HomeMy WebLinkAbout2018-09-18 TranscriptionPage 1
2. Proclamations
2.a. National Suicide Prevention Awareness Month
Throgmorton: We have five proclamations to read tonight. It will take not more than 30
minutes, I promise (laughter) I'm only kidding! Uh, but I also want to welcome
you to your City Hall. It's great to see all of you, especially on a wild and crazy
day like today where, I don't know, I don't know about you but I looked out the
window at one point and thought I saw trees fallin' down all over the place
(laughter) and, you know, enormous amounts of water coming down, but luckily
....god bless everybody in North Carolina, things are quite as rough here as in
there .... in that state. Okay, so the first proclamation is National Suicide
Prevention Awareness Month. Who did I ask to read that? Pauline!
Taylor: (reads proclamation) And I believe Joy ..... Eyman .... Eyman is here to accept!
(applause) (mumbled) ....say a few words, right?
Eyman: I'm a member of the Johnson County Suicide Prevention Coalition and I work
closely with the C1is.... Crisis Center and with the National Alliance on Mental
Illness to raise awareness of suicide. I appreciate the opportunity to witness and
accept this proclamation. We are thankful for the City Council and the City of
Iowa City for addressing this critical issue, and for encouraging action to reduce
the number of suicides. We can make a difference! Thank you.
Throgmorton: Thanks so much! (applause) Okay, the next proclamation is Childhood Obesity
Prevention Month. John.
2.b. Childhood Obesity Prevention Month
Thomas: (reads proclamation) And Vickie Miene is, uh.... is she here (mumbled)
(applause)
Miene: Thank you all. I'm from the College of Public Health and a member of our
InvestHealth team and, um the statistic that you stated, that we're the fourth
highest in adult obesity is actually a recent statistic that was released last week.
We were 12w in the nation and so we're trending in the wrong direction. Our
entire nation is trending in the wrong direction, but if we all make healthy
choices, like drinking more water, eating more fruits and vegetables, and staying
active throughout the day, we can tum those numbers around. So thank you for
drawing attention to this incredibly important issue.
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 2
2.c. The International Day of Peace
Throgmorton: Thank you, Vickie. (applause) Okay, the next proclamation is the International
Day of Peace! (reads proclamation) Somebody's phone! (cell phone in
background) (continues reading proclamation) Ed Flaherty, could you come on
up please? (applause) And John Christensen! (unable to understand, speaking
away from mic) (laughter)
Flaherty: Uh, I'm Ed Flaherty with Veterans for Peace Chapter 161. This is John
Christenson, co -president of Veterans for Peace 161, and these are the members
of Veterans for Peace. (applause) (mumbled) I wanted to thank the Council for
this opportunity. It is an opportunity to, uh.... accept the idea that war .... that we
are in right now, the 17 years of continuous war, is not a perpetual war. We do
not have to be at war forever. Peace is possible! Your proclamation, uh, and
agreement to the international declaration today speaks to that, speaks to hope.
There's a lot of things involved in the war on peace thing, um, but just on the
money and for a moment. The 2019 budget for the military for the United States
is $717 billion. The general fund budget for Iowa City, as I understand it for 2019,
is proposed to be $67 million. On a per capita basis, uh, the Pentagon spends
$2,182 per person ......for every Iowa City resident. I mean that.... they.... they
don't, Iowa City residents don't necessarily pay that much in taxes because most
of that military spending just winds up being added to the national debt.
But .... so..... expenditures of $2,182 per Iowa City citizen for the military,
compared to $882 per Iowa City citizen for the Iowa City general fund. Urn .... we
get what we invest in. That's what I used to think as a .... as a banker. So, um, we
need to change what we're investing in and let's not invest so much in war. Let's
invest more in peace. John Christenson will talk a little bit more about the
international aspect of the day.
Christenson: Thanks, Ed. The International Day of Peace is the 21" of September and as an
official United Nations' holiday. It's dedicated to world peace and specifically
for the absence of war and violence. Last year there were 562 celebrations in 127
countries around the world. The theme of this year's.....uh, UN Peace Day is the
"Right to Peace, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights at 70," and this
refers to a covenant that President Carter signed in 1980. But now in 2018, the
United States is the only industrial country that has not ratified that treaty. Thank
you. (applause)
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 3
Throgmorton: Thanks, John and Ed! Okay, the next proclamation is National Hispanic Heritage
Month. Rockne!
2.d. National Hispanic Heritage Month
Cole: (reads proclamation) Barbara Kutzko is here (both talking)
Throgmorton: Yeah, I don't see Barbara out there now.
Cole: Anyone else? All right.
Throgmorton: AM Excellent! (applause)
Pena: Um, thank you very much. I'm Tahuanty Pena, I'm one of the Human Rights
Commissioner, uh, for the City. I wanna thank the City Council for this
proclamation, especially in this time of some divisive rhetoric, uh, in the
community. It's really good to see the commitment of our community to respect,
uh, our heritage and our culture. Thank you very much.
Throgmorton: Thanks! (applause) Okay, we get to have a little bit of fun now. So the next
proclamation, and the last proclamation for the evening, is PLAYvolution. Susan!
2.e. PLAYvolution
Mims: (reads proclamation) Jill Dodds! (applause) (talking in background) (laughter)
Dunkhase: So on behalf of the PLAYvolution Committee, which you see all around you,
thank you so much to Mayor Throgmorton and to the Iowa City City Council
Members for your belief in the power of play and for declaring the month of
September as PLAYvolution Month. Um, this is our fourth year of having a
PLAYvolution in the community and our committee members of people who are
so devoted to making this happen are Simple Abundance Childcare, Four -Cs
Community Childcare, Iowa City Public Library, Iowa City Parks and Rec,
Coralville Library, Coralville Parks and Rec, and this year for the first time we
have the North Liberty Library and Parks and Rec involved, and of course the
Iowa Children's Museum, which I'm representing. So as you send in your
declaration we know that play is critical to healthy child development. What we
also know is that play is a basic human need, as essential to our well-being as
sleep. So when we're low on play, our minds and body notice. Over time, play
deprivation can reveal itself in certain ways. We might get a little cranky. We
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 4
might get a little rigid, feel stuck in a rut or feel victimized by life. So to benefit
most from the rejuvenating benefits of play, we need to incorporate it into our
everyday lives, not just wait for those two week vacations every year, which is
why we are here today to start a PLAYvolution right here in Iowa City, Iowa, and
we're gonna ask all of you to help us. We have a little cheer to kick it off that
we're gonna teach you first. And the cheer goes like this: (mumbled) One, two,
three, four, imagine, create, discover, explore; five, six, seven.... eight, nine, ten,
let the PLAYvolution begin! Okay, now we're gonna do it for real, and when the
cheer stops, either you throw your beach ball high in the air or you twirl your
whirligig high in the air, or low on the ground, however it works for you, and
we're gonna (laughter) play for a minute. Okay (talking in background, laughter)
Okay! One, two, three, four, imagine, create, discover, explore; five, six, seven...
eight, nine, ten, let the PLAYvolution begin! (cheering and laughter)
Throgmorton: Order! Order! (laughter)
Mims: Thank you! (laughter; talking in background)
Throgmorton: I don't know if those Coralville council people can play quite as well (laughs)
(talking in background)
Cole: We'll be seein' you soon, Jill!
Throgmorton: All right! Fun!
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 5
3. Special Presentations
3.a. Iowa Water Environment Association Harris F. Seidel Education Award
presentation
Throgmorton: I think Bob Watson and Scott Wienards are gonna speak about this.
Watson: Yes! I'm Bob Watson from Decorah. Scott Wienards from Waterloo. Tim you
know, I hope. Um, we're here this evening to present the Harris Seidel Education
Award, and a little history. Um, when a society like ours, uh, puts in advanced
water treatment, the life expectancy goes up 20 years, and so what we do is fairly
important and the education part of our, uh, association is the primary part of our
association. We try to educate ourselves. The very first, uh, operator training
course in the United States was 103 years ago in Ames on the Iowa State campus.
Uh, 12 years later we put together the association, which is now the Iowa Water
Environment Association and a year after that the Iowa Association morphed or
spawned the National and International Association, uh, the Water Environment
Federation, and so strangely enough from humble Iowa beginnings for water and
waste water education, um, we now have an international organization. Uh,
Harris Seidel was very important in a lot of the education that happened in our
association. He was the president of the, uh, Waste Water Organization. The
president of the Engineering Association. The president of the Water Association
to the state. He also, uh, put together and was on the board of the, uh,
certification company that does certifications. So, uh, grade 1, grade 2, grade 3,
grade 4 — there is a company that puts together the criteria, gives the testing. So
Harris wanted waste water and water workers to be paid, the higher certification
the more, uh, intricate your equipment you work with, your technology and
therefore, uh, the higher pay grade that you have. Um, education for us also is not
only educating people but educating ourselves, and as I go through Tim's resume,
I think that will become fairly evident that Tim has done both of these, uh, both of
these things. So ..... I'll go through the resume first and then I'll go through what
he's done for our association also. So in, uh, January of 1974, uh, Tim was a
welder at the Harsh .... Hamischfeger Corporation in Cedar Rapids. Uh, in 1983
he was an iron worker for Mid America Construction. Uh, in 85 he was a drilling
assistant for Shive-Hattery in Iowa City, the engineering company. A welder and
assembler at Divine Engineering in Cedar Rapids, and then Tim took advantage
of the, urn ...... the Clean Water Act and the im.... and the monies that the Clean
Water Act gave for people to join our ed .... uh, association and our industry, and
he went to, uh, Kir ... Kirkwood Community College and was given an .... an
Associate of Applied Science in 1986. Waste water treatment operator at the
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 6
Glenbard Waste Water Authority in Glen Ellyn, Illinois, in 1986. Manager of the
waste treatment, uh, operation at Iowa Beef Processors in Columbus Junction,
Iowa, in 1987 to 90. Associate professor, Environmental Training Center,
Kirkwood Community College. So Tim got his training at Kirkwood and then
went back as a professor at Kirkwood. Then he was an auto -cad technician with
Johnson County, the Auditor's Office in Iowa City here. University of Iowa, he
went back to school again and in 1994, uh, got a Bachelor of Science. Um, I
actually used to stay with Tim when I would come down here and he was never
home (laughter) He was either working or taking classes somewhere. Um, then
in the, uh, Superintendent of the Water Pollution Control Facility in Ottumwa,
Iowa. Project manager with Hart Fe .... Fredrick. Uh, the University of Iowa,
Iowa City, 2005, Tim got his Masters of Science in Civil and Environmental
Engineering. And he was the senior environmental engineer and a project
manager with Stanley Consultants, working on projects both in the mid -east and
in Australia, as well as other places. And so I will go through what he's done for
our organization itself, the IWEA organization. Tim was on the biosolids
committee when the biosolids committee received a national award, uh, a video
that they put together talking about biosolids. Scott was actually the chair of the
biosolids committee at that point. Uh, Region Six director, which is the DNR
region here that you guys are, uh, he was, uh, elected, uh, and then kind of
forgotten about, he said, and (mumbled) He's not there now. Education
committee for IWEA, Region Six education director from now until whenever he
fades away. Uh, multiple presentations at the Region Six meetings over a 20 -year
period. He was a member of the ad hoc water source (mumbled) committee,
which gave away K through 12 supplemental science education to mostly private
schools in the state who were hard up for curriculum money, and that was on
water, waste water, uh, surface water, ground water, and wetlands, and it was K
through 12. We gave away the curriculum to the schools. The schools used `em
in their classrooms. Over a 10 -year period we hit about 400 classrooms in the
state. Uh, those people were too young mostly, most of the little kids were too
young to be part of our association and our industry, and so Tim was then a
member of the ad hoc committee that put together the waste water and water
curriculum program at DMACC, and so the Kirkwood curriculum that Tim went
through kinda fell by the wayside about 10 years ago, but we knew that we
needed a curriculum so we put together a committee and we got DMACC, which
now has water and waste water curriculum, so that we can train water and waste
water operators in the state. He was also the, uh, a member of the ad hoc
committee that, um, put together.... having the Governor each year proclaim one
week the week of `water and waste water workers' in Iowa. Tim was actually an
author of the language that's used every year. Uh, this is the most recent, signed
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 7
by Governor Reynolds. Um, Tim, Bill Stowe, and Jenny Puffer were the authors
of the language that is used in that. And he's also a member of IWEA's five -S's,
the five shoveler's and it's kind of the mucky -muck brain trust of IWEA. And so
with that, and his final stop .... maybe not his final stop, but his stop now is
working for you, uh, here in Iowa City, and with that it gives us pleasure to
present the Hams F. Seidel Education Award to Tim Wilkey for 2018. (applause)
Wienards: This award .... this award here says the Iowa Water Environment Association
presents the Harris F. Seidel Award to Timothy D. Wilkey for exemplary service
in the field of water pollution control and environmental science through
education, training, and motiva, uh, and motivation. Tim, congratulations!
(talking in background)
Wilkey: (mumbled) ......okay with you guys, I think you guys wanna move on so
(laughter) (several talking)
Throgmorton: Nice to see ya again!
