HomeMy WebLinkAbout2018-09-18 TranscriptionPage I
Council Present: Cole, Mims, Salih, Taylor, Thomas, Throgmorton
Staff Present: Fruin, Monroe, Dilkes, Fruehling, Nations, Bockenstedt, Andrew, Knoche,
Havel, Hightshoe, Sitzman
Others Present: Stewart (UISG)
Consider elevating hourly staff wages to $15/hour or more within two years (IP#4, IP51:
Throgmorton/ Okay, so we're gonna begin our work session for the evening of September the
18, 2018. We being the Iowa City City Council. The first topic on our work session
agenda is to consider elevating hourly staff wages to $15 an hour or more within two
years and .... I hope everybody in the room understands that these are .... this is a work
session. It's where we try to figure out how we think we need to proceed. We're not
taking literally formal action, but we're trying to figure out what, uh, what we want, uh,
how we wanna proceed. And .... I also would like to say before we get into discussing the
topic in detail, I want everybody in the room, including people watching on TV...
television to know that right now the lowest starting wage the City pays its roughly 200
permanent plo ... employees is $17 and I think 52 -cents.
Fruin/ Six hundred employees, not 200.
Throgmorton/ Oh! Did I say 200? (several talking in background) Sorry! My gosh, how'd I
miss that? I meant 2 ... uh, 600 employees, and it's $17.52, right, Geoff?
Fruin/ Correct.
Throgmorton/ So what we will be talking about tonight is whether or not to increase the
minimum wage for temporary, hourly employees to $15 an hour within a two-year
period, or some variant thereof. We employ at least.... according to our original count,
something like 370 such workers, roughly two-thirds of them work in the Parks and
Recreation department and another one-sixth in the Public Library. And almost all of
those temporary, hourly employees earn between 10.10 and $15.00 an hour. You warm
elaborate in any way, you don't have to, but (both talking)
Fruin/ Yeah, I'll just clarify. Our .... our temporary employees fluctuate quite a bit on the season.
So, uh, at the time that you received your information, uh, earlier this year, was in
January, those numbers were lower than they are now because it's .... it's summer.
There's a lot more particularly Parks and Rec positions, uh, that we have during the
summer months, and as we go into fall and winter, that number will come, uh, come back
down again. So it's .... it's really hard to tell ya how many temporary employees that
we .... we have, cause that .... that's a, uh, number that's constantly changing throughout
the seasons.
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Throgmorton/ Okay. All right, so....uh, would invite Council Members to offer their
suggestions or whatever. Geoff?
Fruin/ Uh, may I just call .... call attention, um, Mayor Throgmorton and Council Member Salih
have requested some additional information, uh, that we pulled together pretty quick. I
just wanna call your attention, there's a memo at your desk. Um, what this gets at, there
was, uh, with the two, uh, the two largest areas where we have temporary employees is
the Library and the Recreation division of our .... of our Parks department. And we had
previously supplied you with some, uh, total numbers of employees and then the wage
scale. Uh, what we tried to do in this memo is .... is give you a better sense of where the
majority of those employees fall within those wage scales. So, if you would like, um,
Simon Andrew, who prepared this memo, could.... could walk you through that, or if
you've had time to .... to read and digest that, we can simply answers questions if they
come up.
Throgmorton/ Well, I thought I saw some broad numbers here. So it looked to me like there are
I l ....out of 52 hourly Library employees, l I .... earn more than $15 an hour. The others
earn 14 or less, per hour. And then with regard to Parks and Rec employees, when this
particular memo was prepared, there were .... 400 part-time employees, is that correct?
Fruin/ Four hundred and one.
Throgmorton/ Four hundred and one temporary employees, uh..... and 73% of them have wages
of $12 an hour or less, 24% have wages between 12.50 and 14.50, and 3% have wages of
$15 or higher.
Frain/ That's mostly accurate. Um, those 401 employees actually fill about 1,300 different jobs.
So .... so for example, you might have a employee at the pool that serves as a manager one
night, a swim instructor the next day, and then just a regular lifeguard. Those are all
different.... they're gonna find themselves in .... in multiple positions throughout the year.
So, um, those percentages that you gave reflect the various positions, and not the actual
employees. You could think of it probably in the same but just to clarify that.
Throgmorton/ Okay. Good deal. All right, Council Members, what are your thoughts here?
Thomas/ Well, I guess I'll start the ball rolling here. You know when we last discussed this, uh
......which was what? Couple of sessions ago, work sessions ago (clears throat) I
referenced the, uh.... had done a little bit of research on this, online, and found that
Madison, Wisconsin, had a, uh, living wage ordinance where the.... the..... the wage for
their temporary employees was set at $13.27 an hour. And, uh, that seemed to correlate
fairly well with some of the work that the Iowa Policy Project has done. Um, if you look
at their estimates for a living wage for a single adult household, it's right around that
same figure. So.....this is a complicated issue, both in the sense of...you know, the
question of what the living wage should be, and then also as, you know, Geoff had lined
out.... outlined, um.....back in .... in August, the .... the impacts of this on the entire wage
structure for the City. So I .... I felt what .... what can we, what could I say at this point,
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and it....it boiled down to in my mind the .... the idea of. ... of striving to raise the lower,
uh, thresholds of the .... the wages. In other words, the entry level wages, uh, to 13.27,
while at the same time looking at essentially compressing the wage scales within our
temporary classes, so that (clears throat) the impacts of this would not, um, would have
minimal impact on the permanent employees. So we .... there would be a significant pay
increase at the, you know, in one's first year, at least for those classifications where
positions which are set at 10 to $11 an hour, uh, but as you move up, the longer you stay
with the City, the .... the, you know, the wage increases wouldn't be as dramatic as they
are now. So in other words, you know, some of the step increases now might be between
50 and 75 -cents. That would come down maybe to 25 -cents. So .... so the goal in my
mind was to .... to increase at the bottom, uh, kind of consolidate and compress within the
temporaries, and .... and maintain that kind of, you know, gradient that we have now, from
temporary to full time employment. Um, in terms of the timeline, I was thinking, uh, that
we could initiate the 13.25 in July of next year, uh, we could also ask staff, cause a ... you
know, what .... what are the financial impacts of this. That's, you know, the big question.
Um, it could be implemented either July of 2019 or July of 2020, with a .... a step to 11.50
as a minimum wage in .... in July of 2018. So just....just, so that we'd understand the
financial implications, have .... have at least a couple of scenarios.
Throgmorton/ What was the step that you said (both talking)
Thomas/ ...roughly between 10.10 and .... 13.25. So it'd be around 11.25, something like that.
That way it would be, uh, 11.50. Uh, so clearly, you know, that step increase.... you
know, the finan... the financial impacts would be significantly less if we did it in two
years than in one year because, uh, many of the positions are already set at 11.50 at an
entry level. And then the last thing I would say is the question of there's a one-year, uh,
high school intern position, whether.... what we do applies to that and as I recall with
Madison it does not apply, uh, so that's a question. If. ... if it's not 13.25, I .... I felt .... that
position should still see a raise, so right now it's at I think 10.27, um, could be raised to
11.25 in July of 2019. So everyone, pretty much everyone will get a raise, uh, even at....
in the, the longer you stay with the City, it won't be quite as dramatic but even those step
increases will see an increase.
Salih/ But you mean like when it should be 13, July of 2019 is 11.25. That what you saying?
Thomas/ I was saying the.....to understand, because we don't know what the financial
implications of ....of this change will be. Uh, that .... I was suggesting we .... we ask staff
to .... to look at it both in terms of 13.25 in July of 2019, and 13.25 July of 2020, with an
interim step in July of 2019 of 11.50.
Salih/ Uh huh.
Thomas/ Uh....
Salih/ I just wanna add to, I really agree with you, John, but I (mumbled) you just mentioned the
Iowa Policy Project. For the, you know (unable to understand) who are watching us, they
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don't have the paper that we have in front of us. I just wanna say that, you know, as
Geoff said, you know, that the .... the part time employees or the hourly employees
increasing every .... maybe (unable to understand) than an other time, but if we just
(unable to understand) Iowa City part time employees, which is hourly employee, are
paid poverty wage of less than $15 an hour. The Iowa Policy Project estimate that in
2018, a single person in Johnson County, would have to earn at least $14.22 an hour to
live... just their basic need budget. And a single parent with one child would need a
minimum of $25 to cover the family most basic needs. Poverty wages really cause a lot
of, you know, bad stuff, like stress and health consequence, and food insecurity, and
really it is just something bad. We don't wanna see it, and I think the City should set the
standard high. I can ... I really will love if you can do the 13.25, by July of 2019, and even
we can (mumbled) add another addition, instead of, uh, when we say 13.25 by July, that
increase means .... like $3 jump (mumbled) but if we can do like July $1.50 and January
of 2020 another $1.50 so we don't have like that $3 like once time. That's .... you
know....
