>>We are calling this wonderful
meeting to order. It's a great
day. If anyone wishes
to address the city council
on any item considered
at this meeting before or
during council's consideration
of that item,
please enter your name
in the electronic kiosk located
in the lobby. The City council
will allocate up to a maximum
of 3 minutes per speaker
for each agenda item. Staff
reports are available online
at the city's website,
cityofredding.gov and in the
public view binder located
on the podium
at the north side
of the chamber. How many
speakers yet? Now we got one.
There was no reportable action
for closed session. Yep, yep.
We are going. Pledge
of allegiance. Then Patrick
Blewett will give us the
invocation.
>>Ready?
>>I pledge allegiance to the
Flag of the United States of
America and to the Republic
for which it stands, one
Nation under God, indivisible,
with liberty and justice for
all.
>>Let's pray as we prepare
for this city council meeting.
Lord, we ask for your comfort
and your wisdom. First, we ask
for your comfort and care as
many grieve the Charlie Kirk
tragedy and prepare
for his funeral on Saturday.
We acknowledge,
like the governor of Utah said,
many people love Charlie and
what he stood for and many
people hated him and what he
stood for. That polarization
grieves us and it grieves you
too. Lord, we acknowledge that
part of the fabric of America
has been torn. Please forgive
us and mend us together as your
one people. Oh Lord, give us
the grace to allow people
to respond and grieve different
in different ways. Give us the
strength to hold our tongues
and be gracious when people
view the situation differently
than us. Give us the courage to
speak our own minds when
appropriate. Give us the
ability to hear each other
with our hearts,
not just our ears. I would ask,
Lord, that you guide us past
the grief borne language
of we are Charlie and
into a chorus
of distinct voices
in mourning. You have made us
each different and you have
made us neighbors. We all
desire your blessing
to be free from fear,
to flourish as a community and
to know your peace, O Lord.
Lord, we ask that you make us
peacemakers
in this angry world. Second, we
humbly ask
for wisdom as members
of the community. Give us
creativity to dream
about what reading can become.
Give us patience with one
another and give us freedom
to dream together. Lord, we ask
that you give this council
wisdom as they make decisions
that affect this community now
and for years to come. Give
them ears to hear each other
and give them ears
to hear the people of Redding
so We invoke your blessing now
on these proceedings. And we
ask this in the name of Jesus
and God's people said, Amen.
All right,
let's sit down.
>>All right,
we got two speakers. Nick,
you're up first. Oh, what?
Okay, sorry. Roll call.
>>[ ROLL CALL ]
>>Thank you. Now, public
speakers. Nick, you can be
first. Steve, you're up second.
>>Well, Barry's retiring,
and I wanted to go over some
of the accomplishments he's
made since he's been our city
manager. You know,
since he took over, Redding's
starting to look
like a banana republic. The
homeless population has
exploded. And, you know, out
of the area,
parolees have been welcomed
to our community. And I know
that Barry and a lot
of other people are aware
of it,
but they keep denying it.
But it's gotten
to the point even the out of
town parolees are getting
angry. You're letting so many
enter our community. It seems
to me that he did keep the
local economy moving because.
Especially if you're in the
glass replacement business,
because of all the homeless and
the vagrants throwing rocks
through our glasses. And the
guys that build fences, iron
fences, around our businesses
to protect them,
they've done awfully well,
too. They've kept the police
busy hurting the homeless
around. And the fire
department, you know,
two thirds of their calls are
for warming fires
by the homeless. It doesn't
seem like anybody wants
to address that. I ran
into a police officer at
Costco right around Christmas
time,
and I asked him what percentage
of the calls would he credit
to homelessness? The homeless
people? I said 50%. He said,
no way. More than that. Seems
to me a city manager would get
on top of that problem and
protect their citizens
from the problems they create.
You know, our sports park went
to hell during Barry's tenure
as city manager. And. But, you
know, one part of our economy
that really blossomed is the
need for private security. And
then I. I wonder about the
public private partnerships
that seem to come into vogue
with Barry. The one that comes
to mind to me is Block 7, where
two blocks in City of Redding
was more or less given away
for just a penance. And it was
developed by a couple
of private entities, and Barry
referred to it as a public
private partnership.
But the city of Redding's name
isn't on any deeds,
and they're not getting any
of the profits or any
of the rents or anything. And I
wonder whose idea it was to
Make Redding a bicycle town. I
haven't found anybody that is
really in favor of it. And then
we've got rebates on bikes,
actually giving bikes away and
cars away. And now they want an
increase
in electricity costs. And
on top of that,
we had the sports park,
the soccer loan for about three
and a half million dollars,
I think it was, didn't pay
back,
but now they want an increase.
And on top of that,
he did do well
with the government employees.
$20 million worth of raises
in the last two or three years.
Thank you.
>>Good morning, council staff,
community members. Nick, I'm
sorry, but Barry doesn't make
any of those decisions. Those
are all city council decisions.
So anyway,
about eight years ago,
seeing all the crime that was
in the streets at that time,
I started coming
to these meetings. And so I
decided to figure out what was
going on. I figured I had
to come to these meetings.
What were the causes
of the huge amount of crime?
This was not the city
in the county I grew up in.
This was something closer to
larger cities and areas that
are crime infested. So that I
could learn more
about the situation, I came
to the council meetings,
and while
at the council meetings,
I met people like Nick Gardner
and was learning that were,
you know, instrumental
in speaking and involved
in the city and speaking
to some of them.
In those discussions, I found
out it was this easy problem
that. That basically the devil
incarnate was our City manager,
Barry Tiffin, that he was the
problem in all this. So that
being the case, I decided
to confront Barry about some
of the problems that existed.
Now,
to say that the city manager,
you know, creates all these
problems is kind of ridiculous
because he simply presents
information
to the city councils, and the
city council basically makes
all the decisions that Nick
Gardner just mentioned. So
shoot. So anyway, I asked him
about some of the different
problems that I saw, and Barry
always had a good explanation
and he always had a good
rationale as to why those
decisions were made. I came
to respect his decisions, and I
found that usually when I
disregard disagreed with him,
I hadn't taken into
consideration everything. I've
come over time to respect
Barry as city manager
to the greatest extent. The
city Council changes as time
goes on,
but the city manager remains
in his position. It was one
of Barry's responsibilities to
help the new city council
adjust to their jobs
without making bad decisions
before they could be fully
informed. I think he's been
very successful at doing that.
I think that he has saved the
city millions of dollars
over the years being able
to explain to the council
members and other people the
ramifications of hasty
decisions. I don't believe you
can find an individual that has
greater knowledge of the City
of Reading than Barry Tippen.
With that knowledge,
he has served the City of
Redding very well. Barry, I
personally want to thank you
for all that you've done
for the city. And I want
to thank you for your service.
I wish you good fortune
on your next adventure.
Anyway, thank you very much.
>>Thanks, Steve. All right,
let's get rolling.
Presentations 2A. Pardon me.
>>There should be more public
comment. I know I signed up on
the kiosk.
>>I don't have it down.
>>Here we go.
>>Adopt resolution honoring
Barry Tippen
for his distinguished service
to the City of Reading and
associated presentations. I get
more than three minutes,
don't I? Good evening,
everyone. Tonight we come
together to celebrate and honor
someone who has left an
extraordinary mark on the City
of Reading. Our City Manager,
Barry Tippen, who is retiring
after 21 years
of dedicated service. It's hard
to capture a career like this
in just a few words, so I'll
share a few highlights that
speak to the impact Barry has
had on our city. Under Barry's
leadership, Reading became one
of the first cities in
California to launch a crisis
intervention response team,
pairing police with mental
health professionals. Barry
also worked to modernize the
fire department,
moving three firefighters per
engine, acquiring new fire
engines, a ladder truck, and
improving the fire department's
technology, which keeps both
firefighters and our community
safer. And when our community
faced some
of its toughest challenges,
the Carr Fire, Snowmageddon and
COVID 19 pandemic, Barry guided
our response and recovery
with steadiness,
compassion and determination.
One of Barry's most valuable
legacies is the transformation
of downtown Reading.
From opening Market street and
creating the Market Street
Promenade to the Pine Street
Lofts Block 7, Whistle Stop
Park, Barry helped bring new
energy to the heart
of our city. And all while he
never lost sight
of the importance of housing.
From the Woodlands Apartments
to the Lawrence Hotel, from
Kinetic Court to East Street
Senior Apartments, and through
multiple micro shelter
projects, Barry made sure that
more
of our residents had a place
to call home.
Behind the scenes, Barry pushed
forward many substantial
infrastructure investments,
including major upgrades to our
wastewater treatment plant,
the expansion of Cypress
Street Bridge, the development
of Stillwater Business park,
which now houses employers
like Amazon and Frito Lay. He
also helped bring more jobs and
opportunities through projects
like the redevelopment of
Mount Shasta Mall, the
relocation of Costco, and
expanded air service to the
Reading Regional Airport,
giving our residents direct
flights to San Francisco, Los
Angeles, Denver and Seattle.
Inside City Hall, Barry is just
as impactful. He's created the
city's communication team who
are all responsible for all
of our press releases,
our social media channels,
podcasts, the city's website,
the city newsletter,
basically.
>> Anything and everything that
should be shared
with the public.
>> Barry has represented
Reading regionally statewide
and we testified before
Congress. As director of REU,
he has served as the director
of chairman of Shascom. You
may know them as 911
dispatchers, TANIC,
otherwise known as
Transmission Agency of
Northern California and I guess
Banic Also known as Balancing
agency of Northern
California. Agencies you and I
don't necessarily know about
because we have good people who
handle these things. Speaking
of good people, Barry has
assembled a highly effective,
well rounded leadership team.
The majority of whom have been
in their positions
for just a couple of years.
But well beyond the titles and
the projects, Barry has brought
vision, steady leadership, and
a collaborative spirit that has
made Redding stronger.
On behalf
of the city council, I want
to say thank you. Thank you.
Thank you. Thank you, Barry,
for your leadership, your
service and your unwavering
commitment to the people of
Redding. You leave
behind not just a list
of accomplishments, but a
legacy that will shape this
city for generations. Thank
you. So apparently we don't
have a clock or anything
for you. Anybody want
to say anything? Mr. Littal?
Yeah, I do. I've been here
for just under a year, but I
firmly believe that the city is
better today than what it was
when he took over. And
from the moment I met Barry, I
just felt trusted
with this information,
his guidance. He's able
to answer all my questions.
And we're just incredibly
grateful for your leadership
and guiding us
through difficulty
over the many, many years
in the past
before my time when I was here.
But I'm just eternally
grateful. And I don't think we
know what we're going to lose
until you're gone and you're
going to be very difficult
to replace. And I'm grateful
for everything you've given
to the city of Redding. Thank
you.
>> Anybody else, I would like
to say thank you. Barry is
aware of this now because I
told him pretty soon when I
came onto council that I was
pretty judgmental of his choice
when he was chosen as the city
manager, that I felt like we
were rubber stamping someone
who would simply moved up the
ranks. And I have been
thoroughly impressed
by your knowledge, by the way
in which that you have no
problem with me disagreeing
with you or agreeing
with you. I really, really have
valued just your insight and
the ability
to really have knowledge of
virtually every single
department. So merely replacing
your knowledge and your input
is gonna be a large shoes
to fill. Thank you for your
honesty and your candor.
>> Always.
>> Well, personally I would say
we've met many, many, many,
many times. I'm grateful
for all that you've done. You
guided us.
But you've never tried
to persuade me in my decisions
like Aaron when we agreed. We
have had several disagreements
and we still have
disagreements. But I'm very
respectful and honored
to know you and grateful to
have met you and know you and I
Hope that we can be. I know
I'll be your friend when we
leave. And I'm sure you won't
answer all my calls
after then, but you know, I'm
thankful that you answered most
of them now. So anyway,
thank you very much, Very much.
All right. Are we going
to get a picture maybe?
>> Oh, yeah.
>> What you think so?
>> We also need a motion
on the.
>> Resolution before we do
pictures.
>> I'll make a motion that we
accept the resolution. I'm
sorry, what was that? I'm just
making a motion that we accept
the resolution as stated. I'll
second that. All in favor?
Aye.
>> Aye.
>> Aye. Second pass unanimously
or was there photo? Anybody?
Yeah.
>> Yep.
[ PICTURE TAKING ]
>>Mr. Mayor, would you mind?
>> Yes, please.
>> Thank you.
>> I do not mind.
>> First, you know, I want
to thank Nick for all the
amazing powers he thinks I
have. So I appreciate that.
>> And.
>> And you love the city so
much, I think you should move
into the limits so you can vote
for council, so
to say the least. You know,
I never really expected
to end my career
under these circumstances. You
know, I've always planned
to retire in 2025, and that's
been long known, you know,
to move on
to my next phase.
>> Reality.
>> I was going to retire about
seven years ago and decided
to stick around. But I never
thought I'd finish my career
with a bit
of character assassination
by a council member. It's
pretty disheartening,
especially when these
allegations and accusations are
baseless and completely false,
seem designed to serve some
unknown political agenda and
harm our city. And
unfortunately, revisionist
history is something that seems
to be the go to move
for some politicians
to wipe away what we all know
to be true. I know for certain
that we own our individual
integrity as individuals. Only
we can give it away. What I
know for certain is my
integrity is fully intact.
But I cannot say with certainty
that it's the same
for my accuser. That said,
tonight's not about anger.
It's not about bitterness.
It's about celebration and
gratitude and none
of what I've been able
to accomplish. Whether you
believe it or not,
it's possible
without my wife, Joanne,
sitting in the back
of my family with my son Zach
and daughter in law
Gabrielle. You know,
they've let me be through these
long nights and all the endless
meetings and crises that seem
to never end. You know,
they've been my support system.
They're my anchor. And I thank
them from the bottom of my
heart. I thank the council
members as well. Through my
eight years as city manager and
before, you've supported me
while I support you. You've
helped me be successful,
and I hope I've done the same
for you. And, of course,
I have to acknowledge
Camille. Camille just
extraordinarily manages the
office of the city manager,
and she's our rock. She's our
stability. She takes care
of everything. She protects us.
She's awesome. Thank you,
Camille. When I look
at my time as city manager,
I'm proud of how together,
we've navigated
through many things. Some
of them were mentioned, you
know, the car fire in as
Firenado, Snowmageddon. What
wasn't mentioned was the
pension tsunami when I first
took over.
At least that's what I call it.
And of course,
the global pandemic. And each
of these events tested our
community in ways that could
have broken us, really,
but it didn't. You know,
it revealed our resilience,
our strength, and our ability
to adapt.
>> And.
>> And I think our community is
better for it. And I think we
have shown some amazing
aptitude as a community. But if
you ask me what I consider my
greatest accomplishment,
it isn't surviving disasters.
It's building the executive
team that now leads the city.
They're talented, dedicated,
and deeply committed
to serving Reading
with integrity. They are,
without question, the best team
I could have ever hoped
to work alongside. And our
city's future is secure
under their guidance. So, yes,
it's been an honor
to serve the city, an honor
to work with so many good
people who care deeply
about this community as I do.
It's an honor
to have played my part in
shaping its present and
preparing for the future. So
thank you
for the trust you've given me.
Despite the noise
of politics,
which is deafening at times,
I leave my post with pride in
what we've accomplished
together, and confidence
in the people who will carry
on in the future.
>> Thank you.
>> Thank you very.
>> Much.
>> All right, moving on
to be presentation by Danny
Orloff. Visit Redding's tourism
marketing director, providing
quarterly report regarding
tourism marketing and
promotional efforts
for the city of Reading.
Danny, thank you. You guys kind
of set a vibe
with the lights dim real quick.
When I came up here,
it was really cool to see.
Just right before the
presentation came up,
you guys got to see the slide
of the beautiful area that we
live in. No, you don't have
to go back. It's the Sundial
Bridge with Shasta Bali and the
river just running
through the town. It's an honor
to be up here to be able to
represent our our city and our
community. And I'm excited
to highlight some of the things
that we've been able
to accomplish this past.
Overall, you guys have gotten
the annual report from us.
Once the Chamber of Commerce
took
on the visit writing contract,
there's been a $2 million lift
that's been able to stabilize
for TOT. Talking amongst my
peers
in the tourism industry, a lot
of them have maintained flat
since 2019. So seeing that
effort being able to increase
and sustain has been awesome.
It would be detrimental
to anything for happen
for the marketing budget
for us. We truly understand
that marketing advertising is
the fuel for sales and we
understand that we are the
megaphone for Reading and we're
that positive light to be able
to showcase everybody,
everything that we have
to offer in this city. As you
guys see Here, with the TOT
stabilized website,
visitors went up by 14% and
impressions how many times our
ads were seen was up by 25%.
In this last year, we got
to see positive KPIs
from the average length
of stay going up by 12%,
average night stays going up by
2% and seeing more repeat
guests come to our area being
up 10% versus the previous
year. We are very strategic
with our marketing dollars and
want to market
to those who are coming
to our area. We're seeing more
visitation from Sacramento,
from Eureka, from Reno, from
those areas that are small
drive distances to us
in comparison to in the past
where it was longer distances
such as la, Seattle, Portland
and other areas. We're excited
to be able to use that data
to be able to make the
strategic decisions so we can
have our money last longer and
get a stronger return
on investment. For the
investment that you guys put
in to visit Reading, we're able
to see increase in visitation
for hotel occupancy. Today's
been a great day overall.
Started off the day with State
of the City, hearing the impact
from Turtle Bay and how that
makes our visitors feel as well
as our locals. Being able
to see that Sundial bridge and
knowing that that is our icon
for our area and people love
to see that. They are thrilled
to be able to come to our area
to witness a piece
of architecture that spans
across the river. We also went
to my place. It shows people
are investing in our area from
a hotel occupancy and it's the
first hotel in California
from my place. So it shows
people are investing
from outside of our area
because they see the power of
tourism and they see the power
that people want to be able
to be invigorated when they
come to our area. The speeches
that they said they could have
picked anywhere in
California,
but they chose here. We saw
increase in revenue
from hotel stays. We did see a
fluctuation
in short term rentals and a lot
of that's based
on the consumer mindset being
in post Covid and they want
to stay in hotels, they want
to be able
to have their beds made instead
of going
to a place where they feel
like is at home and live
like a, like a resident
in that area,
they're just shifting
into hotels. So we're watching
trends overall and seeing that.
Sorry for the voice inflection
as you see here. You can see
our visitor snapshot for some
of the data that we have.
Sacramento is our number one
market. San Francisco as well.
And California is a big,
a big.
>> Market for us overall.
>> On here you're seeing the
numbers and based
on credit card data we look
at multiple different things
from analytics
from our website,
from geofencing
from the cell phones, but also
credit card data and who's
spending it and where they're
spending it. Visit California
came out with a, a study and it
shows every dollar
in marketing spent relates back
to $21 in visitor spend. We
understand that having a very
fruitful economy is important
to us. Outside of tot, we're
on the cutting edge. We
understand that influencers
have a stronger voice now than
they ever have had in the past
with different forms
of advertising. We were able
to bring
in seven different influencers,
increase our social media
presence by up 13%. Being able
to get a 25,000 follower
followership on Instagram and
being able to reach more than
6,000 people throughout that
platform as well as nearly
40,000 people on Facebook. We
understand that they're
different markets and we
understand we need to market
to people differently
across different platforms.
Overall, we understand what the
consumer wants. These were our
top posts. The drag strip.
People want to know those aha
moments and those historical
pieces from our area the
previous year and it was
about the Geosphere on i5.
This last year is about the,
about the racetrack. We also
know that people want those
authentic moments that are
uniquely found in reading such
as the rodeo which you see
through the 48,000 views and
reaching over 33,000 people
organically. Our top
collaboration posts. We
understand that we love our
area and we want to be able
to bring optimism
to our area and people
to feel invigorated after they
leave and so they can come back
and support us time and time
again, you see that with the
63,000 people who are watching
the mural that was donated
to our town to showcase that
positive message through
Steffi Lynn. And this is all
relationship building. She
could pick anywhere
in the world where she wanted
to donate a mural to.
But picking Reading
California. It shows something
about our area. We're able to
have cornerstone campaigns such
as Perfect Vacation, funded
by Choose Reading Lodging. And
it showcased that we're more
than just a pit stop on i5.
We're a place that you can stay
in multiple days and you can
come back to and do multiple
things once you come back as
well. There's no other place
like this. Shasta Lake
Whiskeytown, the caverns, the
dam, the river, the Sacramento
river and rail trail,
our downtown. We have it all
here. We're also able
to promote local events such as
Glowing Wild, Garden of
Lights, the rodeo,
and you can see those through
the different impressions
below. We also understand the
power of other people's voices
and their stronger platforms
outside of influencers. Public
relations is huge for us. We
brought in and hosted over 20
writers articles were published
more than 57 times
with an audience reach of
over 27 million people. These
are numbers that our team is
extremely proud of and we
couldn't do it alone. I want
to compliment my colleague,
Jennifer. She's amazing. I feel
like I'm getting emotional
because it's not just me up
here,
like it's a whole team effort.
