HomeMy WebLinkAbout1999-11-10 TranscriptionNovember 10, 1999 Council Work Session Page 1
November 10, 1999
Council Work Session
7:00 PM
Staff: Atkins, Helling, Karr, Winkelhake
Others: Cole Chase
Tapes: 99-106 all
A complete transcription is available in the City Clerk's office.
Lehman/Well why don't we get started and the first thing I think we should do is go
around the table and everybody introduce themselves so we all know who's here
and then we're going to sign in for Madan because she has to know for the record.
Don Saxton/I'm Don Saxton, Mayor Elect of Oxford.
Steve Schmadeke/I'm Steve Schmadeke from the Daily Iowan.
Irvin Pfab/Irvin Pfab Council Elect for Iowa City.
John Weihe/John Weihe Coralville.
Ross Wilburn/Ross Wilbum Council Elect Iowa City.
Matthew Bahl/Matthew Bahl Council Elect in North Liberty.
Minnette Doderer/Minnette Doderer, Resident of Iowa City.
Lehman/No your State Representative, we need to say that.
Champion/Your more than that.
Lehman/Your (can't hear).
Ron Brandy/I'm Ron Brandy, Noah Liberty Council.
Richard Myers/Richard Myers State Representative House District 49.
Lehman/That was more than we needed.
man/I'm tired of folks (can't hear).
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Joe Bolkcom/I've just got to apologize for this (can't hear), I just got back from Des
Moines just now, I'm Joe Bolkcom, State Senator from Iowa City District (can't
hear).
Connie Champion/Connie Champion, Iowa City Council, District, what (can't hear).
Bill Dorst/I'm Bill Dorst Council Elect from Noah Liberty.
Mary Ann Dorst/Mary Ann Dorst, Noah Liberty Council Communication (can't hear).
Dee Vanderhoef/Dee Vanderhoef Iowa City City Council.
Lehman/Emie Lehman, Iowa City Council and these three gentlemen probably introduce
themselves Dale.
Dale Helling/Dale Helling, Assistant City Manager.
Steve Atkins/Steve Atkins, City Manager.
RJ Winkelhake/RJ Winkelhake, and I'm Police Chief of Iowa City.
Lehman/And the person in charge of it all Marian Karr. OK. Well I want to thank the
legislatures who are here, obviously you are out numbered. This is a.
man/I like the way you did that, you may be tired but your not that tired.
man/That's right.
Lehman/This is sponsored by Iowa League of Cities and the purpose of the meeting is to
look at some of the priorities that the League of Cities have established for the
upcoming legislative session and I think there are as opposed to previous years
where there were a long long wish list, there are top priorities and additional
priorities and the top two priorities are only two rather than the 12 or 15 that the
legislature has traditionally received and I think the hope is that with only a
couple issues that maybe the chances of getting some action will be a little better.
But the purpose of this meeting I think for those of us involved in city
government to I think express ourselves to you folks and also for you to tell us
what you envision relative to the first issue which of course is the land use issue,
which is an issue I think is important not just to the city but to counties and to one
of the few things that major cities and farm bureau can agree on but I think it's an
issue that has universal interest across the state and it's going to make life a lot
simpler for counties like Johnson County who tries to have land use plan as
comprehensive when they compete with counties across the state that have no
land use type at all but I think it's really a high priority across the state, it's not
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one that's going to be real easy on the (can't hear) a very rural oriented legislative
(can't hear) so I think why don't we start with the land use if you folks have any
comments great if not we'll (can't hear) have any questions for them or comments
why then we' 11 go from there.
Joe Bolkcorn/(can't hear). Have you guys, I mean I guess my first question I'm we
received the legislative priorities, is it the?
Lehman/Same.
Bolkcom/Is it the cities position in Johnson County that we ought to just do a pilot
project to decide how in planning? I mean it seems to me that I'm confused about
this legislative objective because I think we're further along in Iowa.
Vanderhoef/I agree.
Bolkcom/Than a lot of places because there's a lot of cities that have plans, there's a lot
of council (can't hear) League of Cities is just suggesting that we ought to have a
pilot project somewhere on planning. That's what this says but then I also got
another mailing that had some legislation, some proposed legislation that would
give cities the power to do zoning in a two mile extra extra territorial which is a
question that I think counties would probably have some questions. Or should
cities be able to do zoning of land where folks that live on that land should say so
and so on. City council or City Planning and Zoning Commission, so that was
another, and in reviewing the legislation I don't know if people have seen that
there's some legislation that's been drafted by the cities (can't hear) or people are
up to speed on (can't hear).
Lehman/Steve, Steve's a member of the Executive Committee of League of Cities.
Atkins/The League of Board of Directors. I happen to agree with you Joe that I think
that legislation is really unparticularly hard of hitting and what is the minority we
were trying to get something, seat something as a league to get the legislature to
respond more aggressively. Position the league took I think is substantially
because there are so many small cities in Iowa City, or in Iowa City, in Iowa that
they just simply can not afford to do the kind of comprehensive planning that I
believe is necessary as a board member, Professionally I believe it's necessary and
I think that legislation in the sense of disappointment (can't hear) is not aggressive
enough I happen agree with you. And the best we can do is come up with a pilot
program that at least we can point to something to make it work.
Bolkcom/The proposed legislation that essentially we create which I have some concerns
about in how it hits the ground here establishes a county wide committee which
would have the mayor's of all the communities or to designate a supervisor and
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then form members of the public pointed that would come together and they
would write a plan. The plan would spell out where growth wouldn't occur in the
county, they would submit that plan to the state, this new board created by the
state and if they would side up with this viable plan or not I just think it's a
challenge to somehow get the mayor's all together and meet, meet, because it
would take some time to do that and then whether or not maybe a power to
articulate for this immunity where growth is suppose to occur.
Lehman/How would the state evaluate a plan as to whether or not it was acceptable to
the local officials, county and city is bound to have an acceptable plan, how would
the state, would they just rubber stamp it or would they?
Bolkcom/Most likely, the legislation also (can't hear) it's assembly and goals and both
plans and (can't hear).
Dick Myers/You've got the Council of Governments.
Champion/We already are deemed.
Myers/
And we do a lot of stuff and I review the legislation as (can't hear) in a lot of
ways, adding, in the first place you can't tell future city council members what to
do. And in that matter you can't tell future legislatures what to do and a (can't
hear). That's, I think there is structure in place to this kind of thing. I think in
many cases where there clearly case workers in Iowa (can't hear) and yet in some
areas I think we're almost over planed and I say that because it seems like every
time we right legislation like this we get the structure and bureaucracy but we
don't get to the dogs and it bothers me a great deal. In particular when somebody
wants to change it after a new (can't hear).
Vanderhoeff What do you see as a possibility for those areas that have done basically
zero?
Myers/Well one thing I do see is local control, I've always believed in local control and
I believe that's the most important thing you can (can't hear) people got to do
what they want to do in their place and if they don't, like they, if they think that
these things ought to go unchecked and want to suffer the consequences that's
their business to some degree. Only to the extent of course where it affects the
state. I mean when you get to messing around with too much of this stuff you've
got to be careful what you ask for. You've got machinery now to blame, (can't
hear) you have it, it's in the budget, you've got the two mile business, use it. The
biggest problem with the two mile thing is there's you know there not every city's
got one of those two mile agreements, I find that extraordinary, that' s a piece of
machinery fight now, use it, you don't need (can't hear) at all.
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John Weihe/I think that like you said Johnson County seems to be ahead of the curve but
I think that you know what is it 33 or 35 counties do not have plans. And Johnson
County just implemented theirs. And so I think that that's where a lot of the push
is coming in from some of the other areas so I would think that maybe mandating
the County's have plans so that they can enforce zoning maybe something the
state can do and that might just kind of level off the (can't hear).
Myers/Not every county has zoning. You know you go down to some of these counties
in southern Iowa and zoning is communism for god sake I mean.
Minnette Doderer/In the first place, you've got to the rural lobbyist on your side, at least
talk to them. You know we can vote for it and we'll be a minority so you need to
start with the Farm Bureau.
Myers/I'm like Joe I'd be very skeptical of this stuff because I think that's (can't hear).
Bolkcom/Yea I think what's currently proposed is too it's too much.
Doderer/Well I'm not talking about everything, I'm talking about land use (can't hear).
Bolkcom/I'm a supporter of it the joint agreements, the 28E agreements, we call them
fringe area agreements, but I guess nobody else calls them fringe area agreements.
We start talking about fringe area agreements and what are you talking about?
But I think that those ought to be required in any annexations that because I think
it's a mechanism for the cities or the counties to communicate with one another,
lay out the ground rules and branch the rural property owners who don't feel like
their well represented then know the ground rules for development in their
neighborhood. And if we could solve one problem which has been a big problem
is the annexation questions (can't hear). But I think all the folks are going to
decide and we've got to figure out ways to get them talking to each other so (can't
hear). I think that said I think it would be good for the state to encourage land use
goals and maybe like are we concerned about farm land protection or are we
concerned about (can't hear), give some guidance in those areas.