Throgmorton/ So .... so you're suggesting that we start with, what was it, 13.25 in July of 2019.
Then six months later bump it up again.
Salih/ No! Do it like one .... let me .... 10.25, 1.50 like..... 11, uh, 75, 11.75 on July of 2019.
Thomas/ Well that's (both talking)
Salih/ Like in the beginning of the (both talking) and in January (several talking) January make it
13. That what I think!
Cole/ If I could maybe jump in here and offer my own views. I think it's very important that we
identify what the target is first, what the timeframe to get there is, and what the budgetary
impact will be. So I think the target for me is $15 an hour. I think we need to make clear
that that's what we stand for and that's what our goal is. Um, especially, it is a phrase
going around the United States, but I think the history of the labor movement are slogans
based upon real working needs — the 40 -hour work week, the 8 -hour work day — and I
think now the new standard is the $15 an hour, and I think it's very important that the
public sector set the standard, because if we can't do it, how can we possibly expect the
private sector to follow along. Uh, we do have the financial capacity to do it. It is
something that's feasible. That said, it is a budget .... big budget impact. Um, I would
like to see, I don't want to get into the minutia of precise timeframes, um, but I would
like to see it over the course of three years. Um, I do believe that if we do it over three
years and have a goal, um, of $15 an hour at the end of three years, we are gonna have
some significant property tax revenue that is gonna come in. It will allow our staff
opportunity and the collective bargaining to be able to adjust to that so we don't .... we
avoid some of the wage compression, uh, but that's what I would like to see, and with the
first step being July I", um, of 2019, uh, prospectively after that point. So, um, and then
from there, I .... I think we would just have to have that budget discussion, but that's what
I would like to see. I think that gives us time to adapt. It establishes the target, and it
also establishes clear guidelines in terms of which direction we would like to go.
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Taylor/ Um, Council Member Thomas, Salih, and Cole have all made some very good points, uh,
I have given this a lot of thought and consideration, and I ask you to be patient with me
while I read a statement that I've prepared that includes my, uh, comments and concerns.
And first of all with all due respect to my brothers and sisters in the organized labor, I see
you all out there, and to Councilwoman Salih, this proposal came as a surprise to me.
Uh, no one had ever brought this to my attention, uh, there was a concern that City
employees were receiving poverty wages, uh, to me as a Council Member, uh, or to the
Council as a whole, and just last year we as a Council made a proclamation supporting
the Board of Supervisor's efforts to increase the minimum wage locally, and again, no
one raised the issue of City employee salaries. Uh, I have many questions yet, uh,
regarding this, most importantly who is this intended for and thank you all, uh, Simon,
Geoff, whoever made the list, uh, of some of those that would be included. But, urn ... so
is this referring to part time employees, uh, and by that, uh, I'm familiar with the
definition of part time is those who work 20 hours or less. So I'm, uh, just wondering,
uh, what is the definition of part time for us, or you know is this 20 hours or less or more,
uh, and is this of their own choosing to work part time, uh, does this include seasonal
employees. I think I've heard the answer to that, that, uh, it does include some of those.
And are they hourly positions or budgeted positions, um, cause I've recently heard about
some part time staff members whose hours have been cut back, uh, and that's concerning
to me. I don't like hearing that, that someone who's expecting, uh, so many hours per
week is cut back significantly in the number of hours. I don't like to hear that ... that's
happening. Uh, and I think the question was brought up whether this would include
student interns, cause we do have quite a few interns that work for us in various
capacities. Uh, do any of these positions require special skills? I haven't heard an
answer to that. Are any of these positions off shifts or even weekend shifts? And if so
does the City pay shift def or weekend def? I .... I don't know the answer to that, and
if...if we don't, uh, we should consider doing that or even raising that, uh, that's a
possibility. Uh, and this has kind of been raised already. Do we know for certain the
total effect this would have on all of the other salaries? Uh, over the course of the next
two to three years, uh (mumbled) I originally was thinking of the Board of Supervisors'
lead with same percent rate, uh, of increments, uh, such as this year it was increased 17 -
cents per hour, and follow that same continual progression, uh, but I .... I do, uh, like
Council Member Thomas's suggestion about the progressions.....on...... on that. Um,
another thing that I would like us to consider is offering incentives, such as, uh, a yearly
bonus for continuing to work for the City or perhaps even considering educational
assistance for college classes. A lot of cities, I looked into that, a lot of cities, uh, nearby
and surrounding do offer that tuition assistance, particularly for their part time folks so
that they can, uh, continue their education and go further in their careers, or even
vocational training. We've heard a lot about that from, uh, members of the audience and
the Council, that there is a need for that, for the vocational training. I think that ... that
might be something, cause there are cities that offer that also. Uh, we've heard that
possibly due to the need to achieve the goals in our strategic plan, the City staff are
feeling stressed, and what I would like to see is that we put our efforts towards .... I'm
sorry, this is long! I told ya it was gonna be long ... towards looking at each of the
departments to assess their possible need for additional full time staff and put financial
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resources towards that, thus getting additional full time job opportunities for more people.
And one place where there's likely to be a major need for more positions is the Transit
department. We heard about that earlier, that we're going to be looking at that very soon.
So I think it would be imperative that we have sufficient funds in our salary budget to be
able to add Transit drivers. And that would be quite a cost. Uh, and Councilwoman
Salih, uh, you told me about one employee that you know of who struggles to make ends
meet, uh, and that does concern me and of course you have good intentions and are well
meaning with this proposal, but I was wondering if we also considered whether it might
put these certain individuals in a higher tax bracket, hence paying more in income taxes
and possibly change their eligibility for free and reduced lunches or even reduced rent
rate, uh, meaning in the long run perhaps less money in their pockets. Uh, I'd like to
know some information about that, as far as, uh, how that might affect them. Uh, I
believe that we do need to take a closer look at this issue, who it involves, how it would
effect not only them but the salary scale of all employees, and whether we might want to
consider adding some incentives to the salary package for part time employees. We need
to look at the whole picture here, and I would suggest we take more time to look into all
these issues and concerns before we jump right into proposing $15 an hour for over 300
employees. That's all!
Mims/ I'll just add my thoughts, and I've commented on this previously. Um, one of the things I
kind of feel that kind of gets missed in a lot of this discussion is the fact that I think the
City pays our full time, permanent workers very well. Um, and I think we have great
benefits, uh, I think between our .... our health insurance and IPERs, etc., um, and so I
think we have to look very carefully at what group of employees this is focusing on. And
to me when you look at .... literally the history, um, of our economy, there have always
been temporary, part time, seasonal, often times relatively low skill, entry .... entry type
jobs into the labor market, and those are not jobs that we .... look at people filling on a
long term basis who are trying to support themselves or a family. Now, not to say that
there aren't some people in those jobs, but typically they are transient people. They are
people who are working only seasonally and part time, often times by choice. Maybe
they are students, um, you know, maybe they're in and out of the community or
whatever, but again, they tend to be .... in general I would say often times relatively low
skilled jobs that are an opportunity for people to start developing some skills within the
job market, even things of, you know, coming to work on time and how to be responsible
and those sorts of things, and building up to that point where they develop those skills for
more significant jobs with higher skills, more responsibility, etc. So when we talk about
living wage jobs, I absolutely entirely support the fact that we are doing that, and more
than that with our full time employees, but when we are looking at these .... part time,
seasonal, temporary positions, I .... I don't agree, um, in terms of the $15 an hour. I think
when we look at the 900,000 to a million dollar impact on the budget, and the fact that,
again, our economy has .... has always had these entry level type jobs. Um, I think we
need to look at this as much more modest, um, kinds of increases within this area.
Fruin/ Mayor, can I make one .... one clarification, uh, based on some comments? I just wanna
clarify that we do have permanent, part time staff .... that fall within, um, either, uh, one of
our collective bargaining units or our administrative and confidential units. So we do
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have part time employees that work year round for us, that make 17.50 to ... or more.
What we're talkin' about are the hourly or sometimes referred to as .... as seasonal
employees, um, they .... they generally work less than 30 hours a week, but we do have
some that work 40 hours a week. However, there's limitations on how long they can be
employed 40 hours per week. Um, so .... just want to clarify that. It's not a full time, part
time issue. Um, it is, uh, there are part time members of our staff that are permanent.
