Name: Ames City Council
Uploaded: 2025-08-23T00:00:00Z
Duration: 2 h 18 min 24 s
Description: I know that many of the residents are concerned about the safety issues, and I suspect that there would be people who would be willing to help.

[2:20] We didn't call the regular meeting of the MCD council for Tuesday, April 8th to order. Welcome, everybody. And we've got a couple of proclamations. And then we have a presentation to make tonight.

[3:04] National Library a week. Whereas the libraries can spark creativity, fuel imagination, inspire lifelong learning and are where individuals of all ages can explore new ideas and be drawn to new possibilities. Libraries also serve as vibrant community hubs, connecting people with knowledge, technology and resources while fostering civic engagement.

[3:23] critical thinking and lifelong learning, and whereas libraries provide free and equitable

[3:28] access to books, digital tools, innovative programming, ensuring that all individuals,

[3:33] regardless of their background, have the support they need to learn, connect, and thrive,

[3:37] and whereas libraries empower job seekers, entrepreneurs, and lifelong learners by providing access

[3:43] to resources, training, and opportunities that support career growth and pursuit of economic

[3:48] success.

[3:49] us.

[3:49] And whereas libraries nurture young minds through story times, steam programs, literacy initiatives,

[3:55] fostering curiosity and a love of learning that lasts a lifetime.

[3:58] And whereas libraries support the right to rethink, explore without censorship, pursue

[4:03] intellectual freedom, and whereas dedicate librarians, staff, and volunteers create welcoming

[4:09] spaces that inspire discovery, collaboration, and creativity for all.

[4:13] And whereas libraries across the country are joined together this year to celebrate National

[4:17] library week. Under the theme, drawn to the library. Therefore, I, John A. Haylet,

[4:22] Mayor of the City of Ames, I want to hear by proclaim April 6th through 12th, 2025,

[4:27] as National Library Week. During this week, I encourage all residents to visit our wonderful

[4:32] Ames Public Library, explore its resources, and celebrate all the ways that the library

[4:37] helps strengthen and build the Ames community. That's my privilege to introduce Sheila Schoher.

[4:43] I'll let you go ahead and introduce your board members too, if you would.

[4:51] Well, thank you so much mayor for the strong proclamation.

[4:54] I'm joined tonight, I'm Sheila Schofer, the director of the library.

[4:57] I'm joined with two of our trustees, Rick Rieger.

[5:02] This year's theme is drawn to the library, and as we know that is certainly the case here in Ames, where the community continually shows its overwhelming support and high use of the library. We see close to a thousand people come into our doors every day, and they check out nearly 1 million items every year. Libraries offer so much for all members of the community, from babies to seniors and everyone in between. It's a place to learn and explore, find information

[5:29] and connect with other community members.

[5:33] At a time when access to information

[5:35] and intellectual freedom is being challenged

[5:37] in libraries, university, schools, newsrooms,

[5:40] having uncensored access to credible information

[5:43] and a place to dialogue and have conversations

[5:46] is more important than ever.

[5:48] We've got some great events planned

[5:50] coming up into the spring and summer,

[5:52] including a ribbon cutting tomorrow

[5:55] in a scavenger hunt with it at 4 p.m.

[5:58] to highlight our new carpet and some other fun areas of the library, so I encourage you

[6:01] to join us then.

[6:03] And I also encourage you to check out our page 1 newsletter to see upcoming events

[6:07] for all ages, and I'll call out one in particular our very popular repair cafe.

[6:14] That's coming up April 19th, so check us out and come enjoy your public library.

[6:19] All right.

[6:20] All

[6:43] right.

[6:44] Next I need Mike Vanessa to join me in Beth and Annabella.

[6:50] Hello.

[6:51] I

[6:58] think that one is next.

[7:01] We're standing just for the population.

[7:03] Yep.

[7:04] Yep.

[7:04] Okay.

[7:05] Very good.

[7:05] Oh, you're just being efficient.

[7:09] Let me come clear in a few minutes.

[7:13] Ames Story County Fair Housing Month.

[7:15] Whereas April is National Fair Housing Month.

[7:18] This year, we commemorate the fifth anniversary of the passage of the Fair Housing Act.

[7:23] The landmark civil rights law, Assembly of President Lyndon B. Johnson on April 11th, 1968,

[7:28] that made discrimination in housing transactions unlawful.

[7:31] The Fair Housing Act prohibits discrimination in housing because it raised color and

[7:36] national origin, religion, sex, including gender identity and sexual orientation, disability and familial status.

[7:42] Because during this time we want to celebrate the Fair Housing Act and recommit ourselves to ensuring every American has access to fair housing that is free from discrimination.

[7:51] And whereas this year's Fair Housing Month theme for Ames Droid County is fair for all, which reflects the commitment to advancing equity in housing and the importance of increasing public awareness of everyone's right to fair housing.

[8:03] And whereas the city of Ames prohibits discrimination in the areas of housing, education on employment, public accommodations or services, credit, sexual orientation, developmental disability, physical disability, gender, and gender identity.

[8:18] And whereas equality of opportunity for all is a fundamental policy of this nation, state, county, and our city, and that fair housing is a positive, community good.

[8:26] And whereas with the cooperation, commitment and support from the United States Department

[8:31] of Housing and Urban Development, City of Ames and Story County, the Ames Human Relations

[8:36] Commission and Central Iowa Board of Realtors, area housing providers, and all the residents

[8:41] of Ames and Story County, can bear years to the enjoyment of this and other aspects of

[8:45] the quality of opportunity for all to be removed.

[8:48] Therefore, I, John, and Hayland Mayor of the City of Ames, Iowa, to hear by proclaim the

[8:51] a month of April 2025 as Fair Housing Month and established Amesstory County as a welcoming

[8:57] community committed to fair housing encourage all residents of our community to support

[9:02] and endorse fair housing, reaffirm their commitment to fair housing for all and wholeheartedly recognize

[9:08] these rights and responsibilities throughout the year.

[9:11] And I'll turn it over to Vanessa and let her offer some comments and introductions.

[9:15] Thank you, ma'am.

[9:16] Good evening, and we're excited to continue to support fair housing in our community.

[9:24] And in partnership with the Central Iowa Board of Realtors and AMT Human Relations Commission,

[9:30] we have an event coming up.

[9:32] We'd like for you to mark your calendars for April 24th from 11 to 130 at the AMT Auditorium

[9:40] on 6th Street is going to be an exclusive screening of the award-winning film Divisible.

[9:49] And this feature film highlights Omaha, Nebraska to illustrate how redlining continually affects

[9:55] and harms people nationwide today.

[9:58] And then following them

[10:00] That film, we're going to have a panel discussion. We're also going to include free lunch. So, you have to register, either on the City of Ames website and also through our social media posts and through the Central Iowa Board of Real Tools posts. You'll need to sign up by next the Friday the 18th in order to get a lunch. And we're excited to have this screening offered here for Ames community to understand.

[10:29] and the impacts of redlining and other discrimination practices that happen in our own community.

[10:37] So with that, I'll let Beth come up and share anything she wants to share.

[10:41] Well, thank you, Mayor, for doing this proclamation for us.

[10:45] There you are behind me.

[10:47] I want to thank all of you for allowing us to be here.

[10:50] I am Beth Scluzacek.

[10:52] I am the Association Executive for the Central Iowa Board of Real Tours.

[10:57] We represent 13 counties and nearly 500 real tours here in Central Iowa.

[11:03] So, you are one of my bigger stops on my road path for fair housing this month.

[11:09] Doing proclamations all over because this is a very important topic for real tours.

[11:14] And unfortunately, there is still redlining and discrimination today.

[11:18] So, we are using this month to draw attention to that.

[11:21] And I am so proud of the partnership that we have developed with the city of Ames and

[11:25] Vanessa, because we are able to spread the word and get this out there to more people

[11:31] and allow our real-tor members also to educate our community.

[11:36] So I want to thank you all very much and I hope you join us on April 24th for this award

[11:42] winning film.

[11:43] Thank you so much.

[12:12] All right, and we have a annual presentation and I'll turn this over to the AIMS Human Relations

[12:18] Commission.

[12:18] Good

[12:26] evening, everyone.

[12:27] My name is Anna Balmer, because I'm the Vice Chair of the Ames Human Relations Commission.

[12:33] It is my honor to present the 2025 Home for Everyone Award.

[12:37] This award recognizes an honors and individual or an organization that has made an exemplary

[12:43] commitment to providing safe, quality, and equitable housing opportunities that enhance the quality

[12:49] of life of members of the dissipated populations.

[12:51] This year's recipient is Kathy Pinkerton, who is the service center administrator for the

[12:57] SIT Salvation Army of Ames.

[13:00] The nomination described Kathy as an individual who serves the most vulnerable of our community

[13:06] every single day, and as someone who treats people of kindness, dignity and respect.

[13:13] On a day-to-day basis, Kathy provides rent and utility assistance by helping people keep

[13:19] their homes.

[13:19] She also secures funding for emergency shelter and secures funding for hotel rooms.

[13:27] In February and January of this year, Kathy went above and beyond to get more than 20

[13:32] households, about 35 people, sheltered during the extreme cold week experience.

[13:37] Kathy is also a member of the Homelessness Outreach Support Team.

[13:41] Please join me in congratulating Kathy Pinkerton as the recipient of the 2025 A Home for

[13:47] Everyone Award.

[13:47] Thank

[14:08] you. I was very surprised when I was told that I was getting this. I've been a social worker for over 30 years and helping people get housing has always been a priority and we definitely have seen some issues in Story County and aim specifically this year.

[14:26] And I guess I'm just very thrilled to be able to provide these services to our folks in names and Story County. So thank you.

[15:28] consent, agenda, is there any item that council would like to pull tonight from consent?

[15:37] Hearing none, introduce, entertain any motion to approve consent.

[15:42] Move consent, second. Thank you, roll call. Aye. Aye.

[15:47] Aye.

[15:48] I.

[15:49] Aye.

[15:50] I.

[15:51] I.

[15:55] Thank you.

[15:55] Move on to public forum.

[15:58] This is time we set aside for comments from the public on topics of city business other than

[16:02] all listed on the agenda.

[16:05] Ask people to limit their comments to three minutes or less if they could.

[16:09] So we'll open that up.

[16:10] Is anyone that wants to address council under public forum?

[16:16] Seeing none, we'll close public forum.

[16:18] Move on.

[16:19] I'm sorry.

[16:20] Please.

[16:24] This is the time.

[16:25] I'm supposed to come up.

[16:26] If it's are you is it anything it's on the agenda? Yes. Okay. What's number are you interested in?

[16:32] I'm sure you get called it is number 36 on the police. All right. We will make sure we call you up, sir

[16:37] Okay, yep, you bet. Thank you.

[16:41] Sorry. I wasn't very clear. Anything. It's not on the agenda

[16:45] All right, we'll move on with close public form and we'll move on. I number 34

[17:03] Good evening mayor and council

[17:05] We're here tonight to discuss

[17:08] the acceptance of

[17:10] the guiding vision for

[17:13] the downtown area. This is an effort that's been undertaken by downtown Ames and businesses

[17:19] and organizers within the downtown area alongside the city over the past several years.

[17:25] And it culminated with a draft report being presented to the City Council on February 18th.

[17:31] At that time, there was a lot of information to digest about the vision that was offered up

[17:37] through that document for what downtown may aspire to become.

[17:44] I think it's important to recognize a couple of components to this.

[17:48] One is that it is not necessarily a rigid blueprint or plan that will dictate that downtown

[17:56] will become those things that are described in the document.

[18:01] But it is intended to offer up a variety of ideas that could be individually pursued if the

[18:06] City Council, either as it exists today or as it might exist in the future, is interested

[18:12] in pursuing those ideas. Additionally, it offers up a variety of action steps that could

[18:17] be undertaken by Ames Main Street and other partners in the downtown area. So tonight,

[18:24] we are asking for two actions. One is to simply accept the document which would then allow

[18:34] the second component to move forward, which would be to take the short-term actions that

[18:40] are described in the plan and begin putting some more firm information behind those actions.

[18:51] The Council Action Forum suggests that there are a couple of different ways to do this.

[18:56] I think there's another alternative that has been identified as well.

[19:00] So, this could be accomplished either through joint effort between Ames Main Street and the City to develop an implementation task force.

[19:13] It could be accomplished separately with each of those partners.

[19:18] Ames Main Street focusing on its implementation steps and the City focusing on its implementation steps.

[19:23] or the third idea, which I think was suggested earlier today or yesterday, which would be to allow Ames Main Street to work on identifying across all of the potential implementation tasks, which are the ones that are most critical to pursue earlier on.

[19:43] So it will be up to each of those groups, the City Council and Ames Main Street,

[19:49] to once those suggestions are received, make the decisions about how to prioritize and how to

[19:57] finance if necessary and adopt a policy.

[20:05] So, I'm happy to answer any questions that you might have, and unless Kelly has anything. Okay,

[20:12] Kelly does not. All right, thank you. Questions or comments?

[20:25] Okay, let's do this one more time. So the three options. So, step one is, right, accept

[20:31] the plan. Yeah, if that's easy. Step two is for pursuing the implementation.

[20:37] Okay. Do you want to ask Ames Main Street to lead that effort for all of the tasks?

[20:44] Do you want to have a joint implementation task force which would involve both city,

[20:56] staff, downtown businesses, perhaps an elected official and official remain as Main Street?

[21:04] or do you want to suggest that Ames Main Street prioritize its tasks and the city prioritize its tasks?

[21:12] Independent of one another.

[21:13] All right,

[21:16] so Brian, there's some implications for those three that we should be considering.

[21:26] So one thing to keep in mind is that if it's our belief that if there is a task force that's

[21:34] convened by the City Council or by the mayor or so those latter two options that were described.

