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HomeMy WebLinkAbout1998-06-17 TranscriptionJune 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 3 Norton/That's all you're talking about. That's all you have leverage over. Lehman/I think it's all taxes, isn't it. Mitchell/It would be for all taxes... There's some steps we have to go through. For instance, what we could do is designate this an economic development area under the Urban Revitalization Program... Norton/You'd have to discuss it with the county and the school board. Mitchell/Right. Kubby/Can we do that for just this one lot or would it have to be the whole area? Mitchell/No. David and I have talked about that and we could just do it for the one lot if the city council was just interested in that. Kubby/What kind of money are we talking about that we would be foregoing? Mitchell/I think that if this was over $2,000,000 structure, I spoke with Dan Hudson some time ago about this and property taxes would probably be in the range of $60,000 a year .....That would be the total. That would include city, school board .... Norton/(can't hear) Lehman/I guess I've got, cut to the chase. Over a period of time, the amount of money that the city would be asked to invest in the taxiway and whatever is in the neighborhood of $200,000. Is that correct? Anderson/That's correct. Lehman/Over a period of time what I'm assuming that, with tax abatement or whatever, at some point in time we would be able to recover the costs of what we're investing in. Is that correct? .... I guess I'm looking at bottom line. Bottom line is we have a piece of property that nobody's using. We'd like to see this area developed. Obviously this means something in the way of development, something in the way of jobs. It means something in the way of getting a area started for development that we've indicated we feel is important to be developed. I guess what I'm looking at is what is it going to cost us, if anything, and what is the payback. I mean if we get a pay-Is the payback five years or ten years or what ever. We talked last night and we agreed to go ahead and, through inter- This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 1 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session 9:O0 AM Council: Lehman, Champion, Kubby, Norton, O'Donnell, Thornberry (arrived 9: 10), Vanderhoef. Staff: Atkins, Holecek, Mitchell, O'Neil, Karr, Winkelhake. Tapes: 98-76, Side 2; 98-78, all. Iowa Jet Services 98-76 S1 Lehman/First thing we're going to talk about is the Iowa Jet. Who's going to speak to that? Ron? Ron O'Neil/Mark Anderson will start you out. Karr/Do you want to use the podium or one of the hand held mics, Mark. We want to record it. Whichever you prefer? Mark Anderson/Am I supposed to have a picture too? Lehman/Here it is fight here. How many do you want? (All talking) Anderson/Why don't we get started. Is Dean Thornberry coming this morning? Lehman/I think he is, but we need to get started. Anderson/What I've passed out to you is two items. One is a photograph of the facility that Mr. Staib would like to build on the north side of the airport. The second is an exhibit out of our... Actually it's of a site survey of the area where that facility would want to be placed. It's in the area that's circled by the dark black line, 3.35 acres. And we looked at a number of sites throughout the airport property. We looked at putting it near the terminal building actually on the south side of the terminal building where we approved that hanger project last night... The amount of facility that they need is way more than will fit over on that part of the airport... In going through all these areas, we determined that that north commercial zone was probably the best location for them. In order to accommodate this facility over on that part of the site, we do need to get them some taxiways and some apron areas to that space which we wouldn't've had to have done on the south site, but being a new area we do need to provide that to them. The other thing too is utilities to that site are available at the end of Ernst This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 2 Street which is... fight down between the middle of the Alexis Park Inn. Good moming, Bob. Bob Staib/Good moming. Anderson/So utilities are available at the end of that area. And that street will also be used as the temporary access to this facility until the new roadway is put in in the north commercial area. So I think that's really at this point where we are... So what we're asking for is a part of the support infrastructure for this facility would be taxiway in the apron area. And then do you want to talk about the other issues? Mitchell/Sure. One of the other things we discussed a little bit is the possibility of tax abatement. It's another incentive for getting Iowa Jet Services in the north commercial area. I think there are some things we can do. We're not probably going to be able to provide full tax abatement, but I think there are things that we could do if that' s something the city council would be interested in- to at least help them out... We could probably do something whereby that could get by the first three years with tax abatement, or we could do some sort of graduated plan. Those are things I've talked to David Schoon about and things we could probably do. I think the benefits of providing that incentive would be getting Iowa Jet Services into the noah commercial area. Hopefully once we get one business there, that's just going to have a domino effect and get other businesses there. And as we all know, I think the purpose of developing the noah commercial area is to get the airport self sufficient. I think this would go a long ways towards meeting that goal. Norton/I thought that tax abatement was not possible. I thought we had a note on it. Lehman/We did. Mitchell/That was just with respect to... the partial industrial tax exemption that David Schoon had sent you a note on. Kubby/Our normal tax abatement where you don't need council approval. Mitchell/Right. Kubby/You just fill out the paperwork. Norton/Oh, I see. That was the one... Now when you say tax abatement, does that mean just the city portion of taxes or is that? Lehman/That's all. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 4 department loans or whatever, do a hanger because we know we are going to get, over a period of time, we're going to get our money back. And it would appear to me that over a period of time, this is probably also true for the two hundred thousand dollars. Do we know the time frame? We got an idea? Anderson/I'm not sure if we got any numbers on that. Lehman/Do we know that over a time frame this will in fact be an investment for the city, that will return our investment? I guess that's my bottom line. Mitchell/I think so, and I think it might be hard to say that we'd recover it in five or ten years, and we'd... Lehman/We will recoup the money we'd invest. Mitchell/Oh, definitely. (All talking) Kubby/Isn't the, I mean, kind of a basic question is, is that kind incentive necessary, or are both this incentives necessary, in order to make this happen? We really-I haven't heard anything directly from Iowa Jet Services that without this our businesses cannot go. Thornberry/Well I don't think that's necessarily the point, and I don't think it needs to be. Actually, they don't have to answer that question. Kubby/So we're going to give away the money? Thornberry/It's just like the furniture store asking for a help on a bagger. If we didn't give them the money to box their cardboard, would they go out of business? Probably not, but we did it. We do things to help businesses in this community in different ways, and this is just one of the ways. (All talking) Kubby/We're giving the land, we're providing a road, a major road, we're rezoning property, I mean we're doing things to facilitate this business. That's the question I'm having is how far do we go, we also need to have and go through the economic development policies and through all the questions that everybody else answers and we give public assistance to visit. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 5 Norton/I wanted to ask, I'm reading, perhaps not between the lines, that we're talking about the park as an apron in the taxi way. But aren't we also talking about the road to some extent in the short run. But also about fill, isn't that also likely to add to the two hundred thousand that we're alluding to. Anderson/The plans that sit right now is that they'll be given bare piece of land, we'll be providing them with the taxiway and apron which, in my view, and thinking about that as an airport stand point, that's like putting in rows of sewers for other developments. I mean that's the infrastructure that supports... Thornberry/We're not talking three miles either. Norton/...go ahead. What about this fill that's required to do that? Anderson/...We will probably need to bring some fill in to get that up to the proper... Norton/That's not in the $200,000 figure. That's just for the cement I take it. Anderson/That's the concrete and the sub-base... You're fight, Dee. I don't know that we've got a lot of fill in there at this point. We'll have to have that looked at in engineering. Norton/What about the road? Anderson/The road is... we have access to, like I said before, Ernst Drive, which is like right to the property line. From that point in to the parking lots and the parking lots themselves would be part of their project and as well as utilities in from that point. So we bring them to their property line and then they bring it to. Norton/The bottom line may be more, bigger than $200,000. Lehman/It could be, but there would not be fill involved in the taxiways or whatever. The building itself would be, but the taxiways don't have to be above the flood plain. Anderson/Yeah. That's true. We'll need to see what slope. We'll have to have the property (can't hear) in there and then we can grade that up from... Norton/What happens in the future? If this thing you're in for perpetuity of course no problem, but if it were a turn over issue here, this went to some other purpose, fight, you'd be just sitting with a little extra concrete. Is that right? Anderson/On the building. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 6 Norton/The building, yes, but I mean, the development would have neighbors (can't hear) know exactly (can't hear). Anderson/Correct. Thornberry/It's airport things... Norton/...presumably it would be replaced by something analogous. Anderson/...I guess the commission really sees as a catalyst for this noah area and our hope would be that it would encourage to bring in other aviation businesses whether it's repair power plants or avionic shops or paint shops or that type of thing. The other thing I think that's really exciting about this particular project going in at this location is its relationship to the future science center. There's been some discussion between Staib and some of the folks from the science center on some things they could do together to help make that more of an exciting facility there. Kubby/Do we know the cost of temporary? Anderson/The temporary road (can't hear) from the site? No, I do not have an idea. Kubby/Because that would be our dollar too, so I think we need to add that to what the assistance is. So I guess I'd like to know the figures are. Does anybody have those figures? Because we wouldn't be doing it... Norton/What would be involved? There's grading and not a lot. Anderson/Grading and maybe some light asphalt to keep the dust down. That wouldn't be... Atkins/I think once you settle in on a project plan, that (can't hear) assuming ...possibly $200,000. (can't hear) .... Yeah. I think a whole package because you need to have this whole package to (can't hear). Lehman/Are you looking for an indication from us as to whether or not we think this is a good idea? Obviously the numbers are not here. Like Karen says, the access road, I mean conceptually we know what you're trying to do. We don't know exact numbers. Are you asking from us an indication as to whether or not we approve of this sort of concept? This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 7 Anderson/Right. So they can go ahead and start on engineering (can't hear) and get construction going. Kubby/So we're talking about the $205,000 for the taxiway being incorporated into the lease and any kind of selling that we need to do for that or are we talking about that, we're talking about recouping that, fight? That's where we were last time, I thought. Lehman/That's what I understand from what we said this morning. Kubby/Okay, so the final (can't hear) so it's an up front loan. It's paid back full cost, full true cost, get incorporated into the lease, a long term lease, 20, 30 years. Whatever it ends up being. And then the real public assistance is that front end money that gets paid back. That's in whatever tax abatement. Lehman/That's what I hear. Norton/How does this fit with what we will do now. First of all I think the general notion is why is I'm trying to get a handle on the scope is still a little bit vague to me. But what are we doing here now with the next person that comes along wanting something done in here, whether it's airport related or not, looking at a property in this region. How would this proceed then? Would that also go through this same kind of process? Champion/Sure. Norton/Each individual parcel would go through this kind of situation .... That's what I mean. We are setting the precedent for how we're going to proceed with this and I wanted to be sure that... Kubby/What would be our rationale for denying another aviation use that's the second and third and fourth that wants a taxiway? I mean would there be any reason to say no to it? Maybe not. Lehman/Yeah. I think there is and I don't know that this really sets a precedent. In my mind, we're looking at a 52 acre on the noah side of the airport that we consider to be very very valuable. We also know that a forest starts with one or two trees. You don't forget the forest. I have no problem with planting the first few trees. Norton/I don't know what we're talking about. Lehman/Getting the forest started. I don't believe that if the Science Center or other development that takes place in the noah corridor there, the noah pan of the This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 8 airport would necessarily have the same consideration that this does. I think it's legitimate to jump start something on a project that we feel is... Norton/As long as we understand that and everybody listening understands that we're doing something here that is kind of a trial balloon and we need to get moving here. Lehman/But not necessarily would we follow this from my perspective, would we necessarily follow this procedure for that whole area. Vanderhoef/We could have... Kubby/But you can state that this doesn't necessarily set a precedent. Lehman/And I would want that to be explicit. Steve, you had an observation. Atkins/Mine's a land use observation... Mitchell/One thing just before we finish up, but I've been a little remiss in introducing you to Bob Staib. I don't know if everybody here knows Mr. Staib or not. And Bob, I don't know if there's anything you wanted to add to the discussion that we haven't brought up already or not. Staib/I'd be happy to. Lehman/You need to come to the mic, Bob. Mitchell/Yeah, why don't you go ahead and pass that around. Staib/Good morning. I think that our having you ask to supply that taxiway has been taken slightly out of what context. This project began with a plan to have this proposed terminal fight beside the current terminal. A lot of planning happened on having that happen. Of course there you have a ramp. And at the time that I was told it would have to be moved because the tanks that you had there that had been supposed to be taken out were going to have to be moved, I said well okay I'd agree and commercially to us that spot that has been proposed is substantially worse because we're way across the field. Folks that come in, they're going to by habit head to the same spot they have headed. I said okay, I'd be glad to have the thing moved, but I felt that it is fair to then request that the town fund the cost of the things required to have things that had been at the prior spot replaced. It is not in any way a question of how properly the projects funded. We are going to pay for exactly the same costs in the proposed plan as we had been going to pay. We're not saving a dime. We are prepared to have this done because we're trying This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 9 to do a project to help the town and to I believe have something started that's going to be great. I like and approve of and agree with completely the concept of having it called a catalyst. I think that's a perfect word. That's what we're trying. And I have tried to have all of the questions that have been handed to us put down in hand writing. I apologize. It came a bit tardy, but I've been away. All right? Lehman/Thank you, Bob. Kubby/Could somebody clarify the (can't hear)? Norton/Yeah. Mitchell/Yeah. And maybe Ron would be better answer that, but I know unfortunately that there wasn't quite enough space in order to allow staff, Bob built the hanger building that he wanted to build fight by the terminal. Anderson/The fuel tanks are leased and owned by the Iowa City Flying Service who has four years left on that area. So we couldn't really just kick them out. Kubby/Right .... I'm thinking about the memo where it says that the FAA will probably not approve a fuel tank's crossing an active runway. Does that mean that someone comes and fills up the tanks for Iowa City Flying Service and then they're going to go over to Iowa Jet Services. They have to back out on the road and over... Anderson/Actually the fuel tanks have been a real back and forth issue with the commission and as to how we wanted to do those because we've looked at the liabilities of the groundwater issues and contamination vs. above ground vs. below ground... It's a long story, but where we are at this point is that from a safety standpoint of air traffic, we do not want and the FAA does not allow let's say a fuel truck to go across the runway. So what that means is that on the Iowa Jet Services side on the noah side, they will have their own fuel tanks and they will not have to cross the runway with their trucks to go get fuel at some other spot to bring it back to their side of the runway. So in essence what we're going to end up with is multiple fuel locations on sight, which we've talked round and round and round about it and I think our commission is comfortable with that. Thornberry/So in other words .... Iowa Jet may have Phillips, and Iowa City Flying Service may ...have Conoco. Is that what you're saying? It would be two different companies. Lehman/But this is really not relevant to what you're asking us. You're asking us whether or not we're willing conceptually ..... Until we get bottom line numbers, This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 10 if conceptually the city is willing to assist in the form of the taxiway and whatever to... this project taking place. Thornberry/I was just speaking to the fuel issue... That's really immaterial as far as we're concerned. Norton/Would there have been fuel tanks for Iowa Jet at the earlier location in addition to the ones we now have? Would there have been additional fuel would've been there in any case, right? Anderson/It could've been. It was requested by them to have their own tank because of the amount of fuel that they use, they can buy it at a better rate than what they might be able to buy it for from PSA or Iowa City Flying Service. Norton/It's the location. We're not talking about anything else other than the location of the additional tank. Anderson/Right. Kubby/So I don't mean to be a... Well, I do mean to be a stickler, is that I have a hard time saying yea or nay without having Iowa Jet Services go through our economic development guideline to say whether principal, and I know that I'm going to be the only one who feels that way, but at some point they're going to have to go through those guidelines. Champion/Oh, I agree. Lehman/I have a problem with that... Kubby/And so we should...That can be part of the package that we when we get information back we can the results from it. Lehman/The big thing here that differs from other things that I've seen is that we will over time recover the money that we're investing, so we're really not subsidizing something in effect if we do get our money back... And I do think that's significantly different. Kubby/But it is an assistance that otherwise would not be provided and if we're talking about tax abatement, that is a direct monetary... Norton/But I don't think that would be unreasonable... This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 11 Lehman/I don't either, but Steve, you have something about land use. Because I think we have to move along with this. Atkins/One of the observations I want to make... planning process, ...our plan is to have (can't hear) property. We do need ...think about ... And I don't know legally whether we can extend that. I kind of doubt it. So it's something you may want to think about in the language planning. You need to wrap that thing up. Lehman/This is something that needs to be worked out, I would assume, by the Airport Commission and Dennis. This is a unique situation in that the Airport Commission really acts independently of us. You ask us to cooperate with you, which we may or may not do, but how this works out is really your call. So you're going to have to put together the package you come to us with a bottom line. Mitchell/Right. Kubby/Do we make contact with school board members or put it on our joint meeting? Lehman/I think that' s their job. Mitchell/Commission will continue to work with... (All talking). Norton/We're meeting in the next couple of weeks aren't we? Mitchell/I guess in closing real quick, it sounds like there is support for ramp and helping them pay for the ramp and taxiway provided it's recovered over the life of the lease. And then in regard to tax abatement, do you want I guess more numbers? Lehman/Dennis, would you in the meantime, before we meet with the school board, which will be next month, approach them realizing that we do need access to this. Mitchell/Right. Lehman/Get a reaction from them. I'm sure council would be more than willing to visit with them as well, but I do think that the contacts that we made sooner rather than later. Mitchell/Right. In fact I think Karin Franklin as well as Steve has been in contact with the school board and there are other locations. In fact probably preferable This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 12 locations for Iowa Jet Services where possibly we could put the road in there if the school district doesn't work out. Norton/Before we sign off, I want to be careful. Where do we stand then in respect to our economic guidelines? Just out of faimess to our existing policy