Wilkey: Thanks for the time! You bet! (several talking)
Throgmorton: ... congratulations. (laughter) Okay!
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 8
Beginning of Consent Calendar (Items 4-9)
Consider adoption of the Consent Calendar as presented or amended
Taylor: So moved.
Mims: Second.
Throgmorton: Moved by Taylor, seconded by Mims. Discussion?
Salih: (mumbled) later or now?
Throgmorton: What?
Salih: When you say discussion, can I just highlight two thing or I can highlight later on
the work session?
Throgmorton: If ...well, if it's just praising something or (both talking)
Salih: Yes, just like very quick.
Throgmorton: Yeah, okay!
9.j. Virginia Miller: biking on sidewalks
Salih: I'm just gonna highlight the Item #9.j, with a J, which is Virginia Miller: biking
on sidewalk. You know just, I would like to ask the staff, as a matter of
community educations to really respond to her and (unable to understand) so the
people can know exactly when (unable to understand) because our (unable to
understand) interesting that she bringing like her kids and she ... to the Li ... Public
Library, and they were, you know, the City doesn't have like bike lane or
anything. Yeah.
Fruin: We have responded. I think it came out after the agenda was published. So we
can get you a copy of that response.
9.k. Bonnie Riggan: Request for exception to City Code for prohibited
animals
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 9
Salih: Okay, and then the second one is, uh, of the 91, uh, really I don't know, you
know, the code exactly, but from the way that, you know, Bonnie lay out like her,
where her house is, the location, and the, you know, the yard that she have and
everything, I just wanna see if there is .... if there is any special exception, like to
have or could be put together for those kind of houses?
Fruin: Um, yes it could be done. We would recommend against that, and if you'd like
we can explain that in a memo to you on why we would resist, uh, an exemption
for that property and others.
Salih: Sure, thank you! Yeah. That's it!
Throgmorton: Any further discussion? Hearing none, roll call please. Motion carries 6-0.
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 10
10. Community Comment (items not on the agenda)
Throgmorton: This is for .... anybody can come up to the podium, speak to us about any topic
that is not on the formal meeting agenda. Please limit your comments to not more
than five minutes, uh, state your name when you first come up. So would
anybody like to address us on any particular topic? Hey, Brandon!
Ross: All right. Hi, I'm Brandon Ross. And, um .... I had an interesting conversation
with a gentleman yesterday, um, and it brings up a problem, uh, in Iowa City, uh,
which is economic, and a lot of it has to do with, uh, with housing, which is, uh, is
expensive. Iowa City is a really expensive place to live. His name is Greg, uh,
and he was telling me problems that the poor have. Uh, they have very little place
to live. Uh, housing is very un .... is very unaffordable. Shelters are, uh, often
decentralized, uh, to the city, far to go, and if, uh, if you can get into a shelter, uh,
that's great, but they need transportation to be able to get out to the shelter which
oftentimes is lacking. The homeless people tend to often carry what they own
with them, uh, everywhere they go, so that makes things, uh, doubly, uh, difficult.
Um, sometimes the shelter has kinds of curfews that prevent, uh, homeless people
from doing other things that, uh, most of us, uh, wouldn't even think twice about
doing. Um, if they're older — 40's, 50's, 60's — uh, there're further handicaps. If,
uh, if ...if it's women, uh, there's even more things we can mention about that. I
don't have to go into that. There are few jobs and almost, uh, there are almost no
jobs for such people who can't get showers or, uh, to get their clothes cleaned and
things like that, and um, I said I would come out here and, uh, and mention these
problems. Uh, meanwhile new construction, uh, takes away common space and
replaces more affordable places with, uh, unaffordable ones, and even the
Recreation Center, uh, is very forbidding to homeless people, uh, who used to go
in and have a place to go, uh, but that section has been removed in our Rec
Center. Now those who have jobs, uh, let's go to the working class and I consider
people who are homeless working class people because, uh, if you are homeless
you're working your tail off all day long and all night long. You're lucky you can
get sleep. So don't calla homeless person just a homeless person. They are
working class people. They don't have a job, but they're workin' hard. But those
people who actually have the jobs, and they can afford to .... they can't afford to
live here much easier. Uh, I'm talking about people who are in the service
sectors, uh, waiters, bartenders, baristas, librarians, shop clerks, substitute
teachers, Uber drivers, even store owners, construction workers, people who work
for the City, artists, students, you name it, urn ..... the cost of housing in town is
skyrocketing, and uh, you know if you have, um, minimum wage, even raising the
minimum wage would mean nothing if the landlords are allowed to, uh, keep
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 11
pumping up their rent. Urn .... they suck practically all the capital in the working
outer ... hours out of these people. Um.....I asked some people about the
percentage of what they pay for rent. Say a person works about 16....160 hours
in the course of a month. Very few people of those I mentioned spend less than
90%, 90 hours out of their 160, on rent. Okay? Now say they're making $7.00 an
hour, and they make about $1,200 to $1,300 a month. 700 of their hours goes to
the landlord. Now what if the landlord owns 100 units. Not that unusual in Iowa
City. Well that landlord is taking, uh.... you do the math. Uh, you know, I mean
he's takin' thousands and thousands of hours, uh, you know, if....if for instance
100 units would be 10,000 hours a month. 100 units, 10,000 hours of work. So
the people are working for the landlords. And, you know, you talk about things
like National Suicide Prevention, people can't afford to live they spend all their
time trying to make rent, uh, you know, they're more likely to commit suicide.
Uh, you talk about childhood obesity, well you know cost of food and cost of
living goes up, but what do people pay most for? They pay for rent and they also
pay for healthcare. If we can't get control over that, we can't do anything about
obesity, and we can't really cut into suicide. We can't prevent suicide. So these
things cut so many different ways. Urn .... you know, National Hispanic Heritage
Month. Well it'd be nice if, you know, the .... if the Latino people who are
immigrants, first generation, second generation, also had the ability to be in the
city. You know we talk about affordable housing, and then we toss it off. We
say, oh, affordable housing, you know, let's give five units, you know, let's give
five units out of 50, let's give five units out of 100, let's give 5%. You know, but
why not give .... why not give 95% of affordable housing? Why not give 5% to
the 5% who basically are in the upper 5%, right? Why not those 5% get what
they need and everybody else gets what they need, okay? Why not affordable
housing for everybody? If you see people in the streets living under bridges in
this town, okay? Even people who are in school living in their cars. Okay? You
know there's a problem. If you can't take care of that, if we can't take care of our
own people, if we can't provide a place to live, then the City and everything.... all
the proclamations won't do anything. We have to do much better. So instead of
affordable housing, let's make all affordable housing. Let's not just make a few
units and make the town unaffordable. We have to do better. Thank you.
Throgmorton: Thank you, Brandon. Anyone else? Good evening!
Ford: Good evening! Uh, my name is Justin Ford. Urn .... I, uh, sent a letter to the
Council in July and have not heard back. Do I just stick this sticker on here? Is
that the idea, to make my life a little bit easier? Appreciate that! Um, so I
apologize to read you the letter but I hadn't seen any action one way or the other
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 12
being taken on it. So, um, I called up, uh, the .... the friendly City workers and
they said the best thing to do would be come here and say the same thing that I
wrote you and then maybe we'll get somewhere. Um, so I apologize for .... for
reading to you but ...... Iowa City is a wonderful, friendly, and open community.
We can continue to be a community that leads in a practical and progressive
manner by updating our building code. I am proposing that we amend the current
2015 Uniform Plumbing Code as amended to include the 2018 International
Plumbing Code updates and signage usage requirements for single -user
restrooms. Section 403.1.2 of.....of the `family or assisted using toilet and
bathroom fixtures' originally stated that the fixtures located in such facilities as
required by Section 1109.2.1 in the International Building Code are permitted to
be included in the number of required fixtures for either male or female
occupants. The 2018 International Plumbing Code addition, Section 2902.1.2 in
the 2018 International Building Code adds the following crucial language:
Single -user toilet facilities and bathrooms and family -assisted use toilet and
bathing rooms shall be identified for use by either sex. Making this small change
will help our businesses serve our customers and provide gender non -conforming
people with a welcoming experience in our community. The cost to businesses
will be very small, but the impact to anyone who's forced to hold it because of an
arbitrary designation will be relieved by this progressive view of single -use
restrooms. I think it's a pretty simple thing to do. Um, I don't think it makes
sense to move to the new 2018 code for all plumbing code, but I think this isn't
something that's gonna be hard to ... to comply with for most of our.....our
businesses. Um, I understand.... some people have some really big ideas of what
a city can do and I understand that's challenging. I'm not asking for a really big
thing for the City to do. I'm asking for a rather small thing to do so that we can
welcome all of our citizens, so that they can use our facilities, um, and feel
comfortable, um, when they can, you know, when ... when we .... when it's as
simple as a single -user bathroom, urn .... being a .... a male, that probably means
I'm gonna have to wait a couple more times than I usually do for .... for the
bathroom, but it's kinda silly to see a line of women waiting for a bathroom when
there's single -stall and you just walk in to the male bathroom. Right? So, I think,
um, you've seen this in some other cities. Um, I don't think it's gonna be a big
change or .... or a difficult thing for our businesses to comply with.
Throgmorton: Thank you, Justin. Geoff, it'd be good to have somebody respond to Justin, uh,
you know, directly to, uh, what he's proposing, and maybe somebody can get his
contact information so we can actually do that.
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 13
Fruin: Um, we'll have it. If he wrote the Council previously, um, we'll .... we'll get you
a response and then we'll copy Council on that as well.
Mims: Yeah, I don't recall seeing the letter.
Throgmorton: I don't remember seeing it either.
Mims: But, I mean, I would be interested if we've got four Council Members just to hear
what staff s response is to that idea because on the surface it sounds very
reasonable to me. But I'd be interested in hearing what staff (mumbled) so it
looks like we've got four (several talking)
Fruin: We'll .... we'll (both talking)
Throgmorton:.... get back to us (both talking)
Fruin: ...we'll re -post the original letter and then we'll have a staff response.
Mims: Thank you!
Throgmorton: All right, uh, Maryann!
Dennis: Hi, I'm Maryann Dennis. I'm the Executive Director of the Housing Fellowship.
I'll be up here later for another matter, but um, Mr. Ross brought up some
interesting points, but um .... I also just wanna congratulate the City of Iowa City
because recently at the Iowa Housing conference, you all won the Innovation
Award from the IFA, the Iowa Finance Authority, for your 15 -point affordable
housing plan, and I just wanna say thank you. There's a new State coalition, the
Iowa Housing Partnership, that, um, has .... has received the plan and is actually
using that plan to actually ho .... help, um, devise a statewide plan because as far
as I know this is the only community that's really, really working on what we're
trying to do here. So I just wanna say congratulations and thank you for what you
do.
Throgmorton: Thank you, Maryann. Anyone else? Okay, seeing no one we'll turn to Item 11,
Planning and Zoning Matters.
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 14
11. Planning and Zoning Matters
I l.a.Zoning code amendment related to required retail storefronts in the
Riverfront Crossings District — Ordinance amending Title 14, Zoning related
to required retail storefronts in the Riverfront Crossings Central Crossings
Subdistrict. (ZCA18-00001) (Second Consideration)
Throgmorton: This is second consideration, but staff has requested expedited action.
Mims: I move that the rule requiring that ordinances must be considered and voted on for
passage at two Council meetings prior to the meeting at which it is to be finally
passed be suspended, and that the vote.....that the second consideration and vote
be waived, that the ordinance be voted on for final passage at this time.
Taylor: Second.
Throgmorton: Moved by Mims, seconded by Taylor. Discussion? This doesn't seem to be a
controversial topic, so I'm completely comfortable in condensing the readings.
Any further discussion? Hearing none, roll call please. Motion carries 6-0.
Mims: Move final consideration at this time.
Thomas: Second.
Throgmorton: Moved by Mims, seconded by Thomas. Discussion? Hearing none, roll call
please. Motion carries 6-0.
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 15
12. Public Works Facility Phase I - Resolution approving plans, specifications,
form of agreement, and estimate of cost for the construction of the Public
Works Facility Phase I Project, establishing amount of bid security to
accompany each bid, directing City Clerk to post notice to bidders, and
fixing time and place for receipt of bids.
1. Public Hearing
Throgmorton: I'm gonna open a public hearing. (bangs gavel)
Knoche: Mr. Mayor, Council, uh, Ron Knoche, Public Works Director. We're excited to
bring this project before you, uh, obviously it's a .... a phased project for us down
at our Public Works' facility. Um, I'm gonna have Jesse Bulman with Neumann
Monson Architects come up and run you through the project, and I will be
available to answer questions!
Throgmorton: Okay! Great. Hi, Jesse.
Bulman: Hello! All right. Good evening, Council Members. Um, I'm just gonna run you
through, uh, a little bit about the master plan, because a few of you, um, may not
have been here when we did this back in 2015, just to give you a little
background. And then we'll kind of go through phase I of the project. All right?