[21:42] We believe that that would constitute formal advisory board under state law and so that

[21:52] would mean that there would have to be agendas, minutes, it would have to be noticed in advance

[22:00] of the discussions. Ultimately, regardless of which path is chosen, it will be up to the council

[22:11] to decide whether and how to agree to adopt those recommendations and the same for Ames Main Street.

[22:21] So, regardless of how it's structured, I think the outcome is pretty similar. It's just the level of

[22:26] formality that you want to have for, you know, for the purposes of agendas and

[22:34] minutes and formal meetings, things of that nature.

[22:40] That's a good question, I think, not I think.

[22:44] At the end of the workshop, we talked about the fact that we want to not just put

[22:49] this on the shelf, but we want to decide what would be some of the next steps we can do.

[22:56] And so I think it was commented that an option would be is just having like a working group

[23:03] to kind of help provide some feedback and that document has 15, 20, 25 different suggested

[23:13] options that could be considered for both Main Street and also the city.

[23:17] and so in lieu of trying to have those done independently and certainly some

[23:27] decisions the city might make would might impact you know main street or

[23:31] downtown and vice versa. I think the idea was that all you want to do is try and

[23:35] prioritize them and then bring those back to effective bodies. There's no

[23:42] authority vested in any of them. There's no decision making from a standpoint of

[23:46] Hey, we're going to go ahead and do this.

[23:48] It's really primarily just a collating and then looking at what some low hanging fruit will be a some maybe one to two year.

[23:57] Things they could work on and where some things that are, you know, longer term.

[24:01] And then it would come back to council who would go to the Ames Main Street board.

[24:07] Independently, they make their decisions and then maybe council says, Hey, no, we don't like this.

[24:12] That's completely under their preview.

[24:14] It's just someone needs to help kind of put it together and they just kind of get a little

[24:23] of a schedule put together.

[24:24] So really it's kind of a strategic short term from the standpoint initially.

[24:29] Council makes a decision, hopefully it's going to be used looking at for CIP in the years

[24:34] ahead.

[24:35] But yeah, because of the tool essentially, I don't think we're going to overdo it or overblow

[24:40] it to the point that it's like, oh my gosh, what's going on behind closed doors, that

[24:45] nothing further than the truth is going to be all done transparently. And more or less

[24:50] as a service to both entities, and I think that by Ames Main Street is on a fantastic

[25:00] I've taken the lead on this whole development of this guiding vision. And to me, just makes complete sense for them to go ahead and, you know, propose a task force. And I think if I would bring a variety of people who are stakeholders, people may have been part of that process. And again, they're not going to be adding projects. It's just more or less taking what's suggested. Oh, they may have a few suggestions. And what I'm excited about is that we've already, you've already approved.

[25:29] The first low-hanging fruit, and that's 515 days, which happens next month, and we're

[25:33] going to see the start of using Burnett and Fifth Street, part history for the 515 days.

[25:44] And so I think it's just trying to show that this is part of one of the things that can

[25:48] be done, so I think it's really more or less just the reason it's accepting is that it's

[25:56] taking under advisement, it's not adopting it saying hey this is definitely we're going to do all these things because really is it's a vision, it's not designed to be like as Brian said, okay, we're going to be doing this this and this for sure, there's a lot of public input that's still not needed on each individual project.

[26:13] So, that's really kind of, you know, and my suggestion to, you know, Council is both accepting

[26:21] the document and I just asked Anne's Ministry to convene an implementation, you know, task

[26:28] force to review and prioritize what's in the task within the guiding document.

[26:34] And then I'll come back and then they can even be a reader of process where you might have

[26:37] some, you know, feedback as well, too.

[26:39] So it's a working document and I think it's just going to continue what already has been, I think, a fantastic joint effort.

[26:50] But thankfully, Angis Mainstreet agreed to take the lead and I've done a fantastic job.

[26:55] That's kind of the genesis of that.

[26:57] I move we accept the document and that we direct Ames Main Street to start a task force

[27:08] on prioritizing initial first steps.

[27:11] All right.

[27:12] Second.

[27:13] All right.

[27:13] Any discussion?

[27:15] No.

[27:16] I like to what you said.

[27:17] I really appreciate the work that Ames Main Street and everyone who's been involved in this

[27:23] visioning plan has done and I'm excited to see where we go with them.

[27:27] One thing that I would say is as I look at the the short-term actions that the

[27:33] city could be working on, there may be things on that list that we would be

[27:37] interested in looking at anyway. Something, for example, like reviewing the use of

[27:43] TIFF for redevelopment. I could see that coming up outside of the scope of this

[27:47] plan and so I would hope that we would let the task force know if there were any things

[27:54] that we identified that we were planning to do anyway.

[27:58] Absolutely.

[27:59] And they've undertaken significant efforts and the planters are ready, there's things

[28:04] that can be done that's finally, you know, upgrade the parents to the, you know, Main Street.

[28:09] So I'm excited about the thing that is really something which is an actionable document.

[28:16] and there's gonna be some things that we can do

[28:20] and see quick input or quick impact

[28:23] as we think it will take some long time, so.

[28:25] Mayor, I just wanna note one thing we added

[28:28] to this report was an attachment

[28:29] to kind of help give some context.

[28:31] The future decisions was the list of CIP projects

[28:34] that we have and other things that are happening.

[28:37] So you can see like the next project the city has planned

[28:40] is the reconstruction of Sixth Street in two years.

[28:42] So if there's an implementation measure about Sixth Street,

[28:44] maybe it should be sooner rather than later thank you so that was the help

[28:48] whoever the group is that's looking at it that gives a little baseline

[28:51] information for you and it's not just trying to figure out what we might be doing.

[28:56] I would be curious to know if Ames Mainstery Group has an interest from us. I mean

[29:02] there are things that you would want to hear from us as a way of setting this

[29:08] thing forward in the next step. I don't know if anyone's going to speak

[29:11] tonight mayor but wasn't playing on it if we're going to open a public input I

[29:17] mean we can do that what's the question well I mean is there anything in

[29:21] particular they would like to hear from us I mean we had a pretty robust

[29:25] discussion in February and maybe that's sufficient but if in the interim period

[29:31] there have been some ideas that have been proposed they would like to hear from us

[29:35] seemed like now would be a good time to start weighing on some of those public input

[29:40] But Travis, do you want to have a conversation back and forth between the days and the podium?

[29:46] But certainly, do you understand the question that he's asking?

[29:49] I do.

[29:50] Yeah, thanks.

[29:51] Thank you.

[29:52] Travis Oliver, Ames of Main Street, and the Alliance.

[29:56] Yeah, so definitely, I would imagine this task was-

[30:00] Members being a combination of downtown stakeholders and city staff and wanted to make sure that we're keeping the lines of communication open with council and maybe even doing quarterly updates, via annual updates, whatever the frequency is determined, but always keeping everybody both city and downtown stakeholders in communication and in the loop. I think that's important. So if you identify anything that we need your feedback on or vice versa, we definitely want to work together to make sure that all those

[30:29] things are accomplished.

[30:31] Yeah, cool.

[30:31] Thanks.

[30:32] Thank you for your question.

[30:33] Yeah.

[30:33] I mean, and that's helpful just the idea that there would be some kind of expectation of

[30:36] communication.

[30:38] I think the community's really sort of excited about seeing projects go forward and having an expectation

[30:43] and I'll let you guys sort of figure out the frequency.

[30:46] I think it's an important part of that.

[30:48] Yeah, absolutely.

[30:49] You're welcome.

[30:51] All right.

[30:51] Since we've opened a public comment, is anyone else want to address counsel on this topic tonight?

[31:19] All right.

[31:20] I would like to speak on behalf of the AIMS Main Street Board, which I share.

[31:25] We are a group of volunteers consisting of downtown business owners, employees, downtown

[31:30] visitors, and others who share a love of downtown AIMS, and we desire to see it thrive.

[31:36] As invested community members, we've worked very hard over the past several years to

[31:40] arrive where we are tonight with this guiding vision document in hand asking you to accept it.

[31:46] We are committed to the next phase, its implementation, and we are committed to this for the long haul.

[31:52] We have been and will continue to do the work.

[31:56] We're committed because what downtown means to each of us individually.

[32:00] And we're committed to this because we see day in and day out how special our district is.

[32:04] It's a place which fosters creativity, entrepreneurship, and above all community.

[32:10] It's worthy of this vision's scope and goals.

[32:13] and I want to thank you Mayor Hayla and Council members for the support you've

[32:17] shown downtown Ames. We look forward to working with you, all of you, to make

[32:22] this vision a reality. And the next I like to speak to you as myself, as an

[32:28] almost lifelong Ames resident. So when you grew up here and decided to stay and

[32:32] raise a family here and invest in my community by opening a small business

[32:36] downtown. When my business partner and I decided to open a bookstore, we didn't

[32:41] even consider a location other than downtown. Contrary to popular belief, independent bookstores

[32:47] are thriving, despite being unable to compete with giants like Amazon, Target, and other

[32:52] big box stores, especially when it comes to pricing. What sets indie bookstores apart

[32:58] and what their success can be credited to is their engagement with the communities that they serve.

[33:03] For many bookstores are a third place, somewhere they can gather, find meaningful connection

[33:08] and feel safe. When we decided to open doggered books downtown Ames was the only location we considered.

[33:15] That's because downtown is already a third place. Our seller public library, the farmer's market,

[33:21] the octagon, history museum, all the unique restaurants and stores owned and operated by local folks

[33:28] have created an environment where Ames citizens can come not just to shot but to be in community.

[33:34] This should be evident to anyone who has ever spent time downtown.

[33:37] I ask you to accept this vision, not for the sake of development and growth itself or for what it might mean personally for my business.

[33:46] I ask you to accept this vision because our community, the Ames community, is so deserving of that investment in such a cherished third place.

[33:55] Thank you.

[33:55] Thank you very much.

[34:06] We have a lot of time and effort into downtown we appreciate that very much and you have vested interest as well so thank you all right there's been a motion made and seconded there's a favor the motion please say aye.

[34:28] Aye.

[34:35] Amrit, can you hear?

[34:37] I did.

[34:38] I think it just cut off.

[34:39] I put two two.

[34:40] Okay.

[34:41] All right.

[34:41] Thank you.

[34:42] All right.

[34:43] Any opposed?

[34:43] I'm saying.

[34:45] Motion carried.

[34:47] Thank you very much.

[34:48] Thank you.

[34:48] You'll move on to item number 35.

[35:02] Good evening, Keith. Good evening, mayor and city council. Here tonight to talk about mini-pitch naming. And if you haven't been by Lloyd Kurtz Park recently, you should go by a lot of activity. And right now we're pretty much on schedule would be done by some time in May, May 31st at the latest for that to be operational. So if you remember back in November of 2024, council directed staff to

[35:32] to when we were talking about the mini pitch and the cost of the project to look at maybe

[35:38] soliciting donations to offset the financial contribution from the city.

[35:44] So staff did put some information together.

[35:47] We sent it out to 156 businesses.

[35:50] And what we did is we gave them options, which are in the council action form naming rights

[35:57] for 50,000 baner sponsors, bench sponsors, and indonations.

[36:02] So out of those letters that we sent out,

[36:05] we did get three businesses that committed to being a bench sponsor

[36:10] that's Central State Bank, DrainTech, and Greater Iowa Credit Union.

[36:14] And we thank them for their support.

[36:17] And for anybody that's listening, if somebody is interested,

[36:21] there are additional benches that somebody could sponsor as well.

[36:26] But through this we also did staff did receive interest from Curtin Cindy Friedrich.

[36:33] Curt is owner of Friedrich Realty, Ben and Business since 1927.

[36:38] But they had interest in the naming rights for the mini-pitch.

[36:43] And through several conversations they have pledged $50,000 for the mini-pitch naming rights.

[36:50] Now Parks and Recreation does have a naming policy and I'm not going to go through

[36:55] to all of the details, but one of the categories that people

[37:01] could be named for is a major donation, which is what this

[37:06] would fall under, and we do have parks, we have facilities.

[37:12] This would be considered a major feature within the park.

[37:16] They have requested, if council approves, to have the mini-pitch

[37:22] named the Friedrich pitch and with it Parks and Recreation did go through the myself as director went through the application and made a recommendation to the Parks and Recreation Commission, which is part of the policy Parks and Recreation Commission did approve 50 to recommend City Council approve the naming of the mini pitch.

[37:50] and that was done at their March 27th meeting.

[37:55] So with that, managers' recommendation is alternative one,

[37:59] which is to approve the request,

[38:01] the name of the mini-pitch located in Lloyd Kurtz Park,

[38:04] the Friedrich pitch.

[38:06] Kurt and Cindy are, they have a good moral character

[38:10] while respected within the city of Ames.

[38:14] City Council does have, at its discretion,

[38:17] can choose what dollar amount is worthy of naming or naming rights.

[38:25] So, again, manager's recommendation is to go with alternative number one.

[38:31] I do just want to, in closing, Kurt did send me a short little reason

[38:38] in addition to what's on the naming application.

[38:42] He just says, we and our team at Friedrich are happy to be part of bringing this cool venue to town.

[38:48] We spent a little time on pitches around the Midwest.

[38:51] All our girls were ballers.

[38:53] It's a great sport, a healthy activity for kids and families to enjoy.

[38:57] Maybe we'll have some pickleball too.

[38:59] I already told them that we weren't going to do that at this point.

[39:04] But he said, aims is a special place.

[39:06] We want future generations to think so too.

[39:08] So with that, I would ask if there's any questions.

[39:13] Thank you, Keith. Any questions?

[39:16] Keith, do you have a projected date where we hope to cut the ribbon?

[39:22] Yeah, I would look at probably the first part of June.