Myers/(can't hear) legislation to let apieee of this legislation pass last time (can't hear).
Vanderhoef/Before.
Myers/No this is inside the city limits, condemnation law.
Lehman/Yes.
Myers/I didn't vote, I had to abstain on it because of my own personal situation, I won't
abstain next year, that's a bad bill.
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Lehman/Yes it is.
Myers/Terrible, and it didn't start out that way, and I'd be careful what you ask for when
you deal with legislation because sometimes it just gets twisted, this is an example
of that. It started out being a really simple document to deal with a few situations
like the one over here in Scott County where the city decided to go out into the
county in a huge way and the one up in Hiawatha where they decided to expand in
a huge way because they thought they might put a race track in. And there were
silly things like that and that' s what the legislation originally was reported to deal
with, and then got twisted into what this product and I think has some serious
growth implications in places where they might want to have a tool and the
legislatures (can't hear) someone.
Lehman/OK.
Myers/Again I think it violates local control.
Vanderhoef/Well your talking about one of the things that bothers me in particular is that
we have islands of agriculture land within our cities that are not being developed
and are just sitting there, we're providing infrastructure, passed them around them
and they're not being developed for whatever reasons. But they still have the
agricultural taxation kind of thing.
Myers/Right.
Vanderhoef/And they're not paying their fair sure for what' s happening in the city.
Myers/But they're not causing their very own city resources necessarily.
Vanderhoef/Well when we start putting all that infrastructure around it for years and
years and years.
Myers/But who wanted the infrastructure? You?
Vanderhoef/No the city grew beyond is what I'm saying, and now it's an island in the
middle of the city.
Myers/Yea, (can't hear). The guy that wanted (can't hear) land within the city wanted to
elect that he or she wasn't ready to develop it, they weren't using infrastructure,
they didn't come in and ask you to do that did they?
Vanderhoef/I don't know in particular, however when it's no longer being productively
farmed.
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Myers/Yea.
Vanderhoef/Then should it not be considered potentially developable and be taxed that
way?
Myers/That's a matter of the assessors to say.
Lehman/Dee, they do.
man/They do that.
Bolkcom/Well farmland and cities is taxed at a different rate than.
Vanderhoef/Right.
Bolkcorn/(can't hear). And last year I was on the Board of Supervisors and took a very
significant increase based on (can't hear).
Myers/I know the County Assessor does that now.
Bolkcom/Huge.
Vanderhoef/But what about the city's (can't hear)?
Lehman/Well one of the things that I think Dee is related to when you get to
developments, but Dick I think it is a local problem so when you get
development outside the community I've see where a lot of it, where for example
fight now they're redoing Prairie Du Chien Road, the counties doing it, we're
faced with a real problem inside the city limits. We're looking at West Benton
Street it's a big problem, of course it's going to be a bigger problem. This
development takes place in the county and certainly impact the infrastructure of
the city and we have to respond to that. I have nothing to say about what happens
in those developments. But I still, I think your fight Dick that's a local issue
that' s not something your state is going to come in and mandate or something and
we're going to hopefully work out with our own local Board of Supervisors.
Myers/I think you have to.
Bolkcom/I want to throw an idea out that (can't hear) out there it seems like in Johnson
County we've done a pretty good job because there's been a lot of awareness
about sprawl in sensitive areas and you know some leadership here and you know
to a degree to which people paid attention to it. It's been a issue in a public
sphere, but in other places it's not, and because local folks are going to make
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these decisions year in and year out, Supervisors and City Council I'm wondering
if we shouldn't think about developing some sort of center and probably the
closest model would be the Iowa Waste Reduction Center where we have
expertise that is available to commtmities to assist Planning and Zoning members,
City Council members that constantly turn over, planning staffs in some of the
techniques and some of the things that are working in certain parts of the state and
try and export the things that are working in places where the awareness is not
great or they're not doing a lot. I'm serving on Supervisor's for six years going to
ICAD meetings, not one time in six years did ISAD have at any of their meetings
presentation on language and best practice that kind of stuff. So I guess I'm
wondering in terms of, how do we best develop and pass the old elected officials,
is there a place for that kind of technical assistance.
John Weihe/Through the COGS I would think.
BolkcomJ Well COGS are out there but (can't hear).
Weihe/And so we've got the structure there.
Bolkcom/Sure you could set as a model. And then they have.
Weihe/And then fund some source of education or expertise in that area.
Bolkcom/Another thought was fund a full time position like we did with the Waste
Management position a few years ago we said recycling's a big deal, we'll fund it,
every COG got a position and they all probably (can't hear). I think it's probably
pretty uneven when you talk about the planning function, we, I know it's county
work, with JCICOG but we had kind of a more of a cooking cutter approach.
That's a plan that really meant the needs of johnson County, so I, it was kind of
planning light, I guess the COGS are, the implements out there but I guess I
wonder if it's, it would be uneven number one between 13 COGS (can't hear).
Vanderhoef/The COGS, easy EICOG presently is maxed out with their planning staff
and could use this assistance for sure. They're out there, we, they're getting
requests for doing some zoning things for the small communities and they're
trying to get organized and they are truly maxed out and you get into a situation
then you can't overcharge the small community for the service that you provide
above and beyond what their regular membership costs is there. So money to fund
a planner at the COGS level would be very beneficial I would say to the small
communities.
Bolkcorn/I did do an amendment last year when we evaded this (can't hear) local
government that did not pass that, no show, giving like $25,000 bucks to each
COG but we could come up again. I just think we need to figure out a way to
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develop the capacity of people that tum over every other year in all these
thoughts because they're going to make (can't hear) out of all this stuff.
Doderer/It's going to be a long hard fight?
man/Yea.
Doderer/Even the Des Moines people have vote against the big stuff because they don't,
something wasn't right.
Myers/Well I (can't hear) to support the top priority because I knew of expansion of
something that already is because of another unfunded mandate (can't hear).
Doderer/The Pilot projects in other cases really inspire people to expand it everywhere?
Lehman/Well I think Joe's concern about pilot projects is very valid because there are
enough projects around the state of Iowa that Joe keep pilot projects. We've got
track records in communities that I think that that term is probably not a really
good one. The concem I think is with land use period, and I'm not (can't hear), I
don't know, I haven't read the legislation proposal I believe. But I think that there
is a concern about land use and I think it's even more of a concem across the
state, some areas having a greater concern than others but as far as in particular a
piece of legislation I don't know that, at least from my perspective I'm not
considered an a bill as much as I am a concept that but at some point we do have
to address all these.
Myers/You've also got to remember too that things change.
Lehman/Yea.
Myers/You know, and you have to be flexible enough to realize that. The first decision I
ever made on the City Council 30 years ago was land use, (can't hear) and
nothing's changed. I can remember when you had a vote down here to deal with
putting in that Wal-Mart down there, and it went into comprehensive plan, and it
had to go as far as having a referendum, which I thought was ridiculous. But
nevertheless.
Lehman/Which Wal-Mart?
Myers/The one down south, you had a referendum to go with that. You voted on it.
Champion/But it was brought about by the people.
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Myers/Because it violated the comprehensive plan or something like that. Well you
know it frankly well it demonstrated to me was the plan was wrong. You can
hardly, you ought to change the (can't hear) ofwhat's happened down there in
that area but I mean, that's a decision that you guys made yourself and that's fine,
that' s your job. But I, just you have to remember that plans change because needs
change and you have the idea that you can create something like this and have it
be an end all. It probably won't work.
Lehman/You know Rich that I wish that attitude applied to more things than dealing
with cities.
man/Gun control, sell some more.
man/More control (can't hear).
Lehman/Any other questions on land use from anybody?
Champion/Can you just tell me just briefly you know what the state is doing to preserve
agricultural land?
Doderer/Giving it a tax break.
Champion/So that's it.
Doderer/(can't hear).
Myers/But I believe that Minnette's answer is right, I think that's a profound answer in a
way because it says that look at the tax structure, look at the roll back issues,
clearly I think that' s one of these that works in favor of preserving agriculture
land. Did you know we still have, we have private property rights this year too
and a right to do with.
Doderer/All property isn't equal.
Man/No it isn't.
Champion/No, that's why I'm asking.
Myers/It's also purchasing land in many areas, there's more and more land being
preserved by local groups as well but look at what's been done right here in this
County with the Historic Preservation Groups and so on. And the state fund stuff
like that.
Lehman/And Fed's are even doing it.
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Myers/What?
Lehman/Flood plains, the Fed's are (can't hear).
Myers/Oh yea look at the flood plain work by the federal govemment, that's right, (can't
hear).
Lehman/Well that's, (can't hear).
Ron Brandy/I do have a couple questions about this so I think it's a good time for me to
ask so I'll do so. With the local level, I really appreciate the still having not
forgotten what it's like at the local level, part time politics is extremely frustrating
and you rely heavily on professionals expertise and COGS and that sort of thing
because of that part time thing. This land use I take it I assume that the reason is
that it's at issue now is because there's a great deal of developing going on
otherwise if that weren't the case we would have had a resolution possibly a long
time ago. Am I wrong with that? To me, this certainly can't be a novel idea.
man/Oh no.