Urn .... when we started this project, we actually looked at several locations
throughout the district and we narrowed in on the Napoleon, uh, site, which is
identified by the blue dot here. Um, looking at that dot in relationship to the
growth of your city, most of the existing public facilities, uh, Public Works'
facilities, were built in the 1960s and had been in operation for 60 -plus years and
in that time the city actually grew by 60% as well. So we're kind of looking at
that growth and where that's happening, and most of that was happening in the
southern part of the .... the, uh, city. So it made sense to locate, uh, a consolidated
site on that location. Having an update issue maybe ...... all right, looks like it's...
it's working! All right, the locations, excuse me (mumbled) the locations of all
the facilities — we have the Landfill, uh, Big 10 Rental is a location that we're
renting, um, Fairgrounds, Napoleon, Riverside, Gilbert, Fire and Police
downtown, and then the Water Works are all locations that you have existing
facilities currently. Given that information, we did a little study and we realized
that there was about $300,000 in, uh, savings that could be acquired by locating
everything to the Napoleon site and eliminating the Big 10 Rental, Fairgrounds,
Riverside, and Gilbert Court, uh, locations. This puts, uh, equipment, uh, storage
of Landfill, uh, refuse vehicles, Solid Waste, Streets, Traffic, Transit, Water, and
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 16
a storage building on that location. We also understood the issue with design and
the fact that we were sitting between a ball diamond and Terry Trueblood, and we
looked deeply at the South District to figure out how to best design this building
to create a new connection, um, on the .... east side of the site. We developed
several master plans, uh, options and this is the plan that actually rose to the top of
the heap, uh, so to speak, uh, during that time. This plan shows phase I being a,
uh, shop and vehicle storage, a wash bay. Phase 2 would be solid waste and
additional office and admin building, and a removal of an existing admin
building. And then later phases 3 and 4 being transit and maintenance moving
over onto the site. Just to give you an idea of scale, um, this is Kinnick Stadium,
super -imposed on top of that plan. Uh, this is a .... these buildings are very large,
uh, they take up a lot of square footage, um, and those, uh.... break, that we really
want to break down that scale and think about, uh, how that actually relates to the
site. So that gives you a little bit of background on the master plan. (mumbled)
any questions? All right, I'll move into phase 1. The team comprised of the
Streets, Traffic, Refuse, Transportation, Maintenance departments, and these
represent the ... the end user and admin staff. So we worked with everyone, uh,
that was gonna have a vested interest on the site. Neumann Monson was the
architects. MBG, uh, was our ... our maintenance, uh, design group, uh, our
maintenance facility consultant. Snyder Associate was the civil engineer. Genus
was the landscape. Raker Rhodes roads and Modus and C -Wise, wrapping up our
other consultants. So we have a very large team of people really pushing to get
the best value for the project. Phase 1 will eliminate the Big 10 Rental storage
location. It'll also eliminate the rental from the Fairgrounds, and we will
repurpose the Gilbert Court location for Solid Waste. The phasing that we
(mumbled) walked through is outlined here. We reviewed the master plan, went
back over it with all the departments, went through schematic design, had a kick-
off meeting, and we had many meetings throughout, highlighted in orange at the
top — user groups, round robins, reviews, and at the bottom you can see we had
multiple estimates, uh, throughout the phase. During that process, our first
estimate came in, uh, a little higher than what we had hoped for and we talked a
lot about where we were going and that we would move forward into a
subsequent phase to see if we could bring it down, as the data at that time was a
little unclear. After design development, we were, uh, faced with the fact that the
estimate had actually increased and at that moment we really met with, uh, all the
department heads again and reworked the plan to bring it back into the 10 -point,
uh...... $7 million budget that we were aiming for and we've really did a very
good job. I wou.... I just wanna say the staff, uh, here did a very good job of
identifying the values that they needed. What were the priorities that they really
wanted to see in the building and ... worked very diligently at getting the most bang
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 17
for the buck. One thing I would like to say, um, as well is, you know, this
building is a state-of-the-art building. Uh, we're designing it for longevity. Uh,
those costs for that kind of structure are typically a little higher. There's also land
val.... land costs associated with this. We're actually grading a section of
property, um, that will be used for later, uh, phase. Um, and also we're hopeful
that the bids will come in a little bit better, um, stein' that there's a building
moratorium with the University, uh, going on right now. So this is a prime, uh,
time to actually get this out. Looking at phase 1, A .... we've reduced this phase
now down to ... the blue area. That's shops and, uh, and storage, with a wash bay,
still at the same location. So we reduced the scale of the building and actually
combined some shops and were able to reconfigure it, keep the functionality up.
Police and Fire will still have a warm storage building located here, and a fire
tower will be constructed as well. Everything that you see in white will be, uh,
subsequent future phases. As part of the documents, right now we've identified
two alternates. Alternate 1 is an addition to vehicle storage, and alternate 2 is a
canopy on the west side for outdoor protection of items. The master plan then has
been revised to follow this diagram, showing a future Refuse building potentially
being separated, and then the same outline of the building for Transit and
Maintenance on the south side of the site. Part of the design features of this
building include, uh, storm water quality was taken into consideration. We're
letting the water go through a low area before discharging to the river. Uh, so
we're not discharging water right from the site on .... into the river. Uh, native
plantings, no additional parking will be in phase 1, and we are going to provide
low -emitting vehicle spots and, uh, electrical vehicle spots. We've done a decent
amount of study with the White Group to determine daylight harvesting and
LEED and the envelope, uh, has been scrutinized to give the most efficiency for
the dollar and high-speed doors are even utilized to reduce the amount of time that
we have, uh, open to the environment. Part of this project will .... we're going
under LEED Version 4 and, um, health product declaration and environmental
procla.... declaration, uh, points are coming into play here. This is brand new to
the construction world, and those, uh, products have been specified within the
specifications. We have a durable pre -cast structure and we've looked at water
efficiency with low-fo.... low fixtures, water reclamation, and a fire pump test pit.
A little deeper look inside the building, uh, we have 67, 65, excuse me, uh,
parking stalls. Just under 10,000 square feet of shop area. Uh, 6,600 square feet
of mezzanine area on the upper level. So we've increased, uh.... from your
existing facility by 30% on the first level. If you combine the mez.... mezzanine
it's almost a 50% increase in the amount of area, and vehicles, these buildings that
were done in the 60s, the vehicles have grown immensely, um, so that square
footage is really just meeting today's need with plans for future additions to, uh,
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 18
continue to grow this phase project. This is a rendering of the exterior, um, as we
walk down Gilbert Street. We've broken the building down into bays and in each
of those bays we have daylighting coming in. We're looking at trying to
incorporate, uh, we are incorporating in some lighting strategies. So at night this,
uh, will color shift and change color and allow, uh, for a nice pedestrian feel. Just
an overall project budget of $12 million. Overall construction budget of 10.9.
We have 40.....or 74,250 square feet. Anticipated completion date of November,
2019. Our (mumbled) and environmental design LEED certification will be, uh,
silver. Alternate 1 is priced out at 715,000 and alternate 2 is listed here at 270.
Um, that is .... what we're proposing to, uh, build on the Napoleon site! Thank
you.
Throgmorton: Thanks, Jason. Are there questions for Jason?
Cole: I actually have a question. What are we looking at for solar infrastructure on this
building?
Bulman: Oh, I .... I forgot to mention that. Back in the, uh, the .... the sustainable strategy
we did design the roof so that solar panels could be installed. So we have, um,
factored the weight of the panels and the necessary connections that we'll need to
make into that roof design already. Uh, the solar panels are not inside the project
currently.
Throgmorton: I wanted to ask a similar question, Jason, and that is .... why not shoot for net
zero .... carbon emissions?
Bulman: Shoo... shoot for net zero? Uh, that....
Throgmorton: Or do net zero.
Bulman: Uh, I ... I have.... the.... the, uh.... the construction budget, um, would not allow us
to get to net zero. We would need to basically cover that roof with solar panels to
get there. Um.....that's a possibility, yes, in the future, because we have designed
that entire roof so that you could get there. The issue being, um, you know, we
needed to get the functional space done today, so that we had .... and plan for the
future, so we can get there, is kind of the answer I would leave you with.
Throgmorton: So efficiency's the most important thing, right? The energy efficiency, with
regard to net zero anyhow. So, am I correct in understanding that you're doing
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 19
everything reasonably possible.... that can be done (both talking) with regard to
making the building as efficient as possible, energy efficient as possible?
Bulman: Yes, uh, to kind of ...walk you through the White Group process, we look at
different strategies and what the paybacks are of each of those strategies, and
what that determination would be. So we're trying to find the best value. So
daylight harvesting, LEED, uh, you know, where you can get some .... some
energy points there. We're not using the lights, and going to LED lights made
sense, you know, the amount of insulation in the wall makes sense. One thing to
remember, this building, uh, the ... the factor of safety, um, inside the building kick
out a lot of fresh air coming in. So when the diesel fumes build up, we're
bringing in a ton of cold air during the winter. Um, so we strategized on that, uh,
recovery of that building and what the energy will be used, so we went with a
VRF inside the shops and, uh, a radiant heat overhead. Um, all of those strategies
put together, um, to deliver about a 40 to 50%, um.....over code baseline building.
And then from there, supplementing with, uh, the ... solar panels to get you down
to net zero would be a possibility.
Cole: Do we have a sense of the cost of what the solar panel installation would .... would
cost?
Bulman: Um, so I .... we, this is .... oh, yeah! (laughing and talking in background) It was
right here. Yeah, thank you, Martha!
Norbeck: Yeah, I spent several hours today evaluating this very question, anticipating
someone would ask. Um, so we had, uh, shrunk the building from, uh, 90,000
square feet to 60,000... what? 74,000 and something square feet and the energy
model, uh, we just got preliminary updated numbers today. So I went back and
estimated what it would be to provide enough solar to offset 10 to 15% of the total
load, uh, based on the previous building size. Because I didn't have the new data.
So bear this in mind. Um, so to offset 10 to 15% of a load of the previous
building size, looks like it could be ... as low as 50 and up to 75,000, uh, first cost
for installed cost, uh, solar cost, installation costs have been shifting (laughs)
dramatically and rapidly. So I would never want .... that's as close as I wanna get
is 50 to 75 for that, and so if you take that as 10 to 15% and multiply that of
course by a factor of 10 then you're at somewhere in the $750,000 range to offset
100% of the use of the building.
Bulman: Thank you, Martha.
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 20
Mims: I have (unable to hear person away from mic) No, go ahead (both talking)
Norbeck: ...know someone's gonna ask (laughter) so a power purchase agreement, a PPA,
is a way of a ... a .... a public entity, like a city or school, to reap the benefits of tax
incentives that are available to private entities. I spoke with a .... a, uh, a solar
installer today who .... who said, well, once you pay for lawyer's fees, financing
fees, try to find someone who's willing to finance the project, um, and go through
that whole process, he said, you've almost zeroed out the benefit of those tax
incentives you're trying to pass through and so he discouraged that as an approach
for a small system. If we're looking at 10 to 15%, he's like it's not worth ... he's
like I promise you it's not worth it unless you have an angel investor who's
willing to just loan you the money at a low rate for a little while. Um, but if we're
talking about closer to a megawatt of power, then it might be worth considering,
but if we're just looking at a small percentage, uh, he strongly discouraged it.
Throgmorton: Jesse, what's the design life of the building?
Bulman: Uh, 50 years is kind of the target (both talking)
Throgmorton: So it's got a pretty extensive longevity, if you will, right? I mean (both talking)
Bulman: Yeah, most of your facilities right now are runnin' 60, and they're metal
buildings, so this should be definitely, you know, a longer lasting building than
that.
Throgmorton: Yeah, so PV panels are warranted for 20, 25 years? Uh, and may keep operating
long after that, we don't know. We don't have enough experience with that.
Mims: What do we .... oh, I'm sorry!
Throgmorton:Sony! So in a .... I know it's, uh, front end costs is reasonably high. I think
probably this is one of the sites that our solar feasibility study has looked at, uh,
but (laughs) you know, on the surface it looks to me like we should go for net
zero because of the longevity of the building and because those panels would
generate power for 25 or more years, uh, at no cost while they're generating the
power. I'm not askin' you to (laughs) (mumbled) Susan, you wanted to say
something?
Mims: What did we give up in going from the 90,000 to the 74,000 square feet? It's a
pretty big drop.
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 21
Bulman: Yeah, uh, so in the original 90,000 we had planned for 20 35 -foot with the amount
of vehicle information we had at the time. So we basically gave up our future
expansion of vehicles in that area for the... for the, uh.... the .... the growth factor,
um, if you will, uh, so that addition, or alternate, would get you back to that. We
didn't predict anything out beyond 2035. It's pretty dicey to even predict to 2035.
Mims: So is alternate 1 that....
Bulman: Yes.
Mims: Okay.
Bulman: And then we also gave up a .... a, some square footage in the shops, but again the,
we were able to combine some shops and work within the departments to really
capitalize and, uh, minimize that impact.
Mims: Is it designed such that even if we can't get alternate I in now that we can get that
expansion later on with the way it's currently designed?
