Loading...
HomeMy WebLinkAbout2020-01-07 TranscriptionPage 1 Council Present: Bergus, Mims, Salih, Teague, Taylor, Thomas, Weiner Staff Present: Fruin, Monroe, Andrew, Dilkes, Fruehling, Matherly, Tharp, Bockenstedt, Knoche, Havel, Seydell-Johnson, Ralston, Sovers, Carman, Nagle -Gamin, Fleagle, Grier, Hightshoe, Nurnberg Review of 1/4/20 Budget Work Session: Teague/ All right, it looks like it's about 3:00 P.M. So we will get started with the City Council budget work session agenda for Tuesday, January 7, 2020, and I think we are, um, happy to see everybody here and thanks for bein' a part. We see a lot of staff who will be givin' us reports today, so thanks for bein' here and also to the public. We're gonna start with you, Geoff. Fruin/ Well we, um, have first on a general... our agenda a general discussion of the budget proposals. This is an opportunity for Council to, uh, ask any other questions that you maybe didn't think to ask on Saturday or if you all wanna have some conversations about some of the recommendations in the budget that you, uh, heard from us on Saturday, now's a time that you can do that. If there's not, uh, if there's not a desire, there's not, uh, not sufficient topics for you to cover, then staff is ready to go through the, uh, capital plan, uh, when you're ready. Teague/ I know that many of the Cou... well, all of the Councilors have received Geoffs memo, uh, with the four items that, um, we wanted him to report back on, and so if any of those items ... maybe we can go through it one by one and just, um, discuss them as a Council, because of these are things that we requested you to follow up on. Fruin/ Sure. Teague/ (both talking) All right we'll start with number one, Aid to Agency funding, um, and I know that HCDC Commission requested a meetin' with us. Has anything been set up with that ... or a proposed date? Fruin/ Uh, no, we were looking first to you to make sure that you wanted to have that... meeting. Teague/ Okay. Fruin/ Uh, assuming that you do, we would work with them. I think i ... ideally it maybe could occur at your next work session, regularly scheduled work session. If that doesn't work for HCDC members, we're gonna probably have to poll you individually and try to find a special meeting. Teague/ Okay. I think at the last, uh, budget meeting, what I suggested to Councilors is that we actually wait and ... wait to have the, um, meetin' with HCDC before it, so that we can gather all the information, get their input verbally before maybe we go into, um, great discussion on this item but, it's up to the Councilors what they would like to do. Personally, I thought I ... I thought we got a census of, um, the Councilors wantin' a meeting, um, with HCDC. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 2 Thomas/ Yeah, I would like to have that meeting. (several talking) Fruin/ Okay, so we'll aim for January .... uh, what is that, the (mumbled).... your next meeting? I think I said 17th in error. (mumbled) first we'll aim for, and if that doesn't work, uh, we'll ... we'll look at the next available date. Teague/ All right. Thank you! The second item that we wanted, uh, for the report back from staff re... related to, uh, Forest View tenants and a relationship to the double -wide units in the proposed new Forest View neighborhood. I know that Geoff did submit information in the memo from ... I wanna say it was August. Fruin/ Correct, yes. Uh, I didn't really provide any new information cause there is no new information to share. We did have the request in July from the developer and the Tenants Association to, uh, move to double -wide housing units. Uh, the estimated cost, and I ... I emphasize estimated because the developers made it clear that they don't have the exact cost yet. Uh, was about, uh, a little over $20,000 per home, for a total of 1.2 million. Uh, staff's recommendation remains the same. We encourage the developers to apply for the existing affordable housing dollars that we allocate every year and, uh, continue to work with the Tenant's Association to see how many houses need to be double -wide. Is it every house? Is it 50% of the houses, 75% of the houses, but it seemed like there was a little bit more discussion that needs to be had between those two organizations before we could get a ... a firm number. Um, I know that the development team did submit one grant application to the Trust Fund that was not approved. Um, despite it not being approved, I think that, uh, there would be an appetite for improving that at the trust fund level, uh, if the application was strengthened a little bit. Uh, so, uh, I continue to think that that's a ... that's a source that needs to be fully explored before the Council considers some... additional significant, uh, financial incentives for this development. If you recall, and the memo mentions this, uh, the Economic Development Committee has previously had some conversations about an infrastructure TIF for the Forest View neighborhood. So that would be for the construction of Forest View Drive and the utilities. Uh, that would be the main arterial in that, uh, subdivision. Those ... those TIF conversations have stalled over the last few months, but we fully expect that the developer will be pursuing those. So, um, given that, uh, that's about a $13 million roadway, the TIF is probably gonna be, uh, a good portion of that 13 million, as contemplated right now, uh, given that financial involvement in the process. Again, that's why we would say let's exhaust some of these other affordable housing, uh, funding opportunities before we consider the 1.2 million. Salih/ I just wanna say that I agree with you, we don't have enough information for this right now and even though the proposal by the developer was 1.2 million, that's not ... that's if all the 57 houses, because they said $20,000 per one house and times 57. That's where the 1.2 million come, and my understanding that as you just said, uh, this is not ... we don't know how many house need to be ... this is will be like by any means less than the amount that they proposed, because not only ...not all the houses supposed to be wider, and some ... that's why we really need more information in order to see if we... whether we gonna approve this or disapprove it, we This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 3 need like really more information. The developer is the one who propose the 1.2 million. I guess it is ... we have to tell, you know, ask him to really send us the real cost for this housing, how many ..how many houses. (mumbled) my understanding also, the residents who want the wider house will (mumbled) some money. Uh, right now all the houses will be like 310 a month, but if you have a wider home they are willing to pay more than 310, and this is even will make the one housing instead of 20,000 will be less than 20,000. We need all this information in order for the Council to ... to make their mind if they want to move forward to this or no, or if there is another fund available for that and which fund we should take this out from. I agree with you, Geoff, but I hope for next time, next meeting, we have that information because the developer's the one who propose that. Now we need really specific information from him so we can make up our mind. Taylor/ I agree that a very important piece of the information we need is ... is, uh, how many we actually would need for the double -wide, and I wondered if...you talked about the developers. Uh, have the tenants, the Tenants Association themselves met on their own to determine how many of them would be interested in ... in the double-wides? So that we have an idea from them. Fruin/ I think conver...I'm sure those conversations have taken place, but I'm not aware of a specific number and I don't think ... based on the conversations that we've had with the development team, I don't think they're gonna be prepared to give us exact cost estimates before your next meeting. Um, I ... I just don't think that's ... we probably won't have it maybe even before your budget's approved. Teague/ I guess the one hope, um, would be is ... we can still get maybe some more estimates. It doesn't have to be exact. I think one of the things is we can probably, uh, consider a line item, if the request is still there, just so that we're not ... as we've learned in the past, we get, you know, either close to budget season or even the budget has already started and then there's a big ask. I think now is the most appropriate time for us to even consider it because we are aware that it's been a request on some level and so, um, if you can navigate that a little bit and find out, um, from the developers a direct ask, as well as from the Tenant Association, that would be my request. Salih/ Especially this is 2021 budget. It's not like something, you know, its not this year or next year, the year after which is... Fruin/ The 2021 budget starts on July I st of...of (both talking) Salih/ 21, yeah. (several talking) 2020. Yeah, I mean like is for July (several talking) Yeah ... which is 20 ... July. Taylor/ I ... I just hope that something can be done with this because it's been over three years, almost four years now, uh, that we've been dealing with this development, and we just really have to get moving on it. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 4 Fruin/ Yeah, as a reminder where we stand right now, uh, the Council's approved the rezoning. Uh, what needs to happen now is the Council has to approve an affordable housing agreement, and that's really something that needs to be worked out between the Tenants Association and the developer. Uh, those conversations don't appear to be very active right now, and we can do our best to encourage that, but as staff we cannot speed up the pace of those discussions. It's gonna take cooperation on both those parties, uh, part, and again those conversations aren't very active right now. So we're gonna try to keep things movin', uh, but we have limited leverage and ability in this situation. Thomas/ Do we, Geoff, have any sense of the schedule for this project in terms of actually... needing to purchase these ... these homes, having a definitive idea? Fruin/ No, although I can say based on the ... uh, the need to approve the affordable housing agreement, uh, the presumed need to execute a TIF with the City of Iowa City, uh, the platting process, uh, they are three, four months away at best from getting all the approvals, and that's a ... that's a very best -case scenario from getting all the approvals they need, uh, and when you think about a development of this ... of this nature, um, there's a good year's worth of infrastructure work that has to take place before you could really get substantial housing and commercial properties built. So I think it's ... it's probably very unlikely at this point that we would see a new Forest View neighborhood open up, uh, or...or be ready for occupancy in 2020. I think 2021 would be more realistic. Bergus/ I think even if they don't have the timeline exactly figured out, it'd be helpful for me to understand if this specific request that was put forward in July is still kind of the issue. If the affordable housing agreement isn't na ... hammered down, nailed out, you know, yet, I would like to know is...is this something that's remaining? Are they expecting City action before they move forward? I would hate for us to approve something as unprecedented as this and then be told, well there's other hurdles or there's additional requests that are gonna come forward. So if we can just get some clarification on where this request sits in the context of the larger... project moving forward, that'd be really helpful. Thomas/ (both talking) Yeah, that ... that's sort of what I was concerned. One, we need to sign off on our commitment, or lack of commitment, to the housing component, or at least this ... this piece of the housing component. Dilkes/ Just to provide a little more detail, um, we got, uh, a proposed affordable housing agreement from the developer's attorney, uh, last spring. We sent extensive comments to them in May, um, and also provided those comments to the Tenants Association, urged them to get Council of their own, which they did. Their Council provided comments. We have heard nothing from the developer, nor has the Tenants Association. So there are numerous issues that have to be ironed out before there is gonna be an affordable housing agreement, but obviously without the developer's participation, we can't... This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 5 Bergus/ So just to clarify what you just said, Eleanor, even if we approved this specific request, that doesn't resolve the issues that you're aware of in that agreement. Okay, thank you. Thomas/ The... the... what was not raised, but I ... in reading through some of the background material, the question of the, uh, park was also, uh, brought back into my attention and ... and we're... where do we ... when do we need to make a decision on that ... with respect to budget related issues. Fruin/ Uh, I don't know if there's really any budget implications for this fiscal year. Your ...your budget, I think we can make that, um, down the road, uh, if and when it becomes an issue. We've had that request. Staff's recommendation is, uh, to keep that private, but if Council would like to make it a public park, um, we can work through that with the developer during those final approval stages. I don't think you need to worry about the budget here. It's a small enough parcel, where if we had some maintenance time within this budget period, we'd be to handle that. Teague/ All right, so sound like we'll, um, hope for some more information at our next meeting on the 1 St. Fruin/ Okay! Teague/ The third item that Council wanted more information on, which was presented in the memo, was related to the breakdown of cost for the temporary positions that are not being recommended to shift to permanent status. And so did you wanna maybe kind of, Geoff, cover... Fruin/ I can highlight that again. So ... so this has been ... this is actually an issue that first came up during last budget session and Council spent a good portion, uh, of their meeting time in 2019 breaking down this issue. Ultimately Council has previously converted, uh, what's ... what equivalates to 4.78 staff positions, uh, to permanent status. So these used to be hourly employees, non -benefited employees, and now those, uh, duties are in, uh, in permanent positions. With this budget, we are... staff is requesting, uh, the transition of one additional FTE in our Housing Authority. So with your approval, that would get us to 5.78 FTEs that have been or will be converted from temporary, non- benefited status to permanent, benefited of status. The ... during the 2019 discussion, we offered the Council a, uh, whole list of positions that we felt, uh, would ... would qualify for permanent status. Um, the remaining four positions are listed in that, uh, memo that I provided you that's in your late handouts. There's a Senior Cento... Center video specialist. There's Library maintenance aide, uh, maintenance worker 1, Library maintenance custodian, and the Recreational customer service aides. What we did is we provided you the cost of that ... the estimated cost of that, uh, conversion and per Council's request, we broke that between salary and benefits, uh, to give you an idea of, uh, what could be paid with the employee benefits levy. So the employee benefits levy can cover the benefit expense. It cannot cover the salary expense. That has to be a general fund commitment to dollars. So you can see the total cost down there is $430,000 to make those remaining This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 6 conversions. Uh, we did give strong consideration to those, uh, during our budget preparation, um, process as staff. Ultimately we prioritized the hiring of new permanent positions, which we covered on Saturday. Salih/ I really ...I'm the one who requested that, but, you know, what I did wanna say about this, uh, salary wise this is what cost us like almost 200,000, but benefit wise this is would cost like 2,000... 