providing TIF money for infrastructure for the overall development without all
the businesses in the development having to go through the process seeing if they
meet the guidelines. And what we are basically doing, this is kind of ironic. Is that
we are artificially lowering the price of the land by the public subsidy so that this
land is more competitive, it is more attractive, we can get businesses to come in. It
is a real kind of socialistic way of providing public services and setting city policy
and implementing city policy and I have no problem with that kind of government
intervention in the market-
CHANGE TAPE TO REEL 97-83 SIDE 2
Kubby/To happen. What I do have a problem with is the part of the TIF that doesn't
require all the businesses in the park which will receive this artificially lowered
land price by the investment in the infrastructure for the overall park and that is
what I still feel very uncomfortable with. I don't mind us doing it but what I want
is all of the businesses to receive that benefit which is going to be all of the
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businesses in the industrial park. All the businesses should have to follow the
guidelines and I just don't feel comfortable with that part of it. I know that what
we are voting on tonight gives the parameters of the rules of the TIF and that each
individual TIF application will come back towards us. When TIF applications
come forth to us for individual businesses that meet the guidelines, I will be
supporting the TIF for that specific business but I don't support all of the
parameters that we are outlining on the program and feel that uncomfortable. That
I feel like we are breaking the spirit of the policies and guidelines. That I can't
support the plan.
Baker/
Karen, can I ask you a question? How is- I understand the distinction you are
making and I am trying to see the difference between it and all of the
infrastructure that we provide in Iowa City for businesses, commercial and
industrial. We put in public money into infrastructure but we don't require the
businesses benefiting from that infrastructure to go by to those guidelines.
Kubby/The difference is we annexed a large piece of ground and usually when we do
that, our annexation guidelines say that they pay for the arterial street which this
development will not be doing. 420th Street usually the developer would pay for
or part of it which isn't going to happen.
Baker/But the developer is putting in a substantial investment here.
Kubby/Yeah, so the same thing with Sycamore Farms and they had to pay for those
arterial streets or part of the arterial streets. So for me I guess what the distinction
is is we are not following our normal rules and when we don't follow our normal
rules, I feel like the city needs to insure what we are getting I believe that jobs will
be created through this. My concern is what kind of jobs and what kind of
businesses and I feel like that is a big part of our responsibility in exchange for
this subsidy.
Vanderhoef/However we have had some past experience with when we don't support
this kind of total package, that then the developmental end becomes so expensive
that they have not marketed it well and brought in the businesses that we have
wanted. There is a trade off in our agreement here that is going to create
something that I don't think you are figuring into this entire package.
Kubby/Well, and I wouldn't mind a trade off swing for businesses who aren't going to
come to us for individual TIFs. For an individual business to say you either need
to follow the guidelines or pay X amount per acre to cover these costs that re the
subsidized costs and I have would have no problem with that assuming it is the
business's choice as to whether they follow the guidelines or pay or not receive
the subsidy for the overall development. I would be fine with that kind of facility.
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Thornberry/This TIF, I believe, was part of the agreement that we had with the
developer, the people who own the land and I just assume see the city keep it
word.
Lelur~an/I think there is a significant difference-
Kubby/This is our decision.
Thornberry/The decision was made between the city and the individual owner who
owned the land and this was part of the negotiations of that land. Would he bring
it into the city and all of the rest. This was part of the negotiations and-
Kubby/And I am saying I disagree with that part of the negotiation and I have that ability
and responsibility if I disagree soundly to voice that concern.
Lehman/Karen, you mentioned Sycamore Farms. I think there is significant difference.
Sycamore Farms was residential property and they has been an abundance of
residential property in this community. People don't have to build in that area. For
us to do the infrastructure there over some other area I think would have been not
fair. We found ourselves not very long ago with no industrial development
property in this community. We talked about it as a council and we felt that that
was, I think we all felt that that was a very definite problem for the City of Iowa
City and I think we felt that had we come down to it, the City itself may have had
to invest money in property or industrial development. We were fortunate enough
to have a private developer buy some property, offer it to the city for some
consideration. In other words, this property is available for industrial
development. We did not have to put the investment in the land. We did not have
to do a lot of things that he is doing. He took the risk, the property is sitting out
there. To me it is a small price to pay for us not having to acquire that property to
help in the infrastructure, particularly when payment for that comes from taxes on
that property. The cost to the tax payers is really next to nothing. It is taxes we
collect but we put right back in.
Kubby/I don't disagree with anything you are saying. Where we depart in our paths is
that I want to guarantee for the community that when we make these kinds of
agreements, that the businesses that come in don't place their employees in a
place where they have jobs that may end up needing us to provide them other
forms of public assistance in order to survive in terms of other kinds of welfare,
Free Med Clinic and other kinds of services for Transitional Housing, etc. And
that is one of the- I agree with everything you said. I would like us to have an
industrial park. What I want to do is guarantee that when we provide that subsidy
to make that industrial happen that the community is guaranteed that people who
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are working in those places that they are living up to the guidelines that we have
agreed to and that is where we disagree.
Norton/But we didn't put the money up front. That is the difference here. We are giving
up something because we didn't have to go out and buy the thing and then we
could put all the strings we wanted. I think we need to be cautious about those
strings and some of them will still apply depending on what particular enterprises
ask for. Very likely there will be some cases which we will have a chance to ask
some of the questions. I think we have got to be very delicate here. We didn't put
the money up front as it were and so we have to give up something and I think
that is a reasonable tradeoff. I think we ought to comment right now that we get
this thing underway which has been long due, we may have to move right. into
another. You know, some of our long run financial problems insist on somewhat
in growth in the industrial and commercial sector in order to replace some of the
taxes that will be lost to the state regulations in the early 2000's. So we need to
get moving on another project probably right away I think. We need to think
about it.
Vanderhoef/Absolutely and what Karen is asking is for us to restrict the owner of this
industrial park from selling to any willing buyer and that is-
Kubby/I am saying let's have flexibility to say either you follow the guidelines or you
pay-
Vanderhoef/And that is part of negotiation and we say something else to have this
happen or we don't have it happen. It is a long term kind of agreement that we
have and we have made a choice that this is what we see as the very best
possibilities for the city at this point.
Baker/
Karen has said over and over in the last couple of minutes that she doesn't
disagree with the goals and much of what we had done and Karen, I don't
disagree with your analysis of what we would like to see happen with all industry
coming in. But this- And you also used the word rules. In a sense we are setting
up the rules in this project. This is not unlike another project in Iowa City and it
did require a tradeoff between the private developer in the public sector and it is
an arrangement that is going to make something happen. Some businesses will be
getting additional TIF money and we will be having those guidelines specifically
applied to them. But we have talked about, not just this council, previous councils
and councils before that, economic industrial development and quite honestly,
nothing has happened. This is going to hopefully make something happen. My
concern is if we follow-extended out your goal here, applying those criteria to any
business that comes in-
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Kubby/With public subsidy.
Baker/Well, I have also said and I think the council agrees that we subsidize a lot of
other businesses in Iowa City indirectly through our infrastructure program and
this is very comparable to them in that sense. Just because it is an annexation
designed for a specific purpose doesn't change the underlying principle. We all
don't disagree with each other except we are going to vote different ways. I want
to make sure-
Council/(All talking).
Baker/There is a point, we are at the tail end here. This has been a long process and I
want to maize sure that the public understands that this is not just simply the city
doing a project. This has required a substantial investment by a private developer
and without that cooperation, we wouldn't be getting how may acres? 100 or so
acres in industrial land.
Norton/And keeping the price down over time, too.
Council (All talking).
Kubby/We are also giving. It is not that we are just forgetting jobs and we are making
TIF Districts. There are other things the city is also investing in. like maintenance
of their storm water management which could be some substantial cost.
Baker/I think the majority of the council has come to the conclusion that the tradeoff is
in the city's best interest. That is why we disagree.
Kubby/I am trying to articulate my disagreement with that majority view. I am like 60%
down the road.
Nov/Okay, are we ready?
Lehman/Do we maize this official by voting?
Baker/Yes.
Nov/I just asked if we are ready. I sure hope so. Roll call- (yes; Kubby-no). We have
approved first consideration on a vote of 6-1 and Kubby voted no.
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May.20, 1997 City of Iowa City Page
ITEM NO. 9.
ITEM NO. 10.
CONSIDER AN ORDINANCE REGULATING NON-MOTORIZED VEHICLES.
(SECOND CONSIDERATION)
Comment: This proposed ordinance will amend the City Code by
repealing the regulations regarding "toy vehicles" and set forth new
regulations regarding "non-motorized vehicles." In addition to defining
"non-motorized vehicles," regulations include prohibiting non-motorized
vehicles in the following locations: on streets and alleys (except in RS-5
and RS-8 zones), on sidewalks in the Central Downtown Business
District, within Chauncey Swan Park, within the City Plaza, and in parking ,
lots and ramps. ,
Action:
CONSIDER AN ORDINANCE AMENDING TITLE 2 OF THE CITY CODE,
THE HUMAN RIGHTS ORDINANCE OF THE CITY OF IOWA CITY, IOWA,
TO MAKE IT SUBSTANTIALLY EQUIVALENT TO THE FEDERAL FAIR
HOUSING AMENDMENTS ACT OF 1989, (PASS AND ADOPT)
Comment: The Iowa City Human Rights Commission has recommended
enactment of amendments to the Iowa City Human Rights Ordinance that
will make the ordinance substantially equivalent to the federal Fair
Housing Amendments Act of 1989. A certificate of substantial
equival.ency from the Department of Housing and Urban Development will
allow the Iowa City Human Rights Commission to investigate complaints
of housing discrimination in Iowa City and will provide federal funds to
the Commis.sion to facilita/te such investigation.
ctio :
ITEM NO. 11.
CONSIDER A RESOLUTION RESCINDING THE 1991 PERSONNEL
POLICIES MANUAL AND ESTABLISHING AN AMENDED PERSONNEL
POLICIES MANUAL.
Comment: The Personnel Policies for the City were recently revised to
incorporate additional information into the official City policies. This
information was previously distributed to employees by memorandum or
was verbally.explained. In addition, certain areas have been clarified which
should help employees understand the policies. A memorandum is included
in Council pa,cl~et which sur~arizes the changes to the policies.