But you see that throughout
here with the Garden of lights
with adventure.com and Men's
Journal. These are publications
that you don't just get you
their relationship.
Relationship build. Having a
strong connection
with the city is awesome.
By turning the new scope
from tasks
into goals and being able to
see those goals and
strategically go after them.
We did have to adjust from
losing PR that slide that we
just saw based
on those budget cuts. And we
want to make sure we can put
Redding in the most positive
light we possibly can
from a marketing agency switch.
We also had to do that by
losing our optimizer and going
into more of a tourism agency
marketing agency. We're
diversifying our platforms and
we want to be
on the cutting edge of this
with AI and. And
with those geo fencing. So like
checking people's cell phones
and knowing if they've came
to the area, if they visited,
how they've utilized our
content and being able to make
sure that we're getting more
views from different areas. So
that's where you see the road
trippers icon, Azira click
Trips, Google and etc.
Overall, we can't do this
alone. We want to be that
positive light and positive
megaphone. So you see things
like the partnership with Ru,
being able
to paint the boxes downtown.
Thank you, Nick. And your team
able to host networking events
not only to help us, but also
help others create better
content from pulling
in attractions,
creators and accommodations all
in one area so they can thrive
together. Being able
to team up with the
Historical Society for cultural
sustainability and showcasing
things like the Red and
Regatta. Also teaming up and
showing beautification
in our town with influencers
painting a mural right across
from Whistle Stop park to
highlight all the beautiful
things
in our area as a great backdrop
for photos and to be able
to highlight our history. Also
working with the city and
Multiple partners on Celebrate
20 from the sundial Bridge. So
ultimately, lake and that
bridge looked pretty darn cool.
And then as you guys know
from the collaboration,
as mentioned earlier
in the slide, I'm here
for any questions, comments,
concerns, but I just want
to thank you guys
for giving me the opportunity
to speak today. Thank you,
Danny. No problem. Any
questions? Just got one
question. I know we cut your
budget, which is painful
to do being in business. I know
the impact that when you cut
money from marketing, sometimes
you don't see the impact
of that for a long time. But
have we seen a downward trend
in or are we just not quite at
the point where we'll see the
impacts of spending less money
on marketing? Yeah, we've seen
a slight downward trend right
now. To answer your question,
we are seeing a slight downward
trend. A lot of this is going
to be longer term. I mean,
with cutting PR,
that's a huge megaphone. You
saw Men's Journal,
adventure.com, uSA Today.
Those are articles that they
cost money to be able
to bring the people in
to witness things firsthand.
So marketing is the fuel
for advertising. Sorry,
marketing. Advertising is the
fuel for sales. And we're
selling our area. So the less
money that we're putting
into our gas tank, essentially
we're not going as far. So
being able to, I would say,
double down on helping us
market because we can control
the narrative on how we're
showcasing our city and
enticing more people
to come here. So. So I think
marketing is extremely
important.
>> To answer your question.
>> No problem. Anybody else?
All right, thank you. Thank
you, Danny. Thank you, guys.
Thank you, Danny. All right.
Tusi presentation by
Christian Church Homes
providing an update on past,
present and future projects and
activities in the city of
Reading.
>> Good evening.
>> Thank you
for the opportunity
for me.
>> To tell you about CCH
Christian Church Homes.
>> We've been around for 64
years.
>> We have low income housing
in seven.
>> States, managing or owning
46 properties with.
>> 3,700 residents living
at those properties.
>> Our residents have an
average income of.
>> 17,000 a year for 29
of those years or of the for
29 of the 64 years. We have
been in partners with the City
of Reading. We started our
first Property back in 1996
when we took over the Lorenz
Hotel.
>> And I'm going to see if I.
>> Can do this now because I've
been given instructions.
>> Well, there I did it.
>> The Lorenz hotel built in
191901. 100 room hotel with 78
one bedroom and studios.
>> We converted that over to
78 apartments for low income.
The city gave us some home
funds with that.
>> That project was 13.5
million. We also made sure that
the Lorenz was placed on the
National Historical register.
Our next venture was the
Treehouse. We built a 62 unit
low income senior apartment
complex in 1997. That apartment
building, the cost was about 4
million. Again with the City
of Reading home funds. Next we
took over the Hotel Reading. I
was approached by the city
Reading Police Department back
in those days and that was the
Hotel Reading was built in
1921. A hold old hotel with
100 units.
>> They came to me in 1999 and
said look,
we're having a lot of.
>> Police calls, a lot
of criminal activity.
>> Do you think CCH would come
and.
>> Help us with that?
>> I said absolutely. We took
it over in 1999.
>> By 2002 we opened our doors
for.
>> 50 low income residents
at a cost of 7.4 million.
>> We operate the two oldest
hotels in the City of Reading
by offering low income housing
in those buildings as well as
12 commercial spaces that are
for local businesses.
>> Our latest venture is our
newest crown.
>> In jewel there, that's
Piper Way. We just opened that
with 50 seniors.
>> We worked in conjunction
with the First.
>> Christian Church, the City
of Reading Voucher program,
Shasta County HHSA providing
homes
for six homeless individuals.
The California Department for
Developmentally Service, DDS,
Far Northern Regional. We
provided homes for nine
developmentally disabled.
>> Seniors at a cost of about
33.8 million. Our average
income there is $1,300 a.
>> Month
for our residents.
>> They age average 70 to 81
years old. We wanted
to share this information
with the city council to let
you know how much we appreciate
the partnering you have done
with us throughout these 29
years.
>> We have been able to house
232.
>> Low income housing students
or Residents, sorry.
>> Seniors that wouldn't have a
home without that. We wanted
to thank you for that.
>> We wanted
to let you know that.
>> Without our partnership and
providing the senior homes
throughout this trip that we've
made. Here's our balcony. We
would not have been able
to do this.
>> We've added to the economy
coming into.
>> Reading by hiring local
construction people.
>> We've added to the economy
by our.
>> Seniors shopping in the
local stores.
>> So we encourage you
to check out our website.
>> We are CCH.org and
to learn more.
>> About the seven states that
we have.
>> The other facilities we have
in the seven states. And I want
to take an opportunity to also
introduce the president and CEO
of Christian Church Homes,
Cynthia Alvarez. She drove up
from the Bay Area.
>> Tonight just to be able
to meet.
>> The city council and
to show you our presence here.
We have an open house on
October 1st and we'd like
to extend an invitation
to have you come to the.
>> Open house and see just
exactly what.
>> Our dollars have done
in working
with the city already. And my
last slide,
do you have any questions
at all?
>> What time is the open house?
Is it 9:30 or 10?
>> It is 10. It's October 1,
10 to 12.
>> Okay, I'll be there.
>> Our address is 3294 Piper
Way.
>> And we encourage you to come
see what your dollars have
done.
>> Meet our seniors and hear
some of their stories.
>> They're incredible.
>> Do you have any more
projects in sight?
>> We're hoping to in
Reading,
but we have other projects.
We're working on projects in
Hayward right now.
>> Chico, Tennessee.
>> Sacramento.
>> Yes, but Redding is my pride
and.
>> Joy because I live in
Redding and I was fortunate
enough to take the Lorenz.
>> I'm going to tell you a
quick brief story. I won't take
up all your time.
>> I walked into the Lorenz,
quit a.
>> Really high paying job
down south, moved.
>> Up here to Redding because
it's so gorgeous.
>> Walked into the Lorenz, they
were looking.
>> For an assistant community
manager.
>> I went to work for 18,000 a
year 29 years ago,
fell completely in.
>> Love with the Lorenz and the
city.
>> Of Redding and said this is
my place, this is where I
belong. I was fortunate enough
to be able to work
with a company that allowed me
to expand us here in the city
of Reading with four sites. I
like to do five and six or
whatever.
>> We need low income housing
for seniors.
>> Steve worked on my project
at the hotel Reading as a very
young man for the city of
Reading.
>> He was the hard hat guy
that.
>> Came around and checked to
make sure that we were doing
prevailing wages with his
clipboard and his hard hat.
>> We have a long history
with the city of Redding and I
just wanted
to thank the city council
for always being there
for us and the city.
>> Of Redding for helping us
with the fundings.
>> Thank you. You're welcome.
>> Thank you. Any other
questions? No, Paul. I'll be
there, though.
>> Thank you so much.
>> Thank you. All right,
our last presentation
of the evening. Ryan
Richardson, executive director,
Superior California Economic
Development, providing an
annual update on activities.
Bye, Camille. Have a good day.
>> Hello, my name is Ryan
Richardson. I'm the executive
director of Superior
California Economic
Development. First,
before we get into any
of the updates, I want to talk
about why collaboration
matters. What do we do
for an economy to be healthy
in our area? And this is
anywhere you need people,
obviously that's our workforce.
You need to have a community.
That's the housing,
that's the place making.
That's what we were hearing
about earlier,
all these great things. And we
need to have jobs. That's where
economic development comes
into play as well. So these
items, they have to be
in balance. If you're out
of balance, if you have a lot
of jobs and no housing,
that creates an issue. If you
have a lot of people
with good housing, no jobs,
that creates an issue as well.
So that gets back
to why we were created. So
knowing that economic
challenges don't stop
at the city or county lines,
the four counties, along with
Reading, Anderson and Shasta
Lake, created sced
to become an Economic
Development administration
economic development district
in 1979. So we're managed
by a 17 member board
of directors and we have a
staff of four. And Steve's one
of our boards of directors.
He's on the board. Some
of the things when I go present
at different conferences or
different webinars,
people don't know where
Northern California is. So
usually toss in a couple
of pictures, show a lake,
show some mountains. So we're
not Southern California. One of
the really things people don't
understand is the scope of,
of how big our area is. So the
four counties that I covered,
basically the same size as
New Hampshire and Vermont
combined with a population of
250,000 people. And most
everybody lives
along the i5 corridor. So I
tell if you go either east or
west, you're going
to get very rural very fast.
So it's very fun to. And that's
one of the benefits
of my job, is I get
to travel a lot and see a lot
of beautiful places.
With that backdrop, here are
the four priorities that guide
everything we do at sced.
That's kind
of fancy language. So I'm going
to keep it a little bit more
simple. We make loans
to small businesses. That's our
most forward facing thing that
we have with the public. We
write and update the
Comprehensive Economic
Development Strategy
for the region. That's a
strategy that the Economic
Development Administration has.
You need to have that in order
to get EDA funds. We find
grants to do projects that
support the SEDs. So that's a
part
of my job too where I'll go
out and we have to figure out
where can we get different
grants, whether it be federal
grants, be it
from our state partner,
will it be
from private as well? And then
we have internal metrics as
well. How are we doing as an
organization? Can we be
sustainable? That's one
of the nice things
about our nonprofit, our
organization is that we do
generate unrestricted funds as
well. So it gives us a little
more stability than what we see
in some
of our other agencies. This
question comes up a lot.
Aren't you the chassis EDC
doesn't come up as much now
that Todd's not there because
you know, we were both guys.
He's much younger. So my hair
is much darker, but it used
to be much grayer. It must be
the old days. I was a little
nicer hair. But that happens.
But if you look
at the service area,
I never get to use a point.
Oh, wow. That's cool. What?
Oh. Now how do I get rid
of it? All right,
so we're gonna leave that there
for a while. So on the SCED
for our regional. We're a
region. We cover four different
counties and then we're also a
statewide certified development
company. So we can make certain
SBA loans throughout all of
California. The Shasta edc,
they focus on a local Shasta
County. We have different
functions. We also have
different funding areas. So the
International Economic
Development Council says There
are basically 10 different
pillars
of economic development. Very
few organizations do all 10
of them. It just doesn't work
that way because you have
to specialize. We do a couple.
The Shasta EDC does a couple.
We're not in competition where
we are collaboration. We do
have different areas. We're
complementary. What we've done
a lot recently. We're starting
to really collaborate and
that's one
of the things we've seen in
economic development throughout
the last couple of years. It's
been our trend
of collaboration. So we've been
able to collaborate
on projects that align with our
SIDS and the chassis EDCs
expansion and attraction plans.
So we're looking
at infrastructure projects in
south county as well as the BDO
zone application. Of course,
none
of this work is done alone.
Each
of our partners fills a role.
So again, I toss the logos
on there to show how many
things we have going on. We're
able to work with a bunch
of different agencies. So
on the planning side, EDA and
local jurisdictions help fund
that. On the lending side,
the Economic Development
Administration, the Small
Business Administration, the
USDA and private funds help us
with make loans or give us
funds for loans. And then
on grant projects, again, same
of the usual suspects. Eda,
usda. We received state funds
through the California Jobs
First. We're excited
about them getting
into economic development.
Wells Fargo and US bank have
also been big supporters
on our grant side. And then our
bank partners,
we can't forget them. They're
where we get our referrals
from
for our lending program. 60%
of all of our revenue
at SCED is
from our lending programs. So
it's really exciting. I want
to make sure they get a shout
out and how much we appreciate
their work as well.
Through the California
Reinvestment act,
they also give unrestricted
contributions, which
for a nonprofit,
those help a lot. And Wells
Fargo and U.S. bank or Wells
Fargo is also really good
about giving us grants
for a purpose. So the
restricted grants. So we
actually do so once again
to review three things. So
number one,
we put together the
Comprehensive Economic
Development Strategy. That's
the main thing that we do
with our Economic Development
Administration Partnership
Planning Grant. We do small
business lending that is huge
for us. We're able
to help a lot
of different businesses. We
help with gap financing, so
rarely are we making the
investment ourselves. We're
usually working with a bank
where the business owner isn't
quite ready
to get totally financed
by the bank. We can step
in there. We're
like miracle grow. We help.
They're going
to get there eventually. We
just help them get there a
little bit faster through that
lending project and then the
economic development projects.
This is something we've really
got into the last three years
since I took
over the executive director,
finding different ways
to push the goals that are
in our Comprehensive Economic
Development Strategy. EDA gives
us funds
to create the strategy,
but no money
for implementation. So you have
to work with your partners,
you have to be creative,
find different ways
to get those projects rolling.
So more than just a plan, our
SEDS actually delivers results.
So again, in order
to get EDA funds, you have
to have a roadmap there. And
that's what the SEDS document
does. So here are a couple
of projects that were sent
for application. Hopefully you
recognize both of them. One was
for the Stillwater Business
park extension. Steve and
Jason did a great job
on putting that together.
Your City of Reading staff are
amazing at doing that work.
And then Simpson University as
well applied for a project.
And that was kind
of fun because every time I
talk to somebody, they go, do
you think EDA funds could do
this? And I'm like,
I don't know. So we call our
EDA rep and he goes, oh, sure,
we can do that. Like, really?
Because I didn't think some
of the projects we work
on are eligible.
But it does work, and it's
pretty exciting when it does.
So long time planning. One of
the most visible ways we make
an impact is supporting small
business with access
to capital. So you can see
we've made a lot
of loans. I've been with SKED
for 20 years. 17 years as the
loan program manager, three
years as executive director.
So a lot of those 580 loans
made were mine. So I take a lot
of pride
in what we've been able to do
in the area. My poor kids,
when they were little,
we'd drive around town or we'd
be going somewhere. I'm like,
hey, that's one
of our things. That was a
project we did. That was a
project we did. I like
to say my son's one of the best
economic developers. He's in
Korea right now in the Air
Force. But after listening
to me on so many road trips
for soccer, he learned a lot
about what we're doing as well.
Last year, we made 1.9 million
in loans. 1.1 million
of that was in Reading. And
with those Reading loans,
we leveraged an additional 3.3
million. So that impact is 4.4
million on there. Last year,
the city invested $27,000
with us. So that return
on investment on just that
piece is pretty huge. You toss
in what we're looking at
for those EDA grants. It's even
larger this year because EDA
changed the grant requirement.
It actually went down to
18,000. So it's quite a bit of
a savings that the city will be
seeing there. And one thing,
I'll try this again.
>> Because it's really cool.
>> We don't create. Darn it,
again,
we don't create the jobs. The
entrepreneurs create the jobs.
So these are all people that
have received loans from us.
You can see, hopefully maybe a
face or two that you recognize.
Those are the people that
actually making the impact. So
it's fun to see them succeed.
And beyond our daily work,
we're also launching
initiatives that build upon our
region's unique strengths. So
Outdoor Recreation was one
of the California Jobs First
Catalyst Fund grants that we
received. We're partnering
with siskiyec on that. So we
have a micro loan component.
Siskiyou EDC is handling an
educational component. And this
is for our whole district, all
four counties that we cover.
The MODOC meet again,
that was another California
jumps first. We were able
to get money from that. That's
a Modoc county specific
project.
But anything that we do in
these other counties really
benefits Shasta county
specifically writing because
this is the hub for economic
development activity. And so
what we look at
for that we're trying to market
processing plant up there. We
got a USDA grant a couple years
ago that said, yeah,
it's feasible. And now we're
trying to find someone
to pick that up and
to do a processing plant. The
BDO zone, that's a biofuel
development opportunity zone.
And this was really cool
because Rebecca from Chassis
EDC came over and said, hey,
I want to do this. It fits
into our plan with biomass.
And I think this is a good
opportunity. But we don't have
grant capacity because most of
the people that get these
grants get it through usda.
That's what we do all day long.
We're able
to merge or collaborate
on this. I was able
to help her. This is a project
that we'll be working on
in the fall. And then the
Wells Fargo projects. We just
put the application in
for this and we talk
about how we do regional. And
this is actually a super
regional project because we
work with other economic
development districts in far
Northern California. That's the
California Finance
Consortium. And we're going to
do a rural downtown
revitalization playbook. Right
now, a lot of our rural
communities are struggling.
They're transitioning
from resource distraction
to what's next
in the economy. We all like
to say our areas are beautiful,
but so are a lot
of other places. How do we.
What's going to go
into these empty buildings?
What are going on? These
storefronts? That's what we're
looking for with this.
In addition, that grant also
covers a collaboration that
we're doing with Shasta
College
on entrepreneurial boot camps.
We'll do one in each
of the four counties. It's
replicating a project they did
down to Tehama county is
extremely successful. We're
going to bring it up here and
then we have loan readiness
Technical assistance that will
also be funded
through that grant. So
hopefully in the next few weeks
we'll get that one approved.
Of course,
every opportunity comes
with challenges,
and here are some that, you
know, we're watching for us.
Since we're funded
through the Economic
Development Administration, we
get some USDA funds, the
Small Business
Administration, those are all
federal programs. And the
federal programs have been
in flux this year. It's been a
challenging environment trying
to figure out what's going
to be available, what's not.
So we're looking forward
to the budget coming
out and figuring out, okay,
this is exactly what we're
going to do. As I talked about,
rural communities are
struggling, trying to figure
out what can we do
to help them, what's available,
what, what business can we get
to go in there? That's going to
be a challenge that we're going
to look at in the next couple
of years. But
on the opportunity side, the
continued collaboration has
been nice. I'm the kind
of person, it's much easier
to do it by yourself. And so
now working with different
organization has been really
interesting, working
on my skill set.
But we're starting
to see how it pays dividends.
So we're not replicating
anything. We're enhancing each
other. And that's been kind
of fun to work on as well.
On the lending side,
we're going to EDA
for more money. We have a 92%
utilization rate,
which means the $9 million I
have
in revolving loan funds is out
in the community. There's no.
It doesn't replicate
until I get paid back. So we're
trying to. We could loan
out as much as we have. That's
one
of the issues that we're trying
to get more money so we can
help more entrepreneurs. And
then, probably most excitingly,
is the opportunity for our
comprehensive economic
development strategy update.
So it updates every five years?
Well, we do a full rewrite
every five years. Annually we
update it. So the next new one
will be 2027. So we start
writing it next year. Very
exciting. Will be the first one
that I'm the executive director
on where we get
to put my stamp on it. It's
changed. Ed has changed
requirements
over the last few years. It
went from this big old thick
document that nobody read.
They show them as doorstops
on some of our trainings. Now
it's a much more interactive
document where we're using it.
That's one of the goals,
is try
to make sure everybody knows
about it, how we can use it and
how it can bring additional
funds into the area. And that's
why SCED exists. You know,
we're here to help reading
in the region, navigate
challenges and seize
opportunities on the economic
development side. Any
questions?
>> Have to read the thing
first. Oh, this item. Okay.
All right. Nick Garner. I
didn't intend to comment on
this.
>> I pushed the wrong button.