240,000, almost ... which is gonna be from that benefit levy and that could be like I thinks four ...less than five -cent if you add it to the employee benefit levy, if I'm correct, uh... Bockenstedt/ We did run that calc and it was 5.7 -cents... SaW Yeah. Bockenstedt/ ...for the benefit portion. Salih/ Because if...if one -cent is 50. Bockenstedt/ It was between 40 and 50, it was about 42,000. Salih/ Okay. Uh, and now we reducing the tax levy in general by six -cent. And, uh, I thinks the priority of the Council is not to reduce taxes, uh, or it is one of the priority, but if, uh, we reducing the... the... last year we reduce the employee benefit levy by 10 -cent and this year ...no, not 10 -cent actually. Ten -cent? And you increase it this year 10 -cent, like we ... we getting back 10 -cent. And right now we reducing the overall tax six -cent. I thinks if we add like five -cent to that and we reducing by one -cent, uh, the tax or maybe we can just not reduce it. I mean like leave it as it is for the public. Uh, the public wanna see reduction. They don't like to see increasing or if you ... their bill like stay the same (mumbled) I don't thinks people will start getting mad because we paying our employees benefit. Uh, this is, uh, five -cent additional to the employee benefit levy, and the 190, it is easy to get it from the budget. Uh, I just ... I really think that we (mumbled) some of the employees, we move them to ... we done like four position I ... I think, or three, Geoff. I guess three or four? Fruin/ That we already converted? Salih/ Yes, they already converted. Fruin/ It's ... it's 4.78. Salih/ 4.7, and all the people who are ... when we start talking about this, all the employee who are hourly, they ...they knew about what happened, that we move some position to become permanent and we said ... we need to bring the rest of them back to the Council during budget time, and now all those employees are looking forward ... I just had a meeting yesterday with employees from from the, you know, the ... some like Rec Center and some employees like from ... I talk to two of them from the, you know, different department, and I find out those This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 7 people, they work there for three, four years, and they never get benefit. They would like to continue working there, and if we ... people like to continue working for the City, they told me that their hours sometime like become more hours when student are not here and become less hour when students are here and those people are single mom who have, uh, children. Also like people who graduate and they still working there. They start working there when they was students and all this kind of thing. I just feel like we need... since we moved 4.7 and people, the other people are waiting, uh, since we did it for some employees, we have to do it for everyone, and hopefully the Council will support that. This is ... is not gonna be a lot of money from the budget, because we are proposing to reduce the tax levy for, you know, and this is .... we can just add it ,and it still (mumbled) less than one ... like cent or something like that, but I really encourage we do this. And it's up to the rest. Teague/ I guess one question I have is, um, can we see what it would cost, just as an estimate. rm not exactly sure what all positions are bein' requested from temporary to permanent. Fruin/ They're listed here in the memo. Teague/ Oh, okay so (several talking) yeah, so these... Salih/ (both talking) people. Teague/ Okay. Salih/ This is the cost of the salary, cost of the benefit. Teague/ Okay. All right. All right. I thought there was some additional people that you were referring to. Salih/ No, I'm referring to those, uh, I guess the ... the people, the new hire, the 9 -point something. It is already been budgeted on the budget, my understanding, right? Fruin/ It's in the proposed budget (both talking) Salih/ Yes, it's already from the proposed budget. But those is not been budgeted. Fruin/ (both talking) clarify one thing. This is not an exhaustive list of our hourly employees. We have a lot more hourly positions than you see here. We went through an exercise last year. We ... we sat down with AFSCME and we tried to identify the hourly positions that are, uh, held year- round and have a, uh (mumbled) we kinda used 20 hours per week as a ... as a benchmark. Some of these are a little less, uh, than that, um, but we looked at those positions and we felt that those were the best candidates for conversion to permanent status, but again we have a lot of hourly employees that you don't see on this list, and that's wh... when you're raisin' the minimum wage, that's who you're helping. You're helping those hourly employees who are making that wage because all our permanent employees already make well above even S 17 an hour. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 8 Salih/ I guess we gonna continue have hourly employee and (mumbled) the City need hourly employee. We have seasonal, you know, like sometime we hire more people during certain season. We still wanna (mumbled) that, but those people like, uh, asked me, said last time, this is the people that they really working the average of 20 hour or less, like average of 20 hour I mean. That's why we need to do (mumbled) people who work around the year and been with the City for long time. They call themselves City employees, but they are not getting some benefit, and I know there is many, many more hours employee. We can continue have those, as long as they are not working as (mumbled) Teague/ What are other Councilors thinkin'? Thomas/ Well one question I ... I would have for Geoff would be, Geoff, if you were to prioritize the positions, those four positions that were not funded in your proposal, is there any ...would you have any priority? If we were to fund these positions, is there any priority within those four that you would have? Fnun/ I think I ... probably two answers to that question. One, if...my priority ...my first priority would be hire additional permanent staff and not convert, cause I think we're gonna continue to get more value for the public by looking at adding staff in ... in key positions and even within these operations, Senior Center, Library, in Parks and Recreation. I think the City would benefit more from hiring additional permanent staff in these areas and keeping these temporary. Set that aside, and if your ...if your goal is strictly to move the temporary to, uh, to permanent status, I think the biggest bang for your buck is in the Recreation customer service. It's also the most expensive, um, but ... but there would be value. There ... there would be value to doing that. Um (clears throat) I ... I warm remind you though that there's also going to be in that particular position a number of hourly employees that don't have a job after this process, because we probably employee 20 to 30 hourly employees to meet that demand right now, and what we're saying is we would have seven full-time equivalents. So it doesn't necessarily mean seven full- time employees. Might have some half-time employees in there but some of those current hourly employees would no longer have a job after this process. Salih/ Yeah, there is many students work there and they leave anyway, during summertime, and come back. I been....I, for the Rec Center I don't know. The Rec Center person is here (mumbled) but I examined, I went there and I ask how many people work during this time and this time. I find out there is less employee during summer, which is they get more hours, and when the student ... you constantly hiring again when the students come back. We just, you know, we can just stop ... if this gonna start on July, we can just start not hiring during the summertime and keep those employees, and even if the Council would like to move only one position this time and another leave the rest for another time, I really encourage you to do Recreation Center, those people on the front desk. They ...they are the people who greeting the ... the, you know, the resident of Iowa City every day, uh, just to make somebody staying there all the time and the same face not changing. There is many, many problem happen sometime at the Rec Center because the people don't know other people and they act like, you know, when you get This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 9 somebody there and they understand the job, they been therefor longtime, and I think this is ... have a value to the Rec Center. I ... I really encourage you, even if you ... you don't wanna think about all of them. You wanna do it gradually, like every year you gonna do some people permanent. You should have start with the Rec Center, and I was really hoping this to happen during the, you know, the ... the four position that we approve, that should have been one of them because we have more people there. Berges/ Being new to this process I think for me what I come back to is kind of the balance overall and, um, I agree with the, you know, taxpayers may not have the expectation that their taxes go down, but what we know with this budget proposal is there were assessments last year that I think on average went up 9%, and so even with lowering the levy, we know that people's tax bills are gonna go up a very small amount, and so I'm ... I'm sensitive to that and I think the recommendation as ... as I understand it from staff is to phase it in. We did the 4.8 to start with. There's an additional one in this budget, and then adding those new permanent staff, which I .... I agree with what Geoff said. I think that's our priority. I'm very concerned with the idea of people losing their jobs based on this conversion. I think when we add new, um, positions then we have the opportunity to give people jobs where they know what to expect from the beginning but this would be individuals who were hired with one understanding, then losing their job because of this conversion. So I'm...I'm not supportive of that. Weiner/ I'm also new to this. One of my concerns though is looking at ... the overall budget, um, the limited funds that we have, and looking at departments such as the Fire Department, which has an enormous increase in calls, but is getting at this point no increase in staffing, which is ... which is something of a concern, and so there's a balance in there that we have to strike. I don't know where the right place is, but I think that if we're gonna ... if we're gonna look at...at either converting positions or adding positions, we need to look at the full universe. Mims/ Yeah, I'm ... I'm comfortable with staff's recommendation. I think, you know, were getting the tax levy down six -cents; and as Laura said, people's taxes ... people don't pay any attention to what the levy is. Um, lot of people don't understand the different pieces of the City and the County and School District. They're just ... they're lookin' at the bottom line, is ... is what they're looking at, and I think that is a real struggle for a lot of people in the community. A lot of our low and moderate -income people who do happen to be homeowners struggle with that piece in terms of the extent of the property taxes, and I do ... I do agree with Geoff in terms of kinda where we get the biggest bang for our buck, if you will, in terms of permanent full-time staff. We've ... we started back in probably early 2011, um, not too long after Tom Marcus got here as City Manager, looking at the whole staffing of the City, and over ...I don't know how many year period, um, through attrition of all but two positions, um, we decreased the permanent full-time City staff by almost 40 people, may be 38 or 39 people, and it was ... there was a lot of different reasons but a lot of overlap and different things, and there was a lot of reorganization that happened as well, but when we also then look at the growth in our population in the last say eight years from 2010 to 2018, it's clear that we need to now start building back up very strategically that permanent full-time staff, and as we've talked lots of times about projects not getting done in the time frame that we would like to see. A lot of that's because our staff just This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 10 doesn't... doesn't have the ... the capacity to do that, and so I would prefer to see the prioritization as staff has recommended, with those permanent full-time, and still make that effort to reduce, uh, the tax levy as presented by the 6% and hold these off, uh, for a little bit further down the road. Thomas/ This is a real serious balancing act. Um, I do think we've ... in terms of, um, you know, the compensation for are City employees, we mave... we've made great advancements in terms of the hourly... moving incrementally toward 15, and I ... I tend to be an incrementalist on this thing, that the ... the impacts of it financially, um, are extended over a certain period of time. So I'm ... I am supportive of moving these other positions, but I ... I do kind of wanna view it as something that's done over a couple of budget seasons, rather than just one, and just in terms of some of the things I've tried to initiate, I'm ... I am sensitive to the fact that I ... in some cases I've been kind of...staff response has been, John, we just don't have the staff time to do that (laughs) and so I'm, um, feeling that... that... that that is where there ... there needs to be a better balance struck and I ...... I hope we ... my goal has always been partly because I think it's fairly broad in its scope is to try to keep everything advancing and maintain movement, um, on all fronts and in this case its, you know, with new staff, transitioning some of the temporaries, you know, together as a kind of incremental expansion. Taylor/ I liked how, uh, Laura it as ... as phasing it in. I think John kind of alluded that too, that obviously I ... I believe that, uh, personnel budgets should be a priority for the City. I mean those are our most valuable members of...of our staff, uh, providing the services out there for the community and all the departments. I think Janice mentioned the fire department, uh, and I've heard from them that a priority would be more staff, but I think one thing I've noticed you've done with a lot of these positions as well as ... as that is, uh, kind of shuffling things around. Like they ...they did get some help with the, uh, limiting the inspections aspect of it and putting that in the NDS. Uh, so that's helpful to them as far as perhaps putting us, uh, more of their, uh, employees out onto the streets or on ... on their vehicles. So I think the other thing that concerns me is, uh, what will happen with the transit study I think that before we, uh, delve into, uh, doing so many... adding so many positions and bumping so many of them up, we need to see what comes out of that study. Uh, if it does indeed means more routes and more... more employees, more drivers, uh, I ... somebody can correct me but I think for the most part a lot of the transit drivers are full-time. Uh, perhaps some of them are maybe part-time, a blank. I'm not ... I'm not sure if anybody can clarify that (person responding, no mic) A blend, okay. All right. (several talking) Three-quarter and full, so that could mean a lot, uh, so I think, uh, that ... and that's on ... we need to, uh, keep that in our minds and, uh, if...cause it is on the horizon that, uh, we'll find out about that, so, um, I ... I think that you've done a good job of...of blending some of the positions so far and ... and we can certainly keep it in mind, but I ... I don't like the domino effect. I'm also concerned about the domino effect and that, uh, some persons might potentially lose their jobs and that's certainly not the intent. Teague/ One of the things that Janice said, um, is looking at all of, you know, the staff, at ... as, you know, as a whole, the ... the City staff as a whole. Pauline just mentioned, you know, we have the, um, transportation study coming. Um, when I talked to AFSCME in the ... in the past, you This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page I1 know, they... their... their priorities shift, you know, within... within what they are thinking are the needs of the community, um, or the needs of the staff. So we know that there is 42, um, individuals, if I recall correctly, that request ... that department heads requested, um, for additional staff or some... somewhere related to that. So I think before I make a lot of statements I would first want to see, um, with AFSCME, are these still some of the thoughts for their priorities, um, and then have a conversation from there. I would agree that, um, whatever the outcome of maybe that reassessment is is that we consider that and we do try to phase-in, um, something and, you know, we'll ... we'll consider what their priorities are right now. They