HomeMy WebLinkAbout2006-02-27 Transcription
February 27,2006
February 27,2006
City Council Work Session
Page I
City Council Work Session
6:35 PM
Council: Bailey, Champion, Correia, Elliott, O'Donnell, Vanderhoef, Wilburn
Staff: Atkins, Dilkes, Davidson, Fowler, Helling, Karr, O'Brien
TAPE: 06-25, Both Sides; 06-26, Side I
Plannin!! and Zonin!! Items
Davidson:
(laughter)
Davidson:
Davidson:
a) CONSIDER A MOTION SETTING A PUBLIC HEARING FOR MARCH 7 ON
AN ORDINANCE AMENDING A CONDITIONAL ZONING AGREEMENT
WITH AUTOHAUS L TD TO REMOVE THE REQUIREMENT FOR A30 FOOT
LANDSCAPE SETBACK FROM HIGHWAY 1 FOR .63 ACRES LOCATED
AT 809-817 HIGHWAY 1 WEST.
Good evening, everyone. Thanks for (can't hear) this evening. Hope you don't mind the
junior varsity for one night.
First item is setting a public hearing. Carousel Nissan property. All we need to talk about
is this setting here.
b) REZONING 9.72-ACRES OF LAND LOCATED WEST OF FOSTER ROAD
FROM INTERIM DEVELOPMENT-RESIDENTIAL (ID-RS) TO PLANNED
DEVELOPMENT HOUSING-LOW DENSITY SINGLE-FAMILY (OPD-5)
Item B then, is we're zoning some property on Foster Road, from the current interim
development zone to OPD-5. This is a sensitive area, this development plan, for 9.72 acres.
And you can see where it's located there. [think some of you were on the (can't hear)
field trip and had the opportunity to view that from the bus. This property contains
sensitive environmental features which we will get into a little bit. It would allow the
applicant to cluster two 12-unit buildings and minimize the impact on the sensitive areas
which include steep slopes and woodlands. The interim zoning, as I think you know, is a
zoning classification we use when there is something inhibiting the property from being
developed. Typically it's either the road, water or sewer. And when this property was
zoned with the ill zoning it did not have the necessary infrastructure. Since that time
Foster Road has been reconstructed, and sewer and water lines have been extended to the
area. Initially that was for the new water treatment plant, which has then allowed the
subsequent development to occur, chiefly the Peninsula and Mackinaw Village which you
see there. So we feel it is appropriate for the interim development zone to be taken off at
this time because of that. You've heard between Karin and myself you've heard us talk
about properties on the Peninsula as they come up for rezoning and I think you're aware
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City Council Work Session
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that we have taken a broad view of this area and chiefly because of the restricted access
basically past the intersection of No-Name Road and Foster Road there is one way in and
out past that point, and because of that we've identified this area as being appropriate for
low-density development. So the OPDH-5 which, without the sensitive areas overlaid with
the RS-5 we feel is appropriate for this area as well. We want to try and minimize the
amount of traffic on Foster Road and for this property as well the significant environmental
features, we feel also it's appropriate to limit it to a low-density type development. With
respect to the environmental features on the property, let's see, I can't remember just
exactly, well, that's just a closer-in view showing where the two l2-plexes would be located
on Foster Road. Actually, the broader view here only approximately a third of this property
is developable. And for that reason the clustering of the density, which works out to about
2.4 and 2.5 units per acre, which would be typical to a conventional RS-5 type subdivision.
We feel that the clustering is appropriate in order to allow this higher knoll which is
adjacent to Foster Road to have all the density clustered there, and then, as you can see, the
majority of the parcel left with the existing natural features that are there. And we can do
that through the planned development overlay. Now with respect to the specific buildings,
there you can see how the two l2-plexes would be located. There is a rear driveway, which
would allow that entry from the back for the underground parking. You also note, right
there, there are five basically visitor parking spaces at the front of the building. Now
typically we would not want parking in the front of the building like that, but because of the
severe typography here there is quite a change in grade if we were to relocate the parking to
the rear of the building, say back here, there is a significant change in grade then to get up
to the front doors of these units, and so for that reason and the desire to keep as much of
this in, natural features, preserve those as much as possible, we feel that having the five
parking spaces in the front yard is appropriate. There's actually not that much ofthis
development that will be in yard, quote unquote. The majority of it will be left with the
natural vegetation that is in place. So, at any rate, through the OPDH that gives up
flexibility to allow this parking - where is that arrow? - there we go - the parking in the
front yard such as you see here - there would be a circular drive through here and you can
tell by how the parking is configured it would be a one-way loop around here and then the
majority of the traffic in and out of the development would use the underground parking.
Vanderhoef:
So how many parking places are in behind there off of that drive?
Davidson:
Dee, it looks there are one, two, three, four, five, it looks like there ten, maybe twenty in the
rear here in this area, and then there is of course some underground parking as well.
Champion:
Oh, yeah, so there is plenty of room.
O'Donnell:
Jeff, where is that in relation to the golf course out there? Can you show that?
Davidson:
Golf course is right over here. Let me go back, Mike and. . .
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O'Donnell:
Davidson:
O'Donnell:
Davidson:
Vanderhoef:
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Ok. The entrance to the golf course is where?
The entrance to the golf course is right about in here, someplace. Maybe it's opposite that
road, I can't remember just exactly right, but the clubhouse is up in this area somewhere
and then the majority of the golf course is in this area, so it's basically right across the road.
Ok.
Let's see then. I don't know how much you wanted to. . . I guess, I thought maybe we had
a view of the elevation of the building - you've got those in your materials there. We did
work quite a bit with the developer. These are large structures, especially from the rear, I
believe 40 some feet tall, three story buildings, and we like the idea of a taller building on a
smaller footprint because of what I've been saying about the natural features we want to try
and preserve. However, it does result in some fairly imposing building resulting, directly to
the south and west of this area is the Peninsula development, and, I think, as far as we can
tell, for much of the year when vegetation is around the trees, these buildings are not going
to be that visible. But this time of year, when there isn't vegetation on the trees, these
buildings will clearly be visible. What we were able to do through some negotiations with
the developer, is get the treatment that they were going to put on the fronts of these
buildings expanded clear around the buildings, so all four sides of the buildings will have
very nice materials used and, we think, be a nice addition to the neighborhood out here.
You are aware that the comprehensive plan does try and encourage a mix of housing types,
and we feel this is complementary to the entire Peninsula area. Let's see, I don't know how
much more of this you want to get into with respect to - it does indicate in the staff report
that there were some questions about storm water drainage. Those have been worked out.
Basically there will be an overland conveyance directly to the River. The city engineer has
approved that. With respect to, there might be some questions about the sewer and water
impact fees. There is a water main extension fee. There is not a sanitary sewer tap-on fee,
and that is because the city basically put the sanitary sewer in with the new water plant here
and we've allowed development to occur off of that without an impact fee. Oh, and the
other thing I wanted to mention, that is a nice feature, is that the developer was required to
dedicate .23 acres, which is not very much, in neighborhood open space. What they have
done is approximately three acres of property in this area will be dedicated to the city with
the possibility that we may in the future be able to extend a trail through that area. There is
some very rugged typography in that area. I've never actually seen it, but they say there are
some quite significant bluffs that from the Coralville side can be viewed this time of year,
especially. It would probably be more of a nature trail type trail rather than the nice eight-
foot paved trails that we think of, but we do hope to do that. Parks and Recreation
Commission did consider this matter and agreed to accept this dedication. I think. . .
Jeff, was this started out as fourteen units per building and then cut down? Because our
picture shows fourteen.
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Davidson: Does it? I do recall it might have even been sixteen. Dee, I'm not sure, I wasn't part of all
of those discussions, but I do believe there were. . .
Vanderhoef: It's an upstairs/downstairs per unit.
Davidson: I'm sorry.
Vanderhoef: An upstairs/downstairs per unit and the third floor is the parking underneath?
Davidson: Well, the ground floor, which is actually subterranean on the Foster Road side here is where
the parking would be located, and then all the units are above those. I believe there are
units that are all on one floor, but that might be a question for the developer tomorrow, I'm
not certain ofthat.
Vanderhoef: But then it's showing lots more units than twelve per building.
Bailey: No. Where? It's twelve.
Davidson: It is 'twelve per building, Dee - I can assure you of that.
Champion: It is twelve. Even if you count three windows per each unit, there's six on each side.
Vanderhoef: I'm looking at the flat thing, here.
Davidson: Yeah, as you know, with an OPDH the number of units is pinned down, so I assure you it's
the two l2-unit buildings.
Elliott: I have a question and a concern about the exterior, but I have talked to, this is pretty much
my concern, and I have talked to someone about it and will be following up on that, just,
kind of for the informal record.
Wilburn: Can you say what that was, or?
Elliott: Yeah, it's what is, what I understand at least the city is requiring an exterior that's going to
require periodic maintenance as opposed to something that wouldn't require maintenance.
Bailey: Is there an exterior that doesn't require periodic maintenance?
Elliott: Yeah - vinyl siding.
Bailey: Oh. You should see our siding - it could use some maintenance.
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Elliott: You should see ours.
Bailey: Is it perfect?
Elliott: Perfect.
Bailey: Clean?
Vanderhoef: He gets out there and scrubs it.
Elliott: But I'll be following up on that, Jeff.
Wilburn: Any other questions on this?
Davidson:
(laughter)
Davidson:
Bailey:
Davidson:
(can't hear)
Davidson:
c) APPROVING THE VOLUNTARY ANNEXATION OF A .35-ACRE
PROPERTY LOCATED ON CAMP CARDINAL ROAD
Any other questions about Elk Run? All right. The next item - it's kind of a housekeeping
matter. You probably recall the severance and subsequent annexation by the city of
Coralville that was worked out with the Camp Cardinal Boulevard project. What we
discovered - you can see the arrow there - is that, with the Cardinal Ridge subdivision, the
future intersection of Kennedy Parkway and the old Camp Cardinal Road, which will be
made into more of a local street, prior to subsequent development, will be reconstructed,
and so the desire was to keep the entire Cardinal Ridge subdivision, including that element,
in Iowa City, so there's a little sliver here, that tomorrow evening Coralville will be
severing back. . .
Contingent on you agreeing to annex it.
And then next week we'll have a paperwork contest
This is a housekeeping matter, but it will enable this entire subdivision to be in Iowa City.