[39:26] Oh.

[39:26] It is where we do the project itself should be done.

[39:30] Contractor has a May 31st deadline.

[39:33] They're moving along pretty quick.

[39:35] They've already poured the pitch. It needs the cure for 21 days before it can do the acrylic and then they'll do the fencing and the lighting

[39:43] So I think they're they're well on schedule for forgetting that accomplished so probably first part of June great

[39:50] Right open a public comment is anyone wants to dress counsel on this topic tonight?

[39:58] seen

[40:00] Close public comment and before, is there a motion with approval of option one, second, which is naming it the Friedrich pitch. Yes. All right. Roll call. Beaty Hansen, aye, Rollins, aye, Cory Erie, aye, Garton, aye, Joan, aye, Betcher, aye. Thank you. And I would like to express on behalf of city council and the city aims are incredible appreciation to current

[40:30] and Cindy for their generosity and it's a wonderful gift for a project which

[40:37] is going to be well used and I think, I'm sure I heard you say that I think they

[40:40] also indicated that their kids played soccer a lot and this is

[40:43] a good thing.

[40:45] So anyway.

[40:46] All right.

[40:47] All right.

[40:48] Thank you much.

[40:48] Have a great night.

[40:49] Thanks, you too.

[40:51] Move on.

[40:51] I know with 36.

[41:05] Good evening.

[41:05] You have a memo in front of you for our liquor license renewals.

[41:10] Three of the renewals on the memo, there's no problem.

[41:14] They haven't had any violations in the past 12 months,

[41:17] and we recommend renewal of those licenses.

[41:21] However, there is one on the list

[41:22] that we have encountered a problem with,

[41:25] and that would be perfect games located

[41:28] at 13, 20 Dickinson Avenue.

[41:31] The Iowa Department of Revenue has already denied

[41:34] the application for a liquor license renewal,

[41:39] And the reason given was the failure of the majority owner of record Carl Markley to meet the standards of good moral character and their letter to the business.

[41:51] They said a person of good moral character is one who has such financial standing and good reputation as will satisfy the director.

[41:58] And the person will comply with all the laws, ordinances and regulations applicable to the person's operations.

[42:07] On March 24th, 2025, the United States District Court for the Southern District of Iowa entered a judgment,

[42:14] guilty plea to 15 counts of sex trafficking by fraud and coercion on Mr. Markley.

[42:20] That is the reason for their denial, and that is the same reason that we would recommend denying the renewal application.

[42:28] It is worth noting that you cannot override the Iowa Department of Revenue's decision to deny the application.

[42:37] So that's this memo.

[42:40] Thank you.

[42:41] Questions?

[42:43] So, maybe there's a mark question.

[42:45] Do we even have jurisdiction to even vote on this?

[42:50] I mean, hasn't it been resolved by the state?

[42:54] No, I'm sorry.

[43:04] Well, I don't think it takes away our jurisdiction by the state doing this, but the state has already ruled on it.

[43:12] So, really, the council doesn't have much choice but to deny it if you were to approve it, it would be meaningless.

[43:25] So, yeah, I mean, it's still in front of you, there's still an active application.

[43:30] So I think, you know, the council, it's still appropriate for the council to take action on it, and, you know, unless it's withdrawn by, you know, by the business.

[43:46] Other questions?

[43:48] Chief, and maybe Mark, I'm not sure.

[43:50] If the reason behind this is the ownership of the property and the question of the owner's moral standing.

[44:02] If he were to sell that property, transfer the property to another family member or something like that, could this property reapply?

[44:11] Or is this a denial for the property for a certain number of years?

[44:18] So if a different applicant came forward that didn't have those issues and met all the other requirements then yes, a different liquor license could be approved for that location.

[44:33] And I might add this is not a revocation. A revocation has impact on how long you can at that location you could get a license.

[44:44] So that's not the case here, it's simply denial of a renewal application.

[44:50] Okay, thank you.

[44:51] Any other questions?

[44:54] All right, open the public comment and you are welcome to introduce yourself and begin.

[45:04] My name is Kelly McPartlin, and I am one of the owners of Perfect Games and the manager at Perfect Games. And I'm here to date a request that the city council not take action at this point. We have just entered an appeal or entering an appeal with the Iowa ADP. We just got their notification Friday of the denial of our renewal. And the reason why we have not renewed or we have not removed Carl Markley as an owner is we're under our court order right now.

[45:34] to not remove him, in order which we agreed to voluntarily with the one of the plaintiffs in a lawsuit against him and his businesses.

[45:44] We nothing more than we want to do than remove him from our ownership group and unfortunately right now we can.

[45:52] But we have just entered the appeal process and we just asked that the City Council.

[45:57] I know we've talked to the IWA ADB and they said it doesn't really matter since they've not approved it.

[46:04] Your actions, but we're asking that you wait until we get through the appeal process before you make a vote.

[46:12] Thank you.

[46:13] There's any questions I can answer.

[46:15] Anybody would have questions, but be happy to answer anything.

[46:18] Yeah, usually you can, you're willing to give your feedback, but it's not a back and forth.

[46:23] Anyway, thank you.

[46:24] Thank you.

[46:25] Anybody else want to address council on this topic tonight?

[46:31] Seeing none, we'll close public input.

[46:33] Chief or Mark, do you have any comment on his comment?

[46:40] I mean in terms of the appeal or I think what we heard you say was that it was denied

[46:51] they can once it's different ownership they can reapply.

[46:55] Is that correct?

[46:55] That's correct.

[46:56] And there's no title limit.

[46:58] It was like a six month or three month.

[46:59] Right.

[47:00] It could be the next day once the ownership changes initially by ownership changes next week, they can come back and reapply.

[47:09] Could you clarify? I'm confused on this timing of things. So is there a valid liquor license there today?

[47:21] Yes.

[47:21] and so this isn't a renewal that would begin when?

[47:32] I don't think I have the date in front of me

[47:34] for the renewal.

[47:35] Usually it will be a day.

[47:37] It should have been approved.

[47:38] Our House will prove that April 10th of last year.

[47:41] So, two days.

[47:43] If I may, their license is valid until May 12th.

[47:47] May 12th?

[47:48] Yep, we put licenses on several weeks ahead

[47:51] of their expiration date in case there's any administrative

[47:55] of things that come up that need to work through our process.

[47:58] Thank you.

[48:01] And so this is a very difficult situation for a business like Perfect Games.

[48:08] And I would like to try to brainstorm about ways in which we can be accommodating

[48:16] and still be in compliance with the Department of Revenue.

[48:20] And so the proposal for Mr. MacPartlin,

[48:25] And if I understand it correctly, is that we would simply delay taking action, but isn't

[48:35] the effect of that, then the liquor license will then expire as of, and thanks for clarifying

[48:42] this May 12th, am I saying that correctly?

[48:45] Because then the chronology is important.

[48:47] That's true.

[48:48] Yes.

[48:48] And so,

[48:52] I don't know what the appeal process is, but best case scenario, worst case scenario,

[48:58] what would happen to the business' ability to serve alcohol there?

[49:05] Do you have a sense of the timing?

[49:10] Well, while they're on appeal, they can continue to sell alcohol and, you know,

[49:17] throughout that appeal process.

[49:19] We've seen that with other businesses in the past.

[49:23] So it won't be immediate that they'll be unable to sell alcohol.

[49:31] That will be some time after that.

[49:34] I presume they have legal counsel and they're maybe figuring out ways to,

[49:47] and

[49:48] list of owners so you know during the appeal process then the time that takes

[49:54] and it takes some time you know they'll be able to continue to sell outhaul.

[50:00] And so the appeal and essence buys them some time. They can continue operations and then they can leverage that time to try to change the ownership structure. And then they could come, then they could come back and make an application. Is that my saying that correctly? If they have changed the ownership structure and that one individual is no longer an owner, they can come back and reapply. I mean, they can come back at any time and reapply. But

[50:29] you know, they're going to get denied if that person is still an owner, but once

[50:32] that person's not an owner, they can come back and apply it any time. Okay. All right. Thanks. So now I need clarification.

[50:43] If the license is going to expire on May 12th, that appeal does not extend the license, doesn't?

[50:54] Wouldn't the last years expire?

[50:56] Yeah, it effectively does because it is, I mean, it doesn't directly but in effect it does because

[51:04] they're allowed to continue to sell alcohol while the appeal process is going on.

[51:10] So that, you know, that effectively extends the expiration date of the liquor license.

[51:21] So, it actually adds to the license.

[51:26] Yeah, effectively.

[51:27] Okay.

[51:28] Effectively.

[51:29] Not technically, but effectively.

[51:31] It will.

[51:32] And that's happened on several occasions over the last years where this council has denied renewal.

[51:40] It's been appealed.

[51:41] Right.

[51:42] It's similar to that process when you revoke.

[51:44] Right.

[51:44] And it continues to be, the point is, is that, and then they end up selling the company

[51:50] if somebody else, and then it was approved.

[51:54] So the point is, is that, but in this case, ABD has taken a position first, denied it,

[52:02] and so really, it just seems that.

[52:04] This is a little bit backwards from what usually happens.

[52:07] It's usually a denial in our part, then it goes to ABD, and this just happened to work in

[52:12] reverse.

[52:13] Yeah.

[52:14] So could you just comment on this may call for speculation

[52:18] if you say you just don't want to, that's fine.

[52:22] But there's some times when we have denied something

[52:24] and we've QEK with ABD, what kind of message might it send

[52:28] to ABD if the council would say, no,

[52:31] we're gonna go ahead and approve it or try and,

[52:34] I'm just trying to think there's a tight partnership

[52:36] that exists because we want to try and work together.

[52:40] Is there any kind of comment?

[52:41] And if you don't want to comment, I accept that, but I'm concerned about making sure

[52:48] we maintain the council maintains in his positive relationship, AEDA.

[52:54] But we should just go ahead and make the motion to deny that we're not, I mean, we're not,

[53:00] I would move that we move to deny the renewal of perfect games liquor license.

[53:07] Second.

[53:08] Right?

[53:09] I mean, we've heard all you have to do is come back and reapply.

[53:13] I understand your situation, sorry, you know, but I think there's no question that we

[53:18] would do this.

[53:19] There's also three other licenses.

[53:21] Oh, I would.

[53:22] Well, let's take this one.

[53:24] I want to take it.

[53:25] Yeah.

[53:25] Yeah, we'll do it.

[53:26] We'll catch you.

[53:27] Thank you.

[53:27] Good call.

[53:28] I believe them.

[53:29] I don't want to miss them.

[53:30] So it's an emotion made in the new perfect game is 1320 Dickinson Avenue's Class C retail

[53:37] I'll call a license with Katie and privilege and outdoor service pending.

[53:41] Graham shall review.

[53:44] Roll call.

[53:46] Rollins.

[53:47] Aye.

[53:47] Corey Erie.

[53:49] Aye.

[53:50] Garton.

[53:50] Aye.

[53:51] Junk.

[53:51] Aye.

[53:51] Betcher.

[53:52] Aye.

[53:52] VD Hanson.

[53:53] Aye.

[53:54] I would move that we approve the liquor license.

[54:00] Renewals for law F. I be fast and fresh at six thirty six.

[54:04] and the Cyclone Experience Network.

[54:07] Second.

[54:08] Thank you.

[54:09] Roll call.

[54:11] Coriary.

[54:12] Hi.

[54:13] Garton.

[54:13] Hi.

[54:14] Junk.

[54:14] Hi.

[54:15] Betcher.

[54:15] Hi.

[54:16] Vity Hansen.

[54:16] Hi.

[54:17] Rollins.

[54:17] Hi.

[54:19] Very good.

[54:20] Thank you very much.

[54:22] We're on under 37.

[54:23] Resolution authorizing immediate towing and weekly park vehicles on Saturday, August 23rd, 2025.

[54:29] Chief.

[54:29] You get me again, so you know, in July of 2022, we approved an ordinance to allow for

[54:38] the immediate towing of illegally parked vehicles when authorized by city council resolution.

[54:43] We have used this particular tool three times in the past during cyclone welcome weekend

[54:49] or what is also known as ADA one day or the Saturday for classes begin.

[54:53] and it's been pretty successful since we started.

[55:00] In this new process, we noticed fewer illegally parked vehicles in that area during this event. It did allow for our emergency vehicles to get through those streets easier. Prior to that time, vehicles parked on both sides of the street made it hard to get vehicles and ambulance a fire truck through. So this has really helped a lot. I think the only difference this year versus the past three years is there's going to be a football game on that.

[55:29] Saturday as well.

[55:31] It won't be here in Ames, it'll be in Dublin, Ireland,

[55:34] but that puts a little wrinkle in 801 day for us

[55:39] because we have not had that dynamic

[55:41] of having the event and a football game at the same time.

[55:45] So it's hard for us to predict what changes that may have.

[55:49] Our concern is it actually may bring more people in

[55:53] because there'll be a reason beyond just that day

[55:56] to watch the football game.

[55:58] We anticipate that the game will be in the morning, our time, so we expect that that game will be occurring during the same time that we've had issues in the past and so we would ask for authorization by resolution again to authorize the immediate tone of illegally parked vehicles.

[56:18] questions. Can you remind us again how you notify people that the immediate

[56:26] telling is in effect for those areas? Yep so we will to the extent we can do

[56:32] the door-to-door campaign that we've done in the past. We do some emails, we

[56:37] notify the apartment managers and owners who then we ask them to forward that

[56:42] message on to the people that rent from them, so the university and the city will publicize this.

[56:50] We put up the electric message signs when they're available, if they're not used for construction in those areas.

[56:56] And we will, to the extent, again, we can put up the line green sign, warning signs, that we put up the last three year.

[57:03] Staffings a little bit tight, so we may not see quite as many as we used to see, but we'll do what we can to try and

[57:10] get as many of those put up in the area to give notification.