may come and say, you know, Councilors, these are ... these are important. Don't get me wrong, but we have something that's so important right now that we need to address because this department is really hangin' on by, you know, strings. They're overworked and there... whatever the case might be. Not to kind of create this, uh, fear, but that would be my request is that we, um, this has been a while. We know that priorities change, um, give this back to AFSCME, ask them what are their priorities at this point, you know, definitely look at that and then maybe we can consider ,,,because I...I...what I hear personally from all the Councilors is we ... well, um, from most of the Councilors is that we may consider, um, an..an additional something related to staffing, because we know that there are a lot of needs out there, um, and we .... we wanna phase somethin' in. We don't want any ... and even, um, Susan talked about, you know, we need to start planning for, you know, some more permanent staffin', and maybe we can do that, um, a little bit now, um, potentially and get something in this budget season so that we can move forward and really feel good about havin' an initial in ... uh, investment in the increase in our staff. Fruin/ Can I make a couple of points on that one? Um, first of all you should rely on me to ... to help you understand the staffing needs. It's ... it's certainly okay to have AFSCME weigh in. Um, AFSCME is a union that represents some of our employees. We have two other unions. We have non -unionized staff, and you have a team of, uh, management employees that, um, have really good perspectives on what the needs are in their operations. So I would encourage you if you want to get a better picture of what the staffing needs are, work through our office. Let us develop with ... in conjunction with the ... the management team of all the departments what the ideal staffing levels are in every department. It's gonna be well beyond the 42 positions that we considered for this budg ... budget, and we can present that to you and then you can have the police union, the fire union, AFSCME, the general public, the non -unionized staff, whoever, uh, weigh in on that and yes you may get some disagreements where a union member may say, `We don't need this position, we need this position,' but I ... I'd be careful asking a union, or any sub- group of employees, to develop a staffing plan. That's really why you employ me and ... and why we have the ... the management team in place here. Um, the other thing is I would say, you know, when ... what our thought process has been through this whole property tax reform, um .... uh, transition that we've been in is one of pace. We've had to pace ourselves because we know if we got ... if we overextended ourselves on expenses, and we weren't getting the growth to make up for the tax base loss that we're experiencing with this reform, we're gonna be in a situation where you have to cut, and we've really tried hard to avoid, uh, a situation in which we have to have any conversations about cutting, because as we talked about on Saturday, when it comes down to cutting operations, most of the time you're gonna be talking about cutting staff. So we've done really well and as you can see with this budget, especially those of you This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 12 that have been on the Council a number of years, you haven't seen these types of staffing recommendations from us and ... and certainly in my eight or nine years here, this is the first time we've been fairly aggressive with asking for ...for new staff, but we still have a bit of nervousness about us, and we talked on Saturday about that 2024 cliff we called it on the slide, where the multi -family could drop, uh, 5, 10% down and we might see a sharp loss in ... in tax revenue. So we're not out of those woods yet. What I would encourage you is just ... if...if you want the staffing plan, we'll present it, but you have to exercise some caution. Otherwise if you move too fast, you could find yourself in a couple years having to dial back and that's about as painful as a process as you can imagine. Bergus/ And just to summarize, Geoff, for my education the, um, there had not been staffing additions for a number of years, is that right? Fruin/ The last couple of years, uh, we've added one or two. We've added, uh, you know, a couple of Streets employees. We've added a police employee or two, but it's been very ...very incremental. With these nine new positions, that far exceeds what we've done in the last few years. Bergus/ So nine and a quarter new positions, then the 5.78, I think (laughs) you said, of the conversion. So a total of about 15 full-time equivalent, right? Fntin/ Correct. Bergus/Okay. So I think that's, you know, to your point, Bruce, of phasing in that staff expansion. To me, that seems like a significant move in the right direction ... if we quantify it that way. Teague/ And I have to say that, you know, definitely given the history that this says, um, definitely doin' what Council want is to increase, uh, some of the staffing. I will retrack and at least, you know, asking AFSCME to be the determinin' factor on what we do. I think, um, my correct language should have been, you know, give it to the City Manager and then the City Manager, of course, talk to all of, you know, um, the individuals that are have ... that have interest, such as AFSCME, and I know that they will weigh in with some of. ... some of their priorities as well. Mims/ I .... I guess my only additional comment to that, Bruce, was that was done. I mean that ... the sta... the Mana... City Manager's office worked with AFSCME from that whole hourly list, as I recall, to narrow it down to like 22 positions, something like that, and decide which were the most important. We approved those ... the four plus that we've already done. We've got the one being added, and then these are some that remain from that. So that ... that was just done a few months ago. So I don't particularly see a need to be trying to go back. I ... my sense of what I'm hearing is that there's a majority here that is supportive of the plan as presented ... by the City Manager, in terms of the recommendations on the ... the hourly to permanent part-time. Is that ... I mean I ... we've been talking this for 40 minutes and I ... I guess I would just be curious if we do have a majority that feel that way that we move on. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 13 Salih/ I just wanna add about AFSCME. I remember when first we had this. I was advocating for it, and Susan, if I remember correctly, you read a letter from AFSCME. They saying that they can ... you understood from that letter they are not in support of this, and you guys said, oh, AFSCME even is not support of this and we didn't even move on it until later, when AFSCME come back and said, no, you understood our letter wrong and we start like doing this over again, and we come to decide, yeah (unable to understand) like over the City Council. That's ... by any mean is not the one that (unable to understand) aiming to, but I just believe that we start the process of converting the hourly employee, uh, you know, from ... to .... to permanent employee and we ... we convert some of them, uh, people are watching, looking for the converting of the rest. We said clearly last time we need to do this, uh, during the budget time. I understand that maybe all this will be a lot, and we can, uh, I like the idea to phasing in, see which one is really important, but of course if there is no support or something like that, but I ... I just wanna highlight that AFSCME is not the one (mumbled) but we asked `m to see because I knew from them, some of those position used to be permanent and they confirm it. They ...they make it hourly after that. I think, you know, that too, Pauline. There is some of them, the hourly employee currently... used to be a permanent position, but they make it hourly. I don't know why they did it long time ago but if we needed to have it back, and they cut down, uh, employees during that time. Then this is practice been happening. Taylor/ I think that's what Susan maybe touched on that, as far as the history of that and ... and when those positions were changed, and I think, Susan, maybe you can help me clarify this too, that letter from AFSCME, which I saw and I also had spoken to them. I don't think it was that they didn't approve of this. I think they just were expressing their concerns and some of which have been mentioned, the potential loss of jobs, the potential reclassification, the positions different requirements, like language barriers and things like that. So I think that the letter was more expressing the current (both talking) concerns. I do not think that it...it actually said that they did not approve or agree (both talking) Salih/ No like ... that, what it mean, like you guys understood it like there gonna be a lot of loss of job. This is maybe is not a good idea to have in (mumbled) when they come over and qualify, to us that the way that we understood it was all wrong. That what I mean. I don't mean like anything else (both talking) Teague/ Yeah, yeah, I mean I know that Susan did just make mention that as far as like what the City Manager has suggested, so far we are in agreement with. I think the question really became from Maz like, um, let us just really think about the ... the levy cause the levy pays the benefits and, you know, the full cost isn't the full cost because of the ... the levy and so, um, what are people thoughts as of right now, because I think I ... I ... of course I did hear that, uh, people wanted to, um, you know, work on increasing staff, um, on some level, but it has been pointed out, um, and I'm happy that Laura brought that out, that, you know, again this is nine positions that, you know, it's kinda in that, um, increasin' the staff. Um, do we feel ... I know we all feel good about that. Do we want to, you know, say to Geoff, you know, Geoff, just take our comments you've heard today and just come back to us or do we want to just leave the budget as it is? This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 14 Mims/ I would say leave the budget as it is. I ... I guess I've not ... if I were sitting in Geoff's seat, I'm not sure what you would be telling him to take our comments and then come back to us. Teague/ Okay. Salih/ I ... I really think that we just at least to approve one positions (mumbled) that will be, as Laura said earlier, maybe the people wanna see like less taxes. We're still gonna be reducing the tax by three cent and we can, you know, instead of six cent, and we still have maybe at least the ... the Recreation Center (mumbled) full-time position approved ... and leave the rest for next year budget or...just like that, you know (unable to understand) (several talking) Weiner/ (several talking) ...one of the positions that ... that was just proposed in this budget comes off this list, so that if we're looking at an incremental approach, we did some in the last year, we added one of...we added one in this budget from ... from that list, as well as the, um, nine or so new FTs that are proposed. So I would be supportive of the budget as it stands right now. Thomas/ Yeah, I'm .... I'm okay again with the way it was proposed, and I think it is useful for me to think of it a, you know, as Geoff said, the departments have asked for a lot more than they got too, so in a way we're trying to move ... the way I'm trying to view this is we're moving everything forward, uh, no one's getting everything they want, but everyone's getting something, and that's... that's kind of the way I've been ... I've been viewing it. Taylor/ I agree and I think we are moving in the right direction and ... and thank you, uh, Mazahir, for bringing this up at the last budget session and ... and encouraging staff to ... to look at their, uh, staffing levels and ... and see where it could be changed or where things could be shuffled around. So ... because I think that was ... that was very helpful and started the discussion which needed to be done. Teague/ So I do hear a clear, um, let's leave things as they are with this budget, but I ... and ... and, um, I think we are all very conscientious of, you know, the need to, uh, have our City Manager really do look at in the future, um, you know, looking at the temporary to convert them over to permanent on some level, as well as some of those positions that have not ... that have been requested that we weren't able to fill, So ... all right, we'll move on to number four, and number four is the LOST (mumbled) the local option sales tax, and, uh, right now staff is recommending that we, uh, place this conversation on hold and let's have it at a ... at a future meeting. Anyone, um, not an agreement with that wanna say somethin' right now? All right, we will put that on hold. So we will move on to Capital Improvement projects... and... all right! Capital Improvement Projects (CIP): Knoche/ Good afternoon, Ron Knoche, Public Works Director. Um, I wanna thank you for the opportunity to present to you the 2020 through 2024 Capital Improvements Program. Um, wanna thank staff for their help in pulling together the pictures and, um, graphics that you're This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 15 gonna see this afternoon. Um, kinda one of the unsung heroes is Killian Laughead, who was the one who put together, uh, the presentation in regards to the ... the (mumbled) GIS aspect. Um, she put many hours into ... into putting this together for us. Uh, the CIP begins in your budget book on page 47. Um, the presentation, uh, as we will go through it this afternoon, um, generally follows the ... the budget book, uh, in the way it's presented. Uh, we'll start off with, uh, ab overview by Dennis on the financial aspects, um, talk about some ongoing projects, go into annual projects, and then into the, um, the ... this ... the department specific projects from there. Um, there'll be about a dozen of us that'll be presenting. So there'll be some musical chairs goin' on as we, um, get people up here to be able to go through their aspect of it. So with that I'm gonna turn over to Dennis. Bockenstedt/ Hi, I'm Dennis Bockenstedt, the Finance Director for the City, and I'm gonna give you just kind of a broad overview of the process we went through and then kind of a big picture of the expenses and funding sources for the overall five-year Capital Improvement Program. Um, this process began last September, uh, and on September 3rd we sent a standard form out to the departments to gather new projects. Also to, uh, gather changes to projects that already existed in the program. Uh, throughout the month of September, the departments completed those forms, and then on September 23`d, uh, they turned those forms back into the Finance Department. We began to, uh, pull all that together to kind of pull together our, uh, working document for the CIP. There was a committee, uh, made up of, uh, department heads and other staff, and ... and we went through those projects and the overall program, and through the month of October, we had several meetings and from that way, uh, we produced a ... kind of a .... a operating, uh, or a draft CIP, and then November, we went through, uh, in October, November we went through the remainder of the operating budget, and then in early December we pulled that, uh, Capital Improvement Program in together with the operating budget and then mesh all of those things together, and then, uh, just before Christmastime, we released the combined, uh, operating budget and CIP, uh, to the Council and to the general public. Um, and then today, um, you'll get a chance to go through that CIP. Everybody's gonna get a chance to present and talk about those projects and ask questions, and, uh, kinds go from there. Uh, just give you an idea about the...the size and ... and scope of what's in the, uh, the Capital Improvement Program. Uh, the expenditures total, uh, just over $168 million over the next five years. So it's a fairly sizable, uh, Capital Improvement Program, and this chart gives you an idea of...of how those dollars are bein' programmed and spent, and, uh, as is typical, uh, the Street operations is the largest portion of that. Um, the majority of our CIP dollars go towards Street projects or at least it's the largest, uh, use of our capital dollars. Uh, the next two largest slice... slices are our Transit and