HomeMy WebLinkAbout2013-01-07 TranscriptionJanuary 7, 2013 Iowa City City Council Special Work Session - Budget Page 1
Council Present: Champion, Dickens, Dobyns (1:10), Hayek, Mims, Payne, Throgmorton
Staff Present: Markus, Fruin, O'Malley, Morris, Dilkes, Karr, Bentley, Mansfield, Fosse,
Davidson, Andrew, Boothroy, O'Brien, Yapp, Knoche, Rocca, Moran,
Tharp
CIP (P2.399 - ):
Hayek/ So, uh, welcome back to the budget, everyone. Uh, had a good meeting on Saturday and
we're ready to take things up again today. Um, at this time I'll turn it over to staff, uh,
for I think a recap of, uh, what we did on Saturday and then new material (both talking)
Markus/ ...I think maybe we should start with jumping right into the CIP so that we get going
with that and then kind of summarize both elements at the end...
Hayek/ Sure!
Markus/ ...if that's ... works for everybody.
Hayek/ Yeah.
Markus/ All right. So staff's approach to CIP this year is to continue, uh, with the flood
mitigation and critical infrastructure projects, and just a reminder, uh, the LOST expires
in June of 2013, and quite frankly a number of these flood projects that we have are short
in terms of, uh, funding so ... we're going to have to rely quite a bit on local funding
sources, uh, for these projects. If you have your books in front of you, if you turn to page
16 ... uh, in your budget document, uh, you can see how we've aligned our projects with
the strategic plan and, uh, what we've tried to do is there's more, usually more than one
(clears throat) (noise on mic) um, more than one, uh, strategic plan element that relates to
each project, uh, but we've, uh, only singled out one, uh, for each project. Uh, we have
88 projects, uh, that we're going to actually evaluate today, and we've set aside 120
minutes, uh, to do that. And Rick Fosse, um, is kind of the black belt of the Power Point,
so he's going to race us through all of these PowerPoint, uh, items at this stage. So with
that I'm going to turn it over to Rick, uh, so he can introduce this and get it started.
Thanks!
Fosse/ Thanks, Tom! Uh, as Tom said, we've got 88 slides, 88 projects to get through. 120
minutes. So you do the math on how fast we'll need to move on this. Uh, everybody's
going to give a brief overview of their projects, but please feel free to dig deeper for more
information if you want it on a project as we're going past, and what I'd like to do is to
reserve our conversation of, uh, switching projects in and out of the capital program, until
we've been through all of the projects. That's important to get that full view and the
other thing to remember when we get to that point is that most funding sources for
projects are not necessarily interchangeable. And I'll use an example of a road project
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and a sewer project. If you want to add a $2 million road project, you can't necessarily
take out a $2 million sewer project because that may be financed with revenue bonds,
versus GO bonds, which are necessary for road projects. So if we get into project
swapping, you need to look at both the amount and the funding source. Gets a little more
complicated there. Um, so with that background, any questions before we begin? Okay!
We'll lead off with ... with a couple slides that ... that begin on page 399 in your budget
document. And ... and the first slide is a spreadsheet of ..of program summary, and it's
organized by category, broken down for each fiscal year in the ... in the five -year plan. It
takes quite a while to digest all this information so we're not going to do that right now,
but what I did want to share with you is more of a graphical representation of that
information. This is all five years combined together onto a pie chart so that you can get
a feel for the relative magnitude of each of the ... each of the spending areas. Um, so with
that brief introduction and background, uh ... oh, I do want to point out that ... that we are
going to follow through these projects in the same order in which they appear in your
budget document and that by default is going to cluster them by project area, but there are
some exceptions to that. So don't let that throw you when we get to those. There's some
projects that seem like they're out of place. It's just because of where they fall with their
...their account numbers. Um ... so with that introduction, let's lead off with
Transportation Services and I'll turn it over to Chris O'Brien.
Transportation & Parking_
O'Brien/ Uh, good afternoon. The ... the first project ... that we're going to start off with is #30,
uh, 09, which is the parking facility and enforcement automation. This is a project that's
actually been going on for multiple years now of taking, uh, the equipment that was
existing and ... and moving to more of an automated system, where we have pay -on -foot
stations, pay -in -lane, uh, for cash, credit card, urn ... and ... and additionally, uh, coming up
in 2014, uh, we'll be looking to upgrade our on- street system with a smart-meter system.
We touched briefly on that on ... on Saturday, and what that will allow us to do is to, uh,
replace the existing single -space meters that we have on- street, which are coin mech
only, they only take coins. Uh, and there's no communication internal or out of those.
Uh, to a system that not only accepts credit cards, uh, but there'll be pay -by -cell options,
uh, there'll also be the ability to, uh, provide real time data, should we chose to do that.
Um, that ... that will push information out to the public to ... to give information about, uh,
what spaces are open or the percentage of spaces that are open in different areas. Uh, so
that's what this project will allow us to do, uh, which is to change our on- street and uh,
also add additional equipment, uh, to Tower Place, Court Street ... I'm sorry! Tower
Place, uh, Capitol Street, and Dubuque Street, uh, potentially Chauncey Swan, once we
know a little bit more about what ... what will go on on the corner of College and Gilbert.
Champion/ Will these smart meters be all over town or just in the downtown area?
O'Brien/ Um, currently we ... we believe we've funded enough to do those throughout the entire
town, but depending on what happens through the RFP process, we'll make adjustments
at that time, if...if the pricing comes in different or should we chose a different...
different model than ... than the ones that are out there.
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Champion/ Great!
O'Brien/ Okay, next, uh, is the Riverfront Crossings, uh, multi -use parking facility project. Um,
this is a project that was scheduled to begin prior to, uh, this current year. Um, due to
some... projects that didn't quite develop in the area surrounding, as well as, um,
capacities in the ... in the other parking decks, we decided to hold off on that project for
now and ... and push it back a year. Um, so that's something that we'll be looking at in
the oncoming year to decide, uh, what our plan is, uh, we're evaluating other options, uh,
south of Burlington Street to ... to see if there's, uh, maybe sites that are more favorable
to ... to where development's going to be, um, but once again, that's... that's something
that's in process now. Uh, Jeff may have a few comments on this as well.
Davidson/ Yeah, just to put this into perspective for you. If you look back the last 25 or 30 years
about every five years or so we add ... oh, 400 to 600, uh, spaces to the, uh, downtown
parking system. That helps accommodate growth in the central business district. Now
obviously we're also focused on Riverfront Crossings. Uh, as Chris mentioned, because
of the ... a little bit of softening in the demand numbers, we did decide to postpone this for
a year. We are looking at alternate sites, but it's part of that continuing to allow
economic growth to occur in downtown and Riverfront Crossings. We have a role in
that. That role is parking. We need to make sure there's an adequate supply and this
...this project will continue that, and then of course accommodate a partnership with the
private sector for a tower — you see, uh, an exercise we went through here, uh, with a
mixed -use residential, commercial tower. Maybe this, maybe something slightly, uh,
different, but we like that public partner, private... public /private partnership idea and
hope to do it with this project.
O'Brien/ Another thing too is ... is you're looking at the actual main operating budget, uh, one of
the things that had been noted was the ... the decline in our ... in our operating balance, um,
our cash balance. There were a lot of funds that were expended on ... on the design of that
project, so there is a design in hand for a large, uh, portion of that project. Uh, next is
#3055, the Transit Facility relocation. Um, this would involve the, um, relocation of the
Transit Facility to another site. Um, we've gone through a site selection process, uh, an
exercise that we did with the, uh, MPO of Johnson County. Uh, worked with them to,
um ... list a bunch of options, put a matrix together with criteria, and the Public Works'
site, uh, was the site that had the highest score. Uh, we're currently in the process of, uh,
going through an exercise to do the feasibility study for that location. Um, obviously it's
at a intersection that's been, um, kind of a development, um, target, due to its location to
the highway and coming off the interstate on Riverside. Um, there's been some interest
in that location, um, as well as the, uh, environmental conditions underneath that facility
that make that facil ... that location not a prime ... prime location for ... for that Transit
Facility, uh, and the money that we continue to ... to spend on operating, uh, the methane
abatement, etc., um... one of the difficult things is obviously and... and we discussed
briefly on Saturday, that with the new transportation bill that ... that capital funding is one
of the things that's been really difficult for Transit, um, with that new legislative bill. So,
uh, the way that we fund that facility, whereas we have budgeted for 80% federal funds,
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that's why we keep pushing that back because those federal funds just aren't coming in at
that pace, uh, for big capital projects. So ... um, that might be something that we have to
look at as we move further... further into this project as far as how we fund that, uh, if
there's a mix of options that we use to do that, um ... but I ... I think, like I said, the
feasibility study, hopefully we have that done this fiscal year.
Davidson/ And at the end of the presentation when we get into the on the ... on the radar projects,
we'll talk a little bit more about the redevelopment potential of this site as ... as it pertains
to economic development.
O'Brien/ Okay, last is #3058 and that's the Court Street Facility automation. Uh, similar to the
ones that we talked about earlier, uh, with, uh, #3009. Uh, what this is is the, as we move
forward with the first hour of free, uh, process, uh, automating that facility, cause
currently it's ... it's an open facility, much like Chauncey Swan. We just have two pay
stations, uh, one at each stair tower. Uh, we look to gate that facility, add credit card
payment options, pay -on -foot options, um ... cause that'll open up some flexibility with us
in, um, how permits are utilized, do we allow people to use permits in multiple facilities
should they fill up that they can go to another facility, and bringing Court Street online
and allowing that to be in the, uh, first hour free and then, um, the dollar per hour after
that, um, adding that other facility too, we think's essential to ... to how we move forward,
um, when we have funds put in, and once again, we had to separate this one out because
once again it's a Transit asset, funded with FTA funds. So that's why we did not include
that in the, uh, #3009 project.
Fosse/ Any questions for these two before we move on to Landfill (both talking)
Champion/ One question on the Transit Facility....
O'Brien/ Yep!
Champion/ ...the garage. So ... that will... still be, that will have a first hour free eventually also?
O'Brien/ You're talking about Court Street Transportation Center?
Champion/ Yes!
O'Brien/ Uh, yes, that's the plan is that we would ... we would equip that the same as the other
facilities and have the first hour free option in there, as well.
Champion/ And it'll be raised to a dollar an hour after that?
O'Brien/ That's correct. The same (both talking)
Champion/ ...money still remains for Transit (both talking)
O'Brien/ That's correct. Yep!
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Champion/ Will the money raised, will it raise to a dollar an hour before this improvement is
made?
O'Brien/ No, we would have that done ... that's kind of a ... that has to happen before we can ... we
can incorporate that dollar, or those changes in the fares. Or, I'm sorry, fares! Change in
the rates. (laughs)
Dobyns/ Chris, has the percentage of, in our parking, uh, ramps, has the percentage of spaces that
are contracted during the day, um, has that steadily increased over the last 10 years?
O'Brien/ We've kept that pretty steady actually. Um, we had a little drop -off, uh, last fiscal year
due to, um, the lack of interest at Court Street and Chauncey Swan, but now we're to full
capacity with a waiting list again building for those. Um, we have the ability to move
that however we need to, um, the University has a large portion, um, of permits, uh, some
of which still are unallocated at Court Street ... that we could probably discuss with them
the options moving forward. Um, otherwise that's ... as permits turn over, we have the
option to either renew those or not, um, and depending on ... on what we see as we move
through this first hour free option, we have the ability to ... to manipulate those and to ... to
relocate, um, people throughout other parts of the system.
Dobyns/ Is that a reasonable indicator for future need of more spaces or not? That, your
number... spaces that are contracted out.
O'Brien/ Yeah, and I think because we saw the decline that we saw that's why we held off on
...on the project with St. Pat's and pushed it back a year, because as Jeff mentioned, there
was a softening in the demand for those. So we kind of (both talking) that's correct.
Yep! That's why we backed off that.
Fosse/ Any other questions? Okay.
O'Brien/ Thank you.
Landfill & Public Utilities:
Fosse/ We'll move on to Landfill and Public Utilities. Our ... our first project there is the annual
sewer main projects (clears throat) excuse me! Those come in ... in two flavors. We had
the, uh, direct dig flavor, as well as the, uh, no dig. Uh, the direct dig are more for the...
the acute maintenance and repair activities, for instance when you ... when you have a
hole like this show up in your yard do you know that you're going to need to dig to fix
that, rather than the ... the no dig solutions. The no dig solutions, think of as an asphalt
overlay for the sewers. It extends the life of it. Gets new wearing surface in there, and
uh, gets us in good shape. This is an area in which the EPA would like us to see more of
an emphasis, and we'll talk more about that when we get to the Public Works operating
budget this afternoon, but is ... is in the maintenance of our collection system out there.
Our next project is the south wastewater plant expansion. That's a $55 million project,
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the largest project that the City has ever taken on. Um, the remarkable thing about this
is ... is we put together $46.1 million of external funding for this, and that includes a
portion of the local option sales tax that's being spent on this project. So some of you
may recall that the agony that we went through back around 2000 when we did the $25
million expansion to this plant and what it did to the rates, uh, we'll not have as big
impact this time because of the external money we've been able to compile. Uh, this
project does three major things for us. It gets the operations at the north plant out of the
Iowa River flood plain, it provides additional capacity for growth within the community,
and the third is it positions us, uh, pretty well for coping with the ... the more strict
regulations that are coming out now for total nitrogen and uh, phosphorus. And that...
that's something that I ... Iowa's starting to come to grips with right now.
Dickens/ That doesn't include anything on the tearing down of that?
Fosse/ No, it doesn't. We'll ... we'll (both talking) that in the ... in the on- the -radar projects,
which (several talking)
Davidson/ But as you mentioned, Terry, it does ... it is the ... the first step in establishing the
Riverfront Park and the Riverfront Crossings redevelopment area.
Fosse/ Our next project is the north river corridor trunk sewer reconstruction. This is a sewer, I
should say sewers. There are two sewers in this corridor, along Dubuque Street, from
Park Road north to Foster Road. One dates back to the 1930s. That'll be replaced and
combined as part of the Gateway Project. Uh, the reason it stands as a separate capital
project here is that we'll also be increasing the size of that sewer so that it will be able to
serve the growth that will occur north of Interstate 80. We'll have that in place and...
and it will be ready to go. Uh, that's about a, uh, $4 million project there. Our next one
is for our annual water main projects and uh, Tom'll tell you that ... that the day you build
something is the day Mother Nature starts to tear it apart, and water mains are a good
example of that. The ... the corrosion occurs on those. Uh, some of our system dates back
to the 1800s. We have other stuff that, uh, of course is brand new. The interesting thing
is, depending on where you are and how corrosive the soils are, it all doesn't age at the
same rate. Uh, we have some sewers that are 30 years old that ... that look pretty tough
and other ones, as I said, are ... are in the 120 -year range. Um, so it's just a matter of
staying on top of that. Our goal is ... is to balance maintaining a reliable system, uh, with
the ... with the other end of spending too much doing that. You know, you can get ahead
of it too much to and it's ... this is a hard thing to gauge because it's all underground and
it's hard to ... to gauge the condition of it.
Throgmorton/ Rick, could I ask you a question about that? Uh, are you, uh, experiencing or
observing any difficulties associated with the drought?
Fosse/ Um...
Throgmorton/ Having to do with the water lines.
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Fosse/ Our water lines, the ... the number of water main breaks this winter is higher than normal,
and we think that's related to the very dry soil conditions and the frost perhaps going
deeper because of that. Uh, we're also experiencing some, uh, issues at the waste water
plant, uh, because of the concentration of the effluent. This is the first drought we've
been in since the installation of low -flow fixtures. So with ... with very little ground water
getting in the system, the ... the waste water that's coming in to the plant is ... is more
robust. (laughter)
Markus/ We experience a lot more, uh, breaks during the summer this year too, didn't we, as a
condition of the ... the dryer soil conditions...
Fosse/ We ... we did! We did! And the interesting thing is, uh, what we saw in the drought of the
late, uh, 1980s is that when the drought broke, uh, we saw a lot of trenches settle, of
sewers and water mains that were constructed during the drought. That ... because the soil
content... soil moisture content wasn't optimum for compaction. Saw a lot of settlement
and subsequent settling of pavement and sidewalks and driveways related to that. So, be
interesting to see if we see a repeat of that. Our next project in this category is the Hebl
Road improvements, and just get your bearings here. This is Melrose Avenue, or IWV
Road, and this is our Landfill down here. This is Hebl Road coming in, and it's a chip
seal surface that carries almost exclusively truck traffic, and unlike the other chip seal
roads in the County, we can't embargo this during the spring when the frost is going out
of the ground, so it takes a beating, and some years it...it comes apart pretty significantly.
So this is a major maintenance project. It's not a reconstruction but we're going to im...
improve subsurface drainage and then put an asphalt surface on it, in hopes of having
more durable pavement out there. Any questions for this category before we move on to
Airport?
Payne/ So... so we're maintaining a County road?
Fosse/ Yes we are! We are!
Payne/ Is that part of an agreement that we have with them?
Fosse/ Yes. We have a 28E agreement with the County for a variety of streets on the perimeter
of our community, uh, some that make sense — better sense for us to take care of them.
Other ones, uh, for the County and it... it depends a lot on the plow routes, and... and
other things — what the traffic generators are on that, but I can get you more information
if you'd like on that.
Hayek/ But these ... these funds come from Landfill.
Fosse/ Yes!
Hayek/ Right? So I mean it's ... to the extent there's equitable pay -in to Landfill coffers, that's
reflected in the source of funds for this anyway.
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Fosse/ That's right. That's right.
Dobyns/ Rick, is ... I'm sorry, go ahead.
Fosse/ No.
Dobyns/ Okay, is the potential material recycling facility — is that that concern from Virginia that
we discussed a few months ago? Is that (both talking)
Fosse/ Yes it is.
Dobyns/ Okay. All right.
Fosse/ Yep. And if that comes to be, we'll have even more truck traffic on this road because
some of the trucks will be leaving loaded instead of empty, as well, because they'll be
taking product to their re ... refinery at Blairstown. No other questions we'll move on to
Mike Tharp and Airport.
Airport:
Tharp/ Well, good afternoon again! Mr. Mayor, Councilors. As far as the Airport projects go,
our ... our capital projects are funded in two different ways. They're either funded
through the FAA, the Federal Aviation Administration or through the State DOT. Um,
the projects I believe that everything that's in the CIP plan this year are all FAA -
participant projects, and one of the changes that's happened in the last year, uh, 2012, the
Congress finally passed an FAA reauthorization. Uh, the last one had expired in 2007.
So from 2007 to 2012, uh, airports and the FAA have been run on continuing resolutions.
Uh, one of the things that the 2012 reauthorization did is it changed the local match
program where it used to be a 95/5 split now it's a 90/10 split. So that's had some local
impact as far as matching dollars for any grants we get from the FAA. Uh, with that, the
...the projects that are in our program have, most of `em have been there for some time
and you're going to see a ... a hopefully some familiar projects, uh, starting with our, uh,
#3430, the apron and reconstruction ... uh, apron reconstruction and connecting taxiway.
Uh, prima... primarily this project is a ... a project to ... increase the parking capabilities of
the Airport. Um, as you can see by the photo up there, during high traffic times and...
and event days like football game days we get a lot of aircraft traffic, and we get aircraft
spread all over the field. Um, our hopes on... on expanding the apron facilities, uh,
providing hard surface area where we can collapse the, essentially the range that the, uh,
aircraft are positioned in terms of proximity to the terminal building. That way if
something does happen, uh, response times will be a lot quicker; and also the safety
factor, we can, uh, better see the aircraft instead of having them positioned far away.
#3442 is a obstruction mitigation project. This one will actually get, uh, delayed a little
bit. I know it shows up in FY14. Uh, one of the things we're working with the FAA on
right now is beginning an Airport Master Plan update, and that'll come in a little bit, at
#3454, at the end, but uh, the Master Plan update will essentially re -map all of the Airport
obstructions, anything that would be categorized as an obstruction and we'll be using
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that ... those plans to, uh, come up with a ... a, essentially a ... a mitigation project for, um,
the secondary runway.
Hayek/ Are those obstructions, uh, public obstructions? Are they on private property? Both?
Tharp/ Possibly! (laughs) Um, at this point I'm not 100% sure what all they'll be but it ... it's
likely based on the ... the configuration of the Airport. Some of them will, um, possibly
be trees and things that may be on private property. Um, we will, after we get everything
mapped out we will have discussions, both with, uh, Administration and Airport
commission officials on how best to mitigate, and it doesn't mean we have to go in and...
and remove things. It may mean some other, uh, options could be available, like lighting
and ... and things like that. So...
Hayek/ Yeah. Okay.
Payne/ But as it ... moves away from the Airport I assume it gets higher?
Tharp/ Correct.
Payne/ So it gets ... okay. So these could be a power line.
Tharp/ Very well could be, yes.
Dobyns/ Hopefully they get higher.
Tharp/ #3443 is our Airport equipment, uh, shelter. This has been on for a couple of years and
primarily it's a, um. ... additional space for our snow plowing and off - season equipment.
Uh, right now during the off - season, whatever's not in use, uh, sits outside so it's just, uh,
essentially a 50- square foot building, um, to provide some shelter for equipment when
it's not in use. #3448, the Airport perimeter road. As we start taking a look and getting
closer to the ... the south airfield development, uh, one of the things that needs to be done
in terms of access and accessibility for, um, Airport buildings and Airport traffic is a
perimeter road to be constructed around the runway environment. Uh, so this'll actually
...this perimeter road would actually extend from, uh, kind of that central building area
to, uh ... uh, around runway 3 -0, and into the southern development area.
Dobyns/ Do we see it up there? Or...
Tharp/ We don't ... it's not mapped out, uh, completely right now. It, uh, this one ... I believe in
your CIP is actually shown for FYI 7. Um, so it's still a couple of years away in terms
of...of major planning. And then the big one, uh, #3454 is the Master Plan update. The
two pictures that you see up there are ... are what the Airport looked like in about 1996
versus what it looks like today. Uh, there's been some very significant changes over the
last 15 years, and the Master Plan update would essentially be a road map for the next 20
years in terms of Airport facilities, um, available land for, um, other... commercial
enterprises.
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Fosse/ Questions for Mike before we move on to Streets and Bridges and Traffic Engineering?
None? Okay. Is Ron here?