Throgmorton/ Okay so .... if I could I haven't had a chance to speak yet. Uh.... I've been tryin' to
listen for points of agreement or potential agreement, and .... while also thinking about
some things I wanted to say. So let me express my own preliminary views first, and then
let's see if we can come to some agreement about how we want to proceed. All right, so
I .... I .... I'm completely committed to social justice for all sorts of reasons. I don't wanna
elaborate on that, but I'm completely committed to it. But I am very leery of increasing
the minimum wage for all hourly employees to $15 a year, within one or two years,
without having better information about possible adverse consequences and other
contextual factors that matter. So, for example, all else being equal, if we increase
spending by 900,000 to a million dollars to pay for the po... the proposed increase, we
would ha .... I think this is correct, we would have to increase the City's tax levy by about
28 -cents, or.....cut something, or replace something, right? I think that 28 -cents makes
sense, uh....
Fruin/ If you were to put it all on the .... on the property tax (both talking) look to do that, but yes,
that's equivalent.
Throgmorton/ Al .... also I think it would be fiscally irresponsible of us as the Council of this city
to increase spending by that amount, the 900,000 to a million dollars, without first
knowing what the State legislature is going to do in the spring session with regard to
backfill payments. I don't know if y'all know about that, but that's.....last I knew it was
something like, uh, would be a poten.... uh, a loss of about $1.5 million, if that money's
taken away from us. Now, Geoff, uh, please tell me if I'm makin' (both talking)
Fruin/ That's correct!
Throgmorton/ ...mistakes about that. So if we spend another million dollars and have a million
and a half taken away, we are creating a problem. So, we don't wanna do that, and I
don't think you would want us to do that either. We have to figure out somethin' else to
get where we, I believe, all wanna go. Moreover, if we want to increase the tax levy by
the 28 -cents that I just mentioned, we should be conscious of the fact that there are other
alternative actions that we could take that might have a bigger effect on social justice.
For example, improving night and Sunday bus transit service. That's gonna cost money.
And .... okay, so .... we gotta do .... spend it on raisin' the minimum wage or we gonna
spend it on improving bus transit, etc. Another example would be continuing to
contribute to the affordable housing fund. This year we contributed $1 million to that
affordable housing fund. If we're gonna contribute another million dollars next year,
which is a real stretch .... how we gonna do that while also increasing spending on ... incr...
by increasing the minimum wage by $900,000 to a million. Also, and I think, Pauline,
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you mentioned this, uh, we might want to add additional staff to do work that we value,
and, you know, that kind of stuff, those topics come up during the budget discussion,
which begins officially kind of like in mid, uh, December and goes until the middle of
March, when by law .... by State law, we have to adopt our budget. So we have to, you
know, judge competing values and so on, and decide what we wanna spend on versus not.
Lastly, if we want to increase wages for hourly employees to $15 without increasing
taxes, we should first ask ourselves what existing services and programs we would be
willing to cut. So .... you know, all else being equal. So....I.....I believe, uh, these are
factors that we as the City Council must consider before we immediately decide to
increase the minimum wage for our hourly employees. That said, I was listening pretty
carefully and what I heard several Council Members say was that they would be very
interested in, uh.... st.... starting with something lower than $15 an hour, effective, uh
(several responding) July of 2019 (several talking in background), having another phase
later, and maybe going toward (both talking)
Salih/ .....$15 an hour.
Throgmorton/ ....$15 an hour. (both talking) So then the questions become what would be a
good starting point, what would be a good step wise increase, and... are we in a position to
say, commit ourselves to $15 an hour. I don't think we're in a position to commit
ourselves to $15 an hour, without knowin' some of the .... the things I just mentioned. I
do think we are in a position to commit ourselves to a first phase increase. And I do think
we can ... come up with some negotiated number there and then come up some other
reasonable number for a probable second phase, but we need to know what the State's
gonna do with regard to the backfill before we commit ourselves permanently to that.
That's the way I see things anyhow. So...
Cole/ Jim, how do you feel about that three-year timeframe? Because I think that gives us .... we
.....we, to me it's important that we set the target and just like we did with Mazahir's
proposal on the affordable housing fund, you wanted to get that increase, we had that as a
goal. We wanted to see what the backfill would do and so we ..... before we went ahead
with that we wanted to make sure that was locked in. So to me, if we commit ourselves
to ... to .... to 15, over three and four years, or maybe we decide four, like the Board of
Supervisors, um, we then commit to a quarter of that amount effective July 1", 2019.
Um, that gives us ... staff more time to do the budget analysis, the proposal would come
back to us then in January of this year, um, we'd be able to consider all the other
competing proposals, and so this is our target. That's what I feel is that we just need to
set the target and then would still gives us time to do our due diligence in terms of budget
considerations, etc.
Throgmorton/ Okay, since you asked me, I will answer. I think I'd be willing to identify $15 an
hour by some date, I don't know three or whatever, four... maybe four years in the future,
as an ambition. And, you know, and then we'd, the Council should revisit it, as we go
along, but I can accept it as an ambition. Not as a permanent, fixed target that we commit
ourselves to, and we can't commit a future Council to that. But we can have an ambition.
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Salih/ I guess, yeah .... I, Jim, I guess you can commit, but if the .... if we find out (unable to
understand) Council Member we can commit. I hope we will do that. First I wanna
really tell you that, yes, I'm really worried about the backfill, like everyone else, you
know, and I'm worried about transportation, affordable housing, and I know we need
money for all this. And you know I don't wanna also compare should we do public
transportation on Sunday or should we give our employees livable wage. No, we need to
do all of them. I know this is need money, but guess what? If the .... (unable to
understand) Des Moines become very good people and raise the minimum wage across
the Iowa state to $15 an hour, at the same time they (unable to understand) they cut the
backfill. What's Iowa City going to do? Are they going to comply or they going to say
no, because they cut the, you know, the backfill we cannot do this. Let us implement our
value. We have a very, very good staff. Have a very good City Manager. They know
the budget very well than I do. I always go and take listen about budget so I can figure
out things to tweak in and tweak out, and I figure out there is many, many ways and I
guess that's why we have a City Manager like Geoff and the rest of the good staff, so
they can figure out our values. As a Council Member we have to implement our values
and after that commit to it and try to figure out a way to do this kind of things. That's
why I thinks .... from, that's my own, you know, thinking, I hope I get support. We
should move and have a commitment (unable to understand) the minimum, the livable
wage to $15 an hour on the next three years, and after that, just try to find to .... to do like
a committee, maybe, of three Council Member, to sit down and figure out the ways how
we can implement this. Are we gonna do this on the, like .... also to commit the first raise,
like this is (unable to understand) 19 to 11 -something and after that how we can go, roll
the ball down the road to do this. I hope this is, you know, the people will support this,
because I understand 100% (mumbled) everyone here values social justice. I don't have
any doubt you guys can .... if you can do it today, the whole 15, you will do it, but don't
be cautious! We have a very good like staff here. They can figure out the, you know,
this kind of things and we can (unable to understand) Rockne said, we just have, uh, you
know the.... the.... the building permit and we gonna have like more revenue coming up
you know (mumbled) We don't have to put all this on like (unable to understand) There
is many, many, many other things we can do for this. Just we need to figure out things,
and we need to do everything from public transportation to livable wage to all the value
that we value.
Throgmorton/ What do the rest of the people think here about a starting point? I ... let me, I'm
gonna propose, as a starting point, uh... no. Who .... who is it, Rockne or John who
originally provided us (several responding) What did you suggest, John?
Thomas/ Well like.... because of all the complexities and un .... unknowables at the moment, um,
that, you know, we could look at a couple of options, to understand the financial
implications. One, uh, setting a new minimum at say 11.50 for July of 2019. Uh, and
then there was some variations, you know, Maz mentioned I think setting it .... setting it
11.50 in July of 2019, and then (several talking) raise in January ... of, uh.... I don't know
what you were thinking (both talking)
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Salih/ I mean like, John, mine (unable to understand) $13 an hour by ... $13.25 as Madison did,
for the January of 2020, which is gonna put us in like a....11.80....75 by July 151, and in
January will be 13.25, and after that we ... the goal will be 15 in three years, and after that
we can see how we can do it (mumbled)
Thomas/ Right. So there .... there are a number of variations, I guess, with.....you know, whether
it's three .... 3.25 in January of 2020 or .... 3.25 in July of 2020, it's, you know, just.... with
the idea I think we're talking increments and the timeframe.
Throgmorton/ So I wanna... I wanna see if we can get to a preliminary majority agreement on a
starting point. All right, and then, you know, and then we'll kind of focus on the next
part. So .... July 2019, 11.50 an hour. (several responding)
Cole/ I agree with that.
Salih/ Uh huh. (several talking) Yeah, I was saying 11.75 but 11 ....if I find interest I will go for
it, cause I want it to happen. Yeah.