>> Okay. All right,
thank you. All right,
moving on. Public comment. The
city council will allocate up
to a maximum of 3 minutes per
speaker for 30 minutes total
at the beginning
of the meeting
for public comment
for non agendized matters
within the city's jurisdiction,
the mayor will determine the
order of speakers. If 30
minutes is not adequate
to accommodate all of the
individuals who have submitted
their name
through the electronic kiosk,
the council will trail this
item to the end
of the open session agenda.
The remaining speakers will
address the city council
at that time. All right,
Steve, you're up. Leslie, you
can be next.
>> Good evening again,
Councilwoman Adet. You're a
very skilled individual.
>> I believe you have a degree
in political science. Don't
you? Or didn't you teach
political science at Bethel?
But your skills are being used
in a horrible way. You are
manipulating people with
partial information and
misinformation in order
to capitalize on. On the
feeling that so many people
have that government is
corrupt, that we pay too much
in taxes,
that government employees are
out for themselves and not out
for the people. This is a
common belief to start with.
But you are harvesting that
belief. You are undermining our
city government and our city
employees,
supposedly because you suspect,
because you think something's
wrong, not because you have
facts that you can throw up
here and say there is
corruption. No, it's your
feelings. It's what you think
might be happening.
>> You've been making
implications that employees
are.
>> Hiding things from you or
not giving you the information
that you want. You've been
given the information and you
simply don't believe it or
ignore it. I don't know for
sure why you're doing what
you're doing,
but I suspect it has to do
with you running
for some state office. With the
videos you've been posting
on social media,
it's clear you're trying
to position yourself for
further political ambitions.
Perhaps state board
of equalization or something.
But what you are doing is not
in the best interest
of the city of Reading. You
even stated with a smirk
on your face that
after the first of the year,
if this sales tax does not
pass, many things are going
to be hurt drastically. That is
true. By undermining this sales
tax you are going
to cause many negative impacts
to the city of Reading.
Without extra money, I believe
our civic auditorium will
close. The ball field will end
up continuing to deteriorate. I
doubt the soccer field will be
able to continue to stay open
for any length of time. Our
roads will continue to
deteriorate and they have
nothing to do with the
allegations you're making. The
roads would receive 30% of the
tax revenues and the other
monies come
from the road tax.
>> The city of Reading is only
>> Pass through entity when it
comes to roads. There is no way
the city of.
>> Reading can move that
spending elsewhere. Yet you're
doing.
>> You're undermining the set
by undermining the sales tax.
You will guarantee that our
roads continue to deteriorate
because the state doesn't give
us enough money
to maintain them properly.
Yes, Adet, you are the
destroyer
of cities. I'll leave it at
that. I've got a lot more. I
will continue
on the next time. All right,
thanks, Steve. Leslie, Lance
Law, you're on deck. Have my
shadow with me today.
>> Oh, you want to stand
on there? I feel 112% opposite
of everything Steve just said.
>> Thank you for standing
on principle.
>> Thank you for every time you
sat.
>> In here and tried to ask a.
>> Question and Mayor Mutton
shut you down.
>> Because he wants this
meeting to only.
>> Last an hour or the rest of.
>> The council shut you down
because they love the facts
that they've been managed.
>> By this table over here. I
am really hoping you are not a
continuance of that.
>> So far we've had positive
interactions. I hope that
continues. But this council,
the previous council was
managed by the city manager and
that is not how this works.
>> So thank you for standing
on principle.
>> Thank you again. I've said
it
before and I will say it again.
Thank you for coming forward
and apologizing for the times
that you were wrong and
standing up and taking that.
Everything you have done would
hurt any political aspiration
that you have. Yet you have
stuck your head out.
>> And your neck out
for us because.
>> You are doing the right
thing and standing
on principle. Sorry, you were
right.
>> I did not put in for that
first comment because I thought
if there is nothing nice
to say, it's better not
to say anything at all. So I
only put him
for public comment.
>> What I will say is when
somebody shows you who they
are, believe it.
>> Tanessa sat there,
had nothing nice to.
>> Say, so she didn't say
anything at all.
>> Barry, however, gave a very
disgusting display.
>> Of who he is.
>> So thank you
for having class. Thank you
for having our backs,
and thank you for standing up
when no one else will.
>> Lance Law and Janet
Chapman, you're
after him.
>> Hi.
>> I live in Crown Estates and
have Clear Creek
along the back
of my property. There's a
neighborhood there, and there's
probably a dozen houses that
line the creek. We're
on the south side
of the creek,
on the north side, or, excuse
me, we're on the north side
of the creek,
on the south side
of the creek. It's pretty
common for homeless people
to be camped back there.
There's kind
of a typical cycle. They get
in there, they camp.
In the wintertime, the creek
floods, it floods
out the camp, sort
of washes all the debris
from the camps
into the creek and eventually
into the river. It makes a
pretty big mess. It's something
we've kind of
in the neighborhood been able
to handle. Right now there is.
It's gone from camp
to compound. These guys aren't
afraid to build a cabin,
use a chainsaw. When it flooded
last spring, I went back there,
took a look at it, and they had
actually built it up
on elevated platform. They had
a wood stove in there. They
have solar panels. They have
batteries that store the
electricity for the solar.
They have a mini fridge that
floated
down the creek and kind
of got stuck in a log jam.
This spring, when,
before all the trees budded,
I could literally see the camp
from my dining room. If I were
to walk out the back
of my gate, walk
down the trail, swim
across the creek, I could be
in the camp
in maybe one minute. There's
constant dog barking, fighting,
all the carrying on that kind
of goes on with that sort
of thing. And there's been
something that's been pretty
weird. You know,
in the wintertime, people
actually put their windows
open. And every now and then
I'll wake up and it's just
like, my God, what's this toxic
plume? You know,
it just smells
like something just crazy is
on fire. And I've spoke
with a few of my neighbors,
and it's kind of been sort
of a weird, ongoing thing that
we've all noticed. You know,
I've talked to some
of my neighbors. Yeah, what are
they burning? Trash. What
happened when their tents catch
on fire? Can't really figure it
out. So anyway, you know,
in the past, I've gone
into the camps
before and tried
to have conversations
with the. With the residents
of the camps. So Sunday, went
across the creek, went
into the camp. Everybody kind
of scattered except
for the pack of dogs. And I
started looking Around.
There's stoves,
there's pots and pans,
empty solvent jugs. There's a
meth lab. And so maybe I've
reported it to RPD a bunch
of times,
but maybe you guys can help us
out and direct some more
resources to this. Basically,
it's a meth lab. All right,
thanks. Thank you.
>> Where was this property
again?
>> Crown Estates.
>> Crown Estates subdivision.
It's on the south side of
Clear Creek and it's probably a
block down from the 273 bridge.
They've kind
of worked their way
through that forest. And, you
know, RPD has been aware of it.
I've actually had conversations
with patrolmen. I've reported
it with to Fish and Wildlife
blm, Shasta County. You know,
it's like everybody kind
of has been aware of it. I've
been pretty vocal and it's been
an ongoing thing,
but typically it's, you know,
a handful of camps. The weather
chases them out
of there and it takes a while
for them to come back.
But do you guys remember, like,
what was going on at Nor Pond
before it got developed
into a recreation area? There
is an astronomical amount
of debris in this.
In this area now.
>> And the chief of police is
over here,
so we're gonna have you talk
to him after you're done.
>> Yeah, I've got some
pictures.
>> He would love that. Well,
yeah, and then we'll. And then,
and then we'll follow up. Have
you emailed or given us any
of your contact info?
>> You know,
I've submitted a bunch
of stuff to the rpd. You know,
the online submission. Yeah.
So there's a long record.
>> Can you just follow? We're
going to follow up with him,
but will you also follow up
with us either
by email or come to the next
meeting and we'll make sure
that something's been done?
>> Yes. Thank you.
>> Thank you.
>> Thank you. Janet Chapman,
you're up next. Nick Garner,
you're on deck.
>> Greetings, council members.
I'm Reverend Janet Chapman
from First Christian Church,
and we are deeply humbled. We
just celebrated our 60th
anniversary here.
>> In Reading, and we are
grateful that.
>> You were able to hear
about Christian church homes.
>> We have been in partnership
with them in the 60 years we've
been here in Reading. And it's
wonderful to see their success
not just here in Reading,
but nationwide in housing. Low
income seniors in beautiful,
sustainable apartments. You
should go check
out these apartments. They're
gorgeous.
But that didn't start
off that way. 69 years ago,
it took time for.
>> Christian church homes
to build.
>> Up, to adapt, to revise,
to adjust,
to navigate grant options,
to consider housing and how to
finance those housing options.
It wasn't an overnight process.
And so I'm sharing from,
I'm so.
>> Grateful Cynthia from the
Bay Area could.
>> Come and be
with us. I'm sharing from the
way back when when we were just
learning how to do this. And I
would like to remind you that
that also applies
to situations
like creating micro shelters.
We are a big advocate
for the micro shelters here
in Reading. It is not an
overnight process. Whereas we
have been working
with the micro shelter
for a couple years in South
Market, the one the United Way
has been undergirding. They now
have 30 people who are
out working in the community
in their own apartments, their
own housing and they are
employed. I also want to
acknowledge this would not have
happened without the support
of Barry Tippen and Steve Baid
and Kristin Schrader. And we
are deeply grateful
for that support. But this is
not an overnight process. This
takes time and patience. And I
know it's hard to be patient.
And I know when you're looking
at the bottom line, you want
to see, well, I want
to get these people out. Let's
get them out right away. If we
had done that 69 years ago in
Christian church homes,
I guarantee to you the Lorenz
Hotel, Reading Treehouse and
Piper Way would be vacant.
They would not exist. Caring
for the vulnerable takes time.
It takes effort. And if
Christian church homes had
given up and city of Reading
had said you're not operating
fast enough, then the 230
people who have homes right now
with CCH would not be so lucky.
Please, friends, consider the
process and recognize this is
not an overnight. It's not even
a one year process or a two
year process. This involves all
of us working together
on the long haul. Thank you.
>> Thank you. Nick, you're up
then. Todd Jones.
>> I've got a radio show.
>> Poke the Hornet's nest.
It's on kcnr1460.com I would
encourage everybody to go
to the show. This last Sunday
we had Christine and Mike
Robinson on. They own a
property at the middle.
>> Of Middle Creek Road and
they were.
>> Burned out with the car
fire.
>> And the city of Reading
in conjunction.
>> And mostly with the Shasta
county code enforcement have
done everything
to steal their property
from them.
>> They put every roadblock up
they could.
>> Possibly put up to where
they can't rebuild and they've
spent a ton of money,
I mean hundreds of thousands of
dollars defending themselves.
And at the end
of the day they Got a hold
of a map.
>> That showed that the city
of Reading.
>> Wanted to put a trailhead
with a 15 car parking lot
on their property. And that was
what the big push was.
>> And this is something
Barry Tippen should.
>> Have been aware
of if he wasn't. This is a
travesty
of justice trying.
>> To steal these people's
property the way they did.
>> So I would encourage
everybody to go listen
to that kcnr1460.com and listen
to how the government can steal
your property,
how things are manipulated.
Now, Mark Mazano said that all
the decisions were made
by the supervisors up there.
And like Leslie said,
they make their decisions
with the information Barry gets
them. But I'd like to ask
Mark, did you vote
on letting our sports park go
to hell? Did you vote
on letting all the parolees
from out of the area be parole
directing? I've got information
that can, can back that up.
And you know, our town's gone
to hell. I don't know where you
guys get the rosy picture that
everything's hunky dory.
>> Because I don't see.
>> All right, Todd Jones,
you're up. Hello, Mr. Mayor,
council and staff, thank you
for having me here today. I
wanted to kind of touch on a
few things. I think the first
one really that kind
of encompasses all of it is
collaboration. I just want
to thank the staff.
>> Of the City of Reading
for partnering.
>> With us and collaborating
with us for Visit Reading and
supporting the work that we do
at Visit Reading to really,
like Danny said, highlight and
be that bright light and
showcase what Reading has
to offer. And I think we've
seen that over the last several
years and the tot increase that
we've seen since the Chamber
has taken on that. And it's
been great to work with Travis
and Steve and the whole team
there.
But the big thing that I wanted
to talk about is really Barry
tonight. And I know I didn't. I
didn't know you could actually
present on those presentations
at the beginning,
but I really wanted to thank
Barry between my time
at the EDC and now at the
Chamber. When I was
at the edc, we were
in dozens and dozens
of meetings
on different projects. Some of
them were a little bit crazy.
So thank you for humoring me
with some
of these people that came
to town.
But I think my big takeaway
from every single meeting I've
ever had with Barry
on these ideas at Stillwater or
other big investments in
Redding is he always found a
way and he always had a
positive attitude. And he said,
we'll, we'll Figure it out.
We'll get it done. And I think
everybody that came into those
meetings that walked away
always felt, I know
for a fact, they always felt
confident that the city of
Reading could do it, take care
of them, and see the project
through to fruition. And a lot
of that came from Barry's
leadership at City hall
over the last several years.
And I really want to thank you
for all of the work that you've
done and the visionary
leadership and the way that
you've been able to stand up
and do what you think needs
to be done
to see progress happen
in our city. So thank you so
much and we're gonna miss you.
Appreciate it, Barry. Thanks,
Todd. All right, moving on
to consent calendar. The
consent calendar king's items
continue routine and or which
have been individually
scrutinized by city council
members and are anticipated to
require no further
deliberation. A member
of the public wishes
to address the item
on a consent calendar. Please
enter your name the electronic
kiosk in the lobby before the
consent calendar is considered.
Yes, it shall be the
prerogative
of any city council member
before the consent calendar is
acted upon to one, comment
on an item two, respond
to any public comment
on an item Three, request the
record reflect an abstention or
>> Nay vote on an item number
four.
>> Remove an item and place it
on the regular portion
of the agenda for delivery of a
staff report and or extended
discussion deliberation. Do we
have any of those today?
>> All right, obtain a motion.
>> I'll make a motion
to approve consent.
>> All right, I'll. A second.
All in favor? Aye. Aye. Aye.
All right.
>> Well,
>> That was nice. All right,
moving on. 9.10. Mr.
Robinette, consider the city
of readings, year end budget
review, associated resolution
for fiscal year ending 2025.
It's all yours. Good evening,
mayor, council. Mr. Orloff said
something that I think kind
of spoke to me. It's an honor
to be up here presenting this
information and working hard
for our community. Community. I
don't. I know I don't say it
enough and so I just wanted
to express that,
that I really take great pride
in the work that we do
in our department. And
with that, I'll get started.
This update, I think this is
the fourth time I've given. It
can always be a little
challenging because we just
adopted a new budget,
a new ten year plan,
but yet here we are talking
about the old ten year plan one
last time. And so that in and
of itself can be a little
confusing. I'll do my Best
throughout the presentation to
connect those pieces where
appropriate from kind of how
the new ten year plan was
created
with the information present
in this document. The primary
two connection points, just
to point out off the start is
the beginning cash number for
the new ten year plan has some
loose relationship,
not a direct correlation
to the ending cash of the old
10 year plan as of 6-30-25 will
be our beginning cash
for 7-1-25. And then the other
part where there's a loose
connection is
with our revenue forecasts. We
have to actually,
when we're doing the budget,
it's early spring and we are
having to forecast the rest
of 2425. So I will do my best
to explain the revenue
projections we use as part
of the budget for 2425 and try
to contextualize where we
landed relative
to not just the old budget, but
the new budget as well as we
kind of launch off into the new
budget that we're already two
and a half months into. Okay,
Steve. Okay, so starting
with the first slide here,
this is a kind of our. Our
general fund cash balance
provides a history of each
quarter ending actual cash
reserves. The beginning cash,
6-30-24 is the cash used
in our general fund 10 year
plan. As council may remember,
the cash actually in our
audited general fund financial
statements was much higher than
that. We lower it for various
encumbrances and carryovers
that are carried over
to the next year. In this
fiscal year that was quite
large between encumbrances and
carryovers, we had about a $10
million reduction to cash
from the audited cash to the
beginning cash that was used
by the ten year plan. This V
pattern
of cash is pretty normal. And
then the actual cash
for 6-30-25 is about 10.2
million right now. I also like
to point out as part
of this presentation,
we are not done
with our audit. We're
about four to six weeks away
from the completion
of our audit. So there still
will be adjustments, incoming
on cash and various expenses.
It shouldn't be a lot
at this point, but I do think
it's an important context
to know we are not done
with our audit. So these
numbers are subject
to change. The current ten year
plan, or I call it the old ten
year plan at this point would
project that we would have
about a 6% reserve, $6.8
million. The new 10 year plan
is that we actually forecasted
a $9 million number. I went
through some detail
in the staff report
to explain kind
of the difference between those
two numbers and why I still
believe the 9 million is a good
estimation. And over the next
couple slides I'll get
into those details
of the revenues. Yes, they were
short. There's some context
around those revenues and
expenses. There was a great
deal of savings in the general
fund that we can count as
savings towards the beginning,
cash. So this first slide is
just a high level overview.
Revenues are on the left.
Typically in a perfect world
you would want actuals
to be above, so the dark blue
to be above the light blue.
Just that way you know you're
increasing your revenue
over what you forecasted.
In this case, we're $3.7
million under projections. The
next couple slides I'll break
down what those details are.
And then on the right set
of graphs there,
you always want actual to be
below budget. And while we do
have some budget requests
included in the staff report,
that's kind of the second half
of the presentation. That is
primarily not a result of lack
of savings, as you'll see
in a few slides, but savings
in the right categories
for those departments. So
overall they saved money. But
in the specific categories that
we manage the budget to, they
needed some additional funds.
Not a lot,
but some additional funds. So
first, this is our kind
of our revenue chart
for the audience's benefit.
Although council has heard me
present this a few times, I
still think it can be slightly
confusing. If every bar was
exactly on that line,
you didn't see a bar. That
means we hit the projection.
Exactly. That's pretty hard
to do. So I don't think. I
hardly ever see anything. You
know, some
of those are very close
to the line,
which is encouraging. As you
can see here, sales tax for
2425 was $1.3 million
under projection for 2425.
In a few slides I'll talk about
when we built the new budget.
What did we assume
for 2425? I can kind of
forecast it was lower than the
number that we had in the
budget that was previously
approved by council. Property
tax is over by $500,000.
Transiting occupancy tax
below projection by 300,000.
Cannabis tax and other taxes.
Combine those together, about
300,000 below. Building related
fees, about 238,000 below.
Internal departments, we
haven't finished what's called
the street report or the gas
tax. True up, but that's the
primary difference between the
internal departments. Transfer
is due
to the streets still working
on finishing some projects. We
don't make a transfer
to the general fund until that
money is spent and so there
were some projects that are
kind of lagging
behind that we expect
over the next year we'll be
able to transfer that money
from the streets department
to the general or
from the gas tax funds
to the general fund. Another
big item
on this slide that I wanted
to point out is the revenue
from other governments. The
fire department has been
working pretty hard
with the federal government,
FEMA,
to bill our SAFER grant. We're
owed about $2.2 million
through the end of the fiscal
year and that would mostly make
up for the reduction there.
The reason there's an issue,
it's a little nuanced, but the
federal government has told us
to start switching over
to a singular UEI number. It's
basically a grant number that
we're allowed to have. They no
longer want us
to have multiples. Our city did
have multiples
for a long time. So there was a
UEI number used
on the application that now,
since then we've got rid
of that UEI number. We've
consolidated in the singular
city UEI number. And so we're
having some issues
in their system that we have
to bill through actually
getting that UEI number
updated. Just saw another email
from us, fema. It's called
fema. Go where they were.
It's Tier three, which I guess
is their highest level
of support. And we're trying to
get that issue rectified so we
can bill them
for our incurred costs. But
that's just a good example
where we're going
to receive that money
in the next three
to six months, most likely, and
then we'll have a revenue next
year that we weren't accounting
for. That would actually bring
this graph up more to equal.
This is a history
of tax revenues. As you can
see, sales tax over the past
three years has been mostly
flat. Property tax continues
to grow year over year. I'll
get the next slides. We'll
actually get into some details
of historical growth and the
growth we've seen
over the past few years.
But this just kind
of gives a snapshot
of the last three years. And
this is actually through
June. So property tax continues
to be a strength, but all the
other revenues are mostly flat.
The tax revenues are mostly
flat. So I felt
like it would be good to talk
about more than three years
of actuals, talk
about where our forecast exists
in the new budget,
and also walk through kind
of the previously 2325 adopted
budget and amended budget. So
first up is sales tax. As you
can see on the graph,
we had basically 10 years of.