Hayek/ Thanks, Mike.
Streets, Bridges and Traffic Engineering:
Knoche/ (several talking) All right, the first, uh, project that we're going to talk about is #3624.
It's the Riverside Drive Arts Campus storm sewer improvements. Uh, this project's
about a million dollar project, uh, joint with the University. Um, our share'll be paid for
with, uh, General Obligation bonds. Uh, it's currently scheduled for FYI 6, uh, this is
merely a placeholder at this point. The University is going to take the lead on this project
and they don't ... they don't have it in their plans yet. Uh, the project will increase the
pump sizes in the River Street pump station, um, to allow for the increased, uh, height of
the flood protection that they've put in along the Iowa River, uh, so this one, um, will be
headed up by the University.
Davidson/ Uh, Moss Ridge Road is the project that you set the hearing for, uh, on Saturday at
your special formal meeting and maybe Ron can highlight the actual road, uh, on the map
there. Can you guys just point it out? This is a new ... that's Oakdale actually.
Knoche/ I'm ... I'm sorry (mumbled)
Davidson/ There you go, right there! Uh, it's a ... it's a new alignment, uh, would have a new
intersection with Highway 1. We'll work through the DOT permitting for that. Uh, it's
basically an access street; would be a public collector street, to provide access to the
Moss Ridge campus, uh, area. Of course the first phase of that, the first nine lots has
already been platted. Uh, we want to get at ... we do have one, uh, business prospect that
we're working with that we want to try and accommodate their time schedule so we're in
a bit of a hurry, uh, with this. Uh, this is across ... the very intersection part, uh, with
Highway 1 is on the Luellen Trust property and then the remainder is on Pearson's
property. So we're working through the details of, um, getting the property acquisition
done so that we can construct this city street.
Markus/ Before you move off, uh, talk a little bit about the storm water issues, Ron. That we're
confronting with this road design.
Knoche/ Sure, um ... with the Pearson property, their main campus is here and their storm water
retention basins are ... are pretty much right where the roadway alignment comes through.
There's one here and there's one here. Um, one of the, um, issues that ... that we're going
to face is ... Pearson is ... is going to ask us to purchase everything north of the roadway as
part of an economic remnant. Um, and that would basically put their storm water
management on City property and so we're ... just kind of have to figure out how we're
going to deal with that as we go through the appraisal process.
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Markus/ So when you acquire property, if there's remnants left over, the expectation is the
purchaser kind of gets to buy the whole thing because the remnant is a remnant that has
no use to the main site anymore so ... it drives the cost of this a little bit. The other point
I'd ask is ... is ... I understand that there's a cost update on this at this point. We should
(both talking)
Knoche/ Yes.
Markus/ ... (both talking) expose that at this point.
Knoche/ In, uh, in the CIP I think it's identified as the $3.5 million project. Our current cost
estimate is $4.5 million. Uh, that just came in, uh, last week in regards to, uh, the...
where we're at with the preliminary design.
Markus/ (several talking) ...there's probably other sources that will contribute to this, in terms of
public, uh, utilities. And the other issue that's going on with this is, our intention was to
build this road to get this project moving forward and get access back into this site. The
other thing, you know, that that drives is how much we can contribute and I can tell you
that the developer's going to want to talk to us about incentives at the same time, so those
start to play off of each other quite a bit in terms of how much we can afford to invest in
this project at this point. So...
Champion/ (both talking)
Markus/ Keep that in mind, those issues are coming forward.
Davidson/ As Tom's alluded, the ... the intention is to pay off this, the City portion of this, um,
which we ... we're going to apply for a RISE grant. So hopefully fund up to 50 %, uh,
whether we get that or not then the ... the City expense, the intention is to pay it off
through the TIF increment that's created. It does create this competition then with
incentive ... incenting projects to go into the subdivision, but we ... we'll work that out
with the developer.
Champion/ Does the four and a half mean ... include property acquisition?
Knoche/ Yes it does.
Hayek/ What, uh, that's a pretty big jump. What explains ... the new number?
Knoche/ The original number was a .... was a `back of the napkin' estimate. Uh, we ... we didn't
really have a ... a good idea of what the costs were going to be, um, in the project.
Davidson/ Yeah, you're... you're in the flood area here of Rapid Creek, as you can see, and that
really adds to the expense of the project.
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Knoche/ And ... and also, uh, based on a meeting that we had with the DOT, um, there's... there's
a lot more work that we're going to do on Highway 1 from what we had originally
anticipated. Um, if you'll recall when they did the overlay project along here, they, uh,
increased the taper, uh, north of Northgate Drive. Um, they're asking us to recreate that
taper north of our intersection. So it...it increased the length of roadway that we thought
we were going to have to improve.
Mims/ Will it then probably have to be increased again when Oakdale goes in?
Knoche/ Correct.
Mims/ This access point will not ... I hope would not impact the access point for Oakdale? Has
that been taken into consideration?
Knoche/ We ... we're still discussing that with the DOT. Uh, at this point in time they have not
indicated that it will, um, jeopardize that location.
Mims/ Okay.
Knoche/ Of...of Oakdale.
Mims/ All right, thanks!
Markus / What this gives you at the end of the day is in addition to our industrial development in
the southeast corner of the community, is this gives you a, uh, a pallet for office research -
type development off the 80 corridor, and while that's going to take time to ... to develop
that, you're going to have, you know, the ... the land in place and you're going to have,
uh, land that has services in place so when those opportunities present themselves, you'll
have a place to put those ... those types of things, but it's a big investment up front and
you have to be aware of that going forward.
Throgmorton/ I ... I'd like to ask a question that follows up on something that someone, uh, asked
about a few minutes ago. What, well, basically what effect would construction of this
particular road have on the market value of the Moss property?
Davidson/ Well, given that the access is required in order to, uh, have development occur on the
property, one would expect it to enhance it.
Throgmorton/ Yeah. So I ask that question because I was hearing a comment about providing
incentives. It seems to me that constructing the road pre ... is a pretty big incentive.
Davidson/ I think we all concur with that, Jim. (laughs)
Throgmorton/ I ... I'm a little leery about, you know... saying, okay, we're going to give you
another incentive after we make the property, um, viable from a market point of view.
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Davidson/ Would it be fair to say, Tom, that that's still a work in progress?
Markus/ It would be fair to say that. (laughter)
Hayek/ (several talking)
Markus/ Welcome to my world! (laughter)
Hayek/ We haven't committed to anything but this... this... this is a necessary pre ... pre-requisite
to opening up in the first place (several talking)
Markus/ Huh?
Dobyns/ (both talking) ... always ask!
Markus/ Uh -huh!
Hayek/ And they do!
Knoche/ Uh, next project in the ... in the CIP is #3806, Harrison Street reconstruction. Um, this'll
be taking the block of Harrison Street between Clinton and Dubuque and, uh, removing
the brick and replacing it with concrete pavement. Uh, this is a ... um, funded with GO
bonds. Uh, the project will be done in coordination with the redevelopment of the Sabin
School site.
Champion/ Why are we replacing the ... why are we replacing the brick with cement or whatever
you call it? (unable to hear person responding) Dollars! Why are we (both talking) not
keeping it brick?
Knoche/ The... this... this was just, uh, the idea was just to remove this piece of...of brick
pavement from the system. Um, based on, uh, not really being in any historic districts
that we have in town.
Champion/ That's true!
Payne/ So what happens to the bricks?
Champion/ We keep it.
Knoche/ We'll stockpile the brick and we'll use it for (both talking) yep! For either a ... a
replacement project or res ... restoration work. Yep. (several talking) Take it down to the
Streets Department. Uh, Park Road, third lane improvements, #3808, is a $1.4 million
project funded with GO bonds. Uh, it's scheduled FY15. It will be done in conjunction
with the Gateway project. Uh, this reconstructs Park Road from the bridge, up to
Riverside Drive, uh, basically adding a ... a ... a two -way left turn lane all the way through
the corridor.
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Dickens/ Could this be delayed, depending on Hancher or ... is this pretty well set?
Knoche/ We ... this'll be done in conjunction with the Gateway project, uh, and I'll talk about that
next. I'll address that here next.
Hayek/ Have we, uh ... I've been asked about this before. Do we know whether the road'd...
would maintain its original center line and widen on both sides or shift on one or the
other side?
Markus/ (mumbled)
Knoche/ This ... on this one I ... I'm not quite certain on that. We're ... we haven't got to the final
design yet, um, in regards to that. I ... what I recall on this is that we'll be holding, um,
for the most part the right -of -way line with University in place in this section of the
roadway, and... and be doing a little bit of widening toward City Park. But it pretty much
stays within the existing right -of -way.
Hayek/ Okay.
Knoche/ We ... we're minimizing the effects it will have on the parkland ... and the trees.
Hayek/ Okay.
Dobyns/ I recall there was some concerns from I think parents of kids near Upper City Park.
There's... there was some request about, uh, improved school crossings, when they walk
to Lincoln. Um, how is that going to affect that, uh, at the top of the hill there, where it
goes three lanes?
Davidson/ (both talking) I think that a little further down... Park Road, Rick.
Dobyns/ Okay!
Davidson/ The ... the crossing with Lincoln.
Knoche/ That'll be beyond the reconstruction (both talking)
Davidson/ ...yeah.
Dobyns/ Okay.
Knoche/ All right. Um, #3809 is the Gateway project, uh, a (mumbled) project, uh, multiple
funding sources, uh, currently scheduled for FY14, 15 and 16. Um, this project'll raise
Dubuque Street, uh, replace City utilities in the corridor, and replace the Park Road
bridge. Uh, with this we, um, because of some, uh, delays in getting the environmental
assessment, uh, approved by the FHWA, um, we're pretty much going to track with the
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University in regards to their Hancher improvement projects. I think ... I think we're
going to pretty much stay in alignment, uh, as far as that schedule goes. Um... with uh,
with the EA, the EA right now is with the FHWA for their preliminary review. Um, after
we get it back from them we'll have to hold a public, uh, meeting, uh, to get public input
on the environmental assessment. Um, we will then take those comments, submit `em
back to FHWA to get the ... the final approval of the document which would ... would
hopefully will a FONSI. Um, and as we move forward with this, uh, we will be,
urn ... looking here in the spring to be talking about the preferred alternative for the
corridor and the improvements that we're ... we're looking at moving forward with.
Fosse/ (mumbled)
Knoche/ Oh, a FONSI is a finding of no significant impact.
Champion/ (several talking) ...thank you very much!
Knoche/ Yes, yes. (several talking)
Davidson/ ... with Happy Days (several talking)
Champion/ ...name of your dog or something. (several talking and laughing)
Knoche/ Exactly!
Champion/ When we talk about ... the Gateway project, and I just want to ask, did we ever talk
about just raising two lanes of Dubuque Street that are close to the river? So we don't
affect all those properties along the other side?
Fosse/ Yes! We have looked at those options, and one of the things that, um ... you know, where
...where it's not bifurcated. Of course we've ... our only choice is to raise the whole
thing. Uh, once we get into a split situation, we can start to differentiate those two but
one of the problems we run into is on that ... that major cross - connect there, uh, this is
where a lot of bus traffic turns around after they lear ... leave, uh ... um...
(male)/ Mayflower.
Fosse/ Mayflower! And that needs to be level there for them to get across that. So we can't
have much of a difference in elevation. That was the biggest obstacle to that.
Champion/ But would they only have to go to Foster Road to get ... a turning point?
Fosse/ If they get up to Foster Road, they will not be able to do a u -turn within the street itself.
They'd need to route out ... to No Name Road and then down to Taft ... to make that loop
around.
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Davidson/ It's a much tighter turn there because the road's not separated, Connie. (several
talking)
Fosse/ So ... one of the decisions that ... that you'll be ... have in front of you later in this year is the
level of protection for that. I think that indirectly gets at your question, Connie. What
we're doing for the ... for the environmental assessment, the EA that Ron was talking
about. We're looking at a protection level of 500 -years plus one foot, and that's the same
protection level we require of new homes today. So that was the level we're using for the
roadway, and that would have the, probably the largest conceivable footprint of our
options. Once we get a ... an environmental clearance on that, we can build that or
anything smaller than that. So that has your... that... that keeps your options open.
Throgmorton/ I would think we would want to know, uh, at...at a certain point in the future what
the cost differential is between, um, 500 -plus one foot, I think you said, uh ... uh, as
compared with I don't know, 100 -plus three or some, you know, some other, uh, lower
amount of, um, of protection.
Fosse/ Yes! Yes, we'll ... we'll need to provide quite a bit of information to you, so that you've
got the...the tools you need to make a decision on that, and that'll be a part of that.
Hayek/ So the, um (noises on mic) It looks like thus far funding is ... well into the majority local
dollars, between the LOST and the anticipated GO debt we anticipate taking on. Is that,
do I have that right?
Fosse/ We have about $1.5 million in, uh, THUD money, transportation HUD money... addition
to that.
Hayek/ Right, but basically the rest thus far is local option or GO.
Fosse/ Yes.
Markus/ (both talking) $30 million and ... almost 30.
Hayek/ Yeah!
Champion/ And ... when we take that kind of money into GO bonding, that gets figured into our
percentage of bonding that we allow, or... (mumbled)
Markus/ Part of the GO. That's right.
Throgmorton/ Yep!
Fosse/ Now one of the opportunities that we may have available to us is if we're successful
at... at keeping that community develop block grant money that was for Taft Speedway,
move that down to the waste water project. That may in turn free up LOST, local option
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sales tax money, for this project. So in a indirect way that could benefit this project
financially. It's one option.
Champion/ Rick, do you remember, cause I don't ... um ... has the road ever been totally closed
before?
Fosse/ The ... Dubuque Street? Yes. It was closed for about 60 days in 1993 and then 30 days in
2008. And I've not gone back before that, uh, we ... we do have closures from locally
heavy rains almost every year, but those are more brief in duration.
Champion/ Right, right, right! Okay, thanks.
Fosse/ Uh -huh.
Knoche/ Uh, #3812 is the American Legion and Scott Boulevard intersection improvements.
Uh, this'll be, uh, replacing, uh, the ... remove and replacing the pavement, uh, adding
three lanes to each leg of the intersection (mumbled) left turn lane. Um, which then
prepares it for the next project, which is #3814, uh, adding a signal at that location. Um,
that one is, uh, scheduled for FYI 5. Um, #3814 is the traffic signal projects, uh, annual
allocation of $120,000. Um, we have, uh, the old Highway 218, McCollister Boulevard
intersection, which is in the current works. Uh, that one we're, uh, in the process of
getting a review, uh, from the, uh, railroad, for the signal interconnect between the traffic
signal and the railroad crossing there. So that one'll be, uh, done this summer and then
Scott Boulevard'll follow the following year.
Payne / And when you say this summer, do you mean before July 1 or after July I?
Knoche/ It'll ... it'll be this ... I oughta say this construction season. So it'll be, um...
Payne/ Both?
Knoche/ Both, yep!
Fosse/ I'll just point out that the, uh, the interconnect that Ron's talking about's the important
safety feature such that if the ... the railroad signal comes on, then you get a green light for
the traffic that's on McCollister, so that you're not stuck on the tracks. It's very
important interconnect to have the ... we've got it currently at First Avenue and Mall
Drive.
Davidson/ The traffic calming program is a program that's been in effect for about 10 to 12
years. We developed the program locally here. It's since been used as a model
throughout the state and even out ... out of the state for, uh, neighborhood traffic calming
and trying to bring some objectivity to what is otherwise a rather subjective matter. Uh,
we budget $30,000 a year, uh, the neighborhoods understand that the money is there for
them to initiate a traffic calming project, and that's exactly what it's used for. This is
something that empowers neig ... uh, neighborhoods to determine that they, uh, wish to
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have traffic calming occur in their neighborhood. It's not anything the City imposes on a
neighborhood without them concurring. Ultimately you approve all the ... the projects,
uh, but it's something that's initiated from within the neighborhoods and is a very, uh,
effective strategy. If you look at before and after data, it's a very effective strategy for
reducing speeds in neighborhoods. Uh, we usually don't come near spending anywhere
near the...the $30,000. We had one year when we did Kennedy Parkway that we did, but
otherwise we don't generally come near. I think it's very consistent with your neighbor-
hood preservation strategic planning initiative.
Knoche/ #3821 is an annual allocation of $30,000 from road use tax. This, uh, helps us pay
developers back for over -width pavement that they would put in, either... whether it be
street or sidewalks. Um, and uh, it just ... that is figured out through the subdivision
process. #3822 is the annual curb ramp replacement allocation. Uh, $50,000. Not
annual, it's bi- annual! Um ... and this one, uh, is scheduled in the same years as the
sidewalk in -fill program. Uh, the next one that we'll have will be in FY15. Um, like I
said, this one brings the curb ramps, um, up to ADA compliance and currently MPOJC is
doing, uh, inventory of curb ramps in Iowa City.
Dobyns/ I had a question about the trails. Since Mr. Moran educated me that there's no such
thing as a sidewalk in Iowa City the other day ... um, I guess there are some trails and
there are others. When you're talking about these trails that we're building, like for
instance one on Highway 6. Are those kept open during the winter? Those large... trails?
As part of our...
Knoche/ Yes.
Dobyns/ Okay.
Davidson/ As a rule of thumb, Rick, when ... when a ... when a sidewalk or a wide sidewalk, it's
sometimes called a trail, is integral to the street, those are always kept open through the
winter (both talking) when a trail is separated from a roadway, then I guess it's a local
Parks and Rec decision as to whether or not to keep those open, or to preserve `em for
winter time activities like skiing.
Dobyns/ Okay! All right.
Knoche/ All right, #3823 is the brick street repair program. This is a biannual project. Um,
basically it's funded to do spot, uh, replacement and repairs of brick streets in town.
#3824 is the pavement rehabilitation program. Um, this is half a million dollars, uh, each
year, funded with road use tax, and um, through the utility franchise tax. Uh, it... it is
annual. Um ... this is both for HMA and uh, concrete, uh, streets. Um, we do this in
conjunction with the water and waste water departments, um, to ... uh, meet any of the
needs that they have as far as adjustments in the corridor, um, and we've also, uh, the last
two years have worked in conjunction with the DOT to do, uh, rehabilitation programs,
um, on some of the State routes in town.
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Dobyns/ How much more money is it to restore, maintain a brick, old brick road, as opposed to a
more traditional road? For like ... like a 100 feet. Is it ... in general. Is it ... why ... like way
more expensive or just some?
Fosse/ As I recall, we had discussion about this a year or so ago, and uh, I believe that the ... the
additional cost of premium is about $150,000 per block, uh, for the (both talking)
rebuilding the brick, yeah, versus (several talking) rebuilding a regular pavement. And
when we had that discussion we had a lot of discussion about, uh, maintaining our brick
streets and being selective about any of those that we switch from brick back to a regular
section, in that we wouldn't do that without... without your concurrence and hence that
conversation earlier about that block of Linn Street there between the Post Office and...
and the new, or Harrison, excuse me! Uh, that's one that we recommend going back with
regular pavement on, for that one block, as you go ... west of there, down the hill by the
Courthouse. If that's reconstructed. That may be one that you want to maintain brick on,
just because of its proximity to the Courthouse.
Dobyns/ How about the frequency of restoration compared to a traditional road? I know it's
more expensive per resporation ... restoration, but is the frequency of restoration — does it
last longer?
Fosse/ Well we ... we don't have a good feel for that because we ... we have not reconstructed a
brick street alongside a regular street in ... in quite some time. We do know from our old
brick streets they do last quite a while — that wearing surface works pretty well. But, how
the new rebuilds will ... will do, I don't know. The oldest example I can think of is that
piece near the, uh, University of Iowa President's House. That was rebuilt in 1986 and
you can take a look at that and see how that's doing.
Champion/ But you can look at Brown Street which has never been rebuilt.
Fosse/ That's right!
Champion/ (laughs) It's been there a long, long time.
Dobyns/ That's never been?
Champion/ Never!
Hayek/ The original (several talking)
Dobyns/ That's like you, Connie! The original!
Champion/ (laughter) I know it! Before we move on, can I just go back, cause I meant to ask a
question and I got confused. Um ... the Scott Boulevard, Muscatine stoplight project —
when...when is that going to be done? I couldn't quite ... see the priority on here.
Knoche/ That'll be in FYI 5.
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Champion/ FYI 5 ... cause I think that's a really busy intersection! And with that hill going up
from the ... from the industrial park, those trucks have a hard time — stop, go, stop, go,
stop, go — and it really holds up traffic a lot! It's really ... it's gotten quite busy.
Fosse/ The finished product for that will look very much like the intersection of Scott Boulevard
and Court Street. Just a half mile to the north.
Champion/ But there's no big hill there.
Fosse/ That's correct.
Champion/ So the trucks aren't going up big hills. (several talking) I'd like to see it moved up
but I mean that just ... I just think it's an environmental concern with all those trucks. I
mean, I use that road with some frequency and it amazes me how busy it is now.
Hayek/ When ... when we get to the horse trading, why don't you pull that...
Champion/... trade you for that! (laughter) Thanks!
Knoche/ Yep. Uh, project #3826 is the underground electrical, uh, this is $175,000 annual
allocation from the utility franchise tax. Um, basically this funds undergrounding of
utilities in corridors where we anticipate to do, uh, some major (several talking)
improvements. (laughter)
Fosse/ They are beautiful! (laughter)
Knoche/ #3828 is a sidewalk in -fill project. This is a biannual project, uh, next one that we'll do,
as I mentioned earlier, is in FY15. This is $100,000 of GO, uh, bonding money. Um, it
funds sidewalk construction to fill in gaps, uh, within the neighborhood, uh, sidewalk
system. #3830 is alley assessments. Uh, $181,000, uh, that will be assessed to the
adjacent property owners, uh, in the alleys. Biannual project, uh, will look at FY14, uh,
being the first project that we do. Um, funds to reconstruct one block of alley and install
storm sewer in that alley.
Payne/ So is that a net zero if you assess it to the property owners?
Knoche/ Yes. Uh, #3834 is the Burlington, Madison intersection and median project. Uh, $1.5
million project, uh, currently, uh, University and State grants. Um, we have it currently
scheduled for FYI but it is dependent on being able to get the grant money from the
DOT. Um, the project will add a median on Burlington Street from Madison Street to the
Iowa River, and also do some, uh, intersection improvements on Madison. Um ... to ... to
make the signalized system work a little bit better. And also improve the safety of the
crossing for the pedestrians.