Bulman: That's correct. So we would recommend that at that next phase, you would build
alternate 1 and the office addition.
Mims: Okay. Thank you.
Throgmorton: Other questions for Jesse? I have another question.
Bulman: Sure.
Throgmorton: Can you show us that, uh, the Gilbert Street side, the rendering of the Gilbert
Street side? Uh, so that appears to be like 30 feet high or somethin' like that?
Bulman: Yeah!
Throgmorton: Yeah, so, uh, that's a pretty big barrier, uh, for one elongated building. So I kinda
worry about the .... that as a .... as what one sees when one's going down the road.
So I'm thinkin' there's a possibility of having some art work somehow connected
to this side of the building. That's all, I just wanna get that idea out there, to
make it much more.... appealing to ... to people (mumbled) drive along Gilbert or
walk along Gilbert, like these folks are doin' in the rendering. Yeah.
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 22
Bulman: Yeah, uh, the one thing that did change from the original master plan is we
actually pulled the building another 50 feet off of Gilbert, um, so we've created a
more space between the sidewalk and the building itself. Um, which would allow
for future installation of art work, other, uh, South District plan amenities that
were identified in that South District plan in 2014 or 15, I can't remember when
that was published. So....
Throgmorton: Okay. Any other questions for Jesse? Hearing none, thanks!
Bulman: Thank you!
Throgmorton: Would anybody else like to address this topic?
Norbeck: One more asterisk on the net zero since you show enthusiasm towards that. I
wanna clarify something cause even though I'm (mumbled) for that, you need to
be eyes wide open. So about half of the .... if you convert therms of gas, which is
being used for the heating in this building, and kilowatts of electricity to ... to a
common BTUs, then half of the building use is for ga... is provided by gas and half
by electricity. So if you take that total BTUs and convert that to how much solar
you would need, then that's what I'm talking about when I'm talking about net
zero. You're.... you're, the actual greenhouse gas potential of burning natural gas
is much more complicated than that calculation. So if that's actually the claim
you want to make, more study would need to be.....required to make that a
legitimate, authentic claim. So, big asterisk! (laughter)
Throgmorton: No footnotes? (laughter) Okay, anybody else want to address this topic? Seeing
no one else I'm going to close the public hearing. (bangs gavel)
2. Consider a Resolution
Mims: Move the resolution.
Thomas: Second.
Throgmorton: Moved by Mims, seconded by Thomas. Discussion?
Cole: I would like to jump in on this question of...well first of all it's a terrific project. I
really like the initial design. Something like this doesn't happen. This has been
years in the making, with careful planning by multiple entities, multiple folks.
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 23
Um, and normally I don't like to get into the minutiae of something as
complicated as a municipal public works building and our primary goal is so we
can serve the City of Iowa City and .... and, you know, at the greatest, at the
minimum of taxpayer (mumbled) expense, but .... I think we're making a huge
mistake by not making a serious commitment to, uh, a net zero facility, even with
the asterisks, and put that solar infrastructure on the front end. I mean we're
living through right now 95 -degree days and is this building alone going to affect
that? No, of course it's not, but ... I think we have to, if we're really serious about
our climate change program, um, and we don't do it on a brand new building,
with all the infrastructure in place, um, you know, and there are .... there are
financial issues too, but that will pay itself back over time, we really need to .... I
don't .... I don't think we're serious about our climate change program if we're not
showing the private sector what the public sector can do. 750,000, the estimate —
I know that that's a big number, but I'm hoping.... obviously I'm supportive of
this project, that we can amend that, whether we need further study in terms of a
Council work session. I'm fine with that, but I really think we need to evaluate
that, because if we can't do it on this building, what building can we do it on?
Throgmorton: I warm follow up on that, if you don't mind, just cause it's directly related to
what you said. I .... I didn't hear you mention geothermal. Are .... are we doing
geo.... proposing to do geothermal on this project?
Bulman: We are not proposing to do geothermal on this project. Uh, your heating load...
you don't, this type of building doesn't have a lot of air conditioning. Uh,
geothermal, uh, efficiencies really ramp up when you have a heating load and a
cooling load. We don't have that cooling load. We have a .... a major demand for
heat. So that's where that payback doesn't make sense. You .... your investment
in the geothermal, um, would be many times that, uh, solar investment.
Throgmorton: Great, okay. Other questions or .... yeah, discussion, other discussion?
Salih: Yeah, even though I wasn't here when this, uh, like plan (mumbled) I just think
this was a very good move from the Council Members and the staff, by like doing
this. I just would like to highlight the importance of, uh, you know, improving
the work place condition for our employees because I think when we have good
work place conditions, it makes employee act safety and most likely they will do
good job, and also even though there is concern about like (unable to understand)
that was a good move that you have a solid plan and you doing a lot to improve
the environment, which is great. I warm thank all the people who put the effort
and work on this and this is great job. Thanks!
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 24
Throgmorton: Some of the existing facilities are pretty miserable places to work, I think, and so
this is a great replacement for those.
Taylor: I remember when we took a tour, one of the departments had like coffee cans on
some of the desks and .... and they had to really protect like their computer
equipment because the roof was leaking. So, you know, I see this as a really, uh,
a .... a great move on our part in consolidating the facilities and that Riverside
Drive, uh, location is long outlived its .... its expected life and, uh, so I think the
working conditions'll be better, uh, and it is a great design, and speaking of the
longevity, the 50 years. I think, uh, Rockne makes a good point that we do need
to set a good example, I think. I think we .... we should, uh, really look into ... to
doing something more. There are some sustainable features in it, but I think we
need to look at some more of that but, uh, I'm also very excited to see the fire
training. You didn't emphasize that enough but I'm looking forward to that cause
that's a long needed since .... since we lost the one we had many years ago.
Throgmorton: Any other discussion? Well I wanna pick up on what Rockne said. Uh, but, you
know, maybe if we .... if we think it's too expensive to do a full array that would
capture, replace all the .... carbon emissions, so the building would be net zero,
maybe we can get part of it. So like half the roof or something.... or half the....
the array.
Fruin: What I would suggest, uh, now, we had a brief conversation this morning
anticipating that this .... this would come up. Um, you have your solar feasibility
study that .... that we're trying to put a bow on and bring to you. That analyzes a
number of different facilities. It doesn't analyze this because that was bein' done
by the design team here. Let us present to you all the data that we have from the
facilities that we looked at. We'll bring the data that is currently being refined,
uh, by Martha and the team right now, bring that to you at the same time, and
we're thinkin' October, um, and we will lay out all the options for solar. There's
a good chance that this one will rise to the top, um, based on some of the
preliminary numbers that the team has looked at and then you can decide how
aggressive you wanna be going into this budget, but I think it's critical that we,
um, get the plans and specs on the street right now, uh, because there's a....
there's a good bidding window here and we can actually get some work started
this fall still and.—and get going through the winter. If we were to hold off and
study this issue further, uh, we don't know what the bidding climate would look
like come December or whenever we could come back to ya, so, urn .... the team
assures us that the .... the structure is in place. I think we can come back with a
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 25
solar project, um, but you should probably look at the broader study that we've
done before makin' that call.
Mims: I think that makes a lot of sense. I'm also concerned about the fact that ... to get
into this budget we've had to downsize it by more than 16% in terms of square
footage, and basically give up any growth in terms of the size of our fleet and
need for work space for our workers, etc. So, um, I guess my first preference
would be to .... get that bid out and see if we can possibly get those alternates in
there in terms of getting some of that square footage back so that we can get the
facility space now while it's cheaper than it will be in five or 10 years, um, and
then once we have that solar study, feasibility study back then look at the
possibility of doing that.
Throgmorton: Sounds reasonable to me. Rockne, does that sound okay to (both talking)
Cole: Yeah, October 2018 sounds like a good (both talking)
Throgmorton: Yeah, okay. Good deal! Any further discussion? Hearing none, roll call please.
Motion carries 6-0.
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 26
14. Iowa City Climate Action and Adaptation Plan - Resolution Adopting the
Iowa City Climate Action and Adaptation Plan.
Throgmorton: Could I have a motion to approve please?
Mims: Move adoption.
Cole: Second.
Throgmorton: Moved by Mims, seconded by Cole. And .... now we're gonna hear from Brenda
and then I guess Ashley, is that right? uh, is that the sequence in mind? (several
talking) Great!
Nations: I'm Brenda Nations, the Sustainability Coordinator, and I'm tryin' to get this
(mumbled)
Throgmorton: Is there some way we can reduce the light on that image so that people could
actually read it? Great! Thank you.
Nations: Um, hi, so I am very happy to be here. As you know, um, we've been working
long on this, and so what I'm going to do tonight is just give a .... a brief overview
and then, uh, talk about the next steps. So, uh, tonight, uh, I'm gonna talk about
just go over quickly the planned development. Um, as you know it was our task
to come up with a plan to .... I guess you can't see that. Um, a plan to, uh, reach
the targets that you set early to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions, and so ... as a
....as a result of that, we have the plan that we're presenting to you tonight. Um,
we have, um, as .... as a result of that, we convened the Steering Committee and
I've, uh, many Steering Committee members are here tonight, if you could please
stand up. (applause) So,um, they've been a great, uh, team to work with and
they've done a really good job and have had a lot of expertise. So, uh, we also
had a lot of community involvement, uh, we .... the consultant used a lot of
calculations, and so what our plan has to do with is real data, um, both in the
calculations from what Iowa City emissions are and we also used best practices,
um, from, um, the Covenant of Mayors, which we're members of, um, STAR
Communities, and looked at other cities. So, um, we started with, um, our
emissions, uh, greenhouse gas inventory. You can see up here, and um, from this
we, um, we used calculations and actions to get to the emission reduction goals
that you, uh, set previously. So you can see over here that 42% of our emissions,
ub, the most current year that we have in the plan is 2015. 42% is electricity and
26% is natural gas, so our built environment, um, is our main user of. ... of fossil
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 27
fuels. 15%, uh, is coal from the University of Iowa power plant and 15% is also
fossil fuels used in transportation within our city limits. Um, the other, uh, item
here is, uh, waste, which is a small percent and for the community that's just the
waste, uh, for the Iowa City community. So, um.....um, you might have seen this
before. This is the timeline of our climate work that we've done in the city, and
uh, with 2016 when we, uh, the Mayor signed the Compact of Mayor's, which is a
three-year project. So, um, this will feed into that. Um, and, um, in 2016 in
December was when you set the reduction targets, and the Steering Committee,
uh, was appointed and has been workin' on this for over a year now, and again
the, uh, short-term reductions target are 2000, uh, 25, a reduction of 26 to 28%,
and in, uh, 2050 is 80%, and so that's a very, um, aggressive, uh, amount for
long-term. If you think about it, 80%, uh, reduction of fossil fuel use in our
community — that's, um, those pretty substantial, and especially when you think
about population growth. So this takes into toun... into account that we're a
growing city and that, uh, population growth, um, during that time. Um, so in the
planning proc... process, um, our Steering Committee actually met more than nine
times, but we met regularly, urn .... we had two community meetings that were
standing room only, um, lot of turnout for that, lot of ...a lot of public input. We
had stakeholder interviews with, uh, internal and external, um, members of the
community and City staff, and we had a survey to get community input, um,
that's also in the plan, and we got over 100 respondents and uh, if you look at
some of those questions you can see that we have a very committed community,
um, for climate action and a lot of them think about climate change every day. So
the majority of people in Iowa City do, which is pretty amazing (mumbled) So,
uh, what we have, uh, are bringing to you tonight is our finalized plans. You've
seen a draft plan of this. Uh, we're feeling like it's final now. It's been, uh, we've
gone over it. We've .... have 35 actions in this plan, out of, uh, in five different
categories, and I'm gonna go over those really briefly. I'm not gonna talk about
`em in real, uh, detail but I'm just gonna briefly cover those five categories. Um,
within the five categories and the 35 actions, um, if you remember that, uh, targets
were for community wide and so this is what we're asking that the community,
um, and that's why we really needed a lot of buy -in and so of our community
missions, the City government, uh, is responsible for 5% of those emissions, but,
uh, within the plan we also have, uh, action items that are really specific for the
municipal government to undertake to show that lead by example as, uh, as we
would like to do. So, um, there's some that are specifically just, uh, for City
government and some that are community wide. Um, in this plan we also have
identified, uh, what residents can do at home, uh, what people can do at work and
businesses can do, and also, uh, those that are City government and some are a
combination of those. So, uh, within the plan there's a couple tables that really
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 28
outline, um, with the plan, uh, those that are expected to cost more, um, those
have a .... a local impact, um, some are higher priorities cause they have a global
impact, and um, the tables have more details, um, for each thing. Um, that being
said too, this is the plan and this is the information, um, that's for the public and
pretty and readable. We also have a lot of other files, um, for calculations, um,
how to get their examples, um, and a tracking toolkit. So, um, what you see here,
uh, some of the actions may look simple but we have a lot of, uh, background
information on those to, uh, move forward with. So the five categories, uh,
building is the one that we talked about the most with having the electricity and
the natural gas. So that's gonna be a big category. Um, within this category
things like increase energy efficiency, um, in homes and businesses, but also, uh,
taking into account new buildings and new building codes, and so that's gonna be
an important part moving forward, and maybe one of the most important parts.