Bolkcorn/It's getting attention (can't hear).
Brandy/And mostly because there's a great deal of, times are changing, there's a great
deal of developing going on. But with at the local level, and I don't have all the
facts, but some of the frustration that countered, we have updated our
comprehensive plan and addressed land use but you take instances where how it's
laid out with the comprehensive plan and then you have the state bonds that
dictate or tell you how you do zoning, there's a contradiction there. And home
rule I've witnessed and been violated on the warrants so and forgive me, I am new
at this but there are a lot of questions with that. And sometimes I even question
just exactly what the intent is of a land use plan and comprehensive plan.
Lehman/I think one of the big concerns that really kinds of bring it about are
developments that take pockets of development that occur outside municipalities
that impact those municipalities or counties. But we think of terms of city
because were involved in city and we worry about problems. Problems are
incredible for counties where you have an industrial development, a commercial
development or even a reasonably decent size residential development. If taxes
the roads in the county, it presents problems for school districts. I mean their
needs, I think what people are looking for is a little bit of a road map, a little, kind
of like what our comprehensive plan does in Johnson County and Iowa City. We
can look at that and say this is what we expect will happen and we've got to plan
for that and that govemance to a large (can't hear) will happen. And I think
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counties are saying perhaps more so than cities like Iowa City, we need to know
what's going to happen, we have some control over what's going to happen in
those rural areas where it impact the rural roads where we don't have the money
to maintain those roads, and it impacts where we've seen several times where the
rural subdivision, the school buses can't go down it's a private street or they can't
tum around and they get to the end of it. And it's probably is a matter of rural
standards probably as much as it is land use surely. I mean it's not just a single
focus, there are a number of things involved but I think the problems that are
occurring around the state perhaps not as dramatically in Johnson County,
although certainly we've got our problems to. I think that' s the emphasis that's
(can't hear) development that is not regulated from a standard standpoint
infrastructure standpoint, you know it doesn't fit the roads, it doesn't fit the school
district, it doesn't fit into anybody's plan but it in the absence of some sort of
planning it occurs and then we deal with, instead of acting we react. Reacting is
not nearly as good as acting. I think you need to set the state and encourage the
kind of development you'd like to see developed instead of reacting to the
development that occurred maybe wasn't a good idea. And I don't (can't hear).
Doderer/But Iowa is not ready to modernize it's government. I mean look at these three
cities sitting here right on top of each other border to border. Look at all these
school districts we could have. Linn County has 7 different school districts. And
if you mention reorganization schools in the legislature your ostracized for at least
two weeks, sometimes its longer. We haven't faced the problems we can deal
with talking to other city council people and we can when we have a road that
doesn't match their road, we can work that out in a hurry and that's very rare of
course. We just fundamentally we aren't ready to get fundamentally.
Brandy/The only reason I bring this up is.
Doderer/We don't need 99 counties but if you talk about it then your just a (can't hear)
or something it wouldn't borders. Unrealistic, we don't need 99 counties, we've
got counties with less people in them than University Heights has, well maybe
that's an exaggeration but (can't hear).
(All talking).
Doderer/And nobody wants to talk about it because it makes somebody mad or lose a
sale or something, and it has to come from elected officials because there's no one
else out there that will talk about all of this. No well combine, we'll sell them fire
support, we'll saddle them and share police support a few things like that. But we
don't talk about 99 counties with 900 and some cities and god knows how many
school districts and we can't afford any of them and nobody wants to pay their
taxes, I've learned that much.
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Myers/(can't hear) reorganization that was a true, reorganization is always driven by
money, they always are and we might be talking about in political terms but
they're never done that way, when you find a county or city that decides to
reorganize or you know combine services, it's done for economic reasons, no
other reasons, and that's the only way it can be done. Because it's always a post
for political reasons I mean and I went through the issue of giving counties the
charter you know, to have a short bow for example, we went through that a few
years ago and you go to hearings and there may be one guy in testify in court and
everybody else will be against it. And they were, sometimes it was because of a
child protection society.
man/(can't hear).
Myers/Yea that's really what it was a lot of times in southern counties but I went to a
hearing one time in Ottumwa and I was the only person to speak or allow counties
to reorganize those cities and they have a short bound, short bound lease you
wouldn't like to share and you wouldn't like a county to boarder (can't hear) I
remember those from that anyway but I was the only guy to speak like that and
everybody else said it was, some guy claimed that it was a plot of (can't hear)
condition and he was dead serious and he was an elected official too and.
Doderer/Maybe he was right because they want.
Myers/I mean some people feel very strongly about these things you know but if the
economics don't force the issue your not going to see changes this time.
Lehman/Your right.
B. Dorst/Isn't resistance change though?
Myers/What?
B. Dorst/Isn't resistance change though?
Doderer/Yea but economics is beginning to affect the issue.
Myers/Oh yea sure resistance, but money drives it.
Lehman/No but the whole issue of land use is driven by money, it's the financial
difficulty that school systems have, counties have, and cities have that even drive
the interest of land use in the first place. There are other issues obviously you
know.
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Doderer/Coralville has a good example of it right now where they can't get volunteers
for fire fighters, so they're either going to have to pay Iowa City for them or
they're going to have to raise their taxes so that they have fire protection because
volunteers are already working double shifts for themselves probably.
Brandy/With what you mentioned driven by money the determination as to whether
that's detriment or asset is yet to come right? I'll give you an example like there's
a small town up noah, Noah Liberty. We have a comprehensive plan established,
land use, we have like 1/3 of the community it's composed of manufactured
housing, we have designated lots as commercial parcels as commercial and
industrial. Barn we got hit with a law suit simply because we discriminated
against manufactured housing even though 1/3 of the city consists of
manufactured housing and so you know and this is probably same old same old
with the state level I don't know. But this is what we have to deal with at a local
level and you know they have metaphors and analogies with the tail wagging the
dog I mean that kind of thing and I mean we've been there before but we're
mandated by the law to have this designated as manufactured housing use
regardless of anything else that' s been said tonight. So what I'm thinking is the
bottom line is how much credibility do you give this land use plan when it's just
perhaps manifestation of some ideas that we can refer to. But actually when it
comes to application that's a whole different. And the same thing they talk about
the roll bans where we didn't went with money driven, it's gone like wild fire in
Noah Liberty for apartments because of the tax base. And a lot of folks will say
because it's good economic development the apartments but down the road your
going to have some consequences to that in fact. We're already having that right
now within, we know within Iowa City, Coralville the nature of what happens
with (can't hear) residents and I have told you, I don't have a good idea how to
even approach that because money does ride and it certainly does dictate and if
you really want to push for the welfare of the people or what I'm getting at is your
going to have like the land owners sitting extremely well and yet their boppiting
or gaining off of the production of affordable housing. So I don't know, I'm not
even sure really what to think or how to think or how to do look at these land use
plans in a way, I don't mean to be sarcastic but you take a look at it and you say it
looks nice but when you go to apply it your talking massive red tape and legal
stuff.
Lehman/If you were to look at the growth of cities in Iowa, Coralville obviously would
be this too, Noah Liberty's going through right now, there were period's of time
when it became far less restrictive to build in Coralville, it was cheaper and
Coralville flustered and flourished and flourished and then Coralville experienced
a lot of problems, Iowa City did, their regulations became more stringent and
whatever and now in Noah Liberty and your finding the same thing there and
your going to find the same problem in Tiffin. It's kind of like third world
countries that you develop the cost of labor, it catches up and you find yourself, I
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November 10, 1999 Council Work Session Page 15
think that's just a natural progression but it is, it is money driven, it's cheaper to
build there.
Doderer/The problem is we don't have (can't hear).
B. Dorst/Growing pains.
Lehman/Pardon.
Dorst/Growing pains.
Lehman/Yea but I mean and I think your discovering now, Coralville discovered it, a lot
of things you have to do in cities to control and plan a row of Altanna in
Coralville was one of the bad ones, I mean there was a situation where there was a
lot of, a lot of people cost them a lot of money, it cost the city a lot of money.
Brandy/But you know, there are some difficulties there with I don't think that
immolating whatever is limited because each city has different characteristics and
as to why a lot of people choose that city. Iowa City's the University and
Coralville's nice because of location and a lot of the immunities, North Liberty is
just location and (can't hear) basically for. And the characteristics really
determine a lot of times what's to be desired or and I don't know how you account
for that because we can't, we're limited as far as examples where what they have
done or pilot program.
Lehman/Well we can discuss that, I'd love to talk, I enjoy the conversation but we need
to be talking about state issues although that's very interesting conver. that would
be fun to sit down and talk.
Myers/Some of the problems your having with that, happened in the 60's, (can't hear)
what happened in the 60' s yea because in the 60's you had an annexation fight
between Iowa City and Coralville, huge fight, and Noah Liberty got involved
where those cities joined and everybody was in a brace to see to it that somebody
didn't expand north or south. It's, that's what happens with annexation without a
real plan at that time.
Irvln Pfab/Emle, I have a question.