Throgmorton/ Okay, so tentatively we're there, on that. July 2019. Okay. Then next question
has to do with so ... sort of, but you suggested three years, Rockne?
Cole/ That's correct.
Throgmorton/ Maz, you wanted to (both talking) where we had a ... within six months ha ... have
another, uh, a different (both talking) So....
Mims/ I would encourage us to look at this annually, based on what the State is doing with
backfill, and what our other budget concerns are gonna be, um, and so I would
recommend we go the .... if we're gonna do this, that we do the 11.50 in July of 19, and
then I mean we can obviously lay out tentative increases from there, but it's something I
think we're going to have to look at every year with the budget, in terms of that three
or .... I'd prefer to see us look at a four-year process, just in terms of. .... the effect on the
budget and .... and maybe we'll get there faster, you know, depending upon .... uh,
additional property tax revenue and if we keep the backfill, etc., uh, I .... Jim, you make I
think .... I think you made a number of very good points that as a Council and with
responsibility to the taxpayers of this community, but still caring about that social justice,
I think you made a lot of very good points, and one is we cannot commit future Councils.
Um, that budget is set year-to-year, and so .... I think to do that one step now for next
year, I mean you're talking for the people on the low end of the scale, basically a 20%
increase, um, in one fell swoop, and then gradually increasing from there as we look at
that budget each year, with the idea of. ... at least a three, maybe a four-year step process,
depending on how the budgets go, to get to the 15.
Cole/ And I would like to do it annually too. My only concern with July I5` is I .... I would just
like to do an annual review with the target of the three years. I guess I would agree with
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you, Susan, that I think we should do the annual step-up, but I do want us to aim for those
step-ups.
Mims/ Which .... which we'll do during our budget review (both talking)
Cole/ Yes!
Mims/ I mean as we do our budget annually.
Throgmorton/ (several talking)
Salih/ Let me get that really I don't get it and I like to understand things. What you mean by
annually? Do you mean like, oh, we gonna increase it to 15 but next year if it's not good
we not gonna do the raise? Like say now is .... July is 11.50. July of 2019, and when the
budget come for 20 and we find the backfill cut or something else happen that means, oh,
this year since we are in really bad situation we can just leave it this year and we do it
next year. Are you saying that? Or .... I wanna see a commitment really.
Cole/ Yeah.
Salih/ We gonna increase, uh, 11.50 by July, you know, 2019 and we will do it like maybe 12.50
on the next year or maybe 12.75 as we (mumbled) agree to, and this kind of thing. But I
really wanna understand what you mean by revisit it every year?
Cole/ (both talking) What I'm saying (both talking)
Salih/ .....why should we visit it?
Cole/ Increases would be annually would be my preference. (several talking)
Salih/ Yes, it is annually (both talking)
Throgmorton/ Can .... can, uh, I'm unclear about whether you meant increases in, on July 1st
every year.
Cole/ Yes, that's what I'm saying and I agree that our target should be 15 at the end of three
years. That's what I would like to do. So .... so as opposed to the increase of January. I
think we should do the increase at July 1st every year, because that's (several talking)
Throgmorton/ I .... I agree, if we're gonna do other increases (several talking)
Salih/ But, Susan, that what you meant? Do you mean like increase it or because visit it as if we
going to review it again? That's the feeling, you know, excuse me, my (several talking)
Mims/ My point is, Mazahir, we cannot legally sit here today and commit future Councils to
specific pay increases. We are going to have to, from a legal standpoint, every year when
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we do the budget, uh, do that process and hopefully the budget will allow us, you know,
to do those kinds of increases, but as we look at what our property tax revenues, what we
wanna do with Transit, what we wanna do with affordable housing, we will have ... we just
legally cannot sit here and commit.... these future raises beyond next year. (both talking)
Salih/ But you are saying two things. Legally we cannot doing, or look at the budget. Look at
the budget, if the budget allow us we can do it, or legally....
Mims/ We'll have to set our priorities every year as we (both talking)
Salih/ ....priorities. If the priorities that we have to set today, I think is to commit to the $15 an
hour. It's like 11.50 on July, 2019, and increase it every year annually as, uh, you know,
everybody else until we reach the goal of 15. Another Council came after two years, they
don't like we did, that's up to them. We're gonna hold `em accountable, but you know I
just mean we as a Council right now, we need to set a goal clearly about what we gonna
do to raise the minimum .... the livable wage to $15 an hour, starting July. How much we
gonna add annually? Visit the budget, but it still ... that' s part of the budget. But you are
not gonna think about, oh, maybe we don't have money, maybe we're not gonna do ... I
don't wanna really see that personally.
Throgmorton/ Well we're gonna have to, but we can express an ambition to increase .... by a
certain amount in July 2019.
Salih/ Okay.
Throgmorton/ But Susan's absolutely correct, we legally cannot commit.....whatever the Council
is, that's in charge at that moment in time, we cannot commit them to doing that. It's in
the end up to them, because they're the ones that will adopt the (both talking)
Salih/ We are not talking about them. I understand what you saying, but can we say we as the
current Council, we agree to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour in the next three
years, starting July, uh, of 2019, 11.50, and we increase it every year. Is that illegal?
Cole/ You're talking about the (both talking)
Throgmorton/ We're expressing an ambition, uh, it's not illegal for us to do that.
Salih/ It's illegal?
Mims/ But it's not commitment. I mean it's, like Jim said (both talking) ambition, but it's....
Salih/ We ... we the one that who agree at the time is not illegal for us to say that. Publicly.
Thomas/ No, we did something very similar (both talking)
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Salih/ ....another Council no problem. Let them, yeah. We are not gonna ask them what to do.
But you know we just, I would like to see a commitment from us. We don't wanna talk
about what (unable to understand)
Throgmorton/ I understand. Geoff.
Fruin/ What ... what we can do is, uh.... readjust the wage schedules for July 19 to 11.50, and...
and figure out how we're gonna compress wages. Um, generally when we present our
budget to you with the exception of our capital projects, we just give you that one-year
snapshot. It's so much data that we really don't go beyond two or three years, but as staff
we do look at some trends beyond two or three years in our operating budget. Uh, so
what we can do when we revisit the budget with you in .... in January, is confirm that we
will get to 11.50 per your direction, and then show you some forecast models to basically
say if we were to increase it $1.75 for the next two years so that you can get to 15 in three
years, this is the type of money that you're looking at, and that way you see the data this
year and .... and you can have that discussion, uh, going forward this year. We, again, we
typically don't show you those forecasted trends, but we can show that to you, um, and
then you can .... you can make that. So if you want .... if you want, if I'm picking up the
conversation, you can, um, strive or have ambition, however you want to phrase it, to get
to 15 by three years, we can start to show you that forecasted data as soon as January.
Cole/ I think that sounds great to me (several talking)
Throgmorton/ All right so we .... we could indicate that it is our ambition .... I think that's an
acceptable way to put it right? Our ambition to increase the minimum wage to $15 by,
what would that be? 20....
Fruin/ 21.
Throgmorton/ 2021, July lst, 2021.
Salih/ (unable to understand) confuse. I don't know what you mean by ambition. What ... I....
want to understand that word because I'm really, is this like a commitment or this is
maybe... what.... what you mean by ambition? Can you explain that to me?
Throgmorton/ For reasons I indicated, I personally will not commit us to paying $15 an hour by
that, by July 1, 2021, without having better knowledge about what the State backfill
payment will be, without having better sense of, uh, alternative costs that are ... and
expenses, that we will want to make, and how those play out in our budget. I need to
know that kind of thing before I will make the kind of firm decision you want from me.
Salih/ That... that's true, and for me I don't like ambition really. (laughter) Yeah! That ... for me,
you said that and I really don't agree with you. I'm glad that I ask about the word
ambition because I really don't know what that means.
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Cole/ It would really take a subsequent... the way this works is that you're right about in terms of
future Councils could change, but .... if we commit to this, it would take a future set of
four that would have to change direction to staff. So they would have to make that
political decision (both talking)
Salih/ Exactly!
Cole/ .....future. So I think we're getting what we want.
Salih/ Yes!
Cole/ Which is the commitment, and then understanding that if a future Council wants to deviate,
and way we want (both talking) and we don't want to do the 15, they would make that
political choice.
Salih/ Uh huh. I agree 100% with Rockne.
Throgmorton/ So I've expressed a .... a phraseology here, a way of phrasing this, that (both
talking)
Cole/ I think we agree.