Uh, transportation is also a big factor, um, in our emissions currently. So the
actions within this, uh, category are things like increase our mass transit system,
um, embrace and increase electric vehicles, and get ready for that. Um, we've
heard about some of that tonight already. Uh, some of these things that, um, are
in the ... in the plan are things that we were already doing or ongoing, and things
that, um, like bicycle and....and, uh, pedestrian transportation, some of the....
some of the goals that we already have, and so the actions that were chosen were
specifically .... there were many actions, um, that we had to sift through so they
were chosen specifically, um, to lower our emissions here in Iowa City, but also
things that, um, our community wanted and that fit within, um, our current goals.
Um, you can see here also we have reduce City vehicle emissions footprint, and
so that's working on our own fleet. So within each action there's a specific, um,
action for the community .... the.....the municipality as well. So for waste, um,
waste is an interesting, um, action for .... you remember it was only 2% of the
community, um, emissions, but for the municipal operations, it's like over half.
It's like 54%, and the reason for that is that we own and operate the landfill and
we're responsible for the emissions for that, and so we have the waste of the
entire county, and so we have the opportunity to do something about, um, the
emissions that we're burning and flaring currently, um, but it is, um, really
complex issue and if it was easy or, uh, inexpensive we would have done it
already. So we've been looking into that for years and, um, as you know, um,
that's a very big project and, um, requires, uh, study and feasibility as with the
emissions from our waste water operations, and so, um, because we operate a
waste water treatment plant, um, there's emissions from that, and also it uses, um,
it's our number one number of electricity. Uh, adaptation is another section. Um,
as you know, um, we're already seeing the effects of climate change. Um, with
this study we also refer to the study that we have done previously on climate
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 29
projections for Iowa City, um, that was data -driven, that we worked with
climatologists and what we found in that study is that we're going to, uh, see and
we're seeing historically more precipitation and more heat, and so looking at that
and preparing, uh, for that was an important aspect of this, and so also, um, I
should note that within this category, it was really important, um, to note that this
is one of the areas that we were thinking about, uh, looking at, uh, equity. We
tried to include equity within our main plan and with each of these sections. Um,
but adaptation was, uh, something we felt was important, um, to help people in
emergencies or, urn .... uh, different, uh.... uh, different situations that people that
might have mobility problems or, uh, language, didn't speak English as a first
language might be vor.... more vulnerable to climate adaptation. And so, um,
even though we haven't gone through each action for, uh, equity considerations,
we hope as we do implementation that we, uh, make sure that each of the, um,
action items doesn't have a disproportional impact to, uh, different residents
within our community. Uh, sustainable lifestyle is, um, another section, and in
this section, um .... um, things were, um, more difficult to measure, and so even
though some things were very important to include, um, this was an .... an area that
was, uh, hard to measure locally but might have greater global, uh, impacts, such
as enclur .... encourage a plant -rich diet. Um, that is one of the, uh, number one
things that you can do globally, but we're probably not going to be able to
measure that in our own, um, greenhouse gas inventory, but we felt that that was
important to have in this as well as, uh, some of the things that are important to us
locally, like community gardens and local food. Um, another thing in here is, uh,
to initiate a green recognition program, which we're really, uh, hoping to do. I've
been working on, uh, something like that with Wendy Ford and we'd like to
recognize the businesses and, uh, organizations in Iowa City for some of these
things to help promote it and encourage it community wide. So basically those
are, uh, is a very quick overview of what we came up with and, uh.... uh, their
within the plan and so I apologize that I went through those very quickly, but the
goal for the plan was to, um, come up with actions that could, uh, reduce our
short-term emissions goals and our long-term emission goals, and so these actions
that ... that we have put in the plan, um, are aimed to do that, exactly that, and um,
if we implement it. That's the .... that's where we're gonna get to. So, uh, the
implementation part, um, as you probably are aware, is the most important part.
Um, the plan is a really good, uh, first step. It gives us the framework. It's give...
given us the information and background to, um, implement, um, these actions to
get there in our community. So this slide here is, um, I think you may have seen
this before. It's our baseline emissions here in 2005, um, along with our
population growth that we're expecting by 2025. So from our emissions, business
as usual, we would expect in 2025, um, these are the areas that we are expecting,
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 30
uh, to reduce in to get to our total, uh, amount of reduction in 2025. So this would
include, um, Mid American's commitment to wind energy for electricity for Iowa,
uh, customers, um, and also the University of Iowa's commitment to get off coal
in our power plant here. So those are two major things, uh, that we are, uh,
counting on for, uh, with our partners, and so in the short-term, we're very likely
to meet our goals and/or exceed them by 2025, especially because of these two
things, but as you can see, other things, urn .... are important and all of the actions,
um, are important if we're gonna get there. Uh.... (mumbled) here. Huh! Um, so
for 2050, uh, that's a larger goal and it's a stronger, uh, commitment to get to
those targets, and so, uh, again we have our, uh, business as usual growth,
which .... here we go .... which is the second blue, uh, I lost my .... there .... is the
second blue, um, column, and so we're expected to grow, um, a .... a larger
percentage by that time. Again that's Mid American is the first orange column.
Um, that's going to wind, uh, 100% renewable wind energy, uh, by the end of
2020, 2021. Uh, the University power plant is going off coal by 2025, but then
you can see the other things, um, will be more important and are important to start
long-term now, which has to do with energy efficiency, uh, electric vehicles, and
uh, the other items that you can see there. So long term is .... is, uh, what we need
to be looking for to reach those goals and starting now. Uh, one of the
calculations that we have, um, are for each of the actions that they were able to
calculate, and um, these were the top 10 actions that had the most, uh, impact
locally, and you can see as I mentioned before, the energy efficiency in res...
residents and businesses, um, is the navy blue, uh, for existing buildings it's
gonna be important. Uh, energy efficiency and also remember getting off of that
natural gas that, uh, right now there's not a lot of technologies for that, but um,
ground source heat pumps or geothermal, uh, like we have in some of our, uh,
buildings that only use electricity is one way. Um, also air source heat pumps,
which is a newer technology, um, that is not very common in Iowa right now is
something that we can look into. So natural gas is gonna be, uh, one of the big
things, and also, uh, vehicle fuels. So electric vehicles and preparing for that and
alternative vehicles is, uh, important, as well as energy efficient, uh, new
buildings, and so new buildings that aren't even built yet and the codes, um, not
just the codes but also the, um, inspections and, uh.... making sure those buildings
are .... are built to new, uh, energy efficient codes is gonna be extremely, um,
important. So, next steps — so this is probably the most important, um, thing
tonight. Uh, we recommend that the plan is adopted and that the reason for that is
that it's for, um, our STAR membership and for the Compact of Mayors, um, it
shows a commitment to these things, and also going forward, uh, funding and....
and, uh, gives the plan some credibility, uh, to move forward on so .... on some of
these things and shows our commitment. Um, the other thing is now that we have
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 31
this done, the tracking of it is going to be very important, and to update the
Council with the progress on a regular basis, um, is gonna be really important.
We have a tracking sheet for all of the actions and of course we do our
greenhouse gas inventory, which'11 be the real, um, key to show our .... our
progress. Um, also within the packet you, um, should have found the Steering
Committee's proposal. Um, the Steering Committee, uh, would like to disband as
a formal committee and continue to work on this, and um, they are a very
committed group and they realize that, uh, the work is just begun and that getting
it out to the public and makin' sure that it's implemented, um, is gonna be a large
effort, and they're willing to, uh, try and do that, and so they'd like to do, uh, a
pilot year of trying to, uh, be an informal group and seein' how that works and
report back, um, to make sure that they're successful in their, uh, help.... helping
the Council with priorities and implementation. Um, there's also a file in your
packet about their implementation suggestions and, um, suggestions from each of
the members, and they voted, and they wanted to come up with some priorities
from the last, um, Council meeting. They knew that you wanted some
recommendations, and so, um, their recommendations align with the actions of
greatest impact, which is why I put the last graph in .... in that, um, in this, uh,
presentation. So their top priorities is to focus on buildings, both new, uh,
construction and existing. Uh, and transportation and especially with the outreach
and getting, um, the plan, uh, out into the public, um, and even though there was
100 people at some of those meetings, it really needs to get out, uh, further into
the community and that's something that they would like to, um, work on. Uh,
with that I'm gonna turn it over to Ashley who can talk about the City
implementation, um, timeframe and budget.
Monroe: I gave.... thanks, Brenda. Um, we just wanted to provide an overview and then
I'm just gonna fill in a couple of potential questions. Um, we also included in the
packet a schedule of proposed City implementation efforts. So, um, I know the
big question is, well, where do we start and when are these things happening, um,
is there any money in the budget for the proposed action items, and so with just a
simple chart I tried to address, um, some potential questions for each of the
actions in the plan. Um, we've identified whether there is already an .... an
initiation of a project. So, um, in that chart you'll see that we know there's a start
of fall 2018 or it's an ongoing initiative. It's not saying that we've addressed each
and every aspect of those, of all that action, um, but there have been some
movement. So for example, uh, working towards the transportation study, um, for
a route study. That's coming up and is listed in this chart as .... as beginning in fall
2018. So we've identified a budget for some of these items. Um, as we proceed
with implementation of each of the actions, relying on the Advisory Committee,
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 32
uh, re .... you know, relying on staff and, um, any analysis of equity issues with the
potential action implementation. Um .... each of the projects will likely come back
in some form or another, uh, from a City.... from the City side, uh, to Council
potentially. So especially the larger items, either through the budget process or,
um, if it's a stand-alone project that we want to bring forward to you for further
approval, um, you'll see that again. Currently we have set aside some money in
the budget for climate action implementation efforts. So we've included that in
the last couple of budgets. Part of that co ... part of that allocation has been
covering the .... the study and, uh, plan development itself. Um, other things have
been, um, dedicated to actions that align with what has been in plan development.
So, um, expanding our tree canopy, we allocated some funds for plantings
recently this year, uh, along Lower West Branch and Camp Cardinal. So .... so
some things have been .... been utilized, but we have a balance of about 100 and,
um, $180,000 that have not been allocated. So, um, over the last couple of years
that we've just been banking that, and those funds are available for projects that
we can start and initiate right away. Um, I just wanted to give you a general, um,
feeling for what's there now, uh, we will be proposing additional projects or
you'll see other projects identified through this upcoming budget process for
fiscal year 20 and um .... that's .... that's all I have right now .... about this.
Throgmorton: Okay. Uh.... y'all done? (laughing and several talking) Yeah, I'd like to make a
quick comment and then ask all the other Council Members to chime in in one
way or another. Uh, mainly what I wanna do is praise .... the staff and the Steering
Committee, and the consultant, for the terrific work they have done on this
project. So I know John and Matt and G.T. and Martha and ... uh, Charlie, you
know, y' all are out there, you put a lot of time and energy into this, and the results
show, especially with regard to your recommendations, I think .... well not
especially, but ... uh, in particular with regard to the recommendations you make
with regard to the Advisory Committee and we'll come back to that in a little bit,
I think, uh, but I wanna praise you and thank you for all the work you've put into
this. Bravo! And the staff as well, I mean, Brenda, you .... you did a lot of
talking, but you've also done a huge (laughs) amount of work for many, many
years, and I saw the smile on your face when you came up. You're .... I think you
feel pretty good about where we've gotten, uh, and we know we've got a lot more
to do, but bravo to you, and Ashley, I know you've worked very hard on this, to
kind of get the whole thing .... keep it goin' (laughs) so well done, but also there
are others, uh, Dylan Cook, Shannon McMahon, Katie Linder, I don't know who
else, but uh, at least those three other staff have, uh, done yopersons work
(laughs) uh, on this project and thanks go to them as well. So, ub, there probably
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 33
other things I could say and I will, but I wanna give everybody else a chance to
speak now, so .... discussion?
Cole: I have a question and then a comment. So I understand that we only, uh, produce
about 2%, by we I mean the municipality of the City of Iowa City, we produce
about 5%? Okay. So that's relatively small number, but are we then committed
though, even though it's just that 5%, we have a plan for 26 to 28% reduction by
2025, as a city? Are we committed to that?
Nations: That is a really good question. We don't have a formal, um, some cities have
different percentages or adopt the same, and we haven't formally adopted one for
the municipality actually. We're assuming that it's the same as what we have
adopted .... at, for the community. So that's up to you. Um, some cities have a
more stringent, um, commitment for reduction. Um, considering our landfill and
waste water, I think it's gonna be actually more difficult for us as a municipality
and more costly, uh, to ... to make reductions. So, um, it's up to you.