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Dobyns/ Um, just a question on this. I'm ... I'm not sure when the planning went into this, but
this is such a moving target, this area with the University's arts campus going on. Is the
planning and development of this keeping up with the rapid -fire changes that are
occurring with Riverfront Crossing planning and the University planning, in terms of you
know... pedestrians crossing this area?
Knoche/ As ... as we move forward with the project, once we get the final, um, construction
money in place, we will be, um, looking at the plan one more time, um, and also working
with the ... the latest group that came to us was the bicycle group, um, asking for, uh, a
way to get bicycles through the corridor (both talking)
Dobyns/ ...exactly! There's always (both talking)
Knoche/ Yep! So (both talking) yes, so before we (both talking) before we move forward with
the project we will, um, you know, have one last shot at it, uh, as far as the plans go.
Davidson/ I think down in this area, Rick, because the street and the right -of -way are so much
wider the median is an appropriate solution, um ... be ... because of the advantages it has
for the pedestrian crossings, uh, north and south, and then I think Ron mentioned just
getting the geometry better for vehicular movements across Burlington Street, as well.
Now as you go east, over to Gilbert Street, I think that's going to require some additional
thought, and if you look at the Master Plan that you'll have on your agenda tomorrow for
downtown and Riverfront Crossings has some ... some alternate things that might be done
instead of the median. It's much tighter corridor. There are some concerns from the
bicyclists. So um, I think it's a little bit apples and oranges. Down in this area, the
median I think we know is a good idea. As you proceed further eat ... east, it's going to
require some additional thought and decision making by Council.
Dobyns/ Do you think a median is very robust solution for all future considerations that might
impact this area?
Davidson/ Well I think the ... the plan that you have on your agenda tomorrow has some good
ideas of how you can handle the ... the Burlington Street corridor and ... and make it better
for pedestrians and bicyclists and motorists.
Fosse / What we're hearing from the bicyclists is those who commute in from the west side of
town that want to get downtown find these two blocks that you're seeing right here
between Madison and Riverside Drive to be the most difficult two blocks in their
journey, and we're trying to ... to look at solutions and ways to improve that. It's difficult,
cause we're trying to cram so many things in there, but that's... that's what we'll ... we've
been hearing.
Knoche/ #3840 is the Burlington, Clinton intersection improvements. Um, $1.1 million, uh,
funded with GO bonds. Uh, scheduled for FY15. Uh, project will be constructed in
coordination with the School of Music project, uh, which will go on right at this corner.
Um, it'll include pavement reconstruction on Clinton Street and signal improvements and
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water main work. Uh, so, um... basically we'll be, uh, making the geometry better here
and ... and as far as the crossing of Clinton Street, uh, at that location. Uh, we are
working with the, uh, trying to scope out contract with, uh, design engineer for the
University's project to ... so that we make sure it's in coordination between the two. Um,
#3843 is the railroad crossing. This is $25,000 in road use tax. It's an annual allocation.
Um, it funds railroad crossing improvements around town. Um, and these are joint
projects with the railroad and the DOT. #3849 is a brick street reconstruction. This is
$400,000 of GO bonds. Uh, we have, uh, currently scheduled for FYI and 17. Um, the
project, reconstruction of one block of brick streets. Uh, the current project that we're
working on right now is Dewey Street and uh, that one we're about halfway done with
the project. We'll finish that up in the spring on that one.
Hayek/ So ... I was curious why 14 and 15 don't show any allocation for ... uh, this ... this kind of
work. Is it related to just ... an unavailability of dollars or where the current project on
Dewey is ... relative to completion. Could you speak to that?
Fosse/ It ... it has something to do with dollars and then also to do with our capacity to
implement. And so we've got the one on Dewey Street going on now and then, uh,
we've got sidewalk in -fill and uh ... alley assessments and brick street reconstruction all
compete for those same dollars and ... and staff time. So we're unable to stack them all on
top of each other.
Hayek/ Okay.
Champion/ Are there any other brick streets as in bad shape as Dewey was, or still is, part of it?
Hayek/ I ... I'd say portions of north Linn'd give it a run for the money! Maybe some others, as
well.
Champion/ (mumbled)
Mims/ (both talking)
Davidson/ ...we have an inventory of the whole brick street system that does show it block by
block by... condition and... Dewey Street was definitely one of the worst, but as the
Mayor's indicated, uh, there are portions of north Linn that are right there.
Throgmorton/ Some of my least favorite sink holes are on north Linn Street. I mean, I've ridden
that thousands of times on my bike and ... almost, you know, put an end to my life.
(laughter)
Davidson/ And I ... I say this somewhat facetiously, but not entirely, it is traffic calming for the
neighborhood. I mean, those streets do keep traffic moving relatively slowly, and that's a
good thing!
Throgmorton/ Absolutely!
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Hayek/ I don't know. I think you have to be careful with that analogy though because you could
say the same thing about the asphalt streets and... and the pot holes that we are quick
to ... to repair there as well, and I just think it ties ... I just want us to keep ... keep this on
our, uh, radar because it is so closely tied to neighborhood stabilization and the
investments we're making in parks, and in other place, in our older neighborhoods are in
the same category, at least from my perspective, as this ... as this kind of works; so I'm
really glad to see the Dewey stuff, uh ... uh, turn out so well, at least the first stretch, the
job from Governor over to the cemetery. That looks great!
Fosse / And back to your question, Matt, about durability. What you're seeing here is ... is one of
those reconstruction projects. We build a ... a full concrete street under that and then
there's a ... asphalt setting bed, and then the brick, as compared with the ... the brick
crossings that are near the ... the mall downtown, relied on the brick for part of their
structural strength, and they got about 30 years of life out that and ... and then they began
to break down. So we don't want to rely on that.
Hayek/ Is there any information from the industry, uh, or just past experience that would suggest
that, you know, the original streets, you know, take Brown Street for example which has
lasted a heck of a long time, uh, on a ... I'm ... I'm sure it's at least a century old.
Champion/ Oh yes!
Hayek/ Um ... relative to this approach, where you've got that underlay and then you brick on
top. Is there any ... industry information in terms of duration? How long this product
lasts?
Fosse/ There's probably some out there, but none that I can recall.
Hayek/ There is? Okay. Thanks.
Davidson/ American Legion Road is a project that we'll reconstruct the existing, uh, rural, you
know, basically rural highway. This is old Highway 6 prior to when the bypass went in
in the 60s. Uh, and you ... and you see it in its existing configuration here. This would
reconstruct it as a, uh, a city arterial street with 8 -foot sidewalk on one side, uh, 5 -foot
sidewalk on the other, uh, curb and gutter, storm sewer. Um, this is a project that's in
FYI so the furthest out year, but it's important for us to have it in the program because
as development occurs along this corridor, and this is the corridor between Scott
Boulevard and Taft Avenue. Uh, we will collect developer, uh, exactions for the eventual
construction of it.
Throgmorton/ So why don't we rename that Jack Kerouac Road, since, uh (both talking)
Davidson/ ...on the road.
Throgmorton/ ... on the road, have him coming through Iowa City on Highway 6.
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Davidson/ You read on the road, they did come through Iowa City.
Hayek/ That's a good idea! So this will be, I mean, in terms of, uh, chicken and egg, and
incenting growth, um, it sounds like we're waiting for development to ... to pop more in
this area before investing the funds.
Davidson/ Yeah, we bought ourselves some time, Matt, when we constructed Court Street,
because that gives the Windsor Ridge neighborhood and the Lindemann Farms
neighborhoods, uh, the opportunity to have, basically a city street and sidewalks to get in
and out of their neighborhoods and the rest of the city. Uh, so that bought us a little bit of
time here, but it is a matter of, you know, ultimately it will come down to a political
decision of when you think it's ready to go, and in the meantime, hopefully we'll collect
some fees from developers.
Fosse/ In ... in this case the pavement is in relatively good condition. Often times we have two
things driving a project. One is ... is the need to convert from a rural to an urban section
and a pavement connection. Here it's just the need to convert.
Throgmorton/ So I'd like to (several talking) I'm sorry!
Dickens/ How far is Taft?
Davidson/ It's ... it's basically a mile between Scott Boulevard and Taft Avenue.
Dickens/ How ... how many years is that ... cause we've looked at that upgrading that...
Davidson/ There's... there's no portions of Taft Avenue in a funded year at this time, uh, Terry.
Fosse/ We'll talk more about Taft later.
Dickens/ Oh! Okay!
Fosse/ Yep.
Throgmorton/ I'd like to ask a ... a fairly broad question and then it's a question that Tom actually
would need to answer, I think. Uh, and maybe not now, maybe later, but ... the question's
simply this: if we have a pot of money, and I know it's complicated. It's not just one pot
of money. Uh, and untold number of potential projects, how does the staff come up with
its recommendation about which projects deserve the greatest attention in the most
immediate future? You know, what ... what's the criterion? How ... how do ... how does
the staff make that judgment about what to recommend to us. I would think it's
something like biggest bang for the buck, where bang means something like...
maximization of things we value, but...
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Markus/ I ... well, I would tell you that, uh, with the adoption of the strategic plan, more and more
emphasis is geared back to what the strategic plan priorities are, and that's where we're
trying to gear more and more of our investments. I agree with you. I think when
you ... when you make a particular capital improvement investment you are looking for,
well, what kind of return are you getting. Returns fall in the category of objective all the
way to subjective types of returns, and sometimes trying to apply a monetary value to
some of those gets very difficult, but ... we're trying more and more, I think, to inform
ourselves based on what the strategic plans call for, but it's like what I was saying earlier
about, uh, the office research area as well. Um ... and the industrial park. You know, we
have a sizeable investment in that industrial park, and the big emphasis, you know, of
recent, uh, years has been `shovel ready' for all of those things. Well, we're completely
shovel- ready. We have a huge dollar amount of investment, and we're not seeing
immediate returns, in part because the economy is not there, you know, where they're
investing and looking for more ... more of those things. So I think what's going to happen
is once you have office research available, I think the emphasis has to shift to taking care
of what you have, and being very careful about expanding, um, before you take care of
what you have. I think taking care of what you have is ... is pretty critical, and I think that
goes back to your constituents then, as well. I think there's some expectation levels
there, but ... because neighborhood stabilization is such a key priority, we're going to be
informed as a staff to start to look back to those things, and if you look at the budget
document and you look at the con, or you heard the conversations that we have during
CIP. That's informing quite a bit of what we're trying to do now, is the strategic plan.
Fosse/ yep, there's all that and occasionally we have outside drivers, as well, uh, regulatory
requirements. That's mostly related to water and sewer. The feds say `you will do it
now.' And then also the availability of outside funding sometimes will drive a decision.
If we have a project that we wouldn't normally do for five years but if we do it now we
get 50% funding, then that might move a project recommendation up.
Throgmorton/ Yeah, well I -80 wouldn't exist if it wasn't for 90/10 (mumbled) 90 /10s funding,
uh, back in the 1956 Interstate Highway Act.
Fosse/ Uh -huh.
Markus / And then there's the more extreme kind of analysis that you do. At some point a road
gets to a point where it's so far beyond, uh, fixing that ... that, uh, you know, instead of
making interim repairs to something, you wait for it to totally demise and then make a
full reconstruction out of it. Sometimes like with, uh, Chris and his parking decks, uh,
he's tried to do preventative maintenance, you know, so that you don't get to a full
reconstruction, uh, issue, and more and more preventative maintenance probably gives
you a bigger return on your investment that way too. So there's lots of strategies that get
involved in these discussions. Like I say — I've not been to a community yet that spends
as much time analyzing how we invest our money in capital improvements. Uh ... we
spend a ... a lot of time talking about those very issues... before we get it to the final
decisions.
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Davidson/ Moving on then, Mormon Trek Boulevard, this is a project that, uh, looks different
than previous years, uh, in the capital improvements program. There was formerly a, uh,
much larger project stretching from Melrose to Abbey Lane, uh, involving ... we ... we
weren't sure what it was going to involve. Either, uh, a center turn lane added to the
existing four -lane section, or possibly several intersection improvements at Cameron
Way, Rohret Road, uh ... uh, Benton Street. Uh, what we ... what we've decided to do
because of the significant financial impact of this project is to pare it down and ... to the
project that you see before you, which deals with the most critical corridor, which is
between Cameron Way and that's the intersection you see, uh, in the foreground, or in the
background there, uh, up to Rohret Road, which is probab ... well, Rohret Road's in the
foreground there, and what it will do is ... is basically what I ... I think is appropriate to call
an interim improvement, but one that will serve us for... for many years that will get the
Rohret Road intersection functioning much better, uh, based on an analysis that's... that's
been done. We believe with the addition of a, as you're looking at this photo right here, a
right -turn lane in the foreground for northbound to eastbound, um ... uh, movements, and
a creation of a dedicated, uh, left turn lane where that white car is sitting, uh, will ... will
not, will keep us in a... in a situation where safety will be improved and capacity will still
be adequate for this intersection, but we do want to emphasize that this half a million
dollar project should probably be considered an interim improvement, uh, and ... and that
eventually we'll be faced with a larger project, uh, at some point in the future.
Dobyns/ Now, Jeff, where this picture is, Rohret Road is actually behind us, and... (both talking)
Davidson/ Yeah, I'm sorry. I said Rohret Road. I meant to say Benton Street. (both talking) I
meant to say Benton Street. But yes, the, uh, we've identified the corridor here as
between Cameron and, uh, Rohret, but the significant improvements, where most of the
expense would be, will be right here. Uh, you can see that utility pole right there, um,
very significant, uh, utility pole. That's one of the reasons why it's very, very high
expense to do any kind of a widening project here. Right now you can also see that
there's a bridge there about half way down the street, uh, that would have to be replaced
and widened as well. So there's just some such significant expense to this project, we
don't feel like in terms of need we're quite there yet. Um ... but ... but, and at this ... this
project in the short-term will help us significantly.
Champion/ Are there a lot of accidents at that intersection?
Davidson/ That's a good question, Connie. This corridor, uh, has been identified in the ... the
crash analysis data that, uh, MPOJC produces as the highest traffic collision corridor in
Iowa City. But, because the speeds are relatively modest, the severity of the crashes are
not significant. The real severe crashes are the ones where we really take notice and try
and do an improvement immediately. These are more fender - bender type, lot of rear -end
crashes, when you don't have the separated turn lanes, but they're not of high severity,
and that's why we don't feel there's more imperative for it.
Knoche/ Uh, #3871 is the First Avenue, Iowa Interstate Railroad crossing improvements. Um,
$8.7 million project, uh, is funded with GO bonds and federal aid. Uh, we're scheduled
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for FY 14, uh, 15, and probably 16. Uh, this ... this project, uh, is currently in design. Uh,
we will be, uh, looking at the potential of an October letting of this year. It probably will
be delayed a little bit in regards to getting the final plans done and uh, getting the
property acquisition purchased. Um, obviously the plan is the railroad will, uh, move up
and the First Avenue will ... will be lowered. Um, and the project will include a storm
sewer, a pump station, uh, down in the sump that'll be created underneath the railroad
tracks.
Payne/ So on our sheet that we have, it says ... show $2.6 million being spent in 2013.
Knoche/ Yeah. That ... that money was not expended. Uh, so it...it would just be pushed back,
uh, with the project.
Payne/ So all of these to be what pushed one year forward...
Knoche/ ...pushed one year back, yep.
Payne/ Or... (both talking)
Knoche/ Yes, into the future. Slide it, yep, one year into the future. And ... with that the
reasoning for that was the Lower Muscatine project ... was not done last construction
season. It's going to be done this construction season. So to not have the whole ... the
whole area messed up in regards to construction. That was the reason for the delay... in
that. Uh, #3910 is the bridge maintenance, uh, project. It's $60,000 a year, uh, road use
tax. Um, we, uh, use these funds to do our bridge inspections on the biannual process
and then we do repairs in the off years, um, based on what those inspections, uh, identify.
#3921 is, uh, Interstate 80 aesthetic improvements. This is a ... identified as a $230,000
project. We have, uh, $30,000 in GO bonds and $200,000 in State grants. Um, it's
shown ... it's scheduled in FYI and 15, and uh, 1999 Iowa City, Coralville, and the
DOT, along with MPOJC developed a Master Plan for some aesthetic improvements
along I -80. Um ... basically the ... the aesthetics that we have (mumbled) focusing on the
interchanges and some, uh, work along the corridor. Uh, it also identified the, um,
painting scheme that you see on the Dodge Street, uh, pedestrian bridge. Um, so, uh,
what we're doing with this is, uh, using the $30,000 to go into the preliminary design for
the project and then we'll be using that design to, uh, submit for grant money from the
DOT, whether it be a living road use trust funds or DNR grant funds, in regards to the
proj ect.
Payne/ Couple of years ago I went to a meeting about aesthetics and we looked at all these plans
and stuff. Is that part of this project? It was like two years ago or (both talking)
Knoche/ Yes. Yep.
Fosse/ The catalyst for this project was the six -laning of the corridor and we wanted to do some
things to counter and soften the impact of that six -lane project.
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Hayek/ Is, uh, is signage or way- finding infor ... material anything that could be construed as part
of this? Uh, I supposed some would say that would detract from the aesthetics,
but ... there's an awful lot of foliage through here and I think some would say it's actually
a pretty nice little corridor, even after the ... the, uh, the construction. Um...
Fosse/ No, way - finding is not currently a part of this, and the ... the DOT and the feds are very
strict about their, you know, the type of signage that goes along the interstate. Uh, one of
the things that we really liked is ... is putting the name Iowa City on the Wolf Avenue
bridge over Highway 1 and that was the last such type installation that happened in the
state. The DOT does ... didn't care for that, um, so we can't do that type of thing here.
Um... so I don't know that that completely gets at your point (both talking)
Hayek/ No, I ... I think, well I think the broader concept which ... which Tom has talked about
before I think is a good idea. I think ... I don't think there's much of an indication as you
drive along Interstate 80 that Iowa City is there and its institutions are ... are beckoning
the traveler east and west on Interstate 80.
Payne/ Well look at our picture! It has a picture of Coralville's water tower! I mean (laughs)
we're advertising Coralville (laughs)
Hayek/ So ... I was just curious whether that was part of this. Doesn't sound like it is. That's
fine.
Champion/ And I agree with you. It's hard to find the Dubuque Street exit anyway. It's really
not marked very well.
Dobyns/ And those, uh, Interstate 80, when they had those 20 -foot faces along the interstate.
Let's not replicate that (laughs)
Hayek/ The ... the, what the fences you said?
Dobyns/ The faces (several talking)
Hayek/ Oh, the face (laughs)
Dobyns/ Those faces, those huge faces. (several talking)
Hayek/ ...increase the accident rate for sure!
Dobyns/ Yeah! (mumbled) (several talking)
Knoche/ Uh, project #3930 is the Dubuque Street/I -80 pedestrian bridge, uh, this is a $2.1
million project, uh, we're going to pay for with GO bonds, and a majority of it is federal
grant money. Um, in our ... in our program it's scheduled for FY13 and 14. Um, the
design is ...is under contract now. The construction probably will not occur until FY16,
uh, that is when the last piece of the federal money is available to us. So that'll... that'll
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push us out and also be at the tail end of the Dubuque Street Gateway project also. So the
timing of it, uh, works a little bit better. Um, this will construct a pedestrian bridge over
I -80. Uh, the pedestrian bridge, uh, currently is going to be on the west side of Dubuque
Street. Uh, we will have a trail continue up from Foster Road up to, uh, where the new
signalized intersection will be, um, here. So it will come up the east side, uh, cross
Dubuque Street at the signalized, new signalized intersection with, uh, improvements that
the DOT'll be doing this summer. Uh ... and then will continue up the west side of the
road, and tie into the, uh, pedestrian bridge project that we did this last summer at the
Butler Bridge.
Mims/ Will they be doing that resig ... that signalization of the entire intersection then this
summer?
Knoche/ Yes ... we will have, it'll be signalized both north and south sides of the interstate.
Mims / And the alignment of the ramp to west -bound 80 is going to be totally redone, is that
correct?
Knoche/ Yes.
Mims/ That is so dangerous right now.
Knoche/ It ... that's ... that's ... (both talking)
Mims/ It's a sharp curve coming on to the interstate. I've heard a lot of people comment about
how dangerous that is, with that alignment right now.
Knoche/ Yeah, and that was ... the way that they tied that in was just a temporary connection.
Um, but you can see the grading's already done for the new on -ramp.
Mims/ Yeah. Okay, well I'm glad it's going to happen that soon then.
Knoche/ Yep!
Fosse/ Our next project is the vehicle wash system that'll go down at the new Public Works
facility on ... on south Gilbert Street. Our current vehicle wash is at the Riverside Drive
site. Uh, we have a huge investment in... in, uh, equipment. Each plow truck is about
$120,000 and ... and it's important to take care of those things, especially when you're
handling salt like you see us doing here. If you don't clean that stuff up, the ... the
equipment will lit... literally seize up on you. Um, our current wash facility was built in
the 70s and it's in very difficult, uh, condition, poor condition, and ... and now's a good
time to migrate that to the new Public Works site at...at the other location. It's got some
really quirky equipment here with a long list of instructions to fire it up and ... and I ... I
like reading it because the last line says that if you do all this and it doesn't work to
contract the ... the Equipment Division and they'll come over and get it running for you.
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So this ... it's time for a new one here. Any questions about Streets, Bridges, and Traffic
Engineering before we move on to flood recovery and mitigation?
Payne / What about Lower Muscatine Road?
Knoche/ Lower Muscatine, uh, does not show up in here. It's, uh, under contract and we will be
building it this summer. Uh, Metro Pavers is ... is the contractor that'll be doing the work,
uh, for us.
Payne/ So it'll start like in the spring or after school gets out or something?
Knoche/ They may actually start some work this winter yet. They want to, uh, get started on the
storm sewer work. Um, where the final piece of the storm sewer goes out, uh, to the,
kind of the west end of the project, and uh, and then, uh, the major road work will begin
after Kirkwood is out, uh, for the summer.
Payne/ Great! Thank you.
Hayek/ As you move on ... I ... I'm going to need us to take a break like in the next 10 or 15
minutes cause I have to make a phone call. Uh, and I assume people need to use the
rest ... the facilities anyway. Do you want to go for another few minutes? Would it
...what's the best juncture to...