and the future taxpayers. What is the status of that...? Thornberry/Dee, I think this is kind of a hybrid deal. We're not building like we just approved last night, the big building on the airport on the other side of the... Norton/ Thornberry/Because we're getting our money back from that in lease payments period. Right? There was no discussion as to whether Iowa City Flying Service should furnish all of that stuff to have that building built for them. Isn't that fight? Norton/Yea .... Thornberry/Okay. If we did this for Bob as an individual or a corporation, yes, I think we should go through all of that process. But we're really not. We're doing this kind of as a hybrid between a purely commercial and purely civic. Being that as we're getting all of our money back eventually so it's not just for going to commercial and then he can sell whatever he's got at the end of the period. It reverts to the city and we're getting back a hell of a lot more than we're investing. It's a million dollar payroll. Kubby/We might not be doing our guidelines real consistently because towards Precision Instruments that's getting CDBG dollars we decided they needed to make the loan payment. We're going to get all the money back. Needed to go through there, so we might want to be consistent one direction or the other. But if we're going to do the tax abatement, it is a direct subsidy .... I see that we're going in the direction of saying, yes we want to look in to tax abatement, but we should follow our policy before we sign on any dotted line for that. Lehman/I think we should go through that process. Thornberry/I think, I don't know if it's required. Lehman/No. And not necessarily the results of it would be governing, but I think we should go through that process. I think that's part of the process. We could say yea or nay or yes this isn't as important or whatever, but it is part of the process and I think that Karen's fight, we probably should go through that. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 13 Thornberry/Would you be willing Bob to do that? Staib/Do what? Norton/He doesn't know. Lehman/He doesn't know about it. Thornberry/It's just couple of bucks to an attorney. It's not a big deal. Staib/I see. Norton/ Kubby/It's not relevant whether they need the money to make it happen. It's not relevant whether they want to go through our process. Thornberry/It does, because... Kubby/Through our process that we have established. Thornberry/Well, they don't have to. They don't have to Karen. Kubby/We don't have to abide by it. They have to go through it. Thornberry/I understand. They don't have to Karen. You just got through saying, this is a hybrid deal. Kubby/ Thornberry/Well, I think it is. Kubby/Maybe not for the runway but for the taxis. Thornberry/Some did want to go through it. Some didn't want to go through it. I think Oral B at one time said no, I don't want to go through it and you can keep your damn money. Kubby/And they declined the money. Thornberry/Then they said, we'll take it. Here' s our stuff. I didn't study that in depth and I don't know how many people other than you did. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 14 Kubby/That's not my fault. Thornberry/It was just... Lehman/We would like to... Ron. O'Neil/To answer your question about the school board and the whole noah commercial area, I believe it's already on their agenda for a meeting towards the end of July so I think that's as soon as, I think, Karin Franklin scheduled that. So before we get done, would you give me some direction so we know what step you would like so we can keep moving. Just tell us what you want and we'll move forward with it. Lehman/My reading is that we proceed with what you have proposed but we do need... Conceptually I think we buy into this, but I think we do need to see numbers and I think we need to see bottom line. We need to see time frames. We need to see the cost of the taxiway. If we have temporary improvements for streets. I mean we need to see the whole package. We can't just say, yeah. It's a great idea. We think it's going to fly, but give us the details. O'Neil/Once Iowa Jet Service gets their actual plot plan and where their building is going on the surveyed area that we gave them, that will then give us an indication of exactly how much taxiway we need. How much road we need and how much fill. Lehman/If you didn't hear anything else from us, you did hear us say this is not necessarily something we're going to be interested in for the rest of that area. O'Neil/I heard that. Lehman/Okay. Kubby/And we can get going on the guidelines thing, too. Lehman/That's fine. Staib/Do you think I could speak again please? Lehman/Sure. Step fight up. Staib/...I believe there are two completely separate questions. On this question of the cost of the taxiway and that ramp to again clarify. There are presently two tanks below ground that are presently supplying fuel to Iowa City Flying Service. We This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 15 were very clearly told that those tanks were to be taken out and moved this year. Our plan then been made to build our building over the present tanks. At the time that that plan to have those tanks taken out was postpones, it became then physically impossible to build there. Thus the... to have the thing moved. I said, and this is a question of something that seemed fair to me, that the town ought to pay for the cost of building that ramp and those taxiways to replace the things that I was having lost. I am prepared to have increase the amount of the land rent so that you do have those costs recovered, i.e. I'm agreeing over time to pay for that. I think we're going far beyond fair there. On the question of possible tax abatements, I agree there is a process. I have been handed a set of the questions. I have handed you this morning a response. I'm in Des Moines twice all week. I have been assured they will be approved. If they aren't approved, I will have to cross that bridge, but I don't have ...a problem having our plans go through the process, whatever that happens to be. And to be approved because they are perfectly upstanding, honorable, fine square plans. I hope that that has this whole thing clarified this ought not happen. Kubby/At the beginning, wasn't this to turn over this building to the city fairly quickly, and now that' s not going to happen. Is that part of your trade off?. Staib/No, that choice has to do with a personal tax consideration on how I'm going to have the project financed. It's substantially more attractive to me to go to a bank and have those funds borrowed than to sell stock, pay the taxes, and pay for the billing. Consequently, we have to have the building financed in a way that it will than qualify for a mortgage, and that means it needs to belong to me, not to the town, so it just had to be. Lehman/That would be reflected in the difference in rental payments, so the bottom line really cuts out the same one way or the other. Staib/Sure. You get paid either way. Champion/I think it's a wonderful asset for Iowa City to have the possibilities of this Jet Service coming here, and I'm willing to support it any way I can. Lehman/I think it's going to fly. (All talking) Lehman/Okay Dennis, thanks. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 16 Police Issues 98-76 S2 Lehman/The main purpose of our work session this morning is to address police issues, policies, whatever .... Atkins/ ....Distributed some time ago, the memo on the police issues identifying on six or seven issues, I had R.J. prepare, and it was in your packet last week, sort of a summary of the activities over the last couple of years. Many of those projects were in the mill routinely anyway, beyond that we will refer to you where you want to take this discussion. Lehman/Well I think in starting out a year ago... Atkins/I have copies of the old summary memo. Lehman/Why don't you let us have those. As your all aware, about a year ago we set up a PCRB which has received to date, what 14, 15 complaints approximately, something like that. We're all aware that so far every complaint that has been filed against our police department has not been sustained. There are a number of things that has been indicated in the memorandum we see in the packet. For last night's meeting things that we have taken, steps that we have taken recently to maintain, I think, the high quality of the police force. We are in the process right now of reviewing our policies and whatever to comply with accreditation, and I don't know, that's a process, R.J., that will be how long a period? Winklehake/We expect that to continue probably another two to two and a half years before it's completed. Lehman/And this is a comprehensive, complete evaluation of our policies, procedures, whatever. Winklehake / Yeah. Lehman/Okay. Champion/My memory doesn't serve me very well on this, but at one point you were not going to actually file for accreditation, but that's been changed, Right? Atkins/We are undertaking the accreditation process, and I forget what the official name of the commission that supervises the accreditation, but we have not applied for or paid the fee, but we are entitled to use all the documents. Once we're finished we can certainly apply for it. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 17 Champion/It really bothers me that... I mean why would you go through the process just to... I mean I think the reward would get to be- Atkins/The official accreditation. The previous councils haven't agreed with that. Kubby/The reward is that we know that we have an assessment so the guidelines and we can choose to do some of them and choose not to do some of them. Lehman/Although I really believe, Connie, that when the accreditation process, after we've gone through that process, I really believe that we probably will, I would. Champion/Oh yeah. Lehman/Folks this is the badge of honor. I would certainly support having the official accreditation myself. I don't see... Thornberry/Once we go through all of that and know what is required and do all of those things, come in and say how long is it going to take them to go through the list. I don't think probably very long. Lehman/But it sends a message to the community, too. Atkins/...The accreditation process isn't just a simple fill out a form and send it in .... They bring site visit teams. Thomberry/How long would it take if you've gone through the list and they say-? Norton/If we've complied with it... (All talking) Norton/Some of us are a little bit jaundiced about the presentation thing. Personally, I've seen a lot of presentations happen that didn't amount to anything. Champion/Oh, I have too. The process is very important but I also think the reward at the end is important. I mean it would be like me going to work every day and never getting paid. I wouldn't like that at all. Thornberry/Like going to school and never getting a degree. Champion/Right. Norton/That's the way a lot of people think about it. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 18 Thornberry/Some of these P.H.D. 