Wastewater, and, uh, Transit is primarily result of, uh, in the CIP a $20 million, uh, transportation facility, uh, which is dependent on grant funding, uh, which inflates the size of the .... the scope of the Transit, uh, capital budget in relationship to all the other, uh, functions and departments, um, and then Wastewater is also the result of a couple of large projects, including the, uh, reconstruction of the digester complex of approximately $8 million also makes that piece of the ... the puzzle look a little bit bigger. Um, if those projects were removed, you can see Park maintenance down there in green, um, is also a sizable piece and that represents the implementation of your, uh, Park master plan, um, and that is more the culmination of...of many smaller components, uh, from that master plan, um, for various parks This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 16 that are being improved and ... and added to. Um, for the funding sources, um, also roughly $168 million, uh, from this, uh, the largest piece of the funding that we use over the next five years is our GO bonds, and when we talk about our bond rating, that, uh, is directly... keys into, um, how we fund our Capital Program. So, uh, we're roughly anticipating to issue about $12 million in GO bonds a year, uh, which will be repaid from, uh, primarily property taxes and through our debt service fund. Um, we're actually also looking at issuing a, uh, revenue bond for our Wastewater. That'd be for that digester complex and then also the extension of the Rohret sewer, uh, which would total about $10 million. Um, and then the next larger pieces are our state and federal grant funding, and, uh, the federal grant funding is also a little inflated because it includes about $16 million for that Transportation or, uh, Transit equipment facility. Uh, but both the state and federal grants primarily represent Airport and ... and Street and Road grant funding. Um, you can see that from the overall program there is a large number of funding sources that ... that go into that, um, including about $13 million from the road use tax fund, uh, for those road improvements. Uh, this slide tells you about how much is being programmed over the next five years. Uh, typically we would see this where the ... the taller bars or the more dollars are spent in the early years and then slopes downward, um, and this one is relatively flat, which means that in those out years we already know we're payin' some large capital expenditures. Um, that 2022, that represents that Transit facility of about $20 million so that ... that year is a little inflated because of that one project, uh, but then when you get into those outer years, uh, 2023 is that di ... Wastewater digester complex, and then, uh, workin' on some major road reconstructions in 24, including, uh, Dodge Street and Park Road, um, but you can see that, um, you know, right now we're expending a ... a fair number of dollars on capital improvements and just from lookin' out over the next five years, we're not anticipating that, uh, that activity's gonna decrease over that next ... uh, for that period of time, and, uh, after that we can ... we can hand it off for ongoing. Um, I will let you know that on page 507 or 506 of your book, there is a table of contents for the projects, um, that you can look up and then look up projects from that table of contents. Seydell-Johnson/ Okay, so moving on to ongoing projects, the first two I wish I didn't have to tell you about (laughs) I wish they were done. Um, these were projects that were started last summer. The first one being the City Park adventure playground. Some of the equipment is in, um, but they will be continuing work into the spring and it'll be open, um, early ...well sometime in the spring or early summer. Um, that has poured -in-place surfacing underneath it as well so the temperatures have to be at a certain degrees before they can do that work there. The other one we talked briefly about on Saturday actually, Willow Creek Park. Playground's in, shelter, restroom are nearly complete, uh, but there is one more application of the poured -in-place playground surfacing and then site work yet to be done around it in the spring and then it'll be open early next summer. Knoche/ Uh, for the 2019 asphalt resurfacing, uh, we have the equipment parking lot that needs to be finished up and, um, that ... I think that's the major piece that's left on that project. The Idyllwild drainage study, uh, we're still working through final plans for the pump station, which will be an add alternate to that project, uh, but generally the, um, drainageway improvements, um, that ... the final plans there are completed. Uh, Public Works facility, as you can see from this This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 17 photo that we are occupying the building down there. We have some final punchlist items that need to be completed. Uh, Riverside Drive pedestrian tunnel, this is a project we have the fin ... the plans that are finalized, um, at the eleventh hour. Uh, Iowa Interstate Railroad has made the decision that they don't want this project to move forward, so we're trying to, um, regroup and figure out how we can get a way to ... to make this project happen. Obviously it's an important project for that Riverside Drive corridor. Uh, Burlington Street/Madison intersection improvements, uh, this project was just bid, uh, through the DOT, uh, and will be constructed this summer. McCollister Boulevard extension project, this, uh, our plans and specs are on for approval at tonight's Council meeting. So this will be construction, uh, this summer. Uh, Prentiss Street bridge replacement, uh, this, uh, the plans are on file with the DOT. Um, it's out for bid currently, uh, will be construction this summer. And then the west river bank stabilization, that project is under construction. Um, we're waiting for river levels to go down to be able to finish up the rip -rap, uh, placement along the retaining wall that was built. Uh, Iowa City Gateway, uh, is ... is also punchlist items, uh, so we're in the process of...of working with PCI to get those items completed and then we will have, uh, the end treatment modifications that'll be bid this summer, or hopefully built this summer, um, to get rid of the fences that are at the ends of the arches currently. Gilbert Street intersection improvements, uh, punchlist items, uh, we have some, uh, footings to remove and some concrete, uh to remove and some replacements to go on there. All right? Seydell-Johnson/ Okay, so moving on to annual projects. Our Park annual improvement fund, some of the things completed out of that this year was a number of new park signs that were put up around the community, and a number of smaller projects or overruns on some of our larger projects, but that'll be similar to next year. We'll be doing a few more park signs, a few more infill smaller projects, um, to continue with things from the Park master plan. The ADA accessibility improvements, um, we are working our way through those and we're getting there. Um, we have a few more parks coming up. We did not get any done this summer, um, so those will be added to next summer. Uh, you have the Park master plan sheet in front of you and it shows which parks are coming up, um, next summer. Annual Rec Center improvements, um, we have combined this so that both Robert A. Lee Rec Center and Mercer Scanlon Rec Center are now out of the same fund, um, and this is a certain amount of money each year, nothing specifically large-scale planned for the next year. We have the racquetball court and restroom project soon at Robert A. Lee. Um, this will be other smaller ones after that. A new one, the contracted tree planting $100,000 a year, um, excited about this. A number of sites that were identified in the tree inventory will be likely sites for these tree plantings, um, and that goes along with the two new Forestry staff that are in the operating budget to help make this happen. Havel/ Annual stormwater improvement, so this will be a ... a fund that's used for a number of things. A lot of times it has to do with, uh, repairs to storm sewer, intakes, those types of improvements. Um, you can see a picture here of a sink hole that was developed, uh, I believe this might have been on Prentiss Street. Um, so ... lot of times that's what happens is we'll ... we'll notice an issue out there and then this funding allows us to go out there and make those repairs kinda as needed. Annual traffic signal projects, this is a ... a pot of money that's used for, um, upgrading or installing new traffic signals. It's also used to replace individual components. Um, one thing This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 18 we've been doing recently is adding, uh, cameras at intersections to help with operations, uh, in those areas. Traffic calming, you can see here is a picture of a ... a speed hump that was installed recently. Um, that's a lot of times what comes out of this account, um, but it really is anything that would come out of the traffic calming program. So there could be any number of measures that would, um, be recommended for approval and if it's approved by the neighborhood, then could come out of this account, um, but again the speed humps are kinds the...the main one there. Curb ramps, so this is a pot of money, 100,000 a year. We typically have a project that will go out and, uh, replace or improve curb ramps in various areas. Our priorities to date have really been focused on areas that don't have curb ramps. Um, it ... we also will have projects where maybe they're... they're not compliant, so they may not have the ... the truncated domes or they may be, uh, out of compliance, but our first priority has been to look at locations that simply do not have ramps that ... that need `em. Pavement rehabilitation, um, this is a program that we look at annually for, um, asphalt overlays, PCC patching, other roadway improvements. Uh, one thing I will note here is we are nearing completion of a pavement management plan, so we had hired a consultant last year to take a look at not only our program, but also the condition of streets throughout the city. Um, as part of that they have been helping to inform our ..our program on what improvements we should be looking at. A ... a big portion of that is trying to make sure we do the right treatment at the right time, so just because a ... a street may not be in good condition, it may not be the best candidate for certain improvements at certain times. So we've asked them to help and, like I said, we're ... we're nearing completion of that and should have a final version here, uh, in the near future, but that will definitely inform the .... this program. The annual bridge maintenance and repair, this is used for a couple different things. One, we look at bridge inspections out of this account, um, and from that we often get recommendations, um, or we'll get condition assessments, but we also get recommendations for, uh, maintenance... projects that would ... would be recommended. So those would be paid for out of this. We also have bridge reconstructions that, um, we do from time to time. This can help to fund those, but it's not enough to fund, um, bridge reconstructions alone. So it's really focused more on the maintenance piece of things. Annual sewer main replacement, this does a couple of different things. This is, uh, I believe it's about 750,000 a year. Uh, we look at sort of spot repairs, so it would be areas where we have issues with sanitary sewer, whether it sags or collapse or...or whatever it might be. It's also something that we do for our sewer lining project. So every year we go out and kind of as a preventative maintenance look at locations where sewer lining makes sense. It's a lot more cost-effective and ... and basically extends the life of the sanitary sewer. So that comes out of this account as well. Bicycle master plan, we'll have Kent Ralston come up and talk a little bit about that. Ralston/ Thanks, Ron. Kent Ralston, uh, Transportation Planner. Good afternoon. Uh, what you see before you is a line item in the larger CIP for the bike master plan. Uh,for those that aren't aware, uh, the City Council approved, uh, the first stand-alone bike master plan back in the summer 2017, uh, and at your ...it's a little hard to read there, but at your seat should be, uh, sort of a mini capital improvements program that exists within the larger capital improvements program. Uh, lots of good projects, uh, happening in 2020. Uh, just a few I'd like to touch on. I believe there's seven total projects that would be, uh, completed, uh, if staff has its way in 2020. Uh, the first is, uh, the addition of bike boulevards on Governor Street, between This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 19 Burlington and Bowery. Uh, bike boulevards on Prentiss and Bowery, which is in conjunction with the Prentiss bridge reconstruction that the Public Works Director mentioned earlier, uh, this afternoon. Uh, a four to three -lane conversion on Keokuk, between Highway 6 and Sandusky, which I think'll be a really important piece of the bike master plan. That'll be similar to what was done on Madison Street, uh, just this last summer, where we take, uh, the existing four lanes, transition it to a three -lane section, and then add bike lanes. Uh, a couple of other, uh, sort of important projects that are also in that area, uh, are the addition of bike lanes on Southgate Avenue and bike boulevards on Sandusky and Taylor. So it really creates sort of this network between, uh, Wetherby Park and the Iowa River Corridor Trail on Gilbert Street, which'll be really nice. Uh, also important projects would be the, uh, addition of bike lanes on Dodge Street, from Burlington to Kirkwood. So in addition to what happened this last summer with bike lanes on Dodge Street. Uh, if we get this project completed this year, you'll be able to ride a separated bike lane all the way from essentially Prairie du Chien, uh, down to Kirkwood, uh, which'll be a nice, uh, nice addition for the community. And then two bigger projects that I think, uh, will be touched on later this afternoon are the McCollister extension project, which includes bike lanes, as well as a 10 -foot, uh, separated wide sidewalk, and then also the, uh, reconstruction of American Legion...American Legion Road, excuse me, uh, which also includes bike lanes, as well as a 10 -foot separated sidewalk, and what you'll notice I think through a lot of these project is, uh, we used to have a policy where on our trail streets we added 8 -foot wide sidewalks, and through the bike master plan we're now, uh, increasing those to 10 - feet wide to accommodate, uh, bikes, strollers, dog walkers, uh, and so on. And I'd be happy to answer any questions that you might have. Thomas/ Kent, what does a bike boulevard translate to< Ralston/ So it..it can ... that's a good question. It can be several different things, but primarily it's gonna include wayfinding, uh, signage as well as pavement markings. Uh, we also depending on the corridor we're examining, we'll look at, uh, things like removing stop signs if possible, uh, removing parking, uh, that sort of thing. Whatever it is that can make bicycling easier, uh, in those corridors. So it takes various, uh, roles. Ralston/ Thank you. Teague/ Thank you. Seydell-Johnson/ So the annual Senior Centl ... Center facility improvements, similar to the two rec centers, just a number of ongoing projects in this facility that we'll be looking at improving. Havel/ All right, so the next section we'll hit on would be the Airport. Tharp/ Good afternoon, Mike Tharp, I'm the Airport Operations Specialist. Um, as Dennis alluded to earlier, our projects are heavily dependent on grant funding. Uh, we get grant funds from two agencies — the Federal Aviation Administration and the State of Iowa, uh, DOT Aviation Bureau. Uh, between those two agencies, there's three pots of money. The FAA projects, when This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 20 they participate, uh... uh, give us 90% of the project cost. The State, uh, there's two programs — the Airport Improvement Program and then the General Aviation Vertical Infrastructure Program. Both of those contribute between 70 to 85% of the project cost, depending on the particular project. Um, with that, the, uh, projects that we have in place here are, uh, straight from ... mostly straight from our Airport master plan, uh, as I mentioned during our operations