Action: ~/~/~~'~-__.~
#9 page 1
ITEM NO. 9 CONSIDER AN ORDINANCE REGULATING NON-MOTORIZED
VEHICLES. (SECOND CONSIDERATION)
Nov/Moved by Thornberry, seconded by Vanderhoef. And now we are going to hear
from Assistant City Attorney Dennis Mitchell because we have revised it from the
last time we voted.
Mitchell/Right. Hopefully everybody has a copy of the memo that I did this afternoon
and a copy of the revised ordinance with those changes. One change I should
point out, I don't know if this was discussed last night or not. But the definition of
central downtown business district has been modified slightly so that the eastern
most boundary will now be Gilbert Street instead of Van Buren and the reason
behind that is so technically skateboarders won't be violating the ordinance in
order to get to the Civic Center Parking Lot or rollerbladers to get to the
Chauncey Swan Parking Lot.
Nov/And the other change was to prohibit bicycles in Chauncey Swan Park.
Mitchell/Correct.
Nov/The ordinance now lists every street that is considered arterial and only arterial
streets will have prohibitions against non-motorized vehicles.
Mitchell/As well as the streets within the central downtown business district.
Kubby/I third< this is a really good improvement.
Norton/They can at least get around down now.
Mitchell/Right, right.
Kubby/Thank Courtney Daniels for talcing the time to come down here and help us see
this a little differently. Thank you, Courthey.
Nov/We are also going to add the requirement that a non-motorized vehicle shall obey
the rules of the road as if they were motorized.
Mitchell/Correct. People who travel or operate non-motorized vehicles on roads, streets
or alleys where permitted will have to stay as far to the fight of the road as
possible except when making a left hand turn on a one way street. Operate the
non-motorized vehicle with the flow of traffic, operate it in a careful and prudent
manner as well as obey all traffic laws applicable as drivers of vehicles.
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Norton/And wear reflective gear at night?
Mitchell/It wasn't put in that but it should have been.
Council/(All talking).
Nov/Okay. Is there anything else we discussed last night that didn't end up here? Okay,
we need a motion to add all of these amendments including wearing reflective
gear at night.
Norton/It didn't say gear, reflective items.
Mitchell/Reflective device or reflective clothing.
Nov/Okay. Moved by Lehman, seconded by Norton, that the amendments be added to
this ordinance. Is there any discussion of the amendment?
Baker/I want clarification for anybody listening because some experience I had getting to
the meeting tonight. Non-motorized vehicles stay as far to the right of the rode.
For the purposes of this ordinance, non-motorized vehicle includes skateboards
and rollerblades?
Mitchell/Correct.
Kubby/Coasting devices.
Baker/Whatever. So the rollerbladers do not have the right to be in the middle of the
lane? They are to be-
Mitchell/Right, not under this ordinance.
Baker/Good.
Kubby/Although, as a bike rider, I stay to the furthest right that I can. Although if there
are cars are pariced I always stay a little bit out just in case I don't see somebody
and they open a door. But when I come upon a traffic device, I tend, ifI have
time, to take the whole lane so that people see me. They can see my hand signals,
they can see my intention and I personally feel safer. And so I guess I would-
Nov/Let me say that bicycles are not restricted in this non-motorized vehicle category.
Kubby/Yes, I understand that but what I am trying to do is make an analogy to these
legally defined non-motorized vehicles who may be in traffic patterns that are not
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on arterial streets and they come upon a stop light and want to be safe and want to
be seen, that it may be that at those traffic devices I personally wouldn't mind
them being in the middle of the lane to be seen and then when they go through the
intersection at the stop sign or stop light, they get back to the right of the rode.
Baker/
Karen, I think you are absolutely right. I don't think we have to write that in but I
don't think- It is the way it would be enforced. We don't want them in the middle
of the lane anywhere else.
Nov/And for the sake of safety, I want to ask them not to wear a headphones and listen to
music because they are not likely to hear the car behind them.
Kubby/We could do that for cars, too.
Baker/I can't watch my television.
Kubby/Keyboard where the horn is.
Norton/We will have to come back and fine tune this probably but let's get it on the
books.
Nov/Right, we now have a motion on the floor to approve amendments. Is there any
further discussion on the amendments? Okay, all in favor, please say aye- (ayes).
Motion carried. Now we are back to the ordinance as amended. Is there any other
discussion of the ordinance?
Mitchell/I do have one more item to bring up. I spoke with Joe Fowler today regarding
the railing that we are going to add along the top of the Chauncey Swan Parldng
Ramp. In order to meet Building Code requirements, there can't be more than 4
inches between railings or between the lowest portion of the top. And the rail
itself is 2 inches in diameter. So if we just have add rail, it is going to give us an
additional 6 inches at the low point which will make it 4 feet instead of 3 1/2 feet.
Personally I am comfortable with that but I did want to bring that to your
attention.
Nov/Okay and Joe Fowler is comfortable with that?
Mitchell/Yes.
Kubby/It is going to be blue, right?
Nov/Oh, I thought it was going to be colorless like the extension on the lower floor.
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Mitchell/I think it is going to match the other railing that is in there.
Nov/On the second floor there is a rail of some sort.
Kubby/Just last night I thought I heard a parking person say it was going to be blue, so
we should make that clear.
Nov/No, we didn't want it blue. We wanted it as colorless as possible. As unobtrusive as
possible.
Thornberry/Do you have a color chart with you?
Baker/A tape measure for that leash though.
Nov/Okay, roll call- (yes). Okay, we have approved second consideration.
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ITEM NO. 11 CONSIDER A RESOLUTION RESCINDING THE 1991 PERSONNEL
POLICIES MANUAL AND ESTABLISHING AN AMENDED PERSONNEL
POLICIES MANUAL.
Nov/Moved by Kubby, seconded by Lehman. Discussion.
Kubby/I had two things I wanted to bring up. One is an addition that I would like to add.
On page 14, under the section of workplace violence prevention and there are
three paragraphs there and I am looking at the middle one that says, "Workplace
violence includes any act of physical, verbal or written aggression within the work
setting as well as the destruction or abuse of property." I would like to add
"electronic" because there have been cases of electronic harassment within the
workplace or from the workplace or from citizens who- an employee-
Nov/What does that mean?
Norton/E-mail.
Kubby/Using the computer to harass someone. That is makes it clearer than written.
Baker/Someone is receiving electronic messages.
Kubby/If they are giving, receiving, employee to employee.
Thoruberry/It would be like telephone harassment in the 20th Century.
Kubby/Harassment of the 90's.
Nov/I don't know that anything here would exclude telephone or computer and I wonder
why you want to list it.
Kubby/Because just to make it very clear that it is inappropriate. That some people don't
view electronic typing as written.
Dilkes/I think it clarifies it.
Baker/One clarification on the process. Someone sends a letter either written or
electronically to somebody else at work, that could be harassment even though it
is mailed from someplace else. It doesn't have to just originate in and received at
work? It can be from outside/Okay.
Kubby/Right.
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Nov/Okay.
Kubby/And the other concern I have and there is not a page number. It is the page after
the cover of the policies, the second sentence there, "The city reserves the right to
change personnel policies at any time." I lmow that that is there to make sure that
everyone understands that the intent is to protect the city in that this is not an
employment contract but I want to find another way to say it because the most
cynical reading of that sentence is oh, well, the city can changes its policies over
the afternoon because whatever happened and that is not really our process. So, I
was challenged to find a sentence but I couldn't. I was doing bead work this
afternoon and got engrossed. So I didn't find a sentence. So really the best way to
do it is to find a sentence and let Eleanor say does this pass legal muster to protect
what we need to protect with this sentence.
Nov/Well, we could say reserves the right to change the personnel policies at any time
and to notify the employees of these changes or employees will be notified of
these changes. Just to say that we are not going to change it without talking about
it.
Norton/After consultation.
Nov/No. You notify them.
Baker/It still have to be approved. That any change in this policy has to come back to us
anyway.
Kubby/Well, there are changes that happen over the year that gets implemented and once
in a while they gather them all together and we approve the policy change.
Norton/We reserve the rights to change them with due notification.
Thornberry/With due notification.
Lehman/Wouldn't it be just as well to say we reserve the right to change the personnel
policy as circumstances dictate. When we find situations they don't, we need to
change them.
Kubby/It may be that whatever wording option we have that Eleanor needs to have time
to see if it provides-
Dilkes/I have advised employers before. You know, I have encountered this wanting to
soften what the reality of it is. This is clearly the reality of it and what you want to
reserve is the right to change them at anytime.
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Lehman/Leave it alone then.
Dilkes/That is certainly my preference but if there is some language that, you know- I
don't like the under specified circumstances or anything kind of qualifter like that
that restricts your discretion to change them is not okay.
Nov/Do you feel uncomfortable saying employees will be notified of changes?
Dilkes/Well, I think that creates a lot. It creates some ambiguity. I mean, I think if you
are going to do it, that is fine but I think it creates a possible claim that they
weren't notified appropriately, they weren't notified quickly enough.
Nov/Let's leave it as is.
Dilkes/I mean I think unfortunately for employees sometimes, this is really the reality of
an at will situation and I sometimes think it best to simply say it.
Nov/Okay.
Kubby/I want to have a clear understanding that we don't change policies on a whim
because of he is involved in a certain circumstance and-
Nov/We haven't done it and we won't plan on doing it.
Norton/Has this been hammered out with the Union? I would think if it is acceptable to
them, those matters-
Kubby/They haven't been notified.
Norton/Nobody has been notified, huh?
Nov/Say it out loud in the microphone.
Helling/The personnel policies generally apply to all city employees, not just employees
in the bargaining unit. These are nonmegotiable things. Now what you will find is
a lot of these things are reflected in some of the same things that are in that
collective bargaining agreements. But, again, that is the reason why you want to
distinguish between the contract and the policies so employees are very clear this
is not contractual and this is not required negotiation to change.
Nov/Okay, are we ready to vote? Roll call-
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Kubby/And this is with that electronic added?
Nov/Yes.
Kubby/We don't need a specific motion to add that, do we?
Norton/You can always amend it.
Nov/(Roll call). (Yes). We have approved the resolution. We are going to take a short
break and we will be back soon.