If you average it all out,
it's growth, but over the past
five years it has pretty much
been flat. Four years it's been
flat. So if you average 10
years, sales taxes increased
by 3.4% over those 10 years
on average. And then from 2015
to 2020 it was 3.2% all told. I
think what's important is what
did we do in the budget? So
with the adopted budget is the
darker blue line. In September
of last year,
we amended the budget down to
the green line and as you can
see for last year,
the revenue continued to kind
of stay flat. And we built the
new budget assuming 2425 was
going to be flat from 2324. It
did slightly come in
below that by about $500,000.
So we're already starting
off kind of on a bad foot. And
then we assume 2% growth
for the first two years of the
budget and then 2.5%
thereafter. I think
with the historical information
of 3.4% growth for 10 years, I
think our assumptions are
pretty conservative.
But also, you know,
to be honest, I don't think
I've ever seen a situation
where besides that little
bubble, you know,
mostly if you look
across those four years,
we're flat. You know, there's a
bubble there and then we've
been flat for four years
besides that bubble. So that's
our forecast
for the new budget and it is
below the even amended budget
or the last adopted budget.
And we, you know, we're kind
of chasing it
down as it continues
to go flat. We assume it's
going to increase at some point
and I'm hopeful that at some
point it'll catch up and start
meeting or beating our
assumptions. A little added
context here, I think. I
started presenting these
updates as a finance officer
in around 2019, and from 2019
to 2022, I would always come to
council and tell them how good
sales tax is doing. It's always
beating our projections. And
then in 2022, 2023 is,
was when I felt like I was, er,
all the time, because it
continually, you know,
we're trying to, trying
to find the bottom, so
to speak, with assumptions that
assume growth. And so I would
always come in and say, yeah,
sales tax isn't meeting our
expectations or meeting our
forecast. So I remain hopeful
that this year will be the
year.
But it is a key component of
our budget that we're gonna
have to watch. The next one up
is property tax. Again,
for kind of context. Again, the
dark blue is our original
adopted budget
for fiscal year 24 and 25, we
amended it last September
to the green, the green bar.
And then we have the purple
bar, which is the new budget.
Those are pretty close
to each other. So
for historical context,
our average revenue increases
for the last 10 years
in this category was 6.24%.
And if you look
over the past five years,
it was 6.89%. And
in the budget,
we assumed a 4.5% increase
from 2324 to 2425, and then
thereafter we assumed a 3%
increase. So pretty
conservative revenue assumption
if you base it off the last 10
years of actual performance,
which could be continue to be
an area where it helps offset
maybe some
of the negative performance
with sales tax. And I will say,
as a finance guy, I am happy to
see that our property tax is
nearly catching up
to our sales tax.
Unfortunately, it's bad
circumstances, but in, you
know, a perfect world, that's a
good thing because this is a
lot more stable revenue than
sales tax. And it,
and you can kind of count on it
maintaining even if things
start to go bad,
it takes a couple years
for you to start to see some
of those bad outcomes
in the property tax. Next up is
tot. This is a lot smaller
revenue than the previous two.
And as you can see there,
there's some volatility that is
introduced
in this revenue potentially
with those major spikes. I'll
just context each of the spikes
and what I think contributed
to them. In 2019 area there we
had the car fire and we had the
campfire in paradise. That
brought a lot of fire crews
to our area, staying
in our hotels,
terrible tragedy. But in terms
of our tot,
it did help quite a bit. And
then in 2022, I always tell
people, I think at some point
people figured out, oh, up in
Northern California, they're
not shut down,
let's go vacation up there.
And so I think they came
to our community
at that time. So I think we're
starting
to see this revenue kind
of normalize again. You see,
the,
the blue line was the adopted
budget, previous budget,
we amended it last September
to the green line. And then the
adopted budget for 2527 is
right there. And the
assumptions we used were flat
from 2324 to 2425. That pretty
much came true. And then 4%
thereafter,
this revenue has averaged
over the past 10 years a 6.55%
increase. And then the past
five years, it's actually
averaged a 7.43% increase. But
for 2025, it was off 0.28%
lower than the previous year.
So with a lot of hot air spent
on revenue, I will now kind
of transition to budget. This
was the previously kind
of alluded to savings that
we've experienced
in the general fund in each
of our major budgets. As you
can see there, almost all
of the budgets have savings.
Some of those will have
carryovers. I, I did look,
we have about 1.4, $1.5 million
of unspent ARPA money that will
be carried over
for next year. Most of that is
in the police department
for the park rangers program
in the public works. Most of
that savings is actually going
to be carried over because it's
streets money. Streets doesn't
necessarily impact the general
fund negatively when we carry
the money over because they
have a funding source that's
available. And Michael will get
into that during his
presentation I believe to talk
about where their funds are and
how they plan to spend them
over the coming years,
including carryovers.
But all told,
this is very good news for the
general fund. I think this is
emblematic of the calls to all
of our departments
to save money. And a lot of
these are real savings that we
can count on, which is part of
the why we will have a balance
right around $9 million instead
of the old 10 year plan
forecasted $6.8 million. So I
also wanted to talk again
in context of the new ten year
plan and relative
to the old ten year plan. So
the,
the light blue is the adopted
FY 24 and 25, but 10 year plan
expenditures and then the dark
blue is the amendment that is
in there right now. The
basically the up
to date amendment. And then the
green is actually what the new
ten year plan looks like. And
so you know, we've talked
about a lot of cuts in that 10
year plan. In the first,
in FY26,
which is the first year
of the new adopted 10 year
plan, there's about $6.8
million
of cuts and then roughly about
four or five million dollars
thereafter. And as council
knows and I mentioned
in the staff report, you know,
we have a full breakdown with
our adopted budget and there
was actually some revenue
increases as well where we're
going to charge more for our
recreation fees and our
development services fees which
will help offset not cost, but
offset the costs that we're
incurring. And we used
to subsidize those programs
to a greater degree. We'll now
subsidize them
to a lesser degree
through increased fees. And
then I wanted
to present the actual 10 year
plans in relationship to each
other because I think this is
Important. So the light blue
line was our adopted 2325
ending cash percentage. As
council knows,
we have a 10% required reserve.
And then the blue was actually
our amended 2325 cash. And if
we continued
on that trajectory, we would
have been bankrupt effectively.
But through the course
of the budget,
we've made some cuts. Not
to say we're not going to have
to monitor the progress
of our budget. I continue
to emphasize that to council.
It's going
to be very important to watch
how our revenues are coming in,
how our expenses coming
in relative to the forecasts.
You know,
our departments have a lot
of work in front of them
to meet their operational needs
with significant cuts
to their budgets. So to kind
of conclude the presentation,
city budget request, starting
with the general fund Police is
requesting $631,000 for
retirement cash outs and then
fires has a $773,000 request
for retirements and negotiated
increases engineering. This
one's a little unique. It has
about a $285,000 request.
Basically, the budget was built
with a higher overhead rate
than we were allowed
to use due to the Caltrans
calculation. So basically a
little bit of offset there that
we didn't get
to incur the advantage of. But
I will say if you follow that
overhead rate
over a long enough period
of time, the goal of the
Caltrans calculation is
effectively to make it zero.
But we've had years where we've
actually kind of made money
off the overhead rate. That was
the late teens, early 20s. And
then now it's kind of flipping
back the other way as it kind
of works to normalize itself
over a long period of time.
And then $437,000 for
engineering and land
development, those have
associated revenues that you
will see
in the budget resolution. And
then parking,
where we have a loan
to parking at this time for
$232,000, effectively, our
belief is parking will be able
to pay this back in the long
term as we hopefully see more
usage
of the parking downtown. So
increased revenues. And also we
will see there they have a loan
to, for the actual system, the
parking pay stations that will
be paid off
in the next couple years. And
so we're hoping as those things
come together and they also can
start to move away from some
of their paid leases
on parking areas. And so we're
hoping the revenue cuts and the
or the revenue increases in the
expenditure cuts will kind
of work towards them putting
in a being
in a cash positive situation.
They can pay this loan back
in the future. Moving on,
the enterprise Funds. The
airport has a variety
of requests there. The largest
of which is increases for
utilities that were not
budgeted for. With the original
budget reading. Electric
utility has about $4.7 million,
the largest of which is
personnel increases due
to negotiations that occurred
in 2023. I will say talking
with their financial team,
they have built these
into their financial plans. So
this number is actually lower
than the amounts that they had
built
into their financial plans.
They had built in about $6
million and this came in at
4.3. And then solid waste has
$30,000
for utility increases. Very
small up there. So I apologize.
We have some internal service
fund requests. These all have
adequate cash reserves to pay
for these requests. GIS has
about $40,000 due to personnel
costs increasing due to
negotiations. ET has retirement
cash outs for 44,000 and
about 22,000
for various O&M costs. Fleet
has $12,000 due to overtime.
And then that large adjustment
for vehicle repairs and
maintenance,
which is mostly due to
inventory timing adjustments.
So it's not actual cash.
Instead it's a recognition of
when do you recognize that
expense due to how much
inventory do you have on the
shelf versus the expenditures
that you paid that year. So
there's no need
for an actual cash increase
to their department. And then
as as previously mentioned,
Parking is receiving a loan
from the general fund for
$232,000. And with that,
I wish I brought my water in,
but I am available
for any questions.
>> Hi. So I'll start
with the new reports. The. So
we'll go
over expenses and revenue,
which you have
in the staff report,
but I'll go over it through the
new reports that you have. So I
think the most glaring issue I
have with these new reports is
that they don't actually have a
column for our budget.
>> So the budget is
on the very left
of the expenditure reports.
>> The year
to date projection.
>> Yeah, that's correct.
>> Is that what you're calling.
So we have amended and adopted
budgets, and that's neither
of those. So our amended budget
was 113 million
for the expenditures,
and that's not included
at all. So you have this year
to date projection that has
encumbrances and whatever it's
including 130 is not the budget
we adopted or amended.
>> So that would include
carryovers and encumbrances.
>> Right. So there's no column
in here for the actual amended
or adopted budget.
>> The column is only the
amended budget. Are you saying
you would like
to see a column that includes.
Includes carryovers as a
separate column?
>> Yeah. So in Our previous
reports, there's always a
separate column.
>> So just those.
>> You'd have to know what the
actual budget was. So we,
we passed a budget. The budget
for this year is 113 million.
It's not reflected anywhere.
So this 130 million is not the
budget that we actually passed.
So that includes carryovers
that. I know, I was not aware
of what those carryovers were.
Had been asking about what
those carryovers are. There's
another report that says
there's 6 million,
but this looks like there are
17.6 million
in carryovers.
>> Yeah. So the,
the numbers would include
carryovers, any amendments to
the budget that have been
performed
over the past two years. So
it's not just inclusive
of carryovers. And the previous
reports didn't have the adopted
budget, it would be amended
budget plus carryovers and
encumbrances.
>> Correct.
>> So amended budget is always
a hard number to get to, you
know, because,
because there's. You would have
to go through all the staff
reports that have gone
to council for the two years
to calculate that number. But
this number does include those
items. It's not that it doesn't
include it,
it's just that it's
in one number now. And some of
that is because the system is
drastically different. We used
to, the way carryovers were
done, there was a separate
like line in our budget
for it that no longer exists.
It's just different systems so
different reports. So it would
be a great deal
of manual effort,
to be frank, to calculate the
amendments. I can certainly
give you a number,
but it's not going to be. It's
going to look different than I
think you're expecting it to
look. I could give you just a
column that has budget
amendments, but that would be
all budget amendments,
including carryovers, including
the amendments that happen
from council. So I could
certainly give that to council
but I can't give it the same
way that it's always been
presented.
>> So we have a budget that we
passed. So this, this is Q4.
So this is the wrapping up,
it's the accounting. It should
be the end
of the fiscal year. So we have
had three months to reconcile
whatever outstanding things are
coming. I've. I've been looking
at. We haven't had three months
for a very long time.
>> So I have
to have this staff report done
about two weeks ago. So, you
know, never has it been the
final numbers. We actually,
in the past, in as 400 land we
would do four closes. The first
close was done in late July and
then we would do three more
subsequent Closes. The reports
that came to council were the
first close. So I just want to
make it clear that this has
never been the same numbers
that would be in the audit.
And so that hasn't changed.
>> Sure. They're not the same
numbers that are
in the audit. I know that
for sure. But the issue for us
is we have a budget that we
pass and we have
to track that budget. And so
when I'm looking at my Q1, Q2,
Q3, Q4, I want to see how we're
tracking according
to the budget. And you don't
include the budget here. So you
would think, if I'm a
constituent,
that the budget is 130 million.
But I know I didn't approve
of $130 million of spending.
And when you call it savings, I
know because last year I heard
the word savings and thought
that meant I was
below my budget, but I wasn't
because that included the
carryovers.
>> When you say
below your budget,
you were not
below your adopted budget.
>> Is what you're saying
adopted or amended? Because the
amended does not include
carryovers. The carryovers are
the carryovers,
which I've had an issue with,
of understanding. Exactly. Can
you let us know what the
carryovers are? So this report
that you have that it's 6
million,
can you tell me why that says
6 million? When this budget
says that it's a.
>> 17.6 million
in carryovers,
it's not saying it's 17.6
million. I'm not prepared to
give you the exact
reconciliation
between the adopted budget, the
amended budget and the
carryovers. I certainly can
provide that to you,
and I'll work on it tomorrow.
And I'll give it to you
off agenda tomorrow.
But I think there's a little
bit of hazing
of the waters right now
between what is authorized
from council. So I just want
to be clear. Carryovers are an
authorized mechanism
of council
through a council policy. 409.
So those are not, I don't want
to call them discretionary,
but they're discretionary
to some degree. Oftentimes they
are things that we just have to
finish using ARPA as an
example. That's the biggest
contributor
to our carryovers.
>> Which is a grant. Our
carryovers are carryovers,
usually grants
in the general fund.
>> Typically carryovers are
grants.
>> And are they typically
capital for capital, typically
for personnel?
>> Yeah, typically they are
for. Well, let me,
let me rephrase that. Just
because I think there's been
some confusion over the years.
>> I'm not trying to get you.
I'm legitimately trying to
understand this new report
court, if it's really going
to work, because I,
I still don't have a budget.
So like in Q1, if we got this,
it would not show the budget
that we just passed of 100 and
whatever it is, $108 million
of our budget. It would show a
different number, but it would
only show a fraction of it. So
I'm not going to know until Q4
that the budget is way higher
because I don't know what the
carryovers are,
certainly.
>> So the request I hear right
now, and I guess I'm kind
of looking
at every council member, is to
have a column that's adopted
budget,
and then one that or.
>> And.
>> Or amended.
>> Yeah, this is amended
with carryovers.
>> So I know because I've
looked at every single
amendment that I could find and
did this tedious work that
you're talking
about that I did not vote
for this level of carryover.
So the best that I can assess
is that years and years ago
there was spending that was
made and it just keeps carrying
over and we're still going. So
I know I didn't approve it and
I don't even know what it is
because it's the first time
at least I've gotten this.
But even still,
I don't know the adjustment
from what I voted for,
what was a carryover. And so
what the budget is that we're
talking about. So when you say
on here that we have 12 million
of savings, I'm like, well,
is it. How much of that is
actually discretionary and how
much of that is actually just
like a grant? Because if you're
asking me for money
for police, well,
they have got $900,000 in
savings use that I'm not going
to approve a budget.
>> Certainly a fair question.
One, there's so many points I
could answer off of that.
But one thing I wanted
to say is I kind of alluded
to it, but when we ask
for budget,
it's because they're
over budget in certain
categories and we're taking
into account use ARPA
in the case of pd. Right. And
this will get into one
of your questions. Is that
typically capital or is it
personnel? And so what we
usually do
with grants is we put them in
like a special tracking account
that historically speaking,
when you adopted the budget,
it would say capital. And
to be honest with you, it was
not right all the time because
it would include, I call them,
these specialty accounts that
aren't really capital. They're
never going to be capitalized.
But it was a tracking
mechanism. That our team would
use. We still have those
accounts. That's the accounts
ARPA lives in. So it could be a
hybrid of personnel costs, but
it was kind of. I call it
specialty tracking accounts
for the purposes
of tracking some type
of specific project. Use ARPA
as a great example where we
need to report that out
to the federal government. So
we need a quick place to go,
capture the expense and review
the expense. You also asked a
question about the kind
of why are we asking for money
if they have net savings?
>> No, what I'm saying is. So I
would like to know. We are
passing an amended. We're
passing an adopted budget
by Q2. You're going
to amend that. That happens
every year. We're going
to amend it by Q2. Then it's an
amended budget. I have asked in
the ten year plan that you
start showing those adjustments
again because you can't tell
where things have changed and
if it's changed,
it's not readily obvious
to you. You have
to go back and find the rest
of your paper anyways. So
that's not included. This also
does not include the
adjustments because these
carryovers are an adjustment or
it's a.
>> Previously it includes it
in the number. Right.
>> So that the number doesn't
actually help.
>> But it doesn't help you
delineate.
>> And it doesn't help me
to delineate if I'm actually
under budget. Because
like you said, if I'm
under budget for police,
which is what you're saying
to me, but I'm actually not
because that money is
designated. It's encumbered
funds
for something specific.
>> Yeah.
>> And so that creates a lot
of muddiness in the water. To
understand what are we talking
about when you say we're
under budget? We're not
actually under budget in a way
that we actually have
discretionary funds
to cover it.
>> Yeah, we, we are
under budget in the sense of
Council has given staff an
adopted budget. We've made
amendments and there are
certain tools as,
as we're talking. I'm thinking
about rolling stock is another
example
of a tool that is discretionary
to staff that council has given
us to be able to move money
from our rolling stock
into our budget
without council approval,
so.
>> Oh, I didn't know that.
>> Yeah, Rolling stock and
equipment replacement,
they can be pretty large.
Right. So there's another area
where staff is amending budget
that we've been given the
authority
through council policy
to make those amendments.
Carryovers is much the same.
So again,
I hear what you're asking
for and I Because I'm not
prepared to answer that exact
question. I would like
to give it
to you and see if what I'm able
to generate is what you're
looking for or not.
>> Yes. And I think
for the next report,
getting as close
to how we are able to look at
what actually we're tracking.
So if we're tracking the budget
really tight and this is
including carryovers,
we're not tracking it tight
at all. We're actually not even
sure what that budget is.
Because why exactly are we
amending or adopting a budget
if you've already decided it's
going to include 13 million or
17 million? So
like what are the carryovers?
Because we're going
to get a budget, we're going
to get Q1 in November. And
what's it going
to show up as? Are you going
to add?
>> The carryovers this time are
going to be a lot smaller
because we've spent most
of that ARPA funding. We don't
have a lot
of grants outstanding. So the
carriers are going
to be a lot smaller.
>> Do you know what they are?
>> I don't know right now
because we're working
on generating the list for
Barry's approval with staff. I
do know how much we have in
encumbrances and I usually talk
about this. Streets is part
of the general fund,
but I remove Streets because
they have a funding source
that's actually going to come
in to offset their carryovers.
I think we have about $1
million in encumbrances. I'm
actually going
through the list
to see if there's anything in
there that can be released or
we don't need anymore. So
there's about $1 million there.
And then I believe the
carryovers will be somewhere
around 1.5 million to 2
million, no more than that. So
between those two you would
have about $3 million
at most. I will also add, I
think this is an important
comment is when, when we look
at the ten year plan, right.
It's never matched the amended
budget that's in this,
the total amended budget that's
in these reports ever.
But just one point
of clarification. Sorry. And
then I'll let you ask your
question. What we do and what
we've always done is we say,
hey,
here's my audited cash number
from the auditors. In the case
of last year, it was 23
million. I knew we had
encumbrances. I want
to say it was 3 million ish.
And then we had these
carryovers of 6. So I actually
lowered our cash
by those encumbrances
in the general fund 10 year
plan. So I didn't use 23
million, which was the number
that you would have taken off
the act for. I used a lower
number because I actually go
in and say, okay,
I'm not going to go amend my
10 year plan,
my financial planning tool
by this. I'm instead going to
lower my cash because it's
spoken for, so to speak, right
through the encumbrances. So I
do want to put,
just put some context
around that
to help better understand some
of those movements.
>> Not only do I understand
that I'm counting on that
because obviously if the money
is spoken for, it is not our
actual reserve discretionary
funding, which is what our cash
reserves are. So those are
different things. So I don't
want them muddied in all mixed
in together. There has
to be some delineation. So if
you're going to like. I would
like to go back to how it used
to be reported before 23:24,
like previous to that, all of
the reports that we had going
back to 2017, 2016, like the
way that these reports were
being given to us in multiple
different explanations because
of that reason, because a
budget that I passed that it's
108 million of expenditures,
but you have five typically
carryovers were like 3 million,
2 million, 5 million. But then
after 2022 we're up to.