budget. Uh, the Airport master plan is a 20 -year document that, uh, members of the Airport community, neighborhoods, uh, City staff, uh, all kind of had a working group and developed that over about a year -and -a -half process, um, and then that ... that gets blessed by the FAA as essentially, uh, the road map of how we see the Airport developing over the next 20 years. Uh, the first project on the list is a expansion at the Airport (mumbled) uh, Airport parking areas. Um, several times during the year if you come to the Airport, parking will be very scarce. Uh, it's a sign of our usage, uh, that has grown over the years. Uh, and when we host large events, like the pancake breakfast or...or even if we host a community, uh... uh, events like, uh, we've done the ICAD annual meetings, um, things where we can encourage the ... the, uh, community come out and see the Airport along with something else, uh, parking does become an issue. Uh, this one is gonna be a project that we do in the spring. Just like all concrete, it wears out. Um, unfortunately with aviation concrete... concrete, as it wears out and breaks up, it causes, uh, safety issues for aircraft. Uh, suck up, uh, bits of concrete or other things into aircraft engines and that's a pricey ...pricey repair. Uh, this one takes care of some, uh, actually this will be our last piece of original 1950's era concrete, uh, that we are gonna take out and reconstruct. Uh, the runway 7 environmental assessment, if you looked at, uh... uh, our Airport master plan, there is a little bit of room where we can add a little bit of concrete to one end of the runway and then both ends of our runaway have a ... a 5,000 -foot landing distance. Uh, the 5,000- foot number is kind of a magic number for a lot of our charter operators and business operators that come into the Airport, based on the aviation insurance requirements for a runway landing for their aircraft. Uh, this is the other half, that's the actual construction work. The first ... the first one was the environmental assessment study, uh, just to make sure we're not gonna displace anything. Uh, this project is same ... same concept, just on the other end. What we're doing is we're moving that landing point on the threshold back about 750 feet. Uh, that actually takes us up to, uh, a landing distance of about 4,900 feet and the previous project (mumbled) the 5,000 number. Uh, runway 12-30 threshold displacement, this ... this project came about as part of our obstruction mitigation work that is also underway. Uh, this is kind of the tail end of it where we kind of shift the runway to the southeast just a little bit. That alleviates, uh, a lot of the issues we have with airspace going over the neighborhoods to the northwest and ... and, uh, tree growth into the approach pass. Uh, self -serve fuel expansion and kiosk replacement, we've kinda got two issues here, uh, both of `em are actually pretty good. Uh, the main one with the, uh... uh, fuel expansion, we are going to add a second storage tank for jet A fuel. That's a byproduct of our activity, um, that will give us 24,000 gallons of storage. Uh, part of that is ... is usage, part of that is also, uh, changes with the rules of delivery and, uh, supply, uh, transportation of fuels, and things like that the, uh, DOT has made on a national level have impacted how reliable some of those suppliers are. So last fall ... not last fall, the year before. Uh, several airports in southeast Iowa actually ran out of gas for a while because we couldn't get ... Iowa City was not one of `em, but they couldn't get, uh, fuel supplied to them appropriately and we're trying to stave off that as well with ... with our activity. Uh, the kiosk readers, uh, the current readers that This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 21 we have are not really able to accept credit cards with chips in `em. They're just straight (mumbled) readers and, uh, you ... the rules with those cards are the liability is gonna be transferred onto anybody operating those for cases of fraud and we're looking to upgrade those so we can not have that issue. Airport apron expansion project, this one is just adding more parking area for aircraft. If you've seen the Airport on game days or even ... even on game days on occasion, uh, we do get some large aircraft that come into the area and a couple of `em, we can park `em and then they take a ... take up about a quarter of the ramp space. So it does limit, uh, what other aircraft we can handle at a given time. Um, the FAA has a number of formulas, but they also have one based on our aircraft, uh, traffic, how big of a parking area we can have and this meets that definition. Teague/ I have one question for you. Tharp/ Sure! Teague/ I couldn't tell from the picture if, uh, where you're redoin' the concrete, if it was in the middle of the runway, but what do you do, um, if you were repairin' concrete in the middle of the runway, how does that affect your operations? Tharp/ For work on the runway, I mean we'd have to close the runway for a particular period of time to do it. Um, there are quick concrete, uh, curing methods of doing patchwork, so it doesn't delay or it doesn't take that long to ... to reopen a runway. Uh, the area that we're, uh, reconstructing here is actually right outside the terminal. So what's gonna happen there is we phase it such a way so that we do about half the project at a given time and then everybody else has access to, uh, that other side of the parking area. Teague/ Okay. Thank you. Tharp/ Thank you! Bockenstedt/ The Finance department has a couple of projects underway and this first one the infa... infrastructure asset management really is primarily being spirited by the Public Works division, uh, as they are the ones who will be impacted the most by it, but is, uh, a software product that really tracks, identifies, uh, maintenance from sewers, water infrastructures, storm sewers, and other infrastructure costs of the City and then interfaces with the other City's software programs to create efficiencies, uh, help us know where to allocate and spend dollars, and, uh, the first phase of this, uh, will be hiring a consultant to evaluate the City's overall, uh, system and how it would work with our other components of that system, um, and then assist in writing an RFP to make sure we acquire the ... the right piece of software, uh, that'll be best suited to us. Uh, the next piece is really impact, uh, a lot of the facilities citywide and that is, uh, looking at upgrading the City's card access system. So it'll be, uh, a more technologically advanced system, a more secure system. Um, we'll also be looking at upgrading systems in buildings. We're adding systems where they're not in place right now and ... and that should take place next summer. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 22 Grier/ Good afternoon, John Grier with the Fire department. Uh, our apparatus replacement program, you see on this slide here. You have something on your agenda toni... tonight to replace a fire pumper, fire engine. I'll use those terms interchangeably, not to confuse anybody. So our, uh, upcoming expenditures for an engine in 20, and 21 we have a fire safety house. That's the trailer that we take around to schools and other neighborhoods. We've, uh, been able to maintain that and we keep kinda just movin' it a little bit each year. That's it...eventually we're gonna have to replace it, but I think we can hold off another year, and then coming up in 22, we have our Quint, which is basically a, uh, elevated waterway. It's another ladder (mumbled) a back up to the ladder truck we have here, and then in 23 would be the aerial. We have our apparatus typically on a 9 -year frontline, 7 -year reserve status. The, uh, quint we're just going straight, no reserve and the ladder is the same. Questions about apparatus? Certainly excited about this one so ... I don't know what else I could tell you other than we... we're lookin' forward to it (laughter) (mumbled) Fruin/ I just remind the Council that we are, um, what we anticipate doing with this fire station is we would open it at the same time we relocate Station 3. Station 3 is the one, uh, near Earl May, Procter & Gamble, and that's, uh... uh, would be envisioned to move out to the east side. So we're actively looking to secure, uh, land that could house a fire station on the east side. So, uh, when you think of executing at ... on a long-term level, it's gonna be building two fire stations at one time and then hiring staff for one of those fire station. Grier/ Questions? Teague/ Busy days ahead! Grier/ Absolutely! Thank you so much! Teague/ Thank you! Carman/ (mumbled) with the Library, and we just have one, uh, pretty straightforward project in the books, um, replacing the carpeting and certain furnishings. Um, these are original to the building. It's considered normal wear and tear. It's just time to be replacing them. Any questions? (several talking and laughing) Thank you! Teague/ Yes, thank you! You all are doin' self -introductions today (laughs) Hightshoe/ Tracy Hightshoe with Neighborhood and Development Services. Uh, we only have one item. It's the permitting software that I mentioned at our NDS budget. So it's our permitting software. We've had the same software for about 20 years, so we're excited about the new functiona... functionality will give the new system, and we hope we can complete and install in spring of 2020. Teague/ Awesome! Thank you. (several talking in background) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 23 Seydell-Johnson/ All right, I have a few. Uh, Juli Seydell-Johnson, Director of Parks and Recreation. Um, once again I refer you to the Park master plan page that you have, um, in front of you. This ... most of these projects follow through on the 2017 Park master plan. We've been making great progress through that plan and, uh, this budget shows a lot more. First of all though we have City Hall. We manage government buildings, so our staff oversees the maintenance and repairs of City Hall, the Senior Center, and a couple other City buildings. The projects here are things like replacing the carpet and painting up on the third floor. We've been systematically going through the building doing different sections of that. City Hall will need a new roof in a few years, um, and some bathroom remodels and different things like that come out of this project. Cemetery Road asphalt, uh, just simply repairing the roads that go through the cemetery so we have access to the different sites within the facility. Intra -city bike trails is infill, smaller infill projects as needed to provide connections and when we have an opportunity to add small sections of trail. The Palisades and Stonebridge Park development, this was previously just called a future parks development. We have two particular sites we're looking at, one more on the north side, the Palisides... Palisades area, and then Stonebridge Park is what you see right there. Behind that bridge that's, um, let me get this right... Lower West Branch Road. Um, there is an old stone bridge back in those trees, um, and that land we've just ... will become parkland and that would allow for development of that area around that stone bridge. The second one, there's a second stone bridge in Courtt Hill Park and its all from, um, a previous railroad expansion that didn't happen, but it's kind of interesting. We have two historic bridges in our park system. Wetherby restroom shelter and playground replacement, we held the neighborhood meetings for this project last summer. Um, we're underway with design development and playground selection, um, for this. It will be bid out this spring, uh, for construction next summer. It will replace the shelter, the restrooms, and the playground area and they will shift a little bit. The shelter will move closer to the parking lot for easier access. Uh, the playground will have a larger area and kinda a swing area and a playground area, um, and then the shelter will match our master plan design shelter as we have at Wetherby, or I'm sorry, at Willow Creek, Creekside, Happy Hollow, some of those. Weiner/ What will that mean for accessibility for the ... the park this coming summer? Seydell-Johnson/ It will be under construction most of the summer. We do intend to try to keep the splash pad operating and the ... you'll have access to the gardens, the sport court, the splash pad. We'll have probably portable restrooms out there, um, but there will probably not be a playground, and the area with the shelter and restroom would be fenced off during the project time. Chadek Green Park, this is a few years out but it is adding a shelter, restroom, small playground, accessible paths to the Chadek Green, uh, Park area, which is currently our community gardens. Uh, we have a smaller fencing project, um, and you see the artwork that was put in last summer. Uh, we worked with Backyard Abundance on some improvements to the gardens. Those are happening during this off season. This is a larger project to come later. Rec Center improvements, these are continuing, um, to correct items in our ADA review of Robert A. Lee Rec Center. As I mentioned, uh, we're just about ready to go out to bid for the conversion of the racquetball game room and the, um, on -deck restroom at the indoor pool. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 24 This would be the next phases down the road of additional restroom changes, uh, changes to the social hall potentially, and the meeting rooms upstairs. Whispering Meadows on the southet ... southeast side, uh, currently is a park with basically a trailer around a pond with a few benches. This would put in a small playground and a picnic shelter at that site. This is one of the areas identified in the master plan as needing more traditional play space. Lower City Park shelter and restroom replacement, you'll see this project, then one for Upper City Park. Basically it's replacing the older structures. Um, we will be combining or condensing the shelters. We don't have quite as many looking at what's rented, what's used. We have a number of shelters that aren't used as much as others out there, so we'll be kind of realigning that park with the use that we're seeing, uh, having some larger, newer facilities rather than a number of smaller ones that are getting older. Kiwanis Park playground and shelter renovation, uh, very popular playground there, kind of a nature play area, but it is nearing the end of its useful life. So this will replace the playground. Currently the project includes the shelter replacement. Uh, we may or may not do that as we get closer, as we see the condition. It's still in pretty good shape. If not, we'll do more with the gardens, um, and some other things that are in that area of the park. Napoleon softball fields, uh, fields five through eight is renovation, so working on the drainage, getting them laser graded, getting them, um, renovated back to what they started with. Upper City Park, just similar to what I just talked about on Lower City Park. Hickory Hill, the Conklin Street shelter and restrooms on the north side of...of that park. Um, this is ... be the last one of these older ..this older shelter style that we have. Um, we'll replace it with the new restroom and shelter as we have in our Park master plan. Glendale Park is kind of a neat little park tucked back, um, along the creek and, um, it currently just has the playground you see there, which is actually recycled playground equipment from a couple other parks. Um, this project will replace it with a new playground and add a small shelter and accessible paths to get to those two areas. Uh, this project was three projects in your last CIP, so we've combined them into one for bidding in construction management. Napoleon Park, it's replacing the playground that you see up there. It has a number of drainage issues where it's sitting, Uh, this is the softball complex and our plan is to replace it with separate and smaller pieces of equipment, closer to the concession area, um, making it kind of pods of play up along the concession area, rather than having the ... the single play space out between the ball fields. Scott Park is getting a new playground and shelter. We had the, uh, neighborhood meetings last summer for that. Scott Park has kind of a smaller playground and it will be replaced with one that's similar in size. It will be to the south of the current playground and the shelter will be in that ... in the same general