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ITEM NO, 12,
City of Iowa City
Page
CONSIDER A RESOLUTION APPROVING DISTRIBUTION OF THE
"PROGRAM FOR IMPROVING NEIGHBORHOODS" (PIN) GRANT FUNDS,
Comment: The City Council allocated $25,000 for Fiscal Year 1998 for the
purpose of funding grants to neighborhood associations so that they could
make improvements in their neighborhoods. The Neighborhood Council has
solicited, selected, and recommends funding of six applications from
neighborhood associations and seeks the City Council's review and
approval of this recommendation. /~~__~
Action:
ITEM NO. 13.
ITEM NO. 14.
CONSIDER A RESOLUTION ESTABLISHING TCI CABLEVISION'S
"MAXIMUM PERMITTED RATE" FOR BASIC CABLE SERVICE.
Comment: This resolution establishes a maximum permitted basic cable
rate according to Federal Communications Commission formulas which is
approximately $0.0z~ per month, per subscriber lower than that
determined by TCI Cablevision. The maximum permitted rate is the basis
for future basic rate increases, and it is in the City's interest to ensure
that it is accurate and is nDt overstated. -7~,~
CONSIDER A RESOLUTION AUTHORIZING APPLICATIONS FOR 100
UNITS OF SECTION 8 VOUCHERS FOR MAINSTREAM HOUSING
OPPORTUNITIES FOR PERSONS WITH DISABILITIES.
Comment: A Notice of Funding Availability (NOFA) was published in the
Federal Register on April 10, 1997. The NOFA announces grants to
Public Housing Agencies to provide rental certificates and vouchers to
enable persons with disabilities to rent affordable private housing of their
choice. The Iowa City Housing Authority proposes to apply for 100
Section 8 rental Vouchers for persons with disabilities. The thirty day
comment period as required began on April 19, 1997. The application
deadline is June 9, 1997. Staff memorandum included in Counci~/~/cket.
#12 page 1
ITEM NO. 12 CONSIDER A RESOLUTION APPROVING DISTRIBUTION OF THE
"PROGRAM FOR IMPROVING NEIGHBORHOODS" (PIN) GRANT FLrNDS.
Nov/Moved by Kubby, seconded by Lehman. Discussion? Okay, presentation.
Jennifer Williams/Good evening. On behalf of the Neighborhood Council of Iowa City
we are pleased and thank you for the opportunity to present information about the
1998 FY Program for Improving Neighborhoods or PIN Grants. We are very
excited about the past PIN Grants that we have had and the future endeavors but
we will try to keep our presentation short tonight. We would like to recommend
that city council once again approve $25,000 for FY98 PIN Grants as you have
done so in the last two years. Our format tonight will be as follows. I will briefly
discuss the Neighborhood Council of Iowa City, what a PIN Grant is, the process
used for PIN Grants, the benefits that we get from PIN Grants. Then we will see
individual presentations by the applicants and if you will note, you have a copy of
these applications in your folder. The presentations will just be a brief summary.
Nov/Brief summary. we don't want you to read all of this material.
Williams/It will be brief and finally if we could ask that you hold any questions or
comments until the end and we can answer them at that time. The Neighborhood
Council of Iowa City represented 21 neighborhoods from across Iowa City. We
meet on a monthly basis to discuss common issues and concerns, one of them
being the PIN Grant. What is the PIN Grant? The PIN Grant the last two years
you have offered $25,000 to neighborhoods for different programs for improving
their neighborhoods. Neighborhood associations get together to discuss what they
can do and plan activities such as transplanting trees of buying playground
equipment to make their neighborhoods a better place. This year we received 7
grants from eight different neighborhood associations and one was eventually
withdrawn. So we will present six to you tonight. The process that we used was
each neighborhood association got together, as I mentioned, discussed what they
wanted to use the funds for, submitted a written PIN Grant application on March
1. The Neighborhood Council of Iowa City then reviewed each grant prior to
another meeting at which time short presentations of each grant were done. We
then had a question and answer session to clarify any information and ask
questions. We had a final meeting in April where people followed up with this
information and then the Neighborhood Council of Iowa City proceeded to go
ahead and rank each grant using a form that we developed previously. The final
step is here where we would like to recommend once again that you allocate
$25,000 for the wonderful PIN Grants that you will hear all about tonight. The
benefits are numerous. not only to the members of the neighborhood but to the
community. It is a great chance to get to know your neighbors, kind of do some
team building things, fun activities together, as well as share information and
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resources. And the most important thing, I feel, is that a lot of these opportunities
and projects would not be possible without the PIN Grant funding. So without
further ado, I would like to welcome the first PIN Grant which is the West High
walkway.
Marsha Akeson/Ty'N Cae Neighborhood. The West High walkway project is a four
neighborhood joint effort. The neighborhood chairperson Judy Full should really
be here but couldn't. She put forth a great deal of effort. She negotiated with the
school district, Aspen Condos, and the City regarding the location and the details.
Students from the four neighborhoods and city bus riders have been entering from
the southeast through the Condo parking lot to a mud and rough rock maintenance
road, up a steep hill to school. The new city trail and bridges will connect Walden
Woods directly to the Southgate and our neighborhoods will have more direct
access without cutting through parking lots. The history, the need, and the
negotiation covers many years. We have additional funding sources which include
the bike group FIRST, who has offered a matching grant for funds raised from our
hot-dog sale at Fareway, River Products has offered to donate 500 tons of rock.
The grant will provide a safe hard walkway surface walkway for students to walk
or bike connecting to the new city trail being constructed this summer. And in
addition, access for northern neighborhoods by bike trail to the Willow Creek
Park will also be enhanced. Thank you.
Mary Lewis/Grant Wood Neighborhood Association and, this is Jane Klitzka also with
Grant Wood Neighborhood Association. This year Grant Wood Neighborhood
ssociation applied for two grants. One is a rather small grant for $500 for a few
more trees for the wetlands. As you know, the Grant Wood Neighborhood
Association adopted the Whispering Meadows Wetlands Park and has been active
in getting it established as a neighborhood park since the beginming. In the spring
of 1995 the Grant Wood Neighborhood Association applied for a PIN Grant for
$5,000 for trees and shrubs for Whispering Meadows Wetlands Park. We planted
over 65 trees and 100 shrubs in the spring of 1996. After we completed the project
we decided there were a few areas that we neglected and in that process we have
applied now for $500 to plant ten more trees in the area that will provide shade in
some strategic areas along the pond and around the benches. This project has been
approved by and supported by Terry Trueblood and the Parks and Recreation
Commission. The other project that we applied for is $5,000 to assist in sidewalk
repairs in our neighborhood. Earl this spring 470 damaged sidewalks in the Grant
Wood Neighborhood were marked for repairs by the city. These sidewalks have
been in need of repair for quite some time, giving the neighborhood a slightly run
down appearance, not to mention dangerous for pedestrians. Because of the long
period of time between inspections, many residents found that they have several
squares in need of repair. We first checked for other resources for assistance for
the neighborhood and we found that there are not other resources available to
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assist with the replacement of these sidewalk squares. In an effort to promote a
sense of pride and to help beautify the neighborhood, we applied for $5,000 PIN
Grant to assist the homeowners with these repairs. The first priority of dispensing
the grant money is to pay for sidewalk repair for people meeting the HUD
guidelines for low income and disabled residents. Any funds left over will be
dispersed evenly between residents who have requested financial assistance. At
this time it would be approximately $25 per square with the homeowner paying
the remainder of the cost. The money will only be used for sidewalks that have
been marked by the city. We currently plan to pay for the entire cost of sidewalk
repairs for 32 residents which would be around 50 squares in the Grant Wood
Neighborhood Association for the people that meet the HUD guidelines. We will
also assist in another 20 residents which will be about 33 squares with sidewalk
repairs. We feel this is an excellent project for a PIN Grant. It benefits many
residents of the area and promotes a sense of pride and involvement. Many of the
people interested in this grant have also joined the Grant Wood Neighborhood
Association to help with other planned projects. Thank you for the opportunity to
speak about our PIN Grant project.
Nov/Thank you.
Joyce Barrett/With the Northside Neighborhood Association. We applied for PIN Grant
for North Market Square Improvements which is primarily a new playground.
North Market Square sits in the heart of the Northside Neighborhood Association.
The Northside represents 1800 households comprising some 4300 persons, 50%
of these which fall below the 50% median family income. The Northside being an
older part of the city, the houses have small lots and yards which increases
demands for play equipment at the park. The park enjoys heavy use from a broad
range of neighbors for the basketball court, playing field, volleyball pit, shelter
and small playground. North Market Square is also located adjacent to Horace
Mann School whose 300 students use the park for a playground. 42% of the
school's population receive free and reduce lunches. Several neighborhood pre-
schools also use the park grounds which include the adjacent Preucil School. The
Northside Neighborhood Association has joined in parmership with the schools to
see improvements made to the playground, targeting the two to ten year old age
group. The Northside Neighborhood Association plans to contribute its own
money to provide park benches for park improvements. In the future we also hope
to see an improved lighting plan. We appreciate the support and cooperation from
the Iowa City Parks and Recreation staff and board as they intend to provide
matching funds to the PIN Grant project.
Nov/Thank you.
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Pam Ehrhardt/I am in the Longfellow Neighborhood Association. And we applied for
$1,000 grant for purchase of trees to be planted along our neighborhood streets.
This is the third year we have applied for similar grant and received it the last two
years. Our goal, in planting these trees, is to select species of trees and select the
site of the trees that will maintain or establish the canopy along and in our older
neighborhood. We very much appreciate the funds being available through the
PIN Grant. The City Forester's budget does not allow for planting these kind of
trees. Thank you.
Nov/Thank you.
David Dawes/I am the coordinator of the Pepperwood Neighborhood Association.
Briefly I wanted to talk to you about the lower Sandusky Drive Tree Planting
Project. So you all know where Pepperwood is but now I will do a close up view
of the area. Basically what you are looking at now is about 250 homes in the area
which, as most of you know and for the viewers at home, it is basically the
neighborhood behind Best Buy and EconoFoods area known as Pepperwood
Place. Last spring our Pepperwood Neighborhood Association survey showed a
78% response to plant trees along streets in our neighborhood and as you can see
on this map, major thoroughfare through our neighborhood, the Sandusky Drive,
the lower Sandusky Drive Tree Planting Project represented about a 1/2 mile area
from Taylor Drive to the east to Cock Street on the west and our $4,000 PIN
Grant basically represents a total of 16 two inch diameter trees which we will
plant on either the northside or the southside of Sandusky Drive. This project will
basically be planted by our neighborhood residents this fall after completion of
two Public Works Improvement Projects. The first phase was recently completed
towards the end of April and the second one as I understand it through Streets and
Sanitation will be completed later this summer. So it is really a celebration of
completion of public improvement projects in our neighborhood and also to
celebrate a belated Earth Day if you may. Thank you.