It's important.
d) CONSIDER AN ORDINANCE REZONING 1.02 ACRES FROM LOW
DENSITY SINGLE-FAMILY RESIDENTIAL (RS-5) ZONE TO COMMUNITY
COMMERCIAL (CC-2) ZONE FOR PROPERTY LOCATED AT 3405
ROCHESTER AVENUE. (REZ05-00024) (SECOND CONSIDERATION)
Item D then is the second consideration of the salvage yard rezoning up on Rochester
Avenue.
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February 27,2006
Davidson:
Elliott:
Davidson:
O'Donnell:
Bailey:
En!!ine Brake
Wilburn:
Davidson:
Elliott:
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e) CONSIDER A RESOLUTION APPROVING THE FINAL PLAT OF GALWAY
HILLS PART SUBDIVISION PART FOUR, IOWA CITY, IOWA (SUB05-Q0032).
(DEFERRED FROM 2/13)
Item E is the final plat of Galway Hills. We put a picture here. This is one that had been
deferred. You can see the location there right adjacent to the interchange of Melrose and
2] 8. And that's with the subdivision plat. ] think you've had quite a bit of discussion
about this, but this is the [mal plat which of course would be concurrent then with the
preliminary plat. The ]egal papers have been completed for this one, right?
What interchanges was that? Melrose?
f) CONSIDER A RESOLUTION APPROVING THE FINAL PLAT OF JJR DAVIS
FOURTH ADDITION, IOWA CITY, IOWA. (SUB05-00027) (DEFERRED
FROM 1/23 AND 2/13)
Melrose and 2]8. Right. Adjacent. And then, Item F, the developer has asked for a deferral
to March 7, ] believe it might in your materials say February 28th, but] think March 7th is
actually - yeah, obviously, it would be, because February 28th is tomorrow. Any questions
about Planning and Zoning items?
Good job.
Thanks, Jeff.
Engine brake?
I guess I'm here as a resource person. I think you received the materials that we prepared, I
guess a little more than a year ago, and we can have any discussion you would like of those.
I think the upshot of the discussion last time was, if there is a majority of you that would
like an engine break ordinance we can put one together. Other towns have them, they
don't, from what we can tell, seem to be a huge deal. I think, probably the one thing you
will want to consider in your deliberations is it is a matter of, like anything, police
enforcement, so if you want to direct some of your police resources to enforcing an engine
break ordinance that would be part of the deal with this.
How much does it cost to do a sign? Why don't we put up a sign and see if it helps? Why
do we need an ordinance?
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Bailey:
Correia:
Bailey:
Elliott:
Dilkes:
Bailey:
(laughter)
Davidson:
Dilkes:
Elliott:
(laughter)
Correia:
Davidson:
Correia:
Bailey:
Davidson:
Correia:
(laughter)
We'd have to have an ordinance to put up a sign.
Wouldn't we be saying Engine Brake Ordinance In Force?
No, no, no, no. No Engine Braking.
No, you could say Please Don't Use Your Engine Brakes, but you can't say. . .
I want a Please Don't Speed by my house sign then, too.
That wouldn't be a regulatory sign, then,.a regulatory sign implies there's been an official
action.
Yeah, you can't put up a regulatory sign unless there's an ordinance that goes along with it.
How interesting.
So there, so if we had, I mean, I think an issue that was brought up was increased truck
traffic on Scott Boulevard. And so, if there was, if we put an ordinance in place citywide,
identified some areas of town where there's more truck traffic and put signs up if we voted
on an ordinance. . .
Yeah, but the police captain at the time who was the interim police chief, did recommend
doing it citywide. We could revisit that.
Oh, no, I don't mean to not do it citywide, but I mean maybe target some areas of town that
signage . . .
To actually put the signs up.
Target the enforcement. I see.
Yeah, that's what I was meaning, target the enforcement, and then maybe get information to
some of the industrial park areas to let them let their truckers who are coming back and
forth know about this have, maybe as we first enforce it have some police presence but then
have it be more of a complaint-based thing over time with the signs in the particular areas.
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O'Donnell:
How many complaints do we get on this?
Davidson:
You know, I get not even one a month, I'm sure. A couple a year. Maybe others have had
- Amy, have you had complaints?
Correia: I mean we had an email to the Council from someone who lives in that neighborhood and.
then there was somebody who happened to be here when we first brought it up that walks
her dog along that area of Scott Boulevard and said that it has been getting loud, there has
been increased truck traffic. Whether people think they should call the City when they hear
loud - I mean, I don't know if that's.
Vanderhoef: I suspect there's a lot of people that don't even know that there is an option to the truck
driver.
Correia: Sure.
Vanderhoef: Until it was brought to my attention, whenever that was, a year or so ago, I wasn't aware
that there was an option to that noisy. But if! live right along there and the truck driving
coming in and out all night long.
Wilburn: Connie, you were going to say something?
Champion: Well, I was just going to say this is another law that is probably not really enforceable,
. unless you have a policeman there, but.
Davidson: That's correct, that's correct.
Champion: I mean, we have a lot of laws that really are never enforced because you count on people
just obeying the law because there probably isn't going to be a policeman there when the
trucker turns on the break. That's my only objection to those kinds of ordinances, though I
don't object to it because I think that most people are law-abiding citizens.
Wilburn: Are there four of us who want to?
Champion: I'm fine with it.
Elliott: Not at this time.
Wilburn: I count four.
Davidson: We'll proceed with an ordinance?
Wilburn: Proceed with it.
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Champion: I don't want signs all over town.
Davidson: Well, on the entryways I imagine is where we'd have the signs.
Vanderhoef: Entryways and a reminder by the Industrial Park.
O'Donnell: Jeff, what do the signs say?
Davidson: You know, we'd have to research that, Mike, but I think that one would say Engine Braking
Ordinance In Effect or something like that.
O'Donnell: Say what now?
Davidson: Engine Braking Ordinance In Effect - you know, the truckers know what that means.
Wilburn: They'll know what it means.
Bailey: That's what I've seen in other cities.
Elliott: I. I guess, that's a whole lot of words, instead of saying No Engine Breaking.
Davidson: We'll figure out some words.
(laughter)
Bailey:
Do you know he works with signs there, Bob?
Elliott:
I don't see why you can't put up signs with Please No Engine Braking or something like
that.
Bailey:
I'm sure we could put please.
Elliott:
Why do we need an ordinance? But, go ahead.
Wilburn:
I guess you said you could put -
Dilkes:
I guess.
Davidson:
Not a regulatory - a regulatory sign is the black letters on white. You can't put that up.
But we could put a sign up Please You little smiley faces.
Elliott:
Whatever.
(laughter)
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Wilburn:
Elliott:
Please doesn't have the same ah, impact as no.
And thank you.
Goal Session Update
Wilburn:
Atkins:
Wilburn:
Atkins:
Wilburn:
Atkins:
Wilburn:
Atkins:
Wilburn:
Atkins:
Wilburn:
Champion:
Correia:
We're so polite. Goal Setting Session update.
I, ah...
Go ahead.
I'll wait.
We had our Goal Setting Session and materials were brought back for us. Then we got
locked into our budget debate and now that the public hearing on the budget is tomorrow
night we'll be voting on the budget shortly thereafter. I think the thing is to remind
ourselves to take a look and we got the materials. What do we want to do? Where do we
want to give direction? I know one item, in particular, we had kind of general impressions
with our work and there was, an impression that's going to be discussed and I think several
folks mentioned that housing issues was one of the items, but, I guess just to throw that out.
Steve you want to?
No, well, that's what I wanted to do, is, I went through all the minutes, the flip charts, I was
trying to look for some common themes. I guess housing does appear in several locations.
But Ijust wanted to hear from, was there something specific you wanted me to do, because
out of it, the way this infonnation is put together now, it's not real directed.
It's a lot of opinions.
Well, we had an Engine Braking, that was one of the ideas, well, we're kind of taking care
of that tonight. Are there others that need attention?
And I, I had, Steve, you were going to put, at least visiting the recommendations from the
scattered site is going to be on our Work Session after the budget?
I think we said the second meeting in March we'd start that.
Yeah, so I'm just putting that out there.
Who'll be (can't here)
What did you say, Connie?
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Atkins:
Correia:
Atkins:
Elliott:
Wilburn:
Champion:
Bailey:
Champion:
Bailey:
Champion:
Correia:
Vanderhoef:
I don't know, Connie. I think we have a recommendation for the task force, you heard that,
I think that we will, because it's been awhile, step back and remind ourselves of why we
created the Task Force, what some of the circumstances were. Unfortunately, we're going
to lose the staff person that did that work. We'll figure that out.
I think there were other staff that were involved and attended most of those meetings as
well.
Yeah, yes.
And Matt Hayek is still around and he would be very knowledgeable about everything that
went on, I believe.
Yes. I believe also that at our joint City/County Meeting the Housing Trust Fund is going
to make, did they every call you back, Marian, ok, they're going to make some kind of
presentation, I assume it's like an update. I'll have to give them a call to find out. Tell
them to call, Marian, to tell us what they're going to talk to us about. I presume it's an
update on the activities of the Trust Fund.
Well, I think we should start some direction if we're going to have a Work Session on it,
about how we're going to start the discussion. I mean, all are in favor of looking at the
standard site housing recommendations, but we can't just say let's look at it, ok, I've looked
at it. It would be very complicated to do, I think.
One of the things I'd like to do as part of that discussion is sit down with the School Board.
I mean, it was original, the idea or the motivation started originally with the schools. I
think it merits sitting down with them, they've looked at it.
But we have ajoint meeting next month, don't we?
Right, but will we actually Work Session, will we have a discussion about that?
I don't think we can, but I think sometimes meetings don't have a lot of time for discussion,
that might be, rather call another meeting. That might be an excellent time to schedule it.
Well, I would. . .
I think it is too a good time, because housing is more than just our boundaries. It's our
metropolitan statistical area, which includes all of Johnson County and Washington County,
and some of this housing piece that I'm looking at and mentioning is where are the folks
going to live that are coming to work the jobs at Riverside Casino.