location. Just a little bit further away from the residents, uh, that neighbor that park. So in that case, construction will happen over the summer, but we'll be able to keep the current playground and shelter open until the new ones are in place. So that ... that's kind of a ... an ideal situation there, and then Fair Meadows playground, uh, we are not touching the splash pad at that park either or the restroom, but we are getting a new playground and it will move to the west of the splash pad, so it'll have access off the actual parking lot for that park, which comes in from the north side. Uh, right now we're kinda down in a low area on the very northeast comer of it, so that will change and the shelter will move a little bit to the west and replace it with a ... and that one is more of a small child playground area because of the ... the location next to Grant Wood, which has three playgrounds at the elementary school. Court Hill Park shelter replacement, this is the one that has the other stone bridge and its actually This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 25 right ... it's kinda hidden down there, but it's right by this playground. Um, so this replaces this playground and the shelter right next to it. Court Hill Park currently has three shelters in it. Um, we'll probably look at consolidating that to maybe one or maybe one and one small one, based on the use that we're seeing there now. Mercer Park, uh, if you remember last year we had a ... a new boiler and HVAC system put in. This is the second part of that project. This is tuckpointing on the building envelope and then a dehumidification project inside to help extend the life of the systems that we've already put in, um, as well as the building itself. It just needs a ... it's at that point of 25-30 years where it needs some, uh, some TLC for the outside envelope. The next one would be the Robert A. Lee pool filter and HVAC system. Um, you'll notice that all three of our pool systems are getting to the age where they're going to need repair and replacement down the line. That is why we have that in the operating budget, we talked about on Saturday the ... the master planning for Recreation and Recreation facilities, to look at the three aquatic centers to really prioritize this and other projects that are needed to keep the swimming pools operating and to really find out what the community wants to see in the swimming pools in the future. Happy Hollow, we've done a lot of work in this park recently, um, and are just about ready to bid the refurbishment of the basketball court. Uh, this will be the playground replacement, so just ... just the playground at this one. Terrell Mill skate park, um, replacing the skate park, upgrading it. We've got a couple designers really interested in coming back into town. They were college students here that (laughs) that played on there... played, is that the right word? Used (laughs) the skate park during their time, um, and we'll get a new design and get this replaced. Mercer ball diamonds, uh, we will soon be doing some master planning along with the School District on the Mercer Park fields, including, uh, the School District uses field one as their, uh, as their high school field at this point, um, but well have an analysis done of the other fields in a pri ... to help us prioritize renovations there, things like lighting, um, or...field number four we've talked about, uh, rotating it to a different, uh, so the sunlight hits it differently and you can play differently on it. So more to come on this, but... Hunters Run, uh, this is replacement of the playground and shelter. You can see it's older equipment here. Once again I think it was recycled from another park at one time. Um, this gets it on the schedule to get it replaced. A trail section, uh, down on Highway 6, Fair Meadows to Heinz, uh, I think any time you go down there you see people walking this section without a trail. It's an area that has a lot of pedestrians that needs access, so we're excited to get this section of trail built. Terry Trueblood woodland and prairie restoration, this is the project being funded by The REAP, Resource Enhancement and Protection Program by the Iowa State DNR. Uh, $200,000 grants, which actually completely covered by the grant. It'll be work down in the lowlands to the west of the park, so between the river and the, uh, lake area. Um, we had a group of University students do some master planning and analysis of that a few years ago. That'll be the basis for some of the work that's done in there. It'll be restoration of the wetlands, the woodlands, and some of the prairie areas. Reno Street, um, Park renovations to match with our master plan. So shelter, uh, accessible paths in this one, and playground. Event facility improvements, yes, it's time to start thinking about Terry Trueblood not being our newest facility any more (laughs) Uh, we have some needs out there, things like staining the outside of the building, at both Terry Trueblood and at the Ned Ashton House we have some HVAC and control... control unit things that need to be fixed. So this gets us a project going, uh, to keep these facilities at the level that they're at now so that we can continue to have use by This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 26 the community. The other building is the H2O or the ... the the boat rental building out at Terry Trueblood. This would give us money to ... to continue to maintain that, as well. Off-road bike trail development, we've been working with a group, uh, from the CVB and others, uh, about off-road bike racing. Uh, we think we've got some opportunities soon for some land to ... to build an off-road cycle area. This would give us money to do that to build a single-track, uh, bike area, and then the ped mall playground, um, it seems like it's not that old but we're having trouble getting replacement parts (laughs) It's nearing the end of its useful life and so we're plugging it in to get it replaced in a few years. That's it for Parks and Rec. Teague/ Any questions for Juli or comments? All right! Matherly/ Good afternoon, Jody Matherly, Police Chief. We just have one item on the CIPs here. Itis a digital, uh, evidence management system. Our officers take in hundreds if not thousands of digital evidence per year at various locations (clears throat) excuse me, throughout the city, um, and they come in all different formats. So presently, as you can see on the left side of the screen there, uh, we have to burn that to DVD disc. It's enveloped. It's ... it's cataloged on paper, and then it's physically stored. So this will allow us to move to the right side of that picture, which is simply to digitize it all, keep it digitized, and submitted into a system where we can categorize it, uh, retrieve it with ease, and then distributed... distribute it later on, uh, to County attorneys or whoever, uh, needs it. That will cut down on 5 to $10,000 in man hours per year we're estimating, and it'll also, uh, meet nicely with our climate action plan to reduce physical storage but also, uh, to reduce waste. Any questions? Thank you! Teague/ Thank you. Havel/ I'm Jason Havel, City Engineer, and I'll be walking you through the Public Works section of the projects. Starting things off out of the Landfill, uh, the equipment building replacement. This is a couple of buildings that need upgrading. There's actually some equipment that won't fit inside the building so we'll look at a new building and ... and upgrades there. Compost pad improvements, um, with the increase we've seen in composting, um, this is an area that gets a lot of work. It currently isn't in great condition, so this will go through and replace a lot of the ... the potholes and other, um, issues with the surface there. It'll install a ... a hard surface for them to work off of. Southside recycling site, so this would be looking at, um, creating a new site for, uh, recycling on the southside. It would include roll -off containers, uh, compactors, as well as electrical lighting, signage, that kind of stuff to basically have a ... a full-time site on the southside to help for, uh, recycling. Landfill dual extraction system, so this would be an expansion of the current system. Looks at, uh, addressing... landfill gas as well as the leachate liquid out there at the landfill. It would be expansion of eight or nine wells. Um, it'd also include new SCADA and, uh, for monitoring of the system. The fully automated curbside collections trucks, this is for two vehicles. Um, really it will help with the efficiency and, um, I guess flexibility of the routes for, uh, solid waste. Future landfill cell design is pretty much exactly what it sounds like. Uh, as the landfill fills up, uh, this will be the ... the next cell that will be created. This will look for design of that cell for creation or...construction in the future when it's needed. Orgra... organics grinder upsizing, so this will be replacement of the current This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 27 equipment. Essentially it will be upsizing the unit and so with that, the current reserve is not enough to fund that, so this is basically making up the difference, uh, to purchase a new and larger piece of equipment. Lower Muscatine area storm sewer improvements, so this'll be looking at a couple of different areas. The main one will be along to Deforest Avenue. Um, there'll also be some along Ginter Street. This is sort of building off of the Lower Muscatine reconstruction project from a few years ago, where we had installed some of the ... the trunk storm sewer. This will help to collect, uh, storm ... stormwater from some of the side streets. Here's a picture from Sycamore Street and Deforest. There's just a couple of areas where we have a lot of water; um, trying to collect that so it spends less time on the street. Along those same lines, the north Westminster storm sewer upgrades. This is an area where we have, again, some localized flooding, so we'd be looking at making some storm sewer improvements in that area. Rundell Street pump station vault modification, so you can see here, um, the existing vault and pump station. This will basically be making improvements to that. Also will make improvements to the, uh, curb ramps that are in that area, help make it more accessible, and ... and help with, uh, pedestrian access in the area and not make `em quite as intrusive. River Street storm sewer improvements, uh, the main thing here is this is an area where we actually have an open ditch, um, so it will help to install storm sewer in that area. It's an area where maintenance is k ... kind of an ongoing problem and so hopefully it will help to address that. We also will be looking to install sidewalk in the area when that project is complete. Petsel Place storm sewer improvements, this is an area where the existing storm sewer is undersized, and, uh, doesn't do a ... a very good job, especially during large events, kinda like you can see here, see quite a bit of localized flooding. So it'll basically look at making improvements to upsize that and ... and make it, uh, operate like it really was originally intended. Court Hill stormwater facility restoration, this is a ... a stormwater detention basin, uh, on the east side of town. It's one that's become overgrown. The maintenance has become an ongoing issue, uh, with the intakes being plugged and so it will look at basically going through cleaning that up. There's also some overgrown trees that are impacting some of our, uh, manholes in the area. So basically just kinda cleaning it up, making it so that it's easier to maintain. Um, in the end it will likely be, uh, adjacent residents that will be maintaining. So basically puts it back to a condition where they can maintain the area. Sand and salt storage bunkers, this is out at the new Public Works site. This is our items that were originally included with the Public Works site project, were removed due to budget concerns, um, so looking at adding them at a later date. Um, not only would it be for sand and salt storage, but they could also be used for storing other materials, such as topsoil, uh, during the non -winter months. American Legion Road reconstruction, this is one that has been mentioned earlier. So it'll include complete reconstruction of American Legion Road from Scott Boulevard to Taft Avenue. The biggest change here is we'll be going from the existing rural section to an urban section. So instead of ditches we'll have curb and gutter, storm sewer. Um, there'll be some other utility work in there. In the end we will have essentially one lane in each direction, as well as on -street bicycle facilities. We'll also have the wide sidewalk on one side, as well. Um, one of...couple other features for this project, we will be constructing a roundabout at American Legion Road and Scott Boulevard, as well as a pedestrian underpass that will be, uh, installed near the ... the Hoover School. Melrose Avenue improvements, this will be a joint project with the County. So we'll be looking at reconstructing Melrose Avenue, Iwv Road, uh, from essentially Hebl Avenue to the Highway This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 28 218, uh, the southbound, uh, ramps. This will be going back as a rural section, so similar to what it is today. It'll basically make improvements to the roadway surface and wide shoulders. As part of this project we'll also be installing water main from where it currently ends at Slothower Road and extend that out to the landfill. Uh, the landfill currently does not have access to city water, so that will provide access to City water to the landfill. Teague/ Jason, the last one, uh, Rochester, you, um ... or American Legion, yes. Is there any plans for bike plan? I don't ... I don't know if I heard that ... like that (both talking) Havel/ (both talking) ...this will have on ... on -street bicycle facilities (both talking) So I think we're looking at ... I believe we're talking buffered bike lanes, but we'll, uh, consult the ... the bicycle master plan but it will be on -street facilities. Teague/ Thank you. Havel/ Dubuque Street reconstruction, so this would be, uh, the block from Washington Street to Iowa Avenue. This would be building off similar to what we had done for Washington Street. It'd be new streetscapes, uh, sidewalk, roadway, that, uh, as well as utility improvements. Kirkwood Avenue to...to Capitol Street connection, so this would be extending Kirkwood Avenue to the west and Capitol Street to the south. This would be down in the Riverfront Crossings area, basically extending those two to connect. Um, it will also include a couple of water main improvements that we need to make in the area, one being on Capitol Street just north of Benton. The other being near the Benton and Clinton intersection. Uh, it will also include the removal of the railroad spur that's no longer being used, uh, that's on Benton Street. 1 st Avenue and Scott Boulevard intersection improvements, this is one we just wrapped up a ... a study, kinda looking at recommended treatment for the intersection. Uh, we will be proceeding with a roundabout in this location. Court Street reconstruction, so this will be from Muscatine Avenue to 1 st Avenue. This'll be a complete reconstruction, so it would be street, sidewalk, uh, utilities, all of that, um, for ...for that section. Benton Street rehabilitation project, so this is one that we would be going from Mormon Trek to, uh, just east of Benton Drive. This will be one where we won't be changing the curb line. We'll basically be doing a ... an HMA overlay of this. Along with that we will be striping officially bike lanes. Right now it's currently striped as a shoulder. So we will be striping it enough that it can be, um, actual bike lanes and then we will also be doing curb ramp improvements at the intersections. 