Nov/Thank you.
Williams/I would like to conclude once again by thanicing you for the opportunity to
discuss the PIN Grants. It is a wonderful way to meet neighbors and as evidenced
by Grant Wood, to get more people involved in the neighborhood associations. So
we are looking forward and hoping that you will go ahead and approve the
$25,000 and this is a way that city council can make a direct impact and you can
see visible improvements in the neighborhoods. Thank you very much.
Nov/And thank you for a succinct presentation.
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Williams/I forgot to mention, if anyone has questions about applying for PIN Grants or
the Neighborhood Council of Iowa City, please feel free to contact any of the
members or Marsha Klingaman, the Neighborhood Services Coordinator.
Nov/Do we have any questions from city council?
Thornberry/I have a question. I don't know who to ask about this. Pam, you mentioned
first, I believe, planting trees along the neighborhood streets. Is this between the
sidewalk and the street and have you contacted the City Forester as to the type of
trees that can be planted?
Ehrhardt/When possible, we want to plant them between the street and the sidewalk. In
some cases there is not enough room and the Forester suggested that we put them
on the private. So some of them on the private. The city staff does not do any of
the digging holes.
Thornberry/Do you lmow the distance between the curb of the street and the sidewalk
that is required to plant a tree there because we requested the City Forester to
plant some trees out in our front yard and we were told we couldn't because the
distance wasn't enough and there was a line running down there or something.
Ehrhardt/Well, we have had more trouble with the cables rather than the spacing. That
there are cables-
Kubby/Underground utilities.
Ehrhardt/Right. So, in that case, then we put them as Close as we can to the sidewalk but
on private. I don't know that your answer- Because of exact footage required.
Thornberry/Some type of trees-
Atkins/Terry consults with folks like Pam when they make those decisions. Dean, I don't
recall the exact width. I keep wanting to say nine feet and in most of the older
neighborhoods, usually that parkway area is free of public utilities. Newer
neighborhoods on the other hand you find them filled with utilities and that is
normally the reason why you don't see them planted.
Ehrhardt/And some species can, like crab and that, can be planted in a smaller space but
we have avoided- We don't plant crab trees and those. We have been trying to
replace the old trees that actually form the canopy.
Thornberry/I wanted to bring this out for the public so that it is nice to plant trees but if
people around town would like to plant trees between the sidewalk and the street,
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they should probably check with the city forester or Terry Trueblood or something
before they purchase the tree to plant it because it may not be suitable for that area
and I don't know what they do. They take it out or they-
Atkins/Well, we try to avoid talcing the tree out. I just encourage anyone who is planning
or thinking about the r.o.w., call our Forester, call the Department of Public
Works. We have the utilities mapped, particularly in the newer neighborhoods and
even planting on the private property side of the sidewalk, you have got to use
some discretion because the roots will just start popping your sidewalk and you
end up with another problem.
Kubby/Getting the species that goes high enough and interferes with the lines and then
you get it trimmed in a strange way.
Atkins/Often in the newer neighborhoods most of the utilities are underground now
anyway. You don't have to get as concerned about it. The older neighborhoods-
Dawes/In the case of the Pepperwood Neighborhood, there is a 10 foot easement
between the existing sidewalk and to the street and checking with city staff, they
clearly said there was enough distance to select suitable plantings and Steve
mentioned about the concern of underground utilities and where we will
eventually decide if you may host families to basically take under root, no pun
intended, a host site for the trees. We will make sure that it won't be in close
proximity or interrupt existing underground utilities. Also one other thing. In
checking with city staff, I do know that if other residents within the city who have
not, you know, become actively involved with neighborhood PIN Grants. They
can request a tree in their neighborhood and city staff will add that to the list if
you may and I think it is twice a year in the spring and in the fall that they go
through the reservation list to determine availability of trees and try to best match
that with other trees in the neighborhoods if there is a good cross pollination of
existing trees.
Thornberry/Thank you.
Kubby/I had a question about the West High walkway. A couple of clarifying questions.
In a couple of places in the documentation there was talk about a gate being
locked. You could just clarify. Maybe I just mis-read that. That how will students
access school property through the gate?
Klingaman/I am going to respond to that if that is okay. Marsha was involved but Judy
obviously was more integral to the whole discussion. The negotiations occurred
with the school district involved the potential for closing off the gate that
currently exists on the southeast side of the gate near condominium development
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that runs near that location. I don't know how many are familiar with that. It
sounds as if there has been years and years of discussion occurring between the
condominium association and the school because of students talcing their breaks
down in their area in the paricing lot and sitting on cars, balconies and those types
of things. So they have gotten a little frustrated over the situation. The idea is to
relocate that gate opening down to where this trail then meets or the walkway will
meet- Well, the creek trail. So it will be moved south.
Kubby/So it is not a locked gate, it is a passage way through the fencing.
Klingamard The existing?
Kubby/The one that will be moved.
Klingaman/It will be a gate but it will be open all the time from what I understand. The
other alternative is to put in some type of- The concern of the school is they do
not want vehicles to be able to go through that area. So they were going to put up
either some ballards or something that would allow pedestrian traffic or bikes or
whatever but no vehicles to go through.
Kubby/And the school district has pledged to maintain this trail?
Klingaman/Maintain it? To the best condition that they can, replacing the rock and-
Kubby/Does that include snow removal?
Klingaman/The Willow Creek Trail will not have snow removal from it and since that is
a city property that was something that we couldn't push real hard with the school
district. They do not plow the current roadway that the students use now. So,
whether it is going to be an improvement or not.
Kubby/I know that there was some discussion about issues.
CHANGE TAPE TO REEL 97-84 SIDE 1
Klingaman/The surface itself is real similar to what is being constructed throughout a lot
of the trail systems in the parks in the city. It is more the slope that is the problem.
They could not reasonably meet ADA standards, I believe it is a 1:5 slope to meet
that and they have got it somewhere in 1:7 or 1:8. It is- I don't know how many
have been back in that area. It is very very steep and in order to be able to put a
trail that would meet ADA, you would be talking about something that would go
triple to quadruple of length of what they got planned. So they did their best and
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they are going to extend it somewhat so that it levels out as much as they can. But
it will not meet ADA requirements.
Nov/Okay. Anything else?
Kubby/I am real glad neighborhoods are active and they are things you want to get done
and you are getting them done.
Nov/Before we wrap this up, I have one concern. Marsha Klingaman has heard me say
this but I am going to say it out loud to the general public. I think paying for
sidewalk repairs based on HUD standards is something that if we do it, we should
do it in all neighborhoods. I don't want people who have low income to say I paid
for my sidewalk and then I helped pay for somebody else's sidewalk also.
Kubby/Nov/(Both talking at same time).
Nov/It is not a matter of neighborhood and PIN Grants because there are plenty of people
who are not in organized neighborhoods. I think I have said before, I have very
strong feelings about even treatment and fairness if we are going to give people
low income discounts. I would like us to be able to say we can at least offer
something to any low income person who meets HUD guidelines. We can say it is
a no interest loan or a lien on the property to be paid when it is sold. But I don't
like the idea that we said these low income people will get a discount and the
other ones will not.
Baker/I agree with you. We haven't got a process yet and nor do we have consensus on
what the guidelines really are.
Nov/They are talking about HUD guidelines.
Baker/Well, we only had a consensus on what those are.
Norton/We should hammer out a way of getting it done more widely and more equitably.
But meantime, let's do this.
Nov/I am not saying that I am going to vote against doing this but I think if we are going
to offer help in sidewalk replacements to low income people, we cannot say only
if they have a neighborhood association and apply for a PIN Grant. That is not
fair.
Baker/Does sidewalk repair qualify for the Housing Rehab Program if somebody wanted
to apply for? Steve or Marsha? Sidewalks would not be eligible for Housing
Rehab money?
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Atkins/I really kind of doubt it. Yeah, that is my immediate reaction.
Nov/It is usually housing.
Baker/It has to be the house.
Atkins/I thought it had to be, yeah.
Klingaman/From what I understand they do qualify. It is the logistics of whether or not it
is practical to administer an explicit sidewalk repair program under those
guidelines.
Kubby/So if someone were doing a bigger rehab project and one little piece of their big
project was repairing one square. But if they came in with just for one square, it is
not feasible for us to administer it.
Klingaman/No and we are tallring about a, you know, a $75 per square cost probably and
that gets administratively very expensive.
Norton/We are undertaking a more serious look at our overall sidewalk policy and I
suspect one of the things we will try to do is figure out how to deal with this
problem. It is difficult to be fair to everybody concerned.
Nov/And we have talked about low income discounts of other city services. I just don't
want this one to come out being unfair.
Lehman/Naomi, I would suggest that perhaps in the future until we can resolve this,
perhaps we make replacement of sidewalks not eligible for PIN Grants.
Nov/Well, I don't want to do that after the neighborhood has gone through all of this.
Norton/He means in the future.
Lehman/No, I mean in the future.
Kubby/No, I disagree with that. I think it is an important part of how people interact in
the neighborhood is having safe sidewalks. If they are safe and they are clear.
more people will sue them. I think it is an absolutely perfect project for PIN
Grant.
Nov/I wouldn't call it perfect. I would call it unfair. I am not going to vote no.
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Thornberry/How about, Karen, if there is a neighborhood that doesn't have a sidewalk
down one or two blocks, would an association then apply for a PIN Grant to put in
a sidewalk?
Kubby/If they wanted to. Then it would be up to the neighborhood council to decide if
that was the recommended project or not.
Baker/And us to agree or not.
Kubby/Right.
Norton/There might be a huge need in a certain neighborhood.
Kubby/That is right. Maybe if there is a school and there is just this one block that is a
link that is not made. There is everything from the school to this one little place
and there is nothing and then-
Baker/We do sidewalk assessments all of the time. We force people to build sidewalks,
don't we?
Nov/We do.
Baker/If they are necessary, they don't have to go through this process.
Council/(All talking).
Atkins/We encourage.
Baker/We don't force them, we encourage them. We don't lean on them or anything.