's can't find their shoelaces, you know, but they've got the degree. Kubby/The important part is that we're a council for the community and that we use our process and our product. Lehman/I think we all agree with that. Norton/ .... Last night was hell. We ended up with a list of twenty-three suggestions from Steve in response to our discussion over the course of the year. Twenty-three suggestions about changes in the department, and then we had some leftovers. I know Karen has several, I have several, and Steve summarized some of those in that memo that we just got. Certainly some of those we ought to...see if that list needs to be expanded, and then go back and maybe take a look at the whole thing so that people who are new to the council will know what we're talking about here. Kubby/Why don't we start with the discussion? Norton/The memo? Yeah. Why not start with the memo and see where we're doing on non-violent signing of philosophy for example. That was one you brought up, Karen. Wasn't it? Is that in... Where are we on that one? Kubby/Nothing's been done with that because we never talked about it, so really it's in our court. Norton/As a topic... Kubby/To talk about. I mean, one of the things, and we reviewed other mission statements of other police departments in Iowa is that there were... (All talking) Kubby/One of the things that was in some of the other mission statements was a statement about the sanctity of human life that is missing from ours that I think is an important value. Atkins/I brought a copy of the mission statement if you want something to work from. Kubby/And the other thing that we talked a lot about that the police department is doing but is looking at even more carefully is... the steps of intervention. And saying something about that in a mission statement seems to be pretty important that the This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 19 way that we will do enforcement and provide services is in the least form of intervention and possible to be effective. And I guess the end of the materials in terms of the non-violence stuff in the memo, there are communities all over the country that are going to a... philosophy of non-violence in their police departments and getting trained in various techniques. It doesn't mean you never use physical force, because you need to use the level of intervention that's appropriate for each situation, but the more tools you have, the safer officers are. The safer our citizens are, and the more effective, I think, are police department will be. Lehman/I guess I'm a little confused. I'm sorry... I would assume, I shouldn't perhaps do that, but I would assume that our police department is basically uses force only when they have absolutely have to. Is that not correct? Atkins/There's the use of force continuum. A couple of you might recall that we took you through a couple of years ago. And just one note of history, particularly for new council members. This mission statement developed in about 1994-5 by our task forces. Remember we had... That's kind of how this came about. Champion/I would like what Karen's talking about addressed. I mean it isn't just Iowa City should do, but it is a trend in the country. And it's more of a... it's like a psychological training, really, and how to deal with situations keep them from becoming confrontational. And how is that being addressed in all of this. Lehman/How does that change what we're doing, now? Thornberry/I don't think it does. Winklehake / What we do for instance with the use of force general order that we have, that's reviewed. When that order was put in place, every officer on the department was trained in exactly what does this mean. Because they start out with simply verbal persuasion moving all the way to the other end to deadly force. Every officer was trained in that. All the lieutenants on the police department have been trained as instructors for that. So there' s an on-going process for that. During the training that we have in January, February, and March, there are various topics and there' s input from all the departments. That' s Coralville, Iowa City, Department of Public Safety, the University, and Johnson County. And each department has some input as to what topic. So they will vary from year to year. We've had updates on various things from the county attorney's office. There are things about use of force, cultural diversity, those kind of issues that are all brought up. I can't tell you that exactly what will be brought up next year, but there is always something coming each year from all the departments. These things are addressed between them as well as after the training, we go over the This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 20 training that's necessary for the use of a PR24, that's the night stick. Something else called an ASP which is an expandable baton. And then also hands on training, over the thing that they should do to take somebody with you to very quickly stop the situation from escalating and those are the kinds of training. Those are mandated. The PR24, ASP, hands on. CHANGE TAPE TO REEL 98-78 SIDE 1 Winklehake / Johnson County, Coralville and the Department of Public Safety. Thornberry/State police also goes through that? Winklehake / Sometimes, but they're not here for that training with us, although in the past they have come down for various parts of the training as well as Washington County, the City of Washington, University Heights, and so on. Champion/Is the police academy teaching at all nonviolent police? I don't know what you call it. Winklehake/There are sections in there training that talk about the use of force. They start with verbal persuasion or sometimes not even verbal persuasion. Simply being there in uniform sometimes will take care of it. And you go from being uniformed to verbal persuasion, hands on, the other kinds of tools that you have. And there is training on that. I can't off the top of my head tell you how many hours are involved in that. We just had one of the sergeants that takes care of our field training activities, at the academy end of last week just to go over the training. We have two officers in the academy now, and he went their to see what they are learning so that we can further build on that when we do our field training here in the department. Norton/I was reading a piece about the reforms in the New York department, and they have regular classes ofwhat's called verbal judo. In order to try to defuse situations because there are people who get hotter and hotter and they... everybody knows what I'm talking about. They say that they really have been very effective program. Winklehake/I think we would all utilize verbal judo. We have a number of officers too- Norton/I think it's a kind of weird name but I mean it's appropriate. Lehman/Do you have any black belts? This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 21 Vanderhoef/It would get your attention. Champion/So this is being addressed as an issue Winkelhake/This is being addressed. We do send people to the very thing that he was talking about. Kubby/I guess I'm talking about something fundamental. That the foundation upon which we direct everything the police department does comes from that place of non-violence were possible, and that that will than dictate how people are supervised, how community policing does this. Ideally non-violence goes perfectly well with the philosophy community. Being more directly connected with the community on a regular basis. And it will also dictate the training. Thornberry/I didn't understand that last- Kubby/About community police? Thornberry/No, about community involvement and non-violence. What do you expect of it? I've never been arrested for non-violent anything, and I'm trying to learn. When you're non-violent, and you're doing something that's illegal, and you're being non-violent, you expect the police department to be non-violent? I don't understand what you're thinking. I don't understand where you're coming from. Lehman/No, I think you missed- No, we're talking about the philosophy of the police department being, the police being non-violent. In other words our response being, as much as possible, a non-violent manner. Not what you're doing. Thornberry/I understand that- Lehman/You're doing something violent. We would like to- Thornberry/I don't think that's going to be a change. Lehman/That's the question. Champion/I think it would be a philosophical change. Thornberry/A philosophical change. Kubby/Right, and that would mean that there would probably be a change in the outlook. Thornberry/I don't think so. You think their going to go in and automatically be violent. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 22 Kubby/No, because we have a continuation of use of force, and so I'm really clear that that's not what happens. I know that's not what happens on the street, because I see interaction with police officers, and they're violent with me. So I don't think that that's true. Norton/What are we trying to change here? O'Donnell/I don't understand what it's about. Thornberry/I guess I don't either. Champion/Okay, it just means-I'm choking on that peach. Thornberry/I mean what are we doing different? Champion/It sounds to me like we're doing it. It's just that as police, well it's hard to explain, but police maybe thirty years ago acted differently than they do today for a lot of reasons. They probably were more aggressive thirty years ago than twenty years ago. But there is a philosophy that expectations can sometimes control behavior, so if the baseline for the police department is, we will in every issue try not to use force, rather than a step process, that we're going to try to control situations without using force. Ifthat's their philosophy, they tend to handle things differently. That's all. I mean that's- O'Donnell/I think that's what we are doing. Champion/We are, but it' s- Norton/Well, let's be careful, because we've had some cases where, I see them in some of the memos, you know I looked in my memos that Steve sent us a number of e- mails that we got from different people over time that they see some kind of heavy-handed hamming of students. I mean, that's the allegations. Let's say downtown, I can understand that's a tough situation, and a huge ..... very difficult to deal with, but I think we need to look at where in the training this has been re- emphasized to just make sure it is and not enough to say it is, I mean we want to be absolutely sure that that's- and the community standard they use the most delicate means they can, even with the people who are pretty provocative. Champion/Right. Kubby/I mean psychiatric wards train people to work with folks that can be violent to themselves, towards property, towards other people, and to intervene in ways that This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 23 don't hurt the patient, and don't hurt the person interacting with them, and some of those techniques the police department is using and some their not, and that we have resources here to help train how to contain inappropriate behavior by our community. Thornberry/Karen, I think if we were paying our police department the salary of a physiatrist at the University Hospital, we could expect perhaps the... Kubby/The physiatrists are not intervening in this way, it is the people are more on the floor, and the attendants. Thornberry/I am just saying sometimes you get what you pay for. O'Donnell/We haven't had one substantiated complaint from the complaint citizen's review board yet. Lehman/I think the complaint board is doing a very good job. Thornberry/I think what he's saying is that there are reports that they're not being as delicate as they could be, in some instances. With students maybe with the traffic stopped, maybe with some other things, and I guess, what your saying is, they should be given some training, delicacy training. Champion/No, it's more than that. Thomberry/Or something. Norton/Where are we going with this? I don't want