>> 30 million and that was
mostly because of ARPA.
>> Right. And that was just
quite large.
But being not here,
I didn't know that. So when
you're reporting
to us that we're
below budget,
we're not actually
below our actual budget, our
10 year budget, we're below
this large huge carryover
budget. So what I hear you
saying is we don't have those
carryovers because ARPA money
is going to be gone now. And so
we're going to get back.
>> To a more normal 2 to 3
million.
>> 2 to 3 million of carryovers
are not going
to be such a huge factor.
But I do think again for
transparency purposes and so
that we actually know apples
to apples, that we're
comparing, having the amended
or the adopted budget has
to be included
in the expenditures.
>> Certainly I want
to take a stab at it
with what would be, I'm going
to say easy from Oracle and see
if that meets your needs and
then we can have a discussion
around what Oracle doesn't give
me, that I used to get out
of the AS 400 very easily. And
so let me try it first and see
if you're happy
with what I'm able to generate
or if it just creates more
questions. But I would look at
this process as semi iterative.
Right. So hey, here's the
reports as I thought that they
would be useful for council.
Does council want to see
something different? I
certainly hear your request.
It makes sense
to me. I think I'll be able
to give you something. It might
not be exactly what you're
after.
>> Well, the previous staff
reports
in the staff report would talk
about basically the budgeted
items. It would tell you that
you made, you know,
like what is considered
in the revenue,
not including the transfers you
made, you know, 98 million or
99 million. It would give you
that information that would
look like what it's going
to look like on the ten year.
But then when you got into the
budget explanations and you got
into the reports,
that's talking
about everything. So you saw
the budget line, but you also
saw the encumbrances,
you saw the carryovers,
you saw previously approved
monies, which are typically
grants, all of that. So as long
as it's all being presented
to us, we can parse
out which is which. But when
those numbers are not included,
which they're not included
in here, it's very hard to
distinguish which is which
because I know I didn't approve
on $130 million budget. I know
they didn't and they were here
for half that time. They didn't
approve those either. So
clearly those came
from something else. So this
12 million that's left,
that's not going
to continue forward.
>> Only a small piece
of it will continue forward.
As I said,
my guess right now is about $3
million of it.
>> So the rest just goes away.
>> Well, that's not entirely
true. And you also have streets
in there that has their
carryovers, so.
>> Which you didn't include.
But so if I, if you include
streets, we're up to another
10 or 11 again.
>> 10 or 11? Yeah.
>> So we're up to 10. So it's
about that 12 million is what
is going to be the carryover.
>> I don't expect it
to be that large,
but it could be that large. But
we also have revenues that
obviously are coming in next
year that we weren't accounting
for without having done that
work. I don't want to give an
exact number because we're
still in the process of. I
literally think my team right
now this week is closing all
the grants out, making sure all
the expenses that are in the
grant accounts are accurately
accounted for and our capital
accounts and all of These
things that we have to do
for year end, as they finish
that, it really tells us how
much money is available
from a budgetary standpoint
for potential carryovers. And
so I'd really like to. I would
like to finish that process
before I try to commit
to a number.
>> Okay. The reason I bring
that up is because you put it
on the slide as savings.
>> Understood. So it's savings
that could be carried over
at the approval
of the city manager, but
at this point,
it is truly savings.
>> Right.
>> So there's a potential that
it gets carried over if there's
projects that warrant it. But.
But at this point right now,
it's not encumbered. So the.
>> The streets money's not
encumbered.
>> The street's money is
unencumbered at this point. It
might be allocated
to a project, but they haven't
issued a contract yet.
>> But it's for streets.
>> It's for streets.
>> It's for streets. So we
didn't. Our general fund
doesn't have $12 million.
>> No.
>> And.
>> And if you read my
breakdown, I don't. I'm not
suggesting that the difference
is $12 million. I actually kind
of break it down to, you know,
maybe we have four or five
million dollars
of real savings. When you.
When you net off the. I'd have
to give you a full breakdown. I
have it written down somewhere
in here. When you net
off the carryovers,
I think we're looking at
like one, maybe $2 million of
savings that are true savings.
And then we have revenues that
would be below. But then we
also have revenues that we know
are coming in.
In future years,
but that would.
>> Future year revenue wouldn't
be talking about the closing.
End of last year's budget,
but it's.
>> Talking about what we can
expect in.
>> Terms of cash
for next year.
>> For next year.
>> Right, but this is. We're
talking about closing it out.
So cash has
to be already done by. By June
30th. So we're not talking.
This is.
>> But as I said, we adjust
cash for a variety
of factors. Right.
>> Namely getting cash should
be what's. Based
on what we have
for cash now.
>> It is based on that.
>> Right. So it wouldn't be
affected by revenue that comes
in later that we can use
in next year's budget.
>> Well, you're
in the future,
so that would be end.
>> End cash.
>> We're gonna. We're gonna see
revenues next year that we can
count on for $2.3 million as an
example for safer that 2.2.
>> Sorry, but you expended that
this year.
>> We expended it this year.
>> And you're gonna let it go
and then use it
in the next.
>> We will receive the revenue
in the next year. So. So.
Meaning we won't budget
for that revenue,
but we're going to get it.
Right.
>> So reimburse yourself.
>> We're. Yeah, we're going
to get reimbursed
by the federal government.
>> Okay. So that. And that. So
that. Let's talk about the,
the general fund reserves. Can
I ask a clarifying
for a minute? Can I ask a
clarifying question? Just.
Yeah, absolutely. Were you
suggest. Were you requesting.
>> Just so that I am clear on.
>> What it was that. That you
were asking because we have
amended budget actuals over or
under in the percentage.
You're also asking
for one more so
on the expenditures
on the actual revenue compared
to cash flow estimates year
to date. Yeah. So the two
expenditure ones don't include
the actual budget. I'm just
asking, are you wanting one
more line that essentially is
sort of like a red line,
although you would use red
in finance. But no, no, the
first line should be your
actual budget. So we're
talking. It's a budget
document. So we're talking
about the budget that we
passed. So the first line would
be your adopted or your amended
budget.
>> It's our amended.
>> Yeah, it's your amended. I
am asking. The thing you were
asking Mr. Robinette
for is that you would like
another column that gives you
what it was that we approved
and then an amended so that you
can compare the two. Well,
for two of those. Is that what
you were asking him to do? I
understand the confusion
because I was talking
about this.
But then also what we're going
to get in November. So for
that's probably why I'm using
two different words.
>> Can I add a little bit
of context?
>> It would be an amended. It
would be the amended budget.
The amended budget is not 130
million. The amended budget
would be what's on the 10 year.
And then you would have
whatever the previous ones
on the next one, November 1st,
which is the Q1 that's going
to be our adopted budget.
Yeah, I, yeah, that's. What is
that? Does that clarify it?
Sure. No.
>> I just wanted to say some of
these reports will look
slightly different when it's
not the year end and they all
look very similar because some
of the reports do cash flow
versus actual and then some
bring in, you know,
the total budget. And so that
I'm trying
to replicate as best I can.
It's going to be impossible
to replicate what we Used
to have. And that's the one
thing I just want
to make clear. I'll do my best,
but just the tool is different,
so I can't get the information
out of it. The exact same. And
frankly, this is part
of why currently I'm doing it
with data extracts and
presenting the information so
that we can come
to a general consensus
of what this Council wants
to see from these reports,
what's useful to them relative
to what we're actually able
to even provide
with relative ease.
>> Does that. Yeah. So
for this one, obviously,
if you could. But that would
actually have to. Then these
would be the carryover. You
have to put the carryovers
in there. And now for this one
is different because usually
you have the month in there.
This doesn't include the actual
month.
>> So that's a question I
actually had for council. We
used to include month,
because these reports, many,
many, many years ago used
to come to Council monthly. I
personally find the monthly
information to be, for a
Council member, not super
useful,
but I can certainly add it.
Just the more information we
add, you know,
the wider the reports get and
so on and so forth. But I can
certainly add the monthly
information. That's not hard
to do. It's just a question
of whether Council finds it
pertinent, especially
considering we now do quarterly
updates instead
of monthly updates, like we're
done when those reports were
originally generated. So I'll
look to Council. We want the
monthly information.
>> I've used the quarterly
reports usually have that last
month. It's just good to see,
like a trend,
because sometimes you started
off really good, the beginning,
and so the numbers are higher,
but you can just see a trend.
So that's what I've used the
monthly for, is to. To see if
there's trends that are
happening. Because sometimes,
you know, the beginning of that
quarter was better than the end
of that quarter and you're
trying to figure out what's,
you know, which direction
you're trending. So that was
the usefulness that I found
with the monthly
for the cash flow. But you see
that it's only three months.
So you see what you begin and
what you end the quarter,
because it's only 12 weeks or
so at. I mean,
you see that trend. Yeah,
that's what I'm saying. That's
that. That is the usefulness
to me is to see how we're
trending and it's every
quarter. So you see that
at least the last month. It's
sort of like the budget,
where you only get
to see the actuals
for the one year, but
at least it's something. So are
you saying you want the monthly
or you want the quarterly?
Because what you just said.
No, no,
it's a quarterly report. It's a
quarterly report is when he
brings it. And in that
quarterly report is just.
It's. That's. This report
typically has.
>> What I'm hearing is she
would like to see. See,
in addition to this,
which used to be present
on the previous reports, which
would be. I guess it's three
more columns,
it would be your monthly
budget, which in most cases in
the expense categories was just
our budget divided by 12
relative. And so that has its
own set of potential noise.
And then it would be your
actuals for that month and then
your variance.
>> I never saw an average. I
never saw an average.
>> I don't think. I didn't say
average. Yeah, I don't think
there's. What I'm saying is the
budget on the monthly column
was the average of the 12
months of budget put
in that budget monthly column.
Does that make sense?
>> You mean
like the far right where it
has. Like the far left?
>> Yeah, I don't think there's
a lot of.
>> I like having it. I
like having a quarterly.
>> I like the quarterly. So
that's. With no monthly,
without monthly. Okay. Did you
want the monthly yourself?
No, no. I mean,
the quarterly is easier for me
to follow.
>> So I think that if there.
>> There have been times
in the past in which that there
has been some sort
of anomaly or some sort of.
>> Quarter that felt a little
funky.
>> And in those cases, when
there is something that needs
to be further explained or that
the math feels confusing.
>> That sounds great.
>> I would love a thorough
report and those sort
of charts. However, I believe
that you said this or extra
noise that can come.
>> Because, because especially
in the expenditure category,
we, you know, we,
we take a great deal
of effort. On the revenue side.
I always use property tax as
the best example to try
to meet our cash flow forecast
in the month that we expect
to receive the revenue. So we,
we do a lot
of looking back and saying,
okay, when did we receive
property tax? Okay, 90%
of property tax comes in in
January and May. And then we,
you know, there's some little
amounts that come in in June
and a little bit that comes in
in September and October. And
so we, we try to actually
replicate the cash forecast
with that. In instances
like that. In the case
of our budget expenses, there
are very few where people go
through the effort to go
in and say,
I think my cash is going
to come out this this month
versus next month. The best
example where I could think
of that we might want to
consider it and I always use
this example in the first and
second quarter and even third
quarter updates
with council is, you know,
fire overtime. There's a
seasonality to it so maybe we
should front load that. And
July, August, September,
October, because that's when
most of their overtime is being
spent. But we currently don't
do that as an example. So
that's an example of I
untechnically call it noise
that you would see in the
report because we all kind
of know that's going to happen
with fire. But it would be,
it would be present in those
monthly numbers because we just
take it and divide by 12.
>> All right. So
for the revenue side. So I'm
struggling to find. Well
there's, it's like a bunch
of different numbers. So this
says that the total was 105.
The 10 year budget has it at
106.
>> Yeah. So you want a
reconciliation
between the two.
>> Yeah. What is that from?
>> Well, I'd have
to provide it but I don't have
that handy right now. The exact
reconciliation
from what the ten year plan
says
to what these reports say.
>> Well, it's been amended. So
the Q3,
the report that we got then was
from December and as far as a
10 year plan and it was at
105, 203 or no, 105, I think
7. 105.7. But now it's at
106, 826. So why the,
what's the increase
of revenue? I didn't see.
>> Well, one
of the increases would be
in the resolution. The
engineering land development
has associated revenue so I
increased the revenue
for that. I would need to go
through the whole.
>> Where is that?
>> It's in your budget
resolution. You'll see an
increased revenue for
engineering land development
and the budget resolution.
>> Engineering and design.
>> Yeah. So they will bill
developers for those costs they
incurred and so the amount that
they're over budget,
they'll be able
to bill the developers
for those costs.
>> So they're over budget but
they have.
>> A revenue that will come in.
>> But it's a bill, it's a
billable, it will be billed and
that's where the 99 goes. So
that's where the revenue piece
goes up or the transfers are
going up because both have gone
up on this.
>> So I can't speak
to the transfers off top
of my head. I would,
I would need to dig into that a
little more and I want to give
you accurate information so so
let me get back to you
on the transfer piece.
>> It's not, it's got to be
in the report though.
>> The details of it though I
don't have a reconciliation
right in front
of me. I certainly agree with
the premise that the numbers
are in the report,
therefore it must be
in the report. I don't disagree
with that. What I'm saying is I
do not have the ability to
recall every change that's been
made off the top of my head.
But I certainly will provide.
>> You know it would be great
for that is if you put the
adjustments into the tenure
then we would know.
>> It would just look
like a lump of adjustments and
then I'd be having to still off
a memory recall remember what
all the adjustments were,
which is challenging
to do sometimes. So I apologize
but I'll get you that
information.
>> But this revenue increase,
it just, it had said in the
report that you're not changing
the revenue increases. But it
does change the revenue.
>> There, there's one
Exception is the 437,000 and
the transfer. Well the loan
given
to parking increases the,
this revenue. We're not
changing our major revenue
sources. Right? We're not
making any changes to our major
revenue sources.
>> So the revenue went up
from it's you said we ended
at 105 to 105.2, but it's at
106.8. So that's a lot more
than the 400,000.
>> I will certainly provide you
a reconciliation
between those two numbers
to explain it.
>> Okay.
>> And then where did this 108
come from?
>> When you.
>> So the budget that we passed
in the 10 year and the last
amended was at 105. So I don't
understand when was this
amended?
By what authority?
>> Well some of those would be
rolling stock is just one
example off top of my head
where we amend the budget for
rolling stock and we don't put
those adjustments into,
into the actual 10 year plan
because it's,
it has a funding source
in the large scheme
of things it's a net wash.
And.
>> So we don't, we don't
authorize that.
>> It's authorized by council
policy. I can't remember
off the top
of my head. I'm looking at
Barry to see if he knows the
rolling stock council policy.
So you have rolling stock,
you have equipment replacement,
you have if somebody donates
to us to say somebody passes
away and they want
to build a bench,
sometimes they'll donate money
to us, but.
>> We don't have to approve
that or receive it as a
council. You Just put that
into revenue
without administrative knowing
about it. It's administrative.
>> It's council policy 416.
And so those are all council
policies. Clearly the council
body can change those
at any time you wish.
>> Another, another adjustment
to revenues that happens is we
do re budgeting for grants that
are reimbursement grants. So if
we know next year use SAFER as
an example,
although we built that
into our budget,
if we knew we had a carryover
for some SAFER amount,
SAFER grant amount, we would
actually rebudget the revenues
associated
to that because we know, we
expect, given the carryover
of safer, that we would
actually see increased revenues
next year as well. So that
could explain some
of the difference. Again, I
would much prefer to provide
you a full reconciliation than
to sit here and spitball every
potential scenario
of what could be different
between the report and the
Ten Year Plan, which I think is
your question.
>> Well, I mean that's what
we're approving is if they
match up and if.
>> The effort, I don't think
council's approving that the
revenues match the report. I
think council's approving the
budget resolution. And I just,
you know, historically
speaking,
we do not make a reconciliation
from these reports to the ten
Year Plan. That certainly can
be done. It's just a lot of
effort because there's so many
moving pieces administratively
that are getting appropriated
all the time. So if council
cert wants that information, I
could certainly provide that
information. It's just more
work. My staff's pretty
strapped how it is and so.
>> So you're saying we
shouldn't expect to have the
numbers be reconciled to the
10 year report as things are
amended and decided here.
>> Who's amendments,
Amendments that are finance
amendments that. How would we
know that amendments that are
approved
by this board always go
into the amended 10 year plan?
I'm telling you,
all the administrative
amendments, I do not go in and
go every single administrator.
It would be a ton,
I mean a ton of work to explain
every single administrative
amendment and then put it
into the ten Year Plan. I would
amend it if it was something.
And this,
we could never do this. If it
was something that was net
going to be a draw
on the general fund,
I would always amend it.
Right. But most
of these things are net neutral
to the general fund. And so
think about the ten Year Plan
as a planning tool. And so it's
designed
to help us make decisions
in the future. It will always
reconcile when we adopt the
budget
to the approved expenditures.
After that they start
to diverge because of all these
administrative items. And
Things of that nature.
>> So administrative. Oh, yeah,
yeah.
>> Did she meet with you
before this meeting to go
over all these questions?
Sir? Did she meet with you
over all these questions
before the meeting or no? No,
sir.
>> It's in the report and I
want the public to be able
to hear.
>> Yeah, I feel like we're
losing the audience.
But you've got
about a zillion questions
out here and like,
it looks unprepared. It looks
like you could go to him
before this meeting,
answer all these questions in
the whole world and come back
and we can report these and
clarifying.
But we're just talking
in circles here. You've got
about 100 questions and we
could be here all night.
>> But did you have a question?
>> You have the access to go
to him
before this meeting?
>> That doesn't help the
public.
>> It does help the public.
When you come back
with this information, explain
things, but you just talk
in circles, question
over question over question.
But you're not prepared. My
God, you're not going to him
before this meeting and doing
your due diligence. We have
access to directors. We can go
to directors anytime. That is
your job as a person
to go.
>> It's to actually let the
public know what's happening
with their finances.
>> You look very unprepared
being here. That's all I got
to say. You're not going
to think that asking.
>> Questions means you're
unprepared. You have no idea
the job.
>> You need to go meet
with them
before these meetings,
before it helps so much
for you. Because you look very
confused up here and you're
talking in circles. Just asking
zillion.
>> You would hope so. But
that's not actually what.
>> Meet
with your directors before.
>> That's not actually what it
is in the future.
>> Just meet
with your directors,
ask all these questions.
>> Are you all done? I hope
you're all done. Okay, that's
great. So getting back
to this. In this report,
as far as our cash reserves,
you mentioned that it is going
to be offset
by the gas tax funds. Could you
tell us what amount it would be
offset by for gas tax?
>> Again, we're not done
closing the year, so I can't
give you the range.
>> 2 million, 1 million.
>> So we. We trans. We
estimated the transfer to be
about 8 million when we
produced this report. So I'm
unsure your exact question or
where you're leading your
question.
>> It says in here that the gas
tax funds to offset eligible
costs incurred and paid
from the general fund. And I
just wanted to know what that
amount would be.
>> It was about $8 million.
>> About 8. Because
in our.
>> In the budget, I think it
says there. Somewhere
near there,
if not right there is. Says the
$8 million.
>> Yeah. In the budget report,
it said that it was. The actual
amount was 9 million. So you're
saying in addition to that 9
million?
>> No, no, no addition. So. So
the actual expenditure is
reduced by certain items that
the general fund actually has
to pay for legally. We get some
transfers from solid waste,
wastewater and water due
to the damages they do
to the roads. Those monies are
then kind of pay
for the first, let's call it
the general fund required
maintenance. So there's about a
million dollars roughly that is
paid for out
of those funds. I think
Michael's actually going
to talk about it a little bit
in his presentation. But. So
that's why that number is
actually lower than the actual
expenses is because
of some items that are kind
of paid for
with general fund monies,
which are the transfers
from the utilities
for the damages they do
to our streets.
>> So on the actual revenue
document that you gave to us,
one of the new reports,
it says that the budget,
the amended budget, was 11.6
million for the fund transfers
and then that.
But we expended nine. That was
the actual.
>> The largest difference there
is the forecasted streets
transfer.
>> Oh, yeah, yeah. No, my
question was, is that 9 million
already been accounted for? So
it's another 8 million.
>> No, it's already been
accounted for. We accounted
for the eight that we expect
to receive from gas tax. That
number could change slightly as
we close it out
over the next few weeks.
But we have accounted for what
we believe is our best estimate
at this time.
>> So for the reports that have
the.
>> It.
>> So the revenue was 9 million
that we actually got
for gas tax. And then the
expenditure is. Looks
like it's roughly 9.4.
>> I would have to do the math.