Thornberry/There is not a sidewalk-
Lehman/There is not a sidewalk where?
Thornberry/There is not a sidewalk between Oaks Drive and North Dodge and that is a
good two blocks and there is not a sidewalk on either side of the street. Now if
they formed a neighborhood association and showed a need because there is also a
school bus stop there.
Council/(All talking).
Nov/Are they going to fit the HUD low income guidelines?
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Baker/That is Dean's neighborhood.
Lehman/You should spearhead the installation of that sidewalk and there will be an
assessment of the properties.
Thomberry/Never mind, I withdraw the question.
Baker/Take some of those potbelly pigs and-
Thornberry/It talces a longer leash than that.
Nov/Okay, folks. Any other discussion?
Lehman/Just one comment. I think probably there is no money that we spend that is
probably better spent than on the neighborhood and I don't think we have ever
had a group of folks who appreciate us spending the money. We spend millions
and people don't appreciate it. We spend just a few dollars and you folks
appreciate it and I appreciate your attitude.
Jennifer Williams/I would like to make a brief comment on the sidewalk project. We
worked with the PIN Grants from the beginning with the neighborhood council
and one of the reasons that we had set up the process that we have for approving
the PIN Grants that have been applied for includes the - To improve your
neighborhood and beautify your neighborhood and create a sense of pride in your
neighborhood and in our neighborhood a couple of years ago we worked on
getting a CDBG Grant to do some sidewalk repairs before they were mariced and
we couldn't get it. We didn't qualify. There aren't funds available to help with
this project. What better way to use the funds to improve your neighborhood and
to make it a safer place to live than to improve your sidewalks and everyone if
going to benefit. It is not going to be just a few. Yes, we did set the priorities for
low income. That is where the money should go first in our opinion and it was
approved by the Neighborhood Council to do that also. I am sorry that there is no
other funds available and I do hope this sparks some discussion and hopefully
some way to help assist other people because it does come as a hardship when you
have four squares in front of your house that needs to be replaced at $75 a piece
and how are you going to do that. You lcnow, especially in a neighborhood like
our neighborhood. So I do think this is a good project for PIN money. If other
neighborhoods apply for it, I do have to think that the chances of a neighborhood
being mariced more than once in maybe a 5 to 10 year time is pretty slim. Unless
there is a complaint, they are not going to come back for 10 years. It is not going
to be something that is going to repeatedly come to you in a PIN Grant form.
Maybe at first because they are going to do the whole city but after that you are
not going to see it just repeatedly come back every year.
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Kubby/Thank you.
Nov/I still want to see us do something. At least a no interest loan if somebody qualifies
on the basis of income.
Thornberry/You are right. It will spark discussion.
Nov/Okay, roll call- (yes). We have approved the resolution.
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ITEM NO. 13 CONSIDER A RESOLUTION ESTABLISHING TCI CABLEVISION'S
"MAXIMUM PERMITTED RATE" FOR BASIC CABLE SERVICE.
Nov/Moved by Kubby, seconded by Lehman. Tell me, what is this rate? What is the total
rather than the $0.04 difference?
Helling/It is on the resolution.
Nov/Off the top of my head I don't remember and I would like it to be in the-
Kubby/$11.05.
Helling/No, it is a little higher than $11.05.
Kubby/$11.70.
Helling/I think that is right. I think $11.70 is the rate that they are proposing to charge. I
don't have that resolution flagged in here.
Norton/So you want $11.66. They want to raise it to $11.70.
Helling/The maximum permitted rate is simply a rate, would be a maximum they can
charge under Federal Communication Commission guidelines. The rate that they
are proposing to charge this year is the same as the maximum permitted rate
which is arguably $0.04 more per month for the basic package than they would be
allowed. If you recall, last year we- There was a discrepancy of about 10 1/2
cents. We appealed that to the Federal Communications Commission. We haven't
gotten a ruling. A resolution of that issue could very well say they split the
difference or whatever could very well render this $0.04 difference moot but we
don't know that because we don't have the ruling from last year yet. Quite
frankly, this is a very small amount of money. The FCC has tons and tons of these
kinds of things to look at and I don't hold out a lot of hope that we are going to
get any relief from them at all. This may remain as an ongoing kind of dispute
but, in fact, the 1996 Act totally deregulates all rates in 1999. So to take it to the
courts and litigate this amount of money, you know, maybe it is something we
would want to look real seriously at doing or consider it very seriously before we
do it because of the fact they are going to be totally deregulated in two years. If
we are able to enforce $0.04 less rate now, they can certainly make it up then.
Kubby/Even though $0.04 doesn't sound like a lot, when you think of $0.04 per
household per month, over the years that adds up to a lot of money that the federal
law says TCI doesn't deserve to have on their rates and so it does take a chunk of
money out of the community that is not staying here, that shouldn't be leaving. So
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I hope that as long as they are regulated, that even though we don't get an answer,
that we do file the documents.
Helling/Establishing this rate simply preserves our right to do that.
Thornberry/I distributed a list to the council. After being in Ann Arbor, Michigan one
weekend, I lifted it out o£my hotel room. I borrowed it. I will return a copy. But it
got like 50 channels for less money than we are paying here.
Norton/That basic set was pretty grim though, Dean, I understand. I couldn't find the
Bulls for example.
Baker/They have a different city manager there, too.
Kubby/We have in our franchise agreement, they are suppose to do their expansion, their
rebuild, by February of '98 which is coming up quicker than I think people
realize. Well, and then hopefully we will have some recourses because it is a very
clear part of our franchise agreement.
Thornberry/I lmow but it is cheaper for them to pay the fine than it is to re-do the-
Lehman/I am not sure that is true.
Thomberry/Yeah, it is. Yeah, their fine isn't all that much for noncompliance, the
number of channels that they are suppose to have for the money.
Lehman/Well, be that as it may, I think they really have a responsibility to the cable
users to pass this.
Norton/Do they actually raise the rates and worry about the decision later?
Helling/Sure.
Council/(All talking).
Helling/The number is $11.70, that is what they are saying is the maximum permitted
rate and our calculations are $11.66.
Nov/Okay.
Thornberry/But Dee, you said the other from Ann Arbor was pretty grim for the basic
but the basic.
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Norton/$7.00 1 guess.
Thornberry/Yeah, it was $7.00 for the basic but you get the expanded package like I have
the expanded package here.
Norton/Theirs was $24.00.
Thornberry/Yeah, $24.00 and like 50 channels.
Kubby/How much TV can you watch?
Thornberry/I know but they have the history channel, they have the travel channel, they
have the golf channel.
Lehman/You don't have any control over that.
Thornberry/They have three public access channels and they have the council meetings
on and they have school things and everything.
Norton/There is probably competition in that.
Nov/They have control over the basic cham~el, the public access channels, whatever. The
reason they are getting all of those alternatives that we do not get is because they
are a neighbor of Detroit and those channels are there and they are, you know-
Thornberry/They are on satellite. All they have got to do is beam them down, Scottie.
Nov/No, they have a variety of different cable systems. Okay, folks. Roll call- (yes). We
have approved this resolution.
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ITEM NO. 14 CONSIDER A RESOLUTION AUTHORIZING APPLICATIONS FOR
100 UNITS OF SECTION 8 VOUCHERS FOR MAINSTREAM HOUSING
OPPORTUNITIES FOR PERSONS WITH DISABILITIES.
Nov/Moved by Kubby, seconded by Norton. Discussion.
Vanderhoef/I just like to say in discussion last night I asked and was assured that with
the addition is we were fortunate enough to get all 100 rental vouchers, that this
would not increase our administrative costs or increase any staff to administer.
Atkins/May I comment just to maize sure. I think there may be some administrative costs
increase but we are not planning to add staff. Just so we understood each other.
Nov/And we are planning to receive some administrative funding.
Atkins/Yes but there is a cost.
Vanderhoeff So it is no new administrative costs to the city, excuse me.
Nov/Okay.
Vanderhoef/We are on the same line, thank you.
Nov/All right, anything else? Roll call- (yes). We have approved this resolution.
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May 20, 1997 City of Iowa City Page 13
ITEM NO. 15.
CONSIDER A RESOLUTION AUTHORIZING NEW REVISED PUBLIC
HOUSING LEASE.
Comment: The Iowa City Housing Authority administers 107 Public
Housing rental units. The Public Housing Lease is being revised to update
all regulatory changes recently approved by HUD and includes
recommendations from the state NAHRO (National Association of
Housing & Redevelopment Officials) agency. The thirty day comment
period, as required, began on April 7, 1997. This Lease will be come
effective immediately upon Council approval.
included i n~u/~p~a~ k/~.~ ~
Action:_
Staff
memora~_/~
ITEIVI NO, 16.
CONSIDER A RESOLUTION APPROVING AND AUTHORIZING EXECUTION
OF AN AGREEIVIENT WITH THE UNIVERSITY OF IOWA FOR TEIVIPORARY
USE OF PUBLIC RIGHT-OF-WAY FOR A PORTION OF CLINTON STREET.
Comment: This temporary easement is to allow The University of Iowa
to temporarily close a City sidewalk a ten (10) foot wide portion of the
City street adjacent to their property along the west edge of Clinton
Street. This easement is requested in order to facilitate the renovation
and construction of a new entrance to Burge Hall located at 301 N.
Clinton Street and to secure the construction site from pedest)~__~
vehicular .traffic. ~/~/, ~ ~ /
#16 page 1
ITEM NO. 16 CONSIDER A RESOLUTION APPROVING AND AUTHORIZING
EXECUTION OF AN AGREEMENT WITH THE UNIVERSITY OF IOWA FOR
TEMPORARY USE OF PUBLIC RIGHT-OF-WAY FOR A PORTION OF CLINTON
STREET.
Nov/Moved by Vanderhoef, seconded by Thornberry. Discussion. Can we state for the
record when is this going to happen? Do we know?
Dilkes/Yeah, it is in there. Just a second, I will get it for you.
Nov/I would like somebody to say it out loud for those who are listening.
Kubby/State it during council time.
Nov/All right, we will state it during council time. That makes sense. Okay, roll call-
(yes). We have approved this resolution.
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May 20, 1997 City of Iowa City Page 14
ITEM NO. 17.