to just say we're doing everything fight. I think we need to emphasize things that need to be done better, and this is one of them. (All talking). Lehman/Would it be fair for us to say that it is important to this council that our police department be proficient in non-violence training and philosophy? Council/Sure. Lehman/... And I believe that is the goal of the police department, but I think it's fine for council to say that basically we prefer nonviolent confrontation to violent confrontation. Which I'm sure... Karen? This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 24 Kubby/I have done a lot of research a couple of Octobers ago about this issue and talked to folks all over the country and I can provide R.J. with all that information again and the contacts. But to maybe get some of the material from the Martin Luther King, Jr., Center for Nonviolence h who has a whole department for police training that the Miami... Police Department has gone through this training. And to see what their materials are that... to see how they compare with what we do. Maybe we do 80% of it. Maybe we don't. But I would like us to direct R.J. to look at some other departments who have gone through this to say, what has it brought to your department that lets you be a better police department in your community. Thornberry/Don't know if we would like our police department to emulate the police department of Miami, Florida. Lehman/I don't know, but I think what Karen says that ifR.J. would like to look at that, compare that with how we do it, I have no problem with that. Vanderhoef/To look at materials and see how they differ or how much they are the same is important to what we have right here. That's all I... Atkins/I just want to remind you, I think there' s one very, very important thing that came out of everything where we are today. We have detailed use of force report. Each and every report is reviewed by the chief and by an internal review... Our use of force definition is handcuffing. Kubby/That's right. Atkins/...We have a very, I don't know how to describe it, but we have a very stringent standard that if you handcuff someone, that is a use of force and you must be able to describe what happened, why'd you do it, what were the consequences thereafter, and most of which is obviously taking someone to jail. So please understand that use of force which I think is kind of an underlying issue with this whole discussion, I think we do a very good job. And I think you look throughout the state, not many cities are doing that. Kubby/And we made a huge change when we said drawing your firearm in the presence of someone or not is considered a use of force and will be reported. That was a radical change, a small change but a huge change... Atkins/I think the important thing to know is that R.J. took it further by saying if you have physical contact basically that' s going to get reported and I think that the officers at least I read those reports. I know that he does. They put them in detail. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 25 I think they also recognize this substantiates the conduct I had out on the field. And it's all written down. Champion/I don't want you to think that I'm criticizing it. Atkins/You ought to be critical. Champion/But I'm not criticizing. I'm really not criticizing, but just as an example, Dean. It's a matter of training in just body language and language. If you say to a two year old, sit in your chair, they're probably not going to do it. But if you say, let's go and sit in your chair, it's... that kind of training. It's how the approach is done. Norton/...it's like we were going to hire saints ...It's really hard to do all these things. You read these... reports and circumstances that arise are just so kind of all different, unimaginable sometimes that it really would be very hard. Here's an example. This is an e-mail we got, I'll give you the author. Norton/John Robertson wrote it for JC News. He says, use of force continues to be the primary method compared to a year ago... to be the primary method of police intervention. Firearms continue to be drawn on a regular basis, notwithstanding the petty nature of the nearly all crime. Officers continue to exercise an intimidating and militaristic approach toward the community as opposed devoting (can't hear) towards improving peacekeeping skills of the police department in place of PR and other factors designed to build its image. I don't know... That's the harshest side... Atkins/John Robertson is... Norton/I'm just saying that exists. Atkins/John Robertson's a local attorney and uses a chat line to comment. That's all in the speech. Say what you want to say. And to our knowledge, we've never received anything directly from the legal community, whether it Mr. Robertson or some other attorneys saying, I've experienced this. We'd like you to look at that. It's never happened. Vanderhoef/Totally ungrounded. Norton/I understand. I just said that those are the kind of comments you hear. I just think we need to be as careful as we possibly can. I think we're trying to... Atkins/But I think we are... This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 26 Vanderhoef/What happens here folks is that we now have a report, and we're not even acknowledging that for the size of our city and the number of contacts that our policemen make, look how few we have. And this has been consistent this last year. And I'm saying, I will challenge the people who make these ungrounded assessments, gross and this is what's happening in our police force to come and look at this and see, isn't that interesting. We have not escalated to the point of use of force. Atkins/And I'd also like to comment that I'd think we have community conflict with respect to this. It wasn't an hour or so ago you were telling me one of our police officers appearing before the Downtown Association saying, what is the police going to do about moving these kids out of the ped mall. Moving them out implies I don't want them there. They're certainly entitled to be there. Lehman/Every right to be there. Atkins/That's a conflict in community policy because there are merchants who would say, back the truck up. Load them up. Get them out of here. Lehman/There are merchants who would say the police are not doing there job when in fact they have every right to be there. And there are people downtown saying, we don't want these kids here. What's wrong with the cops. Then an hour later they're saying, but the police have to be so careful. Norton/I know. It's a toughie... Kubby/But the purpose of this time today is to talk about left things that we hadn't talked about in the heat of crisis. Okay... and because we want to make improvements and discuss and struggle through some of these issues doesn't mean we think our police department is corrupted and horrible. It just means we have other issues to talk about outside of the heat of a specific issue. Lehman/...I think we legitimately say that number 1, nonviolence training and philosophy is a high priority with the council. And I think R.J. probably... Winklehake/The only thing I was going to add to the thing on the use of force that there is a committee of officers and supervisors that do review every one of those every month and the whole purpose of that is how could we have done this better. And if there is something, the supervisor sees that and if there is something that we need to do training for, we will do that right away. The whole purpose of that group to get together to review that is to simply see ifthere's a better way. Could This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 27 we have done this without using this force by doing something else? I think that gets directly to the issue that you're dealing with. Kubby/After we've done those for a year we can see are there certain officers who are on that list more than others. Are there certain types of situation that are on there more than others so that we can dictate, have our training dictated by those kind o f trends ? Winkelhake/And one caution you need to look at there is also the situation where some people are working. Thornberry/The areas and the times. Norton/Isn't that kind of sticky, R.J. when you review those in front of people who are involved in some of them and there' s tacit criticism? Winklehake/Quite frankly, they're harsher on themselves than most other people will be. Thornberry/But I'd like to see them step beyond maybe a baton in use of force right directly to a gun on an injured animal, for example. I don't want to see them beating that poor animal to death... Just right to the gun to dispatch the injured animal... Lehman/ Thornberry/No, Emie. All I'm saying is they still have to know what' s appropriate for the situation, and maybe jump into, I mean when you're stopping a car that's been reported on to the state or federal thing and they see the car, you might have to jump right away. You don't just ease in from one to the other. You might take that other job. But I think they're doing an admirable job. Lehman/That's their call. They've got to do that. Obviously you've heard some concern that we haven't and I don't know that any of us are saying that we're not doing it the way we should, but it is a hypothetical priority for us. Norton/What I meant was, Ernie, that just to finish that a little bit, was that it is difficult for people in that situation to sit around and there' s a certain amount of kind of self analysis and self criticism, and some extent public among their peers the criticism. And they need to know that we want to see that done... So they don't feel this is something that' s imposed on them in an arbitrary way by the chief... The city really thinks it's important. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 28 Lehman/I think the use of force report, which I personally don't pay a lot of attention to it. I read through it occasionally. But that report alone probably makes a strongest statement that we could make for nonviolence. Because you have to fill out that report, chances are you'll do everything possible short of violence so that you don't have to fill out... O'Donnell/Well, Ernie. So does the Police Citizens' Review Board .... That's a step beyond that. We given everybody a tool to use. Champion/I would hope during that, using that report could control their behavior very easily. Lehman/I hope they are to some degree. Norton/ Kubby/Is there any sentiment on the part of council to review our mission statement to include the sanctity of human life? Champion/I think that's an understood statement. O'Donnell/I don't think it need to be changed. I think it's a given. Lehman/I think it really is kind of explicit. But I don't... one way or the other. Thornberry/Community Standards. What are our community standard? Lehman/As part of the accreditation process, is there any review of community standards. I know that the PCRB is having a meeting later this month where they are inviting public input, which I guess I would have to personally access as listening to some of the public when it comes to community standards. But is there anything in the accreditation process that involves the public. Atkins/I'm not so sure there is in the accreditation process. I'm not going to speak for R.J. He can answer himself. But in response to that particular question, we've already initiated some things that I think are more reflective of community standards, in other words what our folks are saying, and that's neighborhood surveys and R.J. can speak on