Fosse/ Let's do that now! (both talking)
Hayek/ Take a break now? That'd be fine, if that's okay with everybody! Take a break and
come back! (BREAK)
Hayek/ Okay, I guess we're uh, ready to roll here.
Fosse/ Thank you!
Hayek/ Thanks for the accommodation.
Fosse/ Oh, you bet!
Flood Recovery & Mitigation:
Knoche/ The next category is flood recovery and mitigation. Uh, the first project that we'll talk
about is #3961 which is the west side levee project. Uh, $5.2 million project; GO bonds
and CDBG money. Majority of it's CDBG, uh, we're ... be scheduled for FY 13 and 14 on
this project. Uh, we'll construct a levee along the west side of the Iowa River from
McCollister Boulevard, which is here, uh, up to the Crandic Railroad, uh, tracks. Um,
this will also include a pump station, uh, down ... next to McCollister and then also one
behind, uh, the commercial, uh, drive area. #3962, um, this project was originally
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identified at...at roughly a $4.2 million project. Uh, east side levee project. Uh, we did
receive CDBG money, uh, to build the project, uh, we hired MMS to start preliminary
design, um, based on, uh, the current estimate that we have, uh, in hand right now, uh,
which is $11 million. We don't feel we can move forward with this project. Um, the
...the majority of.. of the increase in the cost on this one, um, you know, the levee was
going to follow, uh, along the backs of the businesses, on the west side of Gilbert Street,
um, but we ... with the original, uh, design of that we were not going to pump, um, this
drainage way that comes in along the railroad tracks, uh, on the south end of the corridor,
and we weren't looking at pumping anything along Highway 6, which is the storm sewer
along there. Urn ... uh ... based on the design and based on where the ... the elevations of
the river are going to be at, we would have to do both of those to be able to ... to make this
project work. Um, so at this point, you know, we won't be able to move forward with
this one. Uh, we will, um, look at the, uh, reallocating the CDBG money, uh, that we
have, uh, and similar to what we're doing with the Taft Speedway, uh, money currently.
Uh, #3964, the Rocky Shore lift station and flood gate project, a $6.3 million project, uh,
funded fully with CDBG money. Um, we're, uh, in the process of getting the property
acquisition finalized now. Um, we're working with the Crandic Railroad, uh, the ... the
pump station will be in Crandic Park, on the north side of the tracks. Uh, we will, uh,
also have a flood, uh, gate for a closure of Rocky Shore Drive. Uh, this pump station is
one of four, uh, that will, um, fin ... final-out the flood mitigation for the Highway 6 area,
um ... uh, along Highway 6. Uh, and uh, the ... the key right now, the holdup right now is
working with Crandic in, uh, in getting the property acquisition worked out, uh, for the,
where that pump station will be at.
Mims/ That's not in our packet, at least not in order. Is that because of...(both talking)
Knoche/ That one did not make it into the packet, unfortunately. Uh, so this one is ... is not in
there... currently.
Mims/ Okay.
Knoche/ So that ... that is one that you will not find in your handout.
Mims/ But it's a 14?
Knoche/ Yes, yep!
Mims/ Okay, thank you.
Champion/ Where does that water get pumped to?
Knoche/ To the Iowa River.
Champion/ Isn't that where it's coming from?
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Knoche/ The ... with this, uh, the project that will have ... will use the railroad tracks, um, and
...and with, uh, work that we'll do to put some soil on the river side of the railroad tracks,
and it... it will use that as a levee.
Moran/ Greetings, everybody! CBD streetscape project is a four -year project. We've, uh, sent
the RFP out for that, uh, already. We asked the, uh, potential bidders to review and to
unify and to update the current city plan, which would include the near northside. Uh,
we'll try to do that in ... in four different phased projects. Uh, we know that the areas of
concern that we're going to concentrate on are lighting and the electrical system, so that
we can have year -round lighting and ... and not struggle to light the trees and do a lot of
the things that have been done and we can do that with capacity, which we don't have
right now. Uh, we also need to accommodate for, uh, vendors and patrons for all the
festivities that take place on that now, which we currently can't do in full force. Uh, we
want to look at Blackhawk Mini Park and revitalize that area along with the new building
that's being done, and then all the entrances to the central business district, as well. So
we'll do that in conjunction with the Iowa City Downtown Development Group and then
we'll also work with the University, especially the connection piece between Iowa
Avenue and Jefferson Avenue, since that's their property but we want to connect the near
northside and ... and the central business district.
Champion/ How old are those lights that are rusting out?
Moran/ Uh, about 20 years old.
Champion/ Is it that old?
Moran/ Yeah.
Hayek/ That'll be good! (several talking) Looks a little long in the tooth!
Fosse/ Our next project is our refuse building that's currently at the Riverside Drive site. This is
one of four projects that's in the capital program that involved migrating from this
Riverside Drive site down to the south Gilbert site, and we'll talk more about that later.
Uh, this is a project that's, or excuse me, a facility that's reached the end of its useful life
and its structural life. Uh, for our supervisor down there to meet with their staff, he needs
to stand in a doorway between two rooms and ... and uh ... talk back and forth so that he
can cover everybody. Uh, we're having a hard time holding the roof together on this
place. It's a good time to move the facility. So this ... this will end up down at...at south
Gilbert location. Uh, similarly is our traffic engineering building. Uh, which is just to
the east of the building I just showed you. Uh, similar condition — out of space down
there, uh, number of our operations occur outside down there. So in the snow and ... and
rain and lightening conditions, we ... we don't like them working outside there. So this...
this'll be another part of that migration.
Davidson/ Uh, #3974 is Riverside Drive pedestrian tunnel and you see in the, uh, lower right
there the existing situation with there being, uh, just kind of a worn path where the
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sidewalk terminates, uh, around the railroad embankment. Um, there are already some
things starting to happen in the Riverside Drive area. You'll remember this is an urban
renewal area, uh, that's part of the Riverfront Crossings initiative. Uh, the Hampton
Hotels' been, um, completed recently, which does create a tax increment that can be
captured for public or private projects. That project did not have any public assistance,
uh, on it. And so what we're trying to do here is basically jumpstart the streetscape
project for this area, and we will talk about that project more in the `on- the - radar'
projects, but what we're ... what this project would do is, uh, basically put the tunnel
through the, uh, railroad embankment and then connect the, uh, sidewalk links on either
side to the existing sidewalk in front of the Chrysler dealership and uh, Myrtle Street, and
...and again, it would ... it would be a project that would then be used to build off of for
the remainder of the streetscape project that we'll talk about, uh, a little bit later. And it
would be intended to try and uh, capture some TIF funds for these public improvements,
which is what the original people forget, but that was the original intent of the TIF law
when it was put into statute in the 80s was to be able to do public projects and then
provide a catalyst for the private development in the area.
Hayek/ So that... the... the railroad overpass is pretty old, as I recall. Is there ... do we approach
this in a way that doesn't require us to revisit it, if and when they redo their overpass?
Davidson/ Yeah. The only plans that the railroad has for the overpass is to ... they ... they have as
a goal to some day go back to double- track, and the ... the railroad, if you go back far
enough, was a double -track line on this bridge, and the existing, uh, structural
components will accommodate adding that, but beyond that, even though it's not visually
very appealing, it is structurally stable (both talking) railroad and they will periodically
do projects to ... to maintain that so ... we believe what we would be doing, Matt, is
consistent with any plans that the railroad has.
Mims/ Is there anything... as we look at that Riverside Drive corridor that we can ... and I know
this can be difficult sometimes, but coordinate with or do with the railroad in terms of
making that a more attractive overpass?
Davidson/ We have had that discussion with them, Susan, and of course their business is
operating the railroad. Um, any project would be 100% at our expense. The issue with
the railroad, uh, bridge is the need for lead, uh, abatement. Um, which means you
basically put a giant cocoon in it. Occasionally you'll see it on highway bridges, the
giant cocoon, so that all of the lead -based paint can be recovered, at extraordinarily
expensive project that would be entirely our expense. Now, we're certainly keeping it in
the back of our minds to continue to ... to coordinate with the railroad. When the Miller
Orchard neighborhood plan was done, doing something to enhance the aesthetics of that
bridge was one of the things that they identified. So we'll ... we'll keep it out there, but
we don't have anything immediate.
Mims/ Okay. Thank you.
Payne/ So...so this project is to put a tunnel parallel to Riverside Drive.
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Davidson/ Yes.
Payne/ Underneath the railroad.
Davidson/ That's correct. (several talking) Yes. Same principle. This is a much larger
embankment, but... same principle.
Fosse / Any questions before we move on to Parks, Recreation and Trails? Okay.
Parks. Recreation & Trails:
Moran/ Uh, first one, uh, is our annual improvement and maintenance, uh, funding that we use.
You will see that it's down quite a bit at $80,000. It used to be $200,000 every year that
we did ongoing maintenance and repairs with, and we've changed the philosophy, which
you'll see later on, about doing some individual park master plans for neighborhood
parks. Uh, we used to take the money out of this, so we've downgraded this a little bit,
and we'll still be able to make some connection links and some park improvements, but
not to the great extent that we did before, uh, with this one. Oops!
Fosse/ (mumbled)
Moran/ Hickory Hill Park safe room is a hazard mitigation grant. Uh, it's only a $34,000
project for us, and south Hickory Hill, as a result of the tornado. Uh, you'll approve, uh,
plans and specs tomorrow night at your meeting and then we'll be underway and have
this completed by this summer. Uh, what you look at is the current existing shelter that
we have in south Hickory Hill and then the safe room that's off to the side, uh, sort of
built into the embank... embankment there by the entrance to south Hickory Hill.
Hayek/ So just up the hill's Bloomington?
Moran/ Correct.
Hayek/ Or Cedar or whatever (both talking)
Moran/ ...right up here. Frauenholtz- Miller is across from the new St. Pat's Church. We went
through the design process last year, uh, with the neighborhood. Uh, we came up with a
design here, as you can see. There was sort of a little bit of a dispute in the neighborhood
as whether to bathroom or not bathroom that park, and so we decided we'd give `em a
cooling off time. We'll have to go back to the neighborhood and have that discussion
again. Uh, this is scheduled currently right now for FY 16, uh, could be slid either way
but we do have all the design tools in place for this. Cemetery road resurfacing is an
every- other -year project. Uh, $50,000 to maintain the three miles of trails that we have in
the cemetery. We do approximately about a mile a year, uh, try to regrade those. We did
have some improvements, as Matt mentioned, with the road bricks in front and on Dewey
Street, which helped our entrance a lot. So a lot of this'll be interior road work that we'll
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do, uh, within the cemetery. Soccer Park improvements are an FY16 project. Uh, what
we want to do is just bring a more park -like atmosphere down into that area. Uh, we'll
do some more trail connections between north and south, uh, add some trees, and uh,
bring in some more amenities, uh, like park structures so people can go down there and
enjoy it as a park instead of just as a sports' complex. Sort of a sports' facility. Uh, Iowa
River Corridor Trail, uh, between the Iowa River Power Bridge and Waterworks Park is
this corridor along the river. Uh, we have a REAP grant, or have obtained a REAP grant
to go about a mile up into along the river and do a turn- around and come back. Uh, we're
having some concerns about the cliffs and the ... and the sharpness of the terrain in here to
make that connection. So we may revisit this and come back at some point in time and
see if we can reallocate that REAP money and do another, uh, method into going along
the river with that. We figure that the expense is going to be way much more than what
we can do for the connectivity. So, we may go around into the neighborhood and get into
that, uh, underpass underneath Interstate 80 to Waterworks Park instead of along the
river.
Dobyns/ Could you give a sense of my ... what, I mean, it's a bea ... I understand why it's
expensive, but it's a gorgeous, uh, trail along there. I mean, at what point would you pull
it away from the river? And head up toward those new neighborhoods?
Moran/ At some point when we get a... an accurate, uh, cost estimate and then we come to you
and say we need $3 million and you go (both talking)
Dobyns/ ...trying to get a sense of what the topography is there. Is it (both talking)
Moran/ Yeah, it's ... it's pretty much a sheer cliff to a certain extent. (several talking) So we may
have to go up on top of the cliff, which is another option, but then we fight ADA issues,
uh, for that, as well. So we have a couple of options that we could look at for that.
Markus/ Some of the game trails that run through that area are even pretty sharp declines
(mumbled)
Moran/ Yeah.
Markus/ ... grades in there as well.
Dobyns/ So ADA, so these aren't just bike trails. These are bike /wheelchair /walking trails.
Moran/ Correct.
Dobyns/ Okay.
Moran/ Yeah, yeah.
Markus/ Be taking out a lot of woods I would imagine to get to ... if you (both talking)
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Moran/ That's right. Yeah, if we go up higher instead of stay down low along the river, but we
...we'll look at all the options before we come back and ... and figure out a plan of attack.
Mims/ Mike, how much of that land do we, does the City own?
Moran/ Uh, we don't own it all. That's the other issue that we have. Uh, we own about the mile
that we were going to do the trail up into, and then there's a group of...of developers that
own that, and then we own just a little bit on the other side of I ... interstate 80 where the
trail comes out.
Mims/ Okay. Thanks.
Moran/ So that's another issue that we have to ... we would have to get easements for that.
Mims/ Okay. Thank you.
Moran/ Lower City Park, secondary access road — this has been on the radar for quite a while,
and will happen this year. We'll just take the development from here, come across here,
and then T into Normandy Drive area, which'll give us also a secondary access into the
park. For those of you that have been in there during rain storms and everybody tries to
get out at the same time, it's a mess, plus with the construction of the new Park Road
bridge, this would be nice to have a secondary access in there and utilize that during
construction so it wouldn't be such a bottleneck for that. Normandy Drive restoration
project, this is Phase 2 and the final phase of that, uh, this will also include the
Normandy, or the Ashton House, uh, revival, as well. We're currently awaiting final
approval from the State Historical Society and that's so we can set that out to bid to redo
the Ashton House for public use. So we hope to have that on ... on the rental coffer
sometime this summer. Uh, Phase 2 will include more landscaping, uh, towards the park
area. What we concentrated on during Phase 1 was all the pink along the river and uh,
you'll see the fruits of that labor this, uh, spring when some of the stuff that seeded and
planted'll come back up and be a little bit more colorful. Although it'll still take us about
another year to get that back into good - looking, uh, parkland area, because of the
devastation that we did ... that we did with that.
Payne/ Can we go back to the Lower City Park secondary road access for a second?
Moran/ Uh -huh.
Payne/ I...
Moran/ Maybe ... what's that?
Payne/ I just have a question. I don't even know if you need to go backwards, but I thought that
...that secondary access was only going to be for emergency use.
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Moran/ No it ... it's planned to be a full -time road, or a full -time access into and out of the park,
because of use of a secondary for safety purposes. We had initially talked about just
doing it as a... a temporary road and chained it up, but the more we got to talking about it
with the traffic patterns, and we'll talk at another slide about some other master planning,
uh, we feel the need to use that as a... as a road, road road.
Payne/ So I think the ... if I remember right, the citizens in that area were very concerned about
that. Have we talked to them about ... do they understand that this is going to be a
permanent (both talking)
Moran/ They all are aware of that.
Payne/ Okay!
Moran/ There... there's still a few people that are a little disappointed about that. I think the
biggest thing for them and the ones that had the greatest was ... concern is they didn't
want the street to go straight into Normandy and become a speedway. So what we'll do it
we'll T into that road so you have to make either a right turn or a left turn and it won't
create that effect through there, but they're well aware that ... that's our intent.
Payne/ Okay. Thanks!
Moran/ Sand Prairie enhancement is ... is a park that we've had quite a ... awhile. We haven't
ever been able to do anything about. It's off of, um ... Napoleon Park right ... right across
from the softball fields. A little chunk of land next to the ... the new development that's
going along there. We want to put a little trail up in there so people can get back in there
and enjoy it, and then a little parking area off of Napoleon, or off of Gilbert Street, uh,
with that and that's a FYI project. Fairmeadows Park restroom and splash pad (both
talking)
Dickens/ ...off Gilbert Street? Napoleon Park (several talking)
Moran/ Right across the street from Napoleon Park softball (several talking)
Dobyns/ Okay.
Moran/ And the Public Works facility. Fairmeadows Park restroom and splash pad is a CDBG
funding, uh, mechanism that was earmarked for the Chadek property about a year and a
half ago. When that fell through we took it and ... and reappropriated it for this. Uh, will
add a restroom facility to that park as well. It's right next to Grant Wood School. And...
that'll ... that is currently out to bid right now. Uh, we'll take bids in two weeks and
that'll be under construction. We have to have the ... the money spent by May 1St, so it'll
be an operation this summer. Uh, this is what we alluded to earlier, and Jim, I think you
talked about this a little bit yesterday. Uh, we, uh, since North Market Square had taken
off so well in the neighborhood, uh, we've decided to take master park plan money and
construction and... and pick out parks and go a park at a time to the ones that great...
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greatly need it, uh, our Master Plan was done in 2008 and it...it signified a need of...of
west side, uh, parks, so what we're going to look at is we're going to look at, uh, the
parks on the west side that need, uh, it the worst, and Willow Creek we're going to
address separately under a CIP, but we have, uh, Benton Hill Park, we have Hunter's Run
Park, and we have Villa Park on the west side, so the Parks and Recreation
Commission'll have a discussion at their Wednesday meeting about which park they
think would have the greatest need for that. Uh, there's currently some, uh, development
proposals for Benton Hill that could change the outcome and the outlook of that, and we
could obtain a little bit more land in that. So that may be one that we'll want to take a
look at first, but we've also got Hunter's Run which is across Interstate, or Highway 218,
and then Villa Park, which is a ... it's a six -acre park, but it's relatively unknown, just
down from Fire Station #2, uh, on the west side. So, uh, we've got some options to spend
some money on that and we ... we'll let the Commission weigh in on that, then we'll go
through the process just like we did with North Market Square to fund that.
Hayek/ Do you anticipate, uh, what percentage of that budget allocation is for planning versus
actual facilities or construction?
Moran/ My guess is just off the top of my head it's going to be an 85/15 split. 85% of the
funding'll be construction, 15 %'11 be master planning. Cause there... they're fairly small
areas, so I don't imagine that that'll cost us a lot of money to have that service done.
Dobyns/ Mike, when you talk about, and Jim, you brought this up the other day, but ... I mean,
you can imagine how many times I go past the Benton Street Park where I live, and I
never see anybody in that park. I can't imagine running across the Benton Street hill
road, um, so I'm not surprised and I ... I hope the Park and Rec, uh, board talks about
access issues, because I mean it's beautiful territory. It's a wonderful park! But access is
just horrible there! Um (mumbled) talked about this in the past, but I just (both talking)
Moran/ Well Miller Avenue, uh, if we were to obtain some of the land down along Miller
Avenue behind the park that would greatly enhance the access to that because that would
be a lot safer entrance to that, and now that Roosevelt School's closed, you're right.
There's hardly anybody that uses that park, because those were our greatest users were
the kids that went to school there. Uh, pedestrian bridge, Rocky Shore Drive to Peninsula
has remained the Commission's, one of their top two priorities for the last two or three
years is an expensive priority and ... and in the CIP group we've decided that it...it can be
done only if we get outside funding so we're trying to get some outside funding source
for it so that we can combine this. This is an outsourced project, but we just have to
make sure that the funding's in place for it and it's an expensive piece. So, we're going
to keep applying for grants and things, uh, help bring that cost down, plus it also accesses
us another way to get into the Peninsula.
Throgmorton/ Let me pick up on that briefly, Mike, uh ... uh ... I ... I occasionally drive up through
the Peninsula and I was just wondering if it might be possible to get an update from, uh,
probably Planning and Development about that particular, uh, project that, uh, and how
things are going out there. I don't mean right now! Don't give us an update right now,
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but at...at some point in the next ... many weeks, uh, because it's obvious it's really
beginning to blossom.
Moran/ Okay, we can do that. Uh, inter -city bike trails is ... is a fund that we share with, uh,
MPO and it goes to ... to get crosswalks. It goes for signage for bike trails and for trails
we maintain and care, and it's an every year allotment that we utilize for that. Uh, the
sharettes that you, uh, you've been involved with, uh, have shown the need for, um,
mapping and for signage and that's what we're going to try to, uh, concentrate on. Uh,
City Park Master Plan, a pool upgrade. Um, the ADA has come out with a new set of
regulations for, uh, pools, particularly, and in order to become, uh, compliant with that,
uh, the wading pool portion of City Park down here in the corner is ... will be non -ADA
accessible, and we're going to have to do something different with that, and most of it has
to do with zero -depth entry and not raising and not having lips around the pool and stuff.
So I think the ... the plan that we're going to propose to the public this summer and then
gather feedback from `em all summer before we do anything, is to take just the wading
pool portion out of this and, uh, put a splash pad in or a ... a minor splash pad component,
not as big as the ones we have at Wetherby, uh, and Fairmeadows, and then it also shows
some additional areas in the back, uh, to the south of the pool and bumping the fence
lines out a little bit to include some grass areas and just make the ... the area a little bit
better to handle larger crowds so we don't have kids stuck on concrete or burning their
feet and all that and ... and getting' em spread out a little bit with that. So what we're
going to do is propose this and show models to it when people go to the pool this summer
and then have a community meeting and get some feedback from `em and then we'll
progress with the design process sometime in August or September after the season is
over. The ... the other part of this is a City Park Master Plan, uh, we felt that we needed to
take a look at that because of all the change going on and including the Normandy Drive
area, into City Park, which really is what it is, an extension of City Park, and then take a
look at redesigning, uh, anything that might be needed for like Shakespeare Theater
traffic. If we have to change anything for that, and really take a look at some of the ways
we can upgrade that facility with our park shelters, as they become aged and we have to
take those down and ... and put those back up.
Dobyns/ Mike, can you comment on adding (mumbled) like, um, like ... adding like almost
amusement -type things like slides and stuff. I mean, it looks nice but does it really
increase access and utilization to pools?
Moran/ Uh, in ... in this facility I don't believe so, because this facility is so well loved by the
community the way it is. We got enough grief when we put a roof on the bathing house
back in 1986. That was...
Hayek/ I remember that!