[57:14] In the past three years, I didn't mention this.

[57:17] We talked about 30 vehicles each of those years.

[57:20] So that's staying, it remained pretty stable.

[57:25] Other questions?

[57:26] Remind us again, why we have this on this weekend and

[57:33] not weekends where we have home football games where arguably we have

[57:38] 10 times more people in the community.

[57:41] Why here? I can just remind us.

[57:44] Yeah, there's a couple of things.

[57:46] One, it makes it hard to get around, which can be the same case on like football game days.

[57:53] However, we do have the enhanced penalty for game day parking on those Saturdays.

[57:59] So there's an increased fine for illegal parking during those days.

[58:03] So that's a tool that we use during those that we don't do the immediate towing for.

[58:08] And honestly, when you have vehicles parked on both sides of the street,

[58:13] it creates almost a natural fence, where people sort of hide behind that.

[58:19] And when you open those streets up, it's easier for us to see what's going on.

[58:22] It's easier for other drivers to see the roadway.

[58:26] And so I think it's a good tool to combat some of those issues.

[58:32] So we're going to make a decision to, and when I voted in favor of this in the prior years,

[58:39] but we're treating this weekend, we're treating drivers differently on this particular weekend differently

[58:47] than weekends where we have more cars there because it's your opinion to us that there's a public safety benefit.

[58:55] I just want to make sure I'm saying that back accurately, is that correct?

[58:58] That is true and this this event pushes vehicles further west then we see during like football game day

[59:06] Okay, where people are utilizing other parking closer to the stadium paid lots those kind of things. So this really does

[59:14] Effect more of that west area of town than even a football game can in some cases

[59:20] Maybe not the Iowa game when it's here, but certainly the other games

[59:25] Is there any effort to try to communicate to drivers of alternative parking spaces, parking places, so that they wouldn't be subject to this immediate telling?

[59:37] Yeah, so the university does publicize the lots that they have that can be parked in.

[59:45] Really what we're trying to combat here is people that come to Ames that are not students.

[59:51] just for that day that don't really have any connection to our community, don't

[59:55] really care what happens on Sunday when they leave. It's kind of going back to

[1:00:00] Visha mentality, where this event has grown, where people come in from out of town just to party with no ties to our community. And so part of the reasoning behind this is to try and discourage people from coming to town just for drinking parties. Because that's what this event really has turned into. It's just one giant drinking party.

[1:00:24] Okay.

[1:00:26] Chief, I notice that there's a note saying that staff will attempt to install the signs

[1:00:33] again this year but may not be able to commit to the same level of sign coverage.

[1:00:39] I'm wondering if it might be worth it if you are sending out emails to neighborhood associations

[1:00:45] to enlist their assistance in putting up signs.

[1:00:48] We had good luck with no parking signs in the past.

[1:00:52] I don't know how much is involved in putting up the green signs, but-

[1:00:57] These are attached to the actual no parking, they're not like in the yard, because we are attempting to keep them from getting stolen, so we can use them from one year to the next, and we've actually had pretty good luck recovering most of them from year to year, but we can certainly look into that.

[1:01:13] I know that many of the residents are concerned about the safety issues, and I suspect that there would be people who would be willing to help.

[1:01:24] Sure.

[1:01:25] And part of it's just an unknown.

[1:01:27] We know we've got some shortages right now.

[1:01:29] Our parking division has some shortages where they normally help and we're not sure streets and public works.

[1:01:35] We just don't know exactly where their staffing will be, so we don't want to commit fully to what we've done in the past, but our intent is to do as much of it as we can, and it may be just as much as we've always done.

[1:01:46] And I can't find it now, but it seemed like the form here led me to believe that some of the senior administration from Iowa State was not going to be around because of the football game.

[1:02:03] So I'm just wondering how that might be impacting the welcome weekend events which have typically drawn some people away from from the parties and the parking and the illegal.

[1:02:17] So we don't know yet exactly what impact the game is going to have on the cyclone welcome weekend events that they normally do.

[1:02:26] So our understanding is that a lot of the administrators will be there for the game, not here.

[1:02:33] We don't know how many.

[1:02:35] I think there's still an intent on their part to do some of those events, but I can't

[1:02:40] yet speak to what differences there may be for them just based on that issue.

[1:02:46] The game really is a complication this year.

[1:02:49] We need to have a big game watch somewhere.

[1:02:51] Yeah.

[1:02:52] At the stadium would be great.

[1:02:55] Any other questions?

[1:02:56] Yes, I have a question on the towing area map.

[1:02:59] It looks a little different to me than previous years.

[1:03:02] And I think previously it's also included an area north of Lincoln way.

[1:03:07] Could you comment on if this has changed at all and maybe some of the reason why?

[1:03:11] It's the same map as last year.

[1:03:13] Okay.

[1:03:13] So there shouldn't be anything north of Lincoln way.

[1:03:18] Okay.

[1:03:18] So I must be thinking back a couple years when we initially did this.

[1:03:24] I'm not sure if it's ever been any different off the top of my head.

[1:03:28] I know it's the same as last year because I literally grabbed the same pen and threw it in there.

[1:03:34] Okay, so it's that Lincoln way, Lincoln way between beach and state,

[1:03:41] state between Lincoln way and Mortensen,

[1:03:44] Mortensen between state and beach, and then beach between Mortensen and Lincoln way.

[1:03:48] So you actually have it for the east of Beach I think I'm here or no, okay. Yeah, you're right. Sorry. That's right. I

[1:04:01] will share that. Yeah, the State Administration really appreciates what the Council's done in the past and they believe that it really has helped control some of the issues that haven't experienced and so with that entertain a motion.

[1:04:16] I would move, not sure whether I'm moving to approve here, alternative one to authorize

[1:04:25] the immediate towing of vehicles on Saturday, August 24th, 2025, not 2024, from midnight

[1:04:36] 8 to 11.59 p.m. in those designated areas.

[1:04:40] Sir Second.

[1:04:43] Local.

[1:04:45] Gordon.

[1:04:45] Aye.

[1:04:46] Junk.

[1:04:47] Aye.

[1:04:47] Betcher.

[1:04:48] Aye.

[1:04:48] Vity Hanson.

[1:04:49] Aye.

[1:04:49] Rollins.

[1:04:50] Aye.

[1:04:50] Warrior.

[1:04:51] Aye.

[1:04:53] Thank you.

[1:04:54] All right.

[1:04:54] I'm number 38.

[1:04:55] Resolution approving.

[1:04:56] Authorizing and hands penalties for a nuisance party.

[1:05:00] So a lot of the same arguments as we just discussed. In the past few years, so we have had the enhanced penalty for nuisance parties beginning at 5 p.m. on that Friday before the Saturday, and then ending around 4 a.m. on Sunday, the day after the event. Those are kind of the hot times seem to be the appropriate time to enhance that penalty. In the past few years, we've still used

[1:05:29] Since it's sparingly, we actually had a few more last year than we've had in the past.

[1:05:33] I think we went three, five, and seven total of those enhanced penalty nuisance parties.

[1:05:39] What I can tell you this year is we are going to really target some of the properties that we have had the same issue

[1:05:49] year after year after year after year.

[1:05:51] We know exactly where they are, we know exactly who owns them.

[1:05:55] We will be engaging with them to ensure their cooperation and their part in trying to cut down on these very large parties.

[1:06:04] Honestly, if we could get control about eight houses, most of 801 day would not be much of a problem.

[1:06:11] Because these are really the properties where we are having four, five hundred people still showing up, which is not in any way appropriate.

[1:06:19] And so we'll engage directly with those property owners and managers along with everybody else, but we specifically want to have those conversations with them, they need to help us with this, they need to be on site, and they need to make sure that their tenants are not having these ridiculously large parties that are inappropriate by any standard questions.

[1:06:43] And so the penalty is assessed against whom?

[1:06:48] So it is assessed against a person that is in control of that property, so it could be the tenant.

[1:06:55] Technically, it could also be the owner, and that is one of the things that we're going to discuss with those property managers and owners that we need them to get on board with us.

[1:07:04] And if not, a potential outcome could be them being cited.

[1:07:09] So we are really putting them on notice.

[1:07:11] Yep, so could you clarify? So we've got tenants, but you could also have a property management company

[1:07:16] Yep, and then you have the actual owners. You have three potential parties. Yes, any one of those could be cited for a nuisance party

[1:07:23] You violation and and how do you know who to cite like who what's the basis for

[1:07:31] Why why one instead of all three? Yeah, so normally what we do is on a first violation

[1:07:38] We cite the tenants who are directly responsible for hosting that party.

[1:07:45] A lot of times, the second time as well, we're citing them.

[1:07:49] After every violation, we notify the property manager or owner, whichever that may be.

[1:07:55] That, that violation occurred and we cited them.

[1:07:58] And the reason for that is to try and get them to help us get control of their tenants.

[1:08:02] On a third one, though, we do entertain citing the property manager or owner for

[1:08:10] the violation, because at that point, they've been warned twice that their tenants

[1:08:14] are causing some big problems and they need to get more engaged.

[1:08:17] And I don't know if this was last year of the year before.

[1:08:20] I think you mentioned to us that you've got hundreds of people showing up.

[1:08:25] They're just throwing money in the hat to cover the cost of that violation.

[1:08:30] So if that's the case, is this stick really working?

[1:08:35] We have seen, I would say, a slight reduction in the number of very large parties.

[1:08:42] We're now down to just a few properties, literally, it's like 8 or 10, that are the biggest problem.

[1:08:48] And I think getting control of them is the last piece of this.

[1:08:51] And I think that's where we need to get these landlords, property managers, and

[1:08:56] owners more engaged.

[1:08:57] And the potentially citing them might get them more engaged?

[1:09:02] Well, I don't think it's appropriate for us to give heavy-handed guidance in terms of how you go about implementing these things.

[1:09:14] But it just as an observer, if you've tried this year after year where the first line of focus is on the tenant,

[1:09:25] And what you're telling us is that it's 8 to 10 properties that's the issue, it seems like making the focus now on the property manager and the owner seems like an appropriate because the message isn't getting through.

[1:09:41] And so I guess what I want to do is I want to give you what you need in order to effectively enforce.

[1:09:47] But you feel like you've got all of the direction.

[1:09:50] Yeah, I think that so what we're dealing with is the tenants each year are different right it's

[1:09:57] But the parties are still

[1:10:00] All those same places. So the, the tenants is part of this. The property manager, owners, landlords are the other part of it. Some of the landlords that I spoke to, they actually said their tenants lied to them and said that they were going to, we're not going to be in town on needle one day. She don't have to worry. Well, they got tricked. So we're going to make sure that they understand better this year. And part of what we're going to ask of these particular landlords, owners, or tenants is that they come

[1:10:29] in that day. Get a lawn chair and sit in the front lawn and ensure that you don't have 500

[1:10:36] people at that property that you own. That's what we're going to ask you.

[1:10:38] And one final question. So have we ever considered tying compliance with these expectations to

[1:10:45] the letter of compliance? That's honestly where you're really going to have some leverage.

[1:10:53] We control the letter of compliance, and so if we had someone that wasn't maintaining fire alarms or wasn't providing proper

[1:11:02] Egress windows, we could say you can't get a letter of compliance.

[1:11:08] If the control of the property is blatantly a risk to our students that we have charge over, could we not tie that to letter of compliance,

[1:11:20] And then you're going to get some, a much different attitude from the owner.

[1:11:25] Some places have done that, we've actually done a little bit of work.

[1:11:29] I think our goal is to get voluntary compliance, but I think the conversation is if you can't get this under control,

[1:11:38] the City Council may do something different to help.

[1:11:43] So we would look to you to make recommendations to us if you think that that would be an appropriate sort of

[1:11:50] Next step for consideration, but I would be very interested in that if there is, if they're continuing to flip off our police department year after year, then we need to send a better message.

[1:12:02] I don't disagree and we've had some of those discussions with inspections.

[1:12:05] It would probably be PD along with inspections that might look at something like that.

[1:12:11] Right, thank you.

[1:12:12] If you desire at some point, right, thanks.

[1:12:15] there have also been college towns especially that have started charging the

[1:12:20] property owners for the services that are rendered by first responders of

[1:12:27] whatever kind might be necessary to handle a party the police or paramedics

[1:12:31] or whoever might have to come in to that. I firmly believe if any of those property

[1:12:36] managers or owners were on the property the day of they're not going to have a

[1:12:42] 500 person party, that's over.

[1:12:44] That's what we're trying to get out of them this year.

[1:12:46] And I'm interested to see if we can get all that done.

[1:12:49] Other places like some of our apartment complexes,

[1:12:53] higher security for that weekend.

[1:12:55] And they don't have the problems.

[1:12:56] And so we just have a few more,

[1:12:58] we gotta get a little bit more engaged.

[1:13:00] And I think I'm hopeful that they'll do that.

[1:13:03] And for people watching this,

[1:13:04] it's not that we're trying to be jerks to people,

[1:13:07] but we have a public safety issue.

[1:13:09] there are students whose health is at risk by over-consumption of alcohol in these venues

[1:13:15] that that's what we're trying to protect at least I think that's the goal.

[1:13:19] Yeah, literally some of these parties are three, four, five hundred people, no doubt,

[1:13:24] and they don't have the facilities for that. So they don't have the bathroom for that,

[1:13:28] which leads to problems. So this, yeah, this is actually a serious problem.

[1:13:32] Do you remind me, is there like an expiration date on the first defense or does that stay with the property, you know, for an infinite amount of time?

[1:13:42] So it depends on who you cite. So if we cite a tenant and then we go back next year and it's a different tenant, then it would be a first defense again.

[1:13:51] If we cited the property owner or landlord, whatever, that might be different.