that... Winkelhake/That's already under way. Doing that you come up with... This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 29 Atkins/...Following the recent following the recent Broadway Taylor, there are folks who have expectations that are here in time of crisis, somewhere else when things are peaceful. Norton/Have we tried to help articulate community standards right here as this group is trying to reflect and articulate what we take to be community standards ...kind of reflected in the matter of use of force and the efforts to be as civilized as you possibly can in dealing with this difficult cases. Kubby/On the 29th we might hear some more from the community... Norton/Yeah. Lehman/Which is another form that literally we created by forming the board. Atkins/Also, community standards, there's a dynamic nature to that. Thomberry/Sure. Atkins/And I think it's something that you've got to constantly keep your finger on the pulse that it's going to go through peaks and valleys and I think that you just have to be sensitive to what's going on out there on the street. How we deal with it. Norton/Can I ask one that's related to that? You alluded to it the other day, Steve. This has to do with the policy... R.J ..... you're kind of, in many police departments, they're trying to pick up on... relatively minor infractions that may lead to something else... It's kind of preventive policing, but you're trying to be a little tougher on more routing things and sometimes that leads to heading off heavier duty. Winklehake/...the name they use is broken windows by Kellogg I believe it is. The idea is there, you address some of the small issues before they can lead to larger issues. And that means for instance the prime one that they use is broken window. You have a broken window in a building and you don't repair it, within a few days you're going to have a couple more broken windows and before long you have broken windows all the place. So as soon as you see something like that, you gotta repair it. Abandoned vehicle. Find an abandoned vehicle get it out of three. Thornberry/Graffiti. Winklehake/The small things like... walking down the street drinking beer. It's a violation. You leave people to do that, you're going to end up with a lot more things going on. And it's addressed some of those small issues which can be This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 30 somewhat controversial in certain parts of your community. But the idea is address some of the small as quickly as you can and some of the bigger issues never become that large. Norton/...We need to be sure about that because I understood you to say, Steve, that you'd hear a few calls. You get some call, hey one of the police wasted their time with somebody drinking beer, walking down the street. That' s the other side of that. Atkins/And it's usually someone who has experienced the police. And they will say why aren't you doing this instead of that... And the underaged dtinking, regardless of how you feel, is flat out against the law. We enforce that. We try to enforce all. We also use other tools. For example HIS. In the Broadway/Taylor, one of things that we did somewhat quietly is, just inspect, go through, take a quick look at the neighborhood. See some trash. You see something. Ding them. We did that... And if it's just R.J., he knows those things are going on, the officers are tipped off and watch what the things are going on. We just believe it makes for a better neighborhood. Norton/Is that something that the council sees what the community standard is, probably wise to pay attention to those small things, even though that may not be everybody's. . . may not understand the full implication... Kubby/As long as those small things are looked at equally across the board and not just... Norton/Selectively you mean. Kubby/Because in my neighborhood, if my neighbors walking down the street drinking beer, that same result should happen. As if it happens on Taylor Drive. O'Donnell/I think it does. Norton/That should be a point then to this. It should be fairly... Because that's always a charge... Kubby/That's not what we're heating... Atkins/I said Broadway/Taylor was a unique circumstance where we put in an intense effort and went after that. I don't think there's any doubt that you know that throughout this community we enforce the Housing Code regardless of what spot you're in in town. Are there times when you need to rally your forces to do more intense effort? ...The answer to the question is yes we do. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 Jtme 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 31 Champion/There is. Definitely. Atkins/We have Parks and Recreation activities planned for that neighborhood. Now is that something extraordinary and above and beyond what other neighborhoods get? Sure. And we knew what we were doing walking fight in to it. Thornberry/How far do you want our officers to go as far as underage smoking? ...How far are you going to go? (All talking) Lehman/I think Karen brought up an issue and I think it's important. When we talked about the staying in the downtown bars and whatever. I don't know of people that fish in bathtubs. You fish where fish are. And if you've got violations occurring in an area, you concentrate your efforts in that area. And I don't disagree with you that drinking a beer on your sidewalk certainly is as much in violation as drinking one in an area that has a high incidence of civil disobedience. I would not expect the police to be in your area looking for the beer. And I would expect them in the other areas. And I have no problems with that. Champion/There is a difference, too. If I'm on my sidewalk dfinking a beer. Lehman/Your breaking a law. Champion/Well I probably have .... And my walking downtown drinking a beer. The implications are different. You have to have some common sense. Atkins/Remember, you ask your police officers to make those judgements everyday. Champion/Right. Atkins/Somebody's going to be upset about it. Champion/I expect them to use rationality. Atkins/Yes. Norton/They are though reinforced for that kind of activity. I trust they're not criticized. If they bring up something or identify something, take steps... Does somebody say, there's nothing to put a charge there. That's what I hear a lot of times when a cop brings up too many items, his superior says it's not enough to make an arrest This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 32 or a charge there. You're just causing trouble. I hope they're reinforced for this kind of behavior. Atkins/My impression of our officers, and I think maybe there' s something and R.J. can explain it better than I, but it's something that I've learned over the years. We have a small police department... by a community of our size, our department' s not all that big. And that our officers. Thornberry/Seems like they're everywhere. Atkins/No those are parking monitors. They follow you around. 50-60 of them. Our officers who respond to calls in the field, also exercise, and I think it's something they're to be commended for, a great deal of independent judgement and sense of follow up investigations. We have detectives and so forth but I think you know that that is an important part of their workload and they come in contact with lots of other folks. Patrol officers are often thought of as driving up, take the report, ship it downtown, back in the car. Our folks don't do that. And I think that's something they need to be commended for. It also gives them greater exposure because they're in contact with more folks about some particular incidence. But we almost have to do it given the size of our department. Thornberry/Back to smoking. What do you want them to do? O'Donnell/I saw the neatest thing. I stopped in a HandiMart and got a newspaper. And a guy in front of me bought a pack of cigarettes and a little speaker came out and said, check ID. Champion/That should be required. Norton/A little what came out? O'Donnell/A little speaker came out of the cash register .... As soon as they keyed cigarettes into the machine, it came out and said, check ID. I think it's a wonderful idea. Norton/We got a lot of input just recently, didn't we about this whole thing? Champion/It might be a way to control some of that hanging out downtown. I mean if you don't want them hanging out. I mean they have the right to be there. Lehman/You're fight. Champion/You're being selective again. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 33 Lehman/No. This moming officer was talking to a group of downtown merchants and this was exactly the truth. We walk onto the plaza. The kids put their cigarettes out. We walk around the comer, they immediately light up. Sometimes they even have kids watching. Look, the cops are coming. Put your cigarettes out .... It's going on all the time. They have an impossible job enforcing that. It's true that there are citations for underage smoking. Occasionally I've seen those. Atkins/Yes occasionally they'll use it. Lehman/When they catch them, but it happens all the time and it's a cat and mouse game between those underage smokers and always will be. Thornberry/...drinking is the same thing... The beer goes under the coat... Kubby/That might be an important topic to have a separate discussion on. Put it on our list because we have things that have been waiting for over a year to be talked about. Lehman/I think you're going to get correspondence from last night's meeting regarding enforcing the cigarette... Atkins/Yes... Kubby/When will we get the response... Lehman/The third item on your list is all policy should be written. I am assuming that we have pretty much accomplished that. Atkins/Under way. Lehman/And through this process all policies will be written. Winklehake/Every policy that we're going to have that going through the accreditation process there are four hundred and some standards that have to be addressed. Everyone of them have to be written. You have to be able to show them... have to be written. With the police department for instance some of them address personnel issues that we get from personnel department... They will all be written down. Norton/How will they review those?... This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 34 Winkelhake/The way we're dealing with that issue... the one captain deals very closely with the training. Our intent... to use roll call... a breakdown ofwhat's happened since the last time you've worked, basically the last 16 hours. That takes about five minutes .... Plan to have a signoff sheet. This month you're going to look at general order number so and so... We'd like to have a training officer who does nothing but set up the training, where they'll be a presentation for the watch commanders to go over and highlight the main topics... Once you have all these standards in place that somewhere in the course of 12 months, every one of those are going to get reviewed in roll call. Norton/And particularly the most important ones... Winklehake/We have had Gallagher-Bassett Insurance carrier for the city have identified 12 orders that for them they feel are critical. Those 12 are... either in place, being reviewed, or being prepared at the present time. Lehman/Okay. Champion/How often do you review policies? Winkelhake/It depends... there are some that are going to be reviewed every year, some that will be reviewed every two years. There are some that in accreditation, they will say three years, but that's the outside. Thornberry/PCRB also reviews them. Right? Winkelhake/They