I don't have that math handy. I
certainly could do it real
quick if you want
to give me a second.
>> No, no,
I'm just saying this is. This
is what the actual. So that's
my question. So if the money.
The money.
>> So we're effectively streets
between the transfers that the
general fund makes
from solid waste, wastewater
and water that get transferred
in the general fund. And then
we give to streets
for the damages to the streets
and then the gas tax transfers,
streets is made completely
whole
between those two sources.
>> And so for our general fund
cash balance, we're
anticipating that that gas tax
fund is going
to be reimbursed an amount of
about 8 to 9 million. Now or
because it says up here it says
that this 10 million, it has an
estimated cash transfer. Is it
including that transfer or it's
going to be added?
>> I'm a little confused
by your question. I continue
to want to read it
to you.
>> The general fund cash
balance was 10.2. This was
adjusted
for estimated cash transfers
from the gas tax funds to
offset eligible costs incurred.
So that's the 10 million
includes the gas tax. And I was
just asking what's that amount
of that gas tax? Is it 8
million, 9 million?
>> I think I've answered the
question. We are transferring
about $8 million includes the
8 million. Yes.
>> So it's already included.
>> Let me look at the report.
What page are you on?
>> 2, paragraph 1 under
General Fund reserves. The
first sentence.
>> Yeah, so. So that the cash
balance in the general fund on
the cash report that was
included includes the estimated
at this time estimated. We will
know by the end of the month.
Yeah, about approximately $8
million transferred
from gas tax.
>> Okay. And then what is the
estimate? It says also will be
adjusted based
on these other items. So the
American rescue plan is.
>> So, so what I'm outlining
there, and this is not a
perfect outline because I don't
have all these numbers
finalized yet. What I'm
attempting to outline is
basically explaining the
council,
there will be adjustments
to that 10.2 million, some
down, some up.
>> Okay.
>> And I believe with all those
adjustments I think I end up
surmising or arriving
at that. Our $9 million
projection is good at this
time. I don't see any reason
for that to change
with the new ten year plan. So
why I explained that is because
there is this crossover
from the old 10 year plan
ending cash which would say
6.8 million. And I think
there's a logical question
to say, well, why does the new
10 year plan say 9 million?
And that was my attempt to try
to explain that crosswalk
from three different sources
of information. Actually the
actual cash that's sitting
in our general fund, the old
ten year plan and the new ten
year plan. So I was attempting
again, it's super complicated.
I was attempting to kind
of explain
to council it's not going
to be 10.3 million,
it's not going to be 6.8
million. I still believe it's
going
to arrive somewhere right
around 9 million.
>> Yeah, I have a real, I can't
find any accounting practices
that end cash is not the
beginning cash. And if you do
are going to change it,
you have
to get very specific.
>> To be abundantly clear,
we do use ending Cash audited.
Once our audit is complete,
we come back to this board in
February and we say here is our
adjusted cash number based
on the actuals adjusted
for these items.
>> Yeah, I'm aware of the
practice that you're doing.
It's just not a practice I can
find anywhere else,
nor does it align with any of
the GASB stuff that I have
found. And, and they said when
and if that were to happen
in all
of the literature that I read
in the, and calling the League
of Cities and asking, they said
if they can itemize exactly
what that is. So I'm looking
for this itemization of why you
think that the cash is going
to change in nine months
from when it ends. Not the
at Q4 which is the end of,
of that fiscal year, which is
September, three months after.
>> I guess I'm confused.
>> As far as the beginning
cash, most of them said that
would change end cash. So if
something was adjusted,
the end cash would change in
February
but not the beginning cash. So
that's what I'm trying
to figure out.
>> Okay, so. So let's be
abundantly clear. Yeah, you
just use two terms and terms
are important. You said
beginning and ending cash
like they're different. So let
me be clear. The ending cash
of June 30, 2025 is the
beginning cash 7125
of our new 10 year plan.
>> Correct.
>> At this time it is a
forecasted number. We
forecasted it to be 9 million.
We are completing our audit.
We have 10.2, 10.3 million
in there right now. We will
take that actual number
after the completion
of the audit. We will adjust it
for encumbrances and things
that we have carried over and
we will then bring a number
to council. At this time,
I believe it'll be close to 9
million. I cannot promise you
that because we're still
forecasting. I don't have the
actual audited cash number.
To your point, I agree with you
is very important that we use
an audited cash number that
then set our beginning cash
number for this 10 year,
the new 10 year plan.
>> Yeah, we don't agree because
I'm not saying that. So I'm
saying when I said the word
ending cash,
what I meant was the end
of the 26. So if, if in
February of 2026 you want
to make an adjustment
to cash, you admit if there
more money came
in or something,
you could make that adjustment
to the end of that year. But,
but that, that should,
that ship has been sailed. So
cash is cash. The idea that you
have audited cash is also I
can't really find that
in any standard as well. So I
don't know why our ending cash
for this last year Q4.
>> So you just want to use
10.3 million? Is that your
suggestion? I guess I'm
confused.
>> No, because 10.2, the 10.2
figure that you have would have
encumbrances would have other
things that are involved which
is why the end cash balance is
actually 6.8.
>> So what would make no 6.8 is
in the forecasting tool which
does not account
for every piece of savings or
every revenue performance.
Correct? Correct. The ten year
plan is a foreclosure.
>> So that's where we're
starting. That's where we start
because that's how it's always
going to be. It's always been.
That's how it was previous
before your tenure is that
NCASH was beginning cash.
>> No, it never matched. I've
done that research. No, never
did it match. I can prove it
to you if.
>> You want to come to my.
Yeah, I would love that.
You're just confused.
>> So you are really confused.
But okay. I'm going
to make a motion
to approve this report. So did
that include adopting the
resolution?
>> As far as the resolution
goes, can we hear from Reu why
it is that the.
>> Speaker. Great. All right,
we have a first and a second.
Leslie.
>> Few things.
>> The annoyance.
>> And the boredom
on your faces.
>> Three of your faces is
echoed right here.
>> My five year old also has
somewhere she'd much rather be.
However, statements like you're
losing the crowd.
>> This is not a show,
this is not a TV episode. This
is something you signed up for.
>> And you asked to run for.
When you say she looks
unprepared,
you know who looks unprepared?
The people who came not having
any questions to ask.
>> The people who have said I
understand. Wait, wait, I wrote
it down.
>> I understand.
>> I agree.
>> This is similar
to what you've been.
>> Asking for,
yet then showed up without
having those items knowing
exactly what she was going
to ask for.
>> And then you want
to go to.
>> Social media and make a
video that.
>> Talks to us
like we are her.
>> Age and tell us you just
don't understand the budget.
>> Because we took the time
to go be managed by staff. We
took the time to go have them
placate us and tell us what
to think and what
to do not.
>> Thank you.
>> Tenessa sat
at home and took the time
to go through the report,
took the time
to prepare questions,
took the.
>> Time to find out where
things don't add up.
>> And guess what?
>> You, you,
and you are all up
for election 2026.
>> And I really hope you two
don't.
>> Run, because I have the
timestamps from.
>> This behavior,
and I will show the.
>> Public who did the work,
who asked.
>> The questions,
and who wants transparency.
>> Okay.
>> I'm so upset, I can't even
read this and tell you the rest
of my. I wrote this much notes,
probably more notes than either
of you came prepared with.
>> So I'm shaking.
>> I can't even.
>> I'll provide a
reconciliation.
>> Guess what?
>> If the number that was
approved is.
>> Different than the number
that you're presenting, maybe
you should have had that
reconciliation. She's been
playing on my phone because.
>> I didn't plan
to be here this long, otherwise
I would have pulled up. How
much money you make
to not have those answers.
Come on. Just out
of clarity and just out
of clarity,
why I can support this. And
point I made is I come
to these meetings, I ask the
directors a zillion questions.
I get on the phone, I go meet
with them
in person. I had a lot
of questions myself,
and if I'm confused
on things,
I definitely go there. There's
times that we take this
information out
of our meetings
with directors, when we meet
with them or talk to them
on the phone, and we come back
and sometimes we ask a question
where we already know the
answer, but we want
to get that answer
to the public itself.
But the difference on myself
and her is she didn't meet
with the director. I did. I met
with the director and had a lot
of questions here myself. I
spent tons of time. So I come
prepared, and I try to come the
most prepared I can. And I
think we're supposed to flush
out questions here
in different kind
of dialogue here, not sit here
for an hour or two hours asking
questions that we should have
really asked these questions
when we met with directors.
And if I have, I want to come
here prepared. I just want
to make that statement. Every
single time I talk to Greg, all
the time in finance, I wrestle
through all these numbers, and
there's some stuff I just don't
understand myself. But I want
to make sure when I'm up here,
I understand the information.
And if I don't,
then we can wrestle through
that together as a council.
But that. That's the best value
we have, is to meet with our
directors as often as we want.
We can call them
on the phone, we can meet
with them in person,
and they're always available.
And I appreciate all the time
that you spent with me, Greg.
You've spent countless time
with me. I appreciate that.
Thank you. Mr. Curtis. Thank
you. Just before the vote,
I wanted
to clarify the motion was
for the recommended action,
including the adoption
of the resolution. Is that
correct? Yes. And then I. This
is probably lost since the
conversations moved on,
but I do just want to make sure
that the council and the public
are aware when it comes
to an adjustment
to ending cash based
on something after the close
of the year, that's not because
there's new revenue that comes
in. That's because
of the changes,
corrections or changes
in the accounting practices,
things that may be adjusted
by the auditors, things that
may be adjusted that need
to be attributed
to different fiscal years,
different sources, et cetera.
So I just wanted to make sure
that everyone was aware
of that.
>> Thank you.
>> No.
>> Mayor, can I ask who made.
>> The second
on that?
>> I have. Vice Mayor Latam
made the motion.
>> Aaron made the second.
>> Thank you.
>> Oral Report regarding City
of Rented Public Works Streets
and Divisions.
>> Good evening, honorable
Mayor, members
of the council, staff,
colleagues, community, this
evening I will be providing a
Streets Department update,
very similar to what Director
many provided for the
Community Services Department
maybe two or three council
meetings ago. Oh, there we go.
This Evening I have 16 slides
for you all,
including questions.
Obviously, I will be here and
available for questions
at the end. First, I will touch
on the Streets Division
functions. Then I will touch
on the fund, the various
various, excuse me,
funding sources that come
into the Streets Department.
Then I'm going to touch
on a brief financial summary
for the Streets Department.
And then I will touch on one
of the things that keeps me up
at night,
the current condition of our
pavement throughout the city.
I'll talk about the pavement
condition index. I'll provide
examples of current PCI scores
within the city. And then I'll
talk about a PCI funding
forecast that we have
for you. So first, touching
on the Streets Division
functions, some
of the core assets that the
Streets Department are
responsible for are roughly
450 roadway miles. And when I
say roadway miles, what I truly
mean there is center lane
miles. And when we convert that
based on the number
of lanes that are out there,
we have approximately 940 lane
miles of pavement that we're
responsible for here at the
City of Reading. And I know
council has heard me talk
about this prior, but just as a
good reference point, one
of our neighboring cities,
Chico, has a very similar size
population,
but they roughly have
about half the lane miles
to maintain about 568. Our
streets department is also
responsible for the 118 bridges
that we have and we also have
about 570 miles of sidewalk,
12,000 signs, 82 traffic
signals and 47 rectangular
rapid flashing beacons. On top
of the hard assets that the
Streets department is
responsible for, we also have a
traffic engineering division
that is embedded within the
Streets department. This unit
is responsible
for evaluating requests for
traffic control devices which I
know most, if not all
of you are very familiar with.
We get requests
from communities very often
to put in speed tables, sign
packages, rectangular rapid
flashing beacons and the likes.
This unit also prepares
engineering studies related
to speed and speed limits,
commonly referred to as
engineering and traffic studies
or ENTs for short. They also
maintain our traffic counts and
accident data, develop projects
that have a multimodal focus.
They also work through a lot
of the permitting process
for special events
in the likes of that. Now we
have about, not about, excuse
me, we have 19.5 full time
equivalents currently in the
streets department and you'll
notice there that I bring
mention to that within the last
the new budget cycle that we
started July 1st
of this year, I did work with
city manager's office and
council and recommended it and
got approved
for an additional position
in the traffic Engineering
group. So we do have that new
position there.
But when we break
down the FTEs between the
streets department and traffic
unit, we have 15.5 FTEs
in the streets department and
of note there 2.5 of those FTEs
are actually made up
from part time employees. So
there's roughly four to five
employees that work part time
that equate up to 2.5 full time
equivalents. And then in our
traffic division we have four
full time equivalent positions,
including the one new position
that was authorized
in the current budget. So that
is a quick snapshot
of what the Streets Division is
responsible for
from an asset perspective,
as well as some of the
engineering traffic duties that
they provide,
as well as the number
of staff that we have
to provide those services. So
jump and I should have
mentioned in the beginning,
I will obviously be available
for questions at the end,
but I would encourage council
to stop me or pause me if you
have a question as I'm running
through the presentation. So
here I'm going to touch
on the Street's funding
sources. There's a lot of
information here and I'm going
to try my hardest not
to simply read it off to each
of you, but I'm going
to try and touch
on what I believe are the,
the most important aspects
of this. So you'll see
at the table
on the very top right, you'll
see a column labeled total.
What that is showing is that is
showing our total revenue
for each fiscal year. Now, I
would like Council to keep
in mind that for 2324, that is
an actual number for 2425, the
12.76 million that you see,
that is very close to an actual
number because we're still
finalizing everything as
Director Robinette walked
through previously. And then
you will Notice that for 2526
and 2627, you will see numbers
slightly over 12.3 million that
represent what we expect
to receive from the various
revenue sources throughout
those fiscal years. Now, one
of the benefits that the
Streets Department has is we do
get a lot of information from
the state regarding what our
revenue, anticipated revenue
sources are going to be
for the upcoming years. So that
is a great benefit for us from
a planning perspective and
removes a little bit
of the volatility.
Volatility, excuse me, from the
streets revenue itself. Now, a
few things I wanted to point
out here that I think are
of note. One, you might notice
and bear with me, I'm going
to attempt
to use the pointer here.
>> Or not.
>> In the rstp column. For
2324, you'll notice there's a
number of just under $1.4
million. And then you will
notice right below it,
we jump up to 1.6 and we kind
of hover around there
for the next couple years.
That is directly attributable
to changes that we've made,
working with SERTA and our
other partner agencies
to find the most appropriate
use for those funds,
to make sure that each
of the agencies within Shasta
county receive the maximum
amount of funding we can
for street maintenance.
Directly to the left of that
column you'll see the column
labeled entitled TDA. And
you'll notice that in 2324 we
had a actual revenue of just
over 2.8 million. And then
you'll notice that we had an
increase of about 1.5 between
2324 and 2425. That is directly
attributable to Rabba's efforts
through Assistant City
Manager Steve Bade and his
staff in finding creative ways
and grants
to fund transit operations
through Raba, which ultimately
frees up revenue sources
for all of the agencies
within Shasta county to spend
on street maintenance. So I do
want
to highlight those two areas
for council to be aware
of because those are
in the.
>> They.
>> Are making up the biggest
aspect, excuse me,
of the increase we're seeing
in revenue between 23242425
in the following two years. So
I'm going to pause here and see
if there are any questions
before I move on. I understand
there's a lot of information
to digest. Okay, moving on.
And I'm happy
to go back if needed later. So
here we're going to pivot
from revenue
to what I titled, excuse me,
a Streets financial summary.
You'll notice
on the second column
from the left again, the total
revenue amounts show up. And
those are the same numbers that
we had on the previous slide.
And then we walk through it's
from left to right we talk
about total budget,
then we talk
about total expenses. And we
break the expenses up into
three primary food groups or
categories, if you will,
including O and M capital and
personnel. And then we touch
on carryover,
which I will explain here
in a few moments. So you'll
notice that our revenues are
hovering around that at least
after 2324. We're hovering
in that $12.5 million per year
range. And you'll notice that
our budget for 2425 ended up
being 19.4. And you'll notice
that our adopted budgets for
25, 26, 26, 27 are
in that low 11 range. And
you'll see our expenditures,
O and M capital and personnel.
So a few things I'd like
to point out here.
On average,
our O and m is roughly 30%
of our total expenditures, with
our capital costs being roughly
about 47% of our total expenses
and our personnel costs making
up the remainder, which is
about 24%. So a pretty decent
split of how we're spending the
resources there. Now keep
in mind, when I say O and M,
what I'm talking about there
are equipment costs, fuel
costs, material costs,
and the likes of all that. So
that's the pothole material,
the cracked ceiling,
that's fuel. That's everything
that our Streets True Blue
maintenance crew needs and uses
every day to go out there and
maintain what we have. When I
talk about capital projects,
what I'm referring to there are
projects that we're putting
through the project delivery
machine, for a lack
of a better term,
that are going through a
planning process and
environmental approval. We're
developing full contract
documents and we're putting
those out to bid. And a
contractor is bidding them and
building them them. And then
the personnel costs are just
what they sound. That is what
we that's what it costs us
to have the team to get all
those projects and efforts
completed. So I'm going
to touch.
>> Can I interrupt you and ask
a question just a little bit
further in that O M versus
Capital. How much of road
maintenance or how big is a
project before it's out
of O and M and into
like capital? If you're. Is O M
always maintenance, that's like
ceiling or patchwork or
something along those sort
of lines.
>> It predominantly is. And we
do have, and that's a great
question, we do have a few
contracts, if you will,
that do end up living
in the O and M bucket.
But they are more for.
From a maintenance perspective.
For example,
we have a few contracts for
what we would call sidewalk
leveling. If you recall
from a few slides ago,
we have roughly 570 miles
of sidewalk and a number
of our panels have moved due to
tree roots or age or whatever.
So we have a contract
with a vendor to where our
maintenance crews identify
those locations and then they
issue work orders essentially
for that contractor to go
out there and grind
down those vertical edges. We
also have a similar contract
with a contractor for them.
When those panels have been
damaged well
beyond the ability
to be maintained,
that vendor will go out and
completely remove the failed
panels and replace with new.
We also have a striping
contract, an annual contract
where we put that out to bid.
And for streets that are not
getting any capital work
in the near future,
but our pavement delineation,
either the striping or the
markings or the markers are non
existent or need
to be freshened up. Our streets
crew will use that contract and
the resources there
to have that contractor go out
there and refresh the
delineation
along the streets.
>> Cool.
>> Thank you.
>> So jumping back into this,
I'm going to touch
on the carryovers. So you'll
see on the very far right
column we have a column title
titled Carryover from P Y.
Excuse me, PY stands
for prior year. And what I'm
showing there is that for the
2324 fiscal year we transfer,
we carried
over and excuse me,
I might mix up some
of the financial terms. So I'm
going to do my very best to,
to use the correct ones. And if
director Robinette throws
something at me,
you knew that I. You'll know
that I used the wrong one.
But we transferred in,
or carried over, excuse me,
just under $5 million
into the 2324 year specifically
for streets projects. Then
for the the next year, 2425,
there was just just under 5.1
million transferred from the
2324 year into the 2425. And
then right now we are
anticipating, and I'm going
to try and be very clear,
we are anticipating just over
10 million being transferred
from the previous fiscal year,
which is 24, 25
into the current fiscal year,
which is 2526. Now my team is
working internally as well as
with the finance department
to get all the final invoices
to get the final bills. We're
waiting for contractors
to submit theirs,
and once we have all that
information, we'll have gone
through the final process to
determine what that actual
carryover will be.
But right now we anticipate it
to be roughly $10.1 million.
And I have a detailed list of
all the projects that make up
that $10.1 million and would be
happy to provide it
to council.
But essentially it's a list of
about 20 projects that consists
of projects where streets funds
are being used as a match,
like on the Bocelli project.
It's projects where the
Streets Department or the
Streets Revenue is funding the
asphalt work that we're doing
along Hartnell right now. It's
funding projects
like we're doing for the Cape
Seal and some
of the subdivisions
on the northern part
of town and a whole slew of
other projects that are still
having the books closed out, or
there's final little remaining
tidbits of work that need
to remain, and that money will
then ultimately go
into the general fund,
and so those bills can be paid.
So I'm going to.
>> Work that you've done, but
you haven't collected on.
>> I like to think
about it again, and I'm trying
to stay in my lane,
and I'm not the finance expert,
but the work has either been
completed and we haven't had
to pay it yet, or. Or it has
yet to been completed and we
know we're going to have
to pay it
in that fiscal year.
>> But you have the revenue
already.
>> We have the revenue. That is
correct,
and that's what I'm going
to touch on.
>> This is a billing issue.
This is just getting that money
in because the work's gone
out and you have the revenue
for it. It just hasn't been
billed to be, like,
finished.