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Champion:
Correia:
Elliott:
Atkins:
Correia:
Vanderhoef:
Correia:
Wilburn:
Correia:
(can't hear) Riverside
Well, I'm willing to, because of my background in Housing, to sit down with Steve, if
that's fine with him, before our Work Session to go through the scattered site more in-depth
and try to figure out a way to do an agenda starting to discuss it as a Council. If that seems
like it would be useful, I 'm willing to do that.
I do think that the School Board needs to be involved. I think when you go back to the old
phrase that no good deed ever goes unpunished, I think the fact that from what some of the,
there's never a win-win situation with this sort of thing, and the school boards, the schools,
our public schools problems are a manifestation of some of the problems that have
emanated from the good work that we have done so far, and I think that there are other
concerns, but I think certainly the schools are one ofthe concerns. I'd be very much
interested in sitting down with the schools for a round table discussion and a good give-and-
take discussion.
I would encourage you, and I think these points are well taken. We need to craft this
agenda very carefully. On the 29th we have a discussion about Family Resource Centers.
Lane wrote that letter to you all and to me, and we tentatively. Now Family Resource
Centers, there's some commonality of interests. Coralville has them, North Liberty has
them, we have them. Scattered site housing policy was generated by Iowa City, and are
Coralville, North Liberty county governments going to buy into that same? That's why it's
going to be real, we have to be smart about how we do this. Because, right now, scattered
site is perceived to be, in my judgement, an Iowa City issue. Family Resource Center,
different.
And I do think the hearing, from what the Housing Trust Fund is doing, because they're,
the Housing Trust fund, is working with United Way and the Chamber of Commerce, and I
think the Housing Authority, to put together a community-wide Housing Forum, to bring in
all of the local elected officials and elective bodies, you know, sometime, by the end of the
year so there are conversations going on county wide, involving the Central Iowa Council
of Governments as well, so it will be good to hear what they are doing and how they will be
doing this, bringing all, everybody together to try and respond.
Are you
So I'm saying, there are, countywide discussions starting and efforts to bring in other
stakeholders besides the city ofIowa City for solutions.
So we're a few steps ahead of where they're just kind of beginning the conversation, is
what you're saying.
They're beginning the planning for conversations, yeah.
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Wilburn: Ok. All right.
Vanderhoef: So you're saying do this on the 29th at the joint meeting.
Atkins: And I'm questioning that.
Champion: He's right.
Atkins: It has to be very well crafted.
Elliott: I agree. I would like to have an agenda, a proposed agenda that we could discuss and
finalize before we have the meeting, because I think the agenda will really set the tone and a
direction and a concept for the meeting.
Atkins: I'm fine with that.
Wilburn: And we might, from that meeting, as the Housing Trust Fund makes the presentation at the
joint meeting, then maybe there might be some carryover that may corne up, and that way
we can,
Atkins: If it's acceptable to you, I delegate to Amy, and then Amy and I will just, we can try
something informally, to see what we get out of it.
O'Donnell: That's fine.
Bailey: I think that sounds like a good way to go.
Wilburn: Can you also call the head of the Housing Trust Fund and tell him to call Marian and say
what it is, what item to put on the
Karr: What to call it?
Wilburn: Yeah. Thank you.
Atkins: So I will communicate. Amy, she and I will sort of see how we can fashion some sort of an
agenda and it'll go back to you all as a group before you make the formal invitation to
everyone else.
Wilburn: That sounds good. Other items related to the Goal Setting?
Vanderhoef: No, I just was thinking that, with the housing thing, I still would like the Housing Authority
to be sure that the community understands what the voucher system is and how it works and
where the housing is and then it goes down into Washington County, and whenever we start
doing that I would like to invite the supervisors from Washington County to hear that. So,
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February 27, 2006
City Council Work Session
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County to hear that. So, if you're going to talk about Housing Authority then, 1 think that
they could be our guests at the joint meeting just to hear what we're gearing up for or
what's available and what our problems are.
Atkins: Well, we know it's a public meeting, and I think if there are issues that appeal to their
interests we'll certainly see that that invitation is extended.
Wilburn: Yeah.
Atkins: That's fine.
Vanderhoef: Our housing authority goes clear down to the edge of the city of Washington, so it includes
all of Riverside and that surrounding area that mayor may not be developing rapidly as the
casino goes up.
Correia: And I would imagine that they are in communication with the stakeholders, because they
are providing that service. I mean, I'm just imagining that.
Vanderhoef: What I have been told was the contract written by the casino with the city of Riverside is
that there is money in that contract for housing, and 1 don't know any more than just this
what I told you.
Wilburn: But I think we've got, we've got that point, yeah.
Bailey: Well and I think it's.
Vanderhoef: But they paid to build it.
Wilburn: I understand, but that's also, that's not on tonight's agenda.
Vanderhoef: No.
Wilburn: But, I think, we've got, an invitation is going to go out to them, and so that's the deal.
Bailey: Well I think it's important to zoom out, that we also have to realize that we need to respond
to a task force report that we asked for for our community as well, so let's not lose sight of
that in looking at the broader issue of housing which is an enormous issues as we all well
understand.
Wilburn: Any other Goal Setting directions?
Bailey: Do you have the goals right in front of you? Because I can't bring them up because
(can't hear)
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February 27, 2006
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Correia:I do.
Bailey:
Wilburn:
Correia:
Dilkes:
Correia:
Wilburn:
Correia:
Bailey:
Correia:
Wilburn:
Correia:
Champion:
Ok, good, because I was counting on I knew exactly where to find them, but. . .
Can you walk us through a few items that jump out to you?
So we have things like programs, evaluate City programs, re-look at Senior Center,
maintain quality of work activities, comprehensive look at transit.
(can't hear) we're doing that?
It's on the schedule, transit.
Would you mind speaking up a little, and a little slower?
I'm sorry. Ok. There are so many pages! How much time - Ok, so there's Programs,
evaluate City programs, re-look at Senior Center programs, maintain quality of work
activities, comprehensive look at transit, which we're doing.
That feels good.
Housing, develop a comprehensive housing strategy, so I'm not going to read through all of
the listings, is that ok?
No, just.
Ok, ok. Environmental beautification, provide activities to create a quality environment.
Some of the things on here are clean and beautify riverbanks Burlington to Benton,
recycling at youth sports parks, the engine brake ordinance, bike trails, update Rec Center
parking ramps for cycling.
I like that one.
Correia: Yeah, that was yours, I think.
(laughter)
Correia:
Improve appearance, flowers, litter pick-up, more trees. Intergovernmental- promote
intergovernmental effectiveness, metro agenda, picking two items out of the metro agenda
to promote and highlight multi-jurisdictionally. Lobby state and federal officials,
partnership with the schools. Capital improvements, we have additional police and fire-
fighters, Northside fire station, upgrade Benton Street, completion of Eastside trail to
Creekside Park, loop trail around Sand Lake, other trails. Economic development: things
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Wilburn:
Correia:
Wilburn:
Atkins:
Wilburn:
Bailey:
Wilburn:
Atkins:
Bailey:
(laughter)
Atkins:
Bailey:
Atkins:
Bailey:
Correia:
(laughter)
Correia:
like make business /hendly, more business /hendly city ofIowa City, continue to grow tax
base, there's a lot of things under here.
Yeah. Some of the and maybe, Steve, this is enough.
The last thing is engagement, and then, that was the last thing.
Some of the things, it sounds like we're just starting to proceed with them, and so maybe
it's enough that maybe every, I would say at least once a month in a Work Session we just
dig out those sheets again.
That's ok.
You know, as we get into the housing stuff, and, that's going to be some busy work some
digging into right away.
That is huge.
So, once a month, in a Work Session make sure as we're moving through some of those
items, take a look where are we at, where do we need to go, I mean, is that enough for you?
I can use it simply by bringing it up once a month for myself, sort of as flagging these items,
it's just that there was something that you had this overwhelming desire to address, I need
to know, I need to know about that. I don't think there's any doubt that the housing is a
complex issue, and we'll sort of never resolve. . .
When will we be dealing with transit? When did they say they would come back?
Second meeting in March.
Ok, so that's a pretty full plate right there.
Yeah.
It's a good thing that those are also related, so that's a good thing to deal with.
And we also have to serve Brie and cheese.
When are we going to start doing that?
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Elliott:
Correia:
Elliott:
Atkins:
Karr:
Correia:
Elliott:
Correia:
Elliott:
Bailey:
Elliott:
O'Donnell:
Elliott:
Champion:
Wilburn:
Elliott:
Wilburn:
(can't hear) some nitty-gritty.
Yeah - fruit.
Steve, I don't know ifthere are others, but I would appreciate if! could get a copy, I don't
even remember what materials that was in. If I could get a copy then I could just bring that
to each meeting.
Sure.
It's the copy of the Work Session. That is from the Work Session minutes, incorporated
right in the Work Session minutes.
Yeah, January 24th, Council Work Session minutes.
Ok. And because, I have asked a couple of times if any of my Council colleagues would
like to have a meeting with either all or representatives of the Historic Preservation
Commission, it is in here, so now I will ask, are there three other people who would like for
this Council to meet with either all or representatives of the Historic Preservation
Commission?
About?
I think we have some concerns that have emerged over the past couple of years and they are
starting to look at their plan for the next year and several years ahead and I think that
certainly as a Councilperson I would like to have a discussion with them.
Won't that naturally happen when they bring forward their plan?
I would like to talk to them before they start on the plan.
I don't have any problem with that.
I would like to do it.
(can't hear)
That's two.
So we don't.
Ok. How about too as they bring up their plan, that's a chance to dig into what they're
coming up, well similar to what staff planning and zoning had done. Are we going in the
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Champion:
City Council Work Session
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right direction otherwise stop us. Well, like what happened with transportation on the bus.
Are we going in the right direction or stop us now. So that's what I look at when they're
bringing their plan forward.
I think you have to remember too that with Historic Preservation, we don't have a lot of
control over their guidelines, and you either support it or you don't.
Council Annointments
Wilburn:
Vanderhoef:
Correia:
Champion:
Wilburn:
(laughter)
Bailey:
Wilburn:
Vanderhoef:
Champion:
Bailey:
Champion:
Correia:
O'Donnell:
Elliott:
Wilburn:
And with that said, Council Appointments. We've got Airport Commission, and one
applicant. You all ready?
I would like to nominate Janelle Rettig, applicant that you picked out.
Oh, yes, that's great.
She's terrific, and she's a woman.
There you go.