CONSIDER A RESOLUTION AWARDING CONTRACT AND AUTHORIZING
MAYOR TO SIGN AND CITY CLERK TO ATTEST CONTRACT FOR
CONSTRUCTION OF THE RAW WATER MAIN PROJECT - CONTRACT 1
IN CONNECTION WITH THE WATER SUPPLY AND TREATMENT
FACILITIES IMPROVEMENTS PROJECT.
Comment: The bid opening for this project was held May 13, 1997. The
following bids were received:
Maxwell Construction, Iowa City, IA
Yordi Excavating, North Liberty, IA
Langman Construction, Rock Island, IL
Hurst & Sons, Waterloo, IA
Van Haugen, Clive, IA
Engineer's Estimate
$ 750,765.00
$ 752,995.45
$ 944,701.00
$1,068,435.58
$1,283,720.00
8995,221.00
This project includes the raw water main construction from the existing water
plant to Foster Road, and the Iowa, River Corridor Trail from Park Road to Taft
Speedway. Approximately $~,~8~.= of the total project cost is for trail
construction. Public Works and Engineering recommend award of the contract
to Maxwell Construction Co. of Iowa City, IA. This project will be funded
water revenues and Road Use Tax funds. __
Action: *~'~ ~~/~~ ~//~
ITEM NO. 18.
CONSIDER A RESOLUTION DIRECTING SALE OF 910,600,000 SEWER
REVENUE BONDS.
Comment: Sealed bids on the sale of these bonds were received at
11:00 a.m. on May 20, 1997. Bond proceeds will be used to pay costs
of improvements and extensions to the Municipal Sanitary Sewer Utility..
Project costs include the Wylde Green Sanitary Sewer, Sheridan Avenue
Sanitary Sewer, Scott Boulevard Trunk Sewer, Willow Creek Sanitary
Sewer, Napoleon Park Lift Station, one year debt service reserve, and
Bond Issuance Costs. Wastewater revenues will repay the debt service
on these bonds. This resolution ratifies and confirms the actions of the
City Clerk and the Finance Director in the determination of the most
favorable bid. A completed resolution will
Council at the May 20 meeting.
Action: '-~~~/~~~
be
presented to the City
#17 page 1
ITEM NO. 17 CONSIDER A RESOLUTION AWARDING CONTRACT AND
AUTHORIZING MAYOR TO SIGN AND CITY CLERK TO ATTEST CONTRACT
FOR CONSTRUCTION OF THE RAW WATER MAIN PROJECT - CONTRACT 1 IN
CONNECTION WITH THE WATER SUPPLY AND TREATMENT FACILITIES
IMPROVEMENTS PROJECT.
Nov/Moved by Thornberry, seconded by Lehman. I want to remind the council that the
approximate cost of the trail was changed from $350,000 to $270,000 just today.
Any other discussion?
Thomberry/I have a question. Did they all bid on the same thing, Chuck. I mean, the
difference between $750,000 and almost $1.3 million is quite a difference. Did
they all have the same specifications? What is the- Why such a large- I don't
normally see this big of discrepancy.
Schmadeke/I don't lmow why there is such a difference. The out of town contractors are
generally higher at least in this case. But I don't- That is not necessarily always
true.
Thornberry/That is right.
Vanderhoef/I am pleased with the bid.
Thornberry/Thank you. I just thought, geez, if there was something they included.
Norton/The wage rates are different.
Thomberry/Coming from Des Moines, maybe they charged mileage or something.
Nov/That is possible.
Thornberry/Okay.
Nov/I think they are entitled to charge for the miles.
Thornberry/Yeah and putting the people up in town.
Atkins/They are entitled to charge mileage, put people up in town and not get the bid.
Thornberry/Yeah.
Lehman/Why don't we give the bid to somebody?
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Thomberry/Let's go Maxwell Construction in Iowa City.
Nov/Okay, roll call- (yes). We have approved the resolution.
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#18 page 1
ITEM NO. 18 CONSIDER A RESOLUTION DIRECTING SALE OF $10,600,000
SEWER REVENUE BONDS.
Nov/Let's see what we have here.
Kubby/We have a great interest rate.
Lehman/Yes, we do.
Nov/We have a low bid of $9,305,994.79 and the interest rate is 5.5373%. Okay. Moved
by Lehman, seconded by Kubby. Don Yucuis, do you want to explain any of these
numbers? Yes, please do.
Yucuis/This bond issue, $10.6 million, for sewer revenue bonds for sewer projects
obviously. We listed some projects previously in the inf. packet. Napoleon Park
Lift Station, Willow Creek Sanitary Sewer, that is actually first phase. Include
Scoot Blvd. Trunk Sewer, part of that funding. Sheridan Avenue Sanitary Sewer,
Wylde Green Sanitary Sewer, and this also includes a one year debt service
reserve which is required when we issue revenue bonds and design and issuance
costs. We did receive three bids. It was actually a syndicate of a group of people
that bid with Piper Jeffrey being the lead player in one group, Griffin Kubick in
another and Childs Hyder in another group. It may look like there is only three
bidders but it was probably close to 15 to 17 groups that were involved in this bid.
So I am real pleased with the rates. One other note. The rating on the bonds tkom
Moody's came in at an A2 which is a new rating from Moody's. Our previous
rating was A and they have expanded the A rating to an A1, A2, A3 with an A1
being the highest in the A level. It may sound like we are a little bit lower than
where we probably should be. The bonds did sell at a AA1 level or the equivalent
and part of the reason for that is the companies that did bid insured the bonds.
They paid that out of their own pocket to insure the bonds and make sure they
were easier to re-sell. So we got a real good interest rate. 1- because of the
insurance and 2- because we are a good client in the market. Iowa City is good in
the market as far as re-paying their bond debt. Again, I am pleased at the rates and
recommend that we award the bid to Piper Jarfray.
Kubby/Thankyou.
Nov/Any council questions. Roll call- (yes). We have approved the resolution.
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May 20, 1997 City of Iowa City Page 15
ITEM NO. 19.
RESOLUTION AUTHORIZING EXECUTION OF A CHAPTER 28E
AGREEIVIENT BETWEEN THE CITY OF IOWA CITY AND THE CITY OF
CORALVILLE REGARDING CERTAIN OBLIGATIONS INVOLVING THE
IOWA RIVER POWER DAM RENOVATION PROJECT.
Comment: The City of Iowa City owns the Iowa River Power dam
located on the Iowa River to the east of the Iowa River Power restaurant.
The City desires to renovate the dam to ensure the permanence of the
water pool formed by the dam and to provide a pedestrian bridge atop the
dam. The Iowa Department of Natural Resources requires the
reconstruction of the Coralville boat ramp to the Iowa River as part of the
Iowa River Power Dam Renovation Project. The 28E Agreement sets
forth the respective rights and obligations of the Cities of Coraiville and
Iowa City. Coralville has agreed to pay $125,000 of the cost of the
renovation project, which has been considered made by Coralville's
application for and receipt of a Resource Enhancement and Protection
(REAP) grant from the Iowa Department of Natural Resources in the
amount of $150,000. The City of Coralville has already executed the
28E Agreenyentl
Action:
ITEIVI NO. 20.
ANNOUNCEMENT OF VACANCIES.
a. Previously-Announced Vacancies.
(1)
Design Review Committee ~ One vacancy for a Licensed Architect
or Business/Property Owner from the Central Business District or
Near Southside Neighborhood to fill an unexpired term ending
July 1, 1998. (Martin Haynes resigned.) (3 males and 2 females
currently serve on this Committee.)
This appointment will be made at the June 17 meeting of the City
Council.
ITEIVI NO. 21. CITY COUNCIL APPOINTMENTS.
Consider three appointments to the Board of Library Trustees: To fill
six-year terms ending July 1, 2003. (Terms expire for Stephen
Greenleaf, Philip Hubbard, and Margaret Cox.) (3 males and 3
females currently serve on this Board.)
#19 page 1
ITEM NO. 19 RESOLUTION AUTHORIZING EXECUTION OF A CHAPTER 28E
AGREEMENT BETWEEN THE CITY OF IOWA CITY AND THE CITY OF
CORALVILLE REGARDING CERTAIN OBLIGATIONS INVOLVING THE IOWA
RIVER POWER DAM RENOVATION PROJECT.
Nov/Moved by Vanderhoef, seconded by Norton.
Atkins/Chuck wanted me to ask you if you would like any more further information on
this project.
Nov/No thank you.
Vanderhoef/Thank you but no thank you.
Norton/I was curious about the bottom line. This dam is an important component of the
water project, right, to stabilize that water. But I just want to comment that we
heard that the dam is in pretty poor condition and it is going to be quite a bundle
of funds expended to renovate it. Isn't that true?
Thornberry/Probably why the county sold it to us for $1.00.
Lehman/That is why we got a 45 minute presentation to make it worth it.
Thornberry/I understand the nuts and bolts of that one.
Norton/The dollar signs kept jumping through my head, I will tell you.
Nov/There is not question that it will be expensive but it is also necessary as our other
water expenses.
Atkins/I think you also- I personally believe it is a very critical community asset that the
county was not about to invest in and if you think about it, getting the trail as well
as maintaining the water table. I think there really are a number of advantages to
the whole project. The water in particular but there are a number of advantages,
particularly it opens up a rather large tract of land eventually from that part of
town which we can all enjoy.
Vanderhoef/It also opens up a very nice way to communicate between the two cities that
is a safe one that isn't in Hwy 6 for bicycles and- It is a very important-
Norton/I don't disagree with any of those. I am just saying if we look at the cost of the
water project and we are going to be hearing a briefing on them, this is going to be
a big number in there.
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Thomberry/You are right.
Norton/Be ready for a little sticker shock.
Thomberry/Yep, you are right.
Vanderhoef/The whole water project has sticker shock.
Thornberry/We have taken out the fish ladders however.
Kubby/I will tell you what I find out about them. I will pursuing that issue.
Nov/Okay, roll call- (yes). We have approved the resolution.
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May 20, 1997
City of Iowa City
Page 1 6
Consider one appointment to the Design Review Committee: To fill a
three-year term ending July 1, 2000. (Term expires for Randy
Rohovit.) (3 males and 2 females currently serve on this Committee.)
Note: Philip Reisetter's term also ends July 1, 1997, but will not be
filled. The number of members of the Design Review Committee were
to be decreased according to Resolution 96-264.