Moran/ ...big enough change for `em that they thought that was terrible, but uh, really if...if we
added amenities to it, I think it would take away the ambiance of the pool itself that's
been that way for a long time, plus, uh, it would increase our fees! Uh, we would have to
charge more, uh, because of...of what we put in for that to recover some of our costs. So
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at this point in time there's enough of those around the Johnson County, Washington
County, Linn County area that I think we've got something on our own that ... that we can
hang our hat on and people still attend.
Champion/ This was discussed several years ago by several different (mumbled) and the outcry
from the community was outrageous, and I think you're gonna have a lot of trouble
getting' rid of that baby pool too (laughs)
Moran/ I'm ... I'm a little afraid of that, and ... and actually the wading pool was put in during the
remodeling of 1986 because there never was a wading pool (both talking)
Champion/ ...little splash pad. It really was a little splash pad.
Moran/ So we're going back to the old design and we're going to have to dig up pictures of that
so people can see that we're really bringing it back to the way it was.
Champion/ (both talking) ...it was outside (both talking)
Hayek/ Well there wasn't a ... probably ADA compliant, I don't know, bird bath across the road
that I had to staff when I was a part-time, uh, highly exploited 14- year -old, uh, less than
$2.00 an hour, part-time employee of the City (laughter) basket checker down there.
Dickens/ Over paid!
Hayek/ Yeah, over paid! (several talking and laughing) All those high schoolers in their
swimming suits! It was okay! Uh, but uh ... I think, uh, I think that concrete, uh,
surround, especially to the south, is ... is aged and I ... I think that holds a lot of promise to
make it a more attractive anyway, just expanding it out.
Moran/ Yeah. We think those amenities will off -set the ... the loss of the wading pool, and it
really won't be a loss. It'll just be an expansion of...of a different sort of wading pool for
the little ones.
Hayek/ My mom's always thought that the, uh, the covering of the, you know, cause it used to be
open -air changing. She thought that was so sanitary, cause the sun would just kill all the
germs in there and (laughter)
Moran/ I ... I'm telling you, that ... that was a painful process in 86 when we put a roof on it!
(laughs) Uh, this is another, uh, Park Master Plan, Willow Creek, uh, we have to take
care of Willow Creek and Kiwanis Park, or Willow Creek Park and Kiwanis Park and
merge those together. We're having, uh, trail issues in there and uh, somewhat of stream -
bank issues where we have to go in and rip -raft that and stabilize that a little bit more.
And splash pads are the ... are the latest and greatest thing that everybody seems to want
to do. So we'll run this neighborhood through that process that we always do when we
do neighborhood park planning and see if they ... if they want to tackle this type of...of
event in their park. But Willow Creek and Kiwanis Park together is a big enough park
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that it could certainly warrant something like that, and I think it would be very popular, as
a neighborhood entity.
Hayek/ Can ... can I ask one other question on City Park, and I think we've talked about it in
years past. The old ... you know, the old cabins, the old (both talking)
Moran/ Log cabins?
Hayek/ Yeah... they're... they're boarded up and patched over.
Moran/ We're currently underway with a fundraising effort to restore those. We have a bid in
place and then we do have some capital, uh, outlay money in our budget to take care of
that. So we're hopeful that this summer we can get those rebuilt and restored. It's about
a $100,000 project.
Dobyns/ Mike, the, uh, there's some creek erosion at the (mumbled) Kiwanis Park and Willow
Creek (both talking)
Moran/ Right.
Dobyns/ ...on the west side. Is that pretty much done or is there ... looks like there's (mumbled)
Moran/ No, it ... it's going to continue on. We're going to have to do something about it. We
haven't had much this summer because of the low water levels, so we sort of just are at
a... at an impasse where we haven't done anything with it, but we have to address it
before the water levels (both talking)
Dobyns/ ...not in this year's budget (mumbled)
Moran/ No, that's correct.
Fosse/ Uh, the Library public space remodeling project is ... is actually bid and awarded. So it
ended up in this slide show inadvertently, but since it's here I'll tell you a little bit about
it. Uh, Phase 1 is complete. Uh, Phase 2 includes, uh, teen activity space, as well as
replacement of worn items in the children's area, and then improvements to the
Information Desk on the second floor. So you can expect that this ... uh, to progress this
year.
Moran/ And then the last one that we've got is Recreation Center Phase 2 improvements. Phase
1 is some of the improvements that you've seen going on now in the east entrance is ... is
currently going on. Uh, the building will celebrate its 50t' anniversary next year, and so
we need to get into a new fresh face and do some remodeling. So we're going to remodel
some fitness equipment and, uh, or fitness room areas and customer service areas, to
bring it up so it... it has a fresh appearance to it.
Fosse / Any questions for Mike before we move on to Public Safety?
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Champion/ I have a question and it's not a very good one. But have you talked about maybe
changing the big room where the pool tables are — I haven't been in it for a while —
because I get a lot of complaints that people, they don't like walking through that room to
get to the pool because there's a lot of riff -raff, quote, in there and I'm (mumbled)
commission talked anyway about how to control that situation?
Moran/ Part of the Phase 2 improvements right here is to take those out and to put a fitness room
in there.
Champion/ Perfect!
Moran/ And move that out because the fitness room now is way, stuck way back in the corner,
and we need to pull it out and that way it's in front of the glass so people can see you
exercise, and you can overlook the pool area. So with this plan, that'll all go away, and
then the fitness area will expand into that.
Champion/ I think you did mention that the other day. (mumbled)
Throgmorton/ Where will the ping -pong tables and uh, the ... the pool tables go?
Moran/ Uh, we're going to reorganize the upstairs social hall a little bit and the old pool
ba ... pool balcony area, and we'll reconfigure that area up there and put `em up there.
Fosse / Anything else for Mike? Well let's turn it over to Andy then!
Public Safety:
Rocca/ Thanks, Rick. Good afternoon! Uh, couple projects that you're generally familiar with,
with fire apparatus replacement. Uh, we've got an apparatus replacement schedule that
over the years has been changed a little bit. Years ago we ran our fire pumpers and
aerials, uh, 10 years front line, 10 years reserve, and found that they were getting
virtually worn out by the time they went into reserve status. So we did change the
schedule to go seven years front line, 7 years reserve, and we've been working with Tom
to re- evaluate that schedule to make sure we're maximizing the life of...of performance
for fire apparatus. So we should have a, uh, a recommendation to Tom here in the next
30 or 60 days on that. The next one has to do with our air system replacement. This
would be all the self - contained breathing apparatus that firefighters use in, uh, structural
firefighting conditions. Um, as well as an air compressor and a cascade system that
stores that air so we can refill those. We're under a United States Department of
Transportation mandate to replace the cylinders and the, uh, systems, the SCVA systems
themselves, are 15 years old. So they are getting close to the end of their life cycle, as
well. Any questions for me? Thank you.
Fosse/ (several talking and laughing) Our next project is the Animal Shelter. This is a $3
million project. It ... it's multi jurisdictional. Of course you spent a lot of time talking
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about that in the last few months. Uh, we're pretty well through the programming
component of the design, and what has emerged is ... is the structure that's a little bit
under 9,000 square feet, and it's designed to grow in four directions. It can go out there,
there, off to the west, and also to the, uh, the south, on ... on this spot here. The ... um, we
recently received from the ... from the, from FEMA two things. One is, uh, approval, a
status as an improved project from what it was before, and then also we've got a schedule
extension that ... that will work with us on this. Uh, the ... the projected completion date is
May of 2015. The next thing that you will see as a Council will be the design contract
will be coming forward, and that'll take that through design development through the...
through the construction phase. Any questions there before we move on to economic
development?
Payne/ So when will construction start? This ... this year? 2013?
Fosse/ Kumi, do you know the answer to that? (unable to hear response; away from mic)
Hayek/ Yeah, we probably need ya...
Fosse/ Come on up, Kumi!
Hayek/ ...on the ... on the record. Thanks!
Morris/ We have the FEMA reviews already approved in terms of where we're at at this point.
We will be going through one more process of review once we ... before we, uh, we take it
out to bid, where they'll be taking a look at the final design, but um, at this point that
should go fairly quickly. We're looking at, um, once we sign the contract with Neumann
Munson, we're looking about a six to eight -month design period and then we'll take that
out to bid at that point.
Hayek/ And the...
Mims/ So potentially break ground next ... late summer? Early fall?
Morris/ Um, we're ... what we're talking about right now depending on the FEMA review
(mumbled) final design, we're looking at, um, hopefully taking this out to bid, um, we're
expecting probably October, November, and maybe looking at (both talking)
Mims/ So maybe not spring. Okay. Thanks.
Hayek/ And the original cost estimate was more like $4 million and now... this... this budget
shows ... a $3 million. Do I ... are those numbers right?
Morris/ That's correct. It's a $3 million cap total for project costs. Not construction. So you'll
see a less, uh, amount for the construction costs.
Hayek/ Oh, cause the $3 million's all inclusive.
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Morris/ That's correct.
Hayek/ Okay. Thanks.
Champion/ Does that ... does that $3 million consider the contribution ... does that include the
contribution from the Friends of the Animal Shelter? Okay, it does!
Fosse/ Well let's move on to economic development, and Jeff!
Economic Development:
Davidson/ We have some economic development projects that are focused on our principle, uh,
redevelopment areas. First is Riverfront Crossings. And you can see there's a
combination of TIF funds and GO bond funds. GO bond funds the $200,000 level for the
next four years, and the intent here is to be able to provide some public catalyst
improvements, uh, and also assistance to private development projects. Uh, one of the
things we want to focus on for Riverfront Crossings in the next year is getting underway
with the park planning process. I mean we all know we have to get the new south waste
water treatment plant built and then get the, uh, old north plant out of there, but we ... we
do feel like it's important, and we've had developers tell us that ... that proceeding with
the master planning for the park sends a huge message to them in terms of what they will
do with the property that will surround what's now a sewage treatment plant but will be a
beautiful park when we get done. So we'll start that process. It'll be a consultant -
assisted process but we hope to make it a community process too and have, uh, a lot of
good ideas brought forth in that, uh, process, and then as I mentioned, we'll just continue
to, um, you know, we ... we have taken some of this funding and used it for the National
Development Council and to various, uh, entities that assist us with the ... but basically
all ... all focused on, uh, trying to increase the tax base, um, in this area through
redevelopment. Uh, Towncrest then, similarly — slightly different scale — but similarly,
and a little farther along, you know, we have the two projects now — the ... the new office
building, which has morphed into two office buildings now, uh, same square footage but
two office buildings, and then the senior housing project, uh, incidentally I'll let you
know that we have ... we have a second senior housing developer that's interested in the
property, if the tax credits don't come through for the Three Diamond project, so uh,
we're feeling good about that, and again, we want to continue to be able to do things in
the public realm, uh, the streetscape in particular in ... in Towncrest since it's, that's pretty
much what it would consist of in Towncrest, but do things in the public realm, uh, that
will both complement and incent private development, and we really think that the two
projects along Williams Street, once those are underway, are going to send a message to
other ... other people in the area of... that ... that there are some good things happening in
Towncrest. We have a lot of interest right now in the Kerr McGee site and that's another
one where there could be a public - private, uh, partnership involved, hopefully. Um,
Burlington Street dam then is ... is then one that we've pulled out separately, um, because
it's a substantial project, uh, you've approved the white water, uh, the white water
project, uh, the ... the design of that. This will ... this is one that will coordinate with some
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additional, uh, riverbank stabilization efforts on ... on, both up and down the river, uh, but
the ... the river ... the river bank stabilization efforts for this portion of the corridor will be
through that project that we did mention, uh, and also of course have a lot of significance
in terms of access to, and you know, basically making the river more accessible in this
area when the white water course gets established. Any questions about any economic
development projects?
Fosse/ Okay. Next we're going to move ... oops, this thing's going backwards! Second here...
we're going to move into a section of miscellaneous other projects and we'll lead off
with, uh, City Hall and other projects. Mike, you want to come back up?
Miscellaneous Other Projects:
Moran/ This is sort of a catch -all for projects that we need to do for City Hall. The most pressing
projects that we have is replace the HVAC systems and the air conditioning, uh, systems
on the building. Uh, so we're going to initiate that process and get that done, and then we
really just sort of keep this money in flux in case things come up, and don't identify
projects, so it's sort of an account that we can go to when we know we have to make
changes, remodeling, and stuff like that. So ... it's a small amount but, uh, they're big
projects for the comfort of a lot of people that are in the building, so...
Fosse/ Our next project is the ERP software.
O'Malley/ Good afternoon, Mayor and Council. This, uh, drawing up there, a schematic, is uh,
of the modules of our new software system. This, uh, is replacing... the reason we're
doing this is to replace our old antiquated system and also provide a ... an enhanced access
for the public and employees. Pretty much what you see in the center, that center's
sphere is how you'll be looking at those modules. Um ... first module, financial
management, will be ... includes accounting, purchasing, budgeting software, and a doc
...and a document management system. The HR, payroll sphere represents streamlining
employee recruitment, tracking employee development, and assisting in employee, uh,
performance management. The next sphere, employee self - service, would be a way for,
uh, the employees to have access 24/7 to changes in their schedules, some of their, uh,
compensation, and uh, any changes in their dependent status. The next sphere, utility
management, is uh, replacing a utility billing system. The 2,500 customers we have,
providing them opportunities to interact with us, uh, from their home. It also enhanced
the work order system, uh, with our water plant. Uh, the next sphere, the citizens' self -
service, is all about, uh, access, getting, uh, people to see what's going on in City
government, uh, information as a byproduct. This is considered the information age. It
started with the digital revolution in the 1970s and I was always under the impression that
information has value, only if it's timely and relevant, and the last few years I think
access is the, uh, higher need. I think that's what the internet has done, and it's also
empowering our citizens. Uh, the last sphere, government reporting, is more or less our
internal reporting that we have to provide, uh, to follow the governmental accounting
standards boards, uh, 58 statements that we have to comply on financial reporting. Any
questions about this?
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Mims/ Yeah, Kevin, where's the money coming from for all this, cause as I look at the report,
it's only showing about $20,000 in terms of, uh, receipts and about, almost a $1.3 million
cost.
O'Malley/ Yes, um...
Mims/ Some of it's already done but still it's not shown.
O'Malley/ Uh, yes. This is a two -year project. Some of it ... what this report shows is only fiscal
14 and beyond. In fiscal 13 we have about another half a million in utility revenues
that'll be helping support this project. Uh, I'm hoping that this will come in under
budget, but information technology projects usually end up costing 20% more in time and
dollars.
Mims/ There's still about $300,000 that's in 15...14, 15, and 16. It's not showing (both talking)
I'm just curious, is that GO or...
O'Malley/ That is a ... yes, it'll probably end up being, uh, a combination of GO and utility
billing. Those additional dollars as part of our ... current software system. That's an
employee, those costs are, and that employee is with, uh, we have, uh, what they call
permanent temporary employees. When the project's over, they're over. And we have,
uh, two in the Finance Department and five in Public Works.
Mims/ Okay. Okay, thank you.
Payne/ In our meeting we had on Saturday, you probably talked about this but I just didn't pick
up on it. There must be maintenance fees on this software?
O'Malley/ Yes, there'll be annual software fees. What has happened, um, Michelle, is that the
three of the four programmers have retired that have written this program. Uh, we
haven't been, uh, replacing them. So those funds, the software funds, are going to be
about 20% a year, so we're looking at about a $200,000 a year, roughly in that range,
support costs.
Payne /And about how many years before you have to do an upgrade?
O'Malley/ Uh...
Payne/ Four or five?
O'Malley/ ...let's see ... (several talking) Software's always changing and ... you always have a
service pack once a year but, uh, hopefully, um, the ... the software ... I can't really answer
that question. Hopefully the ... this is new software for us. We've had the convenience,
flexibility of having people on staff write our software. Um, and provide some, a little
bit more control and ... and as I said, flexibility. Using outside, uh, software house, we'lll
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have to do it the `market' plays out. Fortunately Tyler is a very large, uh, sys ... uh, cust
...uh, let's see — provider. They are actually, uh, traded on New York Stock Exchange so
we have a very large base and a very good user community so...
Markus/ But, Kevin, updates are typically provided as a part of the arrangement.
O'Malley/ Yes. They're usually part of the annual service arra ... uh, service maintenance
contract.
Payne/ Like a service pack upgrade would be, but you know, if you're on version, let's say
you're Version 5.0, and they come out with version, I mean ... 10. By the time we get to
Version 10 are we going to upgrade to Version 10 or you going to do it every time they
do an upgrade or...
O'Malley/ From... Michelle, from my understanding that ... that 15 to 20% maintenance fee
includes both the service packs and every year they have an annual enhancement that
they ... that comes along. Now a total rewrite might be a different story, and from my
understanding, this company has probably... they've been buying up a lot of good
products. I think in their, uh, their warehouse of software products, it's probably to the
tune of about 30 and they do police, fire, all ... all public sector. County, courthouses,
um ... schools, and hospitals. So they have quite an array of services and ... and customer
base.
Markus/ The ... the other thing too is usually they have user groups that meet on a regular basis...
O'Malley / Annually.
Markus/ ...talk about problems they're running into. That results in corrections, and then those
corrections get passed on to the users as well.
O'Malley/ That's correct.
Fosse/ Well we're going to continue the software theme for our next two projects. The ... the first
one is the GIS and Ron.
Knoche/ The 94716 is the geographic information system software, uh, $650,000 project, uh,
being paid for with GO bonds. Uh, in the schedule, it's in FYI 5. Um, in 2001 we did a
GIS -needs assessment and uh, there was some priorities that were established at that
point in time. Um, some of those priorities have been, um, been worked on, uh, but we
still don't have an overall GIS platform here within City Hall. Um, what this project'll
do is ... is go back, reassess those priorities, uh, using internal, um, City GIS staff, uh,
committee, and ... and then going out and potentially using, uh, an outside consultant to
help us, um, get that framework put together and ... and develop the project.
Payne/ If you haven't picked software yet, you're going to go out for... (both talking)
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Knoche/ Uh, we ... in-house currently we do have, um, Esory Products, um, so we'll probably be
building off the Esory platform.
Dickens/ Doesn't the County already have this... somewhat a system like this?
Knoche/ They do, and ... and they use the Esory platform also. So it helps with the, uh, inter-
opera ... inner-operability between the two.
Fosse/ So we don't plan to duplicate anything that the County's already doing. We want to
build, uh, a system that ... that can utilize that. We already share data and will continue to
do so. One of the things that's been an obstacle for this for us over the years has not been
the start-up costs, but the cost to maintain the data once it's in place. And we ... we don't
want to, uh, go through the start-up costs if we can't maintain that data, cause that simply
would not be a good investment of money. So that's why this one is, uh, has been out
there for a while for us. (both talking)
Hayek/ As ... as I recall on this GIS, I mean, it's been... we've... we've had it on the budget or at
least in out years and talked about it in prior, uh, prior years. The ... the $650 number
seems lower than earlier estimates? I don't know if that's right. I thought it was closer to
like a million or a million two or ... that, or maybe 900 is the number sticking in my head
from a couple years ago.
Fosse / Right. Uh, two things. One is the, as time goes by the, it gets less expensive, and
secondly, this is ... is not as much data conversion as was envisioned in those ... those
earlier, uh, estimates.
Hayek/ Okay.
Fosse/ They just took everything we had and digitized it.
Hayek /So this is a ... a scaled, a more scaled back approach.
Fosse/ Correct! Yep. Well, Project Dox is our next piece of software and uh, Doug Boothroy
from Housing is here for that.
Boothroy/ This is the piece that I talked about that we've already started, um ... in the process of
rolling out in February. Uh, we'll be getting all of our documents for building, uh, plans,
as well as major site plans, uh, submitted electronically. Uh, what this slide is is a
placeholder for next year because we will be expanding the number of documents and
types of documents that we bring in — subdivisions, rezoning, uh, it'll allow for, uh, just
about any kind of a document that you can think of to be, uh, brought into the process
where it can be, uh ... put into a workflow where everybody can review it at the same
time. Uh, this system, uh, has automatic notifications, uh, that can be sent to developers,
as well as staff, uh, to ... so that they can find out the status of a project at any one time. It
is digital. Uh, it is ... we were talking about Esory, but it is Esory compatible. Uh, laser
fiche compatible, uh, and A ... uh, should improve our operations as well as we'll be
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paperless so we won't have that process by where we mishandle pro ... uh, paper, lose it,
uh, have to convert it back to a digital format. Um ... any questions about this?
Dobyns/ So this'll give us the opportunity for our Information Packets being even longer?
(laughter)
Boothroy/ Longer! (laughter) I hope not. I ... it, uh, what it ... what it really does is ... is for the
city in general though is we'll all share the same electronic file. So that we don't have
seven different filing systems and seven different departments where documents may not
all be the same and information may not all be the same, and as far as, from your
perspective, I'm not sure you'll see any difference, but the subdivision plats will come in
electronically instead of being, you know, uh .... uh, changed, uh, at some point from
paper to electronic, back to paper again and whatever.
Dobyns/ I assume there are some statutory requirements as far as what a city has to maintain in
terms of data and information that...
Boothroy/ Right, and they...
Dobyns/ (mumbled) does that help with this?
Boothroy/ Well the ... yeah, I would think in terms of storage if that's what you're asking. It'll be
in a digital format so we'll ... we won't have to store it as a ... in a paper. I think it will
help other areas, uh, and I, you know, the City Clerk's office will be involved in the
second phase where, uh, it'll auto...it...it won't ever come in in a paper form where they
have to stamp it. It'll be stamped electronically when it comes through the door so it'll
already be in that format and ... and uh, I would think easier for them to ... to move around.
When they, when it comes time to get it out to the Council or to wherever they...
wherever it ends up.
Fosse / Any more questions for Doug? Well let's move into our final category. We're in the
home stretch here, and this is the section we call on- the - radar. These are projects...
Payne/ Are we still in the 120 minutes?
On- the -Radar Projects:
Fosse/ We are...
Dickens/ Got seven minutes!
Fosse/ Yeah, I got seven minutes to go, so we're going to pick up the pace a little bit here!
(laughter) Uh, these are projects that are not recommended for funding. Uh, the ...they,
but we have a select list from our unfunded projects that we want to have in front of you
for one reason or another, because they might become active, uh, during the next year or
two. And we'll lead off with the No Name Road storm sewer project, and No Name
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Road is ... is this piece that goes between Taft Speedway and Foster Road. What'd that
used to be called, Jeff?