And she has a real interest in (can't hear), which is great.
And, for the press that's present, kindly say that because we have no females on the Airport
Board. . .
She's meticulous in her
Historic Preservation, one.
Well, we have Civil Service, too.
Civil Service.
Civil Service.
We have one appointment for Civil Service. Lyra Dickerson
I usually would have a concern about someone who already has served, what is that, a four
year term, she has served three terms.
Are you talking about
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Correia: Civil Service.
Elliott: Lyra Dickerson, yeah.
Wilburn: Ok
Elliott: She has already served twelve years, but I think that's some things that she brings some
special expertise to that Commission, so I would, as I said, usually it's time for someone
else, but in this case I would think Lyra can still be a very strong, productive member of
that Commission. I would like to see her back.
Wilburn: Ok. Around the table.
Bailey: So would I.
Wilburn: Ok. And you said there was Historic Preservation.
Elliott: We have one app. for Historic Preservation.
Bailey: Yes. The at-large.
Wilburn: Mae Schatteman
Vanderhoef: New to the city? (can't hear) history.
Elliott: She's lived not only different places in this country but in different countries, and I think
she'd bring a good perspective to it. I'd be in favor.
Wilburn: Four? Do you want to see? Two, three, four. Yes. That was it, wasn't it?
Correia: Telecommunication.
Bailey: Telecommunication.
Elliott: One more.
Wilburn: Telecommunication.
Champion: I'd like to keep Saul on there. He's re-applied, he's only served one term, I think it's
healthy to allow people to serve two terms on a Commission if they desire to do it. John is
certainly qualified too, but just because it involves someone serving his first term.
Elliott: But there's two
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Bailey:
Correia:
(laughter)
Wilburn:
Elliott:
Al!enda Items
Wilburn:
ITEM 9.
ITEM 10.
Elliott:
Atkins:
Elliott:
Correia:
Elliott:
Correia:
Elliott:
Wilburn:
There's two
You can have them both
Look's like we're going both.
That sounds good.
Ok. Council Time. Oh, I'm sorry, agenda items.
AMENDING TITLE 3, "CITY FINANCES, TAXATION AND FEES," CHAPTER 4,
"SCHEDULE OF FEES, RATES, CHARGES, BONDS, FINES AND PENALTIES"
OF THE CITY CODE, TO INCREASE PARKING FEES AND INCREASE
MONTHLY PARKING PERMIT FEES.
APPROVING PLANS, SPECIFICATIONS, AND FORM OF CONTRACT FOR THE
2006 PARKING GARAGE MAINTENANCE PROJECT, DIRECTING CITY CLERK TO
PUBLISH ADVERTISEMENT FOR BIDS, AND FIXING TIME AND PLACE FOR
RECEIPT OF BIDS.
Item 9 is the increase in fees for the parking ramp. I have some serious mixed emotions
about that.
I've got someone here to answer your questions.
And I think one of the things we have to do, why do we have, why do we charge for parking
ramps and parking meters?
So people don't park there all day long.
Why do we? Do we do it to make money?
Or do we do it so people won't park there all day long.
That is my understanding, and therefore, I wonder why we're increasing the price, because
by increasing the price, every time we do that we're discouraging people from coming to
our downtown area.
I think we also need to keep in mind perspective, relative to other areas and what they
charge, and there are some communities, well the issue that we had with at least the parking
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Scheiber:
Wilburn:
Fowler:
Champion:
parking on the street, people were from some larger communities - our street parking fine
was less than they pay for parking back horne, so you know, but, let's hear from the.
I don't know about that particular perspective, vis-a-vis you can look at that and say, look at
our property taxes. People pay five times that so why don't we increase that exponentially.
I don't, I think for our town I agree with Bob, I think keeping parking, especially on the
meters, where it's more of a hassle than it is the money, to try and keep that kind of change
on you all the time.
My point wasn't just necessarily other communities, but in terms of keeping parking
available and accessible to as many people as possible, because people will park and stay.
Now, this is bringing forward to you something that we brought at a June 6th meeting last
year, where we came forward and said we have some major repair work that we need to do
in our facilities. They're twenty to twenty-five years old, to extend the life another twenty
years we need to make an investment in them. And at that time, we had a graduated fee
structure increase. The only way we could make these repairs was to borrow money. We
were talking about an intemalloan from the landfill. And, we were going to put in a
graduated fee increase to repay this loan. And at that time the informal majority of the
Council said don't graduate the increases, go ahead and put the increases into effect in one
time and then address the other issues that we need, which is also to begin to accrue
reserves so that we can expand the system in the future, because we're right now running at
just a break-even and. Which is the philosophy of Parking, is that we don't run it as a
business to make a profit, we run it at a level just to sustain itself, and adding the Iowa
Avenue facility increased our bond payments. We owe a million dollars a year on that
facility for the next twenty years. So, if we're going to maintain our other facilities and
build a reserve for future facilities, than we needed the rate increase, and that's why these
two are tied together, and coming when they do now, the first issue is the rate increase, the
second issue is the plans and specs on the facility repair. And if we don't, excuse me, if
you don't pass the rate increase, then there is no need to consider the repair, because we
won't have the funding to be able to complete that. So, what we were looking at is
increasing the parking ramps and the on-street meters in the downtown and North Clinton
Street from .60 per hour to .75 per hour. The University ofIowa currently is .75 an hour,
and next academic year they'll be going to .80 an hour. They also have a graduated fee
structure, so if you pull into several oftheir parking facilities between 5 and 9 am, if you're
there over three hours, they start charging you $2 an hour. So, they're doing the same
thing, they're trying to move people, they're trying to create openings, and that's what we
do with our fee structures, that's why the downtown is higher than the further outlying area.
So the further outlying areas we'd like to increase to .60 an hour. They're currently 040 and
.50 an hour and then the permit fees, we'd like to increase the permit fees $5.00 per month
on all permits.
I'm getting tired of paying more for parking.
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City Council Work Session
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(laughter)
Champion:
Fowler:
Correia:
Bailey:
Champion:
Fowler:
Bailey:
Fowler:
Bailey:
Fowler:
Bailey:
Fowler:
Elliott:
Bailey:
Correia:
Bailey:
I don't have any problems with the increases.
And this would fund a $697,000.00 repair project, it would help us, it would allow us, to
repay a loan to the landfill, an internal City loan, and at the same time begin making
reserves so we can replace our parking meters. The old meters on the street, put it in and
turn the handle, those mechanical meters, they don't even have a school anymore to teach
people how to work on them. So.
When are we going to get card-swipe meters?
Do they make those?
Yes, I'm sure they do.
Yes.
And why can't our meters be an hour and fifteen minutes? It's not that I'm trying to push
it, but if you have an hour meeting, there's no way you can comply. I mean, there's no way.
We'll set a meeting. (can't hear)
A card-swipe, do 'em an hour and fifteen, and I'd be really happy.
We used to have one and two-hour meters downtown. This is ancient history.
Hey, I lived here (can't hear)
Then everybody wanted to go to thirty minute meters downtown so there was more turnover
at the meters, so we went to thirty minute meters in the core of the downtown, and then
after a number of years everybody said, well, thirty minutes isn't long enough, let's have
hour meters, so we went back to hour meters.
Isn't this fun?
Yeah.
I'd like 90-minute meters.
I'd like anything that would take a debit card - anything that would take a debit card, I'm
not crawling around to find change anymore.
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Champion:
Bailey:
Correia:
(laughter)
City Council Work Session
Page 23
The reason that you don't like them. I like the old meters as a businessperson downtown
because it keeps people from who have that hour class from using a parking space on the
street. They either get a fine or they can go to the (can't hear) much easier.
Well, I understand that perspective.
If I had a 90 minute meter I could go to lunch and then go stop in your store before I had to
get to my car.
Wilburn: So, for this to
Vanderhoef: You can do lunch in an hour.
Correia: Do lunch in an hour. I can't do lunch and shop in an hour.
Wilburn: Related to the garage maintenance, in your mind, we either. This is the way to do it,
increase the fees or we don't do it or does someone have another way to recommend to
generate the revenue?
Fowler: The only other option, really, to do to the repairs, would be to break from tradition and no
longer have the parking system be self-sustaining and go with the general obligation,
general fund payment for parking ramp maintenance.
Vanderhoef: That is just raising taxes one more time.
Elliott: Are parking funds used for anything else? Other than -
Correia:No.
Elliott:
Correia:
Bailey:
Champion:
Elliott:
Atkins:
They go to the transit system, do they not?
Just Court Street.
Just Court Street.
The Court Street Transportation Center.
I thought I read in there that there were funds from, from Parking.
For Court Street. Yeah, that's because that's a transit asset. That is an unusual aspect of
our system, in that we have a parking garage, parking revenues are credited to the transit
system.
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February 27,2006
Elliott:
Atkins:
Elliott:
Fowler:
Scheiber:
O'Donnell:
Champion:
Bailey:
Fowler:
Correia:
Scheiber:
Fowler:
Scheiber:
Fowler:
Wilburn:
Scheiber:
Champion:
Bailey:
(laughter)
Vanderhoef:
City Council Work Session
Page 24
The Court Street parking ramp is a unique entity.
Yes, yes.
Ok.
Yes. Some of the parking ticket money goes to the general fund, with all of the money
that's generated from parking fees supports the parking system.
Will the maximum daily charge increase accordingly in the ramps?
$5 a month.
No, that's the parking
No, like a daily.
Yeah, we did away with the daily maximum, so there's no
Hourly charge.
Oh, right, but, like if you lose a ticket or something, don't they charge you a maximum
daily, or something?
Yes.
So, will that increase through?
Right. It would reflect the increase in the hour rate.
Cause it's a twenty-four hour, they just pay for the whole thing
They just pay for the twenty-four hour if you lose.
I think that rarely happens, though. I think they just usually ask you what time you came in.
Not through personal experience, but you're speculating, right?
Joe, can you tell me, a little bit. You projected $670 something annually coming in from
the new revenues. Is that based on what percent of occupancy?
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Fowler: It's $375 would be the increase, $697 was the cost to go ahead and do the repairs. We did
build some elasticity in, thinking that there would be a drop-off as always with the rate
increase. Some people will find another way, some people will take the bus, some people
will park out a little bit farther and walk. There will be some decrease in usage, but over
time we expect that to come back.