Lehman/Yes.
Pfab/How does land and improvement taxes drive the control in development?
Myers/It depends on what the city wants to do, the cities can say to a developer well and
brightly so I think with such things as subdivision ordinances and so on, this is
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November 10, 1999 Council Work Session Page 16
what your going to do when you put in you know, houses or whatever the zoning
calls for and you pay for it. And on the other hand you've had areas come in
where that wasn't going to happen and you know that's what happens as they
approach the land for example. Maybe that person didn't want to come in but
they came in and said we don't want any of these amenities and we want to pay
for them and maybe you had assessments and the land wouldn't stand the
assessment. That parcel land won't stand the street assessment in many cases if
they protest it you know, you can pass a resolution on necessity if you've got the
votes but that doesn't mean the assessment is going to stand up in court and there
are all kinds of tools that people can use to get around what ought to be
supposedly well planned areas, all kinds of things, but that's also protection of
property owners for people, for cities that get just a little to restless.
Vanderhoef/Has the legislature looked at all unchanging taxation on (can't hear)?
Myers/Well we did that a few years ago. You used to have a license plate, that's all you
had, I want to say that was about, that was (can't hear) changed it.
Vanderhoef/1970 was the last time that there was a change in the taxation which is 10
cents per square foot semiannually so it's 10 cents.
Myers/Qualifications changed to whether it was a mobile home or a manufactured
housing.
Vanderhoef/The terminology.
Myers/Whether it sat on a base and whether you took the tires off and all that.
Vanderhoef/And they're all the same now?
Myers/What?
Vanderhoef/And the manufacturing housing type that's put in on the base, the permanent
mobile one but they are still because they are rented lots are taxed differently than
they are than my house that I own my land and so these are taxed on a 10 cents
per square foot semiannually so it's 20 cents per square foot rather than paying for
all the other kinds of thlngs that go by there. And it hasn't changed since 1970 so
in today's dollar that would be like 35 cents or there about per square foot and
when you talk about a third of your city being mobile homes.
Brandy/It affects everything.
Vanderhoef/It affects and it has to do with cost.
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November 10, 1999 Council Work Session Page 17
Myers/I know it was later than 1970 though to (can't hear). All you used to have to do
was pay for a license plate on that, maybe it was in the 80's.
Doderer/Now we've got condo's which has messed up.
Vanderhoef/That' s another one of the things but to bring these around, you know we
have new developments within our city that are promoting the idea that they are
increasing in value appreciating in value for the old folks thought was that they
appreciated in value as they got older so. If they're promoting them and if they
are being built to these kinds of standards now then it would seem like they
should be taxed more in accordance with other property which would be a
tremendous increase of a taxed based owner cities.
Doderer/Because those homes have changed the standards.
Vanderhoef/Because those homes have changed and they're nice homes.
Doderer/Well you need 51 votes and 26.
Vanderhoef/Well it's a possibility.
Myers/I'm not sure I'd want to do that.
Vanderhoef/Well it's something that should be under, we should look at.
Lehman/At some point we probably have to.
Vanderhoef/And it would affect (can't hear) and cities and schools.
Brandy/I'm still struggling with the system as while being part timers, we don't sit on a
seat all that long, moving around, that has to relate with the rest of the legislative
process but I'm not really sure you know, actually the way it's set up the system is
set up is a person. I've got to get with, I guess getting away from the subject here
but some times it really I think all we should never be forgotten or overlooked. I
always ask at a forum why more women aren't on the council?
man/That's a tough one.
Brandy/I didn't expect to get hit at all but thank god the good life saved me but.
Doderer/What was your answer?
(All talking)
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November 10, 1999 Council Work Session Page 18
Doderer/I'm curious OK.
Dorst/Let me give you my answer.
Doderer/OK.
Dorst/They have the same opportunity as I do.
Doderer/That's not the answer.
Dorst/Well yes it is.
Doderer/No it's not.
Lehman/OK we're going to continue.
(All talking).
Lehman/This is talking development. We're going to start talking about the Electrical
Deregulation.
All talking.
Lehman/The state is going to be talking about deregulation's. What do you expect to
occur? Do you expect any action on deregulation this year?
Myers/Well you want to remember something first mayor, we're in the minority so we're
not going to set the (can't hear) but it's my understanding and it may change that
many of the people who were very skeptical of deregulation and I'm not telling
you there aren't any, they're still there are changing their minds. I've been lead to
believe that the governor is more and more acceptable of the plan as it's moving
forward. Now I say the plan, the plan when I first saw it was a 148 page
document or something like that and you try to read through that thing and there
were a lot of people who opposing canes, there were some of the labor unions,
(can't hear), there were major industries that were opposed of it because they were
worried about whether or not they would actually have access to the wholetale
market, that the real market you know. And there were a lot of consumer groups
that were opposed to it especially in southern Iowa because southern Iowa has
very little utility rates as a result of a deal that was made in annexation or (can't
hear) combined each other.
Lehman/Consolidation.
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November 10, 1999 Council Work Session Page 19
Myers/Yea Iowa Southern made a deal to go into Iowa Electric and one of the things was
that their rates down there, and you go to Burlington and the rates are lower much
lower than they are in Keokuk. For example, just a few miles away, and so the
legislatives from Keokuk and the legislatives from Burlington have completely
different ideas about what this deregulation ought to be you see because their
communities are pushing different ways and the sad thing is is that people in
Burlington are going to get an electrical increase regardless of what the
deregulation does or not because their already lower than everybody else and the
system's going to work it out.
Doderer/It's pretty well agreed on that by the legislatures that by being deregulated
Iowa' s rates will go up, whether it's true or not I don't.
All talking.
Doderer/And that was general.
Myers/I've been to quite a few meetings on this subject matter in state and out of state
and explaining what (can't hear) doing with it. Iowa I don't know whether your
going to see much change in Iowa's rates right away but it seems to me that it's
incumbent upon the legislature we're going to pass this thing to have a protection
built into this thing for the (can't hear) the consumers in particular. Now they talk
about this idea of having you as a city getting into the business of buying
brokering. Ha.
Lehman/Brokering.
Myers/Yea brokering effect. I don't know how that's going to work, it seems to me that
it has to be much better defined. I hate to tell you this but it's coming, I mean,
we're going to do it, I don't know what it's going to look like, I'm not telling you
I'm going to vote for it because I was opposed to it last year because I didn't think
they had the agreements worked out that they pursed to do a couple of things.
They've got stranded costs, that's a big issue in this area, because we've got a
(can't hear). How do you pay for that? Who pays for that? Because competition
will not pay for that but yet that's a responsibility the state has to deal with it.
Well naturally the utility, the IOU's Investor Owned Utilities they want this new
system to take that strain of cost into account. That paying for that stranded cost
is you and I see, that's one thing. Right now the REC's and the (can't hear)
utilities are on board, they're all for it OK. I find that strange because I believe
there will be casualties, I really do in the long run. Size is going to get rid of it
you know what I mean it will, it has a way of doing that. And I don't like the idea
of buying my utilities from 5 different companies in the United States or
something like that, I just don't and that isn't an exaggeration but.
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November 10, 1999 Council Work Session Page 20
Doderer/You wouldn't be paying five different bills?
Myers/No I didn't say that, I'm just saying that, I'm just saying that there are only 5
companies in the United States that are doing it and another thing that's
happening right now, all this generating power is being sold off in the country.
For example Iowa Electric owns a place in Cedar Rapids and they own Dubuque
Power and Light and they own Wisconsin Power and Light and they've got
generated lights. Well they're not going to own their generated lights, they're
going to be a billing company, they may be a maintenance company and maybe
they'll call Butte Montana to get it maintained and that is one of my number one
concems. I've gone through this business like all of us have with the telephone
companies and what it's done and I've never been happy with the way that's
turned out.
Doderer/I don't either.
Myers/They say they have cheaper rates you know in many areas. I don't think we have
better service at all and I worry about that. We have some of the best service in
the world and I'm sure all of us have had experiences of it (can't hear) planet,
where they don't. And I'm saying to you that the electrical deregulation is going
to pass this year I think we're going to do it because the coalition's that were split
on it last year were pretty powerful are together now.
Lehman/What do cities do to protect themselves? How do we know, I'm ignorant I'm
sure that our staff knows what's going on a lot more than we ever do. How do
cities protect ourselves? How do we?
Doderer/Protect ourselves from the utilities, reorganization or what?
Lehman/Oh no not (can't hear) because I'm not so sure that Dick's exactly right they're
going to be utility casualties in this too, it's not just going to be, everything I've
seen shows t hat Iowa's in the lowest tier of rate fair's in the country and that we
can probably expect.
Myers/Residentially?
Lehman/Yea.
Myers/Depending on where you live.
Lehman/(can't hear) Probably expect that t here would be an increase in deregulation.
Myers/(can't hear).
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November 10, 1999 Council Work Session Page 21
Lehman/But why if we know or that we have reason to believe that that will increase our
rates why are we deregulating?
Doderer/Illinois could have cheaper rates.
Lehman/Illinois doesn't vote in Des Moines.
man/Because we're deregulating.