Davidson/ (mumbled)
Fosse/ Cambria Court, I believe. Uh, in any event, this is a spin -off from the Taft Speedway
levee project, and we're doing preliminary design. We'll be doing that shortly on that.
There are about 68 acres of drainage that cross under Foster Road here, make their way
through the Idyllwild subdivision to the pond, and then out to the river. Uh, what this
project will examine is the ability to route that along the west side of the subdivision, and
directly to the river, to reduce the vulnerability of this area from locally heavy rains. It's
not going to help from... from flood waters from the Iowa River, but it will reduce risks
from locally heavy rains. Maybe back to you later in the year, after we get through the
preliminary design on that.
Dobyns/ Rick, before you move on, how big a rain would we have to have, single episode
rainfall, in a 24, 48 -hour period that would currently overwhelm that area and create
significant flooding?
Fosse/ The, um, the number of inches I can't tell you off the top of my head, but I can tell you
that the ... the pipes through the subdivision here are designed for a five -year return
frequency storm and then there's an overland route that's supposed to take that, between
the five -year and the 100 -year, uh, to get that through there. Uh, but if you go out and
look at that, that overland route is not very well defined through there.
Dobyns/ I'm sorry. I didn't understand what you just said.
Fosse/ Oh, okay! (laughter) The...
Payne/ ...layman's terms (several talking and laughing)
Fosse/ ...okay, the...storm sewers are designed so that...
Hayek/ Just a doctor!
Fosse/ ...part of it goes through the pipes and another part flows over the top of the ground. So
the pipes are designed to carry the flow up to a five -year storm. So you can expect that
the water will flow over the ground at least once every five years, on the average. And
then that ... that route where it flows over the surface is designed to carry up to a 100 -year
event.
Dobyns/ You're talking about a rainfall. So in other words there's a 50% chance in the next five
years that we will have a rainfall that will overwhelm the current system?
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Fosse/ That'll go ... that'll be more than the pipe will carry, and then it'll go over the ground. But
it...it shouldn't do damage to any of the structures until you get into a ... a larger (both
talking)
Markus/ ...talking to him about is the improved project, right?
Fosse/ No, I'm sorry, I was describing the existing (several talking)
Dobyns/ The current project.
Fosse/ Current, yeah, yeah! So what the improved project would do is ... is low flows you'd want
to keep going through here to keep fresh water in this pond. It's those excess flows from
the large events that you'd want to be able to pipe directly out to the river. So you don't
get those surface flows through the subdivision. That flow over the top of the ground.
Dobyns/ Okay. I just wanted to be clear on this FY14 budget. We don't have any added
infrastructure to the ... to this neighborhood.
Fosse/ That is correct.
Dobyns/ The Idyllwild neighborhood... for this fiscal year.
Dickens/ The flow would go through the Elks property then.
Fosse/ Elks are in a pipe underneath of No Name Road there. I think I burned up almost my
seven minutes on that one. (laughter) I'll, uh, I'll keep going here. The, uh, the next one
is another spin -off from the Taft Speedway project and that is secondary access to the
Peninsula neighborhood, as well as Mackinaw Village. Uh, currently Foster Road is the
only means of access and we, uh, examined the ... the vulnerability of that during the
flood of 2008, and then, uh, on New Year's day if you had a chance to see First Avenue,
you saw the vulnerability from water main breaks and ... and what that can do. Uh, so
what we're looking at are a couple options here and ... and in my mind the front runner is
developing some sort of northerly route that would make a connection up Laura Drive,
across, and tie into the Mackinaw Village area ... over in here, so that you've got dual
means of access to that point. Next project is the demolition of the north waste water
treatment project. This of course is a prerequisite for the, uh, Riverfront Crossings
redevelopment area, and the prerequisite for this is completing the south waste water
plant. So uh, come 2015 we'll be in a position that we can demolish the north plant, uh,
the trick is we need to find the money to do that. Currently that's estimated at about $6
million, just because of the mass of what's out there. Susan, were you going to ask
something?
Mims/ I ... I was going to ask you the estimate of... demolition.
Fosse/ Yes, and that estimate also includes some money to preserve the ... the administration
building, uh, for some flood resilient use that would go in there. So that ... that costs a
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little more to do that. If you want to go with a less expensive option, we can demo that
building, as well.
Champion/ And why do you want to keep it?
Fosse/ Oh ... Jeff, do you want to address that?
Davidson/ Which building, the ... admin, the old admin building? There's actually interest from a
local arts organization that we've been working with about...
Champion/ It's a nice looking building.
Davidson/ ...turning that ... yeah, from the exterior. In ... inside it's a little more utilitarian, but...
but uh, it's something that, you know, we think ... we'll have to evaluate it further, but in
terms of this arts group, might be very suitable for ... for kind of an artist colony type
space. We'll ... we'll hope to develop that further during our park planning.
Hayek/ So in terms of developing that riverfront park amenity, uh, we're looking at, I mean,
soonest would be 2016 I suppose? Is that ... I mean, if this isn't...
Champion/ 2015!
Davidson/ Well obviously we have to wait for the new plant to go online (several responding)
before this one can be de- commissioned. Right.
Hayek/ Right, but the park goes on this site.
Davidson/ Yes.
Hayek/ Yeah, so ... when we're answering questions, we're talk... we're... we're probably looking
at four years or more before that...
Fosse/ Yes. Best case we could do a project to demo the old plant and start work on the parkland
together in 2015.
Hayek/ 20... okay.
Davidson/ And the other thing that helps us a little bit, Matt, is and ... and Mike's demonstrated
this with Trueblood Recreation Area, is that parks lend themselves to being broken into
pieces and implemented over a period of time so that you can afford to do it, basically.
Hayek/ Right.
Fosse/ Okay. Next project is the fire training facility and this is another prerequisite for the, uh,
Riverfront Crossings.
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Rocca/ And it's one we've had before you, uh, I guess for a few years now. Our timetables
always been three to five years to look for a suitable area to relocate or redevelop within
this area. We've done some preliminary site investigation. We've got a ... a list, albeit a
very general list at this point, of preferred sites, but um, we're still working with that
three to five year timeframe before we have to either relocate or ... or I guess ... leave this
building, this facility.
Hayek/ Is that in ... is that a, uh, a project where there could be collaboration ... um, I don't know
what regional, what other training facilities there are in the region.
Rocca/ You know we've attempted that and to a degree there has been some collaboration, but
the tricky point is, is keeping your fire crews in service in training. Uh, Coralville has a
training center. We articulate with Kirkwood Community College and the Fire Service
Training Bureau, but again, to keep our firefighters in our jurisdiction to train, it's
difficult to send our firefighters to the Coralville facility and, you know, we have done
that on some limited basis, but routinely we use this with on -duty personnel.
Hayek/ Oh.
Dobyns/ Is that because of availability? (mumbled) ...Coralville's and...
Rocca/ No, it's more about providing service to our citizens when the need arises. Our ... our
firefighters will do in- service training. They can do it at the current location. They're
reasonably close to their fire jurisdictions or districts, and so they can provide that timely
response, as opposed to having units out in Coralville.
Payne/ So they're doing it while they're work, that 24 -hours on.
Rocca/ That's correct. In- service training (both talking)
Dobyns/ Oh, okay!
Hayek/ Okay, thanks!
Davidson/ The Rock Island Railroad Depot, excuse me (clears throat) Obviously we are, uh, you
know, this ... this upcoming year will be a critical one, in terms of the Amtrak service
extension proposal. Uh, we think we've made a lot of...of headway. Geoff Fruin and
Braden... Brad Newman are kind of coordinating efforts along with, uh, Rebecca and the
Chamber of Commerce. Uh, but this'll be a critical year and we should have a much
better idea of when the, uh, acquisition of the depot and conversion of what we think will
be a portion of it, uh, for the, uh, handicap accessibility depot, uh, will need to take place,
but certainly a ... appropriate on- the -radar project.
Fosse/ couple of large -scale transportation projects wanted to keep in front of you, uh, one is
related to Highway 1, uh, currently we have reconstructed it in to where it intersects with
Governor Street. The next project would go from that intersection down to Burlington
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Street, and we recently overlaid that with asphalt. This project, the DOT is anticipating
about time that that asphalt overlay wears out that they would look to reconstruct this
portion of Highway 1. It would certainly be to a smaller scale than what we have going
further out. Uh, but where we look forward to that project is we have a variety of storm
sewer problems along this corridor that currently do not have a solution because we can't
get that water down to Ralston Creek, and this would create an opportunity where we
could build a storm sewer along this route and solve some of those other problems while
we're in the area.
Mims/ (noise on mic) ...talk about the reconstruction, you're talking just about the, not design at
all but just the ... the street is worn out and having to redo the street itself as it exists now?
Primarily?
Fosse/ Yes!
Mims/ Okay.
Fosse/ Now they would ... they would want to bring components of it up to current design
standards, but I ... I don't anticipate four lanes or anything like that.
Mims/ No, it's awfully tight as it is. So, okay. Thanks.
Fosse/ The other big project that ... that's out there is Taft Avenue that goes from 420th Street up
to Herbert Hoover Highway. That's... that's a very large project. I'm trying to ... the
estimate is $17.4 million and ... to put in perspective, taking on a project like this, we go a
mile to the west and look at Scott Boulevard and I'll share with you that Scott Boulevard
was built in a variety of phases. It went from Highway 6 up to American Legion Road in
the 1970s, and then in ... around 1980 it went from American Legion to Court Street, and
then in 1988 it went from Court Street up to ... Rochester, and then in the early 2000s, it
went from Rochester around to Highway 1. So this is unlikely to be a project you'll bite
off and do all at once, uh, but it ... it's our next big northwest arterial that's spaced a mile
out from our last, excuse me, north -south arterial.
Mims/ And in the meantime I assume we're continuing to make sure that we don't, and know
things have come before us, but we don't allow too many ... roads intersecting with this. I
mean, that's one ... been one of our issues, that we want this to be a major arterial for
truckers and not have too many stop signs or...
Davidson/ Yeah, we always ... pay a lot of attention to access control to arterial streets anywhere
we're building new arterial streets, uh, and certainly Taft Avenue, you know, up in the
Windsor Ridge area I think's what you're referring to most recently.
Mims/ Right. But anywhere as we continue to see development.
Fosse/ Yep! And we're also working to put appropriate zoning and buffers along this route as
that develops. If you look at Scott Boulevard, it's got that little blip where it goes out to
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the west. Excuse me, to the east for a little bit and then comes back. That's because it
was abutting existing development there, and they ended up going out and around that.
Dickens/ So if this was put into a project, what areas would be first?
Davidson/ Well, some of that depends, Terry, on where the pressure's going to come from. Uh,
certainly if, you know, we're anticipating and hopeful of some industrial type activity,
uh, you see the large area there that's undeveloped currently to the east of the trailer
parks and south of Windsor Ridge (both talking) uh, you know, we're starting to feel
some... some pressure there. That's within our growth area, in an area that we can pro
...provide utilities to, and then of course the Windsor Ridge area continues to develop,
and there's even getting to be some, uh, pressure in the area around St. Pat's Church. So
you know just depending on where that pressure comes from will determine what gets
done first.
Dickens/ (mumbled) 420th Street all the way out to Taft now.
Davidson/ Pardon me, Terry?
Dickens/ 420th Street's been done now?
Davidson/ Yes. That's, well, it's completed to the industrial park.
Dickens / Right.
Knoche/ It's not all the way to Taft. It's about two properties short. Yep.
Dickens/ I drove out there... Saturday.
Dobyns/ So do we have property acquired for all ... uh, I mean, is that City property all the way...
it ends at 420th Street? And then... it's south to Highway 6.
Davidson/ Yeah, south of there is a level of service B road, right now, out in the county.
Dobyns/ Okay.
Davidson/ Um ... uh, the ... the, in terms of property acquisition, when we have property annexed
and zoned to ... to come from the county into the city, we try and get the right -of -way that
we need for that, but inevitably there will be some property acquisitions required for
reconstruction to city standards.
Fosse/ Okay. Moving on!
Davidson/ Uh, Gilbert, U.S. 6 is a project that was in a funded year and was taken out of a
funded year, and put into unfunded status by City Council about, uh, five or six years
ago. Uh, we want to keep it on your radar. It is... it is the highest total entering volume
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intersection in Iowa City, and there are some capacity difficulties, specifically in the
north - south, um, the north -south approaches. Those would be converted to dual left -turn
lanes with what we propose to do. There is a slight higher than we like to see crash
history at the Waterfront Drive intersection. It's very slow- moving traffic. Again, it's
not high severity crashes at all. It's something we keep an eye on, but that is something
that would be helped. There would likely be a new intersection perhaps signalized, uh, to
the south, uh, to provide access to all the properties in that area. Access in and out more
easily than right now. Right now the ... it is not uncommon at all for that left turning...
northbound to westbound left turn queue to inter... interrupt a number of the intersecting
streets and driveways, and so again, that's something that we would hope to rectify once
this project goes into funded status.
Hayek/ While you're on that part of town, the ... can you just give an update as to the, um, the
resurfacing progress, uh, along Highway 6? Where ... it's started and seems like it's
going well over by Sycamore, but what about the rest of it — what's the plan?
Fosse/ Ron, you want to do this?
Knoche/ The ... the DOT has a project (mumbled) asphalt, uh, for ... going from Lakeside, um, all
the way out to Highway 218. So they're doing both Highway 1 and Highway 6, along
that whole southern part of Iowa City, and that'll be done this summer. (several talking)
Fosse/ Two great things that have come out of that project. The most important is, it's going to
be a much quieter corridor because that ... that existing pavement's in poor condition. It's
very noisy and then also the shoulders are going to be paved and that's going to clean up
the appearance of that, as well. It's too flat a road to put curb and gutters on most of it, so
they can't make it into an urban section, but it ... they're going to have paved shoulders
there.
Davidson/ This is a project I referred to earlier, Riverside Drive streetscape. In fact you can see
the same slide there, um, used to demonstrate the tunnel project. Um, this ... this is an
area along Riverside Drive where there's a lot of...there are a number of things starting
to happen. Uh, the new Chrysler dealership is under construction right now. Uh, and
that'll be occupied by them in the upcoming year. Uh, that'll create a large parcel of
property, uh, there have been a number of properties transacted fairly recently. Um,
some people that have some intentions. We've got the Riverfront Crossings Master Plan
that will provide some guidance down here. What we hope to do is be able, as these
private projects occur, uh, work with the public sector portion of it, specifically the
streetscape, and get a, you know, basically a transformation, similar to what Coralville's
done with Highway 6, uh, if we all remember the old strip commercial corridor, uh,
they've done a great job out there with sidewalks, landscaping, pedestrian amenities,
consolidating driveways, and that's exactly the kind of thing that this corridor needs, and
that we would hope to do ... recover some of the taxable value created and use that for, uh,
public sector projects.
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Knoche/ The Iowa River bank stabilization project, uh, is one that we'll ... needs to be done in
regards to stabilizing the river bank, uh, at City Park, um, the other slide here shows the
stabilization, uh, just to the north of Highway 6. Uh, that area actually is part of the
Burlington Street damn project, um, but we'll use the monies in this, in the future, to
stabilize areas of the river in town.
Fosse/ Our next project is the redevelopment of the Riverside Drive Public Works and Transit
site, and you ... and you've heard about four projects tonight that ... that are related to the
migration off of this corner here. Uh, simply stated, because of the location, the highest
and best use of this is not public, uh, facilities. Uh, we need to get it in ... into another
use, although it does have encumbrances in that, uh, a portion of that, a large portion of
that, was the old city dump. I wouldn't even call it the landfill. This was before the
technology of a landfill. Um, what we have done so far is we've done a Phase 1 and
Phase 2 environmental assessment. We've done a geotechnical analysis of that, and
we've also, uh, completed a... a survey of the area so that we have components so that
eventually we can put together a request for a proposal process similar to what we've
done across the street over here on the, uh, on the Chauncey Swan site, and uh, tonight
we talked about relocating the ... the uh, solid waste facilities, traffic engineering, as well
as vehicle wash and we talked some about moving the, uh, the transit facility there. Uh,
that's certainly the biggest ticket item down there. The other one that's hard to move is
the equipment maintenance facility, which is right here. So there's... there's two big
pieces of the puzzle that are out there yet that are unfunded on moving, and that is, uh,
the equipment and transit. Our next project is, uh, related to the Landfill and that is the
landfill ground water. You'll recall that, uh, we talked about this a couple of years ago,
that in the northeast corner adjacent to our oldest landfill cells that do not have liners
underneath them, uh, we had some concerns about migration of leachate out from
underneath those cells. Uh, since then we've purchased the 17 acres in this corner here,
which allows us to get out and do additional monitoring so that we can determine what, if
any, additional future action is ... is required at that location. So I just wanted to keep that
there, uh, so you don't forget about it. It's out there. Um, our final project on- the -radar
is ... is the Fiberight concept, and this is something that was presented to you at a work
session, uh, last fall and this is a ... a new process that converts municipal solid waste into
ethanol or other biofuels. And at that time the expre ... expressed a significant enough
interest that we're going to continue researching a ... a partnership with this firm to move
forward where we would be a supplier of municipal solid waste for them. Uh, pursuant
to that, uh, Dave Elias and I went out to their pilot project, it's in Virginia. It's a full -
scale pilot project they're doing to process ... from start to finish there, and that pilot
project is required by the USDA and based on the outcome of that, um, they could get
their $25 million loan from the USDA to move forward with this. They expect to get the
green light on that sometime in April, March or April, and their ... their first move at that
point would be to renovate their Blairstown, uh, ethanol plant that they have ... already
own and uh, gear that up to deal with the municipal waste, and then shortly after that,
they would install a facility at our landfill that would process the municipal solid waste to
a point that it could be transported to the Blairstown facility, and this is ... this is at least a
half hour of stuff to talk about in itself, so I won't go into any additional detail, but if
things go well, we'll be back to you later this year to talk more about this.
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Dobyns/ So does it need to go in this year's budget? That's why this is in after...
Fosse/ That's correct. And also, uh, we ... have not committed any capital investment in this at
this point. This is something that ... that we ... we can either chose to invest in or require
that they do a 100% of the investment at their cost.
Dobyns/ Oh!
Fosse/ So it would just involve a lease of the land, and an agreement to supply the municipal
solid waste. So with that ... um, you want to take a break before we start talking about all
the projects in general, or do you want to dive right into it?
Champion/ Let's dive right in.
Hayek/ I'm getting looks to the contrary. Why don't we take a, uh, five- minute (laughter and
several talking) three- minute break! (BREAK) (several talking)
Public Works Operations:
Hayek/ Okay, so we're back, uh ... back in the meeting, and Rick, you're going to start us on the
operations.
Fosse/ Yes! I'll take you through Public Works' operations and then we'll return to a wrap -up,
talk about any of the capital projects that you want to at that time. Uh, the ... the Public
Works ... first of all, I'll try and do this in about 20 minutes. I'll try to be brief on that.
Champion/ I'm giving you 10! (laughter)
Fosse/ But it's ... it's difficult, cause the Public Works Department, it's ... it's somewhat
complicated in that we've got ... we've got eight different operations, use ... using four
different funding types, and we're combined into five divisions. So we're all over the
place in this budget book, and what I'm going to do is just go through it in the order in
which we appear in the bud ... budget book, and ... and that begins on page 109 with the
Public Works' Department administration. No changes there. So we can move on to
engineering. That was quick! Um ... within the engineering we don't have any new
changes, uh, in the budget there, and one thing I do want to point out that... engineering is
a General Fund operation but we also have charge -backs to our capital projects. So our
engineers charge their time just like a consultant would to the project and then we also
have direct billing for much of our development - related work. Uh, the next section is our
Streets Division, and that begins on page 201 in there, and we, uh ... do not have any
changes in staff level, but I do want to point something out to you and that's on page 202
where you look at the cash balances there. You may recall from our conversation in past
years that the dr ... dire condition of our cash balances. It was declining and in effect we
were projecting some negative balances for about now, and as you can see we ... we've
turned that around and we've done that, uh, thanks to two things. Uh, one is that we're
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using GO money to pay for, uh, some of the things that had traditionally been paid for
with road use tax. Some of our transportation improvements. Uh, the same is true with
the, uh, with the storm water funds, so as far as funding components of our capital
projects that used to be paid with st ... with uh, G ... with road use tax. It's paid for with
some storm water funds. Uh, the other thing that's helped us recover here is we've
scheduled two consecutive mild winters; at least we're mild so far here! And the
difference between a harsh winter and a ... and a mild winter can be upwards of $300,000.
So that makes a big difference! That's a big swing for us. So that's helped us to get
those ... those fund balances turned around (noise on mic) So far this year we're having a
good winter but February usually tells the tale on that. Uh, moving on to the waste water
division, which begins ... on page... 246... there we go! Um, I want to point out first of all
that's a business activity's fund operation, and it also includes our landfill operations.
That's another business activity's fund, but we'll return to that later cause that's in a
different part of... of the budget. Uh, I want to begin by pointing out a correction on page
247 where it talks about the staff there. It shows it continuing, uh, at 25.4. We're
actually reducing by one staff member. We're going to 24.4. We're eliminating a lab
technician and that ... that position's actually already vacant by attrition and we're not
going to fill that. So that's... that's something I want to get fixed in the budget there.
Um ... also you'll note in there that our cash balances are trending downward a little bit on
waste water operations. Um ... there's another correction that needs to occur on page 251,
if you have that handy, under video inspections. We inadvertently, uh, repeated the data
from sewer jetting to video inspections. That's too much detail for the time we have
today. We'll just get that cleaned up for the final version. Um, I do want to point and
and ... and I touched on this in the capital projects part of it is we did have a visit from the
EPA this summer. It's the first one that I remember in ... in my tenure with the City
where they came and ... and spent a couple weeks here, looking at our operations on a
daily basis and ... and going through everything in ... in quite a bit of detail. Uh, in a
nutshell, they were very pleased with our waste water plant operations. They did want us
to spend, uh, more resources on our collection system. Doing preventative maintenance
out there and repair. Uh, they ... with the intent of reducing the amount of sewer, uh,
backups that occur from blockages or collapsed pipes that are out there. So that's... that's
the feedback we got from the EPA. And, talking to our... our other communities in Iowa
that had similar visits, I think that we did very well and I ... I'm very pleased with ... with
our operations down there. Um ... our ... our biggest challenge for the coming year is
maintaining stable treatment in ... in the waste water facility and there's a couple things
that are going to make that challenging. One is ... is, I showed you the picture where
we're expanding the plant, and to do that, you think of your office and getting' new
carpet, you know, you gotta move all the furniture around while you're gettin' the carpet,
but you gotta keep, uh, your operations going at the same time. The same is true with our
processes, only it's even more complicated than that. And then also because of the
drought, which is still ongoing, our waste water effluent, or the waste water that's coming
in to our plant is very concentrated and that makes that challenge of keeping the ... the
process going well during those construction changes, uh, more challenging. So let's
move on to our water (both talking) Yep.