>> That is correct. And I
believe the next couple numbers
you see there,
the four numbers on the bottom
of the slide, will help make
the point you're articulating.
But go ahead.
>> Is the carryovers. Are these
like, carrying over year
after year, or is it a new
amount each year?
>> Essentially, what it boils
down to is projects take longer
than one year to plan,
produce the contract documents
for, put out,
to bid and administer. And
that's why the carryovers are
generally
in my shop and public works,
because that's where the
capital workload Exists.
>> But this isn't 20 million.
This is really. It just keeps,
keeps going
like you're adding on.
>> Yeah. I would suspect that
we will always have carry
forwards and it's going
to be a result of projects
getting established and started
within one fiscal year.
But not all of the expenditures
will actually occur
in that year. They will occur
in subsequent years.
>> Yeah. This is the most
traditional carryover that
everybody's aware of and
understands how it works,
I would say. But I just wanted
to clarify that these
carryovers are accumulating.
So when you want more engineers
is because you want this to be
finished.
>> I'm assuming that's a great
point which I can touch
on here in a little bit.
>> That's where I was leading.
I figured you would catch on.
But okay.
>> Sometimes I can be slow.
Yeah, yeah, but so to finish
off on that point.
>> So you'll see there's just
one point that I think also is
relevant to paving projects and
that's paving projects are
routinely bid later
in the season because you want
to pave in the summertime when
the temperatures are hot. So
you see this more with paving
projects than you might with a
water project that can be done
in the shoulder season.
>> So. Yeah, thank you. Good
clarification. Yep. So the last
part I was going to touch on
on this slide. So there's four
numbers you can see
on the bottom there. So I
worked with Director Robinette
and his team
to get an actual balance of the
special gas tax fund and local
transportation TDA fund fund
balance. I'm viewing this as
the, the checking account that
holds the revenue as it comes
in from our various revenue
sources. Right now as of June
30, there was $20.2 million
in there. We anticipate working
with finance to transfer just
under 8 million or 7.9 million
from that account
into the general fund to cover
expenses that have occurred
in the 24, 25 fiscal year.
Fiscal year. So that will
reduce our, our balance in our
revenue checking account if you
will, from 20 million down to
about 12. And then we have that
carry forward amount
of approximately $10 million
that will also is earmarked
in that balance of 12, if you
will, because we know those
expenditures are going
to occur. So when we take
out the 8 in the 10
from our balance,
we're truly left with just
about 2.2 million. What I'm
going to call uncommitted un
earmarked streets revenue.
That is money that I could use
to start a new project or add
on to a contract or whatever.
But that is truly how much
funding? Approximately,
without getting to the end
of or finalizing the carryovers
from 2425, there's roughly
$2.2 million uncommitted
in our checking account,
if you will, that holds our
streets revenue.
>> And then when do you get the
next.
>> They come in in various
waves. And I left my piece
of paper on my desk that
describes when those various
revenue sources come in
through the year.
But they do come in
at different times. And keep
in mind, one of them, the rstp,
is a reimbursable one. Right.
So we don't get all
of that money. We have to spend
it first and then we can get
reimbursed up
to the maximum amount.
>> But we're starting
off the year with about 2.2.
We anticipate to get another
10 from the gas tax.
>> We should get
about another 12.375 oh total.
>> So we're going to be at
about 14 and a half
for the year.
>> Including what we're going
to end this year with. Yes.
>> Okay.
>> So generally we should see
the streets department putting
out about $12 million worth
of effort combined between O
and M or our true blue streets
maintenance, our capital
projects and then our personnel
costs. Okay.
>> No, I appreciate that
comment. I've heard that
fallacy in the public where
people think that we're sitting
on millions and millions and
millions of dollars in street
money and we're just choosing
not to spend it. I mean,
we hear stuff like that.
That's not true, correct?
>> Yeah, we do work pretty hard
to get every dollar we possibly
can out there. And I do feel
like I should point
out when we look
at that uncommitted $2.2
million as a percentage
of our average revenue,
so I'm just going to call it
12 and a half. We're sitting
at around 18%. And I know that
that's higher than the general
Fund Council policy, but I'd
like to remind this body that
the type
of efforts that we're doing
in CAP
in public works and these types
of projects, I really have no
idea what bids are to come in
at for our projects.
Oftentimes our projects
potentially run
into issues and we have claims
with our contractors. And so I
would recommend that we do run
with a little bit
of a higher than 10% reserve
for those reasons
in combination of if we have an
emergency event,
we likely having some cash
on hand is a good thing. So I
would think that running
in that 15
to 20% range makes a whole lot
of sense for the type of work
that the streets are department
performs as well as the assets
that they're responsible for.
Okay, so I'm going
to move on, but again,
I'm happy to go back
to any questions that we have.
So here I'm going
to touch on, as I mentioned
earlier, kind of one
of the things that keeps me up
at night and this is the
condition of our pavement. So
first I'm going to touch
on pavement condition. And I
apologize, I'm sure the this
body has heard this multiple
times from my predecessors as
well as me. But Pavement
condition index is a numerical
rating from 0 to 100 that
generally just represents the
health of our paved surface.
It's comprised of a number
of things, including the type
of pavement distress. So that
could either be cracking. Are
we talking about fatigue?
Thermal, longitudinal,
transverse,
how much rugging is
out there? Potholes, raveling.
It also takes
into consideration the severity
of the pavement stress. How bad
is it? It also takes
into consideration the extent,
how much of it is there,
as well as the traffic loading,
because obviously routes that
are heavy
with trucks or buses are going
to receive a higher traffic
loading than a street that does
not have that. Age and climate
and weather are other factors
that go into that. So
in general,
PCI is a good indicator
of the health
of your roadway system. So what
I'm going
to do here is I'm going
to run jump through half a
dozen or so slides that are
meant to give visual examples
to the body, the council as a
body, as well as the members
of the public, because I think
this is very tangible
to folks. So I'm going
to touch on routes that have
what I would consider to be
very good or good conditions,
as well as mediocre and as well
as poor. And I suspect that
this will resonate
with pretty much everybody
in the room. So here we're
looking at Bocelli, excuse me.
This is Bocelli Lane looking
north. This is an arterial,
so a major route
within the city,
higher traffic volumes. And we
did significant work along
Bocelli a few years ago and no
surprise,
right now we have a PCI score
of 93, which is very good. And
I think that most people that
drive along that route would
would agree that the pavement
rides very smooth and.
>> It'S
in a good drivable about.
>> Here's an example
of a residential street. This
is Garden Avenue. So this is
not too far from where we're
sitting right now. This is a
residential street. And we're
looking north here again,
and we're sitting at an 86 PCI.
Again, this is a Very good
score. Pavement rides nice.
Very few potholes are cracking
here. We have Westside Road. I
believe we're looking north
here. Again, a residential
street, or, excuse me,
a collector. And we're sitting
at a PCI of 75. I would like
to point out to Council that if
you do look closely,
you're going
to start noticing a few cracks,
both horizontally, which would
be transverse as well as
parallel
with the traveled way, which
would be our longitudinal
cracks. So you're starting
to see some visual signs
of distress there. Here we have
Buenaventura Boulevard. This is
looking south as you approach
Placer Street. Again, this is
an arterial, a major
thoroughfare, and you start
to see a lot
of visual stress here. And
based on our Data, this is a
45 in the PCI world. And it's
teetering right there on fair
to poor. Here we have Churn
Creek Road. Again, we're
looking north. Churn Creek is a
very busy route. It's an
arterial. And you can see a lot
of the cracked ceiling we have
there and the patches and
everything else. And you can
even see a transition between
pavement that must have been
done at different times.
But we're sitting here at a
43. So again, we're kind
of dropping down
through those conditions. And
you can see a visual
difference. Here we have
Brandstetter. This is a
collector,
so not as busy as an arterial,
but a little bit more traffic
than a residential or a local
road. Pretty beat up. You can
see a lot of missing chunks
of asphalt. You can see a lot
of cracking. You can see that
there's a need for us to get
out there and crack seal.
But we're sitting at a PCI of
33, and in my opinion, a road
in this condition is teetering
on not even be worth the value
of going out and crack,
sealing or maintaining,
because the structural
condition of it is so poor that
it's not a great use of the
limited resources that we have.
So this is a good example of
one that's probably gone too
long without maintenance. And I
believe this is my last one.
Give me one second. This is
East Bonnevieu Road looking
south. Another collector PCI
of 31. And I think visually all
of you can understand why. So
again,
another road that's well beyond
its useful time and is
teetering on needing a complete
reconstruction, probably
beyond maintenance. And then I
have here a picture of Bute
street, the worst of the slides
that I'm showing you this
evening. Another residential
street at a PCI of 20. So
terrible condition, definitely
needs a full reconstruction.
If not
at least a significant rehab.
Now, I should remind Council
this information that I'm
providing here, specifically
on the pci,
as well as these road
conditions, is essentially the
same information that City
Manager Tippen provided back
in April of last year. I want
to say it was the 28th. 24th.
Thank you. Regarding the unmet
needs throughout the city as we
kind of kicked
off the budget workshops. So
this. This is not new
information, although they
might be new pictures. So what
I have here is a real fancy
chart, and I'm going
to walk the four of you
through what I'm showing here.
So what I have
on the vertical access, again,
is the PCI from 0 to 100. And
then what I have down there on
the horizontal axis are years.
And I just went every five
years,
because if I showed every year,
there was just too many numbers
down there and it got busy. So
what I'm showing is, first
you'll see a solid red line and
you'll see that there's about
10 years worth of data there.
That is our historical,
actual PCI
for our entire roadway network,
and that's based on that. We
drive every mile
of every street each year. We
collect that, and we collect
visual information
through cameras and videos,
and we upload it in a software
that we have called roadai,
and then we put that into
additional software that we
have that is called Street
Saver. So those are actual
historical network averages
of our arterials, our
collectors and our local
roadways. So that's actual
data. And you can see that
we're really kind of hovering
in the high 40s,
which I would imagine resonates
to most individuals that
traverse reading. Now, you're
going to see two dashed lines.
To the right of that,
you're going
to see a dashed red line. What
that represents is if we
continued on the capital
spending trajectory that we are
on right now,
which is approximately $5
million
of capital projects per year.
And what you're going
to see is our PCI is going
to continue to deteriorate.
And what's happening is we're
getting very close,
in my opinion, to falling off
what I would call the
rehabilitation cliff
to where essentially too much
of our pavement is
beyond maintenance and it's.
It can no longer be rehabbed.
It needs
to be completely reconstructed.
So obviously that's a concern
of mine as your city engineer.
Now, you're going
to see a blue line
above that. That is a line that
I've developed with my team,
again using the current
conditions, the Road AI and the
Street Saver software as well
as working with pavement
officials that I have
relationships with
on what the condition of our
pavement would be if we were to
spend an additional eight and a
half to $10 million per year
on pavement. Now, that number
wasn't grabbed out
of thin air. It was really back
calculated in order
to get us up
to a PCI that you're going
to see is in the bottom end of
the good zone that I'm
indicating on the top. Top
right in the green box. Now,
you may ask yourself, or you
may be asking yourself,
why does Michael not want
to go to the top
of the green zone? Why is he
recommending only the bottom?
That's a good question. I'm
recommending the bottom because
that's where the best value is.
We don't want to spend all of
our resources and get the
pavement into a condition where
essentially we're overspending
in pavement. We want to live
in an average roadway network
with a PCI of 75 to 80. What
that means is that means our
pavement is in a solid
structural condition and
in general good health. And
really what we're doing is
we're doing a lot
of preventative maintenance.
We're not doing very many
rehabs or recon
reconstructions, excuse me,
which we want to avoid as much
as possible because those are
the most intrusive projects to
our businesses and residents
and they're also the most
costly. Unfortunately,
in order to get up
to that PCI score of 75 to
80, there is a capital
investment required which would
consist of a number of
rehabilitations and
reconstructions for a period
of time. Once we get there,
then the type
of our project would pivot
from rehabs and reconstructions
to predominantly preventative
maintenance with select rehabs
once pavement ended,
reach the end
of its useful life. And that's
where we want to live because
that truly is the best value
when we're looking
at being wise with the
resources that we have. Now,
there's one other thing that I
would like to mention
to council here. So the red
line might my forecast if we
were to continue
on our trend. Again, that is a
average roadway network. So
what I'm saying there is that's
the average
between the condition
of our arterials, our
collectors,
as well as the local roadways,
which make up two thirds
of our roadway network. So
these are your residential
streets where people live and
their kids play out
in the streets and everything.
So that's two thirds
of our network. What I would be
forced to do if we continue on
the funding strategy or the
funding that we. The revenue
that we have is I would be
coming back to this body and
recommending that we no longer
spend. Spend resources on those
local streets because we need
to maintain our arterials and
local roadways first. So if I
was to make a chart like this
for your arterials and a
separate one for your local
roadways and a separate one
for the residential streets,
you would see drastic
differences between the
arterials and the collectors
and the subdivision streets.
And then as that problem
continued, we would see the
local roadways fall off. And
then most, if not all the money
would be spent
on the arterials.
>> And none
of this money includes paying
for sidewalks in residential
areas that don't have sidewalks
right now.
>> Or that was not. This was a
pavement focused
into your point. We do have a
dire need
with our sidewalks as well.
Absolutely. I know I've thrown
a lot at the council,
but I am available for any
questions that you all have.
>> I mean,
just the comments that we hear.
Everybody talks about Victor
Avenue and I,
I know the answer to this, but
the reasons why we're not
running and paving it right
now, knowing that I don't know,
I don't know the score of
Victor Avenue would be really
right now. But you can answer
this or confirm it,
but it's because we're planning
on paving that next year and
it'd be kind of silly
to spend money right now.
>> That is correct. We do try
and marry up our true blue
maintenance operations
with our capital. It would be
an unwise investment for us
to go spend money
in the maintenance world just
to rip it up the following year
with a contractor. So we do try
to strategize and organize to
make sure we align those
operations. And we are going
to be very happy to get the
Victor project out next year
and make those improvements.
Absolutely.
>> We also hear
from the community
about bike lanes. Nobody says
that all we're focused
on is just putting
in bike lanes. And if we could
just spend more money on paving
and not the bike lanes,
then we'd be way better off.
But you might be able
to give some color
to that comment.
>> Yeah. You know,
the city's been.
From my perspective, obviously,
I've been your public works
director or city engineer for
about two years now. But the
city really has been able
to hover in that PCI range
because they've been successful
leveraging funding
opportunities
through grants. A lot
of those grants do come
with requirements. And so the
public works department,
specifically the engineering
team and the traffic team
within the streets department
have done a great job
leveraging those grant
opportunities, but doing them
only where they make sense. We
do take a hard look
at when we're going to
implement traffic calming
measures along our roadways and
we try very hard
to maintain the level of
operation that our community
desires. Right. I could talk
to you guys and gals
about level
of service thresholds A, B, C,
D, but that's not going
to resonate very well. The best
I can explain
to you is if you go drive down
in San Francisco, you're going
to experience a different type
of driving that you're going
to experience in Reading. And
people in Reading want a little
bit more space
between their vehicles. They
don't want to have bumper
to bumper traffic. So we really
strive to maintain that level
of operations and safety
along our roadway network. So
we do not just blindly take,
you know, of potentially
available paid surface to put
in a bike lane. We really do
perform analyses, do a lot
of community outreach to make
sure that where we are going
to implement those. It makes
sense.
>> Yeah. Last comment or
question. But I'm
like super nerdy
about the road. So
like I love this stuff. If we
had the opportunity to spend
$10 million a year now,
but we don't do it, but we say
we wait five more years,
we would. Looking
at this graph, we fall so far
behind on that scoring index we
would likely have
to consider spending say 15
million a year, say in five
years or what do you think that
number would look like if we
wait another five more years
to have
to invest even more money?
>> It's hard to say that the
catch up just becomes more
expensive. To your point?
Point and right. It could go
two ways. We could spend more
over the same period of time
to get to that PCI we want
within a certain number
of years. Or we could spend
less and see if we ever get
there. To your point,
we're getting very close
to dipping off what I call the
rehabilitation cliff. And when
that happens, we are going
to have a number of
reconstruction projects which
we haven't had very many
of those in the city. And what
I mean by that is, I mean
ripping up everything that is
out there, down to the virgin
soil and building the road
completely back up. That is a
very intrusive operation. And
if you were just to think
about doing that along Churn
Creek, Hilltop Cypress, you're
talking
about every business that's
out there is having to deal
with temporary access
in and out. Do we do that at
nighttime and put light plants
out there and have backup
alarms all the evening
for the residents? It becomes
very expensive to do that. And
that is really why I would
recommend that we need to take
this information seriously and
do everything we can
to avoid falling off that
rehabilitation cliff.
>> Anybody else?
>> Yeah, I just so on. Sorry.
On that slide
at the bottom it says
forecasted at 5 million per
year versus forecasted at
13.5. Are we currently spending
5 million a year? Is that why
that's there or what would you
say? On average we're spending
it's five.
>> It varies from year
to year. It depends
on the size of the project,
it depends on the bid prices,
it depends on, you know, but
on average we're, we feel
comfortable that we're spending
on average $5 million per year.
And that made me think of
something that I think is very
valid. This is today's dollars.
I have not escalated or
inflated. These are today
dollars.
>> So anticipate a lot more
escalation and.
>> Inflation are going
to occur and I, you know,
it becomes very difficult for
me. I can make escalation
assumptions, but I think it's
always easier to,
to provide this information
without that and be clear that
we're talking
in today's dollars.
>> So if we're currently
spending about 5 million a year
for pavement, is there a way
to increase that?
>> I'm going to stay in my lane
here because I believe the city
manager is going to touch
on that
in the next presentation for
our current budget. I think
he'll discuss what options are
if we were to desire to.
>> Unless. Unless that question
is relative to our current
streets budget.
>> Yeah, like. Like
for what that earlier just.
Yeah, like for what that
earlier slide showed,
like O and M versus capital.
Like is there a way
to switch that and increase?
Or are we committed
on capital projects for the
near future or for like 10
years out or how much have you
already committed
to that?
>> So what? He was laughing
at me. So certainly,
obviously we have flexibility
between those. I think I refer
to them as three food groups, O
and M capital and permanent
personnel. Obviously we want
to put every dollar possible
into the infrastructure. But I
would remind council that
really the OM is also providing
a critical service because they
provide a lot
of pavement maintenance.
Right. So if we were
to take funding
from them and shift it purely
to the capital project,
we're missing out on a lot
of that day to day maintenance
that there's crews perform like
potholes and crack ceiling and
that is a very critical element
of the pavement life cycle. So
I would be hesitant
to take very much if any
from our day
to day O and M operations.
But obviously we look
at that as much as possible.
And then
on the personnel side, we,
we need staff
to put the projects
out and do the work.
>> Yeah, I was mostly just
thinking the OM and capital and
how much flux responsibility
you had between that
to put towards. But I. I get
it.
>> Okay.
>> Thank you.
>> I don't really have you
answer my questions that I had.
I just wanted to say thank you
for this information. I don't
think that when I came.
>> Onto council the first time
that I.
>> Was expecting as many
complaints that we receive
about roads.
But as you are aware, it is the
most frequent and common email
judgment that we get. So thank
you for that information,
for the data. It's extremely
useful for us,
especially when we're
explaining to members
of the community.
>> My pleasure.
>> Thank you, Mr. Webb.
>> Thank you.
>> 9.11. Mr. Tippen.
>> Identify impact to the
general fund if an additional
$10 million annually was
redirected
for street maintenance.
>> Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I
don't have the remote,
so I'm gonna look at Aaron or
something to. Steve's gonna
grab it. So this,
this item actually was an.
Item 12 in August. And at the
same time you'd requested these
monthly updates
from the department. So clearly
it's not a coincidence that
this item fell also where,
where public works and Michael
would give his presentation
regarding street so that we'd
have a good context
of where we're starting
from and where we're going.
And so this item is really
directed at. If we were
to redirect money
from the current general fund
to streets maintenance,
what might that look like
in terms of impacting other
planned expenditures
within the general fund? And so
that's the purpose
of this. I have a number
of disclaimers that I put
in here because, you know,
this, this is a super high
level exercise. I mean, I did
this myself. I did not involve
all of the departments. You can
imagine this type
of discussion gets a lot
of nervousness. I did ask
for some information
from finance in terms of
individual expenditures and I
did ask for information
on impacts
from the department directors.
But $10 million, as you see
in that first bullet point,
we've got about a $65 million
discretionary budget. And
that's just money that you have
available to choose
to do whatever you want with.