Throgmorton/ ....we would have, uh, indicate to the staff that we have, uh, the ambition of
moving to, uh, $15 an hour, effective July I ", 2021. And .... so you're gonna give us
some data when we get .... get into our budget process later this year, that will help us see
that as it, you know, see how it plays out financially. And .... and then.... there's, in the
background there's this caveat that (several talking) laid out. So ... how does that sound to
the five of you?
Cole/ Sounds like a plan to me!
Salih/ And I just .... we just gonna wait for Geoff to come and give us like some idea, if some like
budget work or this is could be also....
Throgmorton/ No. No, I ... I've just said what we're saying is we are telling the staff we have an
ambition of moving to $15 an hour, effective July 1", 2021.
Fruin/ We are gonna prepare as staff to get to $15 in three years.
Salih/ Uh huh.
Fruin/ And along the way we're gonna show you the numbers, and if you get.... uncomfortable
with it, when lookin' at the numbers, you can give us direction to pull back. But we are
gonna move forward and get to the 15 by three years, from what we're .... based on what
I'm hearing.
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Throgmorton/ Yep (several responding) That's what I....
Mims/ I'd rather do four years, but I mean you're talkin' 11.50 in 2019, 13.25 .... uh, in 2021, and
$15.....if you do it in equal splits, you're talkin' a buck 75 an hour, um, per year. I'd
rather see it looked at over four years..... in terms of the budget impact.
Salih/ I think four years too much because Iowa Policy Project (mumbled) that it's 14.29, it's
effecting 2018. We are way behind..... from the actual number. Three years I guess is...
it's good.
Throgmorton/ How bout the rest of you? Uh, do you have a preference about three years or four
years?
Thomas/ I don't personally know that it makes that much difference (laughs) I mean I .... I feel
we're into, uh, you know, predicting futures, which we cannot accurately predict, and uh,
it's a very volatile time. I mean I'm .... I'm happy to stay with three, with .... but I think
we need to be fully aware of the unpredictability that we're dealing with, uh, both within
our own local economy and the national and world economy. But, um .... yeah. So as
long .... I think as long as we understand that, you know, that's....
Salih/ (mumbled) understand that, and we can make everything happen. Yeah. We will.
Throgmorton/ Okay, so ..... I think I see, what? Five people and may .... I don't know, Susan....
who wold be okay with three years. You prefer four, I understand (both talking) Okay.
So I think we're clear about where ... how we wanna move ahead. Okay. It's 17 till. We
don't really have time t move into clarification of agenda items and that kind of thing.
It's... well, we have two minutes, three minutes. Are there any individual items that you
really strongly, uh, need clarified with regard to the, uh, to the agenda?
Clarification of Agenda Items:
Salih/ I guess ..... not the, no, no, no! I mean like the (mumbled) not now. No, I .... I don't have
anything.
Throgmorton/ Does.... does anybody? I'm tryin' to look at my own notes to figure out if I do
(laughs)
Salih/ Yeah.
Throgmorton/ Oh, with regard to proclamations, during the meeting, we have five proclamations.
I'd like to divvy them up. So....
Thomas/ I'll do one.
Throgmorton/ So I'm just gonna pass `em out at random, if that's all right with you, and I'll do
the last one, which is PLAYvolution. It's kinda fun! All right, so there's that, uh....
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anything else ...... uh, yeah, we didn't have a chance to get into the climate action, so we'll
do that during the formal meeting. Okay! I .... I think we'll have to stop there. Okay
with y'all? We'll reconvene the work session after the formal meeting. Thanks to all of
you for coming and, uh, payin' attention.
(BREAK FOR FORMAL MEETING)
(RECONVENE WORK SESSION)
Clarification of Agenda Items (cont.):
Throgmorton/ Okay, so we're re-entering our work session for September the 18`s. So we really
did not have an opportunity to go through questions about agenda items. I don't know
that there's the need to do that, but if anybody has any questions they need to ask, any
follow up questions, anything like that.
Mims/ No, I .... I just want to thank staff as usual for the response to a lot of the correspondence.
I think staff does a fantastic job of, um, I guess if I only had one comment, Geoff, off-
load some of that to somebody else (laughs) I know probably sometimes (several
talking) you feel like it's quicker to do it yourself than send it to somebody else. But
still .... would encourage that! Um .... (laughter) Just forward to Ashley! Forward to
Simon! (laughter)
Cole/ Simon's like, `No!' (laughter and several talking)
Throgmorton/ Ashley's done with Senior Center. Ashley's done with the climate action (several
talking and laughing)
Mims/ The .... the only comment, the only follow up comment I would make, I was gonna make
it when Mazahir was talking about the goats. Was it goats? Okay. Um ... that individ...
one, the City may not wanna grant the exemption. The second comment I would make is
a very large coyote has returned to that area. So they might want to be really careful
with .... if.....if we were even to allow that. Um, it was in my backyard today. (several
talking) I mean.....we.....we have a 55 -pound dog that is getting older and my husband
went out to make sure to get the dog because the coyote was following the dog to the
house. So .... (several talking) No, we saw fox out there today too but .... a large coyote is
back, so .... (several talking)
Throgmorton/ Wolves are next. (several talking)
Mims/ In our neighborhood, yes!
Information Packet Discussion [September 6, September 131:
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Throgmorton/ Okay, I'm assuming there are no other questions about agenda items? Okay, let's
move to the information packet discussion, September 6. Thanks for the email, Geoff, to
Manville Heights neighbor and that links to, uh, Rockne's suggestions, with regard to the
work session. We can come to that in a minute. So, questions about the September 6'
packet? Or comments. Okay. Moving on, September 13a'.
Salih/ Yes, I do have for September.....um, I would like to talk about IP9 through 13, but I'm
gonna lay them down in like three sections. First one like item .... 9 through 13, all of
them related to serving like people of color. This is done out in IP9, uh, because it's
saying June of 2018 the Police Department began (unable to understand) review of DMC.
Uh, this is found also in IP 11, regarding use of the (unable to understand) toolkit, and
(unable to understand) minority impact statement. My question would be, since those has
been studied like ... well anyway, I would like to see a full description of this process and
current implementation. (mumbled)
Fruin/ Of the supervisor re .... reviews that are taking place?
Throgmorton/ (both talking)
Salih/ (mumbled)
Throgmorton/ Ma .... Maz, please talk into the microphone so .... for recording purposes.
Salih/ Okay, again, urn .... that's not (mumbled)
Fruin/ Okay.
Salih/ Okay. Uh, for ... I just am talkin' about if you look at IN through 13, you will find out that
all of them related to serving people of color. And I'm gonna just like tell you why I said
that, because in IP9, in June 2018, says the Police Department began (unable to
understand) for DMC, which is like a, uh, disproportional minority contact. This means
people of color, and again, in IP 11 regarding use of (mumbled) toolkit and (unable to
understand) a racial minority impact statement. You know all this like dealing with ... but
I really would like to see a full description of the process of current implementation
toward those thing, like what you guys have done or.....
Fruin/ I'm not .... I'm not trackin' exactly. Where are you lookin' at on IPI I? What ... what...
Salih/ Yes, if you read all of them from not only 11. I mean like all of them from 9 to 13, they
talkin' about like you know the people of color.
Fruin/ Okay, so just the toolkit process in general?
Salih/ Yes.
Fruin/ And then the Police strategic plan?
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Salih/ Uh huh, implementation plan. Yeah. Maybe not now, I don't mean that, you know. I just
mean like if you can bring us like a short summary version of what the implementations.
Throgmorton/ Yeah, I guess I'm not tracking you either, Maz. Because I think all three of these
reports are designed to be reports on actions that are being taken, or have been taken.
Salih/ But it doesn't have .... it just say like `we did this' but it doesn't have like really the full
description of the process. That....(unable to understand) that doesn't tell me. I would
like to see that.
Mims/ I guess I'm not tracking either cause I....
Salih/ Have you read all of them?
Mims/ Yeah. I .... I .... (both talking)
Salih/ I read `em and I just really don't think it...it clear. Tome.
Mims/ I mean ... to me if I start with IP9, um ..... to me that's pretty direct about what they've been
doing, what their goals are, the updates in terms of additional training, uh, what the
training is on, um.....participation in various events. I .... I mean if you just take one at a
time, like IP9, what ... what would you want different or more than what Chief Matherly
has given us in IP9?
Salih/ I just wanna like really understand the, you know, how the actual process is. When they
do this kind of things and .... yeah!
Cole/ Sort of like more detail on each individual red line event?
Salih/ Yes.
Throgmorton/ That's askin' for a lot, Maz.
Mims/ Yeah, I agree!
Throgmorton/ (several talking) but I hear what you're sayin'.
Salih/ (mumbled) askin' a lot! When you ask you ask, you know. If they can do it they .... they
can do it!