Myers/Oh yes it does.
Man/I mean that there 's this kind of steam roller.
All talking.
Doderer/No there was a majority of(can't hear) last year.
Vanderhoef/Is there any huge hurry? As I understand it we've had 24 states so far
deregulated.
man/That's fight.
Vanderhoef/And there's not a mandate of exactly when this happens so can we sit back
a couple more years and see what happens?
Myers/You know that's a good argument, a very good argument.
Vanderhoef/Well tell me why.
Myers/(can't hear) while your doing. They're saying because the federal government is
going to come in and pass a law to do this if the state's don't do it, the federal
people are going to pass. You know I really believe that' s a (can't hear) argument
because I've spoken to Representative Congressman Boswell, I've spoken to
Senator Harken and Senator Grassley, I haven't spoken to Boswell for stats. I
can't see them passing a law that would take away Iowa' s control of Utilities I
can't see them believe for something like that. And I would think that would be
replete in other states. You know I just, maybe they'll do it, but to say you have
to deregulate, they may pass a law setting up a (can't hear).
Doderer/What did Grassley and Harkin seem to think?
(END OF 99-106 SIDE 1)
man/Extremely skeptical.
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November 10, 1999 Council Work Session Page 22
Myers/They (can't hear) anything they would support you see. As to, and I even talked
to Congressman Leach about it and I'll bet that's the way he'd do it too, he's
pretty strong on local control things you know. I'd wouldn't be, I'd be surprised
if he voted for something like that. Maybe (can't hear) but to come in and say you
will do this gee whiz, I'd think that would be pretty hard for somebody to vote for
and then come home and run for election especially if it costs an increase in rates.
Doderer/You know I'm not sure that city legis, or city council people around the state do
a heck a lot of lobbying to their own legislatures. They assume once they pass out
these resolutions that the lobbyists one or two that you have down there will take
care of it maybe the City Manager would make a call if you asked him to that sort
of thing. But otherwise the only lobbying that's very good when you don't have
the real high price people is from home, from home, give us a good reason and
we'll usually follow it, I don't think any of us (can't hear).
Lehman/Do we understand deregulation well enough to be able.
Doderer/Nobody does.
Lehman/To put things in place to protect our residential customers, our municipal.
Doderer/Eventually it will go (can't hear).
Lehman/I don't think we even understand this well enough do we? I mean I don't think
(can't hear).
Irvin Pfab/I think there's somebody that does, Warren Buffet didn't buy this because he
doesn't understand and that does not work well for what my electric bill is. The
other point is all right so all right so when you use you buy the argument and if
we don't, deregulate, the federal government is going to, are they going to say do
it tomorrow?
Lehman? Probably not.
Myers/No.
Lehman/They may not even do it.
Pfab/Yea so I mean.
Myers/Here's one thing that did happen OK. We passed a (can't hear) tax, now the
history of that was that the big business folks in the state did not want the (can't
hear) tax to pass without deregulation and they lobbied very hard it was called the
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November 10, 1999 Council Work Session Page 23
ICE coalition and I forgot what ICE stood for but regardless in that coalition was
a whole bunch of very strange bed pals, including school districts, and including a
treasurers, you know county treasurers association, and John Deere, Penick and
Ford (can't hear) they call them, a lot of big companies that you may recognize.
They all wanted this thing, they all wanted this not to pass the (can't hear) tax to
be passed. And that started January 1st of this last year. I know that several of us
wanted to delay the implementation of that, we wanted to do it, it made sense to
do, the reason we passed the kilowatt hour tax I suppose your not aware of
because utilities pay taxes, pay property taxes, they are probably the biggest tax
payer in this county otherwise and they pay an enormous amount of property
taxes. They're very, probably next to resolid basis for (can't hear) well if you
have a company coming here selling electricity in the state fi'om New Jersey,
they're not paying property taxes, you see what I mean, you begin to lose that
revenue right off the bat. And utilities could afford that, it made sense to me that
they should pay tax, it made sense to almost all legislatures that they should pay
tax if they're coming in here and selling a product and taking business away from
the best owned utilities, it made sense. And so hence, instead of depending on
property tax we depend on the kilowatt hour tax and it was made revenue neutral,
you see what I mean. It had to satisfy County Treasurer's, it had to satisfy the
school board people that they weren't going to lose any money. Now of course
you don't know what' s going to happen to this because if you have a kilowatt
hour opposed to a property tax, your much more subject to (can't hear) to the
market, by killing the kilowatt hour tax, you know mark them up and down using
less of electricity more, you have development and all kinds of things, property
taxes are pretty steady, pretty predictable.
Lehman/Property taxes is the base that we use to retire our bonds.
Myers/Sure, that's fight, we worry about bond issues always but that was passed. Over
the objections of this ICE Coalition, and it was implemented January 1 of 99.
Dorst/Why couldn't you do Kilowatt hour tax for the New Jersey People and leave the
property tax for in-house?
Lehman/Local people aren't going to pay that taxes if they don't sell the electricity, they
can't pay the taxes.
Dorst/Wouldn't that discourage somebody from the outside coming in or do we need that
power?
Doderer/Depends when they come in (can't hear).
M. Bahl/My biggest worry with this is, you know you were talking the tax and funding
basis but on the surface end then we're relying on some big power plant, or series
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November 10, 1999 Council Work Session Page 24
of power plants 4-5 states away and maybe some squirrel climbs in and trips some
switching mechanism and three states go black and you know that happened not
to long ago.
Myers/They've had (can't hear) in California.
Doderer/I wanted our utilities to come in and re-light my hot water heater and guess
what, I'm talking to South Dakota fight now.
Lehman/You should have called me Minnette.
Doderer/I finally figured it out myself.
Myers/How do the kilowatt hour tax pass? And some people thought that would
increase their rates dramatically particularly those in southem Iowa.
Nevertheless, that bill did not pass easily but it passed, I can't remember what the
vote was but it was about a 75-25 vote and it was for traffic debate.
Doderer/Which one?
Myers/On the kilowatt hour tax (can't hear).
Lehman/If we pass the deregulation and I think, maybe I'm being naive but I really don't
think we know the implications deregulation, we'll study it I'm sure very very
carefully and the best that we can do. And so we pass deregulation and it turns
out that the worst of things happen once what once utility has been deregulated
what can we do or what can the state do then to help?
Doderer/Answer the telephone when they call you and want to change your rates.
Lehman/Well I'm just saying I don't know the results of deregulation I know it's an
(can't hear).
Doderer/We had in the last session we had the attorney general come in and all of his
people, we had the utility people come in, I served on conference, we spent 18
hours listening to them.
Lehman/None of them know.
Doderer/And we didn't do it, I don't know what (can't hear).
???man/You had to believe in the market.
Doderer/What?
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November 10, 1999 Council Work Session Page 25
???Man/You know it's the people that make the market' s (can't hear).
Myers/Well let me give you an example. Mid-America has had an agreement that deals
with some environmental consideration, they plant so many trees and stuff OK.
It's never really been an awe, but Mid-American is an Iowa based company and
they've always done this. They've had these energy conservation programs,
they've always done these things, some of it was a loss some of it wasn't. But it
was an Iowa based company and when you look at Mid-American lobbyist sitting
there in Des Moines and you say now look Jack we want your cooperation on this
or your going to get something you don't want. Well you should get it. Well now
your going to talk to Cal industry or somebody, we can't, when they're people are
up there right now they're trying to get this tree legislation, if the Trees Forever
people or whoever they are trying to get some environmental concerns put into
this deregulation law where it really wasn't need before. You can't get it in there
now and the votes aren't there to get it in there yet, maybe they will before it's all
said and done. There are just things, those things like that, energy efficiency
programs, things that worked because we were dealing with Iowan's I believe, I
believe that was the decorum.
Bolkcom/Both in addition we made the utility companies do the programs and they
repealed back and now they don't do the programs. Energy efficiency is a huge
proposed amendment for nature resources have alternative energy sources and
goals, basically requiring the utility companies that sell out of Iowa to have
certain percentage of their power provided by alternatives. They wanted to pay
attention 2 million statewide every year for 15 years funded by you and I to help
us all continue to do efficiency and there are 3 or 4 other environmental pieces
that are going to be a fight to get into this legislation. I think we have a better
chance this year given the fact that it's an election year people are going to be
slow to take this up probably because it's you know you can imagine the
commercials and the mailers you know Fred voted to raise your utility bill when
he voted for this. But there's some opportunity I think to get the trees, to get the
other environmental stuff if we're ever going to get it.
Myers/Got to do it now.
Bolkcom/Depends on how bad they want it, or we're not going to get it done this year.
Doderer/How many votes have (can't hear)?
Lehman/What should cities do?
Bolkcom/Dunk and cover.
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November 10, 1999 Council Work Session Page 26
Doderer/Tell me how your (can't hear)?
Bolkcom/I don't know I don't think there's much you can do, aggregation's been talked
about but is the city prepared to get in to becoming an energy expert and go out on
the market and do a referendum of Iowa City you know rate payers and aggregate
you know the 12,500 households?