So the $10 million represents
about 15% of that. This is not
a detailed analysis or
identifies any implementation
steps. And what I mean
by that is, you know, some of
the expenditures that I list
are really for a high level
discussion because it doesn't
take
into account perhaps that some
of those have some Other
funding sources currently
embedded in that, whether it's
a safer grant or whether it's
RRU wildfire. I figured that
would be a much more
complicated effort and it's
probably not what you were
really looking for. So that
does not include this. It
doesn't include, you know, any
future actual reductions that
would happen because that
obviously requires much more
detailed analysis. I can tell
you that the most
representative time
in the city's history was the
Great Recession where, you
know, we lost $7 million in
about a year
in sales tax alone,
when that number was 24 million
at the time. And it was hours
upon hours upon hours
of analysis and work
within departments
to bring recommendations back
to council. So I just want to
make sure everybody understands
the level that this is at. Oh
sure.
>> Has it ever been discussed?
It just would. Because he's
public works. It makes me think
why isn't streets part of the
public works or would we ever
use public works budget
for streets? I know it's in
there because the gas tax. I
know, I understand how that
mechanisms work.
>> Streets hasn't always been
in public works. So streets its
own account. Right. So when I
first worked, came to work at
the city streets and actually
existed
under municipal utilities.
>> Right.
>> And then in 2006 it was
moved under engineering and
transportation. So streets has
always been sort of its own
bucket and transferred around.
>> It just moves around.
>> Yeah. And so
after actually the Great
Recession is part
of what caused public works to
get reformed because as we were
consolidating and eliminating
director positions, we started,
you know, building back up
certain departments
like public works. And so
public works became. Came
about because of the Great
Recession.
>> Really.
>> So is it possible to think
of a budget for streets coming
from the public works
department and not general
fund?
>> Yeah, I mean, sure, yeah,
it's really a public works
function, but the amount of
where the money is actually
held as a general fund.
>> Yeah.
>> Would it be worth
to have a discussion
about if it could come from
enterprise funds and not from.
>> It's probably not an
enterprise fund just because
of the nature
of what enterprise funds are.
They're self supporting. They
are usually rate based. They
have application to
Proposition 218. So there's
other fundamental issues if
from accounting. Well,
from an accounting perspective,
I would have to talk to
Finance and Mr. Robert about
whether that would make sense
or not. It's. It's perhaps
possible to move the account
over there. We could have
to talk to. We could,
we could discuss that maybe,
but not.
>> But it wouldn't be pulling
from any of those funds.
>> No, it would.
>> That's my question.
>> It would not.
>> I don't mean where it lives,
but I was just curious if
there's a different.
>> I do want
to just highlight that Mr.
Robinette did point out you do
have some situations where you
have been able
to use funds for.
From utilities that have
impacts on the roads.
>> Yes.
>> To be able to offset.
>> That was in the report.
>> But under Prop 26 and
under Prop 218, you're limited
in your ability
to essentially redirect funds
from those purposes. So it's
really got to be limited
to their direct impacts
on the roads
to the extent that you're able
to take those away and then
repurpose those. Otherwise
you'd be running
into legal issues.
>> Gotcha.
>> Yeah. And so I'm glad you
asked that question,
because this does focus only
on general funding and only on
the discretionary because
really the other elements where
we have opportunity
to transform money,
we pretty much have.
>> Yes.
>> So because obviously streets
have been a problem
for a long, long time. So.
Okay, so this only doesn't
include the issues that we'd
have
with labor groups depending
on where we'd make cuts.
Right. And it also doesn't
address all of our other
infrastructure needs. Just, you
know, we've had these big
conversations
about everything else. So I
don't want
to get just caught up
on streets.
>> And is the only thing we
have.
>> Because as you recall the
big presentation
on fire stations, we have
about 85 to 100 million dollars
worth
of fire station needs as well.
And then the caveat, again,
these are just illustrative.
This is not anything I am
recommending at this time. So
just for context, you know,
because we hear these types
of things all the time. So if
you eliminated every director
in the entire city
of reading, it's about $1.7
million to the general fund.
And that's because obviously
the other utilities pay
for cost allocation, internal
service funds and that sort
of thing. If you decided that,
hey, we still need to keep a
fire chief and police chief,
then that number goes down to
about a million. And that's
right, because the utilities
need payroll done. They need
financial work, they need
personnel, they need hiring,
they need all of that stuff.
So the reality, if you look
at general government, when you
include all the cost borne
by the utilities, it's about
$6.5 million total cost
to support our $550 million
budget. So we spend about 1.2%
of our total budget
in general government. And
lastly, with any reduction,
it's unlikely the city council
would be able to support other
things that don't technically
cost us money right now,
and that's the sports park,
the civic Auditorium, the arts
council, airports, etc. We
would not be able to continue
to assist those likely if
you're going
to make these types of cuts.
So just things to to think
about now we're getting
into the meat of it. Michael
just told us the solution. So I
figured, I just put it
in there, about $10 million a
year and that's what the
request was from the council.
So I'll go through these
relatively fast. I did two
options. One is looking at
staff and programs and the
other was assuming that the
council wanted
to keep all the various
programs
like recreation programs. And
so it's essentially just staff.
So I'll go
through those quick. The real
brief impacts to these are up
there. I'm not going to go
through those in detail.
Certainly you can look at them.
I think you'll know what they
all are. You know,
if we reduce police officers,
we have lower response times,
higher burnout, difficult
recruitments, you know,
all sorts of things. So option
one, police department. So if
we eliminated five officers,
three detectives, eight CSOs
and three support staff
positions,
the total savings would be
around $2.4 million. And
of course, you know,
significant impact was the fire
station. It's about 2.1
million. And again,
significant issues
with our service levels
for the community, whether it's
land development and inability
to process those to just simple
response times as we'd be
covering the entire city
with a lesser station.
Community services. This is one
that actually gets pretty big
and pretty surprising if you
think about it. So recreation
programs, eliminated four parks
maintenance positions,
close the library and sorry,
Todd, if you're still here,
I think you are, you know,
cancel the rest of the visit.
Ready contract, that's about
$3.8 million that, that would
be available development
services,
full cost recovery model. So
that's about 1.5 that we could
expect there. Obviously that's,
you know, probably would not
fully realize that because we
had lower cost. Plus we'd have
people who wouldn't come get
permits because they're too,
too expensive. And we have
increased code enforcement
costs. And so again,
it's just illustrative. If we
went
to the general government,
took a position
from my office,
took two positions
from finance, one position from
the city attorney's office,
it's about $182,000. And that's
because those offices are paid
for by the utilities as well.
So they're providing services
not only to the General fund,
but all of the utilities
in every other department. So
you only get
about a 30% savings. So about
30 cents on every dollar is
what you can claim
in general fund savings. So
in summary, if you're looking
at staff and programs,
that sums up to about 10, $10
million, just over $10 million.
So if we go
to maintaining some
of those programs, obviously it
gets a lot worse when you talk
about staff. Now we're up to
12 officer positions, three
detectives, one captain, 10
CSOs, and three support staff
positions. Those numbers are
picked because it represents
98 sworn officers,
which is our low point in,
in recent history. And so we
have been there. So I just took
us back
to there as an example. That's
about 3.9, almost $4 million.
Fire department largely the
same, except for now talking
two fire stations at 2.8
Community Services. Now that
was way down because now we're
continuing to provide the
recreation programs. The
library remains open. And so
that savings, even though I
added two parks positions
to eliminate, that's about
600,000 development services.
Now we're maintaining the same
cost structure
for our those who want
to have permits,
but we take four positions out
of there. So obviously we're
impacting our ability
to actually deliver permits
to individuals. That's about
400,000 miscellaneous. The
realistic option here would be,
I don't know how realistic it
actually is, but
like a 15% cut to all
of the unrepresented managers.
Likely you probably wouldn't do
that, but this is just
for context because Reu
obviously wouldn't save you a
dime, but that's about
$570,000. If you were
to do that
in the box. I actually said,
well, what if you just cut all
the directors by one half? You
know, their salary gets cut
in half. That's about $1.9
million. I didn't use that
in the final calculation,
but just again,
for some context in terms
of what that number is. And
then if you just started
to go, okay, we just have
to actually sort
of start nipping and tucking.
It really goes into the
internal service funds. And
they have cost
to the general fund somewhere
between 25 and 40%, sort
of depending
on where they're at. I used
about 30% as just a general
average. So we need about
800,000. You'll see that we're
a little high on the 10
million, but I used 800,000.
So that's 20 plus employees,
depending on who they are and
where they come from. That
would be reduced from the
internal service funds. That's
it. That's your fleet
maintenance,
that's your records and,
and those types of positions,
employer services. And so
in order
to get that number up, It's a.
It's 20 plus employees.
>> I know that you said this. I
know that you said this. Can
you go back to one? I know that
you said this out loud,
but I just wanted
to because it's
on the screen. You meant
unrepresented managers, all
of them. Right, all of them.
Your salary gets talked
about a lot, so I wanted to
make sure that reducing your
pay by 15% did not look like
575.
>> Yeah, that's every single
unrepresented manager. So
unfortunately, that's James,
that's Josh, that's Ryan.
>> Yeah, that's about 111 total
are unrepresented management.
>> Correct.
>> Okay.
>> Most of those are areu.
So. So REU RU has a lower level
of unrepresented individuals
like electrical engineers. So
they have a broader swath
of them in REU than you see
in the other departments.
Whereas in public works, like I
just unfortunately pointed out
for those gentlemen
below them is largely going to
be represented employees.
>> So this 111
for unrepresented. It's not
111. Or is that.
>> No, it's 111.
>> The general fund. It's
111.
>> No, it's 111 of
unrepresented managers.
>> Okay, but for the general
fund.
>> I don't know the exact
number. General fund is much,
much lower than that
for just general fund.
In fact,
for just general fund,
it's probably your police
chief, fire chief and deputy
fire chiefs. That's it
for just general fund. Because
my position, Steve's position
is all funded
by other departments. So. So
you, you're only taking bits
and pieces
from their salary.
>> So then what's this number
represent?
>> The 570.
>> Yes.
>> That's a 15 reduction of.
>> Just
for the general fund.
>> Well, I just did it
across all of them. But it,
but it, but that's the general
fund savings. So you got, you
know, Tony Van Bokle,
for instance,
is an internal service fund.
So that director position does
have value
to the general fund,
but it's only about 30%.
>> So it's 111 employees.
But it's. Obviously the ratio
is going
to be different for.
>> Yeah, because I don't know.
I don't know the number.
>> The general fund amount.
>> The. The biggest number
of that 111 is in reu.
>> Gotcha.
>> Yeah.
>> And so obviously there would
be zero value
to the general fund by reducing
them that's why I said largely
you wouldn't do that.
But frankly, we did do some
of that during the Great
Recession
for parity and it didn't work
out so well for us. Yeah, well,
maybe did we got Nick. So then
the general, the general
government, you know,
is basically the same as we had
before at 182,000. Summarize
that you get about 10.26
million with all
of those reductions. And so
again, that's just a real fast
look and it just gives you an
idea of the types of impacts
that you would be looking
at if you truly just wanted
to take our current 10 million
dollar
of general fund money and push
to streets maintenance. The
types of changes you'd have
to make,
especially if you wanted to
make that an annualized change.
And with that, I'm available
for any questions as well as
I'm sure some
of the directors are available
to come up here and talk
about their impacts.
>> Mr. Liddell, this is
like your last report.
>> Yeah, it's fun, right?
>> Begging for money.
>> Yeah. No, I think this is
important to do today. It
strikes back
from some comments Councillor
Danuka said many meetings ago.
He says our city,
we just have a revenue problem,
you know, and just looking
at our entire budget,
there's so much that we want
to do that we need to do. And
how are we ever going to do all
this stuff unless we increase
revenue? And you know, most of
our revenue is sales tax and
property tax and that just
doesn't double overnight. I
mean, there's so much unmet
needs that we really have here.
Just for full transparency. I
don't think anybody in the
council is really advertising
or promoting saying to cut
public safety and saying, hey,
we should be doing this right
away. That's just not a good
thing. And that's not what the
public is saying is to go cut
police officers and
firefighters because we find
very much big value
to that. I mean that's,
that's the core of our city is
making people feel safe and
protected. And so we appreciate
everybody
in public safety. A lot
of sacrifices you make
out there and we need you. The
roads are a big problem. The
roads is what we drive
on every single day. And
they're just going
to get more and more expensive.
And this has been something
I've heard before I was elected
here. I've heard this rhetoric
about the roads 10 years ago.
15, you value public safety.
Which one do you want? You
know, because without increase
in revenue, we're not going
to get this stuff. And it's
just going to Be a constant
discussion that's going
to come over and over again.
So I just think it's very
valuable that we brought this
presentation,
probably the best one we've
seen in many, many years, just
to paint a picture
of what we need to do, because
we've never really been
presented a solution ever
in the past that says,
how are we going to do it?
Right. All we say is we just
don't spend enough towards the
roads and we need to do more.
We have a big problem here. We
just don't have the revenue
to do it. So that's my
comments.
>> Anybody else?
>> I just want
to say thank you
for the information. That's
all.
>> Thank you, sir. All right,
well, we shall move on.
Travel.
>> Council travel reports.
>> Oh, none.
>> All right, item 12.
>> Aaron.
>> She's getting ready to hit
the button.
>> I didn't even get
to hit my button. I have two.
The first one,
and maybe I misunderstood what
Director Webb was suggesting,
but is anybody interested
in bringing back,
changing that council policy
from 10%? Did I understand that
correctly? 10% percent.
>> So I do think there's a
little bit of confusion on that
one. I think you're referring
to the, the question about the
reserve policy and the 10%.
>> That's not an actual council
policy.
>> I believe the policy,
the council policy refers to
the general reserve percentage.
I'll look to Mr. Tiffin
to correct me if I'm wrong.
>> Yeah, there is no,
there is no council policy.
And actually Director Webb and
I today talked
about maybe him taking a stab,
given the state of finances
today versus years past,
not only in streets, but also
in the water utility where we
have, you know,
drought requirements and, you
know, reduced water usage
requirements, but we have
increasing costs and ever
increasing regulatory pressures
and wastewater and solid waste
that, you know,
developing some fashion of
financial management policy
similar to what you have in RU
to help guide the discussion
in terms
of what reserve should be. You
know, what are the metrics
around rates and that sort
of thing. When do you bond,
when you not bond or those
types of things. And so I think
he's going
to be considering that
over the next year. And, and
we'll be coming back
with you if he has a solution
to that.
>> Perfect.
>> Clarifying question
with that on that reserve
policy was that a reserve
policy itself says we can never
have less than that in roads or
we can't have more than that.
>> It's like he just meant it
was general. You can clarify.
>> I thought you meant like we
can't have more than that
dollar amount.
>> Yeah. Is that what I'm
saying common practice. He
wants to keep a buffer, like,
meaning because there's 2
million, don't feel
like go spend it right now
like he wants a buffer.
>> Exactly, yeah.
>> And, and just
for general information, your
general reserve buffer is not
necessarily going to line up
with the buffer that you may
have in individual accounts
for different reasons. So it's
not uncommon to have both the
general reserve and special
reserve, you know, based
on the needs
of particular operations.
>> Then I look forward
to what you come back to us
with and I'm glad that that was
already an item that you
thought was valuable
to us and I obviously agree.
My second item is that last
week it was brought
to my attention that Advanced
Reading had made multiple large
donations in our community,
including contributions towards
the citizen sales tax
initiative and to the Denver
flight. I should probably note
that,
and I'm pretty sure it's true
for the rest of council,
but I can't speak
for everybody, but I haven't
had any involvement
in the sales tax committee. So
that was new to me. It's
citizen led and therefore,
in my personal opinion, it's
not something that city council
members should be getting
in the middle of. When council
agreed to release that 675
from the sale of the
Sheraton, it was to hold
Advanced Reading over and, and
to keep the doors open. But
with this new information,
I would like to revisit the
item and explore any sort
of alternative of options.
Does anybody have any
consideration?
>> Well, it's not,
it's not as easy as that. The
lease agreements and the grant
agreements have all been signed
and are in the hands
of advanced reading. So Mr.
Curtis, can you enlighten us a
little bit?
>> Yeah.
>> So if you want, I,
I can't tell you off the top
of my head, you know, what the
terms might be and whether
there might be termination
clauses or anything that might
allow for anything
to be recouped. If you wanted
an item to come back, you know,
we could take a look at that,
give you the analysis. It's
possible that the answer is
that there's not really much
you can do, but you know, we,
if that's what the council
would like to look at, we could
certainly do that and bring it
back to you. Other option is,
if you'd like,
I can simply do that analysis,
give it
to you and you could bring
Forward another item 12 if you
felt it was appropriate
at that time. Downside would be
there probably a little bit
more delay,
so there's possibility of more
expenditure and more loss if
that is the case.
>> So just, just
for your information, factual
information, it was executed
on September 8, so it's been
in effect
for a little while and it has a
30 day cancellation clause
states that if the council were
to do that after 30 days,
whatever money has not been
spent could be returned. So in
effect they could have spent it
all and you could have zero
back. So I just put that as
information as you decide
whether consensus to bring it
back exists or not.
>> Was it
on a reimbursement or was it.
Did they get the full amount? I
thought they were had
to submit.
>> They got the full amount.
>> Oh, they got the full
amount, yeah. I would love to
know what our options are and I
would likely.
>> I.
>> Would like
to know what our sort of
financial options are here and
moving forward because I think
that it is highly likely that
the city is going
to need that money
to shutter the Civic. And so
whether or not they would be
willing
to have those conversations
with us now while they've
potentially not used all
of that money then.
>> Yeah. So if there's a
consensus
on the council council
to bring that back, I think we
can arrange that and obviously
let advance ready know.
>> So I'm not in favor. I think
it's highly likely the money's
gonna be spent
by the time it could come back.
Which means we're opening up a
can of worms
of discussion that in the
reality we might have given
them the money anyways had
they, had we known they donated
the money just because the fact
that they support the sales tax
initiative means sure, they're
on life support, they're doing
everything they can to keep the
doors open and they need,
from their perspective, they
need the sales tax initiative
and so can't complain so much
that they donated money
to something for,
for their own survival. But yet
this money that has been fused
is still going towards their
operating expenses. I don't
know if I would have, I don't
know what we would have done
differently,
but I think the money is going
to be all spent and maybe,
maybe can, maybe it could come
back if we confirm there's
still money that we could take
back. But we would have to. If
we find out that the money has
already been all spent
in and we're not going
to do anything, I don't know if
that would be worth coming
back.
>> Would you entertain? Go
ahead. Oh, well, if, if it's
defined, I mean, along
with what Mike said, like.
Yes, but. And then if it comes
back and it's already been
spent, then we have
to have that conversation.
>> So if you wanted to Take any
action. Essentially, you need
to tell us now that you want us
to put that
on a future agenda. It could be
that when we bring that
forward,
the money's been spent. It
could be that when we bring it
forward,
you do have options and.
Yeah, we just can't tell you
that.
>> Yeah, that's.
>> Would you want that
to come back if they find out
that they've already spent all
the money and they just pull
the item from the agenda? Or do
you want it to come back no
matter what?
>> I don't think that we have
the. It sounds
like that if there happened
to be options. Options, we
would need it to be
on an agenda to be able
to discuss it in the 30 days.
Within the 30 days. So that is
my suggestion or request is
could we put it
on as an agenda item to discuss
what our options are? It may be
that we have zero options.
In which case,
I suppose staff could pull it
from agenda or something. We
get edits.
>> I. Yeah.
>> So is that a consensus?
>> I, I would be fine as long
as we pull the item. If we find
out there's no recourse and
there's you, you,
you confirm.
>> I, I would encourage you to
actually be more definitive
because, you know, there,
there's just a lot
of squish there.
>> Maybe it would be.
>> Staff would just bring it
back. I don't think we would
pull it once the council said
bring it.
>> Maybe that would be a. It
could just be informational.
Only if we find out that we
don't have any options, then
the report is we have no
options.
>> Yeah, I think what we would
probably couch it as, you know,
receive the report and provide
direction to staff so that the
council can just decide what
you wish to do if.
>> No options.
>> Yeah.
>> And what's the date for 30
days?
>> Well, so 30 days is your
term clause. So, so, so what is
that date?
>> I believe 30 days notice.
So from the date that you gave
notice, it would be 30 days
after that. Right. So
at which point.
>> No, if you did. October 7th
as a termination,
it would be expired 30 days
front then in November.
>> So.
>> Oh, oh, oh. So it's, it'll
be, it'll be a contract
for two months. It will have
been a contract from September
8th to November 7th.
>> Gotcha.
>> Okay, so we'll,
we'll agendize that, won't you,
Steve?
>> Yes.
>> Thank you, Steve. Yes. I
don't have anything else.