ITEM NO. 22.
c. Consider two appointments to the Historic Preservation Commission:
To fill three-year terms ending March 29, 2000; one representing the
East College Street District and one representing the College Green
District. (These are new positions on the Commission.) (4 males and
4 females currently serve on this Commission.)
~ITY OOU~OIL l~FO~TlO~.
ITEM NO. 23.
REPORT ON ITEMS FROM THE CITY MANAGER AND CITY ATTORNEY.
a. City Manager.
b. City Attorney.
ITEM NO. 24. ADJOURNMENT,
City of iowa City
MEMORANDUM
DATE:
TO:
FROM:
RE:
May 19, 1997
Mayor, City Council, and General Public
Sue Walsh, Deputy City Clerk
Addition to May 20, 1997 City Council Agenda
ITEM NO. 21.d. - Motion to appoint Eleanor M. Dilkes as Acting City Attorney
#22 page 1
ITEM NO. 22 CITY COUNCIL INFORMATION.
Nov/City Council Information. We will start with Mr. Norton.
Norton/I just want to mention two things. First I want to comment to the public about a
report that we got from staff. A kind of Downtown Action Plan responding to
recommendations for the Downtown Strategy Committee and outlining ways in
which we can proceed both in the short and near term to respond to some of the
suggestions made. It is really a wonderful action report. I think the city staff took
a retreat kind of.
Atkins/About 20 of us went away for a day to put it together.
Norton/I think it is a very nice way to turn recommendations into somewhat closer to
reality and to remind people that we are moving. I guess they could see that
project, pick up a copy of that report.
Atkins/Sure.
Norton/City Clerk's Office.
Atkins/And my office.
Norton/Another report I want to call attention is a report done by a class at the University
of Iowa and the College of Business on downtown shuttle proposal that you may
have read about it in the local press. But the report is quite interesting and copies
of that, I think, are available from the College of Business or here. It was a class
project on a downtown shuttle.
Baker/(Can't hear), did we?
Norton/I thought copies were to be sent here. I guess I should have-
Nov/They did say they were going to send them but they did not say when.
Atkins/We will get them for you.
Norton/It is quite an interesting proposal.
Kubby/And maybe one for the library. An extra one for the library. Thanks for you and
Naomi going to that on such short notice.
Nov/It was interesting.
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Kubby/Listening directly to their proposal.
Norton/And my last item I just want to mention several of us were at a very wonderful
occasion for the dedication of the Nancy Siberling Grove in recognition of her
many years as well and it was her 80th birthday, I think. She has worked almost
that long on city projects of various kinds as everybody pretty well knows. It was
a very wonderful occasion and a very appropriate way to recognize her many
contributions to the community.
Kubby/And it is the newly planted trees that are the start of the grove that survived the
hail.
Norton/Yes, it did very very good. Good thing they got pretty good sized ones.
Nov/I thought it was interesting also that they gave her a topographic map and told her
that she could map the rest of the grove.
Norton/They work with Nancy a lot.
Nov/Her children donated the first two trees and these are going to be the kinds of trees
that would have been found when the state was founded and some of those in
Hickory Hill Park are on their last years and they will be replaced by this.
Norton/And also a humongous rock contributed by River Products.
Nov/Yes, a boulder. I don't lmow how many tons. It was two tons, three tons, huge and it
will have a bronze plaque also.
Norton/It is in Hickory Hill Park if you want to locate it.
Nov/Yes, Hickory Hill Park, the north entrance.
Kubby/I have two things tonight. One is I want to remind people that on June 7 the city
will be providing another Toxic Clean Up Day. So you can start with all of your
spring cleaning, when you do your garages and basements. When you find toxics,
save them for June 7, 8:30 to 2:30 at the Bus Barn on Riverside Drive. We ask so
that things run smoothly that you get appointments. You can start making
appointments May 27th. You can call 356-6200. I am also trying to get more
people to volunteer to help out as workers at Toxic Clean Up Day and if you
would like to do that, you can call Brad at 356-5235 and if you call that number
tomorrow, mention my name so I get credit. I pledged for 15 volunteers and I
haven't gotten my quota yet. So help me out.
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The second thing is I have been involved with the WRAC in helping provide the
community with some progressive social change training and we had kind of a
weekend training a month ago or so that was very successful and we kind of
pledged to do almost every month but not necessarily every month some real
specific nuts and bolts training and the next one is happening soon on May 29th
and this is training for both men and women and the topic this time will be
planning and facilitating effective meetings and that will be May 29, which is a
Thursday, 6:30 to 9:00 PM in the ICPL. And to register if you need any kind of
special accommodations, please call the WRAC at 335-1486.
I want to thank Sue and Eleanor for being here tonight.
Lehman/I just got one thing. Steve, I think we have talked on several occasions about the
condition of the railroad track and crossings and, you know, I drive over one of
them every morning and I fear losing my van. I haven't lost it yet. Tonight we
approved an ordinance that allows skateboards and rollerblades. We could lose
citizens on those crossings. I don't lmow- The one on S. Capitol Street has been in
decrepit shape for a long time and I know it is not the city's responsibility but we
really need to be doing something with those.
Atkins/I promise you we are after them. The disappointing thing is these are really small
jobs by the jobs you approve during the course of construction season. I don't
lmow what else to tell you. It is not our property.
Kubby/Maybe we need to organize citizens to call the railroads.
Lehman/Get a load of cold mix and we will go down and shovel it in and hammer it
down.
Atkins/I don't think the City Attorney wants to hear you talk that way.
Lehman/We have already approved her, haven't we?
Atkins/Yes you have.
Norton/Ernie, I usually bring this up and John Haefner, one of my good friends out at
Oalmoll has commented a number of times and I keep promising and Steve writes
me notes saying that progress is being made as far as we can do it. But somebody
just doesn't get it done. I don't lmow why. South Capitol was going to be done
locally I thought.
Atkins/I couldn't tell you. That one- I mean, I will get you another update.
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Lehman/It is pretty bad.
Atkins/I know they are. I drove them all. In fact, I think Dee originally brought it up a
couple of weeks ago.
Kubby/Maybe we should get that right phone number and hold it up for people.
Baker/I was going to say Karen has the right idea. We get Document Services, not only
give a phone number but a name. If you have a problem, call this person at this
number and hold it up long enough for people to write it down.
Atkins/And I promise you will get a machine.
Baker/Find this person's home phone number.
Atkins/All right, I will get you-
Council/(All talking).
Norton/This problem has been here for 50- I mean, as long as railroads have been here. I
don't know why we can't get it solved, some mechanism. I don't understand it.
Kubby/We are doing what we can do. We need to figure out another strategy.
Atkins/These are small, seriously, small, small jobs. I think they would be wise in one
construction season to just do them all and get them over with. Just one time and
have it done.
Kubby/Maybe the mayor should write a letter suggesting that. At least it is another
contact that is not city staff. Maybe the mayor will have-
Norton/There should be a modular unit you can put in.
Nov/What if we can do it? We have a contractor out there repairing streets now. Can we
offer to do it and send them a bill?
Atkins/I would be very cautious about that. They have to re-route trains. I think it is a
liability question. Give Eleanor a couple of minutes and I am sure she will think
of a few more things. It is not our property.
Dilkes/That raises a number of issues that we have to be careful about. I think we could
approach them about it but we would have to-
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Atkins/We had applied for these grants that come from the state and they are really not-
Again, by construction standards, they are not large grants, $10,000 to $12,000
per crossing and I indicated to some of our Public Works folks, look, we will be
the granting agent and we have sufficient Road Use Tax funds, we can afford to
do these things. It just doesn't seem to get us anywhere. Try again.
Nov/We have offered to help and they just say no.
Norton/We have a recent memo from Steve listing all of the items.
Atkins/Let me get those updated.
Norton/It was $8,000 1 remember to do the S. Capitol.
AticAns/It wasn't very much.
Norton/It was going to be done locally.
Atkins/I will find out. Let me get you an updated report on where you are and let me do
my best to contact the railroad and raise Cain.
Kubby/I think the mayor should get an appointment, a face to face appointment with the
person who has the power to make those decisions for the railroad and sit down.
Nov/Okay. Tell me which railroad are you dealing with.
Atkins/Both of them.
Nov/I lmow somebody at one of them.
Council/(All talking).
Atkins/I will get you the information.
Council/(All talking).
Nov/Moving on, would you like to say something?
Thornberry/Yes, I would. I would like to recognize seven men who work for the city and
they are real gentlemen and I would like to recognize them for their job excellence
and they are working on the- They are water people working on the water line,
digging up the street, replacing the water line on Highland Avenue. They started
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up Plum Street and they are going west and I think Leon Schluter is the
supervisor. I am not real sure since he was the one doing most of the work. I am
not sure if he was the supervisor or not but he was wearing the white hat and
doing a lot of the work. Earl McCalla, Dave Exline, Jack Crowley, Jamie Jenn,
Ken Hamey, and the guy Ed Moreno, if you are watching, don't let him take a
personal phone call at work because there are contractors going to be calling this
guy, Dave Worby who is the backhoe operator. If Leon asked him to take 3/4s of
an inch off the ground with that backhoe, he could do it. That guy is fantastic. But
those gentlemen were explaining to the sidewalk engineers what they were doing,
answering their questions while they were working and doing a fantastic job.
They told me that I would probably be out of water at the Burger Irdng for about
two to four hours. I think the letter said eight hours but they kind of thought they
would be out two to four hours. They had it in ten minutes and I didn't realize that
I was out of water for that ten minutes and they were doing a fantastic job. I
would like to recognize those gentlemen but don't let them take calls from these
private contractors. They are going to be offered a ton. They are good people and
thank you gentlemen.
Vanderhoef/In the packet this week we had a new kind of inventory update on
subdivisions in Iowa City and I was real pleased to see it because there is a lot of
sidewalk talk sometimes whether there are or are not kinds of lots for
development in Iowa City and we now have, for anyone who would like to stop in
at the CleriCs Office, a subdivision inventory update that gives a history back to
1990 and just in case your are curious, we cun-ently have 635 undeveloped platted
lots in the City of Iowa City and I appreciate the report. One of our planners, John
Yapp, did this fine job. I appreciate it and I hope they have continued updates
annually.
Baker/
Three quick things. One, since we are appreciating staff so much. I had an
epiphany tonight when Don Yucuis was speaking and I realized that if Don would
grow a mustache, it would look like Alex Trebeck. I think I would- Would you
pass that along to him, Steve?