[1:13:57] Okay, so since you haven't cited the property manager as our owners before we're looking at probably a first offence

[1:14:04] It happens

[1:14:08] Any other questions?

[1:14:11] Air team motion move alternative one

[1:14:17] Second, thank you

[1:14:20] Roll call and

[1:14:22] Amber just sent me a message saying she's having some lag problems when you call on her name. She may not respond

[1:14:27] But go ahead

[1:14:28] Okay, Junk, Aye, Fetcher, Aye, Needy Hansen, Aye, Rollins, Aye, Boreary,

[1:14:40] Garden, Aye.

[1:14:44] Thank you. Thank you.

[1:14:48] All right, the one at number 39

[1:15:14] Mr. Mayor, I'm going to present from here because it will remind me to be thorough yet succinct for you.

[1:15:21] So I'm going to walk through this evaluation of water and sewer rates using the same format I've used for several years. So we'll take a look at what's happening in the world around us at some state and national trends. We'll look at our projections for ending balances in the water and sewer funds, how that would translate into rates and then take a look at what that would look like.

[1:15:44] look like from the customer's perspective on a utility bill.

[1:15:50] So looking at national trends, the data point that I used comes from a survey that the American Water Works Association does.

[1:15:57] It's not super regular, so what I'm going to show you here is comparing the results of the 2024 survey to the 2019 survey.

[1:16:07] And what that found over that five year interval was that nationally water rates went up at a rate of 4.42%

[1:16:15] per year. Over that same period, sewer rates went up an annual average of 3.91% per year.

[1:16:26] And if you'll accept the CPI as a measure of inflation over that same five-year interval,

[1:16:31] this inflation was running at 4.43%. So drinking water rates over that interval, very closely mirrored

[1:16:39] inflation sewer was just a touch under the national inflation rates.

[1:16:48] So the next thing I'm going to show is Iowa trends and this comes from surveys that

[1:16:54] our department does every year.

[1:16:57] So I'm going to look at a two year interval here.

[1:16:59] This is from 2022 to 2024 and it's looking at utilities that are serving 10,000 people

[1:17:06] or more.

[1:17:07] And so when we look at the data, the number of those utilities who have had a rate increase

[1:17:11] of any magnitude in the last two years is 88%, the number that had an increase

[1:17:19] that was more than 5% in that interval is 73%, and that had increases of more

[1:17:25] than 10% in that interval at 39%.

[1:17:29] And if you look on the sewer side, the numbers are very similar, just slightly lower

[1:17:36] on the wastewater side.

[1:17:37] No,

[1:17:41] just as a side note, is there a sense in which this whole nutrient reduction is as a factor in the waste water side?

[1:17:49] It certainly is a portion of it.

[1:17:51] There's a number of utilities that are doing projects not necessarily related to the nutrients, though, that are also driving rates like combined sewer separation projects, for example.

[1:18:02] Okay, great, thanks.

[1:18:06] So if I go back to that earlier table and I overlay the statewide trends on there,

[1:18:11] over, so this is a slightly different period than the national survey, but 2024 versus 2020.

[1:18:19] In Iowa, drinking water rates went up at 5.3%, so a little faster than national.

[1:18:26] Iowa sewer rates at 3.74, just a little less than national.

[1:18:32] And then drilling into Ames over that four-year period, this is the rate increases that we have seen.

[1:18:38] So, on average, the water rates over the last four years, 3.5% sewer rates at 3%.

[1:18:46] So

[1:18:50] then if you overlay our increases again on that same table, you can see our water increases

[1:18:55] and sewer increases have been lower than both the national average and the statewide average

[1:19:01] and below the rate of inflation over that period of time.

[1:19:07] So here's another way to look at those statewide trains.

[1:19:10] These are data points from our survey and this is looking across a 20-year window now.

[1:19:18] And each of those stacked columns is a rate, is the $1 amount that a utility was charging

[1:19:23] a customer in this example for using 600 cubic feet of water per month.

[1:19:29] So the red dashed line with the circle markers there, that's the statewide median, meaning

[1:19:34] half are charging more, half are charging less.

[1:19:36] the green solid line with the triangular markers those are our rates so 20 years

[1:19:43] ago we were right at the statewide median now over the course of the last 20

[1:19:47] years you can see we've pulled away lower than the statewide median and based

[1:19:54] on the 2024 survey we came in at the 19th percentile in drinking water

[1:20:00] So, at the bottom fifth,

[1:20:05] same analysis here for sewer rates across the state, and in the 2024 survey, we were in the 21st percentile.

[1:20:17] So, when we look at what is it that's driving the need for rate increases for us locally, we don't ever want to raise rates because everybody else's parents were letting them raise rates, so we want to do it too. We want to be able to justify what we're doing based on our actual needs and our

[1:20:35] actual situations here in Ames.

[1:20:38] So I kind of lumped things into four big buckets

[1:20:40] of what's driving.

[1:20:42] Increased regulatory requirements is certainly one of them.

[1:20:46] And you see that nowhere more dramatically

[1:20:49] than in the nutrient reduction project

[1:20:51] that's going on at the wastewater facility right now.

[1:20:56] There's also a number of risk and resiliency improvements

[1:20:59] that are happening.

[1:21:00] So these are physical security measures,

[1:21:02] cyber security measures, redundant power measures.

[1:21:05] we highlighted a lot of those for you as we went through the CIP.

[1:21:11] There's a number of projects in there that are driven by just regular infrastructure renewal and replacement.

[1:21:18] These systems have a lot of really expensive things and

[1:21:21] those things need to be replaced periodically, and so that's important that we do that.

[1:21:28] And then while we are certainly past the worst of what we saw during COVID,

[1:21:33] We do still see increases in equipment and commodity prices that are pushing the need for additional funds in the water and sewer funds.

[1:21:43] Before you move on there, so I think that comparisons are generally helpful.

[1:21:51] I think it's harder with the national numbers because there are so many variables pricing of labor and materials in different parts of the country.

[1:21:59] Absolutely. Can't skew this so that the comparison with Iowa is more interesting to me, but even among Iowa cities, could you comment just roughly on the variation in communities in terms of the infrastructure piece?

[1:22:17] And one of the things I've been very impressed with over the years is your commitment to make very strategic and regular investments in the infrastructure.

[1:22:29] So you could you could skew a skew those numbers just by not putting money into the infrastructure, but then that's a short term gain.

[1:22:38] And so we as a community want to be making routine and regular investments in our infrastructure.

[1:22:46] Could you speak just a little bit about that piece of it because I think that's really really helpful.

[1:22:49] Yeah, and actually let me back up a couple slides here.

[1:22:52] So if you look at these data points, what's interesting is over this 20-year period of time,

[1:23:00] it's not the same utility that it's the highest rate every year.

[1:23:05] As projects come, people raise their rates, and then they kind of hit a new normal for

[1:23:11] them, and they stay at that level.

[1:23:14] And then another utility will have a project, and so they'll jump up to the top of the pack.

[1:23:18] So the one that you see up there is kind of an outlier right now in the sewer rates.

[1:23:24] If you were to highlight that in a different color so it stood out back in the early 20s,

[1:23:31] they'd have been down in the middle of the pack that would not have been up at the top

[1:23:33] like that.

[1:23:42] So next, we plug our projections, we plug our planned CIP into a rate model and we take

[1:23:50] a look over the next 10 years at what we think the ending balance would be.

[1:23:55] And we always start with an assumption of no rate increases and just a real quick reminder

[1:24:00] of this graph that burgundy colored bar that's the projected ending balance in this case

[1:24:07] the water fund for each fiscal year.

[1:24:10] And then those yellow boxes that are on there, that's our target operating reserve.

[1:24:15] And we are slowly increasing that operating reserve, trying to get to a 25% of our operating

[1:24:23] expenses each year. And actually at the end of this 10-year projection that is 25% so we actually

[1:24:30] hit that mark in this 10-year window now. And so the whole goal of the rate model is just

[1:24:35] is not to just keep the balance above zero but it's to fully fill that yellow box. So that's what

[1:24:41] we're targeting. And so you can see here if we do nothing for rates over the next 10 years the

[1:24:48] The water fund would be at year 10, about $28 million to the negative.

[1:24:55] And then a very similar picture on the sewer side, it would be at about

[1:25:00] About 32 million to the negative if we were to do nothing. John, can you comment on why is that just paying off the water plant? Is that just retiring the bonds? Or why is that going down so much? Because there's no other major projects that you see in the offering? Yeah, so we we did build up a balance during the construction of the water plant and we were been slowly pulling that down.

[1:25:31] But what's really driving that, and the three and a half percent, that's the assumption

[1:25:35] that we plug into the operating expenses for just routine inflation, so that's really

[1:25:40] what it is.

[1:25:41] This is pretty much a status quo budget without adjusting for inflation that you see in this

[1:25:46] graph.

[1:25:53] So the things that we keep in mind when trying to set rates, we certainly want to try

[1:25:59] to meet debt coverage requirements, that's an obligation of any debt that we take on, and

[1:26:04] And this is the advantage of using the state revolving fund as the financing vehicles because they have very favorable debt coverage ratios.

[1:26:14] Our goal is also to meet that operating reserve target.

[1:26:17] Like I said, we're building our way towards a 25% operating expense as our reserve.

[1:26:24] And then we want to try to do rate increases smaller but more frequently as opposed to what historically was done in water and

[1:26:34] sewer as you would wait every 10 or 15 years, and then you would sort of shock the system

[1:26:38] with a 25 or 30 percent rate increase.

[1:26:42] So we're not wanting to do that, and as we went through the evaluation this year, what

[1:26:48] we're proposing is a long-term approach that will adjust both water and sewer annually.

[1:26:55] In the past, we had done water one year, sewer the next, and kind of staggered and back

[1:27:00] and forth. We're proposing that we just make annual adjustments every year gives us an opportunity

[1:27:06] in both funds every year to adjust course up or down if appropriate.

[1:27:14] So over the next 10 years,

[1:27:16] what we are looking at in that fund is to project a three and a half percent per year on the water

[1:27:23] side and five and a half percent on the sewer side. So that would be each year over the next 10

[1:27:31] years.

[1:27:34] If we were to do that, we'd plug that into the rate models. This is what the 10-year

[1:27:38] balance would look like on the water fund,

[1:27:43] and this is what that 10-year balance would

[1:27:45] look like on the sewer fund.

[1:27:51] Just an observation. I just think this is absolutely amazing. I mean, you gave us the inflation

[1:27:55] rate, but that's really not the rate we should be looking at. We should be looking at construction

[1:28:01] inflation, which is much higher. So the fact that we're able to run this Navy at a 3.5%

[1:28:08] increase. That's that's fantastic John. It really is and I'll show you here when we get to the end

[1:28:15] what it looks like from a customer's perspective and it's not even three and a half percent on their

[1:28:20] utility bill.

[1:28:24] One other just sort of a frame of reference data point for you and that's looking at

[1:28:30] continuing the statewide trends and then laying our planned rate increases on there.

[1:28:35] So what I did, those blue bars that you see, that comes from our annual rate surveys.

[1:28:41] And this is sort of a what if, what if statewide rates continue to go up for the next 10 years

[1:28:47] at the same average rate they did for the last six.

[1:28:50] So at the bottom of that blue bar is the lowest water rate and the lowest sewer rate in the

[1:28:55] state sum together and then the highest water and sewer sum together.

[1:29:00] again the red line in the middle with the circle markers that's the statewide

[1:29:05] median projected the green line with the diamond markers that would be our

[1:29:10] projected rates. So you can see at that rate if we're to continue as we're

[1:29:17] projecting right now we would continue to pull probably a little bit below that

[1:29:22] statewide median over time.

[1:29:28] So these are the unit rates that are in chapter 28

[1:29:33] So you can see the existing rates and if you do choose to move ahead, what the three and a half percent increase would look like and that column in the red would be the new numbers that would appear in chapter 28.

[1:29:46] So here you see them for the water fund and for the sewer fund.

[1:29:54] Quick peek that photo is from inside the new administration building at the WPC facility.

[1:29:59] They're moving right.

[1:30:00] Right along, they expect to have us in there in September.

[1:30:06] We would also propose to adjust all of the fees that are in appendix queue of the municipal code. And we would adjust those by the same percentages as the associated utility. So if an expense is associated with drinking water, we would adjust that 3.5%. If it's associated with wastewater, we would adjust that 5.5%. The one exception is meter setting fees for new construction.

[1:30:32] We've got a spreadsheet that tries to calculate as best we can, our actual cost to install those meters.

[1:30:38] So that will be based on actual cost recovery, but that would not be a part of the action on rates.

[1:30:44] That would happen at the same time you adopt all of the city-wide rates coming up probably in about a month here.

[1:30:54] So here's the promised sample bill from a customer.

[1:30:57] This is a median residential customer, so someone who's using 600 kilowatt hours of electricity and

[1:31:04] 600 cubic feet of water, and this is in the summer.

[1:31:09] So these are the higher utility rates in the summer.

[1:31:12] And so you can see by utility there,

[1:31:14] how much each contributes to the total bill.

[1:31:17] So you see the summer electric, you see the storm water fees,

[1:31:21] and then you can see the summer water and sewer.

[1:31:24] Before the rate increases, the combined bill for that customer

[1:31:28] would be 148, 48.

[1:31:31] With the increase, it would add $2.89, which would bring their total bill to $151.37.

[1:31:40] That calculates out to a 1.95% adjustment on the total utility bill.

[1:31:48] And then just one other customer to take a look at for a comparison.

[1:31:51] This would be a sort of a larger commercial customer here because this account example is

[1:32:00] using proportionately more electricity

[1:32:03] than they are water.

[1:32:04] The overall impact on their utility bill

[1:32:07] would be 0.67%.