2nd Avenue bridge replacement, this will be more or less a ... a replacement of the existing structure that's, uh, in need of replacement. With this we will also have some water main improvements, kind of crossing the creek there, as well as installation of sidewalk in that same area. Rochester Avenue reconstruction from 1 st Avenue to essentially Ralston Creek, so this will be from the bridge that was completed a few years ago, um, and continuing to the east to 1 st Avenue. This is one we're workin' on design right now. We'll be coming back to you here shortly to talk about some of the design elements. Um, one piece of that is there are currently sections that do not have sidewalk in here. Uh, we would be looking at, uh, potentially adding sidewalk in those locations. This again will be a complete reconstruction, so we'd be looking at new street, sidewalk, utility improvements. Um, with that the bicycle master plan also includes on -street bicycle facilities, so we'd be looking at This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 29 including those as well. Highway 1/Highway 6 intersection improvement study, so this will be a study to kind of look at the... essentially the south Highway 1, Highway 6 intersection, be looking at potential geometry improvements and what other, um, upgrades we might warm make to that intersection. This would be just the study and functional design, so it would be what we would use at some point in the future to look at, uh, moving forward preliminary and final design. Dodge Street reconstruction from Governor to Burlington Street, this is gonna be a big one. Um, this is one we're working on the... finishing up the functional design right now. So this'll be, again, complete reconstruction of Dodge Street. This will be a joint project with the DOT. Um, so there will be some cost-sharing there, so that's a good thing, uh, but again, it will be all new pavement, sidewalk, utility work as well. So, um, a complete reconstruction of this section. Market and Jefferson two-way conversion, so this would be looking at taking each of those streets from one-way to two-way traffic. Um, so that's gonna include pavement markings, uh, new signals, new signage, essentially the street width would remain the same, but we'd be looking just going from one-way to two-way traffic. Orchard Street reconstruction, so this is the section from Benton Street to the south to Highway 1. This would be looking at essentially all new street pavement. The ... it will also include some water main work kind of so ... I guess it'd be south of Douglas Street, basically between Douglas Street and Highway 1. The water main north of Douglas Street was done not too long ago, so it's fairly new. There's also a wide sidewalk on the west side that we would ... would leave in place, but we'd be likely looking at, uh, reconstruction of the sidewalk on the east side. North Gilbert Street reconstruction, so this would be looking at the section essentially from Brown Street north to ... kind of where we just had finished the work for the Gateway project on Kimball. Um, again this would be new street, side ... we'd be looking at sidewalk, uh, possibly on both sides of the, I think that's where we would start, but uh... we'd be looking at street, sidewalk, as well as utility improvements. Gilbert Street Bridge replacement, this is, uh, like it says, would be replacement of the Gilbert Street bridge over Ralston Creek. Um, it would include not only the bridge, but we'd also be looking at improvements for sidewalk, storm sewer, as well as the, um .... bank slope protection and ... and associated work. Uh, we received some DOT funding for this, so we'd be looking at this one probably starting construction here shortly, uh, with construction in 21. Gilbert Court sidewalk infill project, this is one where we get requests pretty frequently, um, so this would be ... essentially installing sidewalk where there's kind of gaps in sidewalk right now on Gilbert Court, um, and it would be in the area north Highland Avenue, and again it would be on both east and west sides to basically complete the sidewalk, uh, system in that area. Park Road reconstruction, this would be the section from the bend at Rocky Shore to Riverside Drive, which is essentially where the Gateway project had ended. This again would be complete reconstruction, new street, sidewalk, and utilities, um, and other associated work. Taft Avenue reconstruction, this would be just for the section from American Legion Road to Lower West Branch. You can see in 2023 there's a million dollars that would be essentially for the design of the project, uh, so this would be just design money with construction anticipated in, uh, a further out year. And again this would be reconstruction from the current rural section to an urban section with curb and gutter, and all of that. Moving down to the wastewater treatment plant, the clarifier repairs. So this would be repairs of two of the clarifiers; we completed repairs on a couple of 'em not too long ago. It'd be similar to that. These are original components that have just reached the end of their...their useful life and ... and need to be This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 30 repaired. Scott Boulevard trunk sewer, so this would be an extension of the trunk sewer from just north of the Iowa Interstate Railroad, kind of east of Scott Boulevard. It would be extending it up to American Legion Road. We have a lift station out there existing. Um, it would tie into that area. It would allow us to get rid of that lift station, so then we can go, uh, gravity the ... that entire section, so that will be a plus there, um, and with that we'd be looking at timing of trying to coordinate that with essentially the American Legion Road project. That kinda... same area so hopefully, uh, coordinate those to work together. Nevada Avenue sanitary sewer replacement, this one is pretty much a strict replacement, so it's existing sanitary sewer that's, uh, not in great shape, uh, have some sags and other need for replacement, so essentially replacing it, um, in the same location. Dennis had mentioned this one earlier. This is one of the big ones out at the wastewater treatment plant, the digester complex rehabilitation. So this will have a couple of different things that its gonna do. One is gonna be more on the process side of things, um, looking at removing phosphorus before the digestion phase, um, and that's somewhat linked to the second phase of that is that struvite. We've mentioned that in ... in past years. It's kind of a hard mineral -like deposits that occur throughout the system. So looking to kind of change things up, hopefully reduce that, um, and in the second phase would be to, uh, make improvements and ... and kind of a ... address some of the existing deposits that are there and get those cleaned out to help make the system work ... work better, like it was originally intended. The influent rake and screen replacement, so again this is just looking at replacing, uh, original equipment that is at the end of its useful life. This is one that has been becoming more of a ... a maintenance issue, um, so it would be essentially just replacing the ... the existing equipment. The Hawkeye lift station rehabilitation, so this will be essentially making improvements to the lift station that's there, just kind of west of Mormon Trek Boulevard. So this will be essentially making improvements to this. It will allow for capacity improvements. We'll be able to demo the existing building, um, allow for future capacity improvements, but there won't be any additional pumps at this time. It would just be set up for future use, uh, if needed. The Rohret south sewer, so this would be extending sanitary sewer along Abbey Lane, so over near Mormon Trek. This would extend sanitary sewer under Highway 218 and allow for, uh, future development on the west side of Highway 218, uh, especially in the Carson Farm area. This will include a couple of different things. One would be essentially upsizing of some existing sanitary sewer that's out there and then extending new sanitary sewer the ... the rest of the way under Highway 218. Fruin/ Jason, if I can jump in here and give you a break to take a drink water or something. Um, the, uh, this is an important project for ...for Council to think about, uh, because you're... you're opening up a very large area of development with this ... with this project. Currently it's just not really feasible for a developer to build south of Rohret Road there, uh, because the cost of getting that sewer, uh, through 218 is ... is quite high, as you can see. Um, before we get to 22, 23 what we need to do as a ... on the planning end and with Tracy's department is ... is update the comprehensive plan over there and really figure out what we want that neighborhood to be, what types of public facilities we need in that area. I mentioned Saturday do we wanna consider a rec center. When you talk to the school about any school sites that they may want, so there's a lot of planning that needs to take place, um ... uh, and then, you know, obviously what you're doing with the South District form based code, we hope that what comes of that would This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 31 be able to be applied to this area too. So there's... there's still quite a number of variables and that's why you see this project out a few years, but understand that your staff is gonna be workin' pretty hard over the next few years to get us to the point where once the sewer's in, you all and the public feel very comfortable with what's going to come after that. Mims/ Do you know the ballpark number of acres that this opens up for development? Frain/ I don't. Do you... Mims/ Okay. That's okay. Knoche/ (mumbled) ...acreage for the Carson Farm's about 200 acres, but it'll serve more than that in the drainage area. Mims/ Thank you. Weiner/ Geoff, did you mention on ... on Saturday ...was this the area where there's potential for an additional park, once this is (both talking) Frain/ Correct, yes. I think we would look at a ... a potential park site here. There could... current plans show a large stormwater, uh, a regional stormwater detention basin in here. So you could think of a park that incorporates that. Part of the planning process we need to go through is analyzing whether that regional stormwater basin is still the best path forward, or if there's some other stormwater management techniques, but yes, I could see, um, I wouldn't be surprised if the School District wanted a site out here and, uh, it could be an opportunity for us to look at a, again, a Mercer Park, Southeast type of collaboration. Teague/ When will the Coun... County be consulted at all, because this looks like it's abuttin' the county as well. Fruin/ Yeah, so this would be a ... an area that we would have to annex (several talking) Havel/ Continuing down at the Wastewater plant, the de -watering roll -off paving. So this would be an area where we'd essentially have, uh, a paved area for them to work for their de -watering container. So this is basically looking at for, um, sand in car wash and septic haulers. They basically use these for... for de -watering those (mumbled) and then for disposal. The Wastewater plant mixer improvements, these would be essentially for new mixers to help with making the process more efficient. Bio -solids conveyor improvements, again just, uh, improvements to the existing system, help it, uh, operate better and make it more efficient with their operations. Down at the Wastewater plant we have an existing cold storage building. So this project would look at providing some heat to that facility, um, with the goal of keeping it above freezing. Similar to that, this would be, uh, the new cold storage building would be construction of a new facility, similar in size to the cold storage building that's down there now. The difference here is it'd be mostly just covered so the ... the size would be open but it'd be a This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 32 covered, uh, facility again, kinds, that 90 by 40 range, as far as size. Fifth Ward sanitary reroute, so this would be an area down off of Dodge Street. This is a section that currently kind of cuts diagonal through the neighborhood. It goes under, uh, a few different structures. There's been some issues in the past with some sinkholes under structures, so this would look at realigning that ... that sewer, um, to be more within the right-of-way...and to get it out from underneath those structures. Benton Street trunk sewer improvement, similar to the Fifth Ward, this will be another one where we'd be moving the sanitary sewer, uh, into the green space, make it easier to ... to maintain in the future, um, as well as upsizing some of the main near Emerald Street. There's a number of water main replacement projects in here. The Spruce Street is the first one of those. This would be a section where we're replacing existing water main and as is our policy, go ... upsizing from 6 -inch to 8 -inch, which is our new minimum. Bradford Drive water main replacement is along those same lines, again going from the 6 -inch to 8 -inch. Water distribution pressure zone improvements, this will look at making some strategic improvements in the water system at a few different locations. Uh, the main goal here is to really look at helping kind of that northeast section of the city, um, going from one pressure zone to multiple pressure zones. Uh, the northeast portion is an area where we've had some ... some impact..or some issues with proposed development and bein' able to provide sufficient pressure for ...for that development. This will help to alleviate that. Jordan well rehabilitation, so this will look at, uh, removing and reinstalling the, uh, Jordan well, located up at the ... the water treatment plant area. Forest Avenue water main replacement, again this is another replacement project of existing water main, goin' again from the 6 -inch to the 8 -inch. Collector wells 3 and 4, the rehabilitation of those wells, again, up at the water treatment plant. This would be looking at addressing some of the laterals for those wells, as well as rebuilding of the pumps within those wells. Highway 1 water main replacement, so this would be replacement of existing water main from kind of Hawks Ridge area over to the Walmart entrance. This would be 12 -inch water main. We'd be looking at, again, uh, replacement of what's existing. The issue here really has to do with corrosive soils and so it's basically deteriorating at a rapid rate, so we're ... uh, unfortunately it's not that old but, uh, it's in need of repair. High service pump VFD replacement, so this would be the variable frequency drives of our high service pumps, basically replacing those drives. Peninsula well field power redundancy, so this will be extending the Mid American electrical service down Foster Road to the Peninsula area. Um, this would be update ... or upgrading the switch gear and really this will help with redundancy and resiliency for the electrical feed in that area. Chlorine feeder system upgrades, again out at the, uh, water treatment plant. So this would be upgrading of the system, um, to help with their operations. Out at the water plant, looking at upgrading their audio-visual systems for the meeting room. That's a ... an area that's typically used for training. It's nice size to get larger groups in there, so not only meetings but again trainings for staff, as well as outside groups, so it'd be just kind of upgrading the audio-visual components there. At our GSR or ground storage reservoirs for the water system, looking at replacing the generator enclosures at three of those sites. So Rochester, Sycamore, and the Emerald GSRs. The chemical room and outdoor lighting upgrades, again, at the water plant. This would be looking at upgrading to LED fixtures. The water main replacement of Highway 6, so this would be Fair Meadows to Industrial Park Road, um, again, replacement of existing water main. It'd be going ... this would actually be 16 -inch water main that would be replaced. And that is it for Public Works. (laughter) Questions? This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 33 Taylor/ I just have a quick question. In ... in past years you've talked about the aging of a lot of our sewer system in the city. Uh, where do we stand with that or is that like a never-ending process? You've listed a number of sewer main replacements. Are we catching up or just constant process? Havel/ Um, I mean it's (mumbled) gonna be a constant process. I mean with anything you have lifespan of these ... so anything that we install, uh, you know, today is gonna be aging as we move forward. So it will be an ongoing process. I think we do a pretty good job, especially on the wastewater side of things, uh, preventative maintenance, and with televising the cleaning and making sure that we are maintaining those, but also we observe issues that come up sooner, you know, on the water side of things and unfortunately I think a lot of times it's main breaks is how we learn about, um, areas that are in need