Doderer/How about?
Bolkcom/I mean are they ready to do that?
Lehman/I think they may have to.
Vanderhoef/Well what about aggregation easy for cities and let us do it by resolution?
Myers/Personally my.
Doderer/How do, you mean city by city?
Vanderhoef/Yea.
Doderer/Oh well in your resolution with the state you've got protection from municipal
utilities, now does this mean that non municipal utility users will need to be
protected? I don't know.
Vanderhoef/Well since we don't have an electric company.
Doderer/I understand that but.
Vanderhoef/However we could limit (can't hear).
Doderer/(can't hear) got this in the resolution, now how are we going to protect it? I
mean I think we ought to protect all utility users period whether we have a
municipal or a private one but they managed to get that in there and I'll tell you
some of the legislatures are taking it seriously.
Bolkcom/Iowa City's probably big enough to be able to make a decision but there are
going to be a lot of municipals, you know a lot of cities that don't have the
resources. What is the city (can't hear) bond market and provide power for the
residents of town, I don't know.
Doderer/I can't believe we are (can't hear) are going to be here too but the possibility.
Lehman/She said no OK.
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November 10, 1999 Council Work Session Page 27
Vanderhoef/The possibilities of Johnson County and Iowa City and Coralville to do an
aggregate is very reasonable to think of but we need to look at our citizens also
and the way I understand it it works right now is that we would have to do the
referendum kind of thing and then we would have to sign them all up individually
each of our residents to be part of the aggregate after the referendum passed but if
we changed that to do it preferably by resolution and then give the citizen the
opportunity.
Myers/Preferably by ordinance.
Vanderhoef/OK I'll take ordinance versus resolution.
Lehman/That's what you pass.
Vanderhoef/And give the citizen the opportunity to out it if that was their choice but
certainly.
Bolkcom/It would just be residential and putting any money down (can't hear).
Vanderhoef/So we could help our citizens in this whole process too.
man/Could it be small businesses, commercial you know.
Vanderhoef/You bet.
Myers/That's something to look at.
Lehman/Well I think that.
Myers/I think we need to make this as easy as you can, if we're going to do this we need
to make it as easy as possible to do this this brokering or whatever.
Vanderhoef/Well this would be real helpful to get that much done this year and leave the
deregulation alone for another year or so until we understand it a bit better.
Myers/The states that I looked at Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Ohio, Texas, Montana
and Illinois and Texas just did this and Texas is an interesting case because
they're rates are pretty low too. They weren't like Massachusetts and some of the
other states that had very high rates. And they were very skeptical about it, about
doing this in the first place, but they finally did it and I'm interested to see what
their results are going to be as far as this aggregation issue is concerned because
they're a rural state and they're also a big state and there are some big cities of
course but they have small town problems as well as big city problems. I think
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November 10, 1999 Council Work Session Page 28
we need to look at other states and find out how they're doing with this
aggregation.
Lehman/The other thing with aggregation you have to deal with obviously it wouldn't
affect us as much as other places but for example if your from Keota Iowa and
your unable to aggregate with anybody else, if we could visit with Coralville,
North Liberty, Tiffin, University of Iowa, I mean we could put together an
aggregate that might be rather significant and some small communities may have
no possibilities of doing that. I don't know how you handle that.
Myers/You know there's something else coming along this thing called "Bulls eye".
Have you read about it?
Vanderhoef/Tell me what it is.
Myers/People salvage their own little energy plant. There's a police station in some
place in New Jersey or New York that just, they built a new police station and put
their own fuel cell. They're not hooked up to the, it runs a little bit of natural gas
and they're not hooked up to the utilities at all.
Lehman/A little bit.
Myers/What?
Lehman/You mean a little bit.
Myers/Yea I mean a little bit, I mean just that.
Lehman/Well our new water plant will be able to do that too but I don't think it's a little
bit.
Myers/I've been collecting literature on fuel cells and it's a general now of the John
Deere's of the world.
M. Bahl/NASA uses fuel cell for all these years.
Myers/Yea it's not available yet for households you know what I mean, that's a small
thing or would make it, but these are things that have a life for example of
something like 10 or 15 years, 12 years and then you have to buy a new one. And
they might cost for a house the example I was given per house it might cost
$4,000o$5,000 to install.
Lehman/How do they?
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Myers/What? I can't tell you, I wish I would have brought it with me.
man/Your talking about real high efficiency though?
Myers/Yea, oh yea you can do with the whole anything you want.
Pfab/I think automobiles are doing it, they're doing it with in conjunction with another
source of energy (can't hear) fuel cells in part, engine or motors on the batteries.
Lehman/Combination too.
Myers/Yea, I mean utilities are really worded about this, that's why their selling off
generator plants, they want to get rid of them.
man/So this isn't the only one your talking about?
Myers/No it's not. This is probably 10 years away.
Lehman/We should buy a plant.
Myers/What?
Lehman/Well obviously you hear our concerns about deregulation and I don't think any
of us have known what.
Myers/(can't hear).
Doderer/(can't hear).
Lehman/Well we had any extra's we'd try to give them to you I don't have any extra's at
all.
Doderer/No I'm talking 4 months from now.
Bolkcom/But go slow that's what I'm.
Lehman/Yes I think that's yea.
Doderer/Well the head of the Congress Committee in the house wants very much to pass
this so it's going to get to the floor of the house. And so does the ranking
democrat want it.
man/That's fight.
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Doderer/(can't hear) last time.
Vanderhoef/Tell me why they are in such a hurry do you know?
Myers/Because the major insurance.
Doderer/(can't hear) lead by their friends.
Myers/The major industries in the state of Iowa want this, they want to cut their utility
rates. What's going to happen.
Doderer/Sure of that.
Myers/What?
Doderer/Their not sure their rates will go up.
Myers/Well that's what the ICE coalition is.
Lehman/That's what they believe.
Myers/That' s what the major industries are.
Doderer/That's not what they're telling Janet and what's her name in Cedar Rapids.
Myers/But let me, let me brace this to you one way.
Doderer/Everything that they're (can't hear).
Myers/I went to a utility conference about a month and a half two months ago on in Des
Moines on deregulation and I was really disappointed. And they brought in a lot
of people from other states explaining how it worked there. And then one guy got
up and he said "remember something deregulation utilities is not about residents
at all, it's about the big users period." And he put it right up there on the screen
and there were only about six legislatures in the whole audience, it was a huge
room, I don't know maybe 400-500 people in there, all utility folks, it's not about
residential rates, it's about the big companies. They're the ones that are driving
this and that's what this thing is about, don't kid yourself. Now the utilities are
worded about it from this point and that is that are here in the state of Iowa.
They're worded about some company coming in from New Jersey and cherry
picking off the big ones you see so that you and I are left to pick up those
capitalization costs and transmission costs and all the other stuff that they were
formally paying the bill. They ain't paying it now, they're paying some in New
Jersey but the capitalization requirements are still there you see what I mean.
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Paying for the poles and all that other stuff. There' s going to be a pole tax.
There's a generation tax, a distribution tax, or a cost I should say not a tax and
then there's this kilowatt hour. But even all those things not withstanding, the
capitalization if you let these people come in like that without some way of
recouping that money it's about those folks and those people are driving this
legislation, there's no question in my mind about that. You don't see some poor
schmuck living at 806-53rd Street coming down there saying "hey I want you to
regulate so I can get". Nonsense, that's the kind of guy that's going to be left out
in the cold, that and people that have jobs now.
Lehman/That would be like if our really big water users got their water somewhere else
the residential folks would have to pick up the capitalization costs of the new
(can't hear).
Myers/Exactly, you have this capitalization cost you would not be able to recover.
Lehman/Right.
Myers/That is what I call stranded costs, how you pick up that stranded costs. And
another thing, I sat there and waited for a heating that was held by the Iowa
Utility Commission, I was never so disappointed in my life. Three commissioners
sat up there, I need to be careful of what I say here. Usually I'm never, ha?
Doderer/(can't hear) Insurance Commission and that Commission will do it.
Myers/Yea. Well anyway regardless I was disappointed to say the least, that's the kind
of business, because they didn't say anything. They didn't, they want (can't hear)
around and I was hoping for some leadership from the chairman from the Utilities
Commission and I didn't see any at all, all I saw was three people up there
bickering at one another and I was very disappointed. But that's something they
just have to get their act together too but I think Utilities Commission had been
doing this which I think is good. They've been doing a lot of research with other
states. And they also are going around and holding hearings in other parts,
they've been here, they've spoke to the Press Citizen and they've gone to the
newspapers.
Lehman/Another meeting on the first of December I believe.
Myers/Yea that's right. What.
Lehman/Another meeting coming up the first of December.
Myers/Is there. I mean they go out selling their story and they're doing a good job of
that so you know I think they're sort of feeling their way too frankly.
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Lehman/Oh no I felt the same way because I remember.
Myers/What? But I don't see them coming up with any definite leadership.
Lehman/I don't they have the answers either.
Doderer/Protection.
Lehman/I don't think they know.
Bolkcom/They're going to react.