[1:32:13] And so on this slide, we tried to give you

[1:32:15] multiple different customer types.

[1:32:18] So if a customer were looking at this,

[1:32:20] they could try to find a line there

[1:32:21] that maybe closely mirrored them

[1:32:23] and they could see roughly what their impact would be.

[1:32:27] But we wanted you to also see the full picture

[1:32:29] because in addition to the water rate increases,

[1:32:32] there is an electric increase that you would likely be asked to approve later this summer.

[1:32:37] So we wanted to layer those on so you could see the whole thing.

[1:32:41] So that first column is what a customer's current bill would be.

[1:32:44] The second column would be after the water and sewer rate increases.

[1:32:49] The third column then would be in November when the new electric rates would kick in.

[1:32:56] And the current thinking is that that would become effective at the end of the summer rate

[1:33:02] season, so that the rate increase for electric would actually kick in at the time of year

[1:33:07] that electric rates are lower.

[1:33:09] And so that's why you see like for that first example, the bills actually a little bit

[1:33:14] less in the winter than it is in the summer, even with an increase in the overall electric

[1:33:20] And then the last column would be June of next year when the new electric rates for the summer season would first show on a customer bill.

[1:33:40] So our proposal to you, our recommendation would be that we come back on April 22nd with an ordinance for you.

[1:33:49] That ordinance would adjust water rates by three and a half percent, sewer rates by five and a half percent.

[1:33:55] Those would be effective for bills that were mailed on or after July 1st.

[1:34:01] And that timeline would have a first reading on April 22nd, a second reading on May 13th,

[1:34:07] and then the final reading and adoption on May 27th.

[1:34:11] The timing is significant because customers will start using water in June that they will

[1:34:16] pay in July at the higher rate.

[1:34:18] So it just seemed appropriate that the rates be adopted and in place before customers start

[1:34:24] using the water at that higher rate.

[1:34:29] So that's the proposal we have for you.

[1:34:31] I take any questions.

[1:34:32] We will come back at the next meeting with that ordinance

[1:34:36] unless you request that we do something different.

[1:34:40] Thanks, John.

[1:34:41] Questions?

[1:34:42] comments?

[1:34:43] You

[1:34:49] did a great job.

[1:34:50] Thank you so much.

[1:34:51] All right.

[1:34:53] I move on to number 40 hearing on 2023-2024 CDBG.

[1:35:01] Kelly? Or Vanessa?

[1:35:17] Question. It's awarding a bid for construction. I thought you had like 15-minute presentation. You do not.

[1:35:25] It's a public works project funded by CDB. Well, you can go ahead and fill in from 870 feet of pipe. All right. My apologies, Kelly. For some reason it's not a CDB, gee, I thought the NASA was going to be yours now. Yeah. So,

[1:35:43] my bad. But you can say that if you want to. All right, any questions on this particular

[1:35:50] project for any of the staff?

[1:35:54] Do you declare a public hearing on the 2023-2024CVG

[1:35:59] infrastructure program North Russell Avenue, North Second Street, to North Forest Street

[1:36:03] to be open? Is anyone who wants to address counsel on this topic?

[1:36:09] Seeing none, declare a public

[1:36:10] hearing to be closed, entertain motion, accepting the Board of Bids. So moved, second.

[1:36:15] Those in favor please say aye aye any opposed or abstaining

[1:36:20] Motion carried entertain a motion on resolution improving final plans specifications and awarding a contract to Iowa water and

[1:36:27] Ways systems of Boone Iowa and amount of for three hundred forty six thousand

[1:36:31] Eight hundred fifty eight dollars and fifty cents so moved I give a question so do we have amber on the line?

[1:36:37] I just want to make sure for the votes. She's had problems with her internet connection where she's at so so she's no longer

[1:36:44] I think we just show her as being sure we're respecting her vote.

[1:36:52] She doesn't respond just so she yeah.

[1:36:55] Thank you.

[1:36:57] All right, roll call.

[1:36:59] Betcher.

[1:37:00] Aye.

[1:37:01] V.D. Hanson.

[1:37:01] Aye.

[1:37:02] Rollin.

[1:37:02] Aye.

[1:37:03] Coriari.

[1:37:10] Gertan.

[1:37:10] Aye.

[1:37:11] Drunk.

[1:37:11] Aye.

[1:37:12] Thank you.

[1:37:13] All right.

[1:37:14] We want to add on her 41.

[1:37:16] To clear the public hearing on the 2019-2024 low point drainage improvements to be open is

[1:37:22] Anyone who wants to address council on this topic?

[1:37:24] Can I ask why it's those years?

[1:37:26] I mean, I can wait till the hearing is closed.

[1:37:29] It just seems like it's usually 1920 or say 23, 24.

[1:37:34] Is it a five year?

[1:37:35] It is combining several years' worth of CIP projects

[1:37:41] into a single bid.

[1:37:43] We had a variety of funds that were carried over from year

[1:37:46] to year, and we could solidate it into a single bid package.

[1:37:49] So it's from 2019 and 2024. I think it may even be from a little earlier than 2019

[1:37:55] Okay, it's it's from about six different years of

[1:37:59] CIP I'm not super picky. I just curious. I've never seen it written like that before and I was like

[1:38:03] What does that even mean?

[1:38:05] Good question

[1:38:07] Thank you. All right. The hearing is open as I want to address council

[1:38:13] Seeing and hearing none declared public hearing to be closed. Is there a motion on accepting a report?

[1:38:18] Board of bids.

[1:38:18] So moved.

[1:38:19] Second.

[1:38:20] Thank you.

[1:38:21] Those in favor, please say aye.

[1:38:22] Aye.

[1:38:23] Any opposed abstaining?

[1:38:25] Motion carried.

[1:38:26] Interim motion.

[1:38:26] Resolution approving final plans.

[1:38:28] Specifications.

[1:38:29] We're in the contract to aisle water and weigh systems of boon, aisle and amount of 523,245 dollars

[1:38:36] and 20 cents.

[1:38:37] So moved.

[1:38:38] Second.

[1:38:39] Thank you.

[1:38:40] Roll call.

[1:38:41] Beanie Hansen.

[1:38:42] Aye.

[1:38:43] Rollins.

[1:38:43] Aye.

[1:38:44] Or are you?

[1:38:49] Gertan.

[1:38:49] Aye.

[1:38:50] Junk.

[1:38:51] Aye.

[1:38:51] Betcher?

[1:38:52] Aye.

[1:38:52] Thank you.

[1:38:54] And declared public hearing on the 2024 2025 payment restoration slurry seal program to

[1:39:00] go in.

[1:39:01] Anyone want to request counsel on this topic?

[1:39:06] Seeing none, hearing none, declared public hearing be closed, entertain motion, not accepting

[1:39:11] reported bids.

[1:39:12] So moved.

[1:39:13] Second.

[1:39:14] Thank you.

[1:39:15] Those who may have a motion, please say aye.

[1:39:17] Aye.

[1:39:18] Any opposed?

[1:39:19] Or abstaining?

[1:39:21] Motion carried, entertain motion, resolution, improving final plan, specifications, and awarding

[1:39:25] a contract to Fort Dodge, asphalt company, Fort Dodge, Iowa, an amount of 231,228 dollars

[1:39:32] and 26.

[1:39:33] So moved.

[1:39:34] Second.

[1:39:35] Roll call.

[1:39:37] Rollins.

[1:39:37] Aye.

[1:39:38] Coriari.

[1:39:45] Aye.

[1:39:46] Betcher?

[1:39:47] Aye.

[1:39:47] Beatty Hansen.

[1:39:48] Aye.

[1:39:52] We should have Amber give us one of us for proxy.

[1:39:55] I think we'll just, after that, first time when she didn't vote, just, she just showed...

[1:40:00] So she left, she left the meeting, so. All right, move on. On her 43, first reading, ordinance, endoption, regulations for carbon, monoxide, alarms, environmental properties, Sarah, Rich. Good evening. Good evening, Mayor and council. Tonight we're happy to be back to you to present ordinance on carbon, oxide detection and rental units. If you recall, back on March 11th, Sarah and her team put together a memo regarding what the state requirements were and lack of an ordinance that we had locally for enforcement.

[1:40:29] So tonight are building an official survey meter and sphere just to highlight a few things

[1:40:33] of the ordinance and then move forward.

[1:40:39] So as the chief said, March 11th, we sent a memo kind of highlighting the state ordinance

[1:40:44] and what other jurisdictions are doing.

[1:40:47] The state adopted an ordinance in 2018 but did not give us local authority to enforce it.

[1:40:53] Their ordinance is in effect for residential and rental properties.

[1:40:58] So, the state right now says, you're home and any rentals need to comply with this ordinance.

[1:41:06] We are only looking at adopting it for rental properties, the enforcement authority.

[1:41:11] We did reach out.

[1:41:12] We sent an email out to all of our rental contacts, about 1,500 of them.

[1:41:16] I've heard back from four people.

[1:41:19] One was a large landlord representing a large company in Ames, and then the others were

[1:41:23] just small, mom, and pop landlords.

[1:41:27] They were all in favor of it, they liked the ordinance, they had good stories even but

[1:41:32] just had questions on the location.

[1:41:35] So we did tweak the language we had initially had proposed just a smidge based on that

[1:41:43] feedback.

[1:41:43] So there was a lot of concern about having to put them within the bedrooms as well as outside

[1:41:49] of the bedrooms because it's set in the immediate vicinity of.

[1:41:53] We've worked with that language for a long time, so we know that it means outside of the bedrooms,

[1:41:57] but others were reading it to mean the vicinity of could be inside the bedroom.

[1:42:01] So we really just want them outside of the bedrooms.

[1:42:05] For example, a single family home with maybe one bedroom on the main floor would need a

[1:42:11] carbon monoxide detector outside of that bedroom, and then maybe three bedrooms upstairs.

[1:42:16] They would need one in the hallway outside of those bedrooms, so the idea is to alert people if

[1:42:20] they're sleeping that there's an issue.

[1:42:23] The state ordinance did have some exceptions in place.

[1:42:28] I think probably they were in place

[1:42:30] for owner-occupied properties more,

[1:42:32] people that had more ownership in their property,

[1:42:36] concern would maybe respond a little differently

[1:42:38] to something beeping in the basement

[1:42:40] than a tenant that only hangs out in their bedroom

[1:42:43] on the third floor might.

[1:42:44] So we actually chose to be a little more restrictive

[1:42:47] than the state, and we did not implement those.

[1:42:49] exceptions, because we feel that we have a more vulnerable population with tenants, and that added protection is necessary.

[1:42:59] There was also another section of the ordinance, discusses hardwired and interconnected alarms.

[1:43:07] When this ordinance went into effect in 2018 with the state, that mirrored the building code and fire codes.

[1:43:13] So any new construction is already hardwired and interconnected.

[1:43:16] We're not asking rental property owners to retrofit existing.

[1:43:20] So existing construction, they can exchange with a dual sensor smoke alarm, which many

[1:43:27] already have, where they can add a carbon monoxide detector within that vicinity outside

[1:43:31] of the bedroom.

[1:43:33] If they want to hardwire everything, they certainly can.

[1:43:36] And again, this is a minimum, so they can put CO detectors wherever in the house they

[1:43:41] want.

[1:43:41] I think the mayor told me he has 12 or something crazy.

[1:43:47] He's incompliance, so you can have as many as you want, this would just be the minimum

[1:43:51] for rental code compliance.

[1:43:54] Questions?

[1:43:55] Sarah, I'm really excited about this coming back, but could you give us a little bit of background?

[1:44:02] As of today, what percentage of our rental units and aims do you think already have carbon

[1:44:10] I'm an oxide detector, so I'm just trying to figure out what the delta is between what we have and what we want it to be.

[1:44:16] So in 2009, when our rental code was updated, there was a requirement that any new detectors be updated to dual sensor alarms.

[1:44:25] Most of those that people are buying are smoke and CO, they can be smoke and heat.

[1:44:30] But I think smoke and CO is pretty normal.

[1:44:34] We're hearing them, I was on an inspection with them just the other day and when they tested it, it tested for both.

[1:44:39] So, I do think that a lot of them already have them in place.

[1:44:45] I don't know if I can give a, it's just maybe 70% probably have them.

[1:44:50] I would say personal experience out of the last four apartments I've lived in,

[1:44:54] two have had them and two have not.

[1:44:56] Oh, so half.

[1:44:57] well in my

[1:45:00] And then section four provides the ordinance shall be in full force and effect from an afterist passage. So normally, when we pass ordinances, we create an effective date out a little bit to give the public an opportunity to respond. Could you help us think through why in this case that we have this in effect, a potent passage in publication?

[1:45:30] So there was, we intended to have an effective date of July 1st, it's not in here now that I look at it, so we can add that at the second reading if you'd like.

[1:45:42] I would just remind that it is in effect today at the state level, so people have to, I would say between now and July 1, we would not, not issue an LOC because of it.

[1:45:55] So we were going to set the effective date July 1st so that if we go on a

[1:45:59] reinspection tomorrow, we're not citing somebody for not having them, it won't

[1:46:04] preclude the issuance of their letter of compliance, but we'll say, hey, next time

[1:46:08] you need it by July 1st, then everybody should have one, and it would preclude

[1:46:12] the issuance of the letter of compliance. So that date is not in here. We can we

[1:46:16] can add the effective date of July 1. Yeah, that seems like it'd be more

[1:46:20] consistent what we normally do. And the final question, this seems comprehensive.

[1:46:26] Are there any exceptions that we think about? We have a range of different rental type

[1:46:31] properties in aims. Are there any exceptions to this or is this going to be in an application

[1:46:38] universally?

[1:46:40] So I would just keep in mind that this only applies if the property has a fuel fire deployance

[1:46:45] or fireplace in it.