Throgmorton/ Well but they're given a .... I mean I understand your .... your, part of it is, um,
you ... you don't, you can't understand the detail of what's being described in the memos
because there's, I don't know, all sorts of background knowledge assumed by the .... the
people who wrote these, uh, reports, but .... if they go into more detail, we'll
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have.... regular reports that are much longer and .... I don't know that we want that.
They're already.... some of `em are already fairly long.
Fruin/ Well we could do a couple things. One, um, we could set up an individual meeting with
you and Chief Matherly, and .... and you and Stefanie, and they can go in more detail with
ya and take an hour or two and go through that. That might be helpful for ya, and then if
there's something that's concerning that you hear in those meetings or that you think
needs to be, uh, brought forward to the full Council, you can certainly, um .... talk to the
Council about that. Um, the other option would be to have them come before the entire
Council in a work session and, um....
Salih/ Yeah, I ask about that but .... it doesn't happen. That's why I'm saying this. I ask last time
and this is will be in IP 10, and the questions that I'm gonna .... maybe you can respond to
it. Anyway, I can .... I can go with that, whatever you think. If the Council are not
interesting on doing this, I will be more interested to sit down with him and maybe, uh,
Stefanie, as you comment, and just review those. (several talking)
Mims/ I think that might be a good way. I ... I guess I would just .... I don't think it's that we're not
interested. I ... I think it, maybe with you being newer to Council, you don't have quite the
same background, just not having been on Council as long.
Salih/ Maybe.
Mims/ Um.....so that may just be part of it, and so that might be a good way for you to get more
of that background that .... (both talking)
Cole/ And I like Geoff's idea — if you meet with Chief and there's part that you don't think you
should bring to the Council as a whole, I think we'd all consider that. (several talking) If
they could do better.
Salih/ Yeah, I .... I really agree with that. No problem!
Throgmorton/ You're definitely right that they all have to do with people of color. They all have
to do with racial equity. And quite intentionally, I mean, each of these are initiatives that
we started. I'm not .... I mean the prior Council started the, um ... uh, the....
Cole/ The DMC Committee, the (several talking)
Throgmorton/ Yeah, that .... that part of it, uh, and then Stefanie's, uh, regular reports, that's a
consequence of stuff that happened under the prior Council, and the .... the equity review
toolkit is somethin' that really Kingsley pushed for very hard and, you know, we agreed
that it needed to be done and, yeah, so.....yeah!
Salih/ Yeah. Yes, thank you. This will work it out forme. And IP10, it seemed to address
changes in the past practice that were causing over .... over -patrolling in minority area and
resulting in this disproportionate traffic stop. I understand. By the way I really gonna
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(unable to understand) good work that our current Chief doing to really reduce this, and
I .... I been here like when he was not here and I been ..... I see the different now. There is
many, many like we have ... but we improve a lot. The progress is really .... has been
made, you know, and .... but still we have work to do. That's why I guess I wanted the
City Manager, or if he was here, to comment on this, because you know last time I ask
the same question and they said he will be here, and I guess he was here. If we done this
during the (several talking) work session he would have answer the question, but if Geoff
can answer it will be good. Otherwise we can wait for him again?
Fruin/ Sure. Well just....really try to concisely walk you through the memo. So the .... the, uh,
I'm starting on page 29 of the IP, which is, um, IP 10. The, uh, first table is from Dr.
Barnum's report. So Dr. Barnum organizes his data by square miles in the city, and we
have 50 -some square miles, 52 maybe square miles, and the .... the zones that you see
highlighted there are the ones that have the highest frequency of traffic stops. So Dr.
Bamum's.....one focus on traffic stops and then two collects data on .... on a much
smaller level than .... than, um, we patrol. So those areas, 13, 21, 28, 29, and 30 then
correspond, uh, to I guess the data supporting those is the next table there. You saw that
in Dr. Barnum's presentation. We patrol differently than that. We don't assign an officer
to each square mile. We only have six to 10 to 12 officers out there at any given time,
depending on the time of day. So they're assigned to one of four areas, and you'll see
that in table 3, there's green, blue, and a couple of pinkish colors there. Um, we allocate
those resources, how many officers to each of those zones, um, differently based on time
of day and, um, the calls for service, and....and, uh, experience that we have. So
downtown is the smallest beat there, but that's where we put the most of our police
presence down there. Our experience tells us that's where, uh, we need to be to .... urn....
be close to where the calls for service are because there's high levels of accidents, there's
high levels of, uh, OWIs and other ... and other incidents. So the police uses data to .... to
distribute their staffing like that. Um, what I think you .... you get into with the
Chief ...the new information that you're seein' on tables 4, 5, 6, and .... 4, 5, and 6 is that's
some of the data that we look at to help deploy those resources. And when we're talkin'
about traffic stops, um, we're really talkin' about those times in which our officers are
not running from call to call to call, because there's a lot of times during the week where
our officers aren't really proactively patrolling. They're just going from call to call to
call, but in those times that they're not, um, they're going to deploy in .... in different, uh,
areas and sometimes based on their experience. So if they're doing more of a traffic,
um ... uh, traffic kind of beat, um, or detail, thank you, they're gonna.... they're gonna
naturally go where there's the most crashes. So if you look at table 6 for example, you
have the most crashes in those areas that Dr. Barnum highlighted, and that's what the
Chief was trying to convey there. You know, you have zone, urn ..... 13 which is the
Northside, uh.... well, all of them there except really the Miller Orchard and the
Friendship zone, those are the top five, um, the top five areas for Dr. Barnum's report.
So I think what the Chief was trying to convey is .... um .... we're .... we're not, um, doin'
the hot spot policing, and that was a conversation years ago where we were flooding
neighborhoods, and not just .... not just on traffic detail, but flooding neighborhoods
because they might have had a .... a couple of serious crimes, maybe a murder or lots of
vehicle, uh, burglaries or somethin' like that. We're not .... we're not doin' that anymore,
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but we still use data to deploy where we're going, and our experience tells us, particularly
when we're looking at traffic stops and doing proactive activity, that there's certain parts
of town, uh, that we should be in to help prevent, um, accidents from occurring.
Salih/ Yeah, I .... I understand, you know, your explanation but just really when I (mumbled)
question to Dr. Barnus... (mumbled) pronounce his name right, uh, he .... he really said
that, yeah, it....it filled, it seemed to him the police is spending more time on southeast
Iowa City, which is the, you know, the .... the map was showing, and he said yeah, and I
said, uh, maybe you cannot answer that question, this question will be for the department.
I remember I think Captain (unable to understand) or somebody, if I remember, and he
was telling me that because there is more traffic over there, and I was like telling him
really how come the traffic's only on that side. You telling me there is no more traffic
like (unable to understand) you know, Dodge .... north Dodge or something like that, and
we ... we end up, we supposed to meet, you know .... wait for the Police Chief to come and
explain this to us, and now also the data saying that the crash, because there is many
crash over there, call for service. I guess the .... the question will be if this is really...
because there is many crashes. Why there is many crash over there? What wrong over
there in the streets that making people like having like many, many crash there? I just...
we need to solve the problem. If because due to the crash people are not on the City
knowing that. They know who's live there and uh, if our .... our officers doing everything
as it should be, let us tell the public that. Let us solve the problem that making the police
(unable to understand) that area. I will love if the .... if, you know, the Police Chief can
explain this to us like more, like (both talking)
Cole/ Correct me if I'm wrong (mumbled) too, Geoff. Officer Schwindt is leading the way on
data -driven justice initiatives and I think, as I understand what the department's effort is,
is that it's to use rational, strategic, empirical based decisions rather than irrational ones,
and unfortunately the data seems to have sussed out the irrational, um, things that they
were focusing on, like for example consent searches that very clearly demonstrated that
requests for consent for search were not yielding more accurate law enforcement
information, so they were able, I think, to modify that. So I'm comfortable, especially
with what Officer Schwindt is doing, and I think he's sort of leading the way nationally
on this, with the DOG grant, to sort of see how they're going, and Jim, you had
mentioned Kingsley, um, shout out to Kingsley. I bet he's not watching but I'll shout out
anyway, um, he seemed to be very .... he led the way on the DMC committee and he
seemed to think that we were moving in the right direction, but as always, and I'm sure
Chief Matherly would .... would admit we can always certainly advance and accelerate
and do better and always strive to do better.
Fruin/ Yeah, and I wanna make that clear, you know, the .... the data that Dr. Barnum presented,
we're not .... we're not satisfied with that data! We know we have a ways to go, um .... but
we .... we don't feel it's .... it's because of the patrol allocation (both talking)
Salih/ Okay....