Cole: Okay. So with that question answered, and I understand there's complexity,
that's all I have for you, Brenda. I understand there's complexity in terms of as a
city committing to that reduction, but ... in my view, I'm still not feeling the sense
of urgency with the implementation, and I think there are budget limitations. We
want to be pru.... prudent with the taxpayer dollars, but I really wanna feel more
urgency, and I want deadlines that, uh, that we receive in terms of targeted
actions. Um, I think in terms of our upcoming budget discussion, uh, I think we
need to have, I think if the committee wants to do the informal advisory board,
that's fine, but I would like to see a staff person dedicated to implementing to
this .... this policy so we get these reductions. Um, yes there's a lot of variables
that we can't control, but there are a lot of variables that we can control, um, and I
think we need to .... we need to feel a greater sense of urgency. We're living
through 95 -degree September days. We're seeing flash flooding in our streets,
and I think we do need to have, uh, more focus on that. So in terms of our
upcoming budget discussions and staff plannings, I would really like to see at
least a part-time person assigned to monitor and implement this program, cause
I .... I'm still not feeling that we're operating with enough of a sense of urgency so
far. I don't know if anyone has any comment on that.
Throgmorton: Further discussion, folks?
Thomas: I just (both talking)
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 34
Throgmorton: Brenda, you can probably sit down (laughter) I'll yell out if...if we need ya to
come back up.
Thomas: I think I just primarily want to say thanks to everyone who participated in this. It
is a really outstanding piece of work. An important milestone in terms of...
generating a plan, which I think, uh, will complement and rein.... mutually
reinforce with so many of our other plans that we've developed. I think, you
know, that helps position us to move forward. We do have .... some transportation
elements, uh, we're soon to have an urban forestry element. Um ... so .... so all of
these things while I think help us move forward and be heading in the right
direction (laughs) I mean you could generate a lot of activity but it, you know, if
you don't have plans for ... how to ... to actually implement, you may not be making
the most sensible decisions. So, I think I'm mainly just thankful, um, I .... I am
interested in how this plays into, um, questions of equity and into our affordable
housing plan, um, especially insofar as the, you know, one of the key areas of
focus will be on improving energy efficiency. Uh, I think that has potentially
some real great opportunities in terms of expanding on our affordable action, uh,
affordable housing action plan, addressing questions of, uh.....reducing, uh, you
know, our utility bills for those who have, uh, low incomes. So I see some real
great opportunities, uh.... there and, urn .... as well as in....public health. You
know, we just had that proclamation, uh, the .... one of the beauties of...of the plan
is its co -benefits, which .... which you didn't talk about, Brenda, but if you read
through the co -benefits, you could be a climate change denier and still say well
this makes a whole lot of sense, because it....it will help mobilize activities that
will address a number of other issues that we're faced with. So, um, I'm very
pleased we are where we are and .... as we've been emphasizing, it's the
implementation now that's the great challenge.
Mims: I would just ... wanna add my thanks to all the people involved, from staff to the...
to the committee. I'm gonna take a little bit different approach and that is I was
looking back through, cause I can't remember where I read this, and I guess it's
not in the packets, urn .... an article I read in the last couple of days talked about
these issues and talked about, you know, the good work that a lot of cities and...
and some states are doing. But it also had a very negative connotation. Said
given what our federal government has done, these are a drop in the bucket. And
aren't gonna get us where we need to be. Not to say that we shouldn't do what
we can do, but to reemphasize to everybody the importance of speaking out and
lobbying on the state and national level in terms of what we do on the .... on the
much larger scale, um, because if it's only small cities like Iowa City or even
Portland or whatever, um, you know, hit and miss cities across the country that
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 35
decide this is important, that's nowhere near enough, and so it .... it's important for
all of us to remember that we really need to speak out about these issues on a
much larger and more global level. So, would just encourage people to keep
thinking about that.
Taylor: I think ... I don't know, I don't want to speak for you, Susan, but I think I
remember seeing something to the fact that since the U.S. pulled out of the Paris
Agreement, but then it was up to the cities to .... to, uh, fester up and do
something, but that's not enough.
Mims: Right.
Taylor: Uh, it would have been much better if the entire country would have been
working on something like that, but I also would like to, uh, thank the Steering
Committee. It was quite a process when we initially, uh, were sorting out through
35 or 40 applicants to ... to try to get a group that could work together, but I think,
uh, they proved that they did a good job. It was a very impressive process that led
to the development. Uh, also the consultant, that was very helpful. Uh, some very
key points were made, like the realities of climate change, um, that .... that was
very important, and I think your group has provided a nice framework for us to
help, uh, reduce, uh, the greenhouse gas, uh, emissions and, uh, also the stressing
that it's going to be a collaborative effort, including as Rockne's pointing out, the
City. Uh, we need to do what we can, uh, when we can, uh, to be, um, to lead the
way, and I think that's, uh, that's going to be important, and they also ... the point
was made that, uh, several of our plans and projects and policies connect to the
environmental issues, I mean, that's evidenced even by talking about the tree
canopy in our recent discussion about the Emerald Ash Borer and what we can do
about continuing to have a nice tree canopy in the city, so I think it all works
together. So, uh, thank you for all the work that you did.
Salih: Ub, I just think this is really outstanding and great work. I just would like to
thank also the staff and the Steering Committee for like all the time that they
dedicated to this project, and .... we are, I guess we're moving forward here!
Thanks.
Throgmorton: Okay, good, uh, I'm gonna follow up on several points that people have made,
especially to begin with what Rockne and John said. I ... I think we have a ... a
terrific opportunity, uh, through the Steering Committee as reconstituted into an
advisory board, but also with staff, we have an opportunity to focus attention on
achieving much greater energy efficiency in existing buildings. And I ... I think the
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 36
Steering Committee members unanimously pointed out that that's really a crucial
point. And if we can find a way to reduce energy, um, energy use within existing
buildings, especially rental units, we will help and .... and if we really connect that
to the affordable housing problem, we can find a way to deal with the, uh, the
split incentives' problem that rental units have, and I think you all know what I'm
talking about, but split incentives, you know, somebody has to pay for investment
into the ... into energy efficiency within a rental unit, but somebody else often
benefits from the investment. So you get the split incentive. And... and there, one
could describe that differently, but that's pretty close. So .... that's somethin' I
think the, uh, advisory board could really rivet its attention on, how are we gonna
deal with that problem, and link it to the affordable housing challenge. Then we
can really, you know, tie some things together that could really be fruitful, and...
and that's linked to the fact that... Gustave, where are ya? That's linked to the fact
that so many of our rental units are occupied by students, and .... you know, you're
not gonna invest in .... in energy efficiency within the units that you, I mean
students, rent. Somebody else has to! How can we enable that? How can we
facilitate that? That's the .... the nub of the thing. So, Rockne, if we wanted to
focus attention on a crucial series of actions, that would be it! At least to begin
with, right? So that's one thing. A second has to do with ... the recommen.... well,
I want to thank (laughs) the, um, the Steering Committee for meeting on the 10°i
of September and really working through ideas about priorities with regard to
implementation and sharing your own personal ideas about what needs to be
done. I really found it really beneficial to read through those statements. I
noticed that four of you strongly encouraged the City to hire or pay for a staff
person who would facilitate a lot of the work that cannot be done by one person
(laughs) So .... Geoff and I have talked about that. I have shared my own personal
views about it and I'm sure we'll have further conversations about it. Um, and let
me think now, there's another point I wanna make here. Um .... hold on! Oh
yeah! So thank you for making those, all your, the recommendations that you
made. But the key one is to create an advisory board that is .... self-created, that
appoints its own members, and so on, right? I mean that's what I think I'm
understanding. So I'm curious about how you propose to self -create and
maintain, continue, that advisory board, at least for the first year, which I guess is
a .... a test year. So .... do any of the board members or comiss.... committee
members wanna help us understand how you propose to do that?
Krieger: Sure. Anyone else want to talk? (laughing, several talking in background) Um,
yeah, after the last (both talking)
Throgmorton: Say your name, Matt (both talking)
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 37
Krieger: My name is Matt Krieger. Um, the architect representative on the Steering
Committee. Uh.... based on the, uh, comments we heard last time we presented to
Council, um, we did... and... and recommendations from City staff, we explored the
idea of, you know, do we maintain this, um, City commission status, the, you
know, an official committee. Do we do it informally? Um, and many deemed
that there was some, um, additional flexibility in being a self-appointed, self-
governing, um, board, and so that's one of the reasons we looked at doing that, on
an interim basis, a pilot year. Um, we also asked everyone on the committee, who
...who wants to keep doin' this, and the majority said yes, we wanna keep doing
this, and so, uh, of the 15 member board that is being recommended, a majority of
those positions are already filled by members that you're already familiar with.
Um, we also acknowledge though that we had people that, um, representation that
we didn't have on the board, and so within that, uh, recommendation, you'll
notice that there are entities, organizations, or uh, other, urn .... stakeholders in the
community that we thought should be at the table, uh, as part of an actual board.
Um, that's not to say that, um, that others will not be involved as well. So one of
the .... one of the big things that we ... that we're.... that we've discussed as part of
the committee is that we need to, as part of beginning implementation, to start
forming working groups around the priority issues that are first identified. And
those working groups are the .... are the groups that are really going to start pulling
in other experts and other stakeholders within the community to help address what
are .... what are the specific things we need to be doing. What are the specific
initiatives, the specific plans, um, programs, whatever they may be, um, to work
on those, get input, understand the impact — that's where we also bring in the
issues of equity that have already been mentioned, um .... uh, you know, impact in
....in other ways as well. So the board is .... is a .... is a, uh, you know, this way to,
uh, organize how we're .... how we're doing things. The working groups is where
we're doing a lot of the actual ... the actual work, um, but we thought we could
start that for a year. Um, and so knowing that it's only a year, we didn't discuss,
uh, you know, how all those bylaws, those formal bylaws might be set up, how
we ... how we might have the, you know, elections for going forward, all of that I
think still would have to be worked out as ... as we move forward, but, urn .... uh.
Yeah. So, I hope that answers your question. (laughs)
Throgmorton: I have one other suggestion.
Krieger: Uh huh.
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 38
Throgmorton: And I don't know if y'all are just completely onboard with the idea of self -
creating a .... an advisory board, but, you know, if we are, we are. It's comin' as a
recommendation to us from the committee, so I ... I'm ... completely willing to
accept the recommendation. But I, one other suggestion has to do with .... may
....something I think also is recommended by, uh, several of the committee
members and it .... I think of it as basically this: we need to enable an annual
climate action celebration and awards event. So that we draw attention to good
work that.... particular kinds of organizations and individuals are doin', and give
us, people in this city, an opportunity to celebrate what we're doin'! So,I.... I
think y'all recommended somethin' kinda like that, at least several of you did, and
I hope we can follow through on it. Geoff, are there any....do you think there's
any way we need to bless (laughs) the creation of an advisory board or .... uh,
facilitate interaction or anything like that?
Fruin: No, I think just a consensus here tonight and they'll be well on their way.
Throgmorton: Okay! Thanks, Matt.
Krieger: Thank you.
Throgmorton: Thanks to all of you. John, did you wanna speak? Yeah.
Fraser: My name is John Fraser. One of the key things about this group in....in my
opinion is the passion that this group brings to this, uh, assignment. None of us
are gonna be paid, but we really have a burning desire to be your arms and legs,
uh, be accountability partners, if you will, with you. The last thing that we
wanted to do was say, `Congratulations, here's the plan. Have a nice life. Good
luck.' Last time I checked, uh, I think you have other priorities. This isn't the
only thing on your plate. And we just didn't have the, our conscience wouldn't
allow us to just dump this into your laps and walk away without.... volunteering to
help. One of the key things up there, it's the end of the sentence, is outreach. We
look at the, uh, stakeholders that will be necessary to approach for each of these
many, many, many projects relative to the implementation, and it's ... it's, some of
them are universal. We'll be approaching the same stakeholders in many cases,
but there are unique stakeholders that have financial interests and that's key if
we're going to be successful with this implementation. It's gotta be win-win.
There's gotta be payback. There's gotta be a little selfish `what's in it for me' and
we need to determine what's in it for me, based on all these stakeholders, and
approach them, work with you to determine who those stakeholders are, and
communicate, communicate, communicate.... really aggressively. Susan, I totally
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 39
agree that Iowa City, Iowa, alone isn't going to save the world, and certainly until
our administration in Washington, D.C. changes and we step back into the Paris
Accord. Uh, it's going to be the cities, and I would like to think that Iowa City
will be a role model for many, many, many, many other cities across the state and
across the country, and of course we need the Chicagos and the San Franciscos,
the New Yorks, many of those large cities are already onboard as .... as the Mayor
knows. One of the things that I have personally done, and I'm just one person.
I'm stepping down as the President of the Iowa United Nations Association so
that as a board member of Iowa UNA I can focus on our efforts, UNA, to .... to do
whatever can be done to enhance, uh, climate issues and efforts and actions. And
that brings up another point. We need to collaborate, we need to partner with
many other groups across the state. I know this is Iowa City. This is all about
Iowa City, but one of my intentions is to go from city to city across the state over
the next year and talk about what Iowa City's doing and I think we'll probably
develop some synergies and some, uh, volunteers and some ideas and more
stakeholders in doing that communication outreach effort. And communicate
broadly and loudly what we're doing to save the globe, cause that's what we're
really doing. Yeah, we're going to save Iowa City, but we need to go way beyond
that. So, passion, uh, Charlie, I'm glad to see you here tonight. Charlie, uh, is a
lot smarter than I will ever dream of being in these issues and it's people like
Charlie and people like Matt, everyone on this team that has the passion. We
work for you! But we'll also, uh, maybe hold you accountable from time to time.