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Markus/ ...just give `em a, uh, just a snippet of what is going on with our connection to the Gulf
of Mexico!
Fosse/ Oh! Okay! Um ... it has to do with (both talking) Gulf hypoxia. Have you heard the
term? (several responding) And that is the dead zone in the Gulf because of nutrients
that are coming out of the Mississippi River.
Champion/ Right!
Fosse/ And we're ... Iowa is a contributor to that. And the EPA is ... is directed each state to come
up with a plan for how they're going to deal with that. And, uh, so the State of Iowa
has ... has come up with a draft plan. It's out for public comment right now and we are
making comment on that, and it's looking at both point source and non -point source
contributors to nutrients that are ... that ultimately end up in the Mississippi River and the
Gulf of Mexico.
Markus / And a point source is?
Fosse/ Is our plant. So the...
Markus / And a non -point source is?
Fosse/ Is agricultural run -off.
Markus/ There you go!
Hayek/ (several talking) Okay.
Fosse/ And they've come out with some very specific recommendations for point sources, and,
uh, are prepared to hold people's feet to the fire to achieve those goals and that has to do
with total nitrogen removal as well as phosphorous, and that's where our plant upgrade is
going to put us in a fairly good position to deal with that as it ... as it becomes a regulatory
requirement. Um ... the requirements for non -point source contributors are ... are really
pretty vague at this point. And partially because the technology's not there. Uh, partially
because it's difficult to put in place the metrics to measure that, and...
Hayek/ Politics!
Fosse/ ...well, there's a lot of...yeah! There you go! (laughter)
Markus / And largely due to that last one!
Champion/ Obvious!
Fosse/ So that ... that'll be playing out over the next year and you can ... you can expect to hear
more about that.
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Markus/ But ... but the point I really wanted you to point out was 2 %.
Fosse/ Was ... I'm sorry, what?
Markus/ 2 %. Remember the comment about 2 %? That they think that we should be able to pay
up to 2 %?
Fosse/ Oh! Yes! I ... gotcha there! One of the ... the thresholds that they'll use for ... gotta gel this
up in my head here ... as far as how ... how far they're going to require municipalities to
lower their discharge of total nitrogen and phosphorous will depend in part on how much
the customers have to pay for that.
Champion/ Oh my gosh!
Fosse/ And, so ... first of all they're leaving out most of the small communities in the state.
They're just focusing on the larger communities, and ... and the preliminary information
that's out there is that the ... the yardstick they will use is your effluent requirement will
be based on what can be achieved within, uh, making your rates for sewer equal to 2% of
the median household income. So it...it kind of... they ... that's one of the things that
we'll be commenting on (several talking) So ... did that make sense? The way I
described that? (mumbled response) Okay!
Throgmorton/ Well, no. I ... I'd like to get you to elaborate so I make sure I really understand
(both talking)
Fosse/ Okay! It ... it is complicated.
Throgmorton/ Let's assume hypothetically that I earn $100,000 a year. Are ... are you telling me
that they are saying that the rates my household would pay would equal $2,000 a year? Is
that what I'm hearing?
Fosse/ It ... it's not what you make. It's the median household income (several talking)
Throgmorton/ ... was $100,000 a year.
Fosse/ Then it would be $2,000, yes. Yeah. So the technology that you would be required to
implement would force your rates up to that point.
Payne/ So that would mean over $100 a month.
Markus/ If the median were (both talking)
Payne/ ...median were $70,000. (several talking) $1,400, which would be more than $2...$100
a month.
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Throgmorton/ What share of the nitrogen load, um, produced by the ... within the state of Iowa is
contributed by point sources in Des Moines, Iowa City, etc., the major cities. What
percent of the nitrogen load?
Fosse/ I have those exact figures in my office (both talking) well it's well under half.
Champion/ Yes.
Fosse/ The vast majority of the ... of the nutrient loads are from non -point sources in the state.
Yep.
Markus/ It's something we really have to pay attention to.
Throgmorton/ Yeah, it's outrageous. I mean, I ... you know, I think you all would know that I
think it's really important that we reduce our nitrogen and phosphate contribution to the
Mississippi River and thereby... thereby reduce our contribution to the hypo ... hypoxic
zone?
Fosse/ Uh -huh.
Throgmorton/ ... in the Gulf.
Champion/ Sure!
Throgmorton/ But ... uh, we gotta think about it in terms of fair share, as well, and I, so you know
in my mind (both talking) my mind goes to CAFOS, uh, you know, consolidated
agricultural feedlot operations. Uh, and they're... they're a huge source, way more
than ... than we are.
Fosse/ Well, the other thing too...
Markus/ There's direct nitrogen injections going in for crop too. (several talking)
Fosse/ You really get into a point of diminishing returns as well when you get into those ... those
high rates of removal. You can spend a lot more money for just an incremental
improvement in your water quality. Ready to move on to water?
Hayek/ Yes!
Fosse/ (several talking) Okay. For our water division I have a correction to make on page ... 256
and that also's related to the staff. Uh, on page 256 it shows us going up a staff member.
Actually that's going the wrong way. We're going down a staff member, where we...
eliminating a, uh, maintenance operator there. So the correct number in that last box
should be 31.75. Um, also to note on page 257 our cash balances are declining. You
heard, uh, Tom talk about that a little bit on ... on Saturday. Uh, we may be due for a rate
increase in ... in the future there. Um, one thing I want to point out is that our new water
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plant is going to be 10 years old this summer. That ... that's hard to believe! Urn ... that
corresponds with the five -year anniversary of the floods. So we'll be planning some sosrt
of `water' celebration, uh, at some point. Uh, the last summer during the ... the peak of
the drought and the high temperatures that we had, we pumped a record 8.6 million
gallons of.. of water per day, as opposed to an average of about 5 billion gallons a day.
So we were able to ramp up quite a bit, and we were not, uh, at a point where we needed
to put in any suggested or mandatory water restrictions. Uh, we had enough capacity to
do that. And also during the past year, the City's ISO rating, uh, (mumbled) upgraded
from a 3 to a 2, which is a combination of.. of water supply and firefighting...
Champion/ What are you talking about?
Fosse/ ISO? That's the (both talking)
Markus/ ... rating.
Fosse/ Oh, there we go!
Markus / Which rates corn ... you know, largely it's a ... it's a rating service that ... that helps, uh,
commercial insurance companies, uh, classify what an insurance premium will be, based
on, uh, fire and water capacity of an individual community.
Champion/ Ah! Thanks. I'm sure everybody else knew that.
Fosse/ Okay! Well, moving on to our refuse operations, that begins on page 264 in your budget.
Um, I want to point out that we are reducing a staff member there as well. That's in
conjunction with the, uh, addition of another fully automated truck. So we only need one
person on that truck rather than two. Keeping track, that's three so far, uh, of...of
eliminations in the Public Works Department (mumbled) budget. Uh, we do have some
fee increases outlined on page 266, and uh, those relate to ... uh ... the solid waste for...
um, extra bags that go out, as well as bulky items, and I wanted to point out the bulky
item to you, because that's... that's a tough one for us. When you look at most
communities, the cost for getting rid of a couch or ... or something big like that is often
just blended into the cost of doing service. They'll do it for nothing, or they'll do it for a
below -cost because you want that stuff picked up and not end up in the creek or the... in
the woods, or some place you don't want it. Um, because we're a college town and we
have so much turnover, we can't afford to do that. There are just too many couches
coming to the curb to ... to pick those up for nothing. So as a community, we're charging
more toward the actual cost of picking that up. And we're going from $10.00 to $12.50.
What we're going to need to do is to keep a close eye on what that does to illegal
dumping, and see if we cross that line or not. (mumbled) the same is true with yard
waste. We've been at a dollar a bag for a long time. We're going to $1.25 a bag for that.
And then our annual sticker's going from $20.00 to $25.00... for yard waste pick -up.
Throgmorton/ I bet nobody's done research on the price elasticity of, uh, couch removal.
(laughter)
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Fosse/ That would be a grad ... good grad student project I think! Um ... let's see, I think that is it
for ... refuse. We're gettin' on the last page here. Uh, landfill and recycling. That begins
on page 271. Uh, we are also reducing staff by one person in those operations, as well.
If you recall last year you approved two new positions. We have filled one. We had not
filled the other one yet because we're waiting for the need to be really staring us in the
face. Uh, we are ... so we are not going to fill that and we are taking it back out of the
budget this year. So that'll be ... going down, or going from 17.5 to 16.5. Um ... we of
course will be reconstructing the cell from the fire, uh, we'll be going through the bidding
process on that soon. Uh, we talked earlier about the Fiberight conversation that we'll be
having later in the year. And, um, looking at the cash balances on page 272, we do have
some declining cash balances, and if you recall last year we talked about a rate increase,
uh, we did not represent that this year because we want to get through the reconstruction
of the fire, know what our insurance settlement impacts will be, and then also have a
better understanding of what Fiberight will ... what sort of impact that may have on our
rates before we recommend any adjustments there.
Hayek/ Is ... is the, are the cash balance numbers on 272 reflective of any, uh, landfill fire
expenses, or does that await us?
Fosse/ The ... is Kevin still here? I think the projected balance is due, is that ... is that accurate?
O'Malley/ Yes, the projected balance shows, uh, should show that we're going to be spending
some money down for the new ... the new cell, to repair the new cell. The current
expenses for the fire have been charged to a `loss' reserve which we're holding to show
the insurance company money we spent.
Hayek/ Okay, so these ... these cash balances do not show any fire, landfill fire expenses.
O'Malley/ Not the fire, but the repair.
Hayek/ The repair, okay.
O'Malley/ Which hasn't happened yet.
Hayek/ Okay.
Markus/ If you look at the right side of that chart, uh, Mayor, there's 15.6 million is restricted
and used for Iowa State Code for closure and post - closure. And then 6.3 is assigned, uh,
for site expansion and intended to be used to satisfy future capacity.
Hayek/ Okay! Thank you.
Champion/ How much ... how much money does the Landfill have out on loan to other ... City
entities?
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O'Malley/ Uh, we just reduced that at the end of June by $2 million and all, from the General
Fund, to pay for the fire sta ... two fire stations, about $1.7 million loan there, and uh, the
Airport has been successfully selling land and we ... reduced about ... there another half a
million dollars. So they've been recouping some money. Uh, Mr. Mayor, your question,
I wasn't listening that close but in fiscal 13 we did set aside $4 million in other financial
uses that $5 million 2.57 shows $4 million... includes $4 million for rebuilding it. We
just recently got information it's only going to cost about $1.6.
Fosse/ For the contract, for the reconstruction contract (both talking)
Markus/ So then... so Kevin, is the balance net of that?
O'Malley/ It's net of that. (noises on mic) It is net of that.
Markus/ So we have money there.
O'Malley/ So those balances should go up since the construction should be less than what we
estimated.
Payne/ Okay, so I'm a little bit confused. I'm sorry! The two paragraphs that are on the right -
hand side add up to $21.9 million. The projection for FY13 is $21,613,000 so it looks
like we don't have enough money to cover what we're required to have.
Mims/ Those are for FYI 4.
Payne/ Well we still don't have enough because that's 21.8. I...
Mims/ Probably just rounded a little.
Fosse/ We'll check on that!
Payne/ Okay.
Markus/ I think what they did is round it.
Payne/ Okay.
Fosse/ I don't know the answer off the top of my head.
Markus/ ...about $50,000 ... it's $47,000 off.
Hayek/ Couple extra couch pick -ups and we'll ... have that covered (laughter)
Fosse/ There we go! Anything else on landfill before we move on to storm water? Okay. Storm
water, we are having our... our third and final year of the storm water rate increases, and
the increment of that rate increase will be the same as ... as the last two years, and that has
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been put in place for a couple reasons. One is to help cover operating expenses and ... and
also to help cover capital costs of storm sewer. Uh, to shift that away from road use tax
and to shift it away from, uh, GO bonds. So it's part of that diversification of income that
Tom was talking about on Saturday morning. This fits right in well with that. Uh,
moving on to our final, uh, division, which is the equipment division. That's an internal
service fund. Uh, we have no staff changes in that, but I will point out that we did reduce
our staff there in FYI I by one -half of an FTE. Uh, what I do want to point out is on page
302 you'll look at our cash balances and you'll see that those are increasing there, and I
wanted to explain that. Um... for our... for our fleet, with the exception of our... our fire
trucks, which we, uh, sell debt to purchase. For the rest of our equipment fleet, we save
in advance to pay for those purchases, and that's not a policy that's been in place very
long (mumbled) since about 2000. So now at FY12, we've been through that entire cycle
one time now, so that it ... we've saved up and are able to pay in advance for ... for almost
all of the vehicles in our fleet. So what you can expect to see is that ... that increasing in,
uh, in the cash balances should level off at this point. So imagine how your savings
account at home might be if you're making your house payment, or excuse me, your car
payment's in advance into your savings account, rather than to the bank for debt. That's
the approach that we've taken here ... for the past 12 years.
Markus/ So the equipment purchase comes out of the equipment replacement fund and then
there's a charge -back to each department, depending on what part of the fleet they have.
That serves as income to the in ... equipment replacement fund. So by the time that piece
of equipment is needed to be replaced, you have the funds set aside for that (mumbled)
Champion/ (mumbled)
Markus/ It balances out the highs and lows of replacing equipment (several talking) get you a
nice (mumbled)
Fosse/ Part of that fiscal conservative approach that helps us keep the bond ratings where they're
at. Uh, so that's it. It ... it's somewhat of a complex combination of operations and ... and
funds that ... that all combine to fund the ... the Public Works Department. It's kind of a
`form follows function' approach with ... and this is an important part — an
interdependency among divisions. Uh, so that we're not duplicating efforts. It's
interesting ... I was looking at an old Public Works administration handbook that was in
my office from the ... from the 70s. That's not long ago. And they talk about each
division needing to be able to stand completely on its own without any reliance upon
each other, and that's just not an efficient way to do things. It ... it's not going to work
today, and...and I'll point out that that philosophy of inter - dependence is extending
beyond divisions now, and a good example is with the ... with the transportation services
and the parking folks, uh, as far as Public Works and Transportation Services sharing
equipment and ... and sharing duties as well. It's ... it's a good partnership that's working
well. Any questions ... on Public Works' operations? Okay!
Hayek/ Okay!
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Fosse/ Well, let's back up and see, uh, what sort of discussion you'd like to have about the
capital program and any projects you would like to add or delete from that program.
CIP Discussion:
Champion/ I have a couple questions.
Fosse/ Okay!
Champion/ When they talked about ... uh, the waste by the art building that was sewer pipes or
waste water pipes I think they said. Oh...
Fosse/ I'm sorry? Can you repeat that?
Champion/ (mumbled) the art building, on Riverside Drive or whatever that ... (several talking)
Storm sewer!
Fosse/ Okay!
Champion/ And why would that be paid with GO bonds? Why wouldn't that be paid with sewer
or waste water or...
Fosse/ That's a ... that's a storm sewer project, and so our choices are GO bonds or uh, paying
with our cash reserves from our storm water fund.
Champion/ That's what I ... that's my question!
Fosse/ Yep! And...
Markus/ The sewer system deals with the sanitary sewer, uh, revenues for that purpose.
Fosse/ Yep. So we would not want to sell sewer revenue bonds for that, because they couldn't
be spent on the storm sewer. So when ... when Kevin looked at our budget, his choices
were cash reserves from storm water or GO and ... and GO was the best fit ... for that
project at that time.
Markus/ It should result in best rates that you're going to get in terms of selling bonds
(mumbled)
Champion/ Oh, do you want me to finish all my questions or does somebody else...
Hayek/ Go ahead!
Champion/ ...well, I ... I want to talk a little bit about the brick streets, because I think since
neighborhood stabilization is one of our priorities, and I think with the University /City
partnership on ... restoring homes back to single - family, I ... I consider the north side
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one ... probably one of our most vulnerable neighborhoods, and I'm concerned about not
fixing Linn Street. I've not driven down there but everybody says it needs a lot of help.
So that's a concern of mine and don't know how the rest of the Council feels about that.
But, I'd like to see ... that Linn Street brick repair sooner than later.
Dickens / Rick said that there were so many things going on that you couldn't add that right
away, or is that incorrect?
Fosse/ Well, the ... uh, what's reflected in the capital project program here is ... combination of
our libi ... limits of financial capability and ... and staff implementation ability, and ...and
to be honest off the top of my head, I don't remember which one we were bumping up
against.
Champion/ I think you said staff. I think that you said there were too many things going on.
Fosse/ Yes, between... that's right. With the alley assessments, uh, sidewalk in -fill, and ... those
projects all tugging at the same area.
Markus/ (several talking) One of the things you observe when you ... when you look at this slide
is the hand placement of the brick after the substantial base improvements that are made
for a brick street. If I recall correctly, we saw at some point, there's somebody that...
that is out there, that has a machine that ... that sets some of these brick streets. Recall
that?
Fosse/ Yes, and ... that machine works best for, uh, brand -new brick.
Markus/ Okay.
Fosse/ I ... I don't know if there's somebody that ... that has that for replacing the old brick.
Markus/ The only ... the only thought I had is it probably wouldn't make economies of scale, um,
kind of arguments to use that when we only do a block at a time.
Fosse/ Uh -huh.
Markus/ I'm just wondering whether you use that piece of equipment, or instead of...instead of
just doing one block at a time, and ... like for example on the run on Brown Street and
then even on Linn Street, you run into these intersection improvements. I just wonder if
maybe we wouldn't be better off from a, uh, getting the best price for something is to
take a longer run, maybe wait instead of, you know, just one block every other year, or
whatever we're doing, and making a longer run out of it, if we get a better price. And
then we could deal with those intersection improvements, and the other thing I recall is in
talking to the folks in the northside, they wanted substantial traffic calming built into
some of these. I think you were involved in those discussions, Jeff, built into those brick
streets, and those might be some unique characteristics in terms of the traffic calming,
because right now, and I know you said it half - heartedly to some degree, but with the
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rolling nature of those brick streets, they do have somewhat of a traffic calming effect.
When you get those all leveled out, you're going to have a situation where, you know,
traffic's going to move faster through there, and then we're going to have a
corresponding or another problem, and that's going to be people are complaining about
the speed of traffic going through there. They already complain to some degree about
that, volumes of cut - through traffic that go through there. So ... one of the things, one of
the Council's already asked this question, and we had a side -bar conversation — we will
check and see if there maybe is some advantage to doing some of this, um, a longer, you
know, basis, more streets at the same time, maybe saving up some money, you know, get
half way there and then bond for the difference or whatever. Actually end up with a
better price, but we'll do a little more investigation.
Hayek/ Yeah, and I ... as I recall from last year, which ... I think when we shifted from just the
historic $20,000 a year maintenance budget item to that, plus actual reconstruction, um,
as I recall, we had loosely talked about, um, trying to do it every other year.
Mims/ That's what I recall too. I think so too (several talking)
Hayek/ ...which will be great to continue to do, um, from ... from my perspective, because I think
it... it's got a direct tie to the strategic plan, um...
Markus/ But from a... from a manpower standpoint, if it takes, you know, as much time to do two
blocks as it does one block, it would make more sense to...
Hayek/ Yep!
Markus/ ...you know, to ... to take care of it, you know, in a ... in a little more managed way. And
I think it probably does from an engineering standpoint.
Hayek/ Okay. So we're ... how are we leaving this? Are we making (both talking)
Markus/ ...leave it the way it is for the time being. Let us come back with a report on that...
Hayek/ Okay!
Markus/ ...and inform you about that.
Dobyns/ ...my sense is that there's a possibility for FY215 ... 2015 we could do a wholesale
replacement of the brick roads. Um... or at least over two years or...
Hayek/ That'd be a pretty big undertaking.
Mims/ What do you mean wholesale?
Dobyns/ Well, the fact that this, my understanding is that this machine would make economies of
scale better and so it'd make it more...
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Markus / Whether... whether that's the case or whether there's economies of scale in maybe
doing two blocks or maybe doing three blocks at the same time, instead of just one. I
think (several talking) you know ... every time you do one block, you know, you have to
do a spec. The spec has to go out for bid. You go through that whole process, and you're
getting one block out of it. Maybe if we bunched a few together (both talking)
Champion/ ...that's a good point.
Markus/ ...we could do ones and it'd save ... it'd save at least on staff time.
Throgmorton/ What ... what I know as a 20 -year resident of the northside, and as the District C
representative, uh, are like three things. One is the brick streets, uh, constitute a major
component of the historic character of the neighborhood. That's one thing. Second thing
is the ... the stop signs along the way do inhibit, uh, rapid traffic flow, and that's a good
thing. So ... coupled with the ... the brick streets, that ... those two things act as traffic
calming measures. Uh, and the third thing is that there are, as I already indicated earlier,
significant, um ... uh, hazards on certain parts of Linn Street, on certain parts of Linn
Street, and so the street needs attention, it seems to me. Uh, but we ... we definitely want
to maintain the ... the bricks, make sure it's done efficiently, done well, and ... and uh, and
I know ... there's a traffic, uh, calming study, isn't there, Jeff, underway or is ... has one
been requested? It's not ... underway or what...
Davidson/ There's a, uh, traffic study being completed for the northside neighborhood, yes.
Throgmorton/ So I ... I don't know. My thought was that probably, uh, the concerns probably
about Dodge Street but that ... I guess some people have expressed concern about speed of
traffic on Brown Street as well?
Davidson/ Yeah, there's been at least a couple of...of residents of Brown Street have expressed
that, and that's one of the things that the traffic study addresses, yes.
Champion/ (mumbled)
Throgmorton/ Yeah, it's a lot of stop signs (both talking and laughing)
Champion/ ...I can't believe you can go that fast (both talking)
Throgmorton/ ...know the folks who have expressed this concern, so they know what they're
talking about, but uh...