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Fruin/ We don't think that that's the .... the driver, uh, of it. Um .... uh, it's .... it's.....it's more
just, um.....you know, there's.... there's all the things (laughs) laid out in his memo.
It's .... it's training the police force. It's making sure that we're aware of our, um, implicit
biases. It's, um, using discretion on what needs a traffic stop, what needs a traffic
violation, and adjusting some of those norms. Um, I don't think it's patrol allocation,
but.....going through an exercise like this and breaking down that data is certainly
helpful.
Salih/ Yes. Yeah, um.....
Throgmorton/ Okay, other items on that .... uh.....(both talking)
Salih/ The last item, last item is not like question really. It's just a comment on IP13. Uh,
diversity offered by a non-profit fund... funded by the City, like for reaching diverse
population and I know that is really challenge. I want us to continue to try to do better in
including diverse population in the programs and activities of the culture art and
entertainment and educational organization funded by the City, like you know I know it's
challenge but we still would like to .... push on that, to reach out to like (unable to
understand) community, so they can be part of this. We have (unable to understand) but
how we can just advertise it more so more people can know about it.
Throgmorton/ I couldn't agree more, and I can tell ya, in every one of those.... organizations, at
least the ones I have routine contact with, uh, I emphasize this point all the time.
Salih/ Great! Great! Yeah. Yes. Every one of us can do that, that'd be great. That's all I have.
Throgmorton/ Other items?
Cole/ Um, IP3, work session agenda and IP7.
Throgmorton/ Yep!
Cole/ So just wanted to give a little brief background in terms of the level of. ... of. ... of, sort of
review that I'm looking for here. Uh, as we may recall, relatively recently, I had
requested authorization for a subsequent work session relating to what had happened at
the Kinnick House, not retrospective but prospectively, to evaluate future tools that
would not only be used in Manville Heights neighborhood but potentially could,
uh.... uh, affect the city as a whole in various residential neighborhoods. Um, I'm not
viewing the items that I list ... in IP7. I don't want final ordinance proposals. Really what
I .... all I was really looking for is essentially a .... a staff memo to sort of outline for the
upcoming work session, which I don't know if we've actually set. I'm assuming it would
take place in like December or January, something along those lines, essentially just to
essentially like a regular, routine staff memo, uh, so that we could have a focused
discussion. I mean staff may say certain of these proposals just sort of categorically
we're not able to do, they're not feasible, we should look into it further, um, but that's
really what I was looking for, and I think in, um, this originally was a ... an email that I
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sent to Geoff, and I think I had more items, so I think Geoff wanted a little bit of
narrowing down. So for these items, IP7, 1 through 3, um, they're all sort of things that I
think we had discussed at our original work session on Kinnick, to some degree of
generality, and as I see the consensus that emerges, the .... the least the Manville Heights
neighborhood and probably other areas throughout the city don't necessarily want a
heavy regulatory footprint, but they want to evaluate for these large sort of atypical
structures, some additional tool to give staff and the public an earlier opportunity to
weigh in. I think give staff the tools, the regulatory tools, to allow that (mumbled) cause
I think what had happened before is no one saw the possibility of something like this
bein' developed. Who would have foreseen a urban planning conference on whether a
Kinnick House would be in a neighborhood? Um, so that's all I'm really looking for,
essentially just a .... a memo outlining, uh, sort of a general staff response to this, and then
once we have the work session, it would be similar to what we had done when we talked
about, you know, unrelated occupancy, that if. ... that if some of them sort of made a way
through, then we'd say, hey, could staff propose a more particular, uh, solution to this,
cause I don't think there's gonna be immediate structures of this magnitude or of this
kind in the foreseeable future, um, but I don't see it as, uh, I see it as a possibility that
there could be others, throughout the community as well. Um, so that's really what I'm
looking for, urn .... (mumbled) Geoff talked about the need to get additional support, so
I'm just wonderin' whether we would have support to at least get a staff memo response
to that.
Throgmorton/ I think clarity about expectations is good. I don't have any problem with, uh,
what you've suggested, uh, be discussed. I think havin' a staff memo on those topics
would be appropriate. I think we've already addressed a couple of them, and we would
see that in a memo we could get from the staff, but.... we'll.... we'll get, we don't need to
talk about it now (both talking)
Cole/ Yeah!
Throgmorton/ You know, we'll get to that point when we get to it.
Fruin/ I guess what, more what I was hoping for, is .... is that we get all the issues out on the table
so we can fully address all the questions that you have whenever this work session takes
place. That's why I wanted to send Rockne's comments to a conversation like this,
because if others have similar topics they want us to research or comment on, just as soon
get `em out now and ... and try to have a fully vetted conversation in December or January.
Mims/ The additional one that I would have, and this is one we've kind of talked about before,
but haven't gotten into specifies, is .... the idea of somebody being able to buy say two
adjacent lots and tear down the buildings and then put up some kind of a mega -structure
that is not (several talking) which .... which kind of gets to what you're saying here, that
it's kind of out of scale with what's already there in the neighborhood.
Cole/ Yes!
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Mims/ Um....but depending upon underlying zoning, it...it may (both talking)
Cole/ ....complexities, yeah.
Mims/ It may not just be residential. It....
Throgmorton/ Didn't we do .... didn't we address that in that set of, uh, amendments that we
made back when we were doin' the rental cap? I .... I thought that topic was addressed.
No? (several responding) All right, okay, y'all would know.
Cole/ There are other things in that rental cap that we did change that (several talking)
Thomas/ ...could be part of this discussion, it's just refreshing ourselves on what .... what
additional (both talking)
Mims/ ...setbacks (both talking)
Thomas/ ....are in place, but as I recall I too felt there were some gaps in that, in terms of
building, potential building envelope that not only for kind of a Kinnick House but, you
know, with the lifting of the rental cap, you could have a very large house, uh, because of
higher occupancy, uh, which may also be out of scale, uh, with the neighborhood. So,
you know, having some building envelope controls, building on what we already did
through the rental cap, to begin to look at that.
Throgmorton/ Okay. Then .... then we can address that. All right. I .... IP8 is the City Council
salary and benefits material, uh, and there's a September 10' memo from Geoff. Uh, I
don't know if we have the .... the wherewithal to address this tonight but I ... I'll say a few
things kinda right at the start. The table that Geoff provided us concerning the, what is it
12 other cities .... in Iowa, I think it reveals pretty clearly that there's ample justification
for increasing the salaries of Iowa City's City Council Members, especially if we wanna
make it more feasible for more people to consider serving, especially people who are not
already, don't already have the financial wherewithal to ... kind of, uh, do this kind of
thing. So....I.....I have some suggestions. I guess I can just ... I'm on a roll here. I'll go
with it, uh, but I looked at the memo and the information contained in it. I thought, okay,
well the two strong mayor cities are outliers. They're just different. So let's ignore them.
Then I thought North Liberty's different. No insult intended here, but their salaries are,
uh, really tiny. So, okay, throw it out. When I do that, I end up with .... the, urn .... the city
council members ha .... for the remaining nine cities, having a .... an average salary of
$12,300, roughly, per year, with a range between 4,700 to 26,000. All right, so the key
number there is 12,300. Mayors on the other hand had an average of about 22,400 and
again there was a substantial range of difference. And then I started thinking about our
discussion earlier this evening concerning minimum wage for our hourly employees, and
I started thinking, well okay, what if we used that as a .... rubric for generating ideas about
salaries for Council Members and the Mayor. So, if we assume that Coun.... I'm gonna
make some assumptions. People can dis.... disagree with the assumptions if they want. If
we assumed that a Council Member works an average of 20 hours per week, and if we
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use the $11.50 per hour.....frgure we came up with for the first year for the minimum
wage increase, then Council Members would earn .... my math's a little off here, Council
Members would earn, I don't know, $12,000 or something like that, per year. Maybe
11.5, I'm not sure. Cause that.... cause I did it for $12 an hour instead of $11.50. So,
that's what I'd like to suggest. That we use that as a marker. My original idea was to
double the salaries.....of Council Members and the Mayor, but .... in this case I think,
okay, let's tie it to that minimum wage increase.
Cole/ Twelve sounds reasonable to me but I think we should have like a 15 -minute work session
to further flesh it out. Um, what do people think about that?
Throgmorton/ Yeah, I'm okay with that!
Cole/ As opposed to spur of the moment?
Throgmorton/ Yeah, I think we're tired. I'm just given' ya (both talking)
Cole/ ....certainly food for thought, and I think we can project that then to the public then when
we do the (both talking)
Taylor/ But I think in addition to the salary we .... I think we should talk about the insurance, and
City kicking (several talking) in for that, cause we were the only city that they don't kick
in.