Very politely, very humbly. Thank you very much.
Mims: Thank you.
Throgmorton: Thanks, John. (unable to hear person speaking away from mic) Sure, come on
up, Charlie! (laughter) I know he (both talking)
Stanier: I'll be very brief. I want to, uh, draw attention to one thing that hasn't, no one's
drawn attention to.
Mims: Could you introduce yourself for the (both talking)
Stanier: I'm Charlie Stanier.
Mims: Thank you!
Stanier: Iowa City. You're blowing through your 2026 goals. Like you've already gone
through it. This is like if I could make an analogy, you're tryin' to get from 250
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 40
pounds to 150 pounds, and you say, uh, I need to be about 220 by such and such a
year, and you're losing weight at five times the rate you need .... you already made
your goal, and that is ..... very unique. There are very few places that can say that,
and the reason that giant bar is wind power in north central Iowa. Uh, and so I
think there's.... there should be more talk about how to use this unique status of
being one of the lowest carbon, uh, emitting economies in this part of the country.
If we go to the coasts and places with a lot of, uh.... hydro power—we're sort of
on par with them but regionally, this is the silver beacon of the .... the best
environmental performance around, and so I'd like to hear more about how the
City can use that in a marketing program to draw new business, new investment,
new ideas to Iowa City and uh, rather than always focusing on the 35 things that
we have to do and each of those 35 things has 15 things so there's like 1,000
things to do, to step back and pat yourselves on the back for .... already having
made a huge amount of progress through the benefits that you receive from Mid
American's, uh, commitment to wind power.
Throgmorton: Spot on, Charlie. Thanks! Martha!
Norbeck: Martha Norbeck, I'm one of the committee members, and uh, I believe, uh, Mayor
Throgmorton, uh, it was almost two years ago when you said this is not a
technical problem, it's a cultural problem. And I still.... wholeheartedly endorse
that, uh, that per ... uh, perspective. Um, so as a .... a plan for the City, this is ... I'm
very excited about what the City has done, working within the departments,
across every department, thinking through how are we gonna implement this
within our operations. How are we gonna touch the things that we have the
capacity to touch. The City has a really nice record of saying this is our plan,
we're gonna do it, and methodically working through those plans, and so from
that perspective I have a lot of optimism. Uh, the other part is how this plan is
completely different from any other plan the City has undertaken. Because now
you're saying we, this municipality that only directly influences 6% or .... or a
little less of our .... our greenhouse gas emissions, now we want to somehow get
the other 75,000 people to buy in. And we've had about .... 1% of the population
participate in some proactive way with this process. How are we gonna get the
other 99% onboard? There was a gentleman speaking on NPR the other day
about how he's a political canvasser and he said, `I went to this woman's house
four times, but she voted.' It took four times of this guy going to convince this
lady to, just to vote. That's just to vote! It's one action. So when you think about
that and multiply that, it's a cultural problem. And when you think about how are
we going to roll this out on a community basis, it....it shifts the conversation.
And I don't know that the City .... is.....has really, the City or the committee, have
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 41
really thought through how exactly are we gonna roll this out, on a community
basis. I think from the City standpoint, we have a really good road map and I'm
excited about that road map, but how are we gonna reach this other 99%? And so
that's the big .... the big question, and so .... I ...... I ask you to think about that, and
talk to people in your community. We have hardly even talked to the School
District, for example. We've hardly talked to Communi.... uh, Kirkwood
Community College and ... and the people who are influential there. We have all
these major employers. They're not at the table yet, and so we have a lot of work
to do. So on one hand I'm like, `Whew, yeah, we got this done! We've got a
road map for the CityP We've got this whole new way of relating, and if we have
people involved and they're interacting with the City in a completely different
way than they have before, and we're bringing people to the table and .... and
coordinating with the City in new ways, we're gonna have to think really
carefully about how do we organize all that? So .... we have a monumental task
abo... ahead of us, and although Charlie is right, we have .... are very blessed by
Mid American's commitment to wind energy, we still have a cultural problem,
and that's not going away even with, uh, wind energy coming onboard. So
hooray, and get ready for a lot of work! (laughter)
Throgmorton: Thanks, Martha. Yes, ma'am! Please state your name when you come up.
Benhart: Uh, my name is Patsy Benhart. I live at Bon -Aire Mobile Home Court.
Throgmorton: Hi, Patsy.
Benhart: Uh, in our area and throughout the city, the last few years, we've had numerous
apartment houses go up and yet these are all geared towards students, and they
were talking the other day on the news about well the students only have $700
and maybe they could get a little bit more, but their rent is 700 -plus, uh, depends
on the amenities that they have. The one in my neighborhood has a pool and
many benefits that people in, uh, other structures do not have, which is fine. But
I'm considered about our senior citizens. They were shut out of that facility,
which was run down and should have been shut down years ago, and I don't know
if anybody took the time to think what's going to happen to those people? And I
know they were shuttled out to places that they didn't wanna be because they
didn't have any bus service, they didn't have any grocery stores, uh, and I don't
know what our population is for senior citizens, urn .... those senior citizens had
been here for years to make this .... this city what it is, yet today they cannot do
that because they are not able. They don't have the finances. They don't have the
health. And I was wondering if there's anything you could talk about to help
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 42
them. Um, our church no longer has an active youth group. The only ones that
do is our Latin, Hispanic group. They're continue to grow like a .... (mumbled) of
the ... the plague this gentleman got. Um.....Hispanics in my area.....they may live
two and three families in an apartment to make their ends meet. And then they
talk about raising the .... wages for part-time and full-time people to $15 a month,
in the future. Uh, what about the people that, uh, work in the low industry
buildings and, uh, making hamburgers, washing somebody else's clothes?
Something like that. I know last year there was a debate on whether to raise it a
little bit or not and I don't remember at this time if that went through or not, but
these people on both ends of the criteria... they need to be thought about too.
Throgmorton: Thank you, Patsy.
Benhart: You're welcome.
Throgmorton: Thanks so much for, uh, coming and speaking. You raise many issues that go
pretty well beyond the boundaries of the topic we're actually addressing, but still
the con ... what you said about lower income people or people who don't..... maybe
don't speak English or el .... elderly people who live in rental units or whatever.
They all .... could be aided in one way or another by us finding a way to connect
our climate action efforts to them, where they live. So, maybe we can figure out
how to do that. Any further discussion? Hearing none, roll call please. Motion
carries 6-0.
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 43
15. Council Appointments
15.a.Community Police Review Board
15.b.Senior Center Commission
Throgmorton: We have one vacancy to fill an unexpired tern upon appointment and we have
applications from, what is it, seven individuals? We have a gender balance
requirement, a female gender balance requirement. Uh, so .... do you folks have a
preference?
Salih: I do have .... I really like Latisha McDonald to take this. (mumbled) Yeah. Uh,
for many, many reasons. That she, on her application, she been really community
organizing, she been like acting or involving with a lot people from different
background, and also she is, urn .... LGBTQ community, that she was helping
them too, and she been involve with Black Voice Project, CWJ, and WRAC, and
uh, she been really advocate for, you know, just .... for those people when .... and
the interaction between the minority and the police. I think she will be great at,
and she's a woman!
Throgmorton: Uh huh.
Mims: (mumbled) I thought Jessica Ferdig was interesting. She's .... she's a research
associate. She's bi-lingual, um, she's done a lot with under -represented
populations, um, public health background. I thought... just brings kind of a
different perspective, uh, we talk about diverse representations. We ... we do have
two African Americans already on the commission, so I wasn't quite as cerned...
as concerned about the racial, um, balance cause we already have two out of five,
um, so I thought Jessica brought a little different, um, and younger. Um, I think
we've got, urn .... drawin' a blank. Who's the young woman that's on there now?
Um.....
Throgmorton: Vanessa?
Mims: No, um....
Throgmorton: Oh!
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 44
Mims: (several talking) Monique! Yeah (several talking) Monique is on there, um... in
general, I don't know. I just thought she, with her public, uh, health background
and, again, bi-lingual, she's worked with a lot of different populations as well.
Throgmorton: She's bi-lingual in English and Spanish, isn't that right? Yeah.
Mims: Yep.
Salih: I think bi-language I was in the Police Review Board but I been like a, I speak
Arabic too and bi-language I don't think this is .... really helping a lot and the ... I
know that there are two African American, but how long the Police Citizen
Review Board having more .... white people than African American (mumbled) I
think it was (mumbled) since they started, they have a lot of. ... more white than
black. When it was (unable to understand) minority wasn't (unable to
understand) I think it is time for those people, because .... and why we, what the
purpose of the Police Review Board? The people who are really direct affected
by it is the minority and African American! And bringing people who being
contacted directly with those people, it will help a lot to achieve the mission and
the goal of the Police Review Board.
Cole: I would agree with Maz. Latisha is extremely articulate, advocate; um, she
presents herself very well. Um, she sort of tells it like she sees it. Um, and I
think she would be a great addition and I think along that point I think it would be
great if, I don't know how many times historically we've had, uh, minority,
majority boards, but I .... I think let's make history and let's.....let's do that. I
think this would be a great opportunity to get that done. Um, I think she'd be a
good common sense advocate, um, for people from throughout the community.
So I'd support Latisha.
Taylor: I'd like to thank all .... all three of the women that applied. I think, uh, Laura
Kennedy would .... would also be good. She, um, provided a nice perspective, um,
older female. Been in Iowa City over 30 years. The only thing was that she had
said she'd eager to learn more about the board whereas, uh, Jessica, uh, seemed to
have a knowledge of the board and ... and what it does, but what I liked about
Latisha was that she'd said that she's aft ... actually attended some of the meetings
and is acquainted with the members on there, and she would be replacing, um,
Royceann, so it just seemed.... would be a natural fit to .... to replace Royceann
with Latisha.
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 45
Thomas: Yeah, I'd also like to thank all three applicants and, uh, Laurie ... Laurie called me,
I don't know if she called any .... anyone else.
Throgmorton: She phoned me.
Thomas: I always appreciate that. Uh.....I don't know any one of the applicants
personally, um, but I .... I can see where Latisha has, with her familiarity with
many of the issues, and uh, her acquaintance with current and former members of
the CPRB that it would, there would be some benefit to that.
Throgmorton: Sound like four people in favor of, uh, Latisha McDaniel. I'd like to say with
regard to Jessica Ferdig that, uh, her experience in immigration processes and the
legal system probably would be a great benefit. Her bi-linguality in English and
Spanish would probably be a great benefit for anybody from the Hispanic
community who is in, gets involved in the Community Police Review Board's
processes, and ... would like to be able to talk to somebody on the board who
speaks Spanish. I understand Maz's point about Arabic and surely there were
some members of the community who would probably have preferred to speak
Arabic, um, at certain moments. So it's just a similar kind of point. But anyhow,
I think we .... there's a decision, four people at least, in favor of, uh, of appointing
Latisha McDaniel.
Mims: I .... I would just make one further comment and I may take some heat for this, but
so be it. One of the .... and I've .... I'm friends with Lata... Latisha on ... on
Facebook so I see a lot of her postings and that's fine. One comment she made in
here that does bother me. It says, `I've been organizing in Iowa City community
I have been organizing in Iowa City around issues of police brutality/
accountability..'. I do not believe when you look at our Community Police
Review Board and other issues in our community that there is.....a.... documented
or significant issue of police brutality. When you look at the complaints that we
have had, uh, to the Community Police Review Board, and you look at the
resolution of those, um, the five members of that board have almost .... there've
been very few complaints that have ... that have been sustained. And I don't recall,
um, in the nine years that I have been on Council any that were related to police
brutality. And so I just hope with her appointment that she is able to come in with
a more objective viewpoint than what I see her at least partially portraying in her
reasoning for being selected. I don't deny police brutality across this country,
believe me, but .... when people start referring specifically that to the Iowa City
Police Department, I do not believe that there is documentation to prove that in
any manner, or certainly any significant manner, and that bothers me.
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 46
Cole: I think to that point though is that maybe she could use Iowa City as an example
to address it nationally. So I don't think that necessarily precludes she couldn't
be objective, that she could....
Mims: No! I'm just saying I hope she can because she's saying she's .... been organizing
in Iowa City around issues of police brutality. So....
Salih: But she did not say like she found some of them. She just say like....
Cole: She was involved in a lot of the Ferguson organizing I think.
Salih: Yes. Uh huh.