[1:46:47] If you build a home that's all electric, you wouldn't need one.

[1:46:51] Or didn't have an attached garage.

[1:46:54] So we do have rental properties that may, we're starting to see more all electric.

[1:46:59] If that was the case and they did not have an attached garage, they wouldn't need anything.

[1:47:04] If they, there are actually the person that called me from the large property management company

[1:47:10] asked the question that we hadn't really considered about boilers.

[1:47:13] and my media was responsible, it's not an issue,

[1:47:17] but as we researched more, we found out that they can crack,

[1:47:20] they can produce the same issues

[1:47:22] that any other field-fired furnace could.

[1:47:25] And so we are saying if there's a boiler

[1:47:27] in the apartment building,

[1:47:29] regardless of what level it's on,

[1:47:31] there needs to be a CEO to detect

[1:47:32] or outside of each bedroom still.

[1:47:34] And then, and thank you for that.

[1:47:37] So we only have the authority to regulate

[1:47:42] the rental properties. But if we think about the owner occupied properties, are there

[1:47:49] things that we can do to incentivize or educate the public to see this being used white

[1:47:58] spread?

[1:47:59] Absolutely. We love to do education in our office. So I'm happy to do any outreach. We can work

[1:48:04] with the fire department. We often send people to the fire department and they'll go out

[1:48:09] and do tests for people to see if there is any CO present?

[1:48:15] Yeah, and part of our smoke detector plan was dual sensor

[1:48:18] with carbon dioxide and we targeted lower income parts

[1:48:22] of our community to make sure that they were equipped with that.

[1:48:24] So that we've done outreach that way.

[1:48:26] And then when we have our open house,

[1:48:28] we also give away detectors that are dual sensor

[1:48:30] with the carbon dioxide to build awareness.

[1:48:32] So you already have a public outreach on CO2.

[1:48:37] Was it remind me, wasn't it Johnny Orr that had, he almost died from, maybe that you

[1:48:43] couldn't make this the Johnny Orr campaign, because it was, for a lot of people, that

[1:48:47] was pretty scary.

[1:48:49] He almost died from carbon dioxide poisoning.

[1:48:51] So there is also the state code requires when you do your homestead credit through the

[1:48:56] assessor's office that you mark that you have one.

[1:48:59] That's the honor system and you do that once, so it's not all the time, but that is the

[1:49:04] enforcement that the state has for CO1s.

[1:49:07] And I will say that someone dying, I learned from one of the people that called me that it's not just death.

[1:49:17] Two people in their close family are death because of carbon monoxide.

[1:49:22] And I didn't realize that we just always talk about people not waking up.

[1:49:27] I didn't realize that there's other widespread health effects of it, so they're interesting.

[1:49:32] Yeah, great. Thanks for the presentation. Yeah, and I might add in there too that in addition to us going out

[1:49:37] Kermanoxide doing testing for for individual homes. We also on all of our med bags, so every medical call that we go on, we have Kermanoxide detectors. So when we go in and somebody's filling ill, that's that's another tool that we have in our bag to make sure that this isn't related to Kermanoxide. So we're every home that gets a medical call that we go into, we're testing that home for Kermanoxide.

[1:49:57] Thank you.

[1:49:58] Great. Thanks, guys.

[1:50:00] Sarah, you might know the answer to this. Within the last couple of years, we had a large apartment complex that had problems with the furnaces. Or was it the boiler? It was furnaces. Was that complex, fitted with CO2 detectors? I did not believe so. That was out there on West Mortonson, out there on the West end of, forget the name.

[1:50:30] I want to say maybe one of the units had one, like a tenant had one, and that was her.

[1:50:34] That's what triggered the call.

[1:50:36] She was having symptoms, and that's what triggered the call, and then when the crews went into investigate,

[1:50:40] they found that the pipe for the exhaust of the HVAC system had been removed.

[1:50:45] So at least one resident had a CO2 detector, but this ordinance would mean that all of the units

[1:50:55] would have to have CO2 detectors that could stop that sort of incident from

[1:51:03] sneaking up on people perhaps. We see it often we we also have a process in

[1:51:09] the office where if your water heater furnace and your fuel-fighter plants is

[1:51:14] over 20 years old we require you to get it certified so you have to have a

[1:51:18] contractor come out and look at it and make sure that it's functioning and we

[1:51:21] We get several back that fail and nobody would have known that probably until it's too late.

[1:51:27] So this is a nice extra safety measure for us to have.

[1:51:32] I think it's worth noting, too, that it's not always fuel fire appliances that can cause carbon dioxide.

[1:51:36] We've had incidents where construction was going on next door and filled a building with carbon oxide.

[1:51:42] We had to evacuate due to detectors setting off.

[1:51:45] We've also had doors left open where vehicles were running and filled parts of the building with carbon oxides.

[1:51:50] And so they serve a greater purpose than just protecting the residents from fuel-fired

[1:51:56] appliances.

[1:51:56] It's protecting them from anything that could produce carbon dioxide.

[1:52:02] All right.

[1:52:02] Questions?

[1:52:05] I said, just to know as soon as I was looking at this, maybe this is a marked question, too,

[1:52:11] and see a alarm power source.

[1:52:14] First paragraph says, you know, construction began on or after July 1 of 2018.

[1:52:20] I mean, they shall be, you know, hardwired.

[1:52:23] And then it says new and replacement carbon dioxide

[1:52:25] alarms installed in existing buildings

[1:52:27] may be solely battery operated.

[1:52:29] So my question is should that say,

[1:52:31] new and replacement carbon dioxide installed

[1:52:34] in existing buildings constructed prior to July 1, 2018,

[1:52:39] just for a point of clarification.

[1:52:41] We could just change from, instead of saying existing,

[1:52:44] we could change it so it says the same as above

[1:52:45] constructed prior to just to clear it up.

[1:52:48] Yeah, I'm just trying to thank you for your enforcement and people don't say well use it says then the second paragraph

[1:52:54] I'm replacing it so I can get battery backup. See, I'm saying just trying to help make sure that you have the enforcement mechanism

[1:53:00] That's that's the intent correct correct any replacement would be

[1:53:06] Well in existing structures that did not have to comply with that they can use battery backup. Yep. Yep. That's all. Okay

[1:53:13] All right.

[1:53:14] All right.

[1:53:14] Declare the public hearing and all right.

[1:53:16] Okay.

[1:53:17] Public input on this first reading of the ordinance.

[1:53:19] We open.

[1:53:19] Is anyone wants to address counsel on this topic?

[1:53:26] Seeing and hearing none.

[1:53:27] We'll close public input.

[1:53:29] Mark, did you have anything you wanted to share or not?

[1:53:32] I just saw the records clear if we could have motions on that language change that you talked

[1:53:39] about.

[1:53:39] And then on the first ordinance.

[1:53:42] The second date to July 1st, before you vote on the bill.

[1:53:46] Thank you, Ordinette Six, excuse me.

[1:53:51] So, would there be a motion to clarify how would you refer to 5C to the existing buildings

[1:54:01] constructed prior to July 1, 2018?

[1:54:06] Would that be appropriate then?

[1:54:07] Yes.

[1:54:08] Okay.

[1:54:08] I would move that.

[1:54:10] For a second?

[1:54:11] Second.

[1:54:12] motion please say aye aye any opposed motion carried and the effective date yeah I

[1:54:20] would move that we add the effective date of July 1st 2025 second thank you

[1:54:28] motion please say aye aye any opposed motion carried any other corrections or

[1:54:34] amendments if not entertain motion on resolution on the first reading of

[1:54:40] First reading of ordinance adopting regulations for carbon monoxide alarms and

[1:54:45] manual properties.

[1:54:45] So moved.

[1:54:47] Second.

[1:54:48] Thank you.

[1:54:48] Roll call.

[1:54:51] Aye.

[1:54:52] Aye.

[1:54:53] I.

[1:54:53] Aye.

[1:55:00] Thank you for the prompt work, and we look forward to helping keep people safe. Thank you.

[1:55:08] All right, we'll end on our 44 first reading ordinance, assigning annexed areas towards

[1:55:13] and precinct, second and third readings, adoptions requested. Is there any public input on this item?

[1:55:24] Seeing none, we'll close public comment. Mark, do you want to offer any comments?

[1:55:28] I really don't have anything, except if the council has questions.

[1:55:32] questions. I have one question. One of these territories was annexed back in 2021. What

[1:55:39] has been happening with them previously? So here's what happened. I anticipated someone

[1:55:46] would ask this and was going to bring it up actually if no one did, but the honestly

[1:55:53] that one was just missed before and let me explain that the Council passed a resolution

[1:56:06] annexing that approving the annexation of that property in October of 2021.

[1:56:14] In those annexations are not final until the city development board at the state approves

[1:56:20] it. That didn't happen to February. In December we did the redistricting where we drew all

[1:56:27] the new lines. We did not include that precinct because we couldn't draw it into the new

[1:56:39] words of precincts because it wasn't officially part of the city yet. So that happened in December

[1:56:44] that we did the redistricting so what should have happened was that in

[1:56:51] after February when the city development board February 22 when the city

[1:56:56] development board approved it we should have brought this annexation to the

[1:56:59] council. We did three we had three annexations in 2022 that in September that

[1:57:08] year we approved and the process goes like this you know we ask planning for

[1:57:14] for all the recent annexations, they gave us those three, we wrote the ordinance, and the council approved it.

[1:57:22] This one was missed, and I think just because of the timing purposes, because of the October passage of the council's resolution and the February adoption of approval by the City Development Board, it got missed.

[1:57:42] and I totally understand how it's just a weird timing situation with that annexation.

[1:57:53] So that annexation was mostly undeveloped.

[1:57:57] There were two non-consenting properties that were brought into it and I've had lots

[1:58:02] of discussions with planning and we've been looking at this and so there are two properties

[1:58:06] that were not allowed to vote in the city elections in 2023.

[1:58:14] So, you know, we disenfranchised a couple of voters.

[1:58:19] We don't know if those are owner occupied or rental units,

[1:58:23] but there were two properties that were brought in as non consenting owners.

[1:58:26] So, they did not get assigned award and precinct.

[1:58:29] They were not able to vote in a city council election.

[1:58:33] So it's unfortunate, but there's no way to correct that at this point, but what we can do is to assign this to award-precinct at this point, so going forward, it's the case.

[1:58:48] And it's one of those things that I think when we ask planning, like give us all the recent annexations, they're looking back at the resolutions that the council passed, and they're not thinking about the City Development Board approving that in February.

[1:59:03] You know, they're looking at that, that resolution by the council was passed right before we did the redistricting, so but, again, it wasn't in the redistricting because it wasn't officially in the city yet.

[1:59:16] So it was just kind of an odd fluke of circumstances, but, you know, it was not a good thing, but we were fixing it now.

[1:59:25] So, thank you for that question, Gloria.

[1:59:29] So, the takeaway from this, you just learn stuff and see Council members.

[1:59:37] So, someone who is annexed, they don't get to vote until someone in Des Moines says that

[1:59:44] they approve the annexation.

[1:59:46] Is it my saying that correctly?

[1:59:47] Right.

[1:59:48] Some of the city development board at the State of Iowa approves the annexation.

[1:59:52] then it is official that they are part of the city.

[1:59:56] At that point, we need to assign a warden precinct.

[1:59:59] Now,

[2:00:00] I will tell you, we also have a check on this now with the city clerk's office that on their cheat sheet, procedure sheet for annexations, assigning to award and precinct is now on there. So, you know, that, that makes it a step that Renee will be checking with us on to make sure happens. So, hopefully, that will keep this from ever happening again. So, and it's something obviously we're going to be keeping an eye on.

[2:00:29] Planning is going to be keeping an eye on, you know, it just was a very unfortunate situation, but

[2:00:38] You know, it is what it is at this point. So so this will correct it by adding them and also our most recent annexation and

[2:00:46] Assigning them to award and precinct. Now I want to be clear the those people still got to vote in other elections

[2:00:52] It's just a city elections. Those two properties. So

[2:00:57] And again, I feel horrible about that, but you know, they still voted in presidential elections that they wished and that sort of thing, but they just were not given the right to vote in city election and they should have been.

[2:01:13] Any

[2:01:18] questions?

[2:01:19] Good question.

[2:01:19] They're taking a motion on first reading of ordinance assigning annexed areas to awards and precincts.

[2:01:28] So moved. Second. Thank you. Roll call.

[2:01:34] Aye. Aye.

[2:01:36] Aye.

[2:01:42] Moved to suspend the rules. Second.

[2:01:44] Thank you. So some pair of the motion. Please say aye. Aye.

[2:01:50] All right. Is there a motion on second reading of ordinance of sending annexed areas to awards and

[2:01:54] read precincts? Second.

[2:02:00] Is there a second? I'm sorry. Yeah. Second. Thank you.

[2:02:03] All right, Rochelle.

[2:02:06] Hi.

[2:02:07] Hi.

[2:02:08] Hi.

[2:02:14] Her team motion on.

[2:02:15] Hi.

[2:02:16] Barbie.

[2:02:18] Hi.

[2:02:19] She hadn't called me.

[2:02:20] Oh.

[2:02:21] It's mostly a full moon tonight.

[2:02:23] I don't know.

[2:02:25] We disenfranchised you on that vote.

[2:02:27] Oh, yeah.

[2:02:28] Well, they are in my preset.

[2:02:30] There's something poetic about this.

[2:02:32] We disenfranchised your vote.

[2:02:34] My apologies, Lauren.

[2:02:37] Overtail motion on third reading an adoption of the ordinance moved on third second thank you roll call

[2:02:45] I

[2:02:50] Are кру's eye

[2:03:02] Superlating to its own text message and chapter twenty nine and this whole building code

[2:03:07] I mean, it's my municipal code to create town home building type standards.