Champion/ I think it's because brick streets are so noisy. People sound like they're going faster.
Throgmorton/ Could be.
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Champion/ But ... I mean, I ... I, we did some temporary repair to Dewey Street. The year before
we...
Fosse/ That we did with asphalt. Yeah, and that's not what we'd contemplate doing on ... on Linn
or Brown.
Champion/ It was just a temporary repair though.
Fosse/ Yes. Yep.
Hayek/ Um, so ... let's switch away from that. I had a ... a question more for staff on ... on a
couple of these items and it has to do with the timing of funding and ... and whether, um,
what your thoughts are about ... about that, and ... and one is the CBD, uh, the you know,
ped mall enhancements. That seems to be a staged approach and a fair amount of dollars
not allocated until 2015, 2016.
Markus/ (mumbled)
Hayek/ You okay ... you okay with that or ... or...
Fruin/ I think it's just ... there's a ... there's an uncertainty about it now. Until we can get
someone in here and take a look at the landscape down there and recommend a plan. I
would ... I would consider what's in the budget now just placeholder dollars, and the other
...and the other issue there is going to be what's our GO capacity, and is there an appetite
to use TIF dollars, is the District... Downtown District going to be supportive of use of
TIF, because that ... that could expedite the, uh, the project, uh, quite a bit. So we'll take a
look at it. The, uh, the plan'll get underway this year and should finish up probably
around this time next year, to gear up for a Phase 1 in spring, but I imagine we'll be
talking in the fall about, um, changing the funding formula in some fashion.
Hayek/ Okay, and I'd ask the same about Towncrest redevelopment, and on ... on that budget
item, it appears that most of the money is actually sooner, presently or ... or in 14.
Davidson/ Yeah, pretty much there is committed right now, uh, at least to the end of the current
fiscal year it's all committed, um...
Hayek/ Okay.
Markus / And ... and just to give you an idea of what happens in those kinds of projects, um... you
know, we've revisited with the developer on that project, on at least three occasions
where (mumbled) is changed, uh, we also agreed to do the streetscape improvement in
that area, and it's really pushing the limits of the dollars that were available to make all of
that happen. So some dollars between streetscape and TIF, uh, for private property
redevelopment may be changing, um ... what we end up with. Part of the streetscape
though is critical because it provides, uh, parking, quasi - public right -of -way parking that
suits the needs for that particular development. So you get into these redeveloping areas
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and you know trying to stay within the budgets that we have, it gets a little bit tricky so...
we've been pushing back some on ... on the ask that they've made. So...
Hayek/ (several talking) Yeah, I've got other areas but let's ... I'll (both talking)
Throgmorton/ ...toss out one thing, uh, earlier I asked about, um, made a, well, made a point
about the biggest bang for the buck, and ... and ya'll have laid out all sorts of really good
and important projects, but when I found myself thinking about the CIP this year, I asked
myself what one project do I think would produce the biggest bang for the buck in terms
of things I value ... as a Council person. And my mind immediately went to the Sycamore
Mall area, and I found myself thinking, uh, I would hate to see that mall, uh, go downhill
as a result of Von Maur leaving and so on, that would be destructive for that part of the
city, and it seems to me that ... we, maybe you've already done a whole lot of thinking
about this in ways I don't know about, but that's where my mind goes. I'd like to see us
find some way to focus, uh, some CIP dollars into, not just rebuilding the Lower
Muscatine, uh, and Sycamore Road, but uh, enhancing, um, pedestrian access to the mall,
transforming the mall, help working with the owner to transform the mall because that
mall is anachronistic the way it is right now, and...
Champion/ What's that word mean?
Throgmorton/ Um, it's ... it's an outmoded model.
Champion/ Right, okay!
Throgmorton/ Uh, internet sales are, you know, kind of consuming malls all over the country.
It's that report you had us read, uh, indicated. Uh, and ... and there's opportunities for a
connection with Kirkwood, with your company — MidAmerican, with Proctor and
Gamble and ... and ways that would, uh, perhaps, uh ... uh, provide opportunities for re-
imaging what goes on within the mall and so on. So that's where my mind goes. I think
we could get a big bang for the buck there.
Markus/ I can go in so many different directions on trying (laughter) to respond to that, and we
have spent a lot of time talking to the developer, talking amongst ourselves, uh,
brainstorming about what to do. We have some non - traditional mall -type uses that have
tried and have indicated an interest in there. Uh, we're even circling back to some of that
to see if we can put those in what I call more of the dead zones of the mall, you know,
where pedestrian traffic isn't as critical. Um, one of the other things we did is we ... we
said take a look at your site and determine if the square footage that you have built, um,
could be expanded upon and usually that's a ... that's a ratio function between parking and
the square footage of the building. They hadn't done that until we suggested it, and they
came back and they found out that they could actually add to the square footage. When
you start talking about the use of TIF in terms of incentive, you have to have increased
value. And, to just change uses does not necessarily increase value. And the fact is that,
you know, your base may actually be in decline to some degree at some point because of
the loss of Von Maur, which is one of the first things I noted when I came to this area that
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there are consequences to, um ... the use of TIF to just relocate commercial. And,
somebody's left behind with the problem, and that happens to be us with the mall, and I
absolutely agree with you that the mall probably is not contemporary in terms of how
retail is being conducted, and in the companion article that we sent you, you know, it did
talk about kind of the demise of malls, as well. And ... and that's been going on for some
time, the concept of how, uh, people shop and ... and get into retail. So we're looking at
all sorts of alternatives, trying to work with, urn ... retail developers, and sometimes I
think the challenge is that ... that the property's value gets to a point where it can't sustain
itself with the going rates of rent. And sometimes what goes on is that properties get
resold and people take less than what they thought they should have for a particular
property, and it's only until it gets to that point that you can get into a competitive market
condition, uh, for rates. Uh, and ... and for users that might go in there. Uh, right now,
and you talk to landlords, landlords are constantly being pushed, uh, to adjust their rental
rates. And so if you have somebody that's invested in a piece of property at a price point
that's ... that was based on, you know, rents that are up here, and now the market place for
rents are down here, you know, you've got a conflict going on there internally. I don't
necessarily want to get in the middle of that conflict, and I do believe that the private
sector, you know, has the right to invest and make those decisions and I don't necessarily
want to bail out a situation that's not sustainable after the bailout occurs. And remember,
we made a major investment in that mall not too long ago, and here we find ourselves in
a situation (coughing on mic) where a neighboring jurisdiction has offered another
incentive to move that anchor tenant to a new location. And so ... which goes right to my
whole argument about the corridor compact and how (both talking)
Throgmorton/ ...but you know it's ... it's the southeastern corner of...of the corridor and so... we
need to find a way to strengthen it, it seems to me. So you know when I think about
being in that mall. I'll just say this one thing and then stop, you know, is uh ... when
come out of the theater, what do I do? Well, first of all, there's two things that succeed
really well down there. Panera's and the theater. When I come out of the theater, what
do I do? Nothing! There's nothing to do! You ... you walk out into the parking lot and
you try to find your car. And luckily I usually find it. (laughter) So, then I ask myself,
what would I really like to be able to see and what everybody else I know that goes out
there, what would they like to be able to do. They'd like to be able to go into a ... a...
probably a restaurant equivalent to Blackstone's. And that would be really cool to be
able to do that!
Hayek/ Well this is a ... obviously critical, uh, location and it's of great concern for all these ...all
these reasons, uh, it's also complex, uh, given the history there, but in terms of CIP, I
mean, I think the good news is, you know, that mall is surrounded almost on all sides by
major investments that we have made or are making on Sycamore, Lower Muscatine, and
Highway 6, First Avenue, urn ... uh, and the railroad and ... and Towncrest and so as it
relates to CIP, I feel like we're doing quite a lot. Um, that does not answer exactly the
concerns you're raising.
Markus/ I think we have a very open dialogue going on with the current owners and
urn ... obviously they've run into some, you know, challenges with their situation and I
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think they're working their way through those and we expect to be revisiting with them at
some point in the near future again. But I think probably like most retail (laughs) I think
the, you know, the whole... presentation of retail is changing and I think we're going to
have to be somewhat open- minded about our expectations and what we're willing to do
and allow in what we consider traditional retail locations. (unable to hear person away
from mic)
Davidson/ The instability that Tom referred to as part of the issue, Jim. The instability that Tom
referred to as part of the issue, there are literally, certainly weekly conversations going on
regarding Sycamore Mall, but in a way we're like a doctor waiting for the patient to
stabilize so we know what we're dealing with in terms of what we're going to do as a
municipality.
Throgmorton/ Rick, this is your opportunity!
Dobyns/ Yeah, um... (laughter and several talking) Well, I would hope that next year allowing
this patient to stabilize, um ... that we have something in the CIP budget that would
reflect, um, anything that we can do to support this area. I mean, I ... there's only so much
we can do. I realize we put a lot (mumbled) ...the Sycamore Street, which I assume was
very helpful, um, for that area. I guess I would just echo what Jim said — this is just, um,
the glaring concern in the city right now, but I understand the need to sometimes be a
little bit patient and let the market do what it needs to do.
Hayek/ Okay. So let's, we're still ... we want to get out of here by 5:00. We're still looking at
the CIP, uh, line items and staffs' proposals for how much and when and where.
Payne/ Connie, did you want to talk about... Scott and (both talking)
Champion/ Well I, I mean, I ... I do believe that that is a major economic development issue. I
am sure if I was a company looking out at our industrial park, and then seeing these
trucks backed up for blocks, having to stop, and move forward three feet at a time or
whatever it is. I mean, it's just a concern that I have, and I know it's going to be
addressed, so ... I'm not going to push that it be done right now, although it should have
been done two years ago, um, cause I do think it's a ... I never ... I don't anybody expected
that road to ... it just, to be that busy, and with that huge incline, these trucks are going up
two or three feet at a time constantly for a... a four -way stop.
Mims/ I would just suggest you donate the money so we do Taft next year.
Champion/ Well that's not where my money's going! (laughter) That's a good idea though!
Hayek/ It's only 18 mill! (laughter)
Champion/ Not gonna be that much!
Mims/ That's a lot of road!
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Champion/ Why don't you put stop signs ... stop lights up? (several talking)
Payne/ Oh, okay ... because she, you were talking about wanting a stop light at ... (several talking)
Champion/ Oh, yeah! (several talking)
Payne/ At Scott and Muscatine. (several talking)
Hayek/ Which ... which number is that?
Dickens/ It's 38 (several talking)
Davidson/ It's 3812.
Payne / And it's $600,000.
Dickens/ That's to do the intersection and then the lights are another... 120.
Hayek/ Jeff, do you already ... I mean, it's in ... it's in 15.
Davidson/ It's in 15.
Hayek/ So...
Davidson/ It'd be not this coming construction season — the following.
Hayek/ Right.
Champion/ (mumbled) that's...
Hayek/ I mean I (mumbled)
Champion/ ... okay.
Knoche/ We ... we would be in the position that we could ... we could, you know, move it
forward. I don't know financially if we're in that position, but uh, we ... we just did a
water main project in that area so we have all the survey done. Um, so it'd just be a
matter of getting the design work done ... on that part of it.
Champion/ I'm not going to insist that it be done ... I mean, that is coming up soon! That's not
very far away. Yeah. (several talking) It's just I think ... I'm glad to see it's on the radar
to be done, totally!
Dickens/ I just asked for a trash can at Miller - Frauenholtz Park (laughter) There's nothing there
and I think it's going to get done but I'd like to see it. That park has sat empty with
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nothing for ... since it was designated a park. So I know it's in the 2015 or 16 ... (several
talking)
Karr/ I passed along your concern and I think (mumbled)
Dickens/ Yeah, I saw ... I got a...
Hayek/ Well maybe you could raise your chickens out there, like, uh, just temporarily.
(laughter) (several talking)
Dickens/ No, it's 2016. So ... that's one of the few parks that we've done absolutely nothing to it.
Payne/ So puttin' a trash can there will satisfy your needs?
Dickens/ It's just a start! (laughter) Because I know people do go and use that as picnic area and
there's no place to ... (laughter)
Moran/ We could do that in a couple of phases too and get some trees planted out there (several
talking and laughing)
Hayek/ ...next year! (laughter)
Moran/ (several talking and laughing) ...tree planting just to put some ... some shape to it, and
that could be handled within the budget now without changing anything, but what we
really ... we really need to go back to the neighborhood and discuss that issue with them.
Dickens/ Because you were saying that there were some issues about whether to put, uh,
bathroom or whatever in that area.
Moran/ Right, and we could always build it without the bathroom and plumb it for a bathroom
or ... or the other, but I think we really need to go back to the neighborhood and visit that,
cause it was pretty contentious.
Dickens/ Cause we seem to be ... taking care a lot of the older parks and adding to them and we
have this one sitting there that nothing's been done and I...
Moran/ Right.
Dickens/ ...I've heard from quite a few people live in that neighborhood that want to see at least
something started. So...
Moran/ Right.
Dickens/ So I said at least a trash can would be a good start, but ... that...
Moran/ ...(several talking and laughing) ...next week!
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Throgmorton/ I kinda agree with Terry. I think that park has tremendous potential given its
shape, given its location, and relationship to St. Pat and how St. Pat is oriented toward the
park itself, and I think with some good landscape architecture it could really be a ... a
really high - quality addition to that area and really make a major contribution.
Mims/ I agree, I mean, it's just ... we have so many things like that.
Throgmorton/ Yeah.
Mims/ Just ... I mean...
Moran/ We'll take a look and see what we can adjust and ... and trade.
Dickens/ At least get it started! (several talking)
Mims/ ...unfunded $250 million?
Champion/ Do you still have that park on the highway by the Airport, that looks like a City
dump?
Moran/ Sturgis Ferry?
Champion/ Yes! Is that still considered a park? (laughs)
Moran/ Well, sort of We've removed everything out of it because the shelter used to sink on a
regular basis.
Champion/ Did you take the sign off? That's what I think is important.
Moran/ I think the sign's still there! (laughs)
Champion/ That ... that's disgraceful! (laughs)
Fosse/ Well that park is actually more prominent now because it's a trail head for a river trail. A
canoeing trail that goes from Iowa City to the, uh, Mississippi River.
Moran/ Because of its boat ramp. And it hasn't moved yet! (laughter)
Hayek/ Um, while we're on parks, the ... and this kind of goes back to Jim's comment earlier, um,
is this ... I think you mentioned master planning but maybe that was just for City Park.
Moran/ No, a master plan for Willow Creek...
Hayek/ Right.
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Moran/ ...and then for City Park, and then we have a third one to be determined that'll probably
be another west side park.
Hayek/ Okay.
Moran/ Benton or Hunters Run or Villa.
Hayek/ All right. Are we going to incorporate any of the ... we keep talking about the North
Market Park, and I understand that that was unique in that the neighborhood was ... was,
you know, extraordinarily involved, etc., but the outcome was fantastic, and does that
template or model become something we look at in terms of ..the redos or upgrades to
these parks in the west (several talking)
Markus/ That's the whole intent of the Comprehensive Plan approach, because one of the things
that became pretty clear, and you may not recall the entire history of how we got to the
actual design we got to, but there was a lot of neighborhood discussions that occurred
after some designs were made, and we worked very closely with the neighborhood. And
I think that's the key to doing comprehensive planning is to get the neighborhood
involved in those things, because then the neighborhood's gonna take ownership of that
park and they're going to keep their eyes on it. They're going to watch it. They're going
to make sure that when something goes awry they're going to call us and tell us about it.
So the whole approach is kind of shifted, rather than just having staff design something
and put it in there. We're going to the neighborhoods. We're going to engage them in...
in dialogue as to what should be in those parks, what they want to see in those parks, and
from that ownership, I think you're going to get a better result. Plus you're going to have
design professionals, not that we didn't have design professionals from the beginning, but
I think the design professionals, you know, can inform, but they can also ... they should
also be listening to what the neighborhood wants. So...
Dobyns/ And I think, Mike, you mentioned you're going to replicate what we did in North
Market Square over...
Moran/ The process.
Dobyns/ ...over to Willow Creek, Kiwanis.
Moran/ Right, and we've done that at Brooklyn Park. We've done that in other instances, as
well. But it's our ... it's our intent to get the neighborhood in ... involved with that, uh,
during the whole design process.
Hayek/ Okay. Well, I haven't yet heard ... a motion to, uh, to move things around. And my sense
is that people are relatively satisfied, or are satisfied with what's laid out here.
Champion/ The only thing that I want to know is what our percent, our policy percent ... I never
can remember the exact numbers, of the CIP is going to... is that going to raise it or keep
it about the same or lower it?
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Markus/ You mean from a bond issue standpoint?
Champion/ Yes, yes!
Markus/ I think we ... we quoted those numbers but...
Mims/ I think so too, at the beginning.
Markus/ ...he keeps them in his head. (several talking)
Dobyns/ There were a lot of numbers on Saturday, lot...
Hayek/ I think we need someone more experienced to answer this question though (laughter and
several talking)
O'Malley / What we've done is ... is always try to follow like no more than $10 million over the
next three or four years, and what we have scheduled in there now is 9.3 for 13, 9 for 14,
11.1 for 15, 9.6 for 16, and 10 for 17. So that's ... we're trying to keep our, uh, debt
service what it ... what we retire every year and we put on, pretty ... pretty flat. So that
would keep us looking good from a triple -A point of view.
Hayek/ There's your answer!
Markus/ You... you know ... Iowa City has a pretty unique approach to CIP. Geoff and I were
just sitting here talking about, uh, how we did it in our former communities and I think
the more traditional way of doing it is, after you figure out what you have available for
operations, whatever's left over goes into capital improvements. And that's the extent of
a lot of community's capital improvements programs. Having the ability and having the
history of scheduling, you know, a certain level of GO bonds is a pretty aggressive and
pretty progressive approach to how you do things. So you're getting a lot of capital
improvements done in this community and have been long before we got here, uh,
because of that particular philosophy, so you should feel pretty good about that. Not
everybody does it the way you're doing it here. So...
Hayek/ Okay. Anything else on ... on the CIP budget?
Mims/ You know, I feel good about things. I mean, as always there's not enough money to do
what all of us would like to do as fast as we would like to do it, money -wise, and
obviously there's staff constraints as well when you get into certain projects, but um, I
would ... just commend the staff for, I know there's ... I can't imagine how many hundreds
of, probably thousands of staff hours that have gone into developing all of this and really
appreciate that time and effort.
Hayek/ Yeah! I ... you, and you seemed to have put out, you know, to ... to have, you know,
we've gone at this with a broad approach, hitting as many areas of the community.
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think it's balanced. Um, which ... which is good. So, okay, so I guess ... no changes,
which is, uh, welcome news to staff I'm sure. Uh ... what do we want to do with the time
we have left? Do you... do you need to go through anything with us...
Markus/ No, I just ... that we will, you know, there were a few, you know, uh, corrections that we
have to make to the documents and so forth, and at this point we'll bring back the budget
for the hearings that we've scheduled in March, and uh, bring back a sheet, you know,
that shows the corrections and then once, uh, Council has their hearing and if there's any
changes that result from the public hearing process, we'll get it published and uh, and get
the uh, document ready to go for next fiscal year.
Karr/ So are you going to leave the 28th tentatively scheduled? That was a pending work session.
For budget, or do you want to remove that or do you...
Markus/ I would recommend that you remove it at this point. The reality is you can always bring
these things up on citizen ... or, uh, on Council comment in other points, and so ... that you
still have opportunities to discuss it if you need to but...
Karr/ So remove that tentative ... bookmarked for the budget session on the 28th. (several talking)
Hayek/ Michelle wants us too! (laughter and several talking) Yeah, she's... she's got so much
work right around there. Uh, okay! Well, this ... may just have been the smoothest
budget cycle I can recall!
Throgmorton/ Thanks to all of you for your efforts. (several talking)
Hayek/ And I ... the document itself, uh, is great. Um, I think we just turned into a society that
needs illustrative and bullet points and uh, we can probably thank Bill O'Reilly and Fox
News for that but it...it uh, it...it really helps and I think it, uh, makes for a more
readable, uh, document for the public. So...
Mims/ Well, and I would just add, I thought the transmittal letter (several responding) I know it
says City Manager — I'm sure you had some help writing it too.
Markus/ Just a touch! (laughter)
Mims/ But um ... you know, when I started going through all of this, being able to read the
transmittal letter and kind of get a good summary of what this 400 -plus pages contained
in about 16 or 18 pages was really, really helpful, and on ... last Wednesday I was on
KXIC and that's one thing that I told Jay Capron about and I know he got hold of Marian
afterwards so they could make sure to bookmark this on their Face page or whatever, so
it'd be easier for the public to find, cause I said not many people in the community go
through the 400 pages, but they might go through the 16 or 18 pages that are real good
summary. So I thought that was great.
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Markus/ You know, you are right. I ... I've challenged the staff in terms of... of the material that
we produce, and the Finance Department staff, the staff in the Manager's office — Geoff
and Adam — um, Simon, um, obviously, uh, Kevin and ... and Deb and the staff over at
Finance, they...I mean, they just work long hours to put all t his together. Um, I kind of
expressed the vision for what the document is that we're trying to produce, and they've
done so much work that I think that going forward the document will get easier and easier
to produce because we've set up kind of standards for what we want this document to
look like and it'll get refined from year to year but um, I think it will be easier going
forward so ... it's one more thing that Kevin can take into retirement knowing that, uh, he
changed a document that will probably get a lot of... a lot more use in my opinion in the
long run, and will survive in its form for a long time.
Hayek/ Well and the ... the game changer, and you have to ultimately get into the numbers and
that's what budgets are, but to have that narrative and over - arching vision and
explanation is ... is important for us, uh, and staff, and ... and most importantly the public
to ... to see where the trends are and to see why we do what we do and to understand our
underlying policies and ... and um, values is ... is really helpful. So ... so...
Throgmorton/ Matt, I'd like to echo what you and Susan both said, but also uh ... um, indicate
how much I appreciated the effort to link the narratives to the strategic plans (several
talking) uh, it's really helpful to see that playing out throughout each of the departments.
Hayek/ Well job well done!
Markus/ Thank you.
Fosse/ Thank you.
Hayek/ Uh, thanks for your time everyone, and have a good rest of the day! See you tomorrow,
most of you! (laughter)
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council special
work session (budget) of January 7, 2013.