Vanderhoef: Ok, and, as I understand it, we are building a huge waiting list again for permits?
O'Brien: Yeah, we currently have at least a minimum of four to six months for the first available
space to open up.
Vanderhoef: Do you have any thought on how those permits are balanced between workers, you know,
who use it when they go to work, versus, you know, near Southside where they've paid into
Parking Impact Fee and they basically store their car?
O'Brien: I don't have a breakdown of that, that's something I could put together some rough
numbers for a future meeting. But, I do know the University leases a lot of space from us
and those are people that work in the downtown area, buUhere are also a lot of residents
due to the, a lot of the residential I guess the apartments that have gone up in the downtown
has led to a lot of residential usage of permits where people will store their car for longer
periods. It's a good mix, but I couldn't give you any hard numbers right now.
Vanderhoef: Have we ever done a count? You know, at night?
O'Brien: It's difficult to know -I mean, we do track their addresses, so it's something we could look
at, but we don't, I guess that's not what we focus on.
Bailey: So you don't. I don't understand where you're going here?
Vanderhoef: We're going to be talking about the near Souths ide comprehensive plan and how we're
dealing with housing and business and so forth down there. We know there's an impact fee
there. Now, if zoning were to change, how would that effect it, with or without parking. I
want to get a feel what we've got now in the way of permanent storage kind of parkers who
live in the units close by.
Correia: Is it permanent storage? They probably use it to drive.
Vanderhoef: They go out, but, but the car is back in for overnight in many cases. I had one developer
say that he thought out of his large number of renters that probably 25% had the permits
and were using the parking ramps. But that was just one property-owner.
Correia: Don't they generally have enough parking spaces?
Vanderhoef: No, they're Southside.
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Bailey: No, because of the (can't hear) fee.
Correia: Oh, Southside, sorry.
Fowler: We do have two different kinds of permits. We do have a night time permit for people who
want to use their car during the day, and store it at night and over the weekend can pay a
reduced rate, so there is, there is a breakout, but if they leave it their during the day they
would have to pay the hourly rate in addition to what they were paying for the permit.
Vanderhoef: So they have to take it out during the day.
Fowler: If they don't have a-
Bailey: So if you work in Cedar Rapids/
Fowler: If you lived in that area and you used your car all day long there is an option available to
you that doesn't reflect in the total number of permits that we sell during the day.
Vanderhoef: But if you were a student that walked to class, you'd have to have two permits, a night
permit and a -
Fowler: No, no. We have a regular 24-hour and then a reduced rate evening/weekend permit.
Vanderhoef: Gotcha. Ok.
Champion: What a good idea.
Correia: Yeah. What, do you know what, you told us the hourly parking rates for the University,
what are their permit rates? Do you know that, in terms of a comparison with what our
Fowler: They're going to increase to $69 a month, and ours would be anywhere from $60 to $75,
depending upon location.
Correia: Ok, so it's, I mean, we're comparable in both increasing.
Bailey: Do we have any idea of the impact ofthe sale of the second floor of Old Capital and
parking I mean, how many people are we bringing into downtown to work with that sale.
Elliott: 700 I think it said.
Correia: Well, some of those folks are already working downtown, some will be transferring from
the US Bank Building over.
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Elliott: Many are not, though.
Correia: No, I know.
Bailey: Yeah.
Fowler: Yeah, they've already purchased 200 permits from us in the Court Street Transportation
Center. We promised them the Old Capital Center, they'll probably get those, they'll
probably end up with 300 permits plus what they already have, which is, what 400.
Wilburn: No, they have close to 200
Fowler: 200, ok.
Vanderhoef: You're giving them some in the Capital Street?
Fowler: Well, just like anybody else, they go on the waiting list and if they can get one. But, there's
some that we've promised to Old Capital to help with their redevelopment, and I believe
there's less than 20 left there.
Bailey: I don't have any problem raising the rates, because I understand what we're going to use
them for, but I think this has to be a comprehensive discussion when we talk about transit,
is how, how do we reduce those waiting lists by encouraging people to bus, are there other
innovative ways we can get people into downtown that don't always mean that every day
somebody needs a car. I mean we have one ofthe most walkable, bikeable transit friendly
cities, and yet we have huge waiting lists for parking ramps, and I don't fully understand. I
mean, do we need to do some park-and-ride, park-and sorts of things, and I think we should
look at that when we have transit discussion.
Fowler: Through the University we have two different programs that have been very successful.
One is the student bus pass, which we sell at $18 a month, we discount that down, and then
they have a program on their own with new employees or existing employees, if they wish
to give up their parking permit or not get a parking permit, then they sell them a bus pass at
$10 a month to ride our buses and then pay us $23 a month and they make up the
difference. Those have been very successful programs.
Bailey: Right. But it seems we have need for additional programs, I don't know, additional
something if we continue to have waiting lists for parking ramps.
Correia: Well, I also think that the percentage of University employees live out of town, too. I mean,
I wonder what the percentage of
Bailey: So, is there the option of you know, van pool, drop it out-
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Champion:
Bailey:
Champion:
Elliott:
Bailey:
Champion:
Bailey:
Champion:
Bailey:
Champion:
O'Brien:
Bailey:
O'Donnell:
Bailey:
O'Donnell:
Bailey:
City Council Work Session
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They do that.
Right, they do, but
That depends on your job starting you know at a certain time. Who was here when they
told us that the population of Iowa City increases by 30 thousand during the daytime hours?
Yes, something like, is it 92,000?
Right. Well, the fire chief said that, right?
Oh, the fire chief, right.
That's where we got that infonnation, right. The downtown Iowa City, right. And, you
know, if we're doing everything we can, we're doing everything we can and that's great,
but you know, it's obviously very expensive to build parking ramps, because you not only
build them, you repair them, so, I think we have to think about what else are we doing to
use the systems we have in place.
I don't object to the parking ramps because they pay for themselves. I object to the whole
town being covered with them.
Well, that's my point, right. And, if we're going to have more residential downtown I
understand that we're going to have need probably for additional parking spaces. As long
as we're looking comprehensively and not just, you know, building up funds to build
another ramp that will have a waiting list two weeks after it opens.
If we build another one I think it should be underground.
A lot of that waiting list, that was from people who lived downtown, that's where a lot of
the residential that's gone up. Most of the newer people on the waiting list are from the
Vogel House and buildings that have gone up in there, so that's where a lot ofthe people
who want to bring their cars to town but currently don't have a place to put them.
When will we be like New York and people won't have cars?
I hope never.
Well, I mean, a good cab system and some good rentals.
A good cab system.
Good rental system takes care of it.
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O'Donnell:
Fowler:
Champion:
Fowler:
Champion:
Vanderhoef:
Bailey:
(laughter)
Wilburn:
Elliott:
Champion:
(laughter)
Elliott:
Champion:
Wilburn:
(laughter)
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You s&id that, you anticipated with the raising of the prices that there would be a decline in
usage for a period of time.
There will be a slight decline, there will be people that currently use the system will find
other ways and then as the population changes and rolls over, different people will pick
their own method of transportation and.
I have one question about the Court Street Transportation Center. I know the money from
that goes to transit. What about money for repairing that structure? Is that going to come
out of our other parking?
No. That comes out of the Court Street money before it goes. We'll start setting up a
reserve, to do repairs on that facility.
Ok. Thank you.
Self-sustaining building.
Well, not really. That's a myth.
All right. Thank you. Is (can't hear) now the transportation color? Other agenda items.
On this one, I just wanted to say I'll probably end up voting for it. Philosophically, I just
don't like the idea of us wanting to have people come to Iowa City to work and to shop and
yet we charge them to be here. Financially, I sure don't want to raise taxes by putting more
on the capital improvements, which I think this should be, so , I guess, I'll probably vote for
it because it's the lesser of two evils.
There's another side to that coin. That because people want to come here we can charge the
parking.
It's as if! said will you come to our house for supper, and by the way it will cost you a
buck.
Granted.
There might be other costs associated with having us over for dinner.
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Elliott: You mean having to put up with my wife?
O'Donnell: It's true that you need the revenue out ofthe parking, but every time that you increase it you
effect business downtown. Every single time, without exception.
Champion: I have to disagree.
O'Donnell: Well, that's your prerogative.
Wilburn: Other agenda items.
ITEM 12. CONSIDER A RESOLUTION AUTHORIZING THE INSTALLATION OF SPEED
HUMPS ON MORNINGSIDE DRIVE BETWEEN 7rH AVENUE AND COLLEGE
STREET
Vanderhoef: Ah, Jeff is still back there. Just, the speed humps on Momingside Drive. Is that just going
to shift the traffic over to College?
Davidson: Well, we're going to measure that. We hope before, we don't hope, we're going to do it
before City High is out we'll (can't hear).
Bailey: Couldn't we just put speed humps in and rebuild the street?
Davidson: . . . when we do the one-year follow-up we'll have those before counts so we can see how
much diversion there has been over to College Street.
Vanderhoef: Good.
Correia: I also had a question I was looking at and I can't remember which, because there wasn't a
photo in this agenda packet but there was in another one.
Davidson: Yeah, you did receive this memo, (can't hear)
Correia: Right, right, so I saw it but I can't call it up right this second. In terms of I know that
there's a science to how far apart they're spaced, but when I was looking at it, since I'm on
that street a lot, when you, almost the last one is almost to the stop sign, so people would be
slowing down. . .
Davidson: Yeah, it's between the two driveway, right the one that comes out in the Fine Arts area, in
between those two.
Correia: So I was just wondering, would there be people slowing because there's the stop sign there
anyway, would there need to be that, or is it such that. . .
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Davidson:
Elliott:
Bailey:
Elliott:
Bailey:
Correia:
Davidson:
Correia:
Davidson:
Correia:
Champion:
Correia:
Davidson:
(laughter)
Yeah, it was, according to the guidelines of the Institute of Traffic Engineers use, we felt
there should be one there or else that had the potential to be a location where cars could
pick up speed.
What is this item - oh, this is the speed bumps
Humps.
Humps.
Bumps - Humps.
Because there's a stop sign right there.
There's a stop sign at College Street, yes.
No, no, not there, there's actually a stop sign before College Street.
On Momingside Drive?
Yeah, I go there a lot. Because there's a high school.
Oh, you're right.
Can Ijust show you?
Ok. That's my neighborhood too, I thought.