[2:03:11] Move on third.

[2:03:12] Second.

[2:03:13] Thank you.

[2:03:13] Roll call.

[2:03:17] Aye.

[2:03:18] Aye.

[2:03:20] Aye.

[2:03:21] Aye.

[2:03:25] Move on to item number under dispositions of communications to council.

[2:03:29] There's three memos from Kelly.

[2:03:32] The first is on driveway.

[2:03:34] Driveway standards referral.

[2:03:37] Is there an interest placing this on a future agenda or just take it under advisement?

[2:03:43] I

[2:03:46] would move we take it under advisement. Second.

[2:03:50] So this seemed like a little more of a complicated one.

[2:03:55] Steve, do you have any other comments on this one before we...

[2:03:59] I mean, to take in our advisement means we just could deep-six it.

[2:04:02] Yeah, I mean, I thought it was just... I mean, we have this work plan as the next thing, and it's hefty.

[2:04:08] So, unless we're really excited about adding a thing to it...

[2:04:16] Well, but I guess my question is, it's a cost benefit analysis, are there, and I don't know if Kelly, you need to speak to this, but I don't know if this is a minor thing, it's going to affect very few properties, then we can just shelve it.

[2:04:33] But if it's going to have some kind of broader benefit, I mean the Ames Home Builders Association, but it was important enough that they thought there was a benefit to this.

[2:04:44] And I don't know, I'd like to make sure we don't deep-six it without really giving

[2:04:49] us some thought.

[2:04:50] Can you speak to that?

[2:04:51] Is it a big deal either way to us, or if

[2:04:57] you just focus on that forefoot issue, it

[2:05:00] I

[2:05:04] would say from our conversations with the group, they were hoping to be able to present some of their concerns to the council and explain more about what their interests are. The memo is really focused on that with the driveway and they brought it up because of new construction homes. So how they would really elaborate on that and exactly what they would say the extent of the issue as I think that's something they would have to communicate.

[2:05:28] I think the change, the standard that if it is changed, we're trying to keep it as narrow as possible to limit the scope of the work.

[2:05:37] Does it also include querying your memo circle or multiple driveways also being allowed?

[2:05:44] I think that was a secondary interest.

[2:05:47] Like if you go back to when we adopted the driveway standards, many of these things were brought up that weren't included or they were put in in one format not another way.

[2:05:56] So I don't know if they would speak to that in great detail. I know the width is the primary issue and we say width is that

[2:06:02] From the back of the curb to the sidewalk or is it actually on their property?

[2:06:09] It's the the way the standard is written as we measure at the sidewalk and then it can widen out from the sidewalk

[2:06:16] In multiple ways it can widen out

[2:06:19] So they're looking for the measurement to be wider at the sidewalk to allow for a wider or more uniform

[2:06:27] driveway on site as well as the approach.

[2:06:30] And would having this on an agenda

[2:06:34] necessarily create work for you or your staff just to hear a homebuilder's presentation?

[2:06:39] For this, I think we would just use this memo, put it as an agenda item and then if you're willing

[2:06:44] I'm going to take public comment, that's what they're looking for.

[2:06:47] Spell to speak to that.

[2:06:48] I guess why wouldn't we want to at least hear the presentation if we don't have to accept it?

[2:06:53] But these are the people building our houses seem like we should listen to the proposal.

[2:06:57] Yeah, I guess I just thought we had talked about it last in 2023.

[2:07:01] So it hasn't been that long ago that it was updated and they could present their information

[2:07:07] to us without it being on a future agenda as well.

[2:07:12] So it just seems like if we direct staff to put it on a future agenda, it will come

[2:07:17] with recommendations from staff, or it often does, right?

[2:07:20] And I'm not looking to make staff do any extra work on that, but.

[2:07:24] Could we also just have the width piece on and not put the circular multiple driveways?

[2:07:31] Sure.

[2:07:32] I would, I'll recent my motion.

[2:07:33] And I think, you know, if we want to talk about it more in depth, I've been.

[2:07:38] And by wanting to listen to them, I don't have, I'm not expressing a opinion on this.

[2:07:42] I want to hear them out, and I'm trying to figure out, you know, from a cost benefit perspective.

[2:07:47] I agree with you as a starting point, I'm not wanting to revise our codes every other hour.

[2:07:52] So that's not good governance.

[2:07:54] So by, I'll make a motion to put this on a future agenda, but that's not committing me to supporting it.

[2:08:01] I think that's fair, I will second that.

[2:08:03] I just don't want to over promise that by putting it on a future agenda, we're, yeah, we're promising that we're going to fix it.

[2:08:11] agree. And you're looking at this level of information. You're not looking for more alternatives

[2:08:16] and more anything, right? So just to use this memo, get it to an agenda so they can present your

[2:08:21] discuss. Yeah. So to create to a racist point, does that also include considering if circle or

[2:08:28] multiple dryways should be allowed or is it just a with question? Well, if they're going to show up,

[2:08:34] they might as well make their pitch on these things. But I think the starting point should be

[2:08:40] that if we've made an ordinance recently,

[2:08:44] then it's gonna be a higher burden on the applicant

[2:08:47] to persuade us to change things.

[2:08:49] So I, that's my position, but I'd like to hear him out.

[2:08:53] Chair.

[2:08:53] All right, doesn't have any motion to say aye.

[2:08:55] Aye.

[2:08:55] Any opposed?

[2:08:57] Motion carried.

[2:08:58] All right, next one is a monthly work plans,

[2:09:01] status updates.

[2:09:03] And this one is new and you requested this back

[2:09:06] in your January goal setting.

[2:09:08] No action is needed.

[2:09:09] It's really just to keep you apprised of what's happening and to keep track of the things that come out on Tuesday nights for us to do.

[2:09:18] Thank you for doing that.

[2:09:20] And then third is a referral regarding social service provider standards.

[2:09:25] This was something that was requested for consideration by Kate Gregory.

[2:09:33] Now this one does say it would be a heavier lift for staff and would need to be prioritized on the work plan.

[2:09:39] And so, again, I'm just hesitant to add, we've got so many irons in the fire right now.

[2:09:46] I guess, I mean, unless someone feels strongly that we need to, I would move that we thank

[2:09:52] Kate Gregory for passing this along and tell her we'll take it under advisement and think

[2:09:58] about.

[2:10:00] You know, how and when we might look at this topic, when planning has more time open than they do right now. I would second that. And I, I tend to favor that position. I, I think this is a very complicated memo. Can I just, I'll be candid with you. There's a lot to process. And I don't even know how to think about some of the unintended consequences of some of these things.

[2:10:28] So Kelly, do you have any sort of general comments about how much of a change this would bring to our current standards?

[2:10:44] Could you just offer a general comment on that? I mean, I could even tell how close this was.

[2:10:51] So we don't have anything like this in the ordinance.

[2:10:54] So right now, it's a very vague social service provider,

[2:10:58] broad definition, as I said in the memo,

[2:11:00] it could be anything from providing overnight shelter

[2:11:02] to serving at a soup kitchen.

[2:11:04] And that's the definition that we have.

[2:11:07] And then if you need a special use for met,

[2:11:10] you're defining the use on the fly with the zoning port

[2:11:13] of adjustment.

[2:11:13] So there's nothing in the code that this compares to.

[2:11:16] It's so it'd be a whole new approach

[2:11:17] of defining in advance the parameters that such a use could even operate under and still be subject to the zoning Board of Adjustment review of that proposal.

[2:11:28] So would you as a policy from a staff perspective recommend that we look at this again I don't know how to do a cost benefit on this either with this help give direction in future development for the city.

[2:11:46] I don't think I can answer this should.

[2:11:49] I think it definitely defines the guardrails of what is acceptable for future consideration.

[2:11:57] And some of these are operational standards and if they're meant to have retroactive

[2:12:01] application or not, that's something that's a whole nother conversation.

[2:12:05] But there's a lot, admittedly, this is about as involved over requests as you've probably

[2:12:10] ever received in the number of issues it touches on.

[2:12:13] And so is it a solution in such a problem?

[2:12:17] I think you have to ask the people that wrote it.

[2:12:20] I think they believe there's a problem

[2:12:22] and this would help solve it or at least remedy future problem.

[2:12:25] Why no, they think that.

[2:12:26] My question is, do you think that?

[2:12:28] He can.

[2:12:29] I'm not that.

[2:12:30] Don't make an answer.

[2:12:31] That's not fair.

[2:12:32] Well, wait.

[2:12:33] There's a problem.

[2:12:34] This is exactly what staff needs to help us understand.

[2:12:37] Are there problems that this would be?

[2:12:40] I did not write a memo to address the should part of it.

[2:12:42] I just explained what was here, and if you want to discuss this further at another agenda.

[2:12:47] I don't inventory the social service providers that exist across the city.

[2:12:51] I don't have, again, we don't even know all of them.

[2:12:54] We had that conversation back in the fall.

[2:12:56] So there's a lot in here.

[2:12:58] If we need to get into it more, I think it needs to be on an agenda.

[2:13:00] We didn't talk to the sales, the social service providers.

[2:13:03] Look at the detail that's required and all those requirements.

[2:13:06] So we have looked at all of those.

[2:13:07] So, honestly, I think that the discussion of social service providers is maybe a separate

[2:13:16] issue that we should get into at some point, especially after we receive our homelessness

[2:13:23] report and have a better sense of the way in which providers may be playing a role in that.

[2:13:30] But I feel like this particular vehicle for that discussion isn't what I would want to vote for right now to put on an agenda.

[2:13:46] So I think it's an issue that needs the right time and I don't think that this is the vehicle and now is the time.

[2:13:57] All right.

[2:13:58] There's a motion on the floor in a second.

[2:14:00] Those who may have the motion, please say aye.

[2:14:01] Aye.

[2:14:02] Any opposed?

[2:14:03] Dribb standing?

[2:14:04] Motion carried.

[2:14:06] Thanks Kelly.

[2:14:08] All right.

[2:14:08] Report regarding body.

[2:14:10] Any report from discover aims tonight?

[2:14:12] Not tonight.

[2:14:14] Amos Regional Economic Alliance.

[2:14:16] I think the night.

[2:14:18] Not tonight.

[2:14:19] Soy kind emergency management.

[2:14:21] Agency meets next Wednesday night.

[2:14:24] Not tomorrow night, but a week from night.

[2:14:25] tonight and transit anything we met March 27th looked at the herd of contract and annual customer

[2:14:32] survey brief meeting thank you all right council comments Emily you stole on it you're still there

[2:14:41] sure sure can good evening so recently the incoming the vice president president elect they've

[2:14:53] just notify me if they're in tension to appoint me.

[2:14:57] Yay!

[2:14:58] Granted for me, turn.

[2:15:00] So I know you tried to get rid of this.

[2:15:05] Oh, you did it. So you're about that. And then they've also expressed that they intend to appoint me for, um, side-right again. So, you know, mostly

[2:15:16] to be serving on the side art board again.

[2:15:20] And then, not much else for me

[2:15:23] is just wrapping things up with the current trend.

[2:15:27] I will be speaking to Gloria's class on Friday.

[2:15:30] I'm very excited about it.

[2:15:31] I'm then wrapping up a few student interviews

[2:15:34] for side art things and the like.

[2:15:37] But yeah, I saw it will be a point.

[2:15:39] It's the next year.

[2:15:40] And inauguration is on Monday, the 21st.

[2:15:44] So it'll be some time after that.

[2:15:47] But that's where I've got.

[2:15:49] Thank you, and congratulations.

[2:15:50] Look, Forty being with us again for another year.

[2:15:53] Thank you.

[2:15:55] Gloria?

[2:15:56] Congratulations, Emily.

[2:15:58] And she will be coming to speak to my business communication

[2:16:02] class in her capacity as a member of the Transit Board

[2:16:06] and also as our city council liaison

[2:16:09] and helping other students to understand

[2:16:13] and what she does and how they can use her as a contact for communicating with council

[2:16:23] if they don't prefer to go to us directly.

[2:16:27] That's all I got.

[2:16:28] Browell?

[2:16:30] I was just going to mention a couple events on the 19th, I don't know, do we have a council

[2:16:35] meeting next week?

[2:16:36] Special on.

[2:16:37] So I guess I can mention them then.

[2:16:38] But I'll mention them now to repair cafe that library folks mentioned that.

[2:16:43] That's on the 19th and I'll be helping with the headlight, tail light,

[2:16:48] brake light repairs this time and whatever else needs repaired.

[2:16:51] So I always love that event.

[2:16:53] And then the water plant open house is next Saturday, the 19th, so Saturday,

[2:16:58] the 19th as well, 9.31 I have in my calendar.

[2:17:04] So just some reminders on those, that's all I have tonight.

[2:17:06] thank you. So the spring 2025 issue of traction is out and I just wanted to note that Rachel

[2:17:16] Johnk is in there. For those being recognized as for under 40 making an impact in our city

[2:17:26] congratulations. I think

[2:17:34] tonight Rachel. Nothing for me. All right.

[2:17:41] I just

[2:17:42] want to comment. I had the privilege of reading a proclamation at the

[2:17:47] learning lab on Iowa State campus and I had no idea what a fantastic program

[2:17:55] that is and the child will develop. I think it is. Anyway it's there at the

[2:17:59] a polymer building, polymer, that's correct, anyway, but it was, it's just nice at times,

[2:18:09] like you said, you learn a lot sometimes going to council meetings just times, you go to

[2:18:12] different events and you say, wow, it's pretty amazing. So anyway, all right, with that,

[2:18:18] entertain motion to adjourn. Move away adjourn. Second. All right, let's take our say aye.

[2:18:22] Aye. We are adjourned. Thank you.

Ames City Council

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