Throgmorton/ Yeah, so key question there basically would be .... whether to assume a Council
Member's half time or some other figure. So .... my own suggestion is that we use that
minimum wage as an indicator, 20 hours per week, and half time. (several talking)
Thomas/ I'll just say that Sioux City kind of jumped out at me. I kind of liked what Sioux
City... its.... its format, um, or salary structure. The other issue I was thinking of was city
size, uh.... and Sioux City is roughly the same size as Iowa City. And then the question
of the... healthcare insurance I think is really important (mumbled)
Throgmorton/ And, you know, if somebody signs up for healthcare, that .... a lot of that would
come out of the salary for that particular Council Member. Okay. So we need to have
this on a future work session, probably sooner the better and if it's only 15 minutes,
that'd be great. All right, anything else on that information packet?
Stewart/ Um, I was looking through, uh, IP 11, um, and one of the things it mentions is, uh, bike
racks for multi -family, uh, housing units. Um, and that would be very useful for lower
income individuals, students, and so on, um, and I was wondering what type of steps
would be kind of necessary to move forward with something like that.
Fruin/ Well the .... what we were lookin' at there is, um, one of two options. Um, either... through
regulation retro-ly.... retro, making requirements, uh, for existing buildings to provide
bike racks, which wouldn't be a very popular regulation to pass. You're essentially, um,
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requiring them to ... to come up to current code, but that would require them to go out and
purchase and install the bike racks. The other option would be for the City to, um, in...
incentivize it ourselves, so that we would buy the racks or we would use older racks that
we have and we would target certain facilities or certain apartments, um, and .... and
basically ask if they would like to participate in a program where we gave them a bike
rack and either help them install it or allow them to install it. So it's kind of on the back
burner for .... for staff right now, just, um, but it's .... it's still on our radar.
Mims/ Quite frankly if we decide to move forward with it, I have ... no problem personally with
putting it on their dime, given the tax breaks that they're getting from the State. I mean
they're going from being taxed at 100% of their value down to probably 55% of their
value, based on the rollback for residential. So, you know, given how much money
they're gonna be saving in property taxes, I personally don't have a problem with giving
them 12 to 24 months to come into compliance with our current code on their own dime.
Throgmorton/ Okay, anything else in that information packet?
Thomas/ I'll just mention, it was, uh, kind of ..I found it interesting on IP15, the restoring civil
society with, you know, as a focus on libraries, but I thought I'd come .... come up, at
least I hadn't run across the phrase `social infrastructure' (laughs) and uh, I mentioned it,
you know, in one of our rezonings and here it is being used again (laughs) Wait a
minute! I thought I came (both talking)
Throgmorton/ They quoted you, John! (laughter)
Thomas/ ...he heard our .... our meeting, I guess! Um .... but, yeah, he defined it as social spaces
and organizations that shape the way people interact and ... it is a very important aspect of,
um.....the.....the physical landscape.
Throgmorton/ Okay. Let's move on to the last item, which is Council updates on assigned
boards, commissions, and committees. So, Maz, could we start with you and move to the
left.
Council updates on assigned boards, commissions and committees:
Salih/ I haven't done anything since last meeting, yeah.
Throgmorton/ Okay. Pauline? I'm .... I'm gonna ask Ashley to step in here. Um could you
speak a little bit, Ashley, about the Iowa League of Cities, about the, uh, the Metro
Coalition and about the meeting with the Ames' mayor and council members?
Monroe/ Sure! Um, so I had the opportunity last week to attend the Iowa League of Cities, uh,
conference. So it's a collection of city administrators and elected officials, and um,
during that meeting the first day, uh, we met with the Metro Coalition. So the group of
10 largest cities in Iowa, and um, there was a variety of discussions, uh, first about
legislative status, um, predictions for the upcoming elections, um, and what kind of
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impacts that could have on .... on our cities. Um, they followed that with some discussion
of particular legislative issues. So some of it was pertaining to water quality issues, but
also about the backfill and continued conversations about that. It was a nice opportunity
to get a feel for, and meet with other, um, larger communities and .... and the elected
officials that are leading them. Um, so as part of that the next day I met with and talked
with the mayor from the City of Ames, and a council member there, uh, Councilor
Martin, and they had particular interest in our approach to the occupancy code and
regulation changes that we made earlier last year. And, um, it seems like Ames take....
took a very similar approach. A lot of what they've done with their code changes, which
just recently took place, um, mirror what we have done here, uh, as an approach to the
occupancy issues. They do have a, um, like an exception and waiver program for, um,
people who would take exception to their program. Um, that's currently going on. Um,
they were interested in some of the other things that we are doing, particularly the
UniverCity program. They hadn't heard about it, and so they've asked for more
information about, um, turning our rental properties into single-family homes. Um, so
we've provided them information about that, and then they also took interest in our
climate action plan. So, um, they're interested there and already looking to us as an
example, uh, for what they can do as well. So, um, that's what I took from that event and
happy to answer other questions.
Throgmorton/ Great! Thanks, Ashley. Okay, uh, let's see ... Susan?
Mims/ Um, given that the Access Center has meetings three times a month (laughs) two ... two
executive committee meetings and one steering committee meeting, I usually have an
update. Um, we continue to move forward. Um, I think .... I don't have a whole lot more
than what Matt Miller presented at our .... at our work session tonight, other than, um, we
are going to have a .... a staff meeting and myself, uh, City Manager's office, City
Attorney's office, and Police Department and myself, just to kind of talk through what we
might want to see in terms of a 28E agreement between the City of Iowa City and the
County, um, in exchange for putting in our money towards the building, um, what kind of
services we expect, kind of metrics that we might want to have tied into that, um, and if
the thing didn't work, how we would get our money back. So we're just gonna start
looking at some of the details, um, that we would to have in that 28E agreement.
So .... that's it!
Throgmorton/ John?
Thomas/ Nothing.
Throgmorton/ Rockne?
Cole/ Iowa City of Literature has a lot of good stuff coming up. Uh, most importantly the Iowa
City Book Festival, October I" through October Vh, and if everyone couldn't tell already,
I'm sort of a nerd. I love to read and I love books. Um, and I used to always watch C -
Span and I always had these really good books and then these really good authors, and I
often thought, `Gosh, why doesn't Iowa City have those sorts of events,' you know where
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you have these good readings and good discussions. Well we do! And we used to have it
during the summertime, but now we actually have it during a time when people can go
where they're all not hot and sweaty. So, go to the iowacityofliterature.org website, and
the event itself is from October 1' through October 8'. There should be a lot of good
authors that are there. There's one, um, great book that they're talking about with, uh,
you know What Happened With Wisconsin, which is a good book that I wanna read and
um, lot of good stuff. So check that out. Secondly, for you family members out there, if
you have any kids that are interested in writing, another great program that John Kenyon
has implemented is called One Book, Two Book, and it allows kids, I don't know what
the actual age range is. I wanna say it's 8 to 12 or something like that, but they can do,
uh, submissions, and then if they get selected, they get to read their book public ... or their
little writing, publicly, um, I think it's this spring, maybe like February, March timeframe
is when it usually is, but they're taking submissions now. So if you have aspiring, you
know, writer out there in the family, do check out that web site and submit that for One
Book, Two Book, but other than that, that is it! First meeting we had 20 members on our
board. So .... we have plenty of board members!
Throgmorton/ Wow! I have a couple things to mention. The Convention and Visitors Bureau
board meeting is gonna take place on the 20th, and .... Pauline and I are going to be
meeting with Janet Godwin and Paul Roesler, the new Vice President of the School
Board, on October the 3`a, and I'm still waiting to hear from Mayor John Lundell about
meeting with Mayor Terry Donahue. We're kinda waiting on Terry (laughs) So, that's it
for me!
Mims/ Can I mention one other thing I forgot, um, I'm gonna be out of town, but Cyclocross is
not this coming weekend, but next weekend. Starting Thursday or Friday, I'm not sure.
Do you know, Geoff?
Fruin/ Friday I believe, 286 through the 30a'.
Mims/ So Friday through Sunday. So, you know, that's gonna be back for year number.... four?
Three? I forget. Yeah, three.... number three. So great, urn.... international riders. It's a
very different kind of event than what you typically think about in terms of bicycling.
This is like obstacle course with your bicycle. Um, down at the Johnson County
Fairgrounds. So would encourage people to come out and they're probably also still
looking for volunteers!
Salih/ And also I forget to say kids vendor, Farmers Market, on Saturday. Please come out and
encourage the kids to continue participating those kind of event. Yeah.
Throgmorton/ Good deal! Okay. I think we're done for the night. Thank you everybody.
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