Correia: This is College Street, there's a stop sign right here.
Vanderhoef: College and Seventh?
Davidson: No, I thought the all-way stop was.
Vanderhoef: Coming up there's the entrance to the high school.
Correia: There's an extra exit, people coming out around the circle, I'll have to look.
Davidson: I don't think you stop.
Correia: You don't? Ok, maybe not.
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Wilburn:
Outside the circle?
O'Donnell:
There's a stop sign on Morningside on the inside.
Davidson:
I'll tell you what, we'll follow up on that.
Correia:
All right, ok, I was just wondering, people would be slowing down anyway because they'd
see the stop sign, do we need a hump there?
Bailey:
Because they're going to roll through the stop sign
(laughter)
ITEM 13. CONSIDER A RESOLUTION APPROVING AN AGREEMENT BETWEEN THE
CITY OF IOWA CITY AND THE ARTIST FOR THE WETHERBY PARK SHELTER
NEIGHBORHOOD ART PROJECT AND AUTHORIZING THE MAYOR TO
EXECUTE AND THE CITY CLERK TO ATTEST THE SAME.
Elliott: I have Items 13 and 14.
Wilburn: Ok, Item 13.
Elliott: Ok, 13, I'll vote for that, because as I said previously, this had been promised to Wetherby a
long time ago, and they're finally getting it, though for a weather vane and a railing, $15,00
is a lot of money.
Correia: Did you see the picture - it's so nice, Bob.
Vanderhoef: Before you go any further on that one, I want to know what happened to the wood railing
and the latticework and all that stuff that we.
Bailey: It was vandalized.
Vanderhoef: All broken up?
Bailey: I think in some minutes for public art, somebody correct me if I'm wrong, that there were
some, let's just say, usage challenges for using wood at that particular shelter.
Champion: Yes, it's been damaged several times.
Elliott: Yes.
O'Donnell: Birds and damage.
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Elliott: And another reason why this has to be very substantially done.
Vanderhoef: Industrial strength.
Bailey: John's work usually is.
ITEM 14. CONSIDER A RESOLUTION APPROVING THE GENERAL CONCEPT FOR THE
MELROSE NEIGHBORHOOD ART PROJECT
Elliott: Item 14 - they're talking about signs in front of houses, and, my understanding is they're
talking about 10 to 15 signs at almost a $1000 dollars a piece. I can not imagine.
Champion: No.
Elliott: I can not imagine.
Bailey: They're the same ones that are in Longfellow.
Champion: They're the same ones that are in our neighborhood.
Correia: Have you seen those?
Elliott: That's incompre - we can't afford a fire station, we're putting thousand dollar signs.
Correia: We can afford the fire station, Bob. We can't afford the staff.
Champion: We never said we couldn't afford the fire station.
Elliott: Can't afford the people. I can hardly believe we're going to pay a thousand dollars for
signs to put in front of people's houses.
Correia: It's destination location.
Elliott: A thousand dollars! Do you know realize what a thousand dollars buys?
Bailey: Not much.
Champion: Not much.
Elliott: Holy mackerel!
Bailey: A pair of shoes.
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Correia:
It's like the old (can't hear)
Champion:
Cashmere coat.
(laughter)
Correia: Maybe, maybe.
Wilburn: On sale now at Catherine's.
Bailey: Is there a sale?
Elliott: This is unbelievable. I mean, to tell the people we can't provide them with what we think is
appropriate public safety, and we're going to put thousand dollar signs in front of people's
houses.
Correia: Bob, yeah, we have to
Bailey: It's with different money
Champion: Yeah, different money
Vanderhoef: Art funded
Elliott: It's tax money.
Champion: It is tax money.
Elliott: It is property tax money. And we're telling people that's how we want to spend their
money.
Correia: Well, it's also about creating a livable, beautiful community.
Elliott: I don't want to face people and tell them we're doing this. This is to me terribly
embarrassing.
Bailey: May I bring up my agenda item that doesn't concern Bob's?
Elliott: Heck no.
Bailey: Let's talk about the fire station. Last fall, I made the suggestion that we look at the
possibility of doing programming for the Senior Center, through the Rec Department.
Dilkes: But I don't (can't hear)
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February 27,2006
Wilburn:
ITEM 11.
Bailey:
Wilburn:
Bailey:
Wilburn:
Bailey:
Elliott:
Bailey:
O'Donnell:
Bailey:
(laughter)
O'Donnell:
Bailey:
O'Donnell:
Bailey:
City Council Work Session
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Urn, where
TO DISCUSS THE PROPOSED OPERATING BUDGET FOR THE FISCAL YEAR
JULY 1, 2006 THROUGH JUNE 30, 2007, THE PROPOSED THREE-YEAR
FINANCIAL PLAN, AND ALSO THE MULTI-YEAR CAPITAL
IMPROVEMENTS PROGRAM THROUGH FISCAL YEAR 2010.
It's agenda item II.
II?
It's the budget.
Ok.
And, we didn't discuss that, but that would leave the possibility, potentially, of freeing half
a million dollars, even if we funded a program or for senior programming, we would not
lose services, because we would continue to have that programming, and we continue to
have that building, and I think that's something we should explore because we would
continue to provide services and move toward providing fire fighters for a fire station we
can build, and I think that's a discussion worth having.
I do too. I think we should have that on that and any other number of things.
But I think that that's, we haven't moved on that, and I was just wondering ifthere was any
particular reason or concern, because I believe that it would continue services. Because it
would continue programming, just like we do programming for special populations through
Parks and Rec.
You're going to free up half a million dollars.
It's the best I could do with that budget.
You're going to free up half a million, but that's going to have to be picked up someplace
else (can't hear).
What do you mean?
Well, Park, you want, are you talking about specifically
No, it's an $850,00 budget for the Senior Center, a programmer and keeping that building
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open, I don't know what that would cost, but I can't imagine that it would cost more than a
quarter of a million dollars, and that would free up in excess of half a million dollars. And
continue to provide services to seniors in our community.
Champion: I think it's worth looking at.
O'Donnell: Well, it's worth looking at, of course it is, ifit can free it up, but that has to be shown.
Bailey: No, that's what"1 suggested, that's what I suggested last fall, that this was a viable option
that we should consider, because we all know that we have a commitment to providing
those services, but we all have expressed concerns about this fire station issue, and we
haven't explored this, and I think, you know, correct me if I'm wrong, I think that it offers
some potential that we should look at.
O'Donnell: I'd be willing to look at that, but I'd have to see that but someone's going to have to pick
that up somewhere.
Bailey: Well, no, I asked, but right, a programmer, that would cost, I don't know what they cost, I
don't know what staffing would cost.
Wilburn: Well, it looks as ifthere's enough interest in discussing that, and that was something that
was brought up at our Goal Setting Agenda so
Vanderhoef: Look at program sharing, at least.
Wilburn: Any recommendations as to when we might fit that in?
Elliott: And I think we need to have either meet with the Commission or Representatives when we
have that discussion. I mayor may not be in favor, but I think those are the kinds of
discussions we need to have.
Bailey: Well, nobody else was bringing forth any anything about this. I thought we should at least
begin to, and if we discard it that's fine, but we've at least explored one option.
Wilburn: Yeah, I think you've got it, I was just asking you -
Bailey: Ok, I'm sorry, haven't had dinner.
(laughter)
Wilburn:
Any recommendations as to what point we're going to - after, after Housing,
simultaneously with housing? Where.
Bailey:
Well, it depends on how quickly we were going to implement something like this.
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Correia: Well, we couldn't, could we, if we pass a budget that has something, if we were to change it
mid-stream we have to get an amendment.
Bailey: You can pass the bottom line. We can pass the bottom line, right?
Champion: That's how we're passing.
O'Donnell: You can always go down, but you can't go up.
Correia: Oh, I see, ok.
Bailey: I don't know.
Atkins: You can pass this budget, and then, in the middle of the year you choose to make some
organizational adjustment you have virtually all the latitude, reasonable latitude.
Bailey: I think it's something we should begin to explore soon, sooner rather than later, April or
May.
Elliott: I agree. At this point we're not talking about that for this year's budget, but we're
Champion: It could be part of this year's budget. When we approve the budget, we're just talking
about the amount of money, we can make changes anytime we want.
Elliott: You can lower, you can not raise, correct?
Bailey: Well, it doesn't start until July.
Champion: I think we should think about this, that we're going to start this scattered site housing,
however, we're not going to be doing that probably more than once a month, it's going to
take time to collect stuff, get people together, so if we did it on alternate work sessions, we
could do that kind ofthing, you know what I'm saying? We don't do that many before
summer, but yeah, we'll look at it.
Bailey: Ok, Thank you.
Vanderhoef: Even if we had staff starting to look at program sharing or that kind of stuff so we'd have a
starting point when we got all the players around the table, to say here's a table, this is
what's here, this is what's here, it's a start.
Bailey: Well, and talking to the County as well about, I mean, because they do pay in a small
amount, what that might mean, I think is important, but something to look at.
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Wilburn:
Atkins:
Bailey:
Wilburn:
Correia:
Atkins:
Correia:
Wilburn:
Correia:
Wilburn:
Schreiber:
Wilburn:
Schreiber:
Wilburn:
Steve, can you give staff a heads up that we're looking at, talking about all possible
changes.
I hear you. Ok.
And then, Dee and I have some things we want to mention about the Aid to Agencies.
Before you get to that, are there any other agenda items that anyone wants to discuss?
Well, I had something also related to the budget. When we were doing that Work Session, I
think from February 2nd is what I had from the minutes, when we were, when Steve, you
told us the amount we had through discretionary funding
Ok
of $230,000 and we were listing out some things that we wanted to fund, the $17,000 to
CVB, the $38,000 to the Library, all the things that we put on the table added up to
$147,000, which was $83,000 remaining, and I'm wondering if there's a sense, maybe, the
possibility of adding that to Aid to Agencies as a discretionary not to necessarily add that.
We get things in, like we got the request from the school for Lucas.
If that's the recommendation you are going to make, I'd ask that you will hold until I walk
away from the table to do that, Ijust want to make sure there's an opportunity to discuss
any other agenda items.
I'm sorry.
If not, we can move right to that. Any other agenda items?
I don't know if this applies now or if! should do this during Council Time. It might fall
under the budget as far as transit. In discussing with some of the other student leaders, we
were interested in the possibility of extending the shuttle hours to late night, just seasonally.