Atkins/No.
Lehman/Who is that?
Baker/Alex Trebeck. Don't you all watch TV? You got to watch more TV.
Norton/We have to work, Larry.
Baker/That is the problem, see. All right. The second thing. Sort of ascending order of
seriousness. I was almost late tonight because-
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CHANGE TAPE TO REEL 97-84 SIDE 2
Baker/
In the middle of the road at City Park. You are going to start getting phone calls
from a lot of angry people over the next few days. Evidently there has been a
heavier city emphasis on ticketing people who park on the grass down at City
Park who are attending their children's baseball games as I was doing this
evening. There is not enough space to park close to Bobby Oldis Field. There is
little lots here and there but there is along the edge of the road cars are pulled off
and it is very narrow. I understand the problem with safety and damage to the
grass. But one of things- And I wouldn't have had this guy's job tonight whose is
working for the City Parks Department writing tickets to these people as they are
trying to get their children to these baseball games. I mean he was having to
confront them face to face and I told him, I said I wouldn't have your job. But
there is a problem down there and I don't lmow if the council wants to talk about
this or investigate it any further. But there has got to be a way we can
accommodate the crowds that are developing on the sports activities down there. I
just raise that tonight and I will talk to Steve personally and Steve if there is a
direction we can go with it. I have been telling people, don't talk to that poor guy
that are giving you the ticket, call Bob Howell or Terry Trueblood or Steve Atkins
or Dee Norton. So I just wanted to raise that as a problem and-
Atkins/Let me see the level of ticketing and find out what is going on and I will report
back to you.
Baker/It is evidently a new emphasis.
Lehman/Is it posted?
Baker/It is posted no paricing.
Atkins/I think everybody expects to park at the front door and you point it out you hate
to cut into park land to make more parIcing lots out of the grass and it seems to
defeat the purpose of having a park.
Baker/
It does but- I am not saying we are going to go asphalt everything but there might
be a reason to cut some people some slack on occasion. Maybe we can talk about
that.
Atkins/I don't lmow the circumstances but I will find out.
Thornberry/Larry, while you are on that subject. Where are they going to be parking for
the 4th of July Fireworks at City Park?
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F052097
#22 page 8
Baker/All over the place.
Atkins/All over the place.
Thomberry/Are they going to ticket everybody?
Atkins/We will get neighborhood complaints because people just pull in and drop a car
everywhere. They block driveways.
Baker/Private property though.
Atkins/We try to encourage folks to walk down to the thing.
Nov/You can also park at Hancher.
Kubby/You can just walk from the Jazz Fest over to the fireworks.
Norton/We should run a shuttle bus for the 4th is what we should do.
Atkins/Downtown ramps.
Norton/From downtown.
Kubby/I think that is a great idea.
Thornberry/What about from Sycamore?
Norton/It would be a blessing. You might as well. You almost have to ride a bus. We
should think about that.
Atkins/I will find out for you.
Baker/And one last thing, Madam Mayor. I am wondering ifI can get a close up of
camera on this right here. Just one camera, hold it over here very steadily. Okay. I
want to identify this. This is a piece of wood. It is also dead. So it might be called
deadwood. It is a present for Brian and not really for him. I want him to convey it
to Chuck down at the Press Citizen so Chuck would understand what deadwood
was. I didn't sense that in a recent editorial but with a great deal of affection. It
has my name and Ernie's name on it so he can identify us with it but Brian, if you
would like to pick this up after the meeting. I will convey this to you from my
heart and from Ernie's and best wishes to the Press Citizen. Thank you. That is all
I got, Madam Mayor.
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F052097
#22 page 9
Nov/Okay. I have two things here. Mainly Lisa Handsaker has requested that the city
council appoint a couple more people to our Deer Committee. The Deer
Management Committee has kind of lopsided representation and we had asked to
have even representation. We could use to more animal rights organization and
Humane Society people. We have two individuals who were asked at one point
and agreed to participate if we requested, Jan Ashman and Jim Walters. Jan
Ashman lives in Iowa City. Jim Walters does not. If the council agrees, I will
check with the Board of Supervisors to be sure it is okay to appoint Jim Walters
who does not live in Iowa City and I will ask Lisa to call both of them and ask
them if they are willing to be on this Deer Management Committee.
Lehman/Fine.
Nov/Sound okay? All right, we will do that tomorrow. I have had two complaints about
garbage bags and crows. People who put out trash in plastic bags have had crows
who tear the bags open and who throw the trash all over the street and we have a
mess. Crows, you know those large black birds. They are in many neighborhoods
in the city and I would like to ask the public to please be careful. If you can put it
out in the morning before the truck comes by rather then leaving it out overnight,
we are going to be less messy.
Baker/Maybe we can have a crow committee like the deer committee. That was Ernie's
line, I lmew it was coming.
Atkins/If it is at night, Naomi, I doubt whether it is crows at night. It is more like
raccoons. I would suggest to folks, you get a bottle of ammonia and you spritz it
with a couple shots of ammonia, animals won't get- Just hit the bag. It is so
pungent that they will have nothing to do with it.
Nov/Does it work with crows and raccoons?
Atldns/I see the crows in the morning but at night I am almost positive it is raccoons that
are getting those.
Nov/Well, I have heard from a couple of people on various occasions that the crows were
out there tearing the bags.
Norton/Do it early in the morning.
Nov/Okay folks. If you put out plastic bags, ammonia if what keeps the animals away
and keeps our streets neater.
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F052097
#22 page 10
Council/(All tallring).
Nov/We did not specify the exact date for closing Clinton Street. Clinton Street will be
closed on one side, the west side, between Bloomington and Davenport, between
May 19 and August 1 for the University Burge Hall Project.
Thornberry/Maybe if we just notify people of the streets that are open. It might be easier.
Nov/Maybe by then we are going to have Dubuque Street open and they will have a
choice.
Okay. We had allowed a extra time for large trash and such for properties to be
cleared. Property manager came tonight to tell us this was a wonderful idea. She
said if they had a complaint on a particular property, they cleared it out within
four hours. But when they had no complaints, having a couple of extra days made
a nice difference and can we do it again. So I am requesting that you talk to Public
Works and ask if it did work out okay for our people.
Atkins/It did work out okay. Some of the media reporting, not the print media, made it a
little fuzzy and there was some misunderstandings and we did have a few foilcs
that said well, if you are going to do it for the landlords, you have to do it for me,
too. And so we had a few messes but we got through it. Generally it was well
received. It was intended to assist the landlords in the clean out.
Nov/The property managers have so much to take away at the end of the semester. They
really thought it was a great idea. Okay.
I am reminding everybody there is a special election on June 3 for Recorder and if
you are not going to be around on June 3, you can vote now. They have absentee
ballots at the Auditor's Office.
I have to tell you I have made a decision on the city council election. I am not
going to run again. I am going to move on and do something else and you folks
can swim in the sea o£paper without me.
Thornberry/Are you going to run for Recorder?
Nov/No, no, not that one.
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council
meeting of May 20, 1997
F052097
7:00p SPECIAL FORMAL COUNCIL MEETING
Executive Session - Evaluations
City Council Meeting Schedule May 9, 1997
and Tentative Work Session Agendas
[] = Tolecast Live on Cable Channel 4
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Council Chambers
7:00p
SPECIAL FORMAL COUNCIL MEETING
Executive Session - Evaluations
7:00p
REGULAR COUNCIL WORK SESSION
Council Chambers
Council Chambers
7:00p [~ REGULAR FORMAL COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers
MEMORIAL DA Y- CITY OFFICES CLOSED
7:00p REGULAR COUNCIL WORK SESSION Council Chambers
4:00p - 6:00p SPECIAL COUNCIL WORK SESSION Council Chambers
Cultural Center/Library Project: Ballot Issue and Operating Costs
7:00p [~ REGULAR FORMAL COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers
7:00 p.m. REGULAR COUNCIL WORK SESSION Council Chambers
7:00 p.m. [~ REGULAR FORMAL COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers
FUTURE WORK SESSION ITEMS
Iowa River Power Dam Renovation/Iowa River Corridor Trail Project
Graffiti Ordinance
Peninsula Development - Field Trip
Hickory Hill West
Water Project Costs
DARE Program Review
City News Video/Positions
Waste Pickup - 4-Plexes
Cemetery
Elks
Landfill Master Plan
Transit Route Study
Sand Point Wells
CITY OFIOWA CITY
City Council Meeting Schedule
and Tentative Work Session Agendas
May 15, 1997
[] = Telecast Live on Cable Channel 4
7:00p REGULAR COUNCIL WORK SESSION Council Chambers
7:00p
7:30p
8:00p
8:15p
8:30p
8:45p
9:00p
Review Zoning Matters
Iowa River Power Dam Renovation/Iowa River Corridor Trail Project
Public Housing Lease
Section 8 Housing Vouchers - Persons with Disabilities
Linn Street Parking Lot
Consider appointments to the following Boards/Commissions: Board of Library
Trustees (3), Design Review Committee (1), Historic Preservation Commission (2)
Council Agenda/Council Time
7:00p [~ REGULAR FORMAL COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers
MEMORIAL DA Y- CITY OFFICES CLOSED
7:00p REGULAR COUNCIL WORK SESSION Council Chambers
':"!:!i ": ~: :.:":' ' :, . :. :. ':,' . ......: .:';.... ~" ~;~.~,~,~4J~::'.;;%:', ....... ;:i;,:',~ i;::':"~',':,.:, :, ;'.~:,,,' '.:'. :,.'!~ ;:":,,.,;:
4:00p - 6:00p SPECIAL COUNCIL WORK SESSION Council Chambers
Cultural Center/Library Project: Ballot Issue and Operating Costs
7:00p [~ REGULAR FORMAL COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers
7:00 p.m. REGULAR COUNCIL WORK SESSION Council Chambers
TBD SPECIAL FORMAL COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers
Executive Session - Evaluations
7:00 p.m, [~ REGULAR FORMAL COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers
Graffiti Ordinance
Peninsula Development - Field Trip
Hickory Hill West
Water Project Costs
DARE Program Review
Waste Pickup - 4-Plexes
FUTURE WORK SESSION ITEMS
Cemetery
Elks
Landfill Master Plan
Transit Route Study
Sand Point Wells