Throgmorton: Yeah, I wanna re .... uh, ally myself to a degree with somethin', uh, that Susan just
said. In my time on the Council, what's that six and a half years or there abouts,
uh, I have not seen any evidence of police brutality being documented in any
meaningful way, and I'm just not aware of any of that and I have, uh, the utmost
respect for our officers and the challenge of the work that they do, day in and day
out, as I'm sure everybody does. I'm not tryin' to single myself out here. Okay,
can we tum to the Senior Center Commission? We have three applications to fill
one unexpired term with no gender balance requirement. And the three are
Kathleen Crawford, Zachary Goldsmith, and Harry Olmstead.
Mims: Harry's already on another commission, correct? Plus I .... to me we've recycled
Harry a number of times, even if he's not, and we have talked about .... well
(laughs) I'm sorry! It's....
Cole: We all love Harry! He's awesome (both talking)
Mims: Okay, Harry is, but at the same time (both talking) we've talked about giving new
people an opportunity, so .... having said that, I don't know either Kathleen or
Zachary. Um .... I .... neither .... neither application particularly stood out to me
over the others. So I don't know if anybody else knows either of those two or has
a preference.
Throgmorton: I .... I don't think I know either one of `em, and didn't they apply for other
commissions as well? I think they both did, which is okay, I mean we don't have
any prohibition against that. Uh, I .... yeah, I .... I could go with either one.
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 47
Meaning either Crawford or Goldsmith, but I don't know either one of `em either,
so....
Thomas: I was .... I was, everything you've said applies to me as well. I .... I did lean a little
bit towards Zachary.
Cole: Yeah, I did too. I'd support Zachary.
Mims: Yeah, I don't remember how old Kathleen was, but Zachary's on kind of the
younger side and I think that could be a positive in terms of, uh, the commission
member for the Senior Center as well.
Taylor: Yeah, I don't think Kathleen didn't include any data, as far as her (both talking)
Zachary impressed me cause he'd said he ... he has read meeting notes, so he's
familiar with the .... what's going on with the Senior Center (both talking)
Throgmorton: Yeah, so I'm gonna suggest we appoint Zachary. (several responding) Okay,
could I have a motion to appoint McDaniel and, uh, and Goldsmith to those
respective positions.
Salih: So move.
Throgmorton: Moved by Salih.
Thomas: Second.
Throgmorton: Seconded by Cole. Is that okay?
Salih: Yes.
Mims: Thomas.
Throgmorton: Oh, Thomas. Seconded by Thomas. All in favor say aye. Opposed. Motion
carried.
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 48
17. Community Comment
Stewart: Hi, good evening. Urn ... (laughter and several talking) So, um, my name's
Gustave and I'm the (noises on mic) Iowa Student Government, uh, Liaison to the
City Council. Um, so first off I'm really excited about the climate action steering,
uh, plan. I'm really excited to see how that's going to work out and whatnot. Um,
and then, um, recently, um, through collaborations with Iowa City Downtown
District, Campus Activities Board, and UISG, uh, we are funding, um, Campus
Activities Board to, uh, work closely with the Downtown District to increase
student oriented events downtown. Um, hopefully that will help out with alcohol
harm reduction, um, and provide more student oriented events and kind of bring
the uniqueness of downtown to the student population. Um, next, um, tomorrow
at 7:00 P.M., UISG is gonna host, uh, an Iowa City Council election forum. It's
pretty much like, uh, it was last year, if you went to that. Um, that's gonna be in
the Iowa Theater, um, IMU, um, it was a great event last year, urn .... and it's just a
good way to get to know, um, the candidates for students and have the event on
campus so it's outreaching, um, and hopefully getting more students engaged in
the election process.
Tbrogmorton: Gustave, would you say, again, when that will occur?
Stewart: Yes. It will be 7:00 P.M. tomorrow, um, in the Iowa Theater in the Iowa
Memorial Union. Urn .... and if you have any questions you can, about that event,
you can reach out to me, um, at my email, Qustave.stewart(a)uiowa.edu. Um, and
then I'm gonna make a, I feel like I have a lot (laughs) today, but I'm gonna make
a personal pitch, um, I'm the, uh, president of an organization, um, on campus
called Bike Friends. We are a recreational bike club and this Friday, um, from
2:00 to 4:00 P.M. um, it's .... I'm .... we're gonna be hosting, uh, the Free Fall Bike
Checkup. So what that is, we bring local shops onto campus, um, to basically
provide free, um, basic maintenance for, um, students and the community, um, to
bring their bikes, um, and that's gonna be at the North Library plaza, if anyone's
interested. All right, thank you!
Throgmorton: Thanks, Gustave.
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 49
18. City Council Information
Throgmorton: Susan, could we start with you and we'll move to the right (mumbled)
Mims: Sure, just a couple of upcoming things. Um, October 151, the Homebuilder's
Association is having kind of an open house at the student -built home from 3:00
to 5:00 P.M. at 1881 Dickenson Lane. So if anybody can make it to that. And
then ICAD has their annual meeting on October 11°i, from 7:30 to 9:00 A.M. at
Big Grove, and Kellie, would you RSVP for me, please? I don't know if anybody
plans to go (mumbled)
Salih: When?
Mims: The, um, ICAD annual meeting is 7:30 to 9:00 A.M. on October 1 V
Salih: 11"'. Okay. (mumbled)
Mims: Just let Kellie know if you (several talking)
Throgmorton: I wanna go to that too.
Salih: Yeah, I want to.
Throgmorton: Okay, uh, Pauline?
Taylor: Um .... past event, uh, I saw .... I know I saw, uh, Jim and John and probably
Rockne, cause he has a child there, the Longfellow 100 -year celebration, which
was a very nice event. Uh, ribbon cutting, designation of the remodeled building
and of course the Mayor gave a nice speech and the School Board gave some nice
speeches, uh, but they .... the really memorable part of it was in their media center,
had photos going way back to the early 1900s and it was really fun and saw a lot
of people going back, `Oh, there's mom's picture. Oh, there's grandma's
picture,' and uh, just a lot of fun. There was like a newscaster from KGAN,
somebody found his picture in there. Nobody realized he'd gone there, so that
was really kind of fun, uh, to see that. That was a great event and, uh, so that was
good. Uh, coming up of course, also on October I", is the, uh, actual service
begins for the 380 Express, but uh, I think, um, you all perhaps got the invitation
for the, uh, event, uh, the pre -lunch party, which'll be, uh, Friday, September 280,
uh, to raise awareness about it. Uh, they're inviting people to join them. Uh, you
can start and stop at any number of times. I .... did everybody get the emails? I
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 50
won't reiterate the times unless you want. It's going to actually start at 9:30,
meaning at the Cedar Rapids Ground Transportation Center, and depart from
Cedar Rapids at 10:00, uh, 10:45 though it's going to arrive at the Iowa River
Landing, uh, for the Coralville stop. Uh, media'11 be there. 11:00, uh, the
downtown Iowa City Court Street, uh, location, 11:20 depart that, head back up to
Cedar Rapids, uh, and then at ... by noon and by 12:15 come back to Iowa City, uh,
and 1:00, uh, leave ... or arrive at Iowa City Court Street. So, uh, there's different
times during the day that you can get on or off or just be there to cheer them on,
so should be a really fun event, and I heard on the news last night they were
hoping or expecting to get at least 500 riders, uh, from the back and forth, not all
at one time obviously on the bus, but uh, and help decrease some of the
transportation on .... on 380. So that'll be great! So that's kinda fun, coming up!
Throgmorton: Okay! Maza?
Salih: Actually I really don't have .... I always forget when it come to this, um (laughter)
I .... even though I feel like I'm busy, I'm going to a lot of events, but I forget
them (laughter) but anyway, uh, I think tomorrow I have to be at KXIC radio in
the morning, at 8:00 in the morning, and also, uh, I would like just to tell you
about the campaign.... hold on, campaign for City Council, please come and meet
the candidate and ask questions on, uh, 27s' at 6:00 at CWJ. And, uh, on the 2P,
uh, we have immigration clarification about the law that Trump have for
immigrants who receive, uh, you know, low income immigrants who receive
benefit may be they are not gonna have a bus to the citizenship so Don (can't
hear), he volunteered to come to Pheasant Ridge Neighborhood Center so can
explain to the public what that means. I guess that all event I'm gonna go to.
Throgmorton: Maz, did you say the CWJ Meet the Candidate event was on the 270' at 7:00
P.M.?
Salih: Yep! 27 at (several talking)
Throgmorton: Thanks. At 6:00.
Salih: (laughter) 6:00 P.M.
Throgmorton: Thanks. Rockne?
Cole: I just wanna talk about a past event that I briefly mentioned during our joint
meeting. Um, this past Sunday there was something called Farm Tour that was
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 51
put on by one of my favorite organizations, the Iowa City Bike Library, and you
know, sometimes on Council I think sometimes the best thing to do is just let our
fantastic non-profit organizations do their work, and I think Bike Library, in terms
of what they do in terms of community building, exercise, transportation equity,
um, this event was just fantastic. It was organized; essentially there were various
options. There was a short option, an intermediate option, and a long option.
You could go up to 40 miles. We did a 22 -mile option and did pretty well, my
wife and daughter were on a tandem and they survived. There wasn't too much
complaining, uh, but we also got to tour the Poor Farm and I hope you in the city
of Iowa City will go out and try to visit there, call ahead to the County first, see if
you can get a tour with a group, but what they are doing out there is just
phenomenal, and the thing about the Poor Farm that a lot of people forget, as we
mentioned in the Johnson County joint meeting, is that it is actually part of the
city of Iowa City, so sort of moving forward, you know, hopefully we'll have
some strategic opportunities to work with them on that because that.... farm is
really starting to hit on all cylinders. They have immigrant justice groups
growing food out there. They have non -profits, GROW Johnson County. It is
just phenomenal. So if you ever .... mark it for 2019, Iowa City Farm Tour,
fabulous event. Stay tuned for the Iowa City Bike Library in terms of everything
they're doing. It's just really good to see an event with so much going wrong in
this world, an event that went 100% right, lot of fun, good exercise, great time.
And ended at Big Grove. It doesn't get better than that. Uhl once I get an update
on the City of Literature board I'll have some other good events.... soon! So....
Thomas: Uhl I just .... couple of events. One that just happened and then one coming up.
Uhl this past Sunday, uh, the City sponsored a Party in the Park at North Market
Square, uh, which is kind of, you know, it's sort of has the same title as the
summer events, but it's really a different event. It's .... it's in the parks when
school is in session, so you have .... and they're planned in parks which are kind
of, you know, within the sphere of influence of the University. So you have, part
of the goal of it is to have an opportunity for neighbors to engage with .... with the
students who live in their neighborhood. Uhl and it .... the food is, you know,
there's more of a food orientation to it. It's not ice cream. It's actual, reasonable,
and very healthy foods. A number of organizations were represented — Backyard
Abundance, New Pioneer, Food to Table, so there was almost like a marketplace
effect that .... that took place. Uhl and, uh, another aspect of it is that, um, the
University, uh, has .... has its own initiative in creating neighborhood student
ambassadors in seven neighborhoods throughout the city, uh, and so I got to meet
the neighborhood ambassador, student ambassador, for the North Side, urn .... so it
was ... it was really an interesting event. I had no expectation about it and I
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.
Page 52
thought it was really a fabulous experience. So I wanted to thank and
congratulate the staff and ... and all the participants. It was really a remarkable
event. And, uh, then looking forward, um, on the 29b, uh, the University of Iowa
is having a symposium on Public Art at the Arts West Building from 9:00 A.M. to
4:00 P.M. Uh, that sounds like a very interesting event. I mean we're seeing lots
of really good public art, um, our murals for example, uh, and this will be
bringing in public artists from various parts of the country, so it...it should,
promises to be a very interesting experience, very enjoyable experience, and
seeing how public art is ... is being practiced, you know, across the country in
terms of promoting.... community value, sense of place, things of that sort.
Throgmorton: Okay, several things. On September the 6a' Susan and I participated in a guided
tour with our State legislators, three of `em anyhow. Part of our delegation. And
then on the 12`s Mazahir, John, and I had a very fruitful conversation with about
25 DI, Daily Iowan staff. Really interesting conversation. On the 20', looking
ahead, on the 20c' I'm going to be meeting with the new CEO of Mercy Hospital
to talk about this and that. Uh, and the same night from 9:00 to 11:00, or
thereabouts, I'll be walking around downtown with other members of the
Partnership for Alcohol Safety, seeing what .... checkin' out the scene (laughter)
on a Thursday night. Uh, on .... I'll be asleep by 10:00, even though we're
walking around (laughter, several talking) On the 25`s I'm going to be speaking
with Kirkwood students and faculty about whatever's on their mind, and later
that .... no, on the 28th .... Geoff and I are going to be having lunch with Cedar
Rapids' Mayor Hart and City Manager Jeff Pomerantz, which should be fun. And
that same night I'm gonna be speaking about affordable housing at the annual
meeting of the Affordable Housing Coalition, for about, I don't know, five to
seven minutes or somethin' like that. And on the 2"a, what's gonna be happening
on the 2"d? Let me think. Oh yeah, I'm going to be voting on the 2"a (laughter)
and I hope everybody else does. That's it for me.
This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council
regular formal meeting of September 18, 2018.