I don't have any, I can come back to the Council with exact hours and kind of try to figure
out what that could potentially cost and work with some of the transit people, but we'd like
to look into the possibility of maybe using some of the new transit funds or restructuring so
we could have some late night service.
Chris, I would recommend if you all wanted to talk with, get together with Joe Fowler and
come up with a recommendation, something for us to react and respond to.
Sure.
Does that sound ok?
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Bailey: Yeah, 'cause then they can attach dollar amounts to how much.
Schreiber: That's kind of what I had in mind.
Vanderhoef: I would request that you include the Cambus Dave Ricketts in the discussion, because these
two gentlemen work very well together and there may be still another alternative that could
be put together that would accomplish the goal that you're looking for.
Schreiber: Absolutely.
Champion: That's a good idea.
Bailey: That's a really good idea.
Schreiber: I'll corne back with something for you guys.
Wilburn: Great.
Elliott: Think about charging for it too. A quarter.
(laughter)
Schreiber: No, no problem, yeah.
Champion: (can't hear) Like every 15 minutes, doesn't it? So maybe at night we wouldn't have to run
it quite that often.
Schreiber: No, not that often, maybe even seasonal.
Champion: Maybe both shuttles could be done with one bus, so.
Schreiber: (can't hear) in Summertime.
Elliott: You're picking things up.
Vanderhoef: We have stopped shuttles for part of the summer.
Dilkes: Ok, I think we should move that to the transportation discussion, whenever we're going to
have that. We're getting kind of.
Wilburn: Ok. Any other agenda items?
Dilkes: Far removed from agenda items.
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Atkins:
Correia:
Atkins:
Correia:
Bailey:
Vanderhoef:
(laughter)
(can't hear)
Elliott:
Bailey:
Correia:
Bailey:
Elliott:
(laughter)
Before we move off the agenda, just thinking about Amy's comments. Remember,
tomorrow night is the budget hearing, and there's really no legislative action that you could
take if you didn't choose to make an amendment, it would be best at the meeting if you're
going to do your adoption.
All right.
You can certainly put on the table anything you want, but actually voting, tomorrow night is
a hearing process.
But it's good to have a heads-up.
Right.
I have a use for that money too.
I don't think we've sent a each of us or many of us sent memos to you about some thoughts.
Have we seen?
I can't find my notes, from the police and the fire
What? Oh.
I can't find my notes.
I don't even remember what I sent you.
Karr: You gave me the one page, we were going to combine it together, and I do have yours, Bob,
that's the only one that I received.
Bailey: I'm still looking as I said for my notes.
Vanderhoef: Oh, you knew that all along, show-off.
Karr: We were going to package that and address that at the time it was scheduled for the next
one.
Elliott: Ok, thanks, thanks.
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Bailey:
Wilburn:
Bailey:
Correia:
Champion:
Atkins:
(laughter)
Champion:
Correia:
Atkins:
Bailey:
Correia:
Atkins:
Correia:
Champion:
I voted on one little piece of paper, which was.
Ok, I'm going to back away from the table so you can continue talking about Budget Item
II-related topic, Aid to Agencies.
Did you want to present?
I guess this would be my opportunity to have just the heads-up. You know, we were just
thinking about the three-legged stool of a community. You know, we've given some extra
funds for culture and recreation and economic development and we've proposed an increase
of 3% to the Aid to Agencies but thinking that that might be a useful thing for the
community.
Maybe you can keep some slush funds. . .
We call it a reserve.
I couldn't remember the term.
How much?
Yes, there is a small reserve.
It's like $7000.
$7000.
It's usually seven to ten thousand dollars.
I mean, and the other thing is, I know that all of the agencies most likely requested an
increase that is more than our 3% increase, and I don't think our Aid to Agencies has
increased more than about 3%, where other, sort of critical areas for our quality of life have
increased more, especially this year, so that was my.
I don't have any problems with saying some of that can go into a reserve. But, because it's
a small amount of money, that would always be our discretion if something came in, to use
if for human services or whatever we wanted to. So, specifically, does it (can't hear),
because we don't know what's going to happen over the next year. We know we have it,
and that someone can allocate it, like if the Red Cross, sometimes there's a lot of fires, they
need extra money one year, some agencies have come because of some crisis that happened,
and we've been able to use that money for that, so I think that's a good way to keep it.
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keep it.
Atkins: !t's $9700.
Vanderhoef: !t's how much?
Atkins: $9700.
Correia: Well, I guess then to propose increasing that reserve and then maybe using some of these
funds of other ideas to $25000, something that's significant, I mean if.
Vanderhoef: But, see Amy, that's what the regular reserve fund is for. And not putting it into Aid to
Agency reserves. Then, if it's the straight line wins, that's what we need it for. And, as I
understood it, we went a little below that 30% reserve on the budget, and I would prefer
that it was a little higher than 30.
Correia: You mean the contingency, or are you talking about the balance?
Vanderhoef: The reserve.
Elliott: The overall, the total budget.
Correia: We're talking about the contingency.
Atkins: We have a line item called contingency.
Correia: And I wasn't talking about the reserve, which is different. This is the.
Champion: Yeah.
Vanderhoef: But you said there was leftover, and I thought you were saying from the breakout of the
funding when we redid the budget.
Correia: Yes, that's what it was from, and that's where we were able to increase the CVB's to
$17,000, Summer of the Arts $32,000, ICAT $45,000, and it seems that Aid to Agencies
hasn't increased significantly and either we could decide to put it into increase what our
programs are putting in for funding or be able to know that we have, are able to respond,
like the schools wanting to talk to us in March about Family Resource Centers, if we have
the money to match what other governmental bodies, and that's fine.
Vanderhoef: And we put that money into the contingency reserve fund, and if circumstances came up,
we'd have a choice of using it from.
Correia: Fine, I'll keep that in mind.
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Elliott: The aid to which you're referring, is that the CDBG funds?
Champion: No.
Correia: No. CDBG funds go into Aid to Agencies, about $100,000, that makes up part of the total.
Vanderhoef: $105,000.
Correia: Yeah.
Champion: We have allowed that reserve over the years to get quite high, and one year we knocked it
back down, by giving everybody kind of a bonus.
Vanderhoef: We don't spend it out. We carry it forward, and sort of an unwritten policy has been if
there is $7000 left we replenish it to ten. But never above the ten.
Elliott: How much, in addition to CDBG funds do we put into Aid to Agencies? Steve, does that
come out?
Bailey: $36,000 from Water and Wastewater Utility Bill Abatements and $305,923 from General
Funds.
Elliott: So, about $350,000.
Bailey: No, $400 - $450.
Elliott: In addition to CDBG funds.
Atkins: Yes.
Bailey: Yeah.
Vanderhoef: So, it's sizable.
Correia: Sure.
Bailey: The recommendation that Dee and I will bring for the Aid to Agencies, the bottom line
obviously hasn't changed, we'll continue to use the city steps priority as we did last year for
percentage increases. . We have talked with Linda Severson and we will be approaching Aid
to Agencies a little bit more like grant funding, that is to say, as we provide funds to these
agencies we will also be describing the purpose of the funding, similar to what we did with
Mayor's Youth, if they use it for their employment program all the agencies provide an
outline of what they're asking for with the funding, and so we'll just specifY this as we have
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February 27,2006
Champion:
Bailey:
Champion:
Bailey:
(laughter)
Champion:
Bailey:
Champion:
Bailey:
Correia:
City Council Work Session
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just specify this as we have this funding agreement with them and then have the mid-year
reports reflecting upon what we've funded for them. Many ofthem were funding
operations, and the discussion will simply be how did that impact your service, obviously,
because we do provide a lot of administrative support with this funding. And so, with that,
we will probably bring in agencies in November and December to provide us a mid-year
report just like any funder would.
When are we going to get a copy of this?
Tomorrow night I'll have the breakout.
But we won't be voting on it tomorrow night.
Right. Tomorrow night - I thought we would have it tonight. We haven't quite agreed
upon numbers yet.
Well, you don't have to agree. I think you can present two possibilities and we can discuss
them.
Well, I think we'll just present one and you can discuss that. It'sjust as easy. And that's
sort of the general. And with the grants sort of approach, or the funder's sort of approach,
what we'd like to begin organizations and agencies to understand is that this is not
necessarily money you can count on year after year, that there will be years when the city
may want to be responsive to trends or to issues, like Family Resource Centers, that we may
use a larger portion of Aid to Agencies to fund those kinds of initiatives. And so, we had a
pretty good meeting this afternoon with Linda, and she is on top of what we need for
reporting and what the agencies will need to clarify for some of these purposes for the grant
from Iowa City. So, any questions about that direction?
I don't have any problems with that direction, but my question is, are we going to make it,
none of these agencies get a huge amount of money from us, are we going to make it so
cumbersome and hard so that
This will be similar to the United Way, the application they developed for United Way,
because it's very similar, we base our funding on that, it's going to be very similar. I mean,
you're right, Although, I think we should have some concerns that some ofthese agencies
are we provide 8, 9, 10, II % oftheir full budgets, and I think that's a concern, we should
be flagging them and saying, you've got, you know, CDBO is not going to be there forever,
I'm afraid, so I think we have to caution them to diversify their funding streams as well.
So.
I think we need to keep up with what's going on federally. I mean, that's an area of the
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February 27,2006
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federal budget that is slated to be cut. It's funding for critical human services
Vanderhoef: Our doUar amounts are directly affected by the census figures and what they perceive as
poverty in our city.
Correia: Well for CDBG I know, but I'm not just talking about CDBG, I'm talking about all-around
_ Medicaid, Child Welfare Dollars, you know, all sorts of programs that our agencies have
been able to access, Juvenile Justice money, all these types of things are continually
shrinking at the federal and state level, and so that's something - we can teU them to
diversify, and I think all of the agencies are working hard to do that.
Bailey: And we don't doubt that, but when you get to 8% of a budget provided by city funding, I
think that that is getting up to the high end.
Correia: Yeab, I'm not sure. I think it would be good to look at other communities, other agencies.
Bailey: And if you have that information.
Correia: I don't have it right now.
Bailey: But when I look at somebody's budget, I get more comfortable if it's 3 - 5% rather than the
8.