will be given each of the policies at the completion for there review. We have talked about the way we would give the policies to them. They'd prefer that we have them in place here, give it to them. At the completion, rather than as we're going part of the process. Norton/It's just clear that things like searches and car stops and all that kind of thing are ones that have to be do more frequently... Winkelhake/...You're talking about car stops and so on. Some of that will change every year because legislation will have new laws... Usually fight around the end of June... the Iowa County Attorneys Association puts on a training session on the new laws. We usually send 2-3 supervisors... who have to prepare summary... copies of the law... Kubby/One of the policies that was changed two years ago was our open door policy. ...explicit... whether or not we still go into a place of business if we cannot obtain permission... supervisor or search warrant, administrative warrant. We've This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 35 had open door plus policy...Has there been a time when we have not been able to gain permission and have gone in without permission?... Thomberry/What I have said, in my business I have given them blanket permission to go in due to the fact... fast food burglaries ....officers see activity... have blanket permission from me... Norton/...Where do we stand?... What do you do in cases where you don't have that. Champion/Emergency. What do you do then? Kubby/That's taken care of... Norton/ Kubby/ O'Donnell/Each case is different... Kubby/Some communities have it... have to have a search warrant. Norton/...4th amendment? Winklehake/I don't believe you're going to get a search warrant just because you're going to find an open door someplace and you can't contact anybody... How often someone has given permission to go in, I can't answer that... If the supervisor is there... may give permission... Kubby/Can we find out? ...keep track... Norton/...secure and back off... where we stand? Winkelhake/Policy states if you respond to an open door, alarm, whatever... secure business then contact the business owner... Close the door. That business may be left potentially vulnerable because you're going to pull the door shut. It's not locked. In the survey we did, I think there's a little confusion... ifthere's... something awry at the business, who do you call... not necessarily does it say, you have permission to go in... Kubby/So the question is, how many times have we gone in when we haven't...? Winkelhake/I'd have to check. I don't know the answer. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 36 Lehman/All right .... Item #4: Down time after a gun is drawn... What are we doing? How important is it?... I don't feel qualified to comment. Winkelhake/The policy is if the weapon is drawn, there is not any down time. It's a practical matter. We simply don't have the people to be able to do that. Lehman/Right. Winkelhake/You see the use of force. You see how many times officers do draw the weapon. However, the other side. If the weapon is used... what we will do there is the officer is put on administrative leave... Norton/ Lehman/I feel that' s appropriate. Norton/That's right... Kubby/Although the flip side of that is that officers are trained to get out their fire arms only when they feel they are in danger or when other people are in danger. In those situations I hope to God that their physiological systems are in full gear. If they're feeling in danger enough, if they're drawing their firearms appropriately... We don't want someone who can casually say, oh other people are in danger... I want the personality profile of our officers to be slightly disturbed that they had to put that deer down... Thornberry/...When you go down hunting... I don't know you really need down time once you made your kill. Kubby/I'm not talking about two days off. I'm talking about a ten minute cool down period to let your system get back so you can go on to the next call... Norton/How would you possibly do that?... Winkelhake/...The supervisors now... may very well have the officers come to to the station... We've had that... Champion/There is down time anyway... Kubby/There are times... when that happens... Norton/... Yep. They're called from one to another because they're so thin. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 37 Thornberry/... if they're so thin, how can you have half the force down? Kubby/They shouldn't be on if they're drawing their guns that often... Lehman/Go ahead R.J. Winklehake/...As soon as they get in their car, they have to go to the next call that may be for a parking ticket. So there is that transition. It's not unusual to come in here and find that there's calls waiting to be serviced ..... They're are also what you had talked about. There are times when the supervisor to say, I need to see you... Vanderhoef/...How about the flip side of that? An officer who maybe has... two or three in a row... can he call a supervisor? Winklehake/We've had two officers that have done just that. Kubby/Can we accommodate it? Winklehake/Yes. Kubby/ Lehman/Okay. Item 5. Kubby/...some conclusions that we're not... Lehman/We need a three minute break. I said three. [Break] Lehman/Item 5. What discussion would we like to have regarding a crisis plan? Norton/Any type of crisis... we out to get together as rapidly as possible. Kubby/If we had this weather report that we might have gotten four inches in this short period of time, we probably would've had some problems... I would've loved to have the mayor call an emergency meetings... just to know what's going on... Thornberry/Or if that tomado had come a little bit further north. Norton/I say, do not hesitate to call us in an emergency and let us know... This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 38 Lehman/I think that is what is really the key thing, that the council get together as quickly as possible. Norton/You read all these other ones and they're there instantly... You've got to be visible fight now. Kubby/Even when they're a couple of drive by shootings, I think we need a memo or call or get together to say this is what our response has been and this is what we're planning to do the next couple of days so we're all informed. Thornberry/You're fight, but I think a memo is a little too late. Norton/...phone tree. Kubby/I don't want to say there's only one way to have this. Lehman/I would agree, even if we don't know anything. At least we all know that we don't know anything. Norton/...phone tree... no problem. Lehman/...I think we all agree to that ...If we do have a crisis, that's going to involve the city manager, police chief...Rick Fosse, Chuck Schmadeke, Moreno... Kubby/If we ever have another death of a citizen by a public employee, it'd be a time we need to get together... Lehman/Yeah... Thornberry/Or one of the school things that' s been going on... Norton/ Lehman/...at least we have an opportunity to know about it, address it at that point... Kubby/We can bring a strong response together as a group, which is why a meeting is better than a phone call... Norton/...we need to leave Marian a list if you're out of town... Champion/I don't even leave my number for my kids. Lehman/...We're all on the same sheet of music here. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 39 Norton/...answering machine... Have any meeting with Jim ..... our emergency management person? O'Donnell/I don't think so. Norton/... elaborate plans and communication systems... Kubby/If Palo goes, we're going to get a whole bunch of people in town. I just know that from my Red Cross connections... Southeast will be set up... Norton/...interesting to hear... League of Cities' workshops... appalled at how little you're aware of what you ought to know. Lehman/I would assume we're in the loop... Winklehake/We're aware of what would be required, for instance evacuation... number of plans... in place. Norton/Tell you what I'm going to do... CHANGE TAPE TO REEL 98-78 SIDE 2 Norton/...a copy of Crisis Response For Citizen Leadership... just hand one to each person... O'Donnell/I think a big part of it is education... There's a second siren test... We're expecting people to know that the first siren is emergency and the second one means attack .... That's what I'm talking about, it's education... simplify with one siren. I'm going to suggest that to them... Norton/...School kids more than city... Lehman/...we all agree when we have a situation that we get together. Kubby/...can't help but talk about Eric Shaw's killing when we talk about some of this stuff... The other part of the crisis plan for me is when we had the hundred or so people at our council meeting... that one of the things that we didn't do that would've helped with the community crisis... we didn't validate the feelings of the people who there... Doesn't mean we have to agree or disagree with what the say .... training for us on how to deal with high emotions in a public sphere... This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 40 Lehman/And I think really helpful to each other. We were totally untrained for that... We didn't know what to do. Norton/... emotional response is a private, personal matter... Kubby/...to have a couple of people to respond in some verbal way... If we would've met before, we would've been able to say, here's what we're doing... Champion/You're fight. The community was very angry at the council, not because of what happened, but because there was no empathy. Norton/There was. (All talking). Lehman/Don't agree. Champion/Not publicly. Norton/...It's up to the mayor to speak in our behalf. Kubby/Something we need to acknowledge... Lehman/Just the fact that we agree to get together... Kubby/... having some kind of press conference immediately... wouldn't have much to say, but would've said that outlook. Vanderhoef/A press conference that says we have nothing to say. O'Donnell/That was one way, like the killing, Karen. That to me just puts a community fight on guard fight away. I think that's the wrong term... (All talking). Lehman/The point here is in situations of cfisis, we will notify each other. If we deem it necessary we'll have a meeting. Norton/The wording is important... needs to be collectively reviewed... Lehman/And that would be done at a meeting. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 41 Thornberry/On this particular crisis plan, say for example... a tornado is imminent... do we do anything? Lehman/No. Go to your basement. Thornberry/I understand. Then it hits. What do we do? Lehman/If it hits this community then there is reason that the council should meet... Thornberry/We ought to have a plan because if that happens, you're not going to have telephone lines. Champion/Come here. Thornberry/I think we ought to have a plan in place because you're not going to find people by telephone... Norton/ Atkins/Having experienced that back in 1980 and the town was hit by tornadoes... we contacted the mayor and we didn't convene the council until later on... because quite frankly we were overwhelmed... As long as you have some reasonable discretion, you'll allow me that... I would call the mayor immediately and say here's what's coming down... Kubby/For those who can't get through by the telephone can send a community service officer out or another employee out. Lehman/If we have those employees available. Kubby/It can be someone else from the finance department in that kind of situation to be pulled to notify council members... O'Donnell/Or we could know ifthere's a tornado we could all meet somewhere. Then what do we do? Norton/McGinley has a plan under way... who can order evacuations and that sort of thing. They do have that pretty well under control... Kubby/... Maybe a meeting to develop a plan... Lehman/I think it's more important that we know what's going on then we determine what happens. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 42 Norton/If they have a plan for communication centers and all that stuff, that' s what the kind of information we probably ought to hear about so we're reassured that everything is under control. I really think we need that briefing at some point on those issues. Lehman/That's right. Atkins/So you understand, I remember, I could not reassure it was under control. Lehman/But they knew the situation, and I think that's what we're saying. We need to know the situation. Norton/If people ask us, we need to know what the emergency response pattern of this community is, and I think that's something that's just basic training the city council. Atkins/I'm okay with that. Vanderhoef/And for me, if I am out of touch because of a telephone, I take it upon myself to get down here and find out what' s happening, even if it may be that I'm the person that will end up being able to go contact somebody else. Who knows, but this is the central... Atkins/I commend you for your efforts, but one of the first instructions I gave the council members, please stay home. There are power lines down, you're only going to go get fried if you go out of your house. You're just going to hunker down, and in this case it took about twelve hours before we could restore any kind of reasonable communication, and that was just simply radio communication within our...Now I had a couple of council members excited when the national guard trucks started showing up. I didn't have any choice, and I can do that. Lehman/See the point is though council knew the situation, as you kept them informed as to what you knew. Atkins/Yeah, but it was sometime later because I couldn't get to them. Thornberry/Of course in direction by council to anybody else. I mean direction by community, who would be the worst direction. Lehman/But at least we know what's going on .... All right. Item Six Kubby/Do we have four minutes? This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 43 Lehman/All right, you got four minutes. According to my watch we got about ten. That clock isn't fight, by the way .... Canine unit, I have had some interest expressed to me by one person who is willing to contribute to the cost of a canine dog. Canine dog, that's redundant. I've also had communication from another group of people who would be willing to help solicit funds for a police dog, and I guess it's our call as to whether or not we want one. I think there is enough support in the community to pay for a dog. Kubby/Can we find out .... Can we get a report from the sheriff about what circumstances they're using the dog in and how often and-once you get it you have to justify that you have it? Norton/And not only that, there are all kinds of other costs. You got cages, you got this and that, you know if anybody's got an animal at home you know the vet's on you about... it's a big deal. I think we ought to rent a dog. That's my idea. Champion/Rent a dog? Norton/I mean if you need a dog, canine unit, the sheriff could be... Lehman/Well, except that I talked to R.J. at one point, or not too long ago, we had a situation where we were trying to track someone that may have been bleeding, that dog is trying to attack, is that correct? We could use to the dog to trace this person because when they found the person they would have attacked him. Norton/Well you need to rent a different dog. Lehman/Well, my point is we have a number of cities in the State of Iowa using police dogs. Cedar Rapids, less than two months ago there was someone in a church, broke in, they went to the church, they went to the church, they opened the door, the dog went in, the dog found the burglar, the police was not in danger, the burglar was not in danger. I think there's a tremendous asset to the police department and to the people of the community. In the matter of safety, in having a police dog. Marion just got one, Cedar Falls had two that died, the community raised the money to pay for their dogs. Thomberry/How much did your dog cost, Mafian? Norton/It may be very popular, Ernie, but I'm not convinced. I think that there ought to be sharing, given the frequency, that' s my feeling. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 44 Vanderhoef/Within our county though, if there's only one dog and the high population that we have, and, I was hesitant on this early on, and I wanted to step back and take a look, and in talking to the people in the community, and my own thoughts about it, I feel like it is worth the money now. And these offers from the community says to me that there are people out there who think it's terribly important to have this. I don't know how many of you still have your papers that we gave out a long time ago, but the costs of an untrained dog is anyplace from three to seventy-five hundred dollars. Costs of training is upwards to forty-five hundred dollars, the police guard conversion and so forth. There is a list of costs that were provided to us and the total is in the neighborhood of fifteen thousand. You know, round it off. I'm willing to pay for that for the safety in the community. Thornberry/I don't think we need an attacker .... it shouldn't be an attacker, you know we could use a barker dog, that goes in and plays up a person, bounds somebody that' s there and sounds the alarms. Bark, bark, bark, bark, bark. Norton/Why not get the sheriff another dog and then be able to use it occasionally? Why not share this? Vanderhoef/Well we could share our dog too for that matter. Thornberry/I think that it's a good idea to look into getting a dog for the city. Vanderhoef/I would like to talk, I had spoken with R.J., recently about this, and there are dogs trained obviously for different things ..... search is one that I'm very interested in, and the drug sniffing, and if it's possible to have a dual trained dog in those two things that would probably be my high priority, and in a town like this I think it's important. Lehman/Karen, Kubby/Well, we talked about this before, that the officer would most likely be the officer for the canine unit was an officer who had some discipline, a proper use of force, and that was seeming inappropriate to use. Would that be the officer that we would use at this point? Winklehake/What we would have to do is ask for people that would be interested. I don't know how many would apply. Kubby/Because to me that's a big factor. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 45 Atkins/And I think we may be less than candid with you, the officer, he's a very skilled dog trainer, I don't think there's any doubt that it came to evaluation- Kubby/Oh, that' s why he was picked, and his behavior, there has not been repeat of his incidence in a while but this is in recent enough memory that we have a PR problem with that. I want to be supportive, so that's a factor that we would basically understand up front. Norton/How many times a day have you had an occasion to wish you had a dog? Winklehake/ .... if you talked about the county, the sheriff s dog, I think it was within the past week to ten days we called twice the dog wasn't available. We ended up bringing the dog down from Marion and another time from Muscatine County. Now, just the travel time alone creates a additional concern. Kubby/What about a possibility, ifthere's a majority who wants to do this, to collaborate with Coralville to have one dog for Iowa City and Coralville. Norton/It would be a wonderful chance. Thornberry/I think a 28E agreement would be. Winklehake/ .... we already have 28E through mutual aid, so everybody could also sign another one 28E agreement ifthat's what you wanted to do to share the cost. Norton/ Lehman/But wouldn't any, if we had a canine, wouldn't that dog be available because of our mutual aid agreement with Coralville, the county would- any other jurisdiction the county- Winklehake/Yes .... We have 28E agreement with Linn County, Cedar Rapids, Marion, Iowa County, Thornberry/Ask for one for Muscatine, ask one from someplace else, they're willing to do that, we would be willing to do that with ours. Norton/But who pays? Atkins/But 28E is an agreement, but it can also put financial terms in conditions. That' s a component of the agreement. So... Vanderhoef/I guess I want to ask one more question. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 46 Lehman/Go. Vanderhoef/When we request Marion to come down, do we help pay for the cost of that officer' s time and travel and care of that dog? Lehman/No. (All talking) Vanderhoef/Well, the 28E, but I'm just talking about right now on the mutual aid kind of thing. Winkelhake/No, we do not pay for that. Norton/Only if we use supplies and things. You do there. They get on fire if you go down and use a bunch of chemicals or something and they replace the chemicals or they tear up a bunch of suits, you replace that. The actual cost. Lehman/Do we have interest in pursuing this, at least getting a proposal? Champion/Yes. Norton/Talk to Coralville. Lehman/We'll contact Coralville, I would like R.J. for you, if this interests you, to give us an idea of how that animal would be used and how you feel about the importance to the police department, how it would be trained, the kinds of things the dog would be used for, if another tool, really. If we do in fact do this, I believe that it would be possible to raise the money to buy the animal from the public and not use city funds, I don't know that for a fact, but there have been a number of people that have expressed interest, latest one just last Monday, and that is from a group of people who might very well fund the dog in it's entirety. Thomberry/I think it also could possibly be a very good PR tool, also. Lehman/Oh yeah. Thornberry/With kids coming up and "nice doggie." Norton/I think the sheriff thing would also be very appreciated. Lehman/All right it is eleven o'clock, I'm sorry, Karen? This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798 June 17, 1998 Council Work Session page 47 Kubby/There are some other issues. Some of the things from the back of this three ring binder that we haven't talked about, ammunition type we haven't talked about, so will we have another opportunity? I mean, maybe it's like talking about one issue at a time, or two issues at a time just to keep this moving along. Lehman/We could do that or work session. Kubby/You know we got through a bunch of stuff, but lets keep moving. Lehman/Steve, how... It would appear to me that there are a number of issues, if we wanted to take them one at a time at a work session. For example the type of ammunition, do we have a topic for a work session, we could add it on. Thornberry/We could just have a list and see how far we got through each time. You know it wouldn't have to be one issue, two issues, if we could get through- Kubby/Say we'll spend fifteen minutes or whatever. Norton/I think we also may realize the PCRB has their forum coming up and their may be issues in there that would develop into this. We need to be sure to be sensitive to what they find out. Lehman/Oh, I'm sure we will be. Okay, we have a special meeting. Adjourned: 11:00 a.m. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council meeting of June 17, 1998 WS061798