of repair. We do have, on the water main side of things, we have a pretty good idea of certain vintage. I think water main that has tended to be issue. So we kind of keep an eye on those areas maybe a little bit more than others, but certainly it's gonna be an ongoing process. Taylor/ Thank you. Knoche/ And that's part of the importance of the asset management system. Um, you know, we... we ... we have some of those pieces in place now, but as we develop that and can track, uh, those work orders that go along with repairs on those systems, uh, it'll better... better indicators on where we need to focus those improvements. Weiner/ As you look at some of the buildings and storage buildings that you're replacing, do you look at all at...at adding solar to them? Knoche/ We ... we will as we move forward. Um, as ... as we've done our new building down at Streets, that will have a solar component that will be built with that. We're also doing a solar component at the Terry Trueblood lodge also, uh, so as we move forward we'll be lookin' at solar on those facilities. Weiner/ Thank you. Teague/ Thank you both! All right, it's Transportation! Nagle -Gamin/ Good afternoon, I'm Darian Nagle -Gamin, Transportation Services Director. We have about 13 proposed projects, and the first one of which is parking facility restoration and repair. As you could see up there, this is an example of just some of the wear and tear that happens with our parking decks, um, due to the vibration, the salt, the sand, um, just wear and tear, and we are in the first year of a five-year plan to upgrade, um, and maintain our facilities. We've had a consultant come in over the last year and help, uh, do a complete inventory of our facilities, so we know what repairs are necessary and what proactive, um, measures we can take to help lengthen the lifespan of our parking facilities. So that is the first project. The second This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget session of January 7, 2020. Page 34 project is replacement of electronics in our smart parking meters. Um, when we moved to a credit card -based, um, connected parking meter, um, we knew that the lifespan would be about 10 years of the internal equipment, of the brains, the computer pieces, and we're approaching that end of that, urn .... uh, that life span, so we're looking to, uh, upgrade that to the next generation, um, within the next year. The third project is video cameras for parking facilities and this is, uh, security, safety and security cameras at ... which would better enable us to respond to incidents and just make sure that, uh, patrons using our facilities, um, have some measure of security 24 hours a day. Parking enforcement vehicles, this will be the purchase of a new vehicle with license plate reader technology to help, um, expand our enforcement efforts, our parking enforcement efforts, and also the purchase of and replacement of a license plate reader for our existing vehicle that we do have today that is scheduled for replacement in 2020. The next project is parking ramp automated parking equipment and this is another investment we made about 10 years ago that we knew at some point, uh, would come due and, um, as with many electronics, you get about 10 years of life, um, out of them and then it's time to look for, um, replacements, and so we are looking to begin replacing our automated parking equipment in our facilities. We've had, um, I would say a decline in performance over the last few years, which involves a big inv...or an increasing I should say in investment and staff time to help, uh, get people out of the facilities, um, quickly and easily. So this is an investment back into that system. As part of our climate action plan, we've been really focusing on how we can better support, uh, a more... sustainable modes of transportation and of course electric vehicles are one of those initiatives. So we are hoping to, uh, in this project is to, um, expand the number of our parking facility spaces that were ... where we have electric vehicle charging stations available. The seventh project is replacement of LED fixtures in our parking facilities. Um, we of course if you were ... those of you who've been here for a while (mumbled) back about 10 years, we were able to find some significant cost savings in, um, upgrading our LED, um, fixtures in our parking ramps, I think so much so that we got a call from Mid American. They just wanted to make sure everything was okay, because the ... they didn't see as much usage and indeed it was, um, it was from a lot more, or a lot less, excuse me, energy demands. So that said, they don't last forever. They're reaching the end of their useful life and so we're hoping to begin that replacement, uh, process and utilize some of the, um, the lights that are still in working order to help, um, those that might not be in working order in other facilities. Uh, the eighth proposal... proposed project is Tower Place drainage modifications and this is, um, due to the increase in extreme rainfall events and, um, the inability for the Tower Place parking ramps, um, drainage infrastructure to be able to keep up. We've had some situations where we've had cars in the lower level, um, they've been flooded just because we've been ... the infrastructure has not been able to get the water out of the facility fast enough during extreme rainfall events. So this project would be geared towards, uh, making some adjustments to the stormwater infrastructure so those sort of incidents don't happen. It would basically to be to make the ... the facility more resilient. The ninth project is the transit maintenance facility relocation and we mentioned this again at, uh, at the Saturday meeting as well, but our current Transit facility is reaching the end of its useful life. Um, I think we're on our 36' year. The federal, urn ... uh the federal government, the FTA, indicates it uses 40 -years as about .... is about it for a transit facility. Um, other complications are that we can't expand at our facility, um, so it was our growing population. If...if we're trying to expand our services we're kind of hemmed in, um, This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 35 and we're also utilizing equipment in the facility, um, that was built into the facility in the early 80s that is, um, reaching the end of its useful life and it's getting increasingly difficult to, um, to find replacement parts for it. So t his is, uh, the project that would enable us to build a new Transit facility on the Public Works campus. And of course were actively seeking federal funding for this, uh, for funding for this facility. The next project is a transit bus shelter replacement expansion and this is simply going out to to, um, to across the community really and ... and taking down those old transit shelters that maybe are in a state of disrepair and this is a prime example of one, um, that we're... we're systematically removing, but we're also seeking to add shelters and add more comfortable amenities at our transit stops across the community. Salih/ Is this like the shelter will be add before ... or after the study or when exactly? Nagle-Gamm/ Yep, uh, great question! So we have added, uh, nine shelters last ... in the last year. We have seven or eight more coming this year, and then we're going to wait until we get through the transit study, um, just to make sure that we're not putting shelters in locations that may be moving around, but we do intend to keep moving with this process, and we also expect to get recommendations from, um, the consultant team about, um, what sort of amenities we should really, uh, provide at our transit facilities, so we're looking forward to getting that information and then continuing with the program from that point. Teague/ And more of these are all with solar on them Nagle -Gamin/ Yes! That's a great point, yes. So they all have solar lighting, which is fantastic. Um, if you drive by them at night, um, it's really helpful from the driver perspective. They really love that they can see people waiting in there cause there's nothing ... you know, you don't wanna miss passengers ever, um, especially during cold winter nights like we've been having, so ... tun, yes, so they will all be solar powered. Teague/ Awesome! Nagle -Gamin/ The next project is bus wash repair and I would chalk this project up to, one, we hope we don't have to (laughs) to do. This is an example of the built-in equipment at our transit facility. This is what a 36 -year-old, uh, bus wash looks like, um, if you haven't seen one before. Kinda looks like a retro antique car wash, but, um, it's ... again, it's aging. It's reaching the end of its useful life and with every repair we have, we're getting the indication that at some point there's not gonna be a way that we can fix it. So this is sort of, uh, this is in case, but we're really hoping that we're able to, um, to acquire some federal funding for a new transit facility before anything happens. And the last project is transit interchange and bus stop improvement, and just as I was mentioning, um, out of the transit study we're expecting there to be some recommendations about how we can iimprove our transit interchange, make it more user- friendly, make it more comfortable for our transit users, and, um, and also in stops throughout the community, so not just, uh, the transit interchange. So this is to help us maybe get a quick start on some of those, uh, transit recommendations we expect to get this summer. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 36 Weiner/ I have a question about parking meters, which is as you do the parking meter, the smart parking meter replacement, would those meters also be capable of...of having the rates changed at certain peak hours, if that ... if it turns out there's a desire to do that? Nagle -Gamin/ That's a great question and that's... certainly the technology exists, um, that is out there today, so that's certainly something that we could evaluate. I mean I think a lot of communities are looking at demand -based, um, parking pricing at different times of day. I mean the University does it at their ramp facilities. Um, so I think the technology exists and that's certainly something that we can look into. Teague/ Thank you so much! Knoche/ All right, we're into the home stretch. So these are projects on the on -the -radar section that... that are either in your unfunded or may not even show up in the budget book, um, but these are projects that we feel, um, you need to be aware of. Um, cause, uh, sooner or later, uh, they ...they may become a priority for us. So the first project is, uh, Burlington Street bridge replacement. Um, you may or may not be aware of the ... there's two bridges, uh, that ... that cross the Iowa River at Burlington Street. Um, the eastbound bridge is the City of Iowa City's and the westbound bridge is the DOTs. So, um, it's unique that ... that the City would own a facility on a State route, but in this case due to the age of that bridge, um, the DOT has generously left us in charge of that one. So, um, we have, uh, we ... we had a, um, the State had a grant program that they had applied for, uh, for some bridge, uh, funding. We had looked at that, uh, program. It ... it actually was a federal funding program. We had looked at that program for a ... a combined project at this location. Um, it was not eligible, um, but we still have interest with the DOT to look at combining these two bridges into one structure, um, and then with our help, of course, they would then take over, uh, the maintenance of that bridge, uh, in the future. Seydell-Johnson/ Okay, so we've talked bridges, sewers, all this great, fun ... I mean, it's stuff we all need, but let's go back to the fun stuff for a minute, the community engagement spaces. A couple of plans that we have out there that haven't been funded. One is the Lower City Park master plan. This was done in 2016. We do have a num... number of other projects happening in City Park, as you know, and those all support the concepts of this plan, um, but the overall plan to raise the roadway and provide some additional flooding protection has not been funded. Uh, the price tag was about 24... um, (mumbled) 24 million ... yeah 24 million, although some of that would be taken off with these other smaller projects that we've been doing, uh, with the shelters, the ball fields, um, the playground area. So that's out there. The next one is the aquatic facilities. We talked about this a little bit on Saturday with the recreation programming and facilities master plan to look at all three of the aquatic facilities, to determine the best path forward. Do we need three? Do we need different types? What are the needs and ... and the uses desired by our community and how does that reflect in the long-term maintenance and care of these facilities. Knoche/ Uh, future Public Works facility improvements, uh, as Darian had mentioned, we ... on our master plan, uh, we have for ...space for the transit facility. Um, along with that it would be a This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020. Page 37 joint maintenance facility that would go with that, so equipment and ... and transit would have a maintenance facility. As some of you are aware, we are in the process of potentially acquiring some additional land on the comer. Kum n' Go has made the decision that they are not going to pursue, um, a ..a facility there. So we're in the process of looking at that, but, you know, we, you know, it...it opens up some more space for us at that site. Uh, Iowa Avenue pedestrian bridge, so this project, uh, in 2003 we ... we did a, uh, experimental project here where we did a chloride extraction of the bridge deck, um, which worked fairly well for about the first 10 years, um, but it's in the process of deteriorating right now and so we're working with a bridge consultant to ... to do, uh... um, determination of, uh, what we need to do from a repair program on this, whether it's a total reconstruction. Um, this, uh, bridge is a joint facility. Um, the DOT and the University of Iowa and the City of Iowa City, uh, it's 50% DOT owned, 25% University owned, and 25% City owned. So it would be a joint project as we move forward on that. Seydell-Jobnson/ Eastside Sports is another master plan that was completed about four years ago on the east side, um, by the new Hoover Elementary School. The site is out there, uh, we've had the master plan in place. We had a group of...or we have a group of baseball and sports parents and the School District and others that, uh, Convention and Visitors Bureau still interested in this project. Um, so we've been doing some updating work on the master plan, but it is still one out ... that's out there to be funded. Teague/ All right, well thanks to all of the staff for, uh, walkin' us through the Capital Improvement projects, which there are many that we have to really consider for our community, so thank you for doing that. Any other comments for anyone out there? Taylor/ I just had a procedural question, Geoff. Uh, talking about, uh, all the Parks projects and some of 'em that have been continued from last year. Uh, what happens with a contractor that, uh, it's delayed, the finish time is delayed. Is there like a fee, a fine, and then where does that ... where do those funds go to then? Seydell-Johnson/ Yeah, we do have in the contract, we have liquidated damages if they don't meet certain conditions. It's a little more complicated than just a simple date because there's allowances for weather and unknown conditions or delays from our ...our design team or whatnot. So it's not always a clear-cut number of days, um, but the contractors are definitely aware of that in both of the projects that we have that are, um, delayed. Now I don't know where the funding would go... Knoche/ So with ... with our construction projects, you know, there ... there is a liquidated damages, um, clause that's in those. Um, the ... the cost to a contractor, you know, a per -day cost or, depending on how it works out. That's done as a change order on that contract. And so it just reduces the overall final cost of the project. It's ... they don't write us a check out for the—for those damages. It just ... it goes to the change order against the project and it reduces the final cost of the project. Taylor/ Thank you. Teague/ Great! Thank you all again. All right! This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council budget work session of January 7, 2020.