Champion: You'll find that a lot of cities don't contribute at all to human services.
Vanderhoef: That's
Correia: Really? Maybe - maybe not.
Vanderhoef: General fund dollars.
Correia: I think we're unique in this County in terrns of cities that are giving, but I don't necessarily
know. And the County gives over. . .
Vanderhoef: In the top ten.
Bailey: Well, and another thing we want to provide to the Council is the package that the City
provides to some of these agencies. For example, the Ark of Johnson CountY also partners
with Parks and Rec to do a youth summer program, and just providing a comprehensive
level that we're supporting agencies through other departments and I think that's an
important thing for us to note and be proud of. The same with some of our community
events as well.
Vanderhoef: The after-school programs that we run at Mercer Park and the Rec Center that are run with
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Elliott:
Champion:
Elliott:
Dilkes:
Bailey:
Dilkes:
Bailey:
Dilkes:
Bailey:
Vanderhoef:
Champion:
Bailey:
(laughter)
Elliott:
Bailey:
Rec Center dollars, and it's our bus passes, and it's the deer meat, the venison that comes
out to our community organizations.
I think everyone realizes that funding, because City certainly can't afford to provide more
funding, and certainly federal funding with this administration is going to continue to
decrease, and that's just reality.
People need to donate more because we have the nice tax cuts.
I've been saying that for a long time, that you can not continue to look to government to
solve all your financial problems.
Regenia, are you envisioning an agreement with these agencies? Similar to what we do
with CDBG money?
Mmmhmm.
Ok, because we probably need to get that - is Linda Severson the person you've been
dealing with.. .....
Yeab, and I don't think it has to be onerous, but just clarifYing.
. . . . . . What the requirements are?
What the expectations, yeah, what the program is, I mean, when I talked to Cokie Eigert,
she really liked knowing exactly what we expected to happen with our funding, and I think
most agencies would probably appreciate that.
And it was a nice report, short and sweet, but to the point of what they were providing using
the Iowa City dollars, and that, I think is a real positive.
When you looked at all these agencies, and thank you for doing it, did you look at
duplication of services?
Dee always looks at that.
I think it would be beneficial also for the Council to have a handle on not only the out-of-
pocket money mentioned, the Rec Center, Senior Center, the discounts they give on
memberships, everything like that, the out-of-pocket funding and also the in-kind funding
that we provide, it would be nice for us to have a handle on that.
And I think Linda can help provide that.
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Elliott: Yeah. Good.
Vanderhoef: We've asked for a first run-through of it and certainly everyone is welcome to give her a
call if you think of something that a service, an in-kind service that we do do.
Elliott: The only thing is, I think it needs, rather than different people talking to her, it would need
to go through the two of you.
Vanderhoef: Call us.
Bailey: And so, Amy, it won't include that proposal that you made, but you're certainly welcome to
amend, if that's ok with you.
Champion: I like that idea, because we always have that ability.
Correia: Ok.
Champion: And we've done it before.
Elliott: Rest time is over.
Correia: Ross got a break.
Bailey: No, you got a break.
(can't hear)
Council Time
Wilburn:
Council time.
Elliott:
Tomorrow we're going to hear from some people with homeless concerns
Bailey:
I have council time.
Elliott:
And I think we're going to hear from that, and I think we need to understand that there are
_ that's not just an easy call to make. There are concerns that we need to have, too.
Correia:
Is that something we could have on the Work Session agenda for next week, talking about
the homeless overflow
Bailey:
And then have Andy come in and talk - I think that would be best.
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Correia:
I mean, I think Steve's working on talking to the fire chief about this issue.
Atkins:
So is Eleanor.
Correia:
What?
Atkins:
So is Eleanor.
Correia:
And Eleanor. Is that something that people we could put that on the Work Session agenda
for next week?
Schreiber:
Can I have everybody turn and say hi to my girlfriend, Amy?
(laughter)
All: Hi
Elliott: My condolences.
Schreiber: She's never come by before.
Amy: Pleased to meet you.
Wilburn: Regenia?
Bailey: We had a memo, ah, a letter in our packet about eminent domain, and I was just wondering
if we could have a brief discussion about that. I was at a legislative event this weekend, as
were others, and I think it would be helpful to have some talking points about and I've also
gotten a lot of emails about how we consider what the issues are. I mean, can you just brief
us?
Elliott: Yes.
Atkins: Yep.
Dilkes: Have you seen the League's information about that? Ok
Vanderhoef: The League's
Atkins: All may change between now and then, but we'll round up what we have.
(laughter)
Bailey:
Can we have that, well, this is funnel week. I mean, this would be
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Atkins:
Bailey:
Atkins:
Dilkes:
Atkins:
Bailey:
Dilkes:
Bailey:
Dilkes:
Bailey:
Dilkes:
Atkins:
Bailey:
Dilkes:
Bailey:
Elliott:
Correia:
Vanderhoef:
That's what I mean.
Do you have talking points right now?
No
Well, the League sent out
The letter that I wrote? Yeah.
Well, I'd be making the point that Eleanor made, that current laws is sufficient, provide
sufficient protection. Is there anything else that we.
I can't hear you. Regenia, what did you say?
I can't look at you and talk in the microphone.
Ok, you don't have to look at me.
Well, it seems rude. I've been making the point that you made earlier that you believed the
current law provided sufficient protection to private property, and are there any other
additional points that you want to make about the current law that we should be aware of?
I think the League sent out a good, at least I got them, in their Legislative Link when they
did their little thing on points they ask people to make to their legislators about the eminent
domain law. Have you seen that?
You want to know if at the next Work Session (can't hear)
Well, I'll look at the Legislative Link that I got, but I was reading the brief that was 22
pages, and still, it was point by point, with the laws.
No, this was more, this was a shorter thing. Maybe we can just put something in your
packet, would that help?
That would be good.
It seems to me this is the kind of over-reaction that we always see. Something happens
someplace, and just something that's over the top and counterproductive.
Welcome to politics.
And some of the legislators, I was down speaking with several of the leadership group on
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February 27,2006
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Wednesday and one made a comment to me, "sometimes we make laws for the dumbest
reasons." Another made a comment, like, "well, if this is the best we can do to say we did
something this session." I mean, many of them recognize it, certainly the house people
didn't expect it to pass the way it is. They're shifting it over because they know that the
Senate isn't going to pass.
(end of tape)
Bailey: I think I, I think you agree with me that they need to be hearing from us.
Elliott: Yes.
Vanderhoef: For sure. And, another one, if! may, just to follow-up, is this Touch-Play. Did any of you
receive the survey from the League?
Wilburn: I got it.
Vanderhoef: You did? Did you send it back in?
Wilburn: Not yet.
Vanderhoef: Ok. Deadline is today.
Wilburn: I was working on the State of the City Address.
Bailey: Today's not over. I'm kidding.
Wilburn: Today's not over.
Elliott: It's Iowa, if you're wondering what state we're in. It's Iowa.
Vanderhoef: Yeah.
Wilburn: Well, plus also, I'll be going to Des Moines, Wednesday, with a meeting of
Elliott: It's the best I could do.
Wilburn: The mayors of top ten populous cities and I'll be going to the Hill too, so.
Vanderhoef: I would like to be there to hear the discussion tomorrow in committee on Touch-Play, but
certainly, there hasn't been, this survey is pointing towards shall we or shall we not weigh
in as League of Cities on whether we support the Touch-Play machines or if we don't
support them, or if we do, with what kinds of safeguards and those kinds of things. So,
anything that you want to report to the legislators or to me or to the League, please, please
hop on the City Voices and put it in, because all comments are welcome.
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Dilkes: Maybe we should schedule an agenda item for next week, the State Legislative, I mean,
something that lets you all talk about this if you're interested.
Vanderhoef: I think that would be a nice thing. We can always say there isn't anything if we don't have
anything to discuss.
Bailey: Ifwe know what makes it preferable. Sure, that would be good.
Vanderhoef: An agenda item
Elliott: The only thing is, Regenia pointed out, this is funnel week for the Legislature.
Bailey: Well, eminent domain will be through and so will Touch-Play.
Dilkes: That's going to be through.
Vanderhoef: The only thing that funnel week is that, it will narrow down the number of bills that people
can talk about. If they don't corne out of Committee by Friday, they won't come out this
year, unless they're appropriation bills, and appropriation bills can corne at any time.
Wilburn: Any other Council Time?
Vanderhoef: I have one request, just to have Council think about it, I've talked to a couple of you. I am
still interested in seeing about doing the Southeast District Plan and if we can find the
funding for it I would like to hire an independent contractor to do the one job of running
that Southeast District Plan and it could be a regular staff person, and then have a part-time
person corne in during that time period to carry the load of the regular work of the Planning
Department, but I think it's terribly important to get it done.
Bailey: I'd be interested in talking with Planning about that feasibility as well, because there's
economic implications to that. Oh, I told you I wanted both of those things, so, I still do.
Vanderhoef: I do too.
Champion: I'm not so sure I'm willing to do that with outside consultants. I mean, I know we've used
them, I think it's important, because they meet a lot, the staff meets a lot with people who
live in those areas and work in those areas and.
Wilburn: I don't think this is
Correia: We're talking about policy again.
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Febrnary 27, 2006.
February 27,2006
Dilkes:
Wilburn:
Karr:
Dilkes:
Champion:
Wilburn:
Bailey:
Wilburn:
Correia:
Elliott:
Atkins:
Bailey:
Correia:
Bailey:
Correia:
Wilburn:
Elliott:
Champion:
Wilburn:
Vanderhoef:
City Council Work Session
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We need to really get back to raising an issue, finding out that's not on the agenda, deciding
if you want to talk about it and put it on.
Well, I was stuck a little bit, because I think, wasn't there a memo from Karin Franklin
about this, in the, in the information packet?
Right, the information packet confirmed earlier discussion.
But it's not on the agenda.
Right.
Ok
I'm one. I want to put it, I want to talk about it more.
One, two, three, yes - no?
Fine.
That does it, doesn't it? Three?
We can simply put it on the Work Session and if we.
Put it on the Work Session.
And just have Karin here.
When Karin gets back from Guatemala.
Oh, she's in Guatemala too?
When Karin gets back.
I'm not interested in hiring a consultant, so.
Me neither.
Ok, so it's going to be on our Work Session
I want to use an in-house
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council meeting of
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