Myers/I believe they are, I believe they're going to react too (can't hear).
Lehman/Well obviously you we all share the same concerns on deregulation.
Doderer/We can't know enough to do it fight.
Lehman/No I don't know I mean obviously.
Myers/I can tell you that I'm going to bench the issue. I voted against the other stuff you
know all along but I haven't said I'm definitely not against or for it one way or
another, I just think it's too important of an issue to just automatically strike from
some sort ofideological base. I mean I just don't think that makes any sense.
Doderer/Does it happen (can't hear)?
Myers/Yes it does.
man/(Can't hear).
Doderer/Well rates are higher.
Myers/I just want to stick, I think we've got a little (can't hear).
Doderer/Fare rates.
Man/Fare rates, low and (can't hear).
Doderer/The problem is you don't know what your looking at.
Lehman/I heard an advertisement on TV about fare rates, I don't think I'd use the word
fare.
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Myers/Well there's an old saying that "if you don't know, don't vote no" and that might
be a, there's nothing wrong with that.
Lehman/Might be a good one. Other questions on deregulation. Any answers on
deregulation.
Doderer/Well let us know if you know more than we do later.
Man/(can't hear) house.
Lehman/Well I think are there other issues that you would like to discuss with us or that
we as council people would like to talk to legislatures about?
Vanderhoef/Give us heads up on things that you think might come up that we.
Myers/I'd like to bring up the tax thing.
Vanderhoef/OK.
Myers/Because first of all you know I've been working on this rollback thing, well forget
that, we're not going to get that done. It's just a political land mine, (can't hear)
it's never going to pass. And I'd say that with Democrats in charge or
Republicans in charge, and (can't hear). There's fare to say that there's evidence
would support keeping the system the way it is as far as who is paying the taxes.
In other words if you go back 20 years the percentage of tax that was being
derived from farms, the percentage of tax derived from business, the percentage
should come from residents is relatively the same then as it is now, very little
change, it will increase about 2-3 percent in business taxes and that's about it.
Lehman/Is that all?
Myers/That's right.
Lehman/OK.
Myers/The percentage is pretty much the same because these valuations have gone up
dramatically and their just (can't hear) the sight of growth in the commercial
sector. So I of course as a businessman are complaining about that but I'm not
sure if I've that willing to stand on OK, even though I'd like to change the system
but and we said that. What do we do? There's two things that work here. Is the
system farest to who's paying the taxes and what are we doing about cities that
need more of it, income, what are we doing about that? Well the reason I got in
fact involved in the rollback issue is because of the (can't hear) of money that pay
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for city services, wouldn't matter, you can see it shrinking. And we've come up
with, we have had which I've given to Steve and I believe I've sent one to
Coralville's name, Kelly Hayworth. But anyway what it essentially does is it calls
for an allowable growth formula for the $8.10 limit. OK. Your an $8.10 limit
now, I think every county, every city in this county is $8.10 1 'm pretty sure.
Some of you, I don't think any of you that I know of the 30 mil., or the 27 mil.
(can't hear) I don't think you are.
Atkins/We're thinking about it.
Myers/Your thinking about OK, I don't believe anybody's using it, I don't think you are
(can't hear), last time I checked I don't think any of you are. Well school's have
an allowable road tax OK, allowable (can't hear) which allows your rates to go up
whether what the legislature says and I'm not one to do that because I think that's
a tremendous over bite. But I would like to have some sort of standard it would
put it on all growth formula into your rate structure, into your (can't hear). Now
what that really does folks is you know literally be 8.10 levy. Now I want you to
know there are some very conservative people in the legislature that is lobbying
for this that are for this, that are proposing this. Like the Farm Bureau for
example, I can tell you that when things go with the Farm Bureau it likes things to
go along a certain way on taxes that's generally the way it goes, they influence.
Associations, business industry (can't hear) I'm not sure, I don't know what (can't
hear). But this is a new thing and it would allow cities on their own to assess a
part or all of a standard that could be determined let's say every two years or
every three years something like we do allow for local schools now. I think that's
a pretty good idea to give them a lot of flexibility.
Arkins/An allowable growth on the rate, on the rate, but if the tax base continues to be
restricted we're not gaining anything.
Myers/OK, now that's a very good point. The (can't hear) issue about tax (can't hear)
financing and you also have the business of whether or not you can actually
capture your growth. That's one of those being proposed now that would allow
you to capture your growth, it would not strictly restrict taxing the middle
financing yet. I doubt if we're going to do that. But I want you to understand
something about cities, your coming in here and saying you want more money,
OK, your bitching about, pardon me, complaining about the.
Lehman/You were right.
Myers/Complaining about the what do you call that stuff, we got rid of the.
Atkins/M & E.
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Myers/M & E, complaining about that, and then your wanting TIFs expanded at the same
time, in my judgment that's a contradiction in terms OK, I mean that's a
contradiction in forces.
Doderer/In taxes.
Myers/You just can't say that you want, your complaining about why you can't collect
taxes on one side and the other side you want to give it away on the other. I mean
somehow there's something wrong there and that's what we see in the legislature
OK. So we begin to wonder who's paying the taxes for god's sake. I don't know
what we're going to do about TIFs except that I do know one thing, we're going
to be asking for more and more information and I wouldn't be a bit surprised if
some of us conservative, and liberal alike and republican and democrat alike
certainly rural legislatures are going to say "wait a minute, this is enough" TIF in
a whole city that's nonsense, you know like we've seen it done in a few cases.
And you know there are some examples like that, their going nuts with this tax
incremental financing. Is it a good tool? Yes it is. Do we want to take it away?
No we don't.
Atkins/And you understand we don't use it much at all.
Myers/I know you don't, Iowa City doesn't.
Atkins/But there are some cities.
Doderer/That's why our city still looks good.
Myers/Now county wide, county wide the amount of money that's lost (can't hear) that' s
being used in (can't hear) increasing geometrically.
Doderer/Waterloo used it big time and their whole downtown is a disaster, it looks like
slums.
Atkins/I would only say to you that TIF and this is sort of the half of it, if colleagues
from other cities, we don't use it much, we've never really used it much, please
allow the housing because it's really important if your going to put together a
housing project (can't hear).
Myers/You want a TIF housing?
Atkins/No we have the ability we can do, we can do that, I'm not saying TIF housing but
I think if you wrote a policy that allowed us to use TIF for housing related issues,
particularly a low amount of income to be directed in that fashion (can't hear).
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Myers/I think (can't hear). I think some cities are using TIF for housing now.
Atkins/Some cities are using it for traditional housing.
Myers/Everything.
Atkins/And we're not yea.
Myers/And I think that's wrong.
Atkins/And I even happen to agree with you that I don't believe that' s wrong but there' s
still housing related needs that TIF could work.
Myers/To answer your question, we want to allow you, this bill we're talking about
that's being worked out, you k now this ad hoc tax bill and (can't hear) it's not an
official committee or anything like that just 4-5 of us have been working on this
issue for a long time, on this issue of the rollback (can't hear). And we want to
put in there that you can fully capture your growth and I think that's important.
Atkins/Fully capturing the growth is real, we just got our new rollback number and
we've lost our growth. And we gained no ground this year and at least 3 percent
decline of the residentials and also the railroads going down.
Myers/I think the (can't hear) if we did it would have a statutory limit put it in similar to
what you have in the law right now at 4 percent. We'd put some kind of limit in
there, say that allows growth formula, it's going to be based on a series of things
OK. Let's say it's based on a commerce statistic on governmental purchases
which has been suggested I forgot what the hell that things called. But anyway
it's based on commerce departments statistic that's gathered on governmental
purchases, waited for areas of the country we want to be aided same as New York
City which is done the first time. OK that means that thing would just be whatever
those purchases are it could virtually theoretically no limit you see, that means
you could have cities that could raise taxes above the $8.10 limit, 7-8-10-12
percent, (can't hear) says she wouldn't allow that to happen (can't hear) at
sometime, we'd say yes we're going to use this formula to a point, you see what I
mean.
Lehman/What would happen, maybe this is for you Steve.
Doderer/Speak up, speak up for everybody else.
Lehman/If you had that sort of arrangement and was tied to growth how would that, you
would never be able to gain but you couldn't get any further (can't hear).
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Atkins/We don't gain any, we don't gain anything right now, you just basically are able
to keep up and while I understand what your saying about the legislature capping
it in some fashion. And the state is financed by elastic revenues, cities aren't, I
mean in some respect it's still a lot of our taxes but some are taxed where we hate
(can't hear) for taxes but that's where we hooked on sales taxes and yet that's the
direction we say things going because if your going to give us a cap I think it has
to be reasonably flexible enough not to discourage the growth of the economy
with cities for our very reason for being here is to do that and so I just if you give
me a cap that's only 2 or 3 percent we're not any better off, I don't think we are.
Myers/Your not better off at 10 mil. than you are at 8 mil.?
Atkins/No but if you cap that tax phase all you've done is switched to the City Council
to paying making tax.
woman/How do we do that?
Atkins/The pain of making those local tax (can't hear).
Myers/Well we are not going to make that, we're not going to suffer that pain.
Atkins/Oh I estimate that.
woman/Thank you very much.
Myers/You can count on that.
Atkins/I've been around long enough to figure that out but I just think that while in
principle I understand what your telling me it's that tax base that kills us, it's that
every time we see some real healthy growth, we just finished a reevaluation and I
thought our growth was going to be in the 5 or 6 percent range and with the
rollback you took away 3 out of them, they're just gone.
Myers/Yea.
Bolkcom/So there's a proposal last week by leader majority leader Iverson and speaker
Sicgrist to reinstate the property tax freeze what cities and counties (can't hear).
Doderer/They said it with a straight face too.
Bolkcom/Yea it's going to be soundly supported.
Atkins/Oh and I don't doubt that and in what the real frustration I have is the state' s
sitting on what $800 million dollars in the bank.
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Doderer/Not anymore no we had a reevaluation and they cut back.
Atkins/The Fed's are sitting on huge surpluses and we tussled and we're trying to come
up with a buck to build a library. And there's a fairness thing that I'm not so sure
that's (can't hear).
Myers/The county, I don't know how it cut the service, but in county government it was
a real farce to have that, that freeze, I mean it created enormous balances because
here' s what happened. The ceiling that they sat became the floor and every year
they levied to max. no matter what because they were worried about what the
state was going to do to them. So you'd have county government' s throughout
the state now building up huge surpluses for what they call carry-over. The state
auditor for example thinks that counties should carry over about 25 percent of
their money every year because you get your money in September and you start
spending it in July so it's a quarter of a year, it's 25 percent which is, in Johnson
County I can tell you it's never been at 25, it hasn't been at 25 percent very
recently. I don't know when you, when I was there it was around 18-19 percent,
sometimes it got down as low as 12, that's kind of skinny because you, but
Johnson county has a huge cash flow so it doesn't really need it you know to have
a working balance. But I can tell you that there are counties conservative counties
in which they don't even allow you to speak the word democrat let alone liberal
than having 50-60 percent balance. You go right south of here to Washington
county they've got an enormous sum of money sitting there, and you ask the
county auditor why they've got it, (can't hear) your not going to touch my honey.
I'm glad I'm not a supervisor in that county.
man/They probably are too.
Doderer/(can't hear).
Myers/Yes it was worked out over the years. We had, a matter of fact I ran for County
Supervisor saying I wanted to get rid of the surplus.
Doderer/You did it. Well the revenue estimating committee changed their revenue
estimate and that wiped out most of the surplus.
Atkins/That's all you have to do.
Doderer/That's all you have to do, they changed it.
Atkins/Send me back to my room and I can draw a line through something and change
(can't hear).
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Lehman/OK Irvin's got something.
(All talking).
Pfab/Two things, when are you going to do, what are you going to do something about a
local option income tax or make the sales tax more comprehensive?
Doderer/More comprehensive, we've done that.
Lehman/What do you mean comprehensive?
Pfab/All the.
Myers/You mean more progressive.
Pfab/No, right, so many services and things are tax exempt. So the, OK, so that's likely
to happen, what' s happening on the local option income tax?
Myers/Nothing from this legislature I don't know how the (can't hear) I hate local option
tax to begin with.
Doderer/What do you want?
Pfab/Well as an altemative to the grocery well it's a gutted sales tax. Services that the
tax, the services that the more affluent are spending their money is not taxed and
other parts are.
Doderer/(Can't hear) that word affluent to those who have political clout.
Pfab/OK yea well it's the same. Is there any difference?
Doderer/Yes there is a difference, you bet there's a difference.
Lehman/Irvin what are you talking about that isn't taxed?
Doderer/Farm machinery. Almost everything farmers do is not.
Lehman/But I don't think Irvin's not talking about farmers.
Doderer/What?
Lehman/I don't think he's talking about farmers.
Pfab/Well it's all over the board.
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Lehman/No no well what?
Pfab/OK let's start down and thing. How many attorney fees are taxed? How many
CPA's fees are taxed? How much are bank trusts are taxed.
Doderer/Same as doctors.
Pfab/Yes OK.
Doderer/Professionals aren't.
man/See what your saying.
Doderer/But who pays it?
Pfab/Well these are not taxed. OK then what about security transactions, how much are
those (can't hear).
Doderer/Mostly it's on the same.
Pfab/But somebody goes to buy a diaper for a kid it's taxed.
Doderer/Yea, that's right.
Pfab/That's the problem.
Bolkcom/A lot of people don't have (can't hear) the last session there was a whole slew
of property or sales tax exemptions that came through as a means, most of them
didn't go anywhere. One of them was on investment, financial planning.
Pfab/Financial planning.
Myers/Well first of all, on sales taxes, sales taxes are by definition are to be paid by the
in-user on a run whoever that is. Now if a product is used in a competition of
another product that will subsequently be taxed, that's the way the laws do work.
But in some cases we've had products and the most recent one I can think of is in
the publishing business, in the printing business where we tax the product.
Pfab/There's newsprint.
Myers/Not newsprim but in publishing brochures (can't hear)just priming the job where
we exempted the products from the sales tax that went into the composition of the
final product which was sales taxed which it should be. Well who's the in-user?
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That's a big argument, sometimes people disagree on us because (can't hear).
Now local option taxes I personally believe are a mistake and I vote against them
since I've been there, I think it plays one city off against another and I think if you
don't have a tax, it ought to be statewide or not at all and I do not want to put
another (can't hear). One thing I can tell you that's not happening we're not
going to increase anybody's taxes, we just aren't.
Doderer/It's an election year.
Myers/Not going to do it so live within your means as far as that goes, we're not going to
do that I mean I don't care who's in charge.
Lehman/OK other questions.
Don Saxton/I just have a comment. I appreciate the legislatures taking their time to be
with us this evening and I'm sorry that my peer group doesn't have a better
representation here but.
Lehman/I'd say they're represented pretty well.
man/(can't hear).
Saxton/Kind of a selfish issue here.
Myers/We're going to change that law.
Saxton/Good.
Myers/I'm almost sure the Governor's working on it.
Saxton/Well I got a lot of press the last couple years in 98 was the storm and as for 99 it
was my retirement because of the work in the law with IPERS and so forth and so
I even pursued it with legal profession and spent $200.00 there and.
Lehman/Not taxed.
Saxton/No not taxed. You thought about it when I got the bill but (can't hear), but
anyhow we thought we had lost and so there are several of us in eastern Iowa that
resigned and I'm back, my four months is up I got elected a week ago Tuesday
but anyhow the point that I want to make here is at the local level the elected
officials I think we sometimes feel that we're rather far removed from the state
level such as you people sitting here and that's really not the case. And I ought to
publicly thank two senators Bob Dvorsky and Joe (Bolkcom) here. Bob
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November 10, 1999 Council Work Session Page 42
representing my district. He went the extra mile for 1 lth hour, he certainly did
and as soon as.
Doderer/Did you talk to the rest of us? I don't remember talking to you.
Saxton/No your right I didn't.
Doderer/I'm an expert on IPERS, I draw it.
Saxton/The hard part you did to fight.
Doderer/I do not want the state to improve IPERS because it's going to cost you city
people a lot of money if we improve it because you've got to make your share.
But I think we ought to do, allow them to put more into more competition in role
money and if the city wants to match it.
Saxton/That's not the issue, that's not the issue.
Doderer/I know that and he's got it done.
Saxton/But anyhow.
Doderer/But he I also made a point.
Saxton/Joe did call me upon knowing, the reason I didn't call the rest of you, called
those representing my district and so forth but anyhow I've talked to the league
too and I know their going to be supporting and got your answer right there and
I'll look forward to reading about that so that.
Myers/(can't hear).
Doderer/I think it was an oversight.
Saxton/Well that's what we were told.
Doderer/I do, I wasn't aware when we did it.
Bolkcorn/There are going to be other local elected officials affected by it if we don't take
(can't hear).
Saxton/Oh yea and there are going to be those that kind of slid through it and ignore it,
I'm sure.
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meeting of November 10, 1999.
November 10, 1999 Council Work Session Page 43
Doderer/But I think the city people have to start worrying now about whether the
legislatures going to improve IPERS again because it's going to cost the city and
the cotmty's to pay their share. And it's not even been brought up and I'll tell you
there's one group that's working hard, it's already the 60 percent of high three
average and these very intelligent people say well we want what the university
has, we want TIAA, and I say yours is better than TIAA and they say I'm nuts
because TIAA go down as well as up and IPERS never goes down, it's a
guarantee and that is a very important point. If you people in the cities don't get
acquainted with pensions it's going to cost you money and we're not going to
give you the money to do it.
Lehman/And then you folks, I echo what you say I really believe we're very fortunate in
Johnson County to have legis. I've never ever felt that I can't talk to any
legislature we have in the area, the city feels that way.
Doderer/Even if you disagree.
Lehman/But any of the three but thank you for coming tonight. (can't hear, all clapping)
We really appreciate it. (End of tape